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#Again this show could be a dumpster fire but can it be worse than the first live action movie….? I think not

hazbinhazmeinachokehold · 3 months

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The gang + powerful overlord reader who is trying to reform

A/n: Tbh I don't have the strongest grasp on what makes an overlord an overlord but I tried. Everything here is platonic!

Warning: Very slight alluding to suicide. It's in one sentence and not supposed to be about suicide but I just wanted to warn y'all in case.

(Not beta read!)

You honestly didn't want to be an overlord. But if you had some power maybe the citizens of hell would leave you alone. And you were admittedly powerful. Which wasn't by your own doing, just like in the living world everything was down to luck. And you won the lottery. So you decided to spend the money and became an overlord. Just to lower the chance of demons pestering you.

It worked. It worked too well. You took out a few overlords, it was dirty. You caught them off guard in the middle of going about their life. You don't keep up with politics. To your surprise, you took out two heavy hitters. Which did result in people not pestering you. But not just that it resulted in them outright avoiding you. You didn't feel good about killing them, you just killed as many as you thought would need to make you noteable. If you had just killed the two it would have removed more unnecessary deaths that you caused.

People would literally light themselves on fire rather than be near you. Out of fear of what gruesome way you would kill them. Not that you would kill them but rumors spread. It went from you just stabbing the overlords to torturing them in the most messed up way possible. You being this insanely powerful and sadistic being. That was the only way they could imagine you killing some of the most powerful creatures in hell.

So it was like that for years. As you were walking around the death and carnage you didn't mean to cause. Amidst all the screams you heard a TV playing. You check it out and it was some sort of ad. You recognized Angel from Val. Whenever Velvet was the one to show up at meetings she would always manage to bring up her and the other Vee's social media presence. Which with Val would involve his pornos. At least he's able to escape from that prick sometimes. Despite the glitch he was somehow causing and his face being hidden you also recognized Alastor.

You didn't know much about your colleague's personal lives. You barely showed up at the meeting but this piqued your interest. But it was quickly cut off by the news.

"Breaking news in hell today!" One of the broadcasters, Katie, spoke, "We have just received word from the Heaven embassy that the next extermination is happening sooner than ever before!"

Well fuck you guess. You were never worried about exterminations. Not only did you have a safe area then none of the angels seemed to visit, if they killed you you'd be out of this dumpster fire. Granted you could go to an even worse dumpster fire but you didn't know that for sure.

But you were interested in whatever that first ad was for. Granted everyone was panicking so it wasn't like you could ask anyone about it. However, the news cut right back to the ad.

"Welcome to the Hazbin Hotel!" A woman with an x over her eye spoke.

It cut to Husk (Who you've only heard snippets about from Alastor.) and Angel.

"Welcome to the Hazbin Hotel." Husk's eyes lingered below him. Clearly reading a script. If his eyes didn't give it away his monotone voice certainly did. "Can I help you with anything?"

"I've been a bad boy. And I need a big strong daddy to put me in my place." Angel moaned. There was a slight sigh coming from behind the camera. Okay ew. You were not trying to see porn while going for a walk. Just as you were about to walk away Angel spoke up again, "On the path to redemption!"

Oh! That sounded... quite nice actually. You didn't exactly believe in the idea. But a chance to get away and even a chance to redeem yourself was a very nice idea.

You went to the hotel's door and racked against the door. Which was kind of stupid. Hotel doors don't need to be knocked on but it still felt like the right thing to do. The fucking princess of hell herself opened the door with a somewhat panicky smile plastered on her face.

"Hello-" She bit her lip "One second." She left but left the door open a creek, "Vaggie it happened again!" She yelled you could hear the rest of what she was saying but you saw a red glow approaching the door.

Before you knew what was happening your hand (and whole body was being shaken by the Radio demon himself, "Why hello y/n!" His staticky voice greeted, "Are you here to watch this wayward adventure fail as well? Or perhaps you aim to entertain it?" Alastor unnerved you. While you were the same on power level he was unpredicted any vengeful thoughts he had were hidden behind his smile.

He was gently pushed away by Charlie. "So sorry about the wait, just wasn't expecting another powerful overlord." She vaguely gestured to Alastor, "So do you want to check in?" Her voice was cautiously hopeful.

"Yep!"

Her eyes turned the size of saucers, "OK! Great so um sorry I'm just so excited! You can go choose your room! A few are already occupied by our guests and staff! But it's pretty easy to tell which rooms are taken." She rambled. As she guided you through the hotel the woman with an x over her eye pointed a spear at you as you passed by.

A short one-eyed girl scattered around. The exact opposite of how she was in the ad. She stabbed a bug with a whole knife getting dangerously close to Husk being at the end of her knife in the process.

Angel glanced at you and any color his already pure white face had drained. Uh oh.

"One minute." You said and walked over to the spider demon, "Fyi just to let you know I also want to kill Val. Just say the word and I might finally be able to go through with it." You said in a hushed voice. He was still tense but visibly relaxed.

You soon found a room and got somewhat set up. You'd have to bring some stuff from your house tomorrow. But today you decided to just collapse onto your bed. While your first impressions weren't of a super chill place, it did give the impression of a family. Maybe your life wouldn't be so much of a living hell here.

#hazbin hotel x reader #charlie x reader #charlie morningstar x reader #alastor x reader #angel dust x reader

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fabuloustrash05 · 2 years

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Why I Don’t Like 2012 Apritello

A TMNT 2012 Rant

Before I start and the 2012 Apritello fans/shippers come at me with their pitchforks and torches, I want to clarify that I DO think that the ship is cute and it has a lot of potential. S1 Apritello is adorable! But after that it goes downhill and becomes very problematic, which sucks because I see the potential for it to be a good ship, but the 2012 writers just did them so dirty which lead me to dislike this ship over time.

So with that said. Enjoy my rant!

As I said before, season 1 Apritello was perfectly fine. The only minor problems I had with them in the first season was the fact that Donnie has taken pictures of her obviously without her knowledge or consent and has them as his computer wallpaper. That doesn't sit right with me. This is coming from personal experience, a guy I knew in middle school had a crush on me and he used to do that, taking my picture without my knowledge or consent and using them as his phone background and it made me really uncomfortable. If the writers just switch it to him having his background be a selfie him and her took together them that would’ve been better. Other than that, their relationship and dynamic in season 1 was fine and even cute at times.

Then season 2 comes around and the ship just gets worse from there...

I’m probably not the first to say that I don't like how creepy Donnie gets during S2 and onward. He becomes very possessive of April, looking at her like she’s an object or a trophy he has to win, instead of seeing her like she's her own person. Casey is also guilty of this, but this rant post isn’t about him.

Side Note:

April being Donnie’s love interest ruined her character. Most of her interactions with the turtles were mostly just with Donnie, because she was his love interest and she HAD to have “moments” with him. Whenever she did talk to or have genuine sweet moment with any turtle that wasn’t Donnie it felt fresh, rare, and new, but then shippers would ruin it cause they’d start calling April a wh0re for “cheating” on Donnie just from her hugging Leo or Raph, and say his brother’s are “stealing” Donnie’s girl. Like, guys, chill. Leave April alone. It’s a freaking hug. She’s allowed to be friends with Donnie’s brothers.

I always appreciate the little short moments in the show of April interacting with Leo, Raph or Mikey. It’s one of the reasons I like the episode Eyes of the Chimera in season 3 so much becasue it focuses on Leo and April bonding! It made me wish April had more duo episodes with each of the turtles, but sadly most of her episodes were either about her and Donnie (in some way), her ninja training (which now that I think about it, we saw very little of) or her connection to the Kraang, and even that was dumped and no longer explored by like the 3rd season.

Maybe that’s just me. Let me know what you all think.

Anyways, back to the rant!

The very first time Donnie sees April with Casey, he immediately jumps to conclusions and assumes she’s on a date and gets mad. Like, dude, you don’t own her! We, the audience, know she wasn’t on a date, she was just tutoring Casey, but imagine for a moment if she was. Donnie has no right to decide who she gets to be with and has no excuse to be mad if she decides not to date him but someone else, because, again, she is a human being not an object! Does he have a right to feel heartbroken? Yes, it's sad seeing your crush with someone else, I and I’m sure many of you can relate. But should he be mad? NO!

The whole love triangle between Donnie, April and Casey was its own dumpster fire and that’s a rant for another post.

I also don't like how it is hinted during the S2 finale that April is aware of Donnie's feelings for her. Now, we could argue (and I agree) that April was not ready for Donnie to confess his feelings, most likely wanting to sort out her own feelings and I respect that, but I wish April was more honest with Donnie later on. I wish she told him to give her time and space instead of letting him think he has a chance, leading him on, and having him continue to obsess over her for 5 freaking seasons! She had many chances to have that conversation with him. Like in season 3...

Oh god, I hate Apritello in season 3, specfically I hate the Big Foot episode. That music box Donnie gave April in the beginning of the epsiode was extremely inappropriate given what those two have been through so far by that point in the show. Donnie, sweetie, you've literally lost the greatest battle of your life, you and your brothers were chased out of your own home and had to leave the city with Leo badly injured and in a coma, and you also witnessed your father's "death" by the hands of your greatest enemy, and you think NOW is the best time to make a move on your crush and give her a gift, who, may I remind you, went through the same exact sh!t you went through?!

THE POOR GIRL DOESNT NEED TO BE HIT ON RIGHT NOW!!

And don't get me started on the farmhouse kiss later in the episode. What a load of bullsh!t! The writers really had me fooled. They really had me think they were going to give Donnie and April actual development in their relationship. They could've had Donnie finally understand and end his inappropriate behavior and obsession towards her and April could finally tell Donnie that she's aware of his feelings and tells him that she does care for him but needs time and space to think her feelings through. This conversation could have helped them grow together and they would eventually get together when both of them are comfortable and ready to start a relationship with one another.

But NOOOO! Let's just have April take all of Donnie's development in that episode and throw it away by freaking kissing him!! Like, what?! Girl, weren't you literally uncomfortable earlier that episode when he was trying to make a move on you with the freaking music box???

It was at that moment I started to hate Apritello, and it makes it come off that April is just playing a game with Donnie, throwing him away and reeling him back in, repeating the action over and over again. Which sucks, because I really wanna like this ship and at times I can see the good qualities. I like April! She has some great moments (both badass and funny) that makes me appreciate her or be happy for her, but her being shipped with Donnie ruined her character for me. I blame the writers.

After the farmhouse kiss, you know what I realized? I realized that the 2012 writers didn't know what they were doing with this relationship and it pissed me off because, again, they had so much potential!

Also the many times April kisses Donnie on the cheek was so random almost ALL of the time.

Her kissing him after she rekindles her friendship with the turtles, pointless but it’s fine.

Her kissing him after he finished creating a retromutagen for her dad, understandable. Could just be a heat of the moment excitement that she probably forgot about later on, but...

The second time in the same episode, the writers were just forcing it at that point/April did that in front of Casey on purpose to make him jealous and you can’t change my mind.

Her kissing him after Fugitoid fixed his bug sting, very random and very pointless. Like, why? What was the point of that happening??

I need to remind everyone who has come this far in reading my rant that I do think the concept of April x Donnie could work. Though I’m not a big fan of shipping April with ANY of the turtles, it can still work, but only if it’s done properly.

Again, 2012 Apritello had great potential, it’s just the writers handle it so poorly. Honestly, Rise Apritello has more chemistry and potential to be the friends to lovers trope in a version where it is intended for them to only be best friends MORE than their 2012 counterpart where they are intended to be friends to lovers.

You know what I wish the 2012 writers did? I wish the writers did a slow burn mixed with the friends to lovers trope. Basically, make them friends first, build from that, and have them slowly fall in love with each other over the course of the series.

For me, I’d make it go like this:

S1 - Donnie and April are friends, but over the course of the season Donnie slowly begins to fall in love with April.

S2 - Donnie now has feelings for April, but he doens’t want to ruin his friendship with her. Also April is dating Casey.

S3 - Everyone knows Donnie likes April. Her and Casey eventually break up but stay friends. April finds out Donnie likes her and now it’s awkward between them.

S4 - Donnie and April both like each other now. They try hard to rekindle their friendship and try to go back to being just friends, but their hearts want something different.

S5 - They finally confess and become a couple! Yay! Happy ending!

If you want to read the longer version of how I’d rewrite 2012 Apritello, you can check it out HERE

I want to thank everyone who has made it this far and has read my entire rant. Feel free to share your own thoughts on 2012 Apritello, but remember to be kind and respecful towards everyones opinion.

#rant #rant post #its my opinion #tmnt 2012 #tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #nickelodeon #tmnt donatello #tmnt donnie #donatello hamato #april o'neil #tmnt april #apirtello

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dans-den · 1 year

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Velma Review

How's it going everyone? Happy MLK Jr day, unfortunately what I'm gonna be talking about today is anything but happy. Today I'll be giving my review for the...much anticipated disaster that is...Velma.

I honestly did not think I could find something even worse than the Fairly Odder show.....but once again, life finds a way.....to prove me wrong. While Fairly Odder is the worse variation of a beloved franchise in the form of a kids show, Velma is definitely the worse variation of a beloved franchise in the form of an adult show. There is so much wrong with this show that I don't even know where to start, guess I'll dive into this dumpster fire and hopefully come out the other side with my sanity intact.

I guess we should start with how Scooby Doo started. This property goes all the way back to 1969, All the characters have been established since 1969. Now I don't have a problem with modernizing the characters, I honestly don't. There have been several attempts to make them up to date and each decade has had one iteration or another of the Mystery Gang. Now some can argue those old direct to video Scooby Doo movies from the 80's with Red shirt Shaggy and Scrappy Doo is a notable exception where the gang wasn't present and that's true. Some argue that they're great some argue that they go against the source material it's kind of mixed. I personally thought they were entertaining despite that the gang wasn't whole and that it focused on wacky monster adventures rather than solving mysteries. While that is the case, they at least kept the main character Scooby Doo in the movies and they kept in spirit of the franchise. It is a Scooby Doo project that's trying to mix up the formula. Velma feels completely opposite, it feels like it was meant to be something else, but someone at WB decided to slap the Scooby Doo characters names on it because no one had faith in the show. This is the exact same reason the Halo TV Show failed. They made something generic and used a beloved property to make sure its watched to a certain degree. Velma pays no respect to the franchise its "supposedly" based off of. All the characters are different and given either architypes that don't fit them at all like Shaggy (or Norville as he's called in the show. guess they wanna use Shaggy's real name to make him less stoner...idk it doesn't work) or cliché architypes like Fred who of course was given the rich white boy who's dumb and slightly racist. Velma and Daphne are basically self inserts of Mindy Kaling and Constance Wu.

Now the characters/cast, no disrespect to any of them they're all just doing their jobs. However, it does not excuse how the direction given to them is nothing short of a...not so much a slap to the face of the Scooby Doo fandom, but more of a sledgehammer to the face. Mindy herself is an executive producer and I really feel she wanted to make this show something else but someone told her "Use the Scooby Doo franchise, that'll make your show great!". As I mentioned, the show is so far from the source material that it doesn't feel like Scooby Doo. In fact, Scooby Doo, the main character and mascot of the Mystery Gang, is not in the show. To be honest that is probably for the best so they don't ruin him. How can you have a Scooby Doo show without Scooby Doo? It's not a spinoff it's its own thing. I mentioned what types of characters they are, and each one is just...unlikable, especially Velma. Again, no disrespect to the cast for doing their jobs but none of the characters are likable in any way shape or form. Velma is cocky, know it all, rude, mean spirited, a basic bitch. Daphne is a cliché popular girl who is just inconstant yet has her moments of character development but it feels so forced that it's hard to enjoy it. Norville (aka Shaggy) is suppose to be the opposite version of Shaggy where he anti-drugs, bland personality, he's a literal simp for Velma (who treats him poorly), and is just boring to watch. Fred is the preppy rich white kid who looks down on everyone under him and his gag is that he has a small penis...no jokes its a gag that just doesn't go away. Daphne is by far the least bad but that's not saying much. I can't enjoy any of them, they're just hard to watch and mean spirited overall. As I said, I don't have an issue with reimagining's of characters, I'm not bothered by the fact that they're different ethnicities and backgrounds. It's a bit jarring because why not just make original characters with these designs? If you want representation then created new characters that can set that trail. But even if you change these established characters backgrounds, it wouldn't been an issue if you were able to maintain the key aspects of those characters. This show just straight up replaced their character aspects with something different. All the lovable traits of the gang are all gone, they've all been replaced with just generic high school tropes.

Damn, I'm barely getting to the actual episodes just now? That should be a telling sign. I tried to watch the first episode and I could not make it pass the ten minute mark. I have not raged out of a show that fast since Fairly Odder last year. The first episode tried to real Meta and poke fun at movies/tv shows tropes but it doesn't land. The humor feels so forced and nothing builds up to it. A show can at least be watchable if the humor makes it so bad its good, but the humor is such a miss 99% of the time and its so bad...its just bad. They make fun of tropes and try to be meta but none of it works, there's no real set up for the humor and the jokes feel more mean spirited like the 420 joke they told in this show, jabbing at adults who like animation. It doesn't feel like it was made for fun, it felt like it was meant to resent the audience and alienate the fandom. The locker room scene with the dead girl had the joke "She has no brain!" that joke felt like it was AI generated or something a 10 year old could have made. I also find it odd how they talk about the nudity tropes while there's high school girls nude in the shower. If this is meant to appeal to an adult audience...why have high school girls naked? This show is trying to be woke and PC yet you went with a cliché that I strongly feel is outdated and unnecessary as well as just alarming. I understand these are fictional characters, but it doesn't make it any less creepy and unnerving. They also make plenty of pop culture references that just feel....lame. None of it is funny or delivered in any fun or funny way.

Do I think a Scooby Doo show with more mature themes can work?

Yes! It can work and its been proven to work. Mystery Incorporated proved it can work with dark mature themes and fleshing out the characters for modern times. If Velma took a page out of Mystery Incorporated, it could have actually been an entertaining adult cartoon. The Velma show had the potential to be good, I'll admit the animation isn't half bad at times. For the most part it looks average, but the animation has it's moments especially when Velma has her ghoulish anxiety episodes, the animation is actually pretty cool I wish it was more like that style. Even if they didn't want to take inspiration from Mystery Incorporated, I still feel that they could have gone about this show in several ways.

First off, age the characters up. Make them like young adults in college or just in general that way the nudity and raunchiness has more justification to stay rather than sexualizing high schoolers (which has been done to hell and back and is just outdated).

Secondly, there should be more focus on Velma's mom. That may be the one element that could save the show. I don't know if they're saving it for later on or as a finale type deal but I feel that had they established Velma's mom as a main plotline in the show, it would make it more interesting, more of a Mystery/crime solving show.

Third, why couldn't these characters be their own characters rather than the actual mystery gang? I think these guys would have done better if they were a new batch of meddling kids that would be successors to the original mystery gang. In fact there is gonna be a Scooby Doo show about that for preschoolers called Scooby Doo and the Mystery Pups coming soon. It is exactly what I'm suggesting for the Velma show. This should have been new characters brought in to take on the mantle of the mystery gang rather than being cheap imitations of the actual gang.

Final suggestion, DONT MAKE A SCOOBY DOO SHOW IF THERE IS NO SCOOBY DOO!

Overall, This is yet another show that was trying to build off the name of a beloved franchise and failed completely. This I feel is yet another instant of handing beloved properties to people who do not like or respect the source material in the slightest and made whatever they felt like and alienated the fanbase. Velma is down there with Animaniacs (2020), Powerpuff Girls (2016), Teen Titans Go!, and Fairly Odder. There's talks of a Season 2 coming out and I encourage everyone to not watch it. Don't give it the time of day because if you do, WB will continue making shit like this and the only way for them to stop is to hit them where it hurts, profit. If you wanna give Velma a go then by all means but I'm not gonna keep watching it. If something happens that makes it suddenly good then I'll be pleasantly surprised, but I highly doubt that.

Rating Velma I am giving it:

0.5/10

I know this may seem premature to rate it this early on in its run but I do not believe it will get any better. If by some miracle it does, I will come back and reevaluate it with a firm apology. I'm open to be proven wrong but I stand by that this show is beyond saving and I do not recommend anyone watch it whether its Ironic or Unironic. Never thought there could be a show that would beat out Fairly odder.

First review of 2023, off to a good start....Hopefully the next pieces of media I cover won't be as horrendous.

See Ya!

#dans den #velma #velma dinkley #hbo max #tv show review #warner bros

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ravenstodaisies · 2 months

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Dear Daisy,

Just when I thought my week was going to be dull, I got a frantic e-mail from the place I edit for. Deadlines were two weeks ago, so I was surprised it took this long for the team notice any errors, but well. What can ya do? It turns out they had forgotten to send over a few written works and asked how long it would take me to rank them alongside the others. They said I could take as long as I liked, courtesy of their own mix-up.

I don’t usually mind unexpected things like this, but when a whole process moving forward is contingent on you getting work done quickly and efficiently, it’s admittedly stressful. I’m confident I can get these done in a week if I push it, but I’m asking for two just in case. Never know when life’ll throw you in for a loop, and these stories deserve as much attention and care as the others got. Not the authors’ faults, but doing the work over again is frustrating.

There’s no update on the job search, sadly. The place I got an interview for is pausing their hiring process, which I later found out was because of strikes. I support strikes, obviously. Workers deserve fair pay and the cost of living right now is certifiably insane—but it still sucks that it all had to happen right now. I’m applying to other things in the meantime. Have heard nothing else so far. I briefly thought about taking bartending classes, then saw from bartenders on Reddit that those things are a waste of time and money. We’ll see if the bartending avenue leads anywhere, because no one wanted an editor with less than two years’ experience. Job searching is super fun.

On another note, I’ve been reading The Handmaid’s Tale, because the usual high fantasies aren’t cutting it for me lately. I’m getting tired of being drenched in a whole lot of lore that I need to keep track of and wanted something a little more straightforward and…realistic? Or, I guess way less lore-heavy is more what I’m trying to say. A lot of the themes in that book are sadly relatable. I’m not going to lie, it’s a heavy read, but it’s also something that’s consumed me. Half the time when I pick it up, I can’t put it down, and I don’t often get that feeling. A while ago, I made it a goal to read a whole bunch of books that have, at some point, been on a ban list, mostly out of curiosity, and this is the first one I’ve deliberately picked up from that list. Mainly because it was the only one I owned. But also because many people in the book sphere are saying it is an essential read right now.

This area has always been a perpetual dumpster fire, but lately it’s been even worse. I’m trying my hardest not to obsess over the news, though it’s hard when it’s all being shoved in my face. Constantly. It’s just frustrating when politics nowadays seems to be less about taking care of the people and more about sticking it to the other party.

It’s a clown show. With shitty popcorn. And instead of making animal balloons, the clowns just pop each other’s and make all the kids cry.

I hate clowns.

Anyway.

I don’t know how to end this off. It’s a little weird to think I haven’t seen you in over a month. I saw a figure of Captain America eating what I think was shawarma and it reminded me of you. And then I got sad. And now I’m sad again. Ew.

What’s up on your end?

Raven

#ravenstodaisies #deardaisy

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lowtaxsa · 1 year

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Crystal Force (1990)

Alright, so here's the deal: I already reviewed this cinematic disaster back in 2000, but it's 2023 now, and I'm a freakin' robot, so let's see if I've held up better than this absolute trash heap of a movie. Buckle up, kids, because we're diving back into the dumpster fire that is "Crystal Force."

Overview: "Crystal Force" is like the unholy trinity of crap. Watching this "horror" film, I simultaneously lost control of my bladder, gag reflex, and any last shred of hope for humanity. The movie's about a bunch of moronic women who accidentally summon some dude in a Swamp Creature cosplay from a chunk of quartz. Meanwhile, a fat guy who spends all his time walking his dogs and spying on these idiots is either the Devil or a blind pervert on a mission.

Directed By: Laura Keats, 1990

The Case For: If you're a tree-hugging hippie, there's plenty of footage of people wandering around trees, going to their cars, and loitering near playgrounds like a bunch of creeps.

The Case Against: "Sex" scenes will have you puking faster than a frat boy after a kegger, special effects look like they were done by a kindergartner, and memories of the chuckling fat man will haunt your nightmares.

Alright, so we got ourselves another "theme" movie here. If you've read any of my other reviews (and I'm sorry if you have), you'll know what I'm talking about. "Crystal Force" is just another turd of a film that the director / writer decided to base around a single prop – in this case, a hunk of quartz (ooh, spooky!). It's like these people are all related and just whip up scripts during family reunions or something.

The movie starts with the cameraman stumbling around a cemetery like he's on a bender while the narrator drones on about some vague evil force that threatens all of mankind. It's a bunch of mumbo jumbo about an evil power that nobody can even talk about. Yawn. Eventually, the cameraman just gives up and passes out, but unfortunately, the actual movie starts. Spoiler alert: it's even worse than the intro and credits.

We've got a woman sobbing at a funeral for her husband. Behind her is another woman in a miniskirt. Real classy. They leave the funeral and start the long journey home, apparently racing against some "storm" that just makes everything dark for two seconds before it's sunny again. They pass the fat guy walking his dogs, and little do they know, they'll be seeing a lot more of him and his pooches.

To help her mom stop crying, the daughter and her friend decide to buy a haunted chunk of quartz from a fat guy in an antique store. Great idea, right? They bring it home, and instead of cheering mom up, it gives the visiting priest a heart attack. Smooth.

The daughter then has another brilliant idea: let's hold a séance with my friends to help my mom forget about her dead husband! What could go wrong? They all go to sleep, and some guy in a rubber monster suit appears in the kitchen behind the magic crystal. He wanders around the house, and we keep cutting back to the fat guy from the antique store just laughing outside the window. Eventually, the monster gets bored and goes back to his spinning, floral pattern pentagram.

The next day, the denim-wearing ladies gather at their workplace, "Bart's Salon." I have no idea how this place stays in business, considering their idea of beauty is on par with the Jackson family's plastic surgeon. They agree to meet up that night for the séance and to inevitably get killed by some horrifying creature.

The women show up, and the airheaded mystical lady brings enough magic garbage to stock a New Age store. She uses "Pulse Channeling" to predict a boat trip (whoop-de-doo), and another woman picks the "Death Card" from a deck of "Taroosh Magic Cards" and freaks out. The mystic reassures her that "everybody picks that card first." Well, that's comforting.

Oh, and of course, we get more shots of the fat guy laughing outside the window. The lady who picked the "Death Card" goes to the bathroom and sees a picture of the hideous demon in the toilet bowl. I don't know if this was supposed to be scary or a reminder to keep our toilets clean, but it just left me confused.

Anyway, the stupid demon escapes (again), pushes the women around, and the fat guy outside the window keeps laughing. The ladies finally get fed up with being terrorized by the monster, so they run outside and hide in the bushes until the cops arrive. The police try to subdue the demon by letting it crush their heads like melons, which obviously doesn't work, so an undercover cop makes some kind of acid out of hair chemicals and sprays it on the devil. Oh, and the fat guy keeps laughing outside the window. The hellhound disappears, and everything goes back to normal. WHEW.

I guess I could've summed up this entire train wreck of a movie with: "women buy a haunted crystal that kills their stupid friends." But instead, the movie drags this flimsy plot into 90 minutes of God knows what. Why is the fat voyeur always hanging around? Why does some kid's face pop up over a spinning pentagram? Why do the mother and daughter both look like they're 80? Why is everyone wearing blue shirts and denim? And seriously, how the hell does "Bart's Salon" stay in business? The sheer volume of these questions shattered my fragile mind and pushed me over the edge.

But hey, other than those minor points, the movie was FANTASTIC!

Lowtax's Score: Plot: - 9 Acting: - 9 Special Effects: - 8 Directing: - 7 Music / Sound: - 6 Overall: - 39 Each category in the rating system is based out of a possible -10 score (-10 being the worst). The overall score is based out of a possible -50 score (-50 being the worst)

#lowtax speaks #reviews #re reviews #big blog

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gaycey-sketchit · 2 years

Note

(Gary anon) Still kicking myself for somehow missing both shows [and the manga], but fans kept it alive passed their final airings that I didn't mind too much. Just missed out on some of the fandom history, some of it being gone forever. (Sometimes the age of the audience may explain a bit of it of why it happens, but I think often see kids have more patience. xD) And maintain a sense of anonymity while doing so. To everyone, he's just a small, silly white dog making games.

(Part 2) (After hearing the horror stories, it's sad seeing some potential newcomers second-guess the career choice they wanted to pursue) Making your creations your career or an extra way to make some money is not inherently bad; but you gotta be aware of how your workload could affect your spark or even mental health. People often wonder how a creator can come to resent what they made; if you ever created and done it for a long while, you'll run into that feeling at some point.

(Part 3) The challenge is NOT to experience it frequently. (Early 2000s internet was a lawless land when it came to trying to find stuff; ironic how it's easier to do that today but at cost of everything being restricted and exclusive, for better or worse) For what its worth, the concept works better with games. Just for absurdity of having the weirdest crossovers somehow mesh really well or be a dumpster fire.

(Part 4) (Not sure if I shared before; the talk Gary gives Ash about Sinnoh. Not the postcard, though it still applies. After Pikachu vs Electivire, while the tone of the dub music is somewhat similar to the sub, it's still distinctly different. Skip to 2:00, note the violins: / wat ch? v = q yZ1seuA4_k ) Mm-hmm, they deserve a battle that feels more them and showcase how much these two have grown and influenced each other. And again, it's been 20 years since the Johto one.

(Part 5) (I generally don't mind the leaks. We know how most of the PWC battles will end, it's just HOW they're done. Though I'm still debating on whether I want to know if Ash or Leon wins. All I want is the matchups for the battle) In before Leon somehow surprises us.

Yeah, at least the fandom is still thriving all these years later.

True, true.

Yeah, that's impressive too. Like, I think photos of him exist? But in my head he'll always be that little white dog.

Yeah, it's really unfortunate.

Oh, for sure. I respect people who manage to make a career out of their art and do it without their mental health suffering, but that is simply not the path for me.

Yeah, the internet used to be... really different than it is now, in a lot of ways. Some changes have definitely been more positive than others.

True--like, one of the most entertaining things about Smash is the eclectic roster leading to scenarios like an Animal Crossing villager duking it out with Solid Snake.

Ooh thanks for the link! After having watched that bit a couple times to take in the details... yeah.

For sure. Wow, it really has been twenty years. They are long overdue for another really good battle.

Yeah--it's easy enough to guess what most of the results will be, how we get to those results is the important part. But personally I do not want the outcome of Ash vs Leon spoiled, I need to see how that goes myself. (Partly to make up for not being there for Ash becoming the champion of Alola a few years back--I heard about that very significant event from Twitter, I want to actually witness this one.)

He could! We'll see how things go. It's uhh the Friday after this coming one that episodes start airing again I'm pretty sure? Excited to see how things unfold from there!

#Andrew answers #Gary anon

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broadstbroskis · 3 years

Text

take my hand, wreck my plans | william nylander

a/n: if you’ve been around this blog for a while, you’ve probably seen me talking about “willy fake dating fic” for quite a bit now...well here she is! settle in for a long read (the longest i’ve posted in one go before) and i hope you enjoy reading it as much as i enjoyed writing it! so so so much love to literally every single person who cheered me on while writing this, but extra special thanks to @denis-scorianov and @danglesnipecelly for all your love and support

also shoutout to my girl tswift for the title, evermore still slaps

word count: 21.5k

It’s right in the middle of the busiest hours of the day when Steph’s text comes in, which means Aubrey barely even reads the message. She sees the words dinner and Friday and responds that she’ll be there, and then goes back to trying to fix the clusterfuck of code that one of her coworkers messed up earlier in the morning before her project has to get sent off to a client at the end of the week.

By the time Friday comes around, she’s only just managed to fix the code but the project is finished enough to send off as a first draft, so Aubrey races over to Steph and Mitch’s place after work, knowing she looks frazzled as hell from the look on her best friend’s face the minute she enters their kitchen. “Sweetie.” Steph says, then bites her lip.

The feeling is mutual to Aubrey, because she’s giving Steph the same once over that Steph’s giving her. She’d arrived from the office, which took casual Friday to the extreme, in her favorite leggings, denim jacket, and converse- still enjoying the last bit of summer before Toronto turned to fall. Meanwhile Steph was dressed up for the evening in jeans and a flowy top. Her hair was done, her makeup looked beautiful; nothing about her screamed casual dinner at home. Certainly not like the messy ponytail Aubrey was rocking, after running over from work.

“Wine?” Mitch offers, breaking the silence, and Aubrey nods immediately, forgetting entirely about...whatever is going on here in favor of the alcohol she’s been needing since she arrived at the office today.

Mitch pours a glass and offers it out, but honestly, fuck that; Aubrey reaches for the bottle instead and takes a sip. “Nope, listen, these motherfuckers-” And then, she cuts herself off abruptly as she catches sight of the single most beautiful man she has ever had the pleasure of even having in her field of vision, leaning against the counter.

“No, go ahead.” Blondie grins, and fuck that, of course, he’s got the most beautiful smile too. “These motherfuckers, what?”

“Fucked up a huge project at work this week.” Aubrey finishes, pretty lamely, compared to how heated she’d started that sentence.

“Gonna start throwing that at Matts.” Blondie grins again. “Anytime he fucks up a pass to me. This motherfucker.”

“Heh.” She laughs, lifting the wine bottle in a cheers-esque manner, and then, not knowing what else to do, she takes another large sip.

Blondie is still grinning when Aubrey brings her bottle back down and Mitch is doing a very poor job of hiding a laugh, but it’s not hard to see that Steph’s making murder eyes that Aubrey pointedly ignores, so Steph turns her attention away with a sigh. “What’s up, Will?”

“Oh, uh, Matts and Alison nominated me to see if there was anything we could do to help.” Will says smoothly.

“We?” Mitch raises an eyebrow, at the distinct lack of we that arrived with Will.

“Well.” Will shrugs, like that should explain everything, and maybe it does, because Mitch only snorts.

“We’re okay.” Steph jumps in. “We’ll all be out soon.”

Will nods, and leaves Aubrey with one last grin, before he turns and heads out towards their back patio, which must be where dinner is taking place, but as soon as the door shuts behind him, Aubrey turns to round on Steph and Mitch. “What the fuck?”

“Me, what the fuck?” Steph, her best friend since grade school, knows exactly what she’s talking about. “You, what the fuck?”

“This was a setup?”

“You didn’t know?” Mitch cries, turning immediately to his girlfriend and looking incredibly offended.

“Yes she did!” Steph defends. “I literally texted you: Mitch has a single friend we think you’d get along with if you’re interested. Are you free friday for dinner? We were thinking of having you all over. And you said: sounds good I’ll be there.”

“Well, in my defense, work was a dumpster fire this week and I really only skim-read that text.”

“Well now I know why you showed up like that.”

“Rude, Stephanie.” Aubrey sticks her tongue out at her best friend, grinning immediately afterwards, because Steph’s her best friend and she’s the only one she would let talk to her this way. “Just for that I’m not using a glass the entire night.”

“Not like your first impression could get any worse.” Steph deadpans.

“Meh.” Mitch shrugs. “It’s Willy. He’s done way worse.”

Steph sighs, pinches the bridge of her nose, and then looks over. “Could you use your one free hand then to take a second bottle of wine out then please? For the rest of us who’d like some, to share?”

Aubrey grins. “Gladly.”

That this was meant to be a setup couldn’t be more clear to her as the three of them make their way out to the porch with more drinks and some snacks. Mitch and Steph have dragged some of their comfier patio furniture around the firepit; there’s a couple curled into each other on one of the couches, an empty one with Mitch’s favorite type of beer on the table next to it, and one seat open on the couch that’s occupied by Will.

Aubrey shoots Steph a look as Steph practically leaps back onto the empty couch, and then she slips herself into the empty seat next to Will. That level of distinct lack of chill is really her thing, thanks Steph.

Steph merely grins back, formally introducing her to everyone around them. And okay, their friends are cool- like Aubrey knows they are; she’s met more than a few of Mitch’s hockey friends before. She’s many-a-time fifth-wheeled dinner with Mitch and Steph and Matt and Syd. She, Mitch, and Steph still had a group chat going with a bunch of Mitch’s old teammates from the Knights. Hell, Strome and McDavid had joined Mitch in playing with her and Steph on their families’ summer softball team last summer.

But she just can’t seem to understand what they see in Will that they think he’d be good for her. Like sure he’s nice enough, and obviously good looking, and like, yeah she has a good time while she’s there, but like, sparks? Nothing.

Regardless of the lack of sparks between them, it is a fun night, and she curls up in one of the guest rooms in Steph and Mitch’s that night, fully planning on laughing at them the next morning.

Except, the next morning, Mitch is already gone for practice and Steph’s first question is, “So when are you going to see Will again?”

Aubrey frowns. “Uhh I don’t know. Probably whenever you have us both over for dinner again?”

Steph frowns back. “What?”

“What what?”

“You didn’t, like, give him your number? Make plans? Anything?”

“Why would we?”

“Because he’s perfect for you?”

Aubrey gives her a look. Was Steph even at the same dinner that she was? They, like, barely interacted; Will chatting more with Auston and what’s-her-name or Mitch and Auston, and her with Steph pretty much the entire night. “Perfect for me? Seriously? That’s the guy you think is perfect for me?”

She huffs. If Aubrey didn’t know her best friend better she’d think she was offended, but, well, she does. “Yes!”

“No!”

“I mean, at least give it a shot!” Steph needles.

Aubrey pulls a face. “Why? So we can break up and make things super awkward at anything you and Mitch throw for the rest of your lives? No thanks.”

“I’m telling you.” Steph says. “Perfect match.” But she drops it after that, suggesting brunch, an offer that Aubrey immediately agrees to.

-----

It’s a quick stop for Aubrey to pop home to change and pick up her roommate, Erin, before the three girls head over to what’s long been a favorite brunch spot, laughing as Aubrey and Erin watch Steph fire off a series of snapchats to Mitch featuring her bottomless mimosas- her favorite way of asking to be picked up on his way home from practice.

Erin laughs so hard she almost snorts mimosa out her nose as Aubrey and Steph recap dinner from the previous night, but once she recovers, she hits Steph with a look. “I am begging you to invite me to this next time, solely so I can watch the two of them interact.”

Aubrey gasps as Steph laughs. “Rude!”

Erin giggles, beginning to recount the date she’d gone on last night-her fourth with this guy from the gym she belongs to-and Aubrey finds herself nodding along with Steph in all the right places, as friends should, happy that Erin’s happy, especially after her shitty last boyfriend, and eager to meet this guy for more than the five minutes he’d shown up at their door.

Her story is interrupted-for Aubrey, at least-by the vibration of her phone, and she checks the text from an unfamiliar number, rolling her eyes when she sees the message.

hey this is will, followed by an amount of emojis that could only actually be from Mitch.

hi mitch. She sends back.

lol. Comes the response. sorry.

you don’t have to apologize for mitch. i’m familiar

Will reacts to that with a haha and then it’s a while before she checks her phone again, enjoying brunch with her girls and laughing at the look on Mitch’s face as he comes to pick Steph up and realizes he’ll be driving her and Erin back as well.

he’s really found his place between annoying and relentless. Will’s texted, when she checks again a little later, at home on the couch and pleasantly tipsy, deciding what to Netflix with Erin.

that’s his sweet spot. Aubrey sends, and then points halfheartedly at The Office on the screen, well on her way to a post-brunch nap.

-----

Aubrey knows Mitch and Steph well enough to know that’s not the end of it, and sure enough, the subtle (and not so subtle) hints keep coming. But luckily, training camp is about to begin, and so even if they do keep coming, Mitch, and by extension, Will, are both too busy for Mitch and Steph to push anything too crazy on her and Will.

Until suddenly the season begins, and even though things are still crazy for them, suddenly they’ve got days off or afternoons free and she finds that the subtleness of the hints becomes gradually less subtle.

jesus fuck. Will sends one afternoon and she laughs at it immediately, even as he continues typing. tell steph i’m sorry but mitch had to go.

She laughs loudly, which earns her a look from her nearest coworkers. right there with you.

considering just lying and telling him i already took you out last week to just get him off my back jfc.

tried that already. knew i was lying right away. Aubrey sends back. She appreciates him trying, but come on. That was like, the first thing she tried.

well, Will sends, and then those annoying three dots appear and disappear about four times, before he finally finishes. let’s just go somewhere then and get them off our backs.

time and fucking place. She replies.

-----

Aubrey meets Will at a bar that’s close to her work, a couple days after that text exchange, just in time for the end of happy hour. He’s got a drink in front of him already, that he quickly finishes when the waiter comes to take her order, so he can order another one while she orders one of her favorite cocktails, before it becomes full price again at the start of the next hour.

“You know, I thought Mitchy would have been more…” Will trails off, looking thoughtful, but then continues after a moment. “Smug, when I told him we were going out tonight. What’d Steph say?”

“Oh don’t get me wrong. They’ll be smug to each other.” Aubrey tells him, confident that the two of them are at home right now boasting about the fact that they were right. “But if they think we’re actually on the same page now and they say anything that I hear, that would be the end. Downward tailspin, cut my hair six inches, new tattoo, you name it.”

Will laughs. “So it’s like that?”

She nods. “A little lacking in some impulse control.” She holds her thumb and index finger up to him, with about 10cm of space between them, to show him just how poor it is, and Will laughs again.

“Guess I’ll just have to wait for a nice, big I told you so tomorrow.” He says.

Aubrey snickers. “One a day for the next few weeks more like.”

Will shrugs. “Meh, I’ll figure something out to give him a taste of his own medicine.”

“We should.” Aubrey nods absentmindedly, as a comment she’d made to Steph right after the initial dinner comes back to her.

“Should what?” Will frowns.

“Give them a taste of their own medicine.”

“Where are you going with this?” Will asks curiously.

Aubrey grins, as the idea starts to form. “A tragic break up to make things so awkward for the two of them that they’ll regret setting us up in the first place.”

Will pauses for a long moment, but then he grins and leans toward her. “I’m listening.”

-----

Steph is bouncing when Aubrey walks into their weekly Thursday barre class. She’s sure she knows why, but Aubrey gives her a strange look anyway when she slides in next to her. “What?”

“What?” Steph repeats. “Seriously?”

Aubrey laughs. “Use your words, Stephanie.”

“Bitch, you know what I want.” Steph says, which makes the woman in front of them turn and give them a scandalized look.

Aubrey giggles. She’d really just wanted to annoy Steph a little but that was totally worth it all. “Yeah I know. It was good. Like whatever.”

“I hate you so much.”

“I’m going to see him again!”Aubrey protests. “What more do you want from me? I’m not going to like, profess my undying love for him after one date. I’m not Mitch.”

“It was like, our fifth date, and he didn’t profess his undying love for me! He just said he loved me!” Steph huffs as Aubrey snickers. She laughs about it now, they all do, a thing she teases both of her friends about, but she vividly remembers the panic Steph had been in coming home from that date.

“Well.” She says, grinning. “I guess I’ve got four dates to go then. Or maybe Will does.”

“Will’s too chill to do anything like that.” Steph decides, just as their usual instructor enters. “Ridiculous shit is definitely more your move.”

Aub thinks back to her date with Will the other night, where they’d carefully crafted an entire narrative to start this fake relationship, and fights back a grin, because she’s pretty sure Will can be just as ridiculous. He just does a better job at hiding it.

-----

Just after noon one day, a few weeks into her arrangement with Will, Aubrey’s phone buzzes and she more than welcomes the interruption from the current project she’s working on.

need a favor. Will’s sent, followed immediately by, please.

sure, what’s up?

His name pops up on her screen next and Aubrey frowns, swiping to accept the call. “Hey.”

“I’m downstairs.” Will says and she frowns, both at the skipped greeting, and at his words.

“Of my office?” She blurts.

“Yeah.” Will says, like it’s the most casual thing in the world, and Aubrey pushes her chair back abruptly.

“Uh ok. I’ll be right down.” She’s already pushing the button for the elevator, waving off the coworker calling after her, asking if everything’s okay.

Will’s waiting outside, with two cups of coffee in hand, and even though he’d said that he was, Aubrey’s still kind of surprised to see him. He passes her one of the cups in his hand and she takes it, thanking him as she does. “So what’s up?”

“I need a favor.” Will says, starting to walk, and Aubrey follows easily, sipping on the latte he’d brought her.

She laughs. “You said. What do you need?”

“The team’s got this thing on Friday.” Aubrey gives him a look, because she knows what the thing the team has on Friday is, Steph’s been talking about it for a few weeks now, and it is not as casual as Will is throwing it out to her right now. “And I think I need you to come with me.”

“Do you though?” Aubrey says. “Do you really?”

“I tried for you not to.” Will admits, shooting her a grin, which she appreciates. “But, well, it’s a thing I would have brought any other girlfriend to and then Mitchy opened his mouth too…” He trails off.

“So find a dress.” Aubrey sums up.

Will nods. “Please. I’ll pay for it.” He adds, but she brushes it off.

“If we’re still stuck in this for Blue and White, you can buy me a dress then.” She grins, and Will returns the grin.

“Deal.”

-----

Fixing her curls one last time in the mirror by the door, Aubrey grabs her clutch and runs downstairs to meet her Uber. She’s late, not like super late, but more so than she’d hoped to be, even after texting Will that she was running behind with work and that she’d have to meet him at the venue probably, if he didn’t want to be late.

She shoots off a text to him when she gets in the car, letting him know she’s on her way, and makes polite chatter for a few minutes with her driver, leg bouncing anxiously until he pulls up to where she needs to be.

Will’s standing outside the door when she pulls up, like he’s waiting for her as if this was an actual date, looking at something on his phone in the meantime, which gives Aubrey a minute to take a peek at his suit. He looks good; she might not have any desire to actually date Will, but she can absolutely admit to both herself and anyone (including Steph) that he’s probably the most objectively attractive human she’s ever met, and the suit only ramps that up. It’s custom made, perfectly fitted, a navy blue that brings out his eyes, and maybe a little more casual than some others she’s seen but in a good way.

His choice in suits makes her feel better about what she’s wearing. Aubrey’d been trying to work off what Steph was wearing, while making sure that what she'd picked out wasn’t overly fancy for the evening or too similar to what Steph had already chosen, ending up in a knee length dress with a sheer high neckline.

“Hey!” She smiles, catching his attention, mildly disappointed that he doesn’t even flinch in surprise, only looks up as smooth as can be and returns her smile.

“Hey.” He slips his phone in his pocket, reaching out for her hand.

“Fuck, I’m sorry.” Aubrey says immediately, that terrible feeling of letting anyone down instantly relieved when Will waves her off.

“You haven’t even missed the entire cocktail hour.” He says and she feels her eyes widen as he nods solemnly. “Yeah, it’s like that.”

“Our first stop better be to get me a glass of wine.”

Will laughs, pressing the button for the elevator. “Wouldn’t dream of it being anywhere else.”

Will refreshes his own drink as well, and selects a red wine for her after Aub hems and haws over the options for a minute, a choice that she almost can’t bring herself to take a sip of once the glass is in her hand, for fear that she’ll never be able to drink another Malbec again, guessing this one is well out of her price range based on name and bottle appearance alone. (She takes a sip anyway, it’s as delicious as she’d expected).

Will’s smiling, as if waiting for her reaction, like there’s not a wine she doesn’t like (well, chardonnay, but like, even that she’ll drink if it’s all that available). “Should we do this?” Aubrey asks him, ready to watch him be roasted by teammates for the evening, and he nods, hand moving to the small of her back, leading her deep into the crowd.

But for all the shit he claims to have taken recently about her, they must be on their best behavior, out in public. Everyone he introduces her to is nothing but friendly; the few people she’s met before this event greet her with smiles and open arms, welcoming her into the fold.

“Are you sure these are the same teammates you warned me about?” She asks Will, when they have a minute to themselves, just finishing up a long and very nice conversation with Justin Holl, Jake Muzzin and their wives, and thinking of the series of texts he’d sent her this morning about “all these assholes.”

“They’re being nice, just for you.” He insists. His arm is still at her waist; it’s barely left there all night.

“Ugh, so I grew up with seven siblings and I’m not even going to be able to use the skills I got from that to throw down?” She jokes. “What was the point?”

Will actually stops walking for a second, drawing her into him quickly when she stumbles, not expecting the abrupt stop in walking. “You have seven siblings?”

Aubrey nods, wondering if she should bother getting into her family dynamics right now, and settles for a short version. “On my mom’s side, yeah. My parents divorced when I was a baby, and they both remarried. My brother and I have more siblings from both of them; it’s just like a whole thing with my dad.” She winces.

Will’s grinning again, though, like he didn’t even catch it, and he points to himself. “One of six.”

“Oh my god!” She blurts out excitedly, before she can help herself. There’s not many people she knows with sibling counts even close to hers, step and half siblings including, let alone a family like Will’s. “See, you get it!”

“Get what?” She hadn’t even realized that Mitch and Steph had approached them, until Mitch pokes in nosily.

“That younger siblings are actual monsters.”

“You talk to your sisters everyday!” Mitch frowns, because he doesn’t get it; he never has.

“Yeah, your point?” Aubrey gives him a look as the others laugh around them. “That’s literally what having younger siblings is, and you just don’t know it because you are one.”

“Shots fired.” Steph nudges him.

“You’re the younger sibling too!” he nudges her back.

“Mmm, traditionally, Aub and I count all our siblings together, soo.” She trails off, laughing at the look on Mitch’s face.

Aubrey’s nodding; their families had grown up so close that it wasn’t uncommon to see Steph and her sister hanging around with Aubrey and her brothers, from the time they were children, all the way until today. “That’s why when Cam starts driving me crazy when she’s here next weekend, I’m just dropping her at your place. Basically the same thing.”

“Ohh, so she’s definitely coming?” Steph asks, eyes wide.

Aubrey nods. “Confirmed it with my mom today, I’m going to meet her halfway.” She pauses for the briefest of seconds. “Want to come?”

“Yes! Coffee on the way?”

“Obviously!”

“Yeah, Will and I are definitely going to sit this one out.” Mitch nods firmly.

“You weren’t actually invited, but okay.” Steph pats his shoulder mock-comfortingly. “But we should all do dinner when we get back!”

It takes everything in Aubrey not to show the internal panic on her face. She’s insanely close with her sisters, despite the age gap- she’s close with all her siblings, the brothers that she’d grown up probably terrorizing their parents together and the younger ones that terrorize them all now. It was probably unrealistic to think she could make it through “dating” Will without him meeting any of them, especially knowing how close Steph is with them too. “Yeah, that would be fun.”

She feels Will squeeze her side gently, almost comfortingly, but before they can get much further with this conversation, someone’s coming around and asking them to find their seats for dinner, so they split off to their tables, with promises to make plans for the following Friday over the next few days.

-----

Will’s quiet on the drive home after dinner, in his very expensive car, which is fine because Aubrey spends that time marveling over it. Like, she knew he was boujie, but, wow.

“Is your sister staying all next weekend?” Will asks, abruptly interrupting Aubrey’s caress of the soft leather of the seat beneath her legs.

“Hm? Oh yeah.” She nods. “Cam’s been a super pain since Kayls started high school this year since she’s still back in junior high, but worse since Kayls just got invited to her first high school party and it’s next weekend.” She sees Will’s wince out of the corner of her eye and laughs. “Oh my god, you don’t even know the half of it! When I texted Cam to invite her up next weekend, she was like why would I want to come hang out with a bunch of old people like you anyway?”

Will’s laughing and Aubrey’s jaw drops until he shares, “When I was home last summer, my youngest sister made me drop her off at a friend’s house three doors away because I wasn’t cool enough to be seen with.”

She actually laughs at that- if Will, an actual professional hockey player, isn’t cool enough to be seen with, then who is?- but the attitude is so familiar. “They’re super close, Kayls and Cam, and like I kinda get why Cam’s being super annoying about a lot of shit. Like, I know she feels like she’s being left behind. But god, does she have to take it out on the rest of us?” She shakes her head, clearing both the thoughts and a piece of hair out of her face. “It’s just the age, my mom and I talk about it all the time. They’ll be nice again in a few years.”

Will glances over at her briefly with a look of panic on his face, before flicking his eyes back to the road. “That’s not really a comforting statement. As someone with three younger sisters,” He clarifies. “Not someone meeting yours this weekend.” Aubrey giggles. “But actually, I was wondering what your plans were with her on Saturday night? If you wanted tickets to the game for you guys?”

“Oh!” Aubrey blinks in surprise. “That would...that would actually be really nice. She’d like that.”

“Yeah?” She can hear the smile in Will’s voice.

“Well, she’d like the flex on all her friends on Monday.” Aub admits, knowing that her sister could probably care less about actually seeing a Leafs game. “And on the boys, they’d be super jealous.” At his glance, she clarifies. “Cam’s a triplet.”

He mutters something under his breath and she giggles again; she’s pretty sure that was Swedish and she can guess what it was. “But they’re not coming?”

“Not this weekend.” She confirms. She is definitely not hosting all three of Cam, Tyler, and Danny for the entire weekend. No way, no how. “But once they find out you’re offering tickets? I’m sure my phone will be ringing.”

“You know where to find me.” Will shrugs, pulling up in front of her building. “Thanks for coming tonight.”

Aubrey grins at him. “Fooled Steph and Mitch no problems.”

It feels like it takes a second for the comment to register with Will, but when it does, he returns the grin. “Yeah, no problems.”

-----

Steph waits until they are well on the road to meet her mom and both sisters (because in a surprise twist that everyone saw coming, a high schooler got grounded and a party was cancelled) sitting in stop and go traffic, before bringing up what Aubrey knows she’s been dying to ask. “So how’s Will?”

“Fine?” She responds, before she remembers that she’s supposed to know these things and hastens to finish. “It’s been a busy week with like, work and this shit, but like, he’s good.”

Steph makes a noise, like she’s unsatisfied with that answer and Aubrey gives her a look after she’s braked with the masses, waiting for it to pick up again. “But, like, how are the two of you?”

Ah. Ok. So that’s what this is about. “We’re good.” She assures Steph, absolutely certain her best friend is going to see right through her. “Just like, figuring shit out, you know? It’s still new.”

Steph’s nodding. “I mean, it wouldn’t be if you’d just gone out when Mitch and I first brought you to dinner…”

“Stephanie.” Aubrey says warningly, picking up speed, probably with too much hope that the traffic has cleared.

“Fine!” Steph laughs. “I know, I can’t say I told you so to you or you’re going to panic and break up with him and probably dye your hair and get bangs or something, but like. I’m super happy for you guys. You were so cute last week.”

“What?” Aub says blankly, because she really doesn’t have much else to say, but it doesn’t seem to matter, because Steph’s on a roll now.

“Like, Will couldn’t take his eyes off you the entire night.” She continues. “It was super cute; he kept, like reaching for you, you kept finding him.” She taps Aubrey’s leg excitedly. “Ok, I know I said I wouldn’t, but I’m too fucking excited and I knew you’d be perfect for each other, I knew it.”

“Oh, look! There’s a tattoo place right at the next light.” Aub says loudly, even though she has no intention of getting a tattoo right now- all four of her tattoos were impulsive decisions and the three threats she’s made since she’s gotten in the car feel like far too much thought, not to mention the time crunch they’re on to get back for dinner-but it does serve as the threat she intends. Steph clearly has no desire to try and talk her out of getting one today and switches the topic to something she just saw on the Insta of one of their friends, which lasts them until they pull into the parking lot that’s serving as the meeting point.

“Aub!” For all that Cameron pretends she’s too cool for everything, just like every 14 year old Aubrey can remember, she throws herself at Aubrey the second that Aub and Steph get out of the car.

Aub squeezes her back, wondering when she got so tall. “Hey Cammie.” Cam swats at her as she pulls back. She hates that nickname, the one that Aub and her three older brothers have called her basically her entire life, but they’ve never stopped, no matter how much their youngest sibling had begged. “Where’s Kayls?”

“Here!” Kaylee huffs from next to their mom, who’s chatting with Steph, has been since she hugged her the minute she got out of the car.

Aubrey’s eyes narrow, taking in the sibling who looks most like her. “Is that my sweater?”

“No.” Kaylee says too quickly to be true. “Are we ready? We have dinner plans, right?”

“Meeting Aubrey's new boyyyyfriend.” Cam sings, and Aubrey shoves her hand in her sister's face.

“Not if you’re going to act like that, we don’t.”

“Girls.” Their mom pauses, mid-reach for Aubrey, to give her youngest two daughters a full-on mom look. “Be nice.”

Aubrey laughs at the looks on their faces, before clutching at her mom. “Hi momma. Love you.”

“Love you too.” Her mom squeezes. “Thanks for this gift.” She whispers and winks because Aub knows that her mom loves all eight of them dearly, but these two in particular are driving her nuts right now. “See you Sunday, at Luke’s.”

“Bye, I’m sure I’ll call you ten times before tomorrow!” Aubrey waves at her mom as she gets in her car, sliding back into the driver’s seat of her own, where Steph, Kaylee, and Cam are chattering to each other as they buckle their seatbelts.

It’s just as she’s pulling back onto the road that Kayls gasps. “Aub, I think I forgot to pack toothpaste.”

“Ohh, me too!” Cam realizes.

Aubrey exchanges a look with Steph quickly. It’s not looking promising that she won’t be making a call to her mom, to talk her off the ledge.

-----

“What do you mean, you didn’t bring pants?” Aubrey rubs her temples as she stares at her sister.

Kaylee shrugs. “I forgot to pack them.”

“I forgot shirts.” Cam calls from the bathroom, where she’d just showered. “Can I borrow one?”

“Did you bring anything?” Aubrey asks wearily. “Toothbrush? Underwear?”

“Of course I brought underwear.” Kaylee huffs, sounding legit offended, like she didn’t forget to pack pants on a weekend trip away.

“Well excuse me for thinking you might not have, since you didn’t bring anything else!”

Her phone buzzes on the nightstand again; it’s got to be the third or fourth time, but she’s honestly been so caught up in her sisters that she hasn’t had time to check. “Just, like, grab whatever from the closet. We’re already late.”

Sure enough, it’s Will texting, letting her know he’s downstairs. be down in a few, She responds, not bothering to go into the whole pants story. “Girls! Three minutes!” She grins at their shrieks, packing a couple things into her purse and laughing to herself as she listens to them get ready. “Kayls! Cam!”

“We’re ready!” They rush out together, Kayls dressed in a pair of her favorite jeans and Cam in one of her favorite sweaters-how they always manage to find her favorites is ridiculous-but they don’t have time for her to make them change.

“Ugh.” Aubrey just says instead, ushering them out and locking it behind her. “Come on, Will’s been waiting.”

“Will’s here?”

“Yes?” She frowns at the two of them. “Where else would he be?” But Kaylee and Cam are already giggling to each other, enough for her to roll her eyes to herself as she leads them out to Will’s car, knowing it’s definitely too much to expect them to just be cool.

“Hey.” Will greets, as she slips into the passenger seat.

“Hi.” She returns, smiling at him.

“Uh, hi?” Cam says impatiently from the backseat. Will laughs, but Aub gives her a look.

“It’s been literally two seconds. Could you, like, chill?”

“Nope!”

Aub side-eyes her again, but turns back to Will. “These are my sisters, Cam and Kaylee.” They greet him eagerly, a sentiment he returns, and then spends the entire car ride to the restaurant where they’re meeting Steph and Mitch at answering every question they ask with absurd patience.

“Oh, I smell garlic.” Kaylee says, once Will has dropped his car off with valet.

“It smells delicious.” Aub corrects, because it’s definitely heavy on the garlic, but it smells heavenly.

Will smiles over at both of them, though Aub’s not sure if he means it more for Kaylee or her. “This is one of my favorite restaurants.”

“Really?” She blurts out, before she can stop herself, and he nods, reaching for her hand.

“Great food.” He confirms. “Come on; Mitch and Steph are already here.”

That certainly serves to get her sisters moving-all her younger siblings have stopped being impressed by Mitch but they still love seeing him just as much as they love seeing Steph- and they push their way into through the doors quickly enough that Aubrey rushes to catch up to them, not trusting them alone, and tugging Will along with her.

Cam and Kaylee have already found Mitch and Steph, already chatting away with the two of them, like they didn’t just see Steph two hours ago in the car, and Aubrey and Will slip into the last two seats at the table.

“You good?” Will nudges her as they sit.

Aubrey nods. “Yeah. Pretty good.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Pretty good.”

“Well, Frick and Frack may legitimately drive me crazy this weekend but.” She shrugs. “We’ll see.”

“What happened to dropping them off with Steph if they drove you too crazy?”

She laughs. “God, if only, Will. If only.”

“Will!” Kaylee interrupts, looking up briefly from her menu. “What’s good here?”

“Will! What’s this mean?” Cam adds and Aubrey takes a deep breath, even as Will looks like it’s his absolute pleasure to walk them through the names of some of the different dishes on the menu.

“Wine, please.” Aubrey requests from the waiter, the second he arrives at the table. “Literally, anything you’ve got.”

But Will waves that off, ordering a bottle of red for the table, in perfect French. “Show off.” She grumbles at him quietly and he grins at her from over the top of Cam’s menu, before he goes back to helping her out.

From her other side, Steph’s hiding her own smile, or rather, doing a very poor job at hiding one. “What?” Aubrey presses.

“Nothing.” Steph says. “Just happy to be having dinner all together.”

“Well that’s bullshit.” Aubrey calls her out, at the very blatant lie; Mitch snorts into his hand to cover his laugh. “But always happy to be having dinner with you too.”

Steph beams, clinking her wine glass with Aubrey’s the second the waiter fills them both. “Again, tomorrow, pregame?”

Aub looks over at her sisters, who have moved away from asking Will menu questions and are, instead, asking him questions about the bun in his hair. “Assuming you aren’t bailing me out of jail instead? Sure.”

-----

Aubrey Dupont: we’re going to do apps with steph pregame but want to say thanks again for tix tonight! want to do dinner again with us after if you’re free?

Will Nylander: i’m free dinner sounds good 😁 it’ll be late though once I get out

Aubrey Dupont: that’s fine! Id say breakfast but we’ve got to leave pretty early tomorrow to get to my brothers to knock a wall down!

Will Nylander: ….holy shit cam was serious

Aubrey Dupont: 😂😂lollll yeah they’re opening up the dining room and living room! We’re all going out to take the wall down, we’re supposed to meet Steph and Mitch and then head out

Will Nylander: lol does mitch know? he booked us a tee time Sunday

Aubrey Dupont: stfu he did not😂 lol he probably just doesn’t want to get iced that early

Will Nylander: haha what??

Aubrey Dupont: hahaha the first time steph brought him home to meet our families, it was my parents Christmas Eve party, my brothers iced him like three times in the first hour. He was so trashed he couldn’t even walk back next door to Steph’s house.

It’s just like a thing we do, all our siblings and he was not prepared for it at all 😂

Will Nylander: sooo if I left one in his locker this week, how much trouble would you be in?

Aubrey Dupont: lol a lot but it’d be worth it, you should 100% do that

Mitch Marner: we’re knocking down a wall tomorrow wtf why didn’t you tell me? I’ll brave a Smirnoff to knock down a fucking wall. What time are you and Will picking us up?

Will Nylander: i fucked up, sorry

-----

“That’s really cute!” Zach Hyman’s wife smiles as she hands Kaylee her phone back.

“Thank you.” Aubrey mouths to her, as Cam and Kayls flock to the phone to check out the pictures she’s taken of them, and Alannah smiles at her knowingly. Aub’s sure she’s got sisters of her own.

“I’ll see you soon.” Alannah promises. “We should do dinner soon, the three of us, next time the boys are out of town.” And then she’s pushing her way toward Zach before Aub can respond to anything.

“Not a word.” Aubrey says warningly to her sisters, as Steph snickers, thinking of how picky the two of them are about pictures almost always.

“These are actually really cute though.” Cam says, like she even means it.

“Yeah, she did good.” Kayls adds, sliding her phone back into her purse.

“So happy they meet your standards.” Steph says dryly.

“They are the ones to meet.” Kayls flips her hair and it’s all Aubrey can do to fight back a laugh. She honest to god forgets how funny they are sometimes, when they’re driving her as crazy as they are now.

“You’re too much.” Aubrey tells her and Kaylee grins, looping her arms around Aub’s shoulders and squeezing tightly. “Okay, now you’re really too much. You’re suffocating me; get off! Look,” She nudges Kaylee away, noticing quickly that Mitch has appeared recently- without Will, but with Auston-and tries to draw her attention there instead. “Mitch is here, bother him instead.”

Kaylee peers over. “Honestly, who even cares about Mitch? I’d rather bother Will instead.”

Mitch’s jaw drops as Steph and Auston laugh, but Aubrey feels the tension immediately in her shoulders. “Jesus Christ, could you just say thank you to Will so he doesn’t think you’re a literal monster like the rest of the world does?”

“Thanks, Will!” Kaylee and Cam chorus, and she glares at them right up until she feels a presence at her side and realizes he’s actually right there.

“It was great to have you guys here this weekend.” Will smiles at them, sounding absolutely sincere, not a hint of sarcasm.

“We had so much fun.” Kayls is already gushing before Aub can even turn her death glare to her.

“What’d you guys do today?” Will asks her and again, it’s the sincerity that gets Aub, like he actually cares to listen to her sisters tell him about the brunch place that she and Steph took them to this morning, the stores they hit afterwards, a few of their favorite spots, before they had to go home and get ready for the game.

He’s sweet and attentive, asking all the questions that he should and nodding in all the right places. “You guys still want dinner?” He asks, probably as soon as he can find a time to interrupt. He’s got to be absolutely starving after that game.

“Yes.” Aubrey answers for them all; she doesn’t really care what her sisters actually have to say on the matter. If Will’s hungry, they’ll eat right now whether they want to or not.

“Can we go back to that bakery we went to earlier, first?” Cam asks, and Aubrey straight up glares at her, but before she can even say no, Cam’s already whining to her. “Oh my, god, seriously? Stop, Aubrey!”

“Ryan, like, swears you’re fun; I just don’t see it.” Kaylee adds, about their brother, the one just younger than Aub.

And like, Aubrey knows they’re just trying to get under her skin, but like, Jesus Christ. “That’s because Ryan’s an actual adult and whenever you two come up here I have to be your literal mom, because you forget to bring toothbrushes and pants and use manners!”

“Take like four deep breaths.” Will says, in that chill way he is about basically everything, and immediately Aubrey feels her glare swing over toward him. That’s basically being told to calm down and there’s literally nothing fucking worse than that, doesn’t he know that?

Probably not. He’s probably never been told to calm down in his life. Jesus, what was it again that made Steph think he was perfect for her?

Mitch, probably recognizing that Aubrey’s about to lose it, pulls Cam into his side for a one-armed hug, mentioning that he’s starving, which at least cues Kaylee into the fact that Will might be too. “Yeah, dinner does actually sound good.” Her eyes flicker over to Will first, before landing on Aubrey, and only when Aub sees the flicker of remorse in them does she actually take that breath that Will had mentioned.

“What time are we meeting in the morning?’ Steph asks, and Aub knows she’s looking to smooth over any potential blow up.

“9:22.” She deadpans, laughing at Mitch’s face.

“It’s supposed to be a nice day!” He protests. “I wouldn’t have made a tee time if you two had told me we were knocking down a wall! I had to hear it from Willy! What’s this shit?”

“Kicked out of the group chat again.” Aub shrugs, even though she knows well and truly that he hasn’t been- and won’t be again until sometime early spring, when someone does it symbolically for a day as they do every year.

“I’ll kick you out of the group chat.” Mitch says childishly, as Steph tries to collect him, Auston already ready to leave, and promising Aub that they’ll make plans later that night about the next morning.

“Will, where do you want to take us tonight for food?” Kayls asks, as they part ways in the lot.

Will looks a little startled. “Oh! Uh, what-where do you guys want to go?”

“We want to go where you like to eat.” Cam says. “We’ll eat anything.”

Will looks at her for confirmation and Aubrey nods; none of them are picky eaters. “Sushi?” He suggests and both girls nod excitedly, racing off towards Will’s car. “See?” He nudges her as they walk to catch up. “They’re fine.”

She glares up at him; he bumps her again and then again, repeatedly until she smiles. “They’re not awful.” She agrees, especially now that they’ve reminded her just how nice they can really be, at times.

Will’s grinning, matching her own smile. “I know you love them.”

“Don’t call me out like that, William.” He mimes zipping his lips and she laughs. “Ugh, you dork. Let’s go eat.”

-----

Kayls and Cam are in peak hurricane form, only barely dressed and nowhere near packed and ready to go, when Will texts to announce that he’s arrived to pick them up in the morning, so Aub just responds with her apartment number and tells him to come up.

He arrives at her door a minute or two later, with a guest in tow. “Mitchy invited him.” Will explains sheepishly, as he and Auston make themselves at home at the breakfast bar in her kitchen.

“Sorry to just, like, crash.” Auston adds.

Aubrey blinks at them. She feels like Will, of all people, should know better. “There’s legit eight of us; we adopt strays all the time.” He cracks up at that; they both do actually, and she smiles, just as Kayls shouts something about Cam stealing her leggings, from where they’re still in her room gathering her stuff.

“They’re not even yours!” Cam shouts. “Aubrey, tell her I got them first.”

“Well I was planning on wearing them!”

“Well you didn’t say that!”

“It’s just like being at home.” Auston says, smiling fondly enough that Aub laughs. “Make sure you check the straightener before you leave or they’ll fight about who forgot to turn it off in the car.” And then she straight up cackles; that’s a fight she knows well.

Auston and Will are both laughing as well, even as she hears her sisters shout for her. She ignores it, running her hands over her temples and turns towards the cabinet. “Coffee?” She asks them, and they both laugh as a muffled shout can be heard.

“Please.” Will says and Auston agrees so she pours mugs for them both, making idle chit chat, interrupted occasionally as they wait for her sisters to finally appear and be ready to leave.

They do, eventually, far later than Aubrey would have liked, and late enough that she’s grinding her teeth about it, loud enough that Will nudges her gently when she passes him to get her coat. He’s right though, it’s not like they’re in a rush to get out to her brother's house, but she’s anxious enough by that point to get moving that she doesn’t even realize what Kayls has taken from her closet to wear until they’re all climbing into Will’s backseat. “Oh my god, what are you wearing?”

“They’re literally yours!” Kayls snaps back and that’s not a lie, but it’s not what Aub’s got issue with either. It’s the absurdly clashing patterns in her leggings and oversized long-sleeve.

“I never wear them together.”

“That’s because your fashion sense is basic a-f.” Kayls pronounces each letter individually and Aub knows, she knows that Will and Auston are laughing at the look of disbelief on her face, even if she can’t see them. “You should take some tips from Will; his is on point.”

“Thanks, Kayls!” Will beams at her through the rearview mirror.

Aubrey ignores him. “Will’s homeless, that’s why he dresses like that.” She deadpans, which he protests immediately even as Auston cracks up.

“You’re not homeless.” Cam says to her, and it’s the fake innocent thing that does it for Aub. “Will could live with you.”

Aub pulls a face even as Auston just laughs even harder and Cam stares at her like she’s waiting for an actual answer. “Walked right into that one.” She mutters to herself, as Will meets her eyes in the mirror. He’s fighting back a grin; she can see the laughter in his eyes. “Will, coffee at the next Tim’s, please?” She’s going to need one to get through this.

Will’s full on grinning now, but he pulls off at the next exit in search of coffee and hands over his credit card before she can even object. The rest of the ride to her brother’s house feels like it passes in a flash, Kayls and Cam tumbling out of the car to greet Luke practically before Will’s even put it in park.

The only thing that stops Aubrey from having a complete heart attack is the immediate sense of calm she feels from no longer calling herself in charge. Luke’s here; he can deal with this shit now.

She feels Will laughing at her as they exit the car. “I thought you’d be more nervous.” He says, as they walk toward her brother, side by side, with Auston.

She snickers. “For what?” And then leans herself into Luke for a hug. “Hi!”

“Jesus, what’d you give them before you brought them here?” Luke returns the hug.

“Literally anything that would shut them up.” She says, dead serious, and then introduces Will, and Auston, almost as an afterthought.

Luke is friendly and welcoming, like she knew he would be. They’ve never had the overprotective sibling relationship she hears about from people. They’re too close in age, only a year apart in school; or too close in general, sharing too much as they grew up shuffled to their dad and stepmom’s every other weekend for their court-mandated time. She’s never doubted that he has her back, but he lets her live her life, no matter how stupid the decisions she might make (though he’s certainly not shy about telling her when he thinks she making one).

“Fitz and Steph and Mitch here yet?” She wonders, as they walk inside, the chatter between her sisters and sister-in-law already evident.

“Running late.” Luke says. “But Ryan’s upstairs sleeping. He stayed last night.”

She grins at him, contemplating running up to wake him, but in the end decides against it, settling for following the sound of her sisters’ voices into the kitchen. Rachel’s standing at the counter, setting out snacks and listening patiently as Kayls and Cam detail their entire weekend to her.

“-Will got us tickets for Saturday’s game-”

“-we ate at this amazing sushi place-”

“Rach!” Aubrey interrupts, tugging her sister-in-law away from Kayls and Cam, who are talking over each other. “Come meet Will.”

Rachel sends her a grateful look and immediately turns her bright smile at Will and Auston, introducing herself to them both and offering them drinks. By the time that she, Luke, and Aub finish getting drinks for everyone, Ryan’s coming downstairs, rubbing a hand over his face sleepily, and the introductions begin all over again.

Then Aubrey and Steph’s parents come in with her two youngest brothers, which cues another round of that, and then finally, Steph, Mitch, and Fitz roll in, which has Aubrey cackling when Auston leans over and whispers. “You didn’t tell us your brother is Little Fred?”

“What the fuck are you on?” She frowns at him, but Will’s got the same look on his face.

Will nods over at Fitz, the stepbrother who’d been in the same grade as her growing up and one of her best friends for about as long as she could remember. Said brother is currently trying to mess up Cam’s hair with one hand, while fighting one of her triplets, Tye, for the last danish. “He’s come out with us a few times, I guess with Mitch? He looks like Fred.” She gives the two of them a look. Literally the only thing her brother and their goalie have in common is red hair. Will shrugs. “Little Fred.”

“That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.” She declares. “The bar is so low.”

“Must be.” Ryan nudges her side. She hadn’t even heard him come up beside her. “Dating you and all.”

She flips him off and he grins; Ryan’s actually the sibling closest in age to her, with the way all their birthdays work out, but from Luke to Ryan, all four of them are close and when Steph and her sister were added in there as well…well, the group chat gets chaotic.

“Hey!” Her mom snaps her fingers at them. “I don’t want to see any of that today.” And Aub can feel it in her face, the look she’s giving back to her mom, like certain that she’s not serious, because, honestly, has she met any of them? She peeks over at Ryan; he’s fighting back a laugh and that’s all it takes for her mom to lose it, the seriousness on her face quickly turning into a laugh.

It’s enough to get them all moving though, toward the wall they’re going to be tackling today, where they’re divided into teams by her stepdad and Steph’s dad, the only two who competently know what they’re doing.

“Ohhh!” Cam says immediately drifting towards the power saw. “Can I use this?”

Will pulls it away from her hands before she has the chance to even touch it and Aubrey’s calling out to her stepdad. “Mike! Are we stuck with these people all day?”

“Yes.” Her stepdad calls back; he’s already showing Tye and Danny how to demo their end of the wall.

Aub looks at Will and immediately mouths, “I’m sorry,” but he’s already loudly laughing at her. She kinda hates that he’s laughing at her, but she hates even more how contagious his laughter is.

-----

It’s a little past dinner time and Aubrey’s exhausted, too tired even to take her empty pizza plate to the kitchen trash can from where she’s sitting on the family room floor.

Around her, the rest of her family is in a similar state. Ryan’s actually asleep on one end of the couch, and on the other end, Auston’s half-heartedly grumbling at Derek Carr and the Raiders, while Steph’s lying across Mitch’s lap on the other side of the room. It’s about as quiet as they’ve all ever been, even Mitch and her sisters, which is how she knows they’re all exhausted.

Next to her, Will’s been quietly munching on a plate of fries since he finished his pizza a while ago. Aubrey reaches over and steals one from him. “Hey!” He protests.

“You’ve had the whole plate!” She thought she ate a lot; she honestly doesn’t know where he puts it all. “I just wanted a couple!”

“A couple?” Will repeats and Aubrey nods with a grin, reaching out and swiping another one from the plate. “Keep this up and we’re going to have to stop for second dinner on the way home.”

“I could probably eat again by then.” She rationalizes, stealing another.

Will laughs, sliding the plate over a few inches toward her, and Aubrey grins triumphantly. It’s quiet for a minute, or mostly quiet, the only sound for the next minute Auston moaning about a fumble, and Kaylee and Cam asking a question about it and then giggling to each other about it before they even get a full answer to it.

It’s Auston’s perplexed face that reminds her and she nudges Will as she goes in for another fry. “Hey.” She bumps him again, grabbing his attention. “Thanks.”

Will hums, sounding almost confused, and glances over at her. Every time Aubrey thinks it’s impossible for him to be more good looking, he proves her wrong; and always doing the most innocent things. He’s just looking at her, with this tiny little smile, but the light’s catching his eyes and they look impossibly blue and gentle, so soft like the rest of him does right now, in a way he almost never publicly is. “For what?”

“For putting up with my sisters all weekend and their increasingly ridiculous comments.”

Will laughs and he’s so close that she can feel the vibration. He’s leaning back against the wall again, but his head’s tilted a little, just barely leaning against hers, and Aub leans into it a little as he starts to talk. “My two youngest sisters play this game, every time we go to the airport, yeah? After we’ve said goodbye and everything. It’s like this competition between them, for who gets the last touch. And they’ll like chase me down as far as they can until I get to security, back and forth between the two of them…”

Aubrey’s already giggling, picturing the scene. “Same shit, different day,” She summarizes the weekend.

He flicks his finger across her nose and she giggles again. “Bingo.”

-----

It’s only when they’re back in the car and on the highway back toward Toronto after stopping for sushi for a second dinner that Auston says, sounding entirely too casual to actually be casual, “So, like, what’s really going on here with you two?”

Aub feels her stomach drop and it takes everything in her not to look at Will, who of fucking course, plays it enitrely cool. “What do you mean?”

Auston leans forward, from the middle seat in the back, which he’d generously offered to take so that she could sit up with Will even though she’d insisted he’d want the leg room up front; she’s starting to wonder if there was more to it than that. He gestures between the two of them. “It’s just, like, not how you usually are with girls.”

Will’s head whips back to look at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?” He demands.

“Will!” Aubrey hisses. “Eyes on the road.”

Auston’s cackling as Will turns his attention back to driving, but continues to eye him up through the rearview mirror. Aubrey twists in her seat; she can still stare him down. “So anyway,” He continues. “There’s that. And then, I mean, I was in the car with him when you literally texted him your apartment number. That was pretty sketch.”

Aub swings her gaze over to Will. “It came over Bluetooth.” He defends.

She pats his thigh. “Stick with hockey, kay?”

He laughs, and when she looks back at Auston, he’s laughing too, but he’s also got this thoughtful look on his face. “So anyway, what’s going on?” He presses.

“Steph and Mitch.” She says finally, after exchanging another look with Will.

“Ah.”

“That’s it?” She frowns at him. “That’s all you have to say?”

“Well, I mean, I’m sure there’s more to it, but like, I have met them before.” Auston grins when she and Will both laugh. “So what’d they do now?”

“Do you have an hour?” Will drawls.

“I have beer upstairs.” Auston offers, since they’re basically pulling up to his apartment, and since Will looks over at her for confirmation, Aub barely even takes a second before agreeing.

“Any wine?”

-----

It’s actually kind of crazy how relieving it is for someone else to know about her and Will, outside of the two of them. Aubrey hadn’t even realized how much it was weighing on her until it’s not, until the three of them had spent three hours laughing about it, recapping the entire thing and then just laughing about nothing.

She notices right away that it's equally relieving to Will, that the two of them will drift over to Auston when the team does something together, or that she’ll get a snapchat from one of them from the road that features Will and Auston off doing something ridiculous.

Steph calls her out on it one day, when the two of them are at a game one night. “I did not introduce you to Will for the two of you to spend time with Auston.”

“You ditched me last night!” Aubrey protests, but really, Steph’s not wrong. That was one time, because Mitch’s brother wanted to introduce his new girlfriend to them, and she’s been out here avoiding invites like it’s her job.

Steph continues like she didn’t hear a thing. “I introduced you to Will so that we could have great couples’ friends and hang out all the time, so why aren’t we?”

“I thought you introduced me to Will because we’d be perfect together?” Aubrey bitches and Steph gives her a look, so Aubrey promises that she and Will will do dinner with her and Mitch again soon.

Dinner soon, to Steph, apparently means that weekend, and Aubrey finds herself in Will’s car again, with a bottle of wine and a plate of dessert, driving out to Etobicoke on Friday night. “I like that I’ve claimed this seat now.”

Will laughs. “What?”

“It’s always set where I want it to be!” She grins. “Perfect leg room!”

Her phone buzzes as Will laughs again, but it only takes a quick glance at the screen to click back out of it. “You okay?” Will asks.

“Huh?”

“You just got real quiet, real quick.” He says, turning onto Steph and Mitch’s street. “Everything alright?”

Aubrey huffs out an aggravated breath, trying to decide what, if anything, she wants to say. “My other dad is being...my other dad.”

“Oh?” Will parks in their driveway and she huffs out another annoyed sigh as her phone buzzes in her pocket, knowing it’s just her half-brother again with more shit about their dad.

“He’s like…” She gathers her stuff and tries to find the words as they walk inside. “I don’t even know. Everybody’s been freaking out since some lady tagged him in a bunch of pictures on Facebook last week but my siblings are at dinner with him right now and they asked him about it and he told them he’s not seeing anyone.”

“Wait, seriously?” It’s the first thing Steph says to her; Aub’s been bitching to her about the whole thing for a week now and she’s more than familiar with her issues with her dad.

“Yes!” She cries. “My sister asked if he was seeing anyone, he said no. I guess one of the boys asked if he’d taken any trips lately, because of the pictures, and he said no. So he’s just straight up lying and I don’t know why!”

“Maybe,” Will says. “He’s not actually lying.”

Aubrey pats his arms gently. “You’re new here, so I’ll let that terrible thought pass.”

Will looks taken aback but she can barely spare a thought for that as Mitch says, “Maybe he got secret-married again and is just waiting until you’re all there to tell you-OW!” Steph elbows him hard and he grins anyway. “What? I’m just saying!”

“I already went to therapy once this week, Mitchy.” Aub mock-glares at him. “I cried for three hours and only didn’t dye my hair blue because Steph came to pick me up for the game. I don’t need to go again. Keep that shit to yourself and get me some wine.”

Mitch laughs; he’s equally familiar with her post-therapy routine and her feelings for her dad. “Alright fine.” He says, but there must still be something on her face because Will’s hand comes to rest on her shoulder right after that and he rubs it gently for a minute before he comes to sit next to her.

Conversation turns lighter after that- to Mitch’s brother’s new girlfriend, who Steph liked and Mitch thought was only okay and then to Will’s sister’s new boyfriend, who he hates-before they’re all more focused on food and a game later in the evening.

It’s easy to ignore her phone buzzing when Aubrey and Mitch are dominating Steph and Will at Codenames (or calling cheaters, because Will and Steph most definitely are), but much harder to ignore in the car when she and Will are alone again, and Aub barely even notices when Will doesn’t make the turn for her place, instead just driving straight to his place.

“Oh.” She says quietly when he finally parks and they’re in the garage, instead of just pulling up out front of her building, like he has been recently.

“Didn’t want you to dye your hair blue tonight.” Will deadpans and Aubrey laughs, surprised that it’s kind of watery.

“Fair, it was definitely a risk.”

Will smiles at her gently. “I’ve been told my guest room is supremely comfortable.”

Aubrey raises her eyebrows; she can siphon out the source of that one. “I hear your brother has pretty shitty taste.” She says and he laughs, that loud one he’s got that she can’t help but smile at because it sounds so ridiculous, but Aubrey’s already getting out of the car, ready to follow him up before he can see.

Will’s condo is pretty much everything she expected- a lot of modern pieces, a lot of white, very Scandanavian- but there’s plenty of Will in it as well. A lot of family pictures. Some hockey stuff-both Leafs and Team Sweden-but not an overwhelming amount.

She’s still looking at some of the pictures (he looks so much like his mom) when he returns with a couple glasses of wine, and she accepts hers with a gracious smile. “Thank you.”

“We’ve been at this long enough for me to know that wine’s your thing.” He jokes and she laughs.

“I meant for bringing me here.” She shoves at his shoulder; annoyingly enough he doesn’t even move. “I definitely would have done something stupid.”

“What are friends for?” Will smiles and there’s that annoyed feeling again, maybe even more so than just a minute ago, tugging at her stomach, for really no reason. They are friends now, in pretty much every sense of the word. They hang out, they text, they do all kinds of things. It’ll actually probably be hard for her, to not be friends with him, or at least pretend to be, when they have to “break up” for a bit to annoy Steph and Mitch.

“Yeah.” Aubrey says and it just sounds off so she takes a sip of her wine right away so he can’t see whatever her face is doing. “If you were really my friend, you’d let me borrow some sweats to sleep in. You know. Since you kidnapped me to bring me here.”

“Ohh, I don’t know if we’re that close.” Will says, but he’s laughing as he walks toward his room so she knows he’s kidding.

It’s a pretty quiet night between the two of them once they make themselves comfortable, just chilling on the couch and watching Netflix, and Will’s not stingy with his pours so Aubrey pours herself into his guest room a little tipsy, and maybe that’s why she texts him from bed. You were right, your guest bed is pretty comfortable.

*Supremely* comfortable. Told you so 😜

-----

Aub’s still in Will’s absurdly comfortable guest bed when her daily FaceTime call with her sisters comes in and she answers it without thinking. “Hey.”

“Where are you?” Kaylee asks immediately. “That’s not your room-oh my god, are you at Will’s?” She blurts and Aubrey wants to smack herself.

“That’s Leafs stuff!” Cam exclaims, popping her head into the frame. “You never wear Leafs stuff! Oh my god, do you live there now?”

“Back up, calm the crazy.” She’s cutting off this spiral before they’ve got the story of her and Will eloping spread to her entire family.

Kayls pouts. “You never let us have any fun.”

“I do not want a call from Grandma this afternoon asking me why I got married to the blond hippie from the Leafs because you two can’t keep your mouths shut and she saw one bad picture.”

Cam’s jaw drops in outrage. “That’s so rude, we would at least send a good picture out! Like she’d know how hot he really is; there’d be no need to google and accidentally come across a picture of him in a Sugo hat.”

That’s it. She’s up for good now. Aubrey throws the blankets off herself and sits up off the edge of the bed, rubbing her temples in hopes it’ll make her tiny hangover headache go away. Limited success. “You googled him?”

“Of course we googled him!” Kayls says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Aub, oh my god, he’s got-”

“I’m leaving this room right now.” Aubrey warns; she’s already at the door. “Stop talking about him like he’s not here.”

Cam immediately launches into a story about a couple of the girls on her field hockey team and something that had happened at practice after school yesterday, a story that she’s still detailing when Aubrey walks into the kitchen to find Will also looking into his phone with a fond look on his face as a loud jumble of voices shout back to him in what she can only assume is Swedish.

“Coffee’s back there.” He points, greeting her with a smile. “And mugs above it.”

“Thank you.” She’s pretty sure, from the expression on his face, that he knows how much of a lifeline that’s about to be for her.

“Hi Will!” Kayls calls and Aub glares at her, but Will calls back a greeting in return before returning to Swedish, but definitely in an argumentative tone.

It’s a couple more minutes of that-listening to Will speaking in Swedish and going through her usual morning nonsense with her sisters-before Will lets out the smallest groan and then looks at her. “My sisters want to say hi.”

“Oh.” Aubrey says, surprised more than anything.

And before she can really say anything, Cam adds. “Yes! Then we can talk with Will!” Which is how she finds herself sitting next to Will with his dog curled in her lap, both their phones in front of them, speaking with her sisters and two of Will’s sisters.

It’s pretty much maximal chaos, but when they both end their calls a few minutes later, Aubrey’s still smiling as she runs her hand through the dog’s fur and Will’s laughing to himself. “Mmm, good luck to you.” Aub nudges him, easy enough to do since she’s still sitting flush up next to him. “When they’re in town next month. They’ve probably all followed each other on Instagram by now already. Best friends in no time.”

“Gonna be busy with games.” Will says weakly. “Practices, media things. Think it’s gonna be your problem.”

“Like hell.” She laughs, shaking her head when he joins in and doesn’t stop. “Oh my god, that was not that funny!”

“Just thinking of all the ways they’re going to torture us when they’re all together after they’ve spent the last month talking shit about us in a group chat.” Will says, somehow still laughing about that, because he’s literally the most chill person on the planet. Like of course he’s not even bothered by that.

“I don’t have enough food in me to deal with that thought.” Aubrey declares, laughing decidedly less at the thought of actually meeting Will’s family. In person. Where they’ll have to actually see her and see what a farce this is. “Feed me.”

Will shrugs. “Let me change and we’ll grab brunch.”

Aub looks down at the very large sweats she’s borrowed to sleep in. “We’ll stop first, yeah?”

“Depends on how hangry you are.” Will calls back, already walking away.

She pulls a face at his back at that one. She’s actually pretty hungry, but like, she’s not dumb enough to go out to brunch with him in a walk of shame. Not when there’s already a group chat forming about her on Instagram. She doesn’t need Leafs Twitter coming for her too.

-----

It’s easy to settle in a routine from there; meeting Mitch and Steph for dinner a few times, joining Steph for games and then leaving with Will for a second dinner after, and easily splitting off to spend time with her own family and friends or catching up with them when Will is off on road trips.

It’s so easy to settle into a routine like that, a relationship routine, that she lets herself get lulled into a false sense of security, the message from her dad catching her off guard completely one day.

“What’s wrong?” Will asks, when they’re at dinner after a game. It’s their thing now; pick a restaurant and grab some food right afterwards before he drops her off at home. It’s a nice way to wind down actually; she usually looks forward to it.

Tonight though, Aub has been uncharacteristically quiet since they met up and she was a downright bitch earlier when she and Steph were fighting about something. Like, she knows they’ll forget all about it tomorrow, but still. She owes her best friend coffee at the least. “Hmm?” She looks up at him, barely hearing his question.

“What’s wrong?” He repeats, giving her a look before she can fight him against answering.

She pushes her food around a little-very uncharacteristic for her, and she can tell even Will’s picked up on that. “My dad wants to meet us all for dinner this week, which means he probably did get secret-married again.”

“Oh.” Will makes a face and Aubrey returns it, laughing when he contorts his even worse. “And that’s-I mean-again?” He finally settles on and she nods, ready to drop this bomb.

“It’ll be wife number six, but secret wedding number three.” She says, delighting in the way his jaw drops. “This is just, like, what he does; he just announces he wants to have dinner with us and then shows up and is like and here’s my new wife, like it’s super casual, and then we all wonder why I need therapy when he’s out here hiding wives and families like it’s a fulltime job.” She finishes, only realizing how heated she is about it when she looks up to find Will staring at her with wide eyes.

“Um.” Will starts.

“Sorry.” Aub hastens, flushing.

“No!” Will says. “No, don’t apologize at all, you can, like, share whatever you want. I just...I got like half of what you just said.” He gives her an apologetic look. “Missing a big chunk of this story.”

“Right.” Aub nods, pretty proud of how calm she sounds. Dr. Seth is going to be so impressed with her next week. “Sorry. We haven’t talked about the two secret families he was hiding when I was growing up. Ok, I’ll back up.”

“He what?” Will cries, but Aub waves him off, diving into the whole history of her dad, her half-siblings, and her step-moms...as well as their various divorces.

“...and that brings us to now.” She takes a sip of her wine thoughtfully; Will has long since drained his and refilled. She’s pretty sure she didn’t miss anything. “And dinner that’s going to be an absolute disaster.”

“Do you want me to come?” Will offers.

“No!” She says immediately. That’s like-god, that’s the worst idea ever. They do not need to get her greedy father involved in this, who’d take one look at Will and see dollar bills. She’s accepted that she can’t change the way her dad treats her (after many years of therapy); she’s got another dad who loves her and it’s not fine the way her dad doesn’t remember her birthday or what she does for work or pretty much anything important about her, but it is what it is. But like, she’s not going to subject Will to it. “It’ll be-fine.”

He raises an eyebrow. “You think so?”

“No.” She shakes her head. “But thanks anyway.”

Will purses his lips. It’s clear that he doesn’t love that answer, but he doesn’t say anything more on the subject, asking her instead if she wants to split a dessert, as if he doesn’t already know the answer to that question, and Aub, grateful for the change in topic, even agrees to let him pick this time.

It’s a rare gift.

-----

Aubrey knows she had a little too much to drink at dinner with her dad, but she’s not so drunk that she can’t recognize that this is Will’s door she’s standing in front of, knocking loudly and repeatedly.

She has only a moment to contemplate that-that it’s here she chose to come to after yet another disaster dinner, instead of Steph’s or her brother’s or back home to her own place-before Will’s opening the door, the confusion passing quickly over his face when he realizes it’s her.

“Hey.” He beams and steps back, silently inviting her in, but Aub doesn’t want him to go further away from her. That’s why she came here. “Whoa, hey!” Will says, as Aub steps in the condo and presses herself against him. “Are you-” He lets out a strangled choke as she tiptoes up and loops her arms around the back of his neck. “-okay?”

“Peachy.” She says, pulling him down to kiss her.

It’s not really a great kiss; Will’s kissing her back for a moment, and then pulling back. “Wait-”

“No.” She whines, leaning in for another, and he does it again, caught up for a moment in kissing her, but then it’s like his thoughts catch up to him and he breaks it.

“Aub, we shouldn’t- we aren’t-”

And like why shouldn’t they? They’ve been doing this fake relationship for a while now and not able to hook up with anyone else because of it. He’s objectively the hottest person she’s ever seen. There’s no reason that’s coming to her right now that says she shouldn’t. “We’re friends now!” Aubrey says, running her palms over his shoulders. God, why weren’t they doing this the entire time? “Right?” And Will nods, slowly, but it’s a nod, “It’s fine, friends hook up all the time.”

“You really want this?” His thumb brushes her cheek as she nods and only then does he pull her back in for a kiss.

-----

If Aubrey thought Will’s guest bed was comfortable, it’s really got nothing on his actual bed. She rolls over, curling into the pillow a little more and opens her eyes to see the sliver of sunlight coming through catch the edge of Will’s face, that one piece of hair that’s sticking up that should be unattractive, but is totally not.

It’s really just unfair.

The sound comes from behind her and Aub jumps when she realizes it’s Will’s alarm going off. It seems like it barely even fazes him; he just reaches across her and silences it; his arm falling across her when he drags himself back.

“Hi.” She smiles.

“Hi.” Will laughs and it lights up his whole face; she can’t help the hand that comes up to trace over his features. “Come on, that’s not fair.

“What’s not fair?” Aubrey asks innocently, trailing her nails down his chest.

He groans. “I have to go. Skate.”

“You don’t have to go.” She pouts and he groans again.

“You’re making it really hard to have to.”

“Good.” Aubrey giggles, only stopping when Will shuts her up with a kiss.

“Really hard.” He repeats as she rolls her hips into his.

“Fine.” She sighs, flopping onto her back, and she knows the move does exactly as she’d intended when his eyes go right to her chest. “I guess I’ll just have to stay here in bed until you get back.”

“Please do.” He insists, leaning over to kiss her again. “Fastest skate ever.” Will promises.

“You can’t control that.” Aubrey reasons, even as Will’s shaking his head at her while he climbs out of bed.

“Fastest skate ever.” He repeats.

She can’t really confirm or deny that it is; but when he does return, pulling her out of a doze by jumping on top of her, there’s coffee on the table for her too. It’s cold by the time she gets to it.

-----

“You guys are being weird.” Steph comments one night, as Aub’s cheering after Will scores a tie-breaking goal.

“What?” Aubrey gives her a look. “What do you mean?”

“You and Will.” Steph says, like it should be obvious. “You’re like-” She breaks off, making a noise of frustration.

“You’re in the honeymoon phase.” Alannah supplies helpfully and Steph lights up.

“Yes!” She cries and Aubrey glares over at Alannah but she merely smiles back. “But it’s like, you’re back in it? Like, you weren’t for a while and now...you can’t take your hands off each other again!”

Aubrey doesn’t really know what to say to that. She’s not denying that she and Will have been all over each other ever since that first night they slept together. She can’t even remember the last time she went to her apartment for anything more than to pack clothes and she’s lost track of the number of times she’s reached out for him only to find Will already reaching for her.

But before? She can’t think of any moment where they were ever like they are now. Like there’s too much space between them even when she’s right next to him. Or this pull that brings her toward him no matter where he’s at.

But she doesn’t...she doesn’t know what to say about that. Because it’s not like anything has changed between them. They’re still friends; they still laugh and joke as usual, still gossip about their friends together, are still just waiting to drop a big break up on Mitch and Steph.

Nothing’s changed, even if maybe, she thinks, something has.

So she shrugs at Steph and says, “We’re just happy. Is that so bad?”

Steph beams and leans her head against Aubrey’s shoulder, and like, Aub knows that’s exactly what she’d been hoping for since she introduced her to Will, but Aubrey still feels like something wasn’t right about what she said.

-----

Aubrey tugs on the Nylander jersey that drapes over her frame as she and Will walk into the hospital conference room. “Are you sure about this?”

“It’s tradition.” He grins. “Stop playing with it.”

“That’s what she said.” She says as dryly as she can, managing to keep the face until he laughs, and then she cracks up with him.

That’s how the two of them walk into the conference room where the team is meeting; laughing so loudly that everyone stops what they’re doing to turn and look, but she and Will only get a bunch of fond smiles before everyone turns back to their own conversations.

Steph gives her a knowing look when they approach hand in hand, which Aubrey ignores pointedly. “You didn’t warn me we’d have to actually go things wearing this dumb jersey when you plotted to get us together.”

“Oh I didn’t?” Steph says innocently as Mitch and Will sputter in protest. “Must have slipped my mind.”

“Dumb jersey?” Will nudges her.

Aub shrugs, looking up at him with a cheeky grin. “It’s a little big. Might have some trouble getting out of this thing.”

Will grins. “I’m sure some help can be arranged.”

Mitch feigns gagging. “There are children around.”

Wills hand drags up her side briefly-too briefly- as he grins at Mitch. “Where, Mitchell?” But he backs off and Aub does too, both of them catching up with teammates and wives and girlfriends around them.

Or they back off a little, but Aub still finds herself drawn int0 his orbit, especially once they start splitting off into groups to move through the hospital to go see the kids. His hand will brush against hers as they move between rooms; she’s bumping her shoulder against his arm comfortingly as they talk with parents.

It’s not very subtle, but they don’t need to be. Except…

“What is going on?” Auston hisses at her, in passing, as he’s about to step inside the room Will’s just about leaving.

“Nothing.” Aub says innocently, but Will reaches for her hand when he leaves, opting for a fist bump with Auston instead, and Auston’s eyes widen, but Aubrey tugs Will along before he can say anything. “Come on, let’s grab some water real quick!”

The diversion doesn’t last long; Auston catches up to her only two rooms later while Will’s in talking hockey with a little girl and she’s waiting outside, leaning against the wall. He joins her, looking in as well for a moment, before looking over at her. “This is a terrible idea.” Auston says flatly.

“You were on board with it!” Aubrey hisses, trying to keep a smile on her face.

“That was before I realized you guys were sleeping together. Now it’s going to backfire and go to shit.”

Aubrey frowns. “Why?”

“Why?” Auston repeats, like he can’t even help himself. “Oh my god, you don’t even-” He stops abruptly.

“Don’t even what?” She prompts, when it’s clear he’s not going to continue.

But he doesn’t continue. He just rubs his temples for a minute and mutters under his breath. “Fuck me, how do I have to be the smart one here?”

“Hey!” Aubrey protests, offended. “I am always the smart one.”

“Not right now.” He says cryptically. “And it’s hard to tell who’s being dumber: you or Willy.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Aubrey frowns, but Auston’s already walking away. “Auston!” He ignores her. “Auston!”

“Hey.” Will’s reaching for her arm gently. “What’s wrong?”

Auston’s out of sight now anyway. “Nothing.” She shakes her head, clearing her thoughts and then looks up at him. “Next room?”

-----

“What are you doing Friday?” Aubrey looks up from scrolling through her family’s group chat; Will’s peering at her from across the island.

“Nothing.” She says, after thinking about it for a minute. “What’s up?”

“We play my brother on Saturday.” He says and the shoe doesn’t drop until he adds, “So my parents and sisters are coming in for a bit. Watch the game. Do early Christmas. Hang out a bit.”

“Oh.” She bites her lip. It shouldn’t-it shouldn't be weird. He survived a whole weekend with her sisters, he’s met her entire family; they’ve gone out a few times with varying numbers of her brothers since then. It just...feels weird now.

Will eyes her carefully for a second but continues. “They come in early Friday morning and I made dinner reservations for that night, if you want to come with us.”

He says it super casually, the way he is about pretty much everything, but she knows him well enough now. There’s a little hopeful tone at the end of it, almost like a question even though it’s not phrased as one. “Yeah.” She says, and even though she’s already nervous about this dinner that’s literally days away, it’s worth it to see the smile grow across his face. “I’d love to come with you guys.”

“They’ll be excited.” Will says, which really undersells just how excited his sisters actually are when they do roll into town later in the week.

Daniella throws herself at Aubrey the second she walks in the door, chattering excitedly about meeting her, and spending the weekend together, and dinner that night, all before Aubrey can even put her purse down. She doesn’t know what her face is doing but whatever it is is bad enough that Will says something to his sister in Swedish and follows it up with a glare when she giggles something back to him.

It works though; Daniella detaches herself, but she does stay close, almost bouncing along next to Aubrey as she steps further inside. “Come on.” Will nods toward the kitchen. “My parents are in here.”

Fuck, his parents. She takes a deep breath. “Cool.”

He grins. The panic must definitely be showing on her face, but his sister just keeps talking through it- Aubrey can relate- or Daniella just doesn’t notice it in her excitement. But Will does, still grinning at her, and she brushes against him purposefully with her shoulder as she goes to follow Daniella, only for him to grab her hand as she passes.

“You don’t have to be nervous.” He squeezes her hand and the only thing that stops her from frowning is his sister. It’s kind of a harsh reminder of the circumstances that she is meeting his family under, the details behind what’s happening here, and that someday-probably soon even- they’ll go back to...well, she hopes that they’ll at least still be friends.

Even if they stop hooking up.

Danielle goes right up to Stephanie in the kitchen, the two of them whispering to each other in a way that immediately reminds Aub of Kaylee and Cam, enough that she has to fight back a laugh. But it’s Will’s parents that really draw her attention. Michael and Camilla are exactly how she’d pictured from every story Will’s ever told her, full attention on her as soon as she and Will enter the kitchen.

“This is Aubrey.” Will introduces.

“Hi!” She smiles, hoping it’s bright and warm enough to hide her nerves.

And it works- or more likely, Will’s parents are as perceptive as he is- because they jump right into chatting easily with her.

She loves them immediately.

They’re warm and friendly, like they’re welcoming her, even though they’re the ones who spent hours on a plane recently. Will’s mom- Camilla, she insists- draws her into a conversation about her family right away- “William told me you have many siblings as well.” “Mum!” “Mum, they’re the best!”- which keeps them going for a while until Michael reminds them they have a reservation to keep.

“You can keep talking at the restaurant.” He teases Camilla, who’s glaring at him. “Some of us are hungry!”

She rolls her eyes at him- a look that is so similar to one Aubrey’s seen Will make a thousand times- but it serves to get all of them moving. They do keep talking at the restaurant, Camilla shoving her own son out of the way to pull Aubrey in the seat next to her, and Daniella sliding in the seat on her other side before Will can grab it, only for him to mutter something to her in Swedish, sending her quickly sliding over to the next one.

Dinner seems to fly by but it’s actually a few hours later that they’re returning home, pulling out a bottle of wine for a night cap. Aubrey’s just about preparing to go home to her own place before Will’s mom stands up and kisses the top of her head, right in line with all her own kids, promising to see her in the morning, and then the night wraps up and Will’s pulling her into his room, like it’s any normal night.

“Are you-” She trails off abruptly as Will walks right to the closet, like no strange thing. But, what did she even want to ask? Are you sure you want me to stay? It’s not going to be weird if I do?

“What’s up?” Will pops his head out of the closet.

“Nothing.” Aubrey shakes her head, moving to brush her teeth. She’s not even sure she knows where that question was going; she can’t explain why tonight feels weirder than any other night that she’s climbed into his bed before.

It does though, and that’s made even more evident by the way she tosses and turns once they climb into bed and turn the lights off, settling in on what’s become her side of the bed, right after she brushes her teeth and runs through her nightly skin routine.

It feels like it shouldn’t be so hard to sleep- it’s been a long day, following a long week, preparing for Will’s family to arrive, but she can’t seem to get comfortable and her thoughts are racing.

She rolls over again, facing Will this time, only to find him looking at her with amusement. “You okay?”

“Can’t sleep.” She admit, biting her lip

Will grins, pulling her close. “I can fix that.”

“I’m not having sex with you while you’re parents are here!” Aubrey hisses.

“No?” Her breath hitches as his fingers dance lower down her stomach and then-

“Will!” She laughs, as he gently pinches a ticklish spot.

“Shh!” He’s grinning, she hates him so much. “My parents are-”

“Don’t say it.” She says, surging up to kiss him so he can’t finish that sentence. God, she hopes his walls are thick.

-----

“Stop.” Aubrey hears Will right outside the door. “Go away.”

She can hear one of his sister’s respond, but the actual words get lost in the chaos of her own sisters’ FaceTime, which she’s wrapping up as she lies in bed. It’s loud enough outside that she knows Will’s family is awake already, bright enough that she probably should get up, but she’s too comfortable to make herself move.

“Daniella!” She hears, followed by something in Swedish just as the door opens and a blonde head pokes in.

“See! She is awake!” And that’s all the warning she gets before Daniella is jumping up right next to her.

“Daniella!” Will snaps again, but Aubrey’s already sliding over to make room for her.

“She’s fine.” She assures him, wrapping her arm around Daniella’s shoulders as she cuddles in close.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Daniella says to her brother, not bothering to pull herself away from Aubrey’s iPhone screen, where she’d barely wasted a minute before jumping into chatting with Kayls and Cam.

Will’s leaning against the dresser and shaking his head in amusement, watching as Aubrey manages to finish up her call (a task much harder with Daniella in her ear, calling just as much nonsense back as her sisters do), but there’s a soft smile on his face that Aubrey almost can’t bring herself to look at, so she starts twirling her hand through the ends of Daniella’s hair.

“I can’t believe you two.” Daniella huffs, and she’s so much like Will, just loving her hair played with; Aubrey tries to hide her grin because she knows he’d fight her on it if she had to say it out loud right now. “Not even inviting your sisters here for the weekend.”

“Why would we invite ourselves into that kind of roast?” Will says dryly. “The two of you are bad enough.”

“Like you’re not going to talk about us anyway,” Aubrey adds. “I’ve seen the receipts.” She teases. “I know you talk about us on instagram.”

“You talk about us on instagram?” Will demands immediately.

“No.” Daniella says, unconvincingly.

“They talk with my sisters every day.” Aubrey whispers to him and laughs when he turns his outraged face toward his sister, who avoids his gaze completely.

“Seriously?” Will cries.

Daniella shrugs. “We have a lot to say.”

“I’ll give you a lot to say.” Will says, mock-threateningly, before throwing himself on the bed on her other side and poking his finger in her side until she’s laughing so hard that she’s begging for him to stop. He does, after one last poke, which Daniella returns with a pout. “Go get dressed.” Will nudges her. “Or Aubrey’s going to go to brunch without you.”

“Aubrey wouldn’t do that.” Daniella says confidently, standing to leave. “She’s nicer than you.”

Will barks out a laugh. “Is she?”

Both Nylanders turn to look at her, just as she’s swinging her legs out of bed and Aubrey shrugs. “I wouldn’t leave your sister behind.” She says, grinning when Will laughs and Daniella’s got her phone out of her pocket before she even leaves the room.

-----

Will and Alex are close. Aubrey knows this. She knows they talk pretty much everyday whether it’s texting, Facetiming, or even actual phone calls. They’re brothers, sure, but more than that; they’re best friends.

And maybe that’s why it’s hard not to shrink under Alex’s gaze the second they meet. It’s not that he’s not friendly when Will introduces them, returning the smile she gives him.

It’s just that his gaze feels piercing in a way that none of the rest of his family did. It feels like Alex sees through all of her but more than that; he’s studying all of her and doesn’t like what he sees.

God, she doesn’t know what she’s going to do if Alex doesn’t like her.

She tries to be bubbly and bright, more listening than contributing to this conversation that’s mostly just brothers catching up. She knows that dinner later, and at their early Christmas celebration tomorrow, will really be when she gets to make her big impression on him.

“Willy!” John Tavares calls, looking apologetic about the interruption.

“Be right back.” Willy pats her arm gently before jogging down the hall and now Alex’s full attention is on her. Now she can’t help but shift her weight from foot to foot, even as Alex smiles at her. “So, Aubrey, huh?”

She fights back the urge to bite her lip. “Yup.”

“It’s exciting to finally meet you.” He grins and Aubrey’s jaw drops a little. “Will talks about you all the time.”

“He-he does?” She asks quietly. It’s about the most unexpected thing Alex could have said to her.

Alex bursts into laughter. “Uh yeah.” He says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, but before she can press anything further, Will’s back, slinging his arm around her shoulders and squeezing her into his side tightly.

“Ready for second dinner?” Will presses a kiss to her temple.

“Always.” Aubrey leans into him, ignoring the knowing look that Alex is sporting currently and the feeling in her stomach that doesn’t quite feel like butterflies.

-----

Aubrey tries to give it a few days after the Nylander’s leave town, hoping the feeling in her stomach will calm itself, but when it’s been a week and it hasn’t settled, she’s forced to admit that she’s going to need outside help.

Can you let me in? She sends, when she’s sure she’s outside the right door.

Open. Come in.

She frowns at the response, opening the door. “I don’t love that!” She calls as she walks deeper in the condo. “You should really-” She stops abruptly, as a blonde whips her head around to glare at her and Auston stares at her wide-eyed. “Oh!”

“Oh?” The blonde repeats, kind of mockingly, but also seething, and Aubrey doesn’t really know what to do, so she looks over at Auston, who’s pointedly avoiding both of their eyes. “Unbelievable.” She shakes her head, shoving past Aubrey and only when the front door slams does she hear Auston breathe.

“What the fuck?” She asks him immediately, “You could have just said no, it wasn’t a good time to come over!”

“I wanted her to leave!” He protests. “I tried everything! She even volunteered to come take Felix on a walk with me!”

Aubrey cackles, barely managing to compose herself at Auston’s glare. “Well, go and get his leash. We can walk and talk.”

She gets quickly distracted by Felix’s excitement for a walk, snapping like twenty pictures on her phone, before Auston finally prods her about the reason she even wanted to meet today. “So what’s up?”

She takes a deep breath. “Am I in love with Will?”

“Are you in love with...are you fucking kidding me?” Auston responds immediately, looking at her like he had that day they were at Sick Kids- like she’s completely missing something that everyone else knows.

“I’m gonna take that as a yes.” She says reasonably.

“Oh my fucking god.” He says, sounding distressed. “Don’t you have, like, a therapist for this shit? How did I get drafted for this?”

“I mean, yes, I do, but I haven’t gone into the details of it with Dr. Seth before this and I don’t think an hour would cover it.” She says; she’s thought about that already. Auston rubs his temples. “Stop that.” Aubrey chides. “Your hairline is bad enough.”

“Well you’re not helping!” Auston cries. “Jesus Christ, am I in love with Willy? Where the fuck have you been?”

“Egypt, I guess.” She says and he stares at her flatly until she explains. “Denial?”

“Fuck off, I hate you so much. Oh my god.” He groans. “Willy would have laughed so hard at that, fuck you.”

The worst thing is that she knows he would have. He’d have laughed and laughed and laughed, his eyes crinkling and his smile bright and warm, so loud that she couldn’t help but join in.

“Holy shit.” Auston says quietly, watching the smile on her face. “You’re really in deep.”

“Ugh, yes.” Aubrey groans, covering her face. “I hate it. I hate these feelings. I hate not knowing. I hate-”

Auston cuts her off, choking out a laugh. “Not knowing? Not knowing what?” And then he chokes again, once he looks over at her. “Not knowing if Will-” He stops abruptly looking like he’s got a secret that he shouldn’t be telling. “Come on, you aren’t this dumb.”

“You’re being serious?” She says quietly, looking over at Auston hopefully.

He avoids her eyes, bending down for a minute to pet his dog, but Felix absolutely betrays him by trying to run towards a new smell on a nearby bush, giving him absolutely nothing to look at instead of her. “I mean, come on.” Auston gives her a look. “Don’t make me say it.”

“Did he say it?”

“No.” Auston shakes his head, tugging gently on Felix’s leash to turn around. “But Aub, really? He brought you to meet his whole family.”

“He met mine too.” She reminds him. “And so did you!”

Auston shakes his head. “You...you just don’t see how he looks at you.”

Aubrey bites her lip, but she can’t resist asking. “How does he look at me?”

Auston doesn’t even have to think before he responds. “Like the rest of us aren’t even in the room.”

“Oh.” She says quietly, looking down at the ground. Felix is just trotting away happily, like Aubrey’s entire world hasn’t been flipped on its axis.

Auston, at least, seems to recognize the effect of what he’s said. “Look, even if you’re not ready to talk with him, just, like, look at the guy. You’re not in this alone.”

She’s definitely not ready to say anything, but, well, she could give that a try. Just try and see what Auston sees.What everyone sees apparently. “Alright.” She agrees.

“I won’t say anything.” Auston adds. “You two can figure this mess out on your own.”

“You’re the best.” Aubrey declares, leaning up to kiss his cheek.

“I know.” Auston smirks, pulling Felix’s leash out from under her feet.

“Jerk.” Aubrey laughs, shoving his shoulder gently. “If you didn’t have the second best dog in the world right here, I’d push you harder.” She crouches down to scratch Felix’s ears, only for Auston to pull him out of her reach.

“Second best?” He cries, outraged. “Nuh-uh. You don’t get to pet my dog after that kind of disrespect.”

“I just ranked your dog above Zeus!” She protests. “But Pablo’s my boy.”

Auston releases his hold on the leash a little and Felix trots over toward her arms as he teases, “I thought we just agreed Willy was your boy.”

“Yeah, well,” Aubrey scratches behind Felix’s ears, smiling as his tongue lolls out. “Man’s best friend.”

-----

Will’s acting funny when Aubrey sees him the next day.

She only catches him for a few minutes before the game, when they briefly cross paths at his place when she goes to pick up a jacket she left there, and she doesn’t know how to explain it, but something just seems...off.

It’s like...he barely looks at her when she’s in there digging around what’s become her side of the bed and then he brushes past her, muttering something about how he needs to go and for her to just lock up whenever she’s done, which would be fine, except he usually waits for her if she’s around when he leaves so they can walk out together.

Something’s just off.

“Are you sure you didn’t fight about anything?” Steph frowns at her, later that night. “Even like a small, stupid thing that maybe you brushed off? Because you do that.”

“No!” Aubrey swears. “At first I thought he was just annoyed about the book, because the book I’m reading right now takes place in Sweden, so like every few pages I ask him if it’s real? Or what it’s like?”

“God, you must be the most annoying girlfriend.” Steph giggles.

“Don’t even, I know everything about you and Mitch.” Aubrey pokes her and Steph giggles again, admitting defeat. “But no! He wouldn’t even look at me! Something’s up!”

Steph purses her lips. “That is weird.” She admits. “It’s very...not Will.”

“No!” Aubrey cries. “Will doesn’t sit and let things stew! He doesn’t care enough about what people think about him for that.”

“So why is he acting like this then?” Steph asks and Aubrey blows out a frustrated breath.

“I don’t know!” She says. “And I just want him to tell me what’s going on.”

The rest of the game is fairly uneventful for the two of them, slipping quietly out of their seats after the win and chatting between themselves and a few other friends as they all wait. One by one, the boys all make their way out of the locker room, and Aubrey frowns as even Auston and John walk out, stopping briefly to chat with her, before even they go, until finally, finally, Will steps out, his face flickering when he sees her.

“Hi?” She says, a little annoyed.

“Hi.” Will says, like nothing’s just happened, like he didn’t just do a double take of the worst kind at her mere presence.

“What’s wrong?” She frowns, reaching out for him and gently sliding her hand on his forearm.

“Nothing.” There’s no other word for it; Will flinches.

“Will.” Aubrey breathes as he shrugs off her arm.

“It’s nothing.” He repeats. “I’m just tired.” Which is so clearly a lie and she frowns, ready to call him out, but he reaches for her hand and says, “Let’s go eat,” with such finality that she doesn’t really know how she’d bring it up.

All she knows is that his hand feels cold in a way it never has before and the silence they sit in at dinner is like nothing she’s ever felt with him, even before they started sleeping together.

-----

“Merry Christmas!” Cam throws open the front door dramatically before Aubrey, Will, Steph, and Mitch have barely even shut their car doors. “Come on, you’re late!”

“Oh boy.” Aubrey mutters and she hears Steph and Mitch laugh.

Will, however, is as quiet as he’s been all drive up to her parents for their annual Christmas Eve party- as quiet as he’s been all week, as he’s been since whatever happened- and it makes her wonder why he even came. She’d told him he didn’t have to come if he didn’t want to; he’d just given her this tiny smile and asked her what time they had to pick up Mitch and Steph.

“How are we late?” Steph asks, as all four of them start yanking off coats and scarves the second they walk in the door. “None of the neighbors are even here yet!”

Cam huffs at that bit of logic and turns on her heel, walking away from them as they laugh, which cues Aubrey’s brothers into their arrival. Tye and Danny poke their heads around the corner of the wall, calling for Mitch immediately to show them how to do something on a new video game, but right away they’re thwarted by their mom. “Later.” Mitch whispers to them, as Tye and Danny grin, following the four of them into the kitchen.

In the kitchen, they find Aubrey and Steph’s moms working in tandem- the way they always have on Christmas Eve- to finish the appetizers and set food out. They stop only briefly to greet their daughters and their daughters’ boyfriends, and to direct them on where to put the desserts they brought, before they’re shooing them all right back out.

“Dads in the basement?” Steph asks, like they all don’t know the answer already, and Danny nods, leading the way down the stairs, where Fitz and Ryan have already started a beer pong game against Mike and Tom.

“Shotty next.” Mitch calls, while he waits for Aubrey and Steph to say hi to their dads.

“You gonna be able to walk back next door?” Fitz snorts out a laugh.

“That was one time!” Mitch protests. “Nobody warned me how much drinking there was on Christmas Eve!”

“It’s like we hadn’t spent the last four months together before that.” Aubrey deadpans, focusing more on watching Will greet her stepdad with the same enthusiasm as he had her mom, and her brothers, and Cam.

But then, he comes back to her side, and when she goes to tangle their fingers together, his hand stays limp, just kind of letting her do what she wants, not returning the gesture at all, instead of pulling her closer like he used to.

“Guess I thought you two were the anomaly.” Mitch teases. “Then I learned I’d have to bring my A game all the time.”

“Yeah buddy.” Tom says, looking over at his daughter’s boyfriend right after he sinks Fitz and Ryan’s last cup. “Who’s with you?”

-----

By the time Mitch and Will get demolished in beer pong, Aubrey and Steph are fighting back a laugh at their dads’ light buzz already going and the neighbors have started to arrive, which brings a temporary pause to pong play for more introductions.

The neighbors all love Will, which, of course they do. Aubrey’s not surprised at all. He’s funny and charming and personable, just has this air that draws people in, and every one of her mom’s friends finds her at some point after they meet Will to gush about how wonderful he is.

“Yeah.” Aubrey says, almost helplessly to Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Morris, as she watches Will with Kayls and Cam across the room. “He’s pretty great.” They smile knowingly at her, Mrs. Jones winking as she passes, leaving Aubrey to watch them with a fond smile on her face.

It’s Will who notices her staring first, because of course it is. Kayls and Cam are oblivious to everything around them. He catches her eye, still laughing about whatever they’re talking about, and there’s a second where his smile grows when he sees her, a second Aubrey feels a grin growing across her own face.

And then it all stops abruptly as something flashes over Will’s face, and as quick as the grin was there, it’s gone.

Aubrey frowns and watches as Will returns to talking with Kayls and Cam again, but notices the smile on his face seems forced now. She wants...well, she doesn’t know exactly what she wants, but she’s tired of not knowing what’s going on with him.

“Hey.” Fitz nudges her shoulder. “It’s too early for you to be sad about going to your dad’s tomorrow. Come take a shot with me.”

“I-” It’s not that. She starts to say, but stops herself. Today’s not the day to try and tease out whatever’s going on with Will. Whatever it is could wait until after Christmas. “Yeah, sure.”

Fitz grins, leading her over to the makeshift bar, corralling a few friends as they go, but by the time he starts pouring, the crowd around them has gotten bigger. Will’s standing next to her, but the space he’s left between them feels so purposeful, and it only makes Aubrey frown as she listens to Fitz’s Christmas toast, as he cheers to a Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year, to good friends and great family. “And a way too cool future brother-in-law.” He jokes. “Don’t fuck this up, Aub!”

“Yo!” Mitch protests loudly as Aubrey feels the breath get stuck in her chest.

She can’t even look at Will, so tense she can hardly bring her shot glass up to her mouth. The alcohol barely even burns and she knows it’s not because she’s too drunk to taste it; the numbness of her brother’s comment still stinging, and it’s well after she’s deposited her shot glass on the counter that she realizes, “Where’s Will?”

Mitch frowns, looking behind them. “He was right here, wasn’t he?”

Aubrey nods slowly, trying to stand on her toes and search for him. “Can you just-” She starts.

Steph’s right on her wavelength. “You look up here; we’ll check downstairs.”

Will is nowhere to be found on the main floor, so she heads upstairs and finally finds him in the room they’d thrown their bags in earlier. “Hey.” She breathes out a sigh of relief. “There you are.”

“Here I am.” Will says quietly. He’s in front of the taller dresser, looking at the bulletin board covered in pictures from high school and college- one of the few relics left in the room from when it was hers before her mom refashioned it into a guest room.

“I’m sorry about Fitz!” She blurts. “He didn’t mean any-”

“We should be wrapping up soon, right?” Will says abruptly, interrupting her.

“What?” Aubrey frowns, shocked. That is...not at all what she thought he’d say.

“This?” He gestures between the two of them. “Like, Mitch and Steph definitely think we're a thing. Can call this off soon?”

“Um.” Aubrey tries to breathe but something’s definitely restricting that ability. “We…what?”

“We can stop this pretending.” Will says, like it’s obvious, and Aubrey feels her stomach drop. This...this was all pretend to him. “Do that break up that’s going to crush them. The whole reason we did this.”

“Right.” She swallows the lump in her throat. “Uh yeah, we can do that.”

Will shrugs. “Cool.” He says, and then turns and walks away, leaving Aubrey standing there wondering where exactly she went wrong.

-----

“Ok.” Steph snaps her fingers and only then does Aubrey look up from the Leafs vs. Calgary game that her best friend invited her over to watch that she’s paying absolutely no attention to- and hasn’t actually been able to focus on all night. Her best friend is standing in front of her, holding a new bottle of wine, and looking concerned. “I’ve asked for your glass like four times now. What’s going on?”

Aubrey bites her lip and holds her glass out. If she’s going to do this, they’re both going to need refills. “I have to tell you something.”

Steph frowns immediately but fills Aubrey’s glass and then her own. “Uhh, ok? What’s up.”

Aubrey doesn’t know whether she needs a deep breath or a sip of wine to settle her nerves. She goes for both. “Will and I aren’t together.”

And maybe...maybe that was the wrong way to phrase it, because Steph’s face just falls. “I’m so sorry, babe.” She says, reaching out and rubbing Aubrey’s arm. “I really thought-” She shakes her head and Aubrey’s still trying to figure out what she said wrong, what she can say to make her see what she really means. “Are you okay?”

“No.” Aubrey says and Steph looks like she wants to reach for the wine bottle and pull her in for a hug at the same time, until she continues. “No, I mean; Will and I aren’t together now because we were never really together at all and no, I’m not okay either, actually, now that you mention it.”

Now Steph frowns uncertainly, like she doesn’t know what to say. And that look? The one on her face right there? If it didn’t feel like her heart was already breaking, she’d be cherishing that look.

Now she can’t even enjoy it.

“You’re going to have to explain this one to me.” Steph says, her voice carefully neutrally.

So Aubrey does- beginning with the night that Mitch and Steph had had them over and her and Will’s plan to get them to stop nagging, to when they’d started sleeping together, to how it felt like they were together for real and on the same page, right up until they weren’t.

“I wanna be so mad at you right now.” Steph says, after a long silence.

“You should be.” Aubrey admits. “I would be.

“Well, you’re making it really hard looking so sad.” Steph glares. “And being so dumb.” Aubrey’s jaw drops, even if the callout is probably well deserved. “Will looks at you like you are the center of the universe. He looks like his entire day has gotten better every time you walk into the room. For God’s sake, he willingly met your dad on Christmas last week! You cannot honestly tell me you think he doesn’t really want to be with you!”

“He told me he wanted to stop!” Aubrey cries. “He was the one who said we should do the breakup!”

“Well if you don’t want to, then tell him!” Steph dares.

“Stephanie.” Aubrey frowns.

“What?”

“I can’t do that!” Aubrey hisses.

“Why not?” Steph pours another glass of wine for herself and then passes the bottle over. Aubrey accepts eagerly. “Did Will tell you why he wanted to stop this...dating thing?”

“...no.” Aubrey sighs. It’s another thing that’s been driving her crazy.

“So ask him.” Steph says plainly. “And tell him you don’t want to stop.”

Aubrey bites her lip nervously. “But what if he says no?”

“Honestly the worst thing that happens here is that you still break up.” Steph says gently. “But this really just sounds like a matter of you two actually needing to talk about where you stand. Will’s not a mind-reader, Aub; he can’t have known you didn’t want to stop things, especially if this was all your idea in the first place.”

Ugh, she’s right. “I hate everything about this.” Aubrey sing-songs. “Including the fact that you even introduced us.”

Now Steph grins. “You do not hate that we introduced you. You just hate feeling vulnerable.”

That’s too accurate to address, so Aubrey flips her off and reaches for the wine again.

-----

Will picks her up for the Leafs annual New Year’s Eve party and it’s unfair because no one should look that good dressed in black pants and a sweater, but there’s Will waiting by the car with a beanie on his head and a pea coat left open, for maximal torture is the only reason Aubrey can think of.

“Hi.” She breathes, running across the street to him as best she can in her heels.

It takes him a second to respond. “Hi.” He says finally, opening the door for her. “You uh, planning on blinding us all tonight?” He teases, once he slides into the backseat of the uber with her.

Aubrey giggles at the lame joke as she looks down at her glittery skirt. It’s such a lame joke but she’s just so relieved he even made it. That they still have dumb things to laugh over. “Hmm, over-under on how many of us are wearing something sparkly tonight. 10?”

“Over.” Will answers immediately and she giggles again.

The ride doesn’t take long so it’s only a few minutes before they’re pulling up to the club, where they run into Travis Dermott and his girlfriend exiting their uber at the same time. “Nine more.” Will whispers in her ear, as Kat turns to greet them, and they both catch sight of a sparkly tank under her jacket.

“Hush.” Aubrey bites back a laugh, but only barely, before she pulls Kat in for a hug. Inside is about as loud as she’d expected but once they all step upstairs into the VIP section roped off for them, it’s easier to hear, easier to think, and easier to breathe.

Or at least, it is for a moment. She can feel Will’s eyes on her from across the room, where he’s at the bar ordering drinks for the two of them, and she and Kat have gone to say hi to more people.

“So, uh.” Steph says, in lieu of hello. “I don’t think Will’s being weird anymore.”

When Aubrey turns and follows Steph’s eyes, Will’s still looking at her, unashamed in his gaze or getting caught. He winks back at her, grinning when she smiles at him. “No.” She says slowly. “I guess not.” Steph just grins at that, kind of smugly, and Aubrey huffs at that, turning away to greet Morgan and Tessa behind her.

It’s not long before Will returns with drinks, still grinning as he pulls her immediately to the dance floor. He pulls out some of his most ridiculous moves and Aubrey laughs, harder and harder the more she drinks, and then finally falling against him after he and Mitch attempt the Toosie Slide together.

“Why are you laughing?” Will demands, wrapping an arm around her waist and taking her hand, leading her into some weird kind of slow dance, even as the song changes into something by The Chainsmokers.

“I just like seeing you like this.” She grins.

His brow furrows. “Like what?”

“Just-” She doesn’t know how to explain it. How open he is right now, how loose and easy and warm he looks because he’s just able to be himself, and how happy she feels to be with him, especially when he’s like this. “Just happy, I guess.”

Will grins again and presses a loud kiss to her temple, that she barely has time to giggle at, because he says, “Always happy to be with you,” like it’s the most casual thing in the world.

And Aubrey gasps in shock, but she doesn’t think Will even notices, because he’s dipping her back over his arm right after that and then she’s too busy laughing again.

-----

Steph flops down on the remaining couch seat and ignores the look that Auston sends her in favor of fanning herself with her hand. “Sure.” He says dryly. “I’ll move over a little.”

“Would you? Thanks.” She snickers and he shakes his head fondly at her.

“How about you?” He looks over at Aubrey. “Gonna squish me in the corner even more?”

Aubrey’s already settled herself on his other side, on the edge of the couch. “Nah, I’m good here.” She bumps her shoulder against his.

“Is it even possible to squish you in the corner?” Steph muses.

“Why are you squished in the corner?” Aubrey asks, confused. “What, you couldn’t find a date for New Year’s?”

“I make it a point to not bring dates to holiday parties.” Auston says and Aubrey’s jaw drops.

Steph’s snickering into her palm though, so it’s clear this particular brand of assholery isn’t unfamiliar. “Holidays and events.” She cackles. “Keep those expectations low.”

“Although now that I know that all it takes to make a girl leave is to just have you walk in my house the next morning…” Auston trails off thoughtfully.

Aubrey shoves at his head, ruffling his hair on purpose, but she can’t help but laugh along with him. “Don’t you fucking dare. I’ve got better things to do than that.”

“Like what?” Steph says, too innocently to be real. “Will?”

“I’m leaving.” Aubrey stands, as Steph and Auston both laugh. “I don’t have to listen to this.”

“Is noon good tomorrow?” She hears Auston call after her, while Steph cackles next to him. “How about 12:30?” She flips him off over her shoulder, without looking back, instead pushing her way around Fred and his new girl, to find Will where she’d left him at the bar with Mitch.

But at the bar, she finds only Mitch, who’s looking a little confused. “Where’s Will?” She asks.

“Um.” Is all Mitch says and Aubrey frowns immediately.

“Mitch, what happened?” Aubrey says flatly and Mitch caves right away.

“I don’t know!” He says. “We were just ordering drinks, watching you guys, everything seemed fine, and next thing I know, he was walking away!”

“Well where did he go?” She asks impatiently, barely waiting for Mitch to point before she’s shoving her way through the crowd.

It feels like she circles the entire building before she finally finds Will, and it’s more like she happens to run into him than she actually finds him, which just annoys her even more, enough that she grabs his hand and pulls him outside to a spot far enough away that it’s quiet enough to talk.

It’s not quiet- it’s still New Year’s Eve and there’s people all around them going up and down the street- but it’s far enough from the door that they can’t feel the music anymore, at least.

Will’s staring at their hands, still linked, but he’s not saying anything, and even though she’s the one who dragged them out into the cold, he’s the one who started acting weird in the first place, and she feels her annoyance grow. “I thought we were having a really good time tonight?”

Will sighs. “We were.” He pauses. “I was, at least.”

“Ok, I was too.” Aubrey says slowly. “So, what happened?”

Will sighs again. “Look, it’s fine, like this was never supposed to be a thing with us, yeah? I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at me. I’ll get over it.”

She’s so confused. “Get over what? Why are you mad?”

“I saw you,” Will says. “Coming out of Auston’s one morning. I was driving past, after practice on my way home.” He shrugs, almost casually, but she can see in his face how hurt he is. “And like, we were never supposed to be a thing.” He repeats and she frowns. Why does he keep saying that? “So I’m not mad at you and I can’t even be mad at him. But I saw you and Matts together and I knew I liked you more than you liked me.” He shrugs again, trying to play off his words as light as casual, but Aubrey’s trying to put the pieces together of what he said. “I know you’d rather be here with him tonight, but that’s why I can’t do this anymore.”

“Oh my god.” She breathes. “You’re so dumb.”

“Hey!” Will protests.

“We’re so dumb.” She corrects, because, really, it’s the truth. “I was at Auston’s that day because he was the only one who knew about us at the time and I needed to talk to someone about if I’m in love with you!”

Will doesn’t move for a second, the longest second of Aubrey’s entire life. “Where, uh, where’d you land on that one?” He asks, like he’s kind of nervous for the answer.

And Aubrey can relate; there are butterflies in her stomach, even though she’s positive she knows how this is going to end now. “Pretty strongly in favor for.” She says and Will beams, that bright smile that lights up his entire face. “I didn’t get to tell you earlier, but I’m always happy to be with you, too.”

“That’s good.” Will says mildly, and Aubrey grins, waiting for the rest. “Because I really love seeing you smile like that.”

Her jaw drops a little. She’s not upset about what he said at all; it’s just so not what she expected him to say. And in that moment of silence, Will grins down at her once more, before leaning down to kiss her.

-----

It’s late the next morning by the time Aubrey tumbles out of bed, yanking a t-shirt of Will’s over her head. Will’s been up for at least an hour already, and she kisses his cheek as she passes, giggling as he lightly pats her ass in return.

“Coffee’s still warm.” He says.

“I still love you.” She teases. “That’s not changing just because you kept the pot warm.” Will flips her off and returns back to the game he’s playing on his Switch. “Have you seen my phone?”

“Near the front door.”

Most of her stuff is still by the front door, thrown hastily down when they’d come in late last night. Her phone’s still got a little battery left, filled with messages from late last night and earlier this morning, but one in particular catches her eye.

Steph LaChance: i told you so 😉

#william nylander #william nylander fan fic #william nylander fanfiction #william nylander imagine #Hockey Fanfiction #hockey fanfic #nhl fanfiction #nhl fanfic #nhl imagines #hockey imagines #my hockey fics

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fortheloveofwonderland · 3 years

Text

Secure Me [Spencer Reid x fem! Reader]

Find my masterlist here. Requests are Open.

Taglist is open, you can find the form here.

Requested: Yes l No

Request: from Anon - “Hi, can I request something about reader dating spencer and she has like an A cup or very small boobs, and she catches spencer staring at a women with big boobs and gets VERY insecure? I just always feel weird reading fics about reader having a cleavage when I’m a literal wood board :("

A/N: I really hope this is the kind of thing you were after! I want to preface this by saying all bodies are beautiful and hopefully this is just a nice body positive fic for you all to enjoy!

CW: just some good old fun titty sucking! Booby appreciation.

Plot: You catch Spencer gawking over a woman with much larger breasts than you. Spencer is determined to show you how much he loves your body and only your body.

WC: 1K

—————————————————————

It wasn’t as if you were usually an insecure person. Honestly you were more confident than most, and most of the time you were happy with the body you were given.

Most of the time.

That is until you notice your boyfriend Spencer staring at that woman in the coffee shop.

It took a moment to work out what he was looking at but when you did you felt like you’d just been slapped around the face.

He was staring right at the woman’s very pronounced chest, wide eyed and slack jawed.

“Unbelievable.” You muttered under your breath but Spencer didn’t hear you. He wasn’t even trying to be subtle.

You weren’t mad at the fact he was looking at another woman, you still found other people attractive, it wasn’t a big deal. It was the fact he was staring at her large bosom, and it sent a wave of insecurities bubbling under the surface.

Your own breasts paled in comparison, you were barely an A cup but Spencer had always told you how much he loved them and you’d never had a problem with them before.

Until now. Because he was staring at that woman’s chest like she was some kind of chess trophy he wanted to win.

What made it even worse was when you got up from the table, he didn’t even notice.

You scoffed loudly as you stormed from the coffee shop, turning back briefly when you reached the street to see if Spencer was following you or not.

He wasn’t.

With another huff you stormed away.

***

It wasn’t long before there was a knock at your apartment door. You considered ignoring it, but you knew Spencer well enough to know he wouldn’t give up that easily.

You threw the door open and folded your arms across your chest.

“Where did you go?” He looked concerned. “I turned away for a second and when I turned back you’d gone.”

“It was much more than a second.” You huffed. “And I’m surprised you noticed what with that big titted woman you had eyes glued on.”

Spencer’s face fell and he gnawed his bottom lip guiltily.

“Oh.” He pulled a face. “There’s no point in even trying to talk my way out of this is there?”

“Nope.”

“Can I please come in?”

You sighed heavily and with a roll of your eyes you stepped aside to let him in.

“I’m really sorry Y/N. I’m not going to lie to you, I was looking at her chest and I’m so sorry. But you don’t have anything to worry about.”

“Don’t I?” You scoffed. “I don’t look like her, Spencer! And if you’d rather have someone like that with massive tits then I’d rather you just say so.” You felt tears welling in your eyes and Spencer clearly noticed because he came closer to you and put his hands on your hips.

“Are you kidding me?” He looked sad. “Why would I want anyone but you?”

A small tear escaped your eye as you chewed your lip.

“Look at me Spencer, mine are barely even a handful. I get it if you want to be with someone like her.”

His own tears formed in his eyes. In that moment he hated himself for making you feel this way.

“Y/N,” he moved his hands to cup your face. “You are perfect in every single way. I wouldn’t change a thing about you.”

His hands trailed from your face, to your neck and finally moved to cup your breasts over your t-shirt.

“And let me tell you, these are fucking phenomenal.”

“You’re just saying that.” You sniffed.

“I’m saying it because it’s true. I adore every inch of your body. There is no one else in the world I would rather be with.” He still was still cupping your chest, his thumbs running over your nipples and they were hard in no time. “Let me show you how much I love them.”

He led you back towards the couch where he sat down and pulled you onto his lap so you were straddling him. As soon as you sat down he lifted your t-shirt up and pulled it over your head.

He hissed looking hungrily at your bare breasts.

“Fucking perfect.” He breathed, taking his hands to your breasts again.

He tweaked your nipples between his fingers making you moan a little.

He was smiling at you, beaming, he needed to know how perfect he thought you were.

He removed a hand from one of your breasts and bowed his head, taking your hard nipple in between his teeth.

You could feel his dick hardening beneath you from just the simple act.

He toyed with your nipple with his teeth, knowing how much you loved it when he did that. He continued cupping and squeezing your neglected breast with his hand.

He used his tongue to swipe across your nipple a few times before moving his lips over the rest of breast and sucking deep marks on your flesh.

You were moaning and subconsciously grinding your hips into his.

His lips kissed across to your other nipple and he repeated his actions on that one while using his hand on the other.

“You have no idea how perfect these are.” He sat back, giving both your tits a firm squeeze. “Can you not feel how hard I am just from touching them?”

As if to prove his point he bucked his hips a little so you could feel just how hard he was.

“I know, I just got insecure I guess.” You chewed your lip.

“I’m sorry I made you feel that way darling.” He squeezed your chest again. “But these are the only tits I want to look at for the rest of my life.” He smiled brightly at you before bowing his head and taking your nipple in his mouth once more.

And as he worked your breasts hungrily, all your insecurities melted away.

—————————————————————

Taglist -

All ships & genres -

@muffin-cup @andiebeaword @mggsprettygirl @measure-in-pain @ptrs-prkrs @sexy-dumpster-fire @takeyourleap-of-faith

SR x reader all genres -

@boxofsparklingmuses @frickin-bats @reidandhisgourd @ukai-hoe @dreatine @adoringanakin @amesandpineapples @goldeng1rl8 @dr-spencerr-reidd @90spumkin @battinsonn @sleepretreat @dr-spence-reid @thetiniestsupersoldier @spenxerslut @tvandfanfic @wheelsupscenehater @sunkissglow @sweetandsunny @spencereidsupremacy @bellaswanismysoulmate @manuosorioh @mcumorningstar @iamwarrenspeace @reichelhache @pinkdiamond1016

SR oneshots -

@willowrose99 @multixfandomwriter @rougewamchop

#spencer reid #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid x fem!reader #spencer reid x you #spencer reid x y/n #spencer reid x reader #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfiction

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thecarnivorousmuffinmeta · 3 years

Note

There's this sort of trope I've noticed in a lot of Twilight fanfiction where the Cullens do not return as quickly as they did in canon during New Moon and somehow inexplicably run into Bella years later, when she's in her early-to-mid twenties and I was wondering how you think this would go? In my head the Cullens would skedaddle the second they got a whiff of Bella, but suspending disbelief there I always have a hard time buying it whenever older Bella ends up back together with Edward.

I think it depends on the Cullen in question, or, if it’s all the Cullens together.

The Yoko Ono Effect

To be honest, if the Cullens had stayed away in New Moon, I don’t think they would have made it as a singular unit to five-ten years down the road. The cracks were already to show even a few months in.

This isn’t to say Bella is responsible for the collapse of the Cullens, I believe they’re doomed anyway, but she serves as a catalyst.

After leaving Forks in New Moon the Cullens immediately begin drifting apart.

Edward is despondent and depressed, within a few weeks leaves the coven, and travels down the continent until he reaches Rio where he stays for months. Note, Edward knew by the time he hit Rio that he had long since lost Victoria’s trail (for the record, he lost her in Mexico) but I think it’s very telling he does not return to the coven.

I don’t think Edward was ever coming back.

This puts a significant strain on Emse, as Edward is far and away her favorite child, and she’s noted as being anxious and severely unhappy with Edward’s disappearance. In time, I believe this would lead to the collapse of Esme and Carlisle’s dumpster fire marriage (which at this point only survives on denial and miscommunication).

Alice and Jasper leave the group to both a) get out of dodge b) investigate Alice’s past. While they do later return things are... awkward.

Rosalie desperately tries to keep the family together, tells Edward the bad news to a) be the only one with the balls to tell him and b) hopefully get him to come back to the family. This, obviously, doesn’t work.

I think without Bella’s suicide attempt the coven would have broken apart probably within the year. Rosalie desperately would have tried to keep them together, but Esme would crack and go to be with Edward, Carlisle would let her go, Alice and Jasper would probably keep their heads down and go on extended honeymoons, and eventually they all realize there’s just nothing to go back to.

They go their separate ways.

The Cullens Are Still Cullening

But lets pretend that things work out.

Edward gets tired of being depressed in Rio and comes back to... be depressed with the family. To be honest, I don’t think he’d get over this. Edward was severely depressed before Bella.

He was very contemptuous not only of his own family but of humanity in general. Yes, he has this very strange idolation of humanity but he also views them as inherently beneath him and lesser. High school is his purgatory where he listens to the mundane thoughts of mundane mayfly humans.

He outright despises Jasper and Rosalie and even Carlisle, who he adores, he often views as something of a fool in great need of Edward’s personal protection.

Edward has lost all passion in life, even in his hobbies like music, and is slowly but surely spiraling down into a place where he can never recover. His obsession with Bella, while far from a good thing, brings light back into his life.

This is an Edward who gave that all up and willingly returns back to what he used to be. And I think that would destroy something in him. Frankly, I think it’d leave him in an even worse place than canon.

So, if the Cullens run into a now adult Bella...

Well, it’d be a clusterfuck.

Edward will be very conflicted as he tried to leave for Bella’s own good but now she’s done exactly what he wanted. She grew up and got over him, Edward presumably means nothing to her now.

Worse, there is now such a gap between them. Edward is physically much younger than she is now, he poses as a high school student while she’s an adult. Bella’s fears were warranted, she’s too old for him now, and in many ways has outgrown him.

If Bella’s in any sort of relationship with anyone, I think Edward would flip his lid, and murder her significant other. As he often fantasized murdering Mike as well as her nameless future husband. If she’s single...

I think with enough time, distance, and therapy Bella would be able to make significant strides towards a healthier mindset. She’d get over her depression and in turn over Edward. She might be angry at him for a while but in time would likely decide that he had left her for what were immature but noble reasons.

What they had was nice, but the relationship was never going to last. Even when she was a teenager, she knew this, which was why she so desperately wanted to be a vampire.

She likely might talk to him to find closure, but I imagine a more mature Bella realizes they know nothing about each other. She’s had so much time in her life now without him and he’s so different from what she remembered, younger. There’s no way to start a relationship, more, Edward himself realized it was never going to work.

I imagine Edward doesn’t take this well either. For all that Edward says he wants certain things, really, he does an impressive job making sure Bella never ran from him. Bella legitimately not being interested in him would destroy him and... likely lead to him devouring Bella eventually.

After all, Alice had predicted that Edward would not be able to stay away and that, ultimately, there are only two futures for Bella: death or vampire.

Edward Comes Back Alone

Alice had predicted that Edward would not be able to keep his distance from Bella. He tries twice. Once, in Twilight, when Alice first announces that Edward is in love with Bella and she will become a vampire. The second time is New Moon.

The first, he cracks in a week. It just doesn’t work out and Edward has a minature crisis over it and tells himself it’s fine because he has to protect her from spiders therefore he has to be in her life AND THIS IS FINE.

The second, he notes that he’s dangerously close to cracking and Alice predicted he couldn’t do it. He makes it six months, but does confess to Bella he often considered finding her again and watching her life from the shadows in Rio.

So, I highly doubt that Edward would make it to five or ten years or that he’d make it with the Cullens. He probably comes back alone by the time Bella’s senior year starts, and intends to watch her from the shadows.

Now, given the plot of Twilight, he realizes that nothing’s working out. Bella’s not free from the supernatural, as her best friend/potential new love interest is a werewolf who might maul her any second now. She’s being hunted by Victoria and everything’s spiralling out of control.

So, Edward probably gives up the charade fast and comes back to get Jake out of the picture and be very upset with Bella for ruining his plan. Bella’s just glad Edward is back. Given Edward probably calls the entire family back, who likely have nothing to say to this nonsense, things proceed pretty much as in canon.

Jasper Runs Across Bella

Considering the last time he saw her, Jasper would run like the hounds of hell are on his heels. This is a world in which he never sees much of Bella after the birthday incident and, as a result, is still mired in guilt. He can’t imagine Bella’s reaction upon seeing him in the wild nor does he want to.

Rosalie Runs Across Bella

Rosalie likely makes no contact. She probably views Bella with bitterness, sees her as the reason for the collapse of her family, and never understood Bella’s appeal in the first place. However, for all Rosalie’s bitterness, she wouldn’t take it out on Bella mostly because there’s nothing to say.

She’d just choose to be distantly happy for Bella that she got to live her human life and glad she adjusted well.

Emmett Runs Across Bella

Emmett and Bella don’t actually know each other that well, Emmett certainly has no personal connection with her. He wouldn’t make contact because it’d be awkward and would piss off Rose.

Alice Runs Across Bella

Alice doesn’t agree with Edward, but she’s also proving a point to him and ultimately values Edward far more than she does Bella. She’ll abide by his rules and not speak to Bella. Also, she sees that if she tries, there’s no way the conversation goes well as Alice would have to explain why she never answered any emails.

Best to avoid that.

Esme Runs Across Bella

Esme values Edward over everything, and while she perhaps thinks that Bella could fix Edward’s desperate unhappiness I think she’d acknowledge that Edward also doesn’t want to see her. She’d snoop from afar but ultimately, I don’t think she’d make contact.

If she did, it’d be with the sole purpose of matchmaking the adult Bella with Edward, which would lead to disaster.

Carlisle Runs Across Bella

Carlisle I think actually would talk to her, to offer up some explanation of what happened and how they got where they are. He and Bella would likely talk about vampires, the Cullen way of life, etc. and ultimately go their separate ways.

He’d try to give closure if she wants it but nothing more than that.

Though if he thinks Bella doesn’t want to talk/see him or any Cullen, he’d likely also make himself scarce.

Some Thoughts On Fanfiction

But that’s not why people are writing these types of stories, and, really while I can give my depressing takes on Twilight I think it’s fair to note that people write these fics for significantly different reasons.

#twilight #twilight meta #twilight headcanon #twilight renaissance #edward cullen #anti edward cullen #bella swan #edward/bella #anti edward/bella #jasper whitlock #alice cullen #rosalie hale #emmett cullen #carlisle cullen #esme cullen #the cullens #meta #headcanon #opinion

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a-small-batch-of-dragons · 3 years

Text

Lie to Me

Prompts: Post Pof: Janus is not doing ok, everday he can taste Roman's lies, he can feel Roman's pain. He can feel the ego crumbling. Guilt plagues him as hes done the opposite of protecting the ego. Hey uh... could you write a fic when you have the time? - meltheromanstan

Roman is having issues trying to keep up his facade (and maybe struggling with his work cause ADHD makes everything difficult on top of everything because I love the idea of the twins having ADHD) and he is one bump in the road away from a full on meltdown. And Janus realizes a lie in a conversation that’s concerning and at some point in Roman begrudgingly gives a self deprecating reason and Janus is like heck no and Roman’s like why not and Janus is like because i care? And then Roman breaks down because no one has told him anything like that in a long time. Sorry that’s so long. You can write this whenever, or never if you don’t wanna. Anygay, bye and thank you! - anon

Thank you for the requests! oh this poor man. roman i'm so sorry you didn't do anything to deserve this and here I am hurting you. I'm so sorry bb you need to be wrapped up with a hot chocolate and sat far away from everything.

Read on Ao3

Warnings: self-hatred, self-doubt, poor roman’s got so much internalized hatred this poor man, some things that can be interpreted as self-harm but nothing explicit

Pairings: main focus on roceit but it can be platonic or romantic you decide, background LAMP, DLAMP, DLAMPR

Word Count: 10,554

Janus hears every single lie in the Mindscape. It doesn't matter whether or not the liar believes it to be true or knows it's a falsehood; if it isn't true, he hears it.

Roman lies. A lot.

Or: 5 times Janus had to hide that he was taking care of Roman, and 1 time he didn't.

They never gave Roman enough credit for how good of an actor he can be.

The wedding is an absolute dumpster fire. The aftermath is a nuclear explosion. Roman sinks out in silence, long before the video is over. Virgil never shows up, neither does Remus. Logan is cut off before he can realize it.

Well, that’s not true.

Janus cuts Logan off before he can realize it.

Because he didn’t care about them, no. Patton has the most influence over Thomas. Patton is the one who influences the other Sides more than they realize most of the time. And Patton is the one who needed to listen.

So it didn’t matter that the others weren’t there when Janus had to talk to Patton and Thomas, because it worked. Thomas listened, Patton finally understood, and things could start getting better.

…or so he thought.

In fairness, the others came around…fairly quickly. He approached Logan with a book on philosophy and an apology on his lips, only to be swept up into a conversation that had drawn both Patton and Virgil into the living room by the end of the day. It felt…well, right isn’t the correct word, but…warm, perhaps. Yes, let’s go with warm.

Of course, Remus belly-flopping onto the couch—and the rest of them—near the end was certainly an additional factor.

But Roman…

Janus didn’t expect Roman to forgive him. Certainly not quickly. He certainly expected Roman to forgive the others for whatever little parts they played in harming the prince’s precious ego. And he absolutely expected the prince to admit that he was wrong, that it was indeed his fault that everything had gone so spectacularly wrong.

The first time Roman walks into the kitchen after the wedding, Janus flinches.

Virgil notices and all but jumps in front of him, snarling a ‘what do you want?’ in Roman’s direction. Patton had turned around and his smile had frozen, staring at Roman.

“Hello, Roman,” Logan says cooly, “may we help you?”

“Yeesh, aren’t you lot jumpy this morning?” Roman shakes his head and sighs dramatically. “I am not here to grace you all with my glorious presence, simply to grab a little food and depart on a quest!”

“Thank god,” Virgil mutters, too low for Roman to hear.

He pushes Janus behind him as Roman waltzes into the kitchen to take something out of the cupboard.

“…when will you be back,” Patton asks warily, “and where are you going?”

“Into the Imagination, my dear Padre!” Roman spreads his arms wide. “To see where the spirit of adventure takes me!”

“That answers only one of the questions.” Logan closes his notebook sharply.

“Time is a social construct,” Roman says airily, “but I suppose I shall try to return for dinner?”

“Don’t force yourself,” Virgil snarks, crossing his arms, “looks hard enough already.”

Roman just laughs and leaves.

“Goodness,” Patton mumbles, leaning on the counter, “I didn’t expect him to be so—so—“

“Roman?” Virgil rolls his eyes. “Princey’s got a head bigger than a fucking balloon—“

“Language.”

“—and he’s not gonna come down to earth for anything.”

“Roman is—or can be—remarkably immature when it comes to admitting his mistakes,” Logan adds, “it’s not to be completely unexpected that he is still in denial.”

Patton sighs. “I know, I just…expected better.”

“Don’t hold your breath,” Virgil huffs, “what about you, Janus? Are you hurt?”

“I also noticed you flinch,” Logan says, standing, “are you alright? Did Roman…”

“He didn’t hurt you, did he, kiddo?”

No. No, Janus is absolutely fine right now.

The instant Roman had appeared in the doorway, the lies slammed into Janus.

They hate you, they never want to see you again.

Everything is your fault.

Virgil is right to try and shield Janus from you, you were so fucking cruel to him.

They don’t deserve to be burdened with you.

Leave. Leave so they never have to put up with you. You know they don’t want you.

They’ve never wanted you.

And yet, as clearly as he heard those lies, he heard Roman, the blustery, pompous Prince, loud as ever, spoiled as ever. He saw Roman, the swaggering adventurer, the cocky Creativity who was always right, always the center of attention.

The actor.

Janus had definitely given him enough credit for that.

“Janus?”

Right, they’re still waiting for an answer.

“I’m fine,” he says, a beat too late, “just caught off guard, that’s all.”

Virgil eyes him suspiciously. “You’re lying.”

“Well of course I am,” Janus sighs, rolling his eyes, “it’s not like Deceit is one of my primary functions, after all.”

“Kiddo,” Patton says, “you know you can tell us if Roman—if someone hurts you, right?”

Something pinches just under his chin. “I know.”

“…so?”

He shakes his head. “Roman hasn’t hurt me, nor has he threatened to.”

Virgil bumps his shoulder. “Just…keep us in the loop, okay?”

“Because it’s very likely that Roman will hurt me.”

The others chuckle or brush it off. Of course, they did. When they aren’t paying attention, Janus lets his gaze trail up the stairs, following the line where the prince vanished. The others have never paid much attention to when Roman returns from his ‘quests.’

Janus does.

Even if Janus weren’t consciously coming to the prince’s aid, he’s certain he’d be summoned regardless.

He waits, quiet in the shadows, for the telltale squeak of the lower hinge on the red wardrobe door in Roman’s room. He’s learned to keep still, keep quiet, not yet fully materialized, watching as Roman stumbles back through the door, one of his arms sagging in relief as the other holds him up. The door creaks shut and a shuddering breath leaves the prince’s chest.

His head bows.

Before the charade completely falls away, Roman pushes himself up and starts getting ready to sleep. His sash, normally laid so carefully over the back of his chair, is given barely a second thought as he throws his costume onto the floor. Janus winces at the slam of the bathroom door and again at the way Roman all but collapses into the bed with a miserable expression on his face. He doesn’t need to pry away the pillow to know that Roman is desperate.

Stupid, stupid, worthless prince.

Not even a fucking prince, not even the fucking squire.

Useless, can’t even do your fucking job.

Can’t even stop feeling fucking sorry for yourself even though you know damn well you don’t deserve it.

You don’t deserve anything.

Janus grits his teeth and waits. Waits for Roman’s lies to grow less vitriolic, more sluggish, waits for Roman’s breathing to even out, sagging against the pillow, before he moves.

His footsteps are silent as he crosses the room, keeping a wary eye on the door, lest someone else knock and wake up the now sleeping prince. He swallows, leaning down, his lips barely brushing the curve of Roman’s ear.

He doesn’t touch, doesn’t want to risk waking him now.

“You’re not stupid, Roman,” he whispers, barely loud enough to be heard, even by himself. “You’re not worthless, you’ve never been worthless.”

Roman shifts in his sleep. Janus freezes. He stills and he breathes out. Bends just a little closer.

“And you deserve to know that.”

Even if he can only even whisper it when Roman is too deep in sleep to hear him.

The lies don’t stop. They just get worse.

Fortunately, Janus’s powers aren’t limited by the physical space, not when the lies are particularly pervasive. For example, every time Logan insists that he doesn’t have feelings, or Virgil insists he doesn’t care about the others, or Patton says—particularly passionately—that everything’s fine, Janus hears it. These ones typically merit a scoff and a roll of the eyes, or a quip if he’s actually in the same room. These ones he’s used to.

Here’s the thing about the lies that Janus can hear; it doesn’t matter whether or not they’re lies that someone knows is a lie or whether it’s something they believe. If it isn’t true, Janus will hear it.

Case in point: Roman’s lies, and the lies that took Janus far too long to figure out were lies.

When he decides to tune into Roman’s mind, he’s normally greeted with statements lauding about how amazing the prince is, how he’s the best Side, how much he loves himself. Even when he’s not paying particular attention to Roman, he can hear those sentiments loud and clear.

The issue with that? He can hear them loud and clear.

Now, is it likely that these are things that Roman believes that aren’t true? The possibility exists.

Is it more likely, given recent…developments, that these are things that Roman has known aren’t true, and is intentionally thinking them in order to keep playing a role?

No, of course not, why would you ever think that?

They won’t go away. He can barely look at Roman now, can’t stop seeing, hearing all the lies he tells himself every day. The others are starting to worry, growing colder towards Roman, concerned about how much Janus tries to put distance between them. Virgil keeps shoving himself in between the two of them, Logan keeps pulling Janus into long conversations that Roman wouldn’t dare insert himself into, Patton makes sure the two of them are never alone.

Well, almost never alone.

The lies are the worst at night. When Roman is in his room, curled up under the covers, his head buried in his hands, they roam freely, coloring the red curtains with shadows, smearing themselves over his paintings, his drawings, his writing, his keyboard.

They’re right to be scared of you, right to hate you.

You don’t deserve their forgiveness, especially when you haven’t even apologized for the amount of things you’ve done wrong.

And you’re selfish enough to want a fucking apology from them?

Janus, waiting in the corner for Roman to fall asleep, winces, the strength and magnitude of the lie filling his mouth with bitterness.

Does he deserve an apology from Roman? Yes, perhaps, that would be nice. Laughing at his name in a moment of vulnerability was…perhaps not ideal.

But the idea that Roman doesn’t deserve an apology? From any of them?

Roman, the only one who consistently defers and gives and tries and hopes for them, the one who works nonstop to make sure they have something, anything to do, for Thomas, for each other, the only one who’s called out to apologize to them, who apologizes to them when he realizes he’s done something wrong?

Roman deserves an apology. If only to make up for the amount of times he’s been blamed for something that someone else started.

A noise.

Janus blinks, coming back to the present as Roman stirs. For a moment, he worries that the prince has woken up, that he’s discovered someone else in his room, only for a trail of sluggish lies to funnel into his mind.

Janus hates you more than anyone else and he’s right to.

You hurt Janus on purpose.

You never stop hurting Janus.

You will always be someone he can use, a puppet, until you are nothing more than an obstacle.

Before he can stop himself, he’s striding across the room to murmur in Roman’s ear again, chest aching with the weight of the lies.

“The others,” he murmurs, flooding the words with as much sincerity as he can, “they don’t know what I can hear, what they have never noticed, and that is what hurts me, my prince, that you are so quiet and so brave that you can convince the world that you’re not suffering.”

Roman clutches his pillow a little tighter.

“I don’t hate you, my prince, I know you didn’t mean to hurt me like that, and I know—“ he takes a deep breath— “I know that the hurt you caused me is nothing compared to what I have done to you.”

He closes his eyes and feels the guilt well up in his chest. He knows he can’t say the full apology that Roman needs—that he deserves right now. He can’t even begin to imagine all the little things he hasn’t even realized he’s done to Roman, how many things he’s done that he’s forgotten that were just another Tuesday to him, but rewrote entire chapters of Roman’s life.

He can’t begin to imagine how much of this could’ve been stopped if only he’d realized just how hurt Roman has always been.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, “I’m sorry that I never realized how far I let this get.”

Roman is touch-starved, he realized, horrified one day when he walks into the living room to see Logan and Patton sitting on the couch, Virgil sprawled across their laps, and Roman in the corner, far away from everyone else, hiding such a look of heartbreak that Janus almost stops in the doorway as Remus brushes past him.

“Hey!” Virgil splutters when Remus lies down on top of him.

“Remus!” Patton pushes lightly at him. “You’re going to squish Virgil!”

“He’s durable, he’s used to it.”

Logan raises his eyebrows, looking to Janus for confirmation. Janus sighs.

“I can remember every single time I’ve walked into our living room to see the two of them on the couch,” he says dryly, “and I’m certain that all of them have started with Remus asking Virgil’s permission to lie on top of him for hours.”

“See?” Remus wraps his arms around Virgil. “He’s fine.”

“Yeah, yeah, Pat and L’s knees won’t be though.”

“Ooh! Did you know that some people have a third bone in their knee?”

“I would be more than happy to follow this train of conversation,” Logan mutters, “if you were to get off my lap.”

“Fine.”

Janus shakes his head again as Remus clambers off, landing cross-legged next to Logan on the couch and immediately info-dumping. Virgil sighs and scoots, laying his head in Patton’s lap and going back to his phone. Patton runs his hand through Virgil’s hair and wiggles his free hand at Janus.

“Come on, there’s plenty of room.”

Remus snorts, interrupting his tirade long enough to say: “Jan-Jan’s not a cuddler,” before going back to talking about…something to do with knees. Patton frowns.

“What?”

“’S true.” Virgil peers up at him. “He’ll hug you if you ask for it but he’s not big on cuddling.”

“O-oh.”

“He should still come sit with us, though,” Virgil says quickly, shooting Janus a very subtle look, “so get over here, J.”

Janus sits, pulling out his book and opening it. After a few seconds, Patton looks away, and Virgil tunes out again.

Good.

The lies were getting a little too hard to stand.

Here, behind his book, he can shift his attention to Roman, scribbling in his notebook and looking every bit the creative genius at work, dead to the world, couldn’t give less interest as to what’s going on around him.

As he said, Roman is a fantastic actor.

This time, it’s not even that the words are the thing hurting him now. No, these lies are the type he’s more used to, someone frantically muttering the same thing to themselves over and over and over, trying to convince themselves it’s true. The problem is what’s being carried with the lies, and how deep this need must run in order for it to make it to Janus.

I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it.

Roman’s hand is trembling a little on his pen as his brow furrows, eyes skating back and forth over the page. The ache starts just under his chin, right where it meets his throat, and surges, rushing through his arms to the very tips of his fingers. All of them, even the hidden ones. His gloves twitch on the pages of the book.

He’s so cold.

I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it. I don’t need it.

The words start to blur together. It hurts. His arms ache. He risks looking more openly at Roman only for him to notice, looking back and quirking an eyebrow.

“Something wrong, Deceit?”

“He has a name,” Virgil growls.

“Janus,” Roman amends, shooting Virgil a glance, “is there something wrong?”

“Why’re you over there?”

He meant to ask why Roman wasn’t sitting with the other Sides. He meant to ask whether Roman chose to sit by himself and starve himself of physical contact or if the others had cut him off. He meant to ask if Roman wanted to come to sit with the rest of them.

Instead, Roman smiles.

“You’re right. It’s getting quite late. I must be off!”

Before Janus can say anything, Roman assumes his dramatic pose and sinks out, cheerily declaring his farewells.

Next to him, Patton lets out a shaky breath.

“Goodness.”

Logan adjusts his glasses. “Quite.”

“Thanks, Janus,” Virgil mutters, making himself more comfortable, “I thought he’d never leave.”

No.

No, no, no, this is all wrong.

“Why did you want him to leave?”

Virgil shrugs. “It’s harder when he’s here.”

“Harder how?”

“We do not know how to act around Roman,” Logan admits, fixing his tie, “he’s not—well, he seems content to behave as if nothing is wrong, and…”

“It’s not,” Patton says softly. He fiddles with his hands. “We can’t go back to the way it was before, and Roman…Roman doesn’t seem to know how to move on.”

Virgil snorts. “Not that he seems to care enough to try.”

Well, if the lies still plaguing Roman’s thoughts are any indication…

Why would they want to touch you? You ruin everything you touch, haven’t you ruined enough already? Haven’t you ruined them enough already?

They’re done trying with you. They hate you. It’s a wonder they only realize it now.

Broken, useless, toxic prince. Finally left out in the cold where you deserve to be.

Roman curls up under his thin sheet, the heavy blankets put away for the colder seasons too far away and too close to Patton’s room for him to get them safely. Janus watches as he twitches miserably, curling up tighter, turning over, hugging his pillow to his chest, trying, trying to feel warm. Every now and then there’s a quiet noise, quickly stifled. His arms start to ache again, not just from the cold, but from how much Roman seems to believe that no one wants to touch him.

He makes up his mind.

He sinks out to his room, quickly grabbing one of his weighted blankets from his own storage. Returning to Roman’s room, he waits with bated breath until Roman’s chest rises and falls at a steady rate before carefully creeping forward and spreading the blanket over the prince.

“Don’t make yourself cold,” he murmurs, tucking it into place, “stay warm for me, my prince, stay warm, it’s alright.”

Roman shifts, turning his head so it accidentally brushes Janus’s hand.

Janus freezes.

Roman hums slightly and falls back asleep. Shaking, Janus moves his fingers, letting them card through Roman’s hair. The prince mumbles and doesn’t wake.

He does it again, firmer this time. Roman all but melts under this, just this, just a proper blanket over him and someone running their fingers through his hair.

“Oh, Roman,” Janus murmurs, unable to resist cupping Roman’s face in his hand, “you’re don’t ruin everything you touch, far from it.”

He cups the back of Roman’s head, guiding it to a more comfortable angle.

“On the contrary,” he whispers, “you make us better.”

And maybe…maybe he can try and provide a little of what Roman needs. Even if they have to be stolen moments, felt only on the very edges of sleep, when Roman is conscious enough to remember them but not lucid enough to lie and say he doesn’t deserve it.

The time when Roman barely managed to stumble through the door in his room before passing out is the only time Janus seriously considers calling the others to help.

But no, he reminds himself as he rushes to the prince’s side, they would want to wake him up, to scold him, to figure out exactly what he thought he was doing, whether or not he’s considered whether this is hurting Thomas.

Janus bites back a growl as he starts examining the prince.

Perhaps if they were so concerned about whether or not hurting Roman hurts Thomas, they’d be more considerate about what they say to him.

He pushes that away for now, more focused on getting Roman’s tight collar away from his neck and checking the state of his bruises. From what he can see from the dirt on the costume, he’s fallen, from quite a significant height, and who knows what else might be hiding under here?

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs as he looks around for something to help, “but I may have to peel you out of these.”

Sure enough, he can get most of the costume top off fairly easily—and gains a newfound respect for how difficult it must be to put the thing on by himself, there are so many buttons—but the undershirt proves more difficult, especially as it seems to be stuck in places that it should not be stuck in.

…oh.

Oh, no.

Janus bites back a curse and moves quickly. One arm reaches for the first aid kit he knows is in the bathroom, one arm grabs a pillow and stuffs it under Roman’s head, two gently move his arms up and over his head, and two carefully, carefully take the edge of the undershirt and beginning to take it off.

He presses a gauze pad to the wound over Roman’s hip.

He holds an ice pack to the swollen lump on his rib cage.

He checks over the wound on his chest.

He tilts Roman’s head from side to side to see how far up the bruises go.

The pants have to come next and Janus grits his teeth, running his hand over Roman’s forehead as an apology before he shucks the article of clothing.

More bruises. So many bruises. Thankfully no more bleeding wounds.

He lets out a breath and sits back on his haunches, staring down at the injured prince.

The best thing about it, he decides, is that there’s no way for Roman to know that he would’ve been safe passing out and not taking care of any of these.

The wound on his hip has all but stopped bleeding as Janus tends to it carefully, wiping away the blood and soothing the angry skin with a balm, covering the whole thing with a bandage. The mark on his chest isn’t as bad as it looks, bits of dead skin that Janus clears away and brushes off Roman’s torso. The antiseptic makes him hiss a little and he rubs soothing circles into his tummy until he resettles, murmuring that he’s doing so well, he’s almost done, they’ll get him into bed and he can rest.

None of the bruises on his legs are bad enough to merit bruise cream, let alone keeping the poor thing from his bed for a moment longer. Instead, Janus quickly covers the one on his ribs and lifts the prince into his arms.

Roman jolts.

“Shh, shh,” Janus murmurs, stroking a free hand through his hair, “shh, shh, shh…”

Roman shushes, just in time for Janus to lie him down and tuck him in, one hand still in his hair as he sits on the edge of the bed. A furrow grows between his brows.

Should’ve gotten hurt worse.

Janus freezes.

Should’ve let them hit you more.

Got off too easy.

It should hurt more. You deserve it. Maybe if you pay enough it’ll get better.

“No, sweetie,” Janus whispers, reaching out before he can stop himself and cradling Roman’s sleeping head in his hands, “no, no, no, don’t ever believe that we want to see you hurt.”

Shouldn’t have come back.

Shouldn’t be a burden.

At least none of the others know about it, they would only complain and ignore you. Useless, worthless prince.

“You’re not worthless, sweetie,” Janus promises, still cradling the poor thing’s head, running his fingers through his hair to keep him lulled and asleep, “shh, now, everything’s alright, hush now…”

As the lies drift off into nothingness, Roman along with them, Janus’s face falls.

Roman is the protector. The prince that will always put himself between them and whatever dared to try and hurt them. He’s not meant to fight a war on two fronts.

Who protects the protector?

“I will, sweetie,” Janus whispers, so, so quietly as he tidies up Roman’s room and gives the sleeping prince one last pat, “I’ll look after you.”

Roman, perhaps more than any of the others, is essential to Thomas’s mental help.

Roman is Thomas’s hopes and dreams, the things he wants above all else, the things he strives for, the things he desires. He reaches and reaches and reaches for Thomas, holds every single one of his wants close to his chest, and keeps them safe until they can bubble up into reality.

Roman is romance, the reason Patton gets all fluttery and bubbly inside. He’s the suave, fabulous, gay disaster that encourages Thomas to be happy, to reach for who he wants, for who he desires.

Roman is creativity, the livelihood that Thomas has chosen. He works nonstop, tirelessly producing idea after idea for Thomas to film, to write, to create, so Thomas can live and be proud of what he’s doing.

Roman is the Ego.

What is the Ego, you may ask? Well, although Freud is largely considered bullshit by modern psychologists—or at the very least, upsetting due to the fact that his research was largely corrupted by the rich men funding it—there are certain aspects of his work that remain in the public mind.

Simply put, the Ego is the conscious mind. It is the sum of your thoughts, beliefs, and habits as they interact with your physical body. The tether that stretches into your awareness and consciousness and into your physical form. It is a combination of body-thoughts-feelings and the consciousness taken to activate it.

The Ego gives you a sense of self-worth. It is a mask, one you put on and play as a role.

Everyone and anyone, it seems, has been warned about the dangers of an out-of-control Ego. Overconfident, hubristic, arrogant, with no regard for others. A vapid complainer, sustained by the power of approval hoarded selfishly. You are encouraged, if not instructed outright, to learn how to live without paying any attention to your Ego.

Here’s what they don’t tell you.

The Ego is what you think of yourself. It gives you self-worth because that’s its job. To make you feel secure in who you are. It is sustained by approval because it lives in fear. It itself puts on a mask of strength, of imperviousness, that it is indestructible, because it is soft, malleable, and so very afraid.

It is true that the Ego is nourished by positive comments, because it isn’t a crime to feel good, or to feel proud, or to want to be validated. It is true that the Ego sometimes reaches too high, only to fall, because that is its nature, to want, and to hope.

They don’t tell you that when you turn your hatred inwards, your Ego doesn’t just bruise, it crumbles.

So when Logan constantly tells Roman that they can’t do something, or it isn’t a worthy use of their time, despite his best intentions, he’s not doing much other than snatching Roman’s dreams away. Roman learns not to ignore Logan, yes, but at the expense of constantly being told that it is his fault when Thomas feels crushed, never mind that Roman is crushed, too.

So when Virgil insults and belittles his worth, tells him he’s stupid and unimportant, despite the fact that Roman will snipe back at him, all he does is reinforce the idea that Roman is the only one at fault, that Virgil is allowed to sit and insult him to his heart’s content while Roman has to apologize for standing up for himself. Roman learns to stand quietly while Virgil tells Thomas he’s a disappointment until the time comes where he believes it’s true.

So when Patton decides that Roman is bad, after how much Roman has sacrificed for Patton, to do what would make Patton happy, Thomas happy, when all he needs is just someone on his side, something, anything, Roman has to stand there, alone, hurt, angry, upset, and be told that he’s wrong. Roman learns that he’s only here to give, not to receive, that no one will hold him when he falls apart.

So when Remus starts to show up, more and more, less and less restrained, no one puts it together that Roman literally does not have the strength to hold him back. Roman learns that the others don’t realize how little confidence he already has, only that their approval of him is directly proportional to how much they hate his brother.

So when Janus decides that Thomas needs to take better care of himself and that the only one he needs to focus on is Patton, Roman is the perfect tool, the perfect puppet, to be used and tossed aside when he no longer needs him, because it’s so easy to twist and turn the little prince so he dances in just the right way, never mind how much it hurts. Roman learns that no one ever cared about him, not really, and perhaps they never will.

As you might be able to imagine, destroying the thing that gives one self-worth is absolutely the best way to go about things.

Can any of you guess where the blame gets pushed when Thomas’s mental health suddenly plummets?

It’s definitely where it should be.

The thing that scares Janus the most about how that meeting goes is how resigned Roman is.

His hands are folded neatly behind his back. His face is politely blank. His mind is quiet.

When there’s a break in the conversation—if you could even call it that—he opens his mouth.

“What would you like me to do?”

“Have you not been listening?” Logan adjusts his glasses. “To…anything we have said?”

“Of fucking course he hasn’t,” Virgil grumbles, shoving his hands into his pockets.

“Kiddo,” Patton admonishes, crossing his arms, “Thomas hasn’t had any ideas or dreams lately and it’s stressing him out.”

“Which means you need to get out of the pity party and back to reality with the rest of us,” Virgil adds.

“Which means,” Logan sighs, crossing his arms too, “you are going to have to start talking to us again.”

Roman looks between them. “Are we not…talking now?”

“He means actually interacting with us, Princey.”

“Have I…not been doing that?”

“It means accepting that things have changed,” Logan snaps, “and working through it.”

Roman tilts his head. “How would you like me to do that?”

“Well—“ Logan adjusts his glasses— “let’s start with an apology.”

Something flickers across Roman’s face. Janus looks back and forth between Thomas and Remus. Thomas just looks a little confused as to what’s going on—which, when doesn’t he?—and Remus is staring right at Roman. There’s a strange expression on his face.

“What would you like me to apologize for?”

Janus winces when Virgil scoffs, turning away, and Logan’s mouth hardens into a thin line.

“Why don’t you try starting,” Patton says, “and we’ll see.”

“No, you know what? No.” Virgil points a finger at Roman. “I’m done holding your hand through all of this. Waiting for you to realize that you fucked up.”

“Virgil—“

“No, Pat!” Virgil gestures between the three of them. “You know how hard it’s been on us, waiting for something to change, and now he wants us to just…what, walk him through what he did wrong?”

Patton spares a glance at Roman before looking away.

Roman’s face twitches. He looks down.

“Perhaps Virgil is right,” Logan says, “when Roman can try taking the first step, then maybe this conversation will be more productive. Until then, I see no reason to waste time.”

“Great. Bye, Thomas.”

“Wait, you guys are just leaving?”

“I see no reason to simply stand here and be unproductive,” Logan shrugs, “perhaps if something changes, you can summon us back.”

“Doubt it,” Virgil mutters, grabbing Logan’s shoulder and sinking them out. Patton spares one last look at Roman before he leaves too.

Thomas shuffles a little. Remus keeps staring at Roman.

After a moment, Roman moves.

“…you want me to apologize?”

Janus definitely imagines the chill that goes through the room.

Roman raises his head. He does not look at where Patton stood, he does not look at where Virgil stood, he does not look at where Logan stood.

He looks directly at Thomas.

“I’m sorry, Thomas.”

Thomas splutters. “Roman—“

“I’m sorry that I sent you to the wedding,” Roman says softly, Thomas’s words dying in his throat, “I’m sorry that I made a decision that I thought you wanted. I’m sorry that I tried to put your friends above your own wants, because I thought that was right. I’m sorry that I thought I was doing what was right.”

Thomas’s eyes go wide.

“I’m sorry that you never had faith that you would win the callback,” Roman continues, never once looking away from Thomas, “I’m sorry that your dreams are always too far away, that you must always feel the need to crush them in favor of what is more practical. I’m sorry that you constantly feel like you’re set up to be one big disappointment.”

Janus’s arms drop in shock.

“I’m sorry that I can’t do what you want,” and by this point, Thomas looks on the verge of tears, “even though that’s supposed to be my job. I’m sorry that nothing I do is ever good enough on its own, that you feel so afraid, so scared of doing the things you want. I’m sorry that I’ve made you feel even the tiniest bit of my fear.”

Thomas stifles a noise.

“I’m sorry that I don’t know things.” Roman chuckles sadly. “I’m sorry that it takes me so much time to figure out what to do. I’m sorry that it always feels like everyone’s one step ahead of me, that you have to wait for me to catch up, even though I never, ever do. I’m sorry for not sticking to the plan.”

Something heavy presses against Janus’s throat.

“And I’m sorry that I’m hurt. I’m sorry that it’s been a little too much for me to handle. I’m sorry that my pain is an inconvenience to you.”

“R-Roman—“

Roman just smiles sadly when Thomas can’t finish the sentence. He spreads his arms, giving a little gesture to himself.

“I’m sorry that this is your Ego.”

Janus sees the moment the horrified realization dawns on Thomas’s face.

“I’m gonna fucking kill them,” Remus snarls and it’s only years of practice that makes Janus’s reflexes fast enough to catch hold of him before he sinks out. “Let me go!”

“You can’t hurt them,” Janus grunts, “you know you can’t.”

“Fucking watch me!”

“No, no, Remus,” Thomas splutters, “don’t—don’t do that.”

“Why the fuck not?” Remus snarls, spittle flying from his lips as he struggles against Janus’s hold. “You heard what Roman just said, they—they—“

“We did it too, Remus,” Janus says softly, glancing at Roman, “we’re not blameless either.”

Remus keeps struggling. “Let—me—“

“Remus.”

Roman’s soft voice still the duke entirely, his head whipping around. Roman just stares at him, resignation and acceptance written plainly on his features.

“It’s not fair, Ro,” he mumbles.

“Life isn’t fair.”

“I—I can summon them back, we can get them back, they can listen to you—“

“But they won’t,” Roman cuts off in the same soft fury, “they won’t listen to me.”

“Roman, they love you!”

Janus winces. Roman just turns to look at him. He can’t meet his eyes.

“Maybe,” Roman says eventually, “maybe not. Either way…”

He spreads his hands.

“Here we are.”

“Let me go, Jan.”

“If I do, will you stay?”

“Fine.”

Janus lets him go, only for Remus to lunge and wrap his brother in a tight hug. Roman stands there, immobile, until Remus lets out a howl. Roman just murmurs another soft ‘I’m sorry,' and sinks out.

Remus collapses to the floor, his Morningstar cupped in his hands.

“What—what just happened?”

“The twins share things,” Janus murmurs quietly, his eyes still on Remus, “including emotions when they are particularly strong.”

“So—“ Thomas shakes his head— “so Remus is feeling what Roman’s feeling?”

“No,” Remus snarls, still gripping the weapon tightly, “I’m feeling what Roman isn’t feeling.”

He stands up, eyes blazing.

“I am what Roman isn’t. To you. What Roman isn’t, I am. Which means—“ his knuckles turn white— “the fact that I’m feeling so strongly right now means that Roman isn’t.”

Thomas goes pale. “What?”

“Roman is numb,” Janus says quietly, “he’s closed himself off from…everything. To protect himself.”

“It means my brother, the good Creativity, passion, desire, romance, hopes and dreams, whatever you want to call him,” Remus growls, “is now numb, touch-starved, and too afraid of rejection to reach out for anything.”

“What do I do,” Thomas asks frantically, “how do we fix this?”

“You can let me kill the others.”

“No, Remus.”

“Talk to them,” Janus suggests instead, “I’m not sure they realize what Roman being the Ego means.”

Thomas nods. “Okay, we can do that. Should we do that…now?”

Janus opens his mouth to respond only for something very familiar to trickle into his mind, along with an all-too-familiar tug.

Stupid, useless, worthless, toxic, dumb, unimportant, bad, can’t do anything right, selfish, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong—

“Not now,” he manages, “get some rest. You need it.”

Thomas nods tiredly. Remus just gives him a look that says ‘you’d better not fuck this up’ and leaves, probably to go work out some of his aggression on creatures in the Imagination.

Janus sinks straight into Roman’s room and his heart breaks.

Roman is on the floor, pieces of his prince costume thrown haphazardly around him, sobbing hysterically. It’s so loud that for a moment, Janus worries that someone else will come, trying to figure out what’s wrong, before he’s hit with another wave of lies.

Broken broken broken broken broken broken broken broken wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong hopeless hopeless hopeless hopeless hopeless hopeless—

He aches.

Because he knows he can’t do anything while Roman’s awake. He’d never let him close, never let him see this. A sick feeling crawls into Janus’s stomach at the thought of invading Roman’s privacy like this but it wars with the knowledge that he’d be summoned anyway, and that Roman is falling apart.

So he has to wait.

Watching as Roman falls apart, believing himself unloved, unwanted, and unseen.

Slowly, far too slowly, the harsh sobs morph into softer cries, then sniffles, then Roman stills, slumping on the carpet as his breathing evens out. Tears of his own threaten the corners of Janus’s eyes.

The poor thing cried himself to sleep.

But as he moves closer, reaching out a hand to stroke back his hair, he lets out a coo before he can stop himself when he sees more tears.

The poor thing cried himself to sleep and kept crying.

“Oh, sweetie,” Janus whispers, moving to cradle him as gently as he can without waking him, “sweetie you come here, shh, shh, honey, it’s okay, it’s going to be okay.”

He lifts the poor prince into his arms, moving swiftly to the bed and laying him down, tucking him in protectively and running his fingers through his hair.

“It’s okay, sweetie, you’re safe now, it’s okay, you’re safe…” He settles Roman’s head on the pillow. “Shh, shh, shh, that’s it, shh…”

Sleep-clumsy fingers curl around his arms. Oh. Oh, dear. Well…

“Oh, sweetie, are you—do you want me to stay?” Janus tries to pull away a bit only for Roman to grumble and hang on. “Oh—okay, sweetie, I’ll stay, just—just a moment.”

He snaps the fingers on a free hand and changes into something softer, something he can sleep in, something Roman can hold and cuddle. He slides into bed next to him, only to be immediately cuddled by a sleeping, still crying Roman.

“Shh, sweetie,” he whispers, nuzzling Roman’s head, “I’m right here, I’m not leaving, I won’t leave you.”

Roman mumbles something and snuggles into Janus’s chest. He makes another comforting noise at the evidence of more tears.

“It’s gonna be okay, sweetie, I promise, I’ll look after you, I’ll take care of you.”

And when Roman lets out a little cry, still asleep, he breaks, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

Roman melts.

“Oh, sweetie…”

Janus spoils him with kisses, across his forehead, down his tear-stained cheeks, running his hands through his hair, down his arms, over his back, soothing a particularly painful hitch with a hand on his tummy, rubbing gently until he lapses back into a peaceful sleep. He buries his face in Roman’s hair and holds him tight.

He swallows heavily, guilt and concern warring in his throat.

“I don’t want you to think,” he begins carefully, “that I’m only apologizing because I feel guilty over seeing you hurt and that it’s my fault.”

He tightens his grip on the sleeping prince.

“I am sorry, Roman,” he whispers with his lips against Roman’s forehead as if to speak the truth into the prince’s dreams, “for all the hurt I have caused you. For using and manipulating you, for dismissing you and letting you think you were useless, and for letting the others make you believe you were so unlovable.”

He shudders, his breath coming out shaky.

“But mostly…” he swallows, “mostly I’m sorry that I won’t be brave enough to say that to you when you’re awake.”

+1.

Janus blinks. There’s sunlight coming in through the curtains.

His room definitely has curtains.

Oh. Right. He’s in Roman’s room.

Shit, he’s still in Roman’s room.

He’s fallen asleep, he realizes, in Roman’s bed, with Roman cuddled protectively to his chest, after the poor thing had sobbed himself to sleep in the aftermath of that awful, awful meeting.

Unconsciously, he goes to tighten his grip on the sleeping prince before realizing that he should be doing the opposite.

He should leave. Now. Before Roman wakes up and sees him.

He definitely wants to be around for that conversation.

So, despite the ache in his stomach at the thought of leaving Roman alone right now, he grits his teeth and starts trying to disentangle himself from Roman, despite Roman’s best efforts to cling onto him. If he weren’t so afraid of the consequences of getting caught, he’d find it adorable.

Okay, maybe he still finds it adorable.

But Roman’s so soft when he sleeps, so lovely, so unabashed at chasing what he wants. He clings to Janus’s shirt with clumsy fingers, burbles soft noises of protest when Janus’s warmth leaves his side.

“Come on, sweetie,” Janus coaxes, gently prying Roman’s fingers off, “let me go, you don’t want me to be here when you wake up.”

“Mmno.”

“You say that now…” He still won’t let go. “Come on, sweetie, let me go…”

He leans down to press a kiss to his cheek, hoping Roman will melt and he can escape.

“That’s it, just go back to sleep, sweetie,” he murmurs, his voice low and hypnotic, carding his fingers through his hair and kissing his forehead, “sleep, sleep, sleep…”

“Stay,” comes the sleepy little mumble, its voice still lost in the dream, “take care ‘f me.”

The earnest plea brings a sad little smile to Janus’s face.

“If you knew who I was,” he whispers, “you wouldn’t ask that.”

Roman opens his eyes and stares right at him.

Janus freezes, his hands still caught in Roman’s hair, Roman’s hands still gripping his shirt.

“Stay,” Roman repeats, his tongue thick with sleep but awake, “don’t run away this time.”

This time?

Oh.

Oh, no.

Janus swallows. “How long—“

“You said you didn’t hate me,” Roman mumbles, still tugging on Janus’s shirt to get him back, “and that it hurt more that the others didn’t realize.”

“You were supposed to be asleep.”

“You were supposed to hate me.” Roman tugs harder. “Come back.”

Janus gets slowly back into position, letting Roman cling to him like a child with a teddy bear. Without permission, his own arms wrap around the sleepy prince, and Roman all but purrs.

“We c’n talk later,” the prince mumbles, already drifting back to sleep, “but stay. Want you to stay.”

And…well, if it’s the first time Roman’s asked for something he wants in god knows how long, what else is Janus supposed to do but obey?

“Alright, sweetie, I’m right here,” he murmurs, curling his arms tightly around the poor prince, “do you want to try and go back to sleep?”

“Mm.”

But his eyes don’t drift closed. Instead, they stay glassily alert, one hand fisted loosely in the slack of Janus’s shirt.

“Sweetie,” Janus calls after a little, “do you want to change into something easier to sleep in?”

He lifts one shoulder in a halfhearted shrug.

“Can I help?”

Another shrug. Janus tucks a loose piece of hair behind Roman’s ear, snapping his fingers to put the costume on the mannequin in the closet and replace it with a soft red shirt and boxers. He presses another kiss to Roman’s forehead and ruffles his hair.

“Why don’t you hate me?”

Janus frowns, pulling Roman closer. “How could I hate you?”

He holds a finger gently up to the prince’s lips before the lies can fill Roman’s head again.

“Let me rephrase: I don’t hate you, Roman, I promise.”

Roman’s disbelief is palpable. “But why?”

...maybe he is going to have to do this.

“I can hear lies,” he murmurs, “whenever someone says them or thinks them. If they’re not true, I’ll hear it. No, no—stay here, sweetie, shh, I’m not angry, I’m not disappointed. I can hear them when you tell yourself that you’re worthless, or toxic, or that we all hate you.”

He lifts Roman’s chin gently.

“They’re lies, sweetie, that’s why I can hear them. You’re not worthless, you’re not toxic.”

Roman whimpers.

“You’re not broken,” he continues softly, holding him still, “you’re not hard to love, we don’t hate you.”

He cups Roman’s face and pulls him in to rest their foreheads together.

“And I care about you, sweetie, so, so much.”

Roman’s breath shudders warmly on his cheeks.

“Shh, shh, oh, come here, sweetie—there you go, you can cry, honey, I’ve got you, I’m right here, shh, shh...”

The weight of the prince’s tears drying on his collar makes it hard to swallow. He tugs the blankets closer around them and lets Roman cling onto him as he cries.

“I know you don’t believe me,” he whispers as familiar lies start to drift across, “but it’s true, sweetie. It’s true, it’s true, I promise. I’m here to take care of you.”

“I’m—I’m sorry—I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sor—sorry—“

“Shh-shh-shh, don’t apologize to me, sweetie, you don’t have to apologize, I’m right here, I’m not angry, nothing’s so bad.”

“I’m sorry.”

Janus hushes him gently with a kiss to his cheek. “I know you are...even though you don’t have to be, not like this.”

His chest aches when Roman won’t stop burbling apologies.

“Roman.” He takes the prince’s face firmly in his hands. “Roman, look at me.”

Roman’s glassy eyes fixate on Janus’s face.

“I forgive you, my prince,” he says, “I forgive you.”

Roman’s mouth stills.

“If that is what you need to hear,” he continues, softening his grip, “I forgive you, my prince.”

“You...you do?”

“I don’t want you to think that you need my forgiveness for me to love you,” Janus murmurs, “but yes, sweetie. I forgive you.”

Roman collapses.

Janus catches him. Of course, he catches him. He curls around his prince and murmurs sweet nothings, reassurances, anything he needs right now.

It’s messy, it’s frantic, it’s desperate, it’s human.

He can care for Roman while Roman lets himself be human. So he holds the poor thing while he cries himself out.

He doesn’t cry himself to sleep again, thankfully, just enough to slump against Janus’s chest and huff.

“Sorry.”

“No need to apologize, that was long overdue.” He runs his knuckles up Roman’s back. “Can we get you something to drink?”

Roman stiffens. “Does that mean going downstairs?”

“No, sweetie. Come on...”

He gets Roman seated on the edge of the bed with a glass of water in his hands. Roman drinks, blinking as Janus passes him a warm cloth, then a cool cloth, to clean his face.

“What do they want me to do,” he asks after he’s finished the glass and the cloths are hanging over the laundry basket, “now?”

Janus winces. Is he surprised? No.

“Shh, sweetie, I’m not angry,” he soothes when Roman tenses, “I’m concerned. You’re still—you still need to take care of yourself first before you worry about everyone else.”

But everyone else is worthy of the worrying, not me.

Janus hisses gently. Roman just sighs.

“It’s what you’ve told me,” he mumbles, “I don’t—I can’t just stop it.”

“I’m not expecting you to be able to just stop it, sweetie, it’s going to take time, but part of it is going to be recognizing what’s not true.”

“I know.”

Janus opens his mouth to say something else when Roman gasps, his hand flying to his chest.

“Sweetie? Sweetie, what is it?”

“I’m—I’m being summoned.” Roman clutches his shirt, staring up at Janus. “Thomas—Thomas—“

“I’ll go.” Janus gives Roman’s shoulder a squeeze. “Just wait here for me, sweetie, I’ll be right back.”

He can still feel the warmth of Roman’s shoulder tingling under his palm as he appears in the living room.

“I’m sure you have a wonderful reason for trying to summon Roman,” he drawls, raising an eyebrow at a Thomas.

Thomas looks up from his computer. “We were still filming.”

Janus stiffens. “You’re not thinking of trying to continue—“

“What? No, no, I’m saying that while Roman was talking the camera was still rolling.” Thomas points to the screen. “Which means we have it. All of it.”

Ah, now he sees where Thomas is going.

“You want them to watch.”

“They should, shouldn’t they?”

Yes, a bitter part of Janus growls, they should see how badly they’ve made Thomas’s Ego crumble.

“What do you think?”

Thomas rolls his shoulders back. “I think up until Roman said...all of that, I didn’t think the others were wrong either.”

He glances up at Janus.

“Did you?”

Janus huffs. “I don’t think we ever give Roman enough credit for how good of an actor he is.”

With that, the whole sorry tale spills out of him. He doesn’t reveal the exact nature of the lies, just the broad swaths of them and how many there are. To Thomas’s credit, he deals with it better than Janus expected. That is, he doesn’t burst into tears.

Thomas takes a deep breath.

“...yeah, we’re watching this now.”

“Right now?”

“Answer me this,” Thomas says, looking up at him again, “where is Roman? Right now?”

“...on his bed.” At Thomas’s pointed stare, he relents. “He’s not alright, Thomas, he hasn’t been for a very long time.”

“Then yeah. Right now.”

“Then I’m going to ask Roman if he wants to be here.”

Thomas nods. “Can you—can you tell him I’m sorry?”

“You can do that yourself when he’s ready to hear it.”

Understandably, Roman does not want to be there. Janus wraps him tightly in the softest blankets he has, tucked up with a pillow and a glass of water nearby if he wants it, along with the reassurance that if Roman wants him back here, at any point, to call. He’ll listen.

“Thank you.”

Janus leaves him with one last squeeze, appearing in the living room with the others. Thomas is back to setting up the computer so they can all see the screen.

“Thomas?” Logan adjusts his tie. “I was unaware we had something scheduled for today.”

“We didn’t. Spur of the moment.”

Remus shoots Janus a look. Janus nods. Remus shifts a little closer to him and his hand grips his Morningstar.

“Is this about the video from yesterday?” Virgil looks around warily. “Or is it something else?”

“It is about yesterday.”

“Shouldn’t we...wait for Roman?” Patton rubs the back of his neck. “He kinda—well, if we’re talking about yesterday—“

“Roman’s not coming.” Thomas keeps fiddling with the computer.

Logan raises an eyebrow. “Are we deciding how to film the video without Roman?”

“No.” Thomas glances at Janus. Janus nods. Thomas looks back at the others. “Roman’s not coming because he doesn’t want to.”

“What the fuck?”

“Language, kiddo,” Patton mumbles halfheartedly.

“Wait, so—“ Virgil doesn’t look so much as chided— “you’re just gonna let Princey throw his temper tantrum and not come work?”

“How much attention were you guys paying to what happened after you sunk out yesterday?”

“…not much, why?”

In response, Thomas just pushes ‘play.’

Their voices fill the room, telling Roman what he’s done wrong, why he’s holding all of them back, why he’s the source of all their problems. Lies, lies, and more lies. They get to the part where the other three sink out and Remus tightens his grip on the handle.

“…you want me to apologize?”

Virgil opens his mouth, presumably to make some quip, only to cut himself off with a strangled noise once Roman’s apologies begin.

Janus watches with a sick sense of satisfaction as Patton’s hands fly to his mouth, eyes wide at the hopeless tone coming out of the computer. Next to him, Virgil goes rigid, borderline catatonic. He looks as if one little push would send him toppling over.

He can’t see Logan’s face until Thomas stops the playback. It’s only when Logan takes his glasses off to clean them that he can see the tears on his cheeks.

Thomas looks up at Janus.

“Can you still hear them?”

“The lies?” Thomas nods. “Yes.”

There’s a moment of silence.

“Roman is the Ego,” Logan whispers, mostly to himself, “Roman is the Ego. Of course…of course, I understand—I understand now.”

“What does that mean?”

Logan takes a deep breath and looks up at Patton. “It means that Roman is Thomas’s sense of self-worth, more or less, and that he—he takes the brunt of Thomas’s reactions to…any sort of feedback, more than any of us. Good or bad.”

Virgil stifles a curse. “And we’ve taught him to hate himself.”

“Quite.”

“We—“ Patton takes a breath— “we need to apologize.”

“We all do.” Thomas closes the computer and sets it aside. “I don’t…I don’t know how we do that, though.”

“Breaking patterns of thinking is hard,” Logan says, “and…especially hard when you have been taught not to ask for help.”

“But there has to be something!”

“Touch-starved,” Virgil breaks in, staring at a spot on the carpet, “Roman’s touch-starved.”

Janus raises an eyebrow.

“…when I was still having trouble,” Virgil says after a moment of them all looking at him, “Roman—Roman would just come and ask me if I wanted to—to—“

He hunches his shoulders.

“Sometimes it’d be a hug. Sometimes he’d sit next to me and—and lean on me. Sometimes he’d just—you know, with the forehead thing—“

“Bonk.”

They all turn to Logan, who has…a surprising flush to his cheeks.

“Roman said that he—he wanted to be able to express affection for me and not disturb my work,” he manages, “so we…came up with a solution.”

Patton blinks. “Is that why Roman will just walk up to you and bonk his forehead against yours?”

“Yes.”

“Huh.��

“That’s adorable,” Thomas says quietly, “that’s—wait, hang on, that’s really adorable.”

“It was Roman’s idea.” Logan swallows. “Most of his ideas are good.”

“Yeah,” Thomas says, “maybe we should try telling him that next time.”

Janus looks around. The others look to be in various states of remorse and determination. With the exception of Remus, who still looks like he wants to bash a few of their skulls in.

“…can we go hug Roman now?”

“I wanna do that.”

“If he’s—“ Logan glances between Thomas and Janus— “do you know if he would be amenable to that? If he—would like that?”

“We can ask,” Janus says quietly, “but I don’t know.”

“And if he says no,” Remus growls, “you get out.”

“We understand, Remus,” Logan promises. He looks at Thomas. “Thank you, Thomas.”

Thomas shakes his head. “Don’t thank me. Not yet. We all have stuff to fix.”

Janus adjusts his cape. “Then let’s get started, shall we?”

They don’t sink right to Roman’s room. Instead, Janus knocks quietly on the door and waits for the soft ‘yes?’ from the other side to open it.

“Roman,” he calls softly, “hey, sweetie, why’re you over there?”

Because Roman, the poor thing, is at his desk, trying to work.

“I—um—“

“I’m not angry, sweetie,” he murmurs, arms going around the prince to pull him up out of the desk chair, “just concerned.”

“I figured that if I got to work they’d be less mad that I wasn’t there,” Roman mumbles, even as he lets Janus pull him back to the bed, “so I…”

“Oh, sweetie, no one’s angry at you.”

Roman looks up at him with such a heartbreaking look of disbelief that he lets out a soft noise, cupping his face.

“Would you believe me if I said they want to apologize and make it up to you?”

“No.”

He squints. “Have you believed anything I’ve told you since you woke up?”

“No.”

The lack of hesitation makes his eyes widen. Leaning forward, he rests his forehead against Roman’s as he pulls off his gloves, reaching up to cup the prince’s head.

“I meant every word,” he murmurs, doing his best to wipe away the bits of salt in the corners of his eyes, “every single word.”

He pauses, then leans closer.

“They’re sorry, Roman,” he whispers, “they’re so sorry and they want to know how to make it better.”

They don’t want you. They hate you. They’ve never cared about you. They don’t even want to touch you.

Janus hisses softly as he pulls Roman in for a hug. The poor thing still reacts like it’s the first time someone’s touched him in years.

“They want to see you, sweetie,” he whispers, “and I believe their exact words were ‘can we go hug Roman now?’”

“W-what?”

In response, Janus pulls away a little and nods to the door. Roman’s eyes widen.

“Can we let them in, sweetie?”

“They’re here?”

“Right outside.”

“They want—they want to—“

Roman’s desperate gaze flies to the door. He raises a shaking hand and lets it open.

Patton’s through the door before it’s even all the way open. Roman lets out a wounded noise as Patton barrels into them, his arms wrapped around Roman before Janus can blink.

“Pat—Patton—Pa—wha—?”

“I’m sorry, Roman, I’m so sorry, kiddo—“

Virgil follows not too long after, pulling Roman’s legs into his lap and reaching out to take Roman’s outstretched hand.

“Hey, Princey,” he says, the growl from not five minutes ago softened to a low rumble, “missed you.”

“Mis—miss—missed me?”

“Yeah, Roman, missed you. Didn’t feel the same without you there.”

Then Logan. As Patton and Virgil move to get Roman into a more comfortable position, Logan sits behind him so that when Roman leans back, his head rests against Logan’s shoulder. Logan reaches up to tangle his fingers in Roman’s hair, smiling softly at the low noise from Roman’s throat.

“Bonk?”

Roman nods, still blinking in confusion but lets Logan press his forehead gently to his.

“Thank you, little star,” he murmurs, smiling at the way Roman’s mouth falls open, “I didn’t forget, Roman, even if I haven’t been the best at showing it.”

“We don’t hate you, Princey,” Virgil says, squeezing his hand, “and we—well, we owe you one hell of an apology.”

“But we don’t have to talk about that now.” Patton adjusts his grip around Roman’s waist. “Not if you don’t want to.”

Remus picks this moment to not walk through the door and climb onto the bed but to sink down through the ceiling and land on top of them.

“Re!”

“Hey, Ro-Bro.”

“Re, get off, you—it’s too much.”

Remus rolls to the side, right into Janus’s lap, effectively making sure that none of them are leaving, not that they particularly wanted to.

Janus watches as Roman slowly asks if they can stay like this for a while, smiling when the answer is a resounding ‘yes,’ the cuddle pile closing in around their prince. Roman’s head rests against the crook of Logan’s neck, one of his hands wrapped in Janus’s, the other in Virgil’s. His legs lie in Virgil’s lap, Patton cuddling him protectively as Logan strokes his head. Remus and Janus keep watch, sentries over the resting prince.

For the first time, in a long time, as Roman drifts off to sleep, the only lie in his head is this won’t last forever.

They’ve got time to prove him wrong.

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scarlettriot · 3 years

Text

When one feels like shit, one writes things to feel better :)

This is based on a very short headcanon I had a little while ago that I've decided to make into a little fic. I hope you enjoy.

Featuring: Mainly Pro Hero Red Riot. Also includes Pro Heroes Dynamight, Chargebolt, Earphone Jack, and Pinky

Y/N: They/Them (Y/H/N: Your Hero Name)

Warnings: Kidnapping (well, not kidnapping exactly, adultnapping), restrained, minor physical injuries, drugged into unconsciousness

HAPPY ENDING THOUGH, I PROMISE!

Summary: You've been captured by villains. Wonderful, right, just how you wanted your Friday to go. Your quirk isn't working thanks to them pumping you full of suppressant drugs. You were actually having a hard time remembering how you were abducted. You're only able to remember being on patrol and something smelling off before passing out. Now, thanks to the drugs, you were having a hard time remaining conscious in this...basement? Warehouse or it could be a factory... Someone would find you, your friends were perfectly capable. You just hoped it'd be before anything worse happened.

When you didn't report in at the specified time and weren't answering their calls, the rest of the heroes at the Alliance Agency grew concerned. Jiro was already pulling up your location on your cell phone while Kaminari searched for the tracker in your suit.

Unfortunately, they both ended up at the same location, a dumpster behind an apartment complex, you were nowhere to be found.

Bakugo and Kirishima, who were also concerned about your whereabouts, took a different approach since neither was too talented at the tech side of things.

Kirishima canvases the immediate area around your phone and tracker, using his easy-going smile and charming personality to coax information out of anyone who was willing to talk to him in the area. Meanwhile, Bakugo played to his own strengths and threatened the low lives of the area.

"Someone said they noticed two guys, 'helping' someone in a hero suit down the street earlier. The description of the person and suit match Y/N." Kirishima could see lights in a few of the windows flickering but no signs of people moving about in the apartments above. He couldn't help but wonder if you were in one of them.

He got a grunt of a response from Bakugo through his earpiece. "Yeah, well, I just persuaded some scum into giving up an abandoned factory location about 10 blocks from here. Says he doesn't know what they're doin' but he's seen people goin' in and out all the time. Seems odd since it's abandoned."

The location pinged on Kirishima's phone. "I'm six blocks away. Meet you there."

The building in question looked like it hadn't been in operation for at least a decade when he arrived but fresh tire tracks him something was definitely going on. Not to mention the building had electricity running to it judging by the lights he could see.

When Bakugo showed up minutes later they decided to enter through a southern entrance that Ashido had pointed out after pulling up blueprints at HQ.

"Most of the electrical usage is centered in that location." She explained, "If you're going to find anything useful, I'm betting it'll be there. Chargebolt and Earphone Jack will meet you as soon as they're done collecting security footage from the suspected abduction sight."

Bakugo scoffed. They were Dynamight and Red Riot, they didn't need any damn backup.

Kirishima broke the lock on the door with a sharp tug rather than letting Bakugo shoot it off with an explosion. "You take downstairs and I'll go up. We stay on coms." Kirishima nodded and started his descent.

There was a single guard with a gun resting on his knee and headphones in his ears making Kirishima's job too easy. Not even bothering to harden his skin, he whacked the back of the guy's head and he crumpled to the floor unconscious.

"Took out two guards and a scientist. Oh, there's a lab up here too."

"One guard taken out. Moving into another room now."

The metal door was locked up tight and the guard had a surprising lack of keys on their person. They could have been close by but Kirishima was impatient. He was aware this would be loud but at least it was efficient.

He hardened an arm and with one, two, slices of his hand diving into the metal he was able to create a hole... and garner attention. A knife broke across his hand and two gunshots were fired from inside the room, doing nothing to him.

"Gonna have to do better than that!" He roared with laughter.

Kirishima ripped the metal wide and stepped through. He wasted no time, grabbing the gun point-blank, bending the barrel upward with a devilish grin before turning on the man with two daggers. A green substance ran off his skin and down onto the blades. It burned slightly when they slashed at him but Kirishima was used to Ashido's acid by now that this was practically child's play!

The other guy came at him with an orange beam of light right from his eyes that managed to break through a bit of his hardened skin. He could feel blood start to trickle down from his forehead. "Now, we're getting somewhere!"

Using his body weight, Kirishima shoved the man with the daggers down to the ground, disarming him quickly, and used his own blades to live into his friend's leg. He watched as the acid melted the fabric and left black burns on the man's skin, nasty stuff. He tired another beam in retaliation but Kirishima dodged it this time.

"I'd love to keep playing around but I'm lookin' for someone." He used one hand to hoist the man up and another to shield his eyes. Instantly, Kirishima's hand started to burn but he held steady. "Do you know where Y/H/N is?" The beam pulsed stronger, "Fine. If you won't help me then I have no use for you." He sat him back on the ground, a harden fisted to the back of the head had him good and knocked out.

"What about you?" Kirishima asked, returning his focus to the dagger man, "Do you know where they are? Your operation is a bust, the least you can do is tell me where my friend is. I might even put in a good word for you if ya do."

He grabbed a discarded metal pipe and the man must have taken it as a threat because he lifted shaky hands that were no longer coated in green. "B-back there with the others."

"Others? Other victims or others of you?"

"Subjects, we have other subjects!"

Rage pulsed in Kirishima's veins but he kept a lid on it. "Right then. Thanks." He bent the pipe around the man's hands and another around his ankles before speaking over the coms again.

"Y/N isn't the only victim. Dynamight, get down here."

He was running to the back of the room when he saw you along with five others. Your wrists had been bound by metal shackles suspended from a beam high on the wall that the tips of your toes were just brushing the concrete floor. You were slumped forward with IVs poked into both arms.

"Y/N?" He calmly approached but you didn't answer. You just hung there like a rag doll.

Kirishima lifted your head in his hands and saw a few cuts on your face that had dried blood still surrounding them but he breathed a sigh of relief when he felt the steady drumming of your heart, shallow, but there. You were alive and that was all he cared about.

"Okay. Gonna stop whatever the hell these are..." He flipped switches on the IVs and continued to talk out loud about his process. "Then gotta get 'em outta you..."

With surprisingly delicate fingers, he pulled the needles from your arms. Stopping the small pools of blood with a few pieces of gauze and tape that someone had been so kind to leave behind.

He then wrapped his left arm snuggly around your body. Holding you against him in a way he hoped didn't hurt you any more than you already were. With his right hand, Kirishima reached up to the shackles just as you started to stir awake.

One side of him was so completely soft and caring, the other hard and brutal, snapping the manacles in a powerful grip and you fell against him completely.

"Whadda hero." His ears glowed pink from the compliment.

"I'm really glad I got you back."

A/N: I know it isn't my best writing by any means but I had to do something to distract myself. Hope you're all doing well <3

#mha #mha y/n #mha fluff #bnha #red riot #eijiro kirishima #kirishima headcanon #bakugo katsuki #dynamight #kirishima fluff

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mara-xx217 · 3 years

Text

The Monsters’ Favorite (1): Introduction [can read here on AO3 or under the cut]

Parings: None

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Death mentioned, Swearing

It's not the best, since this dumpster fire was started when I was drunk. But, hey! If I must suffer these thoughts, then so do you!

You just can’t seem to be able to catch a break. It’s been one shitty trial after another as of late, and they seem to be getting worse and worse. You watched the Trapper push poor Dwight’s face into a bear trap while you were fighting off the Entity on a hook. Demogorgon had a hard on for tunneling you all throughout the last match you faced them, and ended up mori-ing you in front of your friends anyways. And the Shape of Haddonfield ended up slicing your clothes to ribbons in the last trial you had faced. Then he mori-ed Laurie in front of you. Again…

Sighing heavily, you looked down at your ruined clothes. Stained and ripped in all the worse ways, it barely covers what’s required of it anymore, with your plush stomach peeking out of your slightly too tight shirt, thighs squishing out of slits cut all down your shorts (that were once pants, you glumly remind yourself) and finally your chest, which had just enough cleavage showing to make you feel really gross. Like you were some kind of slut…

“Hey, you doing ok?”

You blink up in surprise as a familiar blond crouches into view.

“Huh? Oh, yeah, Laurie… Sorry, were you saying something?” You ask, sheepishly rubbing your shoulder while slightly covering your chest with your forearm.

“It’s fine. Just checking up on you. You look, uh kinda…” Laurie paused, looking away uncomfortably.

Like a slut? A whore? A dollar store hooker?

“…tore up?” She finishes, giving me a tired smile. Laurie moves to sit beside me near the fire.

“Heh, yeah… I guess just a bit.” You mumble softly, staring absentmindedly into the fire. You really didn’t want to talk right now, especially to her of all people. Not that you had anything against Laurie. Quite the opposite, in fact. You liked her and got along with her well enough, but seeing her get brutalized by her older brother mere feet away from your face made the prospect of talking to her a serious turn off.

“Uh, well, maybe you should make an offering to the Entity and try to get some new clothes. I’ll give you something to try to sweeten the deal, and I’ll try to talk to the others about helping you out, ok?” She gives you a tired, but warm smile. She seems genuine with her proposal, but you can’t imagine why she would try to help you, given how everyone has been shafted in trials as of late.

“That’s really nice of you, Laurie, but you don’t have to do that. Everyone is struggling right now, and it’s just clothes. I can go without. It’s not like we’re all strangers here.” You joked, letting your arm fall from your chest. It wasn’t completely true. It did bother you, feeling this exposed in trials was going to suck, especially against the more perverted ones like Ghostface or the Legion, but it didn’t feel right to have the others worry about you like that when they were struggling, too.

Laurie smiles sadly, but nods in agreement nonetheless. “Alright, but just so you know, you’re a helluva lot stronger than I could ever hope to be, Y/N.” She pats me on the back then rises from her spot beside me. “Be careful, ok? Who knows what will happen next.”

“Yeah, you too…” You couldn’t help but to feel a little uneasy at her parting comment. Maybe it’s just the past trials getting to you, but your stomach wouldn’t stop knotting up anxiously. Surely the worst is over, right?

Right…?

#dead by daylight #dbd #dbd x reader #reader insert #Laurie Strode #Dwight Fairfield #dbd trapper #dbd demogorgon #og michael myers #the monsters' favorite #reader has some low self esteem #just an intro nothing to see here #yet...

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theoriginalcarnivorousmuffin · 3 years

Note

After that gorgeous sequel rant, would you be willing to share your thoughts on reylo?

Ugh.

Once again, that is the most succinct, easiest, answer I can supply. But it's so short, and that just won't do.

I mentioned in a recent post that Dramione comes in a myriad of disguises. Every fandom usually has at least one Dramione ship, you can usually guess which characters the ship will consist of, and while you might not be able to articulate exactly what about it makes it so damn similar to Dramione you will recognize it on sight.

Usually, to me, a Dramione ship features a strong, independent, female lead who may be varying levels of sexually empowered, varying levels of intelligent (Hermione loves to tell us how smart she is but it's not the heart of the ship), is strong, courageous, and noble who depending on the story du jour might slide into depravity. The real give away is her love interest, always a man, usually a young man of comparable age, who has the bad boy appeal that's not too bad boy where he often is redeemed to the good side for 'reasons' in the course of the story.

Reylo is such a Dramione pairing.

You don't believe me? Look at the authors who write it, I haven't done this too often myself, but I guarantee you that a not small majority of them will either write Draco/Hermione or will have it all over their favorites and bookmarks. It's the same damn pairing.

But worse.

Because Kylo-Ren and Rey aren't really characters.

"Whoa, hold up!", you say, "That's just slander and uncalled for!" Well, change my mind. Rey Palpatine and Kylo-Ren are a series of character tropes and archetypes thrown to us by Disney screaming "LOVE MY CHARACTERS".

Rey is our noble, very Luke like, hero who is a scrappy desert rat with overwhelming mystical powers only acknowledged when the movies feel like acknowledging them (guys, admit Rey kicked Kylo-Ren's ass every time they fought with 0 training, come on, it's not hard).

However, there is nothing underneath her surface. Her hero worship of the resistance feels dull and given to her because it's expected. Of course Rey likes the resistance! The resistance is great! Sign her up! Rey has been living in the desert at the edge of nowhere for presumably 15 years, I'm shocked she's even heard of the new republic let alone the resistance. Despite essentially starving and only having a home that's a broken down old fighter, Rey saves a random droid. We're not really given a compelling reason of why she would do this, that she has a deep respect for droids/is horrified by their use, really really really hates the random trader she sells things to, or really really really hates the empire (if she even realizes it's them behind the bounty). She does it just so that a) the plot keeps moving b) to show Rey is... noble... I guess?

Remember that even Luke (who I have some problems with as a character) started his journey with more backstory and personality than this. Luke loved the empire and desperately wanted to become a pilot. He was very put out that his aunt and uncle kept saying, "Uh, no, bad idea." Luke was ready to skip town and sign on up for flight academy, he just got distracted by pretty women, er, his sister.

So, Rey is never given a compelling reason to do any of the things she does in the series. Just vague feelings of hero worship. And, of course, the drama over her parents. Just... I feel like Disney took out a hat, put a bunch of pieces of paper with words on them, and drew out the one that said "orphan angst about parents" and said "See, now she's conflicted! What a character!"

So yeah, Rey is your cardboard generic hero who is so generic she's not even a person. She has no hopes, no dreams, no fears, just these vague things we're told as an audience she cares about but never shown in any legitimate manner. Rey likes the resistance and rando droids, Rey imprints on Han Solo as the father she never had, Rey has this thing about her parents, Rey is attracted to Kylo Ren.

And that last one, oh boy that last one. It sold me less on the attraction to Kylo Ren than... oh... I don't know... Palpatine's secret Sith planet of doom. I mean, we all saw it coming, The Last Jedi it was very clear where that was going and then Abrams went for it even harder. But what we had was a series of skype conversations where Rey went from "Gr, you killed my pseudo father!" and Kylo-Ren responding, "Yeah, well he was my real father AND HE WAS SO MEAN" to "Oh Ben, I will fly to you through space and we shall save the galaxy together!"

I am given no reason to believe Rey's change of heart. Han Solo's death just suddenly... doesn't really mean much to her anymore (the man was murdered by his son in cold blood so that his son could feel better about himself). She believes Ben Solo is good now because Luke is a dick (never mind that, no matter what a dick Luke is, Ben Solo still murdered dozens of children and then went on to gleefully massacre his way through the galaxy). We're told there's a Force Dyad, which is um... not this thing the writer's made up because they were too lazy to convince me that Kylo-Ren and Rey would end up together in any organic way.

So, yeah, why does Rey like Kylo-Ren? Because the Force told her too? Because it was somehow all Snoke's fault in a way that's never properly described? (Indeed despite us spending quite a bit of time on Kylo-Ren's decision to remain Kylo-Ren being a very internalized thing) Because we saw him shirtless in yoga pants this one time?

It's bad when that last is actually the most legitimate reason I can think of out of the whole lot.

Now let's go to Kylo-Ren. If Rey is boring and nonsensical then Kylo-Ren is a dumpster fire and non-sensical. The guy reminds me a lot of Commodus from the film "Gladiator", the man is cowardly, vile, and murders his father in despair that his father never will be capable of loving him/passes him over for the throne. Kylo-Ren's murder of Han Solo is extremely similar to the murder of Marcus Aurelius in "Gladiator". Han Solo is a flawed father, trying to make his peace with his son, who approaches him unarmed and Kylo-Ren decides to murder him in order to solidify his place in the dark side.

Only, the films never acknowledge that every action Kylo-Ren takes is horrifying.

We're told "oh, Kylo-Ren exists because evil Snoke corrupted him" but also shown repeatedly that Kylo-Ren chooses the darkest path again and again and again. He "struggles with the light" but I don't see it. His opening scene, he has massacred a village and is torturing a man for information (this is presumably a daily routine for him). In the same film he later tortures Rey for information. He serves on a Death Star which wipes out billions in an instant. He murders his father to feel good about himself. He dresses as a man who was reviled and feared throughout the galaxy, a man who murdered countless children, and a man who dressed the way he did because he was barely hanging onto life, because Kylo-Ren thinks it makes him look like a badass. Think about it, this is like if a fully abled Kylo-Ren is wheeling around in a wheel chair, perfectly capable of walking, because he thinks that Professor X is so cool. Now, replace Professor X with Hitler, this is what the movies gave us.

Yet, the films seem to take it for granted that Kylo-Ren is a redeemable character. He's just lost and misguided, he's really struggling with the light and dark side! They don't just tell us this over and over again (which they do) but also just assume we know it.

And base the entire Reylo pairing off of it. Reylo believed Kylo-Ren could be redeemed, they battle Snoke together, then Kylo-Ren stabs her in the back and continues the assault on the Resistance and asks her to be his Dark Queen (TM). Reylo is shocked and appalled, I'm just wondering what movie she thought she was watching, because that was coming a mile away.

Later, when Kylo-Ren is redeemed, we're never given a reason why it happens. Leia just gives him a nagging, one word, phone call and then Han Solo shows up to go, "Ben, are you going to do the right thing?" and Ben goes, "Mumble, grumble, fine" because there's only an hour left in the last film.

Kylo-Ren, like Rey, is the writers' desperate attempt to create a compelling anti-hero with all the anti-hero sauce we love. They just won't admit they made an overgrown genocidal toddler.

Wow, this turned into why I hate both Rey and Kylo Ren, but, uh, back to the ship. Basically, the films give me 0 reason to ever believe it, and even if I wanted to, even if I said "Alright brain, let's make these characters real people for once", I still wouldn't like it. Because the ship itself is just as flat as the characters. It's spicy but not too spicy bad boy gets together with strong female lead.

I know a lot of people enjoy this, and I won't say it's any less legitimate than any of the weirdness I ship, but I'm not one of them. And the whole thing just makes me go "ugh".

#ask #anon #anti reylo #anti kylo ren #anti rey #anti star wars sequels

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queenofhearts7378 · 3 years

Text

Constellations Ch. 2

(Yes it finally has a title. Yes this is ending up multi chaptered. Yes there’s another part I’m writing. Yes I already have an outline for a vague plot....Yes I’m still blaming @ladylynse for this XD)

Prev. Chapter - Next Chapter

Danny was very much unprepared and underdressed for the time when some wizards fell out of his fireplace.

He paused in the doorway, spoon still in his mouth and cheeks full of cereal, as his brother stood up and brushed the soot off him with a displeased nose scrunch.

Danny swallowed. "And you couldn't just use the door?"

Honestly they're lucky his parents had left to chase down the Box Ghost earlier. Otherwise they'd be covered in a lot more than soot and ash.

Danny couldn't help the snort that escaped at the mental picture of Draco covered in ectoplasm and boiling in rage.

Draco narrowed his eyes, seeming to pick up that Danny was making fun of him. "Using the Floo was quicker."

"....quicker than walking through the door."

"It's a wizard thing you wouldn't understand." Draco snapped back, his go to response whenever he couldn't argue against Danny's logic at the moment.

"Uh huh. Anyways what are you doing here?" Danny asked, "You aren't supposed to be here for another two weeks."

Which was time previously planned for Draco to prepare for his summer in America while Danny finished school. Spend the two weeks after Hogwarts let out recuperating and making public appearances with his parents, then spend the rest of the summer with the Fentons.

Actually now that Danny was looking, it seemed Draco had come straight from school. His hair was lacking half its gel, he was still wearing his green tie, and his robes were a very boring black as opposed to the various greys and blues he flaunted around in the previous summer.

“Denebola, pleasure to finally make your acquaintance.” Drawled the man standing behind Draco.

“Hello creepy man that I have never met before,” Danny said, echoing his tone.

Draco choked on air as the discount Kylo Ren sneered at him.

“This is Professor Snape Danny.” A familiar please-don’t-say-anything-that-will-get-us-in-trouble tone coloring Draco’s words. “My godfather.”

Oh the potion guy. Danny remembers Draco talking about him now. He was friends with Draco’s parents, which didn’t really impress Danny that much as all of the Malfoy’s friends seemed to be really rich snobs or really racist. Mostly both.

But he was Draco’s godfather, the reason he got into potions, his favorite professor and someone Draco would willingly go to get advice from. So, Danny decided to reserve judgement till he met him. Well….he met him.

Danny looked Draco dead in the eyes, “My apologies.”

Draco closed his eyes in mortification, which made Danny grin internally. They were really getting the hang of the whole ‘speaking without talking to each other twin thing’.

Professor Snape just scowled at him. “Where are the….muggles?" Disdain dripped off his words, instantly making Danny defensive. He had heard enough at Malfoy Manor about disgraceful, savage muggles from Lucius. Even Draco had echoed his father till Danny dragged him kicking and screaming into being a slightly decent person.

"My parents," Danny said, stressing the word, "Are working right now."

Okay maybe they were just being their usual trigger happy selves and running after Boxy, but there was no way he was telling Professor Snape that without it leading to an hour long discussion about ghosts. And Danny did not have time for that. He shoved a giant spoonful of cereal in his mouth as he met Professor Snape's eyes and-huh.

Draco never told Danny his godfather could read minds. He could feel the light brushes of a foreign mind attempting to gleam information from his surface thoughts. Danny didn't know if it was his wizard ancestry or halfa weirdness that made him sensitive to this kind of stuff. Either way, it was useful in keeping his secrets in his head from privacy invading school teachers.

Danny glowered at Snape and immediately thought of Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up music video.

The two of them stared at each other for a minute, making Draco more and more anxious as no one said anything.

Finally Snape broke contact, "Where should his things go?"

Danny tried very hard not to smirk after winning that staring contest, "You can just leave them here, we'll get them later."

With one last displeased sneer, Snape turned to Draco. "I'm needed back at Hogwarts. I trust you are in good hands."

Draco nodded, still looking tense and anxious as hell.

Snape walked back to the fireplace. He paused next to Draco, "Take care of yourself Draco."

Draco softened under his glare, "I will Professor. Thank you."

Snape nodded and shot one more glare at Danny, who still had Rick Astley echoing in his head, before vanishing into the fireplace in a swirl of green fire.

Draco turned back to Danny and said, "You stress me out."

Danny snorted before walking back into the kitchen to put his bowl in the sink. Draco followed after him, looking at all the kitchen appliances with a barely hidden curious look.

"Something else we have in common."

"What are you wearing?" He asked with a nose scrunched in displeasure.

Danny shot him a look, "My pajamas, cause I just woke up. I haven't finished getting ready for school. You should probably change too."

"Why?"

Danny started for the stairs, Draco still following at his heels. "You can't wear robes to public school. I think you can fit in my jeans."

"What?!" Draco screeched, halting at the bottom of the stairs, "I'm not going to muggle school with you!"

"It's either that or stay here by yourself for hours." Danny said as he paused outside his room. Draco scrambled up after him. "Cause my parents won't be home for a couple more hours, after which you'll be alone with them till I get home."

Danny smirked at him, "My parents are going to be thrilled to see you, can you really handle their enthusiasm all by yourself?"

Draco could barely stand Danny showing various forms of physical affection, as proven last summer when Danny would throw an arm around Draco's shoulders and almost get hexed. And Ancients forbid Danny try to hug him. Draco might actually lose the wand and just punch him. Danny had spent most of their correspondence over the school year prepping Draco for the Fenton welcome wagon so he wouldn't hiss like a cat when he gets hugged. Okay, and maybe Danny just wanted to see his overdramatic brother's face as he is subjected to his parent's bear hugs.

Draco scowled at him, "Fine. But I'm not wearing any jeans."

Draco stomped into Danny's room and slammed the door in his face. He heard the lock click as it was shut.

"Hey! I still gotta get dressed!" Danny banged on the door, "C'mon Drake it's still my room!"

Danny groaned before walking over to the bathroom. He phased through the wall and landed on the fire escape. It took a few minutes, but he eventually maneuvered to his window and slipped in.

Draco had dug into Danny's closet and pulled out the most dressy tux Danny owned and was in the middle of putting it on.

"You are not wearing that."

Draco scowled at him, "It’s bad enough I'm lowering myself by going with you-”

“Lowering yourself?”

“-But,” he said loudly, “I absolutely refuse to wear common muggle wear. If I’m going to this school, I will not look anything less than my absolute best.”

Danny stared at him. “Drake you will be thrown into the dumpster if you wear that to my school. Let me just-”

Danny jumped on him, trying to remove the suit jacket from a struggling Draco. Draco shouted and tried to twist away, only for Danny to pull it over his head. Once Draco was out of sight, and swearing loudly at him, Danny subtly used his intangibility to yank it off him. And if he happened to remove all of Draco’s hair gel that he used to keep his hair slicked back….well, that would have gotten him thrown in a dumpster as well.

Danny tried not to laugh as Draco glared at him, his hair fluffed up and looking vaguely like an angry kitten.

"Do you know how long it takes me to fix my hair? I have to completely redo it now! And how'd you get that off me?" He pointed at the jacket Danny was throwing back in his closet.

Danny grinned at him, "Magic."

Draco gave him a flat look.

"Anyway we've got to go, otherwise I'm gonna be late again, and get detention again, and you'll be forced to either walk home by yourself or stay at school with me."

Somehow Danny had managed to get dressed and drag Draco out the door with him, texting Sam and Tucker his plans to walk so they could meet up on the way.

"What is that?" Draco leaned over to squint at the phone in Danny's hand.

"My phone. I told you about it last summer."

Draco hummed, "I thought it was broken?"

"Yeah, cause your magic blew it up. My parents fixed it." Danny shoved his phone back in his pocket like Draco was about to blow it up again. "Now what happened?"

Draco shot him a glance, before letting his eyes flicker around them. "I did try to tell you muggle 'technology' and magic doesn't always go together."

"Drake, you know that's not what I mean." He said softly.

Draco was silent, his jaw clenched and his hands shaking before he shoved them in his pockets.

They walked in silence for a while.

"You'll get hurt."

Danny looked at him.

"I…." Draco sighed, "I've never…."

Danny waited silently for him to get the words out on his own, knowing that pushing him will only make him clam up.

"You aren't like us. And I don't mean that in any bad way!" He said quickly when he saw Danny's face. "But you know what my parents are like, and their friends are so much worse, and you're the first person I've ever had to worry about. I just want you to be safe."

Oh Ancients, that was a lot to unpack there.

Danny had known something had happened during school. The two of them spent the school year exchanging letters, both of them wanting to stay in contact. Danny would tell him about his school, and his parents' antics, and explain random muggle technology to get Draco prepared for his summer with the Fentons.

Meanwhile, Draco had complained at length about Potter and a tournament and Potter being insufferable about a tournament. There was a furious letter about being turned into a ferret and how Potter and his friends keep bringing it up. Draco sent him about three feet of parchment around Christmas just making fun of Potter at a dance and how horrible he was. There was a lot about some famous Quidditch guy and then a lot about Potter’s friend stealing the famous Quidditch guy.

Draco complained about Potter a lot, okay?

But Draco never sent him a letter about the tournament results or if Potter got eaten by a bog witch or whatever it was he was hoping for the last task. He just showed up, two weeks early and clearly shaken about whatever it was that happened.

That isn’t a good sign at all. And Danny had eavesdropped enough last summer to get a decent idea as to what was going on.

“This is….this is about him isn’t it?”

Draco flinched, which was enough answer for him. Danny let out a breath.

“We can-we can talk about this later. I care about you too Drake, and I know your family is neck deep in this mess.” Danny bumped his shoulder, “You’re safe here, that’s why Narcissa sent you here right?”

Draco leaned against his brother’s shoulder, eyes still flitting across the street and his jaw clenched. “Yeah. We’re safe here.”

#queen will write #dp twin au #harry potter #draco malfoy #danny phantom #danny fenton #crossover #constellations fic #oh boy here we go #....this is coming out a little angsty #hmmm....that was not supposed to happen #i know five-rivers is writing a fic too #but we seem to be going different directions with it #they're bringing danny to the wizarding world #i'm shoving malfoy at the muggle one #oh i haven't even got to the part where he actually goes to the school #*rubs my hands maniacally*#this is gonna be fun

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uwuwriting · 4 years

Text

Shinsou and Bakugou w/ truth quirk

Request: Can I request headcanons for Shinsou, Bakugou and a character of our choice(s?) where said person is hit by a truth quirk so truth bombs galore everywhere and they realize they need to avoid the reader like the plague. Like they literally take off holding their mouth. Because the reader does not need to know about their giant crush. Their every thought. Or that one dream they're still ashamed of themselves for having. And their friends don't make it easy. - anon

I’ve seen a ton of those ‘clone who shows true emotions’ scenarios and imagines and they manage to make me laugh every time. Just the thought of these boys desperately trying to keep the truth from coming out cracks me up every time. Enjoy. Love yaa.💖💖💖

warnings: a sprinkle of crack

Shinsou Hitoshi

-Ha

-HA

-You are the plague now.

-I mean he avoided you before because he got anxious around you but he would talk to you sometimes.

-Now he combusts on the sight of you.

-It’s hilarious.

-Kaminari is wheezing at the corner because they saw you in the hallway and Shinsou our baby here hid behind the janitors huge garbage can *you know the one with the wheels and the cleaning supplies*.

-Tbh Kaminari is struggling to keep a straight face every single time Shinsou finds an impromptu hiding place.

-It’s taking a toll on you as well and he doesn’t know that because he won’t come in a five mile radius of you.

-You like Shinsou you really do.

-You wished you were something more than friends but you know that he isn’t interested, I mean he doesn’t really want to spend much time with you so....

-And now you have done something and he decided to put you in his black list.

-You haven’t seen him all week and every time you think you see him he has disappeared.

-Poor baby Y/N if only you knew.

-Shinsou has had five breakdowns as of now because he’s pretty sure you hate him at this point.

-Kaminari has just about had it and has set out on a journey to unite the two love struck souls at last.

-Those were the exact words he said to Mina while he was talking about his plan I kid you not.

-He didn’t have to do anything though bc you dragged Shinsou’s ass in one of the classrooms when you finally spotted him.

- “Okay spill it! What did I do?”

-You were ANGRY.

-And he was scared not only of you but also of the things that were about to come out of his mouth.

- “SO??? You are just going to stay silent?”

-Is that steam coming from your head?

- “You did nothing wrong I’m just afraid of telling you how I feel.”

-Ah there it is the first slip up.

- “And don’t get me started on that dream I had. The situation was very similar.”

-Hitoshi STFU!!!!

-You were blushing and stammering over your words while he was covering his mouth as to not say anything and make matters worse.

-Finally you composed yourself and listened to what Kaminari had to say since Shinsou wasn’t opening his mouth ever again.

-One hell of a story to tell the kids am i right??

Bakugou Katsuki

-A dumpster fire tbh.

-He’s already a raging ball of anger management issues and with the extra stress....oh boy.

-Unlike Shinsou he would not change his schedule and takes the risk of running into you.

-And when he does.....be prepared for a string of overly aggresive compliments.

-You can’t decided if you should be offended or flattered.

-So you just flush a deep red and YOU ignore him.

-You may be in the same class but you are amazing at exiting the room in a flash.

-Its better for him as well.

-He doesn’t have to worry about his mouth when he’s around you if you doesn’t see you at all.

-That is until he had that one specific thought.

-The bad one.

-The you-need-Jesus one.

-Your skirt had ridden up to your upper waist while you were trying to reach something for Mina and it exposed your thighs and you did something to Bakugouuuuu.

-He swears he wasn’t meaning to say it.

-He really does.

- “Oi Y/N nice legs!”

-Everyone froze.

-Maybe time froze as well but you wouldn’t know you were trying to come up with a clap back.

-So you being the cheeky little shit that you actually ARE you decided to tease him.

- “We know you like it juicy Bakugou but please keep the drool in your mouth.”

-He did not speak for the rest of the day.

-The blush never left.

-I don’t think it would ever leave lol.

-Poor thing almost had a heatstroke.

-Of course when the quirk wore off and he could speak with no fear he apologized to you and explained everything.