#okay so pretend this is good enough to get into the new yorker even though they have like a .0004% acceptance rate for short stories :

[virzafar]

From the archives of The New Yorker, 04/21/12: “Stargazers” by Vir Singh

“I’m leaving,” Astrid announces as she unceremoniously plops a camper-style backpack down on her bed. 

Moesche looks up suddenly from where he’s lounging on his own bed with a government-issued book in hand. Astrid looks frantic with her hair in her face and the corners of her eyes puffy, looking like she just cried or she’s about to cry or some winning combination of the two. 

Moesche puts his book down as he sits up, trying to get a better gauge of the situation. Astrid is unrelentless as she starts packing, grabbing things from the closet without much regard. Too many shirts, Moesche notices, and not enough pants. Is she even packing socks? 

He watches her hands move, quick and unsystematic. She’s shivering slightly, keeps pulling her sleeves down lower. Nervous. She’s nervous. She’s leaving.

“Oh,” is all Moesche says in response. It’s not like he hasn’t seen this coming at all. Astrid hasn’t exactly been a happy camper since the president issued a nation-wide containment order, but they’ve been in this bunker for nearly three months now and Astrid’s disdain has almost faded, become background noise for an otherwise mundane life.  “Why?”

“Because,” Astrid says as she chucks a first aid kit into a side pocket of the backpack, “I can’t just sit around here anymore doing nothing. If the government isn’t willing to give me some answers I’ll go out and get them myself.” 

“Oh,” Moesche says again.

“You sound like a parrot, Mo,” Astrid says. 

Moesche doesn’t reply, taking out a lighter from his pocket and playing with that instead. The flame flickers on then off, on then off, on then off – he finds solace in the repetition of it. 

“Well?” Astrid asks. “Are you coming?”

Moesche looks up from the lighter at the guards standing by the doors leading outside. He thinks of the large fence towering over the Safety Facility and the unknowns waiting for them beyond that.

“Eh,” he says, running a hand through his curls and gives a curt shrug. “I’ll try anything once.” 

Astrid seems to accept that as she tosses an empty backpack towards him.

“I’m still a little lost,” Moesche says. “What makes you sure there’s going to be aliens at this place?”

“No, not aliens,” Astrid tells him. She sounds tired. “Information about aliens.”

“Fine. What makes you sure there’s going to be information about aliens at this place?”

“It’s called ‘Area 51’. The government kept classified information in it years ago, inaccessible to the public eye. It was eventually abandoned once their secrets became too vast to keep confiscated to a single facility, which is when they adopted Island Luesch for use instead. But there’s hundreds of official statements claiming that they never fully cleared out their facilities. All we have to do is get there, break in, and find the right files,” Astrid says matter-of-factly.

“And this is a theory you were just sitting on for a rainy day?”

 “Before they rounded us up, I read a ton of books about it as a part of my research thesis,”  she says. There’s a tinge of sadness in her tone, an underlying bittersweetness about the studies in history that she had to abandon. Moesche can’t say he doesn’t understand it – there’s very little he wouldn’t do to live just another day in the life he had before the UFOs made the sky black and turned society into a place to be evacuated.

“When was this 51 place shut down?” Moesche asks. 

Astrid scratches the back of her head, avoiding his gaze as she answers with a timid, “Around 2050.”

“Almost 80 years ago?” Moesche asks in disbelief. Astrid’s silence is enough of an answer. “You snuck out of the safety of government care to investigate a hunch from a place that shut down nearly 80 years ago? We might as well deep-sea dive to find Atlantis!”

“I know!” Astrid shouts back. “I know, I just – I don’t know. I have a gut feeling about this place. I have to trust myself. I need you to trust me too.”

Silence swallows them. When Astrid meets Moesche’s gaze again she looks decades younger.

“I trust you,” Moesche says finally, and he tries to sound sincere. Astrid smiles at him and the thank you is spoken without a word exchanged.

With that, she gains a new perk in her step, picking up the pace slightly from the casual strides they had been taking. Moesche follows right after, gripping his backpack as if it would fall off otherwise.

“Come on, I want to get through at least another two miles before we rest for the day.”

It doesn’t take long for them to grow tired of walking. Moesche spends a whole day trying to remember what his father had taught him when he was still certain Moesche would inherit the family body shop, but he eventually manages to hijack an abandoned car with three paper clips and some radio gadgets.

“Impressive,” is all Astrid says before she claims the driver’s seat. 

They switch off cars each time they run out of power, sometimes lasting longer if they find a working charging port on the side of the road. They try their best to avoid driving by other Safety Facilities scattered across the countries. Like scavengers, they keep moving out of fear of what may follow them.

At night, Moesche begs desperately for his subconscious to bring him pleasant dreams, memories of what Earth once looked like – greens, browns, blues. Instead, he gets blackness with snippets of dialogue he think he may have once said.

“I want a war,” his voice at age 12 echoes one night. “Life is so mundane. I want the world to see what I’m capable of.” 

It seems he’s gotten his wish.

He was most worried about finding food sources when they first left, though it turns out they have more food at their disposal than they could ever consume. With the government promising an endless supply of federally issued supplies in their designated Safety Facility, there was no need for the people to raid supermarkets out of blind panic. As a result, the two of them bounce from town to town and pick up whichever perishables appeal most to them with plenty to choose from.

Today, they sit on the roof of their latest ride and eat lunch in silence. For Astrid, this consists of a can of peaches and a jar of strawberry jam; for Moesche, a stale loaf of bread and a can of corn. 

“What’s your theory?” Moesche asks as he rips a bite from the baguette in his hand. 

“About the aliens?” Astrid asks.

“Mhmm,” he says. “Where do you think they came from? What do you think we’ll find in those files?”

“You’ll never be able to look at me again without imagining a tinfoil hat on my head,” Astrid says.

“I think we’re well past that.” To make his point, Moesche gives a wave-around at the terrain around them as if to say ‘look where you’ve gotten me’. Astrid laughs. 

“I have a few theories,” she admits. Moesche quirks on eyebrow at her as if to prompt her to go on, which she does. “Mainly, it’s that the government did this as a reason to expand their military-industrial complex. A month before the aliens invade, all of Earth’s world leaders finally sit down after a human history spent fighting each other to finally find some international peace and decrease military spending to effectively zero. 

“Then the aliens arrive, and after a century of the media brainwashing us to fear them, we’re willing to do just that. The government jacks up its defense spending to more than double of what it was to fight off the immediate threat, and eventually the UFOs leave and the people come out of their bunkers.

“But wait! The government insists that it keep expanding its military to get bigger and better technology in case they ever return. The military is left to stay rich forever, the people feel protected from intergalactic threats at the cost of trillions.” Astrid pauses to express a self-satisfied smirk before adding on, “It’s just a theory though. What do I really know?”

“Maybe a little too much,” Moesche says. He scoops another heaping of corn onto the bread and takes a bite.  It goes down dry and tasteless.

“I was going to be an astronaut, you know,” Moesche says. They lie on a field looking at the stars somewhere in Middle America – Kansas, maybe. It’s hotter than where they came from.

“Were you?” Astrid asks. 

“I just finished a summer internship with NASA when the aliens came,” he says. “Ironic, no?”

“Bitterly so,” she says with a frown. “Were you any good?”

“They certainly thought so. Offered me a permanent position after my internship ended. I said no,” he admits.

“Why?” she asks.

“There was something else I needed to do.” His voice breaks ever-so slightly at the thought as he clenches the grass they’re sitting on a little tighter. “I told myself I’d come back to it.”

“You still could,” she offers, though it’s laced with a kind of false optimism that neither of them can quite buy into.

“I’m not so sure,” he says. There’s a long pause as he stares up to the stars, and when he speaks again, he speaks with a whisper. “How do we forgive ourselves for the life we never got to live?”

They’ve been on the road for two months now. According to their heavily-calculated, maybe-accurate, please-God-don’t-let-them-down predictions, this means they should be arriving at Area 51 today. Astrid buzzes; Moesche might throw up.

“Maybe we should think a little more about this,” Moesche suggests. “Take some time to really hash out the details, make a more concrete battle plan, consider all possibilities —” 

“There it is,” Astrid says. Moesche looks up from the dashboard of today’s car and squints into the distance, only to be met with an imposing gray building barely a mile away. 

“There it is,” Moesche confirms. Astrid grins manically and steps on the gas pedal. Moesche holds on tight to his seat and mutters a prayer to a god he stopped believing in long ago.

They pull up as close to the building as they can, and when they step out, Astrid all-but sprints to get to the building as Moesche jogs behind her. He expects an electric fence, a pack of dogs, a well-regulated militia to be awaiting them at the entrance of this place. Instead, a door that’s only just pulling through hangs by a hinge that the two of them can push to the side with ease.

“Where do we even begin to look?” Moesche asks, but Astrid pays him no mind. She’s too busy walking towards a large filing cabinet with a stretch of tape covering it labeled ‘CLASSIFIED’. “Oh. I guess that’s a start.”

Astrid wastes no time, ripping the label off hastily and throwing it away with a kind of dying urgency. Moesche stands warily to the side, watching as she opens cabinet after cabinet and sifts through file after file, only to find nothing. He thinks perhaps this is a good thing, that the government is hiding nothing from them after all, that they can pack their bags and get out of here. With time, he could forget this whole trip even happened.

“Oh my god,” Astrid breathes so quietly Moesche almost misses it. She stands over what must be the hundredth file she’s gone through, and by the look of her wide eyes, it seems she’s finally found what she’s looking for. “Oh my god, Moesche. It’s everything I could have imagined and more. You’ve got to see this, this is absolutely —” Astrid voice cuts off as soon as she turns around. “...Mo? Why are you holding a gun?”

“You never should have come here,” is the last thing Moesche says before his fingers pull the trigger. The first bullet hits Astrid’s rib cage; the second bullet hits her head. She falls to the ground, hands splayed in front of Moesche’s feet. 

He steps over her corpse delicately, grabs the file from where Astrid had left it, and proceeds to unlock the bottom drawer of the cabinet. There, an explosive awaits him, which he bends down and programs to go off within five minute. He picks up the holo-phone from inside of his shirt, presses two numbers, then holds it to his ear. “It’s done,” he says. He flips the device closed and throws it behind him.

 He doesn’t look back.

#m: about #okay so pretend this is good enough to get into the new yorker even though they have like a .0004% acceptance rate for short stories :/ #focus on the essence! the vibe! vir's crushed dreams! etc etc #anyway still cant believe i wrote a fictional short story for a fictional character fuck my life

[barnibumblr]

Coffee Run - Part One

Pairing: Ina x Bea

Summary: Tensions are high after Bea is paired with Poppy on a project.

Warnings: Mentions of bullying, but mostly fluff!

Word count: 2045

Tagging: @ikingsley @kaitlynliaofanxx @kwaj115 @sheepmomther-personal @swimmingshoebakerydreamer @domakir @veenast @hellyeah90sbaby

***

“How do I look?”, Bea asked, walking into the common area like it was her own personal catwalk. Arms in the air, the brunette paused ahead of the kitchen island, adding a twirl for flair. Hiding her mouthful, Zoey threw her an exaggerated wink whilst she finished chewing her food. “Twit twoo Babe! You look pure fire!” She reached out to touch Bea, hissing and pulling her hand away at the ‘burn’.

When their laughter died down, Zoey shot a look at her watch “oh shit Bea, you’ve got five minutes to get across campus! And we both know this is a class you do not want to be late for”. Bea ran over to the door, slipping on her shoes and throwing her bag over her shoulder. The girl was right though, every minute Bea was late, was one less minute she could spend observing her beloved professor. As she stood up, Zoey was already holding the door open, half a slice of toast in the other hand. Bea rushed past, stopping to steal the toast with her teeth and leaving before her roommate could stop her.

Zoey stepped out into the corridor behind her, “yeah have my toast Bea, what’s mine is yours!” she called out across the bustling hallway. “Oh and say hi to Ms Candice for me” she added, purposely poking for a reaction. Shaking her head, Bea spun around to blow her second favourite New Yorker a kiss. Still moving with the crowd, she turned again to face the direction she was heading, trying to ignore the somersaults in her stomach as she recalled the impromptu book club reading with Ina. ‘I can’t believe I actually straddled my professor’ she taunted herself, mentally facepalming at the ridiculousness of the whole situation.

Bea hurried her steps as she crossed the quad. All jokes aside, she was still desperately trying to impress Ina as her newly appointed TA and being late would not help her case. She was relieved to say the least, when she entered the lecture hall and the Professor was still unpacking her laptop.

The relief was short lived when she glanced around the room and found the only free seat was beside Chloe St James. Bea grunted under her breath, ‘great, just great’ she thought before taking her place next to the blonde. Her behind had barely touched the chair when Chloe threw her first look of disgust, “do you have to Hughes? My day was going just fine”. Bea narrowed her eyes, “it’s not exactly my first choice either Chloe, so how about we both just pretend I’m not really here?”. Along with her retort, she produced the most sarcastic and insincere smile she could summon.

“I’ve got a better idea” Chloe countered, “how about I act like you don’t exist?”. Bea paused, eyebrows furrowed in confusion, all while Chloe stared at her like she was the stupid one.

Ina cleared her throat pointedly and quiet swept across the room, immediately drawing Bea’s attention back to the front. She couldn’t help but think how incredibly sexy it was to watch Ina command the room, how easily she captured everyone’s interest and just kept it.

“Okay, so today we will be heading in a slightly different direction, a bit of a change from the last four weeks. We are going to start covering some elements of linguistic anthropology. I’ve got a short presentation to run through, you’ll have some time to note your key points, and then I would like to open the subject up to debate”.

The professor was just about to continue when a voice called out from the back, “are we going to mass debate Miss Kingsley?”. Ina rolled her eyes good naturedly. “Real smooth Craig. Tell me, how long have you been waiting to use that one?” she challenged. For a guy easily clearing 6ft, Craig almost disappeared in his chair. “Oh and it’s Professor Kingsley, thank you” she added as she launched her powerpoint.

“If everyone could please take out your textbooks and find page 356”, Ina instructed. Whilst everyone started to shuffle and organise themselves, Bea watched how Ina seemed to be searching the room. When her gaze finally settled on Bea, her eyes softened and a small smile graced her lips before she looked away. The eye contact was brief, but long enough for Bea to know Ina had just found what she was looking for.

The class were set to work after the presentation and Bea busied herself, trying her damnedest not to keep staring at the perfect specimen of a woman, currently seated on her desk at the front of the class. Bea’s swooning was cut short when she realised the sniggering she could hear was coming from beside her.

When Ina had finally agreed for Bea to be her TA, it was on the understanding that no drama would be brought into her classroom. It was for that reason Bea inhaled slowly as she turned to the blonde beside her, internally begging for patience. “Can I help you Chloe?” She asked, keeping her tone as neutral as humanly possible. The eye roll she received in reply was already pushing her to the limit, “I don’t know Farmsville, can you?”. Chloe’s tone dripped sarcasm, it took everything Bea had in her not to flip her desk there and then, instead she just calmly replied. “Chloe, if you have something to say, just come out and say it already?”.

Before Chloe could respond, Bea already regretted asking. People in the row in front started to turn their way, aware that it could go off any minute now, some with their phones at the ready.

“Well Bea, I actually wanted to ask you what perfume you were wearing?”, Chloe paused with her hand over her mouth but the brunette wasn’t about to answer. Bea clamped her jaw tightly shut, the muscles twitching in an effort to keep her cool. To make matters worse, Bea could see Ina now watching over her glasses. “Let me guess, is it pig de eurghhh? Chloe laughed excessively, looking over each shoulder to bask in the glory of her own joke.

‘Okay that was actually pretty funny’ Bea thought, taking a moment to appreciate Chloe’s attempt before correcting her. Remembering her voice, she kept it low as she spoke. “I think you meant Eau de Pig, but you know what Chloe… I’m just impressed you came up with that all by yourself!” Bea appraised.

The blonde’s eyes screwed up so tight they almost closed, Bea knew whatever was coming next would be spiteful. Thankfully Ina’s voice rang out across the classroom, “is there a problem ladies?”. Chloe plastered on a well rehearsed smile before responding. “Not now thank you professor, I was just trying to help Bea”, still facing forward her smile dropped to something resembling false pity. “It smells really bad up here, so I was just suggesting she shower more often… To wash away all the pig poo”. As she finished, she gestured at Bea, screwing her nose up.

“That’s quite enough Ms St James. I will absolutely not tolerate any attempt of bullying during my lectures, thank you” Ina reprimanded, her tone much firmer than the class had ever seen. Having Ina defend her should have been everything Bea wanted but instead she covered her face with her hand, trying to hide the embarrassment flooding her cheeks. ‘Oh great’ she thought, ‘ now everyone thinks I’m being bullied’.

Chloe sat back in her seat looking like the cat that got the cream. “See Farmsville, you don’t belong here. Belvoire is a way of life, you can’t just buy your way in and be accepted”. Bea was starting to wonder if Chloe had a point, was she in over her head? “I’m surprised Kingsley even offered you the TA position, I mean what does she even see in you? Maybe she just feels sorry for you, yeah that’s probably it”.

That was the final straw. Bea slammed her laptop closed and started to make her way towards the exit.

“Ms Hughes, is everything okay?” Ina asked, her brows furrowed in concern as Bea raced past her. Bea could only wave her away as the tears prickling her eyes threatened to fall. Ina followed her out into the hall, once she was clear of the classroom she called out to the brunette, who hadn’t even looked back. “Bea? Please stop, are you okay?”.

Ina was relieved when Bea finally halted at the end of the corridor, chasing her across campus would certainly arouse some unwanted attention. Keeping her back to the professor, Bea sighed “I just need to be alone Ina”. And with that she was gone, leaving Ina behind.

Later that afternoon, Bea was still hiding in her bed when her phone pinged.

———————————————————-

1 New Email

From: [email protected]

Afternoon Ms Hughes.

Sorry to contact you on such short notice, however I require your assistance as a matter of urgency. If you are available this evening, please could you stop by my office. My evening lecture will be finished at 19:30, so I can meet you there shortly after.

Best,

Professor Ina Kingsley

————————————————————

By the time Bea needed to leave, the campus was fairly quiet, only the odd student passing here and there. Bea wasn’t sure what she would say when she got to Ina’s office, she just knew she needed to apologise. Although she felt bad for walking away from Ina that morning, the last thing she wanted was for her to see just how much Belvoire was really affecting her.

When she arrived the door was already slightly ajar. Bea peered around it, to find the professor sitting in one of the armchairs. Ina hadn’t noticed her yet, so she took the liberty of just watching her for a moment, absorbing her beauty.

The older woman was sat back in her chair, one hand in her lap, the other propping up her chin on the arm of the chair. She seemed to be deep in thought as she stared out the office window, so Bea approached her slowly. At first Ina appeared perfectly still, but as she got closer, Bea could see her furiously jigging her leg. Ina’s aura of calm was not quite reflected from the waist down.

Despite the slow approach, Ina still startled when her visitor came into view. “Oh, Bea!” she laughed nervously, hand to her chest. Bea awkwardly returned a smile as she took the other seat, “Ina, I…” she started. Ina leant forward to listen, her elbows now resting on her knees. Opening her mouth to talk, Bea didn’t quite know where to begin or how to excuse her behaviour, instead her eyes dropped to the floor.

Sensing Bea’s discomfort, Ina knew it was time to put her plan into action. “Right” she said, standing up and straightening out her skirt. Bea watched her move across the room, waiting for the wholesome stack of quizzes she thought were coming her way. Instead Ina picked up and put on her coat.

“We’ve got a lot to get through, so I was thinking we could go grab a coffee first?” she asked, untucking her hair from the collar.

“Are you sure another date’s a good idea?” Bea questioned with a smirk. Although she was upset, she still had it in her to make the other woman blush and she got exactly the response she was going for. Ina grinned, shaking her head at the floor as the tips of her ears turned red.

Ina paused at the door, openly pondering. “I’m not sure of much when it comes to you Bea, but… What I do know is that coffee is never a bad idea”.

Regardless of how bad her day had been, Bea loved how she could bring Ina’s walls down, even if only temporarily. “You’re not really selling it to me, Ina” she teased.

“Miss Hughes, please will you allow me the pleasure of your company and join me on a brief walk to the coffee shop?”. Despite the flutter she felt in her stomach, Bea laughed at Ina’s formality. She made her way to the door, giggling again as the professor held it open with a bow.

***

#ina kingsley #ina x mc #professor kingsley #bea hughes #zoey wade #chloe st james #queen b #choices queen b #choices qb #playchoices #fanfiction #myfanfiction #fluff

[aspenroman]

and i saw sparks (jaque x mc)

Summary: MC struggles to pick up the pieces after her catastrophic fight with Jaque.

Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort

Word Count: 2515

A/N: I caved and bought VIP and binged Ms. Match. I adored it, it was so fucking funny but I wish there was more angst. This is my continuation of Chapter 12 and 13 but with more sadness. Inspired by the song “sparks” by coldplay. bold and italicized words are lyrics from the song

did i drive you away? i know what you’ll say

MC can’t focus on anything besides the rushing of blood in her ears. Her entire nervous system is overwhelmed by everything going on, especially the betrayal by Jaque. Her dad has disappeared, run off somewhere and instead of being able to chase after him, she’s stuck here with her, in a dumb argument.

“You threw Veronica, my dad, me, and your own integrity under the bus tonight, Jaque. You can’t talk your way out of this one,” MC screams.

Jaque rolls her eyes, “You backed me into a corner! I had no choice! No good choice! Veronica likes your dad! A lot! Richard was the only one who might be able to win against that connection.”

you’ll say, “sing one we know”

“Veronica could be happy with my dad. That’s what she asked us to find her. Love. I can’t believe you forgot what this is all about.”

Jaque laughs, her annoyingly beautiful face contorting into a sneer, “No, you forgot what this is all about.”

She began to pace as she spoke, practically spinning in place as she huffs. MC watches on, her fists clenched.

“When does what I want get to matter? When do I get to live my dreams? Why do I have to fight you for the position of my dreams?” Jaque shouts, her voice cracking at the end with emotion.

i promise you this, i’ll always look out for you

Deep down, MC feels sympathy for her. But the twinge of sympathy is buried by overflowing anger and hurt. She pushes any kind feelings aside, focusing instead on her rage.

“You’re insane,” MC breathes.

i say “oh”, i say “oh”

Jaque turns on her, laughing bitterly, “Insane? I’m insane? What’s insane is that you managed to blunder your way to the finale. I spent a decade earning my position, you’re lucky I brought you to the gala. I’m the only reason you’re here.”

“Lucky? I don’t feel very lucky to have met you right now,” MC shakes her head, “I really thought you were more than...more than this. I thought you were more than the woman I met forever ago. I thought you had morals, I thought you had a heart, I thought...”

“You thought what?” Jaque’s voice lowers from a shout, but her tone is still strained with frustration.

my heart is yours, it’s you that i hold on to

“I thought you loved me, the same way I love you,” MC smiles weakly, but her eyes water.

Jaque doesn’t meet her eyes. MC takes a step forward and Jaque steps back.

“Well, you thought wrong. It was always about the competition, love was never in the equation,” Jaque says tersely, “what we had wasn’t love. It was lust.”

yeah that’s what i do

“You’re telling me you took me to meet your mom just so Richard could get those flowers? You’re telling me all those times you showed up unannounced, all those secret glances and touches were fake? All a part of some elaborate plan?” MC questions.

“Yeah,” Jaque still doesn’t meet her eyes, “and you played right into my plans. I barely had to lift a finger, you were too busy falling to realize I was never going to catch you.”

MC freezes, the words finally sinking in. She can feel the gazes of hundreds of people on her, watching her heart shatter into billions of pieces. Some sadistic part of her hopes that the fragments manage to hurt Jaque, but MC knows that’s not really how this works. She knows she gave her heart to someone who was never really hers.

It makes sense now. All the dancing around labels, all the sneaking around in favor of “not breaking the rules”. All the things Jaque spew about her family, in an effort to get MC to trust her. Jaque was right about one thing, she had more experience professionally. And in that moment, it seemed to MC that Jaque used every technique to get MC to think they were perfect matches.

i say “oh”, i cry “oh”

MC can’t get her brain to form words, all she can concentrate on is not falling completely apart. Her eyes sting, but she doesn’t look up, she can’t. Instead, she trains her gaze on the road a few feet away. She doesn’t say anything as she goes, she just starts in one direction.

Jaque yells after her, but the words don’t even phase her. In fact, MC can’t even remember what she said. She walks for miles, away from the gaudy life of the rich Upstate New Yorkers and back toward where she thinks the city is. It takes almost an hour before she spots a cab and manages to flag it down. It’s a miracle she even finds one, and she gets in and mumbles her address.

She hugs herself in the back of the cab, eyes staring unseeingly out the window. Soon enough, the bright lights of the city that never sleeps come into view. She thinks it should be a comfort, but it doesn’t help. When MC finally gets to her place, she pays the fare and stumbles up into her apartment.

As soon as the door is unlocked, she walks inside and slams it behind her. MC barely manages to lock it before her legs give out and she crumbles to the ground. Her chest heaves for breath, her throat closing up as she panics. Tears stream down her cheeks, unable to control herself anymore. Her nails dig into her palms, trying desperately to calm herself down.

yeah, i saw sparks

She’s had panic attacks before, more so in the past few months because of the matchmaking business. Although then she had Jaque to call up and now she has no one. She can’t rationalize how Jaque would be willing to call her at 2am, to hold her through breakdowns, and not care an ounce about her.

yeah, i saw sparks

MC tries to intellectualize her feelings, tries to calm herself down the way Jaque taught her to, but nothing works. Nothing works because everything reminds her of Jaque and Jaque is the one causing her this pain. Her heart aches and for a second, she thinks she might be dying as her chest tightens. A pain from behind her sternum makes it hard to breathe and she loses her breath, before it releases in a big sob. 

She’s not okay.

---

Maggie tries to come over the next day, but MC can’t face her. She ignores Maggie’s desperate knocking, pretending that she’s asleep and turns her phone off completely. The rest of the weekend passes in a daze, MC unable to do anything but stare at the ceiling and dwell in her feelings.

When Monday rolls around, MC knows it’s time to pull herself together. She doesn’t know how she will, but she has to. 

“No competition is worth this,” she murmurs to herself as she pulls on her favorite blouse and a pair of dress pants. She fixes her hair in the bathroom mirror, putting on makeup to cover the bags underneath her eyes. Her eyes are still swollen and a bit red, but she tries not to draw attention to them.

She finally turns her phone on as she enters the building, her phone vibrating with a billion messages. Most are from Maggie, while some are surprisingly from Jaque. MC doesn’t even bother reading them as she sees the text from Veronica, summoning her to her office.

and i saw sparks

MC knocks on the office door and after a second, she enters. Unsurprisingly, Jaque is already there, engaged in deep conversation with Veronica. They both turn to her as she enters.

“Where have you been?” Veronica speaks, “I’ve been trying to contact you all weekend.”

“Family stuff, won’t happen again,” MC lies, forcing on a smile.

“Good,” Veronica pinches the bridge of her nose, “onto more pressing matters, we’ve had an unexpected request from-”

Veronica keeps talking, but MC tunes her out. Instead, she keeps her eyes glued to the space behind Veronica’s head. MC can feel Jaque’s intense gaze on her, but she refuses to look at her. She doesn’t think she can bear it right now.

“Dismissed,” Veronica finishes and MC nods, swiftly leaving the room. She walks briskly down the hall and into her office. 

Sunlight streams through her windows. Without hesitation, MC slams the blinds closed, plunging the room into darkness. She closes and locks her office door before settling into her chair. The room feels colder somehow, without the presence of either Maggie or Jaque.

MC takes a shaky breath, resting her elbows on the table. She closes her eyes, putting her head between her hands. The darkness of the room brings her comfort. She doesn’t know how much time she spends like that, before she finally pulls herself together.

Turning on her computer, she searches the database for the person Veronica was talking about. MC missed most of the debriefing, but luckily the system had already assigned the client to her and Jaque. She spends some time going through the man’s profile, making notes in a separate document. 

Hours pass like that, MC hunched over her computer and trying to make sense of this “unmatchable” person and finding people who might like him. She has spreadsheet after spreadsheet, trying to do things the analytical way. Jaque’s way, her brain reminds her and it stirs up a bitter feeling.

“I can’t fucking do this,” MC mumbles, standing up from her chair. She can’t matchmake when her own love life is in shambles, when every piece of advice she used and gave to other people made her blind. How can she give advice out, when no one loves her? She has no prospects anymore, it’s pathetic. 

MC paces back and forth, trying to decide what to do. Suddenly, there’s a knock at the door and she freezes.

yeah, i saw sparks

“I know you’re in there,” Jaque’s voice rings out, “everyone else already went home. It’s almost seven.”

MC glances at her phone, to see Jaque’s words are true. She doesn’t even feel hungry, even though she hasn’t eaten today. She just feels empty. Without saying anything, MC sits down in front of the door, resting her back against it.

“Can you unlock the door? Can we talk, please?” Jaque pleads.

“I don’t want to talk to you,” MC says plainly, her voice hoarse still from their screaming match.

“I get it,” Jaque’s voice is softer and MC can hear her sit down on the other side of the door, “just give me five minutes, that’s all I ask.”

“Okay,” MC concedes, closing her eyes.

“I lied on Friday, okay? I was angry and I took it out on you. Veronica’s been like...like family to me. I thought that maybe if her and Richard could get back together, it would be like fixing my parents’ divorce. And I... I was jealous. You’re a really good matchmaker, like really good. And, it’s scary,” Jaque tells her.

“This competition isn’t worth it,” MC ignores most of her statement, “you can have the CEO spot. I’m quitting anyways.”

“What?” Jaque says.

“If I can’t even keep my personal life from falling apart, I shouldn’t be a matchmaker,” MC’s voice cracks, “everything I’ve told my clients, I followed and it didn’t work out. I shouldn’t be here.”

“You should be here, you deserve to be here, are you...are you crying?” Jaque’s voice is surprisingly gentle.

“No,” MC sniffles, tears running down her cheeks.

“Please, just open the door MC, let me explain,” Jaque murmurs, “please baby.”

MC rubs at her eyes, taking in a shaky breath as she stands up and reluctantly unlocks the door. She takes a step back. The door gently swings open, light from the hall flooding into the room.

Jaque is silhouetted by the light, and MC hates how effortlessly put together she seems. Still, when Jaque takes a step forward, MC sees the tears in her eyes.

sing it out

Jaque takes one look at her and then breaks out into sobs. Alarmed, MC’s eyes widen as Jaque’s shoulders shake. She takes a hesitant step forward before wrapping her arms around her. Jaque leans into the embrace.

“I lied, okay? I lied,” Jaque says through sobs, “I love you, I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone in my life and I thought that if I just pushed you away I could win. But I can’t, I can’t deny what you make me feel. This competition isn’t worth losing you, nothing is worth losing you. You’re...you’re my match, MC. As soon as you left on Friday, I ran after you. I got into the first cab and made my way to your apartment. But I couldn’t even take a step inside, I’m a coward, okay? I...I thought pushing you away would solve my problems. But that’s not how this work, love isn’t something you can hide. Fuck the competition, fuck the CEO role, fuck everything. None of that means anything to me, if I can’t have you.”

Jaque clings to her, her fingertips digging into MC’s shoulder blades. MC is content with letting Jaque hurt her, if only to feel her in her arms one last time. 

“You really hurt me, Jaque, one apology won’t fix that,” MC says.

“I know, but would it help if we have makeup sex?” Jaque jokes before sniffling.

“You’re on thin ice,” MC rolls her eyes.

“...That wasn’t a no,” Jaque tells her.

MC pulls back, hitting her on the arm. Jaque yelps before a soft smile breaks out on her face.

“Just please stay here, even if you don’t want to take me back, that’s okay. Just please stay with the company, with Veronica, with-, with me,” Jaque says to her, eyes sparkling.

MC mulls it over before she nods, “Okay.”

“Can I kiss you, please?” Jaque says desperately.

MC rolls her eyes again before grabbing onto Jaque’s collar and pulling her close. Their lips meet, the taste of mint toothpaste mixing with the salt from their tears. It’s a slow, gentle kiss and MC is the first one to break it.

“Did you just brush your teeth?” MC murmurs.

Jaque grins, “Maybe.”

MC lets out a quiet laugh, “You’re a dork.”

“But I’m your dork,” Jaque says.

“You act like I forgive you already, one kiss won’t change that,” MC tells her honestly.

“I know, but it doesn’t hurt,” Jaque smiles before kissing her again.

When they finally pull away to breathe, Jaque grins at her. MC smiles up at her, a half-smile but it’s the most she can muster. The hurt from Jaque’s words won’t fade overnight and they’re far from being official, but MC feels a little less shaky about where they’re at. Maybe it would be good to take things slow, try and approach things like a normal couple would-

“Is it time for makeup sex?” Jaque whispers.

Or not.

#ms match #playchoices #choices: stories you play #choices #jack x mc #angst #my writing #mine #hurt/comfort #wlw #jaque x mc #jaqueline monroe #jaqueline x mc

[cagestark]

WinterIronSpider//5

Chapter One | Chapter Two | Chapter Three | Chapter Four | Chapter Five

sorry about this, really wanted to share SOMETHING with you, even if it’s not my best work.

Here on AO3. -

At the sound of Tony Stark’s rumbling voice, Peter’s stomach drops to somewhere around his socked-toes. All the terrible things that could have happened (not that he’d been imagining any of them, not when he saw Bucky’s pale eyes drop to his lips. All thoughts of morals had been beaten away by the butterfly wings that battered inside his stomach), all those terrible things that could befall any infidelious person and this is the worst of them. Getting caught. 

“Mr. Stark,” Peter gasps, stumbling back to put distance between himself and Bucky. Nothing to see here, nothing funny, just two acquaintances slow dancing with red, raw mouths. Yeah—Peter can’t imagine anyone being able to pull the wool over Tony Stark’s eyes, much less himself. Even if he had an excuse that wasn’t thin as he is, there’s no way his conscience could let him hide behind it. Aunt May hadn’t raised him to be that kind of man. Shoulders bowing, Peter says, “Please don’t be angry at Bucky. I came on to him, he—” 

“Is that true, Bucky?” Tony asks. “Did you make this sweet, sick boy do all the work?”

“Hell no,” Bucky mutters. “My ma raised me better than that. He didn’t have to lift a finger.” 

Had the pneumonia scrambled Peter’s brain? Maybe the medicine Dr. Banner gave him had strange (wonderful) hallucinogenic properties that hadn’t manifested until now. His eyes flicker back and forth between the easy banter of the couple, throat growing tighter and tighter.

“In that case, don’t mind me. Fly on the wall,” Tony says, leaning back into the doorway. In his three piece suit, he is the picture of a respectable businessman. The way his eyes burn as he traces up and down them is anything but respectful. His tongue traces his lower lip and Peter replays the sight in his head in ultra high-definition. “Pretend I’m not here. Picture me in my underwear, if you’d prefer—you know, that idiom doesn’t work when I’m not wearing underwear, but these goddamn worsted wool suits, you can see every line—” 

“What, you’re, you—I’m sorry Mr. Stark, but are you joking?” Peter wonders. A worse thought comes with no justification save for a long history of experiencing cruelty at other people’s hands: what if they’re trying to trick him? What into, Peter can’t be certain. What he is certain of is that no man like Tony Stark (no man in general) could possibly be okay with someone else kissing their lover. 

Tony’s face goes soft, a tender twisting of his mouth. Peter’s eyes drop. No, these aren’t the kinds of men who would trick or hurt him. Surely if he looks Tony in the eye, the man will see Peter’s cowardice, his betrayal of their characters. 

“Kid—I’m sorry. It was just a joke. In a way.” Tony lifts the needle on the record player and the music cuts away, leaving a heavy silence behind that no one is sure how to fill. After a stretch, Tony goes on: “Pizza for dinner? Are you hungry?”

Peter is always hungry. “Yes, but—Mr. Stark, maybe I should go.”

“You can’t even stay for dinner?”

“I—alright. No—I mean. I don’t know.”

Tony turns to Bucky. The tone he uses to speak to the other man is night and day from the tone he uses with Peter, his voice low and familiar. “Did you not explain anything to him? What have you been up to all day, buttercup?”

Bucky’s mouth curls up at the corner, a wry, guilty look that makes him look ten years younger. “Dancin’?”

-

Peter clears his plate twice, burning the roof of his mouth (though he hardly cares, the pizza is so good. From someplace in upper Manhattan, real gourmet stuff topped with portobello mushrooms and red peppers and black olives). Bucky is almost as ravenous, folding his pizza like a true New-Yorker. When he takes his metal fingers into his mouth to suck the grease off, Peter has to look away, stomach feeling hot in a way that has nothing to do with the peppers on the pizza. That mouth, those fingers, god. 

All throughout dinner, Tony’s dark eyes flicker back and forth like they are prime entertainment, looking a little heated under the collar himself when Bucky cleans his hands. He tells them a story about running into a professional Tony Stark impersonator in the pizza shop, until Peter nearly forgets that there’s a reason Mr. Stark should hate him. By the time nothing remains but empty, grease-sodden pizza boxes, Peter feels sleepy and full, lulled in the best way. 

“Two things, kid,” Tony says, using a napkin to wipe his mouth. “Small things. We’d like you to live here, and also Bucky would like to make out—“

“Nice opening,” Bucky huffs, eyebrows low and threatening. “Any other bombshells to drop on him? You his bio dad? Tell him that I killed JKF?”

“FRIDAY, scrub the last five minutes,” Tony snaps. 

Peter struggles to follow along. Tony began to lose him somewhere around live here and left him in the dust at Bucky would like to make out. Blinking hard, nothing changes, no world slipping sideways, no veil lifting to reveal everything as a hallucination. But surely this can’t be real life. Real life wouldn’t be nearly so strange. 

“I have no idea what’s going on,” Peter admits, fingers tapping his thighs in an anxious rhythm. “Did you say something about living here, Mr. Stark?” 

“Let’s start with Bucky first, actually,” Tony says, eyes glittering like he’s getting strange pleasure from seeing Peter so flustered. 

“Tony—” 

“No, no, you had your chance to talk to him during the 9-5. You’re officially off the clock. We’re all about not violating Fair Labor Standards Act.” Bucky’s face gives away nothing. His metal hand makes a sound as he clenches it into a tight fist and then tucks it into his lap, shrugging in a way that says less fine, whatever and more I, very begrudgingly and under extreme duress, relent. When Tony’s gaze turns back on Peter, he can’t help but stare down at his lap and the fraying knees of his pants. Aunt May always said the eyes are the window to the soul. “Kid, there’s no reason to apologize to me for kissing Bucky. We’re open. Do you understand what I mean?” 

Peter clears his throat, mouth dry. “You mean you’re in an open relationship?” 

“We don’t usually label it, but that’s acceptable terminology. We aren’t people who stifle our desires, how’s that? Sometimes Bucky’s with someone else, sometimes I’m with someone else, sometimes we’re both with someone else, but we’re always with each other. Bucky has my explicit approval to make moves on young, pneumonia-ridden college students, so long as they are willing.”

Imagining Tony and Bucky together is enough to make him want to squirm in his seat. Imagining them sharing someone between them makes him long to pant like a dog, anything to help abate the volcanic heat bubbling up inside him. One thing at a time, Pete, he thinks to himself. He’s good at giving himself pep talks. After all, for a long time there was no one else around to encourage him. “That makes sense, Mr. Stark. But what does that mean? Mr.—Bucky wants to, to...you know?”

“That is a question you can direct to the defendant. Mr. Bucky?”

Peter colors, looking at the long-haired man from beneath his dark eyelashes. 

“I want to kiss you any time you’re looking sad,” Bucky says, eyes on the hardwood of the table. “I want to make sure you don’t have anymore reasons to cry when you’re around me or not. I want to protect you. I want to kill your enemies—” 

“He’s a poet, isn’t he, regular Shakespeare—FRIDAY, let’s just scrub this whole conversation okay—” 

“I’m sorry,” Peter says, “But it’s Monday, Mr. Stark.” 

Tony smiles. It hints at a lot, not half of which Peter can decipher. He adjusts the blue-tinted glasses on his face. “Right. You’re right, Peter. Did Bucky answer your question?” 

Replaying it in his mind, Peter can feel himself flushing. His mouth tingles where an hour before, Bucky’s own had been pressed against it. If Bucky wants to kiss him every time he’s looking sad, then Peter won’t ever smile again. Not if he can help it. “Sort of. I guess I just don’t get why. You two have each other, and you’re both. Wow. You’re both really wow. I think if I—” Peter barely manages to stop before he says something hopelessly romantic and tragic, something like how he thinks if he had either of them, he’d never be sad again. “I just don’t understand why you’d be interested in anyone else.” 

“I don’t believe in soulmates,” Tony says. He walks to the bar in the corner and pours himself an amber-colored drink. “I believe in chemistry. That’s a renewable resource in my book, Pete, one that can be experienced between a multitude of people all at once. A gas stove has several burners, and just because you turn the gas up on one doesn’t mean you can’t ignite the others, does it?” 

“Not if it’s a good stove.” 

“Not if it’s a good stove,” Tony repeats, voice warm like the alcohol he sips at. He tips the glass towards Bucky. “Snowflake here believes that a person can have many soulmates. It’s all about the ones we choose to cultivate. Sometimes it’s that deep. And not to watch you flush, kid, but sometimes it’s just about the sex.” 

Peter works to keep his face neutral even if he can feel the heat of a blush crawling across his skin. Mr. Stark must think him a blushing virgin (and in some aspects, Peter is). Hopefully, he can’t tell that Peter’s flush is more arousal than embarrassment. 

“So which am I?” He asks, glancing nervously to Bucky. “Am I a cultivating thing or am I a sex thing?”

“You’re not a thing at all,” Bucky says. The murderous expression on his face doesn’t agree with his words. “You’re a human being. But it’s more than just sex. Sex doesn’t need to be included at all. See—I told Tony this morning that we were going to move too fast. We shouldn’t even be mentioning sex until after the third date—“

“Incredible. Do you hear that, kid? He didn’t take me on a date until after the sixth or seventh tryst in the lab. You’re something special.” Tony’s waggling eyebrows belie any jealousy or bitterness Peter might have imagined. 

Still. Peter can’t help but feel...special. Not in a million years would he have imagined someone as handsome as Bucky Barnes being interested in him, not romantically, not sexually, not any way at all. He feels more than a little like he’s stepped into the Twilight Zone. Surely any moment Rod Sterling will appear leaning against the bar talking to some invisible camera.

“We don’t have to talk about it,” Peter says, wringing his hands in his lap. He smiles at Bucky with shaking lips, watching the furrowed brow smooth. “I don’t expect anything at all. This is like, not expected. At all. Way out of left field. I still don’t understand…”

“Which part?” Tony asks. He puts a hand on Bucky’s shoulder, thumb soothing the skin just above the collar of the man’s shirt, and Peter feels it all over. 

“The me part,” Peter admits. “You could have anybody. Why me? Not to sound like, like I’m fishing for compliments or anything but I’m not the sort of guy people are attracted to.” But. Bad thoughts come rolling in like thunderheads, always clinging to the edges of his mind eager to blot out any sun that might appear, because there’s one thing Peter knows he’s good at. One thing people are attracted to. 

Mr. Rumlow tells him so. 

Peter shivers despite the warmth of the room, pizza sitting like a heavy stone in his gut. God, why had he told Bucky and Mr. Stark about the arrangement between himself and the super of his apartment complex? Their reactions were fuzzy in his mind, the effects of the medicine he’d taken turning everything mottled and loose at the edges, but Peter knows how it sounds. He knows what he would think, if it had been another student sucking Mr. Rumlow’s dick anytime he knocks just to keep from having to pay rent. 

It’s not as bad as it sounds, though. Mr. Rumlow (“Call me Brock, I think you’ve more than earned it, Pete”) is attractive enough. He’s not really rough, not large enough to leave Peter’s throat sore the way a bigger cock might (Peter has read on the internet that that’s Possible). He likes to say foul things while Peter’s on his knees, things he knows that are just said during sex, like how Peter is so dirty, such a slut for his cock. But more often than not, Peter just drowns that out. 

Why he feels so pathetic thinking about it, he isn’t sure. 

“Kid.”

Peter looks up and sees the blurry form of Tony, the taller form of Bucky crouched down beside his seat. Eyes stinging, he reaches up to palm at them. His hands come away damp, vision clear, but now he can see the worry on Tony’s face, the intense stare Bucky has fixed him with, and that makes it so much worse. People caring rubs a tender part of him raw and it hurts. 

“I’m not doing such a good job keeping you from crying,” Bucky mutters, handing Peter a cloth plucked from beneath the bar to wipe his face with. 

Peter laughs wetly. “Can’t kiss all my sadness away.” 

“Can sure as hell try,” Bucky says. His metal hand cups Peter’s chin with contradicting tenderness, cooler than skin. His eyes flutter closed on instinct, opening only when the older man pauses close enough that Peter can feel his warm breath against his face. Those eyes, the entire expression—it makes Peter feel like Bucky could swallow him whole. And Peter might like it. “Tell me if you want it.” 

“I want it,” Peter breathes. 

Bucky kisses him. The sound that slips past Peter’s lips is downright disgraceful, a needy desperate little thing that Bucky swallows, his metal thumb coming up to coax Peter’s jaw open. Peter’s only prior kiss was a girl in highschool, and it was nothing like this. That had been an anxious, quick thing, more time spent worrying about his breath and where to put his hands and how to turn his head so their noses wouldn’t touch than time spent actually kissing. This is a submersive experience. Nothing but Bucky exists, Bucky and his tender hand, the tongue that teases, the mouth that sucks when Peter is brave enough to go exploring with his own. 

Eyes opening a fraction, his heart jerks in his chest because—

Tony. 

Tony stands having taken a few steps back, watching them with wide, wondrous eyes. His throat bobs as he swallows, Peter’s eyes tracking the movement. Why, Peter wonders, does the sight of Mr. Stark watching them make every last drop of blood in his body turn tail and head south? He can’t help but groan, letting his heavy lids fall shut again, neck going lax while Bucky kisses him deep and slow and filthy. 

Maybe they kiss for a minute or ten. Long enough for Peter’s tears to dry, for his cock to ache, for his lips to feel raw and swollen. When they part, Bucky’s eyes seem to burn, the thinnest sliver of silver corona around the aroused pupil—and then they flicker over Peter’s shoulder. Peter turns to see that Tony is lounging against the bar, face buried in his phone. He glances up at their movement and gives them a smile that is small but real and warm. 

“Coming up for air?” Tony asks. He slips his phone into his pocket. “Before you have Peter as desert on the dining room table, there is one more important item to discuss.” 

Peter’s head swims drunkenly. Fingers tighten at the nape of his neck where they are buried in his curls. They release in an instant—just an anxious reflex—but Peter’s eyes flutter anyway. How long has it been since he was touched? Mr. Rumlow. Before that? MJ and Ned, when they’d visited him over their semester break last year. Sometimes his skin downright itched, he was so desperate for someone to hug him, to put their hand on his shoulder. His heart would burst at the sound of Rumlow knocking on his door, just to feel human contact, just to feel wanted.

Shaking his head, Peter struggles to clear it. “Sorry Mr. Stark. What, what else is there?” 

“The matter of your destitution,” Tony says, taking his seat at the table again. His glass is full now, though Peter never heard him pour it. “Delicately put—you lack resources. I have an abundance of them. I’d like us to come to some sort of arrangement. Preferably one that doesn’t make me feel seedy, but even more importantly!—one that doesn’t make you feel trapped.” 

Peter blinks. “Trapped?” 

Tony clears his throat. His hands can’t seem to still, fiddling with the tumbler glass, adjusting where it rests on the napkin. Nervous ticks?, Peter wonders. What could a brilliant, powerful man like Tony Stark have to be worried about? “I wanted to invite you to move in to our penthouse; there’s plenty of room. But my better half over there told me that you might feel obliged to say yes even if you didn’t really want to. Or that saying yes might make it difficult for you to maintain your independence.” 

“You want me to live with you?” Peter can hear how his voice grows high towards the end. Even to his own ears, it sounds like hysteria. Maybe most of it is shock, but there’s a part of it (a frighteningly large part) that is...excited. This is young Peter’s dream, his idol asking him to live with him. Kid fantasies. Nothing that should ever be possible.

At his shrill voice, Tony winces. “Here’s what we want: your security ensured and your health maintained. Whatever it takes to see those things come to fruition. Our one request is that you don’t go back to Lafayette Hall. There are people there who would, who are taking advantage of you, kid. As it is, I have it under good authority that Lafayette Hall will be experiencing a change of management soon, but until it does, it would be a real comfort to Bucky and I to know that you aren’t vulnerable.” 

His face burns. It takes effort to swallow past the knot in his throat. “If I didn’t go back there, where else would I go?” 

“You’ve got options,” Bucky says, voice a warm, comforting timber from beside him. 

“One,” Tony says, holding up a finger. “I can set you up in a nice apartment close to campus. All amenities taken care of. I know the supers, very hands off kinds of people. Two, I could set you up on a different floor in the Tower here. I have several that used to belong to the Avengers, but they come and go so sporadically now that there’s no sense in giving them their own permanent space. You’d be free to come and go from the Tower the way you would any apartment. It would be as much your home as ours.” 

“Or I could stay here with you?” Peter asks. 

“I’m prepared to have provide any legal requisite that would make you feel comfortable, so that you would know there’s no obligation to Bucky or to myself. I have lawyers at the Tower six days a week; they’d be more than glad to do paperwork that prevents me from potentially causing a legal scandal. For once.” 

“Mr. Stark, this is, that—it’s all more than generous. Not to sound like a broken record, I just don’t understand why,” Peter says. “Why me? Why would you spend so much money on me, if you aren’t getting anything in return?” 

If there’s one thing Peter has learned in life, it’s that no kindness is unconditional. Yet here Tony is trying to convince him of that very thing, that Peter can have his cake and eat it too, that there are no strings attached to this gift. Just a big, beautiful bow. 

“Because it’s the right thing to do,” says Tony. It’s too difficult to look away from his heated gaze. And Peter doesn’t want to. “ You’re intelligent, hardworking, kind. I was barely two of those things when I was your age, and I’ll let you decide which. I want to see you thrive kid, and if that means investing some—not even a fraction—of my resources, then it will be more than worth it. If nothing else, feel free to consider me a lecherous rich bastard who will sleep easier at night knowing he’s doing his civic duty.

“So what do you say, Pete? No need to break it to me gently, though there will be a mandatory period of forty-eight hours of sulking should you say no, just a warning, but don’t—” 

“Yes. Yes, absolutely,” Peter says, tucking his fingers beneath his thighs to keep from doing something embarrassing like clapping or throwing his arms around the man. He should say no. May never liked the idea of handouts. She was a proud woman who worked until she couldn’t stand anymore and had instilled in him the same work ethic. Would she be disappointed in him for taking this easy way out, for accepting generosity without giving Mr. Stark anything in return? 

If Peter lets himself wonder questions like that, then he’d never stop. 

“Yes? Yes? That was easy.”

“Tony’s used to people telling him no,” Bucky says slyly. 

“As they should,” says Tony, leaning back in his chair. It’s not hard to imagine that the smile on the older man’s face might be thanks to Peter, but it’s certainly hard enough to believe. “I was convinced I might have to beg you to take my money, kid. I’ve been turned down a few times in the name of pride.” 

Peter smiles, lips pressed together tight so that he doesn’t have to say anything like, Don’t worry Mr. Stark, I have no pride.

“You could have Sam’s floor, it’s right below this one, and he spends most of his time in DC anyway,” Bucky suggests. The man looks about as happy as Peter’s seen him. Something about his serious face isn’t made for smiling, the low brows and narrowed eyes and downturned lips, but his brow is smooth and the corners of his lips quirk upwards. 

“Oh, not here? Up here, I mean. With you two?” Peter cringes even as the words slip out. Of course they wouldn’t want him up here in their space, not when there were better options so close by. Still, an entire slideshow had played inside his brain of all the domestic activities they could get up to together: watching movies on the couch at night after Mr. Stark came home from work, cooking breakfast in the morning with Bucky at the stove. He should just be grateful, though. Grateful he’ll be in a place with food and heat and running water that doesn’t taste like iron and rust.

“Up here?” Tony asks. He claps his hands. “All the better. My lawyers will be here first thing in the morning to draw up a makeshift lease of sorts—anything to let you know that your security isn’t contingent on any relationship with us. But if you leave crumbs on my carpet, kid, I’ll throw you to the wolves I swear to—kidding! Jesus, Buck, don’t slap me with the metal hand.” 

“I can walk home tomorrow and grab my stuff,” Peter says, mind far away in the tiny apartment. All he’ll need is to fill his backpack with the few clothing items that he hasn’t worn to death, the picture of Ned and MJ, May and Ben’s and his parents’ wedding rings, his school books. He could pack up his entire life into one bag, which is both a little sad and a godsend. Peter hates moving.

“Take one of my cars; I have plenty of them.” Tony stands from the table and holds out a hand. When Peter takes it, it’s warm and calloused. They shake, but it isn’t enough, no amount of gratitude can be poured from palm to palm. Peter rounds the table and wraps his arms around the man’s waist, smelling cologne and sharp alcohol, feeling Tony arms carefully come down around him. When the man speaks, it rumbles through Peter’s own body. “Lovely doing business with you, Mr. Parker. Saturday is for chores and Sunday is funday.” 

“I’m really good at doing dishes,” Peter grins. 

“That’s what the dishwasher is for, kid. Unless you’re Bucky who likes to do them by hand.” They pull away and Tony smiles down at him, and Peter thinks that maybe things are actually getting better. Maybe all those prayers he made finally reached up through the clouds and were heard and answered. Maybe he’s suffered enough, and the universe is finally giving him some good karma. “You know,” Tony says. He winks at Bucky. “I think this business deal could absolutely be sealed by a kiss—” 

“Tony,” Bucky sighs. 

“Good idea,” Peter says brightly. He shifts up onto his toes, letting his eyes fall shut as he presses a chaste kiss to Tony’s mouth—

What he wasn’t expecting was for Mr. Stark to pull away the way he does, to turn his head so that the kiss falls on his whiskered cheek. When Peter blinks up at him, he can’t understand the shocked, no, the horrified expression on the older man’s face. 

“Kid—I meant you and Bucky,” Tony says. “This thing—between you two? I’m not included.” 

#winterironspider #unedited lmao #as always #cagewrites #helping hands

[stephcrawford]

who’s that? oh it’s STEPHANIE "STEPH" CRAWFORD. i hear they’re 21 and are known as THE LAMB around NEW YORK. they're also a JUNIOR at NYADA, have a voice like JENNIFER DAMIANO and are part of VARSITY DANCE, SPOTLIGHT DINER. they’re known to be LOYAL AND MILD and WEAK-WILLED AND SERIOUS. some people say they remind them of NEVER SMILING IN PHOTOS, OPENING THE WINDOW DURING THUNDERSTORMS, BLIND LOYALTY, AND UNWAVERING DEDICATION. only one way to find out!

BASICS

Full Name: Stephanie Summer Crafword

Nickname: Steph, Stephie, etc.

Birthday: March 17, 2022

Place of Birth: Greenwich, CT

Age: Twenty-One

Zodiac Sign:  Pisces☼, Virgo☽, Libra↑

Hometown: Greenwich, CT

Current Residence: 9th Ave Apartment, New York, NY, Unit 4-B w/ Phoenix Harper.

Sexuality: Bisexual

Relationship Status: Single

Education: High School Diploma, Some College

Major: Dance Arts (BA)

Minor: Education

Occupation: Spotlight Diner Waitress

HIGH SCHOOL NEED TO KNOWS

School: Greenwich High School

Former Activities: Drama Club, Allegra Dance Greenwich Competitive Team

MUSICAL THEATER RESUME

NEWSIES- Crutchie (High School, Sophomore Year)

HAIRSPRAY - Nicest Kid Dance Ensemble (High School, Junior Year)

CHICAGO- Go-to-Hell Kitty (High School, Senior Year)

A CHORUS LINE- Cut Dancer (NYADA Players, Freshman Year)

LIKES/DISLIKES

LIKES: polaroid photos, straight legs and pointed toes, comfortable clothes, eating healthy, family, carly rae jepsen.

DISLIKES: making decisions, losing friends, rude customers, missing laundry day, being called on first, bitter words.

TL;DR BIO

Steph Crawford has never been number one, and has often faded into the background and she doesn’t mind in the slightest. In her eyes, it’s okay to be more of a follower than a leader. Her passions and priorities lay within forging strong relationships with those close to her, and working her hardest when it comes to dance. She tends to be soft and mild, a gem as far as New Yorkers go. But Steph wound up in that environment didn’t want to go too far away from Connecticut for college and the idea of going to her Father’s Alma Mater always seemed so magical to her. Now three years into her schooling, she’s living her life in the same way, and cherishing all the time she can with her friends.

BIO

Adam Crawford always thought he was going to make it as a performer. After all, he’d left behind his family in England, and come to the States to stay for good. He had to make it matter. From founding Adam’s Apples to taking New York City by storm, he knew he was going to be somebody. He just wasn’t expecting that somebody to be a husband to Aydin Cevdet, a hotshot lawyer from Connecticut. Adam was sure he liked his independence and fast-paced city living too much to ever settle down with this hot Turkish lawyer he’d met out on the town one night, but the pair were quick to hit it off.  Adam and Aydin really bonded over ideals of hardwork and some times feeling out of place in the country. So, after year after meeting and traveling back and forth between NYC and Greenwich, Adam was sold on leaving city life behind and settling down with the love of his life. Adam, always happy go lucky, was quick to adjust to his life in Greenwich. In fact, he was able to cultivate his take-charge nature and continue creative pursuits by opening his own sit and paint shop called Booze and Brushes. It was an idyllic life Adam and Aydin shared, and the only thing that made it more perfect was a wedding, then eventually, a couple of kids. 

Stephanie Summer Crawford was welcomed into the world on a rainy spring day via surrogate. Aydin and Adam were both dedicated workers, but first and foremost they were Fathers. Despite being biologically Adam’s, Steph always had a wonderful relationship with both of her parents. There isn’t a time in Steph’s life that she remembers before her sibling was born. Adam and Aydin went through the exact same procedures for her younger sibling as they did with Steph, although the new addition was biologically Aydin’s. They wanted the kids decently close in age so they could really relate to one another, and eventually bond. 

Despite being the older of the pair, Steph tended to let her sibling take charge. It was never Steph o be the one who had the ideas of playing pretend with paint brushes or rounding up as much neighborhood kids as they could to hold fake courtroom dramas in their backyard. It was her sibling. And Steph just looked on, a happy participant. Sure, all siblings fight about small things, but from day one, Stephanie and sibling were always best friends. Whether it be compatible personalities, or their souls knowing that perhaps their time as siblings would be limited, they wasted no time getting along. Even now Steph is never the one to take charge and is incredibly susceptible to some good old fashioned peer pressuring.

Adam and Aydin were good to their kids. Spoiled them, even, but never hesitated to let them know that they would have to work for their own lives at one point. Childhood was characterized by days spent at Booze and Brushes, plenty of springs running through their spacious backyard, family movie and game nights, and enough giggles to fill two lifetimes. Life in Connecticut was perfect.

High School came and went in a blur. Interesting enough, Steph’s High School friends she had made before her sibling reached Greenwich High, eventually became their friends. While her friend group consisted mostly of people from the Drama Department or her Dance Studio, she felt grateful to always have been included and surrounded by such vibrant people. But before Steph knew it, it was time to start the college application process. Like any wise person, she applied to safety schools, but she had her heart set on NYADA’s Dance Program. And much to her delight, come fall of 2040, Stephanie was NYC bound. The hardest part, undoubtedly, was being away from her family, but she adapted pretty well. Steph was quick to settle into classes and her job at the Spotlight Diner. Freshman Year, she even tried her hand at NYADA Players, but the cutthroat environment just wasn’t for her, so she’d save all her focus for Dance. 

While Steph thrives when she can make those close to her feel warm and fuzzy one on one, she can also err on the side of coming across a bit serious, or even sullen at times. Remaining positive and practicing healthy habits is just about as important to her as Dance. She might dull in the crowd, or against the bright city lights, but Steph has a tender gift of making her loved ones feel special, seemingly always being able to make friends, and of course dance. After some time at NYADA though, Steph settled on the idea of becoming a Dance Instructor. Whether that mean she work at a studio, own one of her own, or teach it in schools, she’d prefer to teach it, so now she studies both dance and education. Knowing that her time being on stage rather than teaching behind it is limited, she also participates in NYADA’s varsity dance team. In a way, it’s like a little slice of home. 

Now, Steph continues to work at the diner, study hard, and absorb every precious moment she has with her New York buddies. Currently, she lives in an apartment with a roommate and is feeling pretty grown up in the wake of her twenty-first birthday. But no matter how grown up she feels, Steph can’t wait for Summer and to spend some quality time with family and friends alike.

PLAYLIST X  II PINTEREST X

#crhq:intro

[sunriserose1023]

Merry & Married {5}

SUMMARY: It’s been almost a year since the most humiliating moment of your life. You’ve done your best to move on—by literally moving across the country, starting a new job, and you’re finally starting to feel settled. That, of course, is when your bubblehead cousin sends you the invitation to her wedding—which is exactly one year to the day that you were left at the altar. You have to go, but you don’t have to go alone. Enter Bucky Barnes, the best friend you’ve ever had. You fill him in, and of course he agrees to go home with you. What are friends for? Never mind the fact that he’s desperately in love with you. And if you hadn’t sworn off men forever, you might just find him … attractive. So there you are, surrounded by love, bridesmaid dresses, champagne, and no less than one hundred sprigs of mistletoe. What could possibly go wrong? WORD COUNT: 4265 WARNINGS FOR THE SERIES: Emotional angst, presumably unrequited love, friends to lovers, fluff, happily ever after, written for the @heamarvel​​​​ Holiday Movie Challenge

Masterlist

You glanced over your shoulder when the overhead light came on in the kitchen. Bucky had one eye closed, the other narrowed as he stared at you. 

“What are you doing?” “Why aren’t you asleep?”

He shrugged, yawning as he stepped into the kitchen, the white t-shirt he was wearing riding up as he raised his arms above his head. You quickly looked away when you saw the strip of skin, feeling your cheeks warm as you went back to kneading. Bucky shook his head, rubbing a hand on the back of his head as he shuffled towards you. 

“You okay?”

You shook your head. 

“I couldn’t sleep.” “So you decide to take your aggressions out on this poor dough?”

You gave a laugh. 

“I felt like being productive.” “What are you making?”

You looked down at the dough, the ingredients you had set out on the counter. Bucky followed your gaze, giving a quiet laugh when he picked up the “Everything But the Bagel” seasoning. He blinked, then turned his head to look at you. 

“Are you making bagels?”

You nodded, looking down as you kneaded the dough some more. You felt your cheeks flush again and Bucky stepped closer to you. 

“Y/N.” “Hmm?” “Why are you making bagels?” “Well, we’ve got to have something for breakfast.” “Yeah, but why bagels?”

You opened and closed your mouth a few times, feeling like a fish. You lifted your head and met his eyes and his lips curved into a soft smile. His voice was pitched low, and the sound sent shivers up and down your spine. 

“Are you making bagels for me?”

You automatically shook your head, looking away from his cool sapphire eyes. 

“No, I … I usually make something for everybody while I’m here, and I just thought bagels would be something different this year.” “And it has nothing to do with the fact that I’m a born-and-bred New Yorker, the bagel capital of the USA?”

You swallowed, letting go of the dough and turning to look at him. 

“Maybe it had something to do with it.”

You’d barely even whispered the words, but Bucky smiled, stepping closer to you. 

“Thank you, sweetheart.”

You nodded and Bucky stepped closer, smiling when you closed your eyes and moved to rest your forehead against his chest. Your dough-covered hands hung by your sides, and Bucky lifted his hands to gently rub your shoulders. 

“I’m tired, but I can’t sleep.” “What’s got you so anxious?” “The dinner tonight.”

Bucky nodded, still kneading your shoulders. 

“The dinner that’s not the rehearsal dinner?”

You nodded, lifting your head. 

“Nana throws this huge … gala every year. Only the elite get an invite. We did the same thing last year. The big dinner tonight, rehearsal tomorrow, wedding to finish out the week.”

Bucky nodded. 

“And the elite who do get an invite?” “I haven’t seen any of them since my wedding. And some of those women are real bitches.”

Bucky stifled a laugh and you turned back to the bagel dough, punching it as you spoke. 

“‘Oh, Y/N, how lovely to see you. Where have you been?’ ‘The decorations are so lovely this year. Where did you find all these things?’ Knowing damn good and well the decorations are leftovers from my farce of a wedding.” 

You shook your head and Bucky smiled, stepping up behind you and rubbing a hand along your back. Some of the tension left your shoulders at the touch of his hand, and you moved the dough from the flour-covered counter into a bowl. Bucky stood in the same spot as you went to wash your hands, and you held onto the edge of the sink. 

“Peter’s parents will be there.” “Seriously?”

You lifted your head, looking out the small window at the moonlight on the lake. 

“They’ve been friends of the family for years. Nana can’t just not invite them.” “Even though their son is king of the douches?”

You smiled, then sighed. 

“I guess I’m just dreading seeing them.” “What would you say to them, if you could say anything you could?”

You glanced over your shoulder and smiled. 

“That their son is king of the douches.”

Bucky grinned and you sighed, turning to face him, wiping your hands on a dish towel. 

“I’d love to say that wedding and not marrying their son was the best thing that ever happened to me, but I’m just not there yet.” “I get it.”

You met his eyes, smiling as you tossed the towel onto the counter behind you. 

“Of course … if it wasn’t for that disaster of a wedding, I might never have met you.”

Bucky smiled as he stepped closer to you. 

“And my life would be dreadfully boring.” “Oh, please.” “No, it’s true. Who would come over for movie night? Who would cook me soup when I’m sick?”

You rolled your eyes. 

“Yeah, that ‘man cold’ just about took you out this year.” “Hey.”

You snorted, and Bucky took your hand. 

“I, for one, will forever be grateful for your disaster of a wedding. My life wouldn’t be the same without you in it.”

You smiled, gently shoving his shoulder. 

“Don’t go getting all mushy on me, Barnes.” “It’s the truth, whether it’s mushy or not.”

You glanced up, going still when you saw the mistletoe hanging above Bucky’s head. He followed your gaze, blinking a few times before meeting your eyes again. You smiled, shaking your head. 

“You only have to do it when someone’s around to see. The kids keep score.”

Bucky nodded, giving your hand a gentle squeeze. He let go of you, and you felt a weird emptiness in your chest when you glanced up at the mistletoe again. You started to turn away, but Bucky took hold of your arms. You lifted your head, eyes widening when you saw the look on his face. 

“Buck?” “Just … don’t say anything.”

You swallowed, feeling your heart start to pound in your chest when he lifted one hand from your arm to cup your cheek. He slowly inched closer to you, and your eyes slid closed, feeling his breath against your lips. 

A loud crash made the two of you jump apart, and Bucky stepped in front of you, both of you leaning out the kitchen door see a man stand up and hurry towards the back door. 

“Clint?”

He glanced over his shoulder as he pulled his shirt into place, hair sticking up and pants unzipped. He smiled and waved at you, shrugging his shoulders before turning and running out the door. You bit back a laugh and looked up at a confused Bucky. You motioned with your head. 

“Clint is Natasha’s high school sweetheart. Anytime she comes back to town, he comes over so they can … catch up.” “You don’t say.”

Bucky glanced back down the hall and you took a step back from him covering your mouth with a hand. He cleared his throat and you shook your head, turning away from him, going to the bowl you’d set the bagel dough in. 

“Y/N—“ “I’ve got to get these bagels going. Shaped out and stuff. You should go back to bed.” “Y/N.” “We’ve got a big day tomorrow, Buck. Well, today. You need your rest.”

Bucky nodded, slipping his hands into the pockets of his pajama pants. 

“And what about you?” “I’ll be fine.”

Bucky nodded, and you went still when he moved directly behind you, close enough for you to feel his body heat. You closed your eyes, somehow suppressing a shiver down your spine when he whispered in your ear. 

“If you want to pretend that almost didn’t happen, fine. But know that it wasn’t an accident and I’m as messed up about it as you are.” “Buck—“

He leaned in to kiss your cheek, then turned and walked away. After a few long moments, you lifted your head, staring in the direction he’d gone.

“Earth to Y/N. You in there?”

You nodded in response to Hope’s question, lifting a hand to your mouth as you yawned again. Carol shook her head, pointing at you. 

“That’s like the fourth time you’ve yawned. What gives? How late were you up last night?”

You gave a quiet groan, shifting in your spot on the white couch. Natasha was beside you, and Carol and Hope were in chairs across from the couch, on the other side of the pedestal. You shook your head. 

“I couldn’t sleep.” “Oh, was that the creaking Cassie heard and then came and asked Scott and me about?”

You grinned.

“Nope, that was Natty.”

Hope’s eyes widened as Carol made a slow gasp. 

“I knew I heard the back door open after everyone had gone to bed! Clint came over, didn’t he?” “Fuck you very much, Y/N.”

You laughed and Natasha shifted, straightening out her legs and brushing a hand down her slacks. 

“Yes, he did. No, we’re not talking about it.”

Hope shrugged, resting her arms on her belly. 

“What’s there to talk about? You come to town, Clint comes over, you do the do, and that’s all until the next time you come to town.”

Carol snorted. 

“‘Do the do.’ Does the baby have ears, Hopie? Don’t want him or her to hear you say ‘fuck?’” “I’m trying not to be crude, Carol Anne.” “Don’t even start with the middle names.” “Ladies, ladies.”

You shook your head, yawning again. Natasha tapped her foot against the floor as she side-eyed you. 

“Are you this exhausted because of the bagels we had this morning—“ “Which were delicious, by the way.”

You smiled at Hope and Natasha tapped her foot again. You looked to her and she raised an eyebrow, a sultry smile coming to her face. 

“Spill.” “Darcy should be walking out any minute now.” “But she ain’t here yet, so spill.”

Carol and Hope moved to the edges of their seats and you groaned. 

“There’s nothing to—“ “Don’t lie. You’ve always been shitty at it.”

You glared at Hope, even as your cheeks warmed, and she waved a hand at you. You sighed, looking down at your hands. 

“I couldn’t sleep, so I decided to make bagels. Bucky came down and we talked for a while and ended up under the mistletoe.”

Carol gave a quiet squeal in her throat and you shook your head. 

“Clint tripped over his own feet and interrupted us.” “Damn it, Barton.”

You smiled at Carol’s eye roll, then sighed. 

“I just … he’s my friend. My best friend. He is the best friend I’ve ever had and I don’t want to mess that up. I can’t mess it up.” “And kissing him would mess it up?”

You looked to Hope, pointedly flicking your eyes to her belly, then back to her face. She rolled her eyes, patting her belly with a hand. 

“This did not happen because Scott and I kissed under the mistletoe. There was a lot—and I mean a lot—that happened before this.”

You looked to Natasha. 

“What about you and Barton?”

She raised one eyebrow. 

“What about me and Barton?” “Why haven’t you ever dated him?” “We dated.” “Holding hands in junior high doesn’t count.”

Natasha flipped Carol off without looking at her, making her laugh. Natasha shrugged. 

“We decided a long time ago that we’d just have fun with each other. Over the years, our definition of ‘fun’ happened to change to sex. We like where we are in our lives, but we like each other, too.”

You shook your head.  

“I don’t think I could do that.” “No, you’re way too monogamous for that.”

You looked to Hope, and she lifted her shoulders, shaking her head. 

“You wouldn’t be able to do a friends with benefits thing. You’d catch feelings at penetration.”

Carol made a gagging noise, holding a hand up to her sister. 

“Do not talk about penetration at the table.” “We’re not at the table. We’re at the wedding dress shop.” “Ever. Do not talk about penetration ever.”

You giggled as Carol shuddered. Natasha tapped your knee with a fingernail and you looked over to her. 

“Let’s say, just for shits and giggles, that Bucky likes you as much as you clearly like him.” “I don’t—“ “Oh honey, don’t even.”

Carol and Hope’s voices overlapped Natasha’s, all three of them shaking their heads and denying your claim. You looked from Natasha’s green eyes to Carol’s brown, landing on Hope’s hazel. She smiled at you, one hand gently rubbing her belly. 

“Everyone can see it, sweetie. You look at him like he hung the moon. And he’s all starry-eyed when he looks at you.”

Carol shook her head. 

“I don’t see what the problem is. You like him, he likes you—“ “And what happens when it ends?”

Carol, Hope and Natasha look over to you, and you shake your head, tears welling up in your eyes. 

“What happens when we get tired of each other? Or when he meets the one he’s supposed to be with? What happens when he asks me to marry him and then decides I’m not what he wants?”

You jerk your head to look at Natasha, who had hold of your hand, her nails digging into your wrist. 

“He’s not Peter. I’m personally offended that you would ever lump Bucky in a category with that human shitstain, because I know for a goddamn fact that Barnes would die before he hurt you.”

She dropped your wrist with a push, making it land in your lap. You stared down at your hands, a tear slipping down your cheek. Carol stood up and walked to the couch, and Natasha left the couch to take Carol’s chair. Carol scooped you into her arms and you shook your head as you moved it to Carol’s shoulder. She gently carded her fingers through your hair, speaking softly. 

“I know you’ve been hurt. I know it was horrible, and I know it’s hard to try to move on. But Y/N … you can't keep living like this. Trust me when I say you don’t have forever. Don’t wait.”

You closed your eyes, missing the way Hope watched Natasha, the way she stared down at her hands, lost in her own thoughts. You sat up and sniffled, wiping your eyes when you heard May’s voice announce that Darcy was coming out. You shook your head, meeting Carol’s eyes. 

“Tell me her dress isn’t a carbon copy of mine.” “Oh, no. This dress is much worse.” “She looks like a cross between a Southern Belle and a cupcake. It’s hideous.”

You laughed at Hope, the four of you standing up and waiting for Darcy to appear.

Bucky held the Scotch in his hand as he looked around the room. You’d been right. Anybody who was anybody in the state of Louisiana was at your family home tonight. You’d introduced Bucky to everyone from the governor and his wife to the local sheriff. You’d stayed by him through most of the beginning of the evening, and Hope had come by to warn him not to let you hide in the kitchen or the bathroom, which you’d been known to do. 

Natasha was working the room the way she worked deals, her sultry laugh filling the air while her throat sparkled with diamonds and the emerald gown she wore seemed to highlight the fire of her hair. Bucky noticed a man always near Natasha, watching her, tugging at his tie or his sleeves like he wasn’t used to his suit. You hung to the edges, never getting too deep in the crowd, breathing a sigh of relief whenever Bucky came near. You were gorgeous in your deep purple gown, hair pulled up, your mother’s jewels in your ears. Hope wore a navy blue dress that hugged her belly, Darcy was a vision in red, and Carol wore black slacks and a white puffy shirt, her hair in cascading curls with sparkling starburst pins near her crown. 

The dinner was exquisite, the drinks flowed like a river, the laughter echoing through the rooms. You were sitting close to Bucky as a band played outside, a few couples creating a makeshift dance floor. The doors were open, so the music drifted in at the perfect volume, and the night was not cold, but not hot, lingering in that comfortable temperature. 

“Want to dance?”

You smiled as you met Bucky’s eyes. You nodded and he offered you a hand. You took it, letting him lead you to the dance floor, laying both your hand and your chin on his shoulder. 

“Is it always like this?”

You smiled and nodded. 

“At least once a year. More, if there’s an election of some kind. Parties have been thrown in this house since before the Civil War.” “Really?”

You nodded. 

“There was talk that it was a whorehouse in the Depression, but Nana will vehemently deny that if asked.”

Bucky laughed, pulling you closer, his hand burning on the small of your back. The two of you moved along the floor in a comfortable silence, until his voice tumbled between you. 

“Hope told me not to let you hide in the kitchen.”

You sighed, nodding your head. 

“When I was younger, I had terrible anxiety whenever it came to talking to people I didn’t know. I’d go in the kitchen and hide, because they were so busy in there they never noticed me. Or I’d lock myself in one of the upstairs bathrooms. Only … one time I didn’t lock the door and Natasha and Clint came into the bathroom and I had to hide in the tub and wish I was dead while they … you know.”

Bucky leaned back to look into your eyes, his own wide and his mouth open. You laughed and nodded. 

“She doesn’t know about that, so keep it between us.” “Your secret’s safe with me, sweetheart.”

You smiled, letting it slide from your face as you moved closer to him, your face hidden from his. You and Bucky danced and talked for the better part of an hour, amid which your uncle Phil and uncle Hank cut in for a dance of their own with you. Bucky danced with your mom and then Nana, and you almost had to fight her to get him back. 

Bucky led you back to a table and you let out an appreciative groan when you sat in a chair. 

“These shoes are so pretty but my feet are killing me. Or, as we say here in the South, my dogs are barking.”

Bucky laughed, patting a hand on his thigh. 

“Want me to rub your feet?” “As tempting as that is, Nana would kill us. We have to look like ladies and gentlemen, even if we aren’t.”

Bucky grinned at you, the two of you turning when you heard your name mispronounced in the sweetest way. A smile spread over your face when a dark haired blur ran your way, and you stood up, bending down and catching the blur in your arms. 

“Hello, sweet girl! Oh, I’ve missed you!”

Bucky stood, noticing that all eyes in the room were on you. A tall, blonde woman appeared in the doorway, sighing when she saw you. She smiled and waved to people in the crowd, laying a hand on your back when she reached you. 

“As soon as Mom mentioned your name, she took off.”

You smiled at the woman, leaning to kiss her cheek. You pointed up and she groaned when she saw the mistletoe. 

“Not again.” “It’s a tradition:”

She shook her head, widening her eyes and rolling them towards her right. You smiled. 

“Pepper, this is Bucky Barnes. Buck, this is my aunt Pepper and this is … psst. Tell him your name.”

The little girl in your arms lifted her head off your shoulder, giving Bucky a once-over before speaking. 

“Morgan Maria Stark.” “Nice to meet you, Morgan.”

Pepper shook Bucky’s hand, then turned to you. 

“Sorry we’re late. The plane was grounded because of snow, and then you know how Tony is, always has to make an entrance.” “Well, when you’re worth a billion or so, you can do that.”

Bucky nodded, and you moved back to the table, sitting down with Morgan in your lap. Pepper patted your shoulder and then started making the rounds. The band started back up and Morgan looked up at you. 

“I missed you.” “I know, pumpkin. I’ve missed you, too.” “Daddy said we can move to New York if we wanted.”

You nodded, tucking her dark hair behind her ear. 

“You could, but who would watch out for Goose?”

Morgan shook her head. 

“Goose stays wif Carol.” “Well, what about Charlie?” “Daddy says Charlie is not our problem. But I love him.”

You smiled, looking over to Bucky. 

“Charlie is Nana’s basset hound. He loves Morgan.”

Bucky smiled and Morgan lifted her hands to your cheeks, making you look at her. 

“Is Bucky your boyfriend?”

Your eyes widened as he laughed, and Bucky shook his head. 

“And I think that’s my cue to go to the bar. Can I get you anything?” “Chardonnay, please.”

Morgan nodded. 

“Apple juice, please.”

Bucky grinned. 

“Coming right up.”

You watched him walk away and you shook your head, leaning in to touch your nose to Morgan’s. 

“You can’t say things like that, Morguna. Not until he’s not around.” “Is he though?”

You sighed. 

“No, he’s not. He’s just my friend.”

Morgan nodded. 

“Daddy says it’s okay for boys to be your friends. But that’s all.”

You shook your head, a smile on your face. 

“Your daddy thinks he knows everything, doesn’t he?”

Morgan nodded.

“He does his best thinking with juice pops and me.” “Oh, he does?”

She nodded again. 

“We make a great team.”

You smiled, resting your head atop hers, hugging her gently. 

“You’re one lucky little girl, Morguna Stark.”

You smiled at Morgan asleep on Tony’s shoulder, his other arm holding Pepper close. Hope and Scott were barely moving, one of his hands on her belly. Darcy and Ian were wrapped up in each other’s arms, cheeks pressed together. Natasha … well, you didn’t know exactly where Natasha was, but you had a hunch. You were sitting at the table again, Cassie asleep in the chair beside you, Bucky leaving Carol on the dance floor as she laughed and he shook his head. He smiled as he arrived at your table, sitting on your other side once he’d seen Cassie. 

“You okay?”

You nodded. 

“The party should be winding down soon. Once the little ones fall asleep, the big ones aren’t too far behind.”

Bucky smiled, turning as chants began rolling up from the dance floor. Cassie sat up, a frown on her face, and you laid a hand on her dark hair. She moved to rest her head in your lap, closing her eyes again. 

“Alright, alright! Fine.”

Cheers rose from the floor as Carol stepped up to the doorway, which was a few steps above the rest of the floor. You took in a breath, a smile on your face. Bucky turned to you, shaking his head. 

“What’s going on?” “Carol’s going to sing.”

Bucky’s eyebrows raised and you smiled. 

“She’s really good.”

She started to sing acapella, and just as you’d known would happen, the room became entranced. Carol’s voice brought everyone to a standstill, and you could only smile in pride as you listened to her. She sang two songs, and as the band began to play, she sang one last one. 

“Have yourself a merry little Christmas. Let your heart be light. From now on, our troubles Will be out of sight.”

You took in a breath, eyes on Carol who was resolutely not looking at you. Natasha, Hope, and Darcy, however, had all glanced back to find you. Bucky saw them looking towards you and you swallowed.

“Have yourself a merry little Christmas,  Make the Yuletide gay. From now on, our troubles Will be miles away.”

You closed your eyes, lowering your head. You blinked your eyes open and stared at the table, and Bucky reached over to take your hand. You grabbed onto his hand and held it tightly, staring at the table as Carol continued to sing. 

“Through the years,  We all will be together, If the fates allow. Hang a shining star Upon the highest bough.  And have yourself A merry little Christmas now.”

You swallowed, lifting a shaky hand to rest it on Cassie’s head. 

“Y/N? Are you—“

You shook your head, lifting tear-filled eyes to Bucky’s. 

“Take her.”

He moved to gently lift Cassie from the chair, holding her as she wrapped her arms and legs around him. He turned and watched as you rushed from the room, not stopping until you were outside. 

You took great, heaving breaths in and out, trying your hardest to stop the tears. There was no explanation for it. You couldn’t hear that song without crying. You hadn’t been that way until your father had died, and for some reason, “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” always made you cry. 

You felt somewhat in control of yourself and let out a shaky breath. You ran your hands down the front of your gown and nodded, turning to go back into the house. You stopped when you realized you weren’t alone, all the blood rushing from your limbs and going ice-cold when you saw the man before you. 

“Peter.”

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[evien-stark]

✧I Need You✧ Chapter 174

May 29th. The day of Tony’s birthday began early but slowly. The curtains drew back exactly as dawn began, 5:29AM. You spied the time on the clock before turning it away. Underneath you, Manhattan was already stirring. As were the two of you. Sleepy kisses brought on by the realization that the both of you were right there in each other’s arms moved from simmering to heavy in due time. Eventually you found yourself atop him, both sets of hips grinding in a senseless rhythm that promised more- at least until you pulled back, signaling a stall. You smiled at him and his own smile up was dazed. That was when you eased in on your arms as your nose brushed his. Waiting until the both of you were able to stop panting. When that finally came, “Good morning.” A simple purr of greeting. His eyes had fluttered closed before you’d even got those two words out. “-morning.” His own voice by comparison was a low, rocky rumble. Clearly half awake. Perhaps still partially dreaming. 

“Happy birthday.” Another two. “Seems that way.” He was grinning then, looking at you again with half-lidded eyes. Lazy kisses began anew. Small touches of your lips to his, and you denied every time he tried to arch in forward- both his mouth and his hips. You pinned him, stilling his movements as he got the message. “What would you like to do today?” Asked with a gentle hand carding back through his short hair. “You, mostly.” His grin then was nothing short of charmingly boyish. One of the most handsome looks he owned. Aside every other one. “Tony.” Not really a curve of warning. Just a little preen, another brush of noses. Another lingering kiss. 

When it ended again and he remembered to think, he was looking up at you. “First I’d like to finish this.” Pronounced with a rock of his hips to yours, a tighter grip of your hips to hold you there while he did it. Promising you it would be well worth it. Not that you’d ever questioned such a thing. Your smile gave him ample permission, but in between one deep kiss and another, “But-” 

He was losing his train of thought. And he seemed to actually want something for his birthday. It wasn’t a party. It wasn’t anything ordinary. You already knew from the day prior. But now he wanted to actually voice the thought again. So you slowed down to allow him room to breathe. “But…?” 

His free hand soothed up your spine completely, until he moved just high enough to cup the back of your neck. Holding you as he gazed up at you. “Let’s just drive. See where the day takes us.” He was looking to nest.

With you. He’d said as much earlier. This was what he wanted today. To find somewhere. And… now that you’d had enough time… that was exactly what you wanted, too. “What color car shall we take?” 

The sound of your giggles mixed with his own chuckling. “I’ll let you pick.” 

“Do you have somethiiiing…” Holding the word out on a hum. “...purple?” 

The shape of his smile sent a tremble straight through you while it was paired with those vibrations of mirth at the side of your neck. “Purple, huh? I’ve got lots of purple.” He ended the thought just about the same time his teeth closed around a patch of skin. Following it up with a suction- a swirl of his tongue that promised a bruise. But it renewed your fire, and soon you were writhing on top of him. Probably exactly what he wanted. He was laughing again. “-and so will you.” 

A sure promise that you enjoyed him making good on. 

                                                              ---

You left the penthouse at a quarter past seven. Enough time to finish what you were doing. And then again in the shower. Enough time to make Dvahli a nice breakfast and promise you’d be back. And also to apologize immensely about the comings and goings. About Pepper and Happy babysitting her in your absence (grateful though you were that you had those two to look after her during catastrophes). She seemed fine. And still affectionate. And as long as you and Tony were okay looking the other way on her vengeful peeing on a few things, as it was deserved, things were fine with your small family. And would be even better soon. As promised, Tony brought out a slick purple sports car. He’d probably been more concerned with the make than the color but it didn’t really matter to you one way or the other. The colorful LEDs on the dashboard, on the seats, and the HUD were a nice touch, though. 

The two of you fought over the radio, as Tony made the obvious approach to the Facility. He put on 70s and 80s rock and you went after the same decades but more dreamier, synthier, and poppier hits. Opposites attract and all… it was mostly playful ribbing about awful taste. From both sides. Liars that you both were, too. You liked a little rock. And he liked a little bop. Almost too soon, forty-five minutes of Tony-time-driving later (which may as well have been nearly two normal people hours), the two of you were sitting on the road across from the new Avengers Facility. 

He put his arms over the wheel, looking past the rim of his purple tinted lenses. Gazing out on the lawn. There was minimal activity. It had just turned eight in the morning. “How much further should we drive?” 

This was an important question. While he wanted to just go and see what there was to see, to get a feel for the lay of the land, he first needed to know one important thing. How far away did you want to be? Where did you think your comfort zone was? How far away from not only NYC did you want to be- Stark Industries and the Avengers Tower (transitioning away though you were)- how far away from the Facility did you want to be, too? How far away from them? 

It was surprising, that you hadn’t even thought about it yet. Faced with it now… “Ask me again in another hour.” An hour away from the Facility seemed like a good idea. Especially if it was a Tony-hour. That would put enough distance between your ideal dream home and… everything else. And if you still felt like it didn’t… you’d tell him to drive further. 

His hand went to grasp yours as he let off the brake. “Another hour.” Agreeing. Agreeing to whatever it took to make you happy. Because that was his happiness, too. 

                                                             ---

Tony’s driving north and then more north brought you out into vast landscapes of lush green. ...and corn. There was a lot of corn but. You decided to look the other way on it. Cities turned to towns turned to villages. Things started getting more spaced out. You went longer between places without seeing people or things to do. It was just… countryside. Upstate New York- further upstate than the Facility- it was a breath of fresh air. Literally. And right around nine o’clock, you really started seeing nothing at all. Until you pulled up in a town with still more nothing. But. At least one thing rather than nothing. 

Tony turned into a little parking lot in front of a very small shop. Just as your stomach was starting to rumble. You read the big sign hoping to attract customers. Natural Stone Bridges & Caves. But it was the smaller one hooked underneath it that took Tony’s immediate interest. “Oh look. A rock shop. A shop for rocks. Upstate really knows its clientele.” Indeed. The sign said… Rock Shop. It was easy to see just how unimpressed he was pretending to be, but you on the other hand were smiling. “Be nice.” 

“I was going to ask if you wanted to grab some breakfast, but who even knows if they have a diner in a place that sells rocks as its main attraction?” 

You gave him a little shove to the arm. “FRIDAY, where are we?” Information lit up on the HUD as she spoke. “We are currently in Pottersville, New York. Population of 437. And yes, boss, they have a diner. Two in fact.” “Oh!” He mocked. “Aren’t we lucky?” 

FRIDAY continued her well-deserved sass, “You passed them, already. If you’re too distracted by all the natural splendor, I can take the wheel.” Directions came on screen pointing him the opposite way. Tony pulled out of the tiny parking lot. “I’m impressed with myself. Missing them in the middle of all this nothing.” Though he was putting on an act, it was easy to tell he wasn’t all that grumpy. Actually… he was having a pretty good time. 

You eased back in your chair a little. “We could use a lot of nothing.” After everything you’d been through nothing sounded like an absolute blessing. These upstate New Yorkers really knew the secret to good living. He tried to hide his smile. “Maybe you’re onto something.” 

                                                             ---

The restaurant the two of you settled on was called the Black Bear. It was mostly empty save for a family of four in the back and a bored waitress- who immediately perked up halfway through her welcome speech when she realized who she was talking to. You assumed everyone in this small hamlet knew everyone else. So strangers were probably not plentiful up here. But then there was also… “Ohmygosh.” The two of you were who you were. You could go anywhere in the world. That probably wouldn’t change. Tony pulled his sunglasses off, slipping them into his jacket pocket and gave one of those winning smiles of his. “Hi. Can we have a booth? And some privacy. But I’m sure that won’t be a problem.” 

You made sure the little pinch to his backside was well hidden. “Just the two of us. Thank you.” She grabbed two plastic menus in her shaking arms and went straight into her most professional mode, making sure you were seated- a booth, as you’d asked, near a nice window, away from the other family- as Tony had not-so-subtly requested- and she brought coffee and a little thing of cream without you even having to ask, filling the mugs. “Coffee’s free- um- I’ll let you look over the menu and I’ll be back.” She was jittery with nervous excited energy. 

Strangers were one thing. You and Tony Stark were another. Immediately she went into the back and you could only assume she was talking to what was likely the only other person working here. And then also texting all her friends. Such was life. 

“Can’t ask for anonymity anywhere.” Tony sighed this out as he poured just a little creamer into his coffee and then lifted it to take a sip. “-that’s not as bad as I was expecting.” 

You smiled at him. “That’s not gonna change unless we retire to a hermit cave in the mountains.” 

“Totally doable. If that’s what you want.” “I don’t know that it is. I’d like to be somewhere remote, for safety. And privacy. But I also want…” You were trying to be nice about this. Tony grinned. “Less nothing?” 

“Like- for instance- I don’t want to have to drive an hour to get to a grocery store with actual food.” Okay. There it was. 

At this he couldn’t hold back his laughter. Reaching over, he put his hand atop yours. “My little city snob.” 

“I’m not a snob.” Protesting entirely too much. “I just… need a little bit of life near me. Even if that life knows who I am.” No, you didn’t want to become a complete hermit and shut yourself out from the world at large. But you didn’t want to be near a big city, either. You’d done that all your life and now you were kind of over it. You just wanted… “Somewhere comfortable and quiet but not-”

“Dead. Yeah. I agree.” He tipped his head forward, glancing at the table in the back- the people of which startled at their realizing they’d been caught staring and went back to pretending to mind their own business. “Though this place seems pretty alive.” 

It was the wrong move to make, looking over your shoulder at them, but you did it anyway. Tired parents with a teenage girl  and a slightly younger boy. They were alight with sudden excitement. You went back to looking at Tony. “I want somewhere safe. Somewhere… if- this is a huge if, Tony, so let’s not get into it right now- but if we decided to…” This spooked you. More than you realized. A strange anxiety gripped your chest. ...why was this so hard to get out? He took pity on you, giving your hand a little squeeze. “Yeah. Start a family that’s more human than animal. Discussion for a later time. We’re still looking for a house to put them in, first.” 

You were so grateful for him. That he understood things about you that even you didn’t seem to. “Well… if we go that route. I just want somewhere safe for them. That they can grow up normal, if that’s a thing that exists.” 

To this he took a long breath in and let it out as another sigh. “Not sure I know what that looks like.” “Me either.” For sure, Tony’s life had been far less normal than yours growing up. But even now your lives had been so unbelievable that normal was sort of getting phased out of your known words. “But whatever it looks like, it starts with somewhere safe. Somewhere paparazzi can’t hang out all day. Somewhere we don’t have to worry about neighbors taking pictures to sell to TMZ- but gated community celeb culture- I don’t want them near that either-” Over-sheltering them wasn’t good for them either- 

…these potential children that all too suddenly you were talking about. God. Were you and Tony really talking about kids right now? How had that happened? 

He was smiling at you. You only just realized as you’d come to a dead stop upon that realization. Tony was smiling at you very warmly. It abated the anxiety in your chest but replaced it with something else entirely. You heard the thought- she’ll make a great mother- and you didn’t know what to do with it. Or if you even wanted anything to do with it. So you were glad when that’s not what came out of his mouth. “Safe. Agreed. We could use that, too. And since it’s just us currently- Steve’s horrendous opinions aside-” 

Moving you to laughter all too easily over the thought. “Safe but not here. Why don’t we drive a little bit more after breakfast.” 

“Sounds good to me.” 

Caught up in each other, you hadn’t noticed the two kids approaching the table finally. It had been bound to happen eventually. “Excuse me-” 

This seemed… familiar. Though you’d had this encounter before, hundreds of times by now- you remembered one very similar to this. An older girl and a younger boy. ...and you also remembered that hadn’t gone well. You turned away from Tony to smile at them. “Hi there.” 

She was beaming a little more attentive to her own nervous energy. The boy on the other hand was practically bouncing on his feet. “Can I get a selfie with you?” “Oh- sure-” You’d thought she would ask for an autograph. Her taking out her phone to snap a picture with you was also a practiced trick at this point, but a little more personal than a signature on a piece of paper. 

The boy on the other hand started babbling at Tony. “Iron Man!!” “That’s what they tell me.” 

“Did you bring the suit??” 

“Not this time. Sorry about that, kid. Otherwise I’d have let you take it out for a spin.” “Look at my drawing!! It’s a rocket ship!!” 

“Let me look at that- oh- nice quad thrusters. And the panel siding is expert stuff. Pretty impressive.” 

Tony was filling that small boy jam packed full of wonder and pride. Iron Man was complimenting his work. All his dreams were coming true. And Tony was doing it without a second thought. ...one day, maybe, he’d make a great dad. A thought that had crossed your mind more than once. “Can I get your opinion?” The girl took your attention back as the waitress was approaching. “I’m looking at colleges soon- my mom says it’s too early- that I should take some time off- but I’m finishing up senior year already- I want to get into business- but the good schools for that are so far. People think I should just stay closer to home- but I want to do what you do.” 

“Run Stark Industries?” Tony quipped while drawing a crude Iron Man in red crayon on that boy’s rocket ship picture- at the kid’s request, of course. 

The girl paled. “No- I mean I’d love to work there- but-” 

You caught her attention again. “Find a school you like. Even if it’s far away. Figure out what you want to do and how you want to apply that to the business world. I’ll let you in on a little secret- Stark Industries is about to start up its internship programs under a new banner. We could use kids like you.” 

“Oh- gosh- are you serious right now??” Like you’d just offered her the world on a silver platter. “I wanna look at stuff now. I kind of wanna go now. But that stuff spooks my mom. She says if I leave in a few months- in September- I’ll be trying to remember what life was like when it’s all going so fast.” 

Something prickled up Tony’s spine. Something worrisome. You looked at him briefly, but his head was down. So you put your attention back on her. “Look. You have to figure out what’s best for you. I’ll give you some contact information. Don’t turn opportunities down out of fear of regret.”

She nodded. “Yeah- yeah. That’s what I keep saying.” Then she shook her head. “Sorry- for taking so much of your time- I really appreciate it. You have no idea how much. How can my mom say no after you said to go? This is amazing.” 

You weren’t sure you wanted that responsibility on your shoulders. Especially so early in the morning. 

                                                             --- You’d left Catherine with a number to call and an email to mail- Pepper’s, of course. And while you were handing out selfies, the waitress felt emboldened to ask both you and Tony for one. Breakfast was okay after that. Once you were back in the car, safe and sound, driving away again, Tony tapped his hands on the wheel. “We’re starting up big internships again, huh?” “I think it’s a good idea. And hey, look, I’ve heard rich people who retire love getting into philanthropy.” Teasing just a little. “Give me some credit. I’ve always been a philanthropist. It’s one of my key identifiers.” Grinning, you laid your head on his arm. “So what’s the problem then, Mr. Philanthropist? I think this new generation coming up- they’re gonna have it harder than most. What with all these terrible things that keep happening… we need to help them a little.” 

Tony nodded. “I agree. I think we should go beyond internships. How about a new grant program? A new foundation? For all the upcoming youths? College is hard enough. Let’s give ‘em a hand.” There was something on his mind very suddenly. A strange feeling seemed to be ghosting him.

“I like that.” You certainly had no disagreements with it. Helping kids was a worthwhile cause. Especially like the pair back in that diner, now miles away. But… you couldn’t look the other way on his suddenly odd behavior. “What was it that that girl said?” 

His fingers drummed on the wheel again. “Hm.” A soft noise. Knowing he’d been caught. But only because it was you. Yet, similarly, because it was you, he seemed unafraid to unload. “FRIDAY, play Try to Remember- any female artist.” 

“Yes, boss.” 

The song information came up on the HUD. Try to Remember, Patti Page. You found yourself a little nervous, a little confused, but sat there, still snugged up against him, as a slow piano started playing. Patti’s voice was not too long after. “Try to remember, the kind of September, when life was slow and oh, so mellow… Try to remember, the kind of September, when grass was green and grain so yellow…” 

He reached forward to turn the music down after the first minute. But waited even longer than that to speak. You let him take his time. “Mom used to sing that song all the time. Especially when I’d be on breaks from college. The kid in the diner- I don’t know what it was. It just… reminded me of her. A little bit. She’d ask me to slow down all the time. To be fair I was just a kid. But everyone knew that wasn’t happening. She sang it- ...she sang that song. The last morning I saw her.” 

Tony was gripping the wheel so tight, little tremors running through him. You sat back just a little, running your hand over his arm. This was painful and raw. He’d never given himself a chance to process his parents’ deaths. To think that girl had just connected some dots… Opened a door he’d closed for a long time… It was hard to know what to say. “Do you want to name the grant after her?” 

His smile was brief and bittersweet. “Let’s not be so obvious about it.” 

The song was still playing. “How about… The September Foundation?” 

It didn’t take him long to fall into a nod. “Less obvious. It works. Let’s go with that.” 

Carefully you touched your hand up in a caress near his eyes and then leaned in to press a kiss to his temple. “I didn’t know her- but the way you talk about Maria- I know she loved you. More than anything.” 

“Well. Someone had to, I guess.” Deflecting the statement nearly instantly. Which he caught himself doing, and felt sudden guilt over. There was a deep bitterness there that you knew was reserved for someone else. He tried to rectify his learned defense mechanisms. Only because it was you. “She did her best. And she always did right by me. I think making a foundation- to help kids- in her honor- it’s a little overdue.” 

“Let’s call it fashionably late.” Smiling gently at him, moving to lay your head on his arm again. A certain ease of peace settled over him. You felt his smile without seeing it. “She’d like that.” As the song came to an end he went back to drumming his fingers on the wheel. The quiet inside the car was comfortable. Then finally, “...she would have loved you.” 

This statement filled you with too much to bear. The way he said it- the way he felt saying it. Not all of the feelings were terrible. There was some sure pride in there- knowing he was committing his life to a woman his mother would have highly approved of. Knowing his mother would have loved you like her own. And loved you for taking care of her son. 

Your arms curled around his. “I would have loved her, too. I’m sorry that I never got the chance to thank her. For raising you right.” 

He let a little breath of a laugh go. “Questionable. You had a hand in some of this mess, too.” Maybe that was true. Tony hadn’t always been a good person. He’d tried his best… in some ways, before everything had happened. 

“I think you turned out pretty good.” 

“Well. Your opinion is really the only one that matters anymore. So. Glad to hear it.” 

                                                             ---

You drove a lot longer still. Weaving then, in and out of towns. Now it wasn’t just about how far up north you were- a good distance, but survivable for a drive- or even easier, a flight in the suit (or a jet)- now it was about finding a town that had life that suited the both of you. While it was true, you’d never be able to abandon your life of jet setting, even in superhero retirement, you still wanted somewhere to put a homebase down. Somewhere that, frankly, didn’t suck. Catherine and her brother were nice people. But you didn’t want to live in a place so small that had nothing. Driving that way, picking on small towns in the comfort of your high-tech car (like city snobs might do…), hours passed. Tony liked one thing, you hated the other. It suddenly seemed terribly impossible to pick a place. Almost like the two of you were avoiding actually doing it. Which would have been another problem entirely. But you were sure that wasn’t the case. You also were sure that you deserved to have all your standards met. This is where you and Tony were going to live together for the foreseeable future, after all. It had to be perfect. And you would accept no less. Luckily he was just as amenable to those terms as you were, seeing that he was having a fine time driving around accomplishing nothing right up until sunset. Sunset on his birthday. A perfect time to find a perfect town. A huge lake ran through it. Mountains painted a beautiful backdrop. And life was thriving a little bit more than too-small Pottersville. The shops were nice. The people seemed calm. The whole place had a very nice atmosphere. But even better… following the winding lake up about thirty minutes to where it splayed out so beautifully, you were able to actually get out of the car. And start looking around. The two of you were lucky you had money to spend. More than ten lifetime’s worth (even more than that, really). It made it easy to just speculate on properties. Ones without homes. Plots of land that were wholly untouched. Waiting for just the right developer to come along. Well. There the both of you were. Other homes dotted the lake on the other side, but you went further in. You wanted something secluded. Beautiful and safe, as you’d put it earlier that day. It took some doing. Some wandering. Some hiking. But eventually… Eventually a spot called out to you. A perfect spot, no less. It was guarded by trees on all sides, save for the little road down the way that ran through. It hugged a round of the lake and its picturesque views. Your mind started working. Started thinking. If this was it… and it felt like this was it… 

“This is nice, here.” Talking into the open air, back turned on Tony. “You like this spot?” An open question. One of curiosity and not because he disliked it in kind. 

“Yeah… yeah I think so.” You looked back at him while saying so, smiling, and then turned again to look out. Holding your hands up, you tried to frame it out. “It’s a big spot. I don’t want a huge house but… big enough- and it’s quiet here. And it feels protected with all these trees. The lake is so nice. And- we could even hang a tire swing up right there on that big one- put a fence up around. And have a nice porch out front. And a deck out back.” Letting the picture flow through you as you tried to visualize it. “Yeah. I like this spot.” Finally. This was it. You realized too little too late that Tony had been suspiciously quiet. And when you turned- 

Your heart squeezed. And your brain went into overdrive. He was kneeling- Scratch that. One knee. He was on one knee. 

He had his elbow perched on that knee, and in his fingers he held a ring. No box. Just a ring. A gorgeous ring. You glanced, briefly, and knew that it was beautiful- but your eyes couldn’t stay there. No. Instead they went to his. He was painted in the most gorgeous light by the sunset. But those colors didn’t hold a candle to the ones radiating off him. And they certainly had absolutely nothing on that smile he was wearing. The warmth of his eyes. The sureness of his heart. Yet there was a little quiver of nervousness. This was it. This was happening. He’d picked his moment. This was the moment. “Tony.” Not sure if you were warning him or begging him. Your mind was a sudden mess. Reeling. How had you missed this? How had you missed that this had been on his mind all day? 

“Yes, honey?” “Are you proposing to me- on your birthday?” It seemed so ludicrous. 

His smile warmed further. “Seems like the kinda thing I would do.” Giving a simple shrug. “Look- let’s face it. I’m selfish. I said I wanted a house for my birthday- but what I really want is you. Now- let me do this- I get one chance at it. So I get to do the talking now. And you better believe I’m gonna milk this for all it’s worth.” 

You were sure very soon you were going to cry. Your heart was aflutter. But. For the moment. While he was asking for your undivided attention, you were keen to give it to him. Turning fully to him, you clasped your hands in front of you. You felt yourself wearing the biggest dumbest smile to ever exist, but you couldn’t stop yourself. “Okay, Tony. Go ahead.” 

He blinked up at you. Almost like he was expecting you to refuse him- again. Tell him to wait for some other date that didn’t exist. But you hadn’t done that. “Uh.” An anxious swell bubbled out from his heart, and his grin was oh so telling. “I hadn’t anticipated being so nervous- is it normal to be nervous?” Tony Stark floundering over asking you to marry him. What a sight. Your heart in turn called out to him, and you moved your hand, gently cupping the side of his face. His smile went completely lopsided then as he melted almost immediately. “I’ll wait.” Teasing, but only in the sweetest of ways.

 This seemed to boost up his courage and help him gather his thoughts, and finally waiting only moments after your permission and your encouragement, he started strongly, “I love you. More than anything. You are my one constant. I thought about this- about what I’m supposed to say- thought maybe I should rehearse something… but I knew when we got here, I’d know how to make sense of all this. But looking at you now- finally being here- I know none of it makes sense. Nothing we’ve been through or seen makes any sense. But I know that you’ve stood by me during all of it. And I know that without you, I wouldn’t have stood a chance. Against any of it. Maybe even myself.

I love you. And this is it. We’re here. Finally. I’m ready. I love you, and I want to try this whole white-picket-fence thing. Alright- maybe not so cliche- but you get the idea. Before you, I didn’t care about any of that. And now… before leaving yesterday, it was on my mind constantly. That I just wanted to take you and be together. You said you wanted somewhere safe- I want that, too. But for me, safe is with you. Home is with you. We can pick this spot in front of the lake, and credit where it’s due, it’s a nice spot, but even if we just threw up a tent here- as long as I had you- that’s all I care about.

So. Really. I’m getting to the part where I ask. I’m sensing there’s probably very little objections but- between the two of us- I’ve been known to be wrong maybe once or twice a decade. I figured I’d ask. And make it official.” He took a big steadying breath. His eyes had not once moved from yours, even during his little sassy asides, even when his smile moved more into a smirk or a grin, but right now it was just that. A gorgeous smile. And eyes only for you. “Will you marry me?” A very small beat and then his brows lifted as he asked, “...please?” 

Tears had started. You couldn’t help a sniffle. What a question. Would you marry Tony Stark? Well. ...obviously. The hand still holding his cheek cradled him a little closer still before you brushed your fingers back up, touching at his temple and then straying through his hair. His eyes went just a little half-lidded. He was glowing. So were you. He melted further still with your touch. Your care. Your love. And waited patiently. He’d waited so long to do this. A few seconds more while you collected yourself was nothing. 

But that was all you really needed. “Yes, Tony.” This was soft but the next approval almost punched through you as he took your hand in his and slid that ring- perfectly sized- onto your finger. “Yes.” That’s when the crying really started. Like he’d broken the dam. There was no coming back from this. 

He lifted your hand after settling the ring there, pressing a kiss to your knuckles. And then he got up from his kneeling position, taking you in his arms, kissing you soundly. Almost a little intensely- it threatened to make your knees go weak. He was internally vibrating with so much energy- all of it warm and wonderful. You looped your arms around his neck, pressing up on tiptoe just to be closer. 

One kiss sunk into another and another and you caught yourself mumbling between each lift of lips- “Yes… yes…” Because yes. This was your moment. Together. You were finally, officially, agreeing to a future together. He caught your smile against his mouth as it really dawned on you this was really happening, and when his lips curved against yours, preventing another full kiss, you spoke in a warbly tone. “Happy birthday.” Just a little clip of watery giggles afterwards. 

His hands raised, holding the sides of your face, forehead pressed to yours as he smiled so widely it must have hurt. “No kidding. And, hey, you got me exactly what I asked for. Thanks.” Laughing a little, perhaps at his own absurdity. His eyes were just a little wet. 

“You’re welcome.” 

God did you love this man. With all your heart, with every part of you. And you were so ready to step into this next new unknown. Because it was together. Forever. 

#Tony Stark #Tony Stark x Reader #INY Chapter One Hundred Seventy Four

[captainchrisfics]

Out of Fenway Park

About: A SoCal born-and-raised reader relocated to Boston, where the very last thing she expects is to run into Chris Evans at a Red Sox game with beer dripping down her head and his hotdog plastered to her shirt. Literally, running into him, and then somehow still getting a date out of it.

Word Count: 3,365

Requested By: Anon. Thanks so much for sending this in! Absolutely love this story, thanks for giving me the opportunity to write it. Feel free to send in any other reqs!

P.S. I’m sorry but, as deeply as I love Boston, I’m just a New Yorker, posting a fanfic on the internet, asking you to forgive me for my inability to give the Red Sox the dignity of winning- feat. the best gif I could find of him repping the team

The sun was the only reason I agreed to go to this baseball game anyway and even that had failed me. I was looking forward to sitting back with its warmth washing over my skin so I could close my eyes and try to pretend like I was back on a beach in Southern California. Instead, it was borderline freezing rain and all I could think about was the ground being even muddier with the still melting snow and how I couldn’t tell if there really was rumbling thunder or if it was just the shouts of countless Bostonians surrounding me, cheering on the Red Sox. They were up against the Yankees and even I could tell it wasn’t looking good, but that didn’t dampen their home-team spirits.

My coworkers were maybe the worst of the bunch, drunkenly yelling profanities at the players while they sloshed their beers in agreement with one another’s profane criticisms of the pitcher. I was almost regretting giving up SoCal for a job offer I could hardly dream of fresh out of college with the only downside being that it was on the east coast. Anyone could’ve told you I despised the cold, being too far from the ocean, and the Patriots, maybe not in that order. But even more than that I knew I’d hate myself if I passed up this opportunity. So, without giving more thought than I maybe should’ve, I packed everything I could into three suitcases and a carry-on and moved across the country, hopes probably higher than the plane. 

Winter, however, brought me crashing back down to reality. Everything in nature either died or got the right idea to chase the sun south. I was stuck with snowbanks higher than my knees and a proper coat was nowhere in sight. Not that it mattered much anyway, the weather felt like it was freezing my bones to their core no matter what I wore. Initially, I had this glamorous idea of curling up by the window with a blanket on my lap as the fire crackled, holding a book in one hand and a hot chocolate in the other. Hitting the pavement after slipping on ice knocked the ignorantly blissful can-do attitude right out of me the first time. And the second and the third and I lost count after that.

Which is exactly why I agreed to come to this baseball game in the first place. Back home, spring meant warmer days and blooming flowers and short sleeve t-shirts. I thought I’d get to enjoy a little bit of sunlight at the very least, maybe get to finally connect with my coworkers in a meaningful way outside of asking for help to unjam the copy machine. However, the start of the season in this hell hole apparently included a lot more of the lion than the lamb and a rowdy crowd of Red Sox fans who thought it was good enough for shorts anyway and drank like alcoholic fish to top it all off.

A girl I shared the wall of my cubicle with, Alex, wrapped a lazy arm around my shoulders, pulling me too close into her Heineken haze than I was comfortable given the fact that I barely knew her. Plus, being the only sober one was never any fun. I had a feeling they only invited me under the guise of getting to know each other better considering all I’d become familiar with was the smell of their beer burps. After all, being barely of-age and the new kid made me their permanently designated driver, even though we’d taken the T here. 

“Know the difference between a Yankee and uh,” Alex paused to laugh at her own joke and let out a hiccup, “a pothole?” She was hanging onto me for support, speaking close enough to my ear that it could’ve been a secret though she was saying it loud enough for the rest of our group to hear over the boom of other fans. “I’d swerve for the hole!” 

I chuckled a little to be nice, although I didn’t think it was very funny. Our coworkers to Alex’s right, on the other hand, guffawed as if it was the most hilarious thing they’d ever heard. Preferring their reaction and acting almost in slow motion, she raised her cup in cheers of herself and simultaneously turned to the others, sloshing the frothy drink until it rained down on me.

I shot up out of my seat as the cold beer trickled down my back. Everyone paused, eyes glued to me for my reaction as I tried to maintain my temper. I used my hands like windshield wipers, tossing the liquid on my face to the floor with an angry snap of my wrists. Alex started to profess a slurred apology, but I held up my hand for an extra second or two to compose myself. “It’s...” I paused to suck in another deep breath. “It’s okay. Accidents happen. I’m gonna go clean up.” Before she could offer to help, I whipped around and jumped down the stadium’s stairs two at a time.

My cheeks were hot with embarrassment as I scanned the hall, looking for something resembling a bathroom sign frantically. People were probably busy enough with their own agendas, be it getting back to the game or buying a baseball hat, but I still felt every set of eyes boring into me. So I tried to put my head down and run to the closest restroom until I hit a wall instead. 

Literally, it sent me tumbling to the floor until I landed on my ass, melting into a messy puddle of beer mixed with my former self. Contrary to my belief, someone said, “I didn’t see you there.”

My eyes left my hands, where I’d tried to bury my face like an ostrich in the sand, to see a broad man bending down on his knees before me. He had a Red Sox cap pulled low over his face, a thick beard, and a light grey t-shirt with a dark wet patch in the middle of his chest. Must’ve been where we collided. “I’m so sorry,” he continued with the exaggerated o’s and r’s that sound like ah’s, still so wrong to my west coast ears. I spotted an empty disposable food tray in his hand and looked down to see the hotdog it’d previously housed glued to my stomach by its condiments. Exactly what I needed. 

“Are you alright?” He extended a hand to help me up, but I couldn’t move. Instead, I just sat sprawled on my butt at Fenway Park, reeking of somebody else’s alcohol, staring at this beautiful stranger. His concerned look turned a little suspicious the longer I sat there without grabbing his hand, my mouth moving like a fish out of water. All I had to say was yes or I am or something, anything really, but I couldn’t even manage a three-letter sentence.

Instead, I peeled his hotdog off of my shirt and returned it to its little white boat. “Oh, uh, thanks I guess. Or sorry, I mean.” He adjusted his hat and cleared his throat before extending his hand again. “Is there anything I could do to… help?” His eyes scanned me again as if he were sizing me up, making me even more self-aware of the awful state I was in. 

“Bathroom,” I blurted out as my mind caught up, barely able to rip my eyes from his biceps. He stitched his eyebrows together, back to confusion again, though I didn’t give him any time to ask questions before I all but snatched his hand and he hoisted me up. 

“Nice to meet you, Bathroom. I’m Chris,” he said with a smirk, teasingly shaking my hand. “You didn’t hit your head, right?” He tried to subdue a laugh, but the playful look in his deep blue eyes betrayed him as he reached to brush off my shoulder.

“Very funny,” I shot back with an exaggerated roll of my eyes, betting my smile gave me away. “As in Evans, right? You look too much alike for it to be a coincidence.”

He played with the sunglasses tucked into his shirt’s collar, probably wishing he’d kept them on for the sake of a disguise. Chris only shrugged, claiming he would neither confirm nor deny. I didn’t need him to though, I’d been stuck watching Marvel movies with my brothers long enough to recognize those cheekbones anywhere. “I’m more of an Iron Man fan anyway,” I tried to emphasize my nonchalance in the hopes that I wouldn’t scare him off. “What I meant was I need help finding the bathroom.”

“Oh, yeah. Just passed one over there I think…” Chris trailed off as his eyes swept over the stadium, looking with much more of a level-head than I could. He found one almost immediately and laced his fingers between mine so it was more like we were holding hands. In a silly school-girl kind of way it made my cheeks flush, which was awfully embarrassing that, given my condition, holding hands with a cute boy was what had turned me into a tomato. Then he tugged me in the direction he came from and I wasn’t in the position to protest.

There was only so much I could do with thin paper towels, lukewarm water, empty soap dispensers, and a tide stick from a kind woman who took pity on me. Still, I spent a while scrubbing at the mustard and ketchup stains and wringing my stringy hair over the sink. It was long enough that I was more than surprised to see Chris leaning against the wall coolly. One foot was pressed against the wall and his arms were crossed over his chest while he whistled a tune.

“Is that The Little Mermaid?” I asked with a wrinkled nose, sounding more dumbfounded to hear this burly, bearded, lumberjack-looking man all but belting out Under the Sea than I was to see he’d been waiting for me.

Chris only shrugged, a crooked grin softening his features. 

“Is that a problem?” He cocked an eyebrow and flexed his arms as he crossed them as if to challenge me. But there was this twinkle in his eye that betrayed his demeanor so all I did was shake my head. I tucked some hair behind my ear as I glanced back at Chris, who looked far too satisfied with himself as he said, “Good thing since I owe you some ice cream.”

Chris started walking away, taking quick steps so long I had to take two for each of his to keep up. I called his name but he ignored me until I grabbed his hand to get his attention, which it certainly did as he squeaked to a halt. He squeezed mine before letting it go, looking at me curiously. 

I wasn’t quite sure exactly what I was going to say until it was already tumbling out of my mouth. “If anything I owe you a hotdog,” I muttered, avoiding his stare. Not that I was uncomfortable waltzing off with a stranger in the limelight, which I totally was. Not that my coworkers were waiting for me and would never believe I’d been getting ice cream with Chris Evans, which was also true. Not any of the totally valid reasons to feel a little funny about this whole thing. Instead, I insisted on buying a hotdog for a guy I was sure had more cash sitting in his bank account than I’d ever see. 

“Don’t be ridiculous, my lunch had it coming,” Chris insisted with a swipe of his hand, playfully brushing me off. “Your shirt, however, did not deserve that stain.” His pointed finger dropped to the orangey Rorschach test permanently painted just below my chest, getting a laugh from me. 

“Here,” Chris said as he untied the hoodie around his waist. I tried to keep my eyes from wandering to his stomach, where his shirt lifted a little higher than it should’ve been allowed, revealing the curve of his chiseled hips and the beginnings of a fuzzy trail dipping below his belt. “Take this to cover that up.” He handed me his sweater covered in pet hair and I slipped it on immediately, hoping it would hide my wild blush for a few seconds at least until I popped out the other side. It smelled like a dog had been curled up to it coupled with an intoxicating cologne I didn’t recognize and crisp air right before it rained.

I thanked him but Chris shrugged and puffed out his bottom lip before resuming his long strides to the concession stand, tugging me behind like luggage. “Plus, the game is already over. I don’t have to watch my boys actually lose. Maybe if you’d been a Yankees fan, I could’ve excused the whole sweeping you off your feet thing... but come to think of it you aren’t repping the Red Sox either.” He side-eyed me suspiciously without pausing until he nearly hit someone else’s back. 

“That’s an awfully nice way to put sending me tumbling to the concrete,” I scoffed, skidding to a stop at Chris’s side in line. “And sports culture is just misplaced nationalism if you ask me.” I crossed my arms to emphasize my point when I was met with raised eyebrows and a slack jaw. 

“Then what are you doing here exactly?” He asked, keeping one eyebrow perched a little higher than the other. There was something about the way he smiled at me, all genuine and gentle, and this look in his wide eyes. Whatever it was, I felt like I could tell him everything. So I did.

“All I wanted to do was sit in the sun,” I started, completely aware of how much I sounded like a toddler who missed her nap as I launched off into everything as if he’d been the one pulling up to watch my origin story with popcorn in hand. I told him about how much I missed California and how I felt like I hadn’t met anyone here who got me the way my friends did back home. And how much I loved the work I was doing, the way the end of every day left me feeling complete until I left the office, and how I didn’t think I could survive another Nor’easter for it. I spilled my guts along with the can of worms Chris didn’t mean to open as the concession line grew shorter until we were at the front. 

He ordered chocolate and vanilla cones, giving me the choice between the two once they were handed over so I thanked him.  We walked around the stadium for a while, bumping hips on occasion and crunching on our cones while we chatted about anything and everything except what I’d said earlier. That was until Chris suddenly stopped to sit on a bench, grabbing my hand to take me down with him. He cleared his throat before speaking with more of a serious air to him so I knew to brace myself for what was coming. 

“You’re young, yeah?” he asked, shoving his napkins into a nearby bin. I nodded as I sucked what I could out of the bottom of my cone, though I felt like I’d done a lot of growing up lately. “You’ve got a lot of time to figure these things out. Trust me, I know California is nice, but there’s a reason why I keep coming back to Boston.”

I thought about what he’d said for a beat or two, but I’ll be honest, it was difficult sitting next to him. It was awfully cold with the sun tucked far behind the clouds all day so I was grateful that Chris was so warm. Even his hoodie retained his heat, although I still curled up a little deeper into his side than I might’ve if he wasn’t a human radiator. “Mind telling me why?” I asked, popping the last of my ice cream into my mouth.

He shook his head as he said, “Sure, oh man. So many reasons…” I watched as his blue eyes rose as if he could see the sky through the stadium ceiling, the corner of his jaw flexing as it clenched and relaxed as he thought about it. “Other than my family being in Mass, there’s always something to do. We’ve got the best museums and such a rich history, if that’s your sort of thing,” he paused to scratch his beard as he thought a little more. 

His blue eyes nearly popped out of his head as another thing occurred to him. “The culture is something else. There’s something really special about a middle finger being a sign of affection to some poor sap giving tours in colonial clothing and everyone joining in to sing Sweet Caroline on the T on the way home from a game,” Chris continued with animated, sweeping waves of his arms, talking with a kind of passion for a town I couldn’t imagine having in my heart. He shook his head as he added, “And the food is great, too. I mean, where else do they have a whole word for cod that isn’t really cod?”

I laughed from the bottom of my stomach, where I expected a heavy pit of anxiety to be sitting at the beginning of a conversation like this. My homesickness and unhappiness here wasn’t something that I told anyone before out of fear of disappointing someone or being unable to admit my failure out loud. Chris was easy to talk to, more than a stranger usually was. Their judgment never really mattered to me, knowing that I’d probably never see them again. It wasn’t like that with him though, it was easier than that. I felt like he didn’t really judge me at all. He only tried to understand, help, and make me smile while he was at it. And I couldn’t deny a part of my heart that hoped I’d see Chris again. Not only again, but a lot.

“The people aren’t too bad either,” he smiled sheepishly, bumping our shoulders together and looking at me through his dark eyelashes in a way that made me feel like the only person here. As if I was the only one he was talking about. Chris took a deep breath that puffed up his chest, one he didn’t release until after his arm was comfortably slung over my shoulders. “Just give the city a shot, I think it’ll surprise you.”

I wanted to tell him it already had, really he had, but instead, I laughed dryly and said, “Hell, this city makes me feel like I need a shot.” I leaned my head on Chris’s shoulder as it shook with his chuckle, looking up at him to see how he rolled his eyes even though they were scrunched by his smile. 

“Know what?” he said like he was asking himself with a deep, shaky breath. He shot up from the bench as if he’d been shocked. I obviously didn’t know Chris well, but even I could tell he was nervous as he rubbed his palms dry on his jeans. “Let’s go get a drink then, instill a little Boston pride in you. There’s this great pub down a couple blocks with live music and everything. I mean, if you want to…?” He scratched the back of his head with one hand and extended the other to me with his offer. 

When I grabbed it, Chris broke out into a grin that made my stomach feel like I was on a rollercoaster. “I’d love to,” I said with a smile that barely held a flame to his. Neither of us made an effort to let go so Chris tugged me toward Fenway’s exit. As we left, I heard tens of thousands of Red Sox fans sigh like deflated balloons before the screams of just as many obscenities broke out. Probably another point for their opponents, but it certainly didn’t make me feel like I’d hit anything short of a home run.

Tags: @patzammit​ , @thegetawaywriter​ , @coffeebooksandfandom​ , @captainsteveevans​ , @intrepidandabitcrazy​ , @super100012​ , @spilledinkindumpster​

If you’d like to be tagged in my future fics, please reply to this post :)

#disclaimer: it's been a while since I went to an mlb game and I've never been to one at Fenway so forgive me #I'm a history nerd who spends my time in Boston at as many museums as I can #Chris Evans #CEvans #chris evans fanfiction #chris evans fanfic #chris evans fic #chris evans x reader #imagine chris evans #chris evans imagine #chris evans drabble #cevans fanfiction #cevans fic #Cevans fanfic #imagine cevans #cevans imagine #cevans drabble #chris evans masterlist #cevans masterlist #steve rogers fanfiction #steve rogers fanfic #steve rogers fic #chris evans oneshot #chris evans one shot #cevans oneshot #cevans one shot

[buzzdixonwriter]

Duty Now For The Future (part one)

Welcome to the start of the 21st century.

Oh, I know the calendar says it started January 1st, 2001 (and if you’re one of those who think it began January 1, 2000, go to your room and think about what you’ve done).

But as has been pointed out by David Brin, centuries in the human sociological sense start after that.  Brin’s contention is that the 14th year after the start of the calendar century is when the real new century kicks into gear but again, that’s putting a clock-like timetable on very messy and imprecise human affairs.

But he’s right insofar as some major cultural break needs to occur -- and it doesn’t have to be a bad one; a treaty to put an end to nearly incessant war is just as effective.

Now, a lot of people thought 9/11 was out cultural break, but as traumatic as it was for Americans in general and New Yorkers in particular, it really didn’t impact the rest of the world that much.

Oh, they felt a certain amount of shock, to be sure, and the pity and generosity and goodwill expressed were sincere, but there was also a tinge of “Welcome to the party, yanks.”

See, they had been facing terrorism of various stripes for quite some time, and they saw the US as unduly fortunate to have sidestepped their misfortunes.

9/11 put an end to that, and for a brief while 90% of the planet were our friends (the remaining 10% were cackling with glee, but that’s a different topic).

Then we went and screwed it all up.

We screwed it all up because we had an ineffectual president and corrupt sociopathic thugs who saw the attack as a means to extend their power both as a party and as individuals.

So we launched into a series of pointless, futile wars and we just made a royal mess of it, but hey, so long as the plutocrats got to profit off it, who cares?

Well, I care.

Full disclosure: I voted conservative for most of the 80s and 90s.  However, when it came out GWBush authorized torture in direct violation of the US constitution and the Uniform Code of Military Justice (not to mention the Geneva Convention), and that the GOP and most conservative pundits were okay with this, I didn’t have to leave the party; the party had already left me.

I’m a progressive now because they are the only people currently trying to ensure liberty and justice for all.

But back to our original thesis: Despite the trauma of 9/11 and the seemingly endless wars that followed, the country really didn’t change -- not then, even though the seeds of change were sown.

For one thing, 9/11 obsessed America far more than it did the rest of the world.  The real cultural change, the big cultural change would have to involve the entire planet.

Attempts by progressives to steer America into post-1945 20th century values were sporadic and vehemently opposed by the 1% that dominated both parties, but especially the GOP.

They lashed back at efforts to bring America up to speed for the 20th century in 2009, pushing instead for a literal return to pre-1860 American values and politics.

(For those of you saying, “Buzz exaggerates -- we abolished slavery” WTF do you think our current for-profit prison system is except a way to subject literally millions of people into forced labor?)

This backlash actively sought to overturn everything accomplished by President Barak Obama.  Unfortunately for everyone, the coronavirus has some other ideas and now, like it or not, the entire planet is being dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century.

So what’s the major cultural difference this time?

Well, for one, we’re getting hammered into us but good that we are all one people on one planet.  As cool as space exploration is, we ain’t emigrating to the stars.  We can’t pretend that what happens on the other side of the planet to people we don’t know won’t affect us.  We are all locked down in a common experience and it ain’t gonna spare us because we’re rich or good looking or smart.

We can’t even take solace in it affecting more of the stupid people than us because the ones mocking precautions now and going out and eating at McDonalds or partying in Florida or &#@%ing licking airline toilet seats are going to spread it to us because they are stupid and they are going to show up at their jobs as cashiers and stock clerks in grocery and drug stores.

Google “Typhoid Mary” and see what I’m talking about.

This is an equal opportunity disease and it’s going to take a lot of us.

Let me give you some perspective: World War Two took eight years to kill 3% of the world’s population; the coronavirus unchecked could easily kill 1% in three years.

But the good news is it probably won’t because there are a lot of smart people working long and hard around the world (although not necessarily in the US of A) to find effective vaccines and counter-measures to ensure as many of us as possible survive it, and strict social distancing and quarantining when there are enough test kits to do the job will drastically slow the spread of the disease.

So with any luck, we won’t see 1% casualties in the whole world population, and we may hold the fatalities down below that number by slowing the spread thus not over taxing the medical system until a vaccine is developed.

But it’s going to mean changes.  Lots and lots of changes…

 © Buzz Dixon

#duty now for the future #coronavirus #future #21st century #morals #ethics #culture

[momentofmemory]

fictober - day twenty-nine

Prompt #29: “I’m doing this for you.”

Fandom: Spider-Man (Marvel Cinematic Universe/Tom Holland Films)

Warnings: None

Characters: Peter Parker

Words: 1719

Author’s Note: just a simple, fluffy fic of peter being soft with kids, like God intended. set post homecoming, pre-infinity war, no spoilers for anything.

>>Dumpster Damsel

Peter’s barely two hours into his patrol when he hears a child crying in an alleyway just outside of Jackson Heights.

The evening’s already been a little busier than normal—the Macy’s Parade was this morning, and even if he’s not in Manhattan, there’s still plenty of confused tourists and beleaguered locals out. The recent weather report’s got everyone in a bit of a panic, too—a cold snap’s fallen over the state, and the first proper blizzard’s supposed to roll in this weekend. Peter’s helped at least two different groups of college students install metal studs on their car tires in preparation, not to mention the many grocery bags of bread and milk he’s helped carry.

He’s never been more grateful for the heater in his suit.

The child’s distress breaks him out of the easy-going mood he’d been in, however, and Peter quickly isolates the direction of the sound and swings over, adrenaline singing through his veins.

He drops down into the alley a good twenty feet away from the sound, but his danger sense is oddly quiet.

At first he can’t see where the noise is coming from, but then he sees a tuft of fluffy black hair peeking out from behind a dumpster.

“Hey,” he says—just loud for the child to hear him, but hopefully not so loud it frightens her. “You okay, miss?”

The hair vanishes, but the sniffling continues.

Peter rises from his crouched position and, attaching a web to a nearby fire escape, swings over so that he’s hanging upside down in front of the dumpster.

“Are you lost?” he asks. “’Cause like, I’m pretty good at helping people get un-lost if you’d like.”

“No.”

Peter blinks, his mask squinting in response. “No, you don’t want help, or no, you’re not lost? Because I have it on good authority from at least two other heroes that dumpsters do not count as prime real estate.”

Two brown eyes peek around the edge of the container, and teeth chatter as their owner speaks. “Mother says I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.”

“Your mother sounds super smart.” Peter lowers his feet to the ground and lets go of the web. “Maybe we should start over. I’m Spider-Man.”

The eyes narrow. “I know.”

“So we’re not strangers then!” Peter squats down, trying to get a better glimpse of her. “If you know my name, is it okay if I know yours, too?”

A moment’s hesitation, and then:

“No.”

She scurries all the way back behind the dumpster, and Peter swears he’s never had this much trouble with a kid in his entire career.

“…Okay.” He rocks back on his heels. “You remind me of someone I used to know, so I’mma call you Mary, if that’s all right.”

She doesn’t respond, but the sniffling seems to have stopped. Peter bites his lip and starts fiddling with his web-shooter, just to have something to distract him from the cold.

He clears his throat and tries again. “So what’d you do today?”

A shuffling sound. “Mother took me to see Hello Kitty.”

“Whoa, you went to see the parade?” Peter’s brain spins. That was over nine hours ago; surely she can’t have been lost for that long. Not in these temperatures, anyway.

“…That’s awesome,” he says, remembering to hold up his side of the conversation. “I had Hello Kitty pajamas one time, and they were super fuzzy.”

The eyes return, more curious this time. Peter makes sure not to react too strongly. 

“So did uh, did you walk all the way over here by yourself?”

“No.” She moves another inch closer.

“…Sightseeing?” Peter has Karen search for any reports of a missing child, and three pop up from within the last three hours.

“We went back to the hotel so daddy could take a nap, but mama wanted to go shopping.”

“Yeah, my Aunt does that sometimes.” Peter shoots a line of webbing at a rock and starts fashioning a Yo-Yo while Karen provides an annotated map of the area for him. “Did you at least get anything cool out of it?”

There’s a long pause, and then the girl finally comes all the way out from behind the dumpster. Her black hair is caught up in two bushy pigtails on top of her head, and Peter thinks she might be about six based on her size. She holds out her arm, and there’s a bright pink Hello Kitty watch strapped to her wrist.

“No way,” Peter gasps, his breath forming into mist as it hits the chilly air.

“Yeah.” She tries to hide it, Peter can tell she’s pleased by his reaction. “My mom wrote my name on it. Imani.”

“Definitely a wise woman,” Peter says, internally fist bumping himself for reaching the first-name basis.

Score One for Spider-Man, Best Babysitter Ever.

Karen blinks a warning in the corner of his feed that the temperature is rapidly dropping, and when Peter sees the thin long sleeve t-shirt Imani’s wearing, he tempers his mood.

“So,” he says, casually testing out his new yo-yo as Imani watches, “where on earth did you get such a cool watch?”

She rattles off list of stores Peter recognizes as an area off Roosevelt Ave., and if that’s where she got lost, her parents probably would have gone to the 110th Precinct to report a missing child. Karen confirms his suspicions, and she tips off the station that they’re on their way.

It’s about seven blocks from here, which won’t take long at all if Imani lets him carry her.

“Hey, Imani?” Her hand freezes from where it’d been reaching for the yo-yo and it darts behind her back, but he presses on anyway. “Since we’re Hello Kitty buds, how would you feel about swinging to the police station with me?”

Just like that, all the goodwill he’d built up vanishes, despite how much she’s clearly shivering.

She crosses her arms in front of her chest. “No.”

He takes his earlier victory dance back; his reputation as Best Babysitter Ever is going to be ruined.

“It’s super fun, though,” he pleads. “Like flying in Aladdin!”

“No.”

He squints his mask’s eyes at her. She remains unmoved.

Peter does the math on how long it’ll take them to get to the police station by sidewalk, and sighs. It’s doable.

“Would you… walk with me?”

She doesn’t turn him down immediately, and Peter takes that as a positive. “I’ll even let you carry the yo-yo.”

Imani purses her lips—worriedly tinged blue, to Peter’s mind—and then snatches the yo-yo from him.

“Okay, Mr. Spider.”

Peter takes her hand gently into his own, hoping the warmth from his suit will carry over at least a little. She accepts it, to his surprise, though probably only because she’s distracted in trying to get his homespun yo-yo to work in her other hand. He leads them out onto the street, and while a few people glance their way, no one questions it. Spider-Man interacting with a child is not a novel sight for most New Yorkers.

They make it a block towards the station before Imani speaks again.

“What other heroes do you know?”

Peter glances down at her, and notices she’s shivering significantly harder than she was before. “Hm?”

“You said there were other heroes that liked du—dumpsters.”

“Yep, sure do.” Peter knows she’s not dangerously cold, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t miserable. He feels guilty about his own heater. “You wouldn’t like them, though. I don’t think they even know what Hello Kitty is.”

Imani says nothing in response. Peter gnaws at the edge of his lower lip—at the rate they’re walking, it’s going to be another thirty minutes before they get to the station. Around block two, they pass a street heater and when Imani leans towards the warmth, Peter has an idea.

“Y’know,” he says, rubbing a hand over his arm. “I think I’m getting pretty cold.”

She tears her eyes away from the heater, now several feet behind them, and looks at him with all the suspicion a six-year-old can muster. “Yeah, because you didn’t wear a jacket.”

“Have you ever seen a superhero in a bubble coat?”

She stops so abruptly Peter’s nearly thrown off balance, and a group of people clustered by one of the food trucks stare at them with open curiosity. 

She rubs her hands together. “Doesn’t the wizard have a cape?”

“Dr. Strange, yeah. But capes are like, a whole other subset of clothing so it doesn’t count. Entirely different from coats.”

She scowls, her nose scrunched up in thought. “I guess so.”

They stand there for a few more moments, Imani freezing and Peter pretending to be.

She huffs dramatically. “Are you really that cold?”

Peter gives an exaggerated shiver. “Capsicle levels.”

Imani glares at the sidewalk, and Peter crosses his fingers behind his back.

“…I guess we can swing.”

Peter lights up immediately, widening his mask’s eyes in a way he’s been told is exceedingly endearing. “Ready to experience a whole new world?”

She takes the hand he’s holding out to her, and with her permission, he hoists her up onto his hip.

“I hope you know I’m doing this for you,” she says, voice sullen even as she wraps her arms around his waist.

Peter smiles. “And I’m very grateful.”

Imani shrieks in his ear as he takes off, and they make it to the precinct in less than five minutes. When she sees her mother waiting for her in the station window, she starts shrieking for an entirely different reason.

Peter feels warmer than he has all day.

He sticks around the police station just long enough to tell the cop assigned to the case where he’d found her, and is about to head back out when a small hand taps on his arm.

“You left this, Mr. Spider,” Imani says, holding out the yo-yo.

“You keep it,” Peter says, knowing the web’ll dissolve in a few hours, anyway. “And keep an eye on your mom for me, too. She seems super smart. You wouldn’t want her to get lost again.”

Imani nods. Then she squints up at him. “Were you really cold?”

Peter laughs despite himself, and shoots a web at a nearby sign before launching himself into the air.

“Not when you’re around.”

#fictober19 #peter parker fic #mcu fanfic #fanfiction #spiderman #peter parker #memsfic

[peacefulwriter88]

Part One: Carried Away in A Chariot

Steve Rogers X Reader WoC, Bucky X Reader WoC

Warnings: None

A/N: This will be in three parts and was inspired by Hades & Persephone Mood board. This occurs after the snap where I optimistically believing Steve survives but how he deals with the PTSD. Half of this, like always, is inspired by @geminimoonbeamx and the other has been on my mind after the Endgame trailer.

How do you kill a god?

You rob them of love and loyalty. They will be alone and unhappy, and eternity will seem like a punishment, but it is not death.

                        - Hera, Queen of the Gods

Disappointment hung over him like a cloud, followed him everywhere. Before it was just his psyche that was attacked by the darkness that loomed over him, promises of death that echoed in his subconscious when he slept; images that haunted his mind when he closed his eyes.

Now he carried it like a weight, burdened on his back as he sloppily navigated through the world. He had no desires anymore.

Life had given him the gift of death. To have to breathe it everyday, bear witness to its effect without the power to change the outcomes. He felt like a ferryman, responsible for the living souls of today with the  promised that he’d have to kiss them goodbye tomorrow. He was death on earth, walking in flesh form and he didn’t know how to console it

And yet he stayed.

No matter how much he fought, no matter whatever the evil was that he had to attack it was death that eluded him - not life. And when he had fixed all that had shifted wrong, turned dust back into bone and flesh, to rewind time and save the world from genocide he still remained.

And thus the disappointment lingered.

He was a walking god of the underworld.

“Perhaps you just need to get away?” Natasha had suggested one evening, walking down the cold narrow streets of New York that no longer held the same color. Now he only saw drab colors of black and blue that tarnished his eyesight, burdened his shoulders.

“Go where? I feel like I spent five years getting away. I’m tired of running. I’m tired.”

Natasha didn’t know the answer.

“Maybe you stop….stop being Captain America Steve. You don’t have to be the man that saves the world all the time.”

This time from Bucky who sat across from him in a coffee shop, the a cup of hot coffee cradling his vibranium and flesh arm as his eyes flickered around the cafe. Eight months after the snap and his friend was operating and functioning like nothing had ever occurred. Despite the explanations that Steve had to communicate with him and the others - how he and a few others had to watch his friend disappear in front of his own eyes - Bucky remembered nothing. Nor Sam or Tony or  T’challa or anyone. Instead, they jumped back into their roles head first, like nothing had ever been wrong.

It made Steve snap.

“Right. So I can sit her and broad more. No thank you.”

He looks out the window at the snow, blistery and wet and painting the streets with its evidence. He hated this time of year, hated when the cold weather moved from being nostalgic and romantic and just became a nuance. It was the kind of snow that was light and consistent, black residue sticking to the roads, splashing onto the concrete sidewalks and the annoyed New Yorker’s who were stuck walking to and from their destination in the wet coldness.

Bucky sighs, Steve knows he wants to tell him something but the bell in the cafe rings again, causes the super soldier to shift his eyes over to the door - to the line where you stood. Steve doesn’t have to look behind him to know that it's you - he can faintly smell your perfume of flora above the smell of milk and coffee. Can hear the soft sounds of Tchaikovsky blare from your headphones, the sound of you pulling off your mitts.

“You should just ask her out.” Steve says lowly and Bucky ducks his head, takes a sip of his coffee.

“No way Steve.”

Steve shrugs,

“Life’s too short to - “ he stops himself, chuckles. What did it matter - Bucky wasn’t going to ask you and Steve stopped caring enough to urge his friend.

“She’d never go for it.” Bucky echoes like he always does, low morose tone and all.

Steve picks up his coffee, takes a sip.

“Your loss.”

He doesn’t understand how one can love something so strongly and yet be annoyed by it. Humanity was wearing on him. Their laughter, their remorse, their desires and their laments. Sam moved out of the tower, decided to get an apartment in uptown and Steve only decided to move in after having to deal with his co-workers for a year after the snap.

They were tiresome.

Tony may have actually lost his fucking mind. Steve wouldn’t put it past the older man - isolated in space for weeks on the verge of starvation sounded like enough to make any one human break into two and Tony was always heavily affected by his emotions. Natasha stoically operated through the world like nothing had ever occurred and for some reason that annoyed him. Wanda walked around in depressive remorse - Vision was gone and gone for good. He didn’t’ know how to tell her that it was the consequence of power - to be given a gift and robbed of loved. Bucky was so love strung over you that it was the last straw for Steve - he had to get out.

Brooklyn wasn’t his Brooklyn so he claimed Astoria with Sam like his own.

It worked out nicely for the pair of them.

He still walked the 17 blocks to the coffee shop he liked to sit at, the black coffee perfectly bitter and warm - the residents not giving him any mind. The Captain America in their mind had died when he saved the world and the man that was operating was foreign to them. He was okay with that. It gave him silence, the refuge he needed.

He does this consecutively for weeks, winter changing into spring,  spring into autumn and autumn into winter. Goes through the motions, alone, a cup of coffee and pencil and pad in his possession that he never touches.

That’s before the shift.

It’s in April and it's cold outside though spring has already tried to combat the winter cold. Buds growing on trees, wind blowing dead grass away to make room for new.  He sits, like he always does in the cafe, alone. His phone lights up, a few texts from Bucky and Sam - a voicemail from Natasha but it doesn’t matter. He wants to draw again, wants the breath of inspiration that allows him to see things - people and humans beyond an ash colored lens but he’s frozen.

He looks over at the ivory paper of his sketch notebook, blank minus the charcoal pencil that laid on top of it and sighs, his hands itching to pick up the drawing device but knowing it was to no avail.

The bell of the cafe door rings, his ears pick up on it and he’s rewarded with your perfume again. Jasmine, it's intoxicating and sweet but he doesn’t turn his head, doesn’t look your way. In fact, he had no idea what you looked like. Identified you only by the sweet smell of your perfume - he hadn’t cared enough to look behind him the first time that Bucky had identified you and all the times after.

You were just background noise.

Except today your smell nears him, dangerously close, until he feels the warmth of your body emanating off of you and you hesitate before you clear your throat,

“Excuse me I don’t mean to interrupt but…..would you mind sharing the table?”

He looks up at you and is greeted with the sun.

Your smile is soft, friendly and your eyes are wide and dangerous, the dark pink tinge of your lipstick a contrast to the hue of your skin, brightens it. Your hair pulled up into a bun, hands holding a book and cup of tea safely.

“Or not. Its justs…...really crowded in here and I’d much rather share a table with you than the old man who is licking his lips at me.”

He stares at you, unable to find words but nods, shifts his notebook to make room for you.

“Thank you,” you move into the seat fluidly, delicately before you place your bag near your leg. A long sliver of pink silk slips out, a sliver of a ballet shoe that you tuck back into the bag before you open your book. “Promise I won’t bother you. Just here to read for a bit.”

And you don’t. He spends the hour watching you, probably borderline ass creepy as Bucky stares out at you and you’re none the wiser, head bent over your book as you sip your tea until it's gone. Then you gather your things, thank him for sharing the table and your gone.

Despite your absence, your smell lingers and he feels something stir in him. It's not until hours later, when he’s standing on his balcony in the safety of darkness that he realizes that its longing.

And that he wants to see you again.

You don’t show up to the cafe for three days and its three days enough that tells him to let you go. That no good come from his new interest. He was a broken man and you were life. Better not to drag you down in flames.

‘Besides, Bucky was in love with you’ he tells himself but he knows that he doesn’t care about that, not really. He had started drawing again. Vivid drawings of the events of the past, dark and treacherous and life like.

“Those are kinda freaky aren’t they Steve?” Sam had noted, looking over the large super soldiers frame one evening and drinking the vivid imagery of the death of  Thanos, noting the rest of the Avengers.

“It's what happened isn’t it?” Steve says lowly and Sam nods, walking away. The drawings were disturbing but at least his friend was drawing again. Sam was worried about Steve. He was different. Curt, abrasive, annoyed. Motivated by missions but not truly invested in the outcomes. He knew he was depressed - understood why. Sam understood that he had died - then come back none the wiser - and could understand that to experience the loss of friends where they couldn’t even remember may play a number on the psyche.

For Steve it was evolving into darkness.  

Steve is aware Sam is worried but doesn’t comment on it. Reads all the PTSD books Sam leaves around, occasionally chats with him but pretends that everything is fine. Knows it doesn’t convince Sam but honestly doesn’t care enough to put on the facade that he should. Instead, he escapes the cages of the indoors and greets spring.  The weather is bright, sunlight emerging and rain showers slowly becoming less frequent. He’s always had an infinity for Central Park but after the defeat of Thanos couldn’t stand the large, expansive area. Reminded him too much of how delicate the life balance was. Now, he liked to sit on benches for hours and watch birds emerge from their wooden sanctuaries and bunnies frolic in the budding grass - moms with babies in carriages and kids who giggle pleasantly as they run in child wonder.

When he’s done he goes to the cafe, orders his coffee, starts sketching. Shadows barely captured by light, fine details of the nightmares that haunt his mind.

“You’re drawing again,”

Your voice is sweet, your tone smooth as you ease through each syllable that slowly falls from your lips. He looks up at you, drinks in the book in hand and tea with a smile dancing on your face.

“Do you mind if I join you?”

He should say no, should leave and give you the table for yourself. But he finds himself smiling, the first time in what feels like years and it feels unfamiliar as he waves his inky hands across the table.

“Please.”

You both sit in silence,  you reading ‘A Cautionary Tale for Young Vampires’ and him drawing, sipping on your beverages pleased to be in a moment where you can step away from your day to day nuances and focus on the small pleasures.

You both order three cups each, share a large coffee cake and are asked nicely by the owner to leave before you escape back into the reality of your worlds.

“It was nice seeing you again,” you say as you walk out in the fresh night air, grabbing your phone - your headphones. “Your drawings are nice. I’m glad you’ve found your….inner-voice again. So to speak”

He nods, smiles at you once more as he drinks in your frame in the waning light. The way the orange, rose and blue blend together, highlighting your silhouette, hair pulled back as your dark eyes glisten in the light. He should pull away, take this gift for what it is and be grateful for it.

But he’s hungry for you, likes the small flame you’ve ignited in his dark heart and he finds his voice to say as you turn to walk away,

“Wait!”

It takes you both off guard and you stop, raise a brow as you look at him.

“How do you feel about zoos?”

You are the light he doesn’t realize he needs. Draws your image for five days until he sees you next.

“Who’s the girl?”  Sam asks one night, Natasha and Wanda peeping into Steve’s studio as he move onto another canvas - onto you. Sam’s happy that Steve’s moved on from the dark images of his nightmares, unable to face them in the safety of the light and Wanda and Natasha want to know who’s inspired this new mood.

“You like her,” Wanda says curiously, her psychic brain reading his betrayed thoughts and it's the first time he’s heard her be so positive. That is, until his brain betrays him and she reads the dark secret of you, tsks disappointedly. “I won’t tell him but you should care. He is your friend.”

“Tell who what?” Natasha asks, following the European redhead who walks away from him, her disappointment obvious.

She never shares.

Instead allows him to meet up with you at Central Park, to watch happy emotions play over your face. You find positivity in everything. From the zoo animals to the families who walk by, to the rain that falls on the both of you as he grabs your hand and pulls you to shelter to the nearest tree he can find as you both leave the zoo.

“This isn't safe.” you say, the dress you were wearing sticking to you. A little pink number that reminds him of a time where he was younger and weaker, the red floral design highlighting your frame. He doesn’t care that he boldly drinks in your nipples that were puckering from the cold or that he could see your panties paint your ass. .

He wants to remember how it feels to touch another human again.

“What isn’t?” he says instead.

“Hiding under a tree. We could get electrocuted. You should know this Captain America.” you laugh, exaggerating his title and though it annoys him he can’t help but give an off handed smile.

There’s a flash of lightning, followed by a dark grumble of thunder that shakes the earth and causes you to jump naturally into his arms, gripping his thick biceps as you turn and look around. He takes the moment to drink in your vulnerable features, the softness of your cheek, the length of your eyelashes as they kiss your cheek. Your arms are strong, reminds him of your dancing physique and the strength that your body carries. When the thunder  passes, rain falling heaver you turn your face up to him. Your lips are plump from you biting them in fear and raindrops fall in disarray down your face greedily and he sighs.

Angels weeped of the inception of your beauty.

“I rebuke death it would seem so if you need safety, you’ll most likely find it in my arms.”

Its meant to be a joke but he knows he fails at the delivery - humor had never been one of his stronger characteristics. You watch him curiously, tilt your head curiously before you whisper,

“Death evades us for as long as we need to learn a lesson from living.”

He’s intrigued by your thoughts but distracted by the way your face has contorted, sadness etched in your faces beauty and he wants to bend down and kiss you while he whispers against your lips that it will be okay. Instead, you break away and look off into the distance,

“I know a bit about that. When the snap happened….I lost everyone and yet I remained. And when they returned -  it was as nothing changed. My mother knew nothing that had happened to me in eight months I had learned to mourn and accept her death. She cradles me still like a child despite the fact I’ve been on my own for ten years and she still doesn’t hear the secret I whisper out into the night. That I’ve blossomed into a woman long before she left and will continue to thrive long after she’s gone.”

Your hands are warm over his arms, even through the layer of his jacket and you blink back up at him and smile,

“You didn’t need to know that. Let’s make a run for it and grab a coffee. Its three and I haven’t had my fourth cup.”

You’re gone from his embrace long before he can mourn it. He stands in wonder  as he watches the way you spritely run through the rain, turning back and smiling at him, your dress dancing along your legs.

Like morning glories that raise their petals to the rays of sunlight he’s found himself drawn to you, needing your spirit to pull out his beauty.

He’s a different man. Still dark and brooding and withdrawn, but there’s something different about him. Bucky can't put his hand on it, watches his best friend operate with the same motions but there’s just something off. He was different. Gone most of the time and even when he was around he wasn’t there. Head buried in a new book or in his sketch pad or speaking lowly on the phone. Bucky’s found leftover ticket stubs to three ballets, had no idea that the romantic in Steve still lived and took him to such shows.  

“I think he’s dating someone.” Natasha finally admits out loud as her, Sam and Bucky lay out on the living room floor one evening, high and watching constellations dance above them from the safety of the tower.

“Steve doesn’t date.” Bucky mumbles, eyes half closed and Sam pauses, hesitates,

“I’d normally agree with you Bucky but…...I don’t know. I caught him ordering flowers and he’s always gone and he’s always drawing her, the mystery woman. I swear I found a stub to the ballet but Steve denies it.”

“Holy shit,” Natasha sits up and looks at them. “So have I!”

“Me too.” Bucky agrees, intertwining his fingers together as he closes his eyes.

It’s Sam who nods and shakes his head,

“Not to mention, he comes home smelling like jasmines. Has to be a girl a woman that’s marked her scent on him.”

Bucky pauses, can’t move. His brain racks back to you -the first time that he saw you. Your scent that had caught his attention in the cafe he and Steve had learned to love. It was an autumn day and you were wearing a flowy skirt, a knit sweater covering your tank top. Ballet shoes slipping out of your bag, listening to Chopin and reading the menu of the coffee shop as the sun hit your face perfectly. You smiled at the elderly couple that asked if they could go before you, not hesitating at all as you offered your spot. You had briefly looked at him, smiled, before returning your eyes back to the menu.

“It’s Jasmine,” Steve had said underneath his breath, blue eyes temporarily meeting Bucky’s before returning out of the window, into the busy streets of New York. Voicing the question that was already on Bucky’s mind.

“She smells like Jasmine.”

Tag List:  @ssweet-empowerment@capsofwinchesters@tacohead13@harleycativy@pietrotheavenger@francezka10@papichulosebastian@obsessionsofmynerdheart@melaninmarvel@avengedqueen26@nasteaxluvgal@winterbuttmunch@nys30@buckyslongasshair@ohlumi @wellthirsted @gifsbysimplysonia @misskenni

#Steve Rogers #Steve Rogers x Reader #steve rogers au #steve rogers x woc #Chris Evans

[knock-me-out]

k.o. at fansigns pt. 1

under the cut because it’s long as hell, sorry

hyunseok

if he’s not holding your hands while talking, there’s an issue. will run his thumbs over the back of your hands without fail.

he’s usually first, especially because some fans might be nervous meeting them for the first time and his entire aura is just...calming. 

always asks if fans have eaten, if they haven’t, he’ll share his snacks.

acts embarrassed when he gets anime-related gifts, but you can tell those are the ones he cherishes most, especially plushies. 

thanks people profusely, literally they could say anything and his first reply is going to be “ahh, thank you~” before he’s even registered what they said to him.

always doodles a lil’ bee on everything and signs it with “honey,” which is the most popular fan nickname for him. 

if a fan is from a foreign country, he asks them to teach him a word in their language -- tends to impress people by remembering the word if he recognizes them the next time around. 

if he’s not speaking with victory, he’s on his feet trying to pry ki away from jui’s seat before he gets smacked. 

seungjae

fansign boyfriend extraordinaire, tends to come outta nowhere with lines that should be cheesy as hell but end up super sincere.

he gets kind of tired of only talking about dramas when people have questions, but he won't let it show. 

isn’t super big on a lot of prolonged physical contact, is more of a high-five kinda guy and he might hold your hand for a few seconds after.

always writes a very personalized note when signing things, tends to be something incredibly sincere expressing gratitude.

tends to fidget more than people expect, will click his pen really obnoxiously under the table while victory talk; tends to prefer listening more than talking much, himself. 

hates wearing headbands and things like that, but he’ll do it if doesn’t have a choice. if a fan has a gift for him, he’ll ask them to put it on him.

gets very excited when he gets to speak with someone in japanese, his entire demeanor just changes entirely, he sits up straighter.

doesn’t usually remember people but he’ll pretend like he does.

gem

he’s usually placed somewhere in the middle, which is both a blessing and a curse. when victories get to him, he’ll always start with some obnoxious line like “about time, right? I’m so sorry you had to talk to all of them before me...” and will try to get someone’s attention again even after they’ve moved on.

always acts super offended if someone admits he isn’t their bias, cue the dramatic hand to the chest and wide eyes. will lean across the table to put his hand on the fan’s forehead like are you okay? is something wrong with you??? 

usually ends up with a ton of gifts, all of which he’ll try to wear at once. catch him with three headbands and a feather boa on at any given point.

LOUD. is the most likely to yell if one of the other members bothers him or a staff member tries to take away a gift of his. will cling to his presents and pout until they let him keep it.

really prefers to be called gem-oppa. has been known to stand on his chair and yell to literally everyone like “when I say gem, you say..?” and do a lil dance when everyone just oppa back at him, usually gets yanked off his chair by either jui or remi. 

very touchy feely. holds hands, fixes hair, trusts fans enough to let them touch his face and all but will always “don’t mess up my hair, okay, it takes a lot of effort to look this flawless.” practically purrs like a kitten. 

draws a diamond when he signs and makes an effort to make his signature huge as hell. likes to write personalized messages with a “keep shining” in english -- his handwriting is really loopy and pretty.

shameless with aegyo and blows lots of kisses, has no filter.

jungsoo

laughs at pretty much everything victories say, slaps the table dramatically if it’s funny enough. tends to get a lot of irritated looks from ki because of it, but soo never minds.

ends up in sol’s lap without fail nearly every single time by the end of it, they’re usually next to each other and he has a habit of just sprawling out and getting really touchy feely. 

the eye smile !! is powerful !! he looks like an excited puppy whenever fans talk to him, he’s always got this super sweet smile and has the most genuine aura of happiness about him.

when he’s surprised/shocked, he always jolts really aggressively in his chair and lets out a shocked lil oh! and then apologizes a lot. he gets scared so damn easily, by something as simple as a fan’s hands being colder than expected or a staff member reaching over his shoulder to clear the space in front of him. 

swings your hands while he talks, has accidentally smacked people before, but doesn’t stop. he’s clumsy and 10/10 likely to break something fragile if given to him, I’m so sorry.

will squeeze hands with the most sincere lil “thank you for supporting us, I’ll see you again soon, right?” and then bam there’s the angelic smile

wiggles in his seat when he’s told good news, doesn't know how to sit still for the life of him, but it’s okay.

“oh, already..? make sure to eat and get plenty of sleep for me, okay?” always pouts when fans have to move on, but it’s okay, that smile is back and ready to dazzle the next person in line without fail. 

kiyong

if you speak to him in english, be prepared for him to get annoying and loud and a lot more flirty. even if it isn’t a fan’s first language, he’ll get really excited and ask them how they learned it. if there’s another new yorker there, he’s at his worst. will screech across the venue YERRR until he gets a reply (it’s a ny thing, guys), asks what part of the state they’re from. will go off for hours if given the chance about Brooklyn, and then gets really embarrassed because he’s been talking about a ramen place for too long and not giving the fan a chance to talk much.

if he’s not bothering jui, he’s not being himself. constantly leans over his hyung’s shoulder and makes jokes about how old he is and how creepy it is for a grandpa to be talking to young, pretty girls. will pull gem’s seat out from under him if he’s walking past. usually ends up bruised after fansigns because of how obnoxious he is, but it’s fine, he always has a great time.

loves loves loves fanboys, always acts a lot more mature than usual but still compliments the same amount. god ki is Big Gay 

will find opportunities to be a hoe even during the most wholesome of times. has had fans ask jokingly to touch his abs and he’ll be damned if he doesn’t let them -- usually ends up lifting his shirt at some point during the day to reveal oh look he’s drawn a heart on his chest. 

will glare at fans if they call him kasey or...god forbid...kaseycakes. refuses to do aegyo beyond a finger heart or something like that, might relent if begged enough, but always looks like he wants to die right after. “kasey? sorry, who is that??” and also looks kinda confused for a minute when someone uses his stage name because he kinda forgets he has one, sometimes.won’t mind being called kiki, at least.

“I still look cool though, right?” asking a fan while wearing a neon pink headband, you’d better tell him he looks badass, or he might whine. 

is probably one of the most chaotic members during any event where they’re out in public, let’s be real. the staff members usually need to tell him to calm down at least four times every hour, he always seems to forget what he’s been told not to do. 

remembers people, especially english speaking fans, usually asks how much they missed him.

daesung

he’s usually very nervous at fansigns, bounces his knee a lot and can end up shaking the whole table, oopsies.

gets really stressed because he sometimes can’t hear over the others, so catch him leaning really far over the table like “eh? sorry? what?” 

will 100% leave the aegyo to owen and mess around with him a lot to keep his nerves down, sometimes will just grab his arm and give it a lil squeeze to reassure himself. he always worries about saying the wrong thing or making someone uncomfortable, never knows how to handle himself when someone says he’s their favorite.

panics when fans cry but hyun always a box of tissues under the table for himself, dae will grab it and hand them copious handfuls like “ahh! please don't cry, oh no--” 

will relax after talking to someone for a bit, ask them questions, but he prefers to listen than to talk too much.

his hands sometime shake when he signs things, please help him, and he’s just nervously laughing the whole time and apologizing.

has been known to leave his seat to go lean over remi’s shoulder for attention if the line is moving kind of slowly, sometimes goes around to the other side of the table and acts like a fan and sits down in front of remi like “oh my god I'm your biggest fan--”, but not until his nerves have died down a bit, dumb big baby.

“promise me you’ll continue to support us, okay?” and makes you pinky swear, always smiles like the softest fool afterwards.

#oc kpop group #kocnet #kpop oc #fansigns #member_reacts #🦋 #no one asked but I'm sick and had inspiration #it's just so easy to see ki being obnoxious I swear to god #for those of you who don't get the yerr thing: it's like New Yorker code to shout YERR back at someone if they shout it in a crowded place #I dont understand it but as a New Yorker myself it's my duty to pass that along

[bittenappletv]

Capcom Live Concert Review; 9/29/18 Gramercy Theater NYC

Mega Man 2 on the NES was that video game for me. The one that made me realize video games can be art. The music! The graphics! The music! Doctor Wily's Castle! The music! The ending! Oh and did I mention, the music! Because... THE MUSIC!  I've been a lifelong fan of Capcom ever since. Mega Man used to be my favorite Capcom franchise. Eventually it became Street Fighter and later in life it became Devil May Cry. So it's almost like I've grown up with Capcom throughout the years. As I've matured so have my interests. So of course I’m going to attend a concert that features music from Capcom video games because… Just in case I haven’t mentioned this before… THE MUSIC!

The Capcom Live Band spun out of Video Games Orchestra. Video Games Orchestra has their own show called Video Games Live where they play music from lots of different video games. I've seen them perform twice and I definitely recommend checking them out if they come to your neck of the woods!

The members of the Capcom Live Band originate from Boston. They made the Chrono Trigger song that was performed at Video Games Live and is available on one of the Video Games Live CDs. Well they have broken off into their own thing just to perform Capcom music but they will still get down with Video Games Live when the occasion arises.

On to the performance! I also saw Capcom Live perform at Anime Next in 2017 so I will be comparing both performances.  Spotlighting what was different between both shows when I can.

So first up at the New York show was an arrangement featuring a lot of classic Capcom video games while they displayed video footage of said games. The first one was Commando, the first Capcom game I ever played in an arcade a long time ago! Followed by Trojan, Sonson, 1942, Strider, the NES version of Bionic Commando and wrapping up with Ghosts 'n Goblins!

On to Street Fighter! They played the intro song from Street Fighter II. You may be more familiar with it as Ryu's theme in the first Marvel vs. Capcom game or the intro song to the American Street Fighter cartoon. "Ba Da Da Da Daaaa Da Daaaa!" You know that song! While the track played we got to see Ryu face off against a lot of the Street Fighter II characters finishing up with his confrontation against Master Bison! The next track was a medley they also do at Video Games Live. Ryu, Guile and Ken's themes mashed together as a rock song. When they did this at Anime Next they showed images from the HD version of Street Fighter II, essentially the new imagery from Studio Udon that you can currently see in Ultra Street Fighter II The Final Challengers on the Nintendo Switch. For the New York show they stuck with imagery from the original version of Street Fighter II. While I fig both versions and Udon did an amazing job, I liked seeing the older version at a show like this. Events like these are even better when they evoke nostalgia.

Now for something new! They played the music you hear in Street Fighter V when you are in the mode select screen or waiting for an online match. Now if you've upgraded to Street Fighter V Arcade Edition it is no longer the first song that plays,  but if you stay on mode select long enough you'll hear it. It's the song that starts off with a Spanish guitar. You know, I never even gave too much thought to the Spanish guitar that comes on during the track until I heard it live. I'm Latino so naturally my heritage woke up WORD! What was cool is that a performer who looked kind of like Reuben Langon (AKA Dante's voice and motion capture actor in the Devil May Cry series) just with longer blonde hair and a smaller frame sang English lyrics to that Street Fighter V song! The singer's name is David Vives by the way.

So yeah we got a Dante look alike IN THE HIZOOOOOOUSE so OF COURSE he's going to sing something from Devil May Cry! When the beginning of Devil May Cry 4's "We Shall Never Surrender" (AKA my current smartphone ring tone heh heh heh) started playing David Vives yelled for everyone to get up! I was sitting down and normally don't get up and dance,  pretty much ever unless I am drunk out of my skull. But I love Devil May Cry 4 Special Edition. I played that game until I finished Bloody Palace Mode with Dante and Vergil, and I still fire it up now and again. So if you tell me to get up and dance during a Devil May Cry 4 song MAAAAANG I'm gonna be on my feet dancing all night and that's how I spent the remainder of the concert! So David sang the lyrics to the song and the New York venue had two levels. When he got to the middle part of the song that sounds like a prayer sermon he got up on the balcony level and looked down at those of us on the lower level. For the third part we all sang "Come With Me. We'll Fight Until Eternity..." We all raised our arms and waved them left arms right. So much fun. Felt like I was part of the game for a bit. I didn't get Lady's phone number though. D'OH!

"Go Tell Aunt Rhody!" You guessed it! David Vives sang the main song from Resident Evil VII. He did this at Anime Next too and when I went to the bathroom at that event someone in the stall near me asked me if David was the original singer of that song in the game. Um nah it's a cover the song is sung by a female in the game, Jordan Reyne. That just goes to show how talented David is!

Monster Hunter time! At Anime Next the band was surprised that there were a lot of Monster Hunter fans in the audience since the franchise is a lot bigger in Japan. Well it wasn't a shock that there were even more Monster Hunter fans in New York since this year we saw the release of Monster Hunter World, which has become the highest selling video game Capcom has ever made! We got to hear three Monster Hunter instrumental tracks while seeing images of warriors, Felynes and Monsters on the screen!

Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney time! I didn't hear any OBJECTION to that! First they played the famous arrangement from the first game followed by some music from the latest game. The music from part 6 was accompanied by footage and anime cut scenes from the game!

Video Games Live has this great set that includes the Mega Man 2 intro song, the Mega Man 3 intro song and the famous music from Doctor Wily's castle from Mega Man 2. I wish we did hear that track at Capcom Live, but I've been to two of their shows now and that hasn't happened yet. The tracks they do play are really cool though. First up is a rock version of Cut Man's theme from Mega Man 1. I'm still dancing at this point so I can cut a rug to Cut Man's theme word! After that there's a Spark Mandrel theme from Mega Man X!

SENGOKU BASARA OH MY GOD! I knew that it was part of their show in Japan since it's way more popular there but I never expected to hear any of it in the US. It wasn't at Anime Next but New York definitely had my fam Date Masamune, Sanada Yukimura, Kasuga and more up on the screen while they played the main track of the last game we did get in the US, Sengoku Basara Samurai Heroes. Myself I'm a huge fan of the series but it's not always at the top of my mind when I think of Capcom because I always have to import the games to play them. Playstation 3 and 4 are region free systems and there are lots of online guides to help you play the games so this isn't extremely difficult to do at least. As an aside, the current Gakuen Basara anime airing on HiDive is hilarious and makes me laugh every week! Check it out if you can,  the Sengoku Basara franchise needs all the love it can get in the West!

That's not all for Sengoku Basara! Following that track they had a special song for Ii Naotora! Wait a second hang on, she debuts in part 4 and has never been on an American console. So this must be a track just for their Japanese show right? Wrong! They played her main theme while David sang lyrics to the tune, AND THE LYRICS WERE IN ENGLISH! THE SONG WAS JUST FOR US! WE WENT NUTS AAAAAH!!!!! I guess this is how young women felt in the 60s when the Beatles performed! The footage on the screen was a lot of Sengoku Basara part 4 with a bit of 3 mixed in. Anyway,  go ahead and import some games. The universe said it's okay!

Two Okami tracks! One instrumental and another with English lyrics. For the one with lyrics we were asked to hold up our smart phones and wave them from side to side. So a few days prior to the show my Samsung S4 got water damaged and I upgraded to a Samsung S9. The flashlight button on my S9 is much easier to locate and a lot brighter than my S4, so it was way better for this candlelight... or smartphone light vigil! Big up to the Okami God Amaterasu for messing up my S4 to make me get an S9 so I could be concert ready word!

Since this was the first time the Capcom Live Band played in New York City they wanted to play something special for us. At Anime Next, since it's an anime convention we got to hear the One Piece "We Are" song in English and The Attack on Titan original intro song in it's original language. Well us New Yorkers got something a little different. David Vives noticed that some of us went nuts and jumped up and down during the Sengoku Basara songs. That was me of course! So they played the Van Halen song "JUMP" for us! I guess it didn't have much to do with Capcom, but  if you hear it you can think of Bionic Commando 2 Rearmed where they added the jump feature. Only maybe pretend Rad jumped into a barbershop and got rid of that stupid mustache! Not a fan of that mustache! The Shinkiro design from Grin's first Bionic Commando Rearmed game is my favorite.

The show closed out with a Resident Evil 6 song with English lyrics! 6 is not my personal favorite Resident Evil game, but it's a good song to close things out with! Also 7 is such a departure from all of the previous games so it was nice to see a few familiar faces up on the screen.

ENCORE! ENCORE! ENCORE! We all chanted for an encore and we got it! David Vives sang the first Attack on Titans intro song in Japanese and German, "Feuerroter Pfeil und Boge" for us just as he did in Anime Next! And hey this one is kind of Capcom related since Capcom almost made an Attack on Titan Japanese arcade game! Something fell through the cracks and it didn't happen. However it's probably for the best since Arthur from Ghost 'n Goblins would sneak into the arcade machine and defeat all of the Titans in two seconds. Oh hey I saw a documentary called "Wreck-It Ralph." Stuff like that is possible I tell you!

Suffice it to say I had an amazing time both times I attended the concert,  but I had more fun at the New York show. Mainly because the energy was different and there were a lot more of us dancing and having a good time. There's things I'm leaving out like how each member gets introduced to us and they get to shred on their instruments. The was also stage diving and fun stuff like that but those are the parts you are better off experiencing yourself.

Final grade: I give the concert 5 Felicias from Darkstalkers performing in front of a live audience out of 5! If you're a fan of Capcom music and games or if you just want to hear some cool music accompanied by nice imagery and have a good time I definitely recommend checking out Capcom Live! - Anthony

http://www.capcomlive.com/

[punkscowardschampions]

Sekhmet & Lulu pt.1

Sekhmet: You’re never going to guess

Lulu: You’re going to make me?

Lulu: okay… I’ve had time… and if it’s not your politically leaning older brother I’m going to be truly shook

Sekhmet: Now I’m just 🤔 if this is a better plot twist

Sekhmet: I think so, on the surface, less taboo, but it has more layers, actually

Lulu: It does need to be, to warrant being the first thing you’ve said to me in forever

Sekhmet: That’s how it is now, only come to you with the best news? 

Sekhmet: 👌🏽

Lulu: While I wait for an apology

Sekhmet: Oh please, you’re not still in a mood 🙄

Lulu: you think now you’re not ignoring me it’s absolutely fine that you did

Sekhmet: I wasn’t ignoring you, you told me not to speak to you and I didn’t

Sekhmet: You should’ve said something before this point if you were still going to be pissy about it now 💁🏽‍♀️

Lulu: No, you should be sorry and love me again because it’s been horrid

Sekhmet: Stop being such a baby for five seconds, you’ve totally derailed this reveal 

Lulu: …You have to the count of 5 to actually reveal something

Sekhmet: I know you can’t resist, bitch 😏

Sekhmet: Who would it give you the most pleasure to fuck with rn?

Lulu: you know my hit list, I haven’t been mad enough to add your name, yet, or in the mood to take anyone else off

Sekhmet: Well time to borrow Mattie’s red pen

Lulu: if it’s one of her exes, she really must start spilling secrets

Sekhmet: Warmer

Sekhmet: but no 😆

Lulu: OH MY GOD

Lulu: you’re not serious

Lulu: it can’t be!

Sekhmet: If you’re on the right sister now

Sekhmet: there’s only one person it can be

Lulu: Well duh, we’ve gone beyond the reach of prison penpals

Lulu: but no way, he doesn’t have it in him 🤯🤯

Sekhmet: I’m sure it’s totally un-lesbian to pretend to be a man, even when you’re the one strapping

Sekhmet: anyway, yes way, why would I lie!

Sekhmet: He really does though 😻

Lulu: I’m not calling you a liar, I’m calling him 🥛

Lulu: there’s a reason he didn’t click when you said [fake name] was a new yorker and it’s the whole dungeon fantasy being wildly hypothetical and Jonah a HUGE bore

Lulu: if he’s such a dark horse I’m furious I couldn’t tell

Sekhmet: Babe, he literally fucked me NUMEROUS times, not letting me know he knew exactly who I was AND that I knew him

Sekhmet: then he didn’t tell me until we were alone in a foreign country and he’d already JUST fucked me again

Sekhmet: he’s so not what you had him pegged as, at all

Lulu: Stop, that’s too hot for me to stay livid

Sekhmet: Then don’t be, that’s boring 

Sekhmet: is this not exactly what you were hoping for but never thought you’d actually get

Lulu: Of course it is!

Lulu: tell me everything

Sekhmet: Jesus, don’t even worry about what remembering will do to me 

Lulu: How did he do it?

Sekhmet: He just… did it

Sekhmet: like he knew I wasn’t going to freak

Sekhmet: or he didn’t care, it was the former, definitely but still, it was so fucking hot

Lulu: He hates her too, wow, this is better than every Christmas or birthday…

Sekhmet: I think he’ll leave her

Lulu: I’m going to marry him, he’s CLEARLY my soulmate

Lulu: fuck, this is incredible, forget school, I don’t even care if I fail, nothing could possibly ever touch this level of validation, I’m right about her and about you, and he knows it

Sekhmet: The fuck you are 

Sekhmet: you’ll have to get in line 

Lulu: Sorry? I can’t hear you over the sound of the church bells or my 💓

Sekhmet: Too bad you already have a ring no takebacks

Lulu: so does he, he’s not letting it ruin his fun 

Sekhmet: If you hate me like he hates Jay you aren’t invited so

Lulu: I love you, you made this happen

Sekhmet: Yeah I did

Lulu: I love you so fucking much, for this, for everything

Sekhmet: Good

Sekhmet: because that’s what he wants to see

Sekhmet: how much you’d do for me

Lulu: Does he know I know? 

Lulu: my acting has SOME limits, I’m not sure I could pretend otherwise for v long if that’s also what he wants, not when I’m feeling like this

Sekhmet: Yeah, he wouldn’t meet you otherwise

Sekhmet: he has to protect himself, right

Lulu: He knows who I am too, but not enough to say with certainty I’d think blackmail is the least entertaining way this could play out

Sekhmet: He has enough on you that blackmail isn’t a possibility

Lulu: if I cared about any of it getting out, sure, he doesn’t realise yet either I don’t, but he’ll find out 

Sekhmet: I mean

Sekhmet: it’s more than you think

Sekhmet: I had to tell him some stuff or he wouldn’t even entertain it

Lulu: He isn’t as stupid as Jay makes him look, that’s a given

Sekhmet: Exactly

Sekhmet: so it’s all of us are fucked or none of us

Lulu: how perfect

Sekhmet: It can be

Sekhmet: as long as you understand that

Lulu: What’s not to understand? Telling her ends the game with the quickest and most tedious choice of move, it’s the last thing I’d do

Sekhmet: You can’t just throw the board if you decide you don’t wanna play no more

Sekhmet: It won’t end well

Lulu: I want to play

Sekhmet: Good

Lulu: I got jealous when it looked like a nobody with a trust fund bought apartment was taking you away from me, he’s somebody 

Lulu: this opportunity is special

Sekhmet: What am I, stupid?

Sekhmet: it’s once in a lifetime level

Sekhmet: I can’t believe he even saw the ad

Lulu: He saw you at the engagement party, he was waiting for his once in a lifetime chance too

Sekhmet: 🥰

Lulu: I should’ve known then after I clocked his 👀

Sekhmet: Everyone stares at me

Sekhmet: most don’t do anything

Lulu: True, you didn’t expect me to

Lulu: but I still feel like an idiot for missing something that’s now so glaringly obvious

Sekhmet: If I hadn’t started a conversation, you wouldn’t have

Sekhmet: You’d still be a straight–A student wondering how to talk to guys in your class

Lulu: You’re underestimating me and how bored she, that version, would have been at the pre-hen

Lulu: Also, EW, what boys? And what supposed mystery are they holding onto which I apparently can’t fathom?

Sekhmet: You TOTALLY asked me for advice on boys at school, I haven’t forgotten, you wish 😅

Lulu: You were playing the big sister role, I was giving you what you wanted

Sekhmet: Yeah, okay bitch 😏

Sekhmet: anyway, Jay was playing the big sister role, that’s her thing, not mine

Lulu: she swapped you in because she can’t handle playing any role against me, and boys are your thing, asking for advice was an easy first move

Sekhmet: She’s as good at it as she is the girlfriend role but you know

Sekhmet: Pop off like the expert in both, I guess 🥴

Lulu: It’s no wonder he fucked you how he did every time, she’s lights off, sober, if it’s not scheduled around clients it’s not happening

Sekhmet: Well, maybe I’ll tell you what he’s told me about her

Sekhmet: if you earn it 🙃

Lulu: You HAVE to

Sekhmet: You’ll DIE

Lulu: kill me, I’m begging you, I need it

Sekhmet: Say you’re sorry for being mad at me still

Sekhmet: even though I did nothing wrong

Lulu: I’m BEYOND sorry, it was all my fault, I went crazy

Sekhmet: All this time, I’m trying so hard to sort it so you can stay with me

Lulu: I know, I should’ve trusted you and listened to you

Sekhmet: and not think I was falling for a nobody with a trust fund

Lulu: you wouldn’t leave me, you’re not like everybody, or anybody else

Sekhmet: Don’t forget it

Lulu: If you decide to forgive me I won’t remember anything but, I promise, and I’ll do nothing but behave accordingly

Lulu: perfectly

Sekhmet: Okay then

Sekhmet: [tell her what he said about a threesome and anything else that was inevitably said]

Lulu: 💀

Lulu: I have 0 words

Lulu: maybe I should apologise again for doubting you

Sekhmet: You don’t have to apologise to Jay for calling her vanilla

Sekhmet: it’s still true now

Lulu: I told Mattie she was a cold bitch while you were away, she should apologise to me for telling me off for it

Sekhmet: 😂

Sekhmet: you didn’t lie, she’s a total bitch

Lulu: Who do you think the other girl was?

Sekhmet: They either got wasted and it was a friend that she then ditched immediately because shame

Sekhmet: or they got some poor hooker in one of the various countries they’ve been to, no chance of that tidbit following you home 🙄😏

Lulu: He would’ve created an app for her, for it, if she was capable of accepting a romantic gesture

Sekhmet: she’s such a level 3, not even a good one 

Sekhmet: either way, it must’ve been bad because it wasn’t made a regular thing

Lulu: if she’d gone to boarding school like mummy wanted she wouldn’t be such a huge drama queen, and turn off, about it

Sekhmet: I’m glad she is

Sekhmet: or I wouldn’t get him

Lulu: Yes you would, she still wouldn’t be able to compete

Sekhmet: Okay, true

Sekhmet: but I wouldn’t know I wanted him if he wasn’t looking

Lulu: fumbling her way through a girl on girl scenario more than once without being fully bambi in the headlights wouldn’t mean she’s satisfying him, she wasn’t yonks before, if ever, he’d be looking

Sekhmet: She’s never given him what he wants, she isn’t prepared to

Sekhmet: but she wants to keep him prisoner, it’s so fucked up

Lulu: Exactly

Lulu: bad luck putting a ring on it doesn’t fix anything, she’d try a baby next if she wasn’t scared to

Sekhmet: It’s too late now, she just won’t see it

Lulu: How does she not feel it? 

Lulu: I’d be embarrassed for her if she wasn’t her

Sekhmet: She’s clueless, willingly or otherwise

Sekhmet: she’d have to face her own shit to see this and she ain’t gonna do that any time soon

Lulu: 😬 but I’m Mattie’s cause du jour re needing therapy, meaning even she thinks she’s a lost one 

Sekhmet: Or she buys it

Lulu: If she thought they were the fairytale ending she’d be treating this upcoming wedding as if it is

Sekhmet: Maybe

Sekhmet: who actually likes weddings that aren’t their own though

Lulu: she doesn’t like him, I can tell

Sekhmet: Unsurprising, she actually is boring

Lulu: Does your father like him? 

Sekhmet: You know what she’s like

Sekhmet: she hasn’t let anyone meet him properly and she’d be SO offended if he actually did what dads were meant to do and gave him the once over

Lulu: A real no and a fake yes then

Sekhmet: He wouldn’t like him now but that’s not relevant

Lulu: it is to you

Sekhmet: Not yet 

Lulu: You’re super welcome for the 💭 though

Lulu: see, I’m truly sorry and really love and miss you

Sekhmet: Okay, I missed you too

Sekhmet: He might actually kill him

Sekhmet: except I won’t want him to so he won’t be able to

Lulu: It’s the biggest pity my other mummy’s board throwing tactics mean she’d have to be an ultimate last resort, or I could’ve given him that ménage à trois

Sekhmet: Meh, it’d just give her more to feel like she was right about

Lulu: Like she won’t already be unbearable when he leaves her at the altar

Sekhmet: She can’t fake she saw it coming

Sekhmet: she asked him, we know she thought it would work this time

Lulu: When does he want me? What did he say?

Sekhmet: [this should be before they’ve gone to Ireland so I can drop that in/make you wait some more, so like, give that however many days makes sense]

Lulu: that’s SO mean

Lulu: I love him even more

Sekhmet: that’s the spirit 😘

Lulu: Am I going to see you too?

Sekhmet: You will then

Sekhmet: but we’ve kinda tacked these days on to the business trip so she thinks he’s still in Budapest

Lulu: Not that she honestly cares

Sekhmet: Sadly she’s not that tuned out

Sekhmet: but yeah, it’s not going to be as if I can never see him, she’s all about independence, yeah 🙄

Lulu: Being a boss babe of fitness 

Sekhmet: ice 👸 with no 🤴🏼

Lulu: all the things she could be using her muscles for and she’s only trying to run away 

Sekhmet: She’s not going to get this back

Sekhmet: what a waste, a guy that’s loved you for a decade

Lulu: It’s disgusting, she’s throwing away a degree of loyalty I would literally kill for

Sekhmet: He’s so… 

Sekhmet: loyal doesn’t even cover it, not remotely 

Lulu: 😭

Lulu: something else she doesn’t deserve and takes utterly for granted

Sekhmet: I know he’s never fucked her like me

Sekhmet: even before she ruined it

Lulu: She’d never let him, I’ve never met someone who uses their influence as wrong as she does

Sekhmet: *right as me

Lulu: That too, except yours is genuine power, not tiny amounts of persuasion coming from exploiting other people’s emotions

Sekhmet: She’d need to share a mum to even be able to come close to knowing all the things I know how to do

Lulu: Don’t kill me harder than the wait already is

Sekhmet: My parents are perfect, I’m sorry

Lulu: yeah, you should be 🥺

Sekhmet: Poor baby

Lulu: Your life is perfect rn and I’m stuck here at school all alone, it’s the saddest

Sekhmet: You’ll feel better soon

Sekhmet: if you didn’t miss me how would you know it’s real

Lulu: Promise you’ll miss me, even though you have him

Sekhmet: Duh

Sekhmet: it’s different

Lulu: and don’t be mad at me anymore

Sekhmet: I’m not

Sekhmet: I just can’t stop thinking about him right now

Lulu: Okay

Sekhmet: You know it’s different

Lulu: I know how it works, I wouldn’t be able to stop thinking about him if I was with him either, that’s why it’s more than a job

Lulu: more than 💷💳💎🎁

Lulu: I understand, it’s the reason I hate being left out, a reason anyway

Sekhmet: Sorry I’m bad at sharing

Sekhmet: but it’s going to happen

Lulu: Me too, you’re falling for him without me and you doing anything without me makes me unhappy, that’s all 

Sekhmet: We can’t both have him, not if that’s not what he wants

Sekhmet: I’m good but I’m not tell people what their kinks are good, it doesn’t work 

Lulu: Again, I know, this arrangement is all him and his wants, it’s okay, I meant it up there, I agreed to it because it made the most sense for you pre his identity reveal and it still does

Sekhmet: It doesn’t change anything between us

Lulu: how often we can spend time together, or talk, or how much you think about me has changed

Lulu: I don’t want any promises you can’t keep, they’re too close to a lie

Sekhmet: It’s not a lie, that’s just now

Sekhmet: he has her and a seriously important job, it’s not like he can be around as much as all that

Lulu: Until he leaves her, like you said

Sekhmet: he said yes, to marrying her

Sekhmet: they’ve got this far

Lulu: Oh please, you don’t believe that

Lulu: you want him, you’ve got him, it’s the easiest thing ever

Sekhmet: it’s not that easy

Sekhmet: or you wouldn’t be interested

Lulu: Yes it is, you’re you and he’s a man pushing 30 who hadn’t been fucked properly before

Sekhmet: That hasn’t stopped him knowing how to fuck though

Lulu: I never said I didn’t want him to fuck me in every possible way that either of us can think of, I very much do

Sekhmet: Naturally

Sekhmet: I’ll tell him

Sekhmet: not the pushing 30 bit, I’m not that blatant 

Lulu: I get the feeling he’d like it and I’m not going to be there to play nice, seeing as we’re united by mutual hatred

Sekhmet: Good cop bad cop

Lulu: mhmm

Sekhmet: We’ll see

Sekhmet: maybe I know what he has planned, maybe I don’t

Lulu: Maybe I want it to be a surprise, maybe he’ll change what he had planned because it’s not for yonks and yonks

Sekhmet: he could bring it forward, or push it back

Lulu: whatever he wants, I’ll be there whenever it is, as ready as I’ve been since you first told me who he is

Sekhmet: Right answer

Lulu: This class hasn’t been a complete disaster, in that case

Sekhmet: What class are you in?

Lulu: It makes no difference for what you’re about to ask me to do, regardless I’ll do it anyway

Sekhmet: Sorry to disappoint, I just wanted to know what you were failing at

Lulu: nothing yet, equally sorry if that disappoints

Sekhmet: Guess I’ll live

Sekhmet: you couldn’t have been that distraught though

Lulu: How distraught would you like me to be?

Lulu: I haven’t slept since you left, it’s given me 🤏🏻 study time

Sekhmet: Just be honest

Lulu: I was and am, I told you it’s been rotten

Sekhmet: So don’t ask what I’d like, I’m just trying to talk to you, not play stupid games

Lulu: It isn’t a game, I walked out of model UN because I thought I was going to suffocate if I stayed for another second and now the years I did don’t count for anything and I have to delete it from all my uni applications and Mattie’s been all over me in the least hot way possible assuring me I’m not going to get into any of them, A*s being SO far beyond my current capabilities

Lulu: but it isn’t all 💔…

Lulu: [transfer her the money you made because you couldn’t cry but one of the dudes obvs wanted you to cos that’s his thing so you got into a little bidding war type moment where he was trying to make you by sheer amounts of funds]

Lulu: from [whatever his name is so she’ll know the tea] with love 😘

Sekhmet: Don’t with model UN, I’m trying to be sympathetic here 😂 you don’t wanna be the next prime minister, or one of their various grunt workers, so the model UN is irrelevant to anything but a uni application in your life

Sekhmet: how could you care about that or Mattie being a bitter cow when you’re getting that kind of reward not to think about it 😍

Lulu: 😅 You wanted honesty, the truth is, everyone’s the worst and I need you back, expecting me to be sorry when I only am we’re not together

Lulu: this school acting as though I’ve been blacklisted from the real countries my most cringe haters are representing is never going to force me to wrongly prioritise

Sekhmet: It’s too late now, if you haven’t passed by this point you’re fucked, aren’t you 

Sekhmet: they should let it go

Lulu: Seriously! There are a lot more fun hills to die on

Sekhmet: Will you be having a graduation party

Lulu: Of course

Sekhmet: That’ll be… fun

Sekhmet: you and Dolly being sent off to your new schools never to be seen again

Lulu: it could be if you’re there, and I save my gap year news for max impact

Sekhmet: Would your parents disown you

Lulu: How can they? Mummy had Jay instead of any exam results and Daddy bought his way into [whatever school he went to]

Lulu: besides which, they’re been there, done that, if they don’t have me they don’t have any bragging rights left at all

Sekhmet: You know it’s one rule for them and another for everyone else

Sekhmet: especially if you aren’t being braggable 

Lulu: It’s almost effortless to spin into a positive, I’m doing charity work or working on myself to an even more insta caption approved level, they can take their pick 😇✨

Sekhmet: Hmm, good luck faking you’re building schools in Africa, babe

Lulu: I don’t have to, it’s their photoshopping headache if they care how I look to their fake friends, the wild ones’ll be all too aware I’m really 😈

Sekhmet: True

Lulu: You don’t need to worry, they can throw a huge tantrum if they like, however long I take off from uni I can fund for myself

Sekhmet: I’m not worried

Lulu: 😊

Lulu: Will you make me an outfit for my graduation party? Pretty please

Sekhmet: I might be super busy setting up my business now… 🥰

Sekhmet: but I can try to find the time

Lulu: I’ll be your walking billboard for it, the thousands of photos can be genuinely useful rather than a total bore

Sekhmet: You’ve got a point

Lulu: Duh, and you can have complete creative control, as long as it showcases I’m not wearing my locket, because she blatantly won’t notice before then, I’ll wear anything

Sekhmet: You got it

Lulu: you’ll have me, in front of everyone my parents think are important, dressed exactly how you want

Sekhmet: 😏

Lulu: It’s heartbreaking Jay won’t attend, but there are some other silver linings

Sekhmet: Not even if you said how much you wanted her there

Sekhmet: she’d kind of have to

Lulu: if you help me, we can both lay it on super thick

Sekhmet: Dolly might want her there too

Lulu: Ew, the accuracy…

Lulu: I’ll make Mattie ask her too

Sekhmet: There you go

Lulu: If she continues to refuse it’s proof she hates me, which is a different kind of win

Sekhmet: She won’t wanna look like a bad sister

Lulu: You’ll have to find time to be there

Sekhmet: Of course

Sekhmet: Even though that would be perfect time for me to be with him, as she’ll be busy

Lulu: No no, be nice, he should definitely come as well, he’s family too❣️🥰

Sekhmet: Ha, there’s no way 😅

Sekhmet: guarantee she’ll be out of the country and send you a guilt gift on their behalf, that’s how she actually rolls

Lulu: Boo! 👎🏻 I’m ignoring you if you’re gonna ruin the fantasy

Sekhmet: Uhuh, believe that when I see it

Lulu: unlike you, it’s all I have atm

Sekhmet: Aww boo

Lulu: ☹️

Sekhmet: You’ll survive

Lulu: if survival mode is the best you can offer, I for real am ignoring you

Sekhmet: I’m enjoying being spoilt myself rn, I don’t have the energy to switch roles 🤷🏽‍♀️

Lulu: Thank god I don’t have to rely on you to be treated like a 👑

Sekhmet: Thank God

Lulu: bye then, I guess

Sekhmet: Can’t you let me have anything, OMG

Lulu: No, I’m THAT twin, don’t pretend you don’t know

Sekhmet: Well it’s not cute and I’m not going to cut my good time short to deal with pouting from you

Lulu: nobody’s asking you to, I literally just did farewells, it’s the opposite

Sekhmet: Yeah, bye Lulu 🙄

Lulu: This kind of verbal tough love isn’t cute either, FYI

Sekhmet: I’m not being cute with you, you don’t deserve it, FYI

Lulu: I don’t deserve your half baked attempts at sympathy over something neither of us care about

Lulu: especially when the lack of juicy details about what you’re doing is v telling

Sekhmet: Telling how?

Lulu: You don’t want me to have anything, so don’t put it on me like I’m the one who can’t share 

Sekhmet: It isn’t about sharing, I told you I don’t want to

Sekhmet: this is my thing and you want to take it

Lulu: If I wanted to take it I’d take it

Sekhmet: 😂

Lulu: yeah, it’s completely hilarious how quick it went from our thing to yours

Sekhmet: It is my thing, period

Sekhmet: it was never yours, I need the place to stay, I want to stop seeing other guys

Sekhmet: I put in all this work, meanwhile you were seeing all the clients you could, so no, it’s not ours

Lulu: Then why lie?

Sekhmet: I didn’t lie

Sekhmet: You can come see me still, that’s what we wanted, that’s what he’s okaying

Lulu: You sold it to me one way and him another

Sekhmet: No, you want in harder because it’s him

Lulu: No, earlier in this very convo you were acting as if all the work you were putting in was for my benefit, so we could be together when he’s doing whatever he does instead of fucking his fiancee

Lulu: telling me it’s different because that’s what I wanted to hear

Sekhmet: How is that not exactly what I just said, again

Sekhmet: You can come ‘round and stay… what are you not getting? 

Sekhmet: If he likes you, you can play sometimes, none of that makes me a liar but it doesn’t make it yours either

Lulu: Because it isn’t about him

Lulu: you’re not getting that you can’t just put a line down the middle of things marking what’s yours and what’s mine

Lulu: everything is supposed to be ours, there isn’t supposed to be a line

Sekhmet: How can I help it if that’s not what he wants

Lulu: Again, it isn’t fucking about him!

Lulu: you aren’t meant to enjoy keeping things from me

Sekhmet: I’m not going to not enjoy this, to make you feel better, that is ridiculous

Lulu: It’s cruel

Lulu: how is it days ago that you loved me so hard you almost told everyone my real name and I gave you my locket? We were breathing in sync and now I couldn’t pay you to go back to when we first met and it hurt to miss me so badly you wouldn’t

Sekhmet: It’s not like that

Sekhmet: you don’t enjoy what you do, huh

Sekhmet: why am I not allowed?

Lulu: You know I do because I’m not keeping it to myself

Sekhmet: If I was keeping it to myself, I wouldn’t have told you who he was, wouldn’t have offered to let you join at all

Sekhmet: seriously

Lulu: Wow, you think you get credit for doing what he wanted and told you to do? 

Lulu: there isn’t a single secret I have from you or would want to

Sekhmet: He wouldn’t even know about you if it wasn’t for me, so yeah

Lulu: And you clearly regret it now so it doesn’t make up for anything,

Sekhmet: I wonder why I’m regretting it, a real mystery, that

Lulu: I’m sorry you didn’t meet him first, okay? Bad luck

Sekhmet: Shut up

Sekhmet: you’re being insane

Lulu: There’s less mystery there, I love you and you’re pulling away from me in record time

Sekhmet: I’m not, you are overreacting and you need to stop or you’ll make it worse

Lulu: The honest to god reason you haven’t met either of my grandparents yet is because they’d portray me as having been dramatic and desperate from childhood, but what they don’t understand, which I thought you did, is that I’ve never felt like this before 

Lulu: ever

Sekhmet: You say that

Sekhmet: but how can I trust you

Lulu: You should feel it, I am going insane, that’s what love does

Lulu: you should be going insane too

Sekhmet: I’ve seen you act like this over Mattie, and I’ve heard about it over Dolly

Sekhmet: don’t tell me I’m special when I’m not

Lulu: but you are, they didn’t love me back

Sekhmet: If that’s it

Lulu: Reality matters more than fantasy

Sekhmet: Does it, honestly?

Sekhmet: to you

Lulu: It didn’t used to, when I had nothing else

Lulu: but because of you, I don’t need to delude myself anymore

Sekhmet: I want to believe you

Lulu: Test me, I’ll pass

Sekhmet: This is what this is now

Sekhmet: like you kept saying, it’s not about him

Lulu: I know you need him, but our arrangement predates his

Lulu: I saw you first and I loved you first, I know you believe that

Sekhmet: Yeah, I believe that

Lulu: and you wanted to keep me before you wanted him to keep you

Sekhmet: That’s what I’m doing, you’re mine, not his

Lulu: I’ll never be anyone else’s

Sekhmet: Okay

Lulu: you’re the first and only person I’ve ever belonged to

Sekhmet: It’s a lot of responsibility 

Sekhmet: but I’m going to look after you, you just have to trust me and my decisions 

Lulu: It’s all I want

Sekhmet: You’ve made it this far, it’s just a few more days, okay baby

Lulu: Okay, I’m sorry, I’ll be good

Sekhmet: It’s okay, it’ll all be worth it, I promise

Lulu: It’s him, I haven’t stopped reeling, go ahead and believe that too, truly

Sekhmet: It’s understandable

Sekhmet: maybe I am too… it’s so insane that it’s him

Lulu: wild, I have to cut you some slack, maybe…

Sekhmet: a bit 🤏🏽

Sekhmet: I can’t decide if I knew it was him before I knew, you know

Lulu: You weren’t looking deep because the unknown was hot

Sekhmet: Exactly

Sekhmet: it would’ve been insane to say I knew before I met him

Sekhmet: and it’s not like I could remember his voice exactly…

Sekhmet: but it’s probably no more insane than acting as if I had NO suspicions 

Lulu: He wasn’t bringing the conversation, just the 👀

Sekhmet: His eyes are SO intense

Lulu: and he denied you the eye contact for yonks and yonks, I love how evil he is

Sekhmet: 🥺

Sekhmet: don’t gang up on me

[lighteyed]

thank you — p.p.

summary → there has never been a moment where peter’s words haven’t failed him whilst basking in your presence, so why should they form coherent sentences now?

word count → 3.5k

author’s note → did you guys forget that i write because honestly me 2

  Be it totally and completely out of the blue, you awaken one bright, blazing Tuesday morning in early November, brisk chill whipping through the air, and decide that later that night, when you see him somewhere that isn’t so public and academic like, you’re going to kiss Peter Benjamin Parker.  

  You’re not quite sure what brings it on, perhaps you should just leave it to the raging teenage hormones that the doctors and psychologists and guidance counselors blame everything on, but another part of you understands that this longing, yearning, to let yourself fall in love with your best friend is something far from foreign or new. This loving feels familiar to you, like coming back home after vacations far away and far too long, and it’s warmth in the way that burrowing under your blankets when the chill settles into your bones is. Boys like Peter demand to be adored, and they demand to be kissed as if never before. You’d be damned if you let such prime opportunities escape your grasp, or rather, your lips. 

  The hours in school glide by, which was, admittedly, utterly surprising. Typically, when you’re anticipating something later in the day, any hours before the event that is to transpire drag on as if you’re not impatient, as if you can wait all day without a complaint. But suddenly it’s last period, then two-thirty rolls around and you’re bounding over to your locker where your best friend awaits you, rocking slightly on the heels of his feet the way he has a tendency to do when he’s overexcited. This motion is arguably the most adorable thing you’ve ever seen. Then again, anything Peter does, the simplest actions that bear no real relevancy, is something that you mark down in your head as the cutest thing you’ve ever seen. 

   Peter glances around the halls, unable to see you through the mounds of students rushing hurriedly past him in order to relieve themselves of academia for the day as soon as possible. He pulls down the cuff of his sweater over his hands, then rethinks this and pushes them back up to his elbows. Blue looks nice on him. There are just these little things you tend to notice about him, silly things that only a person in love would pick up, and these tiny details, like the way the light catches in his eyes and the smiles he saves for certain people, make your heart bright and happy and whisper lovingly to him in a voice he can’t hear. The crowd disperses considerably enough, and you manage to fight your way through the remaining throng of people loitering in the hallway for no real reason- beyond frustrating, you think, but then Peter catches your eye and his already happy demeanor increases tenfold. With a beam that practically stretches out and reaches into your heart, seizing it carefully and determinedly, Peter ambles toward you, trying to appear more relaxed than he felt, and pushes himself into your personal space, as usual, by wrapping his arm around your shoulders and pulling you into him. 

    “You’re in a good mood,” you note, because at this point in your relationship there’s no need for formal greetings, as he parades you out of the building after letting go of you long enough to allow you to gear up for the cold sweeping through the borough outside the walls of Midtown. He casts a glance your way, sideways but still joyous, then shrugs, nonchalant. “You’re just so happy to see me, aren’t you, Pete?” 

   You’re half joking and not expecting much until Peter gives you a little look, head tilted to the side and his eyebrows furrowed slightly like he can’t believe the question is something you don’t know the answer to. He gives your shoulder a squeeze. “You should know the answer to that by now!” He exclaims, mock disappointment in the head shake he gives you. “The answer is yes. We see each other for, like, two seconds at a lunch all day and that’s it. I’m deprived. I miss you.” 

  “We’re together right now,” you laugh, nudging into his side. 

   “Not enough. I see Ned twenty-four-seven, I need both of my best friends with me all day every day if I’m gonna survive the next two and a half years of high school.” Your heart sort of twitches again, your palms feel warm. He has that influence over you. Love is such a strange thing sometimes, impossible to decipher or make sense of, and then other times it feels like the simplest emotion in the world, easy and steady and everything. You’ll never know what to make of it. “I just miss you, okay? Don’t make a big deal out of it,” he jokes, rubbing your shoulder for a second before letting his hand dangle across the edge of your shoulder. You reach up to intertwine your fingers with his, the way you have millions of times before in the same seemingly intimate way, pretending as if you don’t know the sweet grin that the gesture elicits from him, staring adoringly at the profile of your face like he couldn’t possibly get enough of the view. 

   “Aw,” you coo, pinching his cheek with the hand that wasn’t holding his. Peter flinches away, his eyes squeezing shut and his cheeks pink. “I missed you, too, Pete. So, where are we off to today? Can we go traipse around SoHo? We haven’t been in ages and oh! Look, I see the A train, it’s on every corner, let’s go.” Before he realizes it, he’s being dragged down toward the steps of the subway, his complaints about constantly getting lost there falling upon deaf ears. 

   Much more than a mere few hours later, Peter is shaking his head as you laugh hysterically down the block leading to your apartment building. He has a feigned look of annoyance on his face as you talk, exaggeratedly rolling his eyes. “C’mon, Peter, we didn’t get lost that bad this time. Seriously, we made it to Union Square, which was right by the R train, then we took it to the mall and hopped on the M which we took to the F, ridiculously simple!” You exclaim, taking a sip from your bottle of water. “You’re acting as if we, like, walked around in a  circle for an hour.” 

   “Because that’s exactly what we did!” He replies, playfully punching you in the arm, but with a carefully light touch. Peter is, and has always been ever since it became a pressing issue, terribly aware of his enhanced strength and senses. He’s so nervous about accidentally hurting you when his intentions were to be playful that he does everything with extra caution now, barely letting himself touch you most of the time or even give a gentle squeeze of your hand. “We did walk in a a circle for an hour! And your phone died while you were trying to use Google Maps, it was pouring rain, you got so cold I had to give you my jacket which made me cold-”

  You interrupt him, “No one said you had to give me your jacket!” 

  He continues on his rant, pretending as if you haven’t spoken even though the smirk twitching at the corners of his lips beg to differ- “we couldn’t figure out where we were which is stupid since we’re supposed to be New Yorkers, then finally I said to just keep walking straight, which we did until we found Union Square due to pure dumb luck.” Peter watches you throw your head back and laugh, high in sound and utterly happy, and he shoves his hands deep in his pockets, a stupidly thrilled grin on his face, too. He hated that he couldn’t stop grinning; it was ridiculous and it hurt his cheeks and made his eyes squint so hard they ached once he was finally able to let his mouth rest. Oh, how his heart couldn’t stop hammering! He was so nervous he could hardly think straight. Peter Parker was drowning, suffocating, choking on these emotions that had been so far buried deep, deep within the recesses of his heart that he hardly knew what to do with them now that they were drifting to the surface like leaves on a pond. 

     You can feel his eyes on you, the soft and sweet, carefully watching gaze of Peter, and so you take the moment for your own. You’re standing in front of the door to the apartment building when you whip around toward him, and he goes in for the hug like he knows what you’re planning to do. Instead, you lean up, take his face in your hands and you note how cold his cheeks are as you avoid his surprised gaze. Then, you’re kissing him. You are kissing Peter Parker in the way you’ve never kissed anyone before; it’s hesitant, over too fast like it never even happened, but you kissed him and he knows you’ve just kissed him, but the thoughts flipping through his brain and the way his stomach is clenching doesn’t allow him to form coherent sentences that you can hear and comprehend. 

   Instead of kissing you again, instead of lifting you up in his arms and spinning you around the street and singing like a madman because the person of his dreams seems to want him right back, he stutters for five seconds. The only words that he can manage to say are, “Thank you,” before he turns back around and quite literally sprints down the block to his own apartment. 

   When he gets home he collapses on his bed, grunting a hello to May before he shoves his pillow over his face and screams into it, unabashed screaming that he drags out for two minutes. He pulls back, red cheeked and panting. He immediately rolls over to call Ned, begging him to come over immediately and no, Ned, he doesn’t care about the comic you’re in the middle of reading because this is an emergency damn it! 

   “You said thank you?” Ned says incredulously, thirty minutes later and trying not to burst into hysterics after what his best friend had just relayed to him. He can’t help himself, and as Peter hugs his pillow to his chest with a look similar to that of someone who is experiencing severe indigestion, Ned wheezes out a laugh held in for so long that it just goes on forever. Peter buries his face in the plush, comforting fabric, emitting a groan that continues for as long as Ned cackles. “Dude, you’re a mess. I can’t believe you said thank you. Who says thank you after being kissed? For the first time? By someone you’ve been dying to kiss for the past, like, three years?” Ned is practically crying by the time Peter  launches his pillow at his so called best friend, resting his fists against his cheeks and letting a pout befall his lips. 

   “Ned,” Peter whines, brown eyes pleading. “I need help. I said thank you! I hate myself, I shouldn’t be allowed to be kissed ever again. I’m… I’m so stupid. I said thank you! To Y/N! Y/N! Of all people! Thank you! Thank you.” He repeats the phrase with a sad, small shake of his head and lies back down on his bed. Ned stretches out across the top bunk, Peter can hear the old bed creak, and they both let out a sigh. “What should I do, man? Do you think Y/N hates me?” 

   Ned is quiet for a moment. “Right now? Y/N definitely hates you right now. I’m not even saying that to be mean, I’m saying that as your best friend. You said thank you.”  

  “I know,” he says, miserable and pathetic and contemplating what sort of injuries he might hypothetically sustain if he attempted a backflip off the edge of the Empire State Building. 

   “He said thank you?” Michelle Jones doesn’t even bother to wait, to even offer a dash of fake but well meant sympathy, before she erupts into hysterics, laughing so terribly hard that she nearly rolls off your twin bed. You stare at her, stone faced, unamused, as she continues her awful wheezing laughter that she has no intention of halting any time soon. “Oh my god, oh my god, I have to-” MJ abruptly stands up, stifling her laughter behind her hand as she leaves your bedroom, then closes the door behind her and starts laughing again. It’s loud, practically deafening, mostly because the laughter feels so mocking and smothering in lieu of recent events that had occurred less than an hour ago. You sigh, hugging your pillow even tighter to your chest as you wait for your so called best friend to return from her stint in the hallway. 

   “Oh, are you done now? Thanks,” you snap, shifting over on the bed to make room for her to clamor back on. “I can’t believe you. I’m having a crisis and you leave to go laugh at me in the hallway. What sort of friend are you, MJ?” 

   She shrugs, the ghost of a hilariously mocking grin still playing at her mouth. “The friend who tells it like it is.” 

   You huff, lying down on the bed and staring up at the glow in the dark stars you had stuck up there when you were fourteen, the July before you started high school. You put them up with Peter, and it was late and hot and your palms were sticky with sweat that sometimes wonder was due to the heat of the summer or the boy sitting next to you in your room, on your tiny bed, rambling on about the rings that Jupiter had, because yes Jupiter has rings, and the reasons as to why stars emit light. Peter was always there, never wavering in his loyalties, your most beloved friend, the boy who promised over and over again that he’d be there for you no matter what. He was Peter, and you loved Peter, and if Peter didn’t love you back that would be just fine- you just wanted to know sooner rather than later. “What should I do? Is he, like, repulsed by me? Why would you let me kiss him, Michelle?” 

   “Uh, excuse me, I didn’t even know you were planning on planting a big one on Peter Parker, so any blame cast on me is henceforth cancelled. Got that? Good,” Michelle brushes her hair out of her eyes, that intense look appearing on her already intense face. “First of all, that loser is physically incapable of being repulsed by you. I’m just telling you that right now before you go off on a stupid tangent about whether or not he hates you. That’s final. Next, he’s never been kissed before! He was definitely overwhelmed, probably freaking out inside, didn’t know what to do, and that was the first thing that popped into his head and he ran with it and then he ran away. Understandable. Finally, boys are just stupid. All of them. They’re all complete morons, and-” 

   “Okay, Michelle, the idiotic tendencies of people who identify as a male is a riveting debate that we enjoy quite frequently, but tonight I think I’m done talking boys. I’m going to just… let things happen as they should? If Peter likes me, he’ll tell me, and that’ll be that. I just won’t bring up the kiss. I’ll pretend like it didn’t happen.” With a satisfied nod, MJ pats your head, then, for a split second, snorts under her breath again. 

  She holds her hands up defensively, exclaiming, “He still said thank you! He’s never living this shit down!”

    The next day at school, Peter is prepared and ready for the conversation he anticipates is going to happen. He is ready to be understanding if you yell at him for being a complete and utter ass after you kissed him, he’s ready to spill his bottled up feelings all over the linoleum floor if that’s what it takes for you to believe that the kiss was the best thing he’s ever experienced, ever would experience, and he’s ready for the beginning of everything he’s ever dreamt of, but none of that comes. At least, not immediately, not in the way he expected. 

   The boy has always thought himself a patient person, but in the months that have passed he’s realized that under no circumstances is he okay with waiting. He’s impatient and annoyed at everyone and everything that comes his way that isn’t you, and then he’s annoyed at you for not appearing to him and acknowledging that you kissed him on the front steps of your apartment building with a fervor that could only be identified as the crashing, burning, raging, bursting power of pent up emotion. He knows he has hardly any classes with you, so there’s no conceivable way you could have an in depth discussion of your relationship status as of this very moment, but still. He’d appreciate a gesture of some kind. And then, after this thought pops into his head, he wonders if he should be the one to make the gesture. 

   Prompt with following his instincts, he sets off to find you before you can avoid him at lunch like he knows you will. He stands by your locker, leaning against the cool metal frame, waiting for you to make an appearance. He sees you first, and by now this is simply rote for him. You don’t have time to even attempt to duck out of his way; Peter is determined, stubborn, and he won’t lose out on his chance by allowing you to go on ignoring him. Even if you don’t want a relationship, a decision he’ll respect wholeheartedly, he flat out refuses to even entertain the idea of no longer having you as his best friend, as his other kind of love. He takes your hand, silent begging scrawled across the weakened, anxious smile he gives you. He leads you toward the front of the school, around a bend of empty lockers, and takes a step back. 

   Neither of you really look at each other until he says, unexpectedly, “You kissed me!” It’s almost accusatory, the way he says it, and, affronted, you look back up at him in alarm.  

   “And you said thank you!” You retort, eyes narrowed. “Who says that!” The entire reason you’ve been avoiding him was to avoid this discussion. It was making you feel feverish. Peter had always made you nervous, it was painfully obvious, but this was so much different than just incessant butterflies in your stomach. This was a post-kiss conversation, and you hardly knew what to say to him other than repeating the previous query of, “Seriously, who tells someone thank you after they’ve just kissed you!”

   The question is rhetorical, so he ignores it. That, and because he’s already embarrassed enough by his tactless reply. He waves his hands around aggressively. “I know! I know I did! I didn’t mean to! You scared me!” 

   “Wow, thanks.” 

   “I didn’t mean it like that! You’re not scary, you’re like a baby deer, a fawn, you’re so cute and non-intimidating, I didn’t mean that you were scary I meant that I’ve never been kissed and being kissed by the person you have a crush on is a scary thing especially when it comes out of nowhere so I’m sorry that I said thank you but I just didn’t- my brain doesn’t work sometimes, okay!” Peter runs his hands through his hair. One curl flips down, curling over his forehead in a stupidly cute way.

   “Peter, you literally drive me up the wall, sometimes.” You shake your head, give a sigh, take two steps forward so that you’re so much closer to him than you were before even though two steps shouldn’t feel like you’re closing the widest gap in history. “Should I not have kissed you?” 

   His pretty brown eyes go wide. “Did you not hear the part where I called you cute? And the part where I said I have a crush on you? Do you have selective hearing? Work with me here,” he pleads, taking holding of your shoulders and giving the gentlest shake he can manage. 

   “So, kissing is a yes, then?” You press, just to make sure, just to tease him a little because you can see the way he grows more and more flustered each time you act like you have no idea what he’s talking about. He closes his eyes. There’s a deep inhalation while you stand there waiting for him, and when he kisses you, you’re the one taken by surprise, hands frozen in midair as he lets his lips move from yours in this painfully slow way you’re almost sure he’s taunting you with. You open your mouth to speak, but he beats you to the punch. 

  “I swear, if you ruin this moment and say it-” 

  “Thank you, Peter.” 

  “I think we’re going to have to break up before we’re even together. You blew it, Y/N. Good work.” 

  “Aw, c’mon! It’ll be our thing.”

  “No.”

TAGS : @iusethistoreadfanfics @pbpz @skymoonandstardust @lunastarwatcher @warcriminalrogers @brittyblogs @tiny-friggin-human @heartfrost @gentlethunderstorm @fairydustparker @emmaaolsen @xwinterromanxff @idioticnerd24 @ravenclaws-say-caw @buckysmaingirl @pillow223 @quacksontommy @handsomeholland @tomarvelicious @fluffyavengers @wavy-ley @radicalstars @nedslaptop @nedandpeter @starparker @parkerroos @stephie-senpai @spideytattoo @peterplanet @fullwizardstrawberry @yoinkpeter @linnsweatpants @mossyfeet @sophia1644 @itsssmichelleee

#peter parker imagine #peter parker #peter parker x reader #spider man: homecoming

[mauveviolet]

Plssssss write Elio and Oliver years down the road meeting up again, Elio is a student st the same university Oliver teaches at and I need a lot of angst in my life, slowwwww burn. Pretty pretty please

AN: Here it is, the prologue of a PROJECTED 10 chapters. Might be more might be less! Sorry this took so long! this has not been Beta'd, sorry for any mistakes! Please enjoy, anon! And yes, i stay consistent with a chosen last name for Oliver, haha."Concrete Trees" -Prologue"Mama. Mama, I said I’m fine.”I spin in my rolling chair idly as the cellular takes up the broad of my hand. I catch the foggy, almost mundane grey light outside of my apartment window one, two, three times before I come to a sudden halt with the skid of a sock, and I stand up dizzily. “I miss you to, Mama. But it’s only been a few days, you must at least try to last the semester. Just this one, okay?” She mumbles.I bounce on my toes over the boxes that scatter my floor. Porcelain keepsakes pile in one with paper wrapped securely around them while in the other clothes seem to reach the ceiling. The ultimate privilege to nabbing my own apartment in New York as a student was the ability to make my own messes. I’m an adult, I told mama, she has nothing to worry about in terms of keeping the place neat and tidy, and while I’m sure I will, some of the things she doesn’t know won’t kill her.“I’ll be home for Hanukkah, I’m sure I’m not the only one here who’s far from home in a place like this. Maybe you should get together with a mom from Germany who sent her son away to New York, too.” I giggle as I rip my phone from my ear abruptly to keep from her cries from hitting me to loudly. “I’m just joking. This was 100% my choice and you know that. We’ve been through this hundreds of times. Everything will be alright, I’ll find another 22 year old who’s too far from home somewhere around here. Maybe they’ll be from Italy.”I pad over to my large window that poses as a portal to what seems like an alternate reality, one with cars in every free centimeter of the hot pavement and people of every race and religion wandering the street aimlessly. If i looked a little too far to my right, I’d be peering straight into someone else's apartment, which doesn’t sit in my stomach well, so I opt to keep my right curtain closed, both for my privacy and the mystery person both feet from me yet, in the grand scheme of things, so far away. I’ve never been so far in the air in my life, minus that dreadful plane ride, if you can even call it that. It’s a huge death tube, I think, but the others around me treated it as if it was normal. The conversation lasts for what seems like hours. Some “highlights” being my grocery list, how much money I’llnspend on tourism in the next year, all those fun things. But at least by the time our talk has ended, my apartment is less of an apartment and moreso a home. The ambiance is red and orange to match the lamp in the corner, there’s a little couch and TV set by a rug all my own, and shelves upon shelves of books I couldn’t emotionally bare to leave in Italy stand at the walls, along with pictures of my family at every corner.“Oliver went to Columbia,” my mama says, finally. Lastly.I swallow. I know Oliver went to Columbia. I pretend I haven’t thought about that so many times it’s burnt a hole through my skull.“Yeah, I know. Last time I spoke to him he said he said he, uh,” I pull on my shirt collar.“Went to work at another school. In another state. Illinois, I think.”“When was the last time you spoke to Oliver, Elio?” I feel the heaviness of the curious pity within her voice like one feels lead pass through their bloodstream. Unfavorable… in the least. “I’m going out, mama. I need to eat in the next week, I should get started on those groceries.”The pause, that evidently only lasts a moment, drags on until she finally responds.“I love you, Elio. Stay safe.”“Always, mama. I love you too.”After deciding it was to humid to shove a jacket over my shoulders and trudging outside in just a black shirt and jeans, I ask myself as I sit on a damp park bench with paper grocery bags sat politely next to me, if I am forcing myself to think about Oliver rather than if it is worth it to think about him. The past was the past when I was in Italy and the past remains the same in Manhattan, but I feel his energy in everything that moves; I feel something coercing me into the thought of him. Life here is chaotic and beautiful. I learned that from Oliver, and because at 17 his worlds mended to me as words do at that age, he lives in the bleeding red light fractured through the water on my eyelashes. He lifts the cruelty from honks and yells of frustrated and busy people. I’m unsure if it’s comforting or not.I decide that due to the increasing rain (and my sheer stupidity in not correlating humidity with storms) that it’s time to aquate myself with the New York subway system, as reluctant as I am. Hands full and swerving around people left and right, I realize how crowded and cluttered it is, but it’s also so exciting to see such a staple in culture unlike mine. Oliver must have rode these everyday before he received a car. I’m riding a mile or two in his shoes.I wait for the subway, now. I shuffle my ticket between my fingers, pressed to the wall furthest from the track ledge. I had taken one glimpse of that sickening fall and had eagerly conjoined myself the furthest thing from it, as if nowhere was far enough to keep myself from falling in.There's a boy a foot away from me, but he stands in front of the ledge. No fear consumes him as it does to me. His leg jitters in a pair of huge sneakers and off white jeans (maybe coveralls?), shrouded in a soft flannel and a green bookbag covered in mini pins and keychains, one that looks like a row of hanging dice on rainbow beads that spell “Percy.” One says Columbia on it- in fact, multiple do. A returning student.How much older is he than me? From behind he looks no different than me; curly brown hair but cut short, a little taller but just as thin. His head swivels left and right eagerly, as if the Eastbound train will emerge from the Eastern terminal. He’s not afraid of the ledge because, like a seasoned New Yorker, the ledge has gotten to know him.I find it peculiar that I think so hard about strangers, but sometimes you can tell so little about a person by how they look and you’re forced to sit and wonder. I knew all about Oliver and even yet, I still sit and wonder so strongly about him.Where was this boy from? Was he American? European? Or maybe Canadian? I’d never met a Canadian, but I hear the land is a conglomerate of Ireland's fields and New York’s buildings. Some canadians speak a french many would say is “botched” though I’ve never really heard it, and some of the more interesting ones speak english like I’ve never heard before. It’d be cool to meet a Canadian.When the train pulls up, the station comes alive again as people scramble to catch a seat and they squeeze through the doors. He’s the first one in, but I let the mass push through; I don’t mind standing. I hobble through to one of the only handles left, near the back of the subway car. To my disdain there is a couple here displaying affection I wouldn’t call publically appropriate, and an older man already passed out asleep. If i stretch on my tip-toes, I can hear a saxophone playing on the other side of the train but only barely see the player. However, my eye catches the boy again. I notice now how freckles fleck the entire surface area of his face and glasses frame his cheeks. He plays a gameboy with concentration I’ve only seen in my father, which is a feat. At the first stop, that concentration fades, and he notices my staring. Instead of being weirded out (as, admittedly, I would be) he hesitantly motions for me to sit in the spot next to him now unoccupied. I accept, placing my bags on my lap and crossing my legs, making a point not to stare at him more than I already have. But curiosity gets the best of me. “You… you go to Columbia?”He looks at me, almost surprised that I had actually opened my mouth.“Yeah… why?”“I’m a first year.”“A freshman?”I scratch the back of my neck. “Yeah, that.” He boots his Gameboy up again. “I’m assuming you aren’t American. You look like a deer caught in headlights.” He’s extremely casual for someone I wouldn’t have met had I not stared at him so indecently. “Italian. But my father is American. I’ve never been here though, so, yeah… Italian.” “What brings you to Columbia then? No good Italian schools? What’s your major?”I didn’t know what to expect when I sat next to this boy, but I can’t say I’m surprised. “Double major in Anthropology and Philosophy, and a minor in Music.” He still doesn’t raise his head from his game. “That’s a real boatload. I’m just doing Integrated Technologies and a minor in education.”“Education? You want to be a professor? My father is a professor, he did the same things I’m doing actually.”“I’d love to be a highschool teacher.”I visibly gulp at the sound of that. I can’t imagine having to stay any longer than I did in a school full of sweaty teenagers. Hell, I was one once, I don’t think I’d want to go back.“Oh, uh,” he interjects.“I actually know what professor you’re likely to have if you’re completing an anthropology major.”“Hm?”“Yeah, he’s quite strict in how things are taught according to my buddies, but it’s the sign of a good teacher. He loves when people interact with him in class; he hates a boring class. He won’t have it. But don’t goof off…I don’t know much- anything, about you, so I don’t know how you’ll fare with that. I wouldn’t be quiet if you were in his class but don’t be slack.”He sounds like an okay guy. I’ll be with people like me, it seems. “What’s his name?”“Professor Bishop. You’ll know him when you see him. Tall, blonde, and stubbly. Younger than most of the professors. You’ll know him when you see him.” My face goes Appalachians snow white and a stack of apples are moments away from hitting the subway floor. “What’s his first name?”“Uh, I’m not sure. Ollie? Owen? Oliver- Yeah, that’s it. Oliver… You okay dude?”