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mrsrcbinscn · 3 years

Text

That’s Probably Not Good

@professorofcrimeratigan

Date: April 10th, 2021

Ratigan meets the baby and accidentally gets capital “i” Involved

CW: blood, medical emergency, baby is 100% fine tho it’s Franny lmao dw no baby ouch allowed

FRANNY:

Pedram Ratigan could deny it all he wanted, but Franny was absolutely certain of three things. One, that they were best friends. Two, that he actually did like Behet Ghol Midam and pretended he didn’t. Three, that when he responded ‘why would I?’ to her ‘miss me yet?’ texts, he really meant ‘you nasty hoe why would you leave me here alone at this university with these clowns?’

It had been a month and a week since her daughter was born and just as long since Franny wasn’t in pain. But Dr. Brennan said she was fine and Franny was always inclined to trust doctors. Still, she thought after seeing him the second time would make him look further into...well, he said there was nothing to be concerned with, so she’d have to believe that.

She wanted to believe that.

Staying busy usually helped, but with a five week old baby that could prove challenging. She rarely left her daughter’s side mostly because she was breastfeeding and needed to be close by because this baby could eat, but it had just as much to do with being in pain more often than not in pain.

Now that Sovanna was a month old Franny felt comfortable inviting close friends over to meet the baby and hold her now that she was a month less delicate and breakable, and of course her “not” best pal Pedram was high up on the list!

“Are you ready to admit you miss me yet, Pedram?” Franny teased, sitting across from him in one of the first floor’s sitting areas with her glass of sweet tea in front of her and a pot of boring, British people, not sweet tea for him.

Sovanna rested in a baby wrap, content and quiet against her mother, only occasionally giving a little coo to let them know she was very much awake and there.

RATIGAN:

Ratigan had been waiting for Mrs. Robinson to contact him since her due date had come and gone. It had not been hard to find the evidence that her child had been born and that there had been little to no complications recorded by the hospital staff in her or the child’s records. (It was a small town hospital, their online security had never been hard to bypass.) He knew it would only be a matter of time before she would reach out to those within her secondary circle once she felt she was up to it.

The beginning of the semester had come and gone without her roaming the ground of the university and while he would not admit to missing her presence, he would say that it had been rather quiet around there without her— whether this was a good or bad thing would be left up to interpretation of whoever had asked the question.

He had made his way to the Robinson home upon her request and immediately he could tell that something was amiss. But, of course, after giving birth to a living being, it would do that to a person. She smelled different and the wolf (aside from its unbound excitement for seeing her and the baby) was concerned.

Ratigan ignored this. It was too temperamental. Nothing was wrong with her besides her body adapting to its new normal.

“I fail to see what you have to gain from my answer to the question. It isn’t as if you will be returning anytime soon.” He smiled at her from where he sat, teacup in hand. “How are her sleeping habits as of now? Bearable enough for you to sleep, I hope?”

FRANNY:

Franny would take that as a yes, for the record. See, you grumpy-ass man? They were totally best friends, just accept it!

“Mm, you’re right.” Franny said, patting Sovanna’s little head. “They tried to get me to stay on as an adjunct like Sarabi Lyons, and I considered it...until I found out by chance how much some of my more recently hired male colleagues in the music department were being paid. I’m not hurting for money, obviously-” she gestured to her house around her, which for full transparency, was purchased with her husband’s money before Franny Sor Robinsons was anyone or anything, because she knew Pedram was similarly beyond comfortably wealthy. “And in fact would have offered my pay to be cut if the department was hurting for funds. But it’s the fact my labor was consistently undervalued for nearly a decade.”

“Not to mention. Who is Andrew Gilliam? Benjamin Davis Braswell? Where are their Grammys, ASCAP and CMA awards, induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, and Netflix productions based on their lives? Were they gifted citizenship to their mother’s home country because of their accomplishments?”

This was a sentiment Franny was careful not to express out loud often, only with Pedram, Petunia, and Tallulah who would feed her petty bone. It wasn’t that she thought she was better than Professor Gillam or Dr. Braswell, but a woman with her accolades should have been at the same rate of pay as them, considering her impressive career. And! All by age forty-one! That was all before her most recent birthday!

The fact of the matter was that Franny Sor Robinson was an asset to Pride U and attracted students to the music department. There are a number of students who passed up scholarships to Juilliard, NYU, or Berklee to come study under her at Pride U. Professor Gillam was a fine man, and as much as Franny hated Dr. Braswell she had to admit that music was the man’s life and his blood, but they weren’t the ones students came to Pride U for.

That was her.

After nearly a decade of putting up with the bruised egos of white men, Franny was relieved to be done with it. She’d miss teaching adults versus just doing music lessons for some local kids at her home, but it also meant she’d have time to focus on her actual career, which was making music.

She smiled down at Sovanna and said, “She isn’t too hard to get to sleep but the thing is she needs to be held until she’s asleep enough to lay down. If you try to lay her down too quickly she’ll wake up and cry -- isn’t that right, little lady? You love attention and cuddles, don’t you?”

“And when she’s awake,” Franny said, unwrapping the baby wrap so she could later pass her to Pedram to hold. “She really only cries if she’s hungry or wants a diaper change. If she’s sleepy she’ll make this sound that’s just a single long, continuous noise until you pick her up or she’s out of breath. Cornelius is wrapped around her finger-- he had to pop to Berlin for a one-day no night business thing.”

Cornelius meant it when he said he was taking six months of time off for the baby, but Franny insisted he go to Berlin.

It’s one day, darling. I know this day’s important and if your team who has handled everything this year wonderfully is saying they’d feel more confident if you were there, that’s okay. A one day business trip to Berlin is nothing. You’ll kiss her goodbye in the morning and be home just two hours after her bedtime.

But he’d be there when she woke up crying in the middle of the night because she got hungry. He’d crawl out of bed probably not fifteen minutes after he finally got comfortable, grab Sovanna from her room, bring her to Franny to feed, and then handle burping her and putting her back to bed so Franny would only barely be woken up.

She hoped his paternity leave would not be interrupted again of course, but if he was needed, say, once or twice more for just a day, she’d consider his paternity leave successful. Franny was not a selfish woman. She didn’t mind sharing her husband some.

“She’s a good baby once she got used to being born. Wilbur was too after he bonded with us. It’s always hard at first whether you had your baby or adopted them. 10/10 don’t recommend childbirth though; it’s much better when you get a free baby.”

Not really free. Adoption was expensive but it at least wasn’t physically painful.

RATIGAN:

One of the things he could admire Mrs. Robinson was her ability to speak so freely about whatever it was that popped into her mind. It had taken him this many years to be able to communicate as little as he did but he would never be able to do what she did. Everything that came out of his mouth (for the most part) was calculated and combed over because he was always wearing a disguise— in order for it to be believable the lies had to be fine tuned and consistent. If there was a slip, one single thread there to be pulled on, the whole life he had made for himself could be unraveled.

Ratigan sympathized with her and said nothing, only nodded. She was not looking for feedback, she rarely did when it came to these matters. Why would she from him? A man who had no qualms or problems within his department. (Nor should he, if they knew what was best for them.) Maybe he was swayed because being a university professor had less to do with his actual care for the job or the students and more to do with keeping a plausible identity. Ratigan did enjoy academics, it was why he had chosen the day job, but it bored him easily. It was why he relied on the challenge of his other job to keep it occupied.

So he remained silent and allowed her to say whatever she needed to on the matter. That was usually the role he played with her, an ear to listen.

Again, he had nothing to say in regards to her answer to his question. He had asked it out of politeness, knowing very well what he had come over for— to talk about and see the baby that everyone had been waiting on for months now. She was about as remarkable as he suspected. Which was to say, she was like any other child he had encountered, and that was more than a few considering he had played the role of nanny for the children of the Shrivani’s and other members of their circle when it was needed of him.

Babies were what they were, simple, fragile, and small. A fleeting stage in life since soon they would grow and the world would take its toll.

“I will keep that in mind,” he said in stride. “And I can assume everyone in the house is happy that she is finally here?”

FRANNY:

“Laszlo most of all,” Franny said, adjusting Sovanna in her arms. “I’m sure as soon as she’s got her vaccines I’m going to wake up to ‘hey I took the baby to school you can have her back at lunch’ texts.”

Now, most families would find that odd, but that was just such a Laszlo thing to do, of course it would happen eventually. Their family was tight-knit and trusted each other without question so Franny would probably just laugh and fall back asleep.

“And her father is absolutely in love with her. He’ll just lie down and lay her on his chest and they’ll nap together, it’s precious. He’s going to be a great girl dad.”

RATIGAN:

Bringing a baby to work, even if the man was only an art teacher (which, to Ratigan, was barely a job so much as it was more of a time occupier) was hardly a smart move. Then again he hadn’t known that particular family member of hers to be entirely competent. Also working in an environment filled with adolescents didn’t seem safe for a baby either. Especially in a town like this where anyone of those children could be in possession of magic that they were still working on controlling.

He did not care enough to say any of this to her aloud— but that would not stop him from judging silently.

“It sounds like everything is going well.” And yet the wolf still did not settle its worrying. It felt more frantic now despite hearing all of what Mrs. Robinson had to say, which was only good and positive things. Ratigan continued to ignore it. “And how are you feeling?”

FRANNY:

Franny’s smile faltered only slightly as Pedram asked how she was feeling. Really, she felt silly for even hesitating since her doctor had said she was just overreacting. Just the hormones blah blah, your body will feel normal soon blah blah.

Yeah? Then damn, would she love to feel like that was true.

There was no reason that she should be bleeding for three weeks straight, right? Right?

But Dr. Brennan said she was fine. So she was fine.

Franny was just being a woman, you know, overreacting like they do.

(but then, why would even Laszlo have pointed out how pale she looked last night, hm?)

“Uh, happy, of course!” Franny said, deciding to just answer with how she felt emotionally. “I’m just in love with her. It was like when I met Wilbur the first time, just this time I was high off my ass on pain meds.”

RATIGAN:

Raitgan caught the hesitation. Anyone may have been able to, but it stuck out to him as he was someone who over analyzed the body language and patterns of those around him. It was just how he had learned to operate. He had been around Mrs. Robinson for a lot longer than many of the people he’d have to pick up on within the span of a few minutes of meeting them, so the slight misgiving was odd. (And it only gave the wolf something to whine at.)

“Of course.” He smiled, but a wrinkle formed between his brows when she did not continue. “I know we’ve not spoken in person for a while, but I did not think that would change the nature of our relationship. I’ve never known you to hold back when asked a question.”

He paused to take a sip of tea. When he set it back down he continued. “Is there anything wrong?”

FRANNY:

I’ve never known you to hold back when asked a question.

Okay, get out of my literal brain? Franny thought, the corner of her mouth twitching upward. Pedram really did know her too well to pretend they weren’t friends, didn’t he?

“I mean...my doctor says I’m fine. It’s probably just general malaise or whatever. Like, I thought I’d feel better post-baby by now but my body is still like, ‘haha, that was wild.’ Probably just what happens when you wait until forty-one.”

She sighed and reached for her glass of sweet tea, only to find it empty. She pouted and set it down, then stood up. “Here, take her for a second, I need to commit more tea sin. She’ll fuss if nobody is holding her.”

RATIGAN:

Ratigan had been prepared to ask her more questions about the topic because she was right, the variable of her age did play a significant role to the rate at which her body healed. He felt as though that should have been more cause for concern than simply thinking it was something to be brushed under the rug. They were all there, ready to go on the tip of his tongue, but then she was standing and telling him he needed to hold her child.

Before she finished her sentence he was already shaking his head. “No. I— I don’t think that’s a very good idea. She doesn’t know who I am, she’ll fuss either way.”

He had not held a child since the detective’s and had no intention of holding Mrs. Robinson’s. His hands were blood stained. One wrong move and nails could turn to claws. He avoided touch with anyone, let alone the fragile body of a baby.

“Surely one of the many inhabitants of this place is home?”

FRANNY:

“Not that I wouldn’t have to call down from the third or fourth floor,” Franny said, though she didn’t argue further because a sharp pain in her pelvis made her lightly gasp and her grip on Sovanna tightened a hair. “On second thought. I’ve had too much sugar today already. I need to shed the rest of this baby weight sooner rather than later.”

That was what she was supposed to do anyway.

Sitting back down only made her wince, because every movement seemed to hurt. Hell, she was so weak at one point last night...but she was fine. This must be what having babies is like. She wanted this after all.

RATIGAN:

He was about to argue that he didn’t see anything wrong with that. It wasn’t as if whatever they were doing would be any more important than helping her when she asked for it.

Then Mrs. Robinson gasped and anything he would have said was pushed away by the sound if it. Inside him the wolf whined in response, scratching in an effort to get closer, the want to provide some sort of comfort or help all the more pressing now.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” This was said in the form of a question and yet he knew that they both were aware of what the answer was. He just wanted her to say it— to give some form of permission.

FRANNY:

“...yeah, I just-“ Franny said, then she chewed on her lip as she tried to think of a lie. “- realized I’m actually hungry! So.”

Before Pedram could protest this time, she hopped to her feet and practically shoved Sovanna into his arms.

“Be right back!”

Maybe if she shoved some cold leftovers in her face she’d gain some energy back. She was sure Pedram could tell she was unwell behind her smile and gushing over her baby. Even Lucille had commented on how pale Franny looked.

Now, her periods has always been incredibly light, but this heavy, prolonged one she was going through felt truly excessive. She shouldn’t feel this awful, right?

RATIGAN:

Mrs. Robinson had left her child alone with him, trusting that she was safe in his hold.

He stilled completely, his already stiff posture going completely rigid. His eyes were trained on the doorway that Mrs. Robinson had fled and disappeared through, as if his will alone would make her see reason and return to them before she could get another step farther— but she did not reappear.

Ratigan did not look at the baby until she made a noise of protest against his awkward hold on her. When she began to wiggle, trying to regain the comfort that she had just been in and that had been shifted into this for seemingly no reason, he was forced to look down to meet her eyes. Again, the child made a sound, this time louder and more aggravated than before. He knew that it would only get worse from there.

Carefully, he shifted her in his arms, his hold on her small body softening and allowing her to be settled closer to his chest rather than where he had been trying to keep a distance. The baby wiggled against him, but less in discomfort and more so that she was settling back down. She blinked up at the new face that filled her view, cooing softly before she relaxed.

It had been many years since he had held a baby and yet the mechanics of it had not changed. (She was bigger than Parisa had been.) Such soft innocence should not have been anywhere near him, so content, and yet there she stayed.

He continued their staring contest, both of them studying one another for some time. Ratigan was looking at the shared traits of her parents in her features, her mother’s— her mother.

It had been some time since the woman had left them. More time than he himself had been aware of.

“Bya, kuchak,” he said when the child wiggled when he stood. “We’re going to find your mother.”

FRANNY:

While Pedram was probably busy pretending Sovanna wasn’t the cutest baby ever to baby, Franny was in the kitchen pretending she was actually hungry. The truth was she needed to scurry away and down something to try and quell the pain in her abdomen and pelvic area.

She ran the tap to get it nice and cold and she rummaged through the drawer with bottles of aspirin, acetaminophen, and ibuprofen, and other over-the-counter basic medications and grabbed the first bottle of painkillers she found - aspirin. After taking three with a literal handful of tap water, she splashed cold water on her face like that would somehow help.

Dr. Brennan said she was fine. She was fine, she was fine...then why did she feel anything but fine?

Time didn’t feel real as she stood leaned over the kitchen sink, the water running and running, her hands gripping the counter no matter how many times she told her brain to reach over and turn off the tap. The sound of the sink so completely mesmerized her that she didn’t even feel herself fall to the kitchen floor. Nor did she remember managing to half-sit half-slump against the cupboard beneath the sink. She could vaguely remember thinking that this would pass soon.

The tap’s still running, she thought. Someone should turn that off.

RATIGAN:

Ratigan could hear the sound of the running water now that he was paying attention— but it was the smell of blood that had him quicken his pace down the hall.

“Franny?” he asked upon entering the kitchen, unable to see where she had slipped below the countertop. It took him only a few seconds to assess the scene before him, eyes flickering over the room. (A drawer had been left slightly ajar— probably in haste rather than carelessness. A bottle of pain killer left beside the sink— she had not come here for food. She had also not caused some sort of accident using a kitchen utensil as there was none to be found on any counter or near the sink, unless it had hit the floor but he hadn’t heard the clatter. The faucet was running but there was no glass— again, out of a lack of time rather than laziness.)

He rounded the other side of the counter and what he found there was to be expected. Mrs. Robinson lay limp in a pool of her own blood.

In his arms, the child stirred. In his chest, the wolf howled. Ratigan remained still.

If he had been someone else he may have gasped, out of surprise or perhaps fear, and his brain would have spiked in glutamate, sending him into a panic. But because he was who he was he remained calm as he bent down on his knees, beside her on the cold tile. He turned to lay the child down, away but not out of his immediate reach.

One hand reached for his phone, dialing the local emergency number as it would shave off time he did not know she had than simply calling 999, while his other reached around to press two fingers to her pulse point. Thankfully, it reached back out to him.

“Franny.” He slid his hand up to turn her head to face him, checking if she was still conscious. “Franny, can you open your eyes? Can you hear me?”

“Ambulance,” the dispatcher answered after a few rings, “is the patient breathing?”

“Yes.”

Next to them, the child began to cry.

FRANNY:

“This happened yesterday,” Franny muttered when Pedram asked if she could hear him. “Though not this bad.”

When her legs gave out on her yesterday like even standing was a terrible exertion of strength, it wasn’t as sudden. She’d had time to bend her knees and lower herself onto the edge of her bed and wait for it to pass. It didn’t pass so she fell asleep waiting and woke up with enough strength to take a shower.

She thought, as the water and blood swirled down the drain together, that surely a proper heavy period shouldn’t be almost three weeks long. Not even after giving birth. But Dr. Brennan said she was fine.

Sovanna started to cry and Franny’s mind cleared enough to reach in the direction the cry came from, and even that motion made her hiss in pain but she didn’t stop reaching for her.

RATIGAN:

Ratigan stopped mid-sentence of where he had been explaining the situation to the person on the other end of the phone. His stare sharpened as he looked at her.

“And you did not think to tell anyone? Or see your physician?” His words were not accusing, more so they were angry, frustrated with this woman for not thinking that an excessive amount of blood was not bad or a cause for any concern. His anger was pointed at her family for not noticing something was wrong— at himself, most of all.

He had made it this far in life due to being able to pick out the details of people to understand the situation he was in and move forward accordingly. This should not have gotten past him.

“I’m sorry, sir? What did you say?”

“Have you sent an ambulance?” He glanced away from Mrs. Robinson for one moment and it was when she had moved for her child. It should not have struck him as an odd reaction. Most mothers across all species would have done the same. And yet it had.

Though she was bleeding, perhaps to her death, she still reached out to comfort her baby.

Ratigan stopped her, pressing his shoulder up to hold the phone between his cheek and suit jacket so that he could take hold of her upper arms to keep her in place. “Do not move. Your baby will be fine, and if you care about her then you will ensure that she continues to have a mother by keeping still.”

“Sir, the baby crying, are they alright?”

“Where is the ambulance?”

“I’ve just been informed our dispatch is on a call, so we have been trying to contact—”

Ratigan hung up, that was all he needed to hear. He stood to scan the room until he located a set of keys. Though he did not wish to do so, he left Mrs. Robinson and her weeping child on the floor of the kitchen to locate the car the set belonged to. In the garage he ensured that the car’s backseat door was open and turned the car on. Before he left he also pressed the button for the garage door itself to begin to recline.

When he returned to the kitchen he kneeled back down beside her. “I’m going to pick you up now.”

It was not hard to do so as for the first time in a while he and the wolf were entirely in tune with one another, the strength it lended to him making it easy to stand with her. One arm was around her back while the other had gone under the bend of her knees. His sleeve and skin was now stained with her blood.

FRANNY:

“I did,” Franny almost whined at the accusation. “Doctor said I was...over-reacting.”

“He got real irritated when I questioned him.” Irritated was putting it kindly. Frankly, it felt like sexist treatment, but Franny so badly wanted to be told she was okay that she just accepted it. Franny wanted to explain further just how Dr. Brennan had treated her postpartum, but there wasn’t energy within her to make more words before Pedram went off somewhere.

When he lifted her off the floor, Franny hissed in pain as the motion jostled her. She tapped his shoulder with what strength she had to get his attention and pointed at her phone on the counter. He’d need it to call her husband at the hospital.

She let her head lean against his chest and wrapped her arms around his neck with no strength behind the attempt to support some of her weight.

RATIGAN:

Ratigan wished his reaction to her telling him this was not to call his people and have her doctor loudly put on display for malpractice and other crimes. (Drugs were easy to plant, especially on a doctor who had them so close at hand.)

He did not regret these thoughts because it crossed some sort of moral or ethical boundary— but if his reaction to her being wronged by someone was to put his own hand on the man’s fate instead of allowing it to be left up to chance. It was that he felt as though he had been wronged as well, somehow, and that his emotions had been stirred at all in regard to this woman’s wellbeing.

Ignoring this for now, knowing he would have plenty of time later to go over this later, he managed to slide her phone across the counter with his elbow and use his fingers to pull it up into his grasp. It did not take long to lay her down in the back seat of the car and return for the weeping child on the ground.

The pool of blood was left behind for someone else to clean up.

He returned to the garage and placed the baby with her mother (as there was no carseat and there was no time to search for one or another vehicle) and got into the driver’s seat. Backing out of the driveway, the tires squealed against the concrete beneath them, Ratigan began the trip to the hospital.

FRANNY:

“Shh, don’t cry, baby. You’re okay. Mommy’s got you; see, isn’t that better?” Franny cuddled Sovanna to her chest and, after whining once in pain, pressed kisses to the top of her head.

Poor baby. She must feel something wasn’t right like babies do and her little body could only cry about it.

“Don’t worry about mama, sweetheart.”

Sovanna quieted down in her mother’s arms and Franny, through her pain, managed to keep her demeanor calm so as not to startle her. If Franny lost it, Sovanna would know something was wrong and cry again.

“Pedram.” She said quietly, suddenly turning her attention from Sovanna. “How bad did it look? As bad as I feel, or do you think my ob is right?”

Surely if he was driving her to the hospital, it was worse than her being hormonal and just spotting or having a heavy period after childbirth.

RATIGAN:

While he knew that talking to a baby was important to the development of their brain, he did not understand the point of telling the child that it need not worry. It lacked the cognitive ability to understand the situation outside of its own needs, why would she say to not worry about her when she was all there was to be worried about?

He said nothing, knowing it best he merely focused on the road.

Someone honked their horn as he paid no mind to the stop sign. (The chances of getting hit had been slim to none due to only one other car pulling up and at their rate of speed he could have dodged them should they have also not abided by the road sign. But it was also a small town, the patrons of it usually did.)

His grip on the steering wheel tightened at her question. “I think that you are in need of a new doctor.”

The trip across town was short— as any trip across Swynlake was, but in a car whose breaks had not been applied through the whole trip until they had reached the entrance of the hospital, it was shorter lived than usual.

Ratigan left Mrs. Robinson and her baby in the car to go inside. It took him little time to rally a group of workers and while they all scrambled (someone calling for a gerni, another for supplies, another to call the attending, and someone to get a room prepped) he returned to the car to open the backseat door.

“I will contact your family.” He glanced back over his shoulder as the group of medical staff came jogging out. “Is there anything else I can do?”

FRANNY:

Franny’s last few logical brain cells kept her calm and she wasn’t sure whose benefit it was for more, hers, or the baby’s. She handed Sovanna to Pedram as the hospital staff filed out of the building and said the most pragmatic, least full of jokes, lacking any sexual innuendo thing she’d ever said to Ratigan in the over a decade they’ve known each other:

“My phone password is capital-B Bitches-aint-shit with the I’s being exclamation points, no apostrophe in ain’t, and dashes between each word.” It was something other than a four-digit code to keep her from trying to unlock it at all while driving. “Call my middle brother first, Art. He’ll leave work early and take Sovanna. Tell him not to tell Wilbur, I don’t want him to worry, and tell him to call Lucille. She’ll handle my husband, I won’t put that on you.”

She nodded to her phone. “One of my bank cards is in the phone case. The PIN should be 5739 but if that doesn’t work, try my wedding anniversary...it’s on my Wikipedia page...give the card to Art to give to Dimitri to pay for cleaning my blood out of his car. Shit, that’s probably a lot to remember…”

RATIGAN:

It was— but for a brain like Ratigan’s the amount of information could easily be acquired and remembered. “I can manage.”

He was surprised to realize he would have done far more had she asked it of him, her saying that she would spare him the experience of telling her husband what had happened having made him want to protest against it. But why? While the words would not be hard to say nor the answering questions hard to hear, it would have been more time out of his day that could have been spent elsewhere. She had given him an out and yet his first instinct had been not to take it.

Before he could say anything else the hospital staff was nudging him out of the way of the door, pulling the stretcher closer in order to transfer her from one surface to the other. Ratigan watched, now off to the side, while the child lay restless in her bundle. The changing scenery and noises most likely disorientating enough to aggravate her.

The lost comfort of her mother also taking its toll— reflected both in the cries of the infant and the rigid posture of the man whose arms she had been entrusted to.

Ratigan watched as Mrs. Robinson disappeared into the hospital, the wolf clawing whining within in the want to follow. When his attention turned back to the baby so did the wolf’s, knowing that she was now in his care until her family could arrive. He only allowed himself another moment to reign in the wolf and the emotions that had begun to cloud his judgement.

Then, he pulled Mrs. Robinson’s phone from his pocket, and got to work.

#pedram

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mithranqueersmusings · 4 years

Text

Before This Dance Is Through IV

Chapter: 4/16

Rating: U

Summary: Ringo's being going through a dry spell for the last year or so and when he regretfully tells his best friend John, he insists on taking them to an all-male strip club for some "fun". Ringo isn't sure whether it's the alcohol, his desperation or a mixture of the two but he thinks he might be falling in love with a stripper.

Tags: AU - Strippers, Modern Setting, Smut, Slow Burn

Pairings: George Harrison/Ringo Starr, John Lennon/Paul McCartney

AO3 link here / Fic masterlist here

Once Ringo had managed to compose himself, which took far longer than he'd care to admit, he ventured back out into the chaos of the club in search of John. He wasn't difficult to find, standing at the front of the stage cheering - practically screaming - and waving money around to get the dancer's attention. Unsurprisingly, the dancer was Paul. He was currently spinning around the pole with one hand, his ankles entwined to give him support. It was quite a beautiful sight, Ringo thought, watching his gentle movements. The club was considerably more empty by this point and the remainder of the customers had circled around the stage. Ringo slinked past a few drunken layabouts as he made his way over to John, he had to shout in his ear just to get his attention.

"Oh, Ringo!" John grinned, his breath stank of whiskey "How'd it go?"

"A little too well." Ringo chuckled, he coaxed John to sit down.

"Did he almost kill you this time?" John only passed Ringo a few glances, mostly his attention was on Paul.

"I think he did kill me. Then brought me back. Then killed me again." Ringo picked up John's drink and took a sip "Are they supposed to touch you?"

John paused his shouting for a moment "Touch you how?"

"Just... Y'know, touching. Getting me to touch him, him touching my chest." Ringo decided to leave out the crotch contact, he still wasn't sure whether it was intentional or not.

"Oh yeah, that's fine. As long as you're both consenting o'course. And as long as he's not dropping on his knees and sucking you off." John laughed and Ringo almost choked on the drink, the image those words conjured up was a surprising one.

"How much longer are you planning on staying?" Ringo settled back in his seat and turned his attention to Paul.

"Why? You in a hurry to get home and bash one out?" John nudged him without pulling his eyes away from the stage.

"Speak for yourself." Ringo scoffed, he didn't see the point in denying it.

"We can head out after Paulie's done." John nodded to gesture towards the man in question.

"Fine." Ringo stretched his legs out in front of him.

If he hadn't been so exhausted from Spike, Ringo probably would've gotten a little excited watching Paul but he was completely worn out. John had a shine in his eyes that Ringo didn't see very often, and his happiness was definitely contagious. They sat watching Paul for another two songs, during which he exhibited a ridiculous amount of core strength that Ringo could only dream of ever achieving. It was obvious that John was hoping to catch Paul before they headed back home, as much as he was trying to hide it, and Ringo probably would've hung around with him had he not been so exhausted or so sure that John was probably going to be back here within the week. In truth the main reason Ringo wanted to get out of there so quickly was because he didn't want to risk seeing Spike again, or rather Spike seeing him again; Ringo happily could've watched him from a safe distance all night but as soon as Spike was looking right back at him, knowing what Ringo was thinking, that was too much.

The cold night air stung Ringo's face and hands as they stepped back out into the street. Luckily his car wasn't too far away and while he was perhaps a little too tipsy to be driving he made sure he stayed off the main roads and never went over the speed limit - he could drive recklessly when he was sober but he'd never risk that when he was drunk. John was the only one talking on the drive back to his place, mostly rambling about things Ringo couldn't understand so he just nodded along and made affirming noises.

John leaned on Ringo for support as they walked up to his front door, Ringo knew he wasn't so drunk that he couldn't walk but he tended to do this when he was feeling a little lonely. Ringo had gotten more than used to it by now, he'd had to carry John to bed bridal style many times over the years so this was nothing. John fell face first down onto his bed which was still unmade and either fell asleep immediately or wanted Ringo to think he had. It had almost become a routine by this point: Ringo drove them home, carried John up to his room, left a glass of water by his bed and tidied up a few bits and pieces on his way out. Occasionally he'd check in John's fridge to see if he had any food in and if it was empty, which it often was, he'd offer to buy or cook the two of them dinner the next day. Ringo wasn't the subtlest about it sometimes, once or twice he'd even shown up with bags filled with groceries and left after handing them over without much of an explanation. John never acknowledged any of these things Ringo did, at least not verbally, but Ringo knew he appreciated them and he was sure John repaid the favour in some ways he wasn't aware of, or very aware of in the case of tonight.

Exhaustion hit like a strong wave once Ringo finally got back to his own place. He kicked off his shoes carelessly in the hallway and staggered into his bedroom; he didn't dare look at the time before he slid into bed, just chucked his phone into the furthest corner hoping that he'd remembered to set his alarm for the following morning. As soon as his head hit the pillow he expected to fall asleep almost instantly but his brain had other ideas. His body was definitely ready for sleep, his eyes were stinging and his muscles ached a little yet his mind was racing. This didn't happen a lot. Ringo was notoriously known for how well he slept and how loudly he snored but tonight that wasn't the case. He couldn't shake the images of the night from his mind or how warm Spike's skin had felt beneath his fingertips or the inviting smell of him. Ringo let out a groan as he tossed and turned, as though vigorous movement would throw the thoughts out of his head. The last thing he wanted to do was give into the urge but the first thing he wanted to do was sleep, and it was a pretty strong urge. Was there any better way to get to sleep than a quick orgasm? Probably. Ringo just had to tell himself that he was doing this purely for that purpose, as he wanked himself off under the covers with his eyes scrunched tightly and his brain filled with thoughts of Spike.

The following day was fairly uneventful, Ringo was up on time to sit eating breakfast in front of the television for an hour before he had to head out for work. It was his weekly lesson with a kid called Peter, he was nice enough and his parents were more than pleasant if not a little stupid. He'd been working with Peter for almost a year and while he'd made a great deal of progress since their first lesson he wasn't showing a massive amount of promise, but at least he was trying. Sometimes Ringo felt like speaking to his parents privately and breaking the news that their son wasn't going to become a world famous drummer, probably not even a locally famous one, but he needed the money too much. Peter was better than a lot of Ringo's students, most of which had watched Whiplash a few too many times and decided they wanted to be the next John Bonham only to give up in two months because it was 'too hard'.

After their lesson ended Ringo decided to walk around town for a little while, usually he'd be out in search of lunch by now but Peter's parents always prepared him some food which he was never too polite to refuse - after all smoked salmon was considerably more appetising than a tepid sausage roll from Greggs. He decided to pop into his favourite record shop, although it wasn't like there were many others to choose from. Despite the accessibility to music his phone provided, Ringo always had a deep love for vinyl records; they were nostalgic somehow, even if they had no significance to his own childhood. Like most record shops, this one sold a fair bit of vintage clothing too although Ringo was never too interested in that. He didn't really have any particular record in mind as he walked in so ended up browsing through the plethora of options. There was only one other person in the shop, excluding the owner who sat behind the counter and gave Ringo a welcoming smile, but it sounded like there were a couple of people downstairs in the clothing section. As Ringo began to flick through some of the records his phone buzzed in his pocket.

can you bring me coffee???

It was John, which was a little surprising considering he usually didn't wake up until far later in the afternoon if he'd been drinking heavily the night before.

hello to you too

i dont have time for formalities i need COFFEE

why dont you have any coffee in your house

i dont have time for questions either

any coffee in particular my liege?

ha ha just get me one from maccies pleaseeee

fine im just in town atm can you wait like 10 mins

suppose ill have to

suddenly im too busy

shut up just bring me coffee ill love you forever and all that

i should bloody think so too

Ringo chuckled to himself quietly as he put his phone back into his pocket, he took a final quick look at the stack of records then began making his way outside. Before he could make it to the door he suddenly collided with someone who had been turning up from the staircase, which resulted in a few pieces of clothing flying upwards and landing on the ground. Ringo began apologising immediately, crouching down to pick up the clothes to hand them back over. As he straightened back up to apologise for perhaps the fourth time he froze upon seeing exactly who he'd bumped into.

"Spike." Ringo blurted out, his brain had decided to throw the name out as soon as it crossed his mind.

"Only after 9." He responded instantaneously, it must've been a frequent line he used "Do I... Oh! It's you."

"The very same." Ringo chuckled nervously, he wondered whether he'd actually recognised him or was just being polite - Ringo couldn't decide which one he'd prefer.

It was very strange seeing him like this, so normal that it was abnormal. He was wearing a dark blue turtleneck which framed his sharp jaw and hugged his slim body nicely. Over that lay a yellow beaded necklace and his trousers were a dark suede material; he looked good, somehow more alluring when he was fully clothed. Ringo noticed he was staring, he only hoped that Spike hadn't noticed but it was impossible to tell with the unreadable darkness of his eyes. He cleared his throat, as if he couldn't get any more obvious, then held out the patterned shirt he'd picked up so Spike could take it from him. Their hands brushed slightly at the exchange and Ringo felt the hairs on his arm standing up.

"They're nice, er- Nice clothes." Ringo stammered, yanking his hand back to his side.

"Suppose I should be thanking you for them." Spike replied, there was a faint smile on his lips.

"Oh?" Ringo heard the pitch of his voice rising slightly.

"You helped pay for them." Spike explained, the smile grew.

"Well John paid, really. But he does owe me money so I guess I did pay in a way. Glad to see the money's going somewhere good either way." Ringo rambled, once again his mouth was moving before his brain could stop it.

"Right." Spike said, his tone was very final yet he didn't move to leave.

"I best be getting out of your way so you can actually pay for those." Ringo shuffled sideways towards the door, expecting Spike to step backwards to give him some room but he just stood there looking at him - was it not enough to make him suffer at the club, did he have to punish him now too?

"Are you always this nervous?" Spike grinned.

"No I- You just caught me by surprise is all." Ringo forced himself to take a deep breath.

"Okay." Spike squinted his eyes slightly then turned to head towards the counter.

Ringo was surprised he was able to get back to his car without collapsing, all the tension leaving his body as soon as Spike's eyes were off him made him feel practically boneless. Spike didn't look back at him but Ringo supposed he didn't have to, he would've known he was staring at him. Ringo gripped the steering wheel tightly as he drove, somehow managing to make it to the drive-through without consciously driving there. He ordered a coffee for John and a milkshake for himself, he figured he could do with a pick-me-up after that atrocious encounter. Not once in all the times he'd gone to that shop had he seen Spike there, and it couldn't have been a case of merely not noticing him before because Ringo definitely would've noticed someone looking like that walking around. It felt like God was playing some cruel trick on him, but in reality it was nothing more than a coincidence married with Spike's cruelty which produced that painful exchange. Ringo tried not to think about it as he drove over to John's but his brain had apparently decided to betray him, just as his mouth had done earlier.

John had took a while to answer the door and Ringo began to worry that he'd fallen back asleep - it was times like this that he figured he may as well have a key to his place. When the door swung open, Ringo burst in a little too aggressively and knocked John backwards slightly.

"Jesus, what's crawled up your arse?" John chuckled as he closed the door "Don't tell me the ice cream machine was broken again."

John's presence calmed Ringo significantly but he couldn't shake the tension in his body completely "Guess who I just bumped into." He set the drinks down on John's kitchen table and took a seat.

"Ooh was it that guy from the train station? Or how about-" John took a seat opposite him and gripped the coffee eagerly.

"You're not actually meant to guess." Ringo interrupted, he tried to sound commanding but it was a little difficult when he was holding a strawberry milkshake.

"Then don't say 'guess' you git. The English language is wasted on you." John put his feet up on the table "Who was it then?"

"Spike." Ringo widened his eyes.

"No shit. Really?" John cackled "What happened?"

"I was at that record shop and he was coming up from the basement and I walked straight into him." Ringo explained.

"Nothing straight about it." John mumbled behind his coffee.

"Funny." Ringo glared "It was so fucking embarrassing, I could hardly speak."

"What did he say?" John asked.

"Nothing really. He probably said about three words so I figured he didn't want to talk to me but he just stood there. I didn't want to be rude and just rush out but looking back I probably should've." Ringo sighed.

"Yeah, you probably should've." John snickered.

"Not helping."

"What do you want me to say?"

"I dunno... I'm sure it wasn't that bad or something."

"Well, was it that bad?"

"He asked me if I was always so nervous."

John burst into laughter "Jesus, Ringo. That's pretty bad."

"Guess that's the last time I'll be going to the strip club, or the record shop for that matter."

"Don't be so dramatic. So you were a little awkward in front of him, who cares?"

"I care."

"Why?"

"Because I don't want him thinking I'm some sort of loser."

"Why do you give a shit what he thinks?"

Ringo didn't say anything, he just held his cup tightly and looked at John straight in the eye.

"Look, you've got nothing to get so worked up about. If he thought you were so pathetic he wouldn't have even spoken to you." John lifted his feet off the table and leaned forward in his seat "He's just messing with you, probably thinks it's funny."

"He was smiling." Ringo mumbled.

"Well there you go." John reached his hand forward and poked at Ringo's arm "You're being ridiculous. Chances are you won't bump into him again, you've gone your whole life without doing it before."

"But-" Ringo began.

"No buts! Unless they're butts on the stage covered in leather I don't wanna hear it." John interrupted "Bottom line is you like watching this guy strip right?"

"Well, yeah-" Ringo tried again.

"So what's the problem? It's not like you found out he's your cousin or one of your students, is it?" John smiled warmly.

"Suppose not." Ringo couldn't help smiling too.

"We really need to get you laid, it's making you crazy. I'm supposed to be the crazy one, don't try and take that away from me." John leaned back in his chair again.

"I don't intend to." Ringo chuckled looking down at his feet.

"So... Same time next week?" John raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"You really hate me, don't you?"

"On the contrary! I love you very much, my dear Ringo. That's exactly why I'm gonna take you back there so you can prove you're not some pathetic weirdo."

"How exactly?"

"Just be yourself, you can manage that can't you?"

"Not quite sure I want to."

"Oh hush. Leave the self-deprecation to me if you don't mind." John paused to sip his coffee "This time next week you'll have forgotten all about this, and I'm sure he will too."

"I guess you're right."

But John hadn't been right. Ringo had thought about that small exchange for days. He found himself picking apart every small moment and trying to rationalise it in his mind: had Spike actually recognised him? Why did he just stand there while Ringo tried to squeeze past? Why had been smiling so strangely the whole time? No matter how many answers Ringo tried to give to himself, the whole situation only became more confusing. He felt like a teenager again, stumbling over his words and blushing at the tiniest bit of contact. It was pathetic, shameful really. Maybe if he just took John's advice and actually went and slept with someone all these weird feelings would just be gone. But he didn't want just someone, he wanted him.

#the beatles #beatles #beatles fanfic #the beatles fanfic #beatles fanfiction #george harrison/ringo starr #ringo starr/george harrison #ringo starrxgeorge harrison #george harrisonxringo starr #starrison

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ohpretty-baby · 4 years

Text

bts as my sophomore class teachers

a thread because i miss my teachers lowkey

anyways enjoy <3

first hour: ap seminar with kim namjoon

super philosophical

is a fanboy for rosseau, calls him the original gangster

intimidatingly intelligent; like reads 3 books in one day and writes two papers on them intelligent

constantly connecting foundational thinkers/texts to real life situations (ex: echo and narcissus and selfies in social media)

makes you feel like a bad person by questioning your moral motives

there’s never a dull day in his class

seriously

one time we spent the hour evaluating billie eilish’s bad boy and that one “sweet but psycho” song and talked about double consciousness

the next day we did a full 180 and talked about mass burials

then we talked about the refugee crisis the day after that

extremely thought provoking conversations

gives you independence, which is a double edged sword because everyone in ap sem procrastinates

wants students to exceed not only in his class but also outside of school

my irl ap sem teacher helped me figure out that i wanted to go into a career of law !

also an extensive librarian (hence the ability to read 3 books in one day)

if you have the slight interest in something, he has a book for it

i literally have 8 books checked out from my school library because of him

gives you complete and honest ratings of r rated movies and posts them on your schoology board

not afraid to be scandalous

“now everyone say it with me: premarital sex!”

that was something my irl teacher said, that day we shouted out premarital sex about 15 times with the door wide open

amazing music taste

literally

he listens to anything and everything, from french rap to spanish pop and then english folk songs

will dj for your graduation party for free

second hour: honors english with min yoongi

insanely calm, probably just very sleepy

easy going, chill

you really don’t feel pressured in his class

people goof off in class and are generally very annoying, but he doesn’t care

occasionally lectures students if he really needs to

communicates what we have to do and then lets us do the work

lets us fail if we’re not responsible

but will understand if you can’t turn in a project if life gets in the way

i still have a project i need to turn in oops-

i haven’t received any negative repercussions tho

lets kids eat in his class and lets them go to the vending machine if they have no food

i go to my locker every morning to get food to eat

eats with us

lets you use your phone and watch netflix

will even ask you what show you’re watching and if it’s good

actually a really good teacher if you pay attention in his class

kids just think they can slack off, they end up failing tho so it’s really none of his issues

for some reason he’s a substitute teacher for a lot of classes

when he subs, the classes are extremely fun

one time i spent my whole sixth hour talking to him about my costar and astrology

goofs off with the kids

that same day he subbed, my friends were making panoramas of each other and he rated all of them

isn’t strict

cares about his students and is very easy to talk to

because of this a lot of students open up to him

isn’t a snitch

would willingly make fun of classic literature with you

third hour: honors chemistry with kim taehyung

Super Sassy

always gets the last word when students mess around with him

“what’s your favorite double replacement reaction?”

“my favorite ones are the ones you guys get right; so none”

as you can guess, students love having conversation with him

probably has a dope ass instagram but damnit he won’t let accept anyone’s follow requests

probably because that’s illegal

constant Bad BItch energy

will openly tell students they are annoying without shame

will also openly tell you that you are dumb

once i thought that we had four principals (one for each grade, don’t question it) and my irl teacher was speechless,, like she couldn’t actually say anything at my stupidity

i would willingly sell my soul for my chemistry teacher

always has labs to do, even if they’re not very helpful at times

lets students retake tests by creating a new test

but they’re actually harder than the actual test

students skip their own classes to visit him

i always skip my 6th hour to go into the chemistry

constantly has to chase away students

actually very sweet and cares about students, but is never really a push over

again, a constant Bad Bitch

fourth hour: honors spanish with kim seokjin

an even Bigger Bad Bitch

super fun and sassy

fiestas!!!!!!!

we have fiestas but literally the only Spanish thing we have is chips and salsa and tacos

i’m not kidding

people just bring in cake pops and brownies

will sometimes teach a whole lesson in Spanish just to fuck with us

will also try to hold a conversation with us in Spanish just to fuck with us even more

loves seeing our shocked and confused faces when can’t answer his questions

actually teaches us

gives a lot of busy work but i honestly think that’s the better ways of learning and practicing Spanish, so there’s no complaints

engaging lessons, encourages us to make mistakes so we can be comfortable with the language

veryyyy helpful with pronunciation, makes sure that we know how to pronounce certain words

super trustworthy

once after school i spilled tea with my irl spanish teacher about a messy breakup i had gone thru, it was real fun

we have a theory that one of the senior teachers has a crush on her because he always visits her when he comes to our class

really good teacher but heavily overestimates our ability

especially when it comes to tests

but will admit his wrongs when we don’t do well in class

literally the best friend you wish you had

fifth hour: ap world with jeon jungkook

literally really pretty

really funny and sweet but his class is hard

not because of the extensive work and the fast pace, but because he doesn’t prepare students enough for saqs, dbqs, leqs, etc.

we still love our ap world teacher bc she genuinely cares about us

teaches an ap class but has never taken an ap class in high school

still teaches even tho he’s sick and his own students have asked him to stay at home so he can feel better

really fun discussion activities, like fishbowls

always drinking tea with a cool ass mug that has all the presidents of the united states on it

wears really cute clothes and coordinates colors

but sometimes will just pull up in pajamas

either way he’s Stylin

makes sure that students know that he doesn’t believe in racism and communism

always tells his students to take care when they say goodbye

draws LOTS of smiley faces

sometimes more confused about the content then the students are

but genuinely kind and hard working, even if it takes him 3 months to grade papers

sixth hour: theology with jung hoseok

confusing lectures

will talk about persecution in rome and then switch the topic onto blts (yes, the sandwich) and then talk about male circumcision

really goofy

deaf

talks very loudly because he takes his hearing aid out during lessons

honestly a really confusing teacher

a lot of people don’t like his teaching style, and neither do i, but it’s not a hard class so there’s really nothing to complain about

you really just need to read the slides in his class to pass

gives out homework but never grades it

i never turn in homework,,,

i get a’s on his test and he just gives good grades for every homework assignment

honestly just really sweet and funny even when he tries not to

talks with his hands way too much

will take selfies with you if you let him

constantly asking for validation from his students

“is my teaching style ok? i know it can be confusing but i really try with making lectures funny so you guys won’t be bored”

can sometimes be annoying but everyone loves him because he just doesn’t make sense

literally the best class to do other homework in

sees students as his friends

once we had a public discussion online about our concerns of the coronavirus instead of actually learning about theology

i said that i was worried that i’d die of the coronavirus before i got a boyfriend

he replied to my comment saying “1. you are killing me ! :) 2. i’m sure that you have a lot of secret admirers, so the boyfriend thing is covered, they just need to figure things out. remember maturity happens at different stages for everyone.”

even though i don’t like his class at times, i know i’m gonna miss how crazy he is

seventh hour: honors geometry with park jimin

Sweetest, Softest, Most Pure of all

gives out candy during tests

but not just any candy

the really good strawberry candies that grandmas always have and never run out of

sometimes the lessons go by too fast but yet too slow at the same time

a Literal Grandpa

doesn’t let kids say “shut up” or “dumb” in his class

claims that he doesn’t even say “shut up” to his own kids

always reminds kids that this is a No Judgement Zone

rewards students who answer challenging questions with little stand-up signs that say “Expert at Work” or “Rockstar” that they can put on their desk

will buy or make little stockings that spell out the initials of the high school

brags about his kohl’s cash

once bought a $50 scooter for only $5 dollars because of his kohl’s cash

stays after school for two hours to reteach lessons to students

takes little strolls around the school building with his friends during lunch

Mental Math Mondays

mondays are when we play mental math card games with the whole class

lets kids make their own card games

will ask if you’re okay if you look sad

will also ask if you’re okay if you look sleepy

asks kids to be patient with him when they have a confusing lesson to teach

wIll thoroughly explain everything to the best of his ability

definitely has never done anything wrong

this made me genuinely miss my teachers even though i hate school with my whole entire heart, soul, and mind! anyways love u guys

#thread #appreciation #bts #bts taehyung #bts namjoon #bts seokjin #bts yoongi #bts hoseok #bts jungkook #bts jimin #bangtan #bts thread #bts as teachers #bts appreciation

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arpwrites · 4 years

Note

arpu, how can we connect to our intuition? i know some say "meditate" but my mind is not calm and my butt itches most of the time. i cant stay still

this is actually perfect timing because I’m feeling the same way so helping you is also going to help myself 🌞✊🏽divine timing fr ✨

okay the goal is to get your mind to stop double checking every thought you have. we’re wired to check the veracity of our thoughts and discard ‘nonsense’ that comes from ‘nowhere.’ the subconscious mind kills it before we’re even aware of it. it goes back to the renaissance/age of reason where the scientific method (that was developed largely by muslim/arab scholars btw!) was heralded and factuality became an important component of clear, rational, logical, good thinking. it’s what you’re taught in school now and what is prized in technological societies.

so, we need to let the brain know it’s okay (and encouraged!) to have thoughts where the source of origin is unimportant. fun story: I accidentally did this when I read Einstein didn’t remember anything that could be looked up. this integrated itself into my worldview very deeply very quickly and I found myself remembering only interesting things without remembering or caring what the source was. didn’t help when I couldn’t pull stats out of my ass while arguing with someone, but did wonders for my intuition.

we can do this through repetitive activities where conscious thinking becomes irrelevant and/or you assign importance to ‘nonsense’ thoughts. this is the core of meditation too if you think about it – its about focusing on a single thing and acknowledging thoughts but not involving yourself in them. these activities will calm your mind in a similar way to meditation and also help your restless ass lol

morning pages!! I personally do this and I love it, it’s helped me grow immensely, I highly recommend it. when you write down every single thing in your head and just empty it out without stopping to consider its worthiness, you are telling your brain every thought is equally important and more of the subconscious intuition comes through to the surface.

random associations!!!!! let your mind wander

play this game with your friend!

pacing! I do this a lot, there’s an origin story if you’re interested lol but the main idea is this: put on music you’ve never heard before and walk really fast and/or run till you can’t think bc you’re barely able to breathe. focus on the music and let your mind wander and go wherever the music takes it. soon thoughts that are completely unrelated will pop up and though they really are nonsense in the beginning, keep encouraging it and u can tell when they eventually have truth to them

dancing! focus on nothing but the music and go crazy. doesn’t matter what kind but fast paced usually works better. don’t think about how to dance, think about it as the music controlling your body! you stop thinking and in that space, u can listen to the under-thoughts that usually go unnoticed

tbh, any activity u enjoy that takes up a lot of your focus + peripheral wandering thoughts. gardening! cutting 1000 stickers by hand! copying a textbook so u study and develop your intuition at the same time! there’s a lot of ways to integrate it into your daily life once u know what it feels like. this is pseudo meditation too btw.

overthink!!!!!!!!!! I loved doing this as I drove to uni every day lol. i’m not saying to distract yourself while driving! safety is most important!! but after the 100th time I drove the same route, I became a pro at it and my lizard brain took over. it didn’t need my thinking brain to drive. so I thought and thought uncontrollably and my thoughts got more nonsensical and irrelevant and there was no connection and like I said before, they were ridiculous at first. just my fears coming through. but then they started having truth to them and I started getting information about the universe and our purpose etc. etc. I think I had the most breakthrough intuitions while I was in that daze. I could predict things really accurately, it was spooky. I recommend this but its a double edged sword bc overthinking doesn’t help have a happy, healthy life. use it as a stepping stone and don’t! drive!! while u do it. pace instead or pour it into a private tumblr.

also! give importance to these random associations/thoughts! document them or record them however you can. write them down, text it to yourself. this tells your brain they’re valuable and encourages their production

dream journal!! do it first thing as soon as u wake up. and within a week or so you can reliably remember a loooooot of what happens and it also helps lucid dreaming actually. since dreams are nonsense anyway, repeated action tells the brain to encourage these types of thoughts and voila! intuition developed in daily life!

you have to Want it! your intentions create another layer of under-wiring in your brain that grows stronger with use and influences the overall synaptic network esp. the parts that control which thoughts are important and not. so start being curious! let things like trying to make predictions and having super powers take up space in your brain! try and guess things before they happen or guess what random strangers are about to do or predict the score you’ll get on a test. the more you do it, the more u tell your brain this is an Important Activity and then it builds the required ‘code’ to make that function run better. you’ll be completely off in the beginning but then slowly your success rate will climb.

like anything in life, you’ll get a lot better with practice. even if what i’m saying sounds like nonsense rn, try it a few times and you’ll see what I mean. btw, you don’t have to stick to a single method!! switch them around, everything counts as +1. you aren’t starting from zero with every new technique.

these should be enough for you to get a head start! if none of them work, let me know a bit about yourself and I can probably come up with more methods custom made for you~

also, this old post I wrote about meditation might help 🌞

good luck!!!!! hope you have as much fun as I did discovering your spiritual side 🌝💖

edit – special anon message for you: For meditation anon: There's a common misconception that meditation requires you to "quiet your mind" and disallow it to wonder, but really, it's more about getting into a flow state where you allow your thoughts to come and go with ease. It's mindfulness more than anything imo, acknowledging the thoughts but bringing yourself to a point where you aren't questioning/over-analyzing and thus reacting emotionally to them (like you ordinarily would throughout the day). It's okay to get distracted by your external environment or physical sensations, because you definitely WILL as a beginner, and still at times even if you're more advanced. It all comes down to practice, and the point is to train your mind, so any time you lose focus - Don't let it discourage you. Let it be a teacher of sorts. Refocus and try again. As you progress, you'll be less likely to get out of focus. Sitting isn't for everyone, definitely try things Arp mentioned, like walking!

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cruelangelstheses · 4 years

Text

but now i’m all smiles

fandom: love live! rating: G characters: nico yazawa, nico yazawa’s parents words: 2.6k additional tags: parent-child relationship, parent death, pre-canon, angst with a happy ending, terminal illness, grief/mourning description: when nico is six years old, she realizes her father is dying. a/n: hi all!! i wrote this for the @kindergarden-zine and now i can post it!! i wanted to explore nico’s relationship with her father, based on her school idol diary entry in which it’s pretty much all but stated that her father is dead. i had her call him “papa” and her mom “mama” because it says in the footnotes of the translation that she calls him “papa” in the original text of the diary entry. thank u for reading, enjoy!! <3

read it on ao3

—

It’s almost dinnertime, and Nico Yazawa is on top of the world.

She rides atop her father’s broad shoulders, feeling his large, warm hands holding her body so she doesn’t fall. Her body bounces as they make their way down the hill from her preschool and tread down the sidewalk of their neighborhood. They’re lucky to live so close—from up here, Nico can already see her house very faintly in the distance. She can see everything from up here, it seems: the houses, the preschool, the trees, the bright orange sky. It’s a perfect day.

Underneath her, her father says, “Do you want to sing your theme song, Nico?”

He asks her this question every day after school, and Nico always has the same response. “Yes!”

Her father counts to three, and then they both start singing together, a song her father made up just for her. “Nico nii, nico nii, ni-co ni-co nii! Nico nii, nico nii, ni-co ni-co nii! Smiling cheerfully, with a ni-co ni-co nii! Smiling like the sun, with a ni-co ni-co nii!”

The song always puts a smile on her face, but she supposes that’s the whole point. Her name, “Nico,” means “smile,” and her father has always told her that he wants her to keep on smiling, even when things get hard. That’s why Nico tries her best to smile even when she scrapes her knee on the playground, or when she doesn’t want to clean her room, and if she ever has trouble smiling, she just sings her father’s song. It always puts her in a better mood, but the best time to sing it is when she’s on her father’s shoulders, coming back from a long day at school, knowing that dinner should be ready by the time they get home. With the warmth of the setting sun on her face and her fingers able to touch the tree branches, she feels like she can go anywhere, do anything, be anything.

After a few rounds, her father lets her off of his shoulders so that they can walk the rest of the way together. They play hopscotch on the sidewalk, even though there isn’t any drawn on the ground. They’ve done this so many times that Nico has memorized the pattern: three hops on one foot, and then it goes two feet, one foot, two feet, one foot, two feet, and repeat. Of course, the pattern can vary, but this is the one she and her father go by, all the way from the sidewalk up the driveway and into the house.

She happens to land on both feet right when she makes it inside, and she and her father both cheer. “That means today is a lucky day!” her father says excitedly as he bends down to give her a congratulatory hug.

Nico grins so wide she thinks her face might split. It’s a good day, a perfect day, a lucky day.

—

That night, Nico awakens to the sound of sirens.

They’re louder than they usually are when she hears them in the distance, and the concerning part is that they don’t get quieter, don’t seem to fade away. Confused and annoyed, Nico pulls herself out of bed and wanders over to the window, standing on her tiptoes so that she can see over the windowsill. Her heart nearly stops right there.

Sitting in the driveway of her home is an ambulance.

Nico knows what an ambulance is, and she knows what it means. Ambulance equals hospital. Ambulance equals someone in danger.

Nico pounds out of her bedroom and nearly trips on her way down the stairs from running so fast. Her mother is standing in the living room, watching as a few men who look sort of like doctors or nurses wheel her father out the front door on some sort of portable bed. He looks like he’s sleeping.

“Mama,” she says, her voice sounding small and squeaky, like a mouse. “Mama, what’s happening?”

Her mother, who looks stressed but not devastated, sighs and rubs her eye tiredly. “Papa is going to the hospital,” she says. “Something urgent came up that they have to fix, but he’ll be fine after that.” She gives Nico a tiny smile, but Nico doesn’t feel much better.

Her father has some sort of sickness, has had it for as long as she can remember. He’s been in and out of hospitals before, but they were always appointments, regular check-ups to make sure he was doing okay or to give him some special medicine. He hasn’t had to do that in a while, though. The doctors said he was going to be fine; they called it “remission.” This shouldn’t be happening.

“Hey,” her mother says, pointing to her own face and smiling with her teeth. “Nico nico nii, remember?”

Nico tries her best to smile back. “Ni-co ni-co nii,” she chants, but she can still feel the fear in her heart.

Her mother nods. “Nico nico nii,” she repeats. “Now go back to sleep, sweetie. We’ll go visit Papa tomorrow, since you don’t have school.”

Nico nods and trudges back up the stairs. As she reluctantly climbs into bed, she sings her father’s song to herself, picturing his radiant and smiling face, but part of her feels betrayed—not by him, necessarily, but by the world. Today was supposed to be a lucky day.

—

They find out the next day that Nico’s father is probably going to have to stay in the hospital for a bit longer than they thought he would. The disease has come back, the doctors say; they call it a “recurrence,” a relapse. Nico tries to put on a brave face in front of her father, but it doesn’t feel right. It feels like lying. She knows he wants her to keep on smiling, but it’s hard to smile when she thinks about how he’s not going to be waiting for her after preschool, not going to carry her on those big, strong shoulders of his. Still, she finds some solace in the knowledge that it’s just for a little while, and then he’ll be back on his feet, playing hopscotch with her like he always does, and everything in the world will be right again.

—

He isn’t getting better.

Days turn into weeks, which turn into even longer, and still her father hasn’t been discharged from the hospital. New problems keep popping up—“complications,” they say—so they have to keep giving him different treatments. Her mother’s insistence that he’ll come home soon has started eroding away, and Nico can see through her halfhearted reassurances. They visit him in the hospital all the time, and he certainly doesn’t look like he’s getting any better. In fact, every time they visit him, he almost seems worse. He’s more tired, and he doesn’t look as big or strong as he used to. He still smiles whenever he sees them, though, a real smile, and despite everything, visiting him helps Nico smile, too.

One day near the beginning of winter, Nico’s mother takes her to a nearby florist, an old family friend, to pick out some flowers for her father. They did this a few months ago for his birthday, but today isn’t a special day, she doesn’t think, so she’s not quite sure why they’re doing it again.

“Sometimes it’s just nice to have flowers,” her mother tells her as they walk through the door. The tinkling of the bell that signals their arrival is music to Nico’s tiny ears.

She has to look at everything. Only the prettiest, happiest of flowers will do for her father, and there are just so many types and arrangements for her to assess. Some of them are too boring; some are too fancy. She needs something that will make her father happy, and she needs something that will show him how happy he makes her.

After considering several different arrangements of various pinks and blues, Nico finds herself drawn to an arrangement she almost missed, sitting on a somewhat higher perch near the back of the store. It’s simple but bright: yellow lilies punctuated by soft purple sweet peas. The contrast mesmerizes her, reminding her of when she and her father would color together. He would tell her about primary colors and complementary colors, and she would find herself surprised by how certain colors look better next to a particular hue.

“This one,” she calls. “This one, Mama!”

As they pay for the flowers, the florist tells them that this arrangement is great for expressing joy, as well as gratitude for the good times. Nico prides herself on picking the perfect gift, as always.

She’s so excited at the prospect of giving her father such a wonderful bouquet, she almost forgets that they’re seeing him in the hospital. She almost forgets that he’s been looking more sickly with every visit. She almost forgets that he’s dying.

Granted, nobody’s ever told her that he’s dying, but Nico can tell. She’s six now. She’s not dumb. She knows that death happens when someone is very old or sick and that it means they won’t come back. She knows that it’s sad, and she knows that it’s happening to her father. She’s long since stopped asking him when he’s going to come home.

Her mother carries the flowers and leads her through the hallways to her father’s room, a route she’s terribly familiar with by now. She hates the strange smells and sounds of the hospital, and she hates looking at the weird machines that her father is hooked up to. But it’s worth it to see him.

Her father smiles as soon as they walk in. “Nico!” he says, but his voice is weak, and he doesn’t seem to be able to move much. “Come give me a hug.”

Her mother helps her climb up onto a nearby chair so that she can lean over and hug him without hurting him. He feels soft and bony, not at all like the strong arms she remembers. She wonders if he would even still be able to lift her.

“Papa, I picked out flowers for you,” she says, plopping down on the chair. Her mother smiles and places the vase on the windowsill. Nico concludes that she made the right choice—she likes the way they immediately brighten up the dull gray of a cloudy winter day.

Her father grins. “They look lovely. So beautiful and cheerful. Just like you.”

Nico smiles briefly, but she can’t stop thinking about something the florist said to her mother when she thought Nico couldn’t hear. Nowadays sweet peas are mostly just used because they’re pretty, she said, but in flower language, they mean “goodbye.” Nico glances back over at the flowers, thinking about the message they’re sending: Thank you for all the happy times and for being such a wonderful father. Goodbye. I’ll miss you.

Her father must be able to tell that she’s preoccupied—of course he can—because he reaches over and takes her small hand in his large one. “Now, now,” he says, “it’ll be alright. Just remember the song. We can sing it together.”

Nico forces herself to smile again. “Okay.”

Her father counts to three, and then they both start singing, much softer than they would when walking home from school. “Nico nii, nico nii, ni-co ni-co nii! Nico nii, nico nii, ni-co ni-co nii!”

Both of their voices are shaking, his likely from the sickness, hers probably because she’s trying not to cry. But she loves her father, and she knows that all he wants is for her to be happy, so she keeps going. “Smiling cheerfully, with a ni-co ni-co nii! Smiling like the sun, with a ni-co ni-co nii!”

When they finish, Nico glances out the window and is surprised to see the first few flakes of snow drifting down. “It’s snowing!”

Her father laughs. “Well, would you look at that? Our singing brought the first snow of the season.” He pats Nico on the shoulder. “When you get home, Nico, I want you to go out there and have fun in the snow. No, twice the fun. Enough fun for you and me both.”

Nico nods and hugs him again, burying her face into his neck so that he doesn’t have to see her cry.

—

Her father passes away the next day.

The months that follow are a whirlwind of sorrow and strangeness. Life seems to simultaneously stop in its tracks, yet move too fast at the same time. Life as Nico knows it has stopped, but this new life, this life-without-her-father, feels like it’s running off without her, leaving her in the dust like a train she just missed.

That winter is the hardest winter of her life. The cold and the grayness are a perfect mirror for the mood that permeates the Yazawa household. No matter how much she reminds herself to keep smiling, no matter how many times she sings her theme song, no matter how many good memories she replays in her mind, the world still feels muted, the colors drained, the air freezing without the warmth of her father’s arms or smile. Even on days when the sun shines, it feels like it’s mocking them.

It’s over that lonely spring break, when it’s still too cold outside to properly be called “spring,” that Nico discovers idols. She’d known about them before, but she never really knew what they did, never really took an interest. Now, though, with nothing to do for a week and little motivation to do much of anything, Nico finds herself watching idol performances on television, fascinated by their perfect choreography, their matching outfits, their cheerful harmonies.

What really gets her, though, is the audience’s reactions. They yell so loudly that Nico wonders how their lungs don’t give out, waving multicolored lightsticks and sometimes shouting different phrases in unison. At the end of a performance, when the idols say their goodbyes and tell the crowd how much they love them, the fans cheer and even cry in happiness, and that’s when it hits her: a desire unlike any she’s ever experienced. A desire to share in that moment. A desire to make people happy.

Now that she thinks about it, becoming an idol seems obvious. It feels like her father has been preparing her for it all along by singing along with her and teaching her the importance of spreading happiness.

She remembers the song she’s been singing all her life. It was meant to make her smile, but maybe it can make others smile, too.

—

On the first day of elementary school, Nico stands in front of the mirror in her room, practicing her idol moves. She’s wearing an adorable pink skirt, her hair ties look like cherries, and her backpack is shaped like a bunny rabbit. Nico bends down both of her middle and ring fingers so that only her pinkies, pointer fingers, and thumbs are sticking out. “Ni-co ni-co nii!” she cheers, putting her hands up and smiling widely. It’s going to be a perfect day, maybe even a lucky day.

It’s still hard without her father, and she has a feeling that it’s going to be hard for a long time. But he wanted her to keep smiling, and that’s what she’s going to do.

“Nico!” her mother says as she leans up against the doorway. “Let me take a picture of you outside on your first day of elementary school!”

So they both head out the front door and slip their shoes on. Her mother stands in the yard and holds up her camera. “Smile!”

Nico strikes the same pose she was practicing in the mirror. Thank you, Papa, she thinks, and as she sends her love up to the heavens, Nico Yazawa, future number one idol in the universe, flashes a winning grin and sings, “Ni-co ni-co nii!”

#love live!#nico yazawa #love live school idol project #love live school idol festival #llsif #llsip #love live! fanfic #my fics

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emeraldwaves · 5 years

Text

Title: Say Yes For the Kamijirou V-Day Exchange! Pairing: Kamijirou Rating: T Word Count: 6,617 Read on Ao3 Summary:

For as long as she can remember, Jirou Kyouka has had a crush on Kaminari Denki. From their time at U.A to now being at the same agency, Kaminari has always been a constant in Jirou's life. However, every time he asks her to hangout out side of work, she knows it will lead to frustration and heartache. Eventually she hopes to get over this crush, even if seems inescapable.

Full fic under the cut! Thanks to @its-love-u-asshole for betaing

Jirou sat at her desk, tapping the end of her headphone jack against the wooden material. The day was so close to ending, and yet her annoyance grew and grew by the moment.

"Yeah! You're never going to believe what happened next," the blond man snorted and grabbed his stomach while he began to laugh.

Kaminari Denki had a distinct laugh. One Jirou had always been drawn to. It was nasally, but resonated deep in his chest, his whole body vibrating with the sound.

He was an idiot through and through, and yet, Jirou found herself watching him, listening to the way he spoke, enjoying the timbre of his voice as she honed in on it.

"I love this part, I love this part!" The other man Sero Hanta, his partner in crime, or... so to speak, always laughed with him. The two of them fueling each others jokes.

Who would've guessed they were pros now.

"So I grabbed her, trying to rescue her and she made some pun about how I'm positively electrifying..."

And now it was time for Jirou to tune out. So damn annoying. They really shouldn't be talking about their flirting and random hookups in the office. No one wanted to hear about it!

Especially not Jirou.

Okay, maybe it wasn't just his voice. Kaminari's face was also... stupid... but oddly handsome. Stupid, but handsome, words Jirou found herself thinking on occasion... or more often than not... or... all the time.

She huffed and pushed herself away from the desk. This was the problem with being at the same agency as her damn high school crush! Said crush was never going to go away, even though she knew he wasn't interested at all.

"Oi, oi! Jirou! Are you going home?!" Kaminari said, stopping her as she walked by. Why did he do this? She knew he could be an idiot, but was he so much of an idiot that he didn't realize she went home every day after her shift ended?

"Uh, yeah?" she said, popping her hip out as she looked at him and Sero.

"Scratch that plan and come with us out drinking!" he smiled.

This wasn't unusual. After their shifts, the two boys would go out for the night, occasionally meet up with Kirishima and Bakugou, if they could actually get the idiot out for the night. They invited her often and usually Jirou's response was...

"No."

Ugh. She hated the way his face fell, looking so disappointed she turned him down yet again. She knew how it would go though. The boys would all sit together and she would sit quietly with them, growing more and more annoyed with how rowdy they were. Then, Kaminari and Sero would wingman each other until they eventually went home with some girls or empty handed.

Either way, watching it was painful; for more than one reason.

"Aw! You always say no, Jirou!"

"I'm going out with Yaomomo tonight," she shrugged, flicking her jacks back and forth.

"Bring her!" Sero smiled.

"No way. We're not gonna sit there and try and talk while your drunk asses parade around the bar," Jirou scoffed. "Forget it."

Jirou really did hate when Kaminari actually looked disappointed. His bright eyes would turn to the floor and he'd let out the softest of sighs. "One of these days I'll get you to say yes!" he chuckled, pointing his finger at her. She could see the sadness glistening in his eyes and she resisted the urge to roll her own.

It wasn't like he would really even care if she was there or not.

"He invited you again?" Momo asked, gently blowing on her tea. The two girls sat on the floor of Jirou's small apartment.

"He invites me every time," Jirou said flatly, shrugging her shoulders.

"And you always say no even though you do want to go?" Momo hummed, cupping her hands around the hot porcelain.

Jirou's cheeks heated up, her eyes glancing to the side. "Why would I want to go to that?"

"Well because you-"

"Don't say it..." Jirou sighed, running her hand down her face. "I know it's totally pathetic," she mumbled, letting her chin rest against the table. "I just can't go and watch him leave and..."

Momo sighed. "Kyouka-chan, I really stand by what I've always told you. You should tell Kaminari-san how you feel-"

Jirou groaned, looking at her best friend with a flat expression. "I didn't tell you about my feelings so you could use them against me."

"I'm really not trying to use them against you," Momo giggled. "I'm trying to help you! We all think Kaminari-san would be thrilled if you asked him out."

Narrowing her eyes, Jirou leaned forward over the table. "Who exactly is 'we all'?"

Momo looked flustered, her finger brushing over the rim of the cup. "Y-You know... the girls... Ochako-chan, Mina-chan, Tsu-chan, Tooru-chan..."

"Do you guys just sit around talking about this?" Jirou muttered.

"Sometimes," Momo giggled. "But it's only because we want to see you two together and happy! Everyone knows Kaminari-san had a crush on you in high school!"

Jirou raised her eyebrow. "Yaomomo... I'm pretty sure Kaminari had a crush on every girl in high school." She said that, but she was honestly skeptical of herself being on that list. She recalled how perverted he could be sometimes and it never seemed like he was looking at her.

"N-No!" Momo said, waving her hands.

"You just didn't notice because you were crushing on Todoroki," Jirou teased.

"T-This isn't about me and Shouto-kun!" she hissed, taking a sip of her tea.

"Right, right," Jirou sighed; because Momo and Todoroki were together and happy and in love and blah, blah, blah. Yuck.

She was happy for her friends, she really was.

"How about next time he asks, we can all go out together! I'll bring Shouto-kun too," she said. Jirou couldn't imagine Todoroki sitting at a bar, it just didn't seem like his scene, but still, it was nice of Momo to offer.

"I dunno..." she mumbled.

"Okay, okay, new topic!" Momo said. "Iida-kun and I are working at getting the location for the class reunion together," she said.

"I still can't believe it's been five years," Jirou murmured. Five pathetic years of her still pining after some electric loser.

"Right!" Momo said, clapping her hands together. "We found this cute ballroom. We can set up a table and bar for food and drink in the corner and everyone can dance. There's also a beautiful balcony overlooking the city!" she explained, pulling up pictures on her phone. Jirou could imagine if she wasn't a hero, Momo would probably have been a party or wedding planner, she was so damn organized.

"Heh," Jirou smiled. "It looks perfect."

"I know!" Momo smiled, taking another sip of her tea. "Maybe you and Kaminari-san can dance together!"

"Oh my gosh, let it go!"

She wished she was more excited for the reunion, but Jirou kept imagining watching a lot of her friends dance together while she sat alone at a table, listening to the vibrations and tones of the popular music they chose to play.

"Morning, Jirou!" Kaminari smiled, walking by his desk. He was always a bundle of energy in the morning. Sometimes it reluctantly made her smile.

"Morning, Kaminari," she muttered, flicking her hand towards him.

This was how it would go, day in and day out. Kaminari would say good morning to her and then they both spent their mornings working through paperwork. Then, they would go their separate ways for patrols, occasionally respond to a villain call together, and then the end of the day would come and Kaminari would ask the same question he always did.

"Hey Jirou! We're going out! It's Thursday, so you should come," he smirked, leaning his hand against her desk.

Her eyes fell upon his fingers, looking at the small scars and calluses. She wondered briefly what would happen if she slipped her fingers forward and wrapped them around his. She could imagine he would probably freak out, maybe pull away... or think something was wrong with her. It could've been all of those things maybe...

"What does it being Thursday have to do with anything?" Jirou asked, tilting her head up at him.

"I dunno..." Kaminari shrugged. "It's kinda close to the weekend?"

She snorted and glanced at her phone. Maybe Momo was right. Maybe if she went out they could talk and she could stop feeling so damn sorry for herself. Jirou Kyouka wasn't some lovesick fool!

"Fine," she sighed, folding her arms over her chest. "I'll go with you."

Kaminari gasped, his eyes widening. "Really?! You will!?"

"Yeah, just this once Sparky," she snorted, pointing her headphone jack at him.

"Okay, okay, we'll be on our best behavior!" he said, and dashed back to his desk to grab his coat. "Let's get going!"

The walk to the bar wasn't very far, and Jirou followed casually behind them while Kaminari excitedly bragged to Sero that he was the one who actually convinced Jirou to come out.

"See!" he said, plopping down in one of the booths. "I can get Jirou to do anything!"

"Yeah, right," she snorted, taking a seat next to him. "I was just in the mood for a drink is all. You two are collateral."

"Ouch dude," Sero winked, smirking at Kaminari.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll grab us some drinks." He scooted out of the bar and immediately returned, the three talking and drinking jovially while they all ordered another round.

"Jirou was so cool the other day, against that one bat villain," Kaminari laughed, starting on his next drink. "You were perfect for that job!" he said, nudging her side.

"Thanks," she smiled, her cheeks warm and red. She was on her third drink now and it was hitting her harder than she expected it to. "You guys are, uh, always doing great too."

"Hell yes, but you, man... Jirou... you're incredible!"

"S-Shut up!" she said and jabbed her jack against his cheek.

"O-Ow!" he laughed, grabbing his cup. "I'm gonna go refill! How about you guys?"

"I'm good," Jirou said, shaking her head. The last thing she needed was to be hungover at work tomorrow.

"I'll take one more!" Sero laughed, gently hitting his hand on the table.

"Gotcha! Be right back!" he said, pointing at them, stumbling back over to the bar.

"You know," Sero sighed, leaning back against the booth. "He really does think you're incredible."

"Eh?" Jirou gasped, glancing over towards Kaminari leaning against the bar. He was laughing, talking to some guy sitting at the counter, his body leaning over the bar. "What are you-"

"I mean he talks about it all the time, how awesome you are. He's always saying you're gonna end up climbing the ranks way above us," Sero said, glancing at him. "He's an idiot, but he's a good guy. That is... he means well."

"Yeah I never... thought he was bad..." Jirou muttered. Her eyes turned up quickly when she heard him laugh from across the bar. It was always a noise which drew her in, even if it wasn't aimed at her. The loud, raucous sound echoed into her ears and made her turn towards him immediately. Her gaze was fixated on Kaminari now. He was speaking to a woman. Her fingers were wrapped around his shoulder, and she tossed her long dark hair back, laughing at something he said. She was pretty and her lips glistened in the bar lighting... she had on a cute dress too which fit snugly around her waist. Kaminari laughed back, the evil tempting sound drawing her eyes to where his hands fell, patting against her hip.

This was exactly the problem.

"But you know... I really should get going. I don't know how you two do this all the time! I'm exhausted!" she said, faking a yawn and pushing herself out of the booth. "This should cover me," she said, tossing some money down on the table before stepping out of the bar. If Sero called after her, she definitely didn't hear him.

Kaminari thought she was incredible? So what? He thought everyone was incredible. Kaminari Denki was the kind of person who could be friends with anyone. He was the kind of person to lift everyone up. It was one of the things Jirou liked about him so much.

She couldn't quite remember when her crush on Kaminari began... but it was sometime during school. For a while, he would give her various compliments and it would always make her blush. Whenever she succeeded at the tests, he would be telling her how amazing she was. When she sang for the class, he constantly brought up how talented she was.

It wasn't until far later on that she realized her blushing was because her heart fluttered a little harder every time they spoke. Her mind often wandered, wondering what it would be like to hold his hand, and as she grew older so did her thoughts, imagining what it would be like to kiss him and more.

That's why it hurt so much to see him with other women. She had no right to be mad at him, especially when she hadn't even tried.

The next morning at her desk, Jirou decided she regretted getting drinks with Kaminari and Sero. Her head was pounding and she felt a little nauseous, even having downed multiple glasses of water before bed.

She even texted with Yaomomo a bit, telling her about the fiasco. Still, Momo said she was proud of her for going at all.

"Morning, Jirou! I'm sad I didn't get to say goodbye last night-"

"Forget it, Kaminari," she snorted, pressing her head against her hand.

"Hungover? It has been awhile for you," he sighed, shaking his head dramatically.

"Ugh, go away," she groaned. "You're too loud!" She just didn't want to be around him anymore.

"O-Oh..." he said, rubbing the back of his neck. "Sorry Jirou. I have some uh, Advil, if you need it."

She ignored him, letting him walk away. All of this was getting to be too much. Five years they had worked at the same agency... and over five years Jirou had held these secret feelings. She had to move on.

Maybe at the five year reunion she could just blurt out her feelings and then disappear into a hole and never be heard from again. Maybe if she just got them off her chest all would be better.

"Oi! Jirou! Kaminari! It's a code red! They need all of us downtown pronto!" Sero called out, waving his arm towards them as he frantically ran by their desks.

Whatever her feelings were, she would have to put them aside for now. She pushed herself up from her desk and grabbed her communicator, heading towards the stairs, Kaminari running directly behind her.

"I know I probably shouldn't find this exciting cause... there's a villain and all, but uh, it's always awesome working a mission with you," he said, running down the stairs with her.

So much for pushing aside those feelings. "Y-Yeah..." She hated how her voice caught in her throat, and she hoped he would chalk it up to her running, instead of being a total loser around him.

"I trust you in the field," he nodded.

"Me too. I mean... I trust you," she said.

Every time she talked to him it seemed to just deteriorate more and more.

The villain's quirk allowed him to spit up water and he was flooding the streets downtown, causing extreme panic and havoc, regular citizens attempting to escape the flash flood.

Jirou bit her lip. This wasn't a good situation for Kaminari. Any electricity used would ultimately shock anyone touching the water... but if they could isolate the villain from the water, then maybe...

"Chargebolt!" she called out, running up next to him. "We need to get this villain above the water. If we do-"

"I can shock him and send him plummeting down into the water."

"Yes!" she nodded. "We can use Cellophane's tape to wrap him up if we catch him."

"Perfect!" Sero nodded, giving her a thumbs up. The three of them pressed against the corner of the wall and Jirou slowly lowered her headphone jack into the water. The distortion made her ears ache and she pressed her hand close to her head.

"Hgn...." she grunted.

"Jir- er... Headphone Jack," Kaminari hissed, kneeling down with her. All these years and he was still terrible at using hero names in the field. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, it's just distorted weirdly, I can't hear how close he is, the sound is uh, warbled?" she said, trying to explain.

"Mmm..." Kaminari hummed, keeping his hand on her shoulder while she focused. The vibrations from his footsteps, though masked by the water were getting closer. She took a deep breath and moved her hand to her chest, focusing on each wobbly step.

"Now," she hissed.

Sero jumped forward, shooting his tape towards the large man, swinging himself around to wrap the tape around his body. The villain shot spits of water towards him and Sero jumped down onto the balcony of the nearby building, bracing himself as he yanked the man into the air. "Now Charge! Go!" he called out and Kaminari leaped out, aiming his finger directly towards the man.

Jirou stepped forward, pulling herself up onto an overturned car, not wanting to be touching the water just in case.

Kaminari sent a bolt of electricity directly towards the man, his body shaking from the shock. Sero immediately yanked on his tape, pushing the man down towards the flooded street, his body flopping over as it jerked about in the water. He screamed, his voice loud and trembling, the water sparking around him.

As Jirou was about to cover her ears, she noticed Kaminari starting to fall back towards the water, with nowhere to land. Idiot! Why hadn't he thought of that when he originally jumped out?!

He began to laugh... or scream? Or maybe both. The sound struck fear into her chest.

She didn't want to lose that laugh. She wanted to hear it again, over and over, everyday until she could hear no longer.

"Kaminari!" she yelled. Stretching her ears towards him, she wrapped around his body, yanking him towards her on the car, both of them falling backwards.

"E-Eh?! J-Jirou!" he breathed. "Shit... you saved me..."

"Of course I did dumbass!" she yelled, her ears still clutched tightly around him. "You would've electrocuted yourself if you landed in the water right next to him."

"Eh... I'm used to it," he shrugged.

She rolled her eyes and quickly unwrapped the headphone jack, letting him flop forward on top of the car. He was such an idiot!

"Besides, I told you I trusted you in the field. I had nothing to worry about."

"Dumbass!" she snapped, her jack poking at his cheek.

"Ow! Jirou!" he whined and rubbed his cheek with his hand. Still, he pushed his glasses up and turned to look at her with a smile. "Thanks, Jirou, for saving me. My hero!" he sighed dramatically, his face far too handsome for his own good.

Her shoulders rose slightly, her cheeks flushing. "W-Well..." she coughed. "Someone had to save your dumb ass..."

"I'm glad it was you," he laughed, giving her a thumbs up.

Yeah. So much for pushing those feelings away.

Flopping face first into her pillow, Jirou groaned as she lay in her bed. This was so stupid. Everything about it was just stupid.

The group walked back to their office and Jirou said goodbye to Kaminari and Sero, happy to hear both of them were going home after the stressful battle with the villain. She loved doing hero work. It was always very fulfilling, but it was tiring, and sometimes scary.

And sometimes it made her wonder if she should just tell Kaminari how she felt. What if she hadn't caught him today? He claimed he was used to being electrocuted, and while that might have been true, how would he have fared in the water?

She sighed and rolled onto her back, staring at the ceiling. Her hand flopped around beside her as she tried to reach for her phone.

[Text Momo]: Do you think I should tell Sparky at the reunion?

[Text from: Momo]: Tell him!

It was an unsurprising answer. Honestly Momo was probably sick of hearing Jirou complain about it so often.

Maybe it would've been easier to get over him if they didn't work at the same damn agency, if she didn't save his damn cute ass from near death or whatever... Or maybe it would be easier if she just told him how she felt. If she spoke the words out loud, really let them vibrate in her chest, her feelings would finally escape her and she could be free from her self-inflicted torture.

[Text Momo]: Or maybe I just won't go at all.

[Text from: Momo]: You can't miss the reunion.

She could almost see her best friend's face. She would probably be devastated if Jirou didn't come to an event she planned, especially one where all their friends would be. It wasn't like Jirou wanted to miss out on seeing all her old classmates...

[Text Momo]: Fine, but if I cry, I'm blaming you.

[Text from: Momo]: I promise you won't cry.

Jirou wasn't much of a crier anyway, but after keeping feelings bottled up for years upon years, maybe everything would just explode out of her like a sound wave she couldn't hold back.

She put her phone down with a sigh.

She supposed it was unavoidable now.

"You look stunning, Kyouka-chan!" Momo smiled, clapping her hands together as she adjusted the small ribbon she placed across Jirou's har.

"I guess," she hummed. She supposed she looked as good as one could for their heart's demise.

"No seriously! This dress is very fashionable, and it looks amazing on you!" Momo gently tugged on the small skirt of the dress, smoothing it out for her. "I love it!" she smiled.

"Yeah, thanks," she shrugged, knowing Momo wouldn't let her get away with wearing anything but something cute.

The two decided to meet a few hours before the reunion. It was probably one of the more girly things she had done recently. When Momo was involved, she didn't mind being a little more girly than normal.

She twisted her hips, trying to look at the dress from various angles. It really did look nice and for a moment she wondered if Kaminari would like it. He did always look a little surprised when she wore a dress, it would be cute to see that shocked look on his face yet again.

No. It wasn't good to get her hopes up. Not at all. She saw how he acted with the woman in the bar, she saw how he acted other nights and the way he spoke with Sero.

Damn, she was an idiot. Why was she so bad at feelings?

She followed Momo to the car heading to the private venue. She spoke about how excited she was for everyone to see it, and she nervously chattered on about being worried about the food and if there would be enough and all the things that suddenly came to a head now that she was supposed to be done with planning.

"Yaomomo," Jirou said softly. "It's going to be great." She gently touched Momo's knee, hoping she would calm down a bit. "You should enjoy yourself tonight. I bet Todoroki can't wait to dance with you."

"E-Eh!?" she gasped, and cupped her own cheeks. "Do you think so!?"

"I know so," she giggled. Momo could be so adorable when she got all flustered.

"I think tonight will go well for you too," she nodded, and Jirou wondered where her blind confidence came from.

"Guess we'll find out."

The two girls made their way into the dance hall, where many of their classmates were already buzzing about. It was a beautiful dance hall, just as Momo had described, tall ceilings, decorated with ornate chandeliers and long windows which all looked out onto the city. The floors were smooth, shimmering with a polish that looked as if it was brand new. The wood glistened against the sparkling lights.

There were tables against the walls with various food dishes and drinks, as well as some circular tables in the back where some people were already sitting and chatting. Some Class B students looked excited and happy to be enjoying their meals.

Towards the front there was a live band, and the music caught Jirou's ears immediately. It was soft and unimposing, but it was something they could dance to if they wanted to. However, no one was yet, probably too early for that.

"Jirou-san! Yaoyorozu-san! It is so good to see you both!" Iida called out, waving his arms frantically. He seemed to be the greeting squad.

"It's good to see you too, Iida," Jirou smirked, happy to see the energetic man hadn't changed at all.

Momo bowed her head. "Please try to enjoy yourself tonight, Iida-san," she said and smiled. "We worked hard."

"Yes! I want to make sure this event is a positive experience for all!"

Jirou swallowed. Yes... didn't they all.

"Shouto-kun!" Momo smiled, waving as they approached him and Deku standing by one of the circular tables.

"Ah... Momo," he hummed and wrapped his arms around her waist, pressing his nose to her cheek.

Right. Sometimes Jirou forgot just how disgustingly in love they were until she saw them.

"Hello Midoriya-san!" Momo said, pulling away from Shouto to greet their other friend.

"Hello Yaoyorozu-san! Jirou-san!" Deku smiled and waved. He was always so cheerful, even after the many hardships he faced over the years.

The group of them decided to get food together, enjoying the festivities from the table while they ate. The food was delicious, and Jirou ate faster than she meant to, especially seeing as her nerves kept rising and rising.

"The party is wonderful," Todoroki smiled and slid his hand down to take Momo's. She smiled and leaned towards him.

"I'm so glad you think so! We worked hard to find a good venue," she nodded.

"Yeah, it's so beautiful," Jirou murmured, glancing around the room.

She heard his laughter first, the chortle hitting her ears like a ton of bricks. She could've picked it out from anywhere. He was doubled over, his elbow nudging a very angry looking Bakugou, and Kirishima was desperately trying to hold Bakugou back from exploding anymore than he already probably was going to.

Whatever. Kaminari probably deserved it.

Still, he looked like he was having so much fun.

"Kyouka-chan?"

"Huh?" she blinked, turning to look at Momo. She had her arm hooked through Todoroki's and she smiled.

"I was just wondering if you would be okay if Shouto-kun and I danced for a bit."

"Oh!" Jirou blinked, realizing she must have been spacing out. "Yeah go for it." She wasn't going to stop them from dancing just because she would probably sit alone for a bit. Many of their classmates had already paired off, taking time for each other to dance. Even Iida was dancing with Hatsume... an unlikely pair that somehow worked.

She stroked her finger over the tablecloth, letting her jacks flick back and forth gently with the beat of the music. She hummed along, the rhythm of the song a simple one she was able to decipher and guess as she enjoyed the sound.

"Oi, Jirou-"

She immediately froze, snapped from her music hypnosis. She wasn't surprised to come face to face with the one person she knew she shouldn't be avoiding.

"Kaminari-"

"You're probably going to say no-"

"I need to-"

"Huh? Oh... you go first," Kaminari said, awkwardly gesturing towards her.

"No, no... uh... you go ahead," she insisted, her cheeks flushing pink.

"Well..." Kaminari's bright yellow eyes moved back and forth quickly. "You look really nice."

"Oh uh... right," she giggled nervously, gently touching the side of one her jacks. "Yaomomo picked it out."

"I guess I'll have to tell her she did a good job," he chuckled. "Anyway, I, uh... wanted to ask... and you can totally say no. In fact, you probably will, knowing you... but do you wanna maybe... you know..." He pushed his thumb towards the dance floor.

"Dance?" she asked, raising her eyebrows. Was he really asking her to dance?

"Yeah!" he cheered and grabbed her hand. He blushed and suddenly let go as if he realized she hadn't actually said yes. "Uhm... I mean if you want to."

"Yeah..." she whispered. "I... I really do."

"Great!" he smiled, pulling her quickly to the dance floor.

The music was louder now, the sounds echoing in her sensitive ears. At least it drowned out the sound of her beating heart.

Kaminari smiled, wrapping his arm around her waist as he pulled her close, his fingers lacing around hers. The two of them began to sway with the music, and Kaminari snorted. "I... actually haven't done this much, so sorry if I suck."

"You're a little stiff," she teased, a smirk pulling across her lips. "But it's not too bad."

"Oh thank you, wise expert," he laughed softly, and oh gosh she wondered how it would sound if they were close together, curled up in bed, sharing secret laughs they would only show to each other.

"Psh," she scoffed. "I'm good with music, not dance."

"I dunno, you look pretty great right now."

She balked. She hated that she did, but her feet almost froze, and she did her best not to completely stumble over herself. "T-Thanks," she said.

She allowed the music to take control of her body, swaying in time with the soft violins and gentle piano. Kaminari wasn't speaking, but his golden eyes looked kind as always, and he was staring at her so intensely.

Her hand squeezed his and tried to not look away. He was so cute, smiling at her; for just this one moment she was his entire world. It was like something out of a fairy tale. The music lifted her heart, echoing in her ears and for a brief second it was just her and Kaminari... no one else around. It felt like her feet were gliding across clouds and his smile made her cheeks heat with a fire she hadn't felt in so long.

This would never be how it was. After this song, her bubble would burst. It wasn't like anything beyond this moment would ever be real. He probably only asked her because all of his friends were off dancing with someone. Kaminari didn't actually care about dancing with her. He probably just didn't want to look like an idiot alone.

"I-I'm..." she said, and shook her head, stepping away from him, her illusion shattered.

"Jirou?" Kaminari took a step forward, his hand outstretched.

"I'm sorry!" she gasped and immediately dashed away from him.

She needed to get air. Her head was drowning in the sound of the band and the room suddenly felt small, constricting her chest and suffocating her. She pushed towards the doors and swung them open, running to the balcony. Her body lurched forward when she stopped herself at the railing, gasping for air.

How could she have been such a fool!?

Kaminari was all about having fun... going out with his friends. Jirou was a quiet loser who did her job and didn't know how to have fun or appreciate a moment apparently.

She was such an idiot.

And now she was an idiot about to cry.

"JIROU!" Kaminari gasped, his body falling forward as he tried to catch his breath. "W-Why did you run-"

"L-Leave me alone, Kaminari!" she yelled, quickly wiping her eyes.

"I-I just... did I do something wrong?" Oh gosh, his voice. It sounded like he was breaking just as much as she was. She could hear every small hitch of his breath, every crack trapped in his throat, every breath deep and desperate.

"W-What? No... I just... look I felt stupid making you dance with me."

"Making me?" Kaminari tilted his head, taking a few steps closer. She curled her hands around the rail. "But... Jirou, I asked you."

"Oh... right..." she muttered and looked down at the ground. "No!" she called out. "I'm fine!"

"Please," he said, still approaching her. "I just wanna fix it if I upset you!"

"Y-You didn't!" she said and shook her head, not wanting him to get closer.

He frowned and gently took her hand in his. "Then why did you run away? Why are you looking like you're standing here crying? How can I not think that's my fault when you randomly run away from-"

"I like you!" she yelled, blurting out the words as fast as she could get them out of her mouth.

"-and it’s not... wait... what?" He looked at her, confusion clear on his face.

She tried to yank her hand away, but he held on tighter. "You heard me. Now I can move on and leave you alone."

"Wait... move on?" Kaminari said, staring at her. "Jirou... But I... You... like me?"

She nodded up and down slowly. Jirou never before wished so greatly that her headphone jacks were larger so she could cover her whole face and maybe even her whole body.

"You... like me?" he repeated, pointing at himself and then at her.

"Yes. What part of that don't you understand!?" she said, blushing furiously. She wished his hand wasn't gripping hers so tightly, both of them stuck in place.

Kaminari bit down on his lip and shook his head, small laughs and snorts slipping from his mouth. Was he laughing?

Not fair. She was always so weak to his cute, nasal laugh, even if was directed at her. Kaminari Denki with all his stupid, cute charm.

"Yes. Ha-ha. So funny. We can move on."

"W-Wait!" he said and grabbed her other hand, squeezing both now. "I-I'm sorry, I was just... so surprised..." he whispered. "All this time, I've been... trying to get your attention and I thought you hated me! I mean you always said no to going out, but Sero told me to keep trying and now you're telling me you like me!"

"...S-Sorry, what?"

"Duh!" Kaminari laughed, swinging their hands back and forth. "I mean I kept asking you out because I liked you. I guess I've kinda always liked you..." he admitted, his golden eyes focused so hard on their hands.

What?

She couldn't bring herself to ask. Not yet... she needed him to keep speaking, even if his voice was a trembling mess.

"In high school, I always thought you were the coolest. Kickass, smart, the best singer I know... I mean I knew you were way out of my league. Then we started working together and I just kept thinking about how cool you were... on missions, even just doing paperwork you always looked so... uh... focused? I suck at that!" he laughed again, the sound resonating in the air.

"That's why I kept asking you out for drinks. I wanted to... ask you out on a date... but you always said no to even hanging out... so I tried to just let it go... but it was hard..." he admitted. "Then tonight you looked, so perfect in the dress... I just had to ask you to dance..."

"Wait... that was you asking me out?" she gasped, thinking of all the many times she said no, instead choosing to sit in her apartment.

"I mean n-no! It was sort of like pre-asking you?"

"But you were always hanging out with other girls..."

"I mean... you said no. I kept trying to moving on. It just didn't work so great. I rarely ever made it out of the bar with any of them. Usually I just... went home on my own. It was too weird," he muttered.

"Kaminari Denki you absolute idiot," she said softly, a laugh slipping from her lips. All this time they could've been together. They could've been a thing...

"I dunno! I still feel like you're pretty out of my league!"

"Yeah... I probably am," she whispered, turning her dark eyes towards his. She pressed herself up, brushing their lips together.

"Finally..." he whispered and pulled away from her hands to cup her cheeks, pulling their lips close together, kissing her softly.

His lips were a little dry, but he kissed her gently, as if her lips might break if he pressed too hard.

"Yeah... guess it really does feel like 'finally'..."

"Yeah..." Kaminari chuckled, and damn she loved how gentle his voice was against the cool night air. "Could we uh... maybe finish that dance? And then... maybe I could take you on a real date?"

"I think I'll say yes, to both," she smiled.

He pulled her close to him again, his arm wrapped around her waist, his hand curled around hers. They began to sway, the sound of their shoes soft against the balcony as they danced underneath the stars. In the distance, she could still hear the violins and piano from inside, but she liked the faint noise. Right now, dancing with Kaminari made her feel like she was floating, her own personal fairy tale, just as she imagined earlier.

Kaminari actually liked her back! It wasn't a dream...

And she could've danced out there all night forever.

Kaminari sighed and wrapped his hands behind his head, leaning backwards. "Man, patrols are so lame. Especially when nothing happens!"

"You want crime to happen?" Jirou scoffed, narrowing her eyes at her rather stupid boyfriend.

"Uh... no?" he muttered, shrugging when she nudged her elbow into him. "I mean it's better with you here at least," he sighed dramatically, wrapping his fingers around hers.

They were lucky they were able to patrol together. It made it easier to spend time together, even though they often took turns spending the night at each others places. Jirou loved looking at Kaminari in the morning, his quiet, sleeping form, the way his gentle breath trickled from his lips.

Her boyfriend was stupid, but also perfect.

"So are we going on that double date with Yaomomo and Todoroki this weekend?" he asked, swinging their hands back and forth.

"Yup," she nodded. "Yaomomo is really excited, so don't be weird about it!"

"Why would I be weird about it!?" he sighed. "You always make these assumptions-"

"-which are usually true."

"Okay, okay. I'll just act like myself! It's not like we're not all friends," he shrugged.

"Yeah, yeah," Jirou snorted, laughing at how casual he was being. Knowing Momo they would go somewhere fancy and Kaminari would be totally out of his element but it would be cute to kinda watch him stumble.

He puffed out his cheeks, but then his golden eyes lit up, like he had an amazing idea. "So if I ask you to get dinner after work, just you and me, you'll say yes now right?"

Jirou rolled her eyes and poked her jack against his cheek. "I guess I could say yes."

"Good!" he said, and began to chuckle. "I'll check in with you after work." He winked.

Dork.

He could've asked her now and she would've said yes.

Instead the two of them laughed, continuing their patrol, his laugh reverberating in her chest, making her feel warm and happy... and maybe a little bit in love.

That damn, stupid laugh.

#kamijirou #kaminari denki #jirou kyouka #bnha #boku no hero academia #pro heroes #future fic #pining jirou #minor side todomomo

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face-turn · 7 years

Text

All I Do Is Drive

Pairing: Sami Zayn/Dean Ambrose Words: 3.1k Rating: G A/N: i have.. no explanation. take this from my hands. for context, this was written after smackdown on 8/29. thank u @breadclubrising for ur encouragement Tags: I.. guess let me know if you want to be tagged in Sambrose content in the future

Sami’s stretching after his match. One leg, then the other. Don’t think about Kevin’s hands. Lean all the way over his feet, nose to knees, until he feels the achy burn in his hamstrings. Stop thinking about Kevin lifting him, throwing him.

“Hey, Zayn.”

Sami blinks and nearly topples, stumbling a couple of steps forward before hands catch the back of his leggings and rebalance him. The hands are familiar, the voice-- Sami always forgets, somehow, that Dean doesn’t have the Southern drawl that seems like it would suit him. He’s Cincinnati through-and-through, that not-an-accent accent that softens his vowels and makes him mispronounce ‘syrup’.

“Dean,” Sami says, sounding about half as baffled as he feels, which is pretty baffled. They’re not-- friends, is the thing. Up until right now, Sami had no reason to believe that Dean even remembered his name. The last time they’d spoken was-- what, a year ago? “Good match earlier. You looked, uh. Good. In your match.”

Dean chomps his gum, blowing a fragile chewing-gum bubble that pops immediately. Sami can smell the mint.

“Thanks, thanks. Hey, d’you wanna go out later?” He says it like Sami hasn’t just finished being the most awkward person on the planet. It’s something that Sami has always appreciated about Dean. His willingness to overlook just about anything. He might just be unobservant, but Sami’s always been willing to give the benefit of the doubt. Again and again and again. Stupid.

Sami is startled enough by the question, anyway, to pause. He actually glances around to make sure Kevin or someone isn’t peeking around a corner, Scooby-Doo style. He trusts Dean, as far as anyone can trust someone who’s teaming with someone who’s punched you in the face before, but-- well. He’s teaming with someone who’s punched Sami in the face before.

“Oh, I-- I can’t, I don’t drink.” That’s all anyone does when they go out later. Someday, someone’s going to ask Sami if he wants to go out later, and they’ll mean... feeding ducks, or going ice skating, or--

“Naw, I was thinkin’, like. Going for a walk maybe? There’s a haunted hotel and I bet I can see a fuckin’ ghost.”

Sami squints at him, then considers his plans for the evening, which had mostly been made up of slouching around eating store-bought hummus and carrot chips.

“Yeah, okay. Do you have a car, because I was riding with, uh--” Sami studiously avoids Dean’s eyes, which have widened with surprise for a moment. Do people not usually go with him to-- haunted houses, or whatever? Dean has friends, right? “Yeah, yeah, I got it. You know me, big star. Sharing rides is for scrubs.” Dean snaps his gum and jerks his thumb over his shoulder. “I’m parked in the further lots. Want me to swing around and pick you up?”

Sami considers his things in his bag at his feet, the ring gear currently sticking to his thighs. “If you’ll wait five minutes, I’ll walk with you?” He doesn’t mean to phrase it as a question. It just comes out that way.

“Go shower, Zayn,” Dean taps his bare wrist. “You’re on the clock now, brother. Get.”

Sami gets. The shower is barely lukewarm and the water pressure is pretty much what you’d expect, but it’s still nice to get out of sweaty gear and into sweatpants and a soft hoodie. It’s not weird to wear your own merch out of the ring, right? Right.

Sami wishes, foolishly, for a second, that he had something nicer to change into, but-- it’s not a date. And even if it were, Sami knows, Dean wouldn’t care. That’s another thing that Sami’s always liked about Dean. Kevin had always had something to say about what Sami was wearing, but Dean-- Sami’s pretty sure that he could wear a trash bag to hang out with him and Dean would just accept that. He wonders if Dean even owns a suit.

He loses a few seconds contemplating that image, halfway through tying the drawstring on his sweatpants tighter. Dean has to have a suit, right? He went to the hall of fame-- thing. Sami resolves to google it.

He ducks out of the locker room, expecting to sort of have to hunt Dean down. He doesn’t know if Dean’s actually the type to wander away when he gets bored, but Kevin always had and sometimes Sami had been left behind as a result. But no, there he is, leaning up against the wall, wearing jeans that really just highlight how narrow his waist is. Sami wonders if he sleeps in jeans, or what. He can’t imagine doing that-- but then again, he can’t imagine wanting to wrestle in jeans, either, but Dean is really good at that.

“Sami Zayn!” Dean says, like they’re just running into each other and he hasn’t been waiting.

“Hi,” Sami says, flustered. “Did I beat the clock?”

“Oh, I dunno-- man, I don’t have a watch.”

Sami can’t help but laugh, even though he’s not completely sure that Dean’s telling a joke. Dean’s mouth quirks up, though, so at the very least he’s not offended by Sami laughing in his face.

“You ready to rumble, big--Zayn? Big Zayn?” Sami takes the stumble in stride. Dean’s not the only one who can ignore awkward conversational tics.

“Sure am. How far away is this hotel?” “Oh,” Dean says, looking a little shifty. “You know.”

Sami obviously doesn’t know, but he lets it slide. He’d go even if it were four hours away. He can let Dean keep secrets.

“Okay,” He says when Dean doesn’t stop eyeing him expectantly. “I don’t care.”

“Cool,” Dean bobs on his heels. Back and forth. “Cool cool. Car’s this way, lemme just--” He shoulders Sami’s bag, even though Sami could absolutely carry his own bag. Just because he’s been losing a lot doesn’t mean he’s incapable.

It’s-- kind of nice, though. Thoughtful. Sami can’t remember the last person to carry his bag for him when he wasn’t even injured. Finn, maybe? Not Kevin. He wishes he could stop thinking about Kevin. Sami doesn’t want to give Kevin the satisfaction of keeping him in mind, but-- well. Sami can’t help it. At least Kevin never has to know.

Sami half expects the walk to the car to be uncomfortably silent. They don’t have that much in common, as far as he knows, and Dean doesn’t really seem like a small talk kind of guy. What he doesn’t count on, though, is Dean being so excited about everything.

“D’you think that we’ll see a ghost, or just hear one? Or maybe some, like-- ghost noises. Like footsteps.” Sami, who isn’t necessarily a believer in ghosts, ponders this. “I think-- if you hear them, I think they’ll be racist?”

Dean actually stops walking for a second. “-- Yeah?” He sounds cautiously interested.

“There were lynchings here,” Sami nods, turning to walk backwards so he can keep talking without feeling rude. “Not even a hundred years ago. And I’d like to think that, uh. The people who get lynched get to go to heaven, or whatever they believe in. So they wouldn’t be ghosts?”

As soon as he’s done saying it, Sami feels silly for thinking through the logic of it, but Dean’s nodding and walking again, lengthening his strides to catch up.

“Good call,” He says slowly, shrugging Sami’s bag up higher. “Next question-- you think I can wrestle a ghost?”

As soon as they get into the car, Dean pops in a CD while studiously not looking at Sami out of the corner of his eye. It’s fine-- not really Sami’s thing, some kind of slowish countryish Johnny Cash situation, but he knows from personal experience that the tension down Dean’s spine is an anxious desire for approval. He bops along like he would to his music, and Dean’s shoulders relax. The corner of his mouth quirks up into a crooked little grin and his fingers tap on the steering wheel as they peel out.

It’s worth the white lie.

Dean’s a fun road trip partner, even when the road trip isn’t especially long. He’s willing to sit in silence when the conversation dies naturally, but he’s also a crack-shot at eye-spy and an amusingly sore loser of never-have-I-ever.

“You can’t tell me you’ve really never--” “Dean, I absolutely promise that I’ve really never--” “No, everyone’s tried that!” “No! Not everyone has tried to ride a horse naked. I don’t-- I don’t think anyone’s tried that!”

Sami’s face hurts with how hard he’s been smiling. Dean keeps sneaking smug little glances at him, which just makes Sami smile harder.

‘Hey, Zayn,” Dean says, all faux-casual in a way that makes Sami laugh. An actor Dean is not.

“Hey, Dean.”

“Truth or dare?” Dean’s eyes are glued to the road, even though they haven’t seen another car in probably ten minutes.

“Truth. I don’t want to know what kind of dares you can come up with in a moving car.” Sami takes the change of game in stride. Dean laughs low, tongue sticking out just a little bit. “I know you’re no coward, Zayn, so I’m gonna let that one slide. D’you believe in love at first sight?” Sami lets his head bonk back against the headrest. “Yeah,” He says, more slowly than he once might have. His voice sticks in his throat. “But I think-- love like that isn’t forever, you know? You need a foundation.” Dean’s looking at him, and Sami can feel heat creeping up into his cheeks when he turns his face away.

Dean’s voice is quiet when he says, “Yeah. You got a real good head on your shoulders, Sami Zayn.”

When they get to the hotel, Sami’s half-asleep in his seat. He feels a little bit like Dean has been stealing his energy, because Dean is hype as fuck. He’s nearly bouncing as he unbuckles his seatbelt, darting thrilled glances over at Sami.

“Rise and shine, sleeping beauty,” He-- he doesn’t chirp it, quite, but only because he has a deep voice that doesn’t permit for things like that.

Sami grumbles, rubbing one eye with the heel of his hand and stretching out his back. He hides a yawn in the bend of his elbow, and when he looks up Dean is smiling at him. Fondly? Is that what fondness looks like on Dean’s face?

“I think I’m too sleepy to fight a ghost,” Sami says, unbuckling and getting out. The grass is wet with after-midnight dew.

“I’ll protect your honor,” Dean says mildly, bouncing up and down. He’s still holding Sami’s bag. “I won’t even let a ghost possess you.” “Oh, wow. Thanks, Dean.” Sami puts one hand over his chest, faux-swooning. “You won’t even let me get my body snatched. Golly!” “Can it, battery man. I’m doing you a favor here.”

They walk in together, jostling elbows and shoulders in a friendly competitive way. The woman working the counter looks professionally bored. Sami’s sure she’d seen much stranger. He wonders if she’s ever seen a ghost, or just lots of drunk people. He’s not going to ask.

“Evening ma’am,” Dean says, propping his elbow on the counter and fishing around for his wallet. “I’d like one of your most haunted rooms, please.” The woman looks politely amused. Maybe like she’s glad to break up the monotony of the evening. “You don’t have a reservation? Let me see what I have free for you.”

“Haunting is not guaranteed,” Sami reads off of a sign propped on the desk. “Dean, if we don’t see a ghost, it’s not the hotel’s fault.” “It’s the racist ghost’s fault,” Dean confirms, sliding his card and I.D. across the counter when the clerk gestures for it. “Not relevant, though. We’re gonna see a ghost.”

Sami wanders a little ways a way to give Dean privacy when he and the clerk start talking about money. There’s brochures all over the place, each loudly trumpeting a road trip destination in Arkansas. Sami’s never bothered to do all the road trip stuff before-- getting to wrestle most days is its own reward. It feels weird to get greedy with his entertainment. Dean seems to like it, though. And he’d been surprised when Sami had been willing to go with him to this hotel. He doesn’t know if Dean wants to ride with him again, or if he’s going to start riding with Seth Rollins, or something. It’s okay, Sami decides, if Dean wants to take the brochures and go do stuff with Seth. They’re probably actually friends. Sami picks out a few and clutches them to his side.

“I have bad news,” Dean says when Sami sidles up. The desk clerk has gone back to ignoring them both. “Is there only one bed? I can sleep on the floor, I don’t mind, it’s fine. I can give you money for the room, also. Sorry.”

Dean blinks at him. “No? No. None of that. We only got the third most haunted room, so I’m gonna need you to look really appealing to ghosts.” “Oh,” Sami says. How is he supposed to look appealing to ghosts? “Uh, okay. I’ll work on that, I guess.” “See, the problem is that you’re too attractive to the living right now,” Dean tells him very seriously. He guides Sami over to the stairs with a hand low on his back. Sami gets a weird quiver in his stomach. “You’re gonna have to seduce the dead.” Sami makes a face. “I don’t want to seduce a racist.” He declines. “That can be your job.” “No, I’m the ghost hunter. You’re the bait. Maybe it’s a perfectly nice lady ghost who died in the hotel.” He peeks at Sami out of the corner of his eye. “Gentleman?” “Either,” Sami says absently, then very determinedly stares straight ahead while he goes cold all down his spine.

“Cool. Cool cool. Equal opportunity ghost bait.” Dean says, looking very relieved. He is taking this ghost hunting thing very seriously, Sami thinks.

Sami, still flushing a little with embarrassment and trying not to hunch his shoulders uncomfortably just bobs a nod. The hotel is loud in the way that all old buildings are, all sorts of creaking and popping and rattling. When he sneaks a look at Dean, Dean’s looking enthralled and delighted.

Sami just feels a little creeped out.

“This is us,” Dean says when they reach the third landing, bumping the door open with his shoulder. “The most haunted floor.”

“Dean, did you ask her to rank the floors and rooms in terms of hauntedness?” Dean’s face says that he absolutely did do that. He avoids Sami’s gaze like a guilty dog and doesn’t answer, just pulls out an old-fashioned door key and starts counting doors down the hall.

“Five, six, sev-- here we go.” He hitches Sami’s bag up higher and opens the door. It’s a little sticky, and the little hesitation makes Sami hold his breath. You don’t even believe in ghosts, he reminds himself. He feels like he can feel someone watching him.

The door swings open on well-oiled hinges and Dean hits the light, setting down Sami’s bag and dropping his next to it. There are two beds. It’s a pretty nice room, truthfully. Much nicer than the ones Sami used to stay in when he was in the indies. He’s pretty sure Dean is thinking the same thing. Maybe not. Kevin likes to pretend he never even had a career in the indies. Maybe Sami’s the weird one. “Does it feel haunted in here to you?” Dean asks critically, breaking Sami’s train of thought.

“Yes,” Sami says immediately, because he still feels weirdly prickly all over. Also, he doesn’t want Dean to try and change rooms. He’s already taking his shoes off. “Super haunted.”

Dean starts picking the laces of his shoes, staring around dubiously. “D’you think if I ask for a ghost, one will come out?” “Probably not,” Sami says, flopping onto the bed closer to the door and snuggling deeper into his hoodie. “You should have brought a list of questions to ask it, or something.”

Dean contemplates this, kicking off his shoes and wiggling out of his jeans. Sami tries not to look, because it’s definitely a weird invasion of privacy to stare at your coworker’s legs, but Dean has really good thighs and nice-to-look-at knees and he’s only human, okay? He looks away before Dean can catch him.

Dean sits on the bed that Sami’s chosen, flopping backwards across Sami’s legs and stretching his arms up. Sami guesses that they’re friends? This is definitely friendly. “Hey, man. I know this is kind of an imposition, but, uh. Thanks for coming. Pro’lly wouldn’t have come without you.”

Sami’s stomach flips. “Dean, can I--” His sentence peters out when Dean actually meets his eyes. “--Uh.” “You can ‘uh’ whenever you want, brother,” Dean says serenely. His head is cocked like a big puppy. Maybe he’s listening for ghostly footsteps.

“Shut up, I was, uh. Can I ride with you again? This was really cool and-- I don’t know, I kind of-- I have pamphlets? There’s a wax museum that looks really creepy, I don’t know.”

“You askin’ me to go steady, Sami Zayn?”

Sami can’t look at Dean. He puts his hands over his face. “-- No! Yes? I don’t know, Dean, you confuse me.” Dean makes a humming noise and sits up off of Sami’s legs. Sami feels the bed dip down close to him.

“Lemme just-- know if i’m misreading this, cool?” Dean’s fingers are cool on Sami’s wrists as he pulls Sami’s hands away from his face.

Sami doesn’t even have time to make his eyebrows form a questioning configuration before Dean’s kissing him. It’s really soft. It’s probably the most romantic kiss he’s ever had, and it’s in a haunted hotel.

At that thought, Sami startles backwards. Dean looks a little sad and confused to not be kissing him, which gives Sami the good kind of punch to the stomach.

“Dean, we can’t!” Before Dean starts looking more upset than mullish, Sami hurries on. “I don’t want an old-timey racist ghost to watch us make out.”

Dean’s eyebrows fold down. For a second, Sami thinks that he’s angry or sad, but Dean just nods.

“This is what I get for trying to seduce you with the allure of the unexplained,” He says, apparently accepting his fate. He might be quoting from a ghost show.

“You, uh-- don’t need to seduce me? I’m… seduced. I guess. I think you’re really great.” “That’s because I already seduced you, Sami,” Dean taps his temple. “Playin’ the long game.” Privately, Sami doesn’t necessarily think that the afternoon and a majority of the evening is the long game, but if Dean will let him hold his hand at the wax museum or whatever weird thing they decide to do, he’ll count it as a win.

Footsteps echo above them, and Dean looks up with a flash of dimples that take Sami’s’ breath away. Yeah. Definitely a win.

#sambrose #sami zayn #dean ambrose #wwe #my writing #theyre the worst ghost hunters ever

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silkhyung · 7 years

Text

MESSAGE DELIVERED | pt.1

→ Pairing: Jungkook x Reader / Namjoon x Reader → Genre: fluff, smut, angst, humor → Words: 2,517 → Rated: NC-17 → Warnings: alcohol, language

→ Summary: A text message sent to the wrong number turns into a long lasting affair between two people completely opposite one another.

→ Note: This is an old thing and actually the first thing I wrote after the accident, and I decided to post it again because I kind of hold it close to my heart ? It’s not all going to be texts between the characters, but quite a lot of backstory and stuff the more we get into it. It’ll be told from both Y/N’s POV and Jungkook’s. Please enjoy! :)

Parts: 01 : interim : 02 : 03 : coming soon

cr.

The first time you receive one it’s in the middle of the night.

At first you simply stir in your sleep, turning around as if that will somehow stop the annoying buzzing resounding from under your pillow. When it doesn’t, you grab the cursed device and flip it over in your hands, wondering whom of your stupid friends decided to be an excruciating pain in the ass this late.

━ unknown 1:32am Heeeeeey what was the name of the beatle who walked first on the Abbey road cover? I’m trying to get into joys pants and she’s a huge beatles and pop quiz fan Help me out pls Hyung?

You squint at the screen.

The Beatles? Joy? Pop quiz? You are pretty sure you don’t know any people named Joy, and all your friends listen to crappy pop and crappy pop only, and the answer is John. Another thing you are most certain of is that you are not a hyung. But… wait…

… who?

Your text of the standard question “who’s this?” is interrupted by three familiar dots blinking, indicating this stranger on the other side of the screen is writing again. Sighing, you wait for their next text. Perhaps they had realized their mistake and would apologize and leave you alone now?

━ unknown 1:33am she’s abt to bail soon help me

Rubbing the sleep out of your eyes to see better, you quickly text them back.

━ 1:34am Hey I think you’ve got the wrong number But the answer is John Hope it all works out lol

It is silent for a few seconds, your messages staring back at you blankly while the other side seems completely dead. You wonder briefly if the stranger and the even more strange Joy had gotten frisky because of your help as you lock your phone with a relieved puff of breath, burying it under your pillow again.

The buzzing returns just as you settle back into a comfortable position, and even though you don’t want to - you need to sleep - curiosity makes you dig it out again to check what’s going on.

━ unknown 1:37am So not Taehyung?

A tired, lazy smile breaks free and you snort amusedly.

━ 1:38am Nope this is Y/N

━ unknown 1:38am Shit sorry But thanks for the answer

━ 1:39am Np

━ unknown 1:39am Lucky i accidentally texted another beatles fan lol I would’ve known 2 if i wasnt so drunk

You let out another snort.

━ 1:40am Sure dude

━ unknown 1:40am Yeah anyways thanks again

With that, you lock your screen and place it on your nightstand, smiling tiredly to yourself while shifting in bed, trying to get comfy again. Hopefully you won’t wake up with circles as black as your soul in a couple of hours.

The second time the unknown number pops up on your screen you’re in the library trying to work on your latest exam paper due this week. Not exactly something you want to do on a Tuesday night, but what does one not go through to keep the grades up?

Several heads belonging to those study nerds your friends sometimes make fun of but you actually identify with turn to stare at you accusingly and you sheepishly smile back at them, hiding your phone under the table to not disturb anyone else.

It’s been three days since the first text on Saturday and you curiously smile at the screen.

━ unknown 7:11pm Hey last cover song beatles did?

A breathy laugh escape you for some reason, and you quickly sink back in your seat, hiding your smile under the cover of your hand to not irritate any more study nerds than you already have.

You quickly shoot back a question of your own.

━ 7:12pm Is your hyung not available?

━ unknown 7:12pm I think he’s ignoring m

━ 7:13pm Lol poor u. I think it’s Maggie Mae but i’m not sure

The dots showing he was writing start moving, then still and begin moving again several times before your phone finally buzzes again.

━ unknown 7:15pm Wow i might actually score thanks to you Thanks beatles genius

Muffling your laugh with the sleeve of your shirt, you bite into your lip amusedly as you type a quick answer back.

━ 7:16pm Np beatles amateur

━ unknown 7:17pm lol

Even though some small part of you want to, you decide against responding to that. The beatles amateur whose name you still haven’t gotten is probably on a date with that Joy who enjoyed the Beatles pop quizzes so much, and you don’t want to intrude. Especially not since you’re just a stranger in his phone.

Despite this, your mind is very much focused on everything besides the computer screen before you, often lingering on a strange guy - guy since he has a hyung - who sucks at Beatles quizzes and apparently can’t get laid on his own.

Third time, it’s Friday and you’re on the bus on your way to meet up with a friend for a few drinks when your phone buzzes, interrupting the soothing tune of Coldplay’s greatest hit with an annoying pling.

You forcefully fish out your phone from the deep pocket of your coat and despite yourself, you smile at the screen when you see the unknown yet familiar number of your Beatles stranger shining on your screen.

━ unknown 5:45pm Hey another question. Do you by chance own an iPhone?

━ 5:46pm Why are you asking me out of all people? But yeah I do

The three dots start moving, then they stop just as quickly. You bite into your lip watching him start typing and stopping several times. You’re just about to lock your phone when he finally sends you the message he spent almost a minute working on.

━ unknown 5:47pm Idk

━ 5:48pm Really?

While he seemingly writes the longest reply in history, you’re at the street Jeongyeon told you to meet her at, so you hop off the bus. Scanning the crowd for your friend who’s nowhere to be seen, you decide to hang back outside the flower shop she mentioned, waiting for her while simultaneously waiting for a reply about the iPhone from the stranger in your phone.

━ unknown 5:51pm How do I download music?

You let out a loud laugh, your cheeks red from both embarrassment because of your obnoxious laughing as well as the biting cold. It reminds you of why you hate winter so much.

━ 5:52pm How can you NOT know that? What are you, 80 yrs old?

━ unknown 5:53pm Apparently lol pls help me out it’s embarrassing asking my friends

━ 5:53pm Buy from iTunes Or ask someone to help you download illegally i guess? Or u know,,, Spotify, Soundcloud, Naver?

━ unknown 5:54pm Spotify it is! Thanks!

Your thumbs linger over the keyboard, wondering if you would offend him somehow writing what you have in mind, but decide to just fuck it. It’s still just a stranger.

━ 5:55pm Np grandpa

His reply comes so quick it actually takes you off guard.

━ unknown 5:55pm HA HA I’m not that old

━ 5:56pm Whatever you say Grandpa

━ unknown 5:56pm T.T

You smile unnecessarily big, your thumbs hovering over your screen as you’re about to type out an answer when you hear your name being called by Jeongyeon. Looking up, you find her jogging towards you with her phone high in the air, waving the lit screen at you.

“Hey”, she breathes out, hunching over to catch her breath before straightening up. “Didn’t you get my texts?”

You flush, not because of the guilt over missing them but because of the fact you let this stranger take up so much of your attention you didn’t even realize you’d gotten text messages from your friend.

“Oh, sorry”, you say as the two of you begin walking side by side to the apparently amazing bar she’d wanted to go to since she first heard about it a month ago. The only reason you were here with her was because it could be something nice to add to your column. “Mind was preoccupied.”

“Don’t worry about it.” She waves her hand dismissively while checking the directions on her phone. “Oh, great news! I talked to that guy from my history class who recommended the bar and he told me this rising hot band was playing, so I hope you’ve got your notebook in there somewhere”, she says and nudges your purse with an arch of an eyebrow.

A part of you is disappointed by the news, because for once in your life you’d like to be able to go to a bar or club and enjoy yourself instead of having to critique the band playing - because there is always a band playing. Rising hot bands are like mosquitoes in this town, constantly popping up everywhere.

Running a popular music column for an even more popular magazine while still in college may have been your ultimate dream come true, but it was still a lot of work that you sometimes felt like you could most definitely live without. But, to not hurt Jeongyeon’s feelings who probably arranged for the two of you to go the same day as this new band - and judging by her proud grin she definitely did - you give her a genuine smile.

“Really? What’re they called?”

She tells you to turn right while thinking for a few seconds. “BTS, but I have no clue what it stands for. Behind The Scenes seems a little off for a band, don’t you think?”

Snorting, you nod in agreement. “Maybe it’s a name in progress?”

“Bath Time Sucks?”

“Your humor sucks.”

“I know- Oh! It’s here!” Jeongyeon exclaims, interrupting her own sentence with her undying excitement. “This is going to be great! We’re meeting up with the dude from my history class, too, by the way.”

Sighing, you glare at the back of her head as the two of you enter the bar. You’re about to say something to her about what an awful person she tends to be sometimes, but get too overwhelmed by the atmosphere to honestly care.

It is one of the tiniest spaces you’ve ever seen being used as a popular bar, but it fits. It’s warm and oaky, the air carrying scents of musky beers and strong spirits to your nose and you enjoy your stay already. The lighting is dim, yet bright enough to make out everyone in the room and the decor is very exclusively homey, with old leather clad chairs and couches, a lot of wooden furniture and Persian rugs covering almost every inch and corner of the floor.

You fit in perfectly, and despite your initial grim expression as you entered the place, you’re smiling now.

“There he is”, Jeongyeon says, nudging your shoulder while waving at her friend.

With nothing but exasperation, you notice it is none other than Kim Namjoon sitting there, smiling cheekily at the two of you with a large beer in front of him.

He greets Jeongyeon, who easily slides in beside him in the booth, with a high five and a huge, dimply smile. You, on the other hand, gets a cool nod in acknowledgement as he asks the two of you what drinks you’d like. You both opt for the same beer he’s having.

When he’s gotten up to go buy you your drinks, you nudge your supposed friend with your elbow as hard as you can without seriously hurting her.

“Why didn’t you tell me your ‘friend from history class’ was fucking Kim Namjoon?” you hiss, careful not to be heard by the man himself as he’s not too far away yet.

“Ow!” She gives you the softest glare you’ve ever seen before. “Seriously, what’s your issue with him? He’s really nice. And pretty cool, too. He writes for the band that’s playing tonight.”

You scoff. “I don’t care. I still think he’s pretentious for pretending to be a philosopher just because he’s majoring in philosophy or whatever.”

Jeongyeon snickers, shoving a handful of peanuts in her mouth and decides to talk through chewing them. “He’s nice. That’s what matters.” A piece of peanut gets stuck between her teeth.

Gross.

Just as you’re about to throw a retort at her, Namjoon joins the two of you again, handing over a beer each with a smile and you want to punch him in the face. Your dislike towards him origins in his pretentious personality, but you suspect it might also have something to do with those damn dimples.

While Jeongyeon and Namjoon dives into a full discussion about music and what underground bands actually deserves more recognition, you pull out your notepad, getting ready to jot down some notes about the place. Mentioning good bars has become your Saturday morning thing for the blog, and since you only have two evaluations for this week, it wouldn’t hurt to add this one since you’ve actually been here now.

You manage to get the first word down when you’re interrupted by your phone buzzing. You’re about to put it to silent when you see your Beatles stranger’s number lit up on your screen.

━ unknown 7:03pm I’m actually jk

Smiling, you scoot away from your friends a little to get some privacy, angling your screen away from them discreetly.

━ unknown 7:03pm Like u can call me jk

━ 7:04pm You mean ur name is jk? Jk Rowling?

He doesn’t respond immediately, so you wait for a few seconds before you decide to just call him “JK” from now on, even taking the liberty of changing his caller ID from his number to his new name.

Oddly enough, you find great satisfaction in seeing his ID on all of his messages change to “JK” instead of a long row of numbers. While waiting, you put your phone down next to your notepad and begin scribbling down some words to describe the space that you can use later. You’re on the fourth word when your screen lights up again and you giddily grab it, checking to see what he replied.

━ JK 7:08pm Original But yeah I figure i should tell you my name Since I know yours and have been using you as a pop quiz key this week lol

You try so many replies that all sound downright awful that you at last settle for the easiest one, hoping it won’t make you sound like a total fool.

━ 7:09pm Okay hi

━ JK 7:09pm Hi :)

It’s the first time any emoticons or emoji’s have been used, and it for some reason makes something deep down in your stomach flip softly.

━ 7:10pm Anything else? More pop quiz questions?

━ JK 7:10pm Nah i’m good for now Thanks though

━ 7:11pm :)

You nearly drop your phone when your mutual friend Hoseok appears out of thin air behind you, swatting at your phone playfully before embracing you from behind over the booth, his lean arms wrapped around your neck tightly. He’s too happy to notice he’s nearly choking you, and Namjoon only laughs.

Asshole.

“Who’re you texting, Y/N?” Hoseok laughs joyfully while sliding in the booth beside you, followed by Namjoon’s friend Jackson.

It’s suddenly so crammed you feel claustrophobic, but you know no one would let you escape even if you begged them so you stay put, leaning into Jeongyeon for comfort. She rests her head on the top of yours and you stay like that because it’s quite nice. It’s actually so nice you decide to not bother remove Hoseok’s yellow cap he for some reason felt to put on top of your head.

You only adjust it so it won’t fall off when the band starts playing, and even though you kind of enjoy their music and the lead singer’s pretty impressive vocals, you can’t help but ponder over Hoseok’s question throughout most of the show.

Because, yeah, who are you texting?

next part

#btswriters #jungkooknet #noonanet #jungkook scenarios #jungkook scenario #jungkook series #jungkook smut #jungkook angst #bts scenario #bts smut #bts angst #this will make more sense as the story evolves i promise #next part will be up within a day or two or maybe three if we're lucky #lol #i'm crying #story:md1 #also the header is a bit blurry because i'm too lazy to fix it hehe

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mrmichaelchadler · 6 years

Text

Thumbnails 7/20/18

Thumbnails is a roundup of brief excerpts to introduce you to articles from other websites that we found interesting and exciting. We provide links to the original sources for you to read in their entirety.—Chaz Ebert

"Why Bo Burnham's 'Eighth Grade' Gets It Right": At Indie Outlook, I share my thoughts on the best film I've seen thus far in 2018.

“Nothing angered me more as a teen than high school movies that failed to take my pain seriously. Despite its memorable soundtrack, ‘Grease’ was a sanitized nostalgic fantasy populated by adults with a troubling case of arrested development. Even films I adored, such as ‘Dead Poets Society,’ contained stereotypical nerds with thick glasses, ever-present allergies and zero social skills. ‘Eighth Grade’ doesn’t have an ounce of condescension, and the laughter that it generates—which is plentiful—arises out of recognition rather than ridicule. (Fisher’s under-the-breath delivery of ‘Who cares?’ while forcing a banana into her mouth is uproarious.) Burnham avoids any hackneyed melodramatic plot developments because he’s well aware that the life of a middle schooler is dramatic enough. Of course, no honest film about junior high could be made without it getting slapped with an R rating by the MPAA for—in this case—‘language and some sexual material.’ What the ratings board, in their famously limited wisdom, appear to have forgotten is that junior high itself is rated R. No parent, teacher or guardian can prevent a sixth grader from rapidly losing their innocence bred in elementary school as they enter a volatile community preoccupied with puberty and four-letter words. This transition would be less extreme if schools simply housed grades kindergarten through eighth grade under the same roof, a prime motivator for students to be better role models. It’s so easy to feel detached from the rest of existence while imprisoned in junior high, and every single person currently enrolled in it is entirely of age to see this movie. This is a rare instance in which sneaking a purchase with a fake ID could prove beneficial to your mental health.”

"Of Their Age: Olivier Assayas on the Making of 'Cold Water'": In conversation with Criterion's Hillary Weston.

“‘Cold Water’ was a turning point. I’ve always had a hard time with scoring movies. It’s something I did on my first and second features, and I was not so happy with the results. I did it on my third feature, ‘Paris Awakens,’ and though the music was by John Cale and considerably better than the music on my previous films, I was still not happy with the way music connected with emotions and within the images. The movie I made right after that, ‘A New Life,’ had no music at all. So ‘Cold Water’ was a way of going back and building a new relationship with music. What was fascinating about it was that, for the first time, I was using only music that I loved. The way I approached that very long party scene was by structuring it with music, with tracks that would cover the specific emotions and the way they change during the night. Ultimately, the songs ended up becoming one with the narrative—they say something that’s beyond the story. I think that people who have experienced the seventies are connected by that music, so all of a sudden it’s a universal language. In many ways, the soundtrack to Something in the Air is much closer to the kind of music I loved at that time. I was very much into British underground. But the way I approached ‘Cold Water’ was a little different. It doesn’t have the music I was actually listening to; it’s the music kids at that time were listening to.”

"Europe's rising nationalism is putting pressure on film directors and the stories they tell": According to Jeffrey Fleishman on The Los Angeles Times.

“‘There is now a blacklist of books, theater directors and filmmakers,’ Polish director Pawel Pawlikowski, whose ‘Ida’ won an Academy Award for foreign language film in 2015, told the press in May at the Cannes Film Festival, where he won the director award for ‘Zimna Wojna (Cold War).’ ‘I have the honor to be on this list. With the new [Polish] government, which has taken control of public television, it is just like under communism.’ Polish authorities have denied a blacklist, but ‘Ida,’ the story of a Jewish orphan raised by Catholic nuns after her parents were killed in World War II, touches on the sensitive question of Polish complicity in the Holocaust. The nationalist government, controlled by Law and Justice Party leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski, amended a bill last month, making it essentially a civil violation to accuse Poland of having had a role in those horrors. It was part of a broader effort by the establishment to whitewash any hint of transgression and celebrate Polish identity. ‘They are obsessed with rewriting history,’ said Agnieszka Holland, a Polish director and Academy Award nominee. ‘They want to change the history into this heroic, nationalistic legend where all Poles are wonderful and all others are guilty of everything.’ She added that the government explored the ‘quite naïve idea’ of producing an epic film on Polish history — spoken in English — that would be distributed by Hollywood.”

"'I Like Being Aggressive in the Storytelling...': Michael Dinner on His CBS James Ellroy Adaptation, 'L.A. Confidential'": Another great interview conducted by Jim Hemphill at Filmmaker Magazine.

“The conversation with the director of photography began with what I didn’t want to do. The cliché in film noir is hard lights coming in through blinds, so we shot everything with soft light. And then there’s a conversation about lenses — we shot on wider lenses that had a shallower depth of field. In general I tend to shoot on the two extremes of the lens; I like being aggressive in the storytelling and taking the audience by the neck and saying, ‘Pay attention to this.’ There’s a scene in the pilot early on where a guy pulls a gun, shoots a cop, gets in his car, speeds away, does a U-turn, and then he’s T-boned. My thought was, I’m going to shoot this the same way I would shoot this scene today, it’s just that they’re in period outfits in period cars. There would have been a way of shooting that 50 or 60 years ago – even 20 years ago – where the camera wouldn’t be as aggressive. I wanted it to be as kinetic as possible, so I turned to the visual effects people and said, ‘I don’t want to be limited.’ The great thing about Broadway in downtown Los Angeles is that there’s architecture to hang shots on, and then you just have to somehow remove the little signs and meters and lines on the street and things like that. I wanted to make sure I could rotate around 360 degrees and clean it up, because that to me makes it less of a museum piece. So that was the approach: how can we tell this story so that there’s an emotional pop to it, and it’s aggressive in modern terms, but still assimilates noir filmmaking? It was tough, because we don’t preserve architecture in Los Angeles. Trying to recreate 1952 L.A. is like doing a science fiction movie set on the planet Xenon.”

"Terry Gilliam and his 'Don Quixote'": Cineuropa's Susanne Gottlieb reports from the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival about the exuberant director's latest polarizing feature.

“Gilliam has a natural aversion to awards and the big limelight. In Karlovy Vary, he jokingly pushed the narrative that he achieved something that the legendary Orson Welles couldn’t. Welles, whose films also got caught up in production complications, was opting for an adaption of the Don Quixote material that never materialized in its final form. But while Gilliam is a fine director, none of his work reaches Welles’ cultural legacy. The comparison is a bit farfetched. Has the master of fantastic worlds simply grown too bitter with the business? Gilliam hopes he hasn’t become Toby. ‘There are so many talented filmmakers that make their first film and then they get dragged into the seductive world of commercials,’ he says. ‘They never come back, so this movie is a warning to young filmmakers.’ Having himself shot commercials, Gilliam is familiar with the instant financial gratification of the money paid in that sector. In an early scene in the director’s latest feature, Toby’s loss of vision and purpose as a filmmaker becomes apparent when he watches the student version of his own ‘Don Quixote,’ a piece of art with an aura he is trying to replicate in a big budget production. Glued to the DVD Player, he gets lost in the film, dissecting its soul but coming up empty. If that was the warning that would reach the young filmmakers in Gilliam’s own audience loud and clear, one might cherish the lesson learned and move on, even if it took a very uneven movie to get there. Unfortunately, that is not the only lesson Gilliam’s film advances. The convoluted mess that is ‘The Man Who Killed Don Quixote,’ a miscellaneous mix of ideas, sends out another warning even clearer: sometimes, it is better to kill your darlings.”

Image of the Day

Chas Allen, one of the real-life subjects of "American Animals" (portrayed in the film by Blake Jenner), chats with Sam Fragoso on his indispensable Talk Easy podcast.

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Alexis G. Zall, the veteran YouTuber who spent her adolescence uploading splendidly sardonic and insightful videos to her channel, shares 20 nuggets of wisdom she's learned during her 20 years on this planet.

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