#(except for some maybe like the director or the editor but the series is not over so...)

[garbagevanfleet]

Pink Lemonade (series)

PART NINE

Pairing: Sam x female!reader

Word Count: 18k words (my longest chapter of anything, ever)

Summary: Being a counselor at your childhood summer camp had been your dream since you were little and you had a specific vision of how it would go when it finally happened. You had not, however, planned to make an immediate enemy.

WARNINGS (this chapter): EXPLICIT SEXUAL CONTENT - 18+ ONLY, tobacco use, feelings, suspense, talk of drugs.

Editor in Chief (and creator of the moodboard on each chapter): @gardenvanfleet

MASTERPOST

Special Playlist here

You were living in a state of bliss - puppy love, sun-kissed bliss. If your infatuation for Sam weren’t all-consuming, you’d probably feel some form of regret for rejecting this kind of thing all throughout your teenage years - all the missed opportunities. But, as it were, he was all you could think about. You found yourself staring longingly at him across the table at breakfast the next morning, as if your pillow didn’t still smell like him from the night before.

With a little work, you were able to convince him to hang out with you at the lake that day, which served as the perfect excuse to show off a swimsuit you’d packed for camp that was just barely on the wrong side of modest. The Rayban’s he’d worn hid his eyes pretty well, but it pleased you to imagine they were glued to you as you laid out next to him in the sun.

The end of your break was quickly approaching; soon, the grounds would be swarming with kids and counselors again, so you took every opportunity you could to be physically close to him. When the break had started, the five days felt like they’d stretch on endlessly, but you knew everything had an end, so you tried not to mourn its passing before it was even over. 

For once, the need to clean the sunscreen and sweat off your skin had outweighed the desire to be intimately close to him, so when you were done at the beach, you and Sam agreed to part ways to shower in your separate cabins with the agreement that you’d meet up again before dinner. You were toweling off when you heard your phone buzz on the lip of the sink, the vibrations sending it sliding into the basin. 

You’d been expecting a text from Sam - maybe a check-in from Josh - so you were a little puzzled to see it was from the director, asking you to report to his office for a meeting at your earliest convenience. You immediately threw your hair up and assured him you’d be there in just a few moments. 

When you knocked on the director’s door, it only took a few seconds for him to call you in. You had those butterflies you’d get any time you were summoned by authority, but nothing about his body language seemed to be out of the ordinary yet. You sat in the leather chair in front of his desk and offered him a smile when he greeted you. 

“How is this summer going for you?” he asked, though you couldn’t tell if it was just small talk, so you kept your response brief. 

“Very well, I think. I’m really enjoying it the more I get comfortable with the role.”

He nodded curtly. “You’re doing an excellent job.” 

You were aware that he wasn’t the type of man to dole out undue compliments, so you let yourself feel pride in his praise as you thanked him. 

“I called you in today because there’s a matter I’d like to discuss with you. Has Sam made you aware of his situation?”

Your stomach sank, leaving you with a sharp panic. You tried to shove the feeling down. Though you were terrified he was going to address the very obvious relationship you’d gotten swept up in, he could just as well be checking up on Sam’s performance. 

“No, sir,” you declined, shaking your head to sell what technically wasn’t a lie.

He hummed. “I had suspected as much. Normally it would be strictly against my policies - personal and otherwise - to share personal information about a counselor, but I think you’ll agree that this is an exception.” He leaned forward in his chair, resting his folded hands on his desktop in a way that told you he wished he didn’t have to have this conversation. “Sam is here as a condition of legal sentencing. Obviously, I won’t disclose any more information about the crime itself, but he’s a counselor with us this summer because he’s serving a sentence.”

It wasn’t tough to keep a straight face since he hadn’t given you anything you didn’t already know, but you braced yourself as you nodded for him to continue.

“I speak regularly with his parole officer - a check-in to ensure everything is going as planned, and from what I’ve seen thus far, he’s been a perfectly adequate counselor. Having had a closer eye on him, would you agree?” 

“Absolutely,” you agreed instantly. You knew Clarence Graywater well enough to know he valued professionalism above anything else, so you tried to approach the subject with a sterile tone instead of gushing the way you’d become accustomed to. “Sam is actually a great counselor. Every cycle of kids has loved him and he’s been a great partner to have - very easy to work with.”

The dark humor behind the situation wasn’t lost on you; if he’d asked you the same question a few weeks ago, who knows how you would have responded. 

“Very well,” he allowed. You might have been able to convince yourself that this was nothing more than a routine evaluation of Sam’s work if it weren’t for the way the director’s mouth tightened at the corners. 

He fixed his eyes on the desk for a beat as he seemed to consider his next words. “Since we can’t very well monitor his behavior for the court if he isn’t here, another condition of Sam’s parole is that he be strictly forbidden from leaving the camp grounds.” After a brief pause for you to process what he was saying, he continued. “That being said, did you and Sam leave the grounds yesterday?” 

You tried as hard as you could to keep the disappointment from your face, but you knew he could see it. Your stomach was in knots as you swallowed back the nervous lump at the back of your throat and nodded. “We did.” You had to force yourself to cautiously ask, “What’s going to happen?”

The director wasn’t one to let his emotions get the better of him, but for the first time since you’d known him, the frown he was wearing showed genuine sympathy for your situation. “I’m sure you understand how serious this is. I don’t see any other choice but to report this back to the proper authorities. Please get yourself prepared to proceed without a partner for the last two cycles - we’ll split his future campers up amongst other counselors.” 

You liked to think you could handle a lot. You’d always been able to stay cool under pressure, but you could feel your bottom lip starting to quiver pathetically. Unable to fully control your volume, you blurted, “No, wait. Please - this isn’t Sam’s fault.” 

“Then who would you place the blame on?” he asked, though hadn’t seemed to make a firm decision, leaving you to hope that you could reason with him. 

“Me. I was the one that asked him to go to town with me. We went there to get supplies for the campers - little stuff like snacks and prizes for the games we play with the kids. I asked him to go because I thought he’d know what to pick out for his boys better than I would.” Again, not technically a lie. 

“Sam was well aware of the conditions of his sentencing,” the director replied, shocking you by still keeping a sympathetic approach. 

“But I was the one-” You cut yourself off in frustration before trying again. “You have to agree that there’s a power imbalance between us - even though we’re both new counselors here this summer, I’m the one that’s familiar with how everything works. I’m positive he felt as though he couldn’t say no. He may not have even really considered it ‘leaving the grounds’, since we were going to get supplies for the campers here. It’s a moral gray area at best.”

He was visibly struggling with the decision as he stared at nothing in particular. “What would you have me do then?”

You let your eyes slip shut as you tried to banish the emotions that were swallowing you up. “Please. Please, consider not reporting this. He’s more than halfway through this summer. I don’t want to have to do this alone, and I don’t want to have to get familiar with a new partner.” 

He remained stony-faced with his eyes fixed on you. “You’re proposing I let Sam break the terms of a legal sentence?”

“Please. This is my fault and I’ll take full responsibility for it,” you stated. “I never break rules, but I can’t see the harm in letting this one slide. You’re the director of this camp; if you feel like you must report this to his officer, you could explain that you assigned us to get supplies and he was monitored the whole time by a trusted member of your staff - because he was. I was with him every second that we were away from here.” 

A few long seconds passed by, marked by the rhythmic ticking of the antique standing clock against the far wall of his office. You held your breath until your lungs started to ache for air as you awaited his final judgment, and finally, he cleared his throat to speak. 

“I’m not going to report this, but believe me when I say I don’t enjoy being put in this position. If anything like this happens again, I won’t hesitate to take action.”

This time you didn’t even try to disguise the relief you felt as you heaved out a breath. “Thank you so much.” 

“Find something for the two of you to do as adequate punishment,” he instructed, leaning back in his chair as the heavy cloud hanging over the room dissipated. He waved you out with a little smile, letting you know he still had a soft spot for you as a counselor. Still, you didn’t waste any time getting out of his line of sight, lest he change his mind. 

It wasn’t until you got out of the building and onto the dirt path that you started to feel it - this crippling anger weighing you down. It was different than the frustrated jealousy you’d felt not that long ago at breakfast. This felt more like true betrayal. 

You let yourself soak in it on the walk back to your cabin. Sam was conveniently standing just outside his door, so clearly unsuspecting as he stamped out his cigarette with a pleased smile. “There you are. I was wondering where you could have snuck off to.” 

You reached past him and opened his cabin door, planted a hand on his chest, and guided him inside, all without saying a word; you knew there weren’t a lot of people around, but you didn’t want to risk the off chance that someone would hear you lay into him.

“Sam, I just got back from the director’s office,” you stated firmly.

Instantly, you could see it click into place for him as a worried frown formed over his features. Still, he had the audacity to ask, “What- Why?” 

“You know why,” you snapped, not bothering to dampen the acid in your tone.

He bit into his bottom lip and muttered a curse in dread for what you were about to say to him.

“Why would you do something like that?!”

He flinched just slightly at your volume, but you could see his posture hardening in defense. “Why the fuck would he have called you in and not me?”

Ignoring his question, you demanded, “Why would you put me in a position like that? Why wouldn’t you have just said no when I asked if you wanted to go into town?” 

“I don’t know, you just looked so hopeful-”

You shook your head. “No, don’t you dare put this on me. You could have just told me you weren’t allowed to leave the fucking grounds - that you were breaking the fucking law!” 

“It’s embarrassing,” he reasoned with a deep-set frown. “I honestly figured that since everyone was gone and we were on break, no one would notice if I was gone for a couple of hours.”

“That’s stupid, and you know it.”

He didn’t bother denying it. Instead he just quietly asked, “So, I’m leaving then? They’re sending me back?” 

A bitter laugh escaped you. “No, Sam, you’re not. You’re not, because I talked him out of reporting it - because I took responsibility for it.” 

You’d been expecting him to look relieved, but instead, he adopted a frustrated expression. With a tight-set jaw and a quiet kind of outrage, he asked, “What?”

“I took responsibility for your stupid choice,” you snarled unforgivingly. “I’ve worked hard to earn the director’s trust and I’m so humiliated, Sam.” 

Behind his eyes, you could see him sorting through his emotions, trying to figure out how he should feel. You were hopeful for a second that he’d come to his senses - that he’d apologize and thank you profusely and recognize your sacrifice for what it was, but your stomach sunk as his eyebrows threaded together in a deep frown. He snapped, cold and petulant, “No one asked you to do that. I don’t need you to speak for me, nor do I want it.”

The response felt like a kick in the teeth, forcing you to take a second to gather your thoughts back up. When you could speak, you found that it came out as a jagged cry. “If it weren’t for me, you’d be going to fucking jail, Sam! The very least you could do is thank me and apologize, but honestly, I’d expect something closer to groveling.” 

There was a fire burning in him, making his normally soft, brown eyes look sharp and spiteful. “I’m not a fucking child. I didn’t ask you to take the fall for me - you did that all on your own. I made my choice and you made yours.” 

You just stared at him, slowly shaking your head in disbelief. The few seconds of silence in the room was crushingly heavy as all the fight drained from you, leaving you feeling empty. You couldn’t see the point in wasting any more emotional energy on him, so your voice was calm and small as you told him, “You’re the most selfish person I’ve ever met in my life. I guess this is for the best.”

The sudden lack of hostility seemed to sober him. Once the outrage cleared and he got a look of just how disappointed you were, he softened, ripping his eyes away and casting them elsewhere. In your infinite naivety, you gave him a couple of seconds to apologize - to make it even a little bit better - but, he faltered. 

You decided you didn’t want to wait for him to slap together some pitiful explanation. He called your name as you turned around and left him there, but you answered only by shutting the door hard behind you. You hoped that the lack of closure would haunt him. Just a few hours ago, he’d had access to nearly every single part of you, but the one thing you weren’t willing to give him was the satisfaction of seeing you cry. 

❀❀❀

The next few hours felt like months - they crawled by with a frustrating reluctance as you sat with your back against the headboard of your bed and your face buried in your bent knees. 

Just like that, you’d run the entire gamut of a romantic relationship - start to finish. This was just the bookend. The after.  

You knew there were people in the world that experienced real tragedy, but this hurt. In that moment, the only thing you could feel was the ache - the loss and betrayal, leaving you without any perspective on just how mundane an issue it actually was.  

You were able to find a little comfort in reminding yourself that Josh would be back sometime the following day, and whether it was true or not, you assured yourself that he’d know how to help. 

He showed up early the next day, some time shortly after breakfast (which Sam was predictably absent for). When he knocked on your cabin door, you’d had a fleeting moment of hopeful panic that it would be Sam. 

Josh was wearing a little smile when you opened the door, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his coral-colored shorts as he absently rocked on his white sneakers. He greeted you with a side hug, and you hadn’t been intending to, but you pulled him in fully, a little too tight to just be casually happy to see someone. 

The truth was that it was such a relief to not be alone with your thoughts, and the comforting presence of your best friend was exactly what you’d needed.

There was the slightest hesitation, like he was trying to figure out if he was missing something, before he gave a confused laugh and hugged you back. “It’s nice to see you too,” he joked, but he tensed entirely when you pulled away and he got a good look at you. 

Josh’s brown eyes scanned over your defeated posture, his expression slipping into one of concern when he recognized the state you were in. “Are you alright?” he asked, following you back to your room. 

With how tight your throat felt, you knew you couldn’t trust your voice to not make a fool of you, so you settled for shrugging at him. It obviously wasn’t a satisfying answer, so he repeated the question, a little more pointedly as he sat next to you on your bed. 

After deciding there was no point in lying to him by playing it off, you pursed your lips and shook your head. 

There was a genuine sympathy behind the way he cautiously placed a hand in the center of your back, between your shoulder blades, reminding you that this was your friend - that he was just about the safest person on earth to confide in. 

“You wanna tell me what’s wrong?” he prompted, using a tone of voice that gave you an out in case you wanted to say no. 

It took a few good seconds for you to gather enough courage to speak after you parted your lips. You couldn’t quite meet his eyes, so you fixed them on a knot in the hardwood floor boards as you admitted to him, “Everything fell apart.” 

“With Sam?” 

You nodded. “Yeah.” 

Josh hadn’t known you for that long, and going through heartbreak together was uncharted territory; there was a bit of uncertainty in guessing how you liked to be comforted. It was clear that he wasn’t sure in his decision to hold out his hand for you, but you took it without hesitation, using it to pull yourself closer to him until your side was pressed to his. 

You felt him let out a little breath in preparation before requesting, “Tell me what happened.”  

“He’s just so fucking-” You started off with a harsh, bitter tone, but cut yourself off instantly - despite how he’d hurt you, Sam was still Josh’s brother and it didn’t feel right. When you spoke again, it was more restrained and collected. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know he wasn’t supposed to leave and so we went into town on a date- I asked him if he wanted to and he didn’t tell me he couldn’t, Josh.” 

He stiffened next to you, wearing a frightened look when you met his eyes. “Fuck. Is he okay- Is he still here?” 

You closed your eyes and nodded. For some reason, the thing that suddenly choked you up was that you’d never heard Josh swear like that until it came to concern for his brother. 

Since the fight with Sam, you’d been counting down the seconds until you could talk to Josh about it, but now that the moment was upon you, all you could muster was a weak, flat tone of explanation.

“Yes, he’s still here. Graywater called me into his office yesterday to question me about it. He was going to report it, but I convinced him not to.”

Josh’s features sloped into a puzzled frown as he cautiously asked, “Sam’s not in trouble at all?” 

You breathed a humorless laugh and shook your head. “No.” 

You tried not to feel upset at the relieved exhale Josh gave upon hearing that confirmation. “You took the blame for him?” 

“Yep.” 

There was a silent pause before he chanced, “And how did he take it?” 

“Not well, Josh,” you stated sourly. 

Josh let his eyes slip shut as he let out a long, frustrated sigh. He pinched the bridge of his nose and, in an exasperated whisper, he breathed to no one in particular, “Oh, no...Sam.”

“He was genuinely angry.” You waited a beat before admitting, “Granted, I was fucking mad at him for not telling me and putting me in that position in the first place, but I’m fucking stupid for expecting him to apologize.” 

He shook his head at you, half-pleading, “Don’t do that to yourself. This isn’t your fault.” 

You swallowed back a sob; you’d been carrying around so much guilt, that hearing him absolve you of it was like the snap of a rubber band. When he heard it, he wrapped an arm around your shoulders. 

“It’s okay.” A deep frown was audible behind the assurance as he offered it to you.

You shook your head as best you could with your cheek against his shoulder. “It’s not.” 

“Listen, I know this hurts - I can only imagine, but take a deep breath,” he requested, waiting until you did so to continue. “You’ve got a choice to make now. You can pack it up and walk away from whatever it is you two have - no one on earth could blame you for that. The summer will come to an end, you’ll go home, and you probably won’t ever see him again. This’ll all just morph into a fond memory some day.”

You should find that idea comforting, but instead, after a couple of silent seconds, you prompted, “Or?”

“Or, you could forgive him.”

You huffed exasperatedly. “It’s kinda hard to forgive someone that doesn’t understand how he’s fucked up.”

Josh shook his head and warned, “No, no. Don’t mistake his stubbornness for stupidity - he’s not stupid. I promise you that Sam knows exactly what he’s done. I’m willing to bet he’s sitting in his cabin beating the shit out of himself right now.” 

“I don’t care,” you informed him flatly, prompting him to hum in amusement. 

“I don’t either,” he agreed, making you crack a smile that he couldn’t see thanks to the position you were sitting in, leaning against him. “But, my point is - he does care. Despite his very poor choices, he cares about you a lot, which lands you on the very short list of people that can claim the same.”

“I don’t know,” you sighed, feeling the ache of grief at the thought. “Sometimes I think he only cares about himself.” 

“I didn’t ask him to stay with you that night of the party,” he admitted after a silent moment of consideration, wearing a little smile. “I am guilty of some meddling between you two, but not that.”

You frowned, pulling your cheek off his shoulder so you could look at him. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, I asked him to walk you back to your cabin that night because I was trying to see how much he’d do for you. I knew he was soft for you, but I wanted to know just how bad it was.” 

“Did he tell you he liked me?” you tried, grasping for something to help you understand.

Josh snickered at you. “C’mon - he didn’t have to. I’ve seen the way he treats people he actually dislikes. If you genuinely don’t like someone, you go out of your way to not be around them. If you don’t like them, you don’t pick on them. All you two ever did was just rough flirting, as far as I could tell.” 

Your eyes narrowed accusingly as you felt your face flush pink. “There were times when he was genuinely kinda mean to me.” 

He rolled his eyes fondly, but you weren’t sure if it was meant for you or Sam. “That’s because he’s lousy at letting people in. I think he panicked when he realized how close he was to getting what he wanted.” He paused for a second and then pointedly added, “Which is obviously you.” 

You stared at him as you tried to process what he was saying, but when you realized you didn’t have the energy or time necessary to do so, you asked, “So...the party?” 

“Ah, right. So, when I asked him to walk you back to your cabin, I was hoping maybe it would help him realize that he had feelings for you, but I never expected him to stay with you,” Josh explained and then snorted a laugh. “You should have seen his face - the moment when he realized you’d told me he lied and said I made him stay. I swear to god he was ready to physically fight me if I brought it up to him, but I never did.” 

“Are you gonna talk to him now?” you asked carefully, dreading the answer. The last thing you wanted was to create tension between the two of them, and you knew Sam would take that confrontation even more poorly than he had with you.

“No,” he assured. “I’m going to try as hard as I can to stay out of it unless he directly asks me for advice, but he won’t.” 

You hummed, considering. “What if I never want to see him again? Can you and I still be friends?” 

He frowned and then took your hand to give it a little squeeze. “Of course. We were friends before him.” 

Offering him a smile was really all you could think to do. The truth was that you didn’t know how you wanted to proceed with Sam, but it made you feel full and warm to know that you’d always have a friend like Josh. 

He did an excellent job of keeping you distracted for the rest of the day. You decided that, for your punishment, you’d work on cleaning up the beach; it wasn’t like people actively littered, but things would fall off boats or blow out of trash cans, make their way into the water, and inevitably end up strewn about the sand. Josh walked with you, picking up an odd piece of garbage here and there and tucking it into the bag you were carrying when you held it open for him. 

As nice as it felt to be doing something good with a person that always made you feel at ease, the weight of your problems had a physical effect on you, and that grew tenfold, the moment you’d gotten back to your cabin. The knowledge that new campers would be showing up in the morning was like a looming fist hanging over you - not because you didn’t want to do this job, but simply because that meant you’d be forced to interact with Sam again. 

The time came too soon. Counselors started getting lined up right after breakfast was finished, ready to be debriefed about the upcoming cycle of kids, but Sam didn’t show up until the last minute. You pointedly didn’t look at him directly, because, frankly, you didn’t want to know how he was doing. 

You weren’t sure whether or not he’d hold his head high and pretend like nothing had happened, or if he’d look a little downtrodden, maybe even apologetic, but you didn’t care to know. You told yourself it wouldn’t make a difference anyway - you’d be able to maintain your coldness towards him, no matter what he appeared to be feeling, but you knew it was a lie. You knew that if he did look sad, it would only leave you with unwarranted guilt, and you refused to let that happen. As Sam took his place beside you, you glanced up at Josh to catch him giving you a sympathetic, tight little smile that you forced yourself to return. 

The children were sweet and excited, which helped a great deal; it was hard to be angry when they were beaming toothy grins at each other. It served to remind you that, no matter what drama you were experiencing, it wasn’t fair to the children to let them shoulder the burden with you. They were there to have a fun, educational two weeks, and you decided then and there that you were going to set aside your issues with Sam whenever they were around, but that quickly proved to be easier said than done. 

For the first couple of hours, you were able to go off on your own with your girls, getting acquainted with them, but that could only last so long. One timeslot before dinner, you were set to do a forest foliage activity as a whole team, and the entire day, you kept looking at your schedule like it would magically change. You tried to hype yourself up on the walk to the meeting place. You told yourself it would be okay - that all you had to do was remember how shitty he’d been to you, and it would be easy to stay hating him, but you were fucking wrong. You kept your eyes anywhere else but on him as you approached the group of boys, but it didn’t matter how justified your anger was - the second you met his gaze, you lost your grip on it. 

He was standing with his hands in the pockets of his shorts, his hair tied back more carelessly than he usually opted for. If you hadn’t spent so much of the last few weeks studying his features, you surely wouldn’t have noticed the slight bags under his eyes. His face was void of an expression, but not in the controlled way he used to wear to convince you of how bored he was by it all - now, he just looked spent. He looked like a child’s toy that was nearing the end of its battery life. 

When he met your stare, you realized that Josh was right - Sam was visibly perfectly aware of how he’d hurt you. 

Naively, you’d been praying you’d look at him and feel disgusted. You’d sincerely hoped that you’d see his face and find that you didn’t want him anymore. You wanted the pain he’d inflicted to be enough to override the infatuation that once consumed your every passing second - but it didn’t. He let you hold his eyes for a few seconds before ripping them away to fix his focus on the ground, and that hurt so much worse than anything he’d done up to that point. 

You weren’t sure what you were expecting - it wasn’t like he was going to rush up to you and pull you into his arms. It wasn’t even reasonable for you to expect that he’d apologize - not in front of all of these unknowing kids. Still, you were learning, more and more every day, that emotions don’t abide by the rules of logic. It didn’t make a difference - it still hurt.

You introduced him to your girls as the boys’ counselor but didn’t speak a word to Sam directly as you walked them through the ins and outs of regional wild plants. You barely had to consult your manual to teach them what was poisonous and some history about what certain things were once used for, all the while, reminding them that it was never okay to eat anything you found in the forest. Sam seemed more or less content to just let you take over, which, stupidly, also upset you. It was starting to become clear that there was nothing he could have done that wouldn’t piss you off - you’d have been seething if he’d chimed in without prompting. 

At the end of the activity, you left any parting nicety unsaid and headed off to dinner separately. True to “first day” form, your girls stuck close to your side, carrying on a riveting conversation about iceberg lettuce as you lead them through the food line, and when it came time to pick a table, you breathed a sigh of relief to find that Josh was alone at a table with a few of his boys, working on opening milk cartons and sauce packets for them. 

“Can we sit?” you asked him, receiving a slightly-confused smile back. 

“Of course, make yourselves comfy.” 

Quiet enough that only a few kids and Josh could hear, you added, “I guess I just wasn’t sure if you’d want to sit with Sam.” 

He took on a sympathetic expression as he flicked his eyes across the room. You followed the direction to see Sam, sitting with his boys pooled around him towards the back corner of the hall. Another counselor you didn’t recognize was at the table too, but they weren’t interacting with anyone but their own campers.

Deep, deep within you, you felt bad, but you put on a cold expression, deciding to say nothing, lest something truly mean accidentally slip out. You were sure that it would only be a couple of days before his campers were off on their own and Sam was back to eating in his cabin. 

For the rest of the meal, he went unmentioned. Instead, the Maple boys excitedly told you and your girls all about the farmette activity they’d just had with Josh, melting your chilled heart by gushing excitedly about the baby animals. 

You leaned across the table towards a couple of them. Employing a playful, hushed tone as if it were a secret, you asked them, “Josh didn’t steal any kittens, did he?”

Josh let out a gasp of faux offense, putting his hand on his chest to exaggeratedly object. “I would never. How could you accuse me of something like that?” 

Just as you’d hoped, that sent the group of kids sitting around you into fits of giggles, and for the first time in too long, everything felt okay. 

❀❀❀

For the remainder of that week, you were successfully able to avoid speaking to Sam directly. Every day, he became less of a main character in your life, and every day, the anger subsided a little bit more. 

You were still upset, of course; what he’d done had been shitty and wrong, but it wasn’t weighing you down like it once had. It used to feel like that fight had left you with a kind of heartache plague, but you found yourself going whole days without thinking of him unless your eyes were on him directly. 

Your logical brain thought it would be efficient to plan it all out - if you kept letting go of a little anger at a time, you’d likely feel perfectly okay by the end of the summer. You still expected it would hurt when you dug into the memory of it, but that’s all he’d be - a memory.

Except, shit never works that way, and you, apparently, never learn. During a free period, you were getting some of your things organized in your room when there was a gentle knock on the door. 

In honesty, you had such faith in it being Josh, that you hadn’t even considered you’d answer the door to see Sam standing in front of you in a pair of jean shorts and his yellow camp shirt. 

“What?” You shocked yourself with how sharp your tone was, and you were suddenly grateful that all your girls were off on their own - they didn’t need to see you act like this. 

In the opposite direction, he used a sheepish demeanor that was so unlike him that it took you off guard. “Hey,” he offered simply. “Should we go pack for the trip?” 

You let your eyes slip shut in exasperation. In the pursuit of getting him off your mind, you’d forgotten all about the camping trip - it had slipped your thoughts so thoroughly, that you assumed he was there to apologize. 

Instead of actively addressing the fact that you’d forgotten, you just shook your head, just on the wrong side of bitterness as you declined. “No, I’ll do it alone in a bit.” 

He raised an eyebrow at you and asked, “Are you sure?” 

“Yes, I’m sure.” 

He pulled his eyes from your to roll them tiredly. “You’re really going to do all this work by yourself because you don’t want to be in the same room as me?” 

“Yep. How does it feel?” you spat back, clearly referencing how he used to do the same to you. 

You weren’t sure what you were expecting, but it wasn’t the way his shoulders slumped. You’d never seen him look so dejected, but it was pretty easy to deduce that he wasn’t trying to make you feel guilty - he was just past the point of being able to hold back his guilt. 

“Bad,” he admitted simply. “But I’m not going to let you pack all that shit alone.”

Just like that, the fire was lit again. Your hands balled into fists as you sarcastically drawled, “Oh, you’re not going to let me?” 

Shocking you, yet again, Sam offered no hostility to match yours; if he was angry, you saw no evidence of it. He put his hands up in surrender. 

“Listen, let’s just go do this and get it over with. You don’t have to like me - you don’t even have to be cordial, but I’m here to help.”

As much as it pained you to acknowledge, even in your own head, he was right. But, who the fuck was he to suddenly be acting like a responsible adult? That’s what you’d wanted from day one, but the character development now?

It felt like a slight. 

You let out a suspiciously tight scoff, and you rolled your eyes dramatically to hide the fact that they were starting to water. 

“Fine, whatever. I’ll meet you down there in fifteen,” you informed him coldly, turning on your heel and shutting the door in his face. 

You heard his shoes crunching up the rocky dirt as he walked away from the cabins, and you waited until the sound was faint enough before letting out a choked-back sob. You counted yourself lucky that it was solitary - you were able to push everything else back after you dabbed at your eyes. 

You considered standing him up as you surveyed yourself in your bathroom mirror, just to make damn sure he wasn’t clued into how that interaction had affected you. In the end, you decided it would be beyond childish - you were still a counselor, this was still your job, and he was still your partner, no matter how deeply and thoroughly you lamented it. 

When you showed up to the dining hall, he was already in the kitchen, pulling down the familiar red cooler from the shelves. The only acknowledgment you received upon entering was his eyes flicking up from his task to meet yours, and only for a split second, but that was fine by you. 

The room was tense and uncomfortable as you both silently packed. You made sure to be conscious of where he was so you could keep a good distance between the two of you, but you must have lost track of him at some point - you turned to grab the ice packs out of the freezer and ran directly into him. Your chests collided, knocking the breath from your lungs and sending the ice packs skittering across the tile with the solid impact.

It was exactly like that first day of camp, except this time, he was the one wearing an apologetic grimace, waiting for you to snap. He had ahold of your arms as he steadied you, but you pulled away from his touch out of panic and stumbled back against the island in the middle of the kitchen. 

“I’m sorry,” he breathed, causing you to exasperatedly shake your head. 

“It’s fine,” you dismissed flatly, nodding your chin towards the door. “Go. I can get the rest.” 

Out of your peripheral vision, you could see him staring at you in disappointed uncertainty for a few prolonged seconds before exiting the room. To your deep dismay, soon after he was gone, you found that it didn’t feel as satisfying to be alone as you hoped it would. 

The next day was the worst you’d had on the grounds of Camp Forest Springs. From the moment breakfast was over, you were stuck with Sam. He was with you while you collected the packed coolers, and he brought up the rear on the walk out to the campsite. He was there, falling into the routine of crafting a fire in the pit and right by your side as you prepared the food, and you were forced into learning a tough lesson: All the progress you’d thought you’d made with unraveling your feelings for him was simply because you’d been able to create physical distance between the two of you. You hadn’t had to see him. Or hear his voice. Or smell him when he was close enough, but suddenly, it was like you were bound to him. 

The entire time you were out there, you’d been dreading bedtime. On one hand, going to bed would mean that this experience was almost over. On the other, it meant you were nearing a milestone; for the past three cycles, you’d met him outside in the middle of the night. It had become an unspoken tradition that you once looked forward to.

But, as you slipped into your sleeping bag, the only thing you could think of was the conversation you’d had with Josh when he got back from break. You had a choice to make. Foolishly, you hoped maybe Sam wouldn’t do it - that maybe he’d spare you the burden, but there was no such luck; about an hour after you’d gone to bed, you heard the tell-tale rustling sound of him sneaking out of his tent. 

You squeezed your eyes shut, pursing your lips anxiously. Multiple times, you considered going out to talk to him - just because you would meet him out there didn’t mean you’d have to forgive him, right? You could have it both ways - you could keep your dignity by staying mad and still go out to see him, right?

It was nothing but a pretty lie you were trying to convince yourself of. You wanted to forgive him - you missed him and the way he talked and his unguarded, goofy laugh, but you had to protect yourself. 

With your face buried into the fabric of your pillow, you tried to keep quiet as you cried, but it became increasingly difficult when, after about twenty minutes of waiting for you, he made his way back to his tent and slipped inside. You weren’t sure how long you laid there, struggling to breathe through your choked sobbing, but one thing was for sure - you’d certainly made a choice. 

❀❀❀

You couldn’t bring yourself to meet Sam’s eyes the next morning, but he didn’t seem to be going out of his way to get your attention. Maybe he was hoping you hadn’t heard him last night, either to spare himself the embarrassment of being rejected or to hold onto the hope that everything was still going to work itself out. 

The guilt ate you alive to the point that you texted Josh to come to your cabin during your first free period the following day. He arrived chipper as usual but his expression fell the second he realized you’d been crying again. 

You did your best to explain it all to him, but he had to put in some effort to make out certain parts when you got too choked up to speak properly.

“I feel so fucking bad,” you told him once you felt like you could catch your breath. “How do people get through this and still function?” 

He hummed through a sympathetic smile. “Love’s just like that. But, I would like to also point out - you’re getting through it and functioning.”

You barked out a humorless laugh. “Barely. If you could call this ‘functioning’.”

“Well, I’ve yet to see you let the quality of your work slip. But, maybe you should think about what this means. Maybe you feel this bad right now because you don’t want to let him go.” While he spoke, he rubbed comforting circles into your back with a firm palm. 

You groaned, tipping your head back in frustration. “Don’t tell me that.” 

There was an amused little tilt to his lips as he replied, “I don’t think I have to. I think you already know.” He paused a second before cautiously continuing. “It hurts this bad because you love him.”

You shot him a look that was supposed to be an accusatory glare but ended up as a pleading frown. “I don’t know if I can do it.” 

“I’m not saying you have to or even should. I’m just saying - I think you should hear him out.” 

“Okay, but first he would actually have to apologize.” 

“If he apologizes,” Josh agreed with a nod. “But I have a feeling that he will.” 

You weren’t as sure, but in the moment, the affirmation helped ease a little of the ache, so you let it slide. 

❀❀❀

Sam stayed true to his unspoken stance on letting you eat your meals in peace, even when your and Josh’s kids started branching off on their own, leaving open seats at your table. Even you had to admit, it was kinda sweet. Whenever he’d avoided eating meals with you in the past, it was so he could be alone in his cabin, but he surprised you by sticking by his kids, letting them plant themselves next to him for every mealtime. 

More to his credit, even with you giving him the coldest possible atmosphere every time he was within twenty feet of you, he stayed cordial - open, even - to your attention, should you choose to give it to him. The dynamic stayed like that for a couple of days, but you could feel the tension starting to build. 

It didn’t feel hostile at all - at least, not on his part. You could feel him looking at you, either staring absently or sneaking quick peeks when he thought you were focused on something else. 

The dam finally broke on the last day of that cycle. The special activity was making tie-dyed t-shirts with your kids, and while it was fun to watch them get really excited about all the possible colors, you knew the second they announced it that it was going to be a monumental mess. Everyone was given rain ponchos and medical gloves, but that didn’t help with the kid that accidentally splashed lime green on your face as you were bent over to help her. 

She had obviously not done it on purpose and she was immediately apologetic, but you were left trying to wipe the little dots of pigment from your cheeks in the camera of your phone. You were so focused on yourself on the little screen that you hadn’t realized Sam was standing right in front of you until you heard him speak. 

“You should leave it - I think it suits you,” he suggested with a little smile, far too playful for what the nature of your current relationship called for. You lowered your phone to find him visibly questioning whether that was an okay thing to say, and it took everything in you to pretend it wasn’t charming, because you sure as fuck wished it weren’t. 

As punishment for cracking your resolve so easily, you kept a blank expression as you stared directly into his eyes and let him stew in the tense uncertainty for a few long seconds before asking, “What do you want?” 

He worried his lips together at your sharp tone before he worked up the courage to meekly joke, “All business these days, huh?” When he realized you were only going to stare impatiently for a few more fleeting moments before he would lose his chance, he cleared his throat and softly asked, “I’m just hoping- Can we talk?”

Despite Josh’s words about “hearing him out” ringing in your head, before you could stop it, you snapped, “No.” 

He frowned for only a second before breathing a nervous laugh and trying again. “Okay, can I talk and you listen?” 

After wrestling with yourself, you let out a long, relenting sigh. “Talk,” you allowed through an impatient tone. 

Looking genuinely relieved, he glanced around to make sure no campers were within earshot, but all of them were preoccupied, having spread out and spilled over into other groups to socialize. 

He briefly gathered his thoughts and then admitted, “I miss you. A lot.”

It wasn’t what you were expecting him to say, and you would have found it repulsively unacceptable if it weren’t for the genuine emotion behind it. It was quiet and breathy. Humble. He was lowering himself to you in a way he never had before. 

It didn’t make everything right, but it did get your attention. Still, you weren’t going to let him off the hook that easily, even if he did look particularly lovely with his hair freshly washed and wavy as the summer breeze brushed the tips of it against his collarbones. 

“Did Josh put you up to this?” you asked, keeping your tone from letting on that a part of you desperately wanted to forget every undesirable thing he’d ever said or done.

He drew in a slow breath as he figured out how he wanted to answer. “I was under the impression that the right way to approach the situation was to leave you alone. Y’know, since you really seemed like you wanted to be...left..alone.” 

The explanation was choppy as he pulled the thought from his lagging brain.  

“I just wanted to show you that I could respect that,” he continued, finally answering your question before adding, “But he told me that was ‘fucking stupid’ - his words, not mine.”

That was what did it. You weren’t quick enough to stop the smile that broke your façade but seeing it seemed to give him a cautious optimism that was almost worth it. You schooled your expression back to something serious just a second later to press him further. “Okay, but were you just not going to apologize to me?” 

“Honest to god, I really thought you’d see me coming to you to apologize as selfish - like you think I was only doing it so I could rid myself of some of the guilt.” 

You scanned his features for sincerity, not rushing yourself, even though he was visibly anxious. When you decided he was being genuine, you stated, “That’s also ‘fucking stupid’.”

A tired little smile tugged at the corner of his mouth as he nodded. “Yeah, he said the same thing.” After a beat of him realizing you were waiting on him to continue, he hurried to add, “So, I intended to come over here today to just apologize to you - I was going to tell you that you don’t have to be nice to me or forgive me, but- Well, I’m bad at this. So, when I opened my mouth, that’s...obviously not what came out.” 

You huffed a humorless laugh and rolled your eyes. “It still hasn’t come out, and I’ve been listening to you talk for like two minutes - which is a hell of a lot longer than you deserve.” 

He quickly nodded. “I know. I am sorry, but I don’t think I can give the heartfelt apology you deserve without attracting some attention. So, I was hoping we could talk again tomorrow. In private.” He paused for comedic effect and then playfully finished with, “Y’know, in case I cry.” 

He was right - if you were ever going to get the emotion from him that you were owed, you were going to have to have the comfort of privacy. Just because you didn’t want him thinking he was off the hook, you rolled your eyes, though there was a shade of fondness buried in the gesture despite your wishes. “Fine.” 

The breath he let out was visibly relieved as he stuffed his hands into the pockets of his jean shorts. You nodded at the bright purple dye splattered down his upper arm, visible due to him having ripped the sleeves off his t-shirt at some point in the past. 

“But, you’re probably gonna wanna wash that off sooner rather than later.”

He glanced down to the spot and a genuine smile spread across his mouth, like he was tickled-fucking-pink to be talking about literally anything else. You figured that was a pretty good time to make your exit, before he could coax any more niceties out of you. 

❀❀❀

You spent the next morning seeing your campers off, making sure to not meet Sam’s eyes from across the dirt pick-up area - you didn’t want him assuming he had any place in your thoughts, even though he was all you thought about half the time. 

He hadn’t given you any specific time he was planning to stop by, so after getting back to your cabin, you took a long shower, deciding that you weren’t going to plan your day around him. As you washed off all the sweat and dirt, you tried to mentally prepare yourself for whatever was going to spill out his mouth, and at the end, you had a renewed sense of confidence. You reminded yourself that he was just coming over to apologize. You were under no obligation to forgive him or even treat him kindly, even if he was making an honest effort. 

He finally showed up about halfway through the day, giving you a tight little smile as you swung open the cabin door. Instead of greeting him, you stepped aside as a prompt for him to enter, and he did so wordlessly. 

You leaned back against the shut door and stared at him until he figured out that you were waiting for him to speak, and upon that realization, he started in a haste. 

“Sorry that it took me so long. I wanted to give you time to enjoy being child-free again,” he explained and then continued with cautious hopefulness. “I think you’d be proud of me - I already took all the laundry down to be washed.” 

“I suppose I would be if circumstances were different,” you admitted, crossing your arms over your chest protectively. “But they’re not.”

He let out a long breath, cast his eyes to the knotted wooden floor and then nodded. “You’re right.” 

“You know, it’s not even about you not telling me you weren’t supposed to leave the grounds - that was obviously shitty of you, but I could have forgiven you easily enough. But, having you get angry at me for trying to help fix your fuck up was fucking heartbreaking, Sam.”

“I know,” he spoke softly, but you just shook your head at him. 

“No, I don’t think you do,” you objected, starting to feel your sinuses sting with the threat of tears that you immediately worked to fight off. “I thought we were so far past that. We’d been spending so much time together and everything felt so easy with you for the first time. I finally didn’t feel like I was walking on eggshells to try and stay in your good graces.” 

After taking some time to process what you were saying, he finally looked you in the eye and, in the most sincere tone you’d ever heard him use, he told you, “I’m sorry. You deserved better than that. There’s really no suitable excuse, so I won’t try to make one up, but I hate knowing I hurt you like that. I regretted it instantly but I was too much of a prideful jackass to apologize before you left.”

You were pretty sure he was done speaking until he seemed to remember something and then sucked in a quick breath before adding, “And, thank you. I know I would be sitting in a jail cell right now if it weren’t for you sticking your neck out.”

Admittedly, you weren’t sure what to say. You’d been worried you’d be tempted to forgive him instantly - without question, but you found no such temptation. You nodded at him, offering only a little “okay”. 

He looked just a little disappointed in this interaction ending this way, but he was making an honest effort to hide it, which you appreciated - you couldn’t handle having to feel guilty on top of everything else. Thankfully, he left without another word, only tossing you the same tight smile he’d been wearing upon entering your cabin. 

❀❀❀

When you told Josh all about what happened, he seemed earnestly happy for you and Sam both that the worst part was behind you. “It’s all uphill from here,” he’d said, but you weren’t so sure. Sure, maybe the worst part was behind you, but that didn’t mean anything past that would be pleasant. 

Sam stuck true to his word - you never felt like he was trying to butter you up or work his way back into your good graces. He actually hadn’t even addressed you about anything other than work until the day before this cycle’s camping trip. 

When he showed up at your door to ask if you were ready to pack up the food, he’d offered to meet you down in the kitchen like you had last time, but you declined. After all, it was silly to make you each walk there separately when you were headed to the same place at the same time. 

Neither of you said a word as you paced the trails, but it wasn’t uncomfortable the way it had been before. Finally, after months of this, he felt like your co-worker. Just your co-worker. It was what you’d thought you’d wanted from the beginning, but you found you didn’t like him like this very much either. Which left you with an odd dilemma. You hated having Sam as your adversary, but you didn’t like having him as a friend either - not after everything you’d experienced with him. It felt incomplete. 

But, you didn’t know if you had it in you to truly forgive him. Or to let yourself love him again, not in the unbridled way you had before.

As you pulled food from the cabinet and set it on the kitchen island to be sorted and packed away, for the first time in a while, you heard him let out a quiet sigh. You couldn’t see his expression because he was facing the fridge, but it was quick, as if he were preparing himself for something. 

He spun around on his heel and met your eyes, wearing a smile that didn’t quite cover the concern in his eyes. “I have something to say.” 

“I can see that,” you noted with a nod, keeping your tone a little flat but not cold. “Say it, then.” 

His eyes flicked around as he sunk his top row of teeth into his bottom lip. “Look, I’ve never been good at talking about my feelings. I’m kind of notorious for it actually,” he unnecessarily informed you with an anxious-sounding laugh. “I always trip myself up thinking that I’m not going to be able to put my thoughts to words so I just don’t even try.”

He saw your features slip into a slight frown in your confusion, so he rushed himself to figure out how to continue. 

“I guess I’m just trying to say that the thing we do on the camping night - where we slip out of our tents and meet- It’s something I...didn’t realize meant something to me until you didn’t show up last time and I guess I just wanted to know if we could...go back to doing that.” 

As you fixed your eyes on the floor, you licked your lips absently, having to use every bit of your brainpower to not show him what that question had done to you; you were feeling butterflies again. You’d really convinced yourself that you wouldn’t feel that way about him again, but it was always a lie and you knew it. The proof was in the way your heart was racing.

You’d been expecting him to walk it back as soon as he’d seen your hesitation, but, to his credit, he just waited patiently for your reply. 

You opened your mouth to tell him you weren’t sure, but what came out was a rather struggled admission of, “Sam, you’re fucking killing me.” It shocked you to have said it, but it shocked him enough that he sucked in a sharp breath and then let the stainless steel fridge door hold his weight as he concernedly but cautiously asked, “What do you mean?” 

As you stared at him, you could feel your eyebrows knitted together in a deep-set, distressed frown. “Do you really think I want nothing to do with you now? You think I went from wishing you were my honest-to-god boyfriend to suddenly actually despising you?” The tone of your voice came out desperate, but you didn’t have the capacity to care as his eyes widened. 

“Sam, it has taken everything I’ve got to keep you at a distance. Aside from the fact that we work together in close proximity every single day, I fucking miss you too.” In your despair, you’d said it all but the one thing that you’d been keeping for yourself, but you realized, at that exact moment, that you could never move forward until you told him, “I loved you, Sam. I- I still do, but I don’t think I can go through that again. I know it’s dramatic and it makes me sound crazy, which is why I decided to bury it all, but I’ve never experienced anything that hurt the way that did.”

He looked like he was barely breathing as he ran his hands through his hair, his breathing suddenly choppy and labored.  

“You’ve taught me a lot of hard lessons, Sam, and I am currently trying my very fucking best to learn them.” 

It fell silent between the two of you for just a second before he squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. “Please don’t let that be what you take away from this.” He gestured between the two of you with his pointer finger.

The laugh you let out was tinged with just a shade of bitterness as you asked, “What do you want me to take from it?”

Even though it seemed like the logical next step in the conversation, the question took him off guard. He stared at you in silence for a few prolonged moments as his bottom lip hung open an inch or so. The moment he decided on an answer was visible, but even then, he had to take a quick breath before admitting, “Me.” 

Unsure as to what he was implying, you naturally took on a puzzled expression, forcing him to clarify, “I want you to take me with you. Even as ‘just a friend’.”

You pursed your lips together as you held his gaze - you were hoping to find some kind of deception behind his eyes so that you could reject him and still feel like you did the right thing, but the only thing you found was sincerity. Even though the shade of his eyes was altered by the harsh, fluorescent lighting, it was still Sam - the soft Sam that he’d accidentally let you get to know. 

It hurt. You suddenly felt so choked that you had to work on shoving back the lump in your throat. You shook your head at him, unsure to your very core about what your next step should be. 

“I don’t know, Sam. I don’t know if I can be ‘just your friend’,” you informed him sorrowfully. 

“Will you try?” he asked, the hope evident in both his eyes and his cadence. He was doing everything right - he wasn’t putting guilt or pressure on you. Nothing he was doing felt manipulative or as if there were an ulterior motive behind it. He was speaking with you in the most respectful manner possible and that realization put a sour look on your face. 

“Why couldn’t you have just done this in the first place?” you lamented, gesturing to him with an open palm. “Absolutely none of this would have had to happen if you’d just been this person with me. Why does it seem like this honesty is coming to you so easily now - after you’ve already done the damage?” 

He seemed to take the question to heart. He let his eyes slip shut and his head tip back as he took a deep, shaking breath, finally past the point of trying to control your perception of him. “I can’t take it back, babe,” he informed you apologetically but as soon as the term of endearment slipped from his mouth, he looked you over to make sure you didn’t react negatively. When he realized you were going to let it go unaddressed, he continued, “But you have to know I regret it, right?” 

“Of course, you do,” you agreed with a firm frown of grief, leaving all the rest unsaid. 

The room fell silent, save for the whirring sound of the refrigerator, leaving the two of you to feel the weight of the words you’d shared. After a while, he let out a sigh of surrender and anxiously scratched at the back of his neck. 

“Look, I’m going to be honest - I’m not sure what to do here. I don’t know where the line is between ‘communicating my regrets and trying to make amends’ and ‘being a fucking nuisance’ so...” He trailed off before starting again, his tone even more gentle this time. “I’ve laid it all out for you. You know I still want you - however you’ll take me. The rest is up to you.” 

He didn’t wait for a response before offering you a weak but honest smile and turning back to the task of collecting the condiments. For the next moment, he busied himself to show you he could respectfully move on from the moment, but you remained stagnant, just taking him in like this. 

Obviously unsure as to why you were just staring at him, unmoving, he snuck a look at you out of the corner of his eye and then curiously pivoted to face you again. 

You weren’t really sure what you were going to say when you opened your mouth, but it just naturally slipped out anyway. “I’ll think about it, Sam,” you stated, more confidently than you felt as you nodded tightly. 

You could see the way your assurance changed his posture - defeated and droopy to pulling in a hopeful breath until his lungs were full. Just because you felt like he’d truly earned it, you quietly told him, “And thank you. For trying.” 

As much as he was trying to downplay it, a wistful smile found his lips, effectively melting the ice you’d built around him in your mind just a little more. He gave you a nod and this time, when you both went back to packing, it didn’t feel quite so heavy. 

The trip out to the campsite felt easier this time around. It wasn’t as fun or exciting as it would have been if you were on the same terms with him as you’d been at any point before the fight, but it also didn’t feel like a grim death march like the last time either so you counted it as a win. 

He wasn’t as timid with you anymore either, which, to your deep surprise, was a relief. You’d thought it would be upsetting to look at him and not see him looking like a guilty puppy, but it wasn’t at all. That’s why, as you tucked into your sleeping bag for the night, you didn’t zip it - “just in case”, you’d told yourself. 

It felt a little like deja vu as you lay awake, waiting with bated breath as you strained your ears. The night was calm and quiet, but you were irrationally afraid you were going to miss it - you weren’t sure you even wanted to meet with him that night, but you didn’t want to be robbed of the decision either. 

You hadn’t realized you’d started to doze until you were swiftly pulled from your sleep by the familiar rustling, and the second you heard the sound of his footfall on the dirt, you started to shrug out of your sleeping bag.

Sam was sitting on the same log you always found him on, but he clearly was not expecting you - when he heard you slip through the tent flap, his head whipped around to show you his surprised face outlined by the moonlight. You kept a relatively flat expression as you sat next to him, leaving a few inches in between the two of you; then you just folded your hands in your lap and fixed your eyes on them. 

You could feel him studying your face, charmingly trying to figure out if it was safe to let himself feel hopeful, but the relief was audible, even through a whisper as he admitted, “I can’t believe you came.” 

You glanced at him out of the corner of your eye and cautiously allowed your lips to turn up into a little smile. “No? Do you think I shouldn’t have?” 

He immediately opened his mouth to reply but then stopped himself abruptly. After taking a second to chew it over, he let out the most sheepish laugh you’d ever heard from him, breathy and nervous. “I don’t think that’s for me to answer. Do I think I deserve whatever you’re giving me right now?” he asked rhetorically, and then instantly answered himself, “Probably not. But I’m...indescribably happy to see you.”  

There was something you had to get off your chest, but it was a struggle to get yourself to say it. You bit your lip and dug deep inside of yourself to admit, “I’m self-conscious that I’ve overreacting.” 

Once he realized what you were suggesting, he shook his head so quickly and fervently that you could only deduce that he was afraid to even let that idea hang in the air. Sam took a big, risky chance; without hesitation, he planted his hand on your jaw to turn your face to him, forcing you to look directly into his eyes and there was absolutely no way for you to voice what that did to you.

The wind picked up just then, graciously muffling the sounds of your voices and eliminating the risk of the kids hearing you over the rustling of debris and leaves. 

“Don’t,” he half-pleaded, innocently leaning in a little closer to you so you wouldn’t miss what he was saying. “Don’t do that. I hurt you. I knew how much this job meant to you- means to you and I still risked leaving the grounds without telling you what we were risking, and that’s bad enough.” He paused, grimacing as he considered the right words. “But, then, you put out the fucking fire for me. I can just hear you talking to the director in that way that you do - diplomatic and informed, reasoning with him to spare whatever punishment I undeniably deserve.” There was a hint of a dreamy tone under the desperation and haste to get it all out and the sound of it suddenly had you struggling to choke back tears.

“Just- Please, don’t blame yourself for this to justify wanting to forgive me. I hurt you. I’d love for us to be okay but that’s not the way to do it.”

You held his stare for too long, waiting for your tongue to speak without you having to come up with the right words. When that didn’t happen, all you could do was rasp out, “Okay.” 

His eyes darted back and forth between yours like he was searching for a thread - anything to give him clarity as to what that meant for the two of you, but even you didn’t know. You let him struggle for only a couple of seconds before cracking a smile that instantly softened him further.

“Okay?” he tried, hopeful despite himself. 

You nodded at him, slowly reaching to brush a strip of hair from where it had fallen from the lazy bun he’d tied it into. To your surprise, it didn’t hurt as much as you’d thought it would when you whispered, “I forgive you.” 

He froze as you watched him visibly wrestle with the choice before deciding to use his hand under your jaw to guide you to him. You held your breath, your heart racing as you realized he was probably about to kiss you, but he didn’t. He spared you the burden of having to make a split-second decision about whether or not it was appropriate for him to rush you into something so romantically intimate, and instead, he met you in the middle to lay his forehead against yours. 

You could feel him preparing to say something meaningful, but the moment slipped past in silence. The two of you stayed like that for a few prolonged moments until he pulled away. 

This time, looking at his face was different. It was almost as if speaking the intention to forgive him had magically pulled it into existence. Out of everything that had happened between you since your conversation in the kitchen, none of it made sense to your logical brain, but that was just another perfect bullet point for the lesson you were learning about how lawless emotions are by nature. 

“So, there’s this building on the edge of my hometown,” he started, piquing your interest with his casual tone. “And you know how every town has that one decrepit place that’s famously forbidden and you’ve heard twenty different stories about it? It’s always like ‘a guy went crazy and murdered his family in that house’ or ‘a kid got lost in this old mine and they never found him’.”

You hummed an agreement, giving him a confused look that caused him to chuckle, pursing his lips to muffle it lest the two of you get too loud. 

“So, in my hometown, that obligatory location is this shack-like building out in the woods. There’s so much bullshit lore that locals have tied to this place but the one thing we know is that it was a tiny church a long time ago. It hasn’t been maintained for decades - like, the wood siding is covered in moss and shit or has just degraded completely in some places. The windows are boarded over and it smells like mold inside and there’s broken glass and loose nails all over.” 

You couldn’t help but let out a breathy laugh at the absurdity of the situation, and he matched it, obviously finding amusement in stringing you along blindly. 

“Well, that lovely place I’m describing is apparently the perfect venue for parties, but the land it’s on is owned by the city now and the city is pretty serious about keeping people away from it because it’s obviously not a structurally safe place for anyone to be, let alone a bunch of drunken young people, but there’s no real way for the city to prevent people from partying there because any amount of money spent on security would be a waste. So, I’m sure you’re wondering why they haven’t just torn the shit hole down, right?” he prompted. 

Either Sam was just a great storyteller or the story itself was out of place enough to catch and hold your interest, but either way, you were invested. You took the moment to tease him by playing along and cheekily asking, “Sam, why haven’t they just torn the shit hole down?” 

You weren’t expecting it, but as he smirked at your antics, he took your chin between his fingers to hold you still as he answered. “Because, next to the church, there’s a little bitty cemetery. There are two slabs left that are obviously headstones - completely unreadable - but who knows how many people are actually buried there. In order for the city to be able to clear the lot, they’d have to find records of the bodies and remove them very carefully and then there’s the issue of how the fuck they’d even locate and get in touch with the families of these people- Anyway, the city just tacks up ‘No Trespassing’ signs all over the property and nails the door shut every now and again to discourage people from snooping, but other than that, they just leave the place alone and hope that the church will decay enough that it collapses of natural causes.” 

He let go of your chin somewhere in the middle of that last part of the explanation, but you could still feel the effects of being handled by him like that, making it difficult to function in the way you wanted to. You struggled to find the impressed tone that you were looking for, instead stumbling over the statement, “Wow. You know a lot about this building.”

His pink little smirk stretched into a satisfied smile as he nodded. Using an intentionally pointed tone, he sounded beyond pleased to inform you, “Well, I ought to, because I burned the place to the ground last year.” 

Before you’d even decided if you’d heard him right, your fingers anxiously found your lips as your eyes widened. “Oh my god,” was all you could think to say. 

He nodded, and there was a distinct lack of regret behind it. 

“Why?!” 

“I want to say it was all just bad luck, but that’d be a lie and, per Josh’s suggestion, I’m trying this new thing where I take responsibility for the shitty things I do,” he teased, making you breathe a laugh despite your shock. “So, a friend of a friend was having a going away party because he was joining the military. Or...maybe it was that he just got back from deployment? I can’t remember because I didn’t want to go, but I do remember thinking that it was a really bad idea from the start. Everything was really dry last summer - like we were nearing ‘drought’ territory during this period, and here these assholes were, lighting a fucking bonfire in the middle of this crispy-ass grass, surrounded by a dry forest. It was a tinderbox. Smokey the fucking bear couldn’t have come up with a better scenario for a fire-related mishap. And, I know you’re clever enough to figure out what happens next.”

You shook your head, giving him an expectant look. “I mean, obviously a fire breaks out, but was everyone okay?” 

“Yeah, mostly everyone bailed. It’s the rural Midwest, so I’m sure a lot of people had hard drugs on them or in them that they didn’t want to get caught with.”

You were stunned silent for a few moments. “You were worried that I was going to find your arrest boring?”

He nodded coyly, a bit too matter-of-fact for that to be the end of it. 

“Getting arrested for burning down a church is maybe the most interesting thing I can think of,” you argued, struggling to keep your voice low in your state of disbelief. 

“Well, that’s because I didn’t get arrested for burning down a church,” he informed you, making your expression fall flat quickly and dramatically enough to pull a laugh that threatened on “full volume” from his lips. 

“What the fuck do you mean?” 

With a faux-innocent smile as your own consolation, he stated, “I got arrested a month later for driving high.” 

You narrowed your eyes to stare at him accusingly. “Then what the fuck was the point of that whole long-ass story?” 

“Because I told myself if you met me out here tonight, I’d tell you what I got arrested for, but getting arrested for driving high is boring, so I thought I’d lead with the most interesting story I could think of - which is 100% true, by the way.”

Yet again, you wanted to be angry with yourself for finding the whole thing charming, but before you could say a word, he added, “Plus, I’ve missed being this physically close to you and I’m, admittedly, kind of selfish so I wanted to draw this moment out as long as possible.” 

Still in a state of disbelief, you sat up straight, fighting to keep a shocked smile from your lips and failing miserably. You shook your head at him disapprovingly but there wasn’t a single shred of hard feelings to grab at anymore, making his next line unnecessary. 

“Remember how you used to fish so hard for information about me? Well, you got some,” he stated, smirking. “And there’s plenty more to fish for if you’d still like to keep me around- As a friend.”

He’d added the last bit as an assurance, making sure you knew he wasn’t expecting anything from you, but you were digging your fingers into the meat of your leg to keep from touching him. 

Your throat was tight, giving your voice a rasp as you told him, “I don’t wanna be your friend.” 

His expression had just started slipping into a showcase of his disappointment when he realized what you were actually implying. You could feel him staring at you and how your eyes were fixed on his lips, making him sound a little desperate as he asked, “Can I kiss you?” 

You glanced over your shoulder towards the tents, but you wanted it just as badly as him, so you didn’t have to think about it too hard when he framed your face with his hands and half-pleaded, “One kiss isn’t going to hurt anything- Please.” 

You nodded at him fervently but you didn’t wait for him to make a move; instead, you just leaned in and pressed your lips to his. It was a little rough, but you weren’t complaining because the rush of serotonin through your veins felt like a wave of warm water. You chased the feeling by wrapping your arms around the back of his neck and found that, somehow, that felt even better. 

He didn’t show any signs of objection as you broke the kiss to hook your chin over his shoulder, feeling his nose nuzzle into the hair by your ear. You sat and soaked in the moment for a few long seconds before sitting up so you could look into his eyes.

You had to work to school your face into a serious, stern expression as you informed him, “If you ever hurt me like that again, I’m going to fuck your brother.” 

Just like you were hoping for, a deeply shocked smile found his lips, but before he could make any kind of quip, you added some comedic relief by clarifying, “Not Josh - the other one. Josh 2.” 

A hand flew up to catch a sharp laugh as it fell out of his mouth. “Jake, but okay. I guess that’s fair,” he informed you in the fondest tone. 

“Damn right,” you agreed and then stood, holding your hand out to pull him up too. “Well, Samuel, this was a shockingly pleasant way to kill half an hour or so, but we should get to bed.” 

He offered you only a smile in allowance, but you pulled him into another hug when you reached the tents that he returned in a way that you could only describe as grateful, but you’d only hugged him so you could press your lips to his ear. “Find me again when the kids are gone this weekend,” you instructed and felt his fingers flex against your back in a very uncontrolled way. 

You placed a kiss against his cheek that you could only assume he found frustratingly chaste and then slipped into your tent. 

❀❀❀

You arrived to dinner before Josh the next evening, giving you plenty of time to think. As your eyes scanned over the bustling dining hall and saw how many of the campers had formed their own groups, leaving their counselors to eat with their coworkers, you couldn’t help but feel the sting of the realization that it was almost over. In just a couple of weeks, you’d have to start looking for a different job - one that could never, ever compare. 

You tried to push the feeling down, lest your eyes start to water in such a public place. 

Luckily, you weren’t alone for too much longer; just a moment later, Josh opened the doors for his kids and ushered them all in with a sweet smile, pointing them towards the food line despite them having gotten the routine down a week and a half ago. His boys scattered to sit in their own little clusters but Josh could always be counted on to take the seat across from you. 

“So, how was the camping trip?” he asked, and something behind his chipper tone told you he was somehow more informed than he ought to be. 

You offered him a fond smile and shook your head. “It sounds like you already know how it went,” you replied before popping a slice of an orange into your mouth.

“I have a hunch,” he allowed cheekily. 

“How? How do you seem to know everything before I do?” 

He shrugged, though he looked proud despite his casual response. “A couple of reasons. One - neither of you are as difficult to read as you think you are. And, two - Sam asked for my advice on the subject.” 

“Oh?” you pressed, eliciting a nod of his head. 

“Well, I guess I kind of forced my advice on him, actually,” A grin spread across his lips and he split his dinner roll to butter it. “If I didn’t practically kick his butt after your fight, I’m not sure he would have made any moves to fix it. Not that he didn’t want to,” he quickly added. “I just know that, when he fucks up socially, he tends to remove himself from the equation so he can’t make it worse.”

“Or, perhaps because he’s too ashamed to confront it,” you suggested, trying to sound flat but accidentally letting a scolding fondness taint the words. 

“Sure,” Josh agreed, endearingly struggling to get the little packet of butter open. “I have no doubt that was part of it. All I’m saying is, I know he wanted to make it better - he just didn’t know how, so I gave him a...let’s say ‘gentle nudge’.”

You breathed a laugh. “Well, thank you. And, yes, things feel better,” you agreed, after a moment, adding, “I missed him a lot.” 

A smile, maybe too pleased for someone mostly unaffected by the situation, spread across his lips. 

When Sam walked in just a minute later, all his kids in tow, he met your eyes for only a second before helping his boys through the line, leaving you in your infatuation over what a good counselor he’d become over the last few weeks. He sat across from you, next to Josh, and you were relieved to find that it instantly felt comfortable, thanks to Josh’s flawless sense for directing conversation. 

The special activity for that cycle ended up being a hike out to a special location on the campgrounds that you’d always loved as a child, called Blueberry Bog. It was a glacially-formed kettle bog; the water was covered in soft, vibrant green moss that acted almost like a trampoline. The kids were pretty underwhelmed until they were informed that they didn’t have to stay on the wooden boardwalk - that they could go out onto the moss and explore. You watched with the kind of satisfaction you’d imagine a parent would have, listening to the kids squeal as their feet squished into the plush surface.

The following day was supposed to bring rain, and it didn’t disappoint in that regard. When you’d woken up to your alarm, you could hear the sound of thunder in the distance, and when you’d gotten out to the main room of your cabin, a few of the girls were already at the windows, watching the lightning streak across the sky. You’d all raced down to the dining hall with your coats over your heads to keep as dry as you could, and after breakfast, that was where their parents came to pick them up. The “goodbyes” were getting harder and harder, and this time you had to take deep breaths in between children to prevent yourself from crying. 

All of Sam’s campers were gone before the final stragglers of your group had been picked up, so you met his eyes across the room to share a look that he’d accurately interpreted as an invitation. 

He showed up at your cabin just a few minutes after you’d gotten back with a softness behind his eyes as you opened the door for him. 

You leaned against the doorframe, blocking his way in so you could playfully inquire, “Would you like to come inside?”

He nodded, breathing a curious laugh. 

You hummed in consideration, smirking along with him as he realized that you were intentionally keeping him out in the rain. “Ask nicely.”

He appeared to chew it over before smugly declaring, “No.” Sam placed his hand in the center of your chest and guided you out of the way with ease, despite your efforts to anchor yourself in place with shocked giggles spilling from your mouth. 

“You’d think you’d be doing whatever you possibly could to win me over again,” you scoffed teasingly, crossing your arms over your chest as a statement. 

He shut the door behind him and wrapped his hands around your biceps so he could move you, yet again. When he had your back against the door, he was wearing a fond expression to note, “I suspect I already have.”

You’d been intending to take the joke further - to play along for as long as he’d allow - but you couldn’t seem to find the drive after that. The ache in your chest reminded you just how much you missed interacting with him like this again. As awful as the admission was, you were suddenly aware of just how different your summer would have been without him - borderline boring, if you had to guess.  

You cupped his jaw in your hands, your voice cracking a little as you admitted, “You never really lost me.”

As easy as it would have been for him to kiss you then - to lead you into a sexual tryst - instead, he leaned forward to rest his forehead against yours like he had at the campsite. 

You let the softness of the moment settle over you as you matched his breathing. The silence remained until you broke it, in the most cautious way you could manage. 

“Sam, what’s going to happen when the summer’s over?” 

He withdrew just enough that he could see your face as a pensive expression masked his features. 

“I’m not sure.” 

Your stomach sank just a little. You tried again, “In the kitchen, you said that you wanted me to take you with me.”

While he pressed the pad of his thumb to your bottom lip, his eyebrows furrowed into a troubled look. “I want to keep seeing you - of course. I just haven’t worked out the details yet.” 

As unsatisfying as that answer was, you knew it was as much as he could offer you at that moment, so you let him know there were no hard feelings by pecking a kiss on his thumb. 

“Well, no need to try and sort it all out right now.” You looked him up and down, putting on a little smirk as you suggested, “I think we have some catching up to do, Sam.” 

The breath he let out held a surprising amount of relief - like he’d been waiting for your cue. Without wasting a second, he gripped your waist, spinning you around and pointing you towards your bedroom door with a nod of his chin. You huffed a laugh, reaching to thread your fingers through his so you could lead him, but he pulled his hand away before you could. 

He only let you feel the sting of rejection for a split second before he was wrapping his arms around your chest from behind, playfully lifting you, mid-step. The surprise of it drew a pitchy squeal from your grinning lips, but he never pulled you fully off your feet. The gesture was simply meant to be a teasing prompt to rush you along, though you had a suspicion that he was only half-joking. 

You’d thought he’d want you on the bed immediately, but you’d barely made it into your room before you felt him anchor you in place. The heat from his mouth as he pressed his lips into the crook of your neck made you physically melt, relying on him to help hold your weight as you leaned back against him. 

You reached over your shoulder to wind your fingers in his hair, deciding then that he must have washed it earlier that morning, as you were able to rake through the silky strands with ease. He let out a soft, absent hum that vibrated against your neck as you gently scratched your nails over his scalp.

The edges of his teeth dragging over your delicate, thin skin made you shiver as goosebumps rose down your arms. His fingers were slipping around your body, dipping under the hem of your shirt to tease along your navel, which only worsened your sensitivity. 

You didn’t want to pull away from him, but you wanted to see his face. You used to see his angular features as intimidating, but you’d gotten lucky - lucky enough to have seen the truly soft side of him. Looking into his eyes used to leave you feeling utterly insignificant, but you could feel your chest swell hopelessly at the depth behind them now; even in the dim, cool light of the grey sky filtering in through your bedroom window, there was a warmth. The moment his lips touched yours, you felt the spark in your chest as if you were experiencing it for the first time, all over again.

Facing him now, you pressed your body flush to his, planting your hands on his chest as your fingers grasped at his shirt. You realized that being able to feel his body heat - his skin on yours - felt right. Like a muscle memory. 

He directed you to sit on the edge of the bed and then bent at the waist to kiss you. You were distracted enough by his tongue swiping out across your bottom lip that you didn’t realize he was sinking to his knees until you felt his hand on your stomach, gently pushing you back. 

You were going to give him a questioning look until you felt his fingers unsnapping the button on your pants. It was setting in, what was about to happen, and you had to take a few deep, controlled breaths to try to still your pounding heart as he slid your panties down.

His fingers almost felt cool when he stroked them over your skin, using a gentle, mindful touch. He gave you plenty of time to get comfortable, directing your focus on where his lips connected with your thigh. You could feel the pleasant burn when he sucked the muscle into his mouth, no doubt intending to leave you with a fuschia-pink bloom to remember this moment by. 

After seemingly avoiding the area up until then, it was the pointed tip of his nose brushing against your clit that made you gasp. Your fingers twisted into the duvet as his considered dipping into you, just barely sliding in to the first knuckle as a tease before withdrawing. 

Sam’s tongue was hot as he ran the flat of it over your skin, slow and languid like a dance. He opted to not use much pressure at first, but instead, letting it build with each lap over your clit. 

Your teeth were sunken into your bottom lip, mindlessly rolling it between your bite until it was tender. A dreamy hum or two escaped you as you pictured the scene behind your eyelids, but when you decided that wasn’t enough, you sat up, propping yourself on your elbows to take it all in. 

He looked lovely with his face buried between your thighs and when he saw you watching him, he met your eyes, planting his hands on the small of your waist to keep you in place. 

Despite the obscenity of the situation, he looked so soft and sweet that you didn’t think twice before reaching to tuck a strip of his hair behind his ear. To your surprise, he careened into the touch absently, pulling his mouth from your pussy so he could press a chaste kiss to the meat of your thumb. 

Before you could retract it, the fingers of his left hand wrapped around your wrist as he sucked your thumb into his mouth, and the fingers of his right hand finally slipped into you to the hilt. A tide of warmth spread through your abdomen as he worked the digits into you to the hilt, but you had to suck in a sharp gasp when his tongue flicked over your clit again. It felt like an electric shock that had your eyes squeezing shut, so you couldn’t protest when he coaxed you into laying back again. 

You wound your grip into his hair, trying to remain mindful of being too rough, but you couldn’t quite reach the thought. You knew you were tugging too harshly on the strands as he seemed to decide to draw you to the edge, but you couldn’t care, because you were peering over it in a matter of minutes. 

You were entirely lost in the sensation; it was all-consuming as it dragged you down into it. The resulting orgasm had you panting as you rode it out, barely conscious of your hips moving to grind yourself against Sam’s tongue. 

At the end of it, all of your muscles untensed at once, allowing you to let go of Sam’s hair as you sunk back into the mattress from your rigid position. 

A content hum slipped from Sam’s lips as he pressed a kiss to the spot on your thigh he’d been bothering earlier, and you could tell by the warmth of the sound that he was smiling proudly. 

He didn’t let you say anything as he guided you further up the bed, which was good, because you weren’t sure you could form an intelligent sentence - at least, not for a couple of minutes. 

He stripped down, not spending a lot of time on the show of it until he realized you were watching him. Once he had your eyes, he stroked over himself a couple of times for you. 

As he settled over you, he helped you sit up enough that he could slip your shirt off, leaving you both entirely unclothed. A warmth spread over your face when you realized you could taste yourself on his tongue, but he effectively erased the thought from your mind by parting your legs and slipped himself in between them. 

Your lips were connected in a kiss, but that didn’t stop you from moaning into each other’s mouths as he slid in. He had clearly been intending to take it slow and let you adjust, but he couldn’t seem to help himself from instantly falling into a rhythm with his little rocking motion. Luckily, you were more than ready. 

You wrapped your arms around his neck and pulled him down onto you, feeling almost cozy under the weight of him. The heat of his body perfectly mirrored the warm feeling you were left with as he slid in and out of you. You tried to bury your sounds into the crook of his neck, but you knew he could hear them perfectly, even over the sound of the relentless rain and the occasional rolling thunder outside.

Over your head, his arm reached to anchor himself on the edge of your headboard, giving him more leverage to work his hips against yours without having to pull away from you much. Without your conscious permission, your teeth nipped into the skin of his bicep, spurring him into a rougher motion that you instantly fell in love with. 

The sound of his breathing, quick and labored, made your eyes roll back into their sockets. You could tell he was getting closer to his end as his movements became less controlled, and even as present as you were in the moment, you took the opportunity to recognize how lucky you were to get him like this - so unguarded and raw. 

His eyes were squeezed shut, letting out an almost pained little whimper as he came and you could feel the shudder through his whole body. You cupped his face, thumbing over his cheekbone and enjoying the blissfully peaceful moment as he grounded himself again. Once he was conscious enough, he rested his forehead against yours, sweetly nuzzling his nose against yours. 

“I missed you,” he whispered under his breath. There was a vulnerability to the admission - just by the tone of it, you knew it was one of the most honest things he’d said to you thus far. 

“I’m right here,” you stated in return. 

❀❀❀

The next two weeks were unspeakably pleasant. 

You realized that, for the first time since the beginning of the summer, interacting with Sam was truly easy. As much as you’d love to say it felt like there had never been any bad blood between you and him in the first place, that wasn’t quite true; you could feel the scar tissue of a wound fully healed, but that made it even more satisfying, knowing that you’d worked through it together.

On the last day of the last cycle, you were proud to admit that you made it through the process of parting with your campers, completely tear-free, even though you caught Josh getting a little watery-eyed with every crouched hug he gave. 

After the campers were gone for the year, the counselors got to stay on the grounds for the remaining two days of the weekend, with the promise of a celebration that Saturday evening. Not everyone stayed - there were some counselors that saw more value in getting home, and you couldn’t blame them, but you were desperate to milk this experience for all it was worth. After all, even though you’d have to be dead before you’d miss doing this again the following year, you’d never be a first time counselor again. 

You and all the other counselors were informed that there would be fireworks after sundown, and you were free to go wherever you’d like on the grounds to watch, but Josh was quick to inform you that he already had the perfect spot. 

He led you and Sam on quite the hike that afternoon, and even though there was a vague trail to follow, it was clear people didn’t take it very often. 

As a branch of thorns grabbed onto your bare leg, you let out a hissing curse and then annoyedly asked, “Josh, where the fuck are we even going? There’s absolutely no way this spot is worth it right? I’m sure we could have seen perfectly fine from the beach.” 

He snickered, glancing back over his shoulder to remind you, “I told you to prepare for a little hike.”

“This is not a ‘little hike’, you jackass,” Sam muttered, cautiously side-stepping a sharp-looking branch. 

“You’re bitching now, but I promise it’ll be worth it,” Josh quipped back, completely unbothered, if the grin he was wearing was anything to judge by. 

“Oh, yeah? Then why did Ashley opt out of this trip?” you challenged. 

“Ah, because in the midst of the drama between you two,” Josh started, pausing to gesture to you and Sam. “You missed her whole story arc. I think she’s kinda been seeing a guy from Birch.”

You tried not to sound too disbelieving as you asked, “Really? Because I honestly thought you’d end up hooking up with her?” 

Josh snorted, flashing his white teeth. “Absolutely not. Unlike the rest of you, I know how to keep things professional.”

Either not buying his story or not willing to let the dig slide, Sam snarkily retorted, “Don’t worry, Josh - I’m sure you’ll get one next year.” 

The sun was mid-way through setting when you finally reached your destination. You’d been able to tell you were hiking at an incline on the way up, but you weren’t expecting for the woods to open up and show you a view of the grounds from one of the surrounding bluffs. 

The entire perimeter of the lake was visible to you, completely unobscured. Seeing your favorite place on earth spread out for you on a platter like that almost choked you up until you felt Sam’s hand on your lower back, giving you a knowing smile when you met his eyes. 

“Okay, Josh. I’m not too proud to admit when I’m wrong. This is a primo spot,” you surrendered, prompting him to beam at you proudly as he pulled a folded blanket from his backpack to spread out over the grass. 

“Thank you, thank you.” 

“Yeah, except I think you’re both forgetting that we’ll have to navigate our way back down in the dark,” Sam informed you smugly, but Josh just waved him off. 

“Let’s worry about that when we get to it.” 

The three of you got comfy on the blanket, settling into each other in a little bundle as you prepared for the show. 

“So, when are you coming to visit?” Josh asked you, and your confused little smile caused him to elaborate. “I mean, I just assumed you’d be coming to stay with us for a while, right?” 

You and Sam shared a blank look before you admitted, “I honestly hadn’t thought about it.” 

“Well, it’s not like I’ll be able to go off to school for the fall semester,” Sam half-agreed, sounding like he was weighing the idea in his head. 

“I’m sure you’ll get there next year,” Josh assured without concern. He finished with a sly grin, “Y’know, assuming you can change your hardcore criminal ways and not land yourself in jail.” He met your eyes and teasingly informed you, “Did you know that Sam was arrested for trafficking exotic animals? When the FBI caught him, he was trying to smuggle a pangolin across the border.”

“Oh, wow, dreamy,” you quipped, playing along as Sam lovingly rolled his eyes. 

“I already told her all about it.” 

Josh hummed, looking pleased with the development. “I figured, but I had to try.”

After a comfortable pause, he put on a playful grin and asked, “So, Sam. Think you’ll come back next year?” 

Sam looked like he wanted to say no, if not just for the principal. You could only imagine that they’d had this conversation a few times before, and Sam had given him a firm declination, but there was a hint of a smile to Sam’s tilted lips now as he glanced at you out of the corner of his eyes. 

He wrapped his arm around your waist, tilting you towards him until you laid your head on his shoulder. 

“We’ll see,” he replied, pulling a contented hum from his brother’s upturned mouth.

There was a certain kind of peace you’d come to know when you were a camper at Forest Springs - the kind of happiness you can only get from the bliss of a responsibility-free childhood. Those two weeks in the summer always simultaneously felt like they went on for months and flew by in a single breath. You couldn’t put a price on the freedom to do whatever your little heart desired and the comfort of knowing you were safe and sound under the care of an adult. To say you missed that feeling would be a criminally-steep understatement. You ached for it. 

Somewhere, deep, deep inside, you had come back to Camp Forest Springs this summer in hopes of feeling it again, but you were wise enough to know that no matter how badly you wanted it back, that time in your life had passed, and that was truly okay. 

Instead, you’d get to pack up and end your first year as a counselor with three different prizes - a love, a new best friend, and the knowledge that you’d been able to gift that same feeling to your campers. 

That was more than enough.

_____________ I just wanted to say a whole-hearted thank you to everyone that stuck with me through this story. It was a big challenge to write believable pacing and dialog, but I’m proud of us for sticking it out to the end! 

As always, your comments, tweets, replies, and asks mean the world, but if you feel like you’d like to show your appreciation in an even more meaningful way, you could always buy me a coffee <3 

Thanks again, Alana 

TAGLIST: @givemeyourtots2 @baylishh @the-chaotic-cow @lltearsofrainll @valleyd0ll @peaceisouranthem @mssives @myownparadise96 @bigblack-catattack @dharma-divine @onevisionanthem @godlygreta @s0livagant @stardustanthem @way-to-go-lad @dannythedog @jakesdeviatedseptum @edgeofcaravel @weightofdreams-gvf @igaspforbreath @galaxy-moon @fruitinthebottom @flower-power-anthem @gretavanhoney @cherrycolawhip @fosterkidwiththebrokenjaw

@the-salt-is-in-chelsea @eatmejoshkiszka @gvfrry @mywaygvf @alwayzthere @brokenbellz​ @calumspretty @star-boxer @moondustmemories @aconfusedhippie​ @sammiboo162​ @garagebandvanfleet​ @kayys-corner​ @stardustingold​ @sarakay-gvf​ @tripthelightfandomtastic​ @jmkiszka​  @jakeslovehandles​ @alwayssotiredbutneverofyou​ @koifishkoifish​ @gretavanfleas​ @ageofnations​ @markleejpeg​ @highladyofasgard​ @ourlovesdesire​ @teddiie​ @theblack-void​ @battywicca​ @cal-a-bungaa​ @ryegvf​ @heatmyfleet​

@ascendingtothestarsasone​ @raspberryopal​ @streamsofstardust​ @prophetofthedune​ @eringvf​ @age-of-nyahh​ @gretafaninheat​ @chalametpwk​ @mylifeisjustafeverdream​ @highdefkiszka​ @mak-gvf​ @jakeydoesit​ @sonicbaptism​ @disgracefulfrog​ @tylervanstyles​ @saoirsemaeve​ @seventieswhore​ @fleet-prodigy​ @thecoldwind​ @spicedandicedtea​ @lovejessejay​ @s-u-t​ @gretasmokerising​ @sparrowofthedawnsworld​ @gretavanfunk​ @maedesculpaeusoubi​ @sammysprincess​ @greta-van-chaos​  @allthatyouneedisinyoursoul​ @cry-me-tears-of-rain​

@fleetingofthegretas​ @sammysgiirl​ @alexiagx​ @brucethemermaid​ @hippievanfleet​ @tlexx​ @daydreamsingold​ @screechesincoherently​

#pink lemonade #sam kiszka fan fiction #sam kiszka smut #sam kiszka fic

[panelshowsource]

hahahaha that is so funny i have no idea! interestingly i've found a few things on taskmaster to be taken from japanese and korean game shows, so i guess we're all just sharing the fun :')

martin freeman. obviously. no debate. bosch. next question

anon this is so exciting for you!!! we all wish we could watch tm for the first time again!!! hehehe

you may be pleased to know s04 is a great fan favourite, as is...most of the first five series 🥹 i have a ridiculous soft spot for s02, which is pretty tragic since it was so short. in the beginning, in general, the contestants didn't quite understand the full potential of the format, didn't realise all of the lateral thinking they could do, didn't try or want to push the rules — so there's something just so stupid about it, like they really just let alex push them around and laugh at them, and that was so funny. now, there are a lot more rules, certain elements can be tired, the writing team has to work hard so it's not formulaic, etc. still an amazing programme, in HUGE parts thanks to 1) alex and 2) their editor rachel (we stan!!!), but the wide-eyedness of the earliest series are unbeatable in some regards imo. that said, we've had some great recent series, 14 being the the most recent fan fave imo!

btw don't forget to watch the nye and champion of champions specials if you're not already!! they're so silly heh junior taskmaster is also coming up!!

i watched the first series of the nz version recently and i just...idk i may be a purist, but it's been hard for me to get into it. the contestants are really great

— except for, you know...you know what. now i can say it. this is my time to say it. i am so angry about a grown white man in all red and these disgusting THIN little 🤢flip flops🤢

like how dare you wear those abominations on your feet. how dare you make me look at this. anon you're a kiwi so maybe you know this man and maybe next time you see him at the supermarket let him know panelshowsource from tumblr is so mad at him istg. i am genuinely fuming sfhdfkgrd —

but it was a bit predictable, especially with paul not finding his own character right off the bat. that said, i hear it gets even better with series 2 so i need to try it! otherwise, people seem to like the denmark version as well! i want to try that one out :)

i think ed has proven in over ten episodes of the podcast that he makes the utmost effort to use mae's pronouns; i can only recall noticing a slip-up once so imo it's exceptionally rare. mae has also commented on this directly and is very understanding to people who are still adjusting to the language. that said, i am sorry if ed's mistakes made you uncomfortable and if you want to shoot them an email with a suggestion then i don't why you couldn't/shouldn't. that said, i don't think you need to be concerned there's any maliciousness or laziness on the podcast's part because it really does seem they care x

ugh i can only HOPE and PRAY and DREAM and FANTASTISE we get miles on tm actually let's all do a collective sigh of disappointment that we couldn't get miles/frankie on the same season...

i'm usually not one for making predictions because i'm just so remarkably wrong so much of the time, but in my mind there are only two routes for miles: he'll either speedrun the entire thing dara ó briain style

— hold that thought did you guys know one of alex's sons is called dara? i just learned that the other day and i was like wow. okay back to the sentence i was writing —

or he'll flop in the most paddington bear way à la john kearns. i don't see a middle of the road for our guy. interestingly, i just listened to the tm podcast episode with the show director andy devonshire, and he and ed were saying that taskmaster isn't a place for characters: that you come into the show and end up having to be yourself (hence why ed was a competitive maniac muahaha). we've seen miles in really intelligent dynamics, and he can be both witty and unseriously goofy in them, but i'm not sure i've seen enough of him trapped with his own thoughts to know just how he'd perform heh

another thing ed mentioned on the podcast with andy d was his belief that greg is biased towards the older contestants (something like "they talk about being tired and greg simply relates to that — even though greg is not a tired old man and actually has a very youthful energy"; which i love, because it's so fascinating to me how often we forget / people don't realise greg's age because he just fits into any age group so seamlessly), so it makes me wonder if greg wouldn't lovingly bully miles and would actually find him charming/cute

sigh [picks up phone to call alex] let me see i can make this happen

LMAOOO like 5 minutes after the movie released one of my besties called me and was like "sarah. listen to me. rob brydon is sugar daddy ken. this is not a joke. this is code red. this is code. red."

rob is living his dream!!!

cutest anon of the year

#a

[legendarywolf2022]

The Letter to Pierre Perifel

(To @tbgmoviecoverage from my friend)

🧡💛🧡💛🧡

Dear Mr Perifel,

First, I want to say I'm your biggest fan of your latest movie The Bad Guys. Also, I am really happy to know that you also worked as an animator on other projects such as the Kung Fu Panda franchise, Rise of Guardians and even Monsters vs. Alien (honestly I think those last are underrated gems).

Anyway I want to apologize for bothering you like this, but since the tumblr "tbgmoviecoverage" canceled "submit and post" section I had no choice, but to ask you directly. Like I said before I really love your movie The Bad Guys. It has everything, charming anthropomorphic characters, heists, action, heartfull moments, really funny jokes and animation style like from manga comic. It's really amazing. But I couldn't help but notice some similarities with another concept I am familiar with. I am not talking about Zootopia, or Robin Hood, heck even not about Lupin the Third or Ocean 11 or any Tarantino's movies. No. The truth is that those similarities don't come from movies. They actually come from the more or less well-known video game franchise Sly Cooper.

Believe it or not there are so many similarities you could even imagine. There are heists, some car chases, foxy love interest on the side of the law (who is pretty much combination of Diane Foxington (be a fox, sassy, flirty with protagonist, sometimes quick to judge but understanding) and Police Chief Misty (temper and similar police status as inspector of Interpol), hero's narrating to us, side character who pretends to be good guy help protagonists until the reveal of him(or her) be the main antagonist who betrays them and put them in jail, villain who pretends to be a samaritan, villain who tries to prove be the greatest thief (there are many villains with different goals so that's why I mentioning it thrice). Some cutscenes have really great comic style, except Thieves in Times, that one is more cartoon style, but it's still cool.

The only difference I think they have (aside from location) are instead of 5 typical stereotypes of villain animals like snake, tarantula, shark, wolf it's actually 3 animals like turtle, hippo and of course a raccoon (who is actually a stereotype for a masked thief). And they only steal from others, because and I quote: "There's no honor, no challenge, no fun in stealing from ordinary people."

Fun fact: 6 years ago there was supposed to be a movie adaptation, but due to Ratchet and Clank movie failure, it never happened. Then there was a tv series idea, but it also ended up forgotten and as for the next game, nothing since Thieves in Times came and that was 9 years ago and it's only a speculation now considering the 20th anniversary is coming this year. But after the success of Sonic The Hedgehog 2 and of course The Bad Guys, being the two of the top movies at the box office in weeks, maybe there is still a chance.

So I am asking you only two questions:

1. Was Sly Cooper one of your inspirations for your movie The Bad Guys? (If you know about this game of course)

2. If there would be a chance of making a movie or tv series adaptation of Sly Cooper, would you take a chance working on it as a director? (Because honestly, there is no other who I would trust with this but you. Like I said, your movie is a great example of how to make a great animated heist movie.)

You don't have to answer that second question if you don't want to. But I still want to know the answer to the first one. Again I apologize for bothering like that, but I assure you this will be the only e-mail you get from me. I just only want to know this. And the rest of my knowledge of Bad Guys production I will learn from a blog on tumblr I just mentioned.

So for final words: Congratulations to your successful movie The Bad Guys and wishing you good luck for future projects like sequel or tv series. You, Aaron Blabey, Damon Ross, Rebecca Huntley, Etan Cohen, all actors, editors, musicians, choreographers, animators, everyone who worked on that movie, you all deserved it.

Sincerely, one of your fans.

P.S. So Long Suckers!🐺😎

🧡💛🧡💛🧡

Please share this to everyone who will get this letter to Mr Perifel himself to see it!

#dreamworks the bad guys #the bad guys dreamworks #dreamworks #the bad guys #mr wolf #sly cooper #sly cooper thieves in time #letter #letter to Pierre Perifel #Pierre Perifel

[alpaca-clouds]

Please understand this about media

*sighs* Really. I want you all to just understand one important thing about media: If you are not reading a self-published book or comic, there is not one person, who made all the decision. Not even with indie auteur movies. Not with TV shows that were dominated by "the one guy".

Sure, there are productions where certain creative voices were clearly dominant. And the less people were in decisive positions (like writer or director) the more power those people tend to hold. But... Unless you are explicitly told by someone who made what decision, you cannot know!

I always see people reading things one way or the other, often completely ignoring how media production works. Media production is a team effort. Even if you have the one writer-director. Because maybe there is a producer saying "This won't fly", maybe there is an actor saying "I won't do the scene like this", maybe there is just somebody saying "I think it works better this way".

Even with books. If they are published by an imprint of any sort, there will be an editor giving their feedback and maybe the publisher says "I love this book, except these three chapters, so redo them." Look, my book had originally had a different finale. But the publisher was of the opinion that it needed more action. So it got more action.

And the more money is involved, the more people will have a say.

Like, just looking over my own fandoms. Three of them (Digimon, Castlevania and Arcane) are game adaptions. So at least the game publisher will always have had some say and be it just an ability to green- or redlight all decisions. Being series with bigger budgets, they also had some other companies giving money. All of which got a say. Even with Castlevania that only had one writer, that writer had no complete creative control over the project. There were others giving their input.

My other fandom, Pirates of the Caribbean, shows this even more, because in the end it s a Disney production and Disney tends to overproduce things. Aka things don't go "three times" through approval, but a hundred times.

So, for the love of god, don't just go and attribute anything to this one person, if you don't have a proper source on them having called that shot. It just ignores the complexity of productions like that.

Yes, you might be right about it. But you also may be wrong about it.

And I am seeing it over and over happening againd and again. Back with Digimon Kakudou got credited with any and all decisions made for the first two seasons, even those of which we know that Masaki or Seki or Hosoda had made them. Same with Tamers, where Konaka gets all the credit, even though he wrote so much about who made what decision. (Like in Digimon Tamers we really know a fuck-ton about the production, because Konaka blogged about it and talked very much about how it was a team-effort.)

Were either creative voices maybe more influencial than those of the other writers or directors? Sure. Might be. But they did not make those decisions alone.

I just hate this, because... it spins a narrative that is so much more simplified than reality. Not only does it devalue the work of everyone else, but it also often tends to make the world so much more stupid, with people spinning productions into stories of "a good and a bad creator", which... Yeah, it's not that easy. It is not.

Please just try to respect the many people who worked on creating you media. You can still critique it, without making it a story about "a bad guy", who made bad decision because he is this or hates that. Just as you can make a critique based on "yeah, some production meddling happened" without blaming a certain person as long as you don't know.

Again: Sure, there are true auteur things, but... look, most media productions are not books or Undertale.

#rant post #media #media criticism #media is a team effort

[pourquoiyyy]

This episode was so good wtf

Like I know it was 1 hour and 27 minutes so they had time, but still, something I don’t like with dramas is that very often an issue drags on for a whole episode or several episodes or a season, but in lovely writer so many things happen in each episode and in this one damn

So much happened???? And it’s very often sadly easy to see where the plot of a drama is going but I keep getting surprised by lovely writer, like they don’t take the easy BL route

This got quite long so…

First, Aey is trying to mess with Gene and Nubsib’s relationships ? Well, yeah, but actually he’s in love with Gene and I really have to watch the episodes again because I really didn’t see that coming, I was so convinced he liked Nubsib??? What clues did I miss?

(also Aey has a very very bad problem with his own self-image and self-worth, he did some very bad things this episode, but this scene of him watching his reflection in his phone, boyyyyyyy, Bruce is a good actor. And like it was a long scene, but it didn’t feel like it, it didn’t feel like time wasted in the episode)

Nubsib is angry at Gene ? Nope, just worried

Aey drugged Nubsib and Gene is trying to find a way to get out this night pUrE? No, my boy Gene is just worried about having sex with Sib for the first time AND actually Sib is somehow just feeling hot and not under any influence, he was just really really into Gene that night

Also so much kissing in this episode?? Like Sib and Gene are in the honeymoon phase of their relationship and they can finally admit to each other how much they love one another. I’m not saying kissing is essential to show in a drama btw, but it sometimes feels in BL dramas that the characters are allowed a quota of kisses per season or episode and once they’ve reached it, it’s DONE, you’ll get a cheek/forehead/hair kiss or a hug, or a high five, but that’s it, and again, it’s not that I absolutely want the characters to kiss, but I can’t help but think sometimes that would it be reality, these people would be kissing right now. So like before Sib’s mum arrived when they were on the couch, the situation they were in really called for a kiss, they were just gazing at each other, excited about this new development in their relationship, but I was in my usual BL mindset of « well, they’ve already kissed enough in this ep » and then they went and surprised me with an another kiss? And not just like a small peck like I’m used to in BL (which again, these aren’t bad, but realistically speaking, this really wasn’t what Gene and Nubsib wanted at that moment) It shouldn’t be surprising, but still it was

AND BAM! The coming out to your parents plot (that is sometimes THE WHOLE ISSUE OF A SEASON, I’m looking at you Korn and Knock) that I didn’t expect in an episode where so much had happened already. So I thought, yeah, they might just pretend they’re not together, we’ll hear some not too good comments from the parents about BL because Gene writes BL novels and Nubsib is acting in one, but nope, they wanted to prove my assumptions wrong again and Gene said he didn’t want to lie to their parents anymore! So yeah, we did hear some homophobia, interesting comments about BL fangirls and how much of a trend BL is right now and it almost seemed like Sib and Gene had changed their minds, but then Gene surprised me AGAIN and they revealed the fact that they’re dating to their parents.

And usually coming out plots drag on which I can understand because coming out to your family isn’t easy, but in lovely writer, in 30 minutes they did so much! Also, in the preview they showed only some parts of this plot carrying on, but I’m pretty sure that like usual with this series, it won’t take the whole episode, maybe the first half of it. And if it does take the whole episode, I won’t be disappointed because I quite like what they’ve done with it already

The double standard of the mothers finding BL cute, but maybe not if it’s their sons. They were saying it would be nice if their sons were actually together, that two grooms in suits would be adorable and that their families would be even closer, but really when Gene and Nubsib admitted they were really together, they went quiet, they cried, they didn’t defend their sons’ relationship to their husbands.

Aaah, the fathers! I expected them to have the worst reactions to Gene’s and Sib’s coming out and also sadly the most « typical »  that we see in series. And they did but not in the usual way it goes. It was really interesting to look at them and see how completely different their reactions were. Nubsib’s father was more about: be careful about my reputation, the reputation of my company and the reputation of this family, and treated his son’s love for Gene like a child’s infatuation that’s gone too far. The authoritative father that won’t even let his son speak and explain, Nubsib could only follow his orders.

While for Gene’s father, it was completely different. He was really really quiet and seemed really suspicious of their relationship before they revealed it and after they did, he just didn’t say a word while his wife kept throwing him worried glances. Then, when it was just their family left, he refused to talk to Gene, just telling him to go to his room until Gene got angry (and again surprised me) saying he was gay (an actual character saying he is gay in a thai bl series, it shouldn’t feel like victory but it does) and loved Nubsib and wouldn’t stop so why couldn’t his dad accept it? Before, AGAIN, dropping a big ass bomb, Gene’s father dated men (or a man) before marrying his mother. As much as this episode surprised me, this shocked me the most lol, I really didn’t expect THAT, but it’d explain Gene’s father’s reaction

Homophobia of course still exists today, but it was even worse when he was young and he never came out and probably chose to leave his partner and lead a « normal » straight life. Seeing your son at around the same age in the same situation but making completely differents choices, choosing to embrace his homosexuality and his love for Nubsib, well, I can understand that he needs a little time to accept this situation and talk to his son

This has become very long and I didn’t think I had that much to say about this episode, but boy I have even more, I loved so much about it. But first:

I HATED that Aey pretended to have drugged Nubsib, especially since he actually wanted to drug Gene and what, rape him??? And then laughing about it? Uh uh boy. Still, I really love Aey’s character, he keeps surprising me and I’m looking forward to his character development.

Otherwise, loved this episode. Gene in particular was really interesting: his conversations with Aey, the way his first time with Sib went (and wow, Sib’s innuendos in this episode, I still can’t get this image of him with his toothbrush in his mouth out of my mind), his bravery coming out to his parents and saying he was gay and forcing his dad to have this conversation and not avoid it.

Loved how supportive the brothers were, trying to tell their parents that society was much more open and accepting nowadays, helping their brothers as well as they could.

On a same note, Gene’s brother getting angry at their father on Gene’s behalf. I loved how their dialogue went about expectations and disappointment in a parent-child relationship, love me some family drama.

Gene and Nubsib holding hands under the table while facing their family’s disapproval

I’m going to stop here because this post is way too long for something probably only me is going to read, but I needed to write my thoughts to get them out of my head

Very raw thoughts btw, I need to reflect on this episode A LOT and rewatch it probably

#lovely writer #i had A LOT of thoughts and needed to get them out #i really didn't expect to love lovely writer as much as i do #but these days it's the series i'm waiting for the most every week #especially since the last 2-3 episodes #very often some bl dramas bore me and i put them on x2 speed #i never do it with lovely writer #it manages to keep me interested all the time #it surprises me a lot (i won't count how many time i've written surprise and again in this post lol) #it never feels boring #the characters are really interesting and not one-dimensional #(except for some maybe like the director or the editor but the series is not over so...) #also i didn't mention it but wtf with tiffy's research??? does she actually like tum but thinks he's gay???? #or she was asking this question about someone else? #i didn't get this #but at least we saw her in this ep #which #always a blessing to see her #how many times*

[elphiej]

Be My Light - Chapter 4:   The Mad Leader

*Genre: Mafia, angst, eventual smut, slow burn

*Warnings: References to violence, minor assault, 

Author’s note: First off, I’d like to send a special Thank You to someone who was a huge inspiration to me and to this story. This is the chapter that really started it all and I was inspired by @bangtan-sonyeonddaeng  ‘s mafia reaction series. She is a fantastic person and was one of the first people I showed this Be My Light to when I was too scared to post it. She is a beautiful soul and wonderful writer. Thank you for the push. 

Another Big thanks to my editor for sticking with me all this time and into the future. And, of course, to all the people who are reading, commenting, and reblogging this. I can’t tell you all how much is means to me. Thank you all and I hope you enjoy this next installment of Be My Light. (P.S. I have a thing for RM in a long trench coat.)

Tag list:  @lolalalooo @bangtan-sonyeonddaeng, @barbikatherine , @mrsfortune1306 , @lovesick-heart0 , @iamnamjoonsbxtch , @deathkat657 , @deeepvibes , @sugamonster22 , @weiinihao, @hemmofluke , @rainbow-zebra-unicorns , @joyfullyobsessed , @elvencantation , 

                                   Chapter 4: The Mad Leader

              You stared at the cell phone clutched in your hand, your mind spinning with so many questions. Who were those people? Why did talking to this ‘RM’ make you feel like something bad was coming? With that deep, serious tone, were they just as dangerous as the man with the cane? And what kind of normal person calls themselves ‘RM’? Agust was already on the edge of interesting and odd as it was. Scanning over the still lit screen, you wondered what other names were in the contact list. Other than ‘God of Destruction’, the last few calls you could see without going through the device belonged to ‘Mochi’, ‘My Favorite’, and ‘Worldwide Pain in my Ass’. Based on those names, you couldn’t begin to imagine who was gonna match those names.

               It was safe to assume that this RM guy was concerned about the man in the suit trying to finish the job. The hospital had a good security team but you thought it best to talk to Doctor- Henry- to see if more could be done. Your hand paused as it went to put the cell phone back with Agust’s things; if RM or any of the odd named voices tried to contact you for an update, they would most likely call that, instead of trying to navigate the hospital switch board. Figuring it was the best option, you placed the phone safely in your scrub’s pocket as you moved to the bedside for one last check on the patient. Agust hadn’t moved again since right before the phone call and was still as could be. The monitors were all reading normally. There was a blood transfusion line in his arm to help replace what he had lost, along with another IV pushing fluids and medication. You adjusted his arm to make it more comfortable for him once he woke up.

               “I’ll be back to check on you as soon as I can,” you said as you fixed his blankets. “Please, try not to do anything until I get back.”

               You slipped out of the room and pulled the door shut behind you. There was an anxious feeling that crept back into your gut, the same one you felt when you had first heard the gun shots ring out from the silence of the construction site. Your mind had so many thoughts and scenarios running through it that you felt overwhelmed. Things like, ‘what if the man with the cane and rough voice came here? Would he shoot his way through the floors until he found Agust? Were you really as safe as you hoped?’ The hospital had been under a few threats but nothing had ever come from those except words. It would be best to stay as cautious as possible. You had too many friends and patients to not take your feelings seriously.

               As you made your way towards your station, you were surprised to see that Henry was already there leaning over the desk with the phone pressed up against his ear. He pulled a pad of paper from the other side of the desk and started scribbling something down as he nodded and spoke in a low tone to whomever was on the other end. That saves me from having to page him, you mused. Henry did a double take towards you when he noticed you out of the corner of his eye. He beaconed you over with an urgent wave of his hand. The calm yet awkward demeanor from earlier had been replaced with a more serious one. Once you were within an arm’s reach of him, he reassured whomever he was talking to that ‘everything will be taken care of’ and hung up.

               “Good,” he said, placing a hand on your shoulder, “I need you to help me.”

               “Henry, about that John Doe patient. I was able to talk to someone close to him. I think we may need to alert the security team about- “

               “I’ve already talked to them. The hospital is going on alert for any suspicious activity entering the hospital. And we are actually moving the patient to one of the private units upstairs. I just got off the phone with the director and we’ve got everything worked out for you so you’ll be safe,” he said over his shoulder as he started walking down the hall.

               “Wait, what does that mean? What do you mean by worked everything out?” You took extra long steps to keep up with his brisk pace.

               “The same person who demanded higher security for that patient requested that you be kept with him as his private staff until otherwise. Which means you’ll be in the secure ward with him in case anything happens. It’s gonna be for the best. You were the first one with him and it’s gonna be more comfortable if he doesn’t have to get acclimated to someone else after all this. Don’t worry, we’ve got it worked out with Jax already.”

               Henry led you back into Agust’s room and made fast work of disconnecting him from the machines that surrounded him. He pulled the IV bags down and placed them on the bed by the still form. Meanwhile, you were frozen at the end of the bed, feeling dizzy from how fast he seemed to expect you to understand what was happening. This wasn’t the first gang related case you had been assigned to since starting at Mercy, nor was it the first gunshot case; why did this sudden change to the routine make you feel ever more nervous? Never had you moved a patient into a secure wing designed from more severe or quarantined patients before just because someone had requested it. Henry called your name to shake you from your thoughts and motioned you to move to the side of the bed as he unlocked the wheels of the gurney and pushed the bed from the wall. As you helped guide it from the room, you couldn’t help but feel the tension grow.

               “So, I am just supposed to stay locked up in some room like a prisoner? And be someone’s private nurse? What about the rest of my patients here? I can’t just leave Amber to tend to them all alone. We are short staffed as it is,” you mentioned as you navigated everyone into the elevator at the end of the hall.

               Henry hit a button and the elevator started to move. He leaned close to look you in the face, his eyes filled with seriousness. “Listen, Y/N, I know this is strange but you just have to trust me. I don’t know all the details but someone particularly important has to be involved to make the director so quick to comply with whatever they asked. But no matter what, your safety is my priority, maybe a bit more than my patients. I’m sure the director thinks that too. Whoever it is must just want to make sure this guy has the best care possible. And when he gets here, he’ll probably want to hear from you what happened. And if whatever gang did this does try anything, I don’t want you to worry because no one is going to get to him or you. Only the director, you, and I will have access to this room or know where he is. Apparently, the man the director talked to said he would have a way to get a hold of you and prove his identity to gain access. I know how you are, Y/N, you are a great person. That’s why you’re so good at what you do. But don’t think that you are inconveniencing anyone; Jax has already rearranged everything and made some calls. I really need you to think about yourself now. And what is best is for you is to do what I am asking and not over think this right now.”

               Henry was being so sincere that you couldn’t find the voice to make any arguments. You gave him a weak nod and tried to take what he said to heart. As Amber had pointed out before, one of your qualities was that you put others well before yourself. Hence, why you were in this predicament. As the doors opened onto the new floor, you promised him that you would try.

               The door opened onto a floor where the more severe, long term patients were kept. This floor could, also, be used for quarantining or the more delicate of patients. At the moment, you knew it had only a few occupants: a coma patient, a patient suffering from extreme burns, and someone from the psych ward that needed more focused attention. To enter this ward, you needed a key card, making this more isolated than your full and frantic floor. Henry commented there was no record that Agust had been moved in any of the files. And if anyone tried to look him up, it would be like he never existed. The person who had called to make all this happen had said he’d contact you and that he and his colleagues were to say they were here to perform community service if asked by anyone else. Apparently, they deemed it as security protection. Henry had you swipe your ID to gain access to the floor and you made your way down the silent hall to the vacant room Henry had staked out for you to stay in. The room was bigger than the one you were used to on your floor. There was a small couch across from where the bed was to go, a private bath off near the entrance, and even a TV in the corner. There was, also, a small recliner near where the head of the gurney was to rest. You imagined you’d be there most of the time. Henry helped you set everything back up in the room and did a quick check on the patient after he was secured in his new residence.

               “Hopefully, he’s gonna wake up a bit soon. He’s reacting well to what I’m doing,” Henry commented as he checked Agust’s pupils constrict as he shined his pen light in them. He gave some instructions about his IV and transfusion processes. He gave you a quick run down of the floor in case you needed anything. “Until he wakes up, I guess feel free to do whatever in here. It can be like a mini vacation. You know, if you ignore all the weird stuff happening. You can watch some TV or order some food. The mysterious man said to spare no expense when it came to our patient or you. I promise by Friday this will be all over and we can go out and talk about nicer things. Okay?”

               Before you could stop yourself, you felt your cheeks get hot and you turned your eyes to the floor. This was not the best place for this, but you knew Henry did it to only ease the anxiety you were feeling. He was almost too perfect. Henry promised to check in once he had finished his rounds as he left from the room and pulled the door shut behind him. You heard the security lock click into place, knowing it would only open from the inside or if you had an ID card. You allowed yourself to drop into the recliner, allowing everything to wash over you. Paranoia was thick in the air as you tried to make sense of everything. Henry was right; whoever these people were they must just want to talk to you and this was easier than scouting the halls. But the thought did very little to chase the nervousness away. Your hands started to rub together out of tension, squeezing your fingers, cracking your knuckles one by one with your thumbs. You took a few deep breaths as you tried to force yourself out of the impending panic. Your eyes looked over at the bed. You tried to remind yourself that you needed to keep it together and be strong for him. Then your eyes landed on his hand. You remembered when you were hiding behind the counter when the man with the cane was getting closer and closer. And when Agust had reached over and squeezed your hand. In that moment, he gave you reassurance with such a small gesture, not thinking of himself. You remembered how genuine it felt. It’d be nice if you could do that now, you thought with a weak smile.

               Instead, you settled for forcing yourself to think of something else. You read through his charts, tapped through some news on your phone, and tried to people watch out the window behind the couch. The afternoon sun had started making its way towards the horizon; how quickly the day had ended up flying by. You had decided against turning on the television for now, thinking how awkward it would be for him to wake up to you watching some trash TV show. You tried walking around the room to get a sense of where you’d be staying for the foreseeable future. But all of that only killed twenty minutes and you were still stir-crazy. There wasn’t much you could do for Agust at the moment, except allow him to rest without you trying to hold his hand or anything else.

               Suddenly, there was a buzzing in your pocket; it was Agust’s phone. You were a bit ashamed at how quickly you reached for it. There was a new text message. It was from a new named contact: Sunshine. The preview of the message said, ‘To Miss Nurse’, making your assumption that the people on the other end would have expected you to keep the phone on you correct. And since it was addressed to you, you didn’t feel too bad about opening the phone again. You swiped open the text and tried not to scroll anywhere higher into their previous chats.

-          Sunshine: To Miss Nurse. if you see this, please take good care of our Hyung. And if he gives you any trouble, tell him I said to behave. RM should be almost there. He tends to speed.  

               There were a couple silly emojis next to it that made you smile. Surely, they can’t be bad people if this is how they communicate. They must be close friends. Though, you still wondered how they had gotten the director to do all this. Maybe there was someone else doing all of this? You shook your head and typed a quick message back, so not to have them worry.

-          I’ll take good care of him. That’s my job.

You really hoped Agust didn’t mind you messing with his phone. Though, you figured it was better to ask for forgiveness than permission in this scenario. There was no response which made you think that it was all he needed at the time. Gazing at the clock on the phone, you had wasted thirty minutes in the room so far. You thought of your backpack in the locker room a few floors down and some of your things at your stations that you could pass the time with. Since Agust was secure here, you thought it may be a good idea to gather some things to help you waste time until this RM shows up. It was unlikely that Agust was going to wake up yet, and you could be fast so he wouldn’t be alone for long. You slipped the phone back into your pocket and rose from the chair, heading for the door. You cast one more look at the still figure in the bed before dimming the lights and pulled the door shut behind you.

               You set off at a brisk pace for the elevator and took it down a few levels to where the staff locker room was kept. You raced in, pulled your bag from your locker, and left before anyone noticed you. You were sure since the director had put the whole hospital on alert that everyone was making rounds to keep eyes everywhere. You hoped grabbing your stuff from your station was just as easy; you weren’t sure about how to explain why you had suddenly deserted your station. Amber wasn’t there but you could hear her and Jax talking loudly from a back room. You wanted to talk to your best friend, to help ease some nerves and have her tell you exactly what you needed to hear. But you didn’t want to wait around or take her away from her new workload. You pulled open the drawer where you kept some personal items, incase of slower work days, and shoved them into your bag. You froze when your fingers hit against something that you knew, instantly, should not be in your bag. Peering into the opening, your eyes locked onto a metallic, black, studded object that you had seen earlier that morning.  

              The gun Agust had placed in your hand.

             How did that get in there? You didn’t remember grabbing it unless it had happened in the chaos of the EMTs and police rushing to assess the situation. Well, if you weren’t already anxious, this just made it worse. Let’s just add this to the ever-growing list of stupid things I’ve done today, you berated yourself. You brought a potentially loaded gun into a hospital. You needed to get back up to the room and get this out of your possession. Maybe when this RM got there, he could take it from you. You pulled the bag shut and slugged it over your shoulder, trying hard not to think about it.

            You moved away from the desk and down the hall towards the elevator. But as you stepped into the silent hall with all the doors closed, one was not closed as it had been when you left; the room where Agust had been. And there was someone looking inside. There was a man, tall and stocky, and dressed in a simple navy uniform. He wasn’t a part of the hospital staff and you didn’t think he was there to clean the room with the lights still off. Trying to stay as unnoticed as you could, you took longer strides towards the end. As you passed behind him, you peered beyond him into the pitch blackness of the room to just make out another figure lurking there. He wasn’t dressed in the same way as the man in the door. He was in darker colors that you couldn’t make out and wore what looked like a fedora on his head. What caught your attention as you passed, was the small peek of icy, blue hairs that were just visible on the side. A deep grumble that sounded from the room made your breath catch in your throat, and made you stop in your tracks. It sounded so familiar to the sadistic voice from this morning. The man with the cane had gotten into the hospital?! How, they upped security measures, hadn’t they? Maybe it was your imagination playing with you with all the stress. Not wanting to stick around to figure out if you were right, you tried to get away before they had noticed you.

            But, sadly, you weren’t that lucky.

           “Excuse me, nurse. Perhaps you can help me.”

           You felt your whole body stiffen as the voice was all to clearly the one that had stalked you from beyond the counter. The voice that dripped with crazed malice and venom as he called out for Agust, that had taunted and tried to lure him out. The voice that you were sure would haunt your dreams. It was the man with the cane, though he didn’t have it now. As you turned, he looked nothing like the half-crazed man yelling and destroying things around him. He looked almost normal, save for the fake smile he had plastered across his lips. He was no longer dressed in the light blue suit and fur coat you had caught a glimpse behind the counter, but in a simple dark blazer and trousers. The man who lingered in the doorway had come to stand next to him as they walked up to you, dressed in a police uniform. His uniform cap was pulled low to obscure his face, though you could see bruising and swelling through the shadows. Both of them gave a slight bow to you.

           “Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Inspector Taop, this is officer Chen. We are here following up on a patient that was supposed to be brought here. I’ve been looking everywhere, but no one has an answer for me whether he is here or not. And I haven’t seen a single worker on this floor.”

           He had never seen you at the scene so you knew he didn’t recognize you, or could see that you didn’t believe anything that was coming out of his mouth. That would help you, you decided. You took a deep breath and tried to hide the fear and nervousness. Just act normal. Try to stall until someone comes around.

           “Sorry, officer, we’re a bit understaffed as it is. What can I help you with?”

           “I’m looking for a patient that was brought here. Gunshot victim, a young man, brought in this morning?”

           “Can you be a bit more specific? We are a hospital. Do you know how many young men we have come in here with some kind of bullet wound? I had six this month.”

           You saw the smile slip and irritation rise in those cold eyes. He cleared his throat, trying to hold on to his polite composure. “This one would have come in this morning. There was a shooting downtown. He would have had multiple gunshot wounds. One nurse said he was brought in by ambulance this morning, but then another said that they found no record of him. And the last person I talked to sent me here. Please, this is very important.”

           “Can I see your badge, sir?” He looked completely off guard by the question. You, also, seemed confused. It had just jumped out of your mouth before you realized it. But it seemed like the right thing to ask. You continued, “There’s been a threat made to the hospital, you see, and I need to make sure that everything is in order. I would get in trouble if I gave such information about any patient to an imposter.”

           You could see the wheels in his head turning. But you didn’t expect him to nod his head, understandingly, and reach into his pocket to hand you a leather, bifold wallet. Was this psycho really a police officer? How could someone so vile be in law enforcement? You thought back to what little memories of your father that you had lingering in the back of your mind and couldn’t begin to imagine him doing anything like what this man had done, no matter how bad of a criminal they were. Before you could think, your body seemed to act on it’s own again and opened the wallet and your eyes started to dance across the metal shield. You weren’t entirely sure what you were looking for at first. Until your eyes caught it and something clicked in your mind. It was a fake, but an exceptionally good fake. Anyone else would have just taken it at face value but something in your mind flashed and screamed that this was a fake like the smile still on the ‘inspector’s’ face. In the reaches of your memory, you remembered running your fingers over your father’s badge, memorizing every detail. And you still did that when you were stressed out; you still had his badge and it was currently in the front pocket of your bag. And you seemed to recall your father teaching you how to identify a real badge from others.

           A sudden anger took hold of you that seemed to spur on some brave part of you. You closed the wallet and handed it back to him, keeping your face neutral to hide that you were even more sure of his act. Maybe it was the dishonor to officers like your father, or that he was trying to get to the boy you had risked a lot to save. And your hard work was not going to waste. “I’m sorry officer. But like I said, we have a few patients that could fit your description. None on this floor at all. And if the other nurses said they have no record of him, I’m not sure what I can do for you. Besides that, if we did have a patient come in with multiple gunshot wounds, I imagine that they’d need extensive surgery and wouldn’t be conscious to answer any questions you could have. And with no guardian to act in their place until they are awake to consent to a line of questioning about a traumatic experience, I can’t let you go any further. You should know that, Officer.”

           The smile was wiped from the man’s face. The uniformed man’s eyes got wide at your declaration and they shifted towards his leader in panic. Taop, or whatever his real name was, straightened up and took a step towards you. He towered over you and the energy radiating from him would have intimidated you into submission. Just like with your ex. But you needed to protect Agust. In any case, all you needed to do was scream and someone would be alerted. There wasn’t much this asshole could accomplish without being found out. But he continued to advance until he backed you up against the wall. Even still, you never broke eye contact with him.

           “I don’t think you understand the situation of this, little girl,” he said, rage tittering on the edge of his voice. “There are some really dangerous people and it would be a shame if you got caught in the crossfires. It’s in your best interest to answer my questions and tell me what I need to know.”

           “Then bring a warrant,” you challenged.

           His hand collided with the wall next to your head, making you jump. His face was so close to yours now, and there was the crazed man you remembered from this morning. Your heart was in your ears. He, suddenly, took a deep inhale then another before tilting his head to the side. “What a brave little girl. Tell me, where were you this morning? Something tells me you may be exactly who I need to talk to.”

           “Hey, back off her!”

           Both you and the man turned to look down the hall towards the elevator towards the source of the deep voice that had interrupted the line of questioning. The doors of the elevator were opened and from them stepped a young man with platinum white hair. His eyes were haunting and strong, like a dragon woken from his peace. He was exceptionally tall, taking long strides towards the scene. You couldn’t help but let your eyes take in the man who was coming to your rescue. Dressed in a dark trouser and a white buttoned up shirt gave him a classic handsomeness, and a long black coat with a hood drawn up that accentuated his height. As he approached, he slid the hood down and swiped his hand up to push the stray white hairs from his face. If you weren’t terrified, you would have appreciated how handsome he was. You glanced back at the man caging you; his body tensed as the newcomer walked up but his face never showed.

           He let out a sigh and a small smile reappeared, but it was not the same he had tried to charm you with. It was one of arrogance.  “Ah, Mr. Kim,” the inspector said, not moving from his position, “how nice of you to drop in.”

          “You’ve got some nerve,” the handsome newcomer said, his tone low and smooth. 

          “What for? Being too formal? Do you not like me using your surname? I’m not sure which name you prefer now; you change names so often, it’s hard to keep up after all this time.”

          “You’re one to talk. What name are you going by now, officer? Here to investigate a fraud? Or are you here to put yourself into more trouble?”

          “Such a negative attitude. Officer Chen and I are here on official business,” the detective flashed his badge at the so named Mr. Kim. “And this nice young lady was willing to help me out with some information. Isn’t that right, Little Girl?”

          “It sure doesn’t look that way coming from the elevator. I think you need to take a step back,” Mr. Kim ordered with a strong but suggestive tone that made you question what kind of power someone as young looking as him could possess.

          The fake detective made no sign that he was planning on heeding the newcomer’s words to move from your personal space. His eyes shifted from Mr. Kim back to you. His stare bore into you sharper than claws and made your breath catch. You weren’t sure if he was trying to scare you into agreeing with him or just threaten you. But Mr. Kim was having none of that; he gave the older man’s shoulder a hard shove and wedged himself in the space between you to keep you away from the other man. Mr. Kim reached a hand behind him and placed it on your arm, to keep you secure behind him and to give you some reassurance that he was not going to hurt you. You couldn’t help yourself, as you fisted your hands into the back of his coat and peered around his massive frame.

          “You always have to play savior, don’t you Rapmon?” The way he had said the name made it seem like he was trying to strike a nerve in Mr. Kim. But the other man gave no sign that he was bothered. “You make it seem like I was doing something unseemly to her. You and your broken boy scouts always turn things difficult. Speaking of, where are the others? Maybe they could answer some questions for me. There’s one in particular I’m interested in seeing. I’m checking up on a victim from a shooting downtown. Just making sure he’s doing alright.”

          “You’re really committed to this bit, aren’t you Choi? Oh, sorry- what name are you going by today? It’s so hard to keep track, isn’t that what you said?” Mr. Kim tilted his head to the side, eyes twinkling with a mischievous shine.

          “What a nuisance you are. I’m just trying to get information to make sure things go well. Though come to think of it, your boys may not know much. Word was that the victim was all alone. Left all by themselves, bleeding and hurt in such a dangerous situation. What kind of friends would let someone knowingly go into that situation alone? Now, I’d really like to finish my conversation with the little lady, Rapmon.” When Choi, as you figured his name actually was, took a step towards you, Mr. Kim moved the both of you to keep you behind him and further away from the other. “Well, since you seem hellbent on keeping me from doing something so simple, I could always ask you. Though to be honest, your being here may have answered my questions.”

          “My being here answers nothing,” Mr. Kim challenged. “Unlike you, I am here to do good for the community. And it’s a good thing I came by when I did. You’re already on thin ice after all the trouble you’ve caused. Imagine what would happen if you caused any problems while on Hallowed Ground. If you were to hurt anyone staying or working here, you would have more than my family looking for you. The rest of the Families would be looking to teach you a lesson. Imagine what most of them will think when they hear about the deceit you pulled this morning. After what I witnessed, you can be sure I’ll have eyes monitoring this place. You will not go against the Accords.”

          “Don’t you lecture me about the Accords, you psycho. I’ve been around just as long as they have and lived them. I taught them to you.”

          “And yet, you only follow them when they suit you. Just like your leader and his before him. But things are different now. They are gone, and your hold is slipping. I have enough pull now to ensure Accords are followed. And if you want to make a further spectacle of yourself, I’ll gladly show you I’m not that kid anymore that you ordered around. You saw what my boys can do when pushed. Try me.”

          Choi started to laugh, eyes shining in disbelief at the younger bossing him around. As you peered around Mr. Kim’s frame, you saw him go to say something to officer Chen, but couldn’t form the word. He raised his hand towards the white-haired man, but let it drop with a growl. Whatever look was set upon the elder made him rethink his next move. He settled for raising his hands in a surrender and jerking his head towards his companion to tell him they were leaving. It surprised you that he was giving up so easily after how he had acted towards you. You weren’t sure what Mr. Kim meant by accords and families, but it was more than obvious that it meant something to them. Glancing up at your protector, his face remained locked in the same stern and serious mask he had when he had appeared. His eyes, perfectly lined and accentuated with makeup that only made him more intriguing, followed the pair as they turned down the hall.

          But before they could get too far, Choi stopped. He turned enough to gaze at the two of you over his shoulder, the dark and manic gleam from that morning flashing like a warning sign. He chuckled before his teasing and taunting voice that had called out to Agust filled the hall like glass shattering. “Look at how far our little maniac has come. Really living up to the title of Mad Leader, aren’t you? He thinks he’s so big and strong that he can just order me around and act like a knight in shining armor to the weak. The Mad Leader’s trying so hard to put up a front, to hide who he is, to hide the other side of the looking glass. But lest he forget, I know things he wouldn’t want others to know. And I seem to recall,” Choi turned fully around and took a full stride back towards Mr. Kim, “you had an issue with places like this. You don’t enjoy being here. Are you falling down the rabbit hole? You even have an Alice this time it would seem. So tell me, Mad Leader, are the walls closing in on you yet? Are you feeling anxious?”

          You could feel Mr. Kim tense up at the name ‘Mad Leader’ each time Choi said it. He took a deep breath, trying to ground himself. He gave you a polite push away from him before fixing Choi with a glare that made officer Chen startle. You could almost feel the air change as he stepped up to be nose to nose with the thug.

          “Since you can’t seem to remember my name, asshole, let me spell it out for you. It’s RM, R to the M. And I’m a motherfucking monster. Keep pushing me. I dare you. You hurt one of my boys. You better pray that he makes it out of all this ok. Or you’ll see just how ‘mad’ I can get.”

          Chen seemed to realize that something bad was building as he took hold of his superior and pulled him away from RM, newly identified. Choi kept the taunting smile spread across his lips as he allowed Chen to lead him away. Before he got too far, he looked over at you and gave a nod, “We’ll be in touch, Little Girl.” And then he disappeared from the floor, leaving you in the presence of RM. You can’t say you had expected this person to belong to the voice on the other end of the phone, but it would seem like that was the theme of the day. The tall man took a few deep breaths and ran his hand through his white hair before turning back to you. The serious mask he had worn had slipped away and was more approachable. He straightened his clothes before returning to your side.

          “I’m sorry you had to see that,” he said, “But he shouldn’t be back. He talks a good game but he knows when he’s out done. Did he hurt you?”

          You shook your head. “I can’t believe he got in. The hospital is on lock down.”

          “Well, he’s been around a while. He has his ways. Now that he’s gone, I was hoping you could help me. I’m looking for a nurse called Y/N.” You locked eyes with him and gave him a nod of affirmation. He gave you a smile, showing off a pair of dimples in his cheeks that made him much more innocent and sweeter than the man who had gone nose to nose with the monstrous thug. “That’s a coincidence. Nice to meet you. Can you show me where to go?”

          “Prove that you’re who you say you are,” you said, taking a step away from him. Despite that you were sure he was the one you had talked to, it seemed like nothing was safe. He looked at you for a moment, before coming to a conclusion. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a cell phone before letting his finger glide across the screen. A moment later, Agust phone sounded off in your pocket. He glanced over at you with a bemused look as you pulled the phone out and saw the screen lit up with a notification.

-          God of Destruction: It’s me.

          “Sorry,” you said, feeling embarrassed by your sudden suspicion, “but after that guy flashed a fake police badge at me, I just wanted to be sure. Thank you for coming and for helping me. Are you Agust’s brother or a friend?”

          RM’s eyes narrowed when he heard you say Agust and gave you a strange look. His eyes seemed to dance about you, as if he was trying to figure something out. But as quickly as it appeared, the look disappeared and he smiled again. “We usually call him Suga. Only people who don’t like him call him Agust. I don’t think he’d want you calling him that. Can we go see him now? We’ve been worried about him.” You nodded and motioned him to follow you back to the elevator. As you waited for the doors to reopen, he leaned over and whispered, “Don’t worry, I won’t tell Hyung you had his phone.”

          “What? Does he have some embarrassing things on here,” you joked.

          “Maybe,” came the reply and heard RM chuckle as he allowed you to step into the elevator.

          You hit the button for the floor that they moved Agu- Suga to, the doors slid shut, and the lift jolted to a start. As the sound of the mechanisms filled the space, you caught a glimpse of the tall man flinch. It seemed odd, seeing as he had just faced off against the most frightening person you had ever seen. The taunting words he had said to RM before leaving came to mind, about not liking it in a hospital. It wasn’t uncommon for people to have bad experiences related to hospitals, so you tried to brush it off. Once you had made it to the secure floor, you led him down the hall. You explained that the floor was only accessible to a few people and how they had followed the directions as specified to the director. The entire time, RM listened very intently, eyes never leaving you. He was the picture of professionalism and sincerity. You swiped the two of you into the ward, and he held the door open for you as you led him down the hall to the room. As you neared the room, you wondered if you were going to survive the present of two very handsome men. Hopefully, the rest of his friends that you heard over the phone were somewhat average.

          As you both entered the room, RM came to a stop in the threshold of the door, his eyes staring at the bed. You could see the worry and panic that you had heard over the phone slip across his face. You reached out and touched his arm. He looked at you with an almost innocent gaze, like he was questioning if it was alright to get closer. You gave him a nod and he was beside his friend in a flash. He looked as if he was debating to reach out to Suga, as if he were made of glass, but settled for taking hold of his hand. RM let out a breath and looked relieved to have finally seen his friend. From your place at the edge of the room, you could see how much one meant to the other and all worries about them being as bad as Choi disappeared.

          “Is he going to be ok? What did they do to him,” RM asked, never taking his eyes off his companion.

          “Dr. Na took good care of him,” you said, reaching for the file at the end of the bed. “He was shot twice, once in the shoulder and on his left side. The gunshot wound on his side appeared to be at close range and the bullet went through. Thankfully, there wasn’t much damage done. The bullet was lodged in his shoulder, but Dr. Na was able to remove it and mend up some of the damage. We’ll know more when he wakes up, but he should have full range of motion after some rest. He, also, has some bruised ribs and a slight concussion. Along with bruising and defensive wounds pretty much everywhere. He, also, lost a lot of blood. He’s in the middle of a transfusion now. But he is responding well to everything and we believe he should be waking up soon. With enough care, patience, and support, he should make a full recovery in no time. Which is amazing; when I found him, I was worried with how much blood he had lost that he may have had a harder road to recovery.”

          RM flicked his eyes over to you. “You found him?”

          “They must not have told you. I was on my way to work when I heard the gunshots. I was the first to find him and get him to safety.”

          RM looked like he wanted to ask more questions, when a soft groan came from the bed and drew the attention. Suga took in a deep breath and his body shifted as if fighting to wake and identify the voices. After a tense moment, his body relaxed and his eyes opened slightly. From the edge of the bed, you could see the glazed and shiny effects of the medication still trying to hold him in the state of unconsciousness, and realized he may not fully be aware of what is happening. But you were sure the presence of RM had drawn him out enough to give them a sign that he was okay. RM called out to his hyung softly, drawing Suga’s attention as he gazed about the room.

          “Hyung, hey, can you hear me?”

          Suga’s eyes fully landed on RM. It seemed as if he was fighting his way to recognition before he gave a small, drugged smile back. “Joon,” his voice sounded exhausted and stained.

          RM laughed. “Yeah, Hyung, it’s me. You’re gonna be okay. You’re safe.”

          “Joonie, I think I’m dead. I saw an angel.”

          The whitehaired man reached out and ran his fingers, gently, through his friend’s hair. “No, Hyung, you’re only tired. That bastard messed you up but you’re gonna be alright now. Why don’t you go back to sleep? The boys and I will be here when you wake up.”

          “Oh,” Suga said, almost sounding disappointed as the drugs started to drag him back to oblivion, “too bad. It was a pretty angel. Prettier than Jiminie and Hyungie combined. But don’t tell them I said that.” And just as fast as he woke, Suga went silent and still again.

#bts fanfic #bts fic #bts imagines #bts mafia au #bts mafia fic #yoongi x reader #bangtan boys #ot7 x reader #min yoongi #kim namjoon #kim seokjin #jung hoseok #park jimin #kim taehyung #jeon jungguk #jeon jungkook #bangtan fic #bemylight #elphiej #badassNamjoon

[latibulesims]

Hey Lati!

I’m so sorry to press you for more information, but I’m so fascinated by your filming process and I have some additional questions if that’s okay. Specifically around your sets that are just individual rooms, are these just multiple secular room sets on one lot, or do you use a different lot for each set? Like with the River’s house when any family member is coming downstairs, is Tresor or Raign’s room not on that lot? The living room and kitchen? Lol I’m just so fascinated by this if that’s the case, and if so it’s extremely impressive because they look like they all could actually be one complete set. Sorry if this makes zero sense, I’ve just never thought to try this and now I really want to! ☺️ Thanks so much!

Haha no you make total sense!! First of all thank you for watching my series, and don't worry at all about asking questions! I know filming with The Sims 2 can be difficult bc of how often it crashes and its loading time, so any tips I can give to help the game crash less, im happy to share 💖

The sets are actually on different lots entirely! So, when Tresor "comes downstairs", or the characters go from the living room to the kitchen, I load an entirely new lot! I think the only exception I make is with bathrooms because they're so tiny haha, but any time you see the characters going from one room to the other, it's usually a different lot all together. :')

It may sound exhausting to some, having to jump from one lot to another, but over the years (I've been doing this since 2017, at least!) I've managed some tips that help, for those that are interested:

1) I make multiple sims of the same character, so that every sim belongs to every lot! So, if Tresor for example needs to be in her bedroom, the living room and Simons bar within the same episode, I create 3 Tresors (TresorBED, TresorLIVING, TresorBAR), and that way I don't have to move her around.

I should also note that I change neighborhoods every episode (more on that in tip #3), so it might sound like a lot of sims over the episodes but really it's usually just 3 versions of the same character in one neighborhood at a time.

You might find it's easier to just move the sims from one lot to the other, but in my experience moving the sims around (or using the tombstone to extract them) always ends up crashing my game so this is a really good way to avoid it all together!

2) I don't film chronologically, but by sets! This is my #1 tip. I basically gather up all the scenes I have in 1 set and I film them. That way i dont have to go back and forth between lots, instead I just finish off all the scenes I need using a lot and move on to the next! Sometimes a set has so many scenes I end up filming in one set for weeks at a time (usually Simons bar, haha, that S2E1 Christmas episode needed like 3 sets (Simons bar, Simons living room, The Rivers living room), and I spent two months just filming in Simons bar).

The only time I won't recommend this, is when you havent yet found your own style. Then you might risk something like this happening: You're just starting to film, and you have the 1st and last scene in the episode in the same set. So, you film them both. Then you film a couple more scenes after that, and then you reach the final set and by then your filming skills have changed (if you haven't found your style and take months filming an episode - which is completely valid, BTW - this could mean a drastic change). Then, scene #1 (which you filmed at the very beginning) could have a completely different filming style than scene #2 (which you filmed at the very end), and so on. You wouldn't want that.

I had something like that happen to me, where I discovered reshade mid-filming an episode, so the scenes I filmed at the beginning of the episode didnt have it, and then the scenes I filmed at the end did it. It made the epsiode look incosistent, which is something I don't really care about (and neither do my viewers, really), but you might so letting you know as a heads up! Some of these tips do compromise the "professionalism" of the episodes, but it's how i manage to film and pop out episodes with (relative) quickness :').

Thats why for many reasons, including should you want to film by set instead of chronologically, I suggest you find your style before filming an episode or starting a series all together. This can be done through creating small machinimas, filming tests, music videos, etc. Take it from someone who can't even handle sitting through the first 8 episodes of my own series because of how much my style back then. The way it drastically changed from one episode to another irks me so much! 😅

3) And this is my most controversial one, LOL, but I always build sets + new neighborhoods from scratch with every episode. As I mentioned above, I change neighborhoods with every episode because, in my experience, neighborhoods get corrupt with time so starting with a fresh neighborhood every episode helps avoid crashing. Previously, neighborhoods would get so corrupt, they'd stop loading at all mid-filming an episode, so im forced to interrupt my filming streak and build the sets and characters all together which absolutely wrecks any motivation I have to film afterwards. Once, this happened mid-filming a scene and so I had to rebuild, and let me tell you: Theres a difference between sets looking a bit different because I had to rebuild between episodes, and sets looking different within the same scene. At least when you rebuild the set with every new episode, you can blame minor changes on the fact that time passed from one episode to the other.

Also: I make sure to build all the sets I need for the episode before I start filming, because I dont want anything to interrupt my filming once I start it. If Im forced to build when I'm motivated to film, I end up losing that motivation in the time I spend building, if that makes sense. As u probably already know as a machinima maker, we do the work that is usually required of a team (writer, director, editor, and also stylist and set designers), so I like to do things one at a time so I can have a clear understanding of my schedule and timetable. So, I dedicate 2 days to style all the sims, a week or so to build all the sets, usually months to film the episode, then another week to edit and audio edit. I try my best not to have all of those parts overlapping, otherwise it gets too overwhelming.

The reason I rebuild from scratch, as opposed to just extracting the lot and installing it in a new neighborhood is because, again, I prefer a fresh start and have found that lots are less likely to get corrupt if they're "new". A lot of people think im crazy for it LOL, or that it's a colossal waste of time, and maybe it is! But it's the process that works best for me, and I end up filming really fast with much less crashing and hiccups because of it!

Hope that helps!!! :') Let me know if you have any other questions about my filming process or any other tips 💖💖💖 I'd love to help!

#latips #ask lati #the sims 2

[elgaberino-mcoc]

JUBILEE

Jubilation Lee

Update Upon Release

SUCCESS! Jubilee’s Champion Spotlight has been published for January 2021. Thanks for your support, Summoners!

FINAL MCOC WISHLIST RANK: #10 most-wanted champ

CHAMPION SPOTLIGHT https://playcontestofchampions.com/champion-spotlight-jubilee/

EDITOR’S REVIEW The community asked for a lot of things for this champ, and MCOC came through. Flavor: perfect. Bright pink, yellow, and blue with the proper colored fireworks animations, and a jubilant, youthful attitude. Her mechanics are similar to the way the community envisioned. Things we got right: energy basic attacks, a variety of non-damaging utility debuffs, Prowess. Differences: speculation that she might be a plasma champ, like Havok, was empty: the word “plasmoids” comes up in her Spotlight, but it is apparently only for flavor. Instead her energy plasma damage gives her alternating Shock and Incinerate DOT debuffs. ImagineJim’s idea for persistent charges did not end up in the build, but the persistence of her pre-fight mode selection isn’t totally dissimilar. It is not known whether anyone in the community expected a mode-switching champ. My ideas for light-based debuffs like Dazzle or Fleeting Blindness didn’t happen. My thought she might reduce the effectiveness of her opponent was exactly right, including my suggestion she would reduce Accuracy, which she does by placing Concussion. But she also does it through Suppression (combat power dampening), Slow (disabling Evade and Unstoppable), and perhaps most appropriately Taunt (increasing Special chance). ImagineJim’s idea, that she could consume her Prowess effects came true, but she does it to increase S3 damage, not to Power Gain, as Jim supposed. The “Slippery Mind” trivia piece, that Jubilee is telepath resistant or immune, slipped through the cracks. There’s nothing about Telepathy immunity or resistance in her Spotlight.

ORIGINAL MCOC WISHLIST POLL (RANKER.COM) DESCRIPTION Probable Class: Mutant (1980s Classic) and/or Mystic (Vampire); #X-Men; Plasma-light blasts look like fireworks. Youthful, exuberant animations. Brightness/blinding/flashbang/dazzle. Telepathy immune.

FULL DESCRIPTION OF PAST SPECULATIONS

High-Level Champ Idea

A playable Jubilee in Marvel Contest of Champions would be Mutant Class. While she has been at times depowered and became a vampire, she’s quintessentially a mutant character. 

There are few more colorful, iconic looks among the X-Men than that of Jubilee, with her bright fuchsia accents and electric canary yellow trench coat matching the X-Men logo. She would likely have brightly colorful character design and fireworks attacks, with body language that expresses exuberance and youthful style. 

In terms of utility, Summoners would expect a myriad of Energy Damage options, and maybe some kind of sight impairment, Distraction, or Plasma.

In terms of synergies, she should pair up with Wolverine and the 1990s X-Men blue team. Other sparkly-shiny female champs could include Dazzler and Karolina Dean.

Jubilee in Other Games

She’s been in many games, including most recently

Marvel Super War, Marvel Puzzle Quest, and Marvel Future Fight. Update December 2020: she has been teased for Marvel Strike Force, which means she’s now in all the major Marvel mobile games except for MCOC. She was also in the Marvel mobile deck-building games Marvel: War of Heroes and X-Men: Battle of the Atom, and games on other platforms including Marvel Heroes, X-Men Legends and Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes (1998).

Jubilee and Summoners

She enjoys more than 100 mentions in the Wishlist 3.0 thread on the message boards. She has more than 900 upvotes on the MCOC Wishlist Poll on Ranker, having lived in the top 15-20 on that list for a very long time.

Jubilee is also a fond favorite of the UMCOC Podcast’s celeb host, Dragon, and a favorite of several other well-known content creators. MCOC Futurism Society member TheRealApoc reacted to the announcement in 2020 of The Summoner’s Choice Champion Vote event: “the champion that should be on that poll is for my @McocSociety team member @umcoc_Dragon . . . is Jubilee!” Profile image creator Universal Soldier has also done a piece or two based on the idea of an MCOC Jubilee.

How Summoners Imagine a Jubilee Kit

Summoner HankSpector suggested some synergies here. 

The original write up by Other MCOC Gabe, from the MCOC Wishlist Poll, was as follows: 

she is an energy-output champ with really fun implications for game animation: fireworks. She can Blind opponents with harmless but bright flashes, or detonate explosions to cause serious Armor Break and Energy Damage. True to the comics, her mind would also be Immune to telepathy.

Content creator ImagineJim, who makes very popular and widely-circulated fan builds of different characters, finally posted his build on June 14, 2020. The editor of this blog, Other MCOC Gabe, collaborated on the build. This is the fan build Jim posted:

In a Theory Thursday feature in June 2020, Other MCOC Gabe tweeted a fan idea for a brightness debuff that Kabam could call “Dazzle,” or something similar, and listed Jubilee among future champs (such as Living Laser, Monica Rambeau, Moonstone, and obviously Dazzler) who could introduce this debuff.

NEWS

Keep an eye out for other blog entries focusing on Jubilee variants, such as her vampire and Tech-class variants.

January 4, 2020: Jubilee’s Champion Spotlight has been published.

December 28, 2020: the official MCOC Twitter account has teased Jubilee for January 2021, announcing her in the v29.2 release notes!

December 3, 2020, Jubilee was teased by Marvel Strike Force’s Twitter account. Her release in MSF would leave MCOC as the only major Marvel mobile game still not featuring Jubilee.

September 29, 2020, Jubilee has broken back into the top 10 on the MCOC Wishlist Poll on Ranker.

On March 6, 2020, content creator umcoc_Dragon, who helped design the 2020 International Women’s Day Boss Rush event, said that “If Jubilee had been an option? She would have been selected!”

On February 25, 2020, Gabe said that of imaginejim’s three 36-character grids, “about 15 of those are in our plans one way or another for the next couple of years.” He did not clarify how many of those 15 were from the original 36-character #jimgrid. (I hashtagged the mystery champs the #mcocjim15.)

On February 14, 2020, Kabam’s creative director Gabriel Frizzera commented of Twitter-user imaginejim’s grid of 36 requested characters (which I afterward hashtagged the #jimgrid for reference, and which included Jubilee), that “a bunch of those” were planned for champ development.

#jubilee #blind #x men #x men the animated series #dazzle #imaginejim #JimGrid #mcocjim15 #Plasma #brightness #light #Asian #Asian female #Chinese #mcoc class mutant #character spotlight

[sineala]

The Old Guard

This post comes to you courtesy of the generous support of one of my Patreon patrons, who wanted to know what I thought of The Old Guard. This post contains some spoilers for both the movie and the comics.

So, a few days after it came out, my wife and I watched The Old Guard on Netflix. Tumblr had said a bunch of good things about it, and both of us basically cut our fannish teeth on Highlander fandom so we already had an automatic buy-in for a story about immortals. I knew it was based on a comic by Greg Rucka, but I had not, at the time, read the comic, although I am now reading it in order to write this post.

The premise of the film is as follows: a four-person team of immortals (Andy, Joe, Nicky, and Booker) makes a living hiring themselves out as mercenaries, fighting for causes that they believe are right. They are successful at this basically because their grasp of tactics appears to be (1) die, followed by (2) come back to life and (3) murder your attackers who are no longer paying attention to you because they think you're dead. Honestly, at this point, you wouldn't really need to be very good at the actual fighting part, I would think, but the film establishes that all of them are -- especially Charlize Theron as Andy -- because presumably it wants you to watch action sequences of everyone being badass, which they are. So, yeah. They take all the good-guy mercenary jobs that no one else can do because it would kill them, which is not a problem for them!

Anyway! The group's routine is interrupted by two major events: the discovery of Nile Freeman, a new immortal, who is a Marine serving in Afghanistan who survives getting murdered; and also the fact that one of their employers, Copley (played by Chiwetel Eijofor, whom you may remember as Mordo in Doctor Strange) has sold them out to the movie's Actual Villain, a Big Pharma CEO named Merrick (played by the guy who played Dudley in the Harry Potter series), who has (as far as I can tell) been given instructions to play this role just like he's Martin Shkreli, who is interested in finding the secret of their immortality, and whom you can tell is evil because he has his name in giant letters on the side of his building.

ME: Look, it's the villain! I've found the villain! MY WIFE: Other than Tony Stark, who actually puts their names on buildings like that except villains? It's just villains, right? ME: Uh. The president? The president definitely does that. (We make horrified faces at each other.)

Because we are Extremely Pedantic, we also spent a lot of time picking at how the characters' names and language abilities match up to their stated background. They all know a lot of languages, as you might expect, and the movie was determined to get through them without subtitles, which is an interesting choice but also kind of left some linguistic plot holes.

For example, Joe and Nicky claim to have met each other in the Crusades, with Nicky as (presumably) a Crusader and Joe as (presumably) a Muslim occupant of the area, although the movie doesn't specify this; Wikipedia gives Joe's name as Yusuf Al-Kaysani, which would at least fit that. Nicky is clearly Italian (as is Luca Marinelli, the actor who portrays him) and when he speaks Italian to the rest of the group we see that he definitely speaks modern Italian as spoken in Rome... which is absolutely, definitely not the language he grew up speaking, given that, among other things, Wiki lists the character's full name as Nicolò di Genova. I don't know if the writer of the screenplay (who I see now is also Greg Rucka) didn't know how much Italian dialects had changed in the last thousand years, if he thought that was good enough to be a nod to the character, or if there's some kind of backstory that didn't make it in where every so often Nicky decides to learn a modern dialect and keep his hand in, and also decides that that's the language he wants to use among his friends who would presumably understand several different dialects.

Also, the reveal that Andy's real name was in fact "Andromache of Scythia" was indeed badass but was slightly undercut by my wife yelling BUT THE SCYTHIANS DIDN'T SPEAK GREEK at the television.

Additionally, I feel like the movie could perhaps have been aware of the ways it chose to label on-screen locations, in which the countries were spelled out in large fonts with the cities above them. Places like LONDON, ENGLAND got their entire names spelled out, as did small French villages whose names I can no longer remember, but I guess AFGHANISTAN and MOROCCO and SOUTH SUDAN have zero cities, huh? However, the end of the movie did take place in PARIS which I guess unlike London is its own country now.

So the actual plot features the group of immortals trying to explain this whole immortality thing to Nile while being on the run from the people who are trying to turn them into Big Pharma, who wants to capture them and exploit the secret of their immortality. This is where it falls down a little for me, because the worldbuilding... gets a little shaky. They dream about each other when they're apart. Okay. Why? Sometimes they just stop being immortal and lose the capacity to heal and are dead in their next battle. Why? Why do they even exist? I just... wanted more answers than the movie gave me, and the pacing where I kept expecting there to be explanations wasn't there. There were a couple of scenes where Nile sat there in silence contemplating the fact that she would outlive her loved ones and my brain kept trying to insert Queen's "Who Wants to Live Forever?" Granted, the Highlander canon explanation for immortality is deeply, deeply weird, but at least it tried. No, I can't believe I'm defending Highlander II either.

The characters, too, could have been more fleshed out. The bulk of the character development is given to Andy and Nile, and I'm not complaining about that -- they were great -- but Joe and Nicky and Booker only got maybe a few lines each. They would have felt so much more real if they'd just had a little bit more to them. Also I didn't understand Copley's arc at all, but saying more about that would be spoilery. I do like that they have definitely set themselves up for a sequel.

But even with what we got, there's a lot to love about the characters. If you're here for canonically queer characters, you will enjoy Nicky and Joe, who have been in a relationship for probably about a thousand years. They are minor characters as far as the overall plot goes, but what they do have is lovely, and there is a romantic declaration between them at one point that is absolutely beautiful and possibly the most fervent love declaration I can remember seeing in a movie since maybe... ever. If you also like your queerness more subtextual, though Andy is never portrayed as explicitly queer, her past friendship with a fellow immortal Quynh was shown as very intense, as is the role she takes here mentoring Nile into the world of immortality. Also she has a double-bladed axe (yes, we kept yelling BRING ME MY MAN-KILLING AXE at the television) and as we all know, the double-bladed labrys has in modern times become a symbol for lesbians. So there's that.

In addition to the characters of color who play important roles here -- Nile was my personal favorite, but there's also Joe and Copley and (in flashback) Quynh -- there's a lot of diversity behind the cameras as well, or so the internet informs me. The director (Gina Prince-Bythewood) is the first Black woman to direct a superhero movie, and the same is true of her editor (Terilyn Shropshire). And, furthermore, apparently 85% of the post-production crew were women. They didn't have to do that, and yet they did. It was nice.

I don't watch a whole lot of action movies these days because I usually find R-rated violence too... violent, but I found myself really liking almost all of the action sequences here. None of them felt gratuitous, and a lot of them really focused on the physicality of the immortals fighting in a way I liked, because I feel like people are probably going to fight differently if they know they can survive every single hit, and I think the movie portrayed that in a way that a lot of superhero comics and movies don't. My favorite fight scene is definitely the one between Nile and Andy at the beginning, when Andy has trapped her on a plane and it's extremely close-quarters fighting and also extremely brutal. They don't stop basically until Nile breaks enough bones that she can't get up anymore, because until then she's going to keep trying, which is both kind of horrifying and a great character note. And they didn't film it like it was a Sexy Catfight! It was so good.

Also, the soundtrack is really good, and I've found myself streaming it on Spotify all week. I didn't know any of the songs in the movie, but there's a lot of hip-hop and -- okay, I don't even know if this is a genre? -- specifically a lot of hip-hop with an electronic/industrial sort of beat, which I thought was really great and livened up the fight scenes even more; "Going Down Fighting" did a really good job getting me in the mood for the final confrontation with the villain, and... yeah, it's all good. Someone made a playlist on Spotify that will come up if you search for it.

So, yeah. It's on Netflix. It's not without flaws (mostly, explaining how the hell immortality works, and a couple of pacing issues), but it's a really satisfying superhero movie.

That's the movie. Onto the comic, which I am just now starting to read as I write these words. Whee!

So The Old Guard: Opening Fire is a 2017 five-issue Image Comics series written by Greg Rucka, with art by Leandro Fernández, and there's also a 2019 sequel, The Old Guard: Force Multiplied, by the same creative team, also with five issues. I have not actually read any of Rucka's work before now because he is mostly famous for his DC work, but I have heard good things about it, especially his Wonder Woman run.

Anyway. The art is very stylized, with a minimal color palette, and it's very pretty but I honestly found it hard to parse sometimes. Many of the characters have very weird noses. Yes, noses. It's basically mostly in Andy's and Nile's POVs, like the movie, and as far I can tell Andy is explicitly queer, because unless I am entirely misreading this panel in issue #1, here she is in bed with a woman in one panel. Whee. Also there are some nice epigraphs at the beginning of each issue.

Okay, so, the plot here is basically the plot of the movie. There is still no explanation of why immortality exists. But even so, there are some fun character moments that didn't make it into the movie -- for example, Andy saying smartphones are too hard to use and she liked the old ones better, only for the rest of her team to say that she couldn't use those either. I think you get a better sense of Andy's world-weariness in the comic. There are also other, now-dead Immortals mentioned, like Noriko, who "went overboard off the Horn." Quynh is not one of them; Quynh basically is Noriko, which is because they cast a Vietnamese actress who asked if her character could be Vietnamese too, which seems perfectly reasonable to me. But anyway, in the comics, she's Noriko. Weirdly, Andy's full name, as she tells Nile when they meet, is Andronika ("man-victory") rather than Andromache ("man-battle," in case you were wondering); I think the movie made a better choice because Ἀνδρονίκα has exactly two attestations in the Lexicon of Greek Personal Names, whereas Ἀνδρομάχη has all that shiny name recognition of being shared by the wife of Hector and also the queen of the Amazons and will ping viewers as a Greek name, and therefore ancient, even if it can't be the name she was born with. (There are five for "Andronike" and four more for "Andromacha" so they actually have about the same number of total attestations, as far as I can tell, when you consider the alpha/eta alternation in how various Greek dialects mark feminine nouns.)

(Yes, you totally wanted a review by someone who looks up character names in the LGPN. Don't lie.)

Plotwise, Andy gets all of the initial exposition in for Nile before they get to the safehouse, which Copley has already gotten to before they get back, so Booker is bleeding on the floor and Nile doesn't get to meet Joe or Nicky at this time, and I am also glad they changed that for the movie. But, don't worry, Joe and Nicky's romantic declaration is still in here. We also get Andy pondering the last time she was in love, with a human who grew old.

Oh, and we get Andy's age: 6,732. And by issue #5 her name has changed to Andromache, because what even is continuity? I guess Andromache is her name now.

So Nile finally meets Joe and Nicky when she rescues them and also, uh, that plot point where Andy might die? Totally not a thing here. Nope. And no "surprise! even more immortals!" end-credits moments either.

Basically, I feel like every change they made to the script for the movie really strengthened the story, and even though I thought the movie could have used more character moments, it's way better than how the characters are separated for even longer in the comic. Nile rescuing the team means a lot more when she has met them before, you know?

So Force Multiplied starts us off with Andy, Joe, Nicky, and Nile, because Booker is still on time-out. They are in the middle of a car chase, and Booker's off getting himself kidnapped by someone who wants to know where the others are. The villain of the piece turns out to be Noriko, who is still alive, whom Booker had never had a chance to meet and apparently had never heard of. So, basically, a lot like the Quynh plot that the movie is teasing.

Overall it's a little less action-filled than the first one, which had multiple splash pages of nothing but violence; this one is a little more character-driven and explores the relationship, such as it is, between Andy and Noriko, as well as Nile coming to terms with her immortality, as well as with what everyone else has done over the years. It does have a bunch of violence at the end, though.

I don't want to spoil the ending, but I definitely wasn't expecting where that was heading. There's apparently going to be a third volume, and I am looking forward to it, whenever it exists.

(Although, now that I think about it, the ending is a lot like a fan-favorite moment of Highlander: The Series, but I think if I said which episode you would know exactly what the ending was.)

So, yeah! The Old Guard! I can't say as I feel particularly fannish about it -- there's nothing that makes me yearn to fill in the gaps in canon -- but the movie was really good and you should see it. And you should read the comics if you're into that.

#posts i actually wrote

[fearsmagazine]

COSMIC SIN - Review

DISTRIBUTOR: Saban Films

SYNOPSIS: It is the year 2524, four hundred years after humans started colonizing the outer planets. Retired Military General James Ford (Willis) is called back into service after soldiers on a remote planet are attacked by a hostile alien fleet. The threat against the human race escalates into an inevitable interstellar war. General Ford teams up with General Eron Ryle (Grillo) and a team of elite soldiers in a race to stop the imminent attack before it is too late.

REVIEW: COSMIC SIN features an impressive cast in an action based plot that tries to address a larger philosophical/morality question about the cost of winning a war, set against the backdrop of a science fiction theme. It focuses the conflict on the soldiers caught up in an alien invasion located on a distant world.

Given the scope of the universe presented in the film, COSMIC SIN feels like an episode in an ongoing series. There are character backgrounds that are briefly touched upon, or hinted at, other significant events that are thinly explained, and the villainy of these creatures hinted at. Given all the banter between the characters we know that they are more intangled than what is presented in this tale. As with episodic stores, having come upon this tale it feels like we’ve missed something and need to catch up. What should feel a bit more epic feels less impactful in the great scale of the narrative. As such, the weighty impactions seem to take a backseat to the action.

COSMIC SIN features three top names in action/adventure/thrillers - Bruce Willis, Frank Grillo, and Costas Mandylor. If the film had included a few more recognizable faces it might have been reminiscent of a classic war film like “A Bridge Too Far” or “The Great Escape” set in space. Grillo is on point and does a consistent job of selling the tale. I enjoy what Mandylor was doing with his character and could have used a bit more screen time. Willis' performance comes across as being cast to play Bruce Willis. His character is a hardened career war veteran. He always has that smoldering expression, his attempts at levity fall flat, and he looks uncomfortable in his mech suit. It feels a tad out of step with what everyone else has going on.

In terms of the overall production, I’m not sure I’m making this connection due to the fact that Saban Films is releasing or maybe it was a criteria for making the film, but regardless COSMIC SIN looks and feels like an adult version of “The Power Ranges.” From the mech suit designs to the alien designs and their costumes, you almost wonder if this film wasn’t pitched as a story for the grown up fans of that franchise. The mech suits don’t morph and meld with these larger robots, nor do they combine into a towering droid, but there is something about them that makes them feel like the precursor to their suits/robots. The suites do transform when they create a wormhole to jump to the planet. When they arrive near the planet the suites are also flight suites and can even navigate a reentry through the planet's atmosphere, never mind flying through space. The rest of the weapons and “the space canon” also look a bit like something from a Saturday morning children’s show. In terms of the aliens, absolutely. From the leader’s mask and cape, to his claw like fingers and weapons, Go back to the very first, Lord Zedd, and work your way up the different series. Except for some of the female villains and their funky headgear, these aliens look like their cousins. There is even something about their alien spacecraft that looks reminiscent in design to the “Power Rangers” universe. You could also say it “borrows” a tad in the designs for the soldiers from the “Halo” franchise, but the Saban association leans me more towards the Rangers. I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, it’s just a thing.

COSMIC SIN has an R rating. After I finished watching it I had to go back and look at it again. Never mind movies, I’ve played with more violence, cursing, sexual references than this film. Hell, even Willis seemed to be on his best behavior and was more subdued then in any of his die-hard films. Maybe I’m desensitized but at best maybe it is a hard PG-13. Again, it just leads me to that YA or teenage film for the older “Power Rangers” fans.

COSMIC SIN is certainly no “Dune,” and I mean the upcoming adaptation by Denis Villeneuve. It does have some talented actors, cool visuals, and, okay, some gear and villains that look like it’s from the “Power Rangers” universe. It’s entertaining, you can watch it with your older kids, even though you may not come away with it’s intended message about sacrifice, war, and the human condition.

CAST: Frank Grillo, Bruce Willis, Brandon Thomas Lee, Perrey Reeves, Corey Large, Lochlyn Munro, CJ Perry, Costas Mandylor, Adelaide Kane. CREW: Director - Edward Drake; Screenplay - Edward Drake & Corey Large; Co-Producer -  Daniel “Dano” Katzman; Cinematographer - Brandon Cox; Editor - Justin Williams; Production Designer - David Dean Ebert; Costume Designer - Nataliya Fedulova; Score - Scott Glasgow; Special Makeup FX Designer -  Alien Makeups; Visual Effects Supervisor - Zeke Faust. OFFICIAL: N.A. FACEBOOK: N.A. TWITTER: N.A. TRAILER: https://youtu.be/65ZM_w87ESw RELEASE DATE: In Theaters, On Demand and On Digital March 12th, 2021

**Until we can all head back into the theaters our “COVID Reel Value” will be similar to how you rate a film on digital platforms - 👍 (Like), 👌 (It’s just okay),  or 👎 (Dislike) Reviewed by Joseph B Mauceri

#film review #movie review #cosmic sin #saban films #edward drake #frank grillo #bruce willis #costas mandylor #science fiction #joseph mauceri #joseph b mauceri

[perryavenue]

Hollywood on Netflix

Hopefully not too late to the party. Sharing my thoughts about Hollywood on Netflix. Putting them below the cut for those of you who haven’t yet seen all seven episodes. Long post, don’t judge me!

I loved it! Hollywood was the perfect escape while being confined at home. All the 1940s glamour, beautiful clothes, great cars, cool music, and pretty people. Plus the underbelly of homophobia, racism, sexism, blackmail, bullying and harassment. I have quibbles with a few things (explained below), but there’s so much in Hollywood that’s really, really good.

Let’s start with the “goods”

Number one on my list was the ensemble acting. Unlike ACS Versace, were Darren had the lead and the story was built around Cuanan and his murders, in Hollywood, no single person carries the weight of the story.  Instead, there are something like ten actors who have roles of similar size. My faves were Joe Mantello as Dick Samuels, Dylan McDermott as Ernie West, Jeremy Pope as Archie Coleman and Jim Parsons as Henry Willson. They were given such great material to work with! I think there could be an Emmy race between Dylan McDermott and Jim Parsons.  I don’t mean to slight Patti LuPone as Avis Amberg and Holland Taylor as Ellen Kincaid, because they were excellent. There were so many good performances across the board!

Number two was the great chemistry among the actors. Darren, Jeremy and David just clicked in their scenes together as Raymond, Archie and Jack.  I was completely sold on the relationship between Darren and Laura Harrier as Raymond and Camille, too. Speaking of Laura, how many saw her in Spike Lee’s BlackKKlansman? She was terrific in that film, and totally unrecognizable.

Next is my list of “Um, what just happened?”

Some of these may be why Hollywood got mixed reviews, but although my eyebrows went up a time or two (or three) I still LOVED the series.

Number one on this list was the one actor/role that just did not click for me. It’s Jake Picking as Rock Hudson. A number of people have mentioned it. I don’t know if the problem was his acting, the direction he was given, or both, but TBH, there were moments when it was painful to watch him.  In the last episode, he tells Henry how badly Henry traumatized him, but I never felt we really got to see it (except for possibly Henry’s Isadora Duncan dance). I just wasn’t able to convince myself that the character was believable.

Number two was Henry’s redemption arc in the final episode. He was apologizing to Rock, and seeking Rock’s forgiveness. I can understand how being in therapy can include the need to apologize to those you’ve harmed. But although my problem might have been more with Jake Picking’s acting (because Jim Parsons was incredible) I had trouble buying what Henry was selling in that scene.

Number three was the decision by Jack, Raymond, Archie and Rock to pimp themselves out so they could raise the $25,000 to pay back the “Meg” budget overrun. Then Jack declines, leaving only three to get it done. I decided to do the math. That’s a LOT of sexual trysts if you base it on three guys taking in either $100 or at best $200 a pop. Ernie was right to tell them no, call in some pros, and generously make up the rest with his own funds. Maybe the shark didn’t quite jump at that plot line, but I saw it circling.

Number four was the request by the photographer to take nude pictures of Camille and Jack. Jack says “yes,” but Camille’s response is ambiguous. Should we assume that she declined? I kept thinking of the harm those pictures did to actors trying to get ahead in their careers. It’s a piece of plot that was left dangling.

Number five was the Oscar ceremony. So many nominations and SO many wins! Fun to watch, but kinda over the top, maybe? Also, Camille was able to claim her front row orchestra seat, yet Anna May Wong ended up in the balcony? What was that about?

Last is my list of “loves”

Right at the top is the Darren of it all. He wasn’t the only reason I watched Hollywood, because the subject matter and the fact it was a Ryan Murphy production had plenty of pull. Darren was great as Raymond. He nailed Raymond’s ambition, his naivety and inexperience as a newbie director, his romanticism and his passion. Plus, the guy should wear those wide brim hats all the time. He wasn’t the lead, but he was great in a supporting role. Just one question… the publicity still of Darren with the thin mustache was used multiple times, yet we never saw a mustache during the series. What was up with that?

Second on this list was the curmudgeonly film editor, Harry Golden, who took no shit from anyone and hid a spare copy of “Meg” when all the others were burned. That was William Frederick Knight, an actor I’ve never heard of before, and he had the best lines in the series. Hands down!

Number three was “Meg,” the film within the series. Just when I thought it was going forward, something completely unexpected would happen. It kept me on my toes. “Meg” had more lives than a cat!

Number four was the closing credit, “The Beginning.” Bring me season 2 ASAP!!

Seven episodes of transactional sex, ambition, and overcoming adversity to follow your dreams.   Worked for me!

#Hollywood #hollywood netflix #hollywood spoilers

[tinayoufatlarrdd]

She

Frankly, they didn’t start on the best term.

He met Y/N during a photoshoot for a certain famous magazine. She was assigned to grace the cover of said magazine with the photograph of the world’s most it couple, Harry Styles and the supermodel who gained the universal acclaim for ‘taming the baby Mick Jagger’.

It was all fun and pretty until Y/N accidentally stepped on the girlfriend’s polished toes.

“For fuck’s sake!” Harry screamed at Y/N as the supermodel girlfriend suddenly started limping her way to Harry, asking for some sort of first aid.

Y/N couldn’t stop muttering sorry, offering ice blocks, even kneeling next to the supermodel girlfriend begging for forgiveness. The creative director, the crew, the editors—the whole studio apologized countless times for the tiny slip as the girlfriend pouted, complaining about the unbearable pain, causing Harry to hit the ceiling.

He yelled at Y/N and refused to go on. Y/N, knowing her inferior position in the equation, could only look down as the apologies continuously rolled out of her tongue. To be fair, everyone in the studio (except the lovebirds, obviously) knew it wasn’t that big of a deal.

Y/N was capturing Harry’s solo session while the girlfriend fixed the hair and makeup. She was up next for her solo session and then it’s a wrap. Of course the photographer would move around; every supermodel should be aware of the fact that angles were plenty and it took treads to actually find the right ones. Y/N was constantly moving, camera on hand, eyes on the viewfinder, then suddenly the ‘big accident’ occurred.

Y/N was barefooted, she wouldn’t even be able to squeeze a hard turd if she ever stepped on one with that wonky heel of hers. There was no way she’d had caused the girlfriend that much pain. And nobody blamed Y/N as they all witnessed how the girlfriend walked on set with her eyes on the phone, hitting Y/N first. Nobody but the girlfriend and Harry Styles, of course. So they all just watched in silence as Harry cursed and threw a fit on innocent Y/N.

The power couple didn’t want to continue unless Y/N was replaced. The crew had to comply no matter how irrational the demand sounded. And on top of that, suddenly Y/N was plastered on the internet as the girl who assaulted the world’s biggest supermodel and Harry Styles.

She would never forget the overwhelming uneasiness caused by the sudden rave of negative reviews about her, all from people who endorsed and supported her in the first place but decided to be the footnote of the Hollywood sweethearts’ testimony: ‘awful to work with’, ‘nothing without the connection’, ‘a mediocre photographer who got lucky’, and ‘talentless’.

And she still couldn’t wrap her mind around that dreaded event. She had heard tremendous chivalry and gentlemanlike attitude when it came to Harry Styles yet somehow, he was nothing but a certified dick who put her job on the line that day. Some friends who remained loyal to her speculated that the girlfriend was the bad influence. Some even were convinced that he was voodooed. She didn’t care about either, all she believed was that he’s an absolute wretch with an extraordinarily thick mask. A media trained monkey was the term she occasionally used after a few tequila shots.

“That witch is his Yoko Ono, I tell ya,” the creative director told her during their final meeting—the meeting to let her go, of course.

She just shrugged. All she wanted was her old life back. And if Harry Styles and/or that supermodel got into some terrible misery in that comeback, that would definitely be her cherry on top.

She still got a few gigs, just not as much and definitely not with big profiles like she used to. For Pete’s sake, she was deemed a promising photographer by those fashion executives! She was only getting started. She would have never imagined that with just a short answer during a talk show’s truth or dare game—who’s the one person you’d never want to work with ever again?—the power couple could diminish her entire life’s worth of hard work.

Within the next few months, she’s back to square one. Every morning she tried to contact some old clients who would perhaps still deign to be affiliated with, according to the world’s biggest supermodel’s words on that talk show, ‘the rudest effin’ bitch I’ve ever seen in the industry’.

And after countless unsuccessful attempts, she went back to the cafe she used to work at when she’s still starting her career, not to network like she used to but to pour some coffee for other people again. She’s back with the apron and the napkin and she couldn’t stop being cynical over some hopeful youngsters who got signed right in front of her eyes, on the table she just wiped.

Her cameras were laid unused on top of her rack and the mini darkroom she built in her apartment became a storage room. Believing she had failed miserably in life, she found herself no longer had hopes on anything. All she knew was to get by the day.

It was a cold December night. Everyone else went home to celebrate the holidays so she decided to do the shift. She’d be paid double plus she wouldn’t have to face her family, which would go eerie in this state of her life, so it was the better choice.

Having had just finished cleaning the whole cafe, she put on her coat. She was ready to come home to… nothing. Her mind raced back to this time last year, where she was fully booked and couldn’t wait to come home so she could recharge herself for an exciting tomorrow. Her life had become exceptionally dull and it was painful to go on.

An abrupt banging on the door halted her train of desperate thoughts.

“We’re closed. Can’t you see the time?! It’s almost midnight!” she snarked, back facing the intruder.

“S- Sorry, love…” the hoarse voice was paused with a couple of hiccups. “‘m just completely devastated…”

She rolled her eyes as she turned around and she almost had a heart attack. There stood the man who destroyed her life, terribly wasted out of his mind. He could barely stand straight without holding onto the doorknob.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” she rolled her eyes, asking some deity entity if there was ever one.

“Hey! I know yeh…” Harry tried to get to her but his legs just gave up.

Falling face first, Y/N really wanted to leave him on the street. But of course she had that little voice of reason inside her that constantly screamed, “If you abandon him, you’re nothing better than him!” She was a decent person and she really hated it this time.

“Come on up,” she pulled Harry up and lingered his arm around her shoulder to help him walk. “Where do you live?”

“I don’t k- know,” he giggled. “I can’t remember, love…”

“Try,” she slapped his arm when he almost fell off yet again.

The snow was pouring down and they stood by the empty crossroad. Harry wouldn’t even remember his own name by now and she didn’t know how to get to his house. There was no other choice than to bring him home to her place.

It was nothing short of hard work to carry a man twice her size to her house on foot since there was not even a single cab around. It was even harder to hear him tell a story about his first imaginary friend during that wobbly trip where he tumbled more than five times and she had to pick him up every time. But it was the hardest when she had to take off his shoes so it wouldn’t mess with her couch—he didn’t want to take it off, nagging her with numerous ‘Go away, Mum!’s.

When she finally got to lay on her bed, she was too tired to even think of what just happened. She literally did some cardio workout bringing Harry home safe so unlike her usual nights, she fell asleep quite fast this time.

It was around four in the morning when she felt a body of weight sunk into her side. She turned around to face his uninvited guest sound asleep, legs tangled over hers like a knot. She quietly removed her legs and tried to get up. She needed to move to the couch, or anywhere far away from this invader.

This is my fucking house, why am I the one sleeping outside, she thought to herself. Anger boiling at the top of her head as her movement was stopped by his strong hand.

“Stay here…” he slurs.

He didn’t seem conscious to her. Maybe he mistook her as his girlfriend.

“I’m not—“

“I know,” he cut her off while still sleeping. “Just stay here for a while. It’s cold out there.”

She sighed and laid back down. Stiff and uncomfortable, but obviously exhausted, she closed her eyes as Harry’s arm pulled her closer to him. She could only hope the night would soon end or better yet, this was all not real.

When Harry woke up, he found a sticky note on his forehead.

‘You were hammered last night, didn’t know where you live so I took you home. Nothing happened, you just sorta burst into where I work around midnight so I kind of had to not abandon you. Don’t make yourself at home because this is my home.’

He couldn’t remember anything. He remembered getting blind drunk after gulping those spirit shots but what happened after that was redacted. His surrounding was unfamiliar and there was no other sign of life other than him that morning.

After splashing his face with cold water, he looked around the apartment. It was modest but very personal. There were random film rolls hung by the ceiling as Harry made his way to the living room. He put on his shoes by the couch as he observed the vinyl shelf at the corner of the room. It was filled with 60s-70s biggest musicians, from Jimi Hendrix to Van Morrison—which grew his curiosity of the owner. There were books that he also read, and the series of psychedelic photographs framed by the doorway was the biggest tic that made him wonder: how did he end up in this hippie’s safe haven, one that he actually wanted to live in when he was young? Did he get so hammered that he traveled back in time? His head hurt too bad to even think of the possibilities, all he knew was there was something about the owner that felt familiar and he ought to know them. He had to.

Harry rushed to shower at his home and got some aspirin. After running some overdue errands, he immediately went back to the apartment. He knocked on the door a few times to no avail so he decided to wait by his car outside.

Y/N was relieved when there was no sign of Harry when she got home that night. She would be lying if she wasn’t a tad bit worried of him considering he could absolutely die that night if he went to the wrong place, but then again he was the guy who ended her career so she couldn’t care less.

She picked Nick Drake’s Pink Moon from her vinyl collection and put it on the turntable. Relaxing by the couch that still reeked of alcohol and him, she ignored the constant knock on the door. It was usually her crazy neighbor looking for his nonexistent cat.

It was the sixth track that she finally got up and opened the door, hoping to end the annoyance of her peaceful evening.

Her eyes bugged out when she saw the figure by her door. It was him again.

Harry, with his furrowed eyebrows and lanky feet, looked just as surprised as she was. He clearly remembered who she was and somehow, not even Nick Drake’s soothing voice could calm her down. Filled with rage, she slammed the door right in front of his face.

Harry was shocked to see her. He’d never thought in a million years that he’d ever meet her again, moreover lodged by her. He wanted to thank her but he knew she’d probably throw a glass of water to his face. But he could not just leave.

So he did the tackiest trick in the book. When the track from behind the closed door hit Free Ride, one of his favourites, he began singing along as loud as possible. Some neighbors shushed him, some even scolded him but he didn’t stop.

She heard him loud and clear. She ignored him at first, but then she received a noise complaint call from the super. Upset, she thumped her way towards the door.

“Stop it!” she gritted her teeth as she opened it.

He stopped. “May I come in?”

“What do you want?” she barked.

“Just wanted to say thanks,” he muttered low.

“You’re welcome. There,” she slammed the door again.

There was nothing he could do so he decided to leave for now.

He came again the next day, this time saying there was something he needed to give back to her.

“What now?” she wasn’t as upset as the day before, but was still unfriendly as they just stood by the door leaf.

Harry handed her the sticky note she left on his forehead the day before.

“You can keep it,” she said as she closed the door.

No slamming door. A progress, Harry thought.

He came back again two days after that, carrying a limited release Fleetwood Mac record signed by Stevie Nicks herself.

“Got Stevie to sign it. They don’t have this at the stores anymore,” he presented it as if he was doing some product placement scene.

“Look, Harry Styles,” she crossed her arms. “I don’t even know what the hell do you want from me but I really don’t want to have anything to do with you anymore. You’ve done enough.”

“Yes, about that…” Harry scratched his forehead. “’m sorry.”

“Whatever,” she pushed the door but Harry was quick to hold it open.

“I’d help you make things right again,” his green eyes were desperate for her answer.

She let out a heavy sigh and moved aside as if cuing him to enter her little bubble. Harry entered immediately, not wanting to waste any more time in the outside world.

She was listening to Neil Young’s Harvest Moon, to which Harry sang along gently. She could hate him all she wanted but he really sounded divine especially within close proximity.

“Shouldn’t you be somewhere else, anyway?” she sat on the far end of the couch.

He put the record on the coffee table. “Where, exactly?”

“I don’t know,” she shrugged. “Some talk show to say some shit about me with the girlfriend perhaps?”

“Look ‘m really sorry, I truly am,” he sighed. “And ‘m not with her anymore…”

He then explained everything. How he fell in love for the first time in his life with the supermodel who was perfect, beautiful, smart, and everything he’d ever dreamed of. How he was so sure of her but she didn’t feel the same so he tried to show it with everything he’s got—grand romantic gestures, going public (which was personally hard for him since he was a very private person), and siding with her on every kind of problem even if it meant hauling over an innocent photographer’s coals. He also explained how he felt awful most of the time since he’d changed so much for a person who didn’t even love him back and he began to feel lost. It all then culminated a couple nights ago when she decided that it was all still not enough and broke up with him over a phone call. That’s when he went crazy with the liquor and ended up wandering around.

She felt sorry for him and although she knew he could be lying, she could understand his pain. So, she decided to accept his apology. She knew it wouldn’t change anything for her but at least she wouldn’t have to carry around so much hatred in her life and he could also move on with his life, not haunted by the guilt.

He promised to help her gain her reputation back. The two planned to make some exclusive photoshoot of Harry himself.

They began meeting every now and then. At first, they would talk about all things professional and did photoshoots. She started receiving positive feedbacks especially after Harry gave her the shoutouts—it didn’t take a split second for his loyal fans to swarm her online profiles. With her raising popularity she started getting bigger gigs again, even bigger than her old gigs. She quit working at the cafe and her darkroom was occupied yet again.

Then, they would spend even more time together. He would make up excuses to meet with her, like he needed to see how she developed her rolls or coming by with a batch of eggs saying he was worried she ran out of eggs. Y/N knew Harry was just feeling lonely after the breakup so she always let him in. Nobody wants to hurt alone, she always thought.

He soon didn’t need any more excuses as he had become an extended roommate of hers. He always said he wanted to live in the 70s and her apartment was like a dream home for him. She just brushed it off, saying it’s because of her hidden interior designing talent. And with each passing day, as they grew closer, her hatred dissipated and was replaced with something strange yet pleasant inside her heart.

She learned the depths of him that no one else knew and it all became the little things only she understood. She felt privileged to gain the limited access.

Sometimes he’d show her the sneak peak of his newest song and she would give notes as she watered the many plants around her place. Sometimes they would play board games while discussing the possibility of living on Mars. Some other times, Harry would lay his head on her legs, not saying a word while Karen Dalton’s magnificent voice filled the air.

Her favourite moment with him had to be when they did the impromptu picnic under the stars. With a bottle of cheap wine, portable turntable, and shared blanket, they laid by the garden as they talked about their fears and desires. That was the first time in such a long time she could open up to someone and he said that made him feel so special.

Of course he was special to her. That’s why she still tiptoed around him from time to time, avoiding conversations like her love life because she didn’t want him to think that she’d like him when actually the growing feelings inside her heart had begun to suffocate her.

The way he spontaneously baked for her (and snobbishly told the infamous ‘I was a baker’ story), the way he laughed at her jokes, the way his eyes sparked when they were dancing around, the way he snored a little when he’s sleeping, the way he called her name—she wanted to just sink herself into his warmth and never let go.

Yet she couldn’t help but wonder whether he felt the same way too. The frequency of the supermodel’s name mentioned in their conversations has since reduced to almost never, but she still felt a sting in her heart as she knew she could never replace her. She was, after all, his first love. And don’t get her started on the physical prowess which she obviously lacked in compared to the supermodel. She didn’t dare to ask Harry whether he’s really forgotten about her, afraid that he’d find out her true feelings for him. So she remained the same. At least, he would be still by her side.

At least, there would never be any rejections.

The city was already blossoming when she realized that Harry had left traces of himself on every corner of her place. The hung film rolls were filled with his silly expressions, so was the polaroid collections stuck on her walls. He had installed a pile of pants by the corner of her living room so that he didn’t have to bring any change. And of course her bathroom now had a pair of tooth brushes. It rocketed her hopes but still, her doubts crept inside her mind every so often.

That lazy Saturday night, she went home from grocery shopping to find Harry asleep on her couch. He looked so soft and warm and she couldn’t help but to run her fingers through his smooth hair. She nervously came closer to his face and pressed a tender kiss on his forehead.

She got up immediately, afraid to wake him up. To her surprise, he suddenly grabbed her arm.

“What was that for, love?” he asked.

He didn’t even have the bed face he usually had, which led her to believe that he wasn’t really asleep.

“Were you pretending to be asleep?” she pulled away.

Harry stood up just as fast and within seconds, he wrapped her in his hug. He placed a kiss on top of her head and slowly traveled down to her forehead, her nose, her cheeks. His lips roamed over hers as he slowly pressed them. It wasn’t heated and full of lust but rather deep and passionate as if he was taking his time.

It didn’t take long before they made their way to the bedroom and undressed each other with no rush. There was no spoken words, no roughness, just two people tangled up in heated infatuation.

When she woke up, he was still there. And it was beautiful.

It was still beautiful the next few months when they became a couple. He was her world and everything else was just background noise. He made her feel like the only person that mattered, as if everything that happened before ‘them’ was unreal. That this was the only real thing and it was all too good to be true.

Y/N should know better though, that life came just like a full circle. She just didn’t expect to actually be put back into the circle so soon.

They were invited to an afterparty of a fashion line Harry was strongly tied to and Y/N was more than proud to be by his side when he was introduced to be the muse that season. He was having the time of his life and so was she. The two held hands the entire time as they talked to everyone.

The belle of the ball, Harry himself seemed overwhelmed with the amount of love he received. He occasionally pressed her hand a little tighter when he was nervous, to which she’d respond with stroking his hand with her thumb. The simplest gestures that they’d developed overtime as they grew accustomed to each other’s idiosyncrasies or as Harry said, the good stuff about you.

That was until he saw a glimpse of her in the middle of the crowd that he suddenly let go of Y/N’s hand as if he was afraid that she would see him with Y/N. It would have been a little over a year since she last saw the supermodel and almost a year since Harry last met her.

All this time, Harry constantly convinced her that her insecurities over his love was nothing, that he only wanted her. And yet, he never even said those three words to her.

She knew now why he never did.

All this time, it wasn’t doubt that kept haunting her. It was a hunch.

The music was blasting but for Y/N, everything was silence. It only took a few seconds before she realized the look in Harry’s eyes. As if it was never truly her his eyes set on. That she was just a company to pass time. That she was the one he wanted just never loved.

She was never the one.

She tried to grab his hand before he’d be gone for good, and could only let out a faint ‘Please, don’t.’

But he could only mutter a little ‘Sorry.’ as he let go of her grasp and made his way through the crowd, trying to get to her, while leaving Y/N drowning in the sea of human who celebrated the man that she loved.

Part two.

Part three.

#harry styles imagine #harry styles one shot #harry styles angst #tinayoufatlarrdd #harry styles fanfic

[multimetaverse]

We've been fed so much lately!! What do you think of Luke's interview with Lisa and Terri's with pastemagazine? And are you happy Josh told us what he meant by the endgame changing?

Indeed we have anon. I loved Luke’s interview with Shine on Media, Lisa has been a fan of the show from the start and her questions are always good ones. I’m very glad we got confirmation that TJ is gay and that’s canon so there should be no more TJ sexuality discourse. Also nice to know that Luke knew TJ was gay from before the muffin scene and that he and Josh were trying to play things as gay as possible the entire time. We really lucked out getting Josh and Luke to play the first two openly gay characters on Disney Channel; that they were so happy and supportive of these roles and always did their best to come through for the audience. And nice to know that they both wanted the Tyrus story line to go faster, as did we all. 

Another anon asked me why Terri wouldn’t have done a chemistry test with Josh and Luke when they were casting TJ which is a good question. Certainly the casting directors would have had that in mind since they cast someone Josh’s age and they obviously didn’t cast Luke for his basketball skills or skills at playing a villain. They did luck out that Josh and Luke ended up being such close friends and having such great on screen chemistry. I don’t think it’s a surprise that Luke’s acting got much better after 2x05 as TJ had an actual purpose and motivation. Terri really should have told him from the start but she would have had to if not by 2x08 then 2x11 for sure, as there’s no way to do the swingset scene if the actors and director and editors don’t all know that it’s a romantic scene. 

 It’s wild that Terri never took steps to make sure either Luke or his family weren’t homophobic or at least unwilling to play a gay character before bringing him on. That would have been a dark timeline, TJ either being written out early on and maybe some new character brought in to take his place or TJ still be used for the dyscalculia story line but then being dropped after S2 and likely no one replacing him as Cyrus’ love interest in S3 given how much more censored the gay story line was in S3.

I’m glad Josh came clean. That they were unsure that Tyrus would ever canon was my best guess and I’m working on another ask about it and laying out how the Tyrus story line in S3 has no real direction and with the exception of the gun plot is just fluffy or angsty filler. It’s sad to know that Tyrus came so close to never canoning and I can’t imagine how depressing it must have been for Josh and Luke to film the entire season not knowing if the Tyrus story line would ever have any pay off. I’m glad though that Terri was at least upfront with them that she wasn’t sure if she’d get canon Tyrus approved in the finale. A lot of Josh’s comments and actions come off much sadder now, like when he was so happy that Asher said Tyrus was real in their October press tour or when he commented on tumblr that the press tour was the first time Disney had let him speak openly about Tyrus. He must have been desperately seeking validation and any kind of hints he could that Disney would actually allow canon Tyrus. 

That being said, the cast should never have been allowed to talk about Tyrus so openly and so often when they had no guarantee it would ever happen. All those cast interviews they did back in October almost ended up being massive queerbait. I don’t blame the cast as they’re all teens but the adults in their lives should have stepped in and reined things in. 

Terri’s paste magazine interview comes off as extremely disingenuous especially in regards to the Tyrus kiss. I’m surprised so many people bought her spin but if she couldn’t even get permission for canon Tyrus until the very end of production which was well after the show had been cancelled then how on earth was she ever going to get a kiss or anything else approved? I could claim that I choose not to live in a mansion because it doesn’t fit my lifestyle but it’s not a real choice because I could never afford to buy a mansion just like Terri would never have been able to get a kiss approved or Cyrus saying aloud that he had a crush on TJ or Tyrus slow dancing or Cyrus founding a GSA club at school, or anything else she wants to pretend she could have done if only there had been one more season. And her ‘’queerbaiting and Disney censorship’’ instagram post back in November was wildly inappropriate when the gay story line was being obviously censored and when the entire Tyrus story line almost ended up being nothing more than queerbait. And for her to attempt an internalized homophobia story line in what she knew were the final eps of the series with a character she had no idea if she could ever confirm is gay is incredibly stupid. 

Still I do feel sorry for Terri as I truly don’t think she knew when she brought TJ in that it would take this long to get so little pay off. The Tyrus story line began in the 20th ep of the series and didn’t canon until the 57th aired ep, two-thirds of the entire series went by before their feelings were explicitly confirmed. The look back was a huge mistake and built up expectations too high even with it being edited but logically if Disney approved TJ looking back at Cyrus in 2x25 it would have been a positive sign that they were open to exploring Tyrus at the time as the unedited look back would have let the audience know TJ was gay which would have given Terri reason to hope she could get them together before 3x20. I think it’s interesting that Josh compared canon Tyrus in S3 to Cyrus coming out in what was originally 1x13 when he’s talked before about how Cyrus was always slated to come out to Andi in 2x13. It really does suggest that Disney more or less let Terri write what she wanted for Cyrus’ arc in S2 which also fits with the Tyrus story line flowing very well before cracking down hard in S3.

Personally, I think the most interesting thing we learned from Terri’s interview is that they learned they would be cancelled when they were going to write 3x10. Looking back, 3x10 does seem like a rough dividing line for a lot of stories. Jonah’s panic attacks are addressed in 3x11 then dropped, Jamber is resurrected in 3x12 along with the wish and Amber suddenly becomes much more prominent in the final half of the season, Walker and Wuffy are disposed of, Marty is brought back and Muffy quickly set up to be endgame. Now that we know that Terri didn’t want endgame Jandi and didn’t know if she would ever get endgame Tyrus we can see why it was so important for the show to bring back Marty so Buffy could get her originally planned endgame. Interestingly, Andi’s art isn’t brought up again until 3x16 which is also when the S1 party was brought back up again which suggests that they didn’t settle on the finale party until then. 

There’s one other big moment that happens right after 3x10 which is Cyrus using the word gay and coming out to Jonah in 3x11. I wrote this back in February after the Salt Lake Tribune spoiled that Cyrus would come out to Jonah:

‘’It’s nice that now all of Cyrus’ closest friends know about his sexuality but this does also read as a potential wrap up of Cyrus’ sexuality arc; Cyrus has come out to Buffy, Andi, and Jonah and is proud and confident in his identity and to label himself as gay, quite a far cry from the scared sad Cyrus we saw when he came out to Buffy. With Jonah now in on his secret there’s no more mystery left among his friend group and no need to talk about it again if that’s the path Disney chooses. I do think Terri got some stuff approved in the finale but this ep could very easily provide enough rep that Disney feels fine with having a quiet Korrasami style endgame instead. ‘’

It turns out that my sense of foreboding was correct as 3x11 was written as a potential series finale for the gay story line as they had no clue if Cyrus would ever be able to get together with TJ and indeed Cyrus never did discuss his sexuality ever again. 

I’m glad we have a lot of the missing pieces filled in now. I’m also glad I wasn’t a cast or crew member as it seems like S3 would have been an anxious nerve wracking experience, waiting to see if the story line that had been planned from the beginning of S2 would have any pay off. I’m eternally grateful to Terri and Josh and Luke for what they managed to do and the history they made. And thank god Gary Marsh, for whatever reason, decided at the last minute to let those final 40 seconds of the bench scene to make it to air.

#Andi Mack #Tyrus #Cyrus Goodman #TJ Kippen #Luke Mullen #Joshua Rush #Terri Minsky #Andi Mack Asks #Asks #Answered #Andi Mack Season 3 #Andi Mack Production

[letterboxd]

Sundance 2020.

“Dude, I hope this gets over 3.5!” Letterboxd rates this year’s Sundance.

Our West Coast editor Dominic Corry returns to Sundance to engage in such essential festival experiences as: judging other people’s cellphone etiquette, pretending not to notice A-listers, coming to rely upon coffee to a dangerous extent, and hastily downing a hot sandwich while standing over the garbage can outside the Park City Fresh Market.

He also watched a whole load of cool films, and spoke with the writing and directing talent behind some of the 2020 festival’s most talked-about premieres: Janicza Bravo (Zola), Eugene Kotlyarenko (Spree), Miranda July (Kajillionaire), Brandon Cronenberg (Possessor) and Jim Cummings (actor and executive producer of Danny Madden's debut Beast Beast).

Zola

“There are more ways to access great storytelling than the ones we’ve been used to.”

Generating much of the buzz ahead of the 2020 Sundance Film Festival was Janicza Bravo’s Zola, a film based on the Twitter thread by A'Ziah King that went famously viral in 2015. It concerns two exotic dancers: King herself—who goes by Zola—(played by Taylour Paige) and her new friend Stefani (Riley Keough), who head down to Tampa one weekend accompanied by Stefani’s boyfriend Derrek (played by Cousin Greg himself, Nicholas Braun) and Stefani’s “roommate” (read: pimp, played by Colman Domingo). To say shit gets cray doesn’t quite cover it.

It’s been simplistically, if understandably, described ahead of time as “Pulp Fiction meets Spring Breakers”, but Bravo herself cited a much more eclectic selection of cinematic inspirations when we spoke to her ahead of the film’s world premiere.

“My inspirations were The Wiz, Coffy, Paris Is Burning, The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, Special Victims Unit. And Natural Born Killers!”

Bravo (pictured above) took to King’s Twitter thread immediately when it went viral. “I think I found it within a day, or days, of it coming out,” says Bravo. “It was sent to me by a group of girlfriends and before finishing it I knew that I wanted it, and I worked at getting [the rights] for about two years.”

Bravo wasn’t the only one who wanted to tell this story on the big screen—James Franco was initially linked to an adaptation.

“It’s not that it was difficult to get the rights, it’s that there were many other people who wanted it and the people who got it before me were just fancier. But here we are.”

Bravo is credited with Zola's script alongside playwright Jeremy O. Harris, who recently blew up Broadway with his incendiary show Slave Play. She concedes there were unique challenges in translating something so specific to the big screen.

“The thing that everyone was attracted to about this story was the voice, and I would say the hardest thing was to make sure the voice was still present in the film. What you’re reading, that it would translate into the visual.”

Bravo says she’s not sure if this is going to lead to a rash of social network-based films (Letterboxd: The Movie excepted of course), “but I would say that what the story tells you is that there are more ways to access great storytelling than the ones we’ve been used to.”

Spree

“Put it on lists and do those Letterboxd battles!”

It can be all too easy to over-perceive mini-trends at film festivals, but it was hard to overlook the large role that social media played in multiple films at Sundance this year.

In Eugene Kotlyarenko’s Spree, floppy-haired Stranger Things star Joe Keery (pictured above) plays wannabe influencer Kurt Kunkle, a driver for a Los Angeles-based ride-sharing service (called… Spree) who plots to up his subscriber numbers by murdering his more obnoxious passengers on a live stream. Or he might just be staging it all for the LOLs. The entire film plays out as a series of live-streaming videos, mostly from the dashboard cameras in Kurt’s car.

Kotlyarenko’s film questions the overly prominent role of social media in modern life. “We've all kind of signed on to this thing, to use the literal expression,” he told us. “It’s part of the way we understand ourselves and our relationship with the rest of the world. It’s basically: a like or repost or a good rating on something, gives us part of our validation or sense of self and that is a kind of twisted place to be. [Spree] is a provocation, it’s a challenge, it’s a way of saying: look, we have a problem.”

Kotlyarenko had a number of inspirations in mind while he was writing and directing Spree. “A lot! A lot of movies! I actually put ten movies in a Dropbox for the cast and crew. One movie that I thought was really inspiring was Jafar Panafi’s Taxi, also known as Taxi Tehran. You want Man Bites Dog in there, because the whole thing is that the movie’s a live stream, right? So how do you do that pseudo-doc thing but now? So you’re following a psychotic character and you’re getting very close to them. Uncomfortably close. What else? Network and To Die For, just hardcore media satires. There’s a bunch of other films, like Coming Apart, do you know this film? It’s a late ’60s movie starring Rip Torn, where he’s a psychiatrist and he sets up these hidden cameras and exploits all his patients and stuff but they don’t know that they’re on camera.”

It turns out Kotlyarenko is a keen Letterboxd member, and he’s looking forward to other members generating an average rating for his film. “Dude, I hope this gets over 3.5!”

We can safely assume Kotlyarenko won’t employ measures as drastic as those adopted by the main character in his movie in order to get his desired rating.

“I want people on Letterboxd to watch the film and rate it whatever the fuck you think it is [worth]. And, you know, put it on lists and do those Letterboxd battles. Put it up against, you know, some Gasper Noé movie. And let it win!”

Kajillionaire

“Instead of sort of half-arseing two jobs, you’re doing one job really well.”

Filmmaker, actor and performance artist Miranda July is a central figure in the American independent cinema scene, even though she’s only directed two films: Me and You and Everyone We Know and The Future. Her third full-length feature Kajillionaire had its world premiere at Sundance this year, just as her previous works did, but the big difference this time around is that she stuck to writing and directing, having also played the lead role in her two previous films.

“It’s just better,” she told Letterboxd of staying behind the camera for Kajillionaire. “Instead of sort of half-arseing two jobs, you’re doing one job really well, you know? You get a lot of energy when you’re performing—that’s nice. Especially initially to kind of set the tone, that was super helpful, starting out. But now it’s like: these people all knew my work. So I didn’t have to actually be in it for them to like, get it. Which is, you know, what a dream right?”

Kajillionaire is a typically (for July) offbeat tale of a Los Angeles family who attempt low-level scams to raise money to pay the rent on the disused office space with oozing walls in which they live. The family (comprised of mom Debra Winger, dad Richard Jenkins and daughter Evan Rachel Wood) find their equilibrium challenged when an optimistic young woman (Gina Rodriguez) eagerly joins them for their latest “heist”.

Miranda July. / Photo courtesy of the Sundance Institute

Letterboxd asked July if she thinks there’s a common narrative thread running through all three of her films.

“I mean, I see the thread, but it’s really just me living my life. Not that it’s autobiographical at all. But now I was ready to face issues and tell a story that only could be told by someone who had been a child, grown into an adult, and then been a parent of a child and had this 360-degree perspective. And also I think there’s a joyfulness that only comes in once you’re like: I know a little bit how to do this, you know? Like, maybe there’s some fun that I had, as well as breaking my heart 100 times.”

Although Kajillionaire would seem to speak to general economic anxiety, July said that wasn’t necessarily the point of the film.

“All I’ll say about that right now is: I wrote it in this time and the whole thing comes from my unconscious. But I am the child of boomers and, you know, living in the same world you’re living in. The sense that something criminal might have happened is in the air, but I wasn’t consciously [thinking]: ‘I’m going to hit them hard with this political satire’. It’s not that movie. But I don’t think anyone would be wrong to find that in it.”

Beast Beast

“It allows you to circumvent all of the bullshit that is Hollywood.”

We met up with one of our favorite filmmakers (and Letterboxd member), Jim Cummings, who wrote, directed and starred in the 2018 low-key masterpiece Thunder Road, an expansion of a 13-minute short that won the Short Film Grand Jury Prize at Sundance in 2016.

Cummings was at the 2020 festival as both an executive producer and supporting cast member in a film in the NEXT program (which highlights emerging filmmakers) called Beast Beast. It’s the first feature from writer/director Danny Madden.

“Danny was my co-producer and creative director on many of my short films, the Thunder Road feature, and my new upcoming werewolf movie. So it’s great to be here for his first Sundance feature.”

Cummings, who also runs The Short to Feature Lab in Malibu, understands more than most how shorts can be a pathway to feature filmmaking.

“It’s just so much more fulfilling to make something as a proven concept. You kind of become your own studio in a way that’s incredibly fulfilling. I think it’s the future. You can afford to make something over a weekend with your friends in the backyard that’s a short film and then you can use that and use Kickstarter or a crowd-equity plan campaign to raise the rest of the money for a feature. It’s absolutely the future and it allows you to circumvent all of the bullshit that is Hollywood.”

Jim Cummings and Danny Madden. / Photo by Jovelle Tamayo, courtesy of the Sundance Institute

Hang on, did you say new upcoming werewolf film? Thunder Road fans can look forward to beholding Cumming’ follow-up feature soon.

“I shot a werewolf movie in Coalville, Utah last March. I spent four months out here. I wrote it, I directed in and I star in it, and it’s a proper monster movie. It’s like a proper werewolf comedy. It’s like Thunder Road with a werewolf. Or Zodiac as a comedy. That’s coming out in theaters in September.”

And because this is Jim Cummings we’re talking to, there’s more: “I ran a crowd-equity campaign for a movie that we made about talent agents that I can’t really talk too much about, but it’s very good and it’s a horror movie that we shot in November. That should be coming out around the same time.”

Possessor

“It has a lot to do with character psychology, without giving too much away.”

Following the world premiere of his new film Possessor, Letterboxd sat down with second-generation filmmaker Brandon Cronenberg, the son of legendary director David. The younger Cronenberg’s second feature (following 2012’s Antiviral) had Sundance audiences audibly wincing at the extreme body horror on display in the sci-fi thriller, which stars Andrea Riseborough as an assassin who forcibly inhabits the minds of others to perform her incredibly violent executions.

We asked Cronenberg how he feels about the term “body horror” (a sub-genre often associated with his father’s work) being applied to his film.

“I guess it depends how you define body horror,” says Cronenberg. “There are violent scenes in the film and I guess that fits into a certain aspect of body horror, but it isn’t really what I would necessarily describe as body horror. There’s a small amount of story stuff that I feel is legitimately a part of that genre, but it’s not [the] prime aspect of the story.”

Cronenberg confirmed that on-screen viscerality appeals to him in general as a filmmaker: “I think especially in genre, although it can be incredibly conceptual. It’s partly defined by deep visceral emotions, not always because of graphic violence or gore. Sometimes it can be a film primarily about dread or anxiety that I would still consider to be a horror film, and a lot of classic ghost films for instance are not graphic but are visceral and in that emotional sense.”

Actors Christopher Abbott and Andrea Riseborough with director Brandon Cronenberg. / Photo courtesy of the Sundance Institute

The violence in Possessor may have had audience members covering their eyes in Park City, but Cronenberg told us there was a point to all the grue.

“It wasn’t just there to be intense or to provoke people. It has a lot to do with character psychology, without giving too much away. The way it’s depicted and the various approaches that are taken in different scenes, very much relate to the main character, her relationship with violence, her own internal space and also where the audience is situated from a kind of more objective or more subjective position.”

#sundance #sundance fim festival #sundance 2020 #jim cummings #miranda july #letterboxd #red carpet #film festival #preview #festival

[docmurph12]

Ok review time. And remember, there is no war in Ba Sing Se.

My next request comes from my very good friend. The last time he and I sat down and tried to watch this was after we cleared through every episode of the animated series this movie was based on. We didnt get through ten minutes. So this was a fun, frustrating challenge. For those noticing, yes this is a retroactive review, instead of a "live" one. Reason for this is that as a fan it would be really difficult to be as objective as possible (given I already know this thing to be really bad) if I was distracted.

So what I know going in is that Shyamalan had a couple big flops and that he picked out this series to be his resurrection, thinking going the large scale epic route would be beneficial to his career. What happened was a ruthlessly infamous flop that resulted in nearly 6 years of silence, jokes, and memes prior to "Split" bringing Shyamalan back to relevance again.

First of all, this film could literally have been directed by anyone. Looking back at my review for Aladdin, I recall saying that I was shocked to find out it was directed by Guy Richey, because all of his hallmark signatures were missing. Same story here; The Last Airbender feels like a basic level cookie cutter epic filmmaking school project. Everything that makes a Shyamalan film is gone, which is crazy because the levity that makes ATLA (the acronym I'll use for the show going forward) is gone too. I have always said that as a director your job is to take what is written (which in this case was written by Shyamalan as well) and use your style to create a visual aspect that compliments the story told by the dialogue and events. Think of this writer/director relationship like one in comics between the writer and the artist. The artist is selected because stylistically he matches what is needed for the story. Great example of a good match is Sin City (picked because of loudness of its specific style). That story doesnt get told the same way or with the same impact with different color palettes, camera work, or actor direction. The Last Airbender is missing everything that gives a person a reason to select a specific director, especially one known for work in small scale supernatural thrillers.

The writing is.....super bad. There are a couple simple tools I like to use to identify if a film has scripting issues as opposed to anything else. First, is the dialogue done in a way that feels contextually natural? Do real people talk this way or is it written like shlockey, overly dramatic stage dialogue (think the Star Wars prequel trilogy)? Second, how easy is the story to follow? Are there gaping plot holes? Is it subtle with a good surprise? Does it hit you in the face with a story shovel with a handle made of heavy handed expositional dialogue?

Lastly, how hard are the actors trying to act around your script? Is it a good film where great performances outweigh poor to middling dialogue (Batman V Superman), or is it Bloodrayne? I've said enough on that, you get the point. That said, I am not sure the actors could have been saved by a better script. The cast was very poorly selected. Insensitive at worst (though I genuinely think the brown dude that insisted on the specific and coincidentally white folk he picked probably DIDN'T have a whitewashing agenda given what he said prior to release), out of touch with the source material at best, picking the virtual unknowns that he did really didnt pan out for him. The kid cast as Aang (pronounced AAng, goddamnit, not ONG, more on that later) got the role because he looks like the character, kind of, and only had a week of acting school worth of experience prior to filming the movie. Let's just say it definitely showed.

I am not sure TOTALLY crucifying the cast is entirely fair, so let's move the witch hunt to almost everything else. There is some good though, I promise so hang in there.

I really hope the editor got sent back to school. The purpose of editing is to make a cut that not only maintains but heightens interest in what you are watching. Cutting the fat in order to get to the point while not giving the movie away. Sometimes that means giving more than a 90 minute cut (which Shyamalan has taken at least partial responsibility for in this case) in order to preserve the story. There are scenes where the continuity from one cut to the next doesnt match up. Like consecutive cuts in one scene with massive distances traveled between cuts and even in at least one case a partial or complete costume change. It's extremely jarring. Something else about cuts--generally you cut to another angle or scene because the film requires you to in order to display more information that you wouldn't get in one single long cut. Usually a film has choppy cuts in it because the scene requires an character to do something the actor can't, or because the director or editor are bad at their job. The story, or sometimes in lucky cases just one scene, suffers as a result of bad or needless cuts. This is the case here. The strange thing is there are truly WONDERFUL long cuts of fight scenes that really suck you in, but the wierd juxtaposition between great non-editing and strange and bad editing really kicks you in the head. Enough on that. On to the next.

I did NOT see this movie in 3d. I understand that the conversion was really bad, but that said what I CAN speak to is the VFX. This film, with the exception of the lighting, was pretty well put together in terms of effects. There were really only a couple issues that were glaring in terms of VFX, but by and large it wasnt awful. There are definitely newer films that look worse. In standard. I dont know about 3d.

I think the thing that makes this film more frustrating than anything is that there are things about this movie I love. They are few and far between, but I really do love them. The intro was a really neat callback to the series intro to each episode. Then the movie happens. Then, the flying bison appears!! Then more movie. Then, a scene where Aang (not Awng) uses the glider in his staff. Then more movie. Then, all the practical martial arts, then, yet more movie. It's like this the entire way. Best comparison here? Green Lantern. It's like the Shyamalan said, "Hey, I like this and need a career boost.", then proceeded to cherry pick things from a beloved series and then ham and egged a movie with a confusing plot that absolutely requires you to be super familiar with the source material. There are a lot of assumptions made by characters in the movie that made sense given background provided by the show, but make absolutely none if you are going in blind. "Those are air bending tattoos, and I think he might be the avatar, despite he fact that I havent seen him bend anything and airbenders havent even been seen in over 100 years! Before my time!" Fucking come on. Throw the newcomers here a bone man.

The long story short here is I guess in spite of the casting decisions, editing, and direction, a good script could have made at least a fun movie. This movie should not have made it past script in the form we all saw it though, and it makes one wonder how much pressure was on everyone involved (almost all of it internally applied, Shyamalan did this project almost entirely on his own volition and cast a bunch of almost unknowns with the exception of maybe Cliff Curtis, so of course they said yes) to join in and take part in this without asking questions. Its upsetting to know the original showrunners were as ostracized as they were on this thing.

I dont see myself going back. Yes there were things that made me smile a little, but the film as a whole is so overwhelmingly bad in the face of those things it is just not worth it. I AM however going to go and rewatch the series with my wife and the kids for their first time, and maybe as a result of having to sit through this war crime of a film adaptation.

Final Verdict? I give it a D-. Purely out of respect for the very small handful of things I did appreciate. Next up?? The Lobster. Really looking forward to that one.

#the last airbender #atla #avatar the last airbender #movies #review #film #filmmaking

[leverage-commentary]

Leverage Season 1, Episode 13, The Second David Job, Audio Commentary Transcript

Chris: I’m Chris Downey, Executive Producer.

John: And Writer of this episode.

Chris: And Writer.

John: John Rodgers, Executive Producer and Oo-Writer. On my 13th Guiness for the DVD series.

[All Laugh]

Chris: For those of you keeping score.

John: Keeping score at home.

Dean: And I’m Dean Devlin the- one of the Executive producers and Director of this episode.

John: Alright what was our problem with this episode? We had broken up the team and done just about the best season finale you can imagine in episode 12. We did not know if we were getting a second season and we all hate cliffhanger endings.

Dean: Right.

John: So we really wanted to get the crew back together and my god how do you do that? And, you know, and this really killed us this- we hammered this first act- we had the back half of this written for ages.

Chris: Yeah.

John: And really just hammered the first act of this to hell.

Chris: It helped having a little time between the two episodes.

John: Yes.

Chris: On the show three months have passed, so that kinda gave you a chance to reset.

John: Yeah.

Dean: One of the things that I loved in this opening, guys, talk about how you guys came up with this. This idea that we’re seeing all of them break in, and of course as the audience I'm assuming they're doing this together, only to discover that none of them knew the other guy’s were doing this. How did that idea come about?

John: It was originally written that they were- it was originally written that they were all practicing a break in together.

Chris: Right.

John: And the idea was that he would go and have his meeting with them to tell them screw you I'm coming. ‘Fill your hands, you son of a bitch!’ And they would be practicing the break in and they would fail miserably and it would be we’ve just basically written a check we can't cash. Our mouth has written a check we can't cash. And then it was- it was weirdly static because the group was- why were they back together again? We felt like we hadn't gone anywhere off the previous episode.

Chris: The dry run didn't really- in a neutral location didn't really give you anything and you had the idea to bring it to where...

John: Why don’t we- basically, first off, like we’re gonna steal the gallery anyways, so let’s see it. We haven't really seen where we’re gonna be doing the crime, yet, and we should establish that as early as possible. I like very aggressive first acts, which is why often they're intercut between two or three, like, pipe and execution or two or three different storylines, and then it was just one of those things in the room where it was like, ‘what if they don't know each other’s there?’ and that just opened it up. The idea that- cause that was it, the question was, ‘alright when did they get back together after they've broke up?’ And that became, ‘what if they didn't?’

Chris: What if they didn't?

John: And that gave us this really, a ton of fun opening.

Dean: I tell you, I still laugh every time I watch this when Sophie turns around and goes, [whispers] ‘what are you doing here?’

[All Laugh]

John: Yeah. And Parker says the same thing back to her. And at that point the characters were so well established, it was really here's the setting just throw the actors in. You know what the responses are gonna be.

Dean: Right.

John: I think it was Lawrence Block who said, ‘you really know your characters when you know if they walk across a dark room and bang their shin on the coffee table what they're gonna say.’

[All Laugh]

John: And that's a quick reminder that she knows Nate’s wife Maggie; that she would recognize her to establish the stakes down there. And this is great, by the way, that's a green screen behind them. This is shot in the upstairs of the-

Dean: Of the same airport.

Chris: Same airport.

John: Yeah, this is the second floor.

[All Laugh]

John: And that's really the crux in shooting TV is, we've got a lot of locations for, you know, a TV show. Which we have to because you can't con people in your office. I mean we’re not a hospital show or lawyer show - we can't just go to the courtroom, so really the location managers job is to find someplace we can do four or five different looks at. And finding locations that do that...

Dean: So difficult.

John: Yeah, it's incredibly difficult.

Dean: Now you know we talked in the first part of this two part season finale about how we worked a little bit backwards, that we saw the location first and then kinda said alright well let's rejigger the script to match this. Well one of the things that I liked very much was these four stories.

John: Yeah.

Dean: Of the main museum. So quite dutifully, you guys wrote action on three different floors simultaneously.

John: Screw you Devlin!

Chris: Dutifully? I remember being there at the time going ‘John we already worked this out!’ ‘Shut up, shut up. He wants it this way! Figure it out!’

John: I will say, this is because we’re all very good friends and you often- the whole idea is that you're allowed to argue with your friends when you’re making television. Dean had brought us to this location we had really planned out the perfect crime and then we show up he's like, ‘it's got four stories, it's completely open, and I want rappelling.’ And we walk into the room and he was like, ‘what do you think?’ ‘I’m sorry Dean, it's gonna take me more than 30 seconds to come up with another perfect crime!’ And we lived there. We literally lived there for two days just walking around looking at it and pulling out notes of other con stuff we hadn't done.

Chris: God bless you, figured it out a way to work in the rappelling and all we lost was the hazmat suits.

John: Yeah, all we lost was the hazmat suits. We’ll use the hazmat suits in season 2.

Dean: Well this sequence not only is it on three different floors, but they all have to see each other at some point and I remember-

John: That was our vengeance, by the way, ‘like okay you want four floors? Here's four floors Devlin! Shoot this!’

Dean: Well at the end of the shooting day, I was in a pancic because I didn't know if what I had done was actually gonna cut together. And I remember coming here that night-

John: You cut a rough draft of this version that night after we wrapped like a 14 hour day.

Dean: We came here cause I was so nervous that I didn't have the coverage and our- Sunny Baskin cut this episode and he's a brilliant editor, and he'd already roughed in something by the end-

Chris: Terrific.

John: Oh that's great, knowing that you'd be freaking out.

Dean: And it was amazing.

John: That's the glass by the way. That's the glass from the first season finale.

Dean: First part.

John: Yeah, it’s basically in that episode.

Chris: 12 Step, too.

John: Yeah.

Dean: Yeah they keep passing it back and forth.

John: In the first episode it's Sterling to Nate and the challenge is to you sir, and in this one it’s Nate to Sterling and the challenge is to you sir. And the idea is that in their friendship the glass became like this sort of-

Dean: It's the glove.

John: Yeah, exactly.

Chris: Maybe talk a little bit about this location. This is not actually a museum this is a-

John: This is the campus building where we see briefly in the first half. And yeah, utterly abandoned and- the fact that he just gets a cheap shot in there is lovely.

Dean: I always love how these guys always try to get a- and again that's a call back to the pilot, when in the reverse situation, Aldis bangs Eliot's head against the car door putting him inside.

John: Just to give him a little something back. Yeah, you can really watch like the pilot and then the two part season finale and match a lot of them shot to shot.

Chris: One of them’s coming up.

John: Yeah.

Chris: One of the iconic shots.

John: Oh yeah the pull up. The car, that’s right.

Chris: Yeah the car, yeah.

John: And yeah, so we had a basically had the place- the run of the place and then we built this entire- this is Lauren Crasco she built the entire lobby to a museum. I've been in museums that don't look this good.

Chris: Look at that.

Dean: Here's a classic comedy beat.

John: Which we rarely do.

Dean: That I've just always wanted to do.

[All Laugh]

John: Oh and by the way that's Gina just realizing she needs to take off the shoes, that’s not written at all. And timing them to come out, Aldis is still handcuffed.

Chris: This is it. I love this, I love this so much.

Dean: This is to match the pilot, when they come out of the the first heist.

John: That matches the first heist, except the first one they're in control, in this one they're almost about to get caught. It's almost like the directors thought about this. This location I love. This is up the hill from the college.

Dean: Right.

John: This was on the campus.

Chris: And this was the president of the college lived there?

John: I don’t know, but this was a night- this was built by like a steel magnate in the 20s, right?

Dean: That's right.

John: And it had a swimming pool, an abandoned swimming pool in the basement.

Dean: Indoor, underground swimming pool and a strange bar area downstairs. It was very-

Chris: Right out of Raymond Chandler.

Dean: Totally.

John: It was! You totally expected to find the like a dead flapper on the concrete down there. It was very- it was really great house. And this became our favorite headquarters. As much as I love the offices we had, there was something about just the looseness of the- well, the space was lit beautifully, I mean, it really was gorgeous.

Dean: Again, hats off to Dave Connell, our DP.

John: It was really gorgeous.

Chris: If we ever get to do the Leverage tour, come to LA we'll take you walking around this.

John: We’re thinking about doing that just to make a little money for second season.

Dean: This is- this scene is a scene that I think is particularly well written, and fun for the actors to play because it's driving home why this team is apart, and watching how Nate pulls them back together again.

John: It's interesting that- it's an interesting arc over the course of the season, where he doesn't want to lead them, they talk him into it, and by the end of it he realizes whether he wants to or not, he has to pull them back together in order for everyone to get the closure that they need, including him.

Dean: And you do get a sense that he really does love these people.

John: Yes; in in his own broken way, you know, he understands that they need each other.

Dean: There's a very subtle thing he'll do in a minute when he does this whistle, and everyone makes their way over to look at the plans, and of course being who they are they cant help but wanna solve the crime. But if you just watch Tim Hutton's face as he's slowly backing away, watching them look at the plans, it tells you more about how his character feels about the other characters than really anything else he says .

John: ‘Oh look at that, aren’t you hooked?’

Dean: It's such a daddy looking at his kids discovering a toy.

Chris: Yeah.

John: Oh there you go, you're absolutely hooked. And that's the whole psychology; he chased them, he knows them, and to a great degree they're all as broken as he is. They have to solve the problem; they just don't have the same skills he does, you know, which gives us the later the hitter, hacker, grifter, thief.

Dean: And it shows, again, his profiling skills. His ability to kinda be two steps ahead in the chess game.

John: I love- And then he does the kind of lay down the law scene and talks them through it. It’s a lovely little scene.

Dean: This is a little inside baseball...

John: Well that’s what we’re here for.

Dean: When we shot this scene, I thought he did a terrific performance and we cut it together - everyone thought it was, but Tim listened to the way he did the lines as he walks forward and says this thing about ‘I already told them’ and he said, “I wanna redo that.”

John: Wanted ADR it?

Dean: Yeah. There was no reason to on a technical level, he just felt he could do something special with it, so he came in here and lo and behold, he did elevate it just a subtle amount, but it was absolutely worth doing. And one of those things that really only someone who really knew their character inside and out, could tell.

John: Yeah and a guy who’s directed. You know, the director part of his brain was like, ‘yeah you could have got a little more out of that’. And this is, again, with the food there, this is the kind of recurring theme. This is their snacks, this is their home, this is their living room, this is what they do for fun.

Dean: Yeah. They enjoy this stuff.

John: ‘Biblical’

Dean: This was the level little twist on, you know, we do a lot of scenes where everybody walks out of the room and we linger on Nate thinking. Here's, like, the opposite.

John: Yeah, because he knows he's in control at this point; he absolutely knows what he's gonna do. He's got an agenda, he's walking in with purpose every time. It’s- by the way, it's interesting, when you got a five hander - trying to get people in and out of these goddamn rooms.

Dean: Oh boy.

John: And the blocking and in writing you know we try to help- the writers try to help the directors, trying to split it up and make sure they're not all there at any given point, but then you have to cook up, you know, there's a lot of times Nate walks into the room with purpose and you have no idea what purpose. It just- obviously he's got stuff to do, and it starts the scene.

Chris: There's just something about the lighting and the way this whole-

John: This became our favorite location.

Chris: It's a really warm and I don't know what it was about it.

John: Yeah, and this is the low tech scene the plans and stuff. This kinda really brought home our love of process, because here's the thing, we spend a lot of time in the writers room trying to figure out how to do these crimes. That's our process scene. So we’re bored with that then we just write the heist. And this was really because the character beats were coming across in the process. When we went back to it, you know like, season 2, you can do a lot more stuff than just them hanging out, figuring out crimes. I like watching them do it. I genuinely enjoy watching them do it.

Chris: We kept wanting to make better screens. ‘We need screens where its like Minority Report where they touch the screen and they move the pictures’ and here they've got planes, and there’s paper.

Dean: Drawings and strings.

John: And the emotional agenda .

Dean: Yeah.

John: They're all basically- It's a Sophie/Eliot and Hardison/Parker scene, happening at the same time Nate is trying to get them to plan the con.

Dean: I love the reminder here, you know, of how angry Eliot is at Sophie for having betrayed-

John: Yeah, he does not forgive her; he will not forgive her until, you know.

Dean: Until he gets an apology.

John: And to me there was always- we played around with a scene we never wrote, where Hardison basically talks him into it, and it was a Hardison/Eliot scene that kind of focused on their relationship, but honestly this things jammed, we just didn't have time. There's a lot going on.

Dean: Yeah. Well in fact, there's some lovely scenes that were cut from this episode that will come back, you know, which is when Parker steals the pills-

John: Oh yeah!

Dean: -and Aldis does the woman who's overdosing.

John: The dying grandma! The dying grandma.

Chris: Oh, that was great.

John: That's right we shot that, too. Can we put that on the extras?

Dean: That'll definitely be on the deleted scenes on this DVD.

John: Theres an entire separate con, to set up the museum con, that we never see and then we just cover it in a line. And it works, it works fine.

Dean: But it's a fun scene to see.

John: Who is that? Who is that gentleman sneezing?

Dean: This would be- we call him the king of hold, affectionately. I first worked with Erick Avari in Stargate where he played Kasuf, the leader of the other planet. He did a small part for me in Independence Day, and then the second Librarian movie, he played main villain and we brought him all the way to Africa. And he worked for 2 days and be off for a week, he’d work for a day, be off for a week, so we called him the king of hold.

John: Digital shutters there.

Dean: Digital shutters, but mirroring the actual shutters that were actually there.

John: There were real shutters there - that was one of the attractions of it. And then I love, however, when they say, ‘okay we can turn them on for you’ and we’re all ready, we’re all gathered to get test footage and everything-

Chris: ‘Better put your earplugs in, these are gonna be pretty loud.’

John: We turn the thing and the alarm starts going off and they come down at about an inch an hour.

Dean: Right. [Laughs]

John: [sound effects] Like, okay, that was somewhat less dramatic than we had hoped for. And so we wound up building- we wound up shooting it actually then speeding it up.

Dean: And then mixing it with some digital ones, that's right.

John: I love, by the way, the opening of this - if young actors, if you go back to the beginning of the scene, you can watch Mark Sheppard subtly upstage everyone. It's not super subtle, but it's just a nice stage technique.

Dean: And Kari, in her recognizing the man who was flirting with her at the party, just gives such a great little performance.

John: ‘Oh, yeah.’ That's also an interesting look that kind of really established that Kari and Sheppard knew each other from when he was Nate’s friend. And there was a softness in that relationship I wasn’t expecting. This is great. And this is something we almost never play.

Chris: Yeah.

John: This is Nate and Eliot bickering, which we almost never do. And Chris by the way-

Dean: And Eliot having the upper hand.

John: Yes. And Chris, by the way, plainly using the voice he uses when he seduces women. This is not Eliot by any stretch- plainly Chris Kane putting on the phone voice.

Dean: And this end here was all improv. And it was just great.

John: Well the hot coffee bit, cause it's really, it’s funny, ‘cause I-

Dean: The ‘you're putting your hair up?’ ‘I’m being the-’

John: ‘-the professor dude!’ I love that. That's all improvised. She probably just wants some hot coffee was great. Chris came up to me right before they shot this like, ‘how dirty?’ And I was like, ‘medium dirty.’

[All Laugh]

John: This is shot in the front yard of one of the university buildings that looks like a frickin cafe. We just, you know.

Dean: Yeah it was such a great location, we just lived there.

Chris: And this was on the stage.

John: Yeah. Inside in the van. And this is great because, again, Nate’s not comfortable. Nate not in control is not good, and this is kind of where we gave Kari all the complaints the other characters had about Nate for her to vocalize, so they could kind of- it was cathartic to the group to here someone else say this.

Dean: And then the kick on the ground to say he was terrible in bed.

John: Just a little- I love the reactions everyone did there - how uncomfortable he plays knowing that Nate is watching.

Dean: Watching everything.

John: Yeah, exactly. Kari really takes a ridiculous amount of delight in here. I often wonder what Tim was like as a director for Kari to launch in to this quite so [mumbles]. She really dug in on that bit.

Dean: Tim gets to play such a reversal here, given that he's always in control, he's always the one whos withholding, and now he's trying to explain-

John: Oh, I love parkers ‘Ooh, there's no save from that’. Yeah, he’s trying to explain- Tell you what, again, the joy of a television show is that the characters change, the actors- you have 12 hours to find what these actors can do. Nate being somewhat annoyed and out of his depth is definitely becoming the kind of the season 2 vibe.

Chris: Yeah

Dean: Oh yeah.

John: He's just- its a bit more they need him in the life more than he needs to be.

Chris: I love her eating gummy bears, too. Sitting there and...

John: Yeah, ‘I feel used’. And it was interesting, cause the originally that was done with them offstage, and seeing them sort of framed there really opens up the space and, you know. ‘Going great. Going great.’ And that’s, again, the old friends vibe that's kind of everyone's locked into at this point.

Dean: Now this is an interesting bit, because it starts off with a bit of humor and it becomes literally the most dramatic scene of the entire series. And the pay off to everything that we set up about the son in the pilot.

John: Now we shot the death of the son full on. We shot the entire sequence when we did the pilot, right? So that we could use that footage- we never used the footage in the pilot.

Dean: Well we used just the beginning part where he's looking at this son, but we never used the part where he ran in and picks his son up.

John: And you had argued, correctly, you had argued that this is really dramatic, it would throw off the tone, the pilots supposed to be light, and I was like, ‘ahh you don't really see what happens’ and I will admit the first time I saw this cut together, I cried. I was like, ‘You’re right, this was devastating.’ Not only for the performance in the flashback, but what Tim is doing live.

Chris: Well, I mean, his- to me he carries the whole thing.

John: Yeah.

Chris: Not even that scene.

John: You don't even need the flashback, but the flashback plus this is devastating.

Dean: And we parsed it out over the course of the season. We saw a little bit more every time we did the flash, it was a little bit longer than the last time. And here we played it out and then of course, we got to bring Kari into the flashback which is really the coda of that.

Chris: And Dean, what went into setting it here? I mean, did you think about other places indoors?

John: For example, one without a fountain 8 feet from the actors?

Chris: No, no but I’m just saying, it would have been...

John: I'm giving him shit.

Chris: You know was- what went into that?

Dean: I thought it was actually trying to go against the cliche of it being night and dark and gloomy. That if it's a beautiful setting, its outdoors, it's a little bit, you know, the thing where if you're gonna break up with your girlfriend, you wanna be in a public place.

Chris: Right, right.

Dean: Well, he’s about to tell her the most painful, private thing in the world, so he's doing that someplace where its gonna be easy to escape if this goes horribly wrong.

John: And thats whats- there’s an interesting there's an interesting moment here where he says,’if you looked at me the way I look at myself, I'd blow my head off’. Nate is fully capable of deal with his own self-loathing. He could not deal with the idea, the concept, that she would stop loving him or hate him. And that's why he kept the secret and that's what destroyed their marriage.

Dean: And look at how he brings it here, this is such a wonderful performance.

John: Yeah. And by the way, we shot this pretty much continuously; he falls apart during the course of the performance in one long take, really. You could watch that take and just watch the entire thing.

Dean: And after the second take, I thought, you know, he must be spent, and I wanted him to get one more moment and I said, “Do you have another one in you?” And he looked at me like ‘Oh yeah, keep- I could go all day.’

Chris: Do you remember what take this was?

Dean: I don't. But I would imagine it was fairly early cause he really- he nailed it right off the bat.

John: Every now and then it’s like, ‘Oh that’s right: Oscar. This is the-

Dean: This is the part of the flashback you didn't see in the pilot, but it was all shot at the same time.

John: And just, yeah. And man, even the day we shot it it was heartbreaking.

Dean: It absolutely was.

John: And actually, Tim has a son about this age, and just flailing. And there's Kari just- And I will fully admit, I am occasionally overly poetic when writing, but there's absolutely some stuff that was written - which is when she steps in the doorway, Maggie realizes she's lost her son, but Nate has lost his mind. And that’s- His sanity, his sense of self worth, everything was destroyed. She had a tragedy, he was destroyed. He will never be the same human being again. And the actors- really great. That's the good thing about writing - you just write something really pretty and let other people do the heavy lifting. [Laughs] ‘Okay, turn this into something that makes people cry. I'm breaking for lunch.’

Dean: And then just so we didn’t end on too heavy a beat, we remind- we bring the plot back in.

John: Oh you hate him so much here. By the way, I love the fact every time we have a ‘Oh, I love my characters.’ ‘Oh, I hate him.’ You really juxtapose Mark Sheppard - Sterling - coming in. It's like, ‘Oh, they've just made up and now you're gonna be mean to Kari? Oh you bastard.’

Chris: There we go! String!

Dean: String!

John: This is the biggest cheat ever! And that's how the plot will work.

[All Laugh]

Chris: Oh come on, that goes back to the Greeks!

John: That does.

Chris: Who was the first person that came up with the-

John: In media res, that’s what it is.

Chris:  And thats how its gonna go. Any questions?

John: It was one of those things where - how do we do pipe that doesn't blow how the con’s gonna work, but shows that we’re planning? Don't. Just come in. Oh. Oh my God, this-

Dean: My favorite Parker moment of the entire series.

John: Why does Parker sniff her? I don't understand.

Dean: It's the weirdest little moment.

John: And yet it completely makes sense.

Dean: And it’s fabulous.

John: You know what it is? It’s like, ‘is this our new mommy?’ Its like it’s- really, really a weird moment.

Dean: And by the way, not a direction I gave her. It just happened because she knows this character so well and it was just fabulous.

John: And that's the nice little look between Hardison and Nate, that Hardison is indeed reading her mail. Just to be on the safe side. And this is where we launch into - when he says we need that large object moved - we launch into our tribute to Never Send a Boy King to Do a Man's Job, the-

Chris: Sure. The touchstone.

John: The Rockford Files episode. The greatest

Chris: From which all things spring.

John: From which all things spring. And this is great. She just- it’s not like you can just make people do what you want. The fact that everyone's kinda laughing at her - no, we do impossible shit every week.

Dean: You haven't been watching this show, have you? She goes, ‘You're adorable’. And pets her head.

John: Which is, by the way, one of the things I say to someone when they've annoyed me or cut short, so they appropriated it for the moment. The actors actually -  it's weird how the actors pick up the writer mannerisms, cause we’re on the set all the time, so there an awful lot of actor writer in-jokes.

Dean: And also sometimes there's second generation. For instance-

John: Seriously.

Dean: Seriously. Started as a thing you would do, it became a thing Amy did, and then the actors pulled it from Amy.

Chris: Yeah.

John: So this- this is great, by the way, again, one of the fact that Nate’s not in control, he's emotionally kind of spun out, and the fact they're telling him, ‘You know what? You were kind of a dick season 1. There are times we like when Sophie- Sophie a little better than you.’

Dean: That's right.

Chris: It's great, too, when you get to add another person to the team. It's not something that we did - we only really did it at the end of the year, and it just kind of mixes things up, changes the dynamics.

John: Opens up the dynamics a lot, yeah. And the idea that Sophie has genuinely come to like Maggie at this point, you just can't not.

Chris: Didn't we-? We lost a little bit of them bonding.

John: Yeah, it was just cut for time. There is a bit where they are having kind of shorthand conversation-

Chris: ‘Oh, and I hate when he-’ ‘Oh this is the worst thing that he does.’ ‘It's terrible.’

John: It kinda went by the wayside, but yeah, they're pretty good friends by this point. See you learn and you con.

Dean: One of my favorite lines.

John: See Nate? Sometimes you know what? You don't have to be so imperious all the time man. And yes and this is- a lot of the little bits here are from Apollo dropping us all those, sort of, loose notes he gave us about cons; like little ways to make people believe you that we worked in.

Dean: Persuasion techniques.

John: Persuasion techniques, and letting him finish it, and never give him the information. Let them completely the information in their heads. And the- you know glasses switch. What was i gonna say the- so yes, so it's a this episode this segment is based on a famous Rockford files episode written by Juanita Rosenberg?

Chris: Juanita Rodriguez. Juanita Bartlett.

John: Bartlett. Which is their big con episode and both Chris and I had watched when we were kids, and really set the standard for big con episodes on television. So we were literally stuck thinking, ‘Alright, Dean has shown us this location, we have now come up with a way to hide everything-’

Chris: ‘Things we could use in a museum. Mummies?’

John: It became what large object could we use to hide the door? And we literally said, ‘Well, I mean, if we're writing Rockford Files, it'd be a mummy. But there's no way we can do that here…’ Well who's stopping us?

Dean: By the way, Gina doing the fantastic, very specific Iranian accent.

Chris: Yes, yes.

Dean: And you probably- most people in America won't even recognize it, with the exception of thinking, ‘Gosh she sounds like Christiane Amanpour.’

[All Laugh]

John: No that was- she was actually- the great thing is, Gina originally- when she’d come back and forth from London, sometimes she'd stay at this hotel, and so when we'd give her an accent she would go down to the bar and just try to find if any of the guests were from there, and then she would hit them up.

Chris: Oh that's great.

John: So yeah, for some of the promos and stuff when she was speaking different languages and stuff, that’s where she got the phrases from.

Dean: She's great in this scene.

John: Just a little distant, a little- just carrying the pipe, not try to sell anything. I like her hair that way, actually. She cut her hair.

Chris: Very 40’s. She had a very 40’s kind of-

John: Very 40’s vibe.

Dean: This was a fun bit you guys came up with.

John: Well again, the idea that we believe the information that's put directly in front of our face. There's so much information on the web, and something happened the week before - one of those things you read and you believe turns out to be fake, just an internet joke that everyone bought into, is we trust the web, we trust Wikipedia, we trust everything on the web, and it doesn't occur to us to think that someone would put a path of lies directly-

Dean: -in front of us.

Chris: Right, right.

John:- in front of us.

Dean: By the way, that's one of our writers, Amy Berg, as one of the professors.

John: Amy Berg, writer of-

Chris: And our prop guy, Eric Bates.

John: Our prop guy, Bates, is one of our other dead archeologists. And the guys just having fun here. Really it's just point the camera at this point. Just kinda slide back and forth and assume they're gonna do something amusing. And then she brings her in for the close out. Lauren Crasco, great job this is the- where is this?

Dean: This is a little auditorium in that same compound that we did the museum and everything else and decorated to be a presentation room for an Egyptian exhibit.

John: Also, you'll notice, by the way, that it's a small writing thing, but it's somewhat satisfying. First off, the virus she describes exists and is real. Because we originally when we were pitching out the mummy's curse. ‘Okay, no one's gonna believe the mummy's curse, he's just an idiot if he believes in the curse.’ Well where did the curse come from? And that led us to this infection, the spore infection-

Dean: -the infection.

Chris: -the spores, yeah.

John: But the thing she uses to distract him, which is ‘you came to my office to talk about the benches, now you sign the purchase orders for the benches.’ The benches are the key to the entire final heist. Shes using his state here, the rest of the con, to set up the final con. And now putting the deadly, deadly mummy away as one would.

Chris: Please get that away from me.

John: And we know they're up to something. And this was actually, Amy Berg wrote this scene. We realized that we were going into the back part of the finale without resolving the Eliot/Sophie bit. And we were kinda stacked and Amy was hanging out for free, honestly she was just really just-

Chris: We were very tired.

John: We were very tired.

Dean: But the thing she brought to this scene that I think is so interesting, is it's the apology without ever having the ability to say you're sorry.

John: Well that's a lot of the writers room. We’re really very emotionally shut down in there.

Dean: So this is, as an actor, that's a very interesting thing to play. She needs to convey that she's sorry, but her character would never ever say she's sorry.

John: Actually the other great thing Amy came up with here, is the idea that we’re seeing the last one, not the first one.

Dean: Right.

John: And how that would annoy him. There's a lot of great little dynamics in this scene.

Chris: It's really nice.

John: I gotta say its a nice piece of work

Chris: Within a very, you know, fast paced episode, it's also nice to take minute.

John: Stop.

Chris: Kinda do some character stuff.

John: Close it out. We feel that we’ve resolved the emotional issue from the first half. By the way, the little thing that Chris spins, everything you notice he does it in almost every episode. I’m always… ‘Do you practice? Do you go home and practice?’

Chris: He did it with the beer, too.

John: Yeah! And he's like, ‘Of course I go home and practice. I would never do something if I don't practice.’ It’s like, damn. Yes the idea that he's genuinely annoyed he wasn't apologized to first, it's a complicated little scene for-

Dean: It is. And for me the thing that really makes the whole thing work, is the thing that brings them together, is the painting from the Homecoming episode.

John: Which is metaphorically their home.

Dean: Their home. And it's such a weird painting.

John : It really is. My own attachment to it has grown quite unnatural. Yeah a little left. That house was insane. I can't believe we had this.

Chris: Yeah, it was great.

Dean: What an amazing location.

John: And that little look he gives him like, ‘Okay. We're done here, we’re okay.’

Dean: Now in the lexicon of music that we use, this is probably the most over the top ‘dun dun dun.’

John: Well of course he's evil, look at him! Oh look, oh she's so nice, oh now she's worried, I hate him so much!

Dean: I love it.

John: Yeah. When we were screening this, I actually couldn't help but-

Chris: Well he gets amped up to make the act break pop.

John: A little bit.

Dean: This is a fun bit. And talk about how you guys came up with this idea that he's talking about each character, not realizing that those character are right in front of him. How did that bit come about?

Chris: Oh yeah. I think I remember I wrote this a 2 o'clock in the morning and then-

John: Yeah, and then I put a shine on it for the choreography because I had been in the location a little bit more than you had.

Chris: Yeah, I think it was just- the purpose of it was basically to set the jeopardy - that this guy was going- that Mark Sheppard’s character, Sterling, was gonna-

John: That's what it was. We had originally done the montage to see everybody going into place because we wanted the audience to know geographically where they were, because geography in a heist is crucial. You must establish where everyone is so the audience isn't wondering. And you had done the great thing of like, what horrible things he had planned to reset the jeopardy, and it was literally page count wise, the act was long and it was once one of those things where - would it work if we jammed it together? And we jammed it together and it absolutely worked.

Dean: Well the lovely byproduct became this hide-in-plain-sight.

Chris: Yeah.

Dean: That the last place you'd look is right in front of your nose.

John: Exactly. And the little look of amusement to Sophie, that, ‘You're good Shepherd, you're not that good.’

Chris: Yeah, yeah.

John : And Nate Ford ending on the arrival of Nate.

Chris: Nate Ford. And I love the idea that he shows up - he bought a ticket.

John: Bought a ticket. Yeah. Nate Ford's superpower is finding the easiest, simplest way to do things. That's when everybody else overthinks it. Because, you know, the rest of this act is so simple.

Chris: Oh yeah.

John: Oh my god. Wow, nice shot.

Dean: Yes. This is, again, one of our 360 shots, but only taken to one revolution to end right on the, ‘we're gonna get him and we're gonna throw him into jail.’

John: This is also nice because we've established, and again, it’s because Mark does an excellent job, we've established that Sterling is very, very scared. He's beaten the team in the previous episode. So by showing Sterling start to get a little worried here, you're actually both empowering your own character and letting the audience know they should be getting anxious.

Dean: And this was nice, him going back and reviewing the tapes.

John: Cause he saw it. He saw it earlier, and now he's like, ‘this is not right.’

Chris: I love that little look - the turn of the head.

John: The little turn of the head, yeah.

Chris: Just disgusted by it.

Dean: Erick is so terrific.

John: Good sneeze; that was an improv too. The tissues here. It was a prop to do it.

Dean: And I love Tim’s look during this. The whole thing is evolving around and he's sitting there eating popcorn.

John: I don't even know how you get popcorn in a museum. It's just great. Look how great that lobby looks. That absolutely looks like the lobby of a New York museum I’ve been in. That's really fantastic that we built that- Lauren built that, so you can shoot 360 in there.

Dean: And again, almost everything we’re looking at in this act is steadicam, you know what I mean? Poor Gary Camp was lugging that thing around nonstop.

John: Well that's your rule, right? That's your rule - once we go to the action, if the con is going smoothly, we go to steadicam.

Dean: Exactly.

John: And we’re in. And the entire act’s the con.

Dean: Right. So poor Gary was lugging that thing the whole time.

John: And we’re shooting the RED which is a little lighter at least.

Dean: At least.

John: At least. How much does the RED weigh?

Dean: Well with all the bells and whistles, probably around 45 pounds.

John: So he's got 45 pounds on his shoulder.

Dean: And the rig.

Chris: Here's comedy, folks.

John: And that's a mummy. That is big sitcom writing right there, ladies and gentlemen.

Chris: And, you know, if you're gonna use a sarcophagus like that, the thing you're gonna assume is somebody's in it.

John: Right. And that's- originally, at one point, we played with that and then said well no, we wouldn't be in there.

Chris: [Mumbles unintelligibly.]

John : That’s Chekhov's rule, actually. If you put a mummy in the first act, it has to go off in the third act.

Chris: Right here's our magic box.

John: Here's our magic box, where we had to- man the set designers just killed themselves designing this thing, because it's actually functioning.

Chris: That's actually- that's functioning.

Dean: Right. And I love this little bit, that they're all just- cause really nothing's going on there except they're synchronizing watches, but it’s such a nice visual, and it's such a nice thing seeing the team is now together and the plan is now afoot.

John: And for the audience it is 3, 2, 1, GO, and it's really a reset that now is when enormous amounts of fun will start. And by the way, it runs roughly real time.

Chris: Oh there it is.

John: I love that look. I love when she does the ‘I'm about to have fun’ look. And by the way, we discovered later, this smoke is real. Tell them about the fogger.

Chris: Oh, the fogger. There is a state of the art security equipment. There now is a fogger, which if you break into a vault-

Dean: Oh and by the way, that’s our first A.D.’s wife Sherri.

John: Yeah. Doing a great job. ‘It's a robbery!’

Dean: So go ahead.

Chris: No, no. At any rate, tt does exist - an impenetrable fog that will be emitted if you break into certain high tech vaults, but this-

John: This was our special effects guys.

Chris: So I’m so happy this came out.

John: But we had to build an actual functioning case that worked with the security.

Dean: Well this next bit here, how did this idea come about?

John: This is absolutely an homage to Thomas Crown, which I wrote the sequel to. This is- this is like, how much absolute blinding chaos can we create? And it's great because we went to Eric in props and were like, ‘It'd be great if- because the entire first act of the show, The First David Job, rests on the fact they are identical. It would be great if we were able to do the same visual reference in the second half. But there's no way you can give us like 40 David statues could you?’ And Eric went, ‘Well I'll figure out a way.’ And on budget and on time, he went out and got us 40 identical-

Dean: He's so remarkable.

Chris: Right. And again, it was to play into what-

Dean: By the way, on the technical level, that is such a difficult steadicam shot. He just did a steadicam shot through a crowd of people. That is so hard.

John: Smoothly. I thought that was the crane. That wasn't the jib?

Chris: That wasn't a crane?

Dean: Nope, that’s Gary on the steadicam, and then he continues it all the way to the door.

John: Oh that’s right, cause he just cut away.

Dean: On a pure technical level, that is a remarkable shot.

John: He's a great operator. There's a lot of stuff we did, that if we didn't have Gary, we'd be in serious trouble.

Dean: And now I get my rappelling scene.

John: Sure, fine.

Chris: There we go folks. Folks, do you know where this came from?

Dean: But the fun of it is it’s Tim doing the rappelling. The last guy we’d expect on the show to do the rappelling.

Chris: There it is.

John: There it is. Boom. And by the way-

Dean: Great stunt.

John: Great stunt. And the happiness, if you actually go back and freeze frame that shot as he lands, you get three entirely different attitudes from the actors. And then he pulls it down and through. And yes, we desperately worked very hard not to kill any of our actors. What was I gonna say? But it is interesting because- how we approached the problem. The original con was that Tim’s the mastermind, and we want to make him the bait. The idea that Sterling’s blind spot is he's afraid of Nate, secretly. And so he would obsess about him and they could use that to drive everyone off. And when it was single rooms and multiple floors that was easier. When it became the big chamber and rappelling, like, well how do we do that? The only place to draw people off is we need to get them out of this chamber, and that birthed a lot of this stuff. And where would you follow Nate? Well it's like Nate would need to get them up on the roof, to get them away to a place where he could get away from them, and they couldn’t follow.

Dean: And they get locked in the box.

John: And that brought us to the rappelling - it brought us to a very cool sequence.

Chris: So when you say here, when Dean says, ‘I want rappelling,’ it can be an interesting sequence. Now I love this shot.

Dean: All kudos to Tim in this scene for just pulling this off.

John: Yeah. Cause this is a guy standing in front of 2 maquettes.

Chris: No its not.

John: By the way, this is beautifully lit.

Chris: It’s beautifully lit, look at this.

John: Yeah, cause are we doing this at night? Is that how we got it so dark? And then we lit it, or-?

Dean: Yeah.

Chris: I think it was night, yeah.

John: Yeah, so the outside’s blown out-

Dean: Yes, that's right. The outside is lit- its night for day.

John: That’s done all the time.

Dean: Sure.

John: Sure! Mad.

Dean: Tim is just brilliant in this scene. I love his sense of accomplishment of revenge.

John: Yup on both guys. And then the big reveal that all the paintings that they’ve stolen, everything but the thing they said they were gonna steal.

Chris: I think that was you Dean, too, wasn’t that? Like we should turn on the lights and all the paintings except the Davids-

Dean: And everything's gone except the Davids. And there's a lovely, again, acting moment  between Kari and Tim as Kari is explaining what has just been stolen. And it says miles about their relationship. Right there.

John: Yeah, and she's also calling back to something that [unintelligible]’s character said earlier. Look, there you go, there's a little bit of forgiveness, a little bit of accomplishment, because she is now fully invested in screwing the people who let her son die, you know. Which I kinda feel bad about cause he’s co-opted her in his emotional immaturity. I don't know how I feel about that now that we're looking at it a second time. Kevin’s meltdown here is spectacular, thank you.

Dean: Yeah, it’s a tour de force bad guy meltdown.

John: And then Sterling realizing, checkmate, you know, really- and again, Mark really modulated that character.

Dean: Mark does a great turn here where he realizes- he goes from ‘I’m screwed’, to ‘I win.’

John: Yeah. Mark Sheppard will not let me rest unless I do note in the DVD commentary that at no point does Sterling lose in season 1. He never loses - at worst, it's a tie. And that's what makes him a great nemesis. And this is, of course, an echo from part 1. You know, and that’s why, we start it with- both parts start with each one of those guys holding a gun on the other. It's one of those little filming things. I'm listening. And again you great to see Sterling- what's the strategy here? What's the out? You know he's always trying to salvage something. And also Tim’s choice to ignore the guy with the gun.

Dean: Yeah, the gun is the least threatening thing to him in the world.

Chris: Right.

Dean: You're doing him a favor if you pull that trigger.

John: Yeah and also that the game’s over. You know, in his head he's so far ahead at this point it, you know, it's all gone right that if he dies at this point, it's okay.

Dean: Right. Cause he knows he already won.

John: And it was, again, it was an interesting choice. The flashback, the classic zhoom zhoom, there's really a lot of zhoom.

Chris: The flashback. The this is very much a classic, ‘here’s how I got you.’

John: Yup. It's not the other version, which is: you didn't see part of this scene, it's the oh, you didn't understand the context.

Chris: You didn't realize the significance of it. Which is actually more-

John: -more interesting.

Dean: Well when you watch this, you always think, well for me, it was always why would he tell them in advance he's doing it? And it's all here you go, ahh, that’s why he tells them in advance.

John: You set up, and again, if you kill me now, I can die a happy man, because regardless I have destroyed you. And at this point Sterling’s- I love that little- he realizes.

Dean: This is when he starts to realize, ‘Wait a minute, I’m gonna come out on top,’ and then he loves it. Sterling-

John: Because he's a perfectly amoral bastard. He really is.

Dean: He is. And I love that he switches the gun. He goes from pointing at Nate, to pointing at his own man.

John: Look at him. He's not scared either. It's really we have- we’re definitely working on the Sterling/Nate team up episode for season 2, because Mark really made the character so interesting. It's: ‘Alright, I wanna see what it was like when these two guy actually did it together.’

Chris: Kids, actually be afraid of firearms, not like our characters.

Dean: The way he- the way Tim delivers the line here about, ‘I lost my only son, do you honestly think that you can frighten me?’ It just tells you everything about Nate for this whole season. It's why nothing bothers him anymore. He's already faced the worst thing a human being can ever face.

John: Yeah. And that's part of the challenge is now, is how do we rebuild him? You know, knowing there's a season 2, as opposed to, really, when we did this, we didn't know. And a parallel punch to the first half.

Dean: Right.

Chris: And it's the payoff.

John: It's the payoff punch. And it's the exact same- that Nate did in the first half.

Dean: Except in this one, it knocks him down. Her punch is even harder.

John: We really wanted to give Kari the win there.

Chris: She's very fiery, I buy it.

John: Yeah, I like the smile there, he's kinda proud of her.

Dean: And I love this line here, that ‘this whole plan counted on me being an utter bastard.’

John: Yeah, not just a bastard, and he's perfectly willing to accept that. What was I gonna say? This- it’s really fascinating this location, considering we lived in it, it looks like a million different things. It's really just the same looks back and forth: door to gallery, door to gallery, door to gallery. Different sizes and different people. You know, cause we decorated the entire other half, we dressed, and we never shot that side.

Dean: Not really.

John: We never needed to.

Dean: Just in one passing walk by.

John: Yes, where he goes up to the alarm room. That’s it.

Dean: That's the only time we ever saw that. And this is a nice, connecting the two rooms and realizing how they got all the paintings out of this.

John: Yeah. And the whole idea that down they shot down earlier. And we had to build these benches, and the original con was they were hiding in the benches and then we realized that Hardison - Aldis - is very big and cramming him in this bench would be cruel.

Chris: Yeah that was just-

John: And we wanted to steal all the art, not just some of the art.

Dean: And it was a great gateway to the room below.

Chris: And I love this shot down here, too.

John: This was a 360 in a tiny basement room.

Chris: Tiny.

Dean: With a very very wide-angle lens, which is a tough lens to put on a steadicam.

Chris: And look at that, it ends on this perfectly composed shot right here, I love this.

Dean: Yeah. We've got terrific camera people.

John: And this is the- I think this is the last thing we shot.

Chris: I think it was.

Dean: It was. It was the last day of shooting.

John: -the last day of shooting, and it's weird because I think everyone's playing kind of a weird beat here because it's the last shot.

Chris: Cause we don't know nobody knows- at this point the actors dont know we’re coming back.

Dean: Well it's also because this next scene that's about to play was shot earlier, but the thing I had said - John was standing next to me at the moment I said it.

John: It was very cruel.

Dean: But we were just about to shoot the set, and I wanted to get the right emotions from everyone, so I gathered the actors together and I said, ‘Guys, remember we don't know if we're gonna get a second season. This might be the end of all of it. This might be the finale of the entire series.’ And then I walked off the set.

[All Laugh]

John: And they were wrecked, they were just-

Dean: And you could see it in their performances. It's all there emotionally and they all- everyone of them brought their a-game for this scene.

John: They were genuinely crying. I mean really, they- you worked them up pretty badly. I'm glad we didn't have to shoot anything else after this.

Dean: No, they just nailed it. And frankly, for me, this is my favorite ending of anything I've ever done in my whole career. I love the way this season ended. Because if we didn't get a second season, I would have been fulfilled that I had gotten a complete story.

Chris: We took people on a trip.

Dean: And of course, the- for our listeners here, the hilarity for all of us was when we found out we were picked up for second season, and suddenly John and Chris said, ‘now how the hell do we put these people back together again?’

John: There are times when you’re a little too smart for your own good. And it really was, ‘You know what? Not like those other punk shows that do a cliffhanger. we’re breaking up the team-’

Dean: -and blowing up the offices.

John: -’and blowing up the offices. We have utterly destroyed all vestiges of the template from the first season. Okay we've got a second season. So you've broken up. Huh.’

Dean: Now what do we do?

John: Offices are blown up.

Chris: Oh come on, the audience see they're back. They're back together. Come on.

John: I know, but you know, we- and there's the-

Dean: And there's our callback to the walk away shot.

Chris: It’s beautiful.

John: But this one’s sad. It's a sad walk away. And we did different reactions here, too. Everyone - oh that's nice, Parker crying - we did different reactions here. Everyone had different reactions; we tried different styles and cut together the ones that-

Dean: Gina here is, for me, priceless.

John: Oh that’s an RSC trained actor right there my friends.

Dean: And I love just falling off the cliff here. That there's no resolution whatsoever, we just literally fall off the cliff.

Chris: Ohh.

Dean: Guys, thank you for such an amazing script.

Chris: Dean, thank you.

Dean: And an amazing year.

John: That was a great year.

Dean: I think this was my favorite year, professionally. And It’s all because of you guys, so thank you so much.

Chris: You too, man.

John: I will say thank you, man. It was so great to actually just make the TV show you thought you were gonna make for once.

Chris: Yeah, it is. We did.

Dean: For once, the thing that you wanted to do. Uncompromised.

John: And that’s all of us. All of us got to TNT let us run, and this is what you get. Thank you.

Chris: Thank you very much, Dean.

Dean: Thank you.

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