#nessie sweep though lets go

[pascal-oswell]

HELPPPP THE BIG FOOT VOTES. FUCKING 8%. NO WONDER

#blabla #nessie sweep though lets go

[prince-rowan-of-the-forest]

Ribbons and Rainstorms

Chapter 4 : Temple of Chores

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Roman kept going back.

It wasn't hard to keep going back. Not in the slightest, especially during storms when Vi was there. 

Even when Vi wasn't there, Roman found himself more drawn to the temple than he had been before. He had done a fair bit of cleaning, dusting off nooks and crannies (though trying his best to leave the spiderwebs in the corners undisturbed since Vi had expressed his fondness for them).

At the market he had bought some new blankets and pillows to take over and leave there so that he wouldn't have to ferry them back and forth every time there was a storm and risk them getting wet. He had spent almost an entire day gathering and stockpiling inside the temple as much firewood as he could find so that it could dry out. He’d bought more embroidery supplies since Vi had started teaching him too. Some of them stayed in his bedroom, stocking up for a project he was currently just planning out on paper, others he brought to the temple to use for their lessons. 

He spent so much time at the temple, that people actually started to notice. 

—-

"You're late." Came the scornful voice of his mentor, the person who oversaw all his training as a Protector, as Roman stumbled into the arena, clothes a mess and still pulling on his second boot, "Roman Edevane, If you are not taking this seriously enough to consider being on time—"

"I am so sorry Master Pryce, I just— I was busy and I lost track of time— I swear it won't happen again," Roman said, trying in an earnest tone. 

"This the third time in the last two weeks," She said, glaring at him, "Let me guess, the Storm Temple, again?"

"Yes ma'am," Roman said, nodding, "I was sweeping the floors today." 

“I’m glad you’re so dedicated,” She said, smiling a little, “But you really can’t keep being late for training like this, have you been practising since last week?”

“Indeed I have!” Roman grinned, standing up a little straighter, “And I’ll try not to be late, in future.”

"Good." She said with a nod, "Now that you’re here, let's get on with this training session, shall we? You know the warm up, hop to it." 

—-

"Roman, sir," One of the two servants they hired — Immy — said, stopping him on the staircase, "You're not going to come home caked in mud again, are you? You know, if Nessy and I have to wash the same set of your clothes every day for much longer they're going to fall apart." 

Roman winced in sympathy, he really did feel bad most of the time about all the extra work he seemed to always put both of them through. 

"I'm sorry," Roman said, taking a deep breath, "I'm almost done with what I've been working on now, so there shouldn't be much more mud." 

"Oh good," Immy said with a sigh of relief, "If I may inquire, what exactly is the task you’ve been doing to get yourself so dirty all the time?”

Roman paused, before sighing, “I’ve been attempting to clear more of a path from our gardens to the Storm Temple up on the hill so it doesn’t take quite as long for me to get up there.”

“I thought there was already a path?” Immy asked, shifting her grip on the laundry basket she carried.

“There is,” Roman nodded, “But it’s been overgrown and full of debris for years now and doesn’t go directly from the house, which was fine to worry about transversing when I only went a few times a month, but…”

“I see,” She nodded, “Well, good luck with that, Sir Roman, and please try not to get so dirty?”

“I’ll do my best,” Roman said grinning as he hurried down the stairs.

—-

"Roman!" His Ma called from downstairs, Roman shot up from where he sat on his bedroom floor, he dropped his needle and thread onto the fabric he was working on and stood up, rushing towards the stairs to call back.

“What is it?”

“Get down here,” She yelled, “I don’t want to yell through the house!”

Roman rolled his eyes with a sigh before scrambling down the stairs to the hallway where Taz stood, waiting impatiently with her hand on her hip. 

“Yes, ma?” Roman asked, wondering if she was mad at him for some reason, but that couldn’t be right, could it? He hadn’t exactly done anything.

“Wonderful, I need you to make some deliveries around town,” She said, Roman sighed. So he wasn’t in trouble, he wasn’t sure if this turn of events was any better though, he was busy with his project!

“Yes, Ma,” he said anyway, because no matter his projects Roman would probably do anything for his mother, even if he didn’t always show it.

“Good!” She smiled, “I’ve been doing a lot of baking, it’s all packed up and labelled so you can set off as soon as you’re ready.”

Roman nodded, reaching to grab his boots from the cabinet next to the stairs, he pulled them on and moved to retrieve the baskets from the kitchen. He hadn’t run deliveries in a long while, but Roman still knew the routine like the back of his hand. Maybe whilst he was out as well he could take a quick detour to grab a few things for the temple too, he’d been meaning to get a broom he could leave down there since the late fall leaves kept being blown in and he was annoyed at them clinging to his blankets. 

He might even have time to deliver them if he was quick… 

“Oh, and Roman?” Taz said, pulling him away from his train of thought, she had a serious look in her eyes, “No detours.”

“Oh but Ma—" Roman huffed, it was like she could read his mind!

“No, sweetheart, you’ve been spending all your free time these last few weeks either in your room working on that massive piece of fabric for heaven knows what, or at that abandoned old temple, I’ve barely seen you! Which is why I’m cooking dinner tonight and I’d like us to spend some time together.”

Roman sighed, not protesting because… well that was fair, he had been spending a lot of time working on his most recent embroidery project — Vi had given him a few lessons since they had talked and he was really starting to pick it up quickly — or working on his current mission of making the temple into a second home. She was right, they had spent hardly as much time together as of late than they had in the past. He probably owed an afternoon and evening to her and besides, he could get the broom another time. 

“I’ll be back as quickly as I can,” Roman promised, “No detours.”

—-

“You’re here every time,” Vi said one day, this time the storm was bad enough and the weather cold enough that Roman had bundled himself up in blankets and taken up refuge behind the altar where he’d built a small fire. He’d end up stinking of smoke by the time the storm was over he knew, but it was worth it for the warmth. Vi had immediately come and sat down next to him when they arrived and took out a few twines of thread that he seemed to be content with twisting around his fingers to form patterns. 

“So are you,” Roman countered, because it was true, there wasn’t a single time Roman had come here during a storm yet that Vi hadn’t appeared for. 

Vi hummed, considering the statement for a moment before shrugging, “Only because you are.”

“I don’t believe that.” Roman huffed, looking down at the embroidery he was supposed to be practising with. In all honesty, he had gotten entirely distracted.

“Why not?” Vi asked, sounding genuinely confused, “Your company is pleasant.”

“Surely you have better things to do than sitting in silence watching me struggle to embroider.” Roman said, voice deadpan, lifting the barely started embroidery in his hands. 

Vi shrugged with an awkward smile, “Not really.”

“You’re serious?” Roman asked, suddenly feeling a little vulnerable. It’s not like people hadn’t wanted his company before, but it was a little different when that person was a deity, someone who could go anywhere, talk to anyone. Roman had no doubt that Vi could easily do better than him.

“I wouldn’t say it if I wasn’t,” Vi huffed, “I like sitting with you, here.”

“Wha— oh!” Roman said, tensing as Vi reached over without warning and took his hand, turning it over and placing something in his palm quickly before letting go again. Roman took a deep breath before investigating what Vi had given him.

…a ribbon?

It was a dark, vibrant red and a little thicker than the ribbons that they usually used for hair ties. With what looked like the same silver thread that had been used on the handkerchief, a pattern was embroidered and when Roman looked closer he realised it was a mirror of the pattern he had embroidered onto the ribbon he’d given Vi. The fabric was almost heavy and unbelievably soft and when Roman moved it, it caught the light from the fire in a way he wasn’t sure fabric normally did. 

“You told me that to accept the ribbon you usually give one back,” Vi said, watching him inspect it, “So I made one for you, too.”

Roman smiled, a vaguely irrational part of him wanted to lean over and pull Vi into a hug, because this ribbon was beautiful and oh goodness he didn’t deserve this. 

“Thank you,” Roman said instead of voicing that last thought, “It’s lovely.”

There was a minute of silence between them where Roman held the ribbon, wondering if he should put it into his hair now or if… maybe…

“May I?” Vi asked eventually, gesturing to the ribbon and Roman barely restrained himself from jolting in surprise. Was Vi really offering? ���You did mine, after all.”

Roman took a deep breath and nodded, offering the ribbon back, not trusting his voice. 

“I’m going to tie it around your bun,” Vi told him, taking the ribbon back. Roman nodded again, turning his head so that Vi could reach easier. The ribbon was long enough that even when tied the tails brushed his shoulders and Roman found himself grinning at the mere idea that he’d really been given a friendship ribbon by someone like Vi.

“Thank you,” Roman said, “Really, this is, I— it’s— I mean, it’s beautiful, is what I’m trying to say, I— um— I really appreciate it.”

Vi chuckled, looking back at Roman with a smile on his face that reached his eyes, Roman realised that the markings on their face had lightened multiple shades, now looking almost magenta instead of their usual black, Roman couldn’t help but smile back. 

“You’re welcome.” Vi told him, and Roman realised quite abruptly how genuine they sounded.

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#sanders sides #roman sanders #virgil sanders #ts roman #ts virgil #ts prinxiety #prinxiety #sanders sides fanfiction #fanfic #rowans writings #Ribbons and Rainstorms

[fanficimagery]

Can’t Help Falling In Love.

Relationship: Sam/Reader Words: 8.2K Warnings: I’m afraid Sam’s OOC. I tried, I really did.

Imagine being Bella’s older sister from a woman Charlie was with before Renee. You’re only staying with your dad now until you get back on your feet and had no intentions of looking for romance, but apparently Fate has other plans for you.

The taxi drops you off in front of a familiar two-story house, and after paying the taxi fee and collecting your two bags, you hesitantly walk towards the front of the house. A police cruiser sits in the driveway and it brings a small smile to your face as you cautiously walk up the iced porch steps. Then hesitantly knocking on the door, tears immediately spring to your eyes when Charlie opens the door and his eyes light up with excitement.

"Y/N!"

"Hi, dad." Charlie is quick to then envelop you in a hug, your bags falling at your feet so you can wrap your arms back around him in return. "I know you knew I was coming, but I'm sorry I didn't warn you I took an earlier flight."

"Don't apologize, kiddo. This is a good surprise. I'm happy you're finally here."

You and your dad continue to squeeze each other as tightly as you can before the cold finally gets to you, Charlie then releasing you to grab your bags himself and gesturing you inside. "Thanks for letting me come back home," you mumble. Charlie drops your bags on the couch before turning to face you once more. "I screwed up, dad, and you had every right to refuse me. I promise I'm going to get back on track. I won't let you down a second time."

He smiles fondly. "We all make mistakes, Y/N. I'm just glad you realized what yours were before it was too late."

"You and me both."

You glance around the room, gaze sweeping over the worn-in furniture and family portraits littering the walls. The house is a lot homier than you remember and you're grateful for it. You haven't had a place that felt like home since you left for college and you're anxious to finally settle down and get your life back on track.

"Bells, Nessie, and Edward should be here soon. I didn't tell her you were coming, but don't be surprised if she's not surprised you're here. In fact, don't be surprised if she shows up within the next few minutes as if she already knew you were here."

Your brow furrows. "Nessie?"

Charlie looks at you, surprised you don't know. "Yeah. Renesmee. Your niece?"

"I have a niece!?" Charlie's eyes widen and yours close as you pinch the bridge of your nose when he takes a beat to answer. "I have a niece and I didn't even know? I must have been really out of it."

"To be fair, Renesmee is Edward's niece they adopted after a tragic accident the girl's parents were in." You frown at your dad and he sighs. "It's weird. Trust me, I know," he chuckles. "There are some things you need to know, but can't know because it's not my place to tell you. What I can tell you, however, is that your sister has changed."

"Changed?"

"Apparently she contracted some very severe illness while on her honeymoon. She spent months recuperating and when Jacob came to tell me that Bella was better, he informed me that she had to change in order to be better. You'll see what I'm talking about when you see her, but please don't voice your thoughts aloud. It's weird for everyone involved when she gives you the speech about can't knowing for your safety."

"Jesus," you mumble. "What the hell did Bella get herself into?"

"All you need to know is that your sister is happy, your niece is adorable, and the Cullen's are really great people."

Your mouth opens to reply, but whatever you had to say just completely blips out of your mind. You sigh and your shoulders droop. "Yeah. Okay."

True to Charlie's prediction, the front door opens and Bella appears around the corner with windswept hair. Amber eyes widen before the most beautiful smile overtakes her features. "Y/N.."

"Hello, sister." Bella closes the gap between you, her body a little too firm and too cold. The oddity of her eyes flashes in your mind as you return her embrace, followed by Charlie's words, and you let it go after a brief thought. Something in your sister has changed, but she's here and she's happy, and that's all you've ever wanted for your little sister. "I'm sorry I missed your wedding."

"It's okay. You're here now."

When Bella finally releases you, behind her is probably one of the most gorgeous individuals you've ever laid eyes on and the cutest little girl who appears at least four or five perched on his hip. His eyes are the same color as your sister's, but again Charlie's words float into the forefront of your mind. Smiling shakily, you ask, "You must be Edward. Welcome to the family, brother-in-law."

He chuckles as he smiles and bounces the little girl in his arms. "It's nice to finally meet you." You nod, but when your gaze is drawn back to the girl once more, he asks, "Would you like to hold her?"

"Can I?" Your gaze darts between Bella and Edward, and both nod. You then hesitantly walk towards him and hold your hands out when Renesmee smiles at you, and you're surprised at how easily she goes from Edward's arms to yours. "Hello, little one," you coo as you perch her on your hip as Edward had her. "I'm your aunt Y/N."

Renesmee yawns and lays her head on your shoulder, and you twist up your mouth to keep sudden tears at bay. Edward chuckles and Bella stares, amused. "You alright there, Y/N?" Your sister asks.

"I've only known the little crotch goblin for two minutes and if someone ever raises their hand to her, I'll kill them."

All three adults laugh and you sway your niece as her body starts to go lax in your arms. Charlie suggests everyone take a seat and you do, moving Renesmee around in your arms so she's comfortable.

There's a brief bout of silence before Bella asks, "Where have you been? We used to keep in contact every week and then nothing, Y/N. What happened?"

Rubbing your cheek atop your niece's head, you then meet your sister's worried gaze. "I messed up, Bells. I.." With your throat suddenly feeling too tight, you trail off and gulp, and then clear your airway. "I got overwhelmed with school and work, and I- I messed up."

"You should have called," Bella says, frowning. "We would have helped you."

"I was so lost. I didn't know how to ask for help or anything without feeling so ashamed."

"What changed?" The question surprisingly comes from Edward.

"A couple of months ago it was like my mind just cleared. I was sober for the first time in a little over a year and when I realized just how much I had screwed everything up, I put aside my pride and called home. Dad made me settle some things with my school in order to take some time off, found me a 30 day rehab program to endure to make sure I had someone with me for the worst of the withdrawals, and then when I completed it, I asked if I could come back home to get back on my feet."

Edward nods in understanding. "For what it's worth, coming from a stranger and what not, you made the right decision. There are a lot of people in your shoes who choose not to seek help and continue on their destructive paths, but you- you're strong. I'm glad you came back. Now Renesmee gets to know another aunt and I get to know my sister-in-law."

Bella huffs a laugh. "Be careful what you wish for. Once Y/N gets comfortable with you, she's a pain in the butt."

You hiss. "Language, Isabella. Don't corrupt the sleepy little crotch goblin."

Charlie groans. "Can you please stop calling my grandchild a crotch goblin?"

"Sorry, dad."

The rest of the evening goes exceptionally well, and you quickly get over the glaringly obvious differences in your sister and her husband. While you are curious about them after your talk with your dad, you're just grateful that she nor Edward had judged you when they realized just how far you had fallen.

Edward, Renesmee, and Charlie had then leave to go grab some take-out while you catch up with Bella, and you apologize over and over for missing such a big day in her life. She assures you it's fine, but after admitting you're more upset at yourself because you had really wanted to be there, Bella comes up with the idea of holding another ceremony so you can be there this time around. You immediately refuse because you don't want her going through the trouble, but after a phone call from her sister-in-law Alice your sister assures you it's very do-able and that Alice was already making arrangements.

Charlie had chuckled when he heard his daughter was renewing her vows already and Edward looked quite scared that his sister was already in planning mode. The only condition Edward had, however, was that they give you a few months to settle down in Forks before the ceremony was to take place.

Bella, along with a reluctant Alice, agree.

In the couple of weeks that you've been home, Bella has only visited twice. You had expected she'd make more frequent trips given how excited she was now that you were home, but Charlie assured you it was the new norm when it came to his youngest. And though you felt let down, you ended up feeling quite content with all the texts and phone calls you shared with her.

"Hey, kid, what smells so good?"

You startle at Charlie's voice, setting the ladle back down into the pot you'd been stirring before grinning at your dad. "Beef stew. The cornbread is just about done, so go on and wash up."

"Sounds good." Charlie turns to walk away, but then turns back around. "Y/N, you remember Billy Black. Right?"

"Uh, yeah. Lives down on the Rez?"

"Right. The thing is Billy usually has a few caretakers, but tonight everyone seems to be busy. If it's not too much to ask, can you take him whatever leftovers we have?"

"Of course."

"Thanks, kiddo."

Dinner with Charlie is had in relative silence, the small talk being the bare minimum seeing as there was really nothing to talk about. Work for Charlie was his usual, boring day, and finding a school to transfer to near Forks in order to complete your nursing degree was proving quite tricky. However, there was an online course you could complete so long as you found a hospital willing to take you on to accumulate hours of experience.

"Well why don't you ask Carlisle to see if they do some stuff like that at Forks General?" Charlie asks when you're spooning the leftover stew into a large Tupperware bowl for Billy.

"Who's Carlisle?"

"Edward's father. He's the best doctor around."

"Huh." Your lips purse in thought. "I'll text Bella or even Alice to ask Carlisle then. I guess Bella gave her sister-in-law my number and that girl texts nonstop once you get her going."

Charlie chuckles. "Alice is a force to be reckoned with. She may be tiny, but she's terrifying."

"Tell me about it. I've never even met the girl and already she has several dresses for me to try on for Bella and Edward's second wedding."

"That sounds like something she'd do."

Clicking the lid onto the bowl of stew and then loading up another with the last of the cornbread, you gather both bowls in your arms. "So I guess I'm using Bella's old truck that she dropped off the other day?"

"Yep. Keys are hanging by the front door. And don't worry, Y/N. Bella's other sister-in-law Rosalie is a genius mechanic. She replaced everything in that truck and it now purrs like it's supposed to."

You laugh. "Got it. See you in a bit. Hopefully I don't get lost."

With the heat nearly on full blast and the radio playing classic rock on low, you drive down to La Push and take the somewhat familiar path to Billy Black's house. The sight of the red house with white trimming brings back vague memories from long ago and you park several feet from the wooden ramp leading up to the white door.

You know the house has seen better days, but it's a house that still brings a small smile to your face. The second the engine cuts, a group of shirtless men come from around the corner. You briefly hesitate, but gather the tupperware bowls in your arms and exit the truck.

"You're not Bella," are the first words that greet you.

"Nope. That would be my younger sister." You attempt to avoid gazes, quickly scanning their faces. With as quick as you look over them, not one face is familiar to you. However, you are a little suspicious of their matching tattoos and the fact they're shirtless in such cold temperatures. More weirdness, but this wasn't something Charlie had warned you about. Not like he did with your sister and her new family. "Is, uh, is Billy home? I come bearing food for him."

"Y/N?"

The guys before you seem to part as another one steps forward. You meet his dark eyes straight on and it's like a light bulb goes off over your head. "Jacob?" He smiles and you allow yourself a short laugh of disbelief. "No way. You're all grown up!"

"That does tend to happen as the years pass by."

"Shut up. I just- I'm surprised is all. You're not supposed to be taller than me." You then pout.

"Yeah, well.." Someone clears their throat and Jacob suddenly remembers that they have an audience. "Oh. Right. Y/N these are my friends Jared, Embry, Paul, and Sam. Guys, this is Y/N. She's Charlie Swan's first born."

You meet each and every one of their gazes now, nodding in greeting, but it's the last face- Sam?- that has you momentarily freezing. His expression seems to instantly drop when your gazes connect, but you're the first to collect yourself and look elsewhere. "Um, right." You drawl, suddenly finding it hard to keep your gaze from darting back to Sam. "So Billy?"

Everyone's gaze seems to be darting between you and Sam, smiles slowly forming into teasing smirks as they nudge and push their friend.

"Yeah, he's inside," Jacob says. "I'll just- lets go."

As Jacob leads you into his home, calling out his father's name, you can't help but ask, "So, Sam..?"

He chuckles. "First day back on the Rez and already you have a crush?"

"Shut up. I just- it was weird. Don't get me wrong, all your friends are oddly attractive, but Sam-"

"Was it love at first sight?" He teases.

"You might be taller than me, J, but I will sit on you and push your face into the sand like that one time." He leads you through his house and towards the kitchen, calling out for his dad once again. "And besides, he might be cute, but I'm not exactly in any position to attempt dating."

"No?"

"Not at all. Talk to your dad, I'm sure mine has already told him all the sordid details of my return."

Jacob opens his mouth to reply, but the appearance of Billy has him stalling. "Y/N! Charlie told me you'd be stopping by."

"Hello, Billy. I hope you're hungry."

Two days later is the next time you see Sam. Though Forks has its very own supermarket, the one down in La Push has cheaper prices for the same quality type of products. But not only that, La Push has always held a special place in heart since that's where your mother was born and you rather your money spent goes towards the smaller community.

So as you're pushing your cart down the aisles of La Push's supermarket, it's there you run into Sam. Literally, almost.

"Oh my gosh. I'm so sorry!" You say, choking down a laugh when Sam's immediate glare shifts into a smile upon seeing you. "I was too busy staring at the shelves rather than where I was walking."

"It's okay. Y/N, right? Charlie's daughter?"

"Yes. And you're Sam." He seems to stand a little taller upon you remembering who he was. "Almost didn't recognize you with a shirt on."

"Ha. Ha." Sam shifts his handheld basket from one hand to the other, his gaze then dropping to your half filled basket. "What brings you down to La Push? I'm pretty sure Forks has their own grocery store."

You shrug. "To be honest, if I had to choose between either La Push or Forks, La Push wins hands down. I love it here," you say while smiling. "From what I remember, everyone was close knit and content to just be. But everyone in Forks- everyone wants to be in each other's business just to have something to spread as the latest gossip. If I'm going to spend mine or my dad's money, I'm going to spend it where I know it'll go towards a community I adore."

Sam smiles at that. "I like your honesty."

"Mhm. Well I, uh, I should get back to shopping. I don't wanna hold you up anymore than I already have."

"If you say so. It was nice to run into you, Y/N."

"Yeah. You too, Sam."

The both of you share a look a little longer than necessary before he reluctantly walks away, and you finish your shopping excursion with a smile on your face. And given that Sam only had a handheld basket of groceries, you're surprised to see him get in line behind you. You'd figured he'd be done shopping long before you, but apparently that wasn't the case.

You then bid Sam another goodbye before you walk out of the store, only to groan and curse your luck moments later when you realize your truck has a flat tire.

"Sonnuvabitch." You already know there's no jack or spare tire anywhere in the truck, so your mood instantly takes a nosedive.

"I would make a joke right about now, but you seem honestly upset and I don't want to piss you off."

You huff a laugh. "You know, learning how to change a flat would come in handy right about now if I actually had a spare to change the flat out with." Glancing over your shoulder, you spot Sam grinning at you. "Today just isn't my day it seems."

"Need a hand?"

"Yes, but I don't want to rope you into this mess."

"Oh you're not roping next into anything," Sam muses. "I was just going to give you a lift after making a call to Paul and Jared. They can pick up the truck, fix the tire, and then deliver it to Charlie's for you."

You shake your head, amused. "Are you sure? I don't wanna step on toes."

"It's fine. They'll be glad to take some time off from their normal duties. Just leave your keys in the visor and you can follow me to my truck."

Grateful to not have to mess with the truck yourself, you place the truck keys in the visor and then reclaim your shopping basket to follow after Sam. He places a call to his guys, telling them the problem and where to leave the truck, and even helps you load your groceries into the bed of his own truck.

"Thanks for this, Sam. Really," you say after hopping into his passenger seat.

"Don't even worry about it. If you continue to shop in La Push rather than Forks, you'll be seeing a lot more of me."

He flashes you a smirk and you can't help but return it. The drive is relatively silent, but Sam somehow manages to sneak in a few questions to learn more about you without making you feel like a bug under a microscope. And by the time you pull up to your house, the two of you are laughing as he helps you grab all your bags from the bed of his truck to take inside.

Before you can even open the front door, however, Charlie is pulling it open.

"Y/N and.. Sam. This is a surprise."

"Hey, dad. Truck got a flat down in La Push and luckily for me Sam was there. His friends will be bringing the truck when they have time."

"Super."

You roll your eyes at Charlie's sarcasm, he then winking as Sam chuckles. "Chief, if you got a minute, I'd like to speak with you. Privately."

Sam seems to convey some sort of message with body language and expression, and Charlie stands a little taller. "Of course."

"Right," you then drawl, gaze darting between the two men. "I'll just get started on dinner while you two chat. And Sam? Thank you. I'm seriously going to have to make you and whatever boys help you some lunch one of these days as a proper thank you."

"Oh. You don't have to."

"I want to. Now stop refusing my kind gesture and talk to my dad about whatever it is you need to talk about."

You show Sam where he can drop the bags and then proceed to take everything to the kitchen yourself. You get the urge to eavesdrop when Sam closes the front door after Charlie's joined him outside, but decide against it and start prepping dinner as you said you would.

Charlie joins you some fifteen minutes later and you smile when you seem him studying you curiously. "What?"

"Nothing," he muses. Your eyes narrow as he takes a casual stance against the door jamb, arms crossing over his chest. "So Sam Uley, huh?"

"Don't."

"What? In all my years, I've never seen Sam smile the way he did earlier."

"He's just being friendly is all."

"If you say so."

"I do."

"Well whether he's friendly or has ulterior motives, I approve. Sam's a good guy."

Groaning, you can't help but chuckle. "Okay, dad. I'll keep that in mind."

Lunch with Sam, Jared, and Paul proved to be a rather delightful event. Sam had been nervous about something from the moment they showed up, and Paul and Jared made it their mission to tease him every chance they got. The homemade hamburgers and fries were a hit with the three of them, and they seemed to be relieved when you didn't comment on how much they ate.

From that day on it seemed like the flood gates had opened and the boys were dropping by more often than not, introducing you to the rest of their close knit group. Charlie found it all rather amusing, especially when the boys and Sam were comfortable enough to show up in nothing but a pair of jean shorts, and you found yourself welcoming the distraction no matter if Sam kept making you blush.

He visited frequently and it was on one of his late night visits that you found yourself truly opening up to him. Sam knew a bit about why you'd come back to Charlie's, but he didn't know the extent of all that you did or how much you struggled in and after rehab. He seemed alarmingly upset about your suffering all alone when you were away and then promised to be there should you ever feel yourself slipping into old habits. You were touched about how genuine he seemed that you found yourself hugging him before he went home.

And it was there, in Sam Uley's overly warm embrace, that you realized you were royally screwed.

Being back at Charlie's and finding a healthy rhythm lifts a weight off your shoulders. With Charlie now a constant in your life, as well as your sister who checks in every other day by calling or texting, it was a lot easier to remain on the straight and narrow while also making them proud. Even Sam had turned into a constant, and while you were grateful for his presence and friendship when Charlie was at work, you had to have the uncomfortable conversation with him that friendship was all that you could currently offer him when you took notice of his too fond expressions when he thought you weren't looking.

And Sam, being the gentle giant that he was, assured you he would take whatever you offered. Your refusal of whatever affections he might have held for you didn't seem to put a damper on his continuous pop-ups and you were secretly relieved.

Today, however, is a day that Charlie and Sam are going to be busy which means you'll be all alone for quite some time. So after quickly packing a bag of snacks, water, and a compass and a map, you decide to explore the woods behind your home. The beginning of the woods just behind your home is somewhat familiar, but the further you walk in, the more you realize you've never been this far out.

You manage to keep track of your whereabouts using the map, marking certain spots on it with a pencil. And around eleven you decide to take a break, sitting on a log near a meadow and eating some of the snacks you had packed.

Then just after you've packed your leftovers and are taking a sip from your water bottle, you see a figure standing just on the opposite side of the meadow. Swallowing your drink and capping off the bottle, you hesitantly stand and call out. "Hello? Are you lost or something, mister?"

Your eyesight isn't the best, but you do manage to make out the guy tilting his head in a curious manner. And the fact that he closes the distance between the both of you within the blink of an eye. Yelping, you step backwards and trip over the log you'd been sitting on.

The man with blood red eyes and too pale skin tuts mockingly at you while slowly crouching before you. "Such a fragile little thing. You should be more careful, darling."

Heart pounding furiously, you stare with wide, terrified eyes. "W-What are you?"

He smirks. "A living nightmare."

Faster than your gaze can keep track of, the man reaches out and grips your left forearm in a bone crushing grip. You scream as you feel your arm break and before you can even comprehend what's going on, you're airborne and then landing with a pained shout. Your vision is blurry with all the tears you're crying and you cradle your injured arm to your chest as you curl up on your side. Deep laughter resonates around the meadow and you scream when he grabs you by the shoulder to push you onto your back.

"Why are you doing this?" You sob.

His then red eyes are now pitch black. "Because, my dear, I'm absolutely starved." His top lip curls back as he hisses and he raises his arm to strike. Another sob breaks free and you clamp your eyes shut as to not see the killing blow.

But before he can strike, a heart stopping snarl seems to cease all noise in the meadow. Your eyes fly open to see the man now frozen above you, he staring at something across the meadow and out of your sight. You're too scared to look for what has the monster above you frozen scared, especially when wolf-like howls rip through the air. Everything is calm and quiet for a split second, and then a snarl to your right has your head whipping in that direction.

Faster than the monster above you can move, an overly large black wolf clamps his jaw around the monster's upper torso and rips him from you. You scream and try your best to roll away from the snarls, the screaming, and the howling. More wolves join the black wolf in a frenzy of ripping apart the man who was set on killing you and then the most beautiful sound reaches your ears.

"Y/N!"

Your heart freezes and you turn towards the voice. "S-Sam?" He jogs up to you, barefoot and wearing nothing but jean shorts, and a look of utter horror on his face. "Sam, you need to go. Run! There's this man and these wolves, and they- he.." you trail off, looking towards where the wolves last were. But only there are no wolves. Not anymore. Instead there stands Jared, Paul, Quil, and Embry- all barefoot, shirtless, and shielding their crotches in front of a roaring fire. "What's going on?" You then murmur.

Sam crouches next to you. "I'm sorry," he apologizes, expression pained. "I should have warned you sooner, but I didn't know how to tell you. This is all my fault."

"Tell me what?"

Suddenly torn about his mental musings, Sam gulps and shakes his head clear. "Not now. I need to get you to Carlisle Cullen. He can help me explain what it is that's happened here."

You frown. "Carlisle? What does my sister's father-in-law have to do with this?"

"Sam!" Paul suddenly calls out. "The leech has been contacted. He's expecting us."

You look at Sam for an answer yet again, but still he refuses. "Not now. Please bear with me, Y/N. It'll all be explained soon."

Everything in you is raging to demand answers now, but his expression breaks your heart. "O-okay."

Vampires. Vampires existed and one tried to eat you.

But not only that, shapeshifting werewolves were also a thing and you just so happened to be the soulmate- er, imprint- of one. But not just any werewolf. No. Life had to go and complicate things, and make you the soulmate to Sam. Which yeah, learning Sam was an alpha of one of the packs protecting Quileute lands? Total mind fuck. And while you were absolutely terrified of the one vampire who tried to make a snack out of you, you couldn't let that one experience paint your view of all vampires. Paul and Jared had tried to assure you that you should think all vampires were the enemy, but you couldn't believe that- not when your sister and her new family were vampires themselves. Vegetarian vampires, but vampires nonetheless.

You had then managed five days of no contact with Sam or the boys after the impromptu meeting put together by the Tribe leaders to properly explain the wolves' duties, and to be honest it was probably the most five miserable days you've experienced since rehab. You had texted with Sam as to not totally cut him out, but it just wasn't the same. So when Charlie took notice and expressed his concerns, you readily agreed to have Sam over so you could talk face to face.

Charlie's at work when Sam shows up and as soon as the door is open you're stepping into his space and wrapping your arms around his waist. With the side of your face pressed against his chest, you feel him exhale with relief before his arms wrap around your shoulders. "I'm sorry."

"It's fine." His voice sounds rough and you squeeze him a little tighter. "It's a lot to wrap your head around."

"Funny thing is I got over you being a wolf and the whole imprint thing days ago. It was the vampire part that left me questioning everything I knew and the fact that my doctor is a freakin' vampire."

Sam chuckles. "I'm not a fan of the leeches, but Doctor Carlisle has proven himself a friend of the packs. We trust him. Mostly."

Realizing the hug has lasted a little too long, you step back with a sheepish smile and gesture him inside. He follows you into the living room and you both take a seat on the couch, side by side. Then picking your feet up onto the cushions and wrapping your arms around bent knees as to not reach out to touch Sam, you say, "So I know we texted a bit about the whole imprint thing, but what exactly are you looking for with me?"

Sam inhales deeply as he rubs his hands along the tops of his thighs. "Whatever you want, Y/N. If you want to remain friends, we can. I'll just be that protective presence which would no doubt annoy you the first relationship you hop into." He says this with a smile, but you can see the forcefulness of it and it actually sends a pang a hurt through you.

"What if- what if I don't want to be just friends?" You ask. Swallowing thickly, you turn your head to meet Sam's wary expression. "What if I want more? Eventually, of course."

Sam actually blinks in surprise before a slow smile curls the corner of his lips. "If you want more, I'd be happy to offer you that too. We'll take things as slow as you need to."

"Thanks, Sam. It's just I'm still kind of-"

"Hey, hey," he shushes you politely, reaching out and tucking a piece of hair behind your ear. "You don't owe me an explanation. You're my imprint and the most important thing to me is your well being. I know what led you back here, so if you say you need to go slow, we'll go slow. I'm more than okay with that."

You take the time to really look at him and this time it's your turn to smile. "My dad's gonna be stoked, 'ya know? He's been singing your praises since you brought me home that first time when my truck had a flat. He's actually the one who made me realize I needed to call you over."

"I always knew I liked Charlie."

"Mhm." Letting your feet touch the ground once more, you grin. "So I know you've been here less than twenty minutes, but I need to go into vampire territory now." Sam tenses and you quietly huff. "Behave. Carlisle's gonna take a look at my arm and see how long I actually need to be in this stupid cast," you say while moving your broken arm to draw attention to it. "I don't want to be wearing this for my sister's second wedding. It'll clash with my dress."

"I know the Cullen's are some of the nicer bunch, but it still doesn't sit right with me that my imprint is walking into a leech lair."

"Then don't think of them as leeches. Think of them as my family because that's what they are. Well at least Edward is, but yeah. I talk mostly with Edward and Alice, and Carlisle and Esme are the most loving couple I've ever seen. You don't have anything to worry about."

"I know, but try telling that to my wolf."

"You can always go with me if that'll make you feel better."

"It would, but my patrol shift starts in less than ten."

"Then I go alone. I'll text you as soon as I'm back in my truck. Promise."

"That actually makes me feel a little bit better."

With nothing else left to say, you and Sam prepare to leave- you to the Cullen's and he back to La Push. After helping you into your jacket, Sam then makes sure you're actually capable of driving with a broken arm. And once knowing you are, he crowds into your space for yet another hug and a kiss to your hairline.

"You can come over tonight. Right?" You ask.

"Of course. Charlie grilling?"

"Yep. I'll see you later then."

"See you later."

The drive to Cullen territory has now become familiar to you and you get there in no time. Out on the front steps, Edward is waiting for you in all his sparkling glory since he knew it greatly amused you.

"Hey, Sparkles, how's it hanging?"

He chuckles at the nickname and steps back out of the sunlight. "Just fine. How are you, Y/N?"

"Honestly? I could be better. I don't like the cast."

"Well lucky for you the break wasn't too bad. Carlisle thinks you'll only have the cast for six weeks."

"God I hope so." You walk up the steps and let Edward lead you inside the home. "So where's my sister?"

"She and the rest of the girls took Nessie to shop for a flower girl dress. Emmett and Jasper are out hunting, so it'll only be Carlisle and I here with you."

"Your brothers don't have to leave when I come over," you say with a small huff. "I already explained to Sam that just because I'm his imprint I won't stop keeping company with your family. After all, you're my family now too."

Edward's brow raises in surprise. "And how did Sam react to that?"

"He growled," you muse, "but he tried to play it off. I told him to come with me now, but his patrol shift was about to start. And speaking of Sam," you then trail off as Carlisle appears with a smile, wheeling an x ray machine behind him, "is it okay to have him as my plus one for your second wedding?"

"Of course." You beam at Edward and he nods, gesturing towards the door. "I'll leave you and Carlisle to it then."

As Edward leaves, Carlisle gestures for you to take a seat where he's now set up. "For what it's worth, I think you'll be quite happy with Sam. He's a great man and protector."

"Carlisle, please stop hitting on my wolf." There's a snort from the other room and you grin. "So what am I looking at doc? Edward mentioned something about six weeks and then I'm free?"

"The severity of the break usually tells me how long you'll need to remain in a cast, and fortunately for you it wasn't too severe. Depending on how fast you heal, you should be out within six or seven weeks."

"Awesome." Then before Carlisle can comprehend what you're thinking or even doing, you touch the tip of your nose with your pointer finger. "Not it on telling Alice the wedding has to be pushed back another two weeks!"

Carlisle gapes and just then Edward rushes into the room, his finger on the tip of his nose as well. "Not it."

The Cullen patriarch glances between you and his first turned son, eyes rolling fondly. "We'll just get Jasper to break the news."

As the weeks progress, Charlie's house seems to become hangout central for Sam's pack. At first you thought your dad would be annoyed by the ever presence of shirtless young men parading around his house, but seeing as they provided money for groceries and seemed to fix whatever plumbing problem Charlie suddenly found, your dad was more than willing to put up with them. But not only that, Charlie now had a group of boys to watch and talk sports with, and you knew he was a lot happier than he led on.

Then the day before the wedding, your cast came off and Alice readily made calls to their cousins up in Alaska and sent out invitations to a select few others- Jacob, Billy, Seth, Charlie, Sue, yourself, and Sam. Others had been invited, but Jacob nor Sam felt comfortable leaving the borders free, so Leah, Embry, and Quil opted to remain on patrol rather than attend the wedding.

The morning of, you were whisked away by an apologetic Jasper and a grinning Emmett. You quickly texted Sam so he wouldn't panic and then left with boys. Alice did your makeup, Rosalie your hair, and Esme showed you to your dress while your sister laughed at your misfortune of being their doll this time around.

Alice reminds you that you'll be giving a speech as the bride's older sister and you momentarily panic. You had forgotten about the speech and have absolutely nothing planned.

"You can always sing a song," Edward muses while you pace what apparently used to be his bedroom. "Renee sang a song, but it was- it wasn't exactly the best."

You snort and then chuckle, your amusement slowly dwindling as you look at Edward in surprise. "Actually, that's not a bad idea. I'm not the best singer, but Bella and I used to love this one song.." You start humming, swaying slightly, hoping he'll know it. He does.

"Can't Help Falling in Love," he says with a faint grin. "Elvis Presley."

"Yes! I'll just- I need to find the music online. I doubt the band can play the version I want to sing. Is that okay?"

"Of course." You're brought a laptop and after finding the music to the song you want to sing, Edward quickly downloads it to have it prepared for after your speech.

Then as you're waiting for Sam to show up, you mentally practice singing the song in your head, praying you remember the lyrics correctly. But as you're singing, Sam keeps popping into your mind. You can't help but picture walking towards Sam at one point in the song, reaching out to him and letting the song help you tell him you're in love with him. You haven't told him you loved him, only relying on your actions so far, but the song is the perfect opportunity to finally say the words out loud.

"Do it." You startle at Edward's sudden appearance, brow furrowing. You almost forgot he could read minds. "I'm sure Sam would like to hear it."

"Yeah, but it's your wedding. Isn't it inappropriate for me to do that?"

"Not really. Bella and I have already had our day. Let us help you do this."

"If you say so."

"I do. Now go out front. I can hear Sam's truck coming up the driveway."

Sam shows up only slightly disgruntled, tie hanging loosely around his neck and suit jacket left unbuttoned. You whistle at him and he glares up until he realizes it's you. You laugh. "Rough day?"

"Something like that." Sam stops just at the bottom of the steps, staring up at you and taking in the dark green dress hanging off your frame. "You look beautiful."

"Thanks. You clean up nice yourself." As Sam joins you on the step you're standing on, he reaches out to bring you into his arms. You settle in his embrace after kissing his cheek in greeting, arms wrapped low around his waist. "By the way, I have to give a speech so don't start growling when I eventually leave your side."

He sighs. "At least the only leeches invited are all vegetarians."

"Shush," you huff a quiet laugh. "Don't call them that when they're in hearing distance."

"Vegetarians?"

Pulling back, you playfully swat at him. "You know which word I mean. Stupid doesn't suit you."

Sam smiles before taking your hand in his own, he then heading towards the front door. "I apologize. Some habits are harder to break."

"I know. At least you're trying though."

          - X - X - X - X - X -

The wedding itself is very beautiful and you're shocked at how quickly the backyard was transformed into the perfect wedding venue. Even Sam seemed surprised and Charlie took great amusement in your awed expression, but not as much amusement as you shared when you realized Charlie was hiding his girlfriend from you right under your nose. Sue Clearwater was a soft spoken woman with a hidden fiery attitude, and she was the perfect woman for your father.

The ceremony itself is rather quick given they were already married and then everyone is moved to yet another part of Cullen property where a newly installed dance floor is covered with a tent of white flowers.

The wedded couple have their first dance all over again, with the addition of their daughter, and then Alice is up on stage and calling you up to give a speech. Sam fidgets in his seat, but after grabbing his hand and giving him a reassuring squeeze, he calms and releases you to perform your sisterly duty.

Then stepping up to the microphone once on stage, you nervously chuckle as all eyes are on you. "First of all, I just want to thank the Cullen's for making Edward and Bella have a second wedding since I missed their first one." Alice preens as the rest of her family throw a mock glare in her direction and the rest of the guests all express their amusement. "So as you all probably know by now, I am Bella's older sister. Unfortunately I have no embarrassing stories to tell since we only got to see each other when we spent summers together when we visited our dad-" Emmett boos and you laugh, "but I can tell you what I thought when I first heard she was marrying the kid she dated since her junior year of high school."

"Oh this oughta be good," you hear Emmett chortle.

"I remember- I remember my sister calling me in tears one day. She asked me if she smelt bad and I laughed, but through her tears she told me that this boy at school acted as if she were the most awful smelling individual he'd ever come across and that he actually tried switching out of their shared classes."

"I apologized!"

"I know you did, Sparkles, and I've already forgiven you." The small crowd chuckles. "But then a week later my sister was singing a different tune. Edward was suddenly the most amazing person ever and she was passed smitten, already claiming to be in love with him. I thought she was being utterly ridiculous and that her hormones were getting the best of her for the first time, but she assured me that wasn't the case. Well," you trail off, grinning, "she did tell me, repeatedly might I add, that she wanted to jump-"

"Not another word!"

Grinning deviously, you hold your hands up in mock surrender as your dad groans and everyone else looks rather amused at Bella's panic. Emmett and Jasper are urging you to continue, but you know she'll only release something embarrassing about you if you do. Instead, you start walking towards the laptop that Edward set up for you which is already connected to the speakers around the area. All you have to do is press play. "So now that I know how perfect Edward is for my sister, I don't feel bad for my early assessment of thinking them fools in love. And speaking of fools," you press play, letting the chords of a guitar play an all too familiar tune, "I thought I'd sing a little something for them. And don't worry, I'm not as terrible a singer as Bella's mother."

More laughter rings out and you unhook the microphone from its stand. It's a wireless one, so you're free to walk around the stage. Then finding your spot near the edge of the stage, you nod at Edward who readily takes your sister's hand in his and leads her to the middle of the dance floor. Bella is grinning and you breathe a little easier, inhaling deeply just in time to sing.

"Wise men say only fools rush in, but I can't help falling in love with you." You sing it slow and a little raspy, and you mentally applaud yourself when you see the small crowd all perk up in surprise. "Shall I stay? Would it be a sin if I can't help falling in love with you."

More couples join Edward and Bella on the floor, half lovingly staring into each other's eyes as you sing while others watch you. "Like a river flows surely to the sea. Darling so it goes, some things are meant to be…"

The music trails off, the lights dim only to be replaced by twinkling fairy lights entwined with the flowers, and as you step off the stage the crowd parts which leaves you a straight shot to Sam who's staring at you in wonder. Jacob and Seth, who'd sat with you at your table, gleefully nudge Sam into standing when they realize what you're doing.

You walk towards Sam and Bella squeezes your shoulder in support as you pass her by. "So take my hand," you grab his hand, smiling through tears as you pull him into your space, "take my whole life too for I can't help falling in love with you. For I can't help falling in love with you."

As the song ends, everyone applauds. There's whistling and whoops of cheer, and you briefly turn around to bow and thank everyone. Alice takes the microphone from you to direct the attention back on her and you feel a tug on your hand once everyone else is distracted. Sam gestures to the side and you follow him out of sight.

"You planned that," he eventually says.

Gulping nervously, you shrug. "I did. I just- it popped into my head right before you got here and Edward helped me quickly put it together."

"Do you mean it? You love me?"

"Sam.." You reach up to cup the side of his face, bringing his gaze down to yours. "I would never say those words- well, sing it in this case- without meaning them. You have been patient with me, and kind, and I- I fell in love." You chuckle, sniffling. "I love you, Sam, and I'm sorry I'm so awkward and told you in front of every-"

Sam immediately leans down, pressing his lips against yours. You smile, returning his kiss, and just breath him in when he then rests his forehead against yours. "Good. Because I love you too."

AN: If you want to hear how the song was sung, Youtube: Can’t Help Falling in Love by Kina Grannis. It’s the version of the song that’s in the movie Crazy Rich Asians. Watching that movie actually inspired this. Haha.

#fanficimagery #imagine #sam uley x reader #sam uley imagine #twilight imagine #new moon imagine #eclipse imagine #breaking dawn imagine #sam uley #bella swan #charlie swan #edward cullen #carlisle cullen #twilight #new moon #eclipse #breaking dawn

[thiswasinevitableid]

Apple, Delight (Sternclay)

Prompt for the fourth was: Apple Orchard

Barclay has cinnamon sugar in his pores, he’s certain of it. The first of October means the crowds arrive in earnest to Amnesty Farm which, from late September to mid-November, becomes a center for fall fun. They don’t serve tons of food, but Barclay is in charge of what they do offer, his pride and joy being their apple cider doughnuts, which he’s made by dozen since eight that morning.

He’s ready to settle in for the night when he discovers he has less firewood than he thought. Ah well, Sass needs to go out anyway, a trip to the wood pile won’t kill him. 

Except, as he’s gathering an armful of chopped logs, Sass goes tearing off towards the orchards, dark fur disappearing into the shadows under the trees.

Barclay sighs, sets the wood down and starts off after him. It’s not like he can get too lost, since the farm is fenced in on all sides, but it’s supposed to rain tonight and he’d hate for him to be out in it. Plus, if he gets into the garden display again, Dani will be pissed. 

He passes the petting zoo, then the goat and sheep pens, smiling when soft clucks come from the chicken coop. They’re on a country road, so at night there’s no traffic to drown out the sounds of the farm and the nearby woods. Maybe some people find it eerie, but hes’ grateful for the relative quiet after a day of being in the kitchen. 

Skirting the end of the U-Pick Pumpkin Patch brings him to the apple orchards. There are also pear and cherry trees, but the apples make up the bulk of what they grow, and visitors are welcome to pick from designated sections. 

Now if only he could spot a wagging tail or hear a jingling collar in the midst of them. 

“Sass!” He whistles, but no shape comes bounding towards him. Usually when the dog fails to come when called, it’s because he’s chasing some poor squirrel or rabbit into the underbrush.

Which is why, when he hears a  distinctly human cry of alarm, Barclay jumps out of his skin before taking off towards the subsequent barks. 

He finds Sass directing his deep woofs at a man about Barclay’s age, with dark hair that was slicked back at some point but is now mussed, and a sweater and jeans that are far too clean for him to be a farmhand. When he gets closer, he realizes he recognizes the guy; he’d been in with his family earlier that day, and Barclay had just enough time to think he was hotter than the fryer before a new wave of visitors came to the counter. Given that he was there with a woman and  young girl, he’s gonna assume the guy is off-limits for flirting. 

“Sass, c’mon boy, heel.” 

The dog turns, lopes over to Barclay as he steps to the man and offers a hand. 

“Sorry, he’s a surprisingly good guard dog for something that gets distracted by butterflies.”

The man takes his hand, stands and brushes leaves from his sweater, “and he's terrifying to have bolting towards you out of the darkness.”

Barclay raises an eyebrow, “that's kind of the point of a guard dog. Y’know, keeping intruders out?”

“I’m not an intruder, I am a visitor who misplaced something.”

“We’ve been closed for two hours.”

“I’m aware. But the front gate was locked and I couldn't get anyone’s attention.”

“Because the staff who live here live out towards the back. That's why we put that phone number on the gate. '' He turns them back towards the cottage, Sass trotting happily in front of them. 

“Which would have worked perfectly. If the thing I was missing wasn't my phone.” The man holds up a smartphone.

“I mean, guess it’s good you found it, but you coulda used someone else's and let us know to look for i in the lost and found. Folds are good about bringing dropped stuff back to the main farm.”

“I considered that option but I might not have a job come morning if I did it that way.”

“Jesus, where do you work?”

“The FBI.”

“Ah.”

“Yes, pretty much.”

“That how come you were able to scale the fence so easily?”

The man nods.

“What kind of work do you do in the FBI?” He may as well make the most of having a cute guy walking with him. A little practice flirting can’t hurt. God knows he needs it. 

“I work for the, um, the UP.”

“....Holy shit, I didn’t know that was real, I thought they made it up for the X-Files.”

“No, though it involves far more dead ends than that show portrays. Oddly, Twin Peaks is more accurate to what I do.”

“Man, that’s fucking cool agh, shit” rain patters on the leaves, “please tell me you moved your car away from the gate?”

“Only a little.”

“Shit. Okay, you probably figured it out from wandering around, but we are literally on the other end of the property right now, and the golf cart is in the shop.”

“It’s, um, it’s alright, if you get me to the main route through the farm, I can walk back on my own and climb the fence. Again.” His tone suggests he’s already working through the logistics in his head. 

“Uh, if you aren't in too big a hurry, at least let me swing by my place and get you a raincoat?”

“Oh. Um, that’d be great. Thank you.”

They veer right and soon the cottage comes into view. He grabs some dry firewood while Sass waits on the step and the man rubs his hands together. 

Once they’re inside, the man turns to him and Barclay has to work to keep his focus on his words rather than the blue eyes and handsome face.

“May I use your restroom? I got a bit muddy.” He holds up his hands. 

“Just down the hall.” 

The man smiles, and Barclay starts building a fire as he walks away. There’s a ding, and he goes to check in case Mama needs something. But it's not his phone, it’s the other man's, glowing where he set it on the table. 

Hayes: I expect better than technical mishaps from you, agent,

Shit, he wasn’t kidding about work. And his other notification is showing thirty unread emails.

The water shuts off in the bathroom and he hurries back to the fire, is just getting it caught when there’s a groan behind him. Turning, he sees his guest running a hand through his black hair, staring defeatedly down at his phone. 

“I’m moving to the bottom of the sea.”

Barclay chuckles and the man looks a little embarrassed at being heard.

“If you want something closer to home, we're hiring seasonal help.”

“I’m sure it’d do wonders for my physique, if you’re anything to go by, but I doubt I’m cut out for it. I’m white-collar through and through, unfortunately. Sorry” he looks at the hardwood floor, “probably shouldn’t whine about my job, since you’re helping me stay dry instead after I committed at least two misdemeanors on your property.”

“It’s Mama’s, I just work here. And it’s okay. Though, uh, kinda surprised you wanna talk to some random dude on a farm about it instead of, like, your wife.”

“Wife?”

“The woman who was with you today? You came into the restaurant at one point.”

“Oh! No, that’s my sister, I came with her and my niece. Her opinion on my work troubles is to get a boyfriend so I’ll have someone to complain to.”

Barclay closes the fire grate slightly harder than he means to at that last sentence.

“Did, uh, did you all have a good time?”

“Very. Ellie, my niece, adored all the animals, and Lily comes here every year to pick out pumpkins for decorating the house. I, um, my favorite part was the food. Those doughnuts were amazing, as were the pumpkin scones.”

Barclay blushes; a cute guy complimenting his cooking tends to make him all fluttery.

“You thought those were good, then I got something you need to try. Uh, I mean, if you want to stay a little, if not I can get the coat and we can go.”

The man looks at his phone, then back to Barclay, “what the hell, things are under control until the morning. I’d love to stay. Um, may I dry my sweater by the fire? It got pretty wet just in the few minutes we were out.”

“Sure thing uh, Mr-”

“Joseph is fine.”

Barclay smiles, heading for the kitchen, but not before watching Joseph's shirt catch on his sweater and ride up, revealing honest-to-god cut muscle. Instead of asking if he can lick apple butter off his abs, he grabs the jar of said butter, the loaf of bread, and starts a kettle for tea. 

Soon he’s setting a plate and a cup of cranberry-apple tea un front of Joseph, who inhales appreciatively.

“Let me guess; you made all of this?”

“Yep, the apple butter is an old family recipe.”

They eat in silence for a few moments until Sass, roused from his spot by the fire by the smell of food, pads over to sit in front of Joseph and stare. When that fails to produce treats, he turns his puppy-dog eyes on Barclay. The cook makes him sit and shake before tossing him a small piece of bread.

“What kind of dog is he?”

“Bernese Mountain Dog and Rottweiler, we think.”

“Is his name short for something?”

Barclay smiles, “Sasquatch. He had huge feet as a puppy.”

“We have similar dog-naming habits.” Joseph pulls out his phone, “this is Nessie.” When he turns it, Barclay almost snorts tea out his nose, unprepared for the sight of a greyhound in a sweater decorated with tiny Loch Ness Monsters. 

“Believe it or not, she adores that sweater. Last time I took it off to be washed, she whined for an hour.”

“Awww” It’s an adorable image, but not quite as adorable as the thought of Joseph on laundry day, in pajama pants and one of Barclay’s shirts, hair still relaxed from a shower. 

“She’s a good girl.” He tucks his phone away, “I feel terrible whenever I have to travel for work; my sister can’t take her so I have to board her somewhere, and it’s just infrequent enough that she forgets the staff and is terrified of them anew each time.”

“We could always get her used to me and board her here, assuming she and Sass get along.” The offer is sixty percent out of the goodness of his heart and forty percent wanting to see Joseph smile. 

“You’d really do that?”

“The farm is secure, she’d have a playmate, and there’d be lots of people here looking after her. She’d sleep in the cottage, of course.”

Joseph gives him an inquisitive look, then glances down at Sass, who’s wagging his tail so hard he’s sweeping the floor.

“Sure, what the hell. Assuming they get along, the next time I have to go, she can stay here.”

They chat for awhile longer about books, cooking, and various farm mishaps, before Barclay reluctantly fetches the spare raincoat so they can get Joseph back to his car. 

“Doesn’t quite bring out your eyes the way that sweater does.” He murmurs, then tries to correct for the come-on with, “because it’s such a, uh, a nice sweater?”

Joseph stays close to him as he replies “I’d offer to trade, but I’m not sure any of my clothes could survive that broad chest.” He ghosts his fingers across Barclays shirt, “Though it could be fun to see them try.”

The walk to the gate isn’t nearly long enough, and he blushes when Joseph once again thanks him profusely for his help and his company. The walk back, however, feels like an eternity, one that gives him time to doubt the other man had any interest in him at all. 

But all that evaporates when he gets home. Because sitting on the table is a slip of paper with a phone number and a short message. 

For arranging dog playdates. And dinner next Friday if you’re interested.

-Joseph

And sitting just below the message is a small, precisely drawn heart.

#agent stern/barclay #sternclay #promptober #meet ugly #TAZ Amnesty

[calpalirwin]

Never Imagined We’d End Like This

Summary: Just because it doesn’t work, doesn’t mean it wasn’t good. Sometimes people are better off as friends.

A/N: Time to learn a little bit more about the couple Finn and Vanessa were before they became our favorite exes (some overlap of the beginning of Package Deal)

Word Count: 4.4k

And away, and away we go!

__

“Um… Mr. Campbell?” Vanessa asked shyly, her knuckles barely scraping against the open door of the young man’s office.

“Yeah?” Finn asked, not looking up from his work.

“Sorry to bother you… but, um Professor Roe sent me. I missed the midterm and he said I should contact you. I would have emailed but I saw your office was open.”

Finn’s eyes tore away from his work and over at the woman. She was young, eighteen, maybe nineteen, if he had to guess. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, with bangs sweeping across her forehead. Soft and innocent eyes that shone with intelligence. “Intro to Psych?” he asked kindly, pulling open a desk drawer and ruffling through it.

“Yes, sir,” she mumbled politely with a nod trying to look anywhere but at the handsome teacher’s assistant the sleeves of his shirt perfectly rolled midway up his forearms, lithe fingers running through the various folders before locating the right one.

“It’s Finn, please,” he told her, opening up the folder and pulling out a test. “I know it’s kinda cramped in here, but you’re more than welcome to the space. Or you can take the test with you and bring it back whenever. I would just recommend setting a timer for like an hour. It’s not worth spending much more time on it than that.”

“Thank you, Finn. But it might be best if I take it here. Quiet space even if it is small.”

He chuckled and cleared off a space on his desk for her. “Here, you can take my chair,” he offered, gesturing to the newly created spot.

“Oh, I can stand,” she waved him off. “You’re already being so nice.”

“Nonsense. I need to check with Professor Roe if he needs anything before class anyways so I’ll be on my feet for a bit,” he half-lied.

“Thanks.” Her cheeks flushed as she took the seat and set out to work.

“I’m sorry,” Finn shook his head. “I’m terrible with names. You are?”

“Vanessa Parker. Tuesday/Thursday class at 3.”

“Daydreamer,” he recalled with a nod. The girl had a strong tendency of letting her mind wander, a lazy smile on her lips with her chin cupped in her left hand while her right twirled her pen. But despite her daydreaming, she always had the correct answer on the tip of her tongue.

“I-” she started to stammer. “Last class. Long day. Don’t mean to.”

Finn chuckled. “No, it’s fine. I’d be more concerned if you weren’t so on top of your studies. Are you a psych major, Miss Parker?”

“Vanessa,” she corrected. “And no. Economics.”

He let out a huff of surprise. “Economics, huh? Never woulda guessed.”

She shrugged. “I like numbers. Always a definitive answer.”

He chuckled again and she smiled, liking the way he laughed and him equally enamoured with the way she smiled.

~~~

“Oh, it’s just gonna be me and my mom. I’m an only child, and Dad died when I was in high school,” Finn confessed when they were their plans for the break after the end of the semester.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Vanessa sighed sadly, cupping Finn’s face in her hands, thumbs rubbing across his cheekbones.

“S’alright,” he smiled softly at her, turning his head to press kisses against her palms. “He was sick a lot when I was a kid. Cancer. So we knew it was coming.”

“That’s still shitty, love. I can’t imagine losing my dad even if he does drive me crazy.”

“Yeah, your family. Tell me about them.”

“Mom and Dad. Still married. A sister who’s a year younger than me. I don’t really get along with any of them.”

“Why’s that?” Finn pressed gently.

“My sister’s a narcissist and my parents let her get away with it. My entire life has been her one-upping me. Like I honestly wouldn't be surprised if when I get home she tells us that she got accepted early into like an Ivy League and is valedictorian.”

“Then come home with me for the break.”

She snorted in disbelief. “I can’t just go home with you for the break.”

“Why not?”

“They’re my family, Finn. Whatever our bullshit I haven’t seen them in four months.”

“They may be your family, but toxic is still toxic, Ness.”

“Well…” Vanessa smiled at the thought of spending her week wrapped up in Finn rather than with her family. “I’d have to at least make an appearance… but no one said I had to stay there the whole time…”

Finn brightened, kissing her excitedly. “Oh, this’ll be great! My mom can’t wait to meet you.”

“You told your mom about me?”

“Of course I did. Think I’d keep someone as great as you a secret? I’d tell the whole world if they’d listen.”

Vanessa blushed. “Oh, stop. I’m okay, sure. But I wouldn’t say I’m great.”

“Well, that’s why I’ll say it for you.”

~~~

“Mom, this is Vanessa. Ness, this is my mom, Carol,” Finn introduced.

“Oh, it’s so nice to meet you, sweetheart!” the older woman said, pulling Vanessa in for a hug.

“It’s nice to meet you, too.” Vanessa returned the warmth, already liking this welcome home much more than the one she imagined was waiting for her at her parents’ place.

The rest of the afternoon found Vanessa sitting besides Carol on the couch, pouring over photo album after photo album, Finn growing up in front of their eyes. School pictures, birthdays, Halloween costumes, his high school graduation, and finally a picture of him that couldn’t have been that old: his hair an unruly wet mess and a wide smile as he straddled a surfboard in the middle of the ocean. “I didn’t know you surfed,” Vanessa murmured, admiring both the picture and the man at her side.

Finn shrugged. “I’m alright. I’ll take you out sometime if you like.”

“And I’ll teach you how to paint!” she agreed happily.

“You paint?” both Carol and Finn asked.

Vanessa nodded. “Mhm. I have some of them up in my dorm room. You’ve seen ‘em.”

“I thought you bought those…” Finn admitted sheepishly. “They’re really good, Ness.”

“Thanks, love,” she smiled at him, interlacing their fingers together as he kissed her cheek.

“So…” Carol said, “Finn tells me you’re a freshman. How was your first semester living away from home and everything? I bet you miss your family tons.”

So Vanessa spent the better part of the evening rattling off how great her first semester had been while Carol listened intently, beyond happy for the young woman hanging off her son’s arm.

“Mom really likes you,” Finn told her later that night as they settled in for bed.

“I really like her too. She raised a hell of a man.”

“And I can’t wait to meet the family that raised such an amazing woman,” he returned the compliment.

“Oh, trust me. You can.”

Finn was sure his girlfriend was exaggerating, so when they got to her house the next morning, he was more than taken aback. “A boy?” was the greeting he got, complete with a look over from Mr. Parker.

“Finn, Dad,” Vanessa was quick to smooth things out. “He goes to school with me.”

“Mmm. And what do you study?”

“Psychology, sir,” Finn told him.

“Mmm… good money in that to be sure. Not sure if it’s worth all the schooling though. What year are you in?”

“I’m a junior, sir.”

“Older,” was the comment as the man looked over at his daughter.

“I got straight A’s, Dad,” she answered the unasked question about what running around with an older boy would do to her academics.

“So did your sister. Got her early acceptance letter, too.”

“Good for Erica,” Vanessa said with a tight-lipped smile. “Where is she? And Mom?”

“Around.”

As if that was the magic word, an older and younger copy of Vanessa practically poofed into the room, with bright smiles and airy laughs. “Nessie!” the younger one shrieked, before wrapping her sister in a tight hug.

Finn rubbed nervously at the back of his neck, thinking that the dad was a piece of work, but the impression of the sister seemed to be going okay so far. “Nessie! Did Dad tell you about school? I got in! Early acceptance and everything!”

“He did,” Vanessa nodded. “Congratulations. Erica, Mom, this is my boyfriend, Finn.”

Erica’s face fell as she looked over at Finn with the same level of scrutiny the father had given him. “Hello,” he said politely.

“Hi…”

The day quickly fell apart from there. Finn learned exactly what Vanessa had meant by Erica’s narcissistic constant one-upping and the parental acceptance. Every story Vanessa tried to tell her parents was quickly interrupted by an even more glorious story of the younger Parker daughter’s accomplishments with little regard to Vanessa’s own feelings. Still, at the end of the visit, Vanessa hugged her parents and sister goodbye with a smile on her face.

“So, whaddya think?” Vanessa asked, her voice far too bright for the hell they’d just endured.

“Do you want my honest answer, or the answer you want to hear?” he asked.

“The honest one…”

“Baby… your family sucks. Like… I don’t know how someone as great as you came from a family as horrible as that. And the fact that you still willingly put up with them… You’re probably the strongest woman I know…”

When her lip quivered, he was quick to add, “Oh, baby… no, it’s not your fault.”

“I hate them!” she wailed, before breaking down sobbing. “I hate my family!”

He held her while she cried, gently shushing her. “It’s alright.”

“No, it’s not!” she continued to sob. “They’re my family! What kind of monster am I for hating my family?!”

“You’re not a monster. Sometimes people just suck. But it’s not a reflection of who you are.”

His words soothed her enough to calm down, but she was still sniffling when they got back to his mom’s. “Oh, my, what happened?!” Carol asked, pulling Vanessa in for a hug and the warmth of it set Vanessa into hysterics again.

“Her sister’s a narcissist and her parents aren’t much better,” Finn deadpanned, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Finn!” his mother scolded, while rubbing Vanessa’s back. “Shh, it’s alright, sweetheart.”

“I didn’t say it to be mean, Mom. I said it as a professional assessment.”

The woman smacked her son in the arm. “Time and place, Finn, time and place. Your girlfriend is upset.”

“She’s upset because her family sucks.”

“Finn Christopher!”

Vanessa sniffled, pulling out of Carol’s embrace and wiping at her face. “No, Finn’s right. My family… they aren’t the greatest.”

“Well, that’s okay, sweetheart. Unfortunately there’s not much we can do about who were bonded to biologically. But, we do get a say in whether we accept that bond and strengthen it, or create new bonds all together. My own family wasn’t much, but I eventually found one that was. They say you don’t get to choose your family. I say they’re half right.”

~~~

Finn’s mom quickly became Vanessa’s family after that. When spring break rolled around, Finn and Vanessa only visited Carol. And when summer came, Vanessa signed herself up for the school’s summer sessions so she didn’t have to give up her dorm room. A summer spent studying in Finn’s office while he worked, or sitting in the warm sand painting the handsome surfer when they succeeded in pulling the other away from their work.

It was a pattern the couple continued with the following school year. Minimal contact with her family while immersing herself in the new one she had found with Carol and Finn. And when Finn graduated that following spring, him and Vanessa moved into a little apartment a few blocks from campus.

It was in their small apartment that they dreamed about the family they would create together once she finished school and got a steady job, and once he completed his master and doctorate programs and started his own practice. Their own little life far away from the scrutiny of her family.

When Vanessa graduated with her bachelor’s and Finn with his master’s, Finn started to set money aside for a ring so they could start living the life they dreamed about together. But life had its own agenda, much like it does and instead of a ring, Finn bought a pregnancy test and stood with shaking hands outside a bathroom door rather than seated in a chair at a fancy restaurant.

“What’s it say? Finn asked timidly after what felt like the longest three minutes of his life.

“Pregnant,” her voice answered, small and terrified from the other side of the door.

He fought against his throat closing up to croak “Can you come out of the bathroom? Or let me in?”

The door slowly creaked open and she flung herself into his arms. “Are you mad at me?”

“No, baby,” he chuckled, running his hands through her hair and cupping her face in his hands so she’d look up at him. “We got this. I’m here every step of the way. I love you.”

“I love you.”

They told Carol first. After an appointment to make sure everything was going smoothly, they presented the woman with the sonogram. “I-is this…?” Carol stammered, looking quickly between her son, Vanessa, and their hands resting softly on Vanessa’s abdomen.

“Mhm,” Finn nodded.

“Oh, that’s great!” Carol clapped her hands to her mouth as a few happy sobs wracked her body. When she composed herself, she rattled on and on about how excited she was for them, and how if they needed anything all they needed to do was ask her.

Telling Vanessa’s family was another story.

The twenty-two year old woman slid the sonogram towards her parents, her other hand clinging tightly to Finn’s underneath the dinner table. “What’s this?” Mr. and Mrs. Parker asked, faces pulled into frowns as they studied the small picture.

“Your grandchild,” Vanessa told them.

“Oh, Nessie,” they said sorrowfully.

“I’m sorry?” she asked.

“Well you just started at your job. This isn’t going to be easy, Nessie,” her mother said, patting her daughter’s hand comfortingly.

“We know that. But it’s still something we’re excited for and honestly, I’m a little disappointment you don’t seem to share the same enthusiasm. This is your first grandchild.”

“Nessie, we are thrilled for you and Finn,” her father stepped in. “But…”

“But you don’t approve of the timing,” Vanessa finished sharply. “Because you never approved of anything I did.”

“Nessie!” her parents called out in shock as the couple got up and left.

“I’m so proud of you,” Finn murmured, placing a kiss in her hair.

“I don’t know what they want from me… I got good grades. I got a solid career. I have a great relationship with a great man. I’m carrying their grandchild. I did everything right!”

“Shh, it’s alright. They don’t have to be around the baby. You don’t owe them anything.”

“That’s the thing though, Finn. Despite it all, I still want them to be able to meet the baby. My own feelings shouldn’t get in the way of them having a relationship with their grandchild.”

“I ever tell you how proud of you I am, and how much I love you?”

She gave him a watery smile as she nodded. “Yeah. You’re really good at that.”

“You make it really easy. And yes, this may be their grandchild, but it’s our child. And if people want to be in their life, they have to earn it, no matter who they are.”

“Five bucks says Erica’s pregnant by Christmas,” she joked humorlessly.

“Ten says your parents are actually thrilled.”

Both ended up being right. They made their appearance Christmas morning and Erica busted out her news before the couple could hang up their coats. And the younger sister’s news didn’t end there, as she flashed her ring hand exuberantly. The entire breakfast was spent with Erica gushing over her pregnancy and following engagement while Mr. and Mrs. Parker beamed with pride of how wonderful it was that Erica would graduate, and become a wife and mother by the time summer rolled around. Vanessa left fuming that she’d never speak to her parents or her sister ever again. Finn wholeheartedly agreed, but knew his girlfriend would probably flip flop back and forth between wanting nothing to do with her family and wanting them in their child’s life.

~~~

“Are you ever gonna ask me to marry you?” Vanessa asked as they crammed together on the hospital to stare over at the bassinet that held the world’s most perfect little boy.

“I was,” Finn admitted.

“Past tense… Uh-oh…”

Finn gave a soft laugh as he kissed the side of her head. “I didn’t want you to think I was asking you because you were pregnant and it was the ‘right’ thing to do. When I ask I want there to be no doubt in your mind about why I’m asking. I won’t ask you if you think I’m only asking because you’re the mother of my child. I want you to know I’m asking you because I can’t imagine my life without you by my side. And when I think you know that, I’ll ask. Until then, I’m just gonna love you and Mason like crazy.”

~~~

“Finn? Finn. Finn!”

“Huh? What?!” Finn jumped in his seat.

“Were you even listening?” she asked, voice laced with annoyance.

“Yeah… the babbling… more stories. Library.”

She sighed.

“What?”

“I told you about the library having toddler time last week.”

“Oh… sorry. What were you saying?”

“I was saying,” she said in a clipped tone, “that we should try to get him in a routine.”

“Mase already has a routine,” Finn pointed out.

“No, but like even more of one. Like we can talk with Mom about getting her to do the same things with him at the same time every day when she watches him. And at home we can do the same thing. Says here that getting rid of any unpredictability can help kids with autism.”

“Mase isn’t autistic though.”

“No, the doctors say he’s too young to know for certain. But he definitely has signs we should be looking for. If they thought he wasn’t autistic, they would say he wasn’t and tell us to look for something else. Not being entirely sure isn’t the same as not being it at all, Finn.”

“Whatever… get him on a stricter routine then.”

She threw her hands in the air. “So you don’t even care? This is our son, Finn.”

“How are you mad at me for agreeing with you?”

“I’m not mad at you. I’m frustrated in general, and would like you to take this seriously.”

“I am taking it seriously!”

“No, you’re not!”

“Just because I don’t spend all my free time pouring over different studies that all conflict with each other like you do, doesn't mean I’m not taking this seriously, Ness.”

“I’m not expecting you to do the research with me! But I’d like it if you would listen to it.”

“I am listening! You want him on a stricter routine. Great. Do that then.”

“Ugh! Why are you so frustrating!”

“Because this is frustrating! You think it’s easy being told that my son will never be able to look me in the eye, or call me ‘Daddy’?! That I’ll probably never hear him say he loves me?! Just because I’m not struggling with this news the same way you are doesn’t mean I’m not equally heartbroken about this! Just because my coping is different than yours doesn’t make me a bad parent!”

“I never said you were!”

“You didn’t have to…” His chair scraped back as he stood up.

“Where are you going?!”

“We’re both way too worked up, so I’m leaving before we say something we’ll regret.”

“This is so fuckin’ stupid!”

“Oh look! Something we agree on!”

Vanessa swallowed the scream. She envied the way Finn could remain level headed, pick his words carefully, and even realize when he needed to walk away from a conversation. Being with him, she had picked up on some of those habits herself, but she knew she still struggled with wanting to give up the fight even if it was only to hit pause.

After ten or so minutes, she went in search of her boyfriend, finding him laying in bed with Mason, doing everything he could to get some sort of response from the almost two year old. “I’m sorry,” she started, crawling up onto the bed with them. “There’s a lot I’m frustrated about and I took it out on you. Forgiven?”

“Forgiven,” Finn nodded. “And I’m sorry too. I should have listened to what you were saying rather than drawing my own conclusions. Forgiven?”

“Forgiven.”

“Do you want to tell me what you’re frustrated about? Or would you rather move on and create a new routine for Mase?”

“It’s my family…” she sighed.

Finn held back on rolling his eyes. “Of course it is… What happened in the perfect Parker household this time?”

“Danny’s talking up a storm. Erica and Scott are planning their anniversary trip to Mexico or Europe or something.”

“And they asked about Mason?”

“Only to compare their two grandsons.”

“Well, I’ll take potty-training whiz over talkative anyday.”

Vanessa laughed at that. Mason had taken very quickly to potty-training, whereas her nephew, Daniel, showed no interest. “Yeah, Mom said we even woke up from our nap dry.”

“Great job, buddy!” Finn beamed at the small boy who was watching his parents intently. “You just want your words to count, huh? Too smart to waste time on nonsense babbling. Right?”

There was a twinge of fear in his last word as he looked over at Vanessa worriedly. She quickly nodded her head. “Of course. Man of few words, aren’t you, sweet boy?”

“You’re a great mom, Ness,” Finn said softly, reaching out to rub his thumb over the back of her hand.

“And you’re a great dad. We did everything right. Mason just is who he is and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

“Exactly.”

While the words were right, it did little to soothe either of their raging thoughts. Thoughts about if they were doing right by their little boy. If they were doing right by each other. The smile they gave each other was weak and forced, and the way their fingers interlaced was far more out of instinct than anything else. They were running on fumes, they just didn’t know how to let go for fear of shattering the other one more than they were already shattered.

Finn told his mother about it one afternoon when he picked up Mason on a day Vanessa had to stay late at the office. “I love her. I do. I know I do. But… we haven’t been us in a long time. We’re fighting more. And I thought at first that it was just a rough patch. But…”

“But you’re both focused on Mase. And as much as you love him he’s a handful. Children require a lot of our attention. And it’s easy to lose track of other things. And it’s no one’s fault.”

“But I still love her.”

“No one’s denying that, sweetheart But, you can still love someone without actually being in love with them anymore.”

“I failed her, Mom… we’re not supposed to end like this.”

“Finn… listen very carefully to what I’m about to say. Some people aren’t meant to be together forever. There’s no shame in that. It doesn’t mean the relationship failed. It doesn’t even mean that the relationship was wrong or that the feelings weren’t real. People fall out of love and that’s okay. This isn’t ending your relationship with Ness. It’s just closing the romance chapter and starting the parenting one.”

“But I’m not ready to fall out of love with her…” he cried. “I don’t want this to be a chapter. It’s supposed to be the book.”

“Then try,” she encouraged. “Go out on a date. Get out of your heads and roles as parents and just be Finn and Vanessa again for a night. See if that helps. If it does, then keep doing that for yourselves every now and then. And if it doesn’t…”

“Then I have to let her go…”

“You have to let each other both go,” she corrected lightly. “It doesn’t mean you love each other any less. But you both deserve to be in love with someone, so you’re not doing anyone any favors keeping each other from that. You don’t want to wake up one day and resent Vanessa anymore than you want her to wake up one day and resent you. You’ve built a beautiful life together. And you can keep doing that. You just might have to change how that looks is all.”

“C-can you watch Mase on Saturday for us?”

“Of course, sweetheart. He can even spend the night.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

~~~

The night started out really nice. Finn felt himself smiling brighter than he had in a long while at the excitement in Vanessa’s eyes he’d missed seeing. But as the night wore on, the guilt sank in and so did the undeniable feeling that they just didn’t work anymore. Still, they couldn’t bring themselves to end their last night of pretending, dragging the moment into the wee hours of the next morning.

“You know I’m always gonna love you, right?” he asked, savoring holding her against him one last time.

“I know,” she nodded her head against his chest. “We’d do it all over again, right?”

“In a heartbeat.” His voice was soft and she felt a tear splash in her hair. “You’ve given me so much, Ness. I know it’s probably cheesy to say, but I’m a better man for having known you.”

“You’ve made me a better woman, and have given me just as much. You gave me a family.”

“We’re still family. I’m not going anywhere. We’re still a team. I still love you.”

“I know.” She kissed her way up his chest. “The only thing changing is that we’re no longer physically together. We didn’t give up on us. We’re making us better. Better people to each other, and better parents to our son.”

“Exactly. And hey, promise me something.”

“Anything.”

“Find someone.”

“Only if you promise to find someone too.”

“Pinky swear,” he nodded. They interlocked their pinkies, giving their fingers a quick kiss, sealing the deal. “No regrets.”

“Not a single one. I love you, Finn.”

“I love you too, Ness.”

__

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#never imagined we'd end like this #finn&vanessa #broke my heart to write this #i'd be full on inconsolable crying if i didn't know how this all ends for them #my sweet oc babies #galcal irwin

[storybycorey]

You Miss Her Everything

author: storybycorey

rating: individual sections may vary, but for entire fic NC-17

summary:  fifth part of the Bunsen Burner college AU which begins here

“I don’t wanna miss you anymore.  Your hands, your mouth, your…everything, Mulder, I miss your everything…”

“Shhhh,” you whisper, missing her everything, too.

It’s the end of May and it’s been two hours.  

Just the length of a movie, that’s all.  A terrible movie though, the worst you’ve ever seen. Worse even than that bubblegum mess of a film her roommate recommended last week.  Instead of watching, you’d entertained yourself by nibbling at her shoulder, naming each freckle aloud as you tasted it.  Cinnamon Sprinkle, Scout, Snowflake, Nessie, Stardust…  The credits had rolled before you were able to finish.

You want to finish.  You can’t bear the thought there are freckles out there, unnamed and untasted and driving away in her sister’s old beat-up Dodge.

Two hours.  It’s as if someone took infinite and crammed it all into a single minute, then took that and multiplied it by one-hundred-twenty.  

On the bench beside her dorm, you sit, while used-to-be-freshman-and-soon-to-be-sophomores shuffle boxes around your in-the-way feet.  You could move, you suppose, but consideration wouldn’t really vibe with the desperation angle you’re working right now.  

It hurts though, right in your heart like the sharpened tip of an arrow would, and each thought of her sad, wet eyes pushes it deeper.  You’re not going to survive.  

She kissed you last night, pressed those rosy pink lips to yours and clutched the back of your neck like a life-ring.  Which is stupid, because if anyone’s a life-ring in this relationship, it’s her.  You’d sink if it weren’t for her, you’d drown in this ocean-ful of sea urchins and jellyfish and fraternity boys.  

“It’s only the summer. We’ll be okay,” she promised, and you believed her.  Dana Scully doesn’t lie.  Her little body is packed with everything good in this world, and good things like her don’t lie.  

You’ll be okay.  You’ll be okay because Scully said so.

…

The two of you took pictures a few days ago with your roommate’s Polaroid camera, were silly and giddy and tragically in love.  She teased you and accused you of being a terrible photographer, then pressed her favorites to her chest while holding back tears.

Sometimes you imagine your life as a Polaroid photo.  Blurry and hazy, your insides not quite gelled.  Until that perfect moment when everything falls into place, until a girl with bluebird eyes and fall-leaf hair shake-shake-shakes you into absolute clarity.

You lay the photos on your unmade bed, arrange them into groups.  Times she was adorable, times she was infuriating, times she was playful, times she was breathtaking (really, they could all fall into that last group, couldn’t they?).  

But there’s also another pile.  One you save ‘til last.  Times she slipped off her shirt and tucked her lip between her teeth and almost broke the camera with the milky white glow of her skin.  

Christ, she’s beautiful.

She’s beautiful, and now it’s been eight hours.  

Your roommate moved out this morning, hallelujah, leaving you to sulk your summer studies away in solitude.  Pity parties are much more fun alone anyway. Sliding to the floor, you drag the bedspread with you, Polaroids tumbling into your lap like ping-pong balls on some horribly misguided game show.  Mr. Foxxxxx Mulder, you’re walking away today with a fantastic set of prizes!  An amazing array of anguish AAAAND a superb selection of sorrow! Congratulationsssss!  

Clenched between your fingers is the last photo you took that day, blurred lily skin and rouge-colored nipples, and a look on her face that could bring you to your knees.

“C’mere,” she’d whispered, shy and sweet but sexy as hell.  You’d dropped the camera then.  The clunk of it had made her gasp, but then the way you’d tossed her back onto the bed had made her gasp even harder.   She’d tasted like seawater that day, and when she came against your tongue, you were sure you were close to drowning.   But no, she’s your life ring, remember?

You’ve read before about photographs as portals to the past, and you wonder what it would take to slip through plastic and emulsion and back into her arms.  You wonder how many years of your life would be required as payment, for just one more taste of her skin.

She’s barely five foot two, but the space she’s left behind is the size of a city, a state, a whole goddamn planet.  How can you sleep knowing it’ll be three months until her little hipbones jut against your thigh, ninety days before you suck a contrary-just-for-the-sake-of-being-contrary argument from her sticky lollipop lips?

You’re silently and pathetically losing your shit right now, aren’t you?

It’s been nine hours.

….

You must’ve drifted off to sleep, because you wake on the cold tile floor with a Polaroid pasted dramatically to your cheek.  Your photo teleportation methods could use some work.  

The phone rings.  You’re bleary-eyed and moody.  Go away you want to yell.  

It rings again though, and somewhere, in the back of your not-quite-lucid brain, there’s a whisper, “There’s potential there, you idiot—can’t you see that?”

And that’s when you grasp it. You grasp that potential so hard, it’ll bear your finger-marks for days.

Across the floor you fly, yanking the phone from its cradle by the cord. Your high school baseball coach would be proud of the hook slide you finagle in order to catch it.

“Hello?” you gasp, frantically and a bit too desperately, but at least the line’s not dead.  

A pause.  

And then angels, harps, a goddamn heavenly symphony, it’s her. “Hi…it’s me.”  Would it be too much if you started to cry?  Yeah, yeah it probably would.

Still though. “Scully,” you practically sob.  Christ, you’re pathetic.  

Another pause.  It’s long and heavy and filled with dread like a sewer pipe.  The panic sets in.  The sheer and utter terror.  She’s been waiting to be miles and miles away, just to let you down gently.  The captain of her high school football team, Dirk or Biff or some other equally disgusting jock-like name, was waiting on her doorstep, John Hughes-style, ready to sweep her off her feet.  You’re going to vomit.

But then there’s something else.  A sniffle.  A sniffle and the faintest little whimper.  And then a terrible, heart-wrenching whisper, “I miss you so much already…”

And right there, right on your filthy dorm room floor, littered with Polaroids and tears and Cheeto crumbs, your heart shatters.

“Scully,” you manage, “Oh baby, me too.  So much.” And then you’re crying, you’re both crying, and screw using a photo as a portal.  You demand this damn telephone line be your portal, because you need to be with her right now more than anything you’ve ever needed in your life.

“I thought…,” she chokes, “Oh god, I thought I could do this.”

She told you you’ll be okay.  She told you that, and you believed her.  

There’s a Polaroid wedged beneath your thigh, one from the very last pile, and you hold the slick plastic to your lips while you speak. “You can, Scully.”  And oh, she can, she has to.  She has to, because if your trusty little life ring can’t stay afloat, there’s no hope for you. “We can do this, we can.  Don’t you remember telling me that?”

“But that was before you weren’t here,” she chuckles through a sob, “Before I had to watch Missy and her boyfriend and their melodramatic reunion, slobbering all over each other on the couch.  Before I had to listen to Bill lecture me about helping Mom with dinner, when all I wanted to do was take a nap after the drive…”  

She’s half-laughing, half-crying, and you want to comfort her and kiss her and shoot another few rolls of film while you’re doing it, because maybe, just maybe, that would help you not feel like you’re dying.  “I wish I could hold you right now,” you whisper, “I wish that more than anything.”

“Me, too,” she murmurs back.

You breathe, and she breathes.  And in the dark of your room and on the cold of your floor, you can almost imagine she’s beside you, that you’ve just made love and her icy little toes are inches from your shins, ready to burrow between.  For ten minutes you breathe, until the hitches in her throat lessen and the gaping hole you feel in your chest doesn’t feel quite so gaping anymore.  You’ve never been so in love that it physically hurts before her.

“I have to go,” she finally whispers.  “There’s no phone in my bedroom, so I’m out in the living room.  Dad would kill me if I accidentally fell asleep out here…long distance charges and all…”

You slide your mouth against that Polaroid photo, the plastic a poor substitute for her lips.  

“I love you, Scully. So much.”  It’s mindboggling just how much.  It’s not even quantifiable.  You can’t  explain it away with an equation or a calculation or even a million Polaroid pictures.  You love her so much you stole a Bunsen burner for her and now it’s worth more to you than anything else in the world, more than money or answers or even your long-lost little sister…  

Her voice chokes. “Oh god, me too, you know that.”  You look at her expression in that photo and she’s right—you do know that.  Because a girl couldn’t look like that if she weren’t in love with you.

“Umm, okay then…,” you stall. You don’t want it to end, you can’t bear the thought of that dial tone taking the place of her voice, so you slowly pull the phone from your ear.

“Wait!” her voice-and-not-the-dialtone blurts out just as you’re about to disconnect.

“Yeah?” you gasp.  A bit too eager, but you don’t care.

“Go check the Bunsen burner,” she murmurs, and then she’s gone.

You look at your watch.  It’s been thirteen hours now.

….

You’d allow yourself to get all dramatic again, to sink back to the floor in a fit of self-pity, then languish there for the next several days or so, or at least until Professor Krasnowski threatens to fire you from your summer T.A. position, and boy, then you’d really be screwed.  

You’d allow that, but your curiosity gets the better of you.  

The Bunsen burner’s held a place of honor on your university-issued shelving unit for seven months now.  You know some college official intended the shelves for books and most certainly not for stolen lab equipment, yet there it’s sat (along with other not-book things like basketballs and cassette tapes and the occasional pair of dirty gym socks).

You rise in the dim light to find it, taking care not to step on the Polaroids laid across your floor like stepping stones.  Only it’s not there.  IT’S NOT THERE, and a balloon of panic expands in your chest until you realize that something’s replaced it.  That something is a folded up piece of paper adorned with Scully’s distinctive loop-de-loops.  Your desk lamp is rickety but functional as you stoop down to read.

Fox (I know you like me to call you Mulder, but sometimes Fox seems appropriate, you know?),

I still remember the first day I saw you, hunched over a lab table and sneaking glances across the room at me, though you thought I didn’t know.  I was captivated by you, do you know that?  So different from every other boy I’d ever known.

When you stole that Bunsen burner, my heart did things it had never done before.  It flipped and it flopped and it clenched within my chest like a fist.  You may not realize it, but that’s the moment I fell in love with you.

Three months is going to feel like an eternity.  So much longer and more painful than I’m ready for, and yet…

We can do this.  We have to.

By now you see that I’ve taken the Bunsen burner, but only temporarily and only as a way of marking the time.  There are six pieces to a Bunsen burner.  Maybe you didn’t know that, but your ever-resourceful girlfriend (do you know how much I love to call myself that?) has learned it to be true.  Six pieces divided by three months equals two (see? I’ve told you I was smarter than you!).  

Soooo, just to make sure you don’t forget me, every two weeks or so, I’ll send you a piece.  I’m just teasing—I know you won’t forget me—but it’ll be a reminder that I’m out here missing you, that I’m out here as broken and incomplete as that Bunsen burner is.  And when that last piece comes back, do you know what it means?  It means the Bunsen burner can be put back together again.  More importantly, it means we can be put back together again, too.

I love you.  So much.

Scully

You’re shaking, you realize.  Shaking and grinning and fighting back tears.  

It’s eleven at night, and you fall more in love with her with each passing moment.  You’re the luckiest guy on the planet. One of these days your brain’s not going to be able to handle just how goddamn lucky you are.

Letter clutched tightly in your hand, you fall back to the bed and smile yourself to sleep.  

….

It’s been nine days.

She’s called once more, the two of you giddy as schoolgirls, and the funny thing is you weren’t even embarrassed by that.  Her voice in your ear is like the sweetest hard candy—she makes you hyper and jittery, bouncing off the walls, but all in the very best way.  

Dana Scully is your sugar rush.

The crash when she’s gone is hard though, and that night, you may have run ten miles just to keep from crying.

But now, two days later, you’re standing in the hallway with a package in your hand, return address making you lightheaded.  It’s only a piece of lab equipment, chill out, but it’s also so much more.

Once in the room, you sit on your bed.  You don’t even pretend to be slow as you rip open her very meticulous, very Scully-like wrappings, and before you  know it, out clangs a piece of metal, which rolls off your knee and onto your toe.  “Shit!” you curse, grabbing it before it hits the floor.  

There’s also a note (of course there is—this is Scully).  Written on pretty blue stationary (again—this is Scully).  Which you tear open immediately to read (this is Scully).

First piece!  Are you excited?  I am!  It means we’ve survived so far.  It means we’re that much closer to being together again!  This is the Bunsen burner’s base, quite obviously.  Only five more pieces to go!

P.S.  I’ll call you on Tuesday night.  Make sure you’re there!  Ahab’s being super strict about long distance phone calls, and they’re cheaper after 7…

P.P.S  I read a really interesting article about psychokinesis that I cut out and saved for you.

P.P.P.S.  Melissa and her boyfriend are SUPER-annoying.

You shove aside a bag of sunflower seeds and a Playboy (hey, you’re very, very much in love but you are still a twenty-one year old guy here) and place the Bunsen burner base on the shelf.  Then her pretty little note standing up tall behind it.  You’re glad you’re not rooming with anyone now, because now that you think about it, you suppose this could be considered embarrassing.

…

She calls on Tuesday night just like she promised, is painfully far away from you and your needy fingers.  

“I never finished naming your freckles, you know,” you tell her.

“Mulder,” she replies, in that voice that makes you want to kiss her face right off, “That’s an impossible mission.  As soon as you’ve named the first three thousand there’ll be three thousand more to take their place.”

“Mmmm, sounds exactly like a mission I’d choose to accept from such a mysterious, sexy, tape-recorded voice.”  

She chuckles, and just when you think the topic’s been closed, she starts back up again, “You knowww, there’s one right here…an unnamed freckle…” She’s speaking in a sing-songy voice that means she’s up to no-good, or in other words, something fantastic.  You’re already panting by the time she adds in a whisper, “This tape…will self-destruct…in ten…seconds…”

Scully wants to play, and whadd’ya know, here comes that glorious sugar rush again.

“Umm, well …,” you stutter, “Freckle-naming isn’t an easy task, you know.  It takes skill, inspiration.  Why don’t you describe this unnamed freckle for me?  So I can appreciate its personality, its essence.”  Yeah, its essence, that’s good.

“Wellll,” she Cheshire cat-grins (you can hear the grin, and it makes you a little dizzy). “It’s small.  Small and reddish-brown and just sort of…freckle-y.  But the skin where it sits is soft.  It’s realllly soft…”  Ohhh, she definitely wants to play.

“Mmmmm… I bet it is, Scully.  And where exactly did you say it is?  For research purposes of course.”  

“Ah, of course,” she replies, but then adds with a whisper, “Why don’t you guess?”, and you just about lose your shit.

“Well I mean, there are so many possibilities really, so many soft possibilities.  Your cheek, your belly, the inside of your—“

“My breast,” she breathes.

“Jesus.”  Your voice cracks like a fucking teenager’s.

“Right there,” she murmurs, “Right where it swells from my torso, that spot where the curve starts, you know?”

Oh, you know.  You most definitely know.  Her skin flushes there before anyplace else, you’ve learned.  “You blush there.  Your skin turns such of pretty shade of pink, Scully, and I love it.” She makes a noise that sounds distinctly like a purr.  You wish you were there to run your nails along her arched-up kittycat back.

“Sooo?” she asks.

“Oh, a name, right.” You’re getting too distracted. “How about Cherry Blossom? Pretty and pink and perfect.  D’you like that?” You’re such a moron.

“Mm-hmm, I do like that.  D’you want me to find another one?”  Her VOICE.  It reminds you of those few  times you’ve called a 1-900 number, only  none of those voices had skin like an opal and eyes like sea glass, none were small enough to fit in your pocket, yet large enough to fill your entire world.

“Please,” you squeak.

“Another one on my breast,” she says all breathy and soft, “This one’s about an inch from my nipple though…”  You’re hard inside your track pants by now.  

The Polaroids are taped on the wall above your bed, and you find one with her breasts exposed.  Running your finger over the plastic, you imagine you’re touching that freckle, that cute little freckle, that sexy little freckle, that most perfect little bit of discolored Scully skin, and you groan.

“Heaven,” you gasp.  “I think I’ll name it Heaven.”  Again, MORON, but maybe not so much, because she expels the sweetest little whimper into the phone.  You wonder whether she’s looking at that spot right now, looking down at her nipple. Is her shirt off, her bra, is she oh christ is she touching herself?  “Scully, god, I’m so turned on, baby.  You’re making me—“

“Oh crap! They’re home!” she squeals.  “I’ve gotta…I’ve gotta go, Mulder!”

She’s gone, and you’re left gasping for air.  

You make do with a Polaroid picture and a sweat-slickened palm, the same way you’ve done for the past thirteen days.

….

She calls again on the eighteenth day, reads you passages from Shakespeare while you picture her high on a balcony, tragically beautiful yet forbidden to touch.  

With your rogue-ish Romeo ways, you call her back on the twentieth.  

“Mulder!  No, you can’t afford it!” she scolds, but the girlish lilt to her voice tells you she’s charmed by your impatience.  You’re sure it doesn’t hurt that Melissa’s in the background asking “Dana’s on the phone again??”

Conversations are mundane though.  Well, no, you take that back, talking with Scully is never mundane—even discussing the weather with her is enough to give you chills.  But let’s just say the conversations are cautious.  There’s always some various Scully milling around in the background, ready with a judgement or a smirk or a tease.

“Can’t you call when you’re alone?” you whine.

“I’m never alone,” she sighs.  

….

On Day Twenty-Four, exhausted from a game of hoops, you open your mailbox to find the next package.  It’s been six days since you’ve talked to her, and you miss her like air. You’ve forgotten the smell of her skin in the morning, and that scares you.

Rubber tubing spills from the package like an old ‘snake in the can’ gag.  Not like you care though.  The tubing’s not what excites you.  There, you see it, that’s what excites you—stationary almost as blue as her eyes, and curlicued handwriting almost as refined as her sweet little body.

Second piece, my gorgeous fox-eyed boy!

We’re getting there, aren’t we, day by lonely day.  I just keep imagining that afternoon in your room, after you took those photos of me.  I miss your mouth, I miss your tongue, and I should be embarrassed to write that, shouldn’t I?  I’m not though.

P.S.  Cherry Blossom and Heaven say hi.  They miss you terribly…

P.P.S. I forgot to tell you, but I’ve picked up a couple extra courses at my local college for the summer—they’ll help boost my credits for next semester.

An hour later, you’re still smiling so wide that your cheeks hurt.

….

Another week.  

She’s vacationing at her aunt’s house, you know this, so when the phone rings at midnight, you’re taken by surprise.  It’s not like you have no friends, but none of your buddies would be calling at midnight.  By midnight, they’re either passed out drunk or boning some chick or sitting pathetically on their bed reading conspiracy theories (oh wait, that last one’s just you).  Midnight calls are reserved for bad news or girlfriends or, god forbid, both at the same time.

“It’s me,” she whispers, but she sounds okay.

“Scully, what’s wrong?  Aren’t you at your aunt’s?” You whisper, too, just because it feels right.

“Everything’s fine, and I’m going to get in such big trouble if I get caught, but god, I just miss you so much.  I miss you so much my bones ache, Mulder.”  It’s hard to describe the sensation that comes over your body.  She turns you to literal goo.

“Christ, Scully, me too.  It’s killing me,” your gooey self whispers back.  You hear her sniffle, and there’s a painful crack in your chest as your heart breaks. “Oh baby, I wish I could touch you right now.  I wish I could kiss you.”

“Me, too.” Her voice is hitched and wet, and it’s the hardest thing you’ve ever known, being this far away from the other half of your soul.

“I have to go now,” she whimpers.  “Seriously, I won’t make it out alive if someone catches me.”

“I love you, Scully.”

“You, too,” she whispers.  

The dial tone is your most mortal enemy, you decide.

….

The next package forty days in marks a halfway point more or less.  Three down, three to go.  

You’ve filled your time as best as you could: twenty percent school, twenty percent work, twenty percent basketball, three hundred percent mourning the absence of her.  Good thing you’ve never fully subscribed to the absolutism of formal mathematics.

The screw-like piece of metal smells like her, and you know that’s absurd, that her scent couldn’t possibly have transferred from her hands to a worn piece of steel.  Maybe this is how it ends, you in the looney bin pressing pieces of a Bunsen burner up against your nose.

Torn wrappings join dirty laundry on your floor while you frantically unfold her note.

Halfway?  Have we really made it this far?  I’d like to think these last weeks will speed through quickly, but that’s probably just wishful thinking.

Today’s piece is a stopcock.  Yes, you read that right, and I can hear you smirking from here.  I tried to think of a dirty joke to accompany it, but that’s much more your genre than mine.  I can’t stop myself from wanting your big, hard cock… See? No good.

I can’t though. I want to climb up onto your cock and ride you so hard… God, Mulder, I’m blushing writing this.  If my parents knew the things their prim and proper daughter thinks about at night…

I love you, I miss you.

P.S.  I swear, Missy and her boyfriend make out in front of me JUST to be mean.

P.P.S.  I think I’m going to have the house to myself on Thursday night.  Crossing my fingers… I’ll call you, and we can do naughty things like talk about stopcocks.

Your dick is hard and cupped in your palm, and you don’t even remember doing that.  You come with a stopcock digging into your ribs and your girlfriend’s last name digging into your throat.

…

It’s Thursday night and it’s been forty-six days.  You turned down Bloodsuckers From Outer Space for this.  You’d have turned down an actual rocketship to outer space for this.  Your priorities are well-defined: Scully first, everything else in the universe second.

You’d think this were a first date.  You’d think you’ve never talked to a girl.  You’d think you don’t already know that little mewling sound she makes when she’s about to come.  

The phone rings.  You may clap your hands with glee, but you’d never admit to it.

“Scully?” No hello. Hello is for people who aren’t broken in half.  Hello is for people who are sitting on a couch with a girl’s tongue in their ear, not sitting alone on a so-short-your-feet-hang-off-the-end dorm room bed.

“It’s me,” she confirms. Her voice is husky, and your dick is already hard.  “It’s… I’m… I’m alone.”  You haven’t talked about this—what her aloneness necessarily means, what sorts of scandalous things could transpire as a result of it.

“Good, that’s uhh that’s good...” The uncertainty hits you then.  You’ve waited all week for this, but have no idea where to go. “Are you ahh…how’s everything going?”

“It’s okay, just ummm… well, you know…,” she mumbles, shy and nervous and too far away.

“I don’t… uhhh… how should we… do you want to—?”  Again, have you ever actually talked to a girl?  You’re beginning to think not.

“God, Mulder… I don’t… I’ve never done something like this…”

“It’s okay, Scully… If you don’t want—“

Before you can finish, “Just talk to me,” she breathes. Yeah.  Of course.  Just talk to her, you idiot.  Just talk to her.

Your voice drops, meets her down in that magical place where far-away girlfriends dwell. “Okay. Yeah, okay. Tell me… tell me what you need…”

If you close your eyes, you can almost feel her warm breaths at your cheek.  “I just… I miss you,” she whimpers.  

“Oh Scully...” You press the words into the hard plastic of the telephone, in hopes by some miracle she’ll feel them.

“I don’t wanna miss you anymore.  Your hands, your mouth, your…everything, Mulder, I miss your everything…”

“Shhhh,” you whisper, missing her everything, too.

“I just wish…I wish it were you…I want it to be you when I...no, never mind…” You picture her cheeks flushing, the sharp curve of her chin tucked down into her chest, and you wonder just how much longer you’ll be able to live without her.

“Don’t be embarrassed, Scully… it’s just me.  Leave the embarrassment to those of us named after fuzzy little forest creatures, okay? Just talk to me...”  She giggles.  You’d trade a bit of self-deprecation for a Scully giggle any day of the week.

“It’s just that…when I…god…ummm, you know…when I do that, I just can’t… because it’s not you, Mulder…it’s not you, and I want it to be.  So much.”  Just the thought of her touching herself, wishing it were you...  Are you absolutely, positively sure that portal concept was invalid?

“It’s okay, baby, it’s okay…,” you shush, “I want it to be me, too.”

“Will you… will you tell me what to do?  Tell me how to do it…so it feels like you…?”  This.  This is one of those scandalous things you tried not to hope would transpire.

“God, yes… Yes, oh definitely yes, Scully.  Let’s make you feel good, baby.”  You’re a bit enthusiastic apparently.

“M’kay.” She’s really just as sweet as can be.

“So…ummm…where are you?  You don’t have a phone in your room, right?”  Gotta be able to picture this, gotta get the details right.

“On the couch,” she whispers, “Oh god, I can’t believe I’m doing this…”

“Shhhh, I love that you’re doing this.  I love it.  Do you have any idea how much you’re turning me on right now?”  

“Yeah? Really?”  There’s that breathiness in her voice again, god help you.

“Yeah. Really. Like really really.”  Nothing’s even happened yet, and your hard-on is about as impressive as it gets.  “I want this for you, Scully.  Making you feel good makes me feel good.”

“Oh baby,” she whines, and your knees go weak.

“So, ummm… what are you wearing then?”  You try your very hardest not to make that sounds sleazy, but probably fail.  

“Well, ahhh…  god, this is so embarrassing…”  Her flushed little face…

“Fuzzy little forest creature, remember?  This is me, Scully.”

“You’re right, I know.  Ummm…”  Her voice turns soft, sexy. “I’m wearing the red… the red bra and panties, the ones you bought me…”

Your response is a garbled sort of mess of the words fuck me.

“I had them on all day, Mulder,” she whispers. There’s absolutely no stopping your hips from thrusting into the stale air of your dorm room right now.  “Beneath my clothes… while I sat in class, while I studied at the library, while I watched “Jeopardy” with Missy… just thinking about tonight… about you…”  Your groan is embarrassing honestly, but hell if you can do anything about it.  

“Shit, Scully, are you trying to kill me?”  She giggles again, and look, another thrust.  “I bet it felt naughty though, didn’t it?  My naughty little schoolgirl…”

“God Mulder,” she gasps in that way that means you’ve both shocked and excited her.  “Ummm I mean,  god… yeah, it did… it felt erotic, naughty… I wanted you to see me so bad…” And you can see, her in that red lingerie on her Daddy’s nice couch, just like one of Matisse’s odalisques.

“Remind me… Tell me how sexy you look… Describe yourself...”  

“Mmmm, god… ummm okay… so the bra… do you remember?  It’s got this beautiful scalloped lace—“

“You, Scully, tell me about you.”

She waits a few beats before continuing, sharp little breaths echoing in your ear. “Okay… yeah… okay… well, my breasts… they’re… they’re pretty… I mean… the lace…it make their curves look so pretty… D’you like my breasts, Mulder?”  

“Yeah, oh hell yeah.” You look down to see the hard ridge of your cock, pressed painfully against the fly of your jeans.  It turns you on, how hard you are, and maybe that’s weird, but you’re entirely incapable of rational thought when the girl you love asks you whether you like her perfect pink breasts or not.  “I love your breasts, I adore them...”

“My nipples…,” she whispers, “I can see them through the lace… They’re hard….”  Your hand finds its way into your pants, how can it not?  

“Pinch them, Scully, the way you like me to do.  Brush your knuckles over them, baby…” Her little whimper, Christ, her little whimper.

“Does that feel good?”  You want her to feel good.  That’s become your sole purpose in life right now, to make her feel good.

“Yeahhhh…,” she murmurs, “More though… tell me what else… tell me what you’d do…”

“I’d… ughh… I’d slide my hand down… Do it, Scully, slide your hand down… I’d slide it down inside your panties slowly, real slowly… Are you doing it?”  Your own hand in your own pants feels nothing like hers, but it’s still good, so good.

“Mmmhmmm…”

“I’d slide it down past your curls, brush real soft against your clit the way you like, remember?” Her clit, it’s sensitive, can make her jump with just the slightest, barest touch.

“Yeah… it’s… god… god, I’m really wet, Mulder…”

Another thrust, this time a big one.

“So wet for me, right, Scully?  Does it feel good?”  Your eyes are locked with hers, even though hers are coated in plastic and hanging on a wall.

“Yeahhhh…,” she breathes.

“D’you wanna… wanna taste yourself?  Pretend you’re me.  Christ, my mouth is watering… lick your fingers and tell me how good you taste…”

“Jesus, Mulder, I don’t know… I’ve never…”

“Please… please, baby…”  Are you begging?  You don’t even know anymore.

“Okay,” she whispers, and you can hear her, the delicious sound of her tongue and her lips on her fingers.  You squeeze the base of your cock before something disastrous occurs.  “It’s salty, tangy… god, it’s really sexy, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, fuck yeah, it’s sexy.  Now go back down, now that your fingers are nice and wet, go back down and rub your clit a couple times, just a couple though, then slide a couple of them in….”  She moans, and you can’t help but moan yourself, moan and spread your pre-cum around with your thumb, the same way she does so well, only yours doesn’t have coral pink polish painted so nice on your nail.

“Now stroke, baby, stroke your fingers in and out, but curl them, you know how I do?  Curl them up until you find that spot… god Scully, I wanna touch you so bad… did you find it?   Did you find it yet?”

“Mmmmyeah, yeah, just like you, Mulder… mmmm it feels good, but… but… need more... Tell me about you… what are you doing?  Are you hard?  Tell me….”

“I’ve been hard all day… just thinking about you… about you and about this… Touch your clit now, use your thumb and rub your clit.  In little circles like I do… See if you can pinch your nipples a few more times…”  Her nipples, sweet and hard behind that latticework of lace…

“Oh… oh… god, it’s so good… Mulder, touch yourself, get yourself off… I wanna hear you…”

And then there’s just breathing, just hot whooshes of air and blurred, slick hands and soft sounds from her throat and your voice whining her name so many times it’s not even her name anymore, just six jumbled letters of need and of lust and of wildly clenched teeth.  And then, then, that little mewl, that sexy little mewl that would bring tears to your eyes if you had any more brain cells available right now to do that.

“Oh goddd,” she chokes out, “Oh god, Mulder…,” then you’re coming, too, slickly and messily, hundreds of miles away.

It’s the widest your smile’s been in forty-six days.

“Scully,” you can’t help but add, after you’ve both calmed down, “That was so much better than talking about stopcocks.”  She giggles (again), and you sit, for ten minutes you sit, closing your eyes and listening to her breathe and rubbing a Polaroid picture with your thumb.  

It makes you ache, but it’s one of the most beautiful ten minutes of your life.

….

You start counting backwards after that; each day the number gets smaller.  Psychology would tell you it’s easier that way—you’re still not sure you agree.  

With thirty-five left, Joe Benasheck from two rooms down bangs like a buffoon on your door. He tosses a package at your chest.  “Dumbasses stuck it in my box instead.  Hey, ya got any beer?”

You’re an asshole and don’t even care when you slam the door in his face.

A small metal tube this time.  When you fit it onto the stopcock, the burner looks almost complete.  Does getting a little emotional make you a total wuss or just a partial one?  She’s taken your heart and twisted it inside out, supplied you with emotions you didn’t even realize you had.

Her note, this time, is written in red.  You wonder whether you’ll ever see the color red again without thinking about last week.  You hope not.

My fuzzy little forest creature,

It’s hard to believe we’re only about a month away, isn’t it? We’re getting there! This fourth piece is called the collar, and though I’d like to be witty, I’ve got nothing too clever to say about it.

God, Mulder, I just keep thinking about that phonecall, keep thinking about you and how you sounded and how you made me feel.  It was amazing…

You’re the most special thing that’s ever existed in my life.  I need to make sure you know that.

P.S.  I love you.

P.P.S.  My cousin Leslie’s coming for a visit this week!

P.P.P.S.  Bill is a dick.  That’s all.

You’re about to toss the packaging when, lookie here, another envelope slips out.  Three photos and, even better, another note.  You’d almost think it was your birthday.

As a bonus this time, thought I’d send you these.

Three more unnamed freckles (well, actually four—there are two in one of the photos) in need of your superior freckle-naming skills.

I think when I return, we may have the need for a proper naming ceremony, dont’cha think?

Three slick photos offer peaches and cream skin with perfectly imperfect caramel-colored sprinkles.  You grin.  Freckle-naming ceremony indeed.

….

Penny.  That’s the first.  From what you can tell, it’s near the bottom of her ribs, right where the curve takes a dive towards her pelvis.  The brightest, shiniest heads-up penny—flawless enough to bring you luck for a year.

Second, the Gemini twins.  Double the freckles, double the desire to slip inside that photo and kiss her downright silly, right there on her thigh just inches above her knee.  

The last.  This one requires some thought.  Only after in-depth scrutinization do you determine it’s on her rear, on that cute little ass that fits itself into your palms like play-do.  Aurora, goddess of the dawn.  You hang it on your wall so it’s the first thing you’ll see each morning.

….

It hits you two days later.  Lying in bed and tracing lazy, looping curlicues on your stomach (her handwriting is prettier), eyes meandering from one blurred photo on the wall to the next.

Aurora.  

How did she take that photo?  She’s small and she’s flexible, can curl herself into the cutest of pretzels, but how did she take that photo?  The angles are all wrong and the shadows not right.  You look ridiculous, you know this, but you try and contort yourself into position for a photo like that, then fall, ungracefully and unceremoniously, flat on your ass.

Or are you just paranoid?

….

Thirty days left the next time she calls.  

There’s longing in her voice when she tells you she misses you.  

She coos at your freckle names, tells you there are so many more just waiting for your skills, tells you there’s one in a private, special place she didn’t want to take pictures of, tells you you can name that one when you see it in person.

By the time you hang up, you’re as giddy in love as you’ve ever been.  You pull down her notes and read them all twice (maybe three times, but who’s counting?), trail your fingers wistfully over the photos taped mish-mash up on your cinderblock wall.  You run five miles and pretend there’s still not a niggling, bony finger poking you in your ribs.  

Day-na Scul-ly Day-na Scul-ly Day-na Scul-ly Day-na Scul-ly.  You breathe her name with each hard pound of your feet.

….

You call her the following day.  You know you’re not supposed to.  You know Daddy has strict telephone rules, and on top of that, you’ve barely got enough money in your account for the rest of the week.  But you call her.

Her brother answers.  “Dana’s busy.”  Without even knowing, you assume this must be Bill.  She’s right.  He’s a dick.

“Please, just for a minute.  There’s something I need to ask her.”  You make it a habit not to bargain with dicks, but this is a special circumstance.  Scully is always a special circumstance.

He snorts in your ear, then slams down the receiver.  “DANA, PHONE.”  Wow, must be an absolute joy living in a house with that.

But her excited squeal makes up for it. “Mulder!”  

There—that’s what you needed to ask her.  The delight in her voice takes that niggling, bony finger and squashes it into the dirt.

“Hey,” you tell her, “I know I’m not supposed to call, but I’ve just been thinking about you.  All day.  I couldn’t help myself…”  There are twenty-four hours in a day, and you’ve been thinking about her for a solid twenty-five.  Even the most standard laws of time and space deviate when it comes to Dana Scully.

“Aww, me too,” she purrs.  Her voice is echo-y, like she’s cupping her hand around the mouthpiece to keep quiet.  

You hold the incomplete Bunsen burner tightly in your lap.

“Can you talk for a bit? I just… I just want to hear your voice.  Recite me the periodic table again.  You know what those elements do to me, baby…”  She could read you the entire phonebook, and you’d still be begging for more.

She chuckles. “Yeah?  Do alkalines make you horny, Mulder?”  Again with the soft, echo-y voice, but who cares, she’s playing with you.  

With a cute made-up tune, she begins. “Hydrogennn, Lithiummm, Berylliummm, Boronnn…”  You’re just about to settle in for the ride when she pauses.  You hear a commotion in the background—male voices, her muffled giggle, then she’s back, speaking even more quietly.  “Ummm, I wish… I wish I could, Mulder.  I want to, I do. There’s just… it’s just not the best time right now.”  

Again in the background, a male voice that’s not Bill’s saying her name, then a shush from her she tries quite obviously to hide.  “I’m sorry, I’ve really got to go,” she whispers.  “I’ll… I’ll call you in a couple days though, okay?  Just like we planned?”

There’s a buzzing then, one that starts in your ears and spreads—to your torso, to your arms, to your legs, until you’re entirely consumed.  “Yeah, okay, yeah… whatever…”  You hang up before she’s even able to respond.

The Bunsen burner slides from your lap and crashes to the floor.  You don’t even care.

….

One of Bill’s friends maybe.  Or her brother Charlie.  No, Charlie’s studying abroad this summer, she told you that.  Melissa’s boyfriend.  Melissa’s friend.  Just some random dude who happened to wander into the Scully house that day.  An amazing, hotshot stud who doesn’t live in a dorm room with a worn-out leather couch, who doesn’t have a collection of underground conspiracy rags, who doesn’t jack off to Polaroid pictures and lab equipment because he doesn’t need to, because he’s got the real thing right there in front of him.

You’re being overdramatic.  

Or are you?  You can’t fucking tell anymore.

Her face up on your wall—sweet and loving and so damn trustworthy.  You’re an asshole to even suggest otherwise.  She wouldn’t do that.  She loves you.  She’s told you that again and again and again. She’s shown you.  You pull down her notes and read them again. Then again.  They’re worn from how many times you’ve read them.  …the moment I fell in love with you… my fuzzy little forest creature… you’re the most special thing that’s ever existed in my life… I love you.  

No, she wouldn’t do that.  You know her.  You’ve lived in each other’s back pockets for seven months.  She’s lived out of your back pocket for two months since then though, your mind supplies.

NO.  She wouldn’t do that.  You flop onto the couch and remember your first kiss, right on this very spot of leather.  And then another first time, here again, her pale skin laid out as an offering.  The way she sounded, the way she became your entire world in just the barest blink of an eye.  

Your dick is hard.

You want her.  

You know she wouldn’t do that.

You pull yourself out of your sweats and spit into your palms, then pretend they’re her hands when you bring yourself to release.

She wouldn’t do that.

….

Twenty-seven days left.  She calls, just like she’d planned.

You consider not answering.  She doesn’t deserve your desperation, your paranoid, wish-washy twist of the truth. But you have to answer—it’s Scully.

“I’m sorry… about the other night,” she tells you.

“Who was he?  Who took that photo?  Why don’t you love me anymore?” you should ask, but you don’t. Instead you say, “No problem.”

But then she’s sweet and Scully-like and says all the right things.  

You catch yourself bantering, you catch yourself flirting, you catch yourself forgetting just what exactly the issue was.  She ends the call by finishing the periodic table for you, and by the time she’s to the Lanthanide series, you catch yourself right back in love with her, maybe even more than before.

You knew she wouldn’t do that.

….

Joe Benasheck again, bragging about his hot as hell girlfriend in the dining hall.  You begin to regret not just grabbing your dinner to go.

“Yo Mulder, you were dating that little redhead, right?  The geeky science one?”  You suddenly feel like punching someone.

“Her name is Dana Scully,” you grind through your teeth.

“Yeah, that’s right, Melissa’s baby sister.  Melissa’s in these pics, too.  Denise sent ‘em to me from her trip.” He passes some photos across a pile of soda cans and used napkins.  The only person you care less about than Joe Benasheck is his girlfriend Denise, so you barely give the photos a glance. Until…

Her red hair glows, shines like a campfire on a blue-dusk night.  “Ain’t Denise hot?” Joe’s asking, but you’re not listening, you can’t breathe.  There’s Melissa kissing some guy, there’s apparently Denise, and then there’s Scully… with another guy.  His arms are around her waist, his chin on her shoulder, and she’s laughing that laugh that sounds like your mother’s seashell windchime. You don’t even have to be there to hear it.

Joe calls you an asshole when you throw the photos on the ground, but you’re already out the door.

….

Sixty-eight days.  Three weeks left.

You try to be mad. You try to hate her. You try to call her a bitch and a slut. But you can’t.  You can’t because she’s Scully.  She’s still Scully. So instead you turn the names on yourself.  Idiot.  Loser. Pathetic and delusional and hopeless. Failure.

The fifth package arrives.  It sits on your desk while you wage an internal war. Open it, burn it, hold it to your chest and cry for the next thirty-six hours or so.

You’re weak and you know it as the wrapping hits the floor. Out rolls another metal tube.  It fits right into the first, up on your shelf.  Your fingers shake while you unfold her note, delicate as always.  Remember when you and Samantha used to do origami?  You were always the clever one, showing her over and over again how to make a valley, yet mountain after mountain she’d fold.  You’re not so clever now, are you?  Your hands are still shaking.

I can’t believe it, can you? We’re almost there.  Today’s piece is the burner tube—fits right in there on top of the collar.

This is the very last package, I just realized.  Because the next piece I’ll deliver in person. Oh Mulder, it’s getting so close, I can taste it. Classes finish the end of next week, then it’s time to start counting the days… I just keep imagining seeing you for the first time.  I don’t think I’ll be able to run fast enough to jump into your arms, so I hope you’ll be ready…

Hey, is everything okay?  Things seemed a little “off” the last time I called. I love you more than anything, please know that.  Okay?

P.S. I’ve been reading some really fascinating material about relativity and Einstein’s twin paradox recently.

P.P.S.  Bill wrecked his car.  My parents are so ticked off!

P.P.P.S.  I’ll call at 8 on Wednesday—don’t forget!

You fall asleep and dream of a thousand origami cranes, folded from pretty blue stationary, going up in the flames of a Bunsen burner.

….

The next day, you almost get fired for bailing on a meeting with Professor Krasnowski.  You must sound as pathetic as you feel when he calls though, because he lets you off the hook and tells you to get your butt back in tomorrow.

You spend the day taking apart then fitting back together pieces of stolen school property, trying to decide how many pieces back she stopped loving you.

….

You’ve watched the phone since 6:00.  It’s Wednesday, and it’s been seventy-one days.

Eight o’clock on the nose when she calls.  On the nose, on her pretty sloped nose.

You glare at the phone, glare at it with tears in your eyes and a guilt-trip on your shoulder.  Why are you the one feeling remorse here? You sit on your hands to keep from answering.

She calls again in fifteen minutes, then thirty, and a final time in an hour.  

She calls a few more times over the next couple days, or at least you assume it’s her.  You’ve basically stopped answering your phone altogether.

You vacillate between loving her so desperately you can barely breathe to hating her with an almost violent sort of numbness.  You went skiing a few years ago, stayed out in the snow until your feet lost all feeling.  It was fun to see how many things you could kick without pain. The bruises bloomed a few hours later though, and hurt like hell for a week.

They’re there now, those bruises, beneath all the numbness, just waiting for the blood to start pumping.

Joe shows up at your door a few days later.  “Denise got a call from Melissa Scully, says her baby sister’s worried about you.”  You grunt disgustingly in reply.  

Good, let her be worried.

….

Seventy-nine days.

You should’ve expected this.  Should’ve stopped checking your mail, school notices and magazine subscriptions be damned.  

The sky blue envelope mixed amidst the whites is physically painful.  You let it sit there at your desk for hours.  Maybe it’ll be slowly devoured by the newspaper clipping convention currently taking place on your blotter.

But you watch it, allow it to occupy just the tiniest corner of your vision for most of the afternoon.  Pretending not to care all the while.  

When you sit on the couch, it reminds you of her.

When you lie on the bed, it reminds you of her.

When you look at your wall, it reminds you of her.

The photos are still hanging.  You can’t take them down.  They’re the only way you can get yourself to sleep, gazing at her freckles, traveling back in time to that afternoon with the camera, before there were days to count down.

You open the letter only after successfully dribbling the basketball two hundred times in a row.  Your downstairs neighbors hate you.

Fox (this feels like one of those times first names are necessary),

You’re scaring me.  What’s going on?  I’ve tried calling several times—didn’t you remember Wednesday night?  Missy checked with her friend Denise, whose boyfriend says you’re there and are fine…

Please, if I’ve done something or if someone’s done something… Please.  I haven’t been able to sleep worrying about you.  There’re only a few days left, we can do this!

Call me collect, reverse the charges.  Please.  I need to know you’re all right.

I love you,

Dana

P.S. I really love you.

P.P.S.  I really, really love you.

P.P.P.S.  Are you getting the picture yet?

….

You don’t call her.  You can’t.  Each time you reach toward the phone, his hands are there, sweeping back her hair, whispering in her ear.  You get an almost perverse pleasure out of imagining it.  She’s been too good for you from the start.  She’s a bright and shiny little sportscar, all devastating curves and crisp, clean lines, and you’re a broken down pickup, your bed sagging low from all the excess baggage.  The two of you could never have shared a garage for long.

It helps to tell yourself these things.  Helps you sink more deeply into those dark and melancholy waters.

But then there’s my fuzzy little forest creature, and there’s Cherry Blossom and Aurora, and there’s god, I’m really wet, Mulder, and you find yourself afloat all over again.  

You’re going to lose your mind.

You’re going to lose your mind, and there’re only eight days left.

….

Another dozen phonecalls over the next several days (god forbid there’s someone who really needs to talk to you), so many you consider unplugging the phone, except no.  Severing that final connection seems unimaginable.  There’s something comforting in the ring every few hours, something life-affirming in the knowledge that she’s feeling this just as constantly and consistently as you are.

The thirteenth time, you answer.  She catches you at a weak point, when for a moment you wonder whether you’ve gotten it all wrong, you wonder whether you’re hurting her just as much as she’s hurting you.

Only it’s not her after all.  It’s the guy who works at the dorm lobby desk, chewing you out for letting your mail stack up for the entire past week, threatening to throw it all in the dumpster.

He gives you the ol’ evil eye when you retrieve it, but you and the ol’ evil eye are good friends by now, so you ignore it.  Life’s been giving you the ol’ evil eye for years.

And there it is.  That little envelope of sky peeking through the pointed paper clouds just like you were dreading.  Were you really though?  You suspect you may actually have been hoping, but are quick to deny it. Regardless, it’s there, and your fingers tremble to hold the stack as you make your way to your room.

You stare at it for a while, lay it on the very bed you’ve kissed her upon too many times to count, and stare.  A month ago, you’d have been ripping it open with your teeth.  They ache now, your teeth, ache from the clenching and unclenching you’ve taken up at night.  Despite everything, you still miss her like hell.

It slides open, almost too easily (shouldn’t it hurt?), and you read her words with barely-there tears in your eyes.

Mulder.  God.  I’m beside myself.  What is going on??  Please!  Please talk to me, call me, write me, anything!  I don’t know what I’ve done or what’s happened, and it’s tearing me apart inside.  I walk through my days either completely dazed or fighting back tears.  You’re my other half, you’re the rest of my Bunsen burner—I can’t bear the possibility that I’ve lost that.  Please.  I’ll be there on Saturday, but please, baby, I don’t want to wait that long. I need to know we’re okay.

Please.

Her handwriting, it’s more jagged than usual, and for some reason that hits you more acutely than even the words themselves.  Your Scully—she’s beautiful calligraphy; she’s not chicken-scratch.  Are you what’s done that to her?  

No.  No, she’s done it to herself.

But what if you’re wrong?

Without thinking, without considering the what-if’s and the why’s, you pick up the phone and dial.  The thought of hearing her voice sends shivers down your spine, if you’re being honest.  It also scares you shitless.

It rings.  And rings and rings and rings.  You wait through eighty seven rings, one for each day you’ve been without her.  Each one hurts worse than the last.

….

It’s Saturday, and it’s been a lifetime.  Zero days left.

You don’t know how you feel anymore.  Numb—that’s how you feel.  You hate it.  The last few weeks have been torture.  Your body can’t take the ups and downs and arounds for one day longer.  You need to know.  As heart-wrenching and painful as it will be, you need to know.

You don’t know what time to expect her and so you wait.  Like a sorcerer before his crystal ball, you conjure things up—anger and fury and rage.  Swirling in your head are images of his chin on her shoulder, sounds of his muffled voice in your ear.  

But then there’s also her desperate scrawled please, her pale white skin adorned in rose-red satin, that freckle you have yet to name.

You took down the photos this morning, pored over each one for hours it seemed, felt aroused, then not, then aroused again.  It will kill you if she’s not yours anymore.  It will kill you even more if you’re the reason for that. It’s like riding a bike—pedaling your hardest, hardest, hardest toward the hill, then changing your mind at the very last minute, pounding your brakes like crazy when you crest over the top, only it’s too late and you’re speeding down so fast you can’t even breathe, but there’s nothing you can do. Because you did this to yourself.  You did it to yourself.  

You remember likening your life to a Polaroid photo.  Your existence right now, it’s just a mixture of chemicals, it’s undeveloped emulsion, it’s color without form.

You need to be shaken.  Badly.

You still love her.

….

The knock on your door is timid, as much as a knock can be.  It sounds like her somehow.

You’ve waited ninety days for this moment.  

You gather up your armor—your stoic-straight face and your sarcasm—layer it nice and thick.  But it isn’t enough and you know it.  You’re destined to crack.

Your heart pounds as you face the door (you fucked her against that door one time), fingers shake as you twist the old brass knob (she squealed when the metal touched her skin).  The hinges squeak as you pull.

And then she’s there, after three months of not being there, after Polaroids and freckles and stopcocks, after questionably-taken photographs and muffled phone conversations and photos with a girl named Denise.  She’s there.

“Mulder,” she gasps.  “Oh my god, Mulder.”  Her face, christ, her face.  An angel, a Renaissance painting, and all you can do is stare.  

Shake.

“My god, I’ve been so worried.”  She crumbles then, before your very eyes, falls forward and catches herself with your body. You can’t move.  There’s concrete flowing through your veins. Her hair is tickling at your chin and you want to die.

She notices, lifts up her eyes (you’d forgotten how blue they are, in three months you’d forgotten), raises her warm little hand to your jaw.  “What’s going on? Please,” she whispers, tears running desperately down her cheeks.  

You almost crack—you’ve never felt anything as perfect as her hand there—but then you see his face, Biff or Dirk or whoever, hovering above her shoulder and grinning. “No,” you breathe. Your concrete legs shatter, and you pull yourself away.  She stumbles in your absence.  “NO.” you say again.

“Mulder, what—?” she sobs, but you don’t even allow her to finish.

“Who is he, Scully? WHO IS HE?”  You bare your teeth like a wild animal’s, and her eyes go wide.

“Mulder, you’re scaring me.  Who is who?”  Ninety days ago, you never pictured this.  You never pictured her with tears in her eyes and cowering against your door, you never pictured the most perfect relationship of your life falling like sand through your fingertips.

“That photo, of that pretty little freckle on your pretty little rear, Scully.  Aurora.”  You say it with a snide sort of sneer.  “Who took that photo, Scully?”

“I don’t know what… I took it—for you to name, remember?  Mulder, WHAT IS GOING ON?”  Her face is still the most breathtaking thing you’ve ever seen, even now, even while she’s lying through her teeth.  

“Been taking gymnastics classes, Scully?  Or yoga, maybe yoga?  Is he some hippy-dippy into yoga?”  You can’t stop yourself.  You’re a snowball rolling down a hill, gathering speed and snow and anger with each passing second.

“I don’t understand…” She sits tentatively down on the bed and curls her arms around her torso.  “I took gymnastics as a kid, is that what you mean?”  It’s a protective measure, what she’s doing, and for some reason that makes you even madder.

“The PHOTO, Scully, how did you take that photo?  Listen, I know you’re flexible, I mean I’ve seen it, right? But that angle? C’mon, I’m not stupid.”  You leer disgustingly at her.  You want to throw up.  You want to punch yourself in the face, then get down on your knees and beg her to make it all better.

“What?  The… the photo?”  The confusion on her face lifts, is replaced by understanding, relief.  “My god, is that was this is about?  A tripod, I used a tripod—Melissa’s into photography, and she has a tripod.  In fact, you should’ve seen me trying to get the positioning right.  It was so absurd—“

Shake.

NO.

No, it can’t be that easy.  She thinks she’s off the hook, but it’s about more than just the photo, and she knows it. “Ahh, a tripod,” you interrupt.  “Convenient, huh?”

“Yes…,” she hesitates, “It was convenient. I still don’t know what you’re getting at here. God, I’ve missed you so much.  This isn’t the way this was supposed to go…” You can’t listen to her, can’t hear that pleading tone right now, can’t look at her expectant, flushed little face.  You tear your eyes away to land on your shelf, and that was an even worse idea.  Just one piece left, one she’s probably got hidden in her bag, just one more ‘til the burner’s complete.

“Okay, then what about the guy?” you tear back into her, trying to ignore the gashes your teeth are leaving on her neck.  “When I called—the guy you didn’t want me to hear?”  You try your hardest to hold onto the anger, you grip it in your sweaty, balled up fists, but his face, his fucking face, and her laughter, and the way she kisses with her whole body, the fact that she could’ve done that with him…  You feel yourself cracking.  “His arms were around your waist, Scully, they were around your fucking waist, his chin was on your shoulder…”  You choke back the tears fighting valiantly to escape.

“You’re not making sense.  What guy?  Around my waist?  You haven’t seen me for three months.  My god, Mulder, I don’t understand what’s happening!”  Why?  Why can’t you just let this be? She’s here now.  With you.  Her arms would be around your waist right now if you could just leave this alone.

Shake.

But you can’t.  Never in your life have you been able to leave something alone.  “In the damn picture, Scully!  With Joe Benasheck’s girlfriend, Diane or Denise or whoever the fuck she is, HIS HANDS WERE AROUND YOUR WAIST.”  You’re pacing, trying your damnedest to outstep the hurt and the pain rising so close to the surface, you can barely breathe.

She looks at you, brings her hand to her mouth and makes a neat little ‘o’.  “Oh, oh my god.  Oh, Mulder.  You saw those pictures?  Oh, Mulder, god… oh, I’m so sorry.” She’s coming toward you, reaching out her arms (weren’t you just wishing they’d fit around your waist?), but you panic, stumbling away from her. If she touches you, it’ll be all over.

“So you admit it then!”  You try to sound angry but you fail.  Instead you sound broken, utterly defeated.  This whole time you’ve held onto the tiniest sliver of hope, that it wasn’t true, that she wouldn’t do that.  Your back hits the wall.  There’s no escape.

She touches you then, tucks her hands into yours and squeezes.  You want to flinch, but Christ, it just feels so good.  It feels so good, your knees feel weak.

Shake.

“NO. Mulder, listen to me.  LISTEN TO ME.”  She ducks her head until you’ll meet her eyes but you pinch them shut—it’s the only way to keep from crying.  She continues anyway, “The guy in those photos, on the phone—that was Leslie.  Don’t you remember?  Look at me.”  You open your eyes and look.  “I told you about him.  He’s my COUSIN.  My cousin!  He’s… he’s just like that.  Always giving bear hugs and being silly… It’s… it was just my cousin… Oh my god, Mulder.  Is this why—?”  She lets go of your hands to stroke your cheek.

Shake.

“Leslie is… a guy?” you ask meekly.  “This whole time I assumed…”  You trail off into nothing.  It doesn’t matter anyway.

“It’s…,” she chuckles, “It’s a family name.  He hates it. Jesus, Mulder, I can’t imagine… what must have been going through your head.  I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry.”  Her fingers slide through your hair, and you can feel the chemicals beneath your weary plastic surface beginning to swirl.

Shake, shake, shake.

“So there’s not someone else?  That’s… It wasn’t true?”  Emulsion beginning to gel, colors dragging sluggishly into focus…

She’s petting you now, running her fingers over your chest like ten little caterpillars.  Outlines slowly defining…

“Oh, Mulder.  No, baby, no. I couldn’t even imagine.  You’re… you’re my everything.   My fuzzy little forest creature, my fox-eyed boy, the final piece of my Bunsen burner…”  She lifts to her toes and kisses you softly beneath your jaw.  Then again on your cheek and again near the corner of your lips.

Shake, shake, shake.

And then, in one glorious breath, you snap suddenly into focus.  Your entire world becomes clear.  You look down at her upturned face and feel the way Hubble must’ve felt, realizing the universe is still expanding, realizing everything was borne of one single, solitary point.  

She is that point.  

Your universe.

Your Big Bang.

“Oh Scully,” you breathe.

You grasp her jaw and pull her to your mouth, kiss her the way you’ve dreamed about for the last ninety days, kiss her the way you wish you could’ve kissed her with each package, with each pretty blue note, each cold metal piece of the puzzle.  She whimpers, and you think she may be crying, you know you’re crying, but none of it matters. Because she’s here, finally, after so long being anywhere but.

“The Bunsen burner,” she mumbles against your lips, “The outer cone. We have to put it together…”

Your hands are working their way beneath her sweater by now, your hungry, hungry hands.  She’s smooth and soft, and her leg wrapped around your thigh is the best thing since sliced bread.  ��It can wait…,” you murmur.

“No,” she gasps, “No.  I think it’s important.”  She tugs away, and you do your very best to chase after her.  She’s quick though, reaching for the Bunsen burner and pulling a package from her purse, holding it out to you like a carrot on a stick.  

You grab for her, spin her around so her back is to your front, slide your arms around her waist and rest your chin upon her shoulder.  “Mulder!” she squeals.

“It’s my turn,” you breathe into her ear, and she shudders.  You work together to unwrap the package, ripping off paper and dropping it to the floor.  She peppers your neck with kisses as you lift out that final, finishing piece.

“Oh, Mulder,” she murmurs, pressing back against you, helping you fit it into place. The most delicious chill slides through your body.  

You turn her in your arms, ready to kiss her senseless, when she stops you.  “There’s a note, too,” she whispers.  Of course there is.  This is Scully.

Placing the burner back up on the shelf, you fish back into the package for an envelope.  “You have no idea how much I love your pretty blue paper, Scully…,” you say when you’ve found it, and she giggles.  With trembling fingers, you slide out her note.

Mulder, Let’s never be apart again.  Never.

You couldn’t agree more.  

She looks up at you with her blue-as-stationary eyes (it finally dawns on you why you loved that paper so much) and runs a nervous tongue along her plump-as-a-berry lips.  You smile, then tumble her down to the bed.  With barely-uttered words and a hungry, needy mouth, you take back all those unanswered phone calls, you personally respond to each unreciprocated note.  You peel back her clothing and commit her pretty-as-a-photograph body to memory. The Polaroids were incredible, but nothing, absolutely nothing, compares to the real thing.

You welcome back Cherry Blossom, you welcome back Heaven.  You welcome back Penny, the Gemini twins, and Aurora.  You press a kiss to each of those freckles on her shoulders and search out the one she told you was hidden in that private, special place.  Then, with her hands in your hair and your tongue sliding through her folds, you name that one, too. Mine.

….

It’s the end of August and it’s been zero hours.  

Zero minutes, zero hours, zero days.  You’ll never be apart again.  You know why?  Because Scully said so.  And Dana Scully doesn’t lie—her little body is packed with everything good in this world, and good things like her don’t lie.  

#You Miss Her Everything #Bunsen burner series #my fic #the whooooole thing

[bronson]

Anonymous said:I really liked the Nessian “Are you jealous” but can you do one with Cassian being the jealous one and having no chill? :))

Plus: Can you please write Nessian like nesta starts dating this guy for a while cus she thinks cassian and mor are a thing and cassian just gets so jealous at some point- I love your writing so much it’s so amazing!!!

{slightly NSFW}

Nesta had been sitting with the same fae male for twenty minutes and thirty-four seconds.

Not that Cassian was counting. 

He downed another shot of green liquor, something he would regret in the morning, but it was what needed to be done. He felt a tap on his shoulder and he risked a glance away from Nesta’s booth. His eyes met those of a female. Smiling blandly, he sent her away. He needed to make sure Nesta didn’t leave with the prick. He was interrupted by someone sidling up to him.

“You’re gonna die a lonely man if you keep watching her like that,” Azriel said, clapping him on the back.

“I’ll die a lonely man or I’ll die with her. I don’t want anybody else,” Cassian stated. It was the truth. 

“Ah,” Az remarked. “I see we’ve entered the sappy drunk stage.” Cassian rolled his eyes and shrugged Az’s hand off his shoulder. He readied himself to walk over. “You’re not going over there, right?” Az looked at him with concern. Cassian downed another shot. 

“I say it’s time for the ‘taking action’ stage of drunkenness, wouldn’t you?” He grinned at Azriel, but he didn’t feel it reach his eyes. As he began walking away, he could hear Az chuckling behind him.

“Good luck with that!” he called after Cassian.

Though his gait was slightly wobbly from the liquor burning it’s way through his body, Cassian attempted to stroll casually over to the booth housing Nesta and her company. With a grunt, he slid in beside Nesta and felt her stiffen. The conversation between her and loverboy halted. Cassian smirked.

“What do you want.” Nesta’s ice blue eyes didn’t meet his and he was annoyed to feel disappointment course through his veins.

“Can’t I meet your new friend?” A cheeky grin spread across his face as he turned to the male. The male smiled awkwardly. Good.

“This is Jasper,” Nesta said, steel in her voice. “Jasper, this is our resident idiot.” Cassian could tell Jasper was a polite prick when a hand was raised in a handshake. Cass made sure to pump his hand extra forcefully, just for the sake of it. Call it a pissing contest.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Commander,” Jasper said, with reverence in his voice. Cassian smirked again. 

“And I you, the great Jasper.”

“Well, now that you’ve met, would you please leave us?” Nesta requested, still not turning to look at him. He was half-tempted to grasp her chin and force her to meet his eyes, if only to see the fire within them. “Jasper was about to ask me something.” 

“Well, that’s not a problem! Ask away, Jas.” Cassian gestured his encouragement. Let’s see where this goes.

“Must you shorten everyone’s name?” He could feel nesta roll her eyes and it only fueled his cockiness.

“Yes, I must. Now Jaspie, what were you going to ask this fine female?” He grinned in the males direction, and saw him gulp.

“Um, well, I was simply wondering if Miss Archeron would like to accompany me to the theater tomorrow evening?” Jasper’s eyes quickly darted between Cassian and Nesta. Cassian held back a laugh. Nesta? On a date? But his humor ended abruptly with Nesta’s response:

“I would love to. And please, call me Nesta.”

Cassian’s mouth hung agape. Was this Jasper a damned daementi?

“Would like to walk me home, Jasper?” Nesta asked. A goofy grin spread across the fae’s face. What an idiot, Cassian thought. But a smaller part of him knew that the same grin would appear on his face if she ever asked him the same question.

“Of course,” Jasper replied.

“Excuse us,” Nesta said to Cassian, and finally, finally, her eyes met his. He relished her icy gaze, however brief and annoyed it was. Just to keep her gaze on him, Cassian didn’t budge. Nesta huffed. He grinned.

Jasper led her out through his side of the booth and they left the club. Cassian felt his face return back to his frown from before. He knew he probably looked like a pouting Illyrian baby, but, quite frankly, he didn’t give a fuck.

Nesta and this Jasper had been going out on dates almost every night for the past two weeks. And Cassian seemed to be the only one who had a problem with it.

“Get over it, Cass,” Feyre jabbed him one night as she, him, Mor, and Rhys were playing cards.

“Seriously, why can’t you just let her be happy? At least she’s not fighting with us every moment of everyday like before,” Mor said while inspecting her cards. “By the way, do you have any two’s?”

“Go fish,” he replied. “And I liked her fights. She’s too complacent now.”

“Just be patient, Cass,” Rhysand said, his assumed wisdom apparent in his voice. Cassian rolled his eyes as Feyre looked to Rhys while they shared some telepathic-mating-bond-lovey communication. Cassian looked at Mor to find her miming vomiting.

“Do you have any sixes?” Cassian asked Rhys. He was still staring deeply into his mate’s eyes. Cassian coughed. Loudly.

“What?” Rhys tore his eyes from Feyre and glared at Cassian. 

“Do. You. Have. Any sixes?” Cassian smiled sweetly. Mor laughed as Rhys shook his head. Cassian looked to Morrigan and rolled his eyes with a smile. Suddenly, Nesta walked in. She looked between Mor and Cassian, huffed, and walked through the living room where they sat 

“How was dinner, Nessie?” Cassian called to her.

“Don’t call me that,” was her only response as she walked up the stairs to her room. 

“Maybe if you stop fucking with her like that you’ll be able to f–” Cassian cut Mor off with a wave of his hand.

“Whatever.” But he couldn’t stop himself as he looked up the stairs to her room. And damn him if he couldn’t help the longing that he knew was written across his face. So he turned back to the card deck and drew one. Queen of Hearts.

The following Friday, Cassian was late meeting the gang at Rita’s He’d been disgustingly sweaty after heading back from the Illyrian camps and he’d needed to change, but for some reason his hair was not cooperating. He finally just decided to tie it back in a bun.

Nesta was just exiting her room when he entered the hallway. Both surprised, they both jumped. He caught her breath hitch as she looked his hair. He felt his own heart skip a beat when he took in her gorgeous figure in the closely-cut dress she was wearing. 

“Um–” 

“Are–”

They both spoke at the same time. Cassian cracked a smile and he could spot the whisper of one on her own lips. 

“You first,” he grinned.

“Are you heading out to Rita’s?” she asked. He nodded, and realized the group was probably wondering what was taking him so long. They could wait.

“How about you? Going to meet Jas?” Her eyes narrowed by stayed alight with humor.

“Yes. We’re going out to dinner then dancing.” She looked away from him to brush some imaginary lint off of her dress.

“Sounds like fun night.” He tried, and failed, to keep the sarcasm out of his voice.

“Should be better than going to the bar with some drunk bat, that’s for sure.” Her fire had returned.

“I’m sure a sloppy drunk Illyrian knows how to move better than than some prim and proper fae male.”

“Jasper can move just fine,” she spat at him. He grinned.

“Oh can he?” Cassian lifted a brow and began stalking toward her.

“Yes,” she said, steeling herself and standing straighter. But she didn’t turn away.

“He knows how to move his hips?”

“His tongue, too,” she snipped.

“I’m not sure you know how a tongue should be properly used.” He was getting closer to her. He could feel her heat.

“And you do?” He knew she was trying to scoff, but her voice hinted desire. He smiled slowly at her.

He leaned down to her, letting his breath brush against the shell of her ear. “Indeed I do.”

“Prove it.”

He smirked and proceeded to lick the column of her neck, back up to her ear, nipping the lobe to finish. He felt her shudder and smiled. 

“I think you can do better than that,” she breathed. Then she took him by surprise by raking her fingers through his hair and bringing his mouth to hers. He ran his tongue over her lips and she granted it entry. Their tongues fought with as much fire as they did, swirling and intertwining. He slid his hands over her perfect curves and settled on her ass, digging his fingers into her covered flesh and pressing her closer to him. She groaned at the friction and he felt pride sweep through him. He slowly began to back her up against the doorframe of her room. Once her back was against the wall, she pressed closer to him and writhed a bit. He groaned into her mouth and she took the opportunity to sink her teeth into his bottom lip. He opened his eyes to her blazing and boring into his. That’s it. He scooped her up and wrapped her legs around his waist. He ground into her a bit, relishing the quiet moan that escaped her lips.

He slowly began carrying her back into her room, not separating their lips, and proceeded to lay her down on the bed. He reached down to take off his tunic. 

“Wait,” she stopped him. “Rita’s?” 

“They can miss me for a night. Jasper?” 

“I’ll send him a note in the morning.” He grinned and took his shirt off. She sat up and began unbuttoning her own clothing as quickly as she could. After he slipped off his shoes and began to help her. 

“Gods how many fucking buttons does this have?!” She laughed and he revelled in the glorious sound. He quickly pressed a kiss to her bare back. Finally, after what seemed like ages, he slipped the dress from her frame, delightfully realizing she was almost completely bare underneath, aside form a pair of barely their lace panties. He growled softly in anger when he realized who they were originally worn for. Nesta took his face in her hands.

“These are meant for you. Only for you.” She then took the tie out of his hair and slowly swept his hair back. He leaned into her touch and his growl softened to a slight purr. She pressed her lips to his, standing on her tip toes, and gently pulled him back toward the bed. They both slowly sank down and moved against each other. At some point Cassian’s pants came off. At another point, so did Nesta’s underthings.

They didn’t get out of the bed til the next afternoon.

FINALLy this is posted. also i added in some go fish action for @a-throneoffeels lol. hope the anons like this!!!!!!!!!!

#nessian #nesta x cassian #acowar #acomaf #acotar #nesta archeron #cassian

[peterkayscarshare]

Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow By OverTheRainbow chp 4

Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow – By Over The Rainbow

Chapter 4 - ....All My Troubles Seemed So Far Away

Yesterday was bad, today had been another shitter. Tomorrow already looked like it wouldn't get much better. He wasn't rating with next week's chances either. Come to think of it he could probably write off the foreseeable future. He'd woken up with a bad 'ead. By the time he'd left the house it was bangin. It wasn't helped by the fact that he'd driven for twenty minutes and was on the A56 towards Bury before he realised he didn't need to do that anymore. He could just sail in and sail out. Travel in silence. No more chatter about last night's telly, or which celebrity was doing what to whom and why. No more singing along to blasts from the past, no more Golden Hour and "Who's in the Toaster?" No more debates about dinosaurs and conspiracy theories and favourite albums and childhood pets and movies and holidays and past romances...and regrets. No more questions about his day....he suddenly realised with a sense of almost overwhelming panic that he never really asked her about hers...why did he never ask her about her day? Why didn't he ask that simple question!? Why did he act like those things didn't matter to him when they did? Why did he let her think she didn't matter when she did? When she does...when she always would. She would matter to him when nothing else ever mattered again. Kayleigh Kitson would "matter" to him until the day he died. In that moment all he wanted in this world was to ask her about her day. To hear her voice telling him about what promotion she was working on. To hear her asking him for ideas about how to make a BOGOF deal on Toilet Duck exciting. Just to have her next to him, to look to his left and see her face, to know she was there, with her perfume and her smile and her laughter, filling up his senses and warming his heart. Losing her had completely frozen it. The thought that she must hate him now, had shattered it to bits. He knew there was nothing left. He was convinced if he shook, he'd rattle as the pieces rolled around in his chest.

By the time he arrived at work he was late. His inadvertent detour had cost him. He hated being late. It set a bad example to the staff. Like fraternising with colleagues after work...or falling in love with your Car Share buddy. Ted 2 was sweeping up the early autumn leaves that were starting to fall in the car park. He was wearing a company sweatshirt for a change. The weather had taken a turn. It had been colder these past few days. For all his bluster about him, it turned out he was a nice lad. He'd spoken to him earlier in the week. His name was Ethan, Ethan Bask. He was in his second year of Medicine at Edinburgh. His Dad hadn't been well; John remembered that his Mum Barbara had mentioned that her husband was having tests. Ethan wanted to come home for the summer to help out. He was glad of a chance to make a few quid. He had a girlfriend. Jenna. They were on the same course. He showed John a picture on his phone. A daft selfie they'd taken with a giant plastic "Nessie" when they'd spent a weekend camping up at Loch Ness. She was a beautiful girl, with a kind, gentle face. They looked happy together. He was a lucky lad. Ethan was leaving at the end of the month. Back to Edinburgh. Jenna had spent the summer in Thailand and would be home in a fortnight. A few of the staff were organising a leaving do for him. John planned to chip in a few quid and some beers. He'd call in to wish him well. Leaving dos. One of the limited exceptions to his "no fraternising rule"....the less said about the amendment pertaining to flame haired, brown eyed promotion representatives, the better. It occurred to him that he hadn't mentioned Ethan's imminent departure to Kayleigh. Partly, he reasoned, because he knew it would make her sad to see him go and partly because the prospect of her being saddened by the news saddened him. She'd doubtless hear it from the staff Newsletter...or as she was better known...Elsie. I'm sure she'll break it to her with her customary tact and diplomacy, he thought.

John spent much of the rest of the day squirrelled away in non-foods. He took a sudden notion to carry out a stock take. Not strictly necessary but highly advantageous when you're avoiding the food aisles. The place was a bloody mess. He was furious at the slipping standards, at the poor presentation, at the amount of waste. He'd torn a strip off Adam Arnold. He was the section supervisor. "How did you let it get in such a state?! Look at it! It's a mess. If you couldn't handle it, why didn't you say something? This is how it starts. You think you're in control. You think nothing can hurt you, then you realise you're in over your head!" Suddenly he stopped. He could see Adam's puzzled face. "Hurt me?" John struggled to recover his composure, "I meant professionally...hurt you professionally. This mess is costing the company money. Get it fixed...or you'll be up the road!" With that he stormed out and back to his office. He slammed the door shut and slumped in his chair. Christ! He was a bloody mess never mind Non-Foods. Rachel appeared with a bottle of water and two Nurofen. She'd heard he had a headache. She'd been buzzin around him all day like a wasp at a picnic. He wished she'd take her arse kissing routine and sod off....after she left the Nurofen of course. He turned on his computer and opened up his emails....and it all suddenly got very much worse...

From: Cath Hilton

To: John Redmond

Subject: Company Car Share Scheme

 Hi John,

I hope this finds you well. Kayleigh called in to the office today to confirm that you've decided, mutually, to end your Car Share Buddy arrangement. I'm sorry to hear this. You were one of our more successful pairings and we'd hoped to feature you both in the Autumn Corporate Bulletin. I completely understand your reasoning though. A ninety minute detour every day is not only inconvenient but hardly consistent with an environmentally friendly travel policy. Kayleigh has now signed and returned the attached form confirming the end of the arrangement. I'd be very grateful if you could please do the same as soon as possible.

Additionally, as the driver, you will be aware that the parking space you are currently occupying will now be subject to review. Pending your acquiring a new Car Share Buddy. HR can of course assist you with this process and should you wish to seek a new "buddy", we will make appropriate enquiries on your behalf. You should note that in the event that no "buddy” can be found, or you choose to no longer participate in the scheme, the parking space will be withdrawn in accordance with company policy, within 30 days. I've attached a copy of the policy for your review.

Should you require any further information on this, or any other matter, please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Kind Regards,

Cath

Catherine Hilton

Human Resources Executive

 She'd gone to HR. Already! She'd said it was "mutual". It wasn't mutual. She's the one who got out of the bloody car!! How the Hell was that MUTUAL?! None of this was "mutual". It wasn't friggin "inconvenient" either! How could she not know! How could she not see! He'd have driven to the ends of the bloody earth for her! He stood up...he was going to find her. He was going to talk to her....she couldn't do this to him. It was driving him mental. He sat down. He stood up again....he sat down again. He put his head in his hands. After a moment and several calming breaths he began to regain his composure...or what was left of it. She'd gone to HR. She wanted it to end. That was what she wanted. He'd been enough of an asshole to her already. If this was what she really wanted, he'd sign the damn form. He'd make it official. He'd let her go...again. It was becoming like death by a thousand cuts. He hit print and signed his life away. This time it felt like he really had.

Rachel had been waiting for him as he left. She was pappin on about a weekend she'd had up in Newcastle and getting her heal stuck in a grate. He'd tuned her out somewhere around her "hilarious" anecdote about Vaseline and a Fireman actually called "Geordie". He wanted to crawl up his own asshole. Instead he slumped against the car. Every part of him was exhausted. He felt like he might just die before this perpetual earache finally ended. Then the door opened and there she was. Like a ray of sunlight, like a dagger in his heart, there she was. Every fibre of his being wanted to go to her. His eyes couldn't look away; he stood up straight as though his subconscious mind was saying go! Go and get her! Look! Run! Quick! There she is! It's Kayleigh, our Kayleigh! We want her back! Get her back John! God he wished she could read his mind right now. There'd been times when he'd been glad she couldn't....particularly that time when he'd bought her a Mr Whippy and she started sucking on the flake...what!?....I mean fair dos...it was outrageous...and shit hot. Anyway, who sucks on a flake?!! She wanted to melt the chocolate apparently. It wasn't just the chocolate that was meltin that day...She looked amazing....he'd wanted her more than he wanted his next breath...By the time he drifted back to the present she was gone. Like a cloud had covered up the sun. He was stood there with Rachel making low level background noise and she was gone. Inspiration took over, "Oh, is that the time! Listen I must dash. I'm picking up my brother from the airport. See ya!" Before she could finish her enquiry about where his brother had been and what time the flight was arriving? John was in the car, seatbelt on and he was off. He saw her crossing at the traffic lights. The early evening sun caught her hair. For a moment he considered changing lanes, catching up with her, offering her a lift but he knew it was futile. He turned right, she walked straight on towards the tram station, her head down, looking at her phone. Probably checking Heart Searchers, he thought. Probably getting a "wink" from some bloke with a bloody dodgy user name. Up to now they'd just been a random assortment of losers and weirdos but the thought of her being in any real danger terrified him. The thought of her actually falling in love with any of them terrified him almost as much. He was due to announce the Christmas Team in a couple of days’ time. The thought of working with her on it had thrilled him. Finding "legitimate" excuses to talk to her during working hours. Maybe the odd very necessary trip to a wholesaler, by way of a nice little pub/restaurant, or a country house hotel. Watching the look of innocent delight on her face, as she helped select the decorations and watched the Christmas lights...and his not so innocent delight at the prospect of catching his favourite Elf under the mistletoe. Along with everything else, that dream was gone. She wasn't in work the next day. Annual leave apparently. He didn't remember her mentioning that she had any plans. It wasn't as though the day was improved by her absence. It was all just one long, endless, slow moving nightmare. If only he'd known then, what tomorrow would bring.

She was leaving. He heard it second hand from Cath Hilton when he left the signed form with HR that brought a final end to their journeys together. He literally couldn't hear anything else after she said it. It was like there was a buzzing in his ears. Nothing else mattered. Where she was going, what she was doing...nothing. She was leaving. He thought proximity without intimacy was a circle of hell, distance without hope was far worse. One month and that was it. He'd most likely never see her again. He finally caught something about cosmetics, Preston and a company car but she might as well have said NASA, Florida and a Space Shuttle. It all meant the same thing. She was leaving. He saw her later that day. He'd gone down to the shop floor to announce the Christmas Team. He'd left her name on the list. For some pathetic reason he just wanted her to hear him say it out loud. To say her full name out loud. Kayleigh Kitson...one last time...this one's for you. There was some light muttering and a faint chuckle as he'd announced her name before Elsie piped up, "Here, Mr Redmond. You know Kayleigh's off to pastures new don't ya?" "Yes Elsie I'm aware." He looked at Kayleigh in that moment and she looked down at the floor as though the tiles were the most fascinating thing she'd ever seen. "I'll consider her replacement when she leaves. The people on this list were my first choice. I thought they should know that." For a second Kayleigh closed her eyes. It was such a subtle moment it could be easily missed. By anyone whose heart wasn't breaking too. "The A Team, eh Mr Redmond. Are you Mr T?!...here…Mr R!?" Elsie's roaring laughter shattered the moment...and a few eardrums. He took the moment to escape back to his office, leaving behind the pleased, the disappointed and the, frankly, couldn't care less, to absorb his announcement. He had no idea what Kayleigh was feeling... then again he never did...till it was too bloody late.

The second time he saw her she was leaving for the night. He was observing that his rear tyre needed air yet again and supposed it was a slow puncture, when she suddenly emerged through the staff entrance. He watched her for a second; she studiously attempted to ignore him. Then, as though he no longer had control of his mind or his body he said out loud, "Congratulations." She stopped and for a second, she didn't move. He assumed she was ignoring him or maybe she didn't hear, then she slowly turned around and faced him. She looked shocked and momentarily confused. He suspected he did too. He couldn't even control his own mouth these days. Then like a drowning man reaching for a lifeline, he said, "I mean it. I'm happy for you. I want you to be happy.... and I know it's not enough but I am sorry. More than you know". The silence was deafening. "I wish you'd talk to me Kayleigh. I need you to talk to me...." "I'm talked out John and anyway...I think you've said enough. I may live in a fairy-tale but I'm not stupid....sometimes there's just no "happy ever after" is there?" With that, she turned and walked away.

#peter kay's car share #carshare fanfiction #John x Kayleigh #over the rainbow

[spintrebuchet-blog]

Wimbledon is here.

 An emerald swale exists in London where dukes would play in the past, and immortals dominate it in the present. I bring you – Wimbledon. This is the holy grail of tennis.

(Center court with the roof closed. That’s Nigel, by the way. My espionage sensei. He used to work in the Mi6. Great guy. Although, he cheats at canasta).

There is a whiff of sentimentality and wistfulness to this place. As a staunch romantic, I am averse to both, but here...I make an exception. Let me prove it to you. In 1880, it started as the ‘Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club’. Over the passing years, croquet lost fashion (unsurprisingly) and its name was omitted from the front billboard. This did not last long as nostalgia kicked in and brought back the word.

I’ve been to the Center Court many times. It is especially beautiful after the rain. Water droplets bring out a sparkle from the grass. The burst of zest is overpowering and all one has to do is just surrender to them. Astronomers say that the Earth was once bathed in stardust, but I wonder if this place got a little more than others. Everything about Wimbledon is just right. . There is not a single sponsorship label to be seen. No pump-up music. Not one cheerleader. And, the result? Dogmatic commitment from players that churn out matches that are both gritty and sublime.

Plus, how good these strawberries and cream look? 

Wimbledon use to have a pigeon problem until 2002. Then MTB, sent in one of my colleagues - Rufus. 

Now. It is time for me to address the Big 4. 

Andy Murray - the Dreadnought of Dunblane - (Slam Count: 3. Rank: #1). 

Yeah, it’s been that kind of year for Murray. He came as the top seed at the Australian Open, for the first time in his entire career. Everyone expected him to storm his way to the finals. Instead, he lost to a crafty Misha Zverev in the fourth round. 

Murray...what happened, man? Just overnight, you lost your mojo. Last year, by this point, you had reached two slam finals and were coming into Wimbledon as the second favorite, to Djokovic. 

Recently, McEnroe commented that you were “a distant fourth” among the others of the Big 4. This is your chance to prove him wrong. Wimbledon is the starry diamond of all the jewels of the ATP treasure trove.

Remember this: you’re number one. You have got the ranking and the seeding. Sure, the rhythm hasn’t been great from the last six months. But, keep in mind, how many more years do you see ahead? You’re already 30. This might be the last time you’ll have the number one seeding at Wimbledon. Winning this title would put ahead of Wawrinka, in the slam count, and rightfully so.  

I am reminded of a passage from Paradise Lost. 

“In dubious Battel on the Plains of Heav’n, And shook his throne. What though the field be lost?  All is not lost; the unconquerable Will; And study of revenge, immortal hate,  And courage never to submit or yield: And what is else not to be overcome?”

When looking at Murray’s most recent highlights, notably from his semi-finals in Paris, against Stan Wawrinka - where he was up two sets to one, you just notice the sense that he is playing too passively. 

There is a Scottish saying which I wonder has gone to Murray’s heart:

 "Whit's fur ye'll no go past ye”. This basically means, ‘What will happen, will happen”. 

Andy, you need to drill that cynicism out of your cranium. I want to see Andy play with the same fervency, that he used to. I am talking about Braveheart times Nessie. I want to see that same demented perfectionist blast scorching aces down the tee. Remember, the same weapon that you destroyed Federer with, back in the finals of the Olympics back in 2012.

Nevertheless, Murray, I shall leave you be and wish you luck with a saying from your Native Scotland - Long may your chimney smoke. 

(Oh, and when you do get on a roll, and steam your way through the first week, which I’m sure you will; after demolishing your opponents, quote the great Demoman, “Oh, they’re going to have to glue you back together...in Hell!”. 

Novak Djokovic - the Djoker - (Slam Count: 12. Rank - #4). 

Nole has been rusty all season. He looked decent in Madrid, but losing in the finals of a Masters 1000 to a rookie, shows that he hasn’t gotten his clutch gene back. 

(Doesn’t Eastbourne sound like a cool name for a spy? Oh, just give it a though. M summons Bond into her office and says, “007, allow me to introduce your new partner. Meet Eastbourne”.). 

Anyways, back to tennis. Playing at Eastbourne would have meant that he would not have any rest before Wimbledon, unlike his rivals who had time to recharge their batteries. But, Nole’s main concern is rhythm. It reminds of me a Smithsonian documentary that I once watched. A cheetah, living in the sandy dunes of Namibia, was at risk of starvation. Just to keep it’s heart pumping, it chased down a measly rat and ate it. Eastbourne is a tiny tournament, with a mere 250 ranking points on offer, yet his decision to play there shows us that the Serb is still hungry. 

Roger Federer - the Maestro - (Slam Count: 18. Rank - #5). 

One wonders what Roger did during his six month sabbatical. Did his team make him drink daily smoothies made out of rare healing fruit, slabbed with ice from the Swiss Alps? Whatever they did, it has certainly worked wonders. He has returned – rejuvenated and motivated as ever.

Don’t forget - he is 35.

At this age, players have usually retired. If they are itching to compete then they do so on the senior tour.

But, Federer remains a true freak of nature. Watching him sweep past twenty year olds, one wonders how many years he has in the tank.

This year already, he has won the Australian Open, completed the Sunshine double with crowns from Miami and California, and remains odds makers second favorite to win here.

There is Sherlock Holmes line that I am reminded of when I watched Federer play his second round match yesterday.

“A man is no happier than doing what he does best”.

Federer’s back on grass. He’s in his element. A crocodile in saltwater. The entire grass court season is three weeks. And, perhaps because of that, only the best of the best have taken home the golden trophy. (That isn’t a figure of speech. The Wimbledon trophy is actually golden).

The famed Carthaginian general – Hannibal, once proclaimed, “God has given to man no sharper spur to victory than contempt of death”.

When you look at the veterans from the Big 4, compared to the youngsters like Tomic who recently said he felt bored – at Wimbledon, you can’t help but think that they greater motivation, the closer they reach to the end.

Agassi recently said that Federer could possibly play for another five years. That would make him forty. Never done before in the Open Era. But, I have come to learn that with the Maestro, you never make the error of betting against him.

Numerous champions across the years had publicly expressed their belief that he would retire soon. From, Borg, to McEnroe, to Wilander. They all expressed their love for the champion but also conceded that father-time remained undefeated.

What I love the most about Federer is that he is an expert tactician. One who is never shy to re-examine and be adaptable. This psychological agility saw him snap up Stefan Edberg as his coach in 2014, who encouraged him to employ the vintage technique of serve and volley into his game. This, combined with a new, larger racquet, saw him return to the finals of Wimbledon, where he waged an epic five-set battle against Djokovic, which he narrowly lost, and improved his ranking from sixth to second.

In 2015, he parted ways with Edberg and brought in Ivan Lbijucic – a veteran player (albeit slamless), to bring a gutsy, streetfighter mentality into his game. He made it two grand slam finals and saw him dominate the North American hard court season with a technique called the SABR. (An acronym for ‘Sneak Attack By Roger’).

Roger’s main goal, ever since 2014, has been to win another Wimbledon. It reminds me of when Hannibal’s generals told him that it was suicide to cross the Alps. 

His response was, ““I will either find a way, or make one”.

Rafael Nadal - El Matador - (Slam Count: 15. Rank - #2). 

Chop. Chop. Boom! 

That was the sound of Nadal dellvering a supermax masterclass in Roland Garros to win his tenth title. I thought Stan played as well as he could, for a mere mortal. But, Nadal at the French Open is a force of nature. It’s as if he has metaphysical allies. The rules of gravity and magnetism bent towards his favor and helped him rout out his veteran opponent. Such was the toll of the match, Stan lost in the very first round at Wimbledon. 

He lost in the fourth round to Dennis Muller. A disappointing result, especially given that he came back from two sets down to level the match. It’ll hurt him for a while, especially given that this might have been his last best chance to win Wimbledon. But, this should fuel his fire for the US Open and finish this year as number one. 

All white uniforms and nothing but brilliance to blight out the competition. For glory! Onward!  

#tennisedit #mcupdate #comoeumesintoquando #dedalvs #comedycentral #howdoiputthisgently #siriuslymeg #onenable #theworstroom #publicshaming #reasonsmysoniscrying #rf #nolefam #oldloves #backonpointe #pcgamer #twitterthecomic #clarincornhd