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countrymusiclover · 11 months

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17 - My Cousin Jo

Part 18

Gemini Runaway

Tag list ask to be added @dragonixfrye @secretdreamlandmentality

Am I posting at 1am when I should go to bed yes 😂 Goodnight my readers

“You finally kissed him!” Caroline Forbes’s sweet squeal came through the phone when I had barely gotten to tell her anything else about the date last night.

Pulling the phone away from my ear I put her on speaker and video call that way she wouldn’t scream in my ear again. “Yes Care and if I’m being honest I loved every second of it.”

“So was it a slow kiss or something with a bit more kick in it?” She asked me while I was walking down the stairs carrying a map in my other hand with a printed out picture of Jo that I had kept with me before she left to work as a doctor.

Sitting the map down on the kitchen table with a single candle in the center. “It was a pretty heated kiss considering we had tried to kiss like multiple times and kept getting interrupted.”

“Awe and ew at the same time. I’m sorry that I am still conflicted over this. I can’t believe it, it's so adorable. Wait, what are you doing with a map. Are you trying to do more magic after you nearly died by Esther’s spell?” She knitted her brows at me in confusion.

Opening a drawer I grabbed one of the knives sitting on the phone on the table. “How do you know about that? I didn’t tell you about that.”

“Bonnie spilled the beans after I was comforting her because Damon killed her mom to stop the ritual but you managed to do it all on your own.” The blonde vampire admitted.

“Oh sorry Caroline. Tell her I’m sorry but I am not sure she will accept it.” Raising the blade I sliced it across my palm sitting the picture in the center of the map letting my blood drop onto the picture.

She got closer to the phone screen seeing what I was doing. “What witchy spell are you doing this time, Rae?”

“Yes I would like to know as well, Raelyn.” Whipping my head up and throwing my hair over my shoulders Klaus entered the room wearing a black jacket thrown over a gray sweatshirt, waving to the blonde on my phone. “You should be resting after my mothers spell nearly killed you. Hello Caroline.”

She waved back at him. “Hi Klaus. He’s right Raelyn you should just come over to my house and we can party and get drunk.”

“I appreciate the offer and concern but I have to see someone in my family. My cousin Josette.” I picked up the knife about to cut my hand but Klaus grabbed my wrist with his vamp speed.

His blue eyes trained on mine where we were very close to one another. “You’re not going alone. I am coming with you. I don’t know this woman.”

“She would never hurt me, Nik.” I fought against his parodied mind knowing my cousin better than he ever would. “She’s the person who taught me almost every spell I know.”

Caroline clapped her hands together, gaining our attention once more. “Hold up if you’re talking about a road trip then I want to come too.”

“Alright fine you both can come. Now can I do the spell. I need to find her exact location or we won’t be going anywhere.” I caved in knowing otherwise he wouldn’t let me leave Mystic Falls without someone to watch out for me.

He released my wrist allowing me to slice the blade across my palm offering his right hand out to me. “Caroline, you get everything prepared. I’ll get the car.”

“Phasmatos tribum, nas ex viras sequita saguines ementas asten mihan ega petrous…” The blood moved across the map slowly circling around a spot that was located as Whitmore College. “Looks like we’re going to college, Caroline.”

“Rae, your nose.” Klaus pointed out.

Holding my hand underneath my nose there was some blood but I waved it off sniffling so it would go away in a little bit. “I’ll be fine. We’re going to find Jo.”

It was an hour later when I saw a small chair be left in the driveway and for Caroline to vamp up to the door ringing the doorbell. She flung her arms open with a bottle of wine in her hands wrapping her arms around me. "I come with alcohol, my friend."

"Hi Care, Nik should be coming down in a second. I looked up the directions to the college." I told her hugging her back before Klaus vamped downstairs.

He held open his palm eyeing Caroline. "I'll drive ladies."

"Why do you need to drive. Are you trying to be the Alpha male?" She snapped.

He smirked, sending me a look since I wasn't saying anything. "I am the Alpha male and I know that you two will probably want to talk."

"Yeah but I am cam drive and talk at the same time." She got in his face.

Holding my hands up I pushed in between them. "Okay, Nik just drive there. Caroline you drive home. Let's go." The three of us got in the car and for the most part of it was spent in silence. Klaus had one hand on the steering wheel while he drove.

"So you said your cousin taught you magic. How old were you and what about the rest of your family?" Caroline asked, sitting in the backseat with me in the front passenger seat.

Turning back around to her I sighed thinking about what Jo started teaching me magic. "I was a teenager. As for the rest of my family they view me as a witch against them. She's always accepted what I am because her brother was the same. Even though he tried to kill her."

Walking into my bedroom Jo sat down with her bag on my bed sitting down across from me. She had her hair very shorter than mine was at the time. “You know I don’t care what the rest of our Coven says right. You are a witch even if you weren’t born with your own magic.”

“What makes you think that I was thinking that, cuz?” I asked her surprised that she would even be right on the money about it.

She sent me a look flipping through pages in a notebook that had some specific spells written down that she felt were important. “By the look in your eyes, Rae. My brother Kai is just like you an outcast so that is why he was sent away because he let his anger take control over him. I have faith you won’t ever do that. Now these are just a few of the spells I think can be useful since we won’t always be around one another, repeat after me.”

“Alright. Are we holding hands too?” I questioned knowing that I could siphon away her magic.

She shook her head yes holding out her open palms so I placed my hands on top of hers. “Don’t worry I stored my magic away in a hunting knife you won’t hurt me, Raelyn. Now pay attention…..Phasmatos tribum exum sue redem su pas quo.”

“Phasmatos tribum exum sue redem su pas quo - A spell to take away a witches power.” I repeated her.

She praised me. “Good what about this one, Te ni rien a boka.”

“Family members interact through consciousness.”

She smiled nodding in my direction. “Phasmatos tribum melan veras raddiam onu pavadus ponemus.”

“A linking spell. Thank you for helping me, Jo.” I dropped our hands wrapping my arms around her in a gentle hug.

She wrapped her arms around me where we just remained in that position for a while. “I will always be there for you. We are family no matter what. Witches or not, we look out for each other.”

Walking up to the room that had her name on it I paused raising my hand turning towards the pair standing behind me. “If you two wouldn’t mind staying out here. I need to speak with her privately.”

“Sure.” Caroline nodded.

“Rae..” Klaus began until she nudged him with her elbow so he took it back. “Fine, we will be out here if you need anything.”

Turning back on my feet I pushed the door quickly opened and closed, locking it behind me before Klaus could change his mind. “Excuse me but you can’t just come in here - Raelyn?”

“Hi Jo, did you miss me?” I waved with a light smile seeing her rise from her desk wearing a white lab coat immediately dropping her notebook.

My cousin rushed towards me wrapping me in a tight hug. “Ohhh! How are you. How…why are you here. I mean not that I overjoyed to see you it’s just..”

“It’s fine. I know it’s unexpected but I just needed to see you.” I broke the hug where she grabbed another chair letting me sit down when she pulled her chair across from me wanting for me to start talking.

She clasped her hands together. “So what do you need to get off your chest. Is it about what happened to Jacob?”

“How did my mother find your location exactly because she came to Mystic Falls and begged me to forgive her after she lied to me about how someone wins the Merge.”

Jo covers her mouth releasing some tears. “Oh gosh. I…she didn’t come alone Rae. My father was with her and he came to check up on me but I should have guessed he came after you when I felt Jacob's spirit die. I…I’m…I’m sorry I had no idea he was using her to find you.”

“The Coven dies if I don’t take my place as leader before he dies.”

“Well I don’t care about that. If you don’t want to be in charge of everyone then you don’t have to do anything. I chose to protect Lucas and Olivia from my brother. I chose to put my magic away after he was gone, you deserve to choose your own life too.” She pushed her black hair from her face, placing her hands over mine in my lap.

Slumping my shoulders I blurted my next words quickly not sure if I could keep thinking I was going crazy anymore. “I saw him, Jo. I saw your brother Kai.”

“What do you mean, Rae?” She made a face at me.

Huffing in a long breath I shifted my shoulders removing my hands away from hers playing with my thumbs while I spoke. “There is someone on the other side of the door that is named Klaus Mikaelson. He is one of the first vampires in history and I recently met his mother who tried to kill me. I was able to stop the spell she was doing to murder all of her vampire children but after I blacked out I saw him. I saw him eating pork rinds and he attempted to siphon me before I regained consciousness.”

“So you’re saying that you went to his prison world and came back out. Does that mean he is free, oh crap if he is he will come straight for me.” She began to panic rising to her feet until I called her name.

“Josette! I don’t know what it was but he can’t possibly be here. I can’t siphon him out of his prison world. That can’t be remotely possible even for a siphon witch. I am just saying that whatever happened to me can’t be good. It must have been something to do with the strength of the spell I took on cause I almost died ... .or I would have been dead if it wasn’t for Klaus.”

Jo slumped her shoulders finally calming down, still confused almost as much as I was about this whole thing. “Alright so what exactly do you think I can do about this. I’m not saying that I won’t help but what happened after you siphoned the magic of the spell away from this woman?”

“I passed out and took almost all her magic but…Dic mihi hva du vet…” Jo gasped as I spoke the next part into her mind so that Caroline and Klaus couldn’t hear us since I didn’t have any sage to burn to prevent them from listening in otherwise. “You have to promise not to say anything to the guy and girl outside this door that came with me, this started happening after I did the spell to find you.”

Rolling up the sleeves of my shirt on my right arm I held my forearm out to her seeing her eyes go wide in shock and horror at what she saw. The black veins that had first appeared the spell to consume Esther spell had returned and we’re making their way up my arm. “Holy crap, cuz. We are in serious trouble. If…if that gets worse then you might.”

“Die, I know Jo.” I sniffed through some tears knowing Klaus would hate me if I told him I might die so I needed to fix this before he ever found out about it. “You’re the only family member I trust so I am begging for your help with this.”

Comments really appreciated ❤️

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hologramcowboy · 8 months

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I’m having a laugh at the thought of elta trying to push her way into Connecticut society. 🤣

If she thought she was unpopular in Austin, just wait until she humiliates herself in Conn.!

Elta being accepted in Connecticut society? Never going to happen. She might as well be wearing clown shoes and a big red nose. They’ll see her fake ass coming a mile away.

I do hope we get to hear some of the gossip though. It should be hysterical!

She fails to be authentic and keeps trying to push a grandiose image of herself instead of actually developing herself so yes, she's going to come off pitiful to that society too. Entitled people are offputting, especially to those who have deep values. I feel sorry for her, she burned all her bridges in the industry and then tried to play the mom card but ended up revealing she's not maternal or authentic. She has no personality, talent or contribution of her own and I guess at this point she's limited to "caring" (she has like what, two nannies? 🤣) for the children "of Jensen Ackles" (her words not mine lol). Not to mention that the "friends" who surround her are either people she pays like her stylist or actresses trying to milk Jensen's image and benefit from it just like she has all this time. I've yet to hear or see anyone genuinely praise this woman in an authentic way without having an angle. It's clear that being attached to Jensen is the only thing that makes her identity currently and that is just endlessly empty and sad. It also reveals her true nature, she's not in it because she loves him, she's in it for the way he makes her look and the opportunities she gets thanks to that otherwise why use phrases like "mother of Jensen Ackles's children" (sorry can't remember the exact wording but she wrote this in reply while offending someone for making an displeasing comment)

She can have 50 of his children and she still will not be Mrs. Ackles to me because she lacks that je ne sais quois that makes a connection special and timeless. Whenever I see pictures of her and him at events my first thought is always that it looks like Jensen bought himself an escort. That's what she vibes to me and not the classy kind either. I bet you anything that is what Fairfield socialites will see her as.

#anti danneel ackles #anti danneel

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messers-moony · 3 years

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Wish | F.H

Paring: Five Hargreeves X Wife!Reader

Summary: Five storms out to time travel after an argument with his wife and comes back to an unexpected surprise.

A/N: Five time travels at the age of 26 instead of 13

He was angry, that wasn’t mistaken, “ You aren’t listening to me! “

“ Are you hearing yourself?! What you’re about to do is dangerous! “ She yelled in response, and he scoffed.

They stood in the main room of their apartment. Y/n was placed in the kitchen leaning on the island while Five was dangerously close to the door. Both of them at the age of twenty-five. They had gotten married only a year before finding each other during one of his trips to Griddy’s with his siblings. He thought she was the prettiest thing he had ever seen.

Five stalked closer to her, “ You are so stubborn. “

“ I am the strongest one. “ His voice was dangerously low as they stood only a foot apart, “ I will do this. I don’t care what you say. Nothing will change that. “

“ Five, please. “ Y/n begged, “ I’m- I’m just worried about you. “

“ You don’t need to be. “ Five snapped, and he fast-walked to the door.

The male swung open the door, “ Five wait, please- “ But before she could finish, the door slammed, “ I’m pregnant. “

It was new news. She didn’t find out until a week earlier. She didn’t know when to tell him; there never was a suitable time. Now he had just threatened to fulfill a lifetime goal of his– time travel. Since he was a boy, he’s wanted to prove his worth. The only way Five could think to do that is by time-traveling into the future. He didn’t know what the future would entail. He definitely didn’t plan to get stuck in an apocalypse.

So for nine torturous months, Y/n endured a pregnancy. She was carrying a child of her presumed to be dead husband, which she didn’t believe in the slightest. Five Hargreeves was alive, and she knew that regardless of what anyone told her. She had a baby boy who she named Malachi. The same bright, alluring green as his fathers.

Despite his birth father not being around, Diego was a significant help. Diego stepped in where Five couldn’t. He was there for all of Malachi’s firsts and everything in between. But he was always Uncle Diego. A constant reminder that this man wasn’t his father. As far as the little boy knew, he didn’t have a father.

Things got more tricky as he got older. Malachi realized that a father figure was more common than not, which brought raising questions. She answered to the best of her abilities, but nothing was ever valid. None of her answers could be a hundred percent true because she didn’t know either. It was killing her to see her son this way.

He longed for a father. Wanted nothing more for a father-son relationship. Every birthday, every Christmas, he wished for his father to come home. It was killing Y/n because she understood his pain. The amount of dread, guilt, and sadness.

Maybe if she had told Five sooner, he would’ve never left. The guilt ate away at her. It was like an insect slowly crawling its way under her skin into her bones and nibbling them until they were gone. It didn’t help Malachi was an exact replica of his father. The dark, almost raven hair parted to the side, the glittering green eyes and a defined face.

No matter how long Five was gone, Y/n never took off her rings. She was a married woman until proven otherwise. Malachi had never even seen photos of his father. That was normal to him. All he knew was that his Uncles and Aunts told him he looked the exact same. Despite the same appearances, they had clashing personalities.

Malachi was the sweetest guy you could ever meet. Kind no matter who the person was. Wise beyond his years and intelligent like no other. His strong suit was English while he struggled in math. The irony was amusing. His father excelled in math, but he couldn’t do a two-step equation if he tried.

In the grand scheme of things, this didn’t matter. He got all the way up to high school. He was seventeen, to be exact, in his junior year of school. It was the summer before his senior year, and he couldn’t be more excited. As the years went on, the hope of meeting his father diminished to the point where he didn’t even think about it anymore.

He had his mom, and that’s all that mattered. His mom was his rock, his number one supporter, and his best friend. Malachi loved his mom more than anything and would give anything to keep her safe. Diego had grown to be like a father to him, but it was never the same. Malachi was sitting at the island doing homework while Y/n was cooking.

“ Hey, mom? “ He called, “ Yeah? “ Y/n turned to look at her son.

Malachi fidgeted with the pencil in his hand, “ Can I- Can I see your rings? “

“ My rings? Why? “ She asked, “ Well, dad gave them to you, didn’t he? “ Malachi replied.

Y/n nodded, “ Of course he did. We were married, technically we still are married. “

“ I just wanted to see what dad gave you. “ He murmured.

Hesitantly Y/n twisted both her engagement ring and her wedding ring off her left ring finger. She set them down on the granite island before her son so he could look at them. Gently he picked the engagement ring up and looked at it. It was the only time he’s ever seen the ring this close. She never took them off.

“ We got engaged in the snow. “ Y/n informed quietly, “ I really wasn’t expecting it. He never seemed like one to settle down. “

Malachi listened intently, “ Regardless. It was almost Christmas, and he took me to go Christmas shopping at one of the malls which was outside. “ She chuckled, “ Why he did that, I don’t know, but it was amusing. We got hot chocolate despite his love for coffee, and I made him wear a Santa hat. “

“ He was never into festivities before meeting me. Neither were your Aunts and Uncles. I started making holidays become more festive when you were born. Eventually, they got the hang of it. “ Y/n continued, “ Why was dad's name a number? “ He interjected.

“ He never got a name like the rest of his siblings. “ She answered plainly, “ Why? “

Y/n sighed, “ His father, more specifically your grandfather was a cruel man. Still is a very cruel man, which is why you’ve never met him. Reginald made the Umbrella Academy, where he adopted your dad along with his other siblings. “ She explained, “ They endured long days of training without breaks and horrid living environments. They were treated as experiments rather than children. “

“ They all got names, but Five didn’t want one. He rejected it because it didn’t matter. Name or anything. Their numbers would always define them, and Five was the only one who understood that. “ She finished.

“ What really happened to him? I know you’ve given me vague explanations, but I think I’m ready for the real thing. “ Malachi stated, “ I’m seventeen now. “

“ I know. Your father had powers. His others siblings do as well. They all do certain things. Five could travel through space and time. “ Y/n began, “ Growing up, he always felt the need to prove himself, to be better than everyone else. “

“ So, one day, he told me he was going to time travel. It was a big argument that definitely didn’t need to happen. At the time, I was a week pregnant with you, and I didn’t know how to tell him. “ She swallowed the emotions arising after remembering Five’s glare,

“ When I told him, it was too late. He was already out the door and gone. “

Y/n walked forward and took the rings back. She placed them back on her ring finger carefully as her son watched every movement. He knew she was upset. Malachi couldn’t help but be a bit resentful towards his father. All this to make a point? It seemed far-fetched.

“ That solution seems a bit absurd. “ Malachi commented, “ That's what I was trying to tell him, but he was very prideful and stubborn. “ Y/n replied.

A knock echoed through the apartment. The room felt tense. It wasn’t right; something felt off. Malachi felt it immediately cause he stood up and began walking to the door, wanting to protect his mother if a threat was there. Secretly Diego may have given him some defense classes, but that didn’t matter.

The boy opened the door to see almost the exact same face staring back at him, “ Who are you? “ Malachi snapped.

“ More importantly, who are you? “ The man retorted.

Every hair on Y/n’s body stood up. She knew that voice, and she knew that tone. It was him. He was back. It took everything inside her not to scream or cry but seeing Malachi hold his defensive stance against his own father was worrying her.

“ Malachi. “ She called, and he turned to her as she began to walk to the door, “ I need you to go to your room and promise not to eavesdrop. “

He wanted to protest, “ Please, sweet. I’ll be okay. I promise. “

Reluctantly Malachi backed away from the door giving the man a harsh glare that made the man evidently tense. Y/n waited for Malachi to be fully retreated in his bedroom before looking at the man in front of her.

“ Well. It looks like you’ve moved on. “ Five murmured, “ No- please. It isn’t what it looked like. “ She pleaded.

Her hand took his, and he recognized the rings on her finger. The same rings Malachi had just been examining. The same rings he took months to search for to find the perfect fit for his perfect girl. Everything seemed so colorful in his greyscale world now. His wife was still his.

“ Who- Who is he? “ His voice trembled as his lingering suspicion felt more accurate than ever, “ Come in and sit. We need to talk. “ Her voice was gentle and held no malice.

Five entered the now unrecognizable apartment. It wasn’t the same as when he left. In fact, everything seemed moved out of place. Y/n walked to the stove and turned off the burner that she was using. Five had peered at the papers on the island that were math worksheets and took a seat beside them.

“ Where did you go? “ She asked, “ The future. “

“ No shit. What did it look like? “ Y/n retorted playfully, “ It’s not as I hoped. It’s an apocalypse, love. “ His voice held so much pent emotion it was almost radiating off him.

She sighed, “ Okay. We need to talk about that- “

“ I- I want to know who that kid is. “ Five interrupted, and she gave him a knowing look, “ Malachi, can you come out here. “ Y/n called, and instantly he was out of his room.

The boy stood beside his mom, still not comfortable with the unfamiliar man. This time Five got a chance to really look at the teenage boy in front of him. The defined face, the almost raven hair, the same sage green eyes. His posture was protective and territorial, obviously for his mom.

“ Y/n… “ Five began as he swallowed the tears in his throat, “ Is- Is he mine? “

She nodded, “ Five Hargreeves, I’d like you to meet your son, Malachi Hargreeves. Malachi, I’d like you to meet your father, Five. “

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stigandr-the-cat · 3 years

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AHHHHHH THANK YOU AGAIN TO @ghost-party for listening to me babble for hours on end and letting me join your collab not to mention beta reading!!!! I LOVE YOU SO MUCH TREASURE OF MY HEART 🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡

A/N : Update because i realized i have zero context for this. 😅

Modern! Single dad! Reiner with GN reader. Theme is meet-cute. 4.8k mentions of death, war, and injury. More along the lines of fluff with slight smut so minors DNI. ENJOY 😊

The young woman ran from Eldia, from a home torn apart with war. One arm caged her son Reiner against her chest, the other hand held fast to the child of her sister, the rest of their family dead. Still in the throes of grief that threatened to tear apart her soul, her only thought was to save the children in her arms. A prayer that they soon would find themselves someplace safe and far away from this nightmare dragged into daylight was whispered unceasingly on chapped lips.

Years later, at 24, Reiner Braun has worn each stage of life like too-tight skin. Skin split down his back as he tried to find freedom with each forward step. Each new layer would crack across the knuckles, dripping blood-soaked memories. More cracks formed down his chest, broken and straining against the strong beat of his heart. He had run from childhood into the military without a second to breathe let alone think. A military that sent him to that first forgotten home to kill his own people that everyone was raised to see as monsters. Yet on the return, he could only see them as a single entity being lead to slaughter. The sight of his mother's tears when he had left burned in his dreams before turning into the screams of comrades who hadn't come home. With that, he now carries himself like a broken weapon, only good for being melted down and used for scrap.

Upon an old motorcycle, Reiner settled down in the traffic, kickstand on the road. They hadn't moved in a while, and from what little he could see, they wouldn't be for a while. As if the sky above had conspired against his desire to have a peaceful night with half-forgotten family before returning to the apartment — to the death that waited. A clean, loaded rifle, with the barrel ready for him to swallow so he could greet the stars above. Would they be welcoming in their cold light? Most of them were long dead after images, just as he was only the mirage of whatever broken mold there had been before. Still, he would say his goodbyes while they welcomed his brother's baby girl into this broken world.

Slowly, traffic moved forward after an age of stillness. A silent prayer of thanks to whatever power kept the world spinning escaped Reiner's lips. The thanks turned into that sharp inhale of one who is trying to stay calm when faced with carnage. His eyes widened at the sight of the crash, one car so mangled as to be unrecognizable, trapped under a jack-knifed semi-truck. Blood dripped down a mangled hand, a ring glinting in a shaft of sunlight. Reiner wasn't sure if he felt envy or pity for the poor bastard. He crawled past and on towards the hospital where his family waited.

"Mr. Braun?" Reiner stood and turned towards the voice, faltering for a moment when he saw a policeman standing with a doctor. Their expressions were agonized, bodies as stiff as corpses on a sting.

"Yes?"

"I'm Doctor Cooper and this is Officer Forger. I'm afraid we have terrible news."

Reiner had known something was wrong when the nurse at the desk had, with the face of a ghost, told him to sit when he gave his name. How she had whispered into her phone, "He's here," when his back was turned. He sat stone-still, mind spinning. What could it be? What could be so bad that not one of the family could greet him? His heart thumped against cracked ribs, the scabbed-over, broken skin now oozing fresh blood at the strength of it. Fear filled his blood, choking the air.

"There was an accident. Your mother and brother were involved in a car crash and died. Your sister-in-law, upon hearing the news, became frantic, and in the attempt to restrain her, stitches from the caesarian tore open. We tried to save her but sadly were unable to do so."

Reiner felt the world stop, a shuddering breath turning to poison in his lungs. The car under the semi… Had that been them?

"What about..." His voice faltered before the soldier in him took over. "What about the baby? Gabi?"

"She’s fine. Healthy baby girl. There will be paperwork and other legalities to take care of, but it looks like you’re the only family she has left."

At nearly 30, this latest skin Reiner wears hardly fits him any better than others in the past. It still bleeds at the knuckles, staining his hands crimson. The baby turned toddler and now child, calling him Dad, not Uncle, even as Reiner tried to convince her otherwise. Gabi is as headstrong as both he and his brother combined. She has learned from her friends that he fits the definition of a dad, and so he is Dad. As such, he has taken this new name like a vow to be the best he could be. The rifle was long ago sold, his old uniform and medals placed in a locked box at the back of his closet, left to rot. The apartment that would have welcomed his death has now been left behind. With his daughter, they have made a faraway condo their home.

"Dad! It's time for the park!" Gabi calls, her little feet dancing loudly at the back door.

"I hear you, I hear you. One second," Reiner calls back from the kitchen, filling a water bottle before adding it to a backpack, along with some snacks.

Gabi continues to stamp her feet and huff as he puts on his jacket and shoes. Then they are out the back door, to the gate that leads from their backyard into the park. Gabi is already running top speed to the playground. Reiner just lengthens his strides to keep up, not even trying to get her to slow down. It’s as futile as trying to stop a rocket with bare hands.

At the park on the benches, three moms sit like The Fates squabbling over their single eye. He takes his place on another bench, close enough to hear them but only just. His mind is more focused on watching the children than listening to their continual tainted stream of gossip.

"Did you hear? The old condo sold, and apparently it’s the sister of that shrew," one hisses.

"They’re going to be living next to each other. It’s a family," a second observes. She must have spent the night over Facebook and wine again.

"Oh, look... Here comes the shrew. The kid must be the sister’s," the final woman — the ringleader — observes.

This catches Reiner's attention. He looks up from the kids to see the new arrivals. You are heart-stopping, wearing a black leather jacket and light pink shirt, snug jeans, and leather boots. Your hand is intertwined with one belonging to a small child, puffy in their coat and boots, and you silently encourage them forward to the swings. They look back at you before running towards Gabi to introduce themselves. Already her hand is taking the place of yours, and they are off running and tumbling across the playground.

Reiner has heard of you before, sure, the mothers only calling you “the shrew.” The only other single person on this block, they tried to set you two up as soon as they learned he was also single. But he never agreed and neither did you. An action he now regrets as his eyes drift back over you, a warm smile dancing on your lips as you stand before The Fates while they weigh you in the scale of their own image. He knows they already find you both lacking. Their ideal of white picket fences with a spouse and two children, with the only variant being what pet you own, doesn’t match the lines you have drawn around as your framework. And yet you stand, head high, knowing you are your own ideal. It is like looking at a river breaking the bonds others would have forced on it — magnificent, leaving him hungry for any scrape of attention you would throw at him. A shriek of delight recalls his attention to the children, even as he strains to hear the nectar that drips from your lips.

"Yes, my sister bought the condo next to me. Rin is the kid's name. I'm watching them today. Yes, my sister will be wanting to join the Facebook group. No, I still don't have a Facebook and won't be joining." Your voice is clipped against the torrent of questions.

Finally, you get away from them and come sit next to him. He can feel the blush rising to his face.

"God, they’re catty. I almost thought they were going to try and eat my heart." Reiner chuckles at this. "I'm Y/N. And you?"

"Reiner Braun."

"Which one is yours?"

"The one with dark brown hair leading the group. Her name is Gabi."

"Cute. Not even five and already a leader."

"Six, actually."

"So close."

"Not in her eyes."

"No, you’re right. Never in the eyes of the child is ‘close’ good enough when it comes to their age and how they wish to be treated." Reiner lifts an eyebrow. "Rin has to say their exact age down to the day and expects everyone else to do the same. But they also desire to be given the same respect as a child twice their age." You pause, eyes wandering the outlines of him. "Househusband?"

"No, our tale is a bit more tragic. She was my brother's child, but our family is... Our family is gone." His voice is ice numb, with the passage of time scabbing over those wounds. Yet he hears you suck in broken air at the revelation.

"I'm sorry to ask."

"I'm not. She changed my life for the better, even if it came with heartache."

"You don't look like a philosopher, Reiner Braun, but you talk like one."

"Oh, do I?"

"Just a bit." You offer him a small smile and it is a sunbeam through the rain.

The conversation is molasses, honey-sweet and slow, an amber spyglass that sharpens and colors in the lines you both have drawn around yourselves. He learns about what you call a sedentary life of living and working from home, broken up with family events and vacations. But it is a life you love, even in solitude. The way your eyes glow with each spilled word has his heart skipping like the children you both watch in between shy glances made of the spun sugar of new yearning.

You learn about Reiner's struggle with being thrust into his guardianship soon after his return home from war. His struggle to find a job that would allow him to be there for Gabi. The path that eventually led him to be a building inspector. He can feel the words rise from places within him that are both featherlight yet suck at his soul like tar. This time, his glance is rewarded with your eyes locked on his, your lip caught in your teeth.

"I know I should say thank you for your service, but your eyes look so haunted." There is compassion written in your eyes that says more than a thousand speeches about the honor he should feel from being a soldier, about doing his country proud. It's overwhelming, so he looks away, afraid to break at this lightest touch of tenderness.

Far too soon, the sky begins its slow turn to dusk. Far too soon, it is just Gabi and Rin running around. Far too soon, you both are the only ones left, yet there is no move to leave. It is comfortable, sitting together as the children run. As if it is a comfortable silence built by months and years of understanding and not just moments and hours.

"It's getting late, but I don't want to say goodbye." Your voice is whisper soft.

"Then don't. You’re both welcome to come over for dinner." His boldness is a surprise, even as he waits with bated breath for your answer. The words begin to slip from your smiling lips.

A discordant, jarring noise fills the air, making you both jump in fright before turning to nervous laughter. You hold up your phone, wincing as you see the name across the screen — a reminder of something previously forgotten.

"Hey, sis."

"What do you mean, ‘Hey, sis’? Where is Rin? I've been texting you for the past ten minutes and haven't heard anything back. Are you guys okay?" Pulling the phone away from your ear as the person on the other end shouts, Reiner grimaces in sympathy.

"Yeah, sorry, Rin is fine. We’ve been having lots of fun at the park. They made a friend."

The voice on the other end goes soft after your apology, so much so that he can't hear it. Not that he should have been listening to your conversation. He turns to face the children, watching them laugh as they go down a slide, tangled together. The blinding brilliance of childhood friendships made in innocence.

"Sorry, Rin was supposed to be home by now. Raincheck?" You offer a small smile in apology.

"Of course." He recites to you his phone number before turning to the children. "Gabi! Rin! Time!" His voice is loud enough to carry but not a shout, never a yell in anger. The two children pop up like weasels before scrambling over.

Rin holds on to Gabi's hand and won't let go. Gabi, too, has a determined look about her that he has seen for so long yet it still affects him, filling him with pride over how fierce she is.

"No. I want to keep playing with Rin. Can they sleep over?" Her voice is the high-pitched whistle of a fire in the clouds. Until you get down to their level, a serenity about you like the sea.

"I promise, you and Rin can play again really soon. Rin is moving here next month. But I'll try and get Rin down here again before then, okay?"

"Okay," She grumbles, the two dropping their interlocked hands. Rin wrapping their arms about your neck, head tucked against your shoulder.

Cooing to the child, you give Reiner one final smile before leaving.

"I'll text you later, Reiner." How you say his name has him weak-kneed. He wants to hear it again, bottle the sound and use it to fuel this newfound addiction. So lost in his name written in your voice, he stands rock still as you walk away.

"Dad?" Gabi tugs at him, her small hand hardly wrapping around his first couple of fingers.

Shaking off the spell of your voice he turns to her, kneeling himself. "Yeah, sweetie?"

"What's for dinner?"

"How about breakfast?" he asks, grunting softly as he picks her up with one arm, the other grabbing the backpack.

"Can I have waffles with whipped cream?"

"Sure, if you ask nicely."

"Please, Dad!" she squeals in delight.

"I'll get it ready. Why don't you go take a bath and get in your PJs?" Setting her down to open up the back gate, he holds it open for her before locking it once he is through.

"Okay!" Hardly remembering to take off her boots and coat, she is running up the stairs, unable to contain her energy and excitement. Reiner smiles at this blessing he has been given. A tree growing again after a fire, healing from its damage.

Reiner has learned the relaxation his mother taught him was in cooking, in feeding those you love with creations of your hands. He remembers her soft songs in a language he cast off. He hums them now, the words long lost to the decay of time. Soon the smell of waffles and eggs fills the small kitchen. Behind him, on the chair where he left his coat, his phone dings loudly once, twice. Work probably, some contractor asking him for the punch list. So he ignores it in favor of not burning their dinner.

Gabi babbles her thanks in between half-chewed bites of whipped cream mixed with syrup dribbling down her chin. Reiner tries to remind her to chew her food, which she apologizes for as more slips down her face, causing him to sigh. When she is satisfied, he sits her on the kitchen counter with gentle hands and cleans her face. How these hands have changed, but still, a scar across his palm catches at the soft skin. These hands are still marked with cracked skin, knuckles with fresh blood that slides down the back of them. He prays she never sees the ache of the bleeding wounds.

Gabi uses the last bit of her energy, squirming under the wet cloth before collapsing against his chest. In the soft silence of their home, he avoids the one stair that creaks before helping her brush her teeth and braid her hair to sleep. Her eyes have gone glassy, hands grabbing around his neck, soft breath against him. She is a gift he never would have deemed himself worthy to have. Already asleep, he tucks her in bed before kissing her forehead. Satisfied with checking that the window is locked, he turns the combination night light music player on before he leaves.

This new life is made of cotton, a cushion against the harsh turning of the times. Looking at the small mess in the kitchen, Reiner remembers his phone going off and puts off the latter in favor of just checking. Surprised delight works a smile up to his face as he sees a new number flash across his screen.

Rin's home safe. Wouldn't stop talking about Gabi and how much they love her. Had to admit, I thought her father was pretty neat. Is the dinner invitation still available if it’s just me?

Of course! Oh, I just looked at the time. Sorry for the late reply. If you want to come over, you’re welcome, but I don't want to disrupt your evening.

You're fine. I figured you were taking care of Gabi. How is she?

Sleeping like a log after playing with Rin. Thank you for letting me know you both are safe. I have to admit, I think you're pretty neat, too.

I'm glad we agree. I can be there in a couple of minutes. I'm back home now.

I'll have a plate of waffles ready for you.

Reiner sets down the phone before looking to make sure that it's only a messy kitchen he has to worry about. Satisfied that it looks decent, he finds no toys left on the floor like landmines. In the small kitchen, he sets up a plate. There is excitement trembling in his hands at the thought of seeing you again in the near dark. What sides will he see from this new angle?

But there is worry weighing on his shoulders, wondering how will you see him? The darkness is a theater screen that plays out the harshest memories of our past. Will the shadows that line his face be too much? Will you see the cracked skin and turn away, squeamish at the sight of blood? His thoughts are quicksand and cold rain, draining even as his breath speeds up.

He has already been given a new direction and blessing in his life with Gabi. Is there the possibility of the hope that he might be blessed with love? Someone who will hold his hand as he continues to bandage the cracks and seal them together? His chest heaves at the strain of racing thoughts, even as he is still blocking out the world lost in the mire. The crack of a stone on wood startles him.

The soldier he has restrained for years rises within, ready to fight to protect the life that sleeps peacefully above. He is quick to rush outside, only to hear giggling. Confusion twists around his head like a halo, the soldier retreating to the corner of his soul where he forces them to find peace. He finds you smiling, another small rock in your hand which is quickly dropped. With a look of false innocence fighting against an overwhelming smile, he can feel his own smile forming in response.

"I wonder who could be throwing rocks at this hour?" He looks around ready to see how far you will take this act.

"Must be a delinquent punk or a ghost."

"Well then, my chivalry demands I let you in, at the very least, to keep you safe."

Your hand coming up to pat against his chest has his head spinning, the lingering heat blooming and unfurling like vines, pulling his cracked edges back together. He hardly remembers the plate he had fixed for you. He cracks open two sour orange beers that he hopes pair well with the sickly sweet of the whipped cream and syrup. He sips at his can while you eat, your content moan at the food nearly setting him on fire. The dark clouds of his earlier thoughts change to different desires.

Those thoughts stay and linger after you set down your plate, thanking him. They rage when you move closer to him. The purse of your lips as you sip at the beer. How your eyes linger on his face before turning back to the sky. The stars that once looked so cold now point out the lights in the dark. Those lights dance across your skin, and he knows you are another light in the dark, calling to him — a blessing he feels unworthy to touch as you pull his arm around your shoulders, leaning into the warmth of his chest. He keeps his vision trained on you, drinking in your soft light. He pulls you closer, until you’re squished against him.

It’s a picture and a movie he will treasure in his heart, the soft exhale of your breath across his chest causing shockwaves. He thinks about leaning down and kissing the crest of your hair. Tensing to ask if he can, the first drops of rain hit. It’s a deluge in a moment, soaking you both as he lifts you into his arms to carry you to the warm safety of the living room.

"Wait, Reiner!" Your laughing hand against his face pulls his attention to your eyes. "Let's dance — please." Your voice is a whispering beg, and he would fall on his knees to hear that sound again.

Reiner is careful in how he sets you down, steadying hands against your waist. Your own hands wrap over his to guide them. The cold rain is nothing against the heat in his chest as he twirls you in the downpour. If happiness were a sound, it would be your laugh and sigh. The gasp you make when he picks you up and dips you back is a benediction. Your hands travel the path of his shoulder and waist to cup his face, pulling him again to your rainwater-soft lips, warm breath against his before the movement is sealed.

When you pull back to breathe, he catches your lower lip in his teeth, finding he finally can breathe. Your arms loop around his neck as you pull in closer to him. His arms lower to your thighs, pulling you up. He starts walking into the condo. Soon, your back is against the wall, legs wrapped around his waist. His heart is beating hard when he finally pulls back, pressing his forehead against yours and pressing a soft kiss to it.

"If this is too fast, tell me to stop." His voice is shaking with desire.

"But we both need to get out of these wet clothes." You nip at his lip, pulling him back into a kiss that quickly turns deep, his tongue scraping across teeth, the taste of beer and waffles lingering in your mouth.

Laughter bubbles soft in pressed-together chests. Soaked shirts and pants abandoned on the floor. Warm kisses press against cold exposed skin. He moves to your neck, placing kisses there. When you tug on his hair, he growls softly before nipping at the skin and moving back to your lips. Again, he is carrying something precious in his arms as he climbs the stairs. Again, he steps over the one that creaks, walks down the other side of the hall until he is pressing you against his bed.

Heat crackles, electricity flowing like circuits finally connecting at last. Soft thighs rub against his own. Nails scrape down his chest and back until he is keening. The heavy weight between his legs presses against yielding hips. The last of the soaked clothing is stripped away, cast off into the darkness. Moonlight plays across your skin, making him swear you have been sent from the stars to guide him home.

"Dad!"

He pulls away quickly, a groan leaving you both. He places a soft kiss on your stomach before trying to find some sweatpants, calling back that he will be there in a second. Looking back, you are smirking, swaddled in the thick duvet, finger pressed against your lips even as your eyes travel the length of him. Padding out and closing the door behind him, Reiner shakes his head at this sweet, tormenting twist of fate.

"Gabi?"

"Down here!" He turns, going down to the living room.

"What is it, sweetie?"

"I was thirsty, so I was getting some water. I came down and saw the clothes on the floor." He can just make out the confusion across her face.

“Oh, I was outside and got caught in the rain, so I took them off as soon as I came in." His body flushes with embarrassment.

"Okay, but why are there two pants on the floor? Are you having a sleepover?"

"You know, I think it's time you go back to bed. Did you get your water?" His voice is cracking, mind spinning, eyes widening with horror as his breath speeds up.

"You are having a sleepover! Can I come join?"

"Gabi! No!" He is too quick, too loud, fear making him desperate.

"Why not?" She is pouting.

"Because." He pauses. "They’re already asleep and I don't want to wake them up."

"Oh, okay. Wait, why do you get to have a sleepover and I don't?"

"Come on, back to bed with you. I'll explain in the morning." He hopes for once she will be too tired and leave it alone.

"Fine." The sigh of relief cascades through his whole body.

Gabi, with a glass of water in her hand, trudges back up the stairs, little legs making her step on the creaking one. He really should fix it. Reiner grabs the clothes and goes back to his room, caught between shock and hysterical laughter, wondering if you heard all that transpired. He hopes to find you laughing. To press against you again, happiness wrapping around you both. To lose himself in your embrace. Instead, he finds you have pilfered one of his shirts and are curled up in his bed, asleep. Not having the heart to wake you, he goes to hang the clothes up in the attached bathroom’s shower so they can dry. Coming back, he leans down to kiss the space behind your ear, enjoying the mewl you let out from the contact.

"Hey, do you want to bed to yourself?"

"No — cuddles." Your arms are already grabbing for him. "Maybe I'll wake back up so we can continue."

"Don’t worry about that. Let yourself sleep. I'll still be here tomorrow,” he mummers against sleep-warm skin as he tucks you two together, bodies nestled together like puzzle pieces. Already, you are drifting back to sleep, face pressed against his chest, arms and legs tangling with his. A sob claws its way around his chest. Questions of why he was blessed and saved with first Gabi and now your brilliance in his life. How you feel like a permanent fixture, even within only hours.

He can feel sleep tugging at him, but still, his thoughts slip out. "Is it strange that I can already see us as a family?"

"No — not if I say yes." The words press themselves deeper into his skin, until they sink to his heart, a new bandage forming over the cracks.

His breath catches before he pulls you closer, lips pressing kisses into your hair.

That night, when he dreams, he doesn't see a mother's tears. But he remembers. When he came home with some groceries he had gotten for doing some work for a neighbor, and how his mother patted his head and told him he would be an amazing husband and father one day.

Reiner notices the next morning that his skin is healing, scars becoming thick with scales like armor. His role as father fits him far better than before, his hand having found yours.

#meet cute collab #attack on titan #aot #aot reiner #aot x you #snk x reader #snk reiner #snk #reiner x reader #reiner braun #reiner fluff #attack on titan reiner #shingeki no kyojin

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myhauntedsalem · 3 years

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13 True Horror Stories from the Psychiatric Ward that Will Give You the Creeps

Death, illness and tragedy have long been part of the history of insane asylums, and for as long as they have existed, so too have the scary stories associated with them. From haunted hospitals to sadistic doctors and nurses, psychiatric wards have been the inspiration for many of our favorite horror movies and books. Yet, the true stories told by the psych ward workers below far surpass any horrors that we might have seen at the cinema or read in a book.

Without further ado, here are thirteen of some of the creepiest psych ward stories on the internet that have been shared by health care professionals.

1. Holding her own Eyes

My mom told me this story from her time at a neuropsychiatric ward while she was in grad school. She was making her routine room checks and happened upon the most horrific scene I’ve ever heard.

This was during the night shift, and generally, all the patients’ bedroom doors should be closed. So my mom turned a corner and noticed an open door. She saw a staff member’s legs on the floor, halfway out the doorway.

When she looked into the room, she saw the patient, a woman with a severe postpartum psychiatric disorder, who had just gouged both of her own eyes out with her bare hands. She was sitting cross-legged on the floor, holding her eyes in her hands.

The first staff member to witness the scene, who was now lying face down on the floor, had a heart attack when he first witnessed the woman while he was making his rounds.

My mom screamed for help and frantically tried to perform CPR on the staff member. All the while, the woman just sat rather calmly, holding her own eyes.

2. The Saw

I work as a psychotherapist in a hospital system. My definition of creepy is probably quite a bit different from other medical professionals.

The one that got to me the most was a patient who came to us after attempting suicide by sawing both his arms off at the forearm with a table saw. His arms were reattached, fairly successfully too, with only limited impairments in mobility. All I could think was how bad it would have to be to live in his head that sawing his arms off seemed better than that.

He has since completed suicide.

3. Jane?

We had a young lady in our custody with quite a few issues. We’ll call her Jane. Jane’s first night at our facility staff doing a bed check found Jane in a puddle of blood. Turns out Jane had been slicing the skin around her shin with her finger nails and was pulling her skin up her leg, essentially de-gloving her calf.

Jane also had a ritual she performed every night before bed. While in her room she would run between walls in her room touching them in a crucifix pattern. After doing this for a few hours she would sit on her bed and go to sleep. This particular night Jane was frantic in her pace, practically running between walls. Our night staff observed the entire interaction and reported Jane screaming late into the night. When the staff went to check on Jane she reported Jane standing in the doorway smiling. The staff asked what was wrong and Jane replied, “what makes you think you are speaking to Jane?”

4. The Vampire

My mom worked in mental institutions in her younger years (and actually worked at a large, well-known asylum before it was shut down.)

There was one woman there that thought she was a vampire of sorts. She was only allowed out one hour a day, and they had to use safety precautions. She had already attacked and killed at least one hospital worker before these were enacted.

When my Mom asked about her, it was revealed that she had killed at least two of her children, wounded another as well as her husband because she had some sort of physical condition called Porphyria, which apparently made her crave blood.

By the time that they discovered there was something physically wrong with her, she already had lost her mind from guilt and grief.

5. The Spitter

I’m not a psychologist but my friend is. She told me about a patient of hers who was HIV positive and a paranoid schizophrenic. He thought that the nurses who worked at the hospital he was in were trying to kill him, so he would frequently bite his tongue, and spit HIV positive blood into their faces/mouths. When they had to come into contact with him, they were required to wear full masks and gloves.

6. The Only One

I once knew a woman who had spent part of her residency at a psychiatric hospital for people with severe mental conditions. Apparently, the grounds had a lovely, enclosed greenhouse. One day, one of their schizophrenic patients was sitting on a bench, smoking a cigarette, as a heron frantically flew around. It had found its way in and, not being able to escape, it was smashing into the large panes of glass. The man just sat there watching.

Finally, my counselor asked him if the bird was bothering him and he kind of sighed and said, “Thank god, I thought I was the only one seeing that.”

7. Family Photographs

My sister is the director of a psychiatric hospital. There was recently a lady there who would cut her arms, legs and torso open and place photographs of her family under her skin.

8. Under the Bed

Once, a fellow female patient told me she found writings under her bed. They were just old, small wooden bed frames with hard mattresses that would make all kinds of noises when you rolled over, but I still wondered what exactly she was doing lying under her bed to find these writings.

When she first told me, I thought it was a joke. But sure enough, one day during group we managed to sneak away, and she showed me. Indeed, there were stories written under her bed. After that, we had everyone check under their own beds, and there was more writing under every single bed.

They were stories of patients who had stayed here before, or ways they were planning on killing themselves, or who the good and bad nurses were. It creeped me out.

9. Time of Death

Well, my mother was a nurse that specialized in geriatrics, and she worked for several hospice hospitals for many years. She often described situations at her work with several of the patients. She would say that each person tends to have a very similar “checklist” that they follow right before death. This checklist often ended in a very similar way.

They would get caught talking to someone that wasn’t there. When asked who they (otherwise lucid people) were talking to, they would describe an individual who was already dead. When asked what they were talking about, they would say that their relative wanted to know if they were ready to move on. A pretty common response would be, “Yeah, he/she said that she will take me tomorrow at 3:00.” Well, it would often happen that they would die at the exact time their relatives quoted.

10. The Test Subject

I had an hour-long conversion with a delusional guy who was confined to a mental health facility, and who was probably smarter than I am. Lots of these folks believe that somebody – often the CIA – is either beaming thoughts into their heads, or has implanted a microchip in their brains for this purpose. This guy was offering a very thoughtful argument as to why such claims should not be so quickly dismissed.

“It’s precisely because such delusions are so common that mental patients make the best test subjects,” he said. There he was, confined and protected, constantly observed, his health and behavior documented, and there is zero chance that anyone would ever take his concerns seriously. How else would you test and improve such technology? Does the government not have a strong motivation and a plausible ability to create such a device?

“You can see I’m not irrational,” the man said. “I’m just straight-up telling you that they are doing this to me. I know just how unbelievable it sounds, and yet, here I am.”

11. The Boy who Loved Knives

As a tech in psych years ago, there was a 7-year-old kid sent to the floor because the mom didn’t know what to do with him. Sadly, common thing to happen, even if the kids don’t have psych issues. Anyway, the mom was shaking and crying, and they had to take the kid into another room. She was genuinely afraid of her own son. She had suspected something was wrong when she kept finding mutilated animals in the backyard, but never heard or saw coyotes or anything around. The neighbors smaller pets started disappearing. The boy had an obsession with knives, hiding them around the house. Denying anything when the mom confronted him. Then when the two started getting into arguments, he would get really violent and hit her, push her down and kick her, threaten to kill her. On multiple occasions she woke up in the middle of the night with him standing beside her bed, staring her in the face. She put extra locks on her bedroom door to feel safe while she slept. The last straw was when she lifted up his mattress and found 50+ knives of all shapes and sizes under there. So she brought him to us.

I remember talking to him, treating him like he was just any other kid that came through. He seemed remarkably normal, until you spoke directly to him. He had this way of looking right through you, or maybe like he didn’t see you at all while you were speaking.

He would respond like a robot, like he was just saying words because that’s what we wanted to hear. And he would always put on this creepy, dead-looking smile. Like all mouth and no eye involvement in the smile. Especially when he would get away with something, like taking another kid’s markers and they couldn’t figure it out. Still gives me chills laying here thinking about him.

I believe I met a 7-year-old psychopath.

12. The New Mom

I was a pharmacy technician at a hospital with a psych ward for some time. We would have to go around with a cart and dispense the patients’ medications, and being a 5’2″ girl, a security guard or male nurse would accompany me, just as a precaution. I never had any real issues other than the occasional death grip onto my arm or manic outbursts, but there was one boy who was entirely different.

His chart said he was nine and he had pale skin, dark hair, and huge bright, green eyes. He always greeted me in the most polite way, asked how I was doing, and always found something different to compliment me on every time. He was extremely well-spoken and mature for his age, so I began looking forward to seeing him, as normal small talk is definitely cherished in that setting. If he saw me outside of his room in the halls, he made sure to say hello and always called me “Miss Jones” or “ma’am.”

One day, a couple of our female nurses saw me pause to chat with him in the hallway, and waved me over to ask if I was out of my mind. Apparently, when he was in kindergarten, he grew an intense attachment to his young female teacher.

This escalated to the point of him calling her “Mom” and leaving notes for her about how he wished he were her son. He had a normal home-life with both parents, and the teacher tried to explain to him that she couldn’t be his mom because that would hurt his real mother’s feelings, and that she already had that job covered.

So, he went home and, killed his own mother in her sleep by cutting her throat, so his teacher could be his mom. The female staff had a general rule of not interacting with him excessively to prevent any kind of attachment from forming.

13. Bugs

Nothing I can say can possibly describe the year I worked in Psychiatric Intensive Care. Creepy isn’t the thing that comes to mind when I think back on it…more heartbreaking and horrifying. But creepiness was a part of it. Especially evening and night shifts, naturally.

There is always something disturbing about watching someone while they hallucinate. You can tell it is 100% real to them, and something about that makes you believe it, on some level. A lot of stories end with, “and of course, I had to look over my shoulder to make sure”. You see the emotions it brings out.

There was a woman that came in and sat down across the table from me for her admission interview. She had bandages all over her arms and scotch tape over her mouth and ears. She looked very uncomfortable and wouldn’t really sit still. When the nurse would ask her a question, she would peel the corner of the tape back and answer, then stick the tape back on really fast.

We eventually found out that she saw and felt bugs crawling all over her, and they were trying to get inside her body. The tape was to keep the bugs out. The bandages were because some bugs got in and she had to dig them out. She couldn’t sit still because she felt the bugs all over her even while we sat and talked. The worst part was, she had some idea that it was her mind playing tricks on her. Can you imagine going through your life, feeling like someone is continuously dumping buckets of cockroaches on your head, feeling like they’re all over you and getting inside of you to the point that you’re digging chunks out of your flesh in a panic, all while knowing intellectually that none of it is real?

#13 True Horror Stories from the Psychiatric Ward that Will Give You the Creeps #shared stories #paranormal #ghost and spirits #ghost and hauntings #haunted salem #myhauntedsalem

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darklymelanatedstories · 3 years

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Freaky Friday (ft Goku&Vegeta)

Vegeta

I woke up to an unfamiliar setting and felt a body pressed against mine. I sat up and looked around. None of this looked familiar. This wasn't my room, this wasn't my bed, these weren't my clothes. Wait...

I glanced down at the body next to me and gasped in shock. This wasn't Bulma. Chi Chi? What the hell!?

I jumped out of the bed, anxiety and stress ran through me. "No, I didn't. I couldn't have slept with Chi Chi. Bulma's the only one for me."

I ran my hand through my hair and realised something else. "This doesn't feel like my hair."

I ran to the bathroom and looked the mirror in horror as my eyes met with ones of an idiot.

"Kakarot!",I shrieked. "No,"I said in disbelief when I noticed his lips moving as I spoke.

I reached out to touch the mirror and the reflection did the same.

"No. No. No! No!" I touched my face, trying to feel any familiarity on it but nothing.

I was in Kakarot's body.

Goku

"Morning Chi Chi.",I mumbled when I felt arms wrap around me.

"Chi Chi!?"

My eyes shot open when I heard that voice. That wasn't ChiChi's voice. It sounded a lot like...oh no.

"B-B-Bulma?",I stuttered. I glanced down at the body resting it's blue haired head on my chest.

She gave a look that scared me even more than I was before. How did I end up in Bulma's bed? And is she naked!?

I immediately jumped out of the bed and ran to the bathroom conjoined to the bedroom.

"Vegeta?",I heard her say as I slammed the door closed.

"Oh shxt! Vegeta's here!?" I panicked. "He's gonna kill me!"

I looked around the bathroom and found a window large enough for me to fit through. As I went to open it, I noticed something.

"Vegeta!!"

Startled, I jumped back, slipped and landed in the tub. "Oomf!"

I rubbed my head as I got up and searched the bathroom for Vegeta. I could've sworn I saw him in here. Once my eyes found the mirror I froze in horror.

"Vegeta?" His lips moved in sync with mine. Was he mocking me?

I reached out to touch the mirror and Vegeta did the same. What was happening? Was he stuck in the mirror or something?

That's what I hoped because I didn't want reality to correct me, telling me that,

"I'm in Vegeta's body." I gasped as realisation hit me.

"Vegeta! What's going on with you?" I heard Bulma say as she knocked on the door.

"Nothing, don't come in." It then that I realized that I didn't even have my voice either.

Vegeta

No, no, no. This isn't right. What the hell is happening?

"Goku, honey are you in there?"

Shxt! Chi Chi woke up. "Uh, yeah. I'll be right out."

"I need get out of here.",I said to myself. I listened to the woman's footsteps as they got farther away. Once I was sure it was safe I slowly opened the door and peaked out into the hallway. Chi chi had entered the kitchen.

Damnit. I needed to go past the kitchen to reach the door.

I took a deep breath and tried to act natural, in Kakarot's way.

"Hey Goku."

"Hello wife.",I said as calmly as possible.

"Uh, okay. What do you want for breakfast?"

"Actually I'm not quite hungry today so if you'll excuse me.",I said as I walked to the door.

I heard her gasp. "Not hungry!",she exclaimed in shock. I then felt a hand pull me back and I was tossed onto the couch.

"Oh Kami. You must be really sick!!" She hurried around the house and came back with a blanket and a tray of food.

She draped the blanket over me despite my protest and placed the tray on the table.

"I need to call Piccolo, Gohan and Bulma.",she said, dialing someone's number.

"Bulma!",I whispered. I needed to see her.

"Mom, what's going on?" Oh no. It's the idiots offspring.

"Goten! There's something wrong with your dad. He's not hungry."

"What!? But dad's always hungry."

"Will you two relax!? I'm fine.",I said, rolling my eyes. I think my tone was harsher than I wanted it to be because they looked at me with complete shock and worry.

"I'll go get Gohan.",Goten said before running out of the house, leaving the door open. I wonder if I could make a run for it.

Goku

I wanted to come out of the room but I was afraid that Bulma was still naked. Even though I might've seen some things when we were kids but I definitely don't think I wanna see anything now.

I then felt a chill. The window was open yes but why did I feel so cold.

As I thought I glanced down and noticed that,

"I'm not wearing any pants. Or anything at all. Dang Vegeta, you two were busy last night."

I balled up the courage and slowly opened the door. I looked around and there was no signs of naked Bulma around.

I quickly ran to the walk in closet and searched for something to wear. I laid out two outfits on the bed. I had a choice between Vegeta's suit or casual shirt and jeans with designer jacket and Carvelas.

Of course I chose the suit otherwise Bulma would get suspicious. Vegeta had nice clothes but all he wore was his suit. Not that I blame him, I always wear the same outfit too.

I heard Bulma call out to 'Vegeta' from another room. "Vegeta, I know you're probably gonna say no but I'm sure you've noticed a new outfit in the wardrobe and I was hoping you'd try it."

I sighed. Just when I put the suit on. I don't know how Vegeta puts this on everyday. It's kinda tight but it quickly adjusts.

I didn't wanna be rude and just try it out. I put it on, never really realising that it might seem out of character for Vegeta to do.

A delicious aroma filled the air that immediately lead me to the kitchen. Woah, wait, Bulma can cook?

"Oh," I then realized that it was her mother. Of course Bulma can't cook. Who'd have time to if they were in her shoes?

"Morning Mrs Briefs.",I said cheerfully.

"Wow, you're awful chipper today, Vegeta.",she said. I then realized that I was being too me to be Vegeta.

"Uh, yeah. I guess.",I said, trying to appear emotionless.

"Wow," I turned away and saw Trunks and Bulma stare at me like I was insane. "Dad, you look so..."

"Handsome!",Bulma exclaimed, running up to hug me. "Thanks for trying it on, honey."

"Well, I didn't wanna seem rude and it is a nice outfit." I rubbed my neck nervously when she gave me a look.

"That's surprisingly nice of you." She touched my forehead with the back of her hand. "Are you alright?"

"That's exactly what I thought.", Bulma's mother chimed in. "He gave me a friendly good morning today you know."

I tried to change the subject. "Um, I think I'm gonna grab a quick bite before heading over to my–I mean Goku's–uh, Kakarot's house."

"Did you just say Goku?",Trunks questioned. I didn't have time for breakfast with all these questions I had no answers to. But I was so hungry.

I quickly grabbed a handful of muffins, like maybe 10, then ran out of the house. Away from those concerned stares.

Vegeta

"Woman, I'm fine!",I shouted. I wish I hadn't because Goku's sons and the Namek came in at the exact moment and their eyes told me that they were preparing to send me to a mental hospital.

"Dad are you alright?",Gohan asked.

"I'm fine. So I refused a little food, no big deal. I just need to be somewhere right now."

"He's awfully rude today, don't you think?",Piccolo said to Gohan.

"Yeah. Something is not right."

I let out an exaggerated sigh and tossed the blanket off as I got up the couch. I was thinking on just telling them what was really going on but I'm pretty sure that they think Kakarot is crazy enough after what just happened.

"Can I leave now!?",I asked rudely. "I don't have time for this nonsense."

Without waiting for an answer I stomped out and took off. I should've done it sooner.

I needed to find that idiot and fast.

Meanwhile..

"Am I the only that noticed dad leaving in his underwear?",Gohan said.

"You're not the only one.",Piccolo said. "Am I the only that noticed Vegeta's ki radiating off of Goku?"

Gohan snorted. "That explains a lot."

Goku

"Jeez, I gotta find my body and fast." I realised that I was coming close to the Lookout and decided to stop and ask Piccolo for answers.

"Vegeta?" Mr Popo looked really surprised but it's understandable. Vegeta rarely comes to the lookout plus I dressed him up a bit today.

"Hey Popo. Have you seen Piccolo?",I asked.

"He went to see Goku. Apperently there's something wrong with him."

"What happened?"

"He refused to eat."

I gasped. "Dang, that's so unlike me." He gave me a puzzled look. "I mean, Goku."

"Did you just say Goku?"

I mentally slapped myself again. Vegeta never says my Earth name. I had to remember that.

"I dunno what you heard fatso but I gotta go." It hurt me a bit but I had to be rude to end suspicions. But I don't think even Vegeta would say such a thing.

I quickly took off feeling bad but hopeful when I felt a familiar ki nearby. Was it mine? Weird.

Vegeta

"Hey Goku.",I heard Roshi call out.

"Where!?",I questioned before face palming myself. "Oh, right. I'm Kakarot."

I then realised that I had flown over the Kame house. I wanted to ignore them but I figured the old pervert might be able to help me.

I landed in front of the old man. He lowered his glasses a bit and his eyes scanned me top to bottom.

"What you looking at pervert!"

Roshi flinched at my outburst. "Uh, it's just, you're not wearing any pants."

I face palmed myself again. I had left in such a hurry that I forgot to change.

"Damnit."

"You alright there buddy?"

"I'm fine. Just stressed is all."

"Has Chi Chi finally got to you?",he said slyly.

I chuckled. "And I thought my wife was crazy but Chi Chi really takes the cake."

"Wait what?"

I clasped my hands over my mouth, realising my mistake.

"Uh, nothing. I better go."

And with that, I took off.

I after a while I noticed an energy coming towards me. Was that my energy? Weird.

"Me!?",I heard him say. As the figure got closer I sped up realising that it was my body.

"Me!?",I said. "Kakarot!?"

"Vegeta!?"

We both stared at each other in a while. I think he was surprised to see himself in his underwear while I was surprised to see myself, the Saiyan prince, in a hippy get up.

"What the hell are you–am I wearing!?"

"Well, Bulma got this for you and I thought I'd wear it. It's really nice actually."

"Yeah, it does look good on me, no doubt but," I shook my head. "Nevermind. How did this happen!?"

"I don't know?" I rolled my eyes. Of course this idiot wouldn't know. I gotta say it was weird talking to myself.

"Think," I held the bridge of my(Kakarot's) nose as I thought. "What happened the last time we were together?"

"I got it!", Kakarot said. "Bulma's machine."

"Bulma's machine? Of course!"

Goku

We flew to Capsule Corp and was surprised to see all our friends there already.

"Hey guys."

"What the hell are you all doing here!?",Vegeta said. I wonder how badly he's ruined my good guy cred.

"Yep, that's Vegeta all right.",Krillin said.

Bulma stepped forward. "I should've known Vegeta couldn't have been that cheerful.",she said blandly.

"Hey!",my body retorted. "I can be cheerful."

"So do you know what's happened?",I stepped in.

"Yeah, it all happened when you two idiots destroyed my particle machine. I guess the explosion got you two to switch bodies.",Bulma explained.

"Can you fix it?",Vegeta asked.

"That depends, are you willing to wear the outfits I picked for you?",she said with a wink.

I turned to myself and awaited the answer of the Saiyan prince inside my body.

"Fine.",he groaned.

"Great, 'cause I already fixed it."

I heard my voice groan in annoyance. "Damn, woman."

We headed to Bulma's lab and she pushed us into this machine before we had a clue what was happening. She shut the iron doors and we waited.

I caught a smile on my face and wondered,"Why you so cheery, Vegeta?"

"I don't know. I guess I'm just happy to finally leave your body and be with Bulma."

Before I could comment, he shut me up with a glare. "Not a word." Weird receiving a glare from yourself.

"Okay."

After what felt like an hour, we were finally in our own bodies. I think. As soon as we got we ran to the closest mirror to inspect for any side effects. Nothing. Phew.

"Hmm.",Vegeta said inspecting himself.

"What?",I asked.

"You were right. This outfit ain't so bad. But don't tell anyone or you're dead."

"Too late." Bulma walked in, followed by chi chi.

"Glad you're back to normal. Come on, you must be starving." She took my hand and lead me outside where there was an entire buffet set out.

"You know me so well Chi Chi."

Everyone asked Vegeta and I what it was like being in each other's bodies. Roshi found it funny that we woke up next to each other's wives and soon I saw Bulma look at me curiously.

"Goku."

"Yeah?"

"So when you woke up next to me was I...?"

"Yep.",I said blushing.

"And you saw me.." She was now blushing too.

"Yep."

Chi Chi and Vegeta looked at me strangely. "What are you two talking about?"

"Nothing!",we said. "Just an inside thing.",Bulma added.

"What a Freaky Friday.",I said.

Piccolo raised his eyebrow at me. "It's Tuesday."

#Goku #Vegeta #Bulma #chi chi #freaky Friday #weird #dbz fanfiction

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debbielouocean · 4 years

Text

jen can be civil, she’s just historically chosen not to be

jen harding/judy hale (also on ao3)

@clearrx7 had mentioned something like this here and claimed she wanted it to magically appear and since i couldn’t get it out of my head due to ‘oh fuck yeah i’d love to see eleanor get yelled at’, i decided that making it magically appear was my new job (additionally- this takes place sometime after the end of season two but there was no car accident and they never found steve’s body)

Jen wasn’t sure how she’d gotten herself wrangled into this situation, but that was almost always the case where Judy was involved. When she’d heard Judy was going to drive an hour out of the city to a women’s prison to pick up her mother, who had just gotten released, Jen had just… offered to drive her. Like she was involved, somehow.

Jen waited in the car while Judy walked inside. She’d wanted to go in with her, but had decided against even suggesting it because being this close to a prison was still terrifying for her. She didn’t need a sneak peak of what was surely still her future, certain that karma was going to catch up with her eventually.

Fucking ‘karma’, Jen thought, I have got to stop absorbing everything Judy says.

It felt like an eternity before Jen finally saw Judy walking out, trailing a few feet behind an older woman that Jen didn’t recognize but figured must be Eleanor Hale. She looked like Judy. God, she, like, really looked like Judy. Jen briefly wondered what Judy’s father might have looked like for Eleanor to have ended up with basically a cloned child. And then she saw Judy pointing towards her car and she sunk down in the seat a bit like she was hiding. Trying to pretend like she hadn’t been watching them walk out.

“Just tell me where you’re staying and I’ll drop you off,” Jen said, frowning. She’d only known this woman for ten minutes and she was already pretty close to kicking her out of the car. Her sickly sweet voice was grating on Jen’s nerves.

Eleanor looked up at Jen like she’d entirely forgotten she was even in the car. She flashed Jen a disingenuous smile,“Oh! Just drop me at Judy’s house. I told the parole board I’d be staying with her.”

Jen almost wrecked the fucking car. “You can’t be serious-”

“Mom, you didn’t!” Judy said, anxiety written all over her face. “I don’t have a house!”

Jen had to bite her tongue to keep from reminding Judy that yes, in fact she did have a house. Because that so was not the point here.

“You’re not still living in a car, are you? For god’s sake, Judy, you’re nearly forty.” Eleanor made a face, like she hadn’t lived in a car herself for the first ten years of Judy’s life.

“She’s forty-two,” Jen said, her face scrunching up in angry confusion. How the hell did this woman not even know how old Judy was? She was the one who’d fucking given birth to her! Jen saw Judy reach across the center console, clearly about to try to calm Jen, but she pulled her hand back before she even actually touched her. Which only served to confuse Jen more.

“I am actually forty-two,” Judy confirmed, looking a bit ashamed of herself. Jen had to struggle to keep her eyes on the road when all she really wanted to do was stare Judy down until she could figure out why she was being extra weird. And why her mother was such a cunt. “Also, I don’t live in my car. I live with Jen. So you really should have run that one by me before you told them that because it isn’t entirely my call, Mom.”

Eleanor cleared her throat, changing tactics fast. That fake sweet voice rolling back in to take over. “Well, I’m sure Jen won’t just kick me out on the street.”

She actually even had the audacity to laugh at the end of that ridiculous fucking sentence. Like it was the most absurd thought in the world that Jen wouldn’t let her stay with them. Like Jen hadn’t heard everything about the cool, fun thirteen years of emotional abuse that Judy got to experience at her hands.

But Judy was looking at her, a silent plea written on her face. Jen couldn’t quite tell if Judy was asking her to say yes or no. She shot Judy a look, hoping she could read the conflict on her face. Because she couldn’t make it any clearer, not when she knew Eleanor was watching their faces in the rearview mirror.

And she had to make a decision. The decision that was best for Judy was obviously to tell Eleanor that she could live in a cardboard box below an overpass for all she fucking cared. But the decision she was almost certain Judy wanted her to make was to let this woman into their home. So Jen ground her teeth together and gripped the steering wheel a bit tighter and nodded.

“It’ll just be for a little bit,” Judy said, glancing anxiously between her mother in the backseat and Jen. Like she could tell that they were a volatile combination that was going to explode at any minute. “Just until we can find her somewhere a bit more permanent.”

“I wouldn’t want to put you out for too long,” Eleanor said.

I’m about to put you out, lady. Jen glanced at the GPS, wondering how much fucking longer she’d have to be trapped in this car.

Eleanor had moved into the guest house with Judy. Which Jen figured would be fine, because Judy was basically living in Jen’s room anyway. Or at least, she had been until Eleanor arrived. But she’d very conspicuously started sleeping in the spare bedroom down the hall, as if that was ever even an option they’d discussed.

Jen had been avoiding Eleanor for the three days that she’d been with them thus far. While also managing to print off about a dozen short-term rental listings and tape them to the guest house door. Judy had very politely asked her to stop doing that when she found out.

The palpable tension in the house came to a head at breakfast on the fourth morning. When Jen had walked down the stairs in her pajamas and found Eleanor sitting at the kitchen island with Henry. Just acting like she was supposed to be there. And Jen was livid.

“Hey.” Judy came up behind her, a gentle hand on her shoulder. Jen could see the understanding in her eyes and the unspoken apology for putting them into this situation. Even though she really didn’t have to apologize for any of it. Jen wouldn’t have allowed her to verbalize an apology, not when it wasn’t her fault.

“Hey,” Jen mumbled back, still glaring at Eleanor. She managed to pry her eyes away for long enough to look at Judy. Who looked… fucking rough. She had dark circles underneath her eyes and was wearing sweatpants. Jen didn’t even know she owned sweatpants.

Judy must have noticed her staring at her legs. “Oh! I borrowed your sweatpants. I hope you don't mind.”

“Uh… nope, don’t mind at all,” Jen said, holding back a comment about how tired Judy looked. That was definitely a conversation for them to have in private. Her worry for Judy almost overshadowed the issue of the abusive cunt sitting in her kitchen with her ten year old son.

Almost.

“Morning, boop,” Jen said, a smile plastered on her face for Henry’s sake. “Don’t you need to go finish your homework before Shandy comes over later?”

Henry looked up, halfway to bringing a spoonful of cereal to his mouth. “I’ve only got a little bit left.”

“Why don’t you take the rest of your breakfast upstairs and finish it up?”

“I can eat in my room?” Henry asked in confusion. “Since when?”

“Since right now,” Jen said, gesturing towards the stairs. “Homework. Go.”

“Good morning-” Eleanor started to say, but Jen cut her off as soon as Henry was out of hearing range.

“You’ve certainly made yourself at home.” Jen put her hands on the back of the barstool Henry had left vacant, purposefully towering over the seated woman. See if she fucking likes it, Jen thought as Eleanor flinched backwards from the vitriol in Jen’s voice. “How did you even fucking get in here?”

Jen was certain she’d locked the patio doors the night before. And she damn well knew she hadn’t given Eleanor a key.

“Henry opened the door for me,” Eleanor said, grinning as she stood up to full height, taller than Jen. “He’s such a sweet kid. Now that other one, though-”

“Don’t talk to me about my kids,” Jen growled, turning away from the other woman. She swiped Henry’s half-full glass of orange juice off the table and walked off. She headed back towards the stairs to go check on Henry and apologize for sending him to his room when he’d done nothing wrong. If she stayed down here for another minute she was going to do something she’d regret.

But she stopped at the bottom of the stairs when she heard Eleanor speaking to Judy. And she couldn’t help but eavesdrop.

“I don’t see how you live with that, Judy,” Eleanor said. Jen rolled her eyes, over the dramatics of having this woman in her house. She was worse than fucking Lorna.

“Jen’s not usually… she’s just frustrated, Mom,” Judy said, sighing. Jen could hear the water in the sink turn on and the sound of Judy loading the dishwasher with last night’s dishes.

“She obviously doesn’t want me here. You don’t have to pretend otherwise for my sake. She’s certainly not making the same effort.” Eleanor laughed bitterly. “Easy to understand why she’d feel that way.”

Jen’s brow furrowed in confusion. She hadn’t thought Eleanor was… self-aware.

Judy didn’t respond, and Eleanor kept talking.

“You’ve finally got someone in this house to look out for you, honey. She knows I’m not gonna put up with her treating you like shit in front of me.”

“What?” Judy said, echoing Jen’s exact thoughts on the matter. Well. Jen’s thoughts had a few more expletives.

She heard Eleanor sigh, like she was taking pity on Judy. “It’s not hard to see what’s going on here. I’ve only been here a few days and I can already tell that woman’s not good for you. She just wants me to leave so she can go back to how it was before.”

“That’s not-”

Eleanor’s voice was soft. Jen could hear the conniving in it, wondering what fucking line she was about to throw at her daughter. “You don’t have to hide it from me, Judy Ann. If she’s hurting you-”

Jen heard glass shatter and it took her a second to realize that it was her who’d caused it. The glass of orange juice slipping from her hand without her notice. She was shocked Eleanor would even suggest-

“Jen?” Judy rounded the corner, concern in her voice. “Are you alright? What happened?”

Eleanor was right behind her. Looking so fucking smug that Jen wanted to pick up the shattered glass and just-

“Let me get a towel,” Judy said, quickly rushing to the stairs towards the linen closet.

Jen stepped over the broken glass and made a beeline for Eleanor. She was inches from her face with a finger pointed directly at the other woman’s nose before Judy even made it to the second step.

“If you ever fucking insinuate that I would fucking hurt Judy, I’ll put you in the fucking ground,” Jen said, anger coursing through her veins. She knew Judy was saying something behind her, but she just couldn’t hear her over the blood pounding in her ears. “And fucking trust me when I tell you that they will never fucking find your pathetic corpse, you motherfucking-”

Judy had a hand on both of her arms, pulling her away from Eleanor. Jen batted her away, trying very hard not to shove her, not to do anything that might make Eleanor think she’d ever put a hand on Judy.

“Jen, calm down,” Judy whispered in a panic. Her voice came out like a hiss, so quiet that Jen almost didn’t hear it. There was a begging tone to it that Jen did not care for. “The boys are just upstairs, Jen.”

“For fuck’s sake, Judy, she can’t just-”

“You just have to be in control of every little thing that happens in this house, don’t you?” Eleanor said in that grating self-satisfied voice. “I can’t have one conversation with my daughter without you flying into a rage over something that has nothing to do with you.”

“Nothing to fucking do with me?” Jen yelled back, ripping her arm out of Judy’s grasp. “I’m not gonna let some piece of shit stand in my fucking kitchen and make accusations that I- that I would ever-”

Eleanor just rolled her eyes at Jen. Like she was a toddler throwing a tantrum in a grocery store. And then she was just fucking walking away like she was the bigger person.

“Judy Ann, I’ll be in my room if you’d like to speak to me,” she said, ignoring that Jen was still on the verge of murder. Walking right back through Jen’s kitchen and out to Jen’s guesthouse that she was very fucking graciously letting her stay in.

“I never thought premeditated murder would be for me, but I swear to fucking god, Judy, I’m gonna kill her,” Jen muttered under her breath, hyperaware of how loud she’d been a few moments before. She turned around to look at the other woman.

Judy was shaking. Standing there in the entryway in Jen’s too-big sweatpants, she looked smaller than Jen had ever seen her before.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Judy said, her hands clasped at her chest. She didn’t sound like she was angry at Jen for having gone off on Eleanor, though.

“Trust me, it wasn’t a burden,” Jen said carefully, slowly coming over to Judy and pulling her into a hug; Judy’s hand pressing against Jen’s chest. Jen sighed, willing herself to get it to-fucking-gether because Judy needed her calm more than she needed her angry. She brushed Judy’s hair out of her face with her fingers, trying for soothing but probably failing as her fingers got stuck on tangles. She wondered if Judy had even bothered to brush her hair that morning, given that she clearly hadn’t bothered with much else in terms of self-care.

“I’m sorry she’s here,” Judy said, pulling her hands out from between them to rub at her own eyes. “Everything was finally good and then I invite a fucking monster into our house.”

‘Our house’ coming out of Judy’s mouth hit Jen like a truck, but she put it aside for the moment, trying to focus on Judy and not on whatever the hell that emotion had been.

“She invited herself here,” Jen reminded her, “It’s not your fault, Judy, you were just trying to… do the right thing, or some bullshit. Not that it’s bullshit. It’s really sweet, actually.”

“It’s really sweet that I let her walk all over me?” Judy asked in disbelief. “Didn’t you tell me I needed to say ‘no’ more?”

“Well, yeah,” Jen said, “but I don’t think you’d still be Judy if you didn’t always try too hard to help people.”

Judy pulled herself out of the hug, but stayed close enough that Jen could keep a hand on her arm.

“I’m gonna go talk to her,” Judy said, somehow sounding both hesitant and confident at the same time.

“Do you want backup?” Jen asked, already feeling that even though she really did not want Judy to have to face her mother alone, Judy probably should. And Jen could always go back and yell at her later if she tried to pull some shit.

Judy shook her head with a choked laugh. “I don’t think I’d be able to get a word in edgewise with you two in the same room.”

“Hey, I can be civil. I’ve just historically chosen not to be,” Jen said in mock offense. But she sighed, admitting to herself that Judy was right. Going out there with her would result in a second screaming match and she still did need to go upstairs and check on Henry. Jen said as much before trudging up the stairs into what she was certain was going to be a fun conversation with a ten year old.

Jen wasn’t sure what Judy had said to her mother. And Judy had been kind of vague about the whole thing. But Jen also couldn’t really bring herself to care as she watched Eleanor put herself into an uber not even three days later.

Eleanor had spent the last three days camped out in the guesthouse before coming in and announcing that Judy had found her an apartment and she’d be leaving that afternoon. As if anyone would miss her.

But as Jen stood on her front porch, she realized that someone would miss her. Or at least, Judy would miss the idea of her. The idea that her mother might improve and they could have something akin to a normal relationship. Sending her away meant that Judy was having to come to terms with that never having been a realistic idea.

Judy was helping Eleanor with her bags, putting them in the trunk of the car. Jen saw Judy reach out for a hug. Saw Eleanor turn away from it as if she hadn’t seen it at all before getting into the passenger’s seat.

The car pulled away and Judy walked back to join Jen on the porch, a strangely peaceful look on her face.

“I’m sorry, Judy. I know you wanted better from her,” Jen said, letting Judy lean into her side. “But I’m proud of you for not letting her drag you back into her bullshit.”

“Well,” Judy said, dragging the word out and grimacing apologetically. “I did pay the deposit and first month’s rent on the apartment. And co-sign the lease. And call the uber. I don’t know if I would say I completely avoided being dragged back into it.”

“Judy!”

“She was in prison, Jen. Her credit score is not great,” Judy said, as if that were the most obvious thing in the world. Jen rolled her eyes with no real malice behind it.

“Whatever gets her out of the guesthouse, I guess,” she muttered, knowing it would take a lot more than one conversation to fully get Judy disentangled from this woman again. But something else was still nagging at the back of her mind.

“Does this mean that you’re gonna move back out there, then?” Jen asked. Judy jerked her head towards Jen in confusion.

“Do you want me to?” Judy looked hurt, and she obviously hadn’t even considered doing such a thing.

“I just- fuck, of course not,” Jen said, wishing she’d kept her dumb fucking mouth shut and just let things be for once. “I just don’t understand why you moved into the guest room of all places. That’s the worst fucking room in the house.”

“I didn’t want to stay in the guesthouse with my mother,” Judy said, once again using that ‘isn’t it obvious, Jen?’ tone that didn’t make any fucking sense to her.

“You weren’t, though?” Jen said, confusion adding a questioning uptick to her statement. “You were… you just said… Judy you weren’t living in the guest house before she got here. You literally just admitted that.”

“I wasn’t,” Judy said tentatively. “But I also wasn’t really living in the main house, either, Jen. We never really talked about where I was living. And I didn’t want to assume… and then my mom assumed that- well, she said that, we could share the guesthouse. And I didn’t want to tell her that I hadn’t actually been… sleeping there. For a while.”

“Oh.”

“Not that there’s anything like, wrong with that,” Judy was quick to amend. “Because you’re my best friend, Jen and we’re adults and we can do whatever we want. But also, like, you kind of never really... mentioned… that that was, like… what you wanted?”

“Do you think I would have tolerated you stealing my blankets every single fucking night if I didn’t want you there, Judy?” Jen asked, wondering how she’d ever not made it clear that she wanted Judy there. Every night. Probably for the rest of forever.

“Oh. Good, then,” Judy said, nodding. “Your guest room really kind of sucks, Jen.”

“That’s intentional. I decorated with Lorna in mind.”

Jen relaxed a bit when Judy laughed, the hard and confusing part of the conversation over. For today, at least. Jen knew they’d have to come back to it.

“We should celebrate!” Judy exclaimed all of a sudden. “A great evil has been purged from this household.”

Jen laughed with her, following her inside to gather the boys up so they could discuss dinner plans.

They were laying in bed together later that week, Jen scrolling through Facebook on her laptop and Judy reading a beach novel, when Jen decided to bring it up again.

Shutting her laptop, she shifted a bit so she was facing Judy, who glanced up at Jen with a smile before going back to her book. She looked better. Calmer. And Jen’s sweatpants had yet to make a reappearance in Judy’s normally put-together wardrobe.

“See something you like?” Judy asked playfully without looking up from the page.

“Yeah, but you just had to open your mouth and ruin it,” Jen shot back. It was comfortable, having Judy around. They had gotten themselves into such a fucking domestic routine that it almost made Jen sick.

But it made her sicker to know she was about to burst their little bubble. “I’ve been thinking.”

“Dangerous business,” Judy said, smirking.

“You never really told me what happened with your mom,” Jen said, regretting the words the minute they were out of her mouth. But she couldn’t keep fighting back the thought that she’d made Judy pick a fight she hadn’t been ready for. And that Judy had just gone with the easier option of kicking Eleanor out because it had been what Jen wanted.

“I told you,” Judy said, finally closing her book and sitting it on the nightstand. “She was negligent and addicted to drugs and I testified against her and it was all a huge fucking mess-”

“Last week, Judy. What happened with your mom last week.”

“She got an apartment?” Judy said, tilting her head in confusion. “You were there, Jen.”

Jen sighed, hating that she was having to drag this out. But god, she needed to fucking know. “Did you tell her to leave or did she make that decision on her own?”

Judy hesitated, trying to read something on Jen’s face. “It was a… mutual decision.”

Jen was sure her face showed her disbelief because Judy was quick to retract.

“I told her to leave.”

“You didn’t have to do that f you didn’t want to, Judy,” Jen said, thinking hard about how she’d made it pretty fucking difficult for Judy to do anything besides that. “I’m sorry if I made you feel like you had to kick her out.”

“No, no, you didn’t.” Judy’s hand came to rest on Jen’s knee, comforting in a way Jen wasn’t sure she deserved. “I didn’t disagree with you about her staying here. I just… you know I’m very non-confrontational. But then she was saying all this horrible stuff about you and I just fucking let her have, Jen.”

“I would have paid to have seen that,” Jen said, eyes going wide at the thought of Judy defending her from Eleanor. She put her hand on top of Judy’s, rubbing her thumb across the back of it. “Thank you.”

“I wasn’t just gonna let her talk about you like that,” Judy scoffed, like the very idea was unthinkable. “I told her to get out if she wasn’t going to be nice to my family.”

“Fuck, Judy,” Jen said, quickly looking up at the ceiling and pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes, “I told you you’re not allowed to make me cry after 9 p.m.”

Judy smiled, reaching up to pull Jen’s hands away from her eyes. “You also told me I’m not allowed to make you cry after 9 a.m.”

“There’s a twenty minute window right after 7 a.m. where I’m fine with it,” Jen said, still blinking her eyes up at the ceiling even though Judy was looking right at her like that. Because Judy had defended her and called her family and stood up to her mother for her and ugh, fucking hell, she couldn’t manage her emotions.

“You’re usually asleep at 7 a.m. I’m supposed to wake you up so that I can make you cry?”

“If you think you can live with yourself after that,” Jen said, taking a deep breath to stop herself from sniffling and finally looking Judy in the eye.

“I really don’t think I could,” Judy admitted. “That’s a pretty airtight emotion-avoidance system you got there.”

“It’s obviously working.”

“Oh, of course.”

“I haven’t had an emotion in years.”

Judy smiled at her softly before reaching over to turn out the light on the bedside table. Jen let Judy curl herself around her, Jen’s arm wrapped around her waist.

“I think you have a lot of emotions,” Judy whispered into her ear in the dark.

Jen frowned in the dark, wondering how much Judy knew about her fucking emotions. “Go to sleep, Jude.”

“Okay. I love you.”

“Love you too,” Jen mumbled, closing her eyes and falling asleep with Judy in her arms. In their house. In their bed.

#dead to me #judy hale #jen harding #eleanor hale #fic #i swear to god every time i typed 'eleanor' i accidentally typed it 'elearnor' and i had to fix it like a million times #also reading back over this now i feel like i should have had jen apologize for yelling at elearnor (fuck see what happened there)#but i also really hate eleanor and so i'm not gonna waste time rewriting the last three pages of this just to give her an apology #so y'all are gonna have to live with that being a deficit in this fic #i gotta stop using so much italics in a fic becasue every time i go to post it on tumblr #i have to go back in and manually add all the italics again lmao

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xwaywardhuntress · 4 years

Text

Yours All Along

Summary: Dean goes MIA and takes off one day every year and doesn’t invite Y/N. During that one day, Y/N is asked to help hunt a Shtriga from Cas.

Warnings: KidBait, Language, Almost Dying, Fluff?

Word Count: 5700+

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural. This is fanfiction only. Please do not redistribute my writings on other sites, horrible or not. Thanks!

Author’s Note: Not sure I liked how this turned out, but hopefully others will like it. Enjoy! Feedback is welcome! :)

“Y/N? Do you know where Dean is?” The younger Winchester asked as he stood by the door frame of Dean and Y/N’s shared room.

Without looking up from your laptop, you shook your head. “Nope.” You popped the p as you continued watching Bones. It had been that one day in the year again. The day Dean always left for the majority of the day to be with her. No, he wasn’t cheating on you. The woman in question had passed away long ago, according to Dean. His first love, even before Cassie. When asked, the older Winchester didn’t speak much of her and it was only this one day every year where he would take the time to think of her, for some odd reason. Otherwise, he never brought her up during the remaining 364 days of the year.

A part of you felt some slight jealousy towards this unknown woman that would take away your man for one day every year, but the first loves are always the hardest ones to forget, right? So you also couldn’t be too upset with Dean for taking this one day to himself.

You felt the bed dip near the edge as Sam had taken a seat while you laid on your stomach, watching the forensic tv show.

“You know you’d be his number one still, right? Even if she was still alive.” The younger Winchester commented, after realizing today was the day Dean grieved for this mystery woman he had never met either.

“Eh, I guess.” You replied with a none-caring attitude. You honestly didn’t want to talk about it, despite accepting what Dean chose to do during this one day.

Sam got the hint as he stood back up and made his way to leave the room. “Alright, I’ll be in the library if you need me, looking for cases.”

You nodded your head in acknowledgement. Pausing the TV show on your laptop, you rolled onto your back as you let out a sigh. As much as you thought you had accepted it, you just couldn’t help but wonder why Dean couldn’t include you in this day. If he was grieving once a year, even if it was for an old flame, you’d still like to be there for him. He always told you that you two were in this life together. He forgot to mention that it didn’t include this one day.

“Y/N.” A gruff voice spoke from your bedside.

Looking over, you pushed yourself up in a sitting position. “Cas? Didn’t Dean tell you to not show up in our room without some kind of warning first?”

“This is urgent.” The angel declared.

“Okay, well Dean isn’t here. But I can get Sam and we can help you?” You asked as you stood up from the bed walking over to grab your jacket hanging on the back of the door.

Castiel followed a couple of steps behind you. “I just need you.” He stated as he placed a hand on your shoulder after you had shrugged on your jacket.

Within a blink of an eye, you found yourself with the angel on an empty street road. “What the hell, Cas? I didn’t even get to grab any weapons. Bring me back!”

“I can’t. Not until you help me here.” The trench coat wearing angel shared as he seemed to be searching for something. It was a car.

Watching as Cas walked away and stopped by what looked like an abandoned 70s car, you made your way over to join him, “Alright, where is here first?”

The angel opened the door and motioned at the car. “Can you get this car started? It should still work.”

You rolled your eyes, disliking his lack of answers, but still answered him by beginning to work on getting the car started. “Cas, once I turn this car on, you better tell me where we are.” The engine revved in and out as you crossed certain wires till it finally turned on.

“It’s not a matter of where, but when.” Cas stated as he walked to the other side of the car and took a seat on the shotgun side.

You took his action as an implication that you would be the driver as you got in and then began driving off the side and back onto the road you had originally appeared on. “Alright, I’ll bite, when are we? And where am I driving too?”

“Just go straight and then take a right into the next group of houses.” The angel shared. “…And we’re in 1983.”

Your foot stomped hard on the brakes hearing the year. Cas had brought you back 36 years?! Stopped in the middle of the road, you looked over at the angel, almost glaring. “Why in the hell are we in 1983?!”

“I can’t tell you why, but I need you to protect a child. There will be severe consequences if the child dies.” The angel explained, yet left so much out still.

You sighed knowing that was probably all you were going to get.

“And I cannot tell you the child’s name right now.” The angel added.

You groaned as you lifted your foot off the brake and began driving again. “You’re lucky you’re one of the few people I trust Cas.”

The angel smiled at your comment as he sat in the passenger seat during the drive.

As both of you entered a street filled with houses, Cas pointed out to a white one to stop in front of.

“This is where the child lives.” Cas confirmed.

You couldn’t help but feel that you had seen the house before somewhere. “Alright, so what am I protecting this kid from?” You turned to the angel in a trench coat.

“A Shtriga.”

Your eyes widened. You’d read about them, heard about them from when Dean and Sam dealt with one, but you never actually hunted one before. “Okay, well if I remember, they can be killed by consecrated iron. So we’ll need to get our hands on some of that.”

“They’re in the back.”

You spun your head quickly as you saw a duffle bag in the back seat that had not been there before. “I’m feeling not very needed right now...” You rose a brow looking over at the angel.

“This is all I can help with. The Shtriga will come tonight. I must go now.” And then Cas disappeared.

If you could scream your heart out, you would’ve. Now, it seemed like it was time to think of a game plan. How were you going to kill this Shtriga? According to Sam and Dean, the monster’s most vulnerable moment to kill them was when they’re in the process of sucking the life out of a child. That would mean you’d need to wait for it to attack this child you were supposed to protect and then kill it before it killed the kid. Easier said than done.

Making your way back onto the road before turning into the row of houses, you parked the car off to the side again among some trees. You decided you’d walk by the house and scope the area out, as well as try scoping out the house too. After eyeing around for any signs of an audience, you made your way to the side of the white house as you began peeking in through the windows. From the window of what you assumed was the dining room, you spotted a little boy. He looked oddly familiar. Before you could think of why, that’s when you saw her.

Quickly ducking out of sight, you squatted below the window. “Mary?” You couldn’t help but whisper to yourself.

You had just seen the mother of the man you loved, which only meant that the little boy who had looked so oddly familiar was the man you would love in the future. Dean Winchester. The small feeling of familiarity with the house was starting to make sense. You’d seen a picture of Mary and John Winchester in front of the exact same house that you were currently snooping around now. As more connections were made in your mind, you came across the realization that Cas had sent you back to protect child Dean. This wouldn’t be weird at all.

After some moments of putting the pieces of this puzzle together, you decided to check on Mary and Dean again. Peeking through the window, you saw little Dean was by himself at the table now, eating. Mary was absent.

As you let out a breath of air, you felt the tip of a pistol press against your back. You gulped, raising your arms up.

“Who are you? And why are you spying into my house?” The female voice demanded to know.

You slowly turned around, with your arms still up, as your eyes landed on the rounded stomach. Mary Winchester was pregnant with Sam.

“I’m a hunter.” You blurted out, remembering that Dean had shared his mother was the side that came from the hunting side.

Mary eyed you for a moment, taking in your clothing. “You’re a hunter without any kind of weapon?”

You couldn’t help but chuckle. “It’s in my car.”

She continued to eye you with the pistol still pointed at you. “Alright, how do you kill a vampire?”

Was she testing you if you were telling the truth about being a hunter? You answered her with a bit of sarcasm, “Not sunlight. You chop their heads off. But if you want to slow them down to do it, you inject them with dead man’s blood.”

The answer seemed to satisfy her as she lowered her pistol. “Mary Winchester. Retired hunter.”

“Y/N. Not retired hunter.” You smiled at her as you lowered your arms back down.

“Alright, Y/N. What are you hunting that brings you around here?” She asked as she put her pistol away.

“I’m hunting a Shtriga.”

“Hm, I don’t think I’ve heard of that one. You’ll have to tell me about it. How about you go grab your stuff from the car and then meet me inside my house? Then I can see how I can help.” Mary offered. “If there is something around here endangering my children, I’d like to help, despite being out of the life.” She shared as she rubbed her stomach.

You agreed to her offer as she left to return inside the house. You left to go get the duffel bag that Cas had magically brought to you. When you came back to the house with your bag, you knocked as the door was answered by a little boy.

You couldn’t help but stare at little Dean. He was pretty adorable. He called out to his mom that a pretty lady was at the door. You couldn’t help but blush a little as you smiled at him a bit awkwardly. Even little Dean had the same effect of making you blush, it seemed.

Mary came into view as Dean ran off into the house. She greeted you, “Y/N. Sorry about that. That’s Dean. I have a feeling he’s going to be giving me headaches when he grows up. He’s already such a lady’s man.” Mary chuckled as she gestured you inside.

If only she knew how much of a lady’s man he truly turned out to be, at least till he met you. You only smiled at her comment.

“Now, I know what you’re thinking. Can a pregnant woman really help me with the hunt?” Mary commented before continuing. “Luckily my husband is away so I won’t have to drag him into something like this again. But, I can help with research and places to go too to get certain items, if needed. Even though I got out of the life, I still planned out on how to obtain what I needed if I did have to deal with a monster.”

“Well, I already know how to kill it and I have the tools to do it too.” You shared as you set the duffel bag on the table and opened it, pulling a pistol out and then ammo. You held an ammo piece in your hand. “Consecrated iron bullets…” You assumed since it was Cas who brought it and it had the same color an iron bullet would have. “These will kill the Shtriga.”

Mary walked over and took the bullet in her own hand, analyzing it. She had a bad feeling she wouldn’t like the answer to the next question she was about to ask. “Alright, and what do Shtriga’s hunt exactly?”

You paused for a moment. You knew once you answered her that there was no going back. “Children.”

Mary’s eyes widened as her eyes landed on little Dean walking into the room with a fake flower. Little Dean walked up to you, holding out the flower with almost a shy smile on his face.

You couldn’t help but smile back as it reminded you of the beginning of your relationship with Dean. You had never seen him as nervous as he was when he confessed to having feelings for you. He had also brought you a bouquet of flowers back then. You gladly accepted the flower as a big smile grew on little Dean’s face as he ran away again, probably back to his room.

“So we just have to shoot the damn monster with these bullets to kill it?” Mary asked as Dean left.

You slightly smiled before sharing more about the Shtriga. You went on to explain how it liked to suck the life out of children and that it’s most vulnerable time to shoot it to kill it was when it was in the process of attacking its prey.

Mary sat down on one of the chairs at the table. She understood what this all meant, if her Dean was the next target, then she’d have to risk his life to kill this monster. Of course, she had to confirm it out loud that her little boy was the next target as it only made sense after finding Y/N checking out her house earlier. And so she asked.

You couldn’t help but nod your head as a confirmation.

“Would you mind giving me a minute?” Mary asked as she swallowed all the information given to her and the danger that her first born would soon meet. “The house is open for you.”

“Of course.” You agreed as you walked away. You walked up the stairs as you searched for Dean’s room. Dean’s room would be the target location, so you’d need to scope it out to find a good spot to hide, if Mary would allow the plan to happen.

Finding little Dean in his room, he was playing with some little army men. You stood by the door frame with a smile. “Well aren’t those some cool army men.” You commented.

Little Dean looked up as he held two little green army men in each of his hands as he sat on the ground. He held one out for you.

You entered his room as you took a seat by him on the ground and took the little green army man that he was handing to you.

“That’s you and this is me.” He commented about the two army men toys.

“Oh, really? So are we fighting against each other?” You faced the army man you had in hand towards the one in Dean’s hand.

Little Dean frowned at you. “No. They’re fighting together.” He stated as he took the army man back into his hand and began having the two toys move along together.

A smile found its way on your lips as you couldn’t help but think how you two would definitely be fighting together in the future, when he was much older. You took the chance to look around his room, spotting the window where you assumed the Shtriga would come through and then found the closet that happened to be right across the window but facing the bed.

“Do you have someone like my mommy has my daddy?” Little Dean interrupted your thoughts of his room as he asked out of the blue while still playing with the green army men toys in his hand.

You looked at little Dean. “I do. He saves people just like your army men.”

Little Dean looked at you interested to hear more. “Is he like Batman?”

You let out a small laugh. Of course, little Dean would compare his future self to batman. “You could say that…”

“Does he take care of you? If he doesn’t, I can take care of you like I take care of my mommy when my daddy is away.” Little Dean shared.

You smiled at his comment, admiring how he already took it upon himself to take care of someone at his age already. It wasn’t that surprising. “Well, you don’t have to worry. He takes care of me, even if I may not agree with how sometimes.”

“Good!” Little Dean exclaimed as he spotted his mother at the entrance of his door.

You looked up as well as she was smiling down at the both of you.

“I see you’ve made a new friend with the pretty lady.” Mary winked at you.

You smiled awkwardly, knowing she was referring to you the same way Dean referred to you earlier.

“Mom….” Little Dean whined as you could see he felt a bit embarrassed about it now.

Mary laughed as she ordered him to go brush his teeth and wash up before bed time. When the little boy left, she turned to you as you stood up. “I don’t like it one bit, but I’m in and I’m helping one way or another. I’m guessing you have a plan at this point?”

You admired Mary’s willingness to help, but of course with her being pregnant with little Sammy, you couldn’t put her in harm’s way. And so you devised a plan where hopefully she wouldn’t need to be part of the action. “Yeah, I think I can hide in the closet and have a good vantage point from there. Then if you want, you can be by the door, just in case. Don’t worry Mary, I’m a good shot. I won’t miss, for Dean’s sake.” You tried reassuring her of the plan. She wasn’t the only one who was at risk of losing someone she cared for deeply.

Little Dean came running back into his room with a toothbrush in his mouth. He mumbled something as he handed you one of the green toy army men. You could barely make out what he said except two words: Keep it. And then he ran back towards the bathroom.

You looked at the little green army men and then placed it in your jacket pocket, it would have to be your good luck charm for what was about to go down tonight.

While little Dean was finishing getting ready for bed, Mary insisted you hide in the closet now and she would tell Dean you had left for the night. After grabbing your pistol filled with consecrated iron bullets, you went to the closet and sat on the ground inside it. Luckily, it wasn’t a solid closet door and you were able to see into the room.

Mary came back with Dean, placing him in his bed. Little Dean had asked about the pretty lady, you, as Mary shared you had left to go home already. There was a disappointed look on his face before he was tucked into bed. She kissed his forehead, lingering there a bit longer than usual. “I love you, sweetie. I won’t let anything happen to you.” She shared with her son who smiled as he closed his eyes.

Mary glanced over at the closet you were hiding in.

You opened the closet door slightly as you held out a thumbs up.

Mary then left, taking her place by her son’s door and her own pistol with the consecrated iron rounds.

And then you both waited for this Shtriga to come.

A little past midnight was when you started noticing a shadow from the window. It all happened very fast after that. As the Shtriga entered and hovered over little Dean, it opened its mouth and was about to begin to suck the life out of the child. On edge a bit, you opened the closet door and fired a shot too early. The Shtriga got hit but didn’t die as it hadn’t even been feeding yet. It used its inhuman speed as it went after you throwing you across the room.

Little Dean had woken up from the gunshot as Mary threw the bedroom door open. She ran straight to her son as the Shtriga turned towards her and little Dean. Mary shot her bullets at it without thinking as self-defense.

You found yourself forcing yourself to stand up after being thrown. “Hey ugly! Over here!” You yelled as you shot at the monster again to get its attention away from Mary and Dean. You gestured with your head for Mary to take Dean and get out of there. This time, the Shtriga slowly made its way over to you as you watched Mary escaping with Dean. When the monster began noticing the boy escaping, it was going to go after Mary and Dean when you shot another bullet at it again.

In anger, it bolted towards you, landing you onto the ground as it held you down. You had turned your head in the direction of Mary and Dean running towards the stairs to get out. Little Dean had looked at you scared, which almost mirrored his older versions look. You tried smiling at him to let him know everything was going to be okay before you left his view of sight as Mary took him running down the stairs.

Your pistol had been knocked out of reach as you turned to face the monster. As you looked at the monster, it opened its mouth, deciding that it would feed upon you now. This was it, you thought. You had failed to protect Dean. Feeling yourself being drained of energy, you barely registered the gunshot in your mind. The Shtriga fell on top of you, but you quickly felt its weight taken off of you. Looking up, you saw two figures above you. One held the gun that had been out of reach from you and the other was by your side. You could feel yourself regaining your energy back, but were still a bit incoherent.

“Is she going to be okay?” You heard Mary’s voice ask.

“Yes. She completed her task.” The very familiar angel’s voice spoke.

You felt two fingers press against your forehead as one word was said to you, Rest. And then you fell into a realm of darkness.

Waking up, you shot up in the bed you were laying on as you yelled, “The Shtriga!”

“Woah there, sweetheart. Take it easy.” A deep voice soothed you.

You turned to be met with emerald eyes. Dean Winchester.

“Did you just say Shtriga?” Dean questioned after taking a second to realize what you had yelled out. “Is that what Cas had you up against without us?!” His voice rose.

“Yes? But it’s dead?” You couldn’t help but answer in question form as you could tell Dean did not like hearing that you went against a Shtriga by yourself. To be fair, you had his mother’s help but were you allowed to share the time jump Cas had done to you?

“CAS! Get your ass down here now!” Dean yelled as Sam came running into the room with a sigh of relief as he spotted you.

Dean had got up from the chair he sat on beside your bed as he was yelling at Cas, who was probably avoiding to show up but heard him nonetheless. If you were in Cas’s shoes, you probably would’ve laid low and came later when Dean wasn’t upset anymore.

Sam sat at the edge of the bed you laid on as you asked him what you had missed. The younger Winchester explained that you were gone overnight. Dean had come home yesterday to find you nowhere in the bunker. After Sam helped his brother to search for you throughout the bunker, thinking you were pranking them till they realized you weren’t, they called for Cas. Cas had explained to them that you were busy with a hunt he asked for help on and that he couldn’t bring you back till you were finished. When asked about the hunt, the angel said he couldn’t share the details and then he left.

Dean had not taken Cas’s answers very well as he then began going through the steps of searching for someone with Sam’s help. To Dean’s misfortune, your cell phone was still at the bunker, so that idea of tracking you was out. As time went on without hearing a word from you or Cas, Dean began to think that you had left him.

At the moment Sam wanted to call it quits after spending all night awake with Dean searching for any sign of you, Cas had appeared carrying you, whom had been passed out. Dean then brought you to their shared room and stayed by your side till you woke up. The older Winchester only got a couple of hours of sleep as he kept waking up thinking you were gone again, only to see your sleeping form on the bed.

After it was clear that Cas was not showing up from Dean’s calls, you thought it would be best to speak up. Sam caught the hint that you were going to speak to Dean alone to calm him down as he left with a good luck smile.

You let out a breath of air as you called over to Dean. “Dean, stop. If he isn’t here now, he probably isn’t coming.”

The older Winchester looked over at you as if you were taking Cas’s side.

“Hey, don’t give me that look. I’m not siding with Cas. That guy almost brought me to help without any weapons.” And that was probably the wrong thing to say from the expression on Dean’s face.

Dean was beginning to boil in anger again. It was one thing for Cas to take you on a hunt and not tell him the details, it was worse if he took you on a hunt without some kind of weapon, especially against a Shtriga.

Trying to prevent Dean from fuming, you quickly added on, “I had what I needed though! Consecrated Iron bullets!”

The hunter let out a big breath of air aware you weren’t intentionally trying to upset him. He also knew you were right, Cas wasn’t showing up, which meant there'd be no yelling at the angel today. However, it wasn’t just Cas who took the blame for putting him through hell last night, Y/N played a part too. “If you are ever against a Shtriga again, I want you to call me. I don’t care how, but you find a way to reach me.”

If this had happened any other day, you would’ve found his statement to be almost heartwarming. He wanted you to rely on him and you wanted him to know that you did feel like you could. Unfortunately, there was still the fact of the one day of the year where Dean would go off and do who knows what grieving over his first love. That fact led you to respond not too nicely. “Unless it was yesterday, right?”

He was taken aback by your response, “What do you mean?”

You really tried not to sound bitter, but you couldn’t help it. “Dean. The same day every year since we’ve been together and even before we got together. Basically for as long as I’ve known you. You’ve always gone MIA on the one day, which was yesterday. I’ve tried calling you on this one day before which you ignored for a while or had your phone turned off, which then led to an argument where you ended up sharing with me about the day concerning an old flame. And since that time you’ve told me, I’ve respected your time and haven’t bother you...”

You could feel your insides getting warm, in not a good way. The years of holding in the jealousy and frustration of Dean keeping this one day away from you was finally being released. Maybe, you were about to be over dramatic. “But now you’re telling me to find a way to reach you? Even if I had a way to contact you back then, who knows if I’d actually been able to reach you yesterday?!” You got up off the bed, as you began shrugging off your jacket. You didn’t want to fight with him right now and sound like a jealous girlfriend of someone who was dead.

“I’m going to go shower and then maybe we can talk about what happened with the hunt Cas asked helped for.” As you dropped your jacket on the floor, an item stumbled out of your pocket towards Dean.

The older Winchester glanced down and saw something he thought he had lost long ago.

You had already left the room, headed to the bathroom when you realized you forgot a towel and new clothes. Knowing you’d have to go back and face Dean again, you swallowed your frustration and went back.

When you found yourself back at your shared room with Dean, the older Winchester had a small green item in his hand. Choosing to ignore him, you went straight for the dresser to grab your new clothing.

“Where did you get this?” He asked from the bedside where he was sitting.

Unable to grab any new clothes before his question, you turned around to face him with a questioning look. “Where did I get what?”

Dean stood up and walked over to you as he held the item that fell out of your jacket earlier in the palm of his hand. It was the little green army man that child Dean had given you. You had completely forgotten about it and were surprised that it hadn’t fallen out when the Shtriga was attacking you. Before you could even struggle to figure out what to tell Dean, he started speaking first.

“I gave this to a pretty lady when I was younger. She came to the house once and I think she was a friend of my moms.” He smiled gently as he recalled the memories, looking at the army man in his hand. “Something happened that night and I think someone broke in and was trying to kidnap me. But the pretty lady saved me and fought with the bad guy…”

Hearing Dean begin the story you had just lived through, you knew that Cas must’ve tweaked Mary and Dean’s memory from what really happened before he brought you back.

Dean continued, “I remember thinking how awesome she was and how strong and brave she was to be fighting this bad guy. But then she started losing and even though she was losing, she smiled at me. I never saw her after, so I assumed that she died that night but I know she saved my life that night…” He paused for a moment. “I gave this badass person one of my army men toys to be there for her when she needed someone…and maybe to remember me by.” He smiled at what he thought was a silly idea now. “I don’t know how you got this, but I made a promise to myself without realizing back then, I wanted to help save people from bad guys and make that badass person proud of me. She’s the one I take the day off for every year because I don’t want to ever forget why I do hunting. I do it to save people and people like her. I know you think she’s my first love and maybe she was. I only knew her that one day, but it only took that one day for her to have an impact on me. ” He finally looked at you. “Now that I think about it, you remind me of her. That’s probably why you seemed so familiar when we first met. But…” He paused again as if realizing something that had been in front of him all along. “…You are her? Cas sent you back to that time, didn’t he? You saved me?”

You were a bit speechless as Dean spoke. The pieces were all fitting together in your mind as he told the story and you had come across the same realization that if this woman that Dean couldn’t forget every year was you, then you had been jealous of yourself this whole time. And now, you felt really stupid.

While swallowing the idea you were jealous of yourself, Dean began to doubt himself. “Or you’re not? And I’m just hoping you two are one and the same. I mean with the way Cas wasn’t sharing the details and then this toy…I thought I’d never see again. Now that I found it again, it’s making that time I was a kid much clearer. I just thought maybe….”

“Dean.” You interrupted him. The incoming headache that would come from the thought that you were jealous of yourself this whole time was something you wanted to avoid for now. It didn’t matter what happened in the past. The time travel and headache of piecing the past and present together could be discussed later. For now, it was just good to know that you had been the woman Dean had thought about this whole time. “Just shut up and kiss your savior.” You smiled at him confirming his thoughts.

His smile grew big as he gladly went up to you, wrapping his arms around your waist and pulling you into a sweet kiss.

Pulling away, he grinned. “Does this technically make you a cougar?”

You hit his chest playfully. “No! You’re still older than me!”

“Yeah, but you were older than me back then and had me infatuated with you before I actually knew you.” He argued.

“It doesn’t matter!” You retorted. As Dean went in for another kiss, you pulled away with a questioning look, “So does this mean I get you all of the 365 days now?”

Dean smiled as he leaned in for the awaited second kiss he’d been trying to get. “That’s a no-brainer. You already had me all those days. I’ve been yours all along.”

#dean winchester x reader #dean x reader #dean winchester #supernatural #spn fanfic #mary winchester #castiel #sam winchester #spn time travel fanfic #time travel fanfic #shtriga fanfic

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musedblues · 4 years

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Always Something There To Remind Me [Part: 6]

summary: Home is where the heart is. You're working on finding yours. After a handful of misfortunes, your old friend Joe helps to unravel life's greatest mystery while adding a bit of extra grief to the mix.

w/c: 3k

a/n: Oh my God, I did it. I finished something I started. I sincerely hope you all enjoy the finale of this story, I tried to make it happy as I could manage. Thank you lot for reading this far and for all the support along the way. Here it is... THE END!!

tagliast: @im-an-adult-ish @mrsmazzello @lettinggosthehardestpart @the-moving-finger-writes @imtheinvisiblequeen @joemazzmatazz @sherlollydramoine

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

one year later...

"When are you gonna come visit me, huh?" Gwilym whined like a child, via facetime. "That's... a very good question. What do you think?" Joe rose a brow, turning his face from his phone screen to look right at you. "Huh?" All your attention had been focused on scribbling music notes onto sheets of paper.

"The weather is finally nice again. We should take a trip!" Joe quipped, and you saw Gwil nodding in encouragement from the phone propped on the kitchen table. "Oh, please! It's about time I take you pair on a tour of my city." Gwil imagined on your behalf, coxing you to dream along. He'd stopped in New York a handful of times, usually just to see you. It was about time you hit up his haunts... You had the money, and you could make the time. The savings from your shifts at the flower shop were a great start, but after leaving your hometown to move in with Joe, you'd landed an even better job.

When you started roaming the city for places that were hiring, a nice woman behind a bakery countertop informed you that her husband might be able to help you out. She scribbled his business address on a sticky note, and you left to follow the directions. And when you discovered where you'd been led too, all you could do was laugh out loud.

It was the piano bar. The one Joe had taken you and Gwil too the first weekend you stayed over, with naugahyde seats and a very nice Steinway. With a deep breath, you stepped inside. It was still early in the afternoon, and there weren't many patrons lazing about the lounge. You moved to the opposite end of the bar from where its only customer sat slumped over a beer. Behind the counter was the same friendly older man with the German accent, whose eyes lit up when he saw you. You wondered, for one fleeting moment, if he somehow remembered you too. "What'll it be for ya, then?" The man set down the glass he was cleaning and looked to you expectantly. "Actually, I heard you were hiring." You grinned. The older man lost his smile but the sparkle in his eye remained as he let out an "ahh," of understanding. "You any good?" He wondered, leaning against the counter. You took a beat to peer past his shoulder at the rainbow of bottles that lined the walls. Some were drinks you'd never worked with, but you had years of experience otherwise. "I'd have to renew my license, but I think-" "Oh no," The man frowned, softly interrupting you. "No, I'm looking for someone to play in residence." He nodded toward the small risen velvet stage where a baby grand sat in waiting. Your heart leapt to your stomach and back up again. "I- I haven't played in years." You meant to think it, but you said it out loud. When you turned back to look at the man behind the counter, his sly smile was back. He insisted you an audition, practically begging you to go and play something. As you stood in deep thought, he spoke up again. The man decided you could work behind the bar until you got the guts to play something. So for a week you mixed drinks and worried over what to do next. The last time you touched your keyboard was a lifetime ago, when you sold it off to pay for groceries. But you were living in another world, now. One where you ended your evenings alongside Joe, arguing over what to cook for dinner and laughing over his well thought out debates of why it was perfectly okay to have pizza four nights in a row. He was silly as ever, in fact, his wit seemed sharper than before. But unlike in high school, when he'd test the limits of how mad his dumb pranks could drive you, he knew when to draw the line. Joe knew when to stop laughing and listen, but never lost his smile when gears shifted. After those first few long nights of laying out all your pent up thoughts and feelings from over the years, after telling every story you could each think of; those late-night conversations didn't end. You listened to each other ramble over silly things, unimportant things. But in the midst of it all, Joe was good at reminding you of your worth.

If it hadn't been for Joe's encouragement, you wouldn't have ever played the piano again. Through his persistence, you understood that an opportunity had presented itself and that you had nothing to lose by taking the chance. So you did. You warned your new boss that you didn't have much practice, but he sat patiently as you got the guts to play through most of Erik Satie's Gymnopedie no. 1 as the sunset. When the open sign flickered to life, you stayed on the bench. After then, you played almost every night, and even helped mix a drink or two when the occasion called for it. You'd settled into such a familiar routine at the piano bar without missing a single day, surely you'd earned a bit of a break, right? And how could you say no to Gwilym? His puppy dog eyes were even more convincing over facetime. /// "Oh yeah, I have a surprise for you." Joe sleepily grumbled like it might have been any other passing thought. "What, you're overtaking Gwilym as the tour guide?" You chuckled, setting back into the airplane seat as Joe's head fell to your shoulder. "No. Something much more exciting." Joe let out a little laugh, drifting to sleep soon after he said so. The plane had barely taken off. But Joe had been so busy planning this weekend-long trip to London that you were almost certain this was the most rest he'd gotten in weeks. Sure, Gwilym had been on the other end of the phone helping decide dates and times and reasons, but Joe was like a soccer mom competing to plan the best Disney World itinerary of the decade. He said it was because this was your first big trip together. But of course, you could have walked down the block with Joe at your side and been just as ecstatic to join him there, hand in hand. The sun rose over the clouds through the plane window, and Joe was heavily snuggled against your side, keeping you grounded a mile above land.

At first, when kisses still seemed new, and every trip to the market was an adventure, you wished you'd loved each other like this much sooner. But you decided everything happened at just the right time. You belonged together, but you wouldn't have been brave enough to accept that if you hadn't lived a few uncomfortable lives apart. After everything, coming back to each other seemed expected.

Your mother, though, acted as if the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ had occurred when you first told her you and Joe made it official. She actually ran across the street to recruit Mrs. Mazzello in asking you one thousand embarrassing questions, but even that seemed like any other day. You spent the majority of the plane ride thinking back to those little moments, letting your mind wander. You thought of the last time you were in London, feeling glad to be headed there with Joe, for a change. Gwilym was lingering near a row of empty seats in a bustling waiting area, grinning from ear to ear. You were the first to greet him with a big hug. Gwil, to you, was a fresh start. A new friend from an old place, who came into your life at the exact perfect time. "Bore da!" Gwilym cheered, like a kid fresh from school. “I leave you all this time to practice and that's the best you've got?" You laughed at Gwil's charming efforts in keeping your silly challenge of speaking in a "secret" language. He was never any good at remembering the rough phrases you passed on to him, but he tried all the while. "I tried teaching him how to say 'welcome back' but we agreed I should be the one to say it." A familiar raspy voice cut through your attention focused on Gwil. Joe broke out into a dance in the place he stood, beaming at you. "Surprise!" He called, as you turned away from the men to lock eyes with one of the best friends that surely ever existed at all. Tegan was casually sipping on an iced coffee, holding back a massive grin. Her icy eyes were free from streaks of black makeup. Her dark hair was a little shorter than she used to wear it, but her smile grew bigger than ever before, and she was here. You lunged toward the girl, wrapping her in a hug she'd been practicing for the same as you. Joe was still dancing. "This was your surprise? How'd you pull this off?" You laughed, connecting the dots with what Joe had said as your plane took off. He went on to explain how the idea just sort of came to him when he started planning the trip. Joe had called Tegan one night while you were at work, and after making sure Gwil was alright with your dearest friend crashing the party he'd thought up, the three of them started scheming right under your nose. Gwil explained how Tegan's flight had been scheduled to land an hour earlier than yours, and how he didn't mind the sudden strange company one bit.

You were well and truly surprised, and you made sure to thank the lot of them for thinking up such an exciting idea.

"Thank you," Tegan's tone floated low and serious past her smile as she reached out to hug Joe, for the first time ever. But there was such an air of familiarity between the lot of you that this too, felt like another day out of the life you were meant to be living. /// "God, I'd love if he'd toss me around like a rugby ball." Tegan sipped from a spiked lemonade, propped up on her elbows as her gaze focused on Gwilym tossing a ball to Joe, who was coaching his friend on proper pitching etiquette. "How romantic." You snorted, reaching for some cherries from the basket of snacks you toted along. Gwilym had led you all to his favorite beach where pockets of sand and tall grass made perfect spaces to enjoy a bit of quiet nature. Of course, you couldn't help but set up a speaker to play a list of everyone's favorite summer tunes. Just loud enough to cover up the sound of your chatter with Tegan, who had some new fantasy about Gwilym to blurt out every other minute. "I know it's not Wales, but it's nice to have you back, even for a minute." She turned toward you, setting her drink aside. you tucked your feet away from the hot sand and admired your friend as she peered up at you. "I'll always come back for you." You halfway joked, but nodded in assurance. "If my flirting pays off, you and I might see more of each other yet," Tegan informed peering at the boys near the shoreline. "Those two seem like the most inseparable of us all. We'd be like sister wives." You laughed, silently wondering when your life became one big full circle. Tegan joked about her little crush, but as the day went on it didn't seem so silly. When your friend wasn't looking, you noticed Gwil stealing glances all afternoon, tripping on his mother tongue, your secret language out the window.

The radio crackled with some chime saturated pop song, birds dared to scuttle toward your picnic.

"I can hear the wedding bells now," You joked, looking toward the radio, laying on your side to face your friend.

"Yeah, those are clearly for you." Tegan pointed out.

"Maybe." You responded with your first thought, conditioned to be wary of the future. But when you caught a glimpse of Joe laughing with his best friend near the water, you realized you didn't have to be weary any longer. "Okay, probably." You corrected, out of some primal fear of keeping Joe at a distance ever again. "But not yet. You know he and I decided to take things slow."

Tegan let out a chirped laugh, causing a nearby bird to fly off.

"Yeah, that's what you keep saying." She subtly stressed how your actions seemed to be contradictory. How you and Joe agreed to ease into a relationship together. But being together seemed like a glass of water after being stranded in the Sahara. You moved into his place in the blink of an eye. You abandoned the guest bedroom to share his long before moving in.

"It's hard to waste so much time when there is a lot we have to make up for." You reasoned. Tegan hummed in understanding right away, but then she sat up a little more, looking back to the horizon.

"I know what you mean. It's like... where has he been all my life?" She dared to speak as Gwil was approaching dangerously close to the two of you. After bursting into giggles and assuring Gwil you weren't talking about him, he grabbed a bottle of water and scurried away with one last glance over his shoulder.

You and Tegan went on planning a double wedding, to save money and time and innovations, naturally. Through fits of laughter, she decided to run the free bar, and you happened to know a pretty good wedding photographer.

And before you knew it the night had turned navy blue. You rented a hotel where each separate room was connected by a door near the entertainment center. You and Tegan claimed one room for yourself, taking turns showering and swapping clothes, like you used to.

The four of you ended up at some all-night joint who catered to a bunch of miners who traveled through at odd hours. The neon sign was a beacon and you all split plates of food and told embarrassing stories. You could have stayed there laughing all night if Tegan hadn't suggested adding drinks to the mix.

So you headed back to your shared suits, filing into one room and setting up shop for a late-night of laughter.

Tegan dropped Joe into learning how to mix a drink at the mini bar, cursing in welsh. You laughed from the place you settled on the balcony, and Gwilym took a seat beside you with a smirk.

"Why didn't we all just go to Wales?" He wondered aloud. You'd been making fun of him for being so lost when you and Tegan traded secrets.

Your first thought was to keep poking fun at Gwil, to say something about he'd get lost navigating the street signs. But you trusted the guy enough to tell him the truth. When you glanced inside to make sure Tegan and Joe were still occupied making a mess at the minibar, you leaned closer to Gwil and tried to make a very long story as short as possible.

Under the dim patio light, you explained how you moved to London after graduation, met a guy, moved to Wales and wasted too long with him. How you felt stuck. How he died and how you went back home to Joe where you belonged. Gwilym listened quietly, running his fingers over the stubble on his jaw as you capped off your story with how glad you were to have scored such a valuable friend in Tegan, through it all. "Guess you really don't need my tour of the city after all, huh?" Gwilym shrugged, realizing you were already pretty familiar with the back alleys. "Of course I do. I'm dying to see this place from your perspective." You grinned. Gwilym had a way of making everything seem newer, more exciting. But the question he asked that kick-started your conversation hung in your heart a little heavier as the evening went on. When you'd become overloaded by everything the day had to offer, you decided it was time to call it a night. You pulled Joe into the room meant to be for you and Tegan, hardly thinking of anything but how badly you longed for a quiet moment alone with the guy. You didn't speak, you just curled up and laid together. And if she noticed, Tegan didn't seem to mind as her laughter existed somewhere behind the door you locked her out of. You could even hear Gwilym singing Christmas carols in the warm summer night.

Your eyes grew heavy as your breathing synced with Joes, chests rising and falling in time. Everyone you loved was right where they ought to be.

The nightmares had gone away, but you must have had one. It happened like it used to, some heavy feeling rising in your chest and causing your eyes to shoot open when you hadn't even realized you'd fallen asleep.

The laughter and music from the other side of the door was gone, and the rising sun was casting a purple shadow through the curtains.

You were drawn to the window, trying to drown the sickening worry rising in your throat. You stood focusing on the sun sparkling over the waves. Watching far away people walk their dogs, and kids chasing each other. You were so lost in the scene that you were almost startled to have been interrupted.

Joe had woken up and joined you, snaking his arms around your middle and resting his chin on your shoulder. You felt safe enough to speak your mind.

"What if I don't ever go back to Wales? Is that selfish? What if I want to, but just can't do it?"

You'd lost so much there. You left so much behind, things you loved. Things you never got to say goodbye to. You realized that some of the things you'd planned on keeping now, could disappear just as well. Days like this could slip away no matter how desperately you clung to them. Nothing lasted, good or bad. You spent the morning worrying over how to exist between those epic highs and tragic lows.

"I heard something once," Joe spoke up, keeping his loose hold around you. You rested your head back against his shoulder as you watched the waves crash to shore, a safe distance away. "Something about how there are only so many cutting patterns used to make puzzles. There was an artist who took different pictures and put them together because the puzzle pattern matched up. So you get funny little pictures, like, a train with the legs of a horse. But others were hard to tell apart. Like different mountainscapes blending together."

Joe rambled, looking at the same view as you.

"Life is like that, ya know? Things might not always make sense but they go together whether you like it or not. I'm not saying you should do anything you don't want to do. But I can promise no matter what puzzle you decide to put together, I'll be there to help fit in the pieces."

"God I can feel my teeth rotting, Joe," You elbowed him in the ribs as you spun to face him, because if you didn't joke about how sappy that was you would have surely burst into tears.

"I love you too." He rolled his eyes before leaning in for a gentle kiss, your own secret language.

Joe gave something that you were terrified to lose. And you were glad it was him. No matter where you wound up, you'd find his humor in places and the color of his eyes in things.

Joe was your destination. His arms remained open, inviting, even though you never truly strayed too far from his reach.

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"Together, we can live with the sadness I'll love you with all the madness in my soul." - Bruce Springsteen.

#joe mazzello #joe mazello x reader #joe mazzello fanfic #joe mazzello imagine

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michelles-garden-of-evil · 3 years

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Episode 36 Review: The Séance

{ YouTube: 1 | 2 | 3 }

{ Synopses/Recaps: Debby Graham | Bryan Gruszka }

Welcome back to my Garden of Evil and thank you for patiently waiting for me to return to reviewing Strange Paradise. It’s been a wild and chaotic past few weeks and I’ve just gotten around to returning to the course of events on Maljardin. And Great Serpent, this time we have one hell of a wild episode!

Because I already miss the bad puns in the earlier episodes.

Of all the episodes of this show, this one is my #1 favorite. It embodies everything I love about Maljardin-era SP: it stars Colin Fox as both Jean Paul and Jacques, features some delightful Jacques scenes, and is genuinely suspenseful and scary. There are also unintentional laughs as usual, but somehow none of them detract from the frightening moments. If I had to introduce SP to someone who had never seen it before (say, my mom, who only knows a little about it), I would use this episode, not the pilot which (IMO) is less scary and far more ridiculous. The magic of Ian Martin’s SP is on full display here. Although he doesn’t leave the show immediately after this episode, it feels like a last hurrah, and a spectacular one at that. You know you want to read about this episode, so what are you waiting for?

We open with Vangie napping on the couch shortly after the events of the previous episode. Over her, Jean Paul and Alison are arguing about whether to go through with the séance to contact Erica. Alison begs him not to because of the risk of death, but Jean Paul insists on pushing through with it anyway because, as Raxl recaps, “The Conjure Woman didn’t see her death, only [Jacques’].” Jean Paul interprets this as meaning that he himself might die, but it’s not clear if he truly believes this or if he’s trying to cover up his frequent possession by the handsome devil.

Vangie recovers and announces that she plans on going through with it, no matter what happens. Still angry from last episode, Matt protests and Jean Paul gives him this nasty smirk that reeks of passive aggression:

Either that, or Colin is trying hard not to laugh. I can’t tell.

“This is not your concern, Reverend,” Jean Paul spits, and Vangie agrees with him. Although she knows that she will one day die on the Island of Evil, she feels that the séance is her duty as the Conjure Woman.

Matt once again reveals his status as the Fool (or, rather, le Mat) when he remarks that Jean Paul and Jacques are indistinguishable “except by [their] manner of dress.” Evidently, he hasn’t considered the possibility that THE DEVIL JACQUES ELOI DES MONDES can possess Jean Paul and thus wear the exact same clothes as him. In fact, Padre, he’s worn that same extremely flattering blue suit before when talking to you, and you don’t even know it.

Jean Paul orders Vangie to begin the séance and we get a lovely overhead shot of the glass-top table. I’ve already posted high-quality photos of the table, but I love it so much that the laws of obsessive fandom require me to post it again:

Oh, how I love that table and those chairs. Actually, I love the whole Maljardin set.

Jean Paul volunteers to help Vangie, Raxl, and Quito set up, which seems to surprise them because otherwise he spends no time cleaning up after himself and all his time brooding, throwing glasses at priceless artifacts, and--of course--getting possessed. Elizabeth and Holly see them setting up, and the former heads down the stairs to watch.

Elizabeth is wearing this fabulous ensemble with a checkered dress and a red scarf pinned with a brooch in the shape of a dahlia. It most likely came from her actress Paisley Maxwell’s own wardrobe, as she mostly wore her own clothes on the show and even provided some costumes for the other actresses. (LINK CONTAINS SPOILERS THROUGH THE END OF MALJARDIN)

A shot with a better view of her brooch.

Vangie tells Jean Paul that the room needs to be dark, and that the only light in the room during the ceremony should be candlelight. Cue Jean Paul glancing up to the chandelier precariously suspended directly over the glass-top table:

If this isn’t painfully obvious foreshadowing, then I don't know what is.

The chandelier even sways ever so slightly as he stares at it!

Holly asks if she, her mother, Dan, and Tim can attend, and Vangie tells them no! According to her, they are all “disruptive influences” who will derail the séance, which will likely be too frightening for her anyway. Jean Paul tells Elizabeth to go, too, which she takes as a personal attack because Jacques has tricked her into believing that he’s in love with her.

LMAO

They are almost ready to begin the ceremony, but first, we need more blatant foreshadowing! We need Jean Paul to glance up at the swaying chandelier again, apparently without thinking of the slight chance that it might fall and cause an accident:

Seriously, Jean Paul? You have an IQ of 187. You should know better.

This is some heavy-handed foreshadowing, even for a show that constantly reminds us that Jacques Eloi des Mondes is THE DEVIL and cuts to close-ups of him every other time THE DEVIL is mentioned. I think you can guess what will happen about halfway through this episode. I normally try to avoid spoilers and to warn about any that I include or link to, but let’s face it. You know that chandelier is going to come crashing down at some point in the episode, because of all the emphasis that the script and the cinematography have already put on it. It’s a foregone conclusion. And I’m sorry, but Jean Paul with his alleged super-genius IQ has no excuse. Move the table! Have Quito tighten the chain! Replace the chandelier with a single candle or small candelabrum on the table! Do something to lower the chances of the accident that we all know is coming!

Vangie begins the séance to contact Erica.

After commercial break (hence the lack of the Drive-In Classics logo), the séance begins. We have Jean Paul, Vangie, Raxl, and Quito, plus Alison and Matt and an empty chair for Erica’s spirit. It’s a marvelous scene with just the right amount of eerie atmosphere, which Vangie’s hypnotic voice only enhances. They bridge the divide between the worlds of the living and the dead and all seems like it will succeed, but then

The third one is my favorite.

Jean Paul contorts his face again as he tries to resist Jacques’ possession of him, but ultimately his efforts are in vain:

Jacques’ beringed hand attacking Jean Paul. This also means that the chain created when the séance participants joined hands has been broken.

Matt asks Jean Paul what’s wrong and Jacques answers. “Everything is under control now,” he whispers with evil relish.

“No! Not now! NOT NOW!” Vangie screams, and then comes the inevitable:

Well, there goes one of Jean Paul’s astrological sign tables. Good thing he has another in storage.

I’m not going to lie: the first time I watched this scene, I shouted “No!” when the chandelier fell, even though I could see it coming. Somehow, despite the foregone conclusion and Jean Paul’s ridiculous headache faces, the scene creates enough suspense and horror to be effective. Plus, if you’re like me, you care about Vangie and don’t want to see anyone hurt her, even if that someone is 6′4″ with amazing cheekbones, a devilishly sexy smile, and the most beautiful hands on any man living or dead.

The power also goes out at the same time, and the handsome devil denies all responsibility for it despite his history of screwing with the electricity:

Classic Jacques sarcasm.

Conveniently, the lights come back on a moment later. They come just in time for Alison and Matt to tend to Vangie, whom the chandelier has knocked unconscious:

You can tell her injury is serious even before her close-up, because the Reverend is in shirtsleeves.

A close-up, showing the blood on Vangie’s forehead.

Jacques tells Holly that there was nothing seriously wrong with the electricity, and Dan flips out on him, insisting that “one day you’re going to blow us all up.” (Does he suspect that Jean Paul is somehow playing with the lights?) Jacques insists that even he can’t afford to buy a nuclear weapon. The fact that he knows what a nuclear weapon is serves as yet more evidence that he’s really the Devil and not a ghost from the 17th century (although, if he were a ghost, perhaps he would have overheard Jean Paul talking about nuclear weapons before).

I think that this is one of maybe two times that I ever envied Holly.

Vangie stands up, but doesn’t say a word to any of the characters, just stares blankly ahead of her. She doesn’t even react when Alison slaps her. Jacques cruelly snaps his fingers in front of her, which Alison demands he not do because it might cause her to be “destroyed, locked into a world of darkness, less living than dead.” She adds that “[she] can’t help but thinking that what happened to her is so like [Quito],” and turns to face the zombie who is watching the now cataleptic Conjure Woman, horrified:

It makes you wonder what sort of traumatic memories from Quito’s human life the sight of Jacques turning Vangie into a zombie evoked. Also, we never learn who turned Quito into a zombie in the show canon, but this scene shows that Jacques knows how and is therefore a possible candidate.

This is yet another point where the plot of the aired episodes differs from the original story as indicated in the Lost Episode summaries. In the original Episode 36, Vangie would have revealed Jacques’ possession of Jean Paul to all the participants at the séance, thus confirming for Raxl that Jean Paul is two different men. I suspect that Matt would refuse to believe it because of his lack of belief in devils and Dan because it sounds irrational and like a cover-up for Jean Paul’s alleged crimes, but Raxl, Vangie, and possibly Alison would have the evidence they needed.

Anyway, Jacques and most of the others leave Quito to clean up the mess while they have some drinks in the dining room. Mostly, it’s Jacques trying to pressure everyone into drinking while trying to gaslight them into believing that there was a storm outside even though there wasn’t. They’re not buying it, least of all Dan, who now has yet another reason to be suspicious of him.

I should also add that Part 3 of the YouTube version of this episode (which contains this scene) is out of sync, meaning that most of the subtitles are combined with the wrong shots and the wrong characters. Sadly, we don’t get anything on the level of “NO NO NO YES YES YES,” but the out-of-sync audio does make Dan’s accusation almost look like Jacques is confessing to making the chandelier fall:

YES YES YES

He offers brandy to both Matt and Holly, but Matt tells him not to give it to either of them, so Jacques brings the glasses he just filled over to Elizabeth instead. He starts talking about how no one was hurt, meaning that she has to remind him that Vangie was injured. Still, “she wasn’t really seriously injured,” so I guess for him it doesn’t count. He sends her away and starts to drink, which I guess lets Jean Paul recover his body because he de-possesses him, finally letting Jean Paul see the mess he left behind.

I already posted a lot of headache faces in this entry, so here I’m just going to include my favorite from this scene.

For a moment, Jean Paul looks like he’s going to cry, but his sadness turns to shock when Quito shows him the writing box. The wooden box which previously only held sand, now bears a message written in grains of rice in the shape of the symbol of the Great Serpent. Quito appears terrified by the message, but sadly he can’t translate it for Jean Paul. Raxl, too, freaks out when she sees it and says it’s “from the Conjure Man, but he needs the Conjure Woman to translate it and she’s still in a trance!”

Apparently, the Conjure Man communicates in grains of rice.

Although she can’t translate the whole message, she can tell Jean Paul, “It tells of more accidents. Spirits are very angry...with you!”

This final scene, like the scene with the crashing chandelier, is genuinely chilling, resulting in one of the scariest episodes of the Maljardin arc. This is one of SP’s finest episodes and certainly one of Ian Martin’s finest from his nine-week period as headwriter. I’m not certain what led the producers to decide to have Vangie enter a trance instead of revealing Jacques’ possession to the other characters, but most likely it was to increase the suspense and the terror. Also, I’m starting to wonder if perhaps Quito isn’t actually undead, but instead is an immortal like Raxl (and Vangie?), but stuck in a magically-induced trance. Perhaps when he recoiled in fear over Vangie’s transformation, it was because Jacques (or perhaps the Conjure Man) did the same exact thing to him three centuries ago.

Coming up next: Jacques continues to meddle in affairs on Maljardin while Raxl struggles to interpret the writing box. (But before then--hopefully--the next part of my review of Shadow Over Seventh Heaven.)

{<- Previous: Episode 35 || Next: Episode 37 ->}

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backinblack1967 · 4 years

Text

The Annual Feeling of Loss or You’re Never Alone (Seonghwa x Reader)

A/N: Hi, everyone! :) Over the years I’ve written several little stories but never had the courage to post them online. I’ve been struggling with the death of my dad the past few months and what better way to cope with it than with writing it down, I thought. So, I made a one-shot with ATEEZ and a reader insert. If you don’t want to read about it, you are warned. (Please be warned that English isn’t my mother tongue, either.)

To be honest, this one is more fluff and (bad) humour after the initial angst. Feel free to leave a comment, ask me about anything or maybe even leave a request for a future scenario.

XXX Sarah

Seonghwa x Reader x platonic!ATEEZ

word count: 3,011

***

네가 힘이 들고 지칠 때 When it’s hard and you’re tired

찾게 되는 그 곳, 나 그 곳이 될게 the place you’re looking for, I’ll become this place

아무 것도 놓을 수 없어서 when you have nowhere to lean on

삶이 버거울 때 꼭 네 곁이 될게 when life is too much, I will be next to you

(BTS - With Seoul)

***

It was that day again. You had dreaded it for the last 2 years and you hated yourself for it. When your father had been alive it had been a funny coincidence that your birthday was on the exact day before his, but when he’d died you had come to loathe both of your birthdays because they had become a constant reminder that you’d never see him again. Never hear his voice again or feel his arms around you in one of his famous bear hugs.

Yesterday you had celebrated your birthday with your friends, trying to suppress the rising feeling of dread and sadness. Currently, you were sitting in a small café, or more like hiding from your best friends you whom were living with. You could try bullshitting them with the excuse of cramps or a migraine, but some would undoubtedly see behind your carefully constructed façade.

And so, you had gone out in the early hours of the day to seek refuge and distraction in the crowds. You were currently sitting in the farthest corner with a cup of warm chocolate in front of you and your iPad and pencil in the other, trying to force the thoughts from your head onto the canvas. Sometimes drawing them helped to forget a little. Or to remember the fond moments you were especially frightened of forgetting over time.

This morning, when you had opened your old chat to listen to his voice again, you had barely been able to contain your cries. The audio messages were still there but the little icon on top which should show his picture had been empty. Maybe it was because he had been offline for too long and at that thought, uncontrollable sobs had taken over your body. You had decided to leave your shared flat then because you didn’t want to ruin their short time off by bringing their jovial mood down.

You had left a note on the kitchen table saying you would be back in the evening and that they shouldn’t wait up if it got later.

You figured if you could only get through today you would be fine tomorrow. Distract yourself until nightfall, sneak in and sleep it off.

Admittedly, you had entertained the thought of talking to Yun-ho this morning and whether you would feel better wrapped in his arms but then you had decided against it. You didn’t want to burden either of them and you really didn’t want them to see you as weak. For good measure, you had turned off your mobile phone so you wouldn’t be tempted to call them or your mom.

***

What you didn’t know was that back in the dorm every sense of carefreeness had been abandoned hours ago. San hadn’t been particularly worried when he had found your note first – sometimes you just ventured off to calm places to concentrate.

He couldn’t blame you when their dorm resembled a playground filled with 5-year olds high on sugar more often than not. He had been curious why you would be staying out late on a weekend but Hong-joong had reminded him that people like them needed the occasional day off to gather inspiration and that you would surely confide in them if something was bothering you.

They had unanimously decided to wait up for you to ask if anything was wrong but to otherwise leave you be for the time you were away. However, San had seen Seong-hwa and Yeo-sang trying to sneakily call you several times through the day. When he had asked them about it, both of them had admitted that they had a bad gut feeling. Both of them had been with you on some of your “alone days” without the others knowing, so their feelings wouldn’t get hurt. When he had gathered all of his team members to tell them exactly that, they had been surprised to hear because as it turned out you had always taken one of them with you when you had gone out “alone”.

Now they were worried. Had something happened? Had they unknowingly done something to hurt your feelings? Or had it been someone else? Jong-ho had oh so kindly offered to beat up anyone who might have hurt their girl, Min-gi volunteering as well. Both Hong-joong and Woo-young had hurriedly convinced them not to do it, in remembrance of the last incident.

And then the phone had rung.

And it wasn’t who they had expected. An angry, high-pitched female voice had greeted Yun-ho on the other end, making his smile drop. That wasn’t you. And she was neither speaking Korean nor English. He picked up two familiar words, however, in her rant: your name and the word “papa”. With wide eyes he told Hong-joong and thrust the phone at him as if it would bite him any minute.

Hong-joong switched the phone to speaker as he waited for a break in her venomous monologue. They winced from the apparent fury in her tone without even understanding what she was saying. When she paused to draw breath, Hong-joong hurriedly interrupted her in English.

“I’m sorry, I assume you want to talk to Y/N, but she’s currently out. May I ask who you are?”

The woman’s voice had turned condescending at that, mocking him for his “horrible” English pronunciation in a sickly-sweet tone before she continued to rant about her little irresponsible and stupid sister who wouldn’t even come home for her deceased father’s birthday. Like, who did she think she was? Not even calling her elder sister to ask her if she was alright on such a somber day. Hong-joong didn’t detect a smidgen of sadness in her voice or any compassion for her family member. And suddenly your absence made incredibly much more sense.

He figured he would let her let off steam before getting rid of her and looking for you with his brothers. It was twenty minutes later when he couldn’t stand the insults hurled towards you anymore and told her to shut up (which shocked his members as they’d never heard him speak less than respectful to strangers or older people). He had tried to tell her of your compassion and warm heart, how you helped everyone around you and brightened their days. But for every positive trait or deed your sister had responded with another insult which were growing more and more farfetched.

They others weren’t too good in English but with certain familiar keywords, their leader’s expression and the tone of the woman’s voice they could piece together the gist of what was being said. Even Yun-ho’s patience began wearing thin as he watched Joong’s expression turning more and more agitated and downright hurt.

He threw a glance at their eldest who held a pensive expression on his face as he stared off into the distance. When Seong-hwa noticed Yun-ho’s pleading gaze and the various distressed and confused faces around him, he lightly tapped on Hong-joong’s shoulder to get his attention.

“Joong, don’t you want to end this conversation? It doesn’t seem to go anywhere… Could you wrap it up and tell us what exactly is going on?”

He nodded and said a few sentences to the other person on the phone that left her silent with surprise.

“You will have to stop right there, miss. I won’t tolerate you insulting my friend any longer. I have no idea how you got this number but please refrain from calling again or I will see myself forced to talk to our manager and lawyer. Have a good day.”

There was a brief silence before Yeo-sang voiced what all of them were thinking.

“So… who exactly was that and why were they so angry at Y/N?”

Hong-joong explained that your older sister had called from home and that today was the birthday of your father who had died two years ago, shortly before his birthday back then, too.

San hugged Woo-young when his face crumbled into sadness at the news. He could vividly imagine what it meant to lose a family member and he didn’t wish that kind of devastating heartache on any of the people he considered family.

Hong-joong couldn’t bring himself to repeat the insults your sister had hurled at you and relied as much to the others. He was visibly angry whereas Seong-hwa looked more concerned.

“Should we go look for her? Do you have any idea where she could be?”

“Don’t you think we should give her some space until she comes back, Hwa? I mean, she obviously had a reason to leave for the day.”

Yun-ho trailed off unsurely because he didn’t want to do anything else besides wrap you in his arms and to cuddle the sadness away.

“I think we should wait here. Don’t get me wrong, I want nothing more than to be with her right now, either, but we don’t know where to start searching. And what if she comes home while we’re running around Seoul? Let’s just wait and cheer her up when she returns,” proposed Yeo-sang, ever the voice of reason, although he didn’t seem to be happy about it. “I don’t want to overwhelm her or make her uncomfortable.”

Min-gi was the first one to agree. “Then can we prepare a movie evening and order take-out?”

***

It was dark when you decided you had wallowed in self-pity and bitter-sweet memories for long enough. You trudged through the darkened streets until you found yourself staring up at the building of your dorm. You had decided to come home earlier than planned because you honestly couldn’t take being alone anymore.

You needed their smiles and distracting chaos to ground yourself in the present and to remind yourself that everything would be okay at the end of the day.

You forced a smile on your face as you walked up the flights of stairs towards your home. Shortly before you reached the front door, you turned on your phone again only to take note of the several missed calls, all of them from your extended little family except one from your sister. You weren’t sorry that you had missed hers, she would have solely reproached you anyway for your so-called heartless behaviour towards her.

You stuffed your phone into your jeans pocket, touched that they had tried reaching out to you despite your little note. You felt childish for ignoring them now.

You had barely unlocked the front door and put your keys on the hook next to it, when something slammed into you and wrapped their arms around your shoulders. Another one joining seconds after at your back. Blinking in surprise, you returned the hugs and automatically your uptight body went lax in their hold.

You felt surrounded and loved and so completely at home.

Judging from the familiar scents, you were currently between San and Min-gi. Over the latter’s shoulder you could see Woo-young nervously bouncing on the balls of his feet. You smiled at him and it felt less forced than all the hours before. When you beckoned with your hand towards him, he bound over to your little bunch and joined the tangled mess. You giggled at their puppy-like behaviour.

“Did something happen? What’s gotten into you, not that I’m complaining?”

“We just missed you,” came Woo-young’s muffled reply.

You smiled at his admission, “I missed you, too. All of you.”

When you had untangled yourself from the hug a few minutes later, Min-gi took your hand and led you towards the grand couch in the living room.

You took in the other members sitting on the couch and on the nest of pillows and blankets before it, with steaming take-out containers scattered in various places.

“Okay, something definitely happened. Are we celebrating a new song? Do I need to beat somebody up?”

You earned various smiles for that and Seong-hwa patted the free space between him and Yun-ho on the couch. You accepted his invitation and after they had wrapped their arms over your shoulders you inquired once more, “Now tell me. What happened?”

There was a tense silence before Hong-joong spoke. “Your sister called today.”

Dread replaced your uplifted mood as you felt the smile slip from your face. In a small voice you asked, “What did she say? … Oh my god, I’m so sorry, guys. I don’t know how she got this number.”

Yeo-sang hushed you from his place at your feet, one hand running up your knee.

“Don’t worry. I don’t think she will call again. But why didn’t you tell us about today? You know you can tell us anything. We love you.”

You fiddled with your fingers, touched by his sincere words.

“I love you guys, too. It’s just- I just didn’t want to bother you on your small holiday. And I thought that if I … don’t need comfort or if I don’t talk about it, it would go away sooner. Like it didn’t actually happen.”

Hearing your reasons out loud made you wince because of how pathetic they sounded. You really were childish. And as horrible as your sister said, for trying to forget your father’s death. I’m sorry, papa. I miss you.

Your self-deprecating train of thoughts was interrupted by a soft palm on your right cheek.

“Sweetheart, whatever you’re thinking right now – stop. You’re not stupid for trying to forget or for being insecure. And you can always come to us if something is bothering you. Have you forgotten the many times you were there for us? Isn’t that right, guys?”

All around the room, there were affirmative nods and assuring smiles. You smiled and leaned subconsciously into his touch.

“I- I think I know, Hwa. I was just being stupid. Sorry for worrying you.”

He leaned in with a soft smile until his forehead and nose were touching yours. You squirmed at his closeness and your obvious blush on display for all of them. He had always been a bit touchy-feely with you, but you had passed it off as Woo-young, Min-gi and San rubbing off on the other members.

You were sure your crush was blatantly obvious right now. Your love for Seong-wha went far beyond the platonic kind and you had been afraid to tell him – or anyone – in fear of making things awkward. But in that moment, as he gazed deeply into your eyes, you could have sworn he felt the same for you.

Your little bubble was interrupted by Woo-young’s coos and Jong-ho clearing his throat.

“So, uh… can we start movie night now? I’m famished.”

You all laughed at that, but you still caught the knowing smiles on their faces. Seong-hwa winked at you when he retreated slightly.

You barely registered Yun-ho mumbling something about popcorn, being far too occupied with Seong-wha draping a blanket over the both of you and engulfing your hand underneath it with his bigger one. You snuggled closer to him, leaning your head on his shoulder. The need for comfort and skin-ship was making you a little bolder than usual.

Yun-ho and Min-gi returned with two big bowls of popcorn and snuggled back into the pillow fort. The next few hours were spent laughing at the people in the movie, munching popcorn and gorging on your favourite take-out.

Sometimes happy moments made you sad when you realized you wouldn’t get to share them with your father. This time, you felt whole and as if you could face any problems as long as they stayed by your side.

There was a comfortable lull in conversation and no more remarks at the stupidity of certain movie characters a few hours later when everyone became sleepy. Your head rested drowsily against Seong-hwa’s shoulder, his cheek on the crown of your head, hands intertwined and blissful smiles on both your faces. You were happy, sorrows not forgotten but dulled and overshadowed by the feeling of absolute belonging.

You heard Yeo-sang whispering and giggling with San.

“Hm?” You raised an inquisitive eyebrow at them.

“Oh, don’t mind us. We were just wondering when one of you will gather enough courage to make the first step,” Yeo-sang remarked matter-of-factly with a good-natured smirk on his face as he made a sweeping gesture towards you and Seong-hwa.

Your earlier blush returned full force. You pressed into Seong-hwa’s chest to hide from their encouraging gazes. His chuckle rumbled underneath your ear as he drew you closer with his arm.

“There you go again, ruining my plans to tell her. And do I have to remind you that most of the time it was one of you two who interrupted me when I was approaching the subject? I should put both of you on dish washing duty for the next month,” he answered jokingly.

You had perked up in the middle of his sentence. Was that an indirect confession?

Your head peaked up at him, catching the warm smile directed at you.

“Do you mean that?”

“Of course, I do. So, what do you say, Y/N. Do you want to be the Light Fury to my Toothless?”

“Yes,” was all you managed through the big smile on your face.

What had begun as a horrible day had ended as one of the best days in your life so far. And all thanks to your little extended family and the guy you had fallen in love with.

“That’s nice and all, but please keep things PG-rated, alright? We have a baby in our midst.”

As Jong-ho hit Yun-ho over his head, Seong-hwa threw you one of those smiles that were a cross between amusement and internal suffering. You giggled and snuggled closer again. You were home.

A/N number 2: Reposting this again because I’m old. I actually messed up the hashtags. Please help, haha.

#ateez #ateez seonghwa #angst #hurt comfort #death #i tried #a second time #the annual feeling of loss #you're never alone

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werevulvi · 4 years

Note

How did you learn to be comfortable with your hirsutism? I've never been trans or detrans or dysphoric so my situation is not like yours but i'm hairier than average and even approaching my 30s i still struggle with my natural body. I've tried going noshave as a dare a couple of times and just feel overwhelmed with revulsion and shame. Even if i think it's conditioning for the most part i don't think i can undo it. Is there a point of no return?

I've always been mostly comfortable with it, but that's not saying I haven't dealt with any amount of shame or stigma about it. Especially a couple of years ago, I did struggle with it. Not everyone in my life loves hairy women, and that does affect me, so I hope I can offer some insight, or uplifting words! I think there are several aspects as to why it's fairly easy for me to love my body hair unabashedly now, and also reasons as to why I've struggled with it. Firstly, being viewed as male makes people less likely to call me gross or stare at me for being hairy, even though some still do because I often wear very feminine clothing (people tend think that hairy men in feminine clothing is "distasteful" ...apparently) and my parents really do struggle with my body hair. Even my sister has promptly given me unsolicited shaving advice. (I’m not exactly sure how my family views my gender, if it’s as a woman or more like a trans person, or as a female who identifies as a man, or I don’t know, but it’s obviously not as an actual biological man. Which I’m totally fine with and really don’t care, as they’re entitled to their opinions of me, but like it’s relevant because they probably wouldn’t have thought my body hair is gross and bad if I had actually been male, which is my only complaint: the sexism nestled in with however they perceived me.) But outside of my family and aside from my femininity, my ability to mostly blend into society as a man (which only some women do/can/want) means most people don't care about that I'm hairy, or might even praise me for it. Like if I just dress a little less girly, it's suddenly "cool" and "oh so manly" that I have hair on my chest, kinda.

Another aspect is that when/if I tell people I "identify" myself as a (trans) man, they also praise my hairiness as a positive personal achievement. Where as when I've instead "identified" myself as a woman, people have instead expressed disgust, being sorry, and other ill-placed compassion, for my hairiness. Like someone saying "I'm jealous of your beard, that looks awesome, dude" does affect me in a very different way from being told "I'm so sorry you grew a beard, I hope something can be done about it" and having been given those very different reactions based on what I've called myself (while looking the exact same way) has definitely affected my confidence about my body/facial hair.

However, I could still love my body hair even when I kept getting tons of crap for it from other people. Receiving all that crap made me feel terrible about my hairs for a while, but I also couldn't make myself truly hate them. I could within a couple of years find my love for them again. Probably so quickly because I had already loved them before, and because I was unable to hate them, despite being under that intense social pressure to conform.

When there's no one around to have opinions of my body hair, and it's just me, I first and foremost enjoy simply how they feel. That's how I started my journey to embrace my hairs. Wearing a long skirt or dress and my thicc thighs suddenly don't clamp together, because my leg hair serves as a natural barrier, which reduces friction? Awesome sensation. Wearing a shorter skirt and feeling the wind in my leg hairs on a warm summer day? Another awesome sensation. Armpits not stinging when putting on deodorant? Very nice, indeed. Not having to deal with any razor burns, and much more rarely any ingrown hairs? Neat. Twirling my fingers around my chest hair, because I still don't have a stim toy? Very soothing. Cuddling my beard? Very calming and reduces my stress levels like a LOT. It's almost as nice as petting a cat.

Then after finding how I love all those sensations and more, it became difficult for me to shave as the shaven sensation left me feeling oddly naked and like I was missing something. Without noticing, I had started to connect emotionally to my hairs as not just part of my body (for better or worse) but as truly part of ME.

Kinda like how many people feel about their head hair, regardless of their preferred length. Many people like having head hair, and would feel naked and at a loss if it was suddenly gone, which applies to both men and women. I started feeling like that "naked and at a loss" without my body hair, because I had emotionally connected to simply the physical sensations of having it there.

But I was still struggling with the appearance of my hairy body being there all visible, so on that point what I did was starting with simply covering up. Wearing clothes that would hide how hairy I was, basically. And not looking too long in mirrors, but also not avoiding mirrors. I'd glance. Except I still went swimming in just a bikini, regularly, at a public, local pool.

I think my experiences with going swimming while hairy, and otherwise hiding my hairs, helped me slowly get more comfortable with how it looked. Because I realised that despite all the comments, etc, it's really no one's business how I groom my body, as long as I'm clean and smell fresh. And my hairs are definitely clean! They're freshly shampooed and conditioned! I'm only saying that because keeping my body hair clean, helps me curb that feeling of being hairy somehow supposedly being equal to being dirty, which it isn't!

The more brave I got to test myself, I decided to show my hairs in public more and more, outside of the swimming pool area. Like with low-cut shirts, short sleeved shirts, tank tops, shorter skirts/shorts, etc. Eventually I developed a stronger connection with my body hair, became protective of it. And I started seeing beauty in it too. Looking at body positivity stuff made by other hairy women out there (mostly on Instagram) inspired me a lot, and having a supportive girlfriend who kept telling me my body hair is hot, helped a lot too. Feeling attractive shouldn't be the end all be all, but I'd be an idiot if I denied that it's uplifting and inspiring to hear/see that my own body hair is attractive.

As a result, I can quite freely love my body hair now, and show it proudly, but it took a lot of work and I still feel a little bit weird about it. Like sometimes I catch myself being puzzled by that I'm so hairy yet female. So like it is deeply ingrained, the belief that female body hair is somehow bad, dirty, gross or shameful, but it's NOT objective truth. It's just subjective opinions that very many people unfortunately have. It's natural, protects the skin, can increase sensitivity, can help regulate body temperature even, it's cheaper to not spend lots of money on shaving products, and lots of other good things that come with being hairy. I think the only negative is when my bracelets, rings and necklaces get stuck in the hairs and yank them out... which doesn't happen often!

I still feel that shame tugging in me whenever my mom decides to berate me for being hairy, and I have to remind myself that that's just her opinion, and not an incredibly valuable one!

So no, I don't think there is a point of no return. Like it’s never too late, as long as you’re still alive and kicking. We continue to be maluable and adaptive, and changing as people throughout life. Any opinions or beliefs that we have can change. Sometimes on a whim, but more often from working on ourselves, consuming media that informs us why we should change an opinion/belief, testing out what works and what doesn't, challenging ourselves, facing our fears, etc, and sometimes it can take a lot of such work and determination to achieve the desired result. But I think, when it comes to self-acceptance and self-love it's always possible to achieve.

Although I may still struggle a little bit with my body, I managed to come to love it in general, and feeling really connected to being female, despite still having dysphoria, from having hated my body in the past, and I think that says a lot. I mean that to say, if I can do that, I'm sure you can too. I hate to say it, but really all it takes is willpower and not giving up.

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spiderman-homecomeme · 5 years

Text

Day One - Hidden Connections

AN: You guys!!! Spideychelle week is finally here!! Ahhhh I’m so excited to see what everyone else as written and to share my stuff! Here is my contribution to day one! It’s a little short and quick, and there’s a fair amount of non-romantic stuff in it, but I just thought this idea was really funny and had to write it down! A huge thank you to @spideychelleweek for putting this together!

Prompt: Secret Relationship AU/College AU

Pls enjoy some 2.4k of humor, fluff, and a dash of angst.

“To whom it may concern,”

“Dear Sir or Madam,”

“Dear Mr. Bugle,”

“Hello,

I hope your day is going well.

My name is Peter Parker, and I happened to film the altercation between the criminal known as Rhino and the heroes Luke Cage and Spider-Man on the intersection of 42nd Street and 11th Avenue. I have some screencaps of it attached, if you are interested in the video for a blog post, let me know. I am willing to sell said footage for a discounted quick-sale price.

Sincerely,

Yours Truly,

Love,

Thanks,

Peter Parker

Releasing a puff of air through his lips, Peter hits send.

The clickable ad he’d seen while scrolling through Facebook said: SEND VIDEOS OF SPIDER-MAN. $1 PER SECOND*. It was only after he’d clicked did he notice the fine print: Spider-Man must be within the frame for the whole second, otherwise the dollar is void.

But that doesn’t matter. Peter has a full five minutes that Dronie had so graciously recorded for him of Luke Cage and him kicking Rhino’s ass.

And he really needs the money.

MJ’s birthday is four days away, a day which also coincides with his rent being due, so in other words: he’s essentially broke. While he does have money in his bank account, he only has enough for one of those things, not both, and he can’t really afford to be evicted at this point. He knows MJ won’t leave him if he doesn’t get her anything…

But she at least deserves something nice.

This video should net him roughly $300; he can take her out to a nice dinner, maybe buy her something actually decent for a change. Not another scarf.

And who knows? She might not even want to go out to a fancy restaurant, seeing as she’s turned down every offer he’s given to take her out in the six months they’ve been dating. Every date night, it’s either been take-out, a quick slice, or some kind of fast food. Not that he’s complaining about hanging out with his girlfriend; every minute spent with her was more than enough. And he’d be a liar if he said it wasn’t a little easier on the wallet.

But there was still that seed of doubt. Why did she never want to leave Queens? Why was it always such a rush to get back home? Why hadn’t she introduced him to her parents? The intrusive, relentless thought that her being embarrassed of him might have been a factor whispered darkly in the back of his mind. He knows he can be immature at times, both with his sense of humor and overall behavior, so, albeit shamefully, he could understand where she was coming from.

Maybe a nice present accompanied by a fancy dinner could help to prove that he can act like a grown-up.

Maybe.

The next morning, while happily munching on a bowl of Hulk O’s, he’s genuinely surprised to see a reply in his notification bar from none other than J. Jonah Jameson himself.

“I want to see that video. Will talk about your payment after I have it analyzed by my team.

Your appointment is today at 9am. Don't be late.

J.J. Jameson

Editor for the Daily Bugle Heralding Your Daily News │Tel [212] 555-7109│Fax [877] 555-0971

Sent from my iPhone.”

Peter only allows himself a moment to be put off by the the informality of Jameson’s response, brows crinkled as he turns to check the time.

8:30 AM.

He drops his spoon into the bowl, milk and soggy cereal splashing.

Well, shit.

He stuffs whatever clothes he can find into a backpack before roughly yanking his suit on; he flings himself out of his fifth story window, cereal bowl abandoned on the kitchen counter. Phone in hand, following along on Google Maps, he wonders how super heroes were able to find their way around big cities before GPS.

The next thirty minutes fly by in a blur, and Peter honestly doesn’t know how he’s able to put enough brain cells together to find a place to change into his civilian “interview” clothes. It’s a wonder he made it there in one piece.

The lobby doesn’t have any kind of directory, or any indication of where J. Jonah Jameson is supposed to be. In fact, Peter isn’t even sure where he’s supposed to meet the guy, unable to recall if there’d been anything like that in the email.

He gingerly approaches the front desk, ducking his head down slightly as he offers a smile to the receptionist. “Uhm, hello! I’m here to see Mr. Jameson?”

The woman gives him the the quick once over, visibly unimpressed. “You got a delivery, kid?”

“Uh, n-no.” Peter shifts awkwardly, smile fading. “He, uh, he sent me an email. To meet him at nine? Today? Right… Right now?”

“Hold on,” she says, her voice monotone, turning to the phone on the desk and dialing a four digit number with freshly manicured nails.

Peter starts to say, “Thanks,” but is cut off by the woman holding a finger up.

“Hey Ted, I’ve got a kid down here. Says he’s supposed to meet with Jameson. Do you know anything about it?”

She listens for a moment, nodding. “Okay, thanks.”

Click.

“Okay, kid, go over to that elevator. 17th floor. Someone will meet you.”

Peter smiles again, throwing a quick, but polite, “Thank you,” over his shoulder as he moves.

He’s met by who he assumes to be Ted, a slight middle-aged man with tired eyes. “Peter Parker?” He asks.

Peter nods.

“Alright, follow me.”

Peter isn’t taken directly to the office at first, only being seated in the waiting area just outside.

For thirty minutes.

9 AM, he said. Don’t be late, he said.

The door to the office is ajar, the sound of Jameson yelling at and berating some poor unfortunate soul over the phone almost as loud as the clacking of Ted’s typing on his keyboard.

“I don’t care what that weasel said, I want it done right this time! And if you had done what I’d told you to, we wouldn’t be having this conversation!” There’s a pause as Jameson presumably listens to the person on the other line begging for mercy. “Fine. Go with the lilac. It’ll clash with your comforter, you’ll see. Don’t come crying to me when you have to buy a whole new bed set.”

Another beat of just Ted’s typing passes.

“Okay. Love you, Mom. Buh-bye.” Jameson hangs up, before yelling out the door. “HOFFMAN!”

“Yes, sir?” Ted answers quickly.

“MY 9:00 IS LATE. IT’S 9:30!”

“No, sir, he’s here sir. He’s been here since 9.”

“WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME? I COULD’VE HAVE ENDED THIS CONVERSATION SOONER. MAKE A NOTE OF THAT, HOFFMAN.”

“Yes, sir. Will do, sir.”

“NEXT TIME, INTERRUPT MY PHONE CALL. STICK YOUR HEAD IN HERE. GIVE ME A SIGNAL.” He sighs. “Okay. Send him in.”

Ted looks over. “You can go on in. Good luck.”

Peter falters for a moment, wondering if he’s really willing to go through with this.

No. He is. MJ was more than worth it.

He says a quick, “Thank you,” before walking in to the lion’s den.

Jameson sits at his desk, looking up briefly, chewing on an unlit cigar. “Well, quit your dawdling, get in here.”

Peter picks up the pace.

The man glares at him for an uncomfortable few moments, sizing him up, before extending his hand. “You got the video?” He asks, skipping introductions entirely.

“Uh, yeah. Yeah.” Peter swallows, handing him the drive.

Jameson hums. “I was expecting someone… More… professional.”

It’s then that Peter realizes he’d left his apartment without even combing his hair or brushing his teeth. He hadn’t even bothered put on deodorant or to change out of his The Mighty Thorgi t-shirt. He’s wearing a pair of the day before yesterday’s and yesterday’s jeans, and to make matters worse, he’s wearing two different shoes; one grey converse and one blue.

“You homeless or something? Because there’s a soup kitchen around here.” Jameson spends the next few moments trying to plug in the USB to his computer, flipping it over and over. “Damn thing. HOFFMAN!”

Ted practically sprints in. “Yes, sir?”

Peter tries to speak. “I can do it if you—”

“—Don’t patronize me, kid,” Jameson snaps. “Hoffman. Plug this in.”

Peter watches in silence as Jameson’s expression never changes as the video plays out on his computer. Peter knows what’s on the video, he knows it by heart, in fact. He fought in it. When the video ends, Jameson leans back, his blank expression now seems thoughtful.

“I’m gonna give it to you straight kid,” He says. “It’s a good video. Now I can send this down to my lab nerds. They can calculate the exact amount of time that Spider-Man’s in a full frame. I’m guessing it’s gonna be around $120 to $150. But, that’s if we give you credit, of course. If you wanna sign the rights of this video over to us, we’re looking at, say, $350 upfront. You won’t be credited, though.”

To Peter, that actually sounds pretty good; he gets a good amount of money, more than he thought, and his name won’t be tied to his alter-ego. It’s a win-win. “Oh, yeah! That sounds great!”

Jameson’s smile is shark-like. “Great. HOFFMAN! GET ME CONTRACT A27!”

“Do you mean A63, sir?” Ted asks from the door, contract already in hand, placing it on the desk.

“Yes, yes of course. A63.” Jameson shakes his head. “Can’t get decent help around here,” he mutters.

Peter signs where Ted indicates. Jameson signs the last page and hands back the contract.

“I’ll be back with your copy,” Hoffman says as he exits the room.

Jameson then opens his drawer, retrieving a thick check book and grabbing a pen. “Parker Peterson, right?”

“No, no. Just… Peter… Parker.”

As Jameson writes the check, Peter takes the time to take in the office around him, his eyes drawn immediately to the portrait on the desk. His stomach drops as he realizes who it is.

No doubt about it.

That’s a picture of his girlfriend.

Why is there a picture of MJ… on Jameson’s desk?

“Pretty, isn’t she?”

Jameson’s voice startles Peter, and he looks over, the older man glaring right into him. “Huh?” Peter asks.

“She’s pretty, right? It’s okay. You can say she’s pretty. Beautiful even.”

Peter nods, voice soft. “Yeah. Really beautiful.” And he means it, more than anything, nervous as he is; MJ is the most beautiful person he’s ever known.

With the flick of his wrist, Jameson deliberately flips the portrait away from Peter.

In the amount of time Peter’s been in the office, Jameson has had two volumes: Loud and VERY LOUD. There seems to be a third setting, however. In a hushed, threatening tone, Jameson seethes. “Listen here, kid. I don’t need no smelly, grubby, unemployed jackass drooling all over my daughter.”

Wait, what?!

Fuck.

“I don’t know what thoughts were going through your sick little mind, but that’s my little girl, and I will be damned if she fuels your pervy little spank bank! Do I make myself clear?”

Oh, if only he knew...

Even though Peter could easily take down the older man, he still finds himself shrinking back slightly.

He nods profusely. “Yes, sir, of course sir.”

“Good.” Jameson roughly shoves the check at Peter. “Now get the hell out of my office.”

Peter doesn’t need to be told twice as he dashes through the door, nearly running past Hoffman who expertly passes him the contract copy.

“Have a nice day!” Hoffman calls as Peter disappears down the hallway.

Omw, the text read from MJ.

Luckily, Peter had already planned for arrival; the apartment’s clean, the floors vacuumed, Febreez has been sprayed. Conditions were perfect. All he needed to do now was sit and wait, mindlessly tapping his fingers against his thigh, the events from earlier replaying in his head on some kind of torturous loop.

The sound of the key turning the lock fifteen minutes later had his pulse quickening. She was here. “I brought Chinese!” She called as she set the bags down on the dining room table.

Peter cuts right to the chase, barely lasting a second. “So. I met your dad today.”

MJ nearly drops the lo mein, her eyes blown wide. “Oh my God.”

Peter shrugs.

“I am so. So. Sorry.”

He tilts his head a fraction, brows wrinkling in confusion. “Why?”

“I don’t know how he find out,” She says, almost to herself. “I tried to keep this— us— hidden from him. He chases away any guy who comes close to me; friend, colleague… One time a teacher said I was a remarkable student and he— It doesn’t matter. I’ve tried explaining this hetero-normative, misogynistic bullshit to him, but it just goes right over his head. He’s always had this… toxic paternity complex. Like, I know that he loves me, I guess, but that’s no excuse.” She folds her arms across her chest, glancing away, her eyes welling in frustration. “And I just didn’t want him to scare you away.”

Peter puts his hands on her arms. “Woahwoahwoahwoah. Hey. It’s okay.” She looks up at him. “He doesn’t know about us. I just went to the Bugle today to sell a video of Spider-Man… and I saw your picture on his desk.”

Relief washes over her, and she puts a hand on her chest. “Oh, thank God.”

“Nothing to worry about.” Peter grins, before growing confused again, expression crinkling. “I thought your last name was Jones?”

“It is.”

“Then…?”

“So’s my Mom’s,” she elaborates. “They just never got married. Or stayed together, really.”

“Ah, gotcha,” Peter nods.

A comfortable silence fills the room, the food on the table surely getting colder by the minute. But MJ finds that her curiosity is growing too strong. She has to know.

“What did he say?”

Peter snorts, face scrunching as he scratches the back of his neck. “A lot. He totally freaked out when I said you were pretty.”

“He yelled at you for saying I was pretty?”

“Well… It wasn’t really yelling. Just angry whispering. And...” Peter turns bashful. “I said you were beautiful.”

A small smile cracks MJ’s expression, and she looks back down at their now intertwined hands. “Gross.”

“I know.” He cups her cheek, thumb caressing the soft skin there as he stares deeply into her eyes. He leans in, placing a loving, lingering kiss against her lips. As he pulls away, they both sigh. “Just so you know…” He starts, voice barely above a whisper.

Her eyes gaze adoringly into his; she’s not even trying to hide how mushy she feels at this moment.

“You’re always the star of my spank bank.”

“Wait, What?”

#spideychelle #spideychelleweek2k19 #peter parker x michelle jones #petermj #fic #ahhhhhh here it is!!#hope you enjoy!

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ijustwant2write · 5 years

Text

Not Your Typical Woman-Jax Teller x Reader

(GIF credit to @charliehunnamxo)

Masterlist

Summary: requested by anonymous: ‘Okay first of all you are amazing second of all I was kinda hoping you could write a one shot, or fanfiction (whatever you like cause I know it will be awesome either way) where the reader is looking for a job as a mechanic at TM where she gets the job an ends up patching in Mabey getting into a fight with a few crow eaters over Jax who she eventually ends up with thank you so much you are amazing 😍😍’

(A/N: Just changed it slightly, but I hope it’s still what you wanted)

Characters: Jax Teller x Reader

Meanings: (Y/N)=Your name (Y/L/N)=Your last name

Warnings: Swearing, bitchiness

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Pulling into the parking lot, I smiled to myself as I looked at my new place of work. All my life I had grown up helping my dad work on his car and motorbikes, it just seemed natural to me. Whereas my sister was the typical girly-girl, playing with her dolls and dressing up, I would roll in covered in oil or mud, helping carry the tool box around; I giggled as I thought back to that time, we were so different yet had the strongest bond. This was all I wanted. A simple mechanic job, surrounded by what I loved doing. I had grown up in Charming too, I could never leave this place.

Confidently strolling towards the office, I kept my head held high as I realised that this place was mostly run by men. Shame really, we needed more women in this industry.

“Hey, (Y/N) (Y/L/N)?” Gemma, the woman who interviewed me called out.

“Yeah, hi!” I said back, shaking her hand.

“Good to see you again, congrats on getting the job.”

“Thank you. I brought those papers you asked for.”

“Great, let’s show you around.”

I had instantly liked Gemma when she first interviewed me, but now I was more sure than ever that she would be a good boss. Her attitude was just amazing, I loved how she was clearly the boss who ran the place, the men respected her too. After showing me where everything was, we ended up back outside, and I couldn’t stop myself from staring at the bikes lined up.

“You got one of your own?” she asked me.

“No, used to. Had to sell it unfortunately, but my dad had one too. They’re beautiful.”

She chuckled.“You know who we are, don’t you?”

I nodded.“Yeah, you’re an MC, Sons of Anarchy to be exact.”

“I’m assuming that’s what attracted you to the job?”

I laughed at that.“No, it’s just a perk.”

My dad had always told me of this MC, almost praising them sometimes. My mom on the other hand, not so much; she could see that they were helping their community, their family, but of course, this couldn’t outweigh the amount of illegal shit they got up to. I always found it exciting. That was something me and my sister had in common, we loved the bad boy look (as most girls do at some stage in their lives), and these men were just the right bunch for us to crush on. Being in an MC interested me. I didn’t know whether it was the danger, the mechanical side, or how close they all were that pulled me towards that life. And here I was, working for them.

“I think you’re going to be just fine here. Hey, I know it’s sudden, but would you mind covering someone’s shift this afternoon? It’s in an hour but he’s called in sick and I need this job doing today.”

“No problem. Might as well get going whilst I’m here.”

I changed into the overalls, pulling down the top half and tying the arms around my waist before throwing my hair up in a ponytail. Normally I was a very confident person, but nerves were starting to kick in. I had only ever worked on cars and such by myself or with my dad, and although I had the degrees necessary, I could feel doubt starting to creep in; it wasn’t a nice feeling.

“Hey, are you supposed to be in here?” I heard someone say behind me as I shut my locker.

“Uh,” I turned around, greeted by a handsome, blonde man,“yeah, I just started today.”

“Oh, right. Sorry, too used to saying that.”

“You’re too used to asking women if they should be in here?”

“Sorry, ignore that. I’m Jax.”

I shook his hand.“(Y/N).”

He looked me up and down before turning away, making me smile. I wasn’t going to lie, I was flattered that someone as gorgeous as him was checking me out. As he turned around, I couldn’t help but stare at his kutte, admiring it slightly. He must have noticed because as he took it off, he looked at me over his shoulder.

“Gotta admit, the chicks dig it.”

“I think I dig it for different reasons.”

“Oh?”

“I’ve always wanted to be in an MC, ever since my dad first introduced me to bikes.”

“Really? Don’t see many women wanting that...actually there aren’t any women patched in.”

“What?! Are you serious?”

“Yeah, it just hasn’t happened yet.”

I thought for a moment, a slow smile appearing on my face.“What does it take to get patched in?”

“You serious? You got any idea the shit you got to go through?”

“No, that’s why I’m asking.”

“Uh...listen, I’m the President of this MC-”

“Oh, shit. This isn’t a good start is it?”

“Look, the fact I’ve never even heard of a woman being patched in means that it’s there for a reason.”

“I mean, it could be that a bunch of males just made that rule because that’s what men were, and sometimes still, are like.”

He nodded to me.“Yeah, it could be. I would have to look into it.”

“So that’s not a no?”

“It’s not a yes.” he smirked.“I’ve literally just met you, I shouldn’t even be considering it.”

“Hm, what does that tell you about me?”

I winked at him, sultry leaving the room with a new found confidence, adrenaline pumping through my veins. With confidence practically radiating off me, I was greeted with another Son, Juice, who was told to show me the ropes before I started working. I was easily able to joke with him as he showed me around, introducing me to everyone else that was there. It seemed easy, everything was where it would usually be, and I just wanted to get started. Once he left, I instantly started working, fully focused on the work in front of me.

As I would bend over the bonnet or lean down to grab another tool, I would notice some of the other men staring; there were those that tried to hide it, others didn’t care if I had seen them. Sometimes I would stare back, instantly causing them to look away, which always made me laugh. They were all working for the Sons of Anarchy, a notorious biker gang, they dealt with illegal stuff daily, yet somehow the presence of a woman made them nervous.

The weeks flew by, and I couldn’t express how much I was loving my job. Not only was I passionate about my work, the people around me became like a second family. It was so easy to fit in with them. When I told my dad everything, instead of being concerned that his daughter was affiliated with a gang, he was excited, asking me tonnes of questions, as if they were celebrities. But I started noticing that I would be given different tasks to the other workers, ones not involving the garage. It was usually Jax who gave the orders, pulling me away from whatever I was working on to ask a favour. I would go with other members for small tasks, like collecting payments; this definitely wasn’t in my job description. These tasks kept appearing, and I was starting to get an incline that something was going to change for me.

Like any other working day, I turned up to work, hanging up my belongings and checking my appearance. I heard someone else enter, making me smile as I went to greet them.

“Morning Jax.” I beamed.

“You’re needed, now.” He said coldly, a dark look on his face.

My smile instantly disappeared.“Oh, for what?”

He didn’t say anything, only gesturing with his head to follow. Nerves started to build in my stomach. Had I done something wrong? What could I have possibly done? Did a job go bad? Was a customer unhappy? Numerous scenarios whizzed through my mind as I followed him to their meeting room, where they had their ‘church’ meetings. I could see all of the club members sat around the table. This was serious.

“Stand over there.” Jax ordered, sitting at the head of the table as I stood opposite.

It went silent, all of the men looking at me intensely.

“Look, we appreciate all you do. It’s clear to see that you’re a hard worker, you know what you’re doing. But I’m afraid that isn’t enough.”

I clasped my hands together, gripping onto them tightly as I listened.

“We’re gonna have to put more on you, show us that you really want to do this.”

I felt something slap onto my back, slinging around my shoulders. I jumped slightly, grabbing onto the material before it slipped off. As I brought it in front of my eyes, my mouth dropped open in shock, disbelief strewn across my face.

“No fucking way!” I exclaimed.

They had handed me a kutte, stating that I was a prospect to the Sons of Anarchy! I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming.

“It’s official, you’re our newest prospect. Means we get to boss you around a lot more.” Jax smirked.

“You’re all assholes, I was about to start crying.” I scoffed as I put it on.

“Looking good lass.” Chibs called out.

“How come I can become a prospect? I thought women couldn’t be one?”

Jax explained,“Well, the way we see it, the rules are old fashioned. I could tell that you were serious about it too. You’re our guinea pig.”

Congratulations were passed around to me as the meeting adjourned, smiles on everyone’s faces. I caught my reflection in the mirror. I looked fucking sexy and powerful with this kutte, it was a new part of my life and who I would be.

“I’ve got your first order actually.” Jax, who hadn’t left the room, said.

“Oh? And what would that be, Mr President?”

“For your ass to be at this clubhouse tonight for a party.”

“I think I can manage that.”

“And wear the kutte. Don’ know why I’ve not let a girl wear it before.”

“Glad you like it just as much as I do.”

His teasing tone stopped for a moment.“You do know how serious this is, don’t you?”

I nodded.“Yes, and I wouldn’t put myself in this position otherwise.”

Once I finsihed my shift, I sped home, racking my brain to think of something to wear. My first party and first time being a prospect, it was daunting. I was making history here, being the first woman prospect. They had seen something in me, and I was going to prove that I was worth the title and much more.

Checking myself out once more in the mirror, I took yet another picture of me, still not over how I looked; I had done an amazing job of getting glammed up. Jax had offered to take me to the party, even though I could easily travel there myself. Looking over the selfies I just took, I giggled as I sent one to him, along with the message that I was finally ready. I must have received the world’s fastest reply, he was on his way.

“Someone’s out to impress tonight.” Jax commented after giving me a wolf whistle as I stepped outside.

I gave a little spin, taking the helmet from his outstretched hand.“Don’t I always? Come on, let’s get going, I’m in desperate need of a drink.”

For the first hour, Jax stayed by my side. His hand was around my waist, not caring what it looked like to others. Instead of it embarrassing me or making me uncomfortable, I relished in the fact that he was paying attention to me. Jax lured me in. I didn’t know everything about him, hardly anything actually but that made me want to know him more; he was interesting to me, not to mention undeniably hot. I felt a little lost when he left me for a moment, but I had to remain confident. I was a prospect, and although we had to earn respect, I didn’t want to come off as someone who would just roll over when someone told me to. Especially when two crow eaters approached me, as if I were some sort of prey.

“Isn’t this funny Jackie? The sons must be playing a practical joke.” one spoke.

Jackie obnoxiously cackled.“Oh god, it’s pathetic how she craves so much attention.”

Hypocrites.

“Can I help you?” I snapped.

“Oh, no. We’re just enjoying the entertainment for the evening.”

“Do you honestly have nothing better to do when you aren’t being used as a sex toy?”

“Listen sweetie, I don’t know why they’ve let you become a prospect, quite tragic actually; makes you more frigid than you already are.”

“How would you know what frigid means?”

“You have to respect us. We’re part of the club.”

“No, you’re really not. I work for patched in club members, and the only woman I’ll ever take orders from is Gemma. Stop kidding yourselves and just get on with whatever it is you do.”

“I’ll be telling Jax about this....once we’ve had our fun.”

No, Jax and I weren’t an item, we hadn’t even spoke about anything remotely close to that. She was trying to push my buttons, and although deep down it was working, I masked that.

“You do that. Now let me get on with my night.”

I turned away, leaning against the end of the bar. My hopes of them leaving were false, making me roll my eyes as they came up with more cute comebacks. That’s when I spotted a crate of beers on the floor, giving me a slightly petty idea. Picking up one, I shook it, turning back to face the girls.

“Look, you’re bitchy comments are great, they’re really making me sad,” I sarcastically said, pouting slightly,“but I really think you should cool off.”

I opened the bottle, letting it spray all over the whores. It soaked their skimpy dresses, their squealing grabbing the attention of everyone. It was silent for only a moment before laughing and yelling followed. I laughed too, really wishing that I had done something more to them. They whined as they rushed off, and that was when I knew I had made some enemies. But before I could celebrate my victory, I was harshly yanked out of the room. I panicked as I saw that it was Jax. Shit, was I really not supposed to do that? Should I have been the bigger person?

As he pushed me up against a wall, I could hear how heavy his breathing was.“That was fucking hot.”

“What?” I breathed out.

“Back there, what you did. Everyday I get more and more attracted to you.”

“J-Jax, are you serious?”

“Yes, look if you don’t want this then just say-”

I quickly grabbed his hand, it was my turn to drag him into another room.“Fuck yes, say no more.”

#jax teller #jax teller imagine #jax teller imagines #jax teller one shot #jax teller x reader #sons of anarchy #sons of anarchy imagine #sons of anarchy imagines #sons of anarchy one shot #sons of anarchy x reader #soa #soa imagine #soa imagines #soa one shot #soa x reader

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myhauntedsalem · 3 years

Text

Bathsheba Sherman

After a infant dies in her care, a woman by the name Bathsheba Sherman was accused by her local community of being a witch and working in league with the devil. Although found innocent, locals still held onto their beliefs.

The name was made popular in ‘The Conjuring’ but who was Bathsheba Sherman?

Many of you have no doubt seen ‘The Conjuring’ and a few have asked the page whether the movie is real or not. Many of the questions have been about the ‘witch’ Bathsheba Sherman, so rather than detailing all of the hauntings in full, which would be quite an interesting task indeed and one that would take a long while, I thought I would just focus on Bathsheba herself and see what facts are present.

Bathsheba Thayer was born on Rhode Island in 1812, and, in her early thirties, she married Judson Sherman who was one year older than her on March 10, 1844. About five years later they had a son named Herbert.

The shermans owned a farm in which Judson worked during the long days while Bathsheba kept house and looked after their young son. Although it is believed that the Shermans had several other children, a girl and two more boys, there are no records to substantiate this or the fact they were all meant to have died in their young years.

However, living the good life it was all to turn around for Bathsheba when a infant died whilst in her care. Different sources get a little bit sketchy on just whose baby it was, some say it was a neighboring family‘s while others say it was one of the Sherman children, but the result was the same… the cause of death was found to be an impalement at the base of the child’s skull, probably from a large gauge sewing needle, and Bathsheba was put on trial (or at the least a inquiry was carried out).

Many of the townsfolk believed the child’s death was a sacrifice on Bathsheba’s part to the devil, or some form of witchcraft. There was much jealousy aimed towards Bathsheba, she was beautiful and many of the local women coveted her looks, no doubt some of this envy fueled the rumors.

However Bathsheba was cleared of any wrong doing, there was insufficient evidence to find her guilty of murder, accidental or otherwise. Unfortunately the law courts are not the only courts, and it was the court of public opinion that was to do the most damage and cause Bathsheba to lead a more sheltered life thereafter.

Locals held onto their belief that she was up to dark deeds and possibly some of them knew stuff that we can not possibly know today, after such a long period of time.

Something changed in her after this time, she became embittered and began to treat the hired help on the farm poorly. She would physically assault them, and in some instances starve them, not to death, but rather fed them poorly.

Bathsheba never hanged herself, but rather lived to quite an old age. She had outlived her husband Judson by four years when she died at the age of 72/73 (her exact date of birth is not known but the date of her death was May 25, 1885).

She died from a strange case of paralysis which doctors did not completely understand at the time. Reportedly the medical report on her death states that her body had turned as if to stone. This no doubt further fueled the rumors of Bathsheba Sherman being a witch, having made a deal with the devil.

Her son Herbert outlived her, had a family and children of his own.

Bathsheba is buried in the Harrisville Cemetery, the fenced off enclosure also holds the headstone of her husband. Bathsheba’s headstone had been broken in half, possibly by vandals or those taunting her in death. She was well known of before the movie was released, though not by as many people.

Since the release of The Conjuring and the surrounding hype Bathsheba’s headstone has been repeatedly vandalized.

With so much attention it seems the court of public opinion still has her guilty .

But was she a witch?

Asides from the strange death of the child in her care and the public opinion there are no hard facts as to this being the case. However there probably would not be either way. If she had caused that child’s death, and had done so via impaling the infants skull, then that is an unforgivable act in any aspect.

The main photograph with this post is said to be the oldest surviving photo of what was then known as the Arnold Farmhouse, which nearly a hundred years after this photo was taken would be purchased by the Perron family. There are several websites and researchers that believe the woman in the chequered dress at the front is Bathsheba Sherman, who lived on a neighboring property. If it is her then this photo would have been taken just before her death, as it was taken at about 1885.

As for the haunting, the Perrons have stated there is some confusion as to Bathsheba’s role in the whole affair. Roger Perron believes the entity he saw one night was that of a woman who had hanged herself in the barn (in her 90’s). She appeared with a very obvious broken neck, the face seemed to change form, from looking like a desiccated hornets nest (cracks, ridges, deep gouges) to that of a old woman with a vacant stare.

However Cynthia saw something slightly different as revealed in this interview:

“I was playing upstairs with the Little People, and the door opens to the closet. I thought it was one of my sisters coming through the door, but it wasn’t. It was an older woman with her head tilted to the side and her arms out (she was wearing gray dress with little yellow flowers all over it, and a gray apron or pinafore.) She had a handkerchief held out. I looked at the face, just for a second, and then I looked down and saw the handkerchief. I didn’t see any feet.

So I jumped up and bolted. I ran through the next bedroom and down those stairs, but I was running so fast that I missed the landing in the middle of the stairs. So, I ended up kind of going down them on my butt.

.Well, my mom just happened to be coming in from the kitchen, which meets at the bottom of the stairs, and she basically caught me. I was hysterical, and, at that time, holding my back and trying to explain to her what just happened. And she’s more concerned about what’s going on with my back. And I’m like, ‘I don’t care about that, mom. She just came to me and said, “Come to me, little girl. Come to me, little girl.”

The link with Bathsheba and the haunting was made when Carolyn Perron (the mother) was lying on a sofa when she felt a sharp prick in her leg followed by muscle spasms. When she checked her leg she found a small amount of blood coming from a perfectly circular hole in her leg. It was Lorraine Warren (an investigator who worked on the case) who went on to suggest that that mark was very similar to what was described as having been done to the infant who died under Bathsheba’s care.

#Bathsheba Sherman #paranormal #haunting #ghost and hauntings #ghost and spirits #haunted salem #myhauntedsalem

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