#June 27 here we come
Text
the jurist system seems really cool i hope they keep using it :-)
27 notes
🌈 lawsbian Follow
hey girl. am i a suspect. because you can "court" me any time
🧊 just--ice Follow
try.
🌈 lawsbian Follow
hey girl. am i a suspect. because you can "try" me any time
🌈 lawsbian Follow
hey girl. are you a lawyer. because you can "try" to "court" me any time
🌈 lawsbian Follow
hey girl. am i on trial.
🌈 lawsbian Follow
i'm determined to make this work btw
🌈 lawsbian Follow
hey girl. law
🔪 violencekilling Follow
hey girl. are you a murderer. because ow ough ouch agh stop stabbing me
732,390 notes
🌟 rockliker270 Follow
guys watch out hes gonna shelly de kill you
293,485 notes
🎀 copiicat Follow
they called me to the witness stand and the defense attorney just shouted "BOOOOOO WE HATE YOUR PUSSY"
43,618 notes
🧇 edible-evidence Follow
look if i was on trial and the guy prosecuting me started advertising his music i'd just plead guilty. avoid the embarrassment of getting put in prison by a guy who basically used the trial to say "this blew up btw here's my soundcloud"
97,384 notes
⚖️ courtofpublicopinions Follow
💞 lawveyourself Follow
didnt miles edgeworth defend someone in a case once
⛲ fountainoftruth Follow
do you know the difference between a prosecutor and a defense attorney
270,934 notes
💟 longingforyou Follow
being rivals isn't enough i need to kiss you
💟 longingforyou Follow
who the fuck is evil magistrate
💟 longingforyou Follow
STOP TAGGING THIS WITH LAWYERS?????
584,769 notes
🐈 nyattorney Follow
they hired a guy to stand in court and shout "GET A ROOM YOU TWO" whenever the lawyers start getting a little too homoerotic
976 notes
💥 courtroomchaos Follow
your honor i know all the evidence points to my client being guilty. but come on you have to admit he kinda ate right
💼 courtofwaw Follow
mia fey when they had phoenix wright on trial
20,475 notes
🔍 thuthseeker Follow
ok hot take but i feel like these lawyers should maybe not be allowed to drag literal children to court with them?? how many people have gotten genuinely actually fucking SHOT in court and they're just ok bringing fucking 8 year olds in?
12,475 notes
💼 courtofwaw Follow
happy almost christmas to all who celebrate
💫 dizzydreamers124 Follow
it's march
🎄 holidazed Follow
happy almost christmas :)
😈 knownjaywalker Follow
WHO is putting this on my dash
👁️ cymorgue Follow
STOP POSTING THIS. IT IS JUNE.
🐼 pandastar91 Follow
ITS ALMOST CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!
1,589,589 notes
💽 platinumcourtrecord Follow
evil gavinners be like. innocent hate. this is a nothing post
19,384 notes
🥚 eggvidenced Follow
STOP asking me about the dl-6 post idc idc look even phoenix wright forged evidence once shut up
📕 lexculpatory Follow
he didn't forge the evidence, though. it was kristoph gavin who ordered the forgery. this was covered in the trial of vera misham. if you're going to try to compare yourself to well known figures, you could at least check the veracity of your claims.
🥚 eggvidenced Follow
yeah well. he might have. on a different case or something.
73 notes
🃏 thecourtjester Follow
i tried to take the bar exam but they didnt let me because i wasnt cunty and traumatized enough
57,384 notes
😇 innosense Follow
683,876 notes
🦀 mad_libz_87 Follow
when will global studios realize that i do not WANT another shitty steel samurai spinoff i just want the original show back
7,094 notes
⚖️ courtofpublicopinions Follow
she present on my evidence til i reach a verdict
⚖️ courtofpublicopinions Follow
WRONG BLOLG. DON'T REBLOG THIS. DELETE POST DELETE POST DELETE POST I SWEAR WE'RE PROFESSIONALS HERE
17,283 notes
👑 courtroyals Follow
"we need more great prosecutors" you guys couldn't even handle manfred von karma
🧊 just--ice Follow
didn't he kill someone?
👑 courtroyals Follow
irrelevant. you guys couldn't handle him.
587 notes
📋 lawandwhoreder Follow
law: i'm so law
lawyer, who needs to one up everyone no matter what: i'm more law than you
🏛️ lawyest Follow
hi
📋 lawandwhoreder Follow
you've got to be fucking kidding me
183,834 notes
🧊 just--ice Follow
why is it always murders with lawblr. why don't we ever talk about divorce or something
#ace attorney#ace attorney spoilers#dashboard simulator#dash simulator#dashboard sim#dash sim#unreality#fake dashboard#fake dash#post simulator#long post#this is just going to be a series now /lh#well. if i make any more. who knows#timeframe is sometime after the end of aa4 but before the start of aa5#the timeframe for these posts is of course always the exact point i'm at in my own playthrough /lh#some of these are based on real posts. but i'm hoping it is more inspiration rather than outright copying#if it is though i'm always willing to remove them#though i will not be removing the one that's based on my own post because that's mine /lh#i worry this may be an unnecessary sequel but who cares. who cares.
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a paddock day
charles x civilian!reader
yn
liked by yourbsf, and 12 others
yn yo soy muy feliz aqui ! hasta mañanaaaaaa barcelona gp, te quiero mucho!
[i am very happy here! see you tomorrow barcelona gp, i love you very much!]
view all 27 comments
yourbsf finally main girl gets to watch a gp!
⤷ yn literally jumped on this plane last night im shivering and quaking.
yourfriend ATE THAT UPPPPPP!!! WNJOY
⤷ yn THANKS BABESSS
yourbsf im literally telling u they’ll see u and go WOAH WOSH WASH! then theyll fall in love with you and you’ll be those lowkey ass wags
⤷ yn Should I just wear a giant banana costume to get their attention
⤷ yourbsf DUHHHH!!! and go public, theyll stalk you and follow u and ull go famous
⤷ yn what happened to being lowkey ass wag
⤷ yourbsf i can be your wag😊💋
yn instagram stories:
you strolled through the paddock through all motorhomes like a little girl, contained with excitement. a lot of people were there but somehow, not in front of the ferrari motorhome.
you saw a man dressed in all black (kind of stupid since it was burning hot) with black sunglasses as a hat on his head walk you way. “um excuse me? would you mind if you took my photo please?” you approached him as he turned to you
he looked at you but of course, he was wearing the sunglasses so you wouldn’t tell what he was thinking. did he not speak english?
“tu no hablas ingles?” you asked “Oh! No, sorry. I do speak english and of course. Where would you want to take it?” He said in a foreign language.
“Just here” you walked over to the 55 wall “You are a fan of Sainz?” He took your phone as you walked over “Both of them, but my best friend loves him and couldn’t come so I thought I’d send her a photo” you laughed as he did as well.
He took a few photos as you stood in front of the wall. “Leclerc or Sainz, for you?” He asked, handing you back your phone “Both” you said in an obvious manner
“Life or death” he laughed “….Leclerc… though, Ferrari needs to stop fucking him over so he can get another win” You shrugged, putting your phone in your pocket as he nodded with a smile. “You?” “Leclerc!” He exclaimed as you giggled, this man was quite fun.
“I lit a few candles today in hopes he might win, I really hope he does. Or any Ferrari win” You said “Do you have a number?” He asked stupid question he thought “I’m sorry— that was a stupid question” you laughed “Do you mind if we exchanged them?” You scratched you head “Um… ad much as I want to, I don’t exchange numbers with random attractive guys, I’m sorry” you laughed “Attractive? Thank you” “Well seeing as I can only see half your face…” you felt your phone start to vibrate and saw your friend calling you
“I have to go but it was lovely meeting you! I hope we get our Leclerc win today!” You started to walk backwards “You too!” You turned around, putting your phone to your ear as you head your best friend’s scream, unknowing that Charles’ eyes lingered on you.
It was only free practice today. He hoped to see you around more.
liked by 20 others
yn LALALALALA
view all 32 comments
yourbsf LETS GO BITCH 55!!!!!!!
yourbsf still think u shouldve given hottie your instagram
⤷ yn i got NERVOUS
june 2, 2023
liked by 21 others
yn POLE POSITION LETS GO BABYGIRL
view all 23 comments
yourbsf CHARLES BABYGIRL LECLERC
⤷ yn FUCK YEAH
june 3, 2023
You were admiring the paddock once again, now race day, as you heard the familiar voice behind you. “I hope we get our Leclerc win today” you hear behind you and you start to smile. You turned around and your heart sank to your ass.
Charles babygirl Leclerc was smiling at you “excuse me?” you mumbled, mouth slightly ajar “I know, I was in a more casual outfit yesterday” he laughed and you looked him up and down, wearing his red Ferrari suit “es muy stúpida” you mumbled
“I know you maybe think this is weird but— I could really not stop thinking about you for the last few days and have been trying to find you” He chuckled softly as you felt like you hit your head on the pavement. Charles Leclerc looking for YOU?
“Well, you found me! Congrats on pole by the way” “Thank you! Though I hope to win tomorrow, for the both of us” “Oh please, I can’t take another Ferrari loss” you closed your eyes.
“You are spanish?” He asked “Oh, no! I just like learning languages and visit here a lot” you said “Would you mind… if you showed me Barcelona some time?” was he asking you out? “I- uhm- sure” you fumbled “You don’t give your number, so what about Instagram?” He smiled
“Sure” you grabbed your phone and showed it to him as he searched it up on his phone and suddenly, he was being called by fans. “It was nice seeing you again!” You walked as fast as you could to the other side and he smiled, shaking his head. yn
| charles_leclerc has requested to follow you! 1h
request accepted!
yn
liked by charles_leclerc, and 25 others
yn did not go with the banana outfit @yourbsf. so so sad its over BUT WE GOT A FUCKING LECLERC WIN AND DOUBLE FERRARI PODIUM LETS GO
view all 40 comments
yourbsf babes idt u needed the outfit…….
⤷ yn 🙂.
charles_leclerc You are welcome
⤷ yn thank you (and carlitos) for stopping the ferrari drought
yourfriend 😊 LETS GO BITCH
june 4, 2023
| charles_leclerc liked your story. 10m
| charles_leclerc liked your post. 7m
| charles_leclerc liked your post. 3m
yn
liked by charles_leclerc, and 12 others
yn mb my definition of “explore” is a museum LECLERC
view all 20 comments
charles_leclerc I enjoyed every moment, stop apologizing cherie. We need another one for more exploring!
june 8, 2023
charles.16
liked by 2,594 others
charles.16 WHO IS THIS NEW WAG
view all 179 comments
chalando1 chilll probs just a fan
⤷ charles.16 they 😭 exchanged 😭 instagrams😭
updatef1I I FOUND HER @yn
⤷ yn no you didn’t
[COMMENT DELETED!]
f1w4gs SHES SO FUNNY I LOVE HER ALREADY
june 8, 2023
f1wags._
liked by 3,281 others
f1wag._ Meet Yn Yln! Charles and her have been spending more time together and were rumored to have met in the Barcelona GP! We don’t know much about her as she’s very private but we’re already loving her humor!
#charlesleclerc #yn
view all 219 comments
f1circuitzz Whatt!!! She’s so beautiful
chacha16 What does she do and what country does she live in?
⤷ f1wag._ We know she is German but we don’t know if she still lives there. She’s a fashion student but don’t know what college/university!
ynsfan11 giggling at the bio
yncharles NEED HER AT THE PADDOCK / GARAGE AGAIN
user1 watch them be together for a week
user3 charles switched to blondes 🌝
june 8, 2023
charlesaep
liked by 6,272 others
charlesaep I CANT BREATHE YN AND CHARLES WERE RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME IM SWESTING IM CURING WHETHTHRUFKC
view all 328 comments
User1 why can’t she just walk
⤷ yntcdts calm down😭 theyre cute
june 10, 2023
yn
liked by charles_leclerc, and 8 others
yn i got a photographer now 🥹
view all 20 comments
charles_leclerc i am “a photographer”
⤷ yourbsf i was THE photographer before you Charles Leclerc.
⤷ charles_leclerc But I am now her favorite one😂
⤷ yourbsf I HATE YOU. YN DUMP HIM
⤷ charles_leclerc NO
⤷ yn why would i dump him? he’s a 2 in one (driver and photographer) / im kidding sharl loveu
⤷ charles_leclerc I mean, I do love driving you around
⤷ yourbsf you both are disgusting
⤷ yn get dick
june 11, 2023
yn
liked by charles_leclerc, pierregasly and 11 others
yn is this montREAL?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?
view all 8 comments
charles_leclerc I love it when my girl is a fangirl 😘
charles_leclerc ma belleeeeeeeeee
yourbsf Can I come
⤷ charles_leclerc Am I the best friend
⤷ yourbsf oh fuck you
charles_leclerc Your caption is funny, I love it
⤷ yn thanks sharlie 🥹🥹🥹❤️🩹
june 13, 2023
| yukitsunoda0511 has requested to follow you! 1h
| pierregasly has requested to follow you! 1h
| landonorris has requested to follow you! 1h
| carlossainz55 has requested to follow you! 1h
| fernandoalo_oficial has requested to follow you! 1h
| francisca.cgomez has requested to follow you! 1h
| carmenmmundt has requested to follow you! 1h
you just accepted 7 requests
yn
liked by charles_leclerc, carlossainz55, and 30 others
yn SOOO PROUD!!!! CHARLES CAME BACK AND IS NOW A WORLD CHAMPION IM SHAKING?! CONGRATS TO FERRARI ON BEING GETTING WORLD CONSTRUCTORS CHAMPIONSHIP AS WELL IM SHAKING
view all 59 comments
charles_leclerc Could not have done this without you, chérie
⤷ yn love u sm babyyyyy⛄️ im scared though why are half the grid following me back (i ofc accepted)
⤷ landonorris because he just ranted to us for TWO HOURS (he always does but for a few mins) about you and how amazing you are, mate! Had to see what the fuss was about
⤷ charles_leclerc Thanks, Lando.
⤷ yn IM GOING TO CRYYYY LOVEU SHARL
francisca.cgomez You’re such a beauty!!! Loved seeing you today💞 Congrats, Charles!
october 22, 2023
charles_leclerc
liked by yn, and 8,559,282 others
charles_leclerc Another post about the Championship but this time for the person beside me who motivated me the most. My beautiful girlfriend, @yn, you are my everything. I love you more than you love pasta❤️
view all 1,181,292 comments
yn good morning?????????????????? WHAT
yn YOU DID THISBALL YOURSELF IM SO PROUD OF YOU LFG
⤷ yn ball
⤷ yncha16 AHAHAHAHAH SHES SO SILLY
⤷ charles_leclerc Without you, I wouldn’t push myself! So technically, you helped.
⤷ yn id do it again ml
ynsbabe yn public when
⤷ yn when sharl learns how to cook pasta 👨🍳
⤷ charles_leclerc Goodluck @ynsbabe
october 23, 2023
#SOF : are we feelin a part 2 ???
#FUTURE SOF: pt2!
#f1 fanfic#f1 imagines#formula 1#charles leclerc#charles leclerc fanfic#charles leclerc x you#social media au#charles leclerc imagine#charles leclerc 16#charles leclerc x reader#charles leclerc one shot#charles leclerc imagines
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"Glamour UK launched its digital June Pride cover this week featuring a pregnant transgender man.
The cover features transgender activist and author Logan Brown standing topless with a suit painted over his chest and his pregnant belly on full display.
“I am a transgender pregnant man and I do exist, so no matter what anybody says, I literally am living proof,” Brown told the magazine.
Glamour UK, an online women’s magazine published by Condé Nast, launched its Pride cover issue on Thursday, coinciding with the start of LGBTQ Pride month. The magazine has previously showcased prominent figures in the LGBTQ community, such as Grammy-award winning artist Kim Petras and "Queer Eye" cast member Antoni Porowski.
This year’s issue “celebrates the allyship between women (cisgender or not) and transgender people through our shared experiences — in particular pregnancy, healthcare and childbirth,” the magazine explained.
The cover interview, which was conducted two weeks before Brown, 27, gave birth to his daughter, Nova, recounts the cover star’s experience with an unexpected pregnancy and navigating the medical system as a trans man...
Despite the backlash, the cover star expressed his desire to educate those who may hold misconceptions about transgender individuals.
Brown shared with Glamour that he is working on a children’s book and an autobiography that highlights his pregnancy, and hopes it will serve as a resource for other transgender people.
He added that he would also like the book to reach people who aren’t transgender but “are curious and want to know about the situation,” referring to trans pregnancy."
-via ABC News, June 2, 2023
-
Especially heartening to see this coming out of the UK, given the dramatic rise in transphobia and TERFism there the past few years.
Right now, it can be a really stressful and heartbreaking time to be trans. Widespread change takes time that it often feels like we don't have. But we're here, and we will always be here, and despite what it may feel like, we have made unbelievable amounts of progress in the last 20 years alone.
I promise you this: the transphobes are going to lose.
#united kingdom#uk#uk politics#trans#trans issues#transphobia#trans pregnancy#pregnancy#male pregnancy#lgbtq news#lgbtq community#good news#hope#childbirth#representation matters#queer#queer representation#trans man#trans pride#trans positivity
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make my heart surrender | carmen 'carmy' berzatto x fem!chef reader | social media au - part one
inspired by @caramelberzatto i made a few social media posts for my make my heart surrender universe with carmy x fem!chef reader. my carmy as your baby daddy series was a headcanon/social media au and i just love these so i couldn't resist!! enjoy these fake social media posts depicting different parts of their story :)
see part two here.
liked by sydneyadamu, poursomesugarnatalie and others
thesustainable.chef: surprise! @/chefsyd and i are popping up at @ bigdeliciousplanet for their urban garden dinner series!! join us on june 1st for a five course dinner starring tomato season.
get tix @ the link in bio
philipKrich: the can't miss event of tomato season!
➡ chefsyd: you heard the man!
carmyberzatto: ❤️
view all 23 comments
____________________
liked by carmyberzatto, maya.kaz and others
thesustainable.chef: what an honor it was to cook at the James Beard House in my hometown, NYC, with some of my favorite people in the world. congratulations to the team @/thebear on a beautiful job! and thanks for letting me cook with you guys again teehee.
more posts to come. this last trip back home was life changing. ❤️
chefsyd: don't call it a comeback 👀
chefsyd: life changing, you say? 👀👀👀
➡ poursomesugarnatalie: 👂🏻i'm listening
➡ liz.jpg: @/maya.kaz and i are SEATED.
marcusmakespastries: what an honor it was to have you BACK with us, chef.
view all 47 comments
____________________
liked by thebear, fakattack and others
thesustainable.chef: my honey on film
#35mm
maya.kaz: hubba hubba! #teamcarmy4ever
view all 27 comments
____________________
liked by chefsyd, philipKrich and others
thesustainable.chef: uncle carmy, cacio e pepe ravioli we made, and very well deserved glass of wine for this milf of 2 🤣
philipKrich: where was my invite?
➡ thesustainablechef: sorry, cousin. 😵💫
poursomesugarnatalie: you're a milf 😘
➡ carmyberzatto: babe... milf? really?
➡ thesustainable.chef: uncle carmy 🤝 dad carmy
➡ carmyberzatto: 😳
➡ poursomesugar: you guys are gross. can you flirt elsewhere?
view all 15 comments
#nolita fairytale's masterlist#carmen berzatto x you#carmy berzatto#carmy x oc#the bear hulu#the bear fx#jeremy allen white#carmen 'carmy' berzatto#carmy berzatto x reader#carmen berzatto x reader#carmen berzatto#carmy berzatto headcanon#the bear headcanon#carmy berzatto imagines#carmy berzatto fluff#comfort and chaos#still into you#make my heart surrender#social media au#marcus brooks#sydney adamu#natalie 'sugar' berzatto
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MCYTBLR AU Fest: General Rules and FAQ
TIMELINE:
May 4: Discord opens at 0:00, Artist creation starts.
May 30-31: Artists with a finished piece of Art can sign up, submitting their work for claims.
May 31: Artist creation period ends at midnight.
June 2-4: Writers can claim art and be assigned to Teams.
June 6-7: Writers who wish to be assigned a Beta Reader can sign up (this is optional)
June 9-10: Beta Writers can claim writers/art and be assigned to Teams
June 29-30: Check-in #1
July 26: Writer creation period ends at midnight. Unless you have an extension, you must be fully ready to post at this point.
July 27: Posting period begins at 0:00
August 2: Extension period ends. Unless you are a pinch hitter, you must be fully ready to post at this point.
August 9: Posting Period ends. All work must be completely posted by midnight.
ABOUT:
MCYTBLR AU Fest is a mini reverse-big-bang event where artists and writers work together in teams to make stories and art inspired by MCYT and set in an Alternate Universe.
EXPECTATION:
Artists must make a completed Art piece.
Writers must deliver a story of at least 5k words, inspired by the art they signed up for.
Dark or triggering topics or themes must be tagged for.
RULES:
You must be a member of the discord, for team matching.
Because of Tumblr, Ao3 and Discord TOS, you must be 13 to participate.
Respect your fellow participants, even when you disagree on fandom matters
You agree to work together with your teammate(s) to make a piece of art and a fic together, and link to each other's works.
All works must be MCYT-centric and set in an AU— no canon-compliance.
No AI-Generated content.
LINKS:
Discord: Here
Ao3 Collection: Here
FAQ:
What is MCYTBLR AU Fest? MCYTBLR AU Fest is a reverse minibang-type event where writers and artists come together to create fanworks centred on MCYT and set in an alternate universe from canon.
How does it work? Artists will have a month to complete an art piece. After a month, once the art is complete, they will submit the art, with information about server, characters, relationships, and any warnings they are opting into, which will be posted anonymously for writers to view and claim, first-come-first-serve. Teams are assigned by mods, and then writers will have two months of creation time to make a pice inspired by the work (minimum 5k words).
What type of MCYT is included? We welcome creations based on any SMP, whether or not they have a canon tag on Ao3. Mianite, DSMP, QSMP, Hermitcraft, 3rd Life, Lifesteal, Witchcraft SMP— it’s all welcome.
Can I join if my Art is a Game/Web Weave? We welcome all types of art— web weave, game, traditional art, original songs, videos, etc. While the list is not exhaustive, we have outlined some of the baseline expectations for an art piece below.
What are the requirements for art? It is difficult to define precise expectations for art pieces, especially given the broad realm of things that could count as art. We are primarily looking for art that is complete to a level that you would normally post as "finished", ready to inspire a fic piece of 5k or more, containing an audio or visual component beyond the confines of the written word, that does not take more than an hour to consume. While you will have the opportunity to include your understanding of the world in things such as if the relationships depicted are romantic or not, the art piece must stand alone without explanatory text or extra worldbuilding.
The defined requirements for different forms of art are:
Digital or Traditional art: one piece, completed to whatever you would normally post as "finished", ready to inspire a fanfic.
Web Weaves: a web weave of at least ten elements, original or properly credited.
Video/animatic: a video at least 30 seconds long.
Other Art Form: other art forms such as fan games or original songs would fall under this category. If you wanted to sign up with an Other art form, you need to contact the mod team and work out what minimum expectations would be for your art.
Is shipping allowed? Yes. Because there is no broad fandom-wide consensus about how Creator boundaries are to be enforced in specific cases (whether it's okay to write beeduo as /r or /p is an obvious one, or whether it’s permitted to ship Joel Smallishbeans) or between specific fandoms (Lifesteal approach to shipping and boundaries is different from HBG is different from DSMP), the mods will not be policing any specific understanding of boundaries across the event. The event's motivating ethos is Don't Like Don't Read, in that artists will be able to specify for themselves if a given relationship is to be interpreted as romantic or platonic, and writers will choose to opt into that, and NSFW will have to be specifically opted into on both sides.
Is NSFW allowed? Yes. NSFW works are allowed, but must be opted into, both in terms of viewing art and in terms of creating fic. No one under 18 is permitted to opt into NSFW and attempts to do so will be grounds for a ban from this event and anywhere else the mod team touches. For the comfort of the greatest number of participants, and to conform with Tumblr TOS, anything with the tags Underage or Incest will not be permitted to be part of the event.
Are major archive warnings (noncon/graphic depictions of violence/MCD) allowed? Aside from the content rules governing NSFW (no underage or incest, for the comfort of the greatest number of participants), major archive warnings are allowed. Depictions of real life horrors such as genocide and slavery are not-uncommon motifs in MCYT fics, and the mod team is not interested in legislating which types of horrors, griefs or abuses are inherently worse than others and are therefore off-limits. Because holding writing to a quality standard or saying only survivors can write atrocities is unworkable from a moderation standpoint, the three mentioned major archive warnings (MCD, Graphic Depictions of Violence, Noncon), are permitted to be included.
However, Major Archive Warnings must be explicitly opted into by the artist, and writers are free to not include Major Archive Warnings that their artist has permitted. Delivering un-asked for major archive warnings is grounds for a ban from this event. The mod team reserves the right to warn other mod teams on both the MCYT and Multi-fandom side about your bad behaviour.
What kind of an information will I provide as an Artist? How long or detailed? Artists will be able to specify
the server their art takes place on
the characters in the work
whether the relationships in the work are romantic, platonic, or could be interpreted either way
if they are okay with NSFW work
what age group of people they are okay working with
the type of AU it is
any content warnings present in the work already (i.e. gore, eyestrain, child death)
if the work is nsfw
any major archive warnings they are okay with happening in the story
common fandom themes and/or triggering content that they are okay with happening in the story.
A DNW
What sort of fandom themes will I specify? While this will not be an exhaustive list of every possible triggering concept, the mods want artists to be able to specify if they are okay with dynamics that circulate in the fandom that may be triggering or people simply may have strong opinions on, and for writers to be able to sort by that. Some of the themes include domestic abuse, alcoholism, family dynamics, pregnancy, dubcon, torture, body horror, dehumanization, child death, non-consensual touching, drugging, etc.
What is a DNW?
Artists will have the opportunity to fill out a DNW, which stands for Do Not Want. This is anything that has the potential to ruin a fic for you, and is where you opt out of content that would trigger, squick, or just render the gift unreadable for you. DNWs must be phrased politely, (so no "No foster aus because they suck and you suck if you like them"), and they must be reasonable, (so no "no blood/injury" if the art depicted shows injury, and no attempting to box someone into a specific gift beyond what is depicted in the art, so no "dnw anything that isn't a modern au where scar is a theatre teacher and grian is a biology teacher and they live in a city named hermitopia and grian has a situationship with mumbo and scarian has a rivalry at a coffee shop for the half-price muffins and jellie has psychic powers she's manipulating the muffin market with" if that is not clear from the art), and they must be specific and clear, (so no “no triggering content"), but they can be as petty (disliking 1st person) or as broad-reaching (no modern aus, no specific ships not depicted, no crossovers with specific servers or fics) as you like. Deliberately breaking someone's DNW is grounds for a ban from the exchange.
Is Dark/Violent content allowed? As long as it is something that the artist has not opted out of, yes. For many of us, the source material that originally drew us to the fandom includes major character death, torture, murder-for-hire, death games, public executions, child death and more. The fanfiction that arose from the source material follows in that trend. We will allow dark content to be part of the event, but it must be tagged for.
We also ask that participants use best judgement in delivering commonly triggering topics un-asked for. We reserve the right to ban people at mod's discretion for delivering unrequested triggering content, under the "do not be an asshole" rule.
Moreover, if your fic is rated E for any reason, (including violence or gore) your entire team must be 18+.
How can I get involved? You can participate in this event as a:
Author
Artist
Pinch Hitter
Beta Reader
You can even sign up for multiple roles, as long as you’re very sure you can make your deadlines!
What is a Pinch Hitter? A pinch hitter is a person who saves the day and steps in when the original creator is unable to deliver their work for whatever reason, making a new work on an accelerated timeline. You must reach the minimum word count of 5k. .
When do I have to join the discord? You have the option to join the dicord and hang out as soon as creation starts on May 4, and if you are an artist, you must join before sign-ups close on May 31. If you are a writer, you must join the discord before claims begin on June 1st. If you are a Beta Reader, we'd ask that you join before claims begin on June 9th.
How does team assignment/claims work? We will release a document with all the art pieces linked in it, and 24 hours afterwards we will release a sign-up form. Writers will be expected to list out out a top-five of artists they want to work with, and mods will match writers with art on a first-come-first-served basis.
How does Beta Reader assignment work? Shortly after writer sign-ups end, writers who wish to sign up for Beta Readers will be able to do so. In a similar way to how writers claimed art, beta readers will be given a list of summaries and then, 24 hours later, will be able to submit a short list of fics they want to help work on. Beta readers will be assigned on a first-come, first-served basis.
What happens if there are more artists than authors, or more authors than artists? If there are more writers, some artists will be assigned multiple writers. If there are more artists, we will put in place a question where writers can specify that they’d be willing to make multiple pieces, and a (hopefully small) number of writers would be assigned multiple teams.
What if all the artists I list have already been assigned? If every artist you wish to opt into has already been assigned, mods will contact you and ask if you wish to be matched to people who have not yet been claimed. You will then be able to choose if you wish to claim other teams, or wait and hope that there will be more writers than artists, and multiple writers on a team will be opened up. If that happens, you can re-submit your list and be assigned as a writer to one of your original artists.
I’m in [insert time zone here]. What if I’m not awake when claims open? There will be a spot to input your time zone in the discord. Mods will try to open the claims at a time that works for as many writers as possible. The art pieces will also be available for 24 hours before claims so that everyone can view them and pick out the ones that are the most interesting to them. We will aim for claims to open between 7 a.m. and 1 a.m. for as many writers as possible across all time zones. If claims fall outside that zone for you, you’ll be able to contact a mod and we’ll work out an alternative method for claims for you.
I don’t know what time zone I’m in? Go to timeanddate.com and enter the nearest major city, and it will tell you your current time zone.
What’s a check-in and how do they work? Check-ins are there to make sure everyone is on track to finish their piece in time, and to communicate any issues with the mods! If you know that you won’t be able to check in on a specific date (lack of internet, etc), please contact the mods in advance.
How long should my fic be? The minimum word count is 5,000 words! There is no maximum word count, but we ask you to be mindful of how much you can actually create in these two months.
If I wrote a multi-chapter work, do I have to have it all posted by the end of Posting Period? You must post your work in its entirety by the end of the two-week posting period.
What does AU mean in this context? AU stands for Alternate Universe and in this case means anything that would make the work not able to be tagged as canon compliant. Alternate endings, role reversals, complete setting or plot swaps, and crossovers all count. As this is a fest specifically to celebrate AUs, we ask that the AU be a significant and celebrated part of the work, not something that could be skipped if you aren’t paying attention.
Can I create two fics for my artist? Absolutely! There is no maximum for number of fics you want to create, but again, be mindful of not biting off more than you can chew two months of creation time.
Can I sign up with two pieces of art? You are welcome to sign up as part of the fest with multiple art pieces. However, if you do so, we will ask that you prioritize which art piece you want to be matched on first, and you will only receive a match to your secondary art piece after everyone else has an writer. We’re going to proritize every particpant getting a team before we prioritize every art piece getting a team.
Can I sign up with a multi-piece art piece? If you want to sign up with a web weave that features multiple panels, a long video, a long comic, a series of connected art pieces, a song cycle, or any other more complex/more ornate work, you are welcome to. We just ask that you make sure you can complete your art piece during the month of artist creation time, and keep in mind that if your piece is sufficiently complex, that might restrict the writers who are able to sign up for your piece. But if you think you can pull it off, then go for it.
Can I sign up with a writing buddy— as part of a collab team? You are welcome to sign up as a collaborative team, either an art team or a writing team! We ask that you make sure you work together well, and when you sign up for an team, you must declare that you’re a duo, so people know that they’ll be getting multiple team members and not one.
Can I submit an art piece that is part of a larger AU? All art pieces must stand alone, so you can't have it that your writer has to consider other art pieces to make a work. The art must also be made specifically for the event. We ask that you not submit an art piece that was made prior to the event, or one that is part of an au you've posted about so often that it will effectively de-anon you. Brainstorming or sketching early is fine.
Once my art piece is done, when can I post it? Art and fic should be posted together, during the Posting Period at the beginning of August. Once you have your art done, you'll have to hold onto it for another two months, while your writer is working.
What if I need to drop out? It is your responsibility to communicate with us if you need to drop out of the event for any reason, and we do need that communication. We know that life is no respecter of fic and art deadlines, so no hard feelings if something happens. However, we would hate for any artist to end up having no fic for their art, so please think about this if you are thinking of dropping out close to reveals.
Dropping out after the last check-in without informing the mods will result in not being permitted to take part in further events run by this mod team.
I have a question not answered here? Send us an ask on tumblr, contact @antimony-medusa on tumblr or discord!
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RWRB FirstPrince AU Recs - Part Three
I'm back with more! Dive into some recently-read AUs with me below.
pixel perfect by rizcriz. G, 1k. Alex is looking over the directions with barely contained glee, and Henry—Henry’s looking at Alex. He’s pushed into the wall of the Photo Booth when Alex suddenly leans forward and pulls his wallet out of his back pocket.
“We are so doing this,” Alex says excitedly.
The corner of Henry’s mouth twitches. “Oh?” He asks, watching Alex pull a ten dollar bill from his wallet. “And here I thought you’d only pulled us in here to make out a bit.”
Or, Alex and Henry are in love in a photo booth.
Total Eclipse by @myheartalivewrites. T, 1.2k. Alex is not sure what the fuck is happening here.
“And if you only hold me tight…”
A man—probably the most beautiful man he has ever seen—is up on stage in this karaoke bar, absolutely murdering Bonnie Tyler’s Total Eclipse of the Heart and he’s pretty sure the guy is crying and it’s one of the most horrifying things he’s ever seen and Alex cannot. Look. Away.
all we are is skin and bones by @indestructibleheart. T, 1.3k. Alex didn't plan to push Henry Fox into oncoming traffic.
it might be worth it for once by blueberriesandcream. G, 1.6k. quick little alternate scene. what if alex's protective streak had made an appearance when zahra found he and henry in their hotel room?
We've Got To Stop Meeting Like This by @everwitch-magiks. M, 1.9k. Alex books an Airbnb studio with a shared bathroom. The other studio is occupied by a man with lush pink lips and impressive personal hygiene — really, he’s super diligent about lathering and rinsing. Alex would know, seeing as the lock to the bathroom is seriously unreliable.
Or: the Airbnb romp you didn’t know you needed.
exclusive member deal by stutteringpeach. T, 2k.
Alex: "Let me take you on a date."
The date: Costco.
beyond measure by T, 2.1k. alex and henry host nora, june and pez for weekly fellow travelers watch parties.
tonight, they're watching the series finale. it comes crashing down on henry, and alex is there to catch him.
Couture of the Juicy Variety by ronans. G, 2.1k. It's Henry's birthday and his work crush has what some may call a wardrobe malfunction.
Adrift by TuppingLiberty. T, 2.2k. Alex works in the Texas Department of Justice as a research attorney. He's been low-key flirting with his downstairs neighbor Henry for the past few months. Unfortunately, he works himself sick and ends up at Henry's doorstep accidentally.
you all over me by @dumbpeachjuice. E, 2.3k. When Henry organises an evening of group sex, he never expects to meet a gorgeous man he wants to marry and have children with.
Or, a meet-cute at a sex club.
something more, something right by rizcriz. T, 2.7k. Alex blinks at him, seemingly entirely unimpressed. “So, you’re just going to pretend we’re not in love with each other?”
Let the flickering flame of your soul play all about me. by barthelme. E, 2.8k. Around them, there is the rustle of trees and the crisp whip of wind against nylon. An owl hooting. Faint whispers of campers still lingering around the dying campfire that Henry would like to block out entirely because, “We shouldn’t be doing this.”
“I’m aware,” Alex says, but his mouth clearly says he doesn’t care.
Or, the one where Alex and Henry are camp counselors who lead overnight hikes and fuck around at night.
please report to HR by @smc-27. G, 3.2k. Alex frowns at his inbox.
The only reason he knows Henry’s name is that people keep calling him “hot HR Henry” as if there’s anyone else in this office named Henry. Alex hasn’t met the guy yet. He’s been avoiding it mostly out of pettiness.
Henry and the Charisma Vortex by ronans. NR, 3.7k. ‘How’s about I take you to a bookstore and treat you to a trashy romance novel to say sorry for interrupting your first date with the love of your life?’
‘I fear the longer I spend time with you, the longer I will be unable to live this spectacular failure down.’
He warms at the thought of spending more time with Henry. ‘Solid deduction, you are absolutely right.’ He takes a punt and grabs Henry’s free hand. ‘C’mon.’
Or, Alex is sat next to a tragic date and has the urge to intervene.
Cloudy With a Chance of Fuckery by ronans. M, 3.9k. ‘Henry’s here with us for the weather.’ He pivots in his seat and grins over to the other corner of the studio. ‘Now, is it hot in here, or is it just you?’
Without missing a beat, Henry smiles cordially and gestures to the green screen behind him. ‘We’re actually in the middle of a cold snap.’
Or, an ode to Alex fucking with Henry live on air.
A Sin Better Than Heaven by @anchoredarchangel. E, 3.9k.
“Show me,” the king says, a demand. He sets the vial back down, careless to where it lands compared to where it originated. He leans back against the table, crosses his arms over his chest; chin raised, jaw set- a picture of regality.
Henry’s heart is pounding in his chest, the unstable beat of too many horse hooves overlapping, like the canter through the woods that very afternoon before he was shoved from his saddle. For the first time, he considers the possibility that perhaps he had hit his head harder than he realized- against the ground or against the tree, because certainly his hope is misplaced; certainly he is not following this conversation as well as he presumed.
“Show you what, Your Majesty?”
The king only deigns to move a hand, untucking it from his elbow in order to wave it vaguely. “How your body responds to men.”
Or: A criminally loose reimagining of the tent scene from Mary & George, only Alex is a sexually confused king, and Henry's the one who has been sent to seduce him.
Don’t You Dare Look Away by @emmalostinwonderland. E, 3.9k. “Jesus, Fox, if you wanna fuck me so goddamn bad, you could just say so.”
Alex fully expects to be dropped to the floor, but Henry just tightens his grip on Alex’s waist. “You… you’re not serious.”
And really, what could go wrong? “Serious as a heart attack, baby.”
// Alex and Henry are paired up for a pro dance on DWTS one week, but they just can’t seem to get along… until something clicks.
a feeling like this (could it be bliss?) by rizcriz. E, 4k. There’s a blonde woman plastered to Alex’s front. Ten minutes ago, he’d been grinding up against a brunette man half a foot shorter than him. Ten minutes before that, he’d been laughing with a red head at the bar. And ten minutes before that?
Ten minutes before that, he’d had that megawatt smile directed at Henry, laughing at something June said. And then he’d wandered off to get them more drinks, and now he’s off, giving his attention to people who are, quite frankly, not good enough for him, and Henry? Henry’s — christ, okay, Henry’s jealous.
Henry’s fucking fuming.
Or, Henry wants his boyfriend back.
Another Door Opens by @14carrotghoul. T, 4.1k. Henry takes a long drink. “If it makes you feel any better, my dad's dead. He and my mum had the type of love straight from the storybooks and it got cut tragically short, so what is the point in finding something real if it's just going to hurt you?”
Alex bites back a smile and shakes his head. “How in the fuck was that supposed to make me feel better?”
He waves his hand awkwardly. “Oh, I just thought we were both sharing the trauma that impacted our romantic relationships.”
Henry and Alex first meet when Henry reveals their partners are cheating on them with each other.
north star by sharkfins. T, 4.9k. “God, you know, I could stare at you all day,” he says finally. “I want to get this tattooed on the inside of my eyelids.”
“Ugh, gross,” Henry says while scrunching up his nose. Even still, his cheeks flush.
“Seriously, Hen, you look pretty.” Alex runs his fingers through Henry’s hair and places another kiss on his forehead.
Henry bites back a slightly embarrassing excited noise and shoves his face into Alex’s neck and smiles into his skin. Hen. Alex calls him that all the time, but for some reason now it’s making something stir inside his chest.
“I can’t believe I get to call you mine,” he adds, running his hand down the back of Henry’s head and settles his arm around his shoulders again.
Henry moves impossibly closer to him and looks up to meet his eyes. “Pretty, huh?”
“Absolutely gorgeous.”
or: Henry experiments with gender <3
Best Practice in Sexual Favours by everwitch. E, 5.1k. They meet at a bar. Alex is young; fresh out of law school, sharp and charismatic and oh-so attractive. The sex is absolutely incredible, and Henry has no regrets. At least not until the morning after when he finds himself opposite Alex in a meeting — equipped with the painful knowledge that Alex’s boss thinks Alex’s only function in said meeting is to sit there and look all pretty. Somebody ought to call HR right about now.
Or: when sexual relationships mix with professional ones, Alex and Henry make the most of it.
We met in the Park by TuppingLiberty. E, 5.3k. Henry is absolutely obsessed with the runner he sees in the park every day at lunch.
cause you're classic, and i'm reckless by @firenati0n. T, 5.4k. “I've, actually, uh. I've never done this before.”
At this, Henry stops short, takes a second as his gaze moves up and to the left, trying to recall something. “I've seen your films. You most certainly have done intimate scenes.”
Alex clears his throat. He hopes his nerves aren't completely obvious, the slight waver in his voice about to give him away. “Yeah, well. Never with a man, so. Not at this scale, anyway.”
“Would it help to, er, practice?" Henry winces a little as he says it, which does not inspire confidence. But Alex is shocked nonetheless. What the fuck?
Diving In Dick-First by quill_and_ink. E, 5.5k. "So... we're doing an intimate piercing today?"
Alex promptly crawls under a rock to die.
Trying My Patience (Try Pink Carnations) by @cha-melodius. E, 5.6k. Unfortunately for him, the only things more beautiful than Alex himself are Alex’s cakes. He’s the most in-demand cake artist in the city, and as such he books a lot of weddings. Many of the very same weddings that simply must also have Fox Florals arrangements for their centrepieces. Weddings like, apparently, this one.
(Or, Henry the florist and Alex the cake artist are forced to collaborate last minute at a wedding job, make a mess, and learn some things about each other in the process.)
A thousand dreams that would awake me by @kiwiana-writes. E, 5.9k.
“It’s not about punishment.” Alex just nods; Henry had been very clear on the form that he wasn’t looking to be dominated or put in his place, so that won’t be new information. “And it’s not the pain as such.” He runs his fingers along the edge of the mug. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I like to feel it, but I’m not looking for pain for the sake of pain. It’s more about… control, I think.”
There’s a long silence. “Taking it?” Alex prompts finally. “Or giving it up?”
“Does it sound ridiculous if I say both?”
Or, Henry visits a sex club to get spanked the way he's craving.
Want Me by @orchidscript. E, 6.1k. Henry had always been weak for a nice smile, but his was impossible to ignore.
Blame it on summer heat and a fresh flush in his cheeks. Blame it on sunset painting the outdoor bar sweltering, romantic colors. Blame it on two healthy glasses of albariño thrumming in his bloodstream, or the good music floating on the air.
Henry could blame it on anything liked if he thought long and hard about it, but that didn’t change much at the end. The core remained the same: he had been gone from the jump.
Henry and Alex hook up on a vacation in Spain. Henry falls a bit deeper.
i think about jumping (just to see you come running) by @coffeecatsme. T, 6.1k. Henry Fox likes to think he’s led a good life.
He’s been a good son to his parents, though his grandmother would probably disagree with him being a good grandson—although, if he’s honest with himself, he’d rather take that as a compliment. He’s used the family money for good, built a life for himself. He’s saved the sweetest beagle from a shelter and paid an arm and a leg bringing him to the States from England. He doesn’t think killing a few mosquitos in his lifetime and the select words he had for the homophobic part of his family should curse him for years of torture.
Alas, that’s the only explanation as to why the public library he’s worked for for years would move him to a branch right next to a goddamn fire station.
Or, 5 times Henry embarrasses himself in front of Alex and 1 time Alex embarrasses himself in front of Henry.
Five letter word for 'unobservant' by @clottedcreamfudge. E, 6.9k. And podfic by @thirdeye1234. “He's so annoying,” Alex says, the words spilling out of his mouth before he can stop them as he sits down at his desk opposite Nora. Nora – colleague, semi-sister-in-law, and unfortunately his best friend – is used to this by now, and continues eating a croissant over her keyboard in the manner of someone who has the only ergonomic, crumb-resistant keyboard in the office, and wants everyone to know it.
“Please,” she says, not even looking at him as she presumably whizzes through accounts or something, mouth full of buttery pastry. “Elucidate. I have no idea who you're talking about and there is no precedent for you interrupting my morning with those words at all.”
Alex scowls at her. “Wordle Guy.”
in this home series by riversdeep. T, 7.5k. At that, Alex looks him straight in the eye. “I'm sorry I fell in love with you years ago and never said a single thing about it.”
A self indulgent childhood best friends to lovers AU, exploring the transition from best friends to boyfriends
me and you and awkward silence by @kill8a. M, 7.5k. Alex has a bit of a predicament. The new librarian, Henry Fox, has proved to be a little too attractive to go un-noticed, and he might be harboring a bit of a crush.
make it five by @anincompletelist. M, 8k. “Fifty bucks says I can get that guy’s number.”
Popping the bubble of cinnamon-flavored gum Alex had just blown, he glances up from his phone to look at where Nora’s pointing. Just over the soles of his shoes, crossed at the ankles and propped on the flaking black wood of the shop’s front desk, there’s a man with broad shoulders lingering by the far wall. Alex hadn’t even heard the guy come in.
“Nora. He’s literally looking at one of the biggest dildos I’ve ever seen,” he deadpans quietly.
alex works at a sex toy shop. it's usually a pretty easy job — if he could just stop daydreaming about the blonde guy that keeps coming in to buy literally all of alex's favorite sex toys.
pour some sugar on me by @sunnysideprince. M, 8.2k. Alex makes not-so-safe-for-work baking videos on Instagram for a living, and Henry, unsurprisingly, goes through a crisis because of it.
An Amateur’s Guide to Professional Gift-Giving by anincompletelist (soldouthaz). T, 8.9k. Alex, a former-law-student-taking-some-time-off turned professional part-time gift giver, is tasked with finding a gift for the most high profile client he's ever worked with, both in and out of the world of law.
It turns out finding the perfect gift for the Prince of Wales might be easier than he'd anticipated.
secret admirer by rizcriz. T, 9.5k. Today, though, he’s watching in delight as a massive bouquet of roses makes its way through the office, the delivery guy carefully weaving between cubicles as he heads for Nora’s desk. Last week, Nora had revealed to the office one of his embarrassing college hook up stories that involved a thong and sitting cold and shivering in a police station while he waited to be picked up. Today—today he’s sicking Nadine and Alberta on Nora as payback.
His gaze flicks over to Nora where she’s sitting at her desk oblivious to her incoming doom, and then back to the delivery guy. Anticipation, hot and excited, bundles up in Alex’s gut as he clears the final turn of cubicles, and just as Alex is about to grin, wicked and delighted at Nora, the delivery guy makes another turns and comes to a stop at the completely wrong desk.
And then he sets the flowers down and leaves.
or, an accidental flower delivery.
my little dove by dearestalez. M, 9.8k.
“Kinda cliché,” Alex says, looking up at the mural.
“It’s Bea’s favourite piece,” Henry says.
Alex looks at him, “that makes sense.”
They travel through a plethora of shops. Henry picks up a hat, Alex holds a jumper to his chest and twirls until Henry is giggling into his fingers.
“Why do they never have my size?” Alex laments, holding a nice pair of shoes that don’t come in seven and a half. Only seven or eight. Henry doesn’t mean to laugh, he didn’t really think that was something he did. Laugh at people’s expense. But he isn’t doing that. Alex is pouting over a pair of shoes, with wide brown eyes and slumped shoulders, and Henry is laughing at the absurdity of it all.
He never thought that the man across the building cradling a beer to his chest was the type to pout and whine when a shop didn’t carry his size. He never thought he’d find that out. He never thought that stranger from that bar would turn into someone he knows.
“You’re a dick,” Alex says, but he’s grinning and Henry is weak.
i want to mark my skin (it is paper thin) by @violetbaudelaire-quagmire. M, 10k.
From: [email protected]
Subj: Tattoo Reference
Attached: 1 file (orionsketch.jpg)
Hello,
Attached you’ll find a line art drawing of the constellation Orion. The shoulder blade is the intended location.
Best,
H.J. Fox
OR: It's a Tattoo Shop AU!
i dream of our odyssey by violetbaudelairequagmire. E, 10k. Alex rests his elbows on the counter of the small cafe attached to Bankston’s Books, enjoying the quiet period in between the morning stay-at-home-mom-crying-toddler storytime crowd and the rush of college students that appear in the afternoon. It’s only a couple hours, but it’s nice to have that time with just a few black coffees in between the rush of “pumpkin spice latte and a cakepop” and “quad shot espressos and keep them coming” that dominate the busy periods at the bookstore. He’s not complaining though- he loves this job. He gets a discount on books, no one cares how much coffee he drinks in a shift, and, in the last couple of weeks, he’s had a great view of the new guy quietly shelving books.
A Tapestry of Intimacy Unfolded by hqwhna. M, 10k. It's a case of textbook serendipity when Senator Alex Claremont-Diaz and Dr. Henry Fox first meet at a fundraiser in D.C. Now, Alex just has to think of an excuse to see him again...
no drug like me by stutteringpeach. E, 10k. “I’d like to pay for your schooling,” Henry says casually. “Move you into a better apartment. You’ll get an allowance, of course, but that will be for you to do with what you will. Your expenses will be covered outside of that.”
Alex blinks. He’s drunk off expensive wine and Henry’s attention. His brain isn’t functioning. “What?”
Henry’s expression hasn’t changed. “Do you need me to repeat myself?”
XOXO Gossip Girl by alyaasca. T, 11k. Diazes love gossiping. And Henry, well, he wants to be a part of Alex's family. Thanks to his therapist, he has a number of breathing exercises up his sleeve, and also a dream. Watch him take his rightful place by learning the art of family gossip.
i don't know how not to by smc_27. M, 11k. “Here’s what we’re gonna do,” he tells Martha in their next meeting, which takes place two hours outside of London at her parents’ ‘cottage’. To think they talk of her family as commoners when they have this much money is fucking insane. It just goes to illustrate how out of touch the whole monarchy machine is.
“Tea?” she offers, and he nods just to be polite. A literal, honest to god butler comes over to pour for him. “Carry on.”
“You’re gonna disappear,” he tells her, and her whole face lights up. Her shoulders relax. She looks straight at him. He can hear the kids playing with their grandmother in the next room.
“Tell me more.”
Or, Alex is Martha's divorce attorney
cut by @havanasroses. E, 12k.
Holy fucking eyelashes.
He’s all tan skin and bright eyes and charming smile— everything that makes Henry weak in the knees. Pretty brown eyes dart between the lineup and his clipboard, trying to put two and two together, but all Henry can focus on are those arms. Those hands. That arse.
“Can I call you up, handsome?”
Henry almost blacks out.
or, the five times alex and henry shoot a video together as (not so) strangers, and the one time they do as a couple.
into temptation by stutteringpeach. E, 13k. When Henry wakes, there’s an ache in his arse and a wet patch on the sheets.
He tries to imagine how it happened. Whether he was on his side or his front already, whether he had to be rolled over. Whether they took their time or couldn’t wait, so turned on by the sight of him lying there.
It shouldn’t turn him on this much—the not knowing. But that was the point.
You've Been My Muse for a Long Time by @affectionatelyrs. E, 13k. There aren’t many instances in which Henry would claim he exhibits a colorful vocabulary. In fact, he could likely list them on one hand: when wretched people say the most bigoted things, when the local grocer has run out of their Jaffa Cake stock in the minuscule international aisle, when he gets bored and resorts to writing homoerotic poetry in his moleskin journal with a fountain pen like some lovelorn literary scholar from the eighteenth century.
And now, when he’s assigned to a gig he doesn’t want to be at. As in, he would rather publish said poetry to the unrelenting, merciless masses of the internet than be at this gig.
“You must be bloody fucking kidding me.”
Or, When Rolling Stone names Alex Claremont-Diaz as the number one rising star to look out for, Henry is tasked with the sole responsibility of photographing him for their cover shot. Which, truly, wouldn’t be an issue—it’s an incredible opportunity—except Henry doesn’t trust that miscreant to be within ten feet of him ever since The Incident™
Star-Crossed by schmulte. T, 17k. Alex is a principal ballerino with a hatred for Henry Fox. What happens when they're paired up and forced to dance together as star-crossed lovers? Will their partnership crash and burn, or will they cross uncharted territory and make ballet history?
Not An Act by quill_and_ink. E, 20k. It was bound to happen at some point. Alex and Henry had both started modeling within three months of each other and they'd both become known for dramatic, high fashion shoots, editorials, and runways, so it had just been a matter of time before they would be hired to work together. He could have handled it if they'd just been on the same set at the same time without actually having to shoot together, but no - the premise of the campaign is sensuality, intimacy. He has to pretend to be in love with Henry.
getting good now by Standinginmoonlight. M, 20k. Alex sighs and balls his hands up into fists, digging them into his eye sockets until he sees stars, and then he’s speaking without his brain giving his mouth permission.
“I can’t believe I’m going to marry someone British.”
Or: the Love is Blind AU that no-one asked for.
we should get married by smc_27. E, 25k. He’d spent most of the week sitting on the floor with his laptop open on the table, typing away about absolute nonsense in between sessions and phone calls with immigration and a lawyer trying to see if it’s possible there’s any way in the world he can stay in America while this gets sorted. The good news is this doesn’t bar him from trying again and just returning when it all gets sorted. Not that that will be easy, but still. It’s a possibility.
He makes the absolutely foolish mistake, after pouring his second drink, of googling ‘marriage visa’ as if that will be the answer to any or all of his problems. Allows himself a brief, excruciating moment to imagine he has someone to marry and make that a reality.
But then…he does, does he not?
OR, a greencard marriage AU
Clean Slate by smc_27. E, 25k. “Henry.” Pez comes over, puts both hands on Henry’s cheeks and looks him dead in the eye. “You are not a sad man who’s gotten dumped. You’re in the prime of your life, and I quite desperately need you to act like it.”
“The prime of my life,” Henry scoffs, more incredulous than questioning. “I’ve just gotten out of a 15 year relationship, endured a divorce, am suffering an almost impressive case of writer’s block, and your hands are like bloody icicles.” Pez grins, doesn’t take his hands away. “Explain to me how this is my prime. Please.”
Pez tilts his head, and sounds entirely serious when he says, “Literally anything can happen from here.”
In Accord by @absoluteaudacitywrites. E, 27k. Pursuant to the establishment of an ongoing relationship between The Crown and the Office of the President of the United States, the representatives of the The Queen and Her interests are authorised to establish a contract of marriage between His Royal Highness Prince Henry of Wales and Alexander Claremont-Diaz.
Claremont 2008 by @happinessofthepursuit. M, 28k. What if Ellen Claremont had gotten elected in 2008 instead of Obama? An alternate timeline story of FirstPrince.
2009 at Buckingham Palace for tea. A sleepover after a quinceañera in 2010. The 2012 London Olympics. A 2014 Model UN Conference. A funeral in 2015. College and another campaign trail.
And the texts, facetimes, and chain emails in between.
By All Means, Rome by @iboatedhere. T, 29k. During a goodwill tour of Europe, Prince Henry rebels against his tedious schedule and disappears into the heart of Rome, seeking reprieve from a life of relentless royal obligations...
Alex Claremont-Diaz, an American journalist living in Rome with a British Monarchy-sized chip on his shoulder, stumbles upon a young man…
Each man keeps a secret to benefit themselves, not thinking how it would affect the other until love gets in the way.
seven fallen angels in atonemеnt by riversdeep. E, 31k. Bea takes the diary from him and snaps it shut. "Well, love, that's because I'm meeting Alex. We'll be at the studio in an hour, so if you're coming with, you should probably wear some nicer trousers."
Henry looks down at his shorts. He thinks they belonged to Pez at one point since they have the words juicy written over the arse in fancy script. "That," He says, "Is completely beside the point."
She shrugs, "Alright. If you want to see the man you've crushed on for two years in those shorts, be my guest."
Well. That only covers part of the problem. The part where Alex infuriates him, that he has to put in an unreasonable amount of effort not to drop things around him because of how beautiful he is. That he is, admittedly, a little bit in love with him.
Or, Alex is a singer collaborating with Bea and Henry is dragged along for the ride, much to his reluctant delight.
would you be my love, my love? (would you be mine?) by ohprongs. M, 32k. When Henry Fox’s fourth series as a professional dancer on BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing rolls around, he’s got a good feeling. He knows what he’s doing — he’s a two-time semi-finalist — and this year he wants to win. That is, until he’s knocked off-kilter by two revelations: they’re allowing same gender contestant/pro pairings for the first time in the show’s history, and Alex Claremont-Díaz is joining as the newest pro dancer.
He is, to put it mildly, absolutely screwed.
(aka, the pro dancers rivals-to-friends-to-lovers au that no one asked for)
Baby (Let Me Put On a Show) by SatinBirds. E, 37k. It’s been five months, and still Alex is never completely prepared for Henry’s performances. Private or otherwise.
Or,
Henry is a night dancer, and he’s everything Alex wants.
Platinum Record series by @cricketnationrise. E, 39k. Email: [email protected]
Channel Name: AustinBoy
Age Restricted?: 18+
Chat enabled?: Yes
Subscriptions: Monthly
Tiers: 2
Tier 1:
> Name: Standard
> Description: Access to chat room, 1 weekly video
Tier 2:
> Name: Bonus
> Description: Access to chat room, 1 weekly video, 1 weekly livestream
Or, a Camboy!Alex AU
A Cloud on Fire Makes its Own Rain by foux_dogue. M, 40k. Henry ends his relationship with Alex in Texas at twenty-one years old.
At forty, Alex's heartbreak is just another relic from the past that he left behind. He's made a name for himself, steadily dismantling the system that never truly welcomed him from the foxhole of a critically-acclaimed late night news show. He's not living his happily-ever-after, maybe, but he's doing work that matters, and he's content with what he's got.
At forty-one, Henry finally decides to abdicate. There's only one person who he trusts to break the story.
February, I'm In Love by IBoatedHere. E, 40k. February themed FirstPrince Prompts
(you got me) cursing the daylight by @waterloolovers. E, 40k.
But if you like causing trouble up in hotel rooms
And if you like having secret little rendezvous
If you like to do the things you know that we shouldn't do
Then baby, I'm perfect
Baby, I'm perfect for you
“ALEX CLAREMONT-DIAZ TAKES ON EUROPE!
America’s darling, ACD, is setting off on his first international tour of Europe and The UK next month. His first stop is in London at the sold out O2 arena.”
Alex is a singer. Henry is a podcast host. They should know that secret relationships don’t usually pan out, but they’re willing to give it a try.
What could possibly go wrong?
(Strangers to friends to besties to lovers)
It's Nice to Have a Friend by mainstreamelectricalparade. T, 59k. Two boys meet on a beach, build a sand castle, write letters, and fall in love.
Someday We'll Know If Love Can Move a Mountain by @three-drink-amy. E, 60k. The emails were never leaked, but the Queen has forced Alex and Henry apart. Alex believes they're biding their time until they can be together for real. One day at work, he's forced to confront how wrong he is when Henry's engagement is announced. With both of them miserable and neither wanting the wedding to happen, they grapple with how or if they could even stop it. Or even if they should.
False Dichotomy by chamel. E, 61k. One of the world’s largest retailers is opening a store on his street. A bookstore. He looks down at the article in his hand again and catches sight of a phrase: “We hope that people will see this as more than a bookstore, and hope to foster a sense of community.” As if Henry Fox-Mountchristen has any concept of what community means.
Alex very narrowly does not break something.
(When global mega-retailer Mountchristen opens a new location—led by the infuriatingly attractive and insufferable Henry Fox-Mountchristen—near his LGBTQ-focused bookshop in Soho, Alex's comfortable life is turned upsided down. Luckily, he has one of his best friends to turn to: a guy he met online and knows only as H. Meanwhile, Henry is battling against his family to make a positive difference in the world and falling further in love with a man he's never met. But... what if they changed that?
(make me) misbehave by @onward--upward. E, 65k. Alex Claremont-Diaz has done it again. The Texas-born singer-songwriter released his fourth studio album second skin Thursday at midnight. Full of Claremont-Diaz’s signature lyricism, critics are praising the album for the cohesive image it paints. second skin is the result of a young writer at the top of his game, and every lyric depicts for the listener a picture of a sun-drenched secret romance. Fans are clamoring to be the first to uncover the mystery girl at the center of it all, although Claremont-Diaz remains tight-lipped on the subject…
Or: Alex Claremont-Diaz is a singer-songwriter rising up in the music industry. Henry Fox is the shining star of an acting empire.
This is a love story.
All our Sweetest Hours Fly Fastest by @ahistoricdistraction. T, 69k. It has been three years since they were outted and Henry and Alex have finally settled into a groove that works well for them, except for the fact that it feels like they're always having to steal time together. Queen Mary constantly coming up with excuses to get Henry out of public events with Alex isn't helping, and Alex is done with it. After a long conference in Tokyo that Henry couldn't attend, Alex's flight home being delayed is the last straw and he calls Henry to say they need to figure out a better way to do this, to which Henry agrees. But fate has other ideas. Alex's flight goes missing somewhere over the Pacific, no trace of it to be found, leaving Henry and Alex's family struggling to not lose hope while unable to do anything.
Such a Burden, This Flame on My Chest by allmylovesatonce. E, 76k. Alex Claremont-Diaz is relocating back to Austin to join his dad's firehouse. His days as a firefighter in Washington D.C. ended badly, but no one knows that, or knows why. And he plans to keep that close to his chest. He has to shove it back down if he wants to seem like a normal person, if he wants to do the job, if he wants to get along with his new crew, and most of all, if he wants to get to know the hot British firefighter on the squad.
No one can know what really happened.
It takes a lot to know a man by dazedandconfused. E, 86k. Alex is doing good. Life is good. Work is good. There's just one tiny problem. He can't get out of his head enough to enjoy sex. Nora has a solution in the form of a not-quite-sex-club called Sweet Encounters where he meets Henry, an attentive dom who shows him the joys of BDSM and sex with a man.
Alex gets a new problem when he starts falling for the man, and it turns out Henry might know more about the case Alex is working on than he lets on.
And then it all stacks up from there.
Heavy Weighs the Crown series by @dwell-the-brave. M, 88k. “I’ll be back by Thursday,” Philip promises, giving Martha a hand up the jet’s steps. She gives them a brief wave from the top of the stairs before disappearing.
“Make sure you don’t ski off a cliff!” Bea calls after him as he follows his wife into the jet. He waves a hand dismissively at her and then withdraws into the darkness of the cabin.
That’s the last thing any of them say to him.
Philip dies, and Henry becomes heir.
Something Borrowed, Something Blue by anincompletelist. E, 116k. When June gets engaged, Alex, her brother, and Henry, her best friend, are asked to be the official Guys Of Honor. There’s a month to plan the whole thing, which would be near impossible anyway, only made worse by the fact that being around each other the last several years has only ever led to petty fights and useless competition. Unfortunately, as the two most important men in her life - aside from her fiancé - they don’t really have much of a choice.
Alex has a lot of feelings about this. As it turns out, Henry does too.
Trust Your Heart If The Seas Catch Fire by Light_of_Bane. E, 171k.
Alex had a plan.
And then his life got thrown upside down after finding out President Claremont is his mother.
Now his plan is shot to hell and he's stuck navigating a world he never expected to be in - one of privilege and the spotlight and a family that's far cry from the abusive one he had grown up with. How's he supposed to do this?
And why is Prince Henry so much prettier in person?
This was not the plan.
I only tag an author once per post, but I'm still figuring out firstprince author handles. If you see one I may not know or find a broken link, please give me a heads up!
RWRB FirstPrince AU Recs Part One
RWRB FirstPrince AU Recs Part Two
Master List of RWRB FirstPrince Recs
Master List of Recommendations
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The Jily Fandom Rec List 2024 is a compilation of Jily stories our readers want to keep an eye on for this year's awards.
MAY
All The Lonely People (Where Do They All Come From?) (WIP, 4.9k as of 31 May 2024) by @nodirectionhome-ao3. Rated M.
James Potter is a Ministry agent. Lily Evans is a disrupter.
But Lily is gone...a figment of the past...
Or so James thinks.
Risky Behaviour (completed, 1k) by @jamesunderwater. Rated M.
Lily is determined not to get distracted during rounds again.
Written for @jilymicrofics Mystery Microfic May Prompt 27: Risk
Sweet Seventeen (completed, <1k) by @jamesunderwater. Rated G.
James is dating an older woman. She loves snow. He loves... well, it's too soon to say it.
here lies (completed, 4.4k) by @gigglesandfreckles-hp. Rated T.
“Were we expecting you?” He looks slightly horrified, as if he’s forgotten an important appointment, and turns to his wife for help. “I’m sorry if—
“No, dear.” Euphemia shakes her head, moving toward him and running a smoothing hand through his mop of messy, white hair. “Lily here was just depositing our highly inebriated son.”
“Oh, that’s rather charitable of her.”
[or: James can't hold his drink, or his affections]
the same rule applies to goodness and grief (completed, 3.6k) by @gigglesandfreckles-hp. Rated T.
“I need your assurance that if this all goes tits up and you end up dead, you’re not gonna haunt me for stealing your family.”
“I’m starting to question whether your concern for my safety is genuine.”
“Just can’t help it, Prongs. World's cutest baby. You and stupid Evans. Beautiful people. I hate you both.”
“Good night, Sirius,” says Lily, shaking her head in laughter.
[or: James is starting to worry Lily so she calls in reinforcements]
maybe it was egos swinging (maybe it was her) (completed, 11.1k) by @apalapucian. Rated T.
james starts rolling his shoulders, wincing. "jesus, evans."
"back at ya," says lily, testing her wrists. "ever heard of taking it easy?"
"with you? never."
"can’t believe you’d use confringo on me."
"knew you'd block it," he says. "can’t believe you’d use depulso."
she shrugs, grinning. "knew you'd block it."
(or: seventh-year, auror-aspirant, academic rivals, head boy and head girl james and lily.)
Hitchhikers May Be Escaping Inmates (WIP, 24.3k as of 31 May 2024) by @themaraudershavethephonebox. Rated T.
At eighteen, Lily Evans learned she had a soulmate. June seventh she woke up with scrawled text over her ribcage that could not come off in the shower no matter how hard she scrubbed, or with the wipes her mother used to get pen ink out of her father’s clothes, nor the acetone her sister used to remove her nail varnish. Lily Evans still believed in love, in magic. That she could fly. But the universe would not be calling the shots when it came to it fuck you very much.
Love for the Summer (WIP, 51.9k as of 31 May 2024) by @missgryffin. Rated E.
It's the summer after sixth year, Lily Evans is realizing she fancies James Potter, and James has Sirius Black's motorbike to thank for getting Lily out of the friend zone.
The Loyal Companion: A Tale of Bad Dates and Good Whiskey (WIP, 10.7k as of 31 May 2024) by @sophie-hatter-jenkins. Rated M.
Lily Evans endures a series of disastrous first dates at her new favourite bar, The Loyal Companion. Still, at least the whiskey is good. And the bartender is cute. Not her type though. Nope, definitely not.
Just the Two of Us (completed, 10.2k) by @arianatwycross. Rated T.
Head Students James and Lily face a perilous twist when a malicious potion surfaces in hate mail directed at Lily. Dumbledore orders a week-long quarantine in the Head Students' suite. With unspoken crushes lingering, the duo navigates close quarters, leading to unexpected revelations, lingering looks and forehead kisses.
silence and patience, pining in anticipation (completed, 1.2k) by @kay-elle-cee. Rated T.
Lily’s been hung up on James for years; a tipsy conversation might be the push she needs to do something about it.
A Heart of Coal (completed, 8.6k) by @wearingaberetinparis. Rated T.
They say fortune favours the bold, yet Lily Evans was given her death sentence at seventeen. As soon as midnight strikes on the eve of her eighteenth birthday, her heart will turn to coal. Gryffindor knight James Potter, however, is the last to accept such a fate. For while Lily Evans’ curse foretells her death, his foreshadows a life without his unrequited true love at his side.
Written for the March Jily Challenge.
Prompt: A curse will strike on A's birthday and that can only be undone by a dragon’s fire, true love's kiss or a fairy's tears. None of those three even exist, or do they?
meet you there (completed, 7.8k) by flagpoles. Rated M.
Lily Evans to James Potter: why is this bar called the horse and carriage btw
James Potter: romantic gesture from binns for his ex wife
James Potter: it was their nicknames for each other. wish i was joking
Lily Evans: fuck me i would also divorce a guy who nicknamed me carriage
James Potter: believe it or not she was horse
Lily Evans: well christ
//
they work in a bar and things are going completely fine, actually
Check out the previous months' recs too: January, February, March || April
Happy reading!
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new beginnings | may 27 - june 2
note: before i start this, i just want to warn y'all that it's 24.4k. if you want to read this in one sitting, i recommend locking in.
please hit me up in my inbox to give me feedback! or your thoughts! or speculation on what's coming next! i want you guys to talk to me all the time and tell me every thought you have. if i could send each of you the google document and force you to leave comments, i would.
also, i think by the time this fic is finished, it might be long enough to be a novel. should we all work together to get it published?
1:90 – TREVOR
“Do we really think it’s a good idea to spend the summer down here instead of the Michigan house?” Jack asks. “We own that one, after all.”
“Everyone knows about the Michigan house,” Trevor points out.
Cole, who had plotted this with Trevor after last summer’s debacle, sighs. “We can’t keep having the same conversation. We decided that we would train at the Checkers’ rink when we can get down to Charlotte and use the cement slab as our own rink in the yard of the rental house in the meantime. So that’s not your problem. So, what is, Jack? You’re gonna miss the girls?”
Jack fixes Cole with a cutting glare. “Fuck off.”
“You know, there are girls in North Carolina,” Cole says, a grin dimpling his cheeks. “Sweet, southern belles, even.”
Jack rolls his eyes. “I can’t wait for the rest of the goons to get here. We’ll put it to a fucking vote and I’ll get to go home.”
“If you want to go home so bad, why don’t you?” Trevor asks. “We’re not forcing you to be here.”
“You triple-belted me in the backseat,” Jack argues. “You’re taking me away from Michigan and you can’t even let me have shotgun.”
“Talk, talk, talk,” Trevor mocks. “You have hands. And fingers. You’re not helpless.”
Jack huffs from his spot in the back, stubbornly turning his head to the right to watch the trees pass. Cole does the same from the passenger seat, tapping his fingers along the pane of the window.
There are twenty miles, an hour total, still on the GPS. Trevor hasn’t seen a town since they stopped at the gas station at the bottom of the mountain, the closest city being Winston-Salem almost an hour and a half ago, barely more than sparse houses and fields in the time since. They’re driving along a stream now and the latest exit off this small, two lane highway said “Love Valley.” Trevor snickers at the sign and goes to point it out to Jack, but Jack beats him to it.
“Don’t, Z.”
“It’s funny, dude.”
“It’s not, though.”
Cole cranks the volume up, drowning out the continuing argument that floats forward from the backseat.
They drive on and Trevor thinks about it– everything. They have three unobscured months in Litchton, the only people knowing about their whereabouts are their families and coaches. The goons, as Jack referred to them, would be joining them sometime in the next day or two. Quinn and Luke had to wrap up some loose ends at home (Quinn, closing up his apartment for the summer; Luke, visiting some college friends as their semester comes to an end.
Litchton was the safest bet and Krebs had mentioned North Carolina to Trevor in passing the one time they caught up throughout the year, heaving heard from Leschyshyn that the mountain towns of his home state were notoriously quiet and drama-free and that their inhabitants, although lovers of gossip, kept to themselves.
After those girls had snuck into the Michigan house at the end of the summer and started showing up wherever the boys went in the evenings, Trevor just wanted a summer off. He wanted time with his friends the way they used to have it, just working out together and drinking until they dropped, swimming and parading around the town like normal guys in their early twenties.
In Litchton, they could pretend to be guys that were home for the summer, ready to start some corporate finance or everyday-tie job. It was a look into what could’ve been, had they not dedicated their lives to their sport.
For three months, he gets to be Trevor Zegras, the kid who complained about his name being last on the roster in every class growing up and the kid who worked in his mom’s store after school. But he’s also Trevor Zegras, NHL superstar, ninth overall pick, owner of the best Michigan goal in the United States, so he might toss his name around in Litchton this summer. Just to see if it gets him anything.
If it doesn’t, his good looks certainly will. What’s flirting with a few old ladies on the street? It’ll be the highlight of their year.
Trevor misses the driveway the first time the car passes it. It’s hidden by brush and along a curve. The GPS reroutes them– but they have to drive an extra fifteen minutes along this road before they can turn around.
They drive into a small town, a strip of eclectic stores littering the main road. There’s a small grocery store with a fruit stand out front that Cole points to.
“We could pick up some food while we’re out here,” Cole suggests. Upon hearing Jack’s mouth open in the backseat, he continues, “Just so we don’t have to come back later.”
Jack slouches against the backseat, huffing about being cut off at the opportunity to express his discomfort.
“Jacky, will you relax? We’re going to have fun this summer.” Trevor tells him, turning into the parking lot and choosing a spot close to the entrance.
Cole laughs when Jack unbuckles his three seatbelts in the wrong order and has to untangle them. Trevor flips the mirror down and fudges his hair, fluffing the ends. He had gotten it cut just before they left for this trip, so the edges were still even and sharp.
Jack is the first to exit the car, practically throwing himself onto the pavement with his excitement to leave the vehicle behind, if only briefly. They’d been driving for hours. Cole flew into New York from Montréal, so Trevor had to pick him up from the airport. They picked Jack up in Jersey in the early morning and started driving south.
Trevor can’t blame Jack for his annoyance. They’ve been in the car with him for ten long hours and they forced the first stretch of driving on him, having spent about two hours in the car before getting him. He had just woken up and had to drive four hours through the traffic of Philly and into Baltimore. He napped while Cole drove down through most of Virginia, and then woke up grumpy anyway when Trevor took over to take on North Carolina.
It’s been a long fucking day.
They shop together, but they bicker quietly. After years of friendship, their arguments seem more like brotherly spats. The knowing smiles from the women in the grocery store prove that they’ve heard encounters like this before, likely in their own homes.
Eventually, Trevor rolls his eyes and goes to sit in the car. He leaves Cole and Jack to pay for the groceries. Upon leaving the store, he pulls his phone out of his pocket and pulls up Instagram, hoping to catch up on the posts that he had missed on the long drive.
Walking past the fruit stand out front, Trevor bumps into someone and he stumbles back.
“I’m sorry,” Trevor apologizes, reaching out and steadying the girl with a touch to her elbow. “I didn’t see you.”
“Hard to see me when you’re on your phone,” she replies with a tilted smile.
Trevor lets out a little laugh at her reply, barely a breath. “I’ll be more careful next time.”
She nods with an approving hum and turns back to the stand, picking up a peach and turning it over in her hand.
Trevor turns and walks to the car, climbing into the vehicle and settling behind the wheel. He watches the sliding door for his friends, but his eyes drift back to the girl.
She’s tied a red bandana in her hair and she slips peaches into her mesh bag. She talks to the vendor, using her hands to speak. She’s pretty, he realizes, far prettier than the girls he knows from California. The vendor hands her a basket of strawberries, which she takes carefully, inspecting the red berries by twisting the basket’s handle from side to side, spinning it. Trevor can see her profile this way– the slope of her nose, smooth. Her eyelashes, long. Her lips, pink and pursed into a little smile. Her stance is tilted, one hand on her hips.
Trevor is back outside the car before he can think. He approaches her as she pays for her fruit, standing behind her when she turns around.
She jumps when she sees him. “You’re still here?” She asks.
“No, but I’m back,” Trevor replies, realizing just how lame he sounds. “My friends and I are staying here for the summer and I just wanted to introduce myself.”
When he falls silent after explaining himself, she looks at him expectantly. He can see the bottoms of her teeth as her lips part. “So introduce yourself.” She gestures for him to go on.
“I’m Trevor,” he says, sticking his hand out. “My friends call me Z.”
Her eyes drop to his hand briefly. She considers it before reaching up and taking his hand, shaking it. “Why?” She asks.
“My last name starts with a Z,” Trevor supplies. “Zegras.” The smile he gives her is strained, expecting her eyes to light up in recognition. They do, but it’s not in the way he expects.
“You’re Greek?” She asks, her interest piqued.
“Yeah,” Trevor replies. “But not, like… Greek. I’m from New York, but I live in California now.”
At the mention of California, her face stiffens. She hums disapprovingly. “Got sick of the West Coast, I take it? Is that why you’re back east this summer?”
Trevor flounders for a moment. “I love California, but the guys and I always spend our summers together. Usually we’re in Michigan.”
“So y’all travel all around, huh?” She asks. She doesn’t sound impressed, which makes Trevor nervous. In fact, she sounds almost disdainful, but the look on her face appears as though she’s holding back a laugh. Whether that is at his expense, he doesn’t know.
“We’re very lucky,” Trevor confirms, nodding tightly. “Most of our travel is for work, though. We all work in the same industry and it involves a lot of, um, business trips.”
“Business trips?” She asks, letting the laugh overtake her this time as she looks him up and down. “You?”
Trevor looks down at his own outfit, the basketball shorts and loose t-shirt. They’re two of the few clothes he owns that are not branded with the Ducks logo. He scratches the back of his head sheepishly. “We’ve been driving a while and I wanted to be comfortable.”
“You certainly look comfortable,” She agrees with a nod, her grin knowing and wide.
“I didn’t catch your name,” Trevor says with a similar grin, shuffling forward just a step now that he’s got her smiling and laughing.
It’s then that Cole and Jack exit the grocery store, each with a hefty load of grocery bags on their arms. They’re laughing, so it appears Cole has managed to cheer up the sullen Jack in Trevor’s absence. Trevor watches the girl’s eyes leave his, drawn to the movement and volume of his two friends. He curses them in his mind, watching as they find him and decide to approach.
“I thought you were warming up the car, Z,” Jack accuses, his eyes flickering between Trevor and the girl. “D’you get distracted?”
Trevor bites his tongue before forcing a smile on his face. He turns back to the girl. “These are the some of the friends I mentioned, Jack and Cole. The other ones, Jack’s brothers, aren’t here yet.” Trevor knows he’s overexplaining, but he can’t help it. Something about this girl has him awkward and tongue-tied, yet his tongue can’t stop forming words and pushing them out.
“Yeah, your business partners.” She rubs a hand over her face, smoothing out the half-smile that was clearly keeping a laugh at bay. “Are they also from California?”
Cole snorts. “Business partners?” He repeats. “From California? No way. You’d never catch me dead in Anaheim, unless we’re playing there. Believe me, I’d be on the quickest flight back.”
“I just said we all worked in the same industry,” Trevor corrects, throwing on his most charming smile to try and salvage the situation. He wasn’t lying, but this girl might think he is, and that would be disastrous. He doesn’t know why, but it would be. He wants her to think highly of him and now he’s made two bad first impressions.
The second one is his friends’ fault, of course.
And she does think he’s lying– Trevor can tell by the way she looks him up and down, then Cole, then Jack. Her eyes squint imperceptibly at Cole’s mention of “playing” in Anaheim, rather than working. It was a statement that could have extended the conversation, but this girl seems to decide that she is uninterested.
She nods sarcastically, then scoffs quietly. “I have to go,” she says. “It was nice to meet you, Trevor. Have fun in Litchton this summer, boys.”
“Oh, we will,” Jack assures her. Trevor hates how his eyes rake over her, combing through each detail of her skin, her clothes, and her hair.
“Nice meeting you!” Cole calls after her as she walks away.
Both boys turn to Trevor, equally annoying smiles on their faces.
“Shut up,” he hisses before they can say anything.
“Who was that?” Cole asks.
“I didn’t get her name,” Trevor growls through gritted teeth. “She was just about to tell me and then the two of you showed up.”
“Boo-hoo,” Jack teases. “So you won’t be the first to bed a girl this summer, for… how many summers in a row is it now, Coley?”
Cole’s laughter breaks his face, but Trevor interrupts before he can speak.
“It’s not even a real competition, Jack. You only act like it is because you fuck the same girl every summer as soon as we get to the lake house. It’s trashy.”
“Being a winner isn’t trashy, Trev. In fact, maybe I should go follow after the girl you were just chatting up. I’ll show her how a real man flirts.”
“Shut the fuck up.” Trevor feels a flare of anger well up inside of him when Jack insinuates taking this girl for himself. It should be anger about questioning Trevor’s manhood, but it is not. “Get in the car.”
He stalks off, starting the car this time and situating himself behind the wheel. Jack vies for the passenger seat unsuccessfully, souring his mood yet again. Despite Cole’s smaller stature, Jack is the one left in the backseat with the bags of groceries around him. Soon, Trevor’s shirt joins him after a misguided throw to the trunk of the car where their luggage resides.
When they arrive at the house, Jack only carries the groceries inside. He claims he’s been stilted all day and Trevor can’t really do much to prove otherwise. Cole carries in his and Jack’s luggage into the home– a rental that Trevor paid good money to book for the entire summer.
“I get the best room!” Trevor yells after them. “I paid for it! I want the ensuite bathroom!”
“Go fuck yourself,” Jack replies. He’ll leave the room for Trevor to take anyway.
The three boys had planned this ahead of time. They would be in Litchton the whole summer, so they will take the three bedrooms that have king beds. Quinn and Luke will take the queen beds in the other bedroom, and the various guests throughout the summer will take the bunk beds in the basement. From the pictures alone, Trevor realizes that the house could sleep more than ten people. If they can find ten people, maybe they could throw a party.
and invite that girl, Trevor thinks.
He’s taken aback by the thought and its suddenness. He doesn’t even know her name or if he’ll see her again– so why is he thinking of her?
Trevor shakes the thought and grabs his bags from the back of the car. He used an extra practice bag from the bottom of his closet in Anaheim to pack his clothes for the summer, so he has a free hand to open the door that Cole closed behind him.
He finds the big bedroom easily and drops his bag in the closet, not bothering to unpack. He looks out the sliding door onto his porch, the wrap-around that encircles the entire back of the house. His porch holds two rocking chairs and a wooden bench. The house is built out of wood– almost overwhelmingly so– and the decorations match. His bedframe, his dresser, his bedside table, his small desk, the fan, even the blinds on the window… all of them are made of wood.
His bathroom has double sinks and a granite countertop. The handles are gold in color, but likely not in material. The spout of the sink is more like a water spigot that one might find outdoors, but it’s classy. When Trevor enters his bathroom, he’s in awe of the jacuzzi tub and shower on the other side of the room.
The tub and shower are both built from dark marble, bespeckled with lines of darker ore. The tub has wooden cabinets beneath the feet of marble on either side of the tub, which holds towels and toiletries on the right and left respectively. The tub has jets and a handheld spout that’s detachable. Trevor considers them. He can think of a use for both.
The shower is spacious with an overhead spout, wide and fancy. It has ledges for toiletries, as well as a seat in the corner. The door is glass and there is a hook for towels next to the opening. The shower stands from ceiling to floor, completely confined. Despite the windows to the side of it, the occupant of the shower would be completely hidden from sight, once the glass door steams up.
Trevor explores the house further, but doesn’t take up residence anywhere. Cole and Jack seem to have put the groceries away while he found his room and looked around. Now, they’re nowhere to be found. They’ve likely taken up residence in their bedrooms for the night, tired from their eleven hour drive.
Lord knows Jack needs sleep before he braves this vacation. He always gets grumpy when he’s tired, part of the reason why he naps prior to every game.
Trevor is glad that all of the boys can make it up for the summer. He can’t wait to get things started.
2:90 – HONEY
She wakes with the sunrise, as she does every Tuesday. It’s her first day of the week at the bookstore and she has to open. The Reading Nook is always closed on Mondays and she is one of three workers– the owner, Ada and her best friend since childhood, Bea. Ada opens the store on Thursday, whereas Bea opens it on Friday. Every other day of the week, the responsibility falls on her.
She makes her coffee and drinks it on her couch, looking out the window towards the mountains in the distance. It’s clear today and she can see the rows of mountains clearly– ten rows back. Once, her father had told her that if you could count ten rows back, you were looking at the mountains across state lines. If you could count ten mountains, then you could count all the way to Tennessee.
She believed him, until she realized that the sun always rises behind those mountains. She faces east. Tennessee is to the west.
Still, the memory comes with fondness. It was before she moved away from home to pursue a life of quietness in the mountains, her favorite place in the world. Those days are long in the past. She has no interest in returning to them, given how far she’s come. The only person from her hometown that was welcomed into this new life was Bea and she has proven time and time again that she is deserving of that role.
Not only did they grow up together, but she got her nickname because of her friendship with Bea. As children, a long-forgotten teacher had made a comment about the two being attached at the hip, stuck together like glue. She had corrected herself with a laugh, evidently feeling clever when she said: “No, more like a bee to honey, right, girls?” From that day on, she had only gone by Honey and Bea had shortened her name from Beatrice to keep the analogy.
She drives to The Reading Nook and unlocks the store, wiping the counter and sweeping the main room while she waits for her regular patrons to enter the store.
On Tuesdays, the “founding” women of Litchton convene in the bookstore and knit. Some days, Honey joins them. Others, she just wishes to sit and read at their table, listening in on the gossip of the week. The women are not so much founders as the grandmothers who lived in Litchton since their birth, having married and worked and raised families here. They are true Appalachian women– driven by superstition and fantastical solutions, lovers of a good story, and wonderful bakers who only crave to share their gift. They are churchgoers, often multiple times a week, and headstrong believers in their chosen politician. These are the attributes that Honey does not share with the women– she was an outsider, although she has been welcomed into the Litchton society since moving here. She attended church when the ladies asked her to, usually for the rare wedding or baptism. Rarer for a funeral, luckily. Honey does not feel any particular way about politics, at least not out loud, and she’s lucky that the ladies try to reserve that topic for the debates of their husbands over dinner parties, not the knitting circle on early Tuesday mornings.
Sacha is the first to arrive to the bookstore that morning, armed with blueberry muffins in a tupperware that Honey will have to wash in the little sink in the back while the women are knitting. Sacha has left one too many tupperwares and bowls in The Reading Nook and Honey won’t allow her to leave another behind.
Honey plates the muffins for Sacha while the elderly woman secures the long table in the store for her friends. It does not take long for Scarlett, Gillian, Vera, and Rosalind to join. The women each knit their own project, waking up over coffee and muffins before the gossip starts.
It begins with Vera’s son’s divorce, something she had been dreading since he proposed to his soon-to-be ex-wife while they were still students at NC State. They had moved to Raleigh permanently, an action that Vera believes started this whole thing. When her son left home, and his wife finally revealed that she didn’t want children, Vera knew it was over. Or so she said. Honey thinks that she’s just butthurt about her son fleeing the nest… ten years ago. She wonders, briefly, if her own mother feels this way about her.
Honey shakes herself out of her thoughts as soon as Scarlett introduces the next topic, the topic that Honey knew was coming since the night before.
“Did you see those young men at the store yesterday? I know you always do your shopping on Monday evenings, Rosalind.” Scarlett tilts her head like she’s conspiring with Rosalind, like Rosalind has been holding information from the group.
Rosalind nods, eyes glinting behind her wired glasses. “They were such handsome boys. Lord, I tell you, if I were a young lady nowadays…”
She trails off and Honey stifles a laugh, looking down at the counter. She can feel the ladies’ eyes on her, no doubt hoping that the mention of boys piques her interest. Honey knows how these ladies were in their day– boy crazy but also efficient, looking for the perfect match and settling for no less. All of them prevailed, although from their complaints, you would never know their husbands were the loves of their lives.
“Ladies, you know this conversation would be better suited for Bea,” Honey teases.
“Bea is too forthcoming, you are still somewhat of a mystery.” Gillian lifts an eyebrow.
“Where is Miss Bea?” Vera asks. “Wasn’t she supposed to be here half an hour ago?”
Honey doesn’t stifle her laugh this time. “Miss Vera!” She exclaims. “It is a Tuesday morning. You know Bea has no interest in showing up to work for at least another hour.”
Vera shakes her head. “You and Ada have got to stop allowing her to show up so late.”
Sacha laughs. “As if they could stop her if they tried!”
All of the women, and Honey, laugh at the joke. It’s well established in Litchton that Bea is the tardy sort, whereas everyone else prefers to be early or on time. Bea has the attitude of a city girl, to quote the old ladies, but the work ethic and priorities of a Litchton woman. She likes her men, she likes her job, but she loves a nice lay-in.
“Besides,” Honey tells the women, hesitating with a coy smile before dropping the bomb of information: “I’ve already met those men.”
The effect is instantaneous. All of them drop their knitting onto their laps and gasp. Gillian clutches at her chest, always the most dramatic of the quintet.
“My darling,” Rosalind marvels.
“Well?” Scarlett questions. “How? When? Tell us everything.”
Honey moves from behind the counter to an empty seat at their table. She sits next to Sacha, the woman taking her hand and holding it tightly.
“You ladies seem to forget that I go to the fruit stand outside the store on Monday evenings,” Honey begins. “Which is where I ran into them. Literally, too– one of them had his nose buried in his phone and bumped into me. He could’ve knocked me over!”
“You should have fallen so that he could have helped you up,” Rosalind suggests. The women murmur in agreement.
Honey rolls her eyes. “I did not. He apologized, I told him that he only bumped into me because he was caught up in his phone, and he said he would be more careful next time.”
“Next time,” Gillian repeats, nodding. “So he wishes to see you again?”
“Turns out, ‘next time’ was about five minutes later, when I went to leave the stand and he was right behind me!” Honey reveals, purposefully lacing incredulity into her voice. She places a finger on her lips and widens her eyes, playing into the dramatics of the ladies as if to say “What do you think of that?”
The women gasp in time.
“Which one was it?” Scarlett asks.
“I only saw the other two for a moment, so I don’t think I could describe them well enough to you,” Honey says. “The one I spoke to is named Trevor.” She pauses to roll her eyes before adding sarcastically, “But his friends call him Z.”
Scarlett and Rosalind nod and look to each other.
“It must have been the one who left earlier than the other two,” Scarlett says. “With those awful tattoos.”
Honey bites back a giggle. Once a southern mother, always a southern mother. “He did have tattoos,” she confirms.
“You two would get along,” Vera suggests, not so subtly casting a glance at the leafy vines that crawl up Honey’s arm.
Honey goes quiet, glaring at Vera. She has worked to try and get the ladies to stop commenting on her body and habits over the past few years, but the ladies are stubborn and traditional in most senses.
“How long will they be here? Or were they just stopping through?” Gillian asks.
“They’ll be here all summer, so I’m sure we’ll get our fill of them.” With that, Honey effectively ends her role in the conversation. She returns to the counter and opens her book, pretending to read it.
She knew the ladies would have caught wind of the men’s arrival by now and would want to discuss it. She knew that the ladies would be interested in setting her up with one of these new arrivals. They were cute, she’d give them that. At a glance, any of the three could have been nice company at a brewery, but Honey wasn’t looking. She was perfectly content with finding herself and making her own life, even if it meant that she wasn’t finding a husband like most women in Litchton wanted her to do.
The other thing was this: Trevor hadn’t made the best first impression. He bumped into her, then startled her, then told her some story about business partners or colleagues that definitely was not true, and he was from California. He’s a yuppie, a hipster who probably enjoys the bustle of Los Angeles and can’t handle the slow, satisfying life of a small town. To her estimate, Trevor has got a week before he leaves Litchton for something more glamorous and fast-paced.
The ladies relay the news to Bea when she finally shows up for her shift, a travel mug of coffee in hand from which she sips throughout each tantalizing detail of Scarlett’s retelling. Upon Honey’s information, Bea’s eyes flicker knowingly toward the counter and Honey just shrugs. Bea’s eyes then narrow, accompanying a questioning tilt of her head. Honey shakes her head at that, and Bea lets it go.
“Well, I heard the reason that Mr. Mayes wasn’t at church last week wasn’t his hip acting up,” Bea says to the ladies when it’s her turn. That starts a whole new tangent for the knitting club, one that will keep them occupied and in their seats for a number of minutes. It gives Honey the time to slip into the back and cut up one of the peaches that she brought from home to snack on during work.
The ladies leave The Reading Nook about an hour after Bea’s arrival, leaving the store empty except for the two girls and floaters looking for their next novel.
Bea leans against the counter with a smug smile, blinking innocently at Honey.
“What do you really think about them?” She asks.
“I think they’re trouble,” Honey says. “They didn’t seem on the same page about their jobs, they don’t know anything about living in a small town, they travel a lot, and I think I saw one of them carrying a 48-pack of beer.”
“Are they cute?”
Honey fixes Bea with a stare that could put a stop to anyone else’s questions. Unfortunately, Bea is immune to Honey’s intimidation tactics and her sarcastic jabs. She sees right through them. Honey’s silence is another thing she sees through.
“Interesting.” She draws herself up to her full height.
“I think you would find them cute,” Honey says.
Bea hums. “You can’t backtrack now. You said enough without saying anything at all.” She crosses her arms over her chest then leans back down onto the counter. “So, tell me, Honeybear,” she muses. Fortunately, she changes the topic. “Did you get my strawberries from the stand, or were you too enthralled by the pretty boy in front of you?”
“He wasn’t pretty.”
“Sure he wasn’t.”
Honey scoffs, then leaves to the back to grab the basket of strawberries. She does so carefully, not touching the strawberries in case she breaks out in hives like she did last time. Bea swears that more exposure to the fruit would “cure” her allergy, but Honey only picks up the baskets to humor her. Honey doesn’t think she’s missing out on much, being allergic to strawberries. It’s her peaches that she would miss, and the blackberry pie that Ada makes when her vines turn ripe. That’s something to look forward to– blackberry season is starting and Ada could show up with a pie any day now.
The day continues slowly, with Ada making an appearance to close down the shop with the girls and help unpack a new shipment of books. After they’re done, Honey and Bea head to their respective homes.
Honey curls up with her book in her bed and listens to some music before the soft noise of the background and the comfort of her blanket draws her to her sleep.
3:90 – TREVOR
They have to go to the hardware store today.
Yesterday, the boys wasted the day, sleeping later than they have in weeks. They ate a late breakfast, which turned into their lunch. They played pool on the pool table, ping and beer pong on the foldable table, and sunbathed out on the porch. Cole watched lazily as Trevor and Jack tried to outline half of a rink in chalk on the cement slab. They never finished the other half of the rink.
Today, they have to go get some wood and tools to make the rink into a 3D structure so the pucks don’t go flying into the woods when they shoot them. Trevor and Cole are the ones who are supposed to go to the store– Jack has decided to stay behind and wait for Quinn and Luke if they show up while the other boys are at the store.
A convenient excuse, even though the goons are planning to show up today. Trevor expects the brothers to try and weasel their way out of working on the rink, claiming that they’re too tired from travel or they need more time to unpack. The thing is, the boys are flying into Charlotte and renting a car for the summer so that there will be two at the house, so they’re only driving for like an hour compared to Trevor’s eleven. They have no right to be complaining, but they will likely enact a vote and outweigh Cole and Trevor because if the Hughes are anything, it’s lazy and loyal to each others’ laziness.
They’re very driven, but only when they choose to work. When it comes to hockey, they’ll work all day. When it comes to creating the hockey rink or putting together equipment, they would much rather watch. Jim spoiled them that way– he was always the builder of the family and the boys were left to go do whatever they wanted as long as they weren’t annoying their father.
Trevor and Cole put off the trip as long as they can, hoping that maybe the Hughes brothers will show up early and they can force them to go to the store before they can even get out of the car.
When the clock hits two, Trevor decides that the waiting is useless. They could’ve done so much during the day instead of sitting around waiting, but no. He was lucky enough to sit around and do nothing all day and watch stupid daytime TV with Cole while Jack read his texts with his brothers out loud.
The hardware store would be heaven compared to this.
He leaves without Cole at first, driving slowly down the driveway until he sees Cole’s figure run out of the house and after the car. Trevor can imagine what he’s saying as he yells after the vehicle– something about not being left with Jack in case the other Hugheses show up, something about how Trevor is a dick.
They follow the one road on the mountain up to the strip where all the stores are. The hardware store is just a few doors down from the grocery store, so they park in the same parking lot.
Cole and Trevor walk side by side, Cole’s eyes on his phone as they walk while Trevor takes in the brick walkway beneath them. Names are etched on some of the bricks– Jude Doyle, Frederick Lawson, Ansley Hood… Grandma. Trevor has seen stuff like this before, but there’s something different about these names being etched on the bricks of this small town. Everyone probably knew these people, or knew someone who knew them, when they died. It’s so personal.
When they reach the hardware store, Trevor holds the door open for a man leaving. They give each other a curt nod, just a passing glance. Trevor sees absolutely no recognition in his eyes and comments on it. Cole doesn’t care, and says so. Trevor punches his shoulder.
“Welcome in,” the elderly woman at the counter greets. “What are you boys looking for?”
“Hi,” Cole replies, a charming smile on his face. “Could you point me towards the power tools? I can find my way from there.”
The woman smiles and points toward the back of the store. “They’re on the left, sweetie.” She turns to Trevor. “And what about you?”
“We’ll be needing some plywood,” Trevor says. “We’re building a little roller rink.”
“Oh, how fun!” The lady, named Vera if her nametag has any truth to it, claps her hands. “How much do you need, dear?”
“How much have you got?” Trevor asks.
Vera waves her hand. “I don’t know. I’ll call Earl, he’ll send you off with what you need.” She turns and takes a breath before shouting the man’s name. Trevor’s heard that shout before– his grandmother used to do the same thing with his grandfather.
The balding, age-spotted man appears at the door to the back of the shop. “I done told ya I have my hearing aids in, woman,” Earl grumbles to his wife, fond and mean and familiar in the way that only a couple who has been married for fifty years can be.
Vera smacks Earl’s arm as he ambles by her. Earl pulls his arm away and puts another foot between them.
“What do you need, young man?” Earl asks.
“Lots of wood,” Trevor says. “A couple of sheets of plywood and some 2x4s, maybe?”
“Boy, you do not think I have all’a that laying around.” Earl fixes Trevor with a stink-eye.
“Don’t you tell him that!” Vera chimes in. “I know you’ve got plenty of wood out back because you bought all of it and never finished our damn basement.”
“I’m going to finish it!”
“Earl, you’ve been saying that for thirty years, you ain’t never finishing the basement.”
Trevor wants to laugh at the absurdity of this conversation. He wants to laugh at this domestic argument and how unreal it is that it’s unfolding in front of him. Instead, he clears his throat. “Excuse me,” he interrupts gently. “I don’t know if I want thirty year old wood for this. We’ll be hitting pucks off the boards all day and I’d like to keep the pucks inside the rink, please.”
“You’re a hockey boy?” Earl questions with a raised brow. When Trevor nods, he lets out a grunt. Trevor can’t tell what that means. Nonetheless, he waves Trevor to follow him into the back.
Trevor squeezes past Vera– she pinches his butt, he thinks– and catches a glimpse of her knitting under the counter when he walks by. She’s knitting something green. It’s too bundled up for him to tell what it is, though. Maybe he’ll ask later.
When he enters the back room, Earl gestures around. “Take your pick of the wood and make a pile over there–” he points to the corner– “and you can drive around back and we can put the wood in your truck there.”
“Oh, I didn’t drive a truck down,” Trevor says before he can help it. Earl makes a face. “But my friend and I can carry the piles ourselves to the car, don’t worry about that.”
“I wasn’t worried,” Earl gripes, shuffling away to sit at a bench with a circular saw and a half finished product on the table.
Trevor sifts through the wood, all neatly arranged into piles of similar sizes– but labeled completely wrong. Trevor thinks that Earl might’ve refused to follow Vera’s labels when she first put them up in the shop, but realized that they’re more helpful than harmful. He’s just petty enough of an old man to ignore the labels, but follow the categorization.
Trevor ends up with a pile of ten sheets of plywood– four that are as long as lunch tables, and six that are just squares. Those will go behind the goals, while the long ones will go around the sides of the slab. He picks up a couple of 2x4s, just in case he needs them, and throws them on the pile with a clatter.
“I’m going to go grab my buddy,” Trevor says to Earl.
Earl grunts, but doesn’t budge. He also doesn’t look up from his station.
Cole is chatting up Vera when Trevor rejoins them. He’s leaning over the edge of the counter, asking about Vera’s knitting and her grandchildren. He’s got a bag of goodies next to him– powertools and nails, Trevor assumes.
“Coley, come help me,” Trevor interrupts.
“No manners, this guy,” Cole says to Vera, scoffing and pointing his thumb at Trevor with a shake of his head.
“Well, don’t keep the bear waiting,” Vera replies. Trevor watches her pinch Cole’s ass as he passes, but Cole just laughs and bats her hand away.
Fucking annoying. Always so good with the grandparents.
“The bear?” Trevor asks once Vera is out of earshot. “Is that me?”
Cole smirks. “We’ve got nicknames.”
Earl looks up when they reenter the back. He lets out a laugh, just a short bark. “This is your friend who’s going to help you carry all that wood?”
As the smirk falls off Cole’s face, Trevor picks it up.
“I can carry some wood,” Cole insists. “Probably all of it. I’m stronger than Z is, anyway.”
Earl’s gaze slides over to Trevor. “Z,” he repeats. “I hope you don’t stick with that one.”
Trevor laughs. “You sound like–” he cuts himself off. He never did learn her name, anyway. What’s it to this old man, who he sounds like?
Cole picks up on it though. “Like who, Z?” He asks with a tilt of his head.
Trevor glares at him.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass who I sound like and I don’t want to hear your smug little bickering,” Earl admonishes. “Get your wood and get outta my shop.”
Trevor laughs in Cole’s face, then pushes him over towards the pile of wood. “Go on, strong man.”
Cole makes like he’s going to throw a punch at Trevor– Trevor doesn’t flinch, because he hasn’t fallen for that since their first stint on the US team– and puffs up his chest before deciding to pick up the long pieces of wood.
“Compensating for something?” Trevor asks.
“Go fuck yourself,” Cole replies cheerfully, turning on his heel and swinging the wood around with him, hoping to hit Trevor in the stomach. Trevor jumps away.
He picks up the rest of the wood and follows Cole out of the shop, bidding Earl a quiet farewell.
Earl grunts.
Trevor nods to himself, not surprised by the response. Vera is much more sad to see them go, gushing over how strong they are and telling them to come back soon.
“What’s your nickname?” Trevor asks suddenly, as they load the wood into the back of the car.
Cole grins, crooked and smug. “Sweetie.”
“You’re fucking with me.”
“Oh, I assure you, I’m not. I’m a real hit with the ladies.”
“Yeah, you’re a real fucking hit with the married seventy year olds,” Trevor scoffs. “Don’t fucking talk to me, dude.”
Cole laughs, tossing his head back. He looks over Trevor’s shoulder. “Hey, isn’t that your girl?”
Trevor spins around. “Where?” He asks, looking to his left and right.
When Cole starts cackling behind him, Trevor takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. “I’m gonna fucking kill you, dude.”
“Bear, you wouldn’t know what to do without me.” Cole pats Trevor on the chest before rounding the car, settling in the passenger seat.
“Fucking passenger princess,” Trevor seethes.
“You wish you were me.”
“I fucking don’t.”
“The more fucks you say, the more fucks you give.”
“Fuck off.”
They drive back to the house in silence, Trevor’s knuckles white as he deliberates driving off the mountain and taking Cole with him. There are pros, certainly, the top one being that Cole would no longer be part of this vacation. The cons, unfortunately, outweigh the pros: without Cole, Trevor would be alone with the Hughes brothers all summer, except for the occasional visiting savior.
Quinn and Luke have arrived by the time the duo returns to the mountain house. They brought with them another SUV, this one only slightly bigger than Trevor’s vehicle. It’s got a third row of seats, but it’s cramped– they’ll definitely have to take both cars down to Charlotte when they go to practice. Because of the limited trunk space in Quinn’s rental car, Trevor’s car will likely end up being the gear car.
Which is lucky, because who wouldn’t want to spend three hours total in the car with smelly gear while the other car gets to have fun and smell nice?
On second thought, the time alone might be good for Trevor. He loves his friends, he really does, but it’s hard to be around them for so long. He’s lucky that they’re all on different teams, that they keep up when they can, and that it’s not constant. Jack can’t escape his brothers, especially not Luke, but Trevor can escape all three of them.
He spends the evening building the outdoor rink, mostly alone. Quinn helps a little bit, mostly chalking up the lines on the remaining half of the slab. He holds the wood for Trevor while he screws some nails into the pieces to keep them in place. They work mostly in silence, as they often do. Trevor is itching to talk with Quinn, see how he is, but he knows that Quinn is a man of few words. He also knows that Quinn is quick to say that Trevor talks too much. They’re at the point in their relationship where Trevor lets Quinn dictate how much they speak.
Luke tries to cook dinner, he does. Trevor can’t fault him for trying. Jack had to jump in to save them from burnt steaks and soggy vegetables, and even if he can’t salvage everything, he does a pretty good job. Luke apologizes and does the dishes. He’s quiet for the rest of the night, falling asleep on the couch during the movie they picked out, and Quinn wakes Luke like a good big brother and shoos him to bed.
It’s more calm than the lake house, Trevor thinks. They’re not really doing anything differently, are they? And yet, here they are, sitting together in calm silence. They’re drinking bottled beer and laughing over the same jokes they’ve heard a million times, reminiscing about summers past and what they’ll do this summer. Quinn wishes for a lake. Jack tells him they’ll find one.
Trevor goes to bed when the movie ends, frogs croaking past his bedroom window in the depths of the night.
4:90 – HONEY
It’s a Thursday, so Honey gets to sleep in until nine. Sleeping in until nine means that she really wakes up at eight, because she just can’t sleep in late after working at the bookstore for five years now. She sits on her couch on Thursday mornings and reads. She does the crossword in the Litchton Local, the newspaper that comes out weekly on Wednesdays.
There’s an immeasurable stillness in the mountains.
Honey noticed it the first time she came up to this house as a child. Everything moves, like the bugs outside and the leaves on the trees, but everything is so still. Like it’s being held in place by something bigger. She knows the feeling well, but it’s comforting here.
At home, it was uniforms and piano lessons after school. She loves piano, even still, but there was something so crushing about the weight of her perfect posture on that bench when there was all the pressure of beauty breathing down her neck.
Home, Honey thinks again, and laughs.
In the mountains, all of the beauty of the world is there and present and taking up space– but it’s not forced. It’s not the idealized version of everything. It just is.
And everything is so green, especially on a rainy day like this. Honey thinks there’s something sacred about the greenness of the mountains, but it’s the melancholic side of divine that leaves you waiting for another whisper or breath in the wind that never comes.
She used to have a piano that she could play in the mornings. She toted it to the antique store down the road when she made the mountain home hers. Sometimes, she wonders why she did that and regrets it, staring at the dents on the floor where its legs used to stand.
But then she remembers that she’s thinking about the past again and she shakes herself out of it. Five years later, but it’s hard to forget all of the things you grew up knowing.
Honey picks Bea up on the way to work, relishing in the girl’s consistent lateness because it allows her the chance to catch up with her friend. They see each other every day, yes, but the bookstore isn’t suited for some topics.
Such as Bea’s current woes:
“I’ve run out of dating app men,” she complains.
Honey bites back a smile. “Did you run out, or did you just swipe left on all of them?” She asks knowingly.
Bea cuts her eyes at Honey. “All the ones I swiped left on are ugly,” she says. “I can promise you that.”
“Is anyone good-looking in Litchton, Bea?”
Bea’s silence speaks for itself.
Honey laughs, her hair whipping around her face in the breeze from the rolled-down windows of her car.
“If I had known you were dragging me to the Ugly Capital of the World, I wouldn’t have come with you,” Bea announces, like it matters. She’s a liar. She wouldn’t have let Honey leave their hometown without her, no matter where she was going.
“You couldn’t turn it down, you had to come,” Honey replies. “Especially since they asked you to be Mayor.”
Bea gasps, affronted. She stares at Honey, her jaw hanging open. “Are you mad at me? Be honest.” She pouts, her voice whiny.
“Oh my God,” Honey groans, rolling her eyes. “No, I’m not mad at you.”
“Okay, well, stop being a cunt, please,” Bea sasses. If Honey were more annoyed, she’d reach out and slap Bea’s arm for the attitude. “We have to go to work and I need to put all my focus into pretending to like you.”
“Yeah, because it’s so hard to like me,” Honey says. Her voice is dripping with sarcasm, monotone and grating.
“Yeah, it is, you suck.” Bea flips her hair over her shoulder, digging through her bag to find her Walmart lip gloss. She smears the cherry flavored gloss over her lips and puckers up, batting her eyelashes at Honey exaggeratedly. “Gimme a kiss.”
“No.” Honey pulls up to The Reading Nook and parks on the street in front of the building, parallel parking with the practiced ease of someone who’s been dealing with nothing but parallel parking (except in the grocery store and church parking lots) for the last five years.
“Ugh, one day you’ll kiss me,” Bea mutters, staring forlornly out the window.
Honey rolls her eyes. “Bea, we’ve already kissed. You weren’t that good and I didn’t like your lip gloss then, either.”
Bea cringes. “That was like ten years ago, Hon. Things have changed since then. Number one, I’m not in middle school. Number two, I’ve had boyfriends and I’ve had sex since then. Number three, you know it wouldn’t mean anything. I want you to try my lip gloss so bad, come on.”
Honey stares. Bea’s got a stupid smile on her face, teasing and annoying. They hold each other’s eyes for too long before Honey speaks.
“You’re insufferable, did you know that?”
Bea nods. “You are so easy to work up.”
Bea and Honey exit the car at the same time and enter the store through the front, the bell jingling behind them. Ada greets them from behind the counter, teasing Bea for being late again and threatening to cut her pay. She never will, never. Bea is too good with the kids, too happy to talk to mothers, and just dry enough to understand the miserly old man that walks through the door looking for a new World War I book.
In the back, Ada has a bowl of biscuits and jam that Honey reheats and eats over the counter before she starts her day.
She’s supposed to reshelve some books from their Borrow Before You Buy section, the part of the store that acts as the town’s public library. It’s a small task. The pile of books that were returned yesterday is less than a hundred. A good portion of the books are little kid chapter books, the kind you could finish in an hour as an adult because the font is so big and there are full-page pictures twice a chapter.
Bea has to read to the kids at noon– some of the mothers bring snacks, like the end of a youth soccer game. It’s like a potluck lunch and the kids love Bea. Most weeks, it’s just her, but since it’s summer, she’s starting to bring in guest readers. Honey refuses to do it every time. Well, that’s not true– she acts as guest reader once a summer, right before school starts. It’s her one moment of the year.
As she’s restocking the books, Honey hears the bell twinkle with each new customer that walks in. She’s grown used to the noise over the years, so it doesn’t draw her eye anymore.
What does draw her eye, however, is the blunt tap on her shoulder. When she turns around, Bea is blinking innocently at her– no doubt the offending hand in this scenario– with Trevor by her side.
“I was just talking to Trevor here, Honey,” Bea says. “And he was wondering if we had any books that a man his age might like. I thought maybe you should talk to him.”
Honey glares at Bea, purposefully obvious about it so that Trevor sees. What does she know about book recommendations for a man in his twenties? He probably wants some shit sports biography, or worse– he’s embracing his inner old man and he’s ready to venture into the world of World War I non-fiction. Either way, book recommendations are Bea’s thing, not Honey’s. She just stocks the books, builds the shelves, and bonds with the old ladies who come in on Tuesdays.
Bea shrugs with a coy little smile– Honey wishes she could slap it off of her face– and disappears behind the stacks. Honey can tell that she’s still listening from a few feet away, always nosy and overly interested in Honey’s exploits. If she can’t indulge in her own, she’s happy to butt in on Honey’s.
“Trevor,” Honey says, crossing her arms over her chest. She didn’t wear a bra today. She doesn’t trust him not to look. She also doesn’t trust her nipples not to peak in the cold air.
“Is Honey your real name?” Trevor asks.
She balks at him. “What is it with you and my name?”
Honey expects Trevor to back down, to act timid and normal and earnest like he did at the fruit stand on Monday. She expects him to apologize, yet again, for another inadvertent mistake that Trevor seemed unable to avoid. It’s because he doesn’t think– he just says the words as they come to mind, hoping that the sentence comes out fully formed and making sense.
And yet, he doesn’t.
“Just wanted to know what name I’ll be saying when I’m telling you to come,” is what Trevor answers.
Honey gathers her wit quickly, scrambling to find a response to Trevor’s bold statement. She wants something clever, something to turn him down, something to tell him that he’s a cocky prick for saying such a thing while she’s at work, but she comes up with none of the above. Instead, she settles for: “It’s a nickname.”
A smirk tugs at Trevor’s lips and Honey wants to reach out and strangle him. He’s smirking because he thinks he bested her– bested her– and that he’s got the upper hand.
“What kind of book are you looking for, Trevor?” Honey changes the subject, trying to get back on task. She turns, continues restocking the Borrow Before You Buy shelves.
“I’m not sure, Honey,” he replies, really milking his use of her name. “What kind of books do you think I’d like?”
She glances at him, looks him up and down. She tamps down a smile and says in a curt, monotone voice. “Guides on how to make the best of your business trip.”
Trevor laughs at that, more of a shake of his shoulders than a real laugh. “You’re funny, Honey.”
Honey raises her eyebrows and waits for him to continue.
“Hey, that rhymed. Maybe a book of poetry? I need to study my craft if I’m going to be waxing poems about you.”
He’s bold, she thinks. He’s really bold, much more sure of himself than he was on Monday. He’s much more confident, a sharp 180º from where he was the other day.
“Why don’t you keep your waxes to yourself?” Honey asks.
“How can I?”
She turns to him, planting a hand on her hip. “Don’t you have something to do today other than bother me at my bookstore? You don’t even know me. Why are you here?”
“I’m here to get a book. I’m not trying to bother you, I’m just trying to make conversation.” Trevor shoves his hands in his pockets and has the decency to look ashamed, even if it’s just for a split second and just to see if Honey will crumble. She knows his type. She’s seen them before.
“You’re flirting with me,” Honey accuses. “Not making conversation.” She puts air quotes around the last two words.
Trevor smiles. “You caught me,” he says simply, no shame evident in his voice. The smile stays on his lips as he and Honey look at each other. He raises his eyebrows and she takes it as a challenge.
“I’m not interested, Trevor.”
“I could show you a good time, Honey.”
“In Litchton?”
“Don’t you hear how good it sounds when I say your name? It’s like we’ve been hooking up for ages and I’ve got a special little name for you.”
“A name that everyone else uses.”
“It’s special to me.”
“How about a self-help book?”
Trevor clutches at his chest, jaw dropping in fake-misery. “You think I need help?”
“If you’re not going to buy a book, then you need to leave me alone.” Honey places the last book in her stack on the shelf and looks at Trevor expectantly. The silence sits between them, suspended for a moment.
“Do you have any books about space?” He asks.
Honey notices that his voice is softer, a little more genuine. She examines his features, waiting for the other shoe to drop. She waits for the joke about not wanting space from her, needing her in his orbit, or whatever. It doesn’t come. She scans his figure one last time, realizing that her brow is furrowed and she’s chewing on the inside of her bottom lip as she does so. She smoothens her expression, hoping Trevor didn’t pick up on her calculating stare.
“How do you feel about creative nonfiction?” Honey asks.
Trevor scrunches his nose.
“Memoirs, personal histories, stuff like that,” Honey supplies. She softens her voice to match his tone. She almost feels a little shy. “We only have one book about space that I’ve read and it’s creative nonfiction, but it’s really good.” Quieter, then: “I liked it.”
Trevor nods, a little hesitant. This is the Trevor she met on Monday. “Okay.”
“Follow me.” Honey leads him to the nonfiction section, to the rows of books whose authors bear a last name that starts with ‘D.’ She runs her fingers along the titles of the books at the height of her chest while scanning the upper shelves. “It’s there,” she says, pointing to the row just out of her reach. “It’s by ‘Dean.’” She looks down, around her on the floor. “Where’s my step ladder…?”
“I can reach it,” Trevor says, stepping forward. He places a hand on the small of Honey’s back and reaches up, fingers hesitating as he searches for the right book. When he finds the spine bearing Dean’s name, he bounces up on his tiptoes for just a second to slide the book from its position on the shelf.
Honey has never been more aware of a hand in her life. His touch is light, just a passing glance really, but it weighs on her. It’s like she’s standing in quicksand and she waited too long to try and get out.
He’s so close to her when he stands flat on his feet again. He’s got the book in one hand and his other still rests on Honey’s back.
She steps away.
His eyes follow her, but instead of saying anything, he just flips the book over in his hand. He reads the back cover and as he does so, Honey puts more space between them. She takes a breath, trying to stay quiet, and grounds herself.
“Is it really any good?” Trevor asks. “Do I have to buy it?”
“Yes, and, um.” Honey throws a look over her shoulder. She lost track of Bea while she and Trevor went to find this book. Fuck, her nosey best friend could be anywhere. “You can borrow it. We just usually give people a week or so to bring it back, and if you don’t, we track you down.”
“Track me down?” Trevor asks, chuckling.
“Yeah.” Honey nods. “Small town. Everybody knows everybody, or knows somebody who knows everybody.”
“Stalking me, Honey?” Trevor teases.
“We’ve met twice, and both times it was because you came up to me. If anyone is the stalker here, it’s you.”
Trevor turns the book over in his hand again, looking down to avoid Honey’s gaze. “Leaving Orbit, huh?” He bites his lip and takes in the sight of Honey in front of him. He taps the book with his other hand. “I’ll let you know if it’s any good.”
“I know it’s good. I read it.”
“Baby, if you knew good, you’d be all over me.”
Honey scoffs. “Alright, fun’s over. Get out of here, Trevor.” She shoos him away, practically pushing him out of the shop. She sticks her tongue out at him through the glass after closing the door behind him. She watches him laugh, run his hands through his hair, and turn away.
‘Zegras’ is written in bold letters across his back, the number 11 in the center of his t-shirt. The detail catches Honey’s eye as she watches him walk away, down the street towards a car with a New York license plate that looks far too perfect and expensive to belong in Litchton. She bites the inside of her lip again, pondering. If anyone asks, she doesn’t care, but Trevor’s different than anyone she’s ever met. She wonders why.
But no, she doesn’t care.
Bea does.
“He plays hockey,” Bea announces, revealing herself. “He’s good, too. NHL. He was a top ten pick when he was drafted.”
Honey just nods. Twice. That’s all she needs. They’re small movements and she’s still chewing on her lip.
“What did he get?”
Honey clears her throat. “Just the, uh, Dean book about space.”
Honey can practically hear the face Bea makes behind her back. “You think he’ll enjoy that?” Bea asks. “It’s really personal.”
“It was the only book I could think of,” Honey replies with a shrug. She finally turns around to face Bea. “You’ve got to stop spying on me. I know you listened to our whole conversation.”
Bea pouts and stomps her foot, the sound echoing along the stacks around them. “How could I not?” She demands. “‘Just wanted to know what name I’ll be saying when I’m telling you to come?’ Honey, girl. Be serious.”
“Bea, you know I’m not looking for that right now.”
“You’re never fucking looking for that,” Bea hisses, pinching Honey’s wrist until she flinches away. “It’s falling into your lap and you’re pushing it out the door! What’s wrong with you?”
Honey glares at her with a tilted head.
Bea relents. “One of these days, I’m going to kick your ass,” she threatens. “You can’t be a spinstery old maid forever, Honeybear. They’re only here for the summer. Maybe you should embrace it.”
“He’ll be gone within the week.”
Bea sighs. “Whatever you say.”
5:90 – TREVOR
“We need to throw a party,” Trevor says over breakfast.
“Why?” Luke asks, voice scratchy from lack of use. He yawns and runs his fingers through his hair, further messing up his already messy curls. He’s not wearing a shirt– none of them are– and Trevor is astounded by how pale Luke is.
“We need to get you outside more,” Trevor mumbles, then clears his throat and continues speaking. “It’s like a housewarming thing.”
Unimpressed, Cole rolls his eyes. “Who do you want to invite?” He asks.
Trevor pauses, side-eying his friend. “Nobody,” he deflects.
Quinn snorts, the spoon he’s using for his cereal clinking against the side of his bowl. “Not much of a party.”
“He wants to invite the girl that he met the other day,” Jack says, butting into the conversation.
Luke frowns. “What girl?”
“Some townie that he met at the fruit stand when we went to the grocery store,” Jack explains. “He doesn’t know her name.”
“Her name is Honey, actually,” Trevor interrupts.
The table stills. Each of the boys’ eyes turn towards Trevor and he suddenly feels like an ant under a child’s magnifying glass, boiling under the glare.
Cole pushes up an invisible pair of glasses and raises a finger, pursing his lips. “Actually,” he mocks, then drops the tone. “How do you know her name, Z?”
Trevor shrugs noncommittally. “I ran into her when I went into town yesterday.”
“Oh, when you were supposed to pick up laundry detergent and you came back with a book instead?” Cole asks. “That makes sense, much more sense than what Luke said.”
Trevor blanches. “What did Luke say?”
Jack snickers.
Trevor turns to Luke. “What did you say?”
Quinn smiles and hides his face, taking a large mouthful of his cereal to leave Luke hanging if he asked for help.
Luke flushes. “I mean, you know… that maybe you confused the two.”
“How the fuck would I confuse laundry detergent with a book?” Trevor snaps. “They’re two completely different things, fuckface.”
Luke throws his hands up in surrender. “We were just thinking of reasons why you might’ve come back without the one thing we needed.”
Trevor looks around the table. “You guys are such assholes.”
“Bro, you’re the one that forgot laundry detergent because you were too busy chatting up some chick,” Jack defends the group. “Now we can’t even do our laundry.”
“If it’s so fucking important to you, go get the detergent yourself!”
A smile breaks out on Jack’s face. “Maybe I will,” he says, his voice shit-eating. “I might need to grab a book for myself, too.”
Trevor’s anger increases tenfold, for no fucking reason. “The fuck you do,” he snaps. “You don’t even know how to read.”
Jack’s face twists, his emotions finally aligning with Trevor’s own. “Fuck you, dude. You know I can read, I just don’t like to.”
Trevor scoffs and rolls his eyes. “I just want to have a party,” he mutters, stabbing at his eggs with his fork.
The boys fall into silence, finishing their breakfasts. Trevor pouts, frustrated that the boys weren’t immediately on board with his idea for a party.
If they were in Michigan, the Hughes brothers would have the front door of the house unlocked past 10pm. The people they know from the golf course, from the lake, from the pickleball courts would all be pouring through the doorway and into the party. Everyone knows that on Saturday nights, the Hughes brothers invite people over and they have a big bonfire. Apparently, that only applies in Michigan.
Trevor leaves the breakfast table first, to jeers from the other boys about being pouty and bitchy for not getting his way. Trevor knows that he’s going to invite Honey and her friend– Bee? Bea? B?– over tomorrow night no matter what the goons say. There’s not much to do in Litchton, he knows that, so he doesn’t want to leave the girls out. Otherwise, they might just sit at home all night. Trevor can’t have that.
Obviously, that’s his only motive. He would never have any other reason to invite Honey and Bea over to the house at night. Never.
Maybe one other reason.
But that’s irrelevant.
He spends the morning outside, using the extra wood from Earl to build a fire pit in the half-circle clearing near the edge of the forest. When they were younger, Trevor’s sister might’ve thought this area was where the fairies lived, and maybe she would have built them a house. He wonders briefly if Honey was the same way when she was a child, when she was growing up in rural Litchton with nothing else to do but imagine.
Come to think of it, he doesn’t know if Honey grew up here. She seems so intimately integrated into the town that she has to be from here, has to have grown up here. She must know all the town secrets and all the town gossip and fuck, Trevor wants to know all of that and more.
He can’t explain the feeling he has about Honey. He’s just… drawn to her. It doesn’t make sense– he doesn’t know her. He’s barely met her. She did not exist in his life a week ago and yet, she’s popping up in his thoughts like they’ve known each other for years. Like they’ve been inseparable for years. When he thinks about it, he decides that Honey is like one of the girls he would have met in elementary school in Bedford. Honey is one of the girls that he would have grown up with, one of the neighbor girls from down the street with whom he rode his bike on hot summer days.
She’s got a hometown charm feel to her. Trevor has to see her again.
He finishes building the wooden part of the fire pit before realizing how stupid it was to build the pit out of wood. A lightbulb seems to go off in his head, though, because it’s an excuse to go see her, to invite her to his party. He can go to the hardware store on the way, pick up some stone and gravel to line the wood, protect it from catching flame. He can pick up some firewood from the grocery store for their first fire and pick up the laundry detergent he forgot yesterday. Jack won’t be so annoying then.
Trevor doesn’t bother telling the boys where he’s going– he just gets in the car and drives away.
It takes all of fifteen minutes to make his way to the bookstore. It’s still early, so he doesn’t even know if it’s open yet. Trevor and the boys are so used to waking up early for hockey that they’ve been up for about two hours and the whole day is still ahead of them.
When Trevor pulls at the front door of The Reading Nook, it doesn’t swing open the way it did yesterday. He knows the doors are easy on their hinges, considering how easily Honey slammed the door behind him yesterday, but today, the wood is barely budging. He knocks on the door, loud.
Honey’s friend’s head peeks out from behind a stack, confusion written all over her expression. Trevor waves at her, gesturing at the door. She laughs, then approaches the door. She points down at the ‘Closed’ sign hanging near the handle.
Trevor tilts his head, unimpressed. “I have to talk to you,” he says through the glass.
Bea unlocks the door and opens it with a snorted laugh. “What’s up, Trevor? Honey’s not here yet.”
“I have a proposition for you.”
Bea steps aside and lets him into the store. “You want her.”
Trevor sputters at her honesty. “I don’t know her.”
“You want her,” Bea repeats with a nod and a knowing smile. “And you want to know how to get her.”
“Well, yes,” Trevor says. “But also, no. I wanted to invite you– both, you both– to a party tomorrow night.”
Bea smiles. She crosses her arms over her chest. “You want my best friend and all I get is some measly party? Come on, Trevor. What’s in it for me?”
Trevor thinks for a minute. “What do you want?”
Bea laughs. She pokes her tongue into her cheek and looks expectantly at Trevor.
“Whoa,” Trevor says, taking a step back. “That’s really… forward, but–”
���I don’t want you, Trevor,” Bea scoffs. She shakes her head and rolls her eyes. “So self-centered, Honey was right about that. But, I’ll help you get her and I’ll make sure we make it to your party if you give me what I do want.”
Trevor hums, narrowing his eyes. “What do you want?”
Bea smiles, devilish and conniving. “The dating pool up here is pretty dry, and I hear you’ve got a few friends.”
Trevor nods.
Bea blinks at him. “Do you have any pictures of these friends? I would’ve looked you up, but Honey and I swore off Instagram years ago.”
That makes sense. That’s why he couldn’t find Honey when he looked her up last night– not that he had much to go off of. Still, “Honey Litchton NC” didn’t reveal many results.
Trevor fumbles with his phone, showing her a picture of the group from last summer. He watches her fingers pinch and zoom in on the picture, on each individual. She keeps her expression neutral, a poker face that impresses Trevor. She hums, thoughts racing behind her eyes too quick for Trevor to understand them.
“We’ll come to your party,” Bea says simply, handing the phone back to Trevor. She snatches it back at the last second. “Wait,” she says, and clicks around for a second.
Trevor waits, then she hands the phone back. On the screen is a contact page for ‘Bea McLean.’
“It’s pronounced like McLane,” Bea tells Trevor. “Since you’re so obsessed with names.”
“Okay,” Trevor cuts her off with a sarcastic nod.
Bea laughs. “Don’t get sassy with me, I have all the power here.”
“Yeah, but I have your number,” Trevor flaunts.
“I could just block you, easily,” Bea points out. “Then where would you be?”
Wisely, Trevor bites his tongue. After a deep breath, he asks, “So, I’ll see you tomorrow?”
“Wouldn’t miss it. Now get out, Honey’s supposed to get here soon and I don’t want her seeing you. She’s annoyingly on time. She’ll know we’re in cahoots.” Bea, much like her best friend did yesterday, pushes Trevor to the door and shoves him through it. She slams it behind him, flipping the sign so it says ‘Open’ instead, and waving Trevor off with a blown kiss.
she’s a flirt, Trevor thinks. those guys will not survive her for a second.
He doesn’t know which boy she has her eye on, but it doesn’t matter. Quinn’s too quiet for her, Luke is too awkward, Jack is too cocky, and Cole is too… short.
Trevor snorts at the insult, laughing to himself. He heads to the grocery store, where he parked, and purchases two gallon bottles of laundry detergent and a Sharpie. He writes “JACK” on one and puts them both in the trunk of the car. Then, he walks to the hardware store.
“Bear!” Vera greets from behind the counter, joints creaking as she moves from her chair behind the counter to give Trevor a hug.
“Oh, Vera, you don’t have to come all the way over here,” Trevor says awkwardly, but hugs the woman back nonetheless.
“Of course I did!” Vera exclaims. “You look so handsome, young man.”
Trevor blushes, shying away from Vera’s examining fingers. She squints at the logo on his chest, one of his shirts from Anaheim.
“I live in Anaheim,” Trevor explains to the woman, catching her hands in his and holding them securely in front of her body before letting go. “Do you have any stone that I could secure a fire pit with?”
“Yes, baby!” Vera claps and leads him to a section of the store that’s, somehow, even more peculiar than Earl’s workshop. There’s bags of gravel, sure, but it looks like fish food compared to some of the other bags and miscellaneous stones on the shelves. “Pick whatever you’d like. I’ll give you a discount for being so darn cute.”
Trevor chuckles. “I bet you give that to all your customers,” he teases.
“I had a local girl put it in the computer for me after we met you and Sweetie on Wednesday,” Vera teases back, batting her eyelashes. Her cheeks are red with blush, too much blush. “His discount is a little more because I see you’ve changed the body God gave you.”
Trevor follows her eyes to his tattoos. He rubs his opposite hand over them sheepishly. “Yes, ma’am.” He tries to smile charmingly. “Maybe I should’ve sent him to do the shopping today, since you like Sweetie so much.” He throws a wink into the mix to punctuate his sentence.
Vera laughs, a twinkling sound.
“Plus, it’d be cheaper for me,” Trevor says, like it’s a scandalous secret.
“I know that’s right!” Vera claps again, waves a hand at Trevor like she’s slapping her knee. She walks off, back to the counter, leaving Trevor to shop for his stones.
He shops through the stones for about half an hour, choosing his favorites. He settles on a midsize gray stone, one that he can stack and seal with cement. He buys the quick drying cement as well, and carries it all to his car. Vera carries the quick dry cement and giggles when Trevor easily shifts the stones in his grasp when she complains about the bucket being too heavy for an old lady. He picks up the bucket and shifts the stones again, knowing he can carry more than this if he needed to. He swears he hears Vera sigh dreamily behind him as he packs the car up.
Like he said, what’s flirting with a few old ladies?
When he bids her goodbye with a kiss on the cheek, Trevor makes eye contact with Honey in the bookstore window. He grins at her and winks to her for good measure. He thanks Vera for her help while he escorts her back to the store, just for the sake of Honey seeing how selfless he can be. He’s not self-centered, no matter what she told Bea.
Vera insists that Trevor and “his band of boys” join her and Earl at church that Sunday morning, pledging to introduce them to the other members of the community. Trevor agrees, thinking that being on Vera’s good side might get him even closer to Honey.
Trevor drives back to his home for the summer to find that the boys are playing in the rink he built.
Come to think of it, he’s making a lot of improvements to this property, and the only one who has actually helped is Quinn.
Not self-centered at all.
He deserves a party.
“We’re having a party,” Trevor calls out, carrying his stones toward the fire pit. He dumps his supplies on the ground. “And I invited two girls.” He wipes the dirt and dust from his fingers. “Someone else needs to finish this fire pit because I’m tired of building your shit. C’mon, Quinn.”
He leads the way inside, to grab a beer from the fridge, and Quinn follows after kicking off his skates, eager to avoid the work. The other brothers and Cole are left dumbfounded on the concrete. Jack makes eye contact with the cement mix first, and he smiles.
They always did love a little project, and maybe they can hide a drawing of a dick in the cement for the owners to find at the end of the summer.
6:90 – HONEY
“Where are we going?” Honey asks.
Bea has barely crossed over the threshold of Honey’s home before the question falls from her lips. Bea’s been cagey about it all day– just explaining that “we have plans” and that “you’ll enjoy them.” Honey loves her, sure, but this is absurd. She feels like she’s being kidnapped.
“More like when are we going,” Bea corrects. “Let’s get you an outfit.”
Honey stumbles back, Bea pushing her out of the way. She closes the door behind her friend, following Bea as she stomps up the stairs to Honey’s bedroom. Bea knows Honey’s place as well as she knows her own, a little townhouse off of the main street in town. Honey’s lucky to live a little farther from city center, closer to the magic of the mountains.
“What kind of plans do we have, at least?” Honey presses. She looks at Bea’s outfit– a jean skirt that falls like an old Poodle skirt and a white bandeau top. It’s sort of see-through– Honey can see the shadow and outline of Bea’s nipples through the skimpy top. “I don’t want to dress like you,” Honey says.
Bea scoffs and turns to Honey. “My plan tonight is to get laid, your plan tonight is to accompany me while I evaluate my prey.”
Honey pretends to gag. “I hate when you say that.”
“Maybe you’ll find someone to flirt with,” Bea says.
“So, where are we going tonight? Statesville? Winston?” Honey asks again, hoping Bea will relent since she now knows the purpose of their adventure.
“Dude, I’m not telling you,” Bea laughs.
She reaches Honey’s closet and throws the curtain open. She strolls into the closet, looking through Honey’s clothes.
“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?” Honey asks, looking down at her athletic shorts and little tank top.
Bea turns around and surveys Honey. “The shirt is fine.” She returns to her task. “Nice tits.”
Honey looks down. It’s a revealing top and she’s not wearing a bra, because it’s a Saturday and she didn’t know they had plans until Bea told her this afternoon. “Maybe not, then.”
Bea glares at Honey out of her peripheral. “But that’s your favorite tank.”
“I have a feeling I’m going to get hit on if I wear this shirt.”
“You’re going to get hit on anyway. Keep the shirt.”
“No, I won’t, because my bitch face will keep most of the guys away.”
“Most of the guys. Which is the whole thing. Those ones will come to me.”
“Ew, you’re going to have a threesome tonight?”
“A threesome?” Bea spins around. “God, no! One at a time for me, thanks. I’m just going to fuck the other ones.”
“Other than who?” Honey asks. “I’m not fucking anyone tonight.”
Bea rolls her eyes. “You don’t know that.”
“Trust me, I do.”
“Whatever.” She digs through the closet, finding a long-buried white tennis skirt, the back pleats of the skirt puffy. Honey would never wear something like that, but Bea would– it’s probably Bea’s skirt in the first place.
“I’m not wearing that,” Honey states.
Bea wrestles her into it– seriously. She tackles Honey onto the bed and literally redresses her, the absurdity of the situation so bizarre that it completely bypasses both girls’ minds. Honey fights Bea the whole time, but Bea comes out on top. She gets her way, Honey wears the skirt, but she’s not happy about it.
“Do I, at least, get to drive?” Honey asks.
“Oh, I was going to force you,” Bea laughs. “You don’t expect me to drive you home, do you? I’ll be… indisposed.”
Honey scowls the rest of the time they spend getting ready– Bea does Honey’s hair and forces Honey to put on some light makeup, just a bit of mascara, eyeliner, and some lipgloss.
The only problem with Bea and Honey’s relationship is that Bea likes to go out, likes to meet people, likes to have a wild time, whereas Honey prefers to stay in. She’d rather watch a documentary or read a book or be present in nature than packed into a club dancefloor like a sardine in a larger can. Not that that matters to Bea.
By the time they get in the car, Bea is jumping off the walls trying to keep her secret destination to herself. Honey keeps trying to push, hoping for the right moment, but Bea won’t reveal her plans. All she does is direct Honey to the main road and type away at her phone, sending text after text to an unknown recipient, an unknown recipient that Honey is sure they’ll be meeting up with later.
They drive further into the mountains, to Honey’s surprise. They don’t head towards Winston or Statesville. They drive up, farther from town, farther from their neighbors. Near the top of the mountain, the houses are miles apart.
Perfect for a party.
Perfect for a party… thrown by boys in their twenties.
It clicks in Honey’s mind as Bea tells her to turn into the hidden driveway along the curve. “You’re not,” Honey says.
Bea laughs. “I was wondering how long it would take for you to catch on. I thought for sure you would’ve clocked me when we turned left instead of right.”
“Bea,” Honey scolds, her voice sharp. They’re on the driveway now, safe from the curves of the road, and Honey stops the car. She turns to her best friend. “You can’t be serious.”
For all of her audacity, Bea manages to understand the gravity of the situation at hand. It finally clicks in her head, why Honey isn’t happy with her plans, and why she’s even unhappier that she was dragged out here without knowing what she was walking into. She can’t just drop Bea off and leave– she would be abandoning her best friend in a house of strange boys all evening. Bea might be outgoing, but she hasn’t been hurt like Honey.
“It’s not going to be like that,” Bea reassures Honey gently, grabbing Honey’s hand with both of hers. “I promise, they’re not like that.”
“You don’t know them, Bea,” Honey explains.
“You don’t either,” Bea points out. “And this time, we’re together. The second they do something– I mean it, the second– we’ll leave. I’ll go with you. Fuckery be damned.”
Honey grimaces, rolling her shoulders to try and relieve some of the tension. She takes a deep breath, then squints at Bea. “Are you really going to fuck all of them?” She asks.
Bea grins, knowing that she’s convinced Honey to at least try and hang out with the boys. She’s smug, getting her way once again. She winks at Honey, coy. “Just the ones you don’t want,” she simpers, giggling. “You get your pick of the litter.”
“I don’t want to fuck any of them. I don’t know how many times we have to go over this.”
“So, you don’t want Trevor? ‘Cuz I was thinking–”
“Don’t fuck Trevor,” Honey groans.
“Why not?” Bea teases.
“You’re better than that, Buzzy,” Honey scoffs with a shake of her head. “He’s weird and a flirt and annoying.”
“I’m weird,” Bea says. “And a flirt. And annoying.” She puckers her lips and blows kisses at Honey as she shifts the car into drive and begins to creep down the driveway again. “Maybe it’s a match made in heaven, me and Trevor.”
“You don’t want him,” Honey growls, her voice short.
Bea shrugs and faces forward in her seat, her hands tapping her thighs. Whether it’s from nerves or excitement, Honey can’t tell. If she had to guess, though, it would be excitement. Bea is the least anxious person that Honey knows, the kind of person who can talk to anyone or anything no matter the situation.
While they might be athletes, they’ve never met anyone like Bea. Honey never has, not since she met her best friend all those years ago. They’re fucked– and she’s irresistible.
Honey and Bea pull up to the house and park under the cover, right next to the front door. This house was a point of contention when it was being built the first year Honey moved to Litchton. It was her first introduction to the gossip of the founding ladies. Scarlett and Gillian had felt particularly perturbed by the building– a five bed, four bathroom house complete with a hot tub and a game room and two stories of wraparound porches.
And it’s all made of the same wood, the same stain, the same ugly pattern. Honey cringes when she thinks about the number of trees that were cut down to make this house match. She’d think the same thing if it was made entirely out of the same stone.
Bea knocks on the door as Honey wipes her sweat from her palms. It takes a minute, but then Honey hears the scrambling of feet and the shouting between one man and his group of buddies, who are just giggling as they do what they can to cut him off from the door. Honey can see it through the thin windows bordering the door, how they rush up the stairs and down the hall. She can also see how they’re holding Trevor back as much as they can.
The brunet from the first day opens the door with a charming smile. “Hi,” he greets. “Can I help you?”
“Jack, you motherfucker–”
Honey bites back a laugh as Trevor curses and struggles, still in the grasp of the shorter boy from the first day and one of the newcomers– another brunet, a taller one. She looks at him carefully– the curl of his hair at the nape of his neck, partially hidden under a baseball cap, the curve of his eyebrows, and the slope of his lips give him away. He must be one of Jack’s brothers.
“We were invited to come over tonight,” Bea replies.
No matter how many times she hears it, Honey is always impressed by the way Bea turns on her charm and makes the people around her melt. It worked on her, too, when they first became friends all those years ago, and then less and less when Bea moved into Honey’s place when they first came to Litchton together and shared a bed for almost a year before Bea found her own townhouse. Then, her charm just got annoying, like a younger sibling who tags along with you everywhere because Mom said they had to.
It’s better for them when Bea and Honey have their time apart. Honey, especially, needs her time alone.
Jack’s eyes finally find Honey behind Bea and he grins. “That’s right,” he says, tapping his forehead like he just remembered. Honey can tell that all he’s doing is messing with Trevor, though. “The party! You must be the girls that Z invited. Hi, Honey.”
“Hi, Jack,” Honey replies, short and sweet. She turns on her customer service voice just for this. She finds Cole next to Trevor and smiles when her eyes slide over the imprisoned boy, as passive as she can be. “Hi, Cole.”
“Hey, Honey,” Cole says with an easy smile. Honey wants to snort and laugh– he’s got a smile that could get him into or out of anything. She wonders briefly if he’s childish and impish, still, even in their adult age, just because he’s got the smile to match.
Jack steps aside and lets the girls enter the house. He closes the door behind them and Honey has a sneaking suspicion that if she turned to glance at him, he’d be staring at one of their backsides. She doesn’t look. It’s not worth the joke that she could make if she caught him.
Bea nudges Honey and points up.
Honey tilts her head, and– “A chandelier made of moose antlers. Wow,” she marvels. She makes a face at Bea, then continues. “That’s really… something.”
“Isn’t it sick?” Cole asks, finally dropping Trevor’s arm and joining the girls where they stand. He spreads his arms out from his sides and spins in a slow circle. When he makes a full turn, he looks at both girls and wiggles his eyebrows. “Want a tour?”
The girls agree and Cole takes them throughout the house, leaving the other boys behind. From their pounding feet, Honey figures they’re headed downstairs, while Cole takes them upstairs. He shows them the bedrooms, the bathrooms, the common areas, the hallways, the outlet in his room that doesn’t work, and much more. They go back downstairs and get the same treatment– Cole even opens the fridge and helps himself to a beverage before offering anything to the girls. They see the kitchen, the living room, the den, the dining room and patio. Cole shows them the wraparound porch and its chairs. Honey takes in the view– it’s just as good as the one from her living room.
Finally, finally, they make their way down to the basement. It’s a smaller room, minimized by a covered porch and larger patio with a hot tub. The basement is clearly the man cave, the game room, or whatever you want to call it. There’s a pool table, a large TV, a ping pong table, a foosball table… everything a boy could want.
As evidenced by the two boys sitting on the couches near the pool table, while the other two wield sticks and study the position of the balls on the table.
Honey finds Trevor on the couch with Jack. His eyes found her first as she walked down the stairs and he hasn’t stopped staring. Neither has she, to be fair.
“Pool,” Bea notices. She looks at Honey and Honey shakes her head. Bea nods. “Honey and I are next,” she announces anyway.
“Oh, yeah?” Jack asks with a little laugh. “Are you any good?”
“I’m okay,” Bea says. She pauses, lets a smirk on her face grow as she looks over to Honey. “Honey’s worse.”
The boys turn to Honey. “Are you?” Trevor asks.
“I wager she could still beat you, Z,” says the only boy that Honey had not seen when they arrived at the house earlier. He’s got dark hair, but it’s also hidden under a backwards cap. The only difference between him and his brothers, assuming he is one of the brothers that Trevor mentioned on Monday, is that he’s smaller, more sullen. The telltale sign is that his comment is offhanded, delivered with the calm venom of an older brother who knows exactly where to bite. He doesn’t even look at Trevor as he lines up his shot and sinks the ball.
Honey likes him immediately.
When she looks over, she notices that Bea likes him too. Her lips are pursed in thought, only the minutest pout on her mouth. There’s a tiny smile pulling at her cheek and her eyes are twinkling under the bright lights, but they would be hazardous in a club.
It’s a game they’ve played before. Bea sucks at pool– she always has, but… when you suck at pool, either the person you’re playing with will laugh at you or they’ll try to give you tips. The night usually ends with Bea sinking the 8 ball with a little bit of help from her gentleman caller and a celebratory, “thank you” kiss.
Honey, however, loves pool. She wasn’t always great at pool, but found that, like almost everything, the more she practiced, the better she became. When Bea’s celebratory kisses turned into rushed hookups in the Winston-Salem dive bar bathrooms, Honey got her fair share of tips and tricks from the other men around. Usually, she would try to shack up with the alcoholic middle aged men who had nothing better to do than sip on their beer and play pool after dinner with their wives. It was rare that they flirted with Honey and she liked it that way.
The game goes like this: Bea finds a group of men that puff up their chest at the idea of beating a woman at pool, she “lets them win” against her (as if she would’ve won in the first place), and then it’s Honey’s turn. Honey, of course, feints a few shots and lets the men get comfortable before coming from behind and beating them. Usually, her win results in two drinks for her and her friend.
Today, the drinks won’t be her bargaining chip.
“What would you wager?” Honey asks the boy who last spoke. “If it were a real bet.”
His stormy eyes look her up and down while Jack’s brother, the tall one, paces around the table to find his best shot. “Money, normally,” he drawls. “But I’d rather not lose my money betting on you if you’re worse than her.” He nods to Bea, who takes the chance to blatantly look him up and down.
“How about this,” Bea proposes, twirling a strand of hair between her fingers. “I’ll play the winner of this game and then we’ll see if Honey can beat Trevor. If I win, I get whatever I want, obviously. If Honey wins…”
Honey meets Bea’s eyes. She nods, knowing that Bea is thinking back to the night when they visited ECU their junior year of high school and witnessed a rugby party in the flesh. It’s their usual punishment when their outings feature a house party and a pool table.
“...Trevor has to do a Zulu Run,” Bea finishes.
Honey finds Trevor again and smiles, overexaggerated and sickly sweet.
“What’s a Zulu Run?” Trevor asks, looking to the other boys and finding nothing but confusion. On the girls’ faces, he just sees plotted mayhem.
“It’s fun, don’t worry,” Honey reassures him. “You only have to do it if you lose. Which, I mean, if I’m worse than Bea, then you should be fine.”
Honey sits on the loveseat across from Trevor and Jack, while Bea sits down next to Jack. Her knee presses against his, subtly, just enough that you can’t tell if it’s deliberate or just a lack of room on the couch and Honey presses her hand to her lips to hide a smile.
“So you’re Jack,” Bea says, interrupting the conversation that he and Trevor had been in when the girls walked down the stairs.
Honey watches as Bea makes her eyes look wide and soft, very flirtatious and fairy-like. She’s got the perfect complexion for it– the light dusting of freckles over her skin, the ounce of baby fat still left in her cheeks and all the right places along her body, her expression just the right amount of interested but not desperate.
For a brief moment, Honey wishes she was more like Bea.
“You’ve heard of me?” Jack asks with a little smirk.
Bea scoffs and waves him off. “Don’t flatter yourself. Honey didn’t even tell me your name.”
Jack’s bright eyes turn to Honey. “Oh, yeah?” He tilts his chin up in challenge. “What is it with you and names? You wouldn’t tell Trevor yours, you haven’t properly introduced me to…”
“Bea,” Bea supplies.
Honey shakes her head fondly at her best friend’s eagerness. Honey bites her tongue to keep her comments at bay, and instead plasters a tight smile on her face. “I didn’t realize I would be seeing you all again,” Honey says, forcing politeness into her voice. “And I’m not the one who’s weird about names.”
Jack and Trevor share a look. Jack hides a snort poorly.
“What?” Honey asks, her eyebrows raised and her mouth in a straight, unimpressed line.
Jack smirks and Trevor shakes his head. Jack speaks anyway. “I don’t know how you would have avoided us,” Jack says. “Considering.”
“Considering…?” Bea asks, leaning around Jack to look at Trevor. Honey catches Trevor’s panicked glance and can guess what Jack’s alluding to. She jumps in, hoping to switch the subject.
“Nothing to consider,” Honey and Trevor say at the same time. Trevor sounds rushed, Honey sounds indifferent. Both of their jaws drop and they stare at each other, Honey affronted and Trevor surprised.
Cole, who had been sitting on the stool-saddles near the pool table, steps over the back of the couch and weasels his way between Trevor and Jack. “Creepy,” he says. “You’re like the twins from the Shining.”
Trevor cringes. “You know, I don’t think we are.”
Honey just hums, picking up her drink and taking a sip. She clears her throat and turns back to Jack. “So those are your brothers?” She nods over to the pool table, where the shorter boy is lining up the 8-ball with the corner pocket. “Trevor said you had family coming.”
Honey doesn’t miss the smirk and blush on Trevor’s face when she says his name, even as he dips his head and takes a gulp of his beer to cover it up.
Jack smiles, a genuine smile. It’s easy to tell the difference with him, when he’s really smiling or if he’s smiling because he thinks he’s supposed to.
“Yeah, the goons.” Jack looks over his shoulder and grins as his taller brother loses his game of pool. “C’mon, Rusty, you brought that pool stick all this way and your game still sucks?”
The taller boy glares at Jack and sulks, re-racking his stick. He walks over and stands awkwardly behind the couch, but flicks Jack on the back of the head and Honey giggles before she can help it.
She looks down at her lap after letting out the little laugh and misses the way Trevor’s eyes light up and train on her.
“Luke, you fucker,” Jack swears, flinching at the impact of Luke’s flick. Jack frowns, his eyebrows furrowed as he rubs the back of his head. “He’s my little brother.”
“Little brother,” Honey repeats. “And you’re just going to let him flick you like that?”
Jack rolls his eyes. “Very funny, Honey. Obviously I’m not going to let him get away with it.” He reaches around and half-asses a punch to Luke’s dick, just hard enough that it expels an “oof” from the younger boy and he doubles over a little bit.
The other boy interrupts. “Quit it,” he says. He glares at his brothers, then his eyes fix on Bea. “Your turn.”
Bea stands and smiles, a smug little smirk reserved for her conspiratory looks with Honey that signifies that she’s getting what she wanted. She joins the man by the rack of sticks and clasps her hands behind her back, looking up at him through her eyelashes. “Which stick should I use?”
Jack looks a little put out by the loss of Bea at his side, and casts a glare toward his other brother. “And that’s Quinn,” he says curtly. “Pool master, or whatever.”
“So he’s the best in the house?” Honey asks.
“We’ll tally scores at the end of the summer,” Luke jumps in as Quinn says, “Absolutely.”
Jack scowls. “You just think that because you’re older. Remember, Quinn: first is the worst. Second is the best.”
Trevor snorts and takes another sip of his beer.
He’s unnaturally quiet, Honey thinks. Trying to be cool in front of his friends, maybe.
“I take it you’re the second child,” Honey says. “That makes sense.”
“That makes sense?” Jack asks, repeating her statement like he can’t believe she dared to say that. “What the fuck does that mean?”
Honey looks over at Bea, who presses her lips together and raises her eyebrows. Daring Honey.
Honey rolls her head back, stretching the muscles of her neck. “You…” She starts, trailing off because she’s not sure how to finish the sentence without sounding mean. She scratches her eyebrow and scrunches her nose. “You like attention,” she decides, trying to keep her voice as free of judgment as possible.
“Do I?” Jack asks, sounding unimpressed.
Honey shrugs. “You– I mean. Jack, you asked. You opened the door for us because you knew it would annoy Trevor, probably because you knew it would bother him that you were opening the door for m– us, instead of him. You flirt and smile when Bea sits next to you but you lean back and manspread when she gets up like you don’t want us to notice that you’re sitting without a girl at your side. You call your little brother a “fucker” and retaliate because you can, honestly escalating the situation from a flick to a punch to the dick. You act annoyed because your older brother is beating you at pool already this summer and it only just started, plus he took the girl from your side. It’s, uh… yeah. You like attention.”
Everyone but Jack starts to laugh.
“Stand up,” Cole says to Honey.
She does, her arms resting by her side awkwardly, her fingers twitching as she waits for him to do something.
Cole looks around the room and swears under his breath. “I didn’t think this through, one second,” he mutters, and disappears upstairs.
Honey continues to stand there. She pats her hands against her thighs and looks around the room, trying not to make eye contact with anyone, but especially not Bea. If she makes eye contact with Bea, she’s going to burst out laughing.
Trevor is still snickering, hiding his face in his shirt. Honey can still see the little crinkles by his eyes.
“She clocked you, man,” Quinn says with a shrug before pulling out a pool stick and standing it next to Bea. It comes up to the tip of her shoulder, Quinn’s chest. He nods in satisfaction and hands the stick over. Honey lets out a relieved breath of air at his approval, and then stifles a second when she watches Bea’s fingers brush over Quinn’s on the stick, her eyes lingering on his for just a second too long.
It’s too easy for her.
Cole comes bounding down the stairs with a plastic soccer trophy in his hand. “Found this when I was snooping,” he says, approaching Honey and holding it out. He stands directly in front of her, makes eye contact with her, and stares into her eyes. “Thank you,” he says with a sincere nod. “For taking Jack down a peg. He needed that. We all needed that.”
And he hands the trophy off to Honey with a handshake, like she’s graduating from high school and he’s the principal handing her a diploma. He takes the handshake and pulls her into a hug, the trophy crushed awkwardly between them.
When he pulls away, Cole puts both hands on Honey’s arms and stares into her eyes again. “If you’re going to do that again, please don’t do it to me.”
Quinn breaks the rack with a crack of his stick, standing at a slight angle, and Honey sits back down, cradling her trophy in her hands.
Cole engages Honey in conversation for a few minutes, with Luke jumping in here and there. Jack turns on the TV and pouts. As much as she tries not to notice it, Trevor just stays quiet and sips his beer and sneaks glances at Honey out of the corner of his eye.
Eventually, the conversation dies out and the group turns their attention to the television, which is streaming some hockey game that Honey doesn’t have an interest in. The boys are chitchatting away, throwing out names and positions and yelling at the TV when a call doesn’t go their way– Honey can’t tell who’s cheering for what team, but she can also tell that Jack and Luke don’t like the team in white… at all. Trevor seems to prefer them over the team in red. Cole doesn’t seem to care. He’s just laughing, still, at Jack. Jack just sulks, but he seems to cheer up once the team in red scores, late in the first period.
“You all really like hockey, huh?” Bea asks between turns. Quinn has sunken a ball almost every turn, but Bea has only sunken one. Honey grins at her, then glances at the pool table and back to Bea. Bea sticks her tongue out at Honey, playful and easy. If Quinn’s the kind of guy that Honey thinks he is, it’s only a matter of time before he starts teaching Bea some tricks to tighten up the game.
Cole laughs. “Yeah, I mean, I’d hope so.”
“What do you mean?” Bea asks, batting her eyelashes innocently, like she didn’t read all of Trevor’s Wikipedia page before coming here.
“We play,” Luke says with a shrug.
Honey and Bea lock eyes and Honey plays along with her game. She tilts her head and blinks, as if this is the first time she’s hearing it. “Are you any good?”
Quinn snorts and shakes his head as Bea leans over to line up a shot and Honey notices his hand on her waist when he points at a different ball, explaining that that would be the better shot for her. Bea sinks the recommended ball and jumps up with a cheer, smiling brightly at Quinn and standing just a little closer than she would if she wanted to be just friends.
“We’re alright,” Trevor says, the first words he’s said to Honey since she walked through the door. He stands. “Does anyone want another beer?”
The boys’ voices ring out in a chorus of yesses, whereas Honey stays mostly quiet. Bea agrees to another drink as well, which is when Trevor turns to Honey. “You’re sure you don’t want another drink? I’m already getting them for everyone.”
“I’m sure, but thank you,” Honey says.
“Why don’t you go and help him carry the drinks,” Bea suggests from her post next to Quinn.
Honey glares at her, but stands. She leaves her trophy on her seat, saving it. “Fine,” she replies, hoping the edge in her voice is only detectable to her best friend. She follows Trevor up the stairs to the kitchen, like an antisocial cat who has FOMO, but only when it comes to their owner. She crinkles her nose in disgust when she realizes that that’s how she looks, not that Trevor would notice or care. Actually, he would probably be elated if she compared herself to a cat following him around.
Trevor opens the fridge and sifts around, the bottles of beer clinking. The beer takes up most of the bottom shelf, unsurprisingly.
“Do you think you have enough?” Honey asks, unable to help herself when Trevor passes her a third bottle, each a different brand of beer, to carry.
“Q and J like Michelob, Luke is a Miller guy, Coley likes Budweiser, and I’m more of a Modelo drinker.” Trevor’s head is buried in the back of the fridge, rifling through a pack of Millers that seem to be running low. “We’ve had to go to the store three times since that first day because we keep running out of the one beer that someone wants.”
He retreats from the refrigerator and turns to Honey. He’s got two beers in his hand. He holds them up and asks, “Which one do you think Bea wants?”
Honey weighs her choices, but ultimately chooses the Michelob. Bea will use it as a jumping point for her conversation with Quinn– it’s a no-brainer. As annoying as Bea’s boy-craziness is, Honey is always going to be her wingwoman and helper when she can.
“Cool,” Trevor says and returns the other beer to the shelf. He turns back to Honey and takes two of the beers she was carrying, leaving her with just two, the Budweiser and the Modelo.
“I thought you were a Modelo drinker,” Honey says.
“I am,” Trevor replies, heading towards the stairs.
Honey follows. “Then why am I holding your beer?”
“Because I want you to hand it to me.”
Honey snorts out a laugh. “Okay.”
When they return downstairs, they distribute the beer. Honey hands Cole his Budweiser and waits for Trevor to finish handing out the beers to the Hughes brothers and her friend. Bea has finally managed to get Quinn to do the work for her, with him leaning behind her and guiding her arms over the cue, pointing out where she should be looking and where to hit the ball. There are no other balls on the table except the 8 ball, which makes Honey chuckle. There’s no way Bea sunk all of hers– Quinn had to have “mistakenly” knocked a few in for her.
Trevor returns to the sitting area and Honey stands, offering him the Modelo in her hand. On purpose, she realizes, Trevor closes his hand over her own to take the beer from her and thanks her with a smile, his eyes far too kind to be harmless and friendly.
Honey shakes her head with a look, then frowns when Trevor plops his happy ass right down on the other side of her loveseat. She shakes her head again and chooses to watch the end of the pool game, sitting on one of the stool-saddles near the table. She claps when Bea finally sinks the 8 ball after her third whiff. The ball only sinks because Quinn leaned over Bea again and did it for her, working together to finish the game.
“I win!” Bea squeals in delight, jumping in celebration in front of Quinn.
He lets out a little chuckle, the most awkwardly and quietly endearing laugh that Honey has ever heard. “You won,” he agrees. “With my help.”
Bea tilts her chin up and smiles at Quinn, proud of herself. “So we both win,” she says. “That means we both get whatever we want.”
Honey bites her tongue and ducks her head, waiting for what’s coming next. She wants to turn around and look out the window, even though you can’t see anything in the dark mountainside now that the sun has set. The thing is, she also wants to see the boys’ reactions to what Bea is going to say next.
Quinn smiles, a little tiny smile. His focus is only on Bea, who has inched her way closer to him somehow. There’s not much more room between them. “Whatever you want,” he repeats. “What do you want, Bea?”
Honey watches Quinn’s face, but she’s torn. She also wants to watch Jack.
“You know that tour Cole took us on when Honey and I first got here?” Bea asks, reaching out and smoothing out the turned-up fabric of Quinn’s sleeve.
“Yeah,” Quinn replies, a little confused.
Bea rests her hand on his arm, slowly making her way down so she can wrap her hand around his fingers. She watches herself do it, then looks up at Quinn through her lashes. “I don’t think I saw your bedroom,” she says. “Would you care to show me?”
Quinn’s lips part in surprise and Honey watches his eyes search Bea’s own for… insincerity, maybe?
At the same time, Jack chokes on a sip of his beer. Honey’s eyes fly to him and Cole pats his back as Jack coughs it out.
“Jesus Christ,” Jack says, clapping his hand against his chest and coughing one last time.
Bea smiles at him, oozing confidence and a little showmanship, as Quinn leads her to the stairs. He lets her climb them first and Honey giggles when Quinn sneaks a glance at Bea’s ass and visibly relaxes before hurrying to catch up with her and get his hands on her hips. Bea’s twinkling laughter grows softer and softer as she bounds up the stairs, her footfalls growing heavier as Quinn closes in on her.
“Well shit, Jack,” Cole says. “I guess you’re not the first to fall into bed with a girl this summer. The streak is finally over.”
“You don’t know that,” Jack says, pushing Cole’s hand off of his shoulder. He turns to face Honey, looking hopeful and a little desperate. “Wanna help me keep my streak up?”
A loud honking laugh escapes Honey. “Absolutely fucking not,” she replies, still laughing. She shakes her head at Jack, then notices the small, but mightily proud smile on Trevor’s lips.
Choosing not to focus on that smile, a smile that she’s inadvertently becoming very fond of because she’s never seen him smile at his friends the way Trevor is smiling at her, Honey hops up from her stool and starts to gather the balls from the pockets of the table. She racks them, then grabs her cue and waves Trevor over. “I believe we had a game to play.”
“You had a game to lose,” Trevor corrects, standing and approaching Honey. He grabs his own stick, the one Quinn abandoned on the edge of the table when Bea proposed her bedroom shenanigans.
“Hmm,” Honey voices, raising her eyebrows and exaggerating a grimace. “Consider me scared. Your break, Trevor.”
“When I win,” Trevor says. “I want to buy you dinner.” He lines up the cue ball and shoots, the colorful triangle of balls destroyed in a single swoop. One of the solids finds its way into a pocket and Trevor smirks.
“What a boring prize,” Honey muses. “But if you insist on those terms, then I agree.” She sticks out her hand to shake his. “And when I win…”
She leans down and eyes a line of three balls. The striped nine is farthest from the hole, but Honey wants to prove a point, so she angles her stick down at a steep slope and pushes– noticing Trevor’s mouth flattening into a line when her ball jumps over the other two and tips into the hole. She stands back up to her full height, tilting her head to the side. She cocks her hip and positions her hand against it, holding the cue up on her other side.
“I’m really going to enjoy your Zulu Run, Trevor.”
Cole whistles lowly from the couch. “I need to find you another trophy, girl.”
Honey shoots him a wink.
They play on. Trevor takes it easy– plays the safe route. With each easy fall into the pocket, he fistpumps to celebrate. Honey can only imagine how insufferable he is at the bowling alley.
She shows him up, not even daring to let him pull ahead in their race and convince himself that he has a chance. She sinks the final black ball into the right-center pocket, bending herself all the way over the table to give him a good view of the girl who’s beating him. Her hips are high on the other side of the table, balancing up on her tip toes, facing the seating area. She doesn’t even look at the ball when she hits it, no, she’s looking up at Trevor with a tilted smile and mocking, bragging eyes.
His eyes evaluate her– eyes, to lips, to chest, to ass. To the boys, making sure they aren’t looking, aren’t gawking at the round globes of Honey’s ass that are presented before them. Back to her ass. Her ass.
Honey stands, slowly, making sure Trevor memorizes the curve of her waist when she does. Her eyes drop to his pants, a smirk growing in time with his bulge, and she rests her hands on the edge of the table. She pulls her shoulders back, broadening her chest.
It’s just a dominant stance. All Honey enjoys about this is the fact that his resolve and dignity crumble at the mere sight of a pretty girl bent before him. She likes knowing that he’s weak for her, but that she’ll never do anything about it.
She’s not looking for that.
“A Zulu Run,” Honey explains, clearing her throat to rid her voice of its sultry tinges. She shakes her hair back, over her shoulders. Trevor’s eyes darken at the sight of her throat. She smiles, but continues. “Is when you have to strip, sing a song, and streak around the house until the song is over.” She throws a glance over her shoulder at the other boys. “Usually your friends get to pick your song.”
Jack perks up at that. Honey turns and hops up on the ledge of the pool table, knowing that Trevor’s eyes have fallen to her behind. Jack looks at Honey with delight in his eyes, seeming to forgive her in an instant for psychoanalyzing him earlier in the night. His eyes slide to Trevor and the look in them seems more akin to yearning for vengeance.
“So, boys,” Honey drawls. “What’ll it be?”
They scramble over each other to reach her, shouting song suggestions as they fly into their head. Honey can’t hear anything they’re saying, so she laughs until they fall silent. Cole’s hand presses into the side of her thigh, she looks down at it in disgust, then back up at him. It falls to the edge of the table, noticeable space between her and the appendage.
“How about this,” Honey decides. She sneaks a glance at Trevor, gloating as she lets her eyes roam all over his body. She takes in his arms, his thighs under his shorts, the way his shirt falls over his shoulders. “Trevor looks pretty fit. Why don’t we all pick a song?” She winks at him. “Make him run for, oh, eleven minutes or so?”
A flicker of recognition passes through Trevor’s gaze, but it’s quickly replaced by disbelief. He doesn’t know how she would know– weren’t they subtle about it? She lets out a breath of a laugh at the look– no, Trevor, you weren’t subtle, she thinks. but it’s cute that you think you are.
She realizes what she was thinking in a split second and shakes herself out of it, snapping her face forward and crossing her legs knee-over-knee.
“But only his friends get to pick, so I guess I’m out.” Honey hops down from her perch and breaks through the boys, settling herself on the loveseat with her trophy, laying out to take up as much space as she could. She picks up the remote from the table and places her other hand behind her head, navigating to the Roku menu screen. “Do we have Spotify on this thing?”
Luke, Jack, and Cole each pick a song and Cole helps Honey connect to the outdoor speakers. He re-presents her with her trophy with a flourish and a bow, playful and lame. The boys push Trevor out to the patio with a whoop, pulling at his clothes even as Trevor fights them.
Honey follows at a distance and watches through the glass door. She looks away when Trevor sheds his underwear and waits for Luke’s countdown to end before looking back up. She doesn’t want to see it. That’s just too far. She gets an eyeful of his ass as he rounds the corner of the house, though.
As Trevor starts his third song, Cole’s cheesy Taylor Swift pick (“You can’t outrun my music now, bitch!”), Jack joins Honey at the door.
“I think I’m going to head home,” Honey tells him, rubbing over the skin on her arms.
Jack nods at her, shrugging easily. “I’ll walk you out.”
Honey leads him up the stairs, hearing Trevor’s whoops grow louder as he finishes the second verse of the song. She knows he catches them walking up the stairs because his singing falters for a moment. His steps speed up. So do Honey’s.
She walks briskly to the front door, bordering on a speedwalk, with Jack behind her. She swings her keys over her finger and wrenches the front door open. Jack catches it before it hits the wall.
“What about Bea?” He asks, calling after Honey and making her pause.
“She’ll find her way home,” Honey replies and steps off again. She has to get out of here before Trevor races up the stairs to stop her from being alone with Jack and she gets an eyeful of his– junk.
“Honey!” Jack calls again.
She lurches to a stop and cringes, turning to face the boy.
"Honey, I don't think I'm going to flirt with you anymore."
Honey takes a breath, walking back and reaching up to pat Jack's cheek, just forceful enough that it'll sting for a moment after she walks away. It's not quite a hit, but it's definitely not a love tap. "That doesn't hold the power that you think it does," she tells him with a nod and a close-lipped smile. She goes to leave, but Jack stops her by grabbing her hand.
"Trevor likes you, you know. He was quiet tonight, but he likes you. He's reading that book you gave him and everything," Jack says in earnest, his blues boring into Honey's own eyes.
Honey picks up on the unsaid words. He's trying, take it easy on him, he might be annoying but he's good, and he likes you. You should like him too, and all of that.
The edges of Honey's smile soften and she gently pulls her hand from Jack's. "It's nice to know he can read," she replies, deflecting. Whatever Trevor feels for her, not that he can really feel anything because he doesn't know her like that, doesn't matter. She's not looking for that right now. "Thanks for hosting us, Jack. I'm sorry for what I... said."
"It's okay." Jack shrugs. "Thanks for coming."
"Goodnight," Honey bids him, and starts to walk away.
"Come back," Jack says, and Honey whips around and finds him looking like the words surprised him when he heard himself speak. He clears his throat. "Friday. Um, it's— it's National Chocolate Ice Cream Day and National Donut Day." He scuffs the tip of his shoe against the ground. "Really... important holiday."
Honey can't do anything but laugh. "I'll bring the donuts."
She walks to her car and ignores the chirping of bullfrogs echoing in her ears as she drives down the mountain to her home, alone.
7:90 – TREVOR
Jack glares at Trevor when he walks down to the kitchen early the next morning. As Trevor rubs the sleep out of his eyes with a yawn, Jack shifts under the frozen pack of peas that rests precariously on his shoulderblades. Trevor had barely touched him last night, he was just being dramatic. So he had a bit of soreness on his back from where Trevor pushed him against the wall and asked him what the hell he was doing, who cares? He went upstairs with Trevor’s girl. Alone.
“Bea’s taking you to church with her this morning for laying a finger on me,” Jack growls out when Trevor looks at him and laughs.
“No shit,” Trevor replies, snorting.
“It’s true,” comes the female voice from the couch. Bea leans forward, her tube top skewed and tilted enough to draw a wandering eye. Trevor rolls his. “You shouldn’t get violent, not on my watch.”
“You weren’t even with me last night, Bea,” Trevor says sweetly, tilting his head down to dismiss her. “You didn’t see me do shit. How can you prove it was me and not Luke?”
“Luke put a video of it on his private story, then showed me,” Bea snickers in the same tone. “So you’re taking me home and helping me choose my best church outfit to hide these hickeys, and then you’ll join me at the service. It’ll be good for your reputation in town.”
“I don’t really care about my reputation in town,” Trevor laughs.
“Honey cares about your reputation in town,” Bea clarifies, a tight, ‘there’s no room for discussion here’ smile on her face. She pointedly looks him up and down. “Little Bear.”
Trevor scowls at her condescending tone and use of the nickname. How dare she flaunt her inner circle-ness to Trevor.
“I was going to go to church anyway,” Trevor boasts. “Vera told me to bring all of the boys.”
“Well, you’re the only one resorting to violence–” Jack begins, seething, before Bea cuts him off.
“No, this is a good idea,” she says, waving her hand to quiet him. “We should all go to church.”
Jack scoffs. “I don’t think we need to go,” he says. “Sounds like you’ve got an ulterior motive.”
“I don’t want the town to think y’all are reclusive party folk who have no interest in the happenings of Litchton,” Bea snaps. “You’d be surprised how quickly the old grannies will turn on you.”
“And you get to walk into church with five guys on your arm,” Jack says, still scowling. This time, his attention is focused on Bea, not the man who physically hurt him the night before.
“Said she wanted five guys, she ain’t talking ‘bout burgers,” Trevor deadpans, a disgusted look thrown Bea’s way.
She’s unperturbed by it, probably from many years of Honey– Honey.– throwing her similar looks. All Bea does is smile and reply, “My pussy already got murdered, Trev. I didn’t need five guys.”
“No way Quinn ‘murdered’ your pussy, Bea,” Jack jumps in, air quotes around the word. “The dude doesn’t fuck.”
Bea laughs. “I assure you, he fucks.”
“Yeah, I fuck,” Quinn agrees, descending the stairs. He veers to the couch first and drops a kiss on Bea’s head in greeting.
“Well, fuck your way to church,” Jack says. “Bea’s making everyone go with her.” Jack looks at Quinn expectantly, maybe waiting for pushback.
Quinn shrugs. “Okay,” he says. “It’s not like there’s anything else for us to do on a Sunday morning in this place. Everything is probably closed.”
“It’s true, everything is closed on Sundays except the grocery store and the gas station,” Bea says with a nod. “And the church, of course.”
Jack scowls and removes his pack of peas from his back. Trevor takes his opportunity to approach the fridge, conveniently behind Jack. “Why can’t we just stay here?”
“Because it’ll be fun,” Trevor replies, trying to exude optimism now that he’s not the only boy being forced to attend church and wash themselves of their sins. He turns and purposefully claps his hand down on Jack’s shoulder, hard. Jack howls in pain. Trevor squeezes just to watch him tense up. “It’s our chance to become one with the community, Jacky.”
Bea smiles, voice dripping with cheerfulness. “Yeah, Jacky, it’ll be good for you. Why don’t you two head upstairs and change?” Her eyes fix on Quinn, whose shirt rides up as he grabs a glass from the upper shelves of the cabinets. “I want to chit-chat with Quinn for a second.”
Trevor and Jack make a face, but scramble towards the stairs. They push and shove each other all the way up– Trevor is particularly satisfied when Jack bumps into the wall and groans– then split off into their respective rooms. Trevor treats it like a race– whoever finishes changing first wins.
Jack is already back downstairs by the time Trevor returns. Cole is there, and Luke, and both of them seem to be dressed for the service too. None of the boys have the best church clothes, but it’s a small town with farmers. Surely not everyone will be in their Sunday best every Sunday. Quinn is noticeably missing, but Bea is standing by the door with a smile on her face. Her lips look a little more red than they did before Trevor went upstairs. He narrows his eyes at her.
“You, and you,” Bea says, pointing at Jack and Trevor. “Come with me. Trevor, grab your car keys. You’re driving.”
“What about Luke and Cole?” Trevor asks, picking up his keys from their spot on the hook next to the door and trailing behind Bea. Jack trails behind Trevor, still grumbling and pretending like his shoulders hurt for dramatic effect. Trevor ought to show him some real pain next time.
The three people climb into the car, Trevor behind the wheel and Bea in the passenger seat. Jack, once again, finds himself relegated to the backseat. He straps himself in and Trevor catches his murderous glare in the rearview mirror.
“Quinn’s going to drive them,” Bea explains. “They’ll meet us at the church.”
“Whipped,” Jack coughs out. He does a terrible job of masking the word.
Trevor rolls his eyes, just like Bea. She opens her mouth to say something, sass him, but thinks better of it.
They drive on in silence, the occasional sigh or grunt from Jack as he shifts in his seat. Trevor glares at him again in the mirror and Jack hits him with a fake smile before looking out the window to watch the trees whip by.
Bea directs them to the main strip of shops, then tells them to take a left onto one of the sidestreets near The Reading Nook. They pull up to a big brick house, separated down the middle by a massive staircase. Bea climbs the stairs and turns to the left again, unlocking and pushing her front door open.
She leads the boys into her living room, which is decorated exactly how Trevor expected it to be. The couch is white with pink pillows and a white shag rug beneath it. Her furniture is odd, thrifted and worn in. None of it matches, although Trevor suspects that her theme was “Barbie girl aesthetic.” It’s messy, and comfortable, and Trevor almost envies how she lives. His apartment in Anaheim is sparse– when you’re on the road so much and as busy with your job as Trevor is, you really only need a place to eat and sleep. His decorations reflect that.
Trevor sprawls out on the couch, leaving Jack standing awkwardly next to the coffee table. Bea disappears down the hall and enters her bedroom, her closet door creaking open.
“Jack, come here, will you?” Bea asks.
Jack’s eyebrows furrow in confusion, but he starts down the hallway nonetheless.
Trevor snoops in his absence, Jack’s presence no longer a threat to his comfort. He drags himself off of the couch and stands, advancing towards the shelves of knickknacks on the wall near the television.
Bea has got a number of books on her shelves, overtaking two of the four rows. The other rows are sparse and far more interesting– there are picture frames spread along the rows, six frames that depict Bea’s life and what she loves.
Four of the pictures feature Honey. The other two are groups of people that Trevor assumes are Bea’s family, her extended family on each of her parents’ sides. He can ignore those easily, not caring about about Bea to scan each of her cousins’ faces. The pictures with Honey are a different story.
There’s a picture of the two when they were ten, or eleven, riding their bikes down an asphalt street lined with suburban houses. Bea’s bike is pink with streamers and flowers and a little basket. Honey’s is dark green and sporty, similar to Trevor’s own bicycle from childhood. Honey’s smile is wry, whereas Bea’s is glowing.
The second, from a birthday party. It’s Honey’s birthday and they’re four, from the looks of the lit candle on her cake. Honey’s smile is wide, much wider than the previous image. Her hair is messy and her tongue is stained green, probably from a lollipop or a Jolly Rancher. Her arms are wrapped around Bea’s neck and she’s pulled her friend close, their cheeks pressing together. Bea’s expression is a little different. Only one of her eyes is squeezed shut, the one closer to Honey. Her lips are pursed like a duck and her little fingers are raised in a peace sign.
Trevor chuckles. If his mom had been the one taking the picture, she would’ve said “What a ham” about the girls’ goofiness.
In the next picture, they’re older. They’re sixteen, probably. Bea’s wearing these short jean shorts and a bikini top and Honey wears a matching top under some long, gray sweatpants. She rolled the waistband up and her back is mostly to the camera, Bea lifted off the ground in a swooping hug. Bea’s legs are kicked up behind her like she’s experiencing a really good, Princess Diaries kind of kiss and her face is frozen in laughter. Honey’s is the same. Trevor’s heart clenches at the smile on her face and the way her hair blows out behind her.
Finally, there’s a selfie of the two of them in a handmade frame. It’s from a high angle and Trevor can’t tell if it’s a .5 picture or a regular one. Honey’s eyebrow is raised and she wears an exaggeratedly thoughtful expression, goofy enough to tug at Trevor’s smile. Bea’s mouth is open and she has a hand pinching Honey’s chin, while the other is raised to take the picture. Behind them is the Welcome to Litchton sign that Trevor passes each time he goes into town.
Trevor’s eyes glide down to the handmade frame, the written message along the top and bottom borders.
“New Beginnings!” and smaller, in the corner, a more personalized message. Trevor thinks that she wrote the message in a thin Sharpie– it’s too pristine still, after years. “There’s no one I would rather have join me in Litchton than you. Thank you for always being the Bea to my Honey! Honeybea 4ever <3”.
Trevor reaches out and takes the frame in his hand, inspecting it. He turns it over. More script, also in a Sharpie: “2019”, it reads. He replaces the item, making sure it’s back in the exact right spot.
“Bea, hurry up!” Trevor calls, returning to the couch.
“Don’t get your panties in a twist,” she replies, leading Jack out of her bedroom. She’s clasping a necklace as she walks, then holds out her wrist and a bracelet for Jack to clasp. “We can go now.”
They leave the apartment and climb back into the car, Jack beating Bea out for the passenger seat this time. He’s smug about it too, grinning to himself while he buckles up. Trevor opens the back door for Bea and helps her into the car with a guiding hand in hers. When Jack realizes that he fumbled the chance to look like a gentleman, his face returns to its scowl.
“If you’re not careful, your face will get stuck like that,” Trevor warns when he finally sits behind the wheel again. He shifts the car into drive and pulls out of the parking space.
Bea directs them to the church and Trevor pulls into the parking lot next to Quinn’s car, which is still running. They’ve got about five minutes before the service begins and Bea chastises the three boys for not going inside and reserving seats early.
“There’s only a few instances where the whole town goes out to do something,” Bea complains as they walk inside. “Church is one of them. We’re never going to find a spot for all six of us.”
“No Honey?” Trevor asks, taken aback. He expected her to join them, especially since the ‘whole town’ is here.
Bea casts Trevor a look and snickers into her palm. “You’re sweet, Trevor,” she says and Trevor rolls his eyes at her saccharine tone. “But Honey decided a long time ago that she had enough religion in her life growing up. She and God know where they stand.”
Trevor reaches the door to the church first and holds it open for the group, letting them file in. He’s grateful that they’re in the church now, because all of the other boys are either too respectful of the space and what it represents or too awkward in a silent building to make fun of Trevor for seeking out Honey. Or they don’t want to get on Bea’s bad side and act a fool in church and suffer her wrath.
They file into one of the back pews, Bea sandwiched between Quinn and Luke. Trevor sits on the other side, right at the aisle.
For an hour, he stays quiet and moves and speaks with the congregation. He counts the number of times that Cole tases Jack’s side, sticking his fingers between his ribs to cause him to flinch and make noise in the reverent area. He does this five times throughout the mass before Bea leans forward and threatens to cut his hands off herself.
For an hour, Trevor stares forward and lets his mind wander to Honey, and all the thoughts he has about her. She’s a mystery and she’s quiet like Quinn, but confident in a way that Quinn never achieved. She knows exactly who she is and won’t budge for anyone, won’t change herself or act in any special ways around certain people.
Trevor admires it– he’s spent his whole life performing for people, in a way. Hockey is his life and always has been, but sometimes it’s tiring to realize that all of his friends are people he met on ice. To think that he can be surrounded by his teammates and the fans in any arena and still feel lonely– it’s the kind of thing that leaves Trevor wondering if this career was a good idea.
In another world, he’s playing in a beer league in a town like this, with a girl like Honey on his arm.
The thought leaves him feeling heavy, weighed down. It ruminates in his mind, even after the service is over. It sours his mood completely and Trevor wishes he was back at the house so he could take a shower or something and stop the prickling feelings from taking over his skin.
In the parking lot, the group chats about nothing. Trevor doesn’t listen. Bea introduces the boys to come of the townsfolk and Trevor smiles and shakes the men’s hands, hugs the ladies or send a special look their way. Vera and Earl honk as they drive past the group, Vera blowing a kiss towards Trevor and Cole through the passenger window. Cole catches it and sticks it to his cheek, then sends one back. It makes Vera laugh.
Trevor tunes back into the conversation as the boys discuss plans for the upcoming week– Jack edges away from Trevor before he mentions that he invited Honey over that coming Friday and that Bea should come too.
“Well, you’ll rarely find a Honey without its Bea,” Bea teases. She claps. “Okay. I’ll see you guys then. Quinn, take me home?”
Quinn nods and puts his hand on the small of her back to direct her to the car. Bea pauses and waves Trevor over, shooing the other boys away. Quinn stays, his hand still on Bea’s body.
“There’s a fruit stand outside the grocery store on Mondays,” Bea says.
“I know, I’ve been,” Trevor interrupts.
Bea quiets him with a click of her tongue. She chooses her words carefully, her eyes hard. “Go tomorrow at, like, six,” she suggests, a faux-nonchalant shrug lifting her shoulders. “You might find something that you like there. I recommend buying the strawberries. They make a lovely gift, Trevor.”
Trevor frowns, confused. “I don’t like strawberries,” he replies.
Bea closes her eyes and processes his words for a moment, a tight smile on her lips. “They make a lovely gift, Trevor,” she repeats.
“Sick,” Trevor says, his voice hard. He doesn’t understand what she’s saying. “I’m not buying strawberries for you, Bea. I don’t know you enough to give you gifts.”
Bea stomps her foot. “Good fucking God, Trevor. Quinn, can you explain this shit to him?” She asks, then walks off to the car. She takes Quinn’s keys from his hand and gets behind the driver’s seat herself.
Quinn watches her walk away, then turns to Trevor. “She’s telling you that you’ll run into Honey, you fucking idiot, and that you should buy her strawberries.”
He leaves Trevor standing there, eyes wide.
Yeah, he’s definitely heading to the fruit stand tomorrow and buying strawberries.
He concocts his plan on the drive home, silent compared to the other three boys, that are laughing and flopping around the backseat with every turn in a game of Jell-O. They’re not wearing their seatbelts. When they get too loud, Trevor envisions ejecting them from the backseat, leaving them sailing down the mountain, falling through the air.
He holes himself up in his room to nap when they get home, too excited to see Honey to let the time pass organically. It’s like time travel, this way. Trevor will wake up and be two hours closer to seeing her, to getting another chance to win her over. This time, with a gift.
In the afternoon, he laces up his blades and skates with the boys. Quinn has come back by now, not spending much time at Bea’s apartment after church, according to Luke. They all skate and shoot for a couple of hours, playing a game of pickup with an extra player to sub in and out. When that ends, they run some drills. Luke and Quinn play defense, like always, with Trevor, Cole, and Jack recreating their legendary line from USNTDP. It works out perfectly, and each boy pushes himself like they’re playing a real game. It’s the brotherly competition that fuels them– and when the drills start to fall into disarray from hits and other penalties that would certainly be called out in a game, they head off to shower.
The night ends slowly, fizzling out compared to the way it ended the night before. The boys lounge in the game room, sprawling out on the couches and snacking and sipping their beer. Trevor isn’t made to perform another Zulu Run, no one picks up a pool cue, and they watch shitty TV movies on the Spanish channel instead of English. They make up the dialogue as they go and Trevor is the first to go to sleep. He makes it to midnight, but then he forces himself to go to bed.
He’s got a big day ahead of him… after 5 p.m., anyway.
–end–of–chapter–one–
#puck luck's fics#andy writes anything🍄#small town girl x tz#trevor zegras#trevor zegras smut#trevor zegras fanfiction#quinn hughes#jack hughes#luke hughes#cole caufield#hockey smut#hockey romance
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One Week Until Spectre Week!
We are just one week away from the start of Spectre Week ( May 25th-31st).
Info on the event can be found here
Day 1 (May 25) Spectre One: Caleb Dume/ Kanan Jarrus - intro post
Day 2 (May 26) Spectre Two: Hera Syndulla- intro post
Day 3 (May 27) Spectre Three: C1-10P/Chopper- intro post
Day 4 (May 28) Spectre Four: Garazeb Orrelios/Zeb- intro post
Day 5 (May 29) Spectre Five: Sabine Wren- intro post
Day 6 (May 30) Spectre Six: Ezra Bridger/Jabba the Hutt/the Emperor's nephew/Lando Calrissian/Commander Brom Titus/Dev Morgan- intro post
Day 7 (May 31) FREE DAY
We are very excited to see what everyone has come up with!
Also, don't forget the other Star Wars Events going on!
@swprequels-big-bang [Signups are closed] will pair authors and artists together to create awesome works based in high republic, the prequel trilogy, clone wars/bad batch, rebels, and or/rogue one, and jedi fallen order!
@jedijune has an event running through the month of June, with a couple different prompts every week to celebrate our force sensitive heroes!
@sabineweek (June 23-29) is all about honoring our girl spectre 5! With a different prompt each day, there's something for Sabine fans everywhere!
Please reblog to spread the news!
@swfandomevents
#star wars rebels#tales of the spectres#spectre week 2024#spectre week#star wars rebels fan art#star wars rebels fan fic#star wars rebels fan fiction#star wars rebels fanart
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The Morrotober blog's first Morro summer event is now here!
This year, the exchange will be open to all content creators and everyone will be randomly paired based on preferred topics.
The theme this year is "Fun in the Sun", so any activities that are done when there's lots of sun count!
If you're interested, then come sign up here! Sign-ups will close June 23, 2024.
How will the pairs work?
We will pair everyone up based on the information submitted in the sign-ups form. The first priority criteria will be the preferred topics submitted, so pairs may end up as artist/artist, writer/writer, or artist/writer.
Everyone will be split into two groups. The first group will go first and create something to be posted July 31. Then, the second group will use that to create a companion piece (can be a scene from a fic, a fic of that art piece, a response, a continuation, etc) to be posted August 31.
What is the timeline?
June 2-23: Sign ups.
June 24-27: Results sent.
June 24-30: Confirmations. Please confirm your spot or else we will assume you are no longer interested.
July 17: Checkpoint for the first group.
July 31: Posting for the first group.
Aug 17: Checkpoint for the second group.
Aug 31: Posting for the second group.
Where we will post?
You can post on any platform, as long as you share the link with us so we can share it with your exchange partner! We do encourage you to share it on our discord or tag us here on Tumblr!
Rules
All participants must be respectful of others and abide by any restrictions given with their assigned topic.
No hate allowed in any of the works, except as an exploration of those topics, and only if it does not violate the restrictions given on the assigned topic.
No adult content will be allowed, as the fandom has a wide range of ages and we wish to avoid asking for every participant's age during sign-ups. This means all content should be in the PG-13 range. However, you may choose to do an "adult version" of your work to accompany your main work but this must not be on the same post/fic without using something like the spoilers option on Tumblr and proper tags. We wish for everyone to receive and work with content they are comfortable with for the exchange event.
All content must be new and created for this event.
No AI content will be allowed and anyone caught doing so will be removed automatically.
Any written media must be in English.
There are no rules on word count or art size/specifications, but we do encourage everyone to give it their best! No one likes receiving something that someone refused to put effort into :(
Any other questions? Feel free to drop by our discord or submit an ask to this blog!
We hope to see you join us this year!
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OLD MAN DOCTOR YAOI SUMMER 2024
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
welcome to the offical old man doctor yaoi prompt list for the month of june! this list contains thirty ideas, which can either be drawn or written or some others art form of your choosing!
there are no restrictions for what day you’re doing, you can obviously do just one day or a week, or all of them! who cares! also how you interpret the prompt, however i would prefer nsfw to be labeled correctly as i want to read these and i am a minor, so leave a heads up!
tag any works of any media type you create under #old man doctor yaoi summer 2024 so we can all see it!!
prompts below the cut!
⭐️here’s our lineup:
day 1: outside the hospital (basically anything outside ppth, a concert, to a restaurant, a conference, a pride parade, the beach, get creative!)
day 2: wedding (self-explanatory, can be the ceremony, the reception, honeymoon etc, as long as it’s wedding-themed!)
day 3: coming out
day 4: ducklings (stuff with their children (house’s fellows))
day 5: domestic (little domestic tidbits, eg cooking, getting a pet, falling asleep, etc, just fluff)
day 6: top surgery recovery
day 7: summer
⭐️(AU WEEK)⭐️
day 8: modern day/2024 au
day 9: fandom fusion/crossover au
day 10: not doctors au (in a universe where they took a different career, perhaps in a diner or casino, camp counselors, field nurses, drug dealers, cops, flower shop/tattoo artist, cowboys, royalty, etc!)
day 11: fem hilson/genderbend au!!!
day 12: different decade au (so like ppth in the 70’s, or maybe 40’s, etc. get creative!)
day 13: soulmates au
day 14: supernatural au (as ghosts, angels/devils, vampires, mermaids, etc)
⭐️(PRE-INFARCTION WEEK)⭐️
day 15: wilson’s first divorce
day 16: first date
day 17: after bailing wilson out of jail (could include awkward diner conversation, road trips, etc)
day 18: young & dumb shenanigans
day 19: college roommates
day 20: doing things house couldn’t do post-infarction (eg skateboarding, yoga, walking long distances, golf, etc)
day 21: wilson in the place of stacy during infarction
⭐️(back to canon/whump week)⭐️
day 22: detox (could be either house or wilson whump!!)
day 23: trembling
day 24: after mayfield
day 25: euthanasia (also could be either house or wilson)
day 26: prodigal daughter (thirteen)
day 27: suicide attempt (if this is triggering to you, please have a free day or a break day!)
day 28: service animal
day 29: on vacation
day 30 (good job!!!): free day/break day
happy pride month and good luck!!
#old man doctor yaoi summer 2024#hilson#house md#hate crimes md#hatecrimes md#medical malpractice md#gregory house#james wilson#housemd#writing prompts#art prompts#writing challege#art challenge#asclexeposting#fanfiction#my prompts#mine#new pinned for this month
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our love in photos
part 1: paddock day , part 2: our leclerc win — next
charles_leclerc
liked by 4,282,393 others
charles_leclerc P1 babyyyyyy! Week here in Barcelona shows we should keep pushing, even on the last lap🏎️
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ynchaaa IS THAT YN SHE DIDNT WEAR A POLO WHAT
⤷ yncharles.16 WHAT. PARENTS?
⤷ charlottecharles1 thank god they broke up
⤷ charleeeeee but they just had their one year anniv?
⤷ gossipxxwag yall she was literally at the garage. what are u on😭
june 23, 2024
yn
liked by 3,272,484 others
yn barcelonaaaa gp! my favorite one for reasons the whole world knows;) baby got p1 and then i heard a broke up? huh. he’s stuck with me and chained to my bed so he can’t leave. if he’s with someone else that’s me in a wig 😘 stay jealous haters xx
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landonorris the bed part wasn’t necessary
⤷ yn i didnt mean it like that DIRTY MJND DUMBASSSSSS
⤷landonorris Oh. Nevermind
charles_leclerc I’d be crazy to not end up with you. ❤️
⤷ yn biting my lip and kicking my feet 😊
yourbsf CRAZY IN LOOVEEEEE
carlossainz55 The last photo is very questionable
june 23, 2024
charles_leclerc
liked by 5,383,594 others
tagged yn
charles_leclerc a summer well spent ☀️
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charchar1 did you win pingpong 🤭
⤷ charles_leclerc Of course!
⤷ yn i almost believed you babe
⤷ carlossainz55 expound please
june 27, 2024
yn
monte carlo, monaco
liked by charles_leclerc, fernandoalo_oficial, and 3,383,484 others
yn late summaaaa diaries 🫀🩰🎧📜
ps. why do u guys think sharl didnt post a pic of himself playing LOLLLL
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ynsmodel WHAT DOES SHE NOT DO.
charleslando mother feeding us the content we deserve 😌
charles_leclerc No one had to know, baby…
⤷ yn im competitive, i cant lose to my boyfriend in PINGPONG
⤷ charles_leclerc Well the photo was not needed!
⤷ yn youre cute
⤷ charles_leclerc Oh, well thank you. ❤️
⤷landonorris LOL HE FOLDED SO QUICKLY IM LAUGHIGN
⤷ yn shut up norris, only i can bully him
june 28, 2024
yn
liked by charles_leclerc, and 7,383,494 others
yn DNF today but still the proudest of charles 💌 i simply do not understand why the car suddenly lost engine right before the race but fine, god works in mysterious ways. next week we will come back stronger. we will, and should, always support charles, as well as carlos. forza ferrari ❤️
[COMMENTS HAVE BEEN DISABLED]
charles_leclerc instagram story:
“luckiest to have her😘”
yn
liked by charles_leclerc, and 5,595,695 others
yn hiiii lovelies! @yn.jpg up and runnin! enjoy ❤️🩹
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charlessgirl so glad we made the right girl famous (thanks charles)
⤷ yn 🥹😭
yn.jpg
liked by charles_leclerc, and 272,494 others
yn.jpg who else did u think id post first? (d1🫀)
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lando.jpg Um. Me?
⤷ yn.jpg next time babes
charles_leclerc ❤️❤️❤️
yn.jpg
liked by lando.jpg, and 217,282 others
yn.jpg day 2! landitooooo my photographer bff alongside danny ❤️
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yn.jpg
liked by 322,474 others
yn.jpg day 3: my 2nd fav driver 🏎️
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fernandoalo.oficial una fotógrafa muy buena y linda 💪tú y charles sois unos afortunados a very good and beautiful photographer 💪you and charles are a lucky
⤷ yn TE QUIEROOOO FONSO!! buena suerte hoy i love you fonso!! good luck today
[fernandoalo.oficial and charles_leclerc liked]
yn.jpg
liked by charles_leclerc, and 4,484,494 others
yn.jpg i lov my boyfirend it hurts so much he’s so perfeet and kind and everuthing ive ever wanted im so grateufl i msis him osuch
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charles_leclerc I love you amour but.. are you okay?
⤷ yourbsf yn got drunk on my watch sorry
charles_leclerc baby please answer the phone
⤷ yn.jpg fiflvoroyu
#f1 fanfic#f1 imagines#formula 1#charles leclerc#charles leclerc x you#charles leclerc fanfic#social media au#charles leclerc imagine#charles leclerc 16#charles leclerc x reader#charles leclerc one shot#charles leclerc imagines
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Louis Tomlinson has dropped a surprise album ‘Live’ – featuring songs that he recorded at 15 shows across 15 different cities.
Announced and shared yesterday (April 25), the album comes after the singer and former One Direction member embarked on two world tours over the past three years – playing just shy of 200 shows globally.
Now, a variety of performances from both tours – the ‘Louis Tomlinson World Tour’ and the ‘Faith in the Future World Tour’ – have been compiled into a new live album, which is available now.
Fifteen songs are included in the tracklist, and each was recorded in a different city, at a different show from across the three-year run. The album comes in both digital and physical formats, and features his singles including ‘Bigger Than Me’, ‘We Made It, ‘Walls’ and ‘Out Of My System’, alongside fan favourite album tracks, all released live for the very first time.
“I’ve been lucky enough to spend the last 3 years touring the world twice over. The feeling I get sharing those live moments will be with me forever,” Tomlinson said in a statement. “To be able to record these songs from all over the world and put them out as an album like this feels so special, and a real tribute to the fans who make each and every show feel unique and incredible. Thank you! Enjoy!”
There are four exclusive tracks split between the physical editions of ‘Live’, including a special version of the One Direction classic ‘Where Do Broken Hearts Go’ – which is available only on the double CD.
Accompanying video clips of compiled tour footage will be shared on Louis’s social channels to support the release, showcasing a glimpse into his past three years on the road and 170 performances.
The ‘Live’ tracklist is:
‘The Greatest’ (Live From London, 17 November 2023)
‘Face The Music’ (Live From Nashville, 18 July 2023)
‘Bigger Than Me’ (Live From Vancouver, 26 June 2023)
‘Holding On To Heartache’ (Live From Barcelona, 6 October 2023)
‘We Made It’ (Live From Manila, 16 July 2022)
‘Chicago’ (Live From Chicago, 15 June 2023)
‘Fearless’ (Live From Rio, 27 May 2022)
‘Common People’ (Live From Sheffield, 10 November 2023)
‘All This Time / She Is Beauty We Are World Class’ (Live From Munich, 22 October 2023)
‘Walls’ (Live From Buenos Aires, 21 May 2022)
‘Written All Over Your Face’ (Live From Budapest, 15 September 2023)
‘Out Of My System’ (Live From Brisbane, 30 January 2024)
‘Saturdays’ (Live From Paris, 14 October 2023)
‘Silver Tongues’ (Live From Krakow, 10 September 2023)
At time of writing, Tomlinson has shared two huge solo albums since departing from One Direction. His debut album arrived in the firm of 2020’s ‘Walls’, which has sold over 1.5 million copies, and the follow-up was called ‘Faith In The Future’. The latter went to Number One in the UK, Spain and Belgium, and Top 5 in the USA, Australia, New Zealand and across Europe.
Since May last year, Tomlinson has been on his ‘Faith In The Future World Tour’, which hits South America next month for its final leg. From there, the vocalist has a number of festival appearances lined up for the summer. Find remaining tickets to his shows here.
In other Louis Tomlinson news, earlier this week the singer, alongside Courteeners and English Teacher, were among the acts to be honoured at the first-ever Northern Music Awards.
The inaugural ceremony was hosted by the UK’s largest music therapy charity, Nordoff And Robbins and took place at the Albert Hall in Manchester; celebrating northern artists, festivals, venues and industry figures. The event saw Tomlinson named as Artist Of The Year.
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q!Foolish lore - GRANDMA'S ROOM
The first message - Found by Cellbit on June 15th
Foolish left only a book in the chest
the binary code translates to "ABUELA", which means grandma in spanish, and the coordinates lead to Bad's base (Foolish wanted Cellbit to think that Bad had something to do with the Federation)
this was made on stream and was actually just a prank to see when would Cellbit find the room
The second message - Found by Cellbit on July 17th
Foolish wanted to prank Cellbit so he played the disc "11" while he was hiding in the castle, this led to Cellbit going in the secret room trying to find where the noise is coming from, but found the keycard instead.
Foolish got this card when him and the others first penetrated the Cucurucho hallways and the area became unprotected (this keycard was found in a box next to the first door in the hallway, so Foolish just took it)
Later that day Foolish told Cellbit that he was the one pranking with the sounds and the keycard is actually useless
The third message - Found by Cellbit on July 17th
Foolish left Richarlyson's head in the chest shortly after the previous message. Cellbit found this because Foolish told him that day that he might find something else in the chest too
The fourth message - Was never found by Cellbit
Foolish wrote this on the day of Mr. Mustard's disappearance
We never saw Cellbit finding this on stream, and we don't know if he ever found it off stream either, but Foolish translated it to spanish and included it in the fifth message (not the exact message but something really similar)
The fifth message - Found by Cellbit on August 5th
This message was actually found by Roier first, on August 4th, but he left it in the chest because he knew it was for Cellbit, not him.
This is the first message that was done off stream. Foolish left a book and a gun in the chest.
The translation of the book:
I hope this finds the right person... Hide it for now, be careful who you tell about this. 7 space 27. Nobody suspects a thing. 🖕. This is a huge middle finger... stupid. No significant meaning, just for fun :D. 3000 sky 0. Someone could find this first
The binary translation is "7 space 27" or 7/27, which is also the date Foolish arrested Pac and Mike
at the coordinates Cellbit found a staircase leading to the sky, at the top was a sign which read "we are humans, not fish."
i made a whole blog about what this quote means, you can read it here. Cellbit didn't know the quote had a deeper meaning so he just left the place without thinking about it further.
The sixth message - Found by Cellbit on September 1th
Second message done off stream. We saw this book on Foolish's stream on August 10th, when he checked if it was still in the chest or not, and it was. He didn't open the book tho, and no items were next to it.
On August 24th during Foolish's stream, we could see that the book is still in the chest
On September first Foolish, Cellbit, Mouse, Jaiden and Richas went into grandma's room and Cellbit opened the book finally, but it was the same as the fifth message. We don't know if Cellbit put the same book back in it's place or Foolish made an exact copy and put it in the chest again.
Cellbit told the girls that the puzzle in that book led to some stupid sign and Foolish told Cellbit that it's actually a quote but didn't say where or whom it's from. He also said that the puzzle "Actually has some real meaning, but some are very vague, that it's almost stupid to figure out". Cellbit asked him "So I didn't finish the puzzle?" and Foolish's answer was "Not exactly"
#qsmp#qsmp foolish#foolish gamers#qsmp cellbit#cellbit#castleduo#‼I will update the blog with every new message
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What is the marauders sports fest?
A fest to celebrate sports aus and the upcoming Olympic Games! They can come in all shapes and sizes, and we are excited to see the amazing works created for this. All sports aus, whether in canon or not, are welcome!
When is it?
Sign-ups: April 27 - August 3 [sign-up form]
Prompting: May 4 - June 1 [prompt gallery]
Claiming: June 8 - August 10
Fics Due: August 17
Posting Starts: August 24
The sign-up, prompting, and claiming forms will all close at midnight EST. The fics are due by midnight in your own time zone. Obviously, we will not be tracking everyone's time zones, we just ask that they are posted and ready for us by August 18 so we can start planning the posting period! If you need an extension, just message us and we will figure it out.
Where is it?
Here and on ao3! All information and updates will be given on here, and all of the works will be posted on ao3 to the collection.
Communication and updates for the fest will happen on this blog.
Once the fics are revealed, please tag this blog in any posts you make about your fic and we will make sure to reblog it after the reveals!
*Please note the recent change in rules involving anonymity. This fest will not be anonymous, so please feel free to post about the progress of your work as much as you want.
Questions?
Please be sure to read through our entire rules page. If that does not answer your question, please feel free to send us an ask, dm, or email us ([email protected])!
♡, cass & shan
#marauders sports fest 2024#msf24#hp fests#hp events#marauders#marauders fest#marauders event#wolfstar#jegulus#jily#rosekiller#marylily#pandalily#prongsfoot#wolfstarbucks#moonchaser
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Broken Hearts Football Club | Chapter 27
Previous chapter | Next chapter
Masterlist
"June, where do you think you are going?"
"To my date with Ben."
"Looking like that?" Kiera said. "No way."
"What is wrong with my clothes?" June asked.
"You can't go out on a date wearing jeans and an England hoodie."
"Why not? It's Ben, he's seen it all already, good and bad."
"But you are going to a restaurant. You can't show up looking like that."
"Well, this is all I have" June shrugged.
"Come with me" Kiera said, taking her hand.
"Where?"
"To Ella's room. She brought some fancy clothes."
"Why?" June laughed.
"It's Ella. Do you seriously have to ask?"
━━━━━━❃━━━━━━
"Don't laugh, Chilwell" June said as she walked towards him. "If you dare laughing, I'm killing you."
"I won't, I promise. But you are wearing something under that coat, aren't you?"
"Of course I am, you idiot" she replied, rolling her eyes.
"It must be tiny, tho."
"It's one of Ella's dresses, that's why it is so short on me. I didn't bring anything fancy and the girls forbade me from leaving the hotel wearing jeans and one of our hoodies."
"But they allowed you to leave wearing one of the huge coats?" Ben laughed. "And how come you didn't bring anything less casual?"
"Because I came here to play football, Chilwell. Not to go partying or having you asking me to be your girlfriend and wanting to go out to celebrate."
"Sorry" he chuckled. "Are they still being annoying about it?"
"All the damn time" June sighed.
She had had to tell them. The moment they landed in Australia, they could tell something was going on, that the stupid smile on her face wasn't because she was happy the flight was finally over.
"Poor Maxwell" Ben pouted, making fun of her. "But I'm glad they force you to wear something nice, because we are going to a fancy restaurant."
"Fancy? How fancy?"
"I'm wearing a blazer and my best shirt."
"Oh my God. I'm going back to the hotel" June said, turning around.
"Oh, c'mon Maxwell. That dress can't be that bad."
"It is worse! Don't tell Ella, but I look like a… you know."
"Show me and I'll tell you if that's the case."
"No" she said, crossing her arms over her chest.
"June…" Ben said, giving her the puppy eyes he knew she couldn't say no to.
"Ok, fine. But if you laugh…"
"You'll kill me, I know" he said. "Bloody hell, Maxwell."
"Is that a good bloody hell or a bad one?" June asked.
"Both."
"Both?"
"Good because you look smoking hot, but bad because we'll probably have everyone looking at us at the restaurant, and we want to go as unnoticed as we can."
"Great. Just great" she sighed. "Why did you have to ask me to be your girlfriend when my suitcase is just tracksuits and trainers?"
"Love works in mysterious ways" he smiled. "But c'mon, we are gonna be late."
"Ben, I'm not going to a fancy restaurant looking like I should be at a club at 3 a.m."
"Then we'll go somewhere else. But let's get into the car, I can tell you are freezing your ass off. And quite literally" he smirked, opening the door for her.
"Fuck you" June replied, showing him her middle finger.
"Now what" Ben said once they both were inside the car.
"This stupid dress has gone all the way up to my waist" she complained, moving on her seat and trying to put the dress down.
"Yeah, we can't go into a fancy restaurant with you looking like that. You are probably wearing your ugliest knickers too, the grandma brown ones."
"I'm so tempted to break up with you right here and right now, Chilwell."
"But you won't because you love me" he smiled.
"A bit less every time you open your mouth."
"Then make me shut up" he replied, his smile turning into a smirk. But June's mind was stuck on what she had just admitted. She hadn't said the three words, but she had told Ben that she loved him.
"June… June, hey. Are you ok?" he said, caressing her cheek and bringing her back to reality.
"Yes, yes, sorry. Just hungry. Where are you taking me, then?"
"We'll see what Google recommends" he replied, giving her one last look before checking his phone.
━━━━━━❃━━━━━━
"You weren't lying when you said you were hungry" Ben chuckled.
"Nope" June replied, giving her burguer a big bite.
"Just try not to get my blazer stained. I need it for work."
"I'm not a kid, Chilwell."
"Then why did you ask for not one, but two Happy Meals?" he laughed, June answering with her middle finger once again while still eating.
They had ended up at McDonald's. They had checked for other restaurants in the city that weren't as fancy as the one Ben had chosen, but after not finding a table, they had opted for something easy and where people would not judge her for wearing the shortest dress ever.
She was now wearing Ben's blazer to try and cover herself a bit, especially when sitting down. But like had happened with her coat, it kept looking as if she wasn't wearing anything else.
"Can you imagine that someone recognizes us, takes photos and sends them to the press? I wonder what they will say."
"They'll probably call you lame. Who takes a girl to McDonald's for a date?" she chuckled. "And if they knew you are doing it to celebrate that we are officially dating…"
"You chose coming here."
"But they don't know that" she smiled.
"I can see them say that I'm trying to corrupt you by making you eat junk food on your free day so you suck on your next game. Because we are enemies and all that."
"Ex enemies according to the last thing they wrote about us."
"Enemies to lovers" Ben smirked.
"My favourite trope" June replied with a matching smile. "What they don't know tho, is that this Happy Meal will be burned in the next few hours."
"Are you planning on going for a run?" Ben asked.
"I was thinking about riding" June replied before taking a sip of her drink, her eyes fixed on him. He was blushing.
"On that dress?"
"Maybe… I don't know… It may show my ass, but it makes my boobs look so good. What do you think?" she said, touching them and lifting them a bit more, Ben moving uncomfortably on his seat.
"Yeah, I think… I think…" he mumbled. "I think you are gonna have to finish your other burger in the car" he finally said, getting up.
"What? Why?"
"Do you want to go riding in there?"
"There? What… oh" June said, following Ben's eyes. He was looking at the bathroom's door.
"Yes, oh" he smirked.
"As exciting as it sounds, God knows what that bathroom has seen. And who has been there."
"My hotel room, then?"
"Your hotel room" she said, putting what was left of her food inside the Happy Meal box.
"You look ridiculous right now, Maxwell" Ben laughed when he saw her standing up wearing his blazer and the tiny dress, her bag on one hand and the red box on the other.
"Yet you still want to fuck me" she whispered with a mischievous smile.
"Badly" he replied.
"Then let's go."
"After you, Miss Maxwell."
"Thank… Chilwell!" she yelped when he squeezed her butt as she turned around.
"Sorry. Couldn't help myself" he said, trying to give her an innocent smile.
"I'm tying up your hands."
"Ok" he shrugged. "Sounds fun."
"We'll see if you say the same after I'm done with you."
"Looking forward to it" Ben smiled, hugging June from behind as she started walking away, leaving kisses all over her neck and making her giggle like an idiot.
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