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storiesofsvu · 3 years

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Classified Affairs Ch 10

Heather Dunbar x fem!reader Warnings: language, mentions of smut, anxiety/panic attacks.

It had been a couple of weeks since Heather’s punishment had nearly destroyed you. She’d seen you briefly through that time, a couple of dinners, a shopping trip, and an evening at your condo where she fucked you so well you nearly forgot your own name, one where she let you come, over and over again until you were fully shivering and happily pleased.

She’d chosen to work from home today, knowing that she had the house to herself, her husband away at a medical conference for the next four days, coincidentally, your ‘weekend’. She’d been planning on a rather large, sex filled weekend with you, ordering a couple of new toys and sending a couple of new outfits over to the condo. To be completely honest, she was relieved, maybe even a bit delighted, knowing she didn’t have to worry about time restraints or coming up with stupid, false excuses as to why she wasn’t home. She had gotten up from her desk, figuring a midday glass of wine wouldn’t hurt alongside a snack, her phone laying on the kitchen island as she got things prepared.

The glass was just to her lips as her phone set off a series of vibrations that she recognized as your Apple Watch’s ‘congratulatory’ pattern. She picked it up, noting that it was mentioning you hitting your 150 mins of heart health thanks to exercise, your heart rate still clocking in at 150 bpm. She raised a brow, knowing that your workouts usually took place in the morning, before you really had a chance to wake up and realizing what you were doing. She flicked her phone open to double check your schedule, reassuring herself that you were indeed not at work, knowing that your heart rate usually spiked when you were running your ass of serving tables. She huffed noting that you certainly weren’t there, and that you were supposed to tell her whenever you picked up a shift.

Taking a large sip of wine she thought back to when you’d drunkenly called her, barely able to mention a coworker having a crush on you before she’d cut you off. Her lips formed a frown, wondering if you were getting up to something. You’d been so goddamn good since your last punishment that she was certain you weren’t about to act up again, so she collected her snack, wine and phone and made her way back to the home office, keeping your stats up on the app as she continue to work through her files.

Heather lost track of time, finally glancing up nearly an hour later, she let out a sigh, rubbing at her temples before picking up her phone. She instantly frowned at your stats, pausing to refresh the app, then closing it completely before reopening it and making sure it was synched properly. Your heart rate was still sitting in the 140’s, even if you had been at the gym, there was no reason for it to still be there.

‘You better be rearranging your apartment, or at a two hour workout class kitten. Because if you’re not alone right now…’ She warned.

‘I am literally lying on the kitchen floor trying to breathe.’

Your next text came through less than a moment later.

‘As much as I would hate to give you photographic evidence, I will if you don’t believe me.’

‘Honey, what are you on about?’

‘My anxiety’s spiked. I thought I’d be fine. I tried to work it off earlier, but that just made it worse. I’ve tried all the home remedies but none of them want to work’

‘What’s going on?’ the worry and concern shot through Heather, ‘should I call? Do you need to talk?’

‘I can barely hold a text conversation M’am, I’m so sorry.’

‘Honey, you have nothing to be sorry for. Does this happen often?’

‘No. Usually I have my meds. I had an appointment to get them filled yesterday but my Dr never went into the office. Now he’s backed up and I can’t get in for another two weeks, and walk ins can’t hand out Ativan. My only choice is to sit in the E.R for twelve hours or power through.’

‘Your heart is racing sweetheart.’ Her first message came through, ‘and you say you can’t breathe?!’

‘Heather…please… I know you’re trying to help but you’re making it worse. You’re making me think about it and that’s making my chest get tighter. I need to try and not think, to make sure I can breathe if I’m going to get through this.’

‘I’m sorry.’

You were half surprised when Heather actually sent an apologetic text to you, it was something you’d never, ever expected, though, in this particular situation, the dynamic of your normal interactions was changed a little bit. You continued to lie on the cool linoleum of the kitchen floor, adjusting every so often to make sure your skin was touching the cold parts of the floor. Pulling ice cubes from the slowly melting tray to hold against your pulse points as you closed your eyes and tried to breathe, watching the relax settling on your watch. Usually it didn’t get this bad, usually you were able to conquer it, and if you felt super jittery at work, you’d pop an Ativan and be fine.

Something just didn’t feel right, you barely realized what was happening until you felt like you were about to pass out. Normally it was just the fluttering in your chest, the extra shaking energy that you were able to burn off by doing something physical, but whatever was in you today was mental, and you slowly started to feel the tears burn in your eyelids as you tried to gain your composure. Your throat was so tight you started to wonder if you’d developed an unknown allergy in the last twenty four hours.

You let out a strangled gasp, your body jumping at the sound of the condo door opening. Your brain, being complete paranoid, caused your heart to leap into your throat, panic soared through your body with the sudden intrusion that someone had broken into your apartment, you let out a small cry, accepting the fact that you were probably about to die, your heart thundering in your ears as you shot up to sitting, your vision tunnelled, leaving you even more panicked.

The nausea coursed through you, and thankfully the figure in front of you wasn’t actually there to murder you, pulling the garbage can from under the sink just in the nick of time as you lost your only meal of the day into it.

You felt a tender hand making sure your hair was out of the way of your face, tucking the loose pieces into your ponytail and softly rubbing at your back before you dropped back against the island behind you. A bottle of water came into your view that you took the cap off, taking a small sip.

“You really didn’t have to come.” You croaked up, now realizing that Heather was your house guest.

“Oh I really think I did.” She replied, a brief dig through her bag and a bottle of pills came into your view, “take at least one, I don’t want you to feel that bad ever again.”

You took the bottle from her, it was labelled as Ativan, and was completely full to the brim, way more pills than your doctor would ever give you at one time. You raised what you could of a brow at her before you popped the lid open, dumping one under your tongue, letting it dissolve.

“How…did you…?”

“Sweetheart.” She smirked, “there’s got to be at least a couple of good perks for being a politician.”

“Thank you.” You started to feel the anxiety well up again, tears breaking into your eyes, “you really didn’t have to.”

“On the contrary,” she hummed, helping you up off the floor and guiding you to the couch, “you’re supposed to be taking care of yourself kitten…you’ve let that slide. No thanks to that fucking doctor of yours.” She huffed in annoyance, making sure you were settled on the couch instead of the hard floor.

“I’m sorry.” You ducked your gaze, your cheeks heating as a tear rolled down your face.

“None of that now.” She flicked at your chin with her finger gently, bringing her gaze up to yours. “Let that Ativan settle in, help yourself to a second one. I’ll set you up with a better doctor next week if that’s alright?”

“It is.” You took a heavy breath, sinking into the couch, trying to focus on your breathing as the meds kicked in.

“Did you eat kitten?” Heather asked and you winced.

“Uh…breakfast….and….then a beer….i thought it would help…clearly I’m an idiot.”

“You are not.” She cast you a glance as she moved around the island, pulling open the fridge door, “this is all leftover take out?”

“I’m sorry.” You nearly whimpered, your heart still beating out of your chest, worried that she would punish you, tears blurring your eyes “I got the groceries yesterday and meant to meal prep but I’m so fucking tired after serving snooty politicians all day the last thing I want to do is work more…” your breath caught in your throat and your heart skyrocketed, “no offence..M’am.”

“Oh kitten….” Heather’s face softened as she turned back to you, “you need to breathe, to relax.” She shut the fridge, “are you feeling better yet?”

“Barely.”

“Okay.” She turned back to the fridge, pulling out the bottle of rose and grabbing an empty glass, “I know you’re not supposed to mix alcohol with it, but I think you deserve it, and it might help knock you out for a bit. I feel like you’re burnt out, two jobs plus I know you’ve been training new kids like crazy this month. You still have the next three days off, right?”

“Yes M’am.” You managed though a shaky breath, taking the glass of wine from her, managing a small sip as your throat finally started to not feel so swollen anymore.

“Kitten try and finish that, I’m going to run you a bath, see if that helps.”

Before you could even protest, you were left alone, your body still vibrating against the couch as you heard the water start to run. It was a few moments later that Heather came out with a soft smile on her face, cupping your cheek as she laid a kiss on your head.

“Go get in the bath. I’ll take care of everything else. If the heat is too much and making it worse just go lie down in bed, alright?” You gave her a shaky nod, forcing yourself up from the couch, your body still tense and jittery, she handed the bottle of Ativan off to you and gently nudged you toward the bathroom.

Slipping under the water you let out a gentle sigh, while the heat wasn’t exactly ideal it seemed to be at least relaxing your muscles that had been locked up the entire morning. You let your head rest against the tub, closing your eyes as you focussed on breathing, you could hear muffled noises from the bedroom, not totally sure what Heather was doing. You weren’t quite sure how long you managed under the water, as much as you knew it was relaxing your body, it was doing nothing for calming your heart rate. You managed to lug yourself out of the bath, draining it as you swiped the bottle of Ativan, popping a second one under your tongue and sipping back some of the wine Heather had left you.

When you pulled yourself together enough to get into the bedroom, it was clear what she’d done, fresh sheets on the bed, fluffy duvet waiting for you alongside plush pillows. You let out a quiet groan, dropping against it as the second pill mixed with the wine started to knock you out, not to mention the complete and utter exhaustion from fighting back the intense anxiety for the past twelve hours.

You weren’t sure how much later it was when you finally woke up, but you knew it had to have been late afternoon, the sun having already started to slowly sink in the sky. You could hear the light rumble of the dryer in the distance, when you rolled over, you noticed your phone plugged in on the nightstand, double checking the time. You’d been out for hours. You also had a slew of missed notifications, a couple from your work app, confirming shifts over the next week, a few Facebook ones you didn’t care about, and a couple of texts from Becca, inviting you out to the movies that night. You grumbled quietly, shooting her off a reply that you were busy, you weren’t but after the day you’d had, the idea of having to go out in public and deal with your coworkers was not ideal.

You shoved out of bed, pausing to change into a cozy pair of pyjama shorts, and a hoodie. Your body heat was finally lowered enough, you could still feel a slight amount of jitters rocking through your body, but you felt a world of better. Even just knowing that you had Ativan made you feel so much more relaxed, that you wouldn’t have to try and fight it on your own.

When you pulled open the bedroom door, you brow furrowed at the sight of Heather at your kitchen island, a row of Tupperware containers in front of her as she scooped something out of a pan into them. She was more casually dressed than normal, a pair of expensive leggings and a three quarter sleeved white very cozy looking sweater type blouse on. Though, you honestly couldn’t remember what she’d been wearing earlier, if it wasn’t for the bottle of pills, you probably would’ve forgotten she’d even been there at all. She glanced up at the sound of the door opening, her face moving into a small smile,

“You feeling better kitten?” You nodded, rubbing the sleep from your eyes.

“You’re….still here?”

She chuckled softly, scooping what was left in the pan to the last container before she turned to rinse it in the sink before placing it in the open dishwasher.

“You had no food.” She shrugged, “I put in an order, figured I’d use my time wisely to make sure you had some meals ready to go for the rest of the week. This way all you have to do is plop them in the microwave.”

“Thank you…” you ducked your gaze from her again, playing with the sleeves of your hoodie as you leant on the island, facing her.

“Hey…” her arm reached across the island, lifting your chin up, “I said none of that, remember?” You nodded, “I told you, I want you healthy and taken care of. And I understand that that can be a pretty fucking hard thing to do for yourself when you’re working as much as someone like you are. You do remember that your weekly allowance is supposed to help alleviate stress, right? I wanted you to not have to work so much.”

“You do remember when this whole thing started I had three jobs right?”

“Do I need to up your allowance?” She asked, raising a brow as she picked up another pan, adding veggies into the containers.

“M’am, no..”

“I will if these assholes refuse to give you a raise.”

“I already got one.” You reminded her, “I’m just extra exhausted from training so many people. It’s hard enough trying to do your job, but to have to stop and verbally explain every single step of what you’re doing and why makes everything take five times longer, and then the customers are way more antsy over how long things are taking. And even if I’m not training, people seek me out for question which throws off my flow and it just…fucking sucks.” You dropped into a stool at the island. Heather raised a brow at you before she poured out a glass of wine, sliding it across to you.

“If you didn’t take another pill when you woke up, I think it’s time for a bit more wine.” She smiled, “dinner’s on its way.” The dryer beeped, pulling her attention, “give me a moment.”

“Heather, just leave it, I’ll deal with it in the morning.”

“You absolutely will not.” She assured, moving around the island, pausing briefly to kiss your temple, “if you feel so inclined, throw the lids on these, toss them in the fridge.” She gestured to the containers before disappearing into the laundry room.

You shifted off the stool, still feeling the exhaustion in your body as you moved around it, as you started to clip lids onto containers you glanced up to the rest of the apartment.

Your brow furrowed at the sight, you knew Heather had mentioned more than once that her ‘taking care of you’ extended beyond the bedroom, but she usually paid someone to do whatever was needed. Today, there was something different, her showing up when you were at your worst, encouraging you in the right direction, and reminding you that you were worthy and she wasn’t upset over something that you couldn’t control? The bath, the fresh sheets? On top of that she’d cooked enough food to last you the week, done your laundry, and your living room was completely tidied and clean, all the dirty dishes waiting in the dishwasher. Along with how gentle she was being with you, making sure you were taken care of, there was something nearly maternal about it. You started to feel yourself nearly melt at the feeling, that she actually did care about you, as you stacked the prepped meals up and slipped them into the fridge.

You dropped the rest of the dirty dishes into the dishwasher, not even noticing the fact that she had managed to put your laundry away while you did so.

“Thought I told you to relax?” There was a slight teasing to her voice as her hand trailed up your side.

“I’m just trying to help.” You admitted, “you really don’t have to do all of this.”

“We all need help sometimes, even if you don’t know how to ask for it.” Her eyes gleamed for a moment before she pressed a kiss to your forehead, “and you need a fucking break.” She nudged you back to your stool and you settled in, your eyes glancing to the clock, noticing it was basically dinner time.

“Shouldn’t you be home by now?” You asked and Heather chuckled,

“Normally? Yes.” She shot you a grin, “Rob’s away for the next bit at a conference.” She let out a soft sigh, pouring herself out a glass of wine as she leant against the island. “My original plan for your weekend was to fuck you until you couldn’t remember your name, not let you out of my sight for three days….but…all things considered…” she took a large sip, “you need some relaxing.”

“Oh…” your breath caught into your throat, “M’am, I mean…I could still..”

“No.” Her voice hardened, “at least not tonight. Tonight you’re going to eat dinner, drink some wine and we can watch a couple of movies. I want you calm, safe and asleep at a reasonable hour, and I’m making you breakfast tomorrow.”

“Are….are you…staying?” You asked hesitantly, glancing up at her surprised with the soft smile on her face.

“Unless you don’t want me to.” She sucked back more wine, “kitten I do think you deserve some undivided attention, and this seemed like the most opportune moment. You’re off and I don’t have to be home until Thursday.”

“What about work?”

“They can try to call if they really want to.” She shrugged, “I may need to steal your desk for a few emails or virtual meetings, but aside from that I’m all yours.” Her phone suddenly buzzed, distracting her for a moment, “that’s the pizza, go get settled on the couch and pick a movie or show.”

“Pizza?” You raised a brow, even knowing Heather was a regular human, you didn’t expect her to be one to order pizza when she was trying to baby you.

“Yes, pizza.” She chuckled, “we all have our guilty pleasures, don’t we?”

“And here I thought yours was younger women.” You teased, your confidence back and she barked back a laugh, rolling her eyes at you.

“You’re ridiculous kitten. Now….go get settled.” She gestured to the couch again and you huffed, grabbing the wine bottle and glasses before you dropped into the couch, nestling under the blankets as you skimmed through the available entertainment.

Heather paused to collect a couple of plates and the roll of paper towels before she joined you on the couch. You suggested a couple of different movies, though she let you take control, wanting to make sure you had the best night you could after your hellish day. You were honestly surprised, once again, when her free arm laid around the back of the couch, and she didn’t even wince as you nestled into her shoulder. You let out a heavy yawn near the end of the second movie and she chuckled, pressing a kiss to your head.

While the credits rolled, she took the time to clean up, tossing the leftovers into the fridge, and the plates into the dishwasher before starting it. She couldn’t help but smile softy at the way your eyes were drooping as you tried to pay attention to the finale of the movie.

“Kitten…” the demanding in her voice pulled your attention from the t.v and you let out another yawn, “it’s bedtime.” She nodded toward the bedroom.

“I know.” You yawned, standing and tossing the blanket onto the couch behind you as you flicked off the t.v, “you can go. I promise I’m just going to brush my teeth and go to sleep.”

“I’m not going anywhere….remember?” She smirked and your heart nearly jumped into your throat as she smirked.

“Oh..” you breathed, “I…I didn’t think you meant it.”

“I did.” She smiled, flicking the light off, “now…bed…”

You followed her lead, swiftly brushing your teeth and shucking the hoodie as you slipped under the covers. She only took a moment in the ensuite after you, returning in her own silky pyjama set that you weren’t totally sure where it came from (though you had been passed out for more than half the day). She slid under the covers, an arm wrapping around you,

“Remember that this doesn’t happen often kitten.”

“I know Mommy.” You yawned again, nestling into her chest, your arms wrapping around her middle, “I can at least take advantage in the meantime?” You smiled softly and she chuckled.

“That’s my good girl.” She stoked at your hair softly, “now…get some sleep.

”Are you going to be here when I wake up?” You asked, your voice slurred with sleep.

“Did I not tell you I’ll be here for the next three days?” She asked with a laugh.

Though this time you didn’t respond, your chest rising slowly as you fell asleep against her. Heather smirked, turning off the bedside light as she sunk deeper into the bed, letting herself cuddle you for once. It wasn’t something she ever did, wasn’t something she had been planning on doing this weekend, but she knew you needed it. A bad day was one thing, but a bad day that nearly sent you to the hospital was way fucking worse. She was glad she was able to help you as much as she could. And honestly, it didn’t take long for her to fall asleep with your warmth against her.

_________ @lesbianologist @screenee @jamiethetrans @natasha-danvers @veteranwerewolf95 @laurenhope13 @imlike-so-gaydude @svulife-rl @gay-ass-bitch @oliviaswifey @mysticfalls01 @cmmndrwidw @bumblebear30 @paulson-hargitay @molllss @solemnnova @svushots @nocreditinthestraightworld @yourtaletotell @cerberus-spectre @thatgaygiraffesquirrelgirl @emskisworld @ex-uallyactive @addictedtodinosaurs @rosiewritesagain @imaginaryoperagloves @wandasbrat @lustvolle-liebe @disn3y7 @samwithnoplan @multifandomlesbianic @swimmingstudentchaos891 @anne-gillettes-wh0r3 @season4scullyhair @whimsicallymad @alexusonfire @mmmmokdok @lazarettta @muscatmusic18 @sia2raw @ladysc @Annieray2020 @dxtery

#Heather dunbar #heather dunbar x reader #house of cards #classified affairs #heather dunbar fluff

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kitchenscene · 3 years

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four chambers buck/eddie (minor), eddie centric, an analysis of the diaz house, (home is about the people, not the space), 1.6k ______________

Eddie holds his heart in physical spaces. Frames, photo albums, ticket stubs. It’s less about the sentiment and more about the proof, evidence of the better moments, and a tangible reminder that they won’t be the last. He carries an old photo of Chris in his wallet and a yellow sticky note from Buck in the back of his phone case, scratchy, all caps writing — “Had to leave early, didn’t want to wake you up. There’s coffee on the counter for you. See you tonight.” — with a heart scribbled at the bottom. He carries his love outside his chest, but hides it in his pockets, under his shirt, and around his neck.

It’s scattered throughout the living room, his heart is in a comfortable place. The warm brown coffee table and throw pillows on the couch. Soft lights, lamps in every corner. An ash filled fireplace and charred brick, as if to say, “yes, there is life here, believe me when I say there’s life.”

[ao3 link]

Out in the living room, his love is most evident on the bookshelf. Loved ones held not by the hand, but by mahogany frames and canvas wrapped photo albums. Two albums, to be exact. The first is from Texas, from his childhood. Family photos year by year, some members disappearing, new ones flooding in, staying whether they want to or not. Some people who only continue to exist in these four-by-six slots, neatly encased in plastic, notes and dates scribbled over the back.

There’s photos of young Eddie cradling a baby Sophia, photos of Sophia and Eddie with Adriana spread across their laps, and a particularly memorable one of Eddie spoon feeding baby Adri ice cream when a baby her age definitely should not have been eating ice cream. First days of school, weekend trips, and middle school phases he’d rather forget. Newspaper cutouts of his baseball stats, team photos with trophies in hand, and senior pictures of him in his jersey. Team captain. He never really wanted it, but he accepted the offer all the same.

Shannon starts to appear around this time, prom photos together, though she wasn’t his date, just a friend of a friend with some sort of connection. Selfies taken on an old film camera from her mother, candid shots of Eddie, smiling, laughing, free, a side of him kept hidden from everyone but her. A few more photos strangers were kind enough to take for them, some strangers proving to be better photographers than others.

Another family photo, this time with Shannon in frame. Off to the side, attached only by Eddie’s arm around her waist, but in frame all the same.

A sonogram of Christopher before they had a name, engagement photos because that’s what they were supposed to do, and a single wedding picture taken from a courthouse bench.

Shannon still makes herself known in the last few pages, though her and Eddie no longer exist in the same frame. Her and Chris. Him and Chris. Chris alone. He’s off to Afghanistan.

Blank pages, accidentally skipped. A photo of him accepting the Silver Star he never wanted, added to the album despite his better wishes, alongside a handful of army memories he’d rather not look back on.

It’s in his heart, all the same.

The last few pages are filled with the only pictures Eddie took himself. Every one, every single one is of Chris. The time lost in those skipped pages finding its way back into the album, one day at a time. First days of school, weekend trips, and all his childhood interests coming and going in phases.

The second photo album carries his second chances. It’s not a memento from Texas or a gift he’d rather not receive, no. This one he chose all on his own. He chose Los Angeles, he chose Chris, he chose the 118, and with them, he chose a fresh start, a blank page. Family photos of a different kind.

Second page, third slot down, Buck makes himself known. He first exists in Eddie’s heart somewhere along the bottom shelf. Three, four, five pages in, Buck never disappears. In the firehouse, after work, trips to the zoo, he never disappears. Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Years, he never disappears. The couch, dining room, and kitchen, Buck never disappears.

It always comes back to the kitchen. Before there was a home, there was a kitchen and dirty dishes. Eddie washes the dishes by hand, one by one. Buck sits on the countertop, stacking dried plates, sorting cutlery in the drawers. He leaves every cabinet open — “it’s way more efficient, Eddie,” — and carries three mugs in each hand.

His heart skips in the kitchen. Flinging soap bubbles while rinsing plates, stealing from simmering saucepans on the stove, his breath hitches when Buck swipes a thumb across Eddie’s cheek, brushing away the suds. His breathing stops altogether when his hand lingers a moment too long.

New beginnings are also found in the kitchen, heavy palpitations bleeding from the sink onto the dining table. Anticipation exists between the tiles, melting the glue he’s used to desperately hold himself together. Buck plays music while he cooks, varying from swing to classic rock. On the good days he sings, out of key, but he sings. He whistles along with the guitar or the saxophone or velvety voices he doesn’t dare to replicate. Buck dances too, waiting for songs to end and timers to ring.

Anticipation flooded the room when he asked Eddie to dance along, a soft blues tune playing over the speaker. Hand to the waist, to the shoulder, hand draped in gentle hand. It was an easy choice; Buck leaned in and he leaned back, holding Eddie like he would never have the chance to do it again, kissing him like there was no sweeter air in the world. The first, “I love you,” was breathed against the counter, just above a whisper. “I always have,” followed shortly behind.

The brightest piece of his heart is held in Christopher’s hands. Rainbow carpets and terrariums, posters plastered on every wall, solar systems and galaxies hanging above. Buck pinned the mobile to the ceiling, Earth, Venus, and Mars dancing around each other, glowing as the room fades to black. The planets spin and spin just above his bed. It makes sense, really, that Buck would hang the stars for Chris.

Eddie didn’t decorate his room, unlike the rest of the house. No, the color, the light, the books lining every shelf, all chosen by Chris, constantly shifting as his interest wean and wane. He’s more than willing to provide, because who is he to deny an action figure on the dresser or plant on the windowsill?

His heart is full with Chris. His heart is empty in his bedroom. Everything Eddie has he gives to Chris. (Where else would it go?)

Barren walls and flat sheets. Empty walls, empty frames. Clock on the nightstand, a lamp on either side, nothing more. A dresser, a closet, it’s a bedroom, nothing more. Most days the curtains are drawn. Most days the door is kept shut. It’s best to keep this hidden, best to leave it bare. He had a rug once. Never managed to unroll it.

It functions as a space, that’s all he needs. Eddie sleeps, and sometimes he dreams. Sometimes he wakes in a sweat, sometimes his hands shake until he’s too exhausted to shake anymore. He resorts to self soothing then; counting ceiling tiles that don’t exist and pacing about the room until holes bleed through his socks.

Buck moved from the apartment to the couch, and eventually made his way to the bedroom. They started out two feet apart but always woke together, somehow making contact and swearing it meant nothing. Even in his sleep, he finds his way to Buck. (Of course it means something).

He first kisses Buck in the kitchen. He kisses him again in the bed. His bed, their bed. He sleeps with his head against Buck’s chest, this time with intent, counting beats instead of ceiling tiles as he sleeps, no sweeter lullaby to be heard. He sleeps through the night, no dreams at all. Buck opens the curtain when he wakes up. Eddie leaves it that way.

The changes are subtle at first, and Buck plays it off like it’s all accidental. “Your room has the best sunlight,” he says, moving plants from the kitchen to the dresser. The ivy cascades down the sides and the cactuses bloom in the new light. In the silence, his heart begins to beat again.

Buck covers his own nightstand with receipts and chargers and photos and reminders. “Printed this for myself,” he claims, filling a picture frame with him and Eddie and Chris, “but I made an extra copy.” He leaves it on Eddie’s side of the bed. It’s less and less barren each day.

The rug under the bed is a welcomed addition. Soft and full, Eddie doesn’t question where it came from. A mirror makes its way to the wall. He can count his scars in the reflection; two in the shoulders, one on the hip. Wrist and thigh, hand and head. With each day the sight is more bearable.

Buck ripped off the sheets, the dark navy sheets, and swapped them out for something brighter. He claims they’re softer, claims they’re more breathable, though Eddie knows the truth, the truth being that they’re lighter on his chest and make his heart beat even. One, two, three, he can climb out of bed each morning a little easier.

“Good morning,” Buck whispers, and Eddie, half awake, half dreaming, feels his lips brush against his temple before moving to the kitchen. One beat, two beats, three, he can climb out of bed each morning a little easier.

#nonsense plotless words but hey they're words !!#911 fox #911 #911 fics #911 fic #eddie diaz #the diaz house #evan buckley #christopher diaz #mine:911 #texas.fic

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feistypaants-archived · 4 years

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Between The Pipes [Chapter 8]

Rating: M Words: 2236 Pairing: Kristanna Summary: When a new owner takes over the Arendelle Ice Breakers, Kristoff isn’t sure about his future with the team. That is, until a PR nightmare throws the newest member of the media team, who also just so happens to be the daughter of the new owner, right into his arms. Kristoff and Anna can’t even stand the interviews they have to do together… how on earth are they going to fix this mess? Hockey!AU.

[Chapter Index]

Where To Read: [AO3]

Notes: hehe this was fun. I don’t know if this is something that actually happens or not, but in my world it does! They have to do those studio headshots and stuff somewhere right?

Anyway, the NHL does these silly things called Puck Personalities and it’s def the inspiration for the last part of this. Here’s a playlist of them if you’re bored and want to watch hockey boys be awkward bc none of them like to be on camera.

Enjoy!

Gerda wanted her to get some practice today. Some dumb, fluffy media that would just go on the internet when they ran out of things to report on, or if they felt that they needed something to smooth over any rough patches PR-wise. It was just going to be silly questions that were meant to play with the guys, get them comfortable with her, and to give fans something fun to watch that would bring the players down to a more relatable

So Anna did herself up as nicely as she could.

Her makeup was natural enough that she didn’t look ridiculous, but emphasized enough for all of her hard work to show up on the camera, she curled her hair and put the front up in a soft braid that circled the back of her head, and she slipped on a still professional but definitely tight black sweater dress, and a soft emerald green sweater, with knee-high black boots over sheer tights. But in her worry that it wouldn’t be what they wanted, she threw a couple more options into the back of her car before heading over to the local studio space that they had rented for the day.

When she arrived, there were more cars than she was willing to count lines up around the lot, including Kristoff’s truck. Swallowing the lump that was forming in her throat, Anna got out of her car, elected to leave the other clothing so she didn’t look like a crazy person, and walked with purpose towards the studio doors.

She was immediately greeted by Gerda, who smiled at her warmly. “I see you’ve taken care of hair and makeup, perfect,” she started, leading Anna by the elbow towards the small green room. “There are snacks and drinks back here while you wait. They’re just finishing up the shots for the players in jerseys, and we’ll be able to proceed with your segment soon.

It was a whirlwind and Anna was grateful she processed anything that was said to her before Gerda ran off to find the next issue she needed to handle.

There were a couple unfamiliar faces, but Anna’s eyes locked on to the one other female in the room, and let out a sigh of relief when she approached. “You must be Anna,” she smiled, her voice gentle. “Honeymaren, but you can just call me Honey.” Anna’s nose scrunched unwillingly, laughter in expression evident, and Honey smiled in response. “My parents are hippies, what can I say?”

Anna shook her hand before letting out another laugh. “I like it, it’s sweet.”

“... Like Honey?”

They shared a laugh and Anna felt suddenly more at ease. It was nice to meet someone around her age and her gender in such a male-dominated area. She quickly learned that Honey was the same age as her sister, was in PR, and had been doing this for six years now. “So,” Anna started, clasping her hands together in front of her hips. “Is it always this crazy?”

“Oh, you have no idea,” Honey laughed, gesturing to the door. “If you want, we can go watch the videographer for a minute? It’s usually less crowded in the studio room.”

Anna nodded enthusiastically and they were soon on their way, making the usual small talk. They passed a few players who gave them winks and playful gestures, but none seemed too eager to stop and talk with them. Honey told her it was only because they had to go get into their suits for the talking head portion of filming and not because they didn’t want to talk to her, and Anna did her best to brush it off.

“These boys are going to be talking to me plenty over the season, I don’t blame them for not wanting to talk to me right now.”

With a chuckle, Honey pushed open the heavy studio door and nodded, leading Anna in. “I think they’ve just got the goalies left, and then it’ll be your turn!”

Anna realized exactly what that meant and felt her cheeks warm as she glanced up just in time to see Kristoff pulling off his mask to listen to the director, his blonde hair fluffy and falling around his ears in a gentle curl at the end. His face was serious until some comment she couldn’t hear made him laugh, and Anna could feel the warmth in her cheeks spread all the way to her toes.

So he does smile. And of course it was a really pretty smile, too.

What good were his looks if they were given to a man with his personality?

She watched with interest as a photographer slid in to take some headshots, mask on and off, posing as if he were playing, and some just standing.

“For stat boards,” Honey had chimed in with a grin.

And then it was the videographers turn, and he made him do some traditional goalie stops. A dive, a slide, all these things that, too Anna, seemed like they would be impossible to do with all that gear and padding. But Kristoff made it look easy.

They finished up quickly - Kristoff had been doing this for a few years now, and he moved to let their backup goalie do the same. He took his mask off again, shaking his hair loose, and Anna couldn’t say she wasn’t completely struck with his strong jaw and bright grin as he walked towards the exit. The one she was standing right in front of.

“Honeymaren,” he grinned, holding up his fist for a bump from the PR specialist. “Nice to see you as always.” Then his eyes drifted to meet hers, and Anna could swear she saw his pupils expand. “Anna…”

She swallowed, expecting the worse.

“Don’t be nervous,” he winked, and Anna felt heat pooling in her stomach. “Just have fun with it.”

And then he pushed through them, his gear making him almost double his normal size, which was already more than double her size, and Anna felt herself gawking at him as he left. “That,” she sighed, disbelief in her eyes. “Is the nicest he’s ever been to me.”

Honey let out a loud laugh, covering her mouth with her hand. “Oh, Bjorgman. His bark is worse than his bite, I’ll tell you what.”

Anna wasn’t sure if she believed it, but it was a pleasant surprise nonetheless.

—

“Thanks for watching IBTV.”

The director made one sharp clap and the lights changed, and Anna let out the biggest breath she hadn’t even realized she was holding. A makeup artist trotted up to her, powdering her forehead and Anna felt distinctly uncomfortable under the scrutiny of the whole team.

“Great, that was excellent, Anna.” He swirled his pointer finger around the room signaling for a reset, and Anna felt herself flush. “One more, okay?”

She nodded, stepping back to her mark and took in a deep breath as she stood straighter. Risking a glance to the side where she new Gerda and Honey were watching, Anna squinted through the lights when she swore she saw two much bigger bodies beside the women.

Oh, god damn it.

Kristoff and Sven were standing there, suited up and hair tamed, watching with grins on their faces. Kristoff just kept his arms crossed tightly over his broad chest as Sven gave her a double thumbs up, and Anna smiled back before switching her attention back to the camera.

“Hey guys, Anna Arne with IBTV, and today we’re doing something fun.” The director had asked her to be more animated, so she did her best to move naturally. Arms swung wide, fingers spread out for emphasis as she danced through her spiel. “Have you ever wondered who your favorite player idolized when they were a kid? How about their favorite Disney film? Whether or not they like olives?”

She heard a small chuckle come from the crew and took it as solid encouragement.

“Well,” she winked, leaning forward as if she were sharing a secret. “Tune in here to find out all of that and more, on Breaking the Ice, your Arendelle Ice Breakers’ weekly interviews.”

The director cut in to send her to her other mark, asking for her to do the outro again, clapping enthusiastically when she nailed it. “Fantastic job, that’s the one!”

Anna couldn’t help herself as she almost literally jumped for joy, pumping her fist as subtly as she could before stepping off the small platform and skipping over to Gerda and Honeymaren, both smiling just as wide as she was.

“You’re a natural,” Honey grinned, patting her arm. “It’s like you belong in front of a camera.”

Gerda simply nodded in agreement, clear pride evident on her features. “I can’t wait to get you on the ice with the boys.”

Anna had only a moment to relish in the praise before she felt Sven’s heavy arm drape around her shoulders, stealing all of her attention. “All right, Anna! You rocked that.” She flushed as he grinned, turning her around to face Kristoff. “Now, ready to have some real fun?”

And with that, Sven was dragging her down the hall to the bigger studio space, the one with a solid white backdrop that they had been doing the player portraits in. Kristoff was following closely behind, a silent but looming presence. In the regular light of the hallway, Anna was finally able to fully take in how they looked, and grinned. “You guys look so nice!”

Sven’s curls were tamed and defined, slick as they fell over his dark skin, complemented nicely by his maroon suit and brown tie. She wasn’t surprised that he was the type to wear something more out there and daring, but it still filled her with glee to see something so bold.

Kristoff, alternatively, was wearing a more classic suit, dark grey with a powder blue tie that made his eyes warmer, honey brown and sweet as he laughed at Sven’s antics. Anna only just noticed that his hair was gelled back, stiff and sleek.

It looked nice, but she weirdly found herself missing the shagginess of it as it brushed over his brows.

Her cheeks reddened as Kristoff glanced down, catching her staring, and turned her attention back forward.

—

The interviews went well. All the players responded well to her, laughing at some of the more ludicrous questions that included props, and Anna found herself relaxing with each set.

Sven was midway through the lineup, and was as cocky as ever. “Lay it on me, sister,” he laughed as they started, Anna poking at his shoulder. “I’m up for the challenge.”

The questions started easy, just some dumb this or thats, would you rathers, hockey tips, and favorites. Then there was trivia about things not-hockey related such as Disney princesses and 90s television stars. Finally, there were challenges. Can you juggle? Can you beat your teammate in arm wrestling? Can you do a handstand?

Players were allowed to skip any question they wanted as this was all for fun, but leave it to Sven to take on each and every one.

Anna was belly laughing by the end of it, as he laid on the floor after trying and failing to do a cartwheel. “You should see Kristoff,” he laughed. “He does these in the locker room all the time.”

“That so?”

Anna trotted off the set, knowing it was unconventional, and grabbed the goalie by the arm, dragging him in front of the camera. “Come on, show us.”

He held his hands up in front of his chest in protest, a blush evident on his cheeks. “Oh, no, no, that’s fine.”

Sven stood up suddenly, squatting to be the same height as Anna, as they started chanting “Cartwheel, cartwheel, CARTWHEEL!”

“It’s just for warm-up!” He persisted, ears turning red. Sven continued on, even as she let up a little. Anna watched his entire body tense before he let out one heavy sigh and gave in. “Fine, you assholes.”

They’d bleep that out in post, she was sure.

“But if I break anything, you’re paying for it.” And then he was shrugging out of his jacket, and Anna was thoroughly enjoying the stretch of the thin white dress shirt over his muscles, the whole studio was clapping, egging him on.

And then he did a fucking cartwheel, his whole face red by the end of it.

She couldn’t hide the surprise. “Wow!” She just about shouted, closing the distance between them. “Where did you learn to do that?”

Kristoff was still blushing, his eyes avoiding hers. “Ugh, I have two sisters,” he laughed, leaning forward to pick up his jacket. “Every day was gymnastics growing up, so… I don’t know, I just picked it up, I guess.” He shrugged it on and Anna tried not to be disappointed about it. “It feels like it gets my blood pumping, so I try to do them to wake up before every game. Maybe it’s all in my head.”

Anna laughed, taking in the genuine smile that had spread on his cheeks.

“That’s… impressive.”

He tried to run a hand through his hair and frowned as he messed it up, glancing up to the camera. “Yeah, well, now I’m not answering anything else.”

Anna knew it was a tease when he leaned over to punch the top of Sven’s arm, grinning widely.

#btpfic #feistypantswrites #hope this doesn’t come off as like ooc lmfaoooo #it just was fun #and if u know hockey players u know some of them have crazy superstitions

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anotherficwriter · 5 years

Text

Polaroid (How They Met)

Alright everyone!!! So sorry that this took so long to post. It has been done for a couple days now but I never got the chance to edit it with work!

This story is set about 7 months before the events of A Serpent’s Secret Lover! I will be creating more one shots based around this story as I really love the dynamic between Sweet Pea and the reader that I have created so far!

Let me know what you think!

Warnings: Cringe cuteness!!

As the end of day bell rings, you begin packing up your notebook and chemistry textbook and start to make your way towards your locker. Dropping off your books, you grab your photography stuff and head to Mr. Grating’s classroom for Photography Club.

“Ready to take some pics, Princess,” as you turn around and shut your locker you see the one and only Reggie Mantle standing behind you.

“I am, Reggie. I still cannot believe that you decided to join the photography club! Do you even like photography?”

“I mean… I did go out and buy a camera specifically for the purpose of using it, so... yes?”

“You bought a camera because you were hoping Cynthia would let you take nude photos of her!”

“Ya know, I regret telling you that! I said that in confidence,” Reggie pushes open the door and holds it open in front of him for you.

“You told it to me when we were studying Stats! In the school library!!” As you walk into the classroom you greet Mr. Grating and take your seat as Reggie plops down next to Cynthia and turns around to give you a wink.

“Alright everyone! Welcome to club. Let’s go around and do small wins of the week! Reggie, you can start.”

“Um, alright! I guess my win for the week is that I beat my personal deadlift record so I’m feeling pretty pumped about that!” When he finishes his words he glances over at Cynthia who is looking at him, impressed. You roll your eyes at the boy’s attempts and how they seem to be working. The rest of the class goes around and shares their small wins of the week and then it gets to you.

“Y/N? What is your small win?”

“I think it would have to be my new camera! I figured I’d hop on the trend and get one of those updated Polaroid cameras! The InstaMax one!”

“Very nice! You can use that for today’s assignment which is to find something outside of your comfort zone and shoot that. If you normally do landscapes try portraits or something! Something new for you! Next week you can come back and we will share the photos, and learn some new techniques. Best photo gets a meal voucher for Pop’s!”

As students start to get up and chat amongst themselves you take your camera out of its bag and head out the door trying to figure out what you would like to shoot. You typically did shoot things like landscapes so you figured you might try to give people a try. Those were definitely out of your comfort zone. You had always been too scared to take photos of people because they were so different and individual. One person would need different camera adjustments than the other and that wasn’t something you were fully comfortable exploring yet. But that’s what this assignment was for: to branch out and try new things.

Walking the halls for a few minutes you try to find someone who looks friendly enough to photograph. After a little while of doing that you decide to give up and begin to pack your things to go home. Maybe you could take some photos of your mom or your animals or a cool looking car on the street. You place your headphones in your ear before walking outside where Reggie and Cynthia are out at one of the picnic tables taking some photos before letting out a chuckle to yourself and beginning your walk home.

You took one or two test shots with your new camera, printing out photos of the sun shining through the trees and of a person walking their dog. The neon signs of Pop’s lays in front of you in the distance and you debate stopping in for a milkshake but decide against it. When you reach the intersection that stands a couple streets down from your house a wild idea pops into your head. Instead of taking the normal turn towards your house you decide to go in the opposite direction and walk down the street towards the southside of town. You know that you might not want to cross the line into the official southside but you might be able to spot a couple of cool looking motorcycles or cars down that direction.

You’re looking down at your camera when you hear the loud rumble of a motorcycle.Your head snaps up to watch it drive past but before you can snap a picture, it is out of sight.”A parked bike would be much easier to take photos of,” you thought to yourself. The bridge that officially marks the northside from the southside looms closer and with some long, deep breaths you begin to make your way across it. It is still bright daylight which you are incredibly thankful for as it takes a bit of the nerves off.

As you walk, more bikes come and go but you see no stationary ones to photograph. Just as you are about to give up and turn around, you spot a motorcycle parked in a spot not surrounded by others. As you start walking towards a bike you notice that it is parked in the lot in front of Southside High. The other cars that are towards the back of the lot must be teachers who are staying late but the rest of the school has seemed to clear out. Before you allow yourself to question why this one bike would still be here, you ready your camera as you start trying to find the best angle and lighting.

You take one shot of the bike and as you are waiting for it to print you hear the doors of the school open and close. You are silently hoping in your mind that this is a teacher coming out and not the person whose motorcycle this is but, of course, your hopes are in vain.

“What the hell are you doing with my bike?!” you hear a booming voice and as you muster up the courage to turn around you see a very angry looking boy walking towards you. As he gets closer you realize just how tall and intimidating he really is and you swallow hard. “Are you deaf, princess? What are you doing with my bike?” His voice shows no signs in calming and you try to scramble your brain for a sentence.

“I-uhm- I… I was taking a picture of it,” you have never sounded so small and you want to slap yourself for being so afraid but who wouldn’t be?!

“You got a reason?” He’s still mad but now there is a hint of confusion in his voice as he looks at you trying to figure out why this northside girl was all the way on the southside taking Polaroid pictures of his motorcycle.

“Well I… um… I needed to take photos of something for my photography club and it needed to be out of my normal realm of comfort so I picked cars or people and then I thought ‘well motorcycles would be cool’ so I started walking and then I saw your bike and the sun was hitting it so it looked really nice and I thought I could take a few photos of it with my new camera. I’m really sorry! I didn't want to cause any trouble,” the words spill out of you at such a fast speed that you hope he was able to understand and process them.

“So you needed photos and you decided to come to the southside to take pictures of motorcycles? Literally risking your safety for a club?” The confusion is there and evident.

“Yeah, I guess so. I realize how silly it sounds! Sorry! I’ll go now, okay? I don’t want any trouble,” you start to back away but he puts his hand out to stop you.

“I’m not going to hurt you, princess. I’m sorry if I scared you. You can never be sure who’s who, especially when I come out and they’re poking around my bike. Did you want to get a few more shots?” his voice is much softer now than it had been only moments ago. As he looks at you he has a gentle smile on his face and he gestures towards his bike. “You know, before the sun stops shining or whatever.”

“You don’t mind? Because I can leave, it’s really not a problem.”

“You came all this way here. You might as well get what you came here to get.”

“Okay, yeah… thanks!” You give him a small smile as you ready your camera again. He smiles back at you and then steps back as not to get in the way of your shot.

You crouch down and get a shot of the bike from below. It looks beautiful in the viewfinder and when you click the shutter button you are excited to see the print.

“How long does it take to print out?” The tall boy is looking down at you while you are still crouched on the ground. You stand up to meet his face and tell him that it takes about a minute to fully reveal the photo.

“You said you wanted to take photos of people right? Take one of me,” the smirk on his face makes you want to scream but you keep your composure. The fear of the previous situation stopped your brain from processing who this boy was but now that you were fully looking at him you recognized him. You didn't know him but Jughead did. This boy was one of Jughead’s fellow Serpents. The cute one. You try desperately to hold back your blush as you cough out a response.

“Oh! I don’t want to impose,” you’re sure you sound just as embarrassed as you feel but you can’t help it.

“C’mon! It’ll be fun!” His voice is filled with humor and amusement and you keep trying to decide if he’s making fun of you or trying to get you to engage with him. You decide on the latter and have him lean against the bike.

You look through the viewfinder and your breath is swept away by how beautiful this boy truly is. It takes you a few deep breaths to finally take the photo because you are much too blown away to concentrate.

“Think I look good?” Your mouth opens wide as you try to formulate an answer. “I mean the photo. You think the photo looks good?” Something about his smirk tells you that that is not what he meant at all. But he wanted to let you dangle.

“Yeah… um… I think so! I mean you looked good in the viewfinder. I meant the photo did. Not that you didn’t! You know what I mean,” you are back to the stumbling over you words and letting a blush crawl up your neck and cheeks. All he does is smirk at you knowingly.

The print out feels like it takes forever to fully develop but when it does you look down and are just as amazed as before. It is a beautiful photo.

“So, what do you think?” He’s bowing his head to look down at the photo your holding. “Am I a good subject for your assignment?”

“It’s a really great photo! You are very photogenic,” that is the best compliment you can think to give him without embarrassing yourself even further.

“And what about you, princess? Are you photogenic?”

“Oh no no! I take the photos! I am never in them,” you are waving your hands in dismissal but he isn’t planning on letting you off that easy.

“Let me take one of you! I want a picture of you sitting on my bike,” his tone is serious and as his eyes meet yours you are at a loss for words. “Please.”

Before you can say no to him, he takes a gentle hold on your elbow and guides you over to the bike where he gestures for you to sit on it. You do. It feels incredibly strange to be sitting on a motorcycle. He is holding the camera in his hands but watches you as you try to make yourself comfortable on the bike. The way he looks at you makes you feel like there is no one else in the entire world and that terrifies you. How could a person you just met have this much of an effect on you? Before you could think to much into it he was telling you to get ready before holding up the camera and snapping the picture.

“I wasn’t even ready! Not fair!” You weren’t actually mad but you didn’t want to be looking like a fool in front of this boy either. Not after that model-quality photograph of him.

“You looked perfect to me!” Oh my goodness, this boy was going to be the death of you and this interaction could not have been longer than five minutes.

“Oh...um...Thanks!”

He waves the photo around to help it develop, like he saw you do. When it finally finishes, he looks at it with his mouth slightly agape.

“You look amazing,” he wasn’t even saying it in a sarcastic manner. He seems genuinely taken aback and you feel pride swell up inside you. You were able to make this beautiful Southside Serpent lose his words.

Before you can even say thank you he was reaching in his back pocket for something. He pulls out an uncapped pen.

“Sign the back for me. I want to keep it.”

“You want to keep a photo of me? Why?” Now you were the one to be confused as he presents the photo and pen to you.

“Because you look beautiful and that way if I ever see you around again, you can’t say you don’t know who I am.”

“Do you take me as the kind of person who would do something like that?” You take the pen and picture out of his hands and lean down against his bike to sign your name on the back of it.

“It was nice to meet you...Y/N,” he reads your signature on the back of the photo and hearing your name comes out of his mouth makes your heartbeat a little faster and you wouldn’t mind if that was all you heard for the rest of your life. “I’m Sweet Pea, by the way,” he holds out his hand for you to shake and you do.

“It was nice to meet you too, Sweet Pea. What are you going to do with that photo?”

He pulls his hand away from yours and reaches into his back pocket again to pull out his wallet.

“I’m going to keep it right here and hope that I see you again soon!” The smile on his face is genuine and beaming so brightly that it lights up the surrounding area. He doesn’t allow you to say anything else as he walks towards his motorcycle and hops on to it. He reaches around towards the back and holds forward a helmet.

“Want a ride back to your side of town?”

“That would be great, thank you! You can just drop me off on the other side of the bridge,” as much as you wanted to spend more time with him, you didn’t quite know how people would react seeing the Northside Princess being escorted around the northside by a Serpent on a motorcycle.

He gives you a little nod before turning on the bike and beginning to ride away. If you weren’t so caught up in how exciting this entire situation was you would’ve asked where his backpack was, what he was doing at school so late, why he was so nice to you, what his number was, and more. But the feeling of the wind rushing past you and the feel of his denim serpent jacket under your palms was overwhelming.

When you finally reached the edge of the bridge you felt a pang of sadness for your time together was over. He cut the engine of the bike and put the kickstand out to steady you both. He swung his arm around to you so that he could grasp your arm help you get off the bike as gracefully as you could. You tripped slightly when your feet hit the ground and let out a little squeak of fear. A small laugh escaped him as he watches you steady yourself.

“See you around, princess. Just hopefully not when you are wandering around the southside alone again, yeah?”

“Yeah, sounds good,” you hand the helmet back to him and watch as he puts it back in its spot behind the seat.

With that he put the kickstand back up, turned the bike on and made a 180 degree turn back towards the southside. You watched him drive away until he was out of sight and when you finally turned around to start walking back home you couldn’t help but think of all the possible ways you might run into him again. Excitement filled your whole body for the day when it would finally come.

Next week, at photography club you would turn in three pictures that you took. One of Sweet Pea leaning against his bike and two of just the bike. The entire club thought they were incredible and you ended up winning that meal voucher to Pop’s. If only you could take your new friend for a meal. Instead, you would probably have to settle for going with your favorite foursome.

#Sweetpea #sweet pea #sweet pea x reader #sweet pea imagine #sweet pea smut #riverdale #riverdale imagines #riverdale imagine #riverdale smut

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lepus-arcticus · 5 years

Text

OMENS: CHAPTER FOUR one | two | three trigger warnings apply

KICKING HORSE B&B JULY 23 - 6:23 AM

Pale sunlight streamed into the room, warming Scully’s cheek, a peaceful change from last night’s storm. She grumbled and stretched underneath the covers, rotating a sore ankle on a cool patch of sheets before letting her eyes flutter open. No one could accuse her of being anything resembling a morning person, but she’d never had the ability to sleep in after a night of drinking.

She surveyed the room in the lavender dawn, sober now, and made mental notes for her own apartment before remembering that there wasn’t much point in redecorating when you had a rapidly approaching expiry date. Her nightmare bled back into her memory in snippets, skin and blood and sweetness and dread, tears and panic, Mulder at the door.

She winced and eased herself up on her elbows, and then the headache hit her, a bolt of pain behind her eyes. Oh, fuck. Jesus. Oh. She needed water, and coffee, stat. She hoped Rhiannon was up.

She fingered her wristwatch on the bedside table, squinting to look at the time. Early, but not so early that it was impolite to be up and about in the house. Gingerly, she rolled out of bed and felt around the footboard for her robe. She slipped it around her shoulders, and stiffly padded out into the hall. Her mouth tasted awful, so she dipped into the bathroom to brush her teeth and finger-comb her hair, and then felt inspired to check in on Mulder.

She shouldn’t have been so harsh with him last night. He was only making sure she was okay. But that dream…

The door to his room was slightly open, and she could hear the steady, muffled sway of his snore. She peered inside, careful not to make a sound. He was completely buried in blankets, save for one long, bare foot sticking off of the edge of the mattress, toes twitching. A swell of guilty affection washed over her, and she had the urge to creep over and run her fingernails down the curve of his arch, see if he was ticklish.

Instead, she turned and moved down the hall, descending the stairs as the Bishop women and their dogs looked on. The wood creaked under her feet, and the sound summoned Hypatia, probably the only creature in the house unafflicted with a hangover. She met Scully a few steps up, whimpering in pleasure, slapping her with her tail and blocking the way downstairs. “Hey, sweet girl…” Scully massaged one of the dog’s fleecy ears between her thumb and fingertips, and maneuvered her way around her massive wriggling body and into the kitchen.

There was no evidence of yesterday’s dinner to be found. The kitchen practically sparkled, and something enticingly yeasty scented the air. A large pot of coffee was percolating, black and seductive, on the tiled counter, and the room was suffused in sunrise, beaming in from the attached conservatory.

A bittersweet hum trickled through the air, a melody that Scully recognized. The water is wide, I cannot get o’er, she thought, and heard ghostly strains of her father’s tuneless Navy warble. The memory tugged at her ribs. She followed the sound and found Rhiannon in the lushness of the conservatory, her frizzy corkscrew hair loose around her waist, lovingly plucking mint leaves one by one from a large potted bush propped up on a wooden bench. The conservatory was packed full of plant life⁠—ficuses and string-of-pearls, roses and tomatoes, and an assortment of herbs that would rival an 18th-century apothecary.

“My father used to sing that song to my sister and I when he was home from sea,” Scully said in greeting.

Rhiannon looked up and smiled. “Oh, good morning, Dana. I hope I didn’t wake you.” An embroidered velvet robe in faded garnet hung off of Rhiannon’s shoulders. With the halo of sunlight around her, the scene resembled a Mucha panel, especially when Hypatia left Scully’s side to wrap herself around Rhiannon’s hips. Her hair was so long that a tendril caught in the crimpy fur of Hypatia’s backbone, dragging in an alluring loop.

“No, no, you didn’t wake me,” Scully said, a little entranced. She wondered if she’d ever seen such a pretty scene in her life.

“I’ve got biscuits in the oven, care to join me in the kitchen? How are you feeling?”

“You know, I’d love a cup of coffee.”

Rhiannon chuckled softly at that, pressing a few more mint leaves into the handful she’d collected. “Perhaps the whiskey wasn’t the brightest idea. But the bottle invited itself to the table, and that’s the story I’m sticking to.”

“It was a wonderful dinner, Rhiannon. Thank you. I really wish you’d have let me help you clean up, though.”

“Oh, hush,” Rhiannon said, as she traipsed neatly across the tile past Scully and into the kitchen, depositing the mint leaves into a copper pot on the stovetop. She rattled four mismatched mugs down from the hutch in the corner, picked up the coffee pot, and tilted it over the largest one, the black stream of steaming liquid making Scully’s mouth water. “Now, Dana, how do you take your coffee? Cream, sugar? Or if you’d like, I can make it my way.”

Hell, why not. “Well, usually I just have a little soy milk, but when in Rome…” Scully smiled politely, leaning up against the counter and trying to ignore the pulse in her temple. She watched as Rhiannon caught a curled shard of cinnamon from a corked ceramic jar, and grated a nugget of nutmeg over it into a rough stone mortar. She added a swift dash of some mysterious blend from another jar, and ground it all together, rotating the pestle and humming lightly as she worked. A mound of butter was produced from the old-fashioned icebox, and she slid a generous pat of it onto a knife and into the mug, adding a fat pinch of the powdered spices, catching Scully’s slight grimace and imploring her not to knock it until she tried it.

“Here,” Rhiannon handed her the resulting brew, and Scully dutifully took a sip. A flood of heat and life immediately moved through her head, through her chest, down into her belly. It was delicious. It might have been the best cup of coffee she’d ever had.

“Oh my God, this is incredible,” she gushed over the rim of the mug, amazed, taking another sip. “... I really might never go back to soy.” Rhiannon laughed, busying herself with making another cup. “You’re quite the cook, Rhiannon. You’ve never thought of doing it professionally?”

“No,” she said, at work at the mortar. “No, I love what I do. I’ve always felt so connected with animals. Cooking’s just a hobby of mine, that’s all. An obsessive hobby, I’ll admit, but a hobby.”

“You’re, um. A medical doctor as well as a veterinarian, is that correct?” Scully asked.

“Well, I’m only certified in veterinary medicine, but my mother was a healer of sorts, so I learned a lot from her. I can handle the basic first-aid stuff⁠—when a kid from town needs stitches, when there’s an uncomplicated homebirth over at the settlement and they need assistance, that sort of thing - and I find a lot of concepts and practical applications carry forward. Medicine is such an instinctual practice anyway.”

“Hmm.” Scully cringed internally, but fought back the urge to argue with her. “Rhiannon, you know that you can’t legally practice medicine without a license.”

Rhiannon shrugged. “Is helping a neighbour out in a pinch the same as practicing medicine? Nobody’s going to sue me, Dana. Horizon isn’t New York.”

“That it is not,” Scully agreed. When they’d driven in to the police station the previous afternoon, they’d found it nestled in the middle of all of seven interlocking streets. The rest of the town, in name, was a scattering of isolated farmhouses and homesteads. She took another sip of her coffee. “Mulder mentioned that you performed an autopsy on Hugh Daly’s horse?”

“I looked him over…” Rhiannon said carefully, stirring spices into her own cup. “It was strange… it was as if Ghost just… laid his head down in the river. There aren’t many examples of suicidal behaviour in animals, unless you’re counting that bridge in Scotland where all those dogs are always jumping to their deaths. He was such a beautiful horse, wasn’t he?”

“Mmm,” Scully agreed.

“Hugh, um. Hugh bought that horse for Anna as a wedding gift. Oh, you should have seen her, Dana. She was like a fairy. She rode up to the church bareback, and she… she wasn’t wearing any shoes, and you know, it’s funny… that day… all I can really remember clearly are the soles of her feet, how dirty they were…” Her eyes misted over, unexpectedly, and she blinked up at the ceiling.

“I’m sorry,” she said, pressing her face into one of her wide sleeves and trying to compose herself. Her grief suddenly filled the room like smoke, and Scully couldn’t help but ache for her.

“I never liked that man,” Rhiannon said. “He was trouble from the start.” Scully furrowed her brows, uncomfortable. “You’re, um...You’re taking a look at Anna today, is that right?”

“Yes,” Scully replied softly. Theo’d arranged for a cleared-out room in the police station and had borrowed the requested materials and tools from Rhiannon’s supplies. Better than a bathroom, she supposed, thinking of Home, but if the photographs were any indication, Anna’s body was so thoroughly wrecked that she wasn’t sure there was much she could determine from it.

“I was the one who… who identified her body. Out in that field. Hugh was raving, out of his mind, he wouldn’t even look at her, wouldn’t even come close. God, I don’t think I’ll ever get over seeing her like that… Theo let Marion see her too, that stupid, thoughtless man. He shouldn’t have done that.” She gripped the counter ledge, coffee abandoned, her eyes still swimming.

Scully reached out and touched her arm. “I’m so sorry for your loss, Rhiannon. I don’t know if I said it last night.”

“Those girls, Dana… they’re my daughters.” Rhiannon dashed a tear from her cheek. “And I failed. I failed to protect them.”

“This is not your fault,” Scully said. “You can’t take that on. But what you can do is tell us everything you know. About Anna, about Hugh, about anyone who might have wanted to hurt her. Beginning with how she came to live with you in the first place.”

Rhiannon sniffed, considering this. “It was that brother of hers. She had to get away.” Abel Stoesz, again. “Abel is… he’s controlling, he’s possessive… even after she made it clear she wasn’t ever going to go back to the colony, he’d come here, screaming at her from the driveway…” Rhiannon ran water from the sink into a blue-tinted Ball jar, and sipped at it, regaining her composure. “He’s been especially persistent with her since she married Hugh, though. It’s a good thing Fox is going to talk to him today, although I wish Marion wouldn’t go with him and subject herself to that. Sometimes I wonder why on earth she went into law enforcement. She’s such a sensitive spirit. But anything to impress Theo, I suppose. She worships the ground that man walks on.”

Scully turned this over in her mind. “If it’s any consolation… Mulder, he’s sensitive too, and it doesn’t negate his strength or his capability. I may not always agree with him, but he has this… incredible ability to get to the heart of an issue, to understand perspectives and motivations that other people might not consider. His compassion makes all the difference in our work. I’m sure it’ll prove to be the same with Marion as well.” She left out Mulder’s desperation, his obsessive nature, how wholly and intensely he took on the pain of the people left behind. How every unsolved case was a new gaping wound that would never scar over.

Rhiannon assessed her for a few moments as she sipped at the jar, leaning back on the wooden island across from her. “You two must be very close.”

“We’re partners,” Scully said. “We’ve been through a lot together.” Suddenly self-conscious, she drew deeply from her mug, draining it, willing her cheeks to cool. A timer sounded, and Rhiannon turned her attention to the oven, opening the ceramic door to reveal a tray of fluffy biscuits. The smell was incredible. Scully hadn’t had an appetite in months, but there was something about Rhiannon’s cooking that was just… different. It was nourishing, appealing in a way that her usual diner fare and dry green salads just weren’t.

Rhiannon retrieved a jar of preserves⁠—“Last year’s serviceberries were so prolific that I made fifty jars, can you believe that? And I’m pretty sure that Theo’s eaten forty of those”⁠—and plunked it on the worn kitchen table. She plucked the steaming biscuits from the tray and piled them onto a chipped blue china serving platter, setting it down on the table next to a bowl of oranges. Hypatia paced, looking for a handout.

Just as Scully was working up the energy to ask Rhiannon for a second cup of coffee, the front door was unlocked from the outside, and Marion, stately and clean in a freshly pressed uniform, strolled into the kitchen. “Morning, Dana,” she smiled at Scully, and gave Rhiannon a kiss on the cheek. Scully’s mind lingered on last night’s dream, the scent of cedar, the woman’s bow-shaped lips poised above her own, and she blinked down at the tile.

Rhiannon asked Marion if she’d like a cup of coffee, and Marion declined. “You’re on a real health kick lately, Mare,” Rhiannon complained, but Marion just shrugged and took a jam jar of water to the table.

Just then, Mulder bounded down the stairs in his running shoes and a Knicks tank, rattling the walls, his hair sticking up in every direction. “Morning, womenfolk,” he said, squinting in the sun. Scully pressed coffee-warm fingers to her pounding temple, and wondered how on earth it was possible for him to run with a hangover. Where did he get all of that energy? Hypatia whined excitedly at the sight of him and rushed to his legs, but he sidestepped her, patting her awkwardly on the head after a moment of hesitation, and made for the sink. He turned on the tap and stuck his mouth under the running water, sucking at the stream obscenely. “Mulder⁠—” Scully scolded him, embarrassed, but the other women just smirked.

Mulder leaned against the counter and wiped his mouth with the hem of his shirt. Scully found herself looking at the lines of his hipbones disappearing into his sweats, and ripped her eyes away, but Rhiannon caught her and smiled knowingly.

“I’m seriously outnumbered here without Theo,” he quipped. “Marion, you okay if I go for a run before we leave?”

“Of course. Take your time. I’m still waking up, and it’s not like they’re expecting us.” Marion scuffled her nails on the tabletop, eyeing him openly.

“Fox, do you mind taking Hypatia with you? She doesn’t need a leash. There’s a lake a little way along the path out back, she’ll take you right to it and bring you back,” Rhiannon said, clearly not expecting him to refuse. Scully glanced at Mulder and caught him looking at her, defeated.

“Save some breakfast for me, Scully,” Mulder squeezed her shoulder on his way past her, last night’s tense exchange wordlessly forgiven. He begrudgingly held the screen door open for the dog, who trotted happily past him and down into the front yard.

“Uh, yum, Dana,” Marion laughed, once he was out of earshot. “Fox is a hunk under all that trenchcoat. I think I was too distracted by that awful tie of his to notice last night.”

Scully felt a grin tug at her lips, despite her best intentions. She suddenly realized how much she missed having female friends; Ellen’s cupboard full of cheap, secret wine, her college roommate Andrea’s fresh flower habit. Melissa, of course, with her incense and her crystals and the way she insisted on carefully studying the full astrological chart of every person Scully slept with.

She leaned towards Marion conspiratorially, nostalgia thrumming. “You should see him in glasses.”

8:04 AM

Mulder’s feet pounded mercilessly into the wet, mulchy grass at a counter-rhythm to the ferocious throb in his head. The trail to the pond was a worn, crushed valley through a field of knee-high wilderness. Wildflowers bloomed, silvery wolfwillow spicing the air with a sour, soaked-fur smell. The dog ran gracefully in front of him, darting off into the distance before returning to circle around his feet, panting joyously. Mulder had the distinct impression she was making fun of him.

“You’ve got four legs and I’ve only got two, you foul hellbeast⁠—” he called to her on her next rocket away. “This whole thing is rigged!” She barked happily in response, and reared onto her hind legs before jolting back to him for another relay.

His thoughts turned to Scully. God, sitting in that bed with her… he’d gotten dangerously close to doing something he’d certainly regret. Whiskey always made him dumb as shit, impulsive.

And her nightmare. He’d only been dozing, and her scream through the wall had been like a wave of ice water over him. How he’d wanted to run in there, wrap her in his arms, chase the shadows away. But she was right. She didn’t need him. Not like that.

He smelled the lake before he saw it, a moist earthy fetor tossed over the land like a wet blanket. As he came upon the glittering water, spooking a few mallards into flight, he noticed a rotting boat in the reeds on the far bank, turquoise paint flaking off in sheets. Just for something to do, he circled the lake at a sprint until he was closer to it. The dog trotted behind him, nose to the ground.

“Don’t eat anything weird,” he warned her, almost tripping as he drummed his heels to a stop. He wiped the sweat from his forehead and his stinging eyes. The morning sun shattered off of the surface of the lake and warmed the back of his neck, and he took a moment to kick out his legs a little as he caught his breath, bending to massage his aching right knee. The dog began to whimper irritably, a low growl that crescendoed into a keening whine. She threaded her long snout under his elbow.

“Hey⁠—stop it⁠—” He brushed her nose away, and returned to pressing his fingers around his oft-tortured patella. Scully’d been trying to get him to wear a knee brace lately, but he didn’t think he was ready to admit that he needed one. Maybe he should just swallow his ego before he did permanent damage, and had to resort to pumping on the elliptical with the government trophy wives at the Planet Fitness down the street from his apartment.

The dog moaned low, insistent, and let loose a stream of discontented yips. He looked up at her to find her crouching, her ears plastered backwards on her skull. “What the hell is wrong with you?” He chuffed a knuckle on her muzzle, and when she didn’t look up at him, he followed her eyeline.

The bottom of the boat was pooled with lakewater and blood.

A dead fox was curled in the murk, his toothy maw twisted into a grimace, as if in pain. The kohl tips of his ears were ragged. His eyes were closed. The dog yowled and whimpered behind him, pacing.

The sweet, mushroomy smell of death furled up from the corpse as Mulder leaned over it, looking for a wound. A few flies buzzed in circles around the eyes, nose, and mouth of the creature. As he got closer, he noticed the wriggling white body of a maggot crawl from the fox’s black-rimmed lip. A cold chill pierced Mulder’s stomach, and he retched into the grass beside him as he whirled away from the scene, losing what was left of last night’s dinner. The dog wailed.

He spat, and looked back up in horror.

“Fucking Jesus fuck,” he swore, scrunching his eyes and scrubbing his face with his palms. The dog’s crouching body was a coil of tension behind him. He backed away, but she wouldn’t follow.

“C’mere, dog,” he called, his voice rusty with bile. “Get away from that.”

The dog dainted a wide berth around the boat, starting and stopping, and Mulder called her again. “C’mon girl. Let’s go. C’mon.” She finally worked up the courage to pass it, throwing back a fierce growl as she skittered along. Mulder spat again, wishing for some water, and launched into a punishing pace back to Kicking Horse.

The sense of unease swirled around him. The dog ran in front this time, leaving him in the dust, eager to get home to her mistress. The fox in the boat couldn’t be a coincidence. Not with his name. Not with Scully’s vulpine head of hair.

Two omens in two days. Shit. And this one was personal.

#I FORGOT I HAD A BANK APPT #and I'm an Old who can't figure out the queuueueu time system and whether it matches with the actual time #so it's here an hour early! sorry lol #omens #txf fic

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ishakzander · 4 years

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‹ RAMI MALEK, HE/HIM, CISMALE, ASEXUAL. › ISHAK ZANDER is the THIRTY-SEVEN year old THAT CAME TO beaver creek, colorado, hired to work as a PASTRY CHEF in the manor. when a friend asked them what they thought of the manor they said, ❝ TO THE DEVIL WITH FALSE MODESTY. ❞ they claim CARRIE is their favorite scary movie, and if they were to die in a horror film they would HAVE SENT A GOODBYE VOICEMAIL TO THEIR FAMILY BEFORE BEING BURIED ALIVE. their fears include SUFFOCATION, HOSPITALS and SNAKES, and they don’t know we know, but… HE WAS INVOLVED IN A REVENGE PORN IN HIGH SCHOOL. ‹ STAFF OF THE MANOR, Pastry Chef. ›

hey hey hey! tis me again, aren, and i’m back with a second muse! and here we go...

STATS—

NAME: Ishak Khalil Zander BIRTHPLACE: Denver, Colorado HOMETOWN: Denver, Colorado DOB: September 28 ZODIAC: Libra AGE: 37 HEIGHT: 5’10 (1.78 m) WEIGHT: 70 kg (154 lbs) HAIR: Black EYES: Green S/R ORIENTATION: Asexual / Demiromantic OCCUPATION(S): Pastry chef. Sous chef (former). Executive pastry chef (former).

Name pronounced as EE-SHAK or ISH-AK.

Egyptian. With some Greek lineage.

Youngest of two; has an older brother.

Majored in Cultural Studies.

After graduating from college, he went and studied in Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, France.

Can speak fluent French, colloquial Egyptian-Arabic, basic Spanish.

An absolute optimist.

His five favorite food groups? Cake, chocolate, macaron, cheese and wine.

Believes in superstition.

200% foodie.

A perfectionist, especially when it comes to his craft.

Catch him snowboarding or hiking during his rare-free time/off days.

Awkward when it comes to technology.

Interned, worked for and was mentored by Wolfgang Puck.

Was the First Family’s executive pastry chef throughout President Obama’s term. (This totally happened in this universe OKAY.)

Then, he moved back to Denver, CO – reunited with his family, and worked as a pastry chef for The Mandalorian. (Yes, I borrowed this from SW but shhh it’s easier for me to remember lmao.)

Come 2018, a job post for the Crenshaw Manor was forwarded to him via email; the pastry chef position. He applied and was hired.

Despite his overall sunny, outgoing, positive disposition… he can be snappy (esp in the kitchen), snarky (don’t bad-mouth immigrants, ever), insensitive (refer to snappy lol).

He’s heard of all the ghost stories and lore concerning the Manor™. He will neither confirm nor deny, but he’s got lots to tell if you’re up for a good story (or some urban myths).

As for his secret, while he wasn’t present when the event took place, he was pressured and manipulated into posting the video online by people he, at the time, thought were his friends. A flagrant outcome, a divisive fallout, and disciplinary actions were taken.

FEARS

SUFFOCATION: He got locked up in a closet when he was little when the fear mounted (and it was dark) and suddenly, he was unable to breathe. HOSPITALS: While he can count the number of times he’s been in a hospital, most had to do with death. He’s lost a cousin, an uncle, a close friend and a co-worker. Want to know what these four have in common? They all died at precisely 3 AM yet different calendar dates and the cause of death were all undetermined. Oh, and mirrors were found shattered in the restrooms. SNAKES: Because they slither and crawl and no thank you fjkvjdfksfbnkj

BIO

Sometimes you watch old videos of yourself. The ones were taken by your older brother, by your mom. There’s something subjective about them, the camera angles, and the crisp sound, your own voice sounding so young. Your mom video calls every now and then when she’s not busy with the restaurant, you are in desperate need of a haircut or a shave, and when you see for yourself you call her back just to agree, to have that good ‘ol mother and son fun banter. You’re good friends with your dad, you’re his confidant. You look up to your brother because he’s quite the role model, he’s fun and witty and everything you’ve aspired to be.

Your childhood was good. You’re the son of Egyptian immigrants. Your father’s a biochemist, and your mother’s a chef; you clearly took after the latter, although you took a lot from the former, too. You’re appreciative and passionate about your roots, proud of your culture. You had good friends, participated in activities in and out of school.

High school was another world, you felt alienated for a season, had to adjust. But you found your place, found your friends. At least, you thought you did. You felt safe, well-liked, ever the social butterfly. Your brother warned you about certain friends, how they never felt right, how they looked at you differently. Of course, you elected to ignore his advice. And then something happened—

It wasn’t the same, you’ve changed. You grew up overnight, forced to face your demons and to deal. Your name was cleared, sure, and your family still loves you. Always have, and they never looked at you any different. They still trust you, they believe in you. Your real friends? They’re a small group, and they stayed—you’re thankful. You’re forgiven, but you’ll never forget. You went to a different high school once the semester’s ended.

College was fun. Your first fling, your first relationship, first drag of mary-jane, first unofficial cook-off. A lot of firsts. Oh, and apparently, you’re now a damn-good cook, quite the baker. One of your best friends questioned why you’re not pursuing Culinary Arts, and you jokingly told him it’s because you want to go to all the free parties and concerts first. You graduated with honors, your family’s proud. You feel good. Still, you felt unaccomplished.

Paris was something else. You wondered how you’ll fit in, how you’ll pull through. But you fucking did. Despite the odds, scheming, and competitive classmates. You’re on top of your class, lauded by your peers and teachers. That’s right, you’re feeling accomplished now.

You started off as a sous chef, a tall task. However, you’re excellent under pressure, you’re damn good at what you do. You’ve faced adversity (dissatisfied customers and foodies), felt a surge of pride (executive chefs and critiques praising your work), humbled (your family and roots are being credited for your skills, your upbringing).

Being the executive pastry chef for the First Family’s a highlight of your life. You didn’t think it was possible, but it happened. It was the First Lady who recommended you when she and her daughters dined at one of Wolfgang Puck’s restaurants. Up to this day, it still feels surreal.

You go back to Colorado once President Obama’s concluded his final term, full of sound and happy memories, friendships, an experience unlike any other. Then, you take up the pastry chef post for a well-known shop, the owner’s a family friend, and personally asked you to fill the spot.

Now comes a new chapter.

You’re now the pastry chef for the Crenshaw Manor. You’re familiar with the stories, the gossip, and everything else in between. You’re familiar with the silence, eerie, and bone-chilling. You hear the whispers, the voices. You’ve seen the figures, have photographic evidence. But you dare not disrupt the balance.

You follow the protocol because you value your post.

Wanted Connections

I don’t have anything specific fbsjjkvjkakbjka

Throw anything at me or let’s brain storm!

I also don’t kind going off chemistry and going with the flow!

Find me on disco or IM here!

#manor.talk #muses that enjoys all things creepy and haunting and cake #joakim also likes cake btw jbkjfsdkjks #manor.intro #sorry for any typos or error #[ intro; ]

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mementomcriis · 5 years

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´ ･ . ✶ ⧼ maya hawke, demiwoman, she & her & they & them / girl with one eye by florence and the machine + the soft, white noise crackle of an ancient vhs tape, aging newspaper clippings and yellowed family photographs pinned to a corkboard and connected with a distinct red string, and the cloying, all consuming smell of lavender and sage ⧽ ━━ don’t look now, but that’s SIDNEY AMELIA KNOX-KHAN. the twenty two year old HUMAN has been here in seattle for their whole life, and is a FILM STUDENT & VIDEO STORE CLERK. they’ve always been IRREPRESIBLE & IRON WILLED, but i guess this town just brings out the worst in people ; apparently, they’ve been way more CONTRARIAN & VOCIFEROUS than usual. it wouldn’t surprise me if they knew what was going on. you can check out their stat page HERE.

i wish that i could say that i am a LIGHT that never goes out / BUT I FLICKER FROM time TO time.

section one of three : bullet point history trigger warnings for talk of murder

sidney was born here in seattle, washington. her mother was BEATRICE KHAN, a fairly well known name in the publishing world ( though she never released any of her own countless numbers of novels ), absolutely unrelenting when it came to cutting her clients a good deal. her father was julian knox, a one time american football player who PEAKED in college and turned to writing romance novels after a career ending injury forced him to confront that he wasn’t much qualified for anything else. the family unit that they created was full of love and ever nurturing - perfect, from the inside to the out.

they were the quintessential all american family, where it COUNTED. parents that were sickeningly in love. two kids, with the perfect age difference between them. they lived in a house in the suburbs with a picket fence ( that was actually stained brown, not white ) and a perfect lawn, where the cat they had in place of a dog due to julian’s allergies would lounge, day after day. even the neighbours figured they were perfect ; the kind of thing with with all smiles, to their faces, and muttered darkly in the privacy of their own suburban homes. beatrice would go to work from eight to five, every day. julian would stay home. he got the kids their breakfast, he got them on a bus. he would go inside and write and break up the day with gardening or do it yourself projects, attending community meetings, fulfilling his pta role - and then his kids would come home, and dinner would be on the table in time for his wife’s return. perfect. clockwork.

sidney loved it, personally. she had no desire to act out. no need to break the mold, so to speak. she never felt as if she were stifled, or that her parents were pushing their own ambitions onto her. if anything, the thing that was most shocking about her early life was that she actually ENJOYED it. school could be challenging, in it’s own way - she was diagnosed with dyslexia young, but it took a few more years for them to pinpoint her adhd - but she got all the help that she could have dreamt of needing. she was allowed, if not encouraged, to try every whim that came to mind. they were, after all, within a privileged position enough to ALLOW it. piano lessons for two years, the violin for five. she attempted gymnastics and managed to break her wrist just two lessons in - never bothered to try another more physical activity, after that, but she had a healthy appreciation for watching sports, just like dad. her home life was excellent. her school life was just fine. she was a BRIGHT and curious soul, and she had aspirations for the kind of college that should she have attended, her mother could have lived VICARIOUSLY through her. she was extremely lucky to like her parents, and to appreciate the life that they had given her for all that it was.

she shouldn’t have to look back on these earlier years with sadness, and yet, life simply doesn’t work the way that it SHOULD. the week before the murders, she never could have presumed what was going to happen, though she was plagued by nightmares - something that she attributed to the horror movie marathon she had just completed or the milk drank before bed, and not to anything legitimate. she dreamt of hooded figures and serrated knives and a screaming that never stopped ringing in her ears, even after she awoke in a cold sweat and struggled to fall back asleep. she would struggle from the tangle of bedsheets with the urge to wash her hands, compulsively ; as if she were trying to get non-existent blood out from beneath her fingernails. she was fifteen years old, and she googled things like ‘can my period give me nightmares?’ and ‘is the milk before bed thing legit’, but she had NO REASON to fear the images that slipped away, as night turned into day.

it seems cruel, in it’s own way, that the night which changed the course of sidney’s life for good is one she spent completely unaware. she was staying at her girlfriends house - a sleepover planned for almost a MONTH - and the next morning, when the police came to pick her up, she had been in the midst of eating breakfast with the affectionately named ‘in laws’ and trying to swallow back a persistent feeling of unease. she was lucky that she was waiting for a lift back to her house - she was luckier, still, that a nosy neighbour had noticed her mother’s car hadn’t left for work, yet, and popped around to check in on them. if they hadn’t, and if she had gotten the early morning bus as planned, then sidney would have had to live with image of her bloodied parents until the day she DIED, too.

her mom and dad were gone. this was the gut punch, number one. number two was that her sibling - her should have been legal guardian - was under arrest. the MURDER weapon ( a phrase she had only ever heard on tv, and could never have guessed would be said in regards to her life ) had been found wrapped in one of their jackets and thrown in a dumpster outside. they had been picked up a block away, and in interrogation, their alibi didn’t stand up. it was a rather cut & dry case, and suddenly, everyone in the neighbourhood - what felt like the whole world, back then - was doing their level best to pick sidney’s picture perfect life apart. people who had once only ever had good things to say now talked about late night arguments between mom and dad. said that they had never trusted the look of her sibling, not even when they were a kid. said there was something not right about them - and that they couldn’t be sure sidney wasn’t the same. the circumstantial evidence piled against the only member of family that sid had left, and there was nothing that could be done. she was put into the system a mere week after the murders, and everything moved quickly on. she talked to a handful of reporters, but for the most part, people out in the world didn’t care for the story. it wasn’t anything too SPECIAL, she supposed.

too many stories talk of foster care becoming a sort of hell for the children stuck in it. for sidney, however, her foster home was her only salvation from the world outside her door. the one thing that she could rely on, even as she went through the most momentous changes. her first week back at school, the staring was almost painful. the whispers were worse. sidney requested she be moved, and in the process, she allowed herself be cut off from her old life - the friends she had, the partner she had loved. she started somewhere new, and she was... different, now. stranger. sidney’s way of dealing with all that had happened was to cling to things that had once only been a special interest - UNSOLVED crimes, sensationalist stories, horror movies and the supernatural. she spent a lot of time in her room, and she spent even more indulging in these new interests. the people at her new school figured that she was weird, and that assumption only got worse when they discovered what had happened to her parents. whispers of her being like her MURDEROUS sibling were somehow worse than anything else that had ever been said, but she took it, for the most part, on the chin. she couldn’t explain her sudden draw to the macabre, even less than she could explain why everything in her life had fallen apart. frankly.... it didn’t matter. she simply was.

sidney’s foster family supported her, right up until she turned eighteen, and even after. she sacrificed the dream of an ivy league school for something more achievable, beginning to attend a seattle local college after graduation and majoring in film, finding among those students - OLDER and more mature, of course, than high school kids - something she had started to forget was possible. her job as a film store clerk didn’t exactly help her rake in the cash, but once she started selling movie reviews to online publications, sidney was able to save up some money and buy professional equipment - beginning her podcast in late 2018. she doesn’t tend to talk about what happened. she doesn’t tend to think about her SIBLING. she’s got a life, now, and it’s not exactly the one she ever expected to be living - but it is her own, and that’s really all that she can hope for.

section two of three : headcanons

sidney dealt with her grief by… hyper fixating on a special interest she had always sort of had, and becoming quite the little movie buff. horror movies, more than anything, but people didn’t react very well when she went off on a tangent over wes craven’s talent, so she broadened her horizons a little. she enjoys film, maybe moreso than she should. all that led her to other special interests, and now she’s dabbled in just about everything that a woman can.

her podcast deals, of course, with unsolved mysteries. this usually takes the form of unsolved CRIMES, but... she believes in ghosts and aliens, and she throws an episode in every now and then that deals with them. she’s very open about this side gig, solely because she hopes that someday, it’ll be what she does for a living - and because there’s no point in attempting to hide something that’s such a huge part of her life, even if people do tend to... not enjoy her being so into these things, as the daughter of two murder victims.

her older sibling was acquitted of the crime - eventually. sidney still doesn’t enjoy thinking about them or it, per say, but when the news reached her, she did begin to... hyper fixate, once again, and begin to obsess over what the TRUTH was. she has cork theory board dedicated solely to her parents - and more recently has added another one, dedicated to what’s happening in seattle. she’s not gifted, or in the know, but she’s certainly not an idiot.

has a pet rat named church ( which is a fairly ironic reference to the cat in pet sematary ), and he’s NOT her first. she’s owned several since she was put into care, and they’ve always been something of an emotional support for her.

while i align sidney more with ‘conspiracy theories’ and ‘true crime’ than i do ghosts and ghouls, i will admit that i tend to push a lot of spooky cliche’s onto her, because i like having a character who’s very IN TOUCH and into that season, in particular. promise i’m trying to control the impulses.

always has on at least five necklaces and eight rings, and never has any less than ten bracelets. her style would be hard to define, but the amount of cheap jewelry is FAIRLY indicative.

section three of three : wanted connections

sidney knox-khan, our maya hawke is looking for their older sibling who resembles finn cole, tiera skovbye, dacre montgomery / up to player and should be 23+. applicants do not have to contact rachel to talk over details before applying. ( pls allow me preface with the fact that i wld be happy for her sibling to be half / adopted / fostered either, and they don’t necessarily have to be named after a horror character like sid was - though the latter is a fun lil thing abt the family, so i would love if u went that route too ! sid and her sib have had. a rough life. and by that i mean, they had an entirely perfect life up until the sib was aged 18 - when they were arrested for the murder of their well to do parents. it’s all explained more clearly within sid’s intro, and basically… the evidence was circumstantial and flimsy. it probably would have made sense they spend SOME time behind bars, but it’s also possible they didn’t - though sid was put into care for the remainder of her teens, so may not know they were ever released ! the two very distinct routes this could go in are …. sid being suspicious of them and feeling as if they must of done it, because who else could have, or alternatively - sid being open to the idea of them not, because nothing about the case ever sat right w her. we could talk more abt it, but i feel like it’s one of those connects i just. wld love to have ! )

sidney knox-khan, our maya hawke is looking for their foster family ( parents, siblings, etc ) who resemble ariela barer, iman meskini, madchen amick, santiago segura, herman tommeraas, bradley cooper / up to player and should be any age. applicants do not have to contact rachel to talk over details before applying. ( sid never took their name, so first up - that’s a detail open to applicants ! basically. there’s a mother, a father, and their merry band of foster kids - probably… four… five? a nice amount. none of them have to be like one another. none of them have to fit a specific role. this is the family that took sidney in after her parents were murdered, and the fact of the matter is - there are a LOT of stories in which foster care became a hell for the protagonist, but that’s not sid’s story. she was ostracized in school. she had lost her only blood relations. her foster home became a safe haven, and the people within it became as close as could be to her. we stan one supportive household who still hold her whole heart, to this day. )

sidney knox-khan, our maya hawke is looking for their close friends ( max. four ) who resemble virginia gardner, justice smith, sydney park / up to player and should be 21+. applicants do not have to contact rachel to talk over details before applying. ( sid didn’t have ANY friends until she got to college, due completely to how #weird people began to find her. she eventually found her squad, but they’re basically. like every good horror movie group. her equivalent would be rany meeks from scream 1996, or noah foster from scream tv. she fits their archetype, but i wouldn’t say that the group MUST comprise of likeminded people. in fact, it’s more fun if they don’t. they’re not a group of jocks or cheerleaders or popular kids, but they are a sort of breakfast club. a merry band of b-listers who grouped together and have remained together for a real long time. )

sidney knox-khan, our maya hawke is looking for their ex poly ship who resemble up to player and should be 21+. applicants do not have to contact rachel to talk over details before applying. ( sidney made a bunch of… not entirely excellent choices, in the yrs following her parents deaths. that isn’t to say she acted out, or that she did anything that was too out of character for her. she really didn’t - but she did become a much more WEIRD version of who she had always been, and people pushed her away because of it. when others came along that seemed to be able tolerate who she had become, she clung to them - to almost extreme degrees. the relationship was a whirlwind if ever there was one, and perhaps wasn’t ‘true love’. maybe not even close. but they did seem to work right up until when they didn’t - and the end was quite messy, by all standards. sid did a good job of ending relationships on friendly terms, but this didn’t - all details aside from these are open for discussion ! )

#equinox.intro #˚ 　　biography 　 .　　 . ⊹ the grandchild of witches you weren’t able to burn.#death mention cw #murder mention cw

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ayerayerproject · 5 years

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Word from the ‘Wart

By Li Li Chung

What is “green”? There’s the color green, which is as soothing as blue and opposite of fiery red.

Trees, foliage are mostly green. I like this subtitle – “Some Kind of Green” in Yahoo News’ Five Singapore statistics that stunned in 2018: “The Botanic Gardens are a UNESCO World Heritage site and almost half the city is under green cover, but we are undeniably wasteful. The 820 million plastic supermarket bags that Singapore uses each year could fill Gardens by the Bay 126 times over. Only about 2 percent of those bags are recycled.”

We can eat green: organic, vegan although I am not fond of eating only uncooked, cold food and I can only take so much of shriveled, air-dried vegetables and portobello mushrooms pretending to be hamburger buns.

This looks positive: “The Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources (MEWR) has designated 2019 as the Year Towards Zero Waste”. The statistic quoted: “Of the 1.6 million tonnes of domestic waste disposed of in 2017, one third consisted of packaging waste (includes plastics)”. Zero is good, right? To me, zero has an artificial “feel good” ring to it. If whatever you consume is burnt up/recycled 100%, net net it’s zero.

So, the official posture gives the impression that our problem in Singapore is mostly about not recycling enough. In fact, some argue that we don’t have a plastic waste problem, it’s only “11 percent of the total waste generated in Singapore in 2017”. What about the demand side, are we overconsuming plastic material? We would not have to recycle so much if we did not use so much in the first place (a stunning 2017 stat: 7.7 million tonnes of waste were produced in Singapore, a seven-fold increase from 40 years ago). The Zero Waste press release says: “Of the 1.6 million tonnes of domestic waste disposed of in 2017, one-third consisted of packaging waste (includes plastics)”. So we are advised to “... avoid single-use disposables where possible. Bring your own reusable bags, containers, and utensils. Choose products with less/green packaging”. That “green” word again. Green also means dissolving miraculously back into nature without harming it or any living thing.

But wait, there’s another color: blue. “Launch of the Singapore Blue Plan 2018!”, which is an impressive 230-page document on what to do about protecting marine life. At around the same time, a motion to charge for plastic bags was rejected in Parliament. A side thought on fighting diabetes: drink more water to cut back on sweet drinks. Connected topics?

Will we Singaporeans only get excited when microplastics show up inside our food? Ernest Goh’s Plasticity project talks about what we don’t see: the microplastic bits that marine life mistakes for food. Makes one think carefully about eating fish as a healthier alternative to meat. It is not conclusive that consuming fish meat carrying microplastics is directly harmful to humans, causing malfunction of our organs. Do we need such hard evidence before we buck up and do something about how much plastic material we are using and throwing away? It’s showing up: “Toxic bacteria found on small pieces of plastic trash from Singapore beaches”.

The tough question is how are we to behave? How do we stop using so much plastic? Is it enough, just shouting to get people to do the right thing? Should we be made to stop using so much plastic?

My favorite plastic gripe is the sale of bottled water (nearly 30% of discarded plastic items). I think we should stop selling them. But, in Singapore, it is not as easy as carrying water from home in your own bottle. It is about finding where in Singapore to refill them. And on that, we are sorely behind other countries. Not only are drinking water dispensers hard to find around Singapore, restaurants, and pubs will not refill your water bottle if you just want to walk in and ask. Nearly all beverage vendors in hawker centers/food courts charge 30cents for a cup of boiled water. Nowhere else except in Singapore, do I cringe at possibly getting scolded for asking for water from a food or beverage vendor. Would it be easy for the government to give a tax break to F&B businesses to allow them to give out free water? If we can ban chewing gum in one fell swoop, we can ban selling plastic bottled water, no?

What can we safely eat? That portobello mushroom bun doesn’t look so comical after all.

Li Li Chung is the founder of Exactly Foundation, a photography art residency based in Singapore. The Residency aims to enable professional photographers and visual journalists to produce works in Singapore that share and propagate the Foundation’s mission and vision. Importantly, the Foundation aims to dialogue and provide through private gatherings of viewers the experience of personal attainment of different perspectives and new ways of “looking” at community issues in Singapore. Secondly, the Residency allows for the Photographer to connect with other Singapore-based practitioners as well as other key professionals and thinkers for dialogue and feedback.

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warmbeebosoftbeebo · 6 years

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Why don't you get your nose out of what other people are into kink wise?? Because even anal is uncomfortable and unpleasant for people and they would consider that violating and triggering. If you don't like the things someone says or posts then fuck off and unfollow instead of shame them for what they enjoy. Kink shaming is not cool dude. I'm sure there's plenty of people that hate anal and you wouldn't like being made to feel like a freak for liking it. Grow up.

oh, boy, buckle up.

i brought it up in a new post, not naming her or alluding to her post, because it is something seen so fucking often both in this fandom and on the internet generally. she also specifically said for him to squeeze his arm around her neck till she passes out. if she had said something like “i’d like him to stroke my neck while i hold my breath as long as i comfortably can and one or both of us plays with my pussy till i come” i would barely have cared, and it wouldn’t have gotten me back on my soap box again. she responded to my post in a reblog and i responded back. she initiated the conversation between us with that reblog. and i responded back, trying to explain my views clearly albeit longly, once.

men choking women is a common sexual act, a meme, and a threat online, and within this fandom. “if you don’t like it fuck off”? honestly, that’s telling women to leave the public square and go back to the kitchen and bedroom and laying back and thinking of england if they can’t handle “robust speech” or sexuality in media in public. i couldn’t be online or in this fandom if i couldn’t handle seeing it, or refused to see it.

here’s another link on the dangers of strangulation https://tonic.vice.com/en_us/article/jpnj5x/how-risky-is-it-to-be-choked-during-sex

this whole “anti kink shaming” thing is just.. if kink shaming is terribly wrong, then we literally cannot criticize anything ever, bc everything is “kinky” (a sexual turn on, a fetish) to someone somewhere. and this is an old joke, but what if your kink is kink shaming? thought we couldn’t criticize any kinks?

the reality is, almost everyone, at least those with any ethical discernment kink shames *something.* if they couldn’t find *anything* that was shrouded in “omg hot sexy stuff” objectionable, i’d honestly be scared of them, and would hope at least that victimized people would have to deal with them.

what about all sorts of dangerous things that are eroticized? i’m thinking specifically about purposely seeking out hiv (mostly men), unprotected pia, knowingly exposing another to a significant risk of contracting hiv (also men; women simply don’t pose the same risk both re “sexual” fluids other than blood and how it is contracted sexually, receptive pia being the highest risk, followed by receptive piv). re: you can talk about choking, being choked, say vaguely that you should do it safely, but not talk about WHY it’s dangerous, what stats are on injury and death, what can happen, etc is like saying you can talk about pia and condoms, but not hiv or other risks of injury from it. i didn’t focus on the danger/risk of pia in my initial post, but it is high, way higher than people think or want to believe. should we not be concerned with those who want to infect other people with hiv, and people who want to be infected or is that prudish, immature kink shaming?

i’m sure there’s things you kink shame. for example, let’s examine pseudo child pornography eg a 18-19 girl pretending to be and usually looking like a naive 14 years old or younger child, with a man in his 40s while they roleplay that he’s her father/stepfather/friend’s father/uncle/coach while he “introduces” her to sex, usually violently, with a focus on men “ruining” and “spoiling” “innocence.” is that fine and dandy? is a father with teenage or preteen daughters watching this and whacking off to it fine and dandy? considering the rates at which girls are abused by their mom’s boyfriends and husbands, what if a man living with a woman and her kids whacks off to this? what if he finds himself fantasizing about her 12 year old daughter?

how about necrophilia? what if a man can only get hard, turned on, come if the woman he’s with *pretends to be dead*? what if he strangles a woman “consensually” until she passes out, then either continues or starts to enter her with his penis? what if he tells women he can only be turned on if he inflicts enough violence on her that he could have killed her?

a few years ago, there was an rcmp cop in canada, jim brown, who was found to have a “kink” for the kidnapping, torture (including bondage and use of knives) and murder of women. he had porn of it, he looked for women to roleplay it, he posted porn he had made online, etc. one news story describes it thusly: “progresses from an apparent street scene of a woman walking past Brown sitting on a wall; he overpowers her; he hog-ties her, and he imprisons her in a cage.In one image, Mulgrew notes, Brown appears to be wearing only his regulation-issue Mountie boots and is aroused carrying a huge knife while the naked woman cringes in terror.” he also worked tangentially on the robert pickton case (a serial killer who murdered dozens of women, mostly indigenous and mostly in prostitution). was he a man who should work on such a case? should he be a cop hearing women’s stories of male sexualized violence? should he be looking at photographic and other evidence of rape, torture, kidnapping?

to get more obviously back on topic, strangulation is the third leading cause of male-induced/violent death for women, second only to murder with knives and guns. strangulation is the second biggest red flag for lethal male violence, second only to him threatening you with death. imagine if we eroticized other leading causes of death for other groups of people: shooting someone during sex, stabbing them in the torso, etc. carefully and safely, of course. how about complications during pregnancy and birth in teen girls? that’s the number one killer of girls 15-19 worldwide. why not turn that into something sexy too? car accidents are also a common cause of death. let’s sex that up too. heart disease and cancer are big killers too. lets look at the leading cause of violent death for young black men: homicide. for black boys, it’s unintentional injury. why not eroticize what leads to their deaths too?

interestingly, the “rough sex gone wrong” defense came to the public’s attention in another strangulation murder case https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/08/nyregion/consent-sexual-assault-rough-sex.html

and here’s a recent case, a rare one in that the man seems genuine in his remorse because he quickly confessed, of a young man strangling a young woman to death in seconds. she also had an interest in it and sought it out. she died anyway. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5492075/Killer-strangled-woman-death-sex.html “the pair had a ‘shared interest’ in ‘erotic asphyxiation’ …Chloe had died in 'seconds’ after he had seized her neck during sex.”

the ads i linked to featuring men strangling women: what do you think of those? how do you feel about how it’s portrayed in pornography? is opposing those kink shaming too, because lots of people, esp men, get off on it, and the men who make that porn generally want to make such pornography and usually have a lot of hatred for women. same with those who make the ads. they find it arousing.

it boggles my mind on how things that people would get raked over the coals for if they presented as humorous, gets a free pass because some guy somewhere gets an erection from it. like that rcmp cop? can you imagine if he was telling jokes like that in a comedy club? what the same people who defended him would be saying instead? but seek out vulnerable women when you’re a white male police officer, “roleplay” with them, make porn of it n post it online n you’re the bdsm martyr of the year, cruelly punished for your private life by prudish busybodies who need to mind their own business and keep their noses out of people’s bedrooms. there’s that public vs private divide. anything sexual is private, even when public, and you cannot criticize the private. rape jokes are bad, terrible, trivialize rape and sexual trauma and misogyny, but rape play is hot as fuck. you can humor shame and speech shame but don’t dare kink shame.

now onto why i referenced anal stimulation and entry, inc pia. i did so precisely bc most females experience of it with males is rape, painful, unwanted, etc. the more it happens, the more likely it is to be rape. the increase in college age people engaging in pia is treated like a big catcally joke and proof of sexual liberation and how awesome porn is and how it’s hot sex, but it is almost universally rape for young women and girls. strangulation and choking of women is seen similarly, and women and girls are expected to eroticize, engage in, and tolerate both. i brought it up precisely bc i like anal stimulation (as outlined in that post, excluding pia) but recognize that it is profoundly harmful in how it is practiced especially for girls growing up and young women, as well as women generally. if i was glib with anal entry of women (with a penis or something smaller) in my fic or posting about what i want to do with b, i’d want people to pull me up on it. it would be contributing to this coercive, painful sexual environment women and girls are in where they don’t want it and find it painful even though they are told they should, sex should be painful for women, women are a collection of openings for male use, etc. i purposely reign myself in and keep it to myself most of the time because of this.

you cannot read panic fic, surf tumblr, etc without certain “kinks” namely strangulation (and to a lesser extent choking), and daddy kink and dd/lg smacking you in the face. similarly, if i smacked someone in the face with how i depicted anal entry of women with men, i’d hope they’d rebel against it, tell me about it, etc. by all means, kink shame away. someone engaging critically with what i post doesn’t make me fucking melt or shivel up, literally or figuratively, and if you (general you, including me) post something publicly, we can expect reaction to it, esp if it’s not a direct confrontation but a “i’ve noticed this happening on tumblr/in fic/etc…” i’d say letting undue critique roll off one’s back, or engaging back n forth as two people wish to, is growing up. and hon, i’ve felt like a freak sexually, but not for that interestingly, but for my interest in tribadism and outercourse. not severely, but it was and sometimes still is there.

#strangulation

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mostlysignssomeportents · 6 years

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#1yrago Mondo 2000, influential 90s cyberculture magazine, returns online

Gareth Branwyn:

A few years ago, I started seeing evidence of the beginning swells of a nostalgia wave for the iconic 90s "cyberdelic" magazine Mondo 2000 and all things early 90s cyberpunk/cyberculture. One person on Facebook unearthed an old copy of Mondo, photographed it, and gushed all over it in a post. They asked (something like): "What could be cooler than a slick art magazine about virtual reality and cyberpunk, hacking, drugs and mind-alteration, weird art and high-weirdness?" I loved being able to respond: "Writing for it."

I also noticed, in 2014, when I published my writing collection, Borg Like Me, a lot of the focus in reviews was on the pieces reprinted from that era, from Mondo, bOING bOING (print), and my own zine, Going Gaga. People waxed nostalgic about that birth-of-cyberculture era, the creativity and promise that infused it, and the revolutionary dreams it inspired. Several reviews said: We need to bring some of this back. Stat!

It is perhaps that rising sentiment that has prompted Mondo's equally iconoclastic creator, RU Sirius, to resurface Mondo 2000 as an online blogazine. RU tells Boing Boing about the launch:

Read the rest:

https://boingboing.net/2017/08/24/the-highly-influential-90s-cyb.html

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godchased · 6 years

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@talonsaconite cont.

“I assure you, our discussions were purely work-related.” Of course, that didn’t mean the question of ethics hadn’t come up. Vivienne was skeptical. The woman unnerved her in a raw, instinctual way, and knowing she’d had part in certain experimental procedures did nothing to erase the chill that ran down her spine as they shook hands. She would need to be careful, and hope the specimen captured her interest more than any human test subjects.

In a shady bar, her voice hushed as they hid in a shadowy corner, Graham made her pitch.

“You know in the advent of Godzilla’s reveal to the public, Monarch has expanded their search for more Titans around the globe. We had a handful of specimens under watch before the San Francisco incident, but in recent years we’ve uncovered several superspecies.” There were files, bare bones. It was confidential of course, but minuscule, she would never bring anything incriminating. Really these were just thermal scans of Rodan and Mothra, the Russian facility and photographs of the Philippine mine. No locations, no stats, no test results. If Joe wanted more, she would earn it like any other Monarch employee.

This specimen, however, this was risky. Monster Zero. There were vital scans, CT scans of each head, calculated estimates of his size, readings of the ice. The structural integrity of the sheet was holding, for now, but there was an unmistakable undertone of dread as she explained,” This is the largest superspecies yet. We’ve found evidence of aurum in the scales, we estimate he conducts electricity naturally, but as a byproduct excites the atmosphere to create storm systems. Note the wings. They’re so taught, he generates winds in excess of 200 miles per hour in flight. And he is over 500 feet tall, easily dwarfing Godzilla, and that only scratches the surface of what he is capable of.”

She’s baiting her, subtly to say ‘there are more secrets, better secrets if you say yes’.

“Sumerian texts describe him as ‘the death song of three storms’. They called him Ghidorah.” Her hand floats over one page, comparing him to the Divine Comedy. Perhaps she is Vigil, and Joe is Dante who must behold the Devil with Three Faces,” We need competent researchers to analyze him. We can’t risk drilling into the ice or we might release him. What do you think?”

#talonsaconite #>Timeframe >Main #>>this got so long but hey come join our awesome kaiju hunting club #>:>we got everything: Giant robots. Aliens. Whatever the heck He/dorah is

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livehealthynewsusa · 3 years

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What’s behind ben Simmons epic playoff meltdown?

It’s a defining moment in a close Game 7, but instead of throwing it off, Simmons fits in with teammate Matisse Thybulle in traffic.

Thybulle is fouled and goes to the line, taking only one free throw instead of the almost certain two points and one that would have come if Simmons had been fouled.

A collective moan echoes through the Wells Fargo Center. Sixers’ center Joel Embiid lowers his shoulders in frustration. The moment becomes an instant meme. The Sixers lose momentum and ultimately the game and the series. Simmons becomes a persona non grata in Philadelphia. His name is now directly on the trading block. There are reports that he won’t play for the Boomers in the Olympics.

The moment provides a snapshot of Simmons’ four year run in Philly where his failure to develop his offensive play and lack of chemistry on the court with teammate Embiid have been a constant source of frustration for fans and led to constant speculation that one the two ‘trial’ stars have to get away. After the meltdown on Monday, the calls for the dispatch of Simmons have reached fever. The problem for the Sixers is that from his chaotic performance on this series, his value may have fallen so far that they will find it difficult to make a decent return.

After the game it got ugly. Embiid tossed his teammate under the bus and found that Simmons had given up the open dunk the moment the game was lost, despite having made eight turnovers himself – to be fair, Embiid was playing on a partially torn meniscus. Coach Doc Rivers, who had defended Simmons all season, joined in, saying he didn’t know if Simmons had what it takes to be point guard on a championship team. Experts like Shaquille O’Neal, Charles Barkley and Magic Johnson piled up, all stressing the fact that the Sixers are paralyzed because they have a star with a $ 217 million contract who is out of the game due to his lack of shooting skills Can play crunch time. O’Neal even went so far as to say that if he were Simmons’ teammate he would have “knocked out his butt”.

Yes, it could be called a rough week for Australia’s biggest basketball star.

I interviewed Simmons for a cover story in Philadelphia in 2018 and have followed his career closely ever since. As a fan, Simmons’ mental breakdown and the subsequent media and internet gathering was brutal. But I have to say I share the frustrations. Simmons is the kind of enigmatic star who teases you with glimpses of his otherworldly talent in one game, only to vanish completely the next. It’s annoying, which only makes Simmons’ cool demeanor and disapproval of criticism worse.

When we showed Simmons on our cover from May 2018, he was very popular. As the next LeBron touted James, his rookie stats were gaudy – 16, 8, and 8. The problem is, Simmons has been offensive since then. That season, he logged 14, 7, and 7. To his credit, he has made himself an elite defender, joining the All-NBA Defensive First Team for the second year in a row, and second this year to Utah’s Rudy Gobert took place in the choice of Defensive Player of the Year.

I have a theory that Simmons deliberately worked on this side of his game to divert attention from his offensive stagnation. He remains an electrifying force in flux, with an amazing court vision that enables him to find teammates for open looks. It works well enough in the regular season, but in play-off time when the game slows down to a half-field chess game decided by “knights” like Devin Booker, Kawhi Leonard and Kevin Durant who take their own shot can create, Simmons becomes a burden, giving up the ball like a hot potato and lurking aimlessly in the spot of the dark. It forces Embiid to come off the post and play an open game if he should dominate on the block. It basically means the Sixers are a man on the offensive.

Simmons’ refusal to take outside shots was now compounded by his refusal to go into the basket for fear of being fouled. First the Wizards and then the Hawks employed a successful “hack-a-Simmons” strategy that took him to a record low of 34 percent in this year’s play-offs – even worse than Shaq!

Theories about Simmons’ struggles are online all over the place right now, and I’ve developed a few myself. Back when Simmons headed our cover, everyone expected his offensive play to develop, assuming he eventually started shooting threesomes. At the time, Simmons told me he was working on his jump shot and if it got better, watch out. “The thing about the shooting is that once I get it where I want it, nobody can stop me,” he said. And so we waited. Every year during the off-season, Simmons posted videos filming from the outside in training, which raised the hopes of Sixers fans only to be dashed once the season started and he was stuck. Teammates talked about how he shot the ball free in practice, hoping it would start shooting in games, but it never happened. Instead, it may have created a dichotomy between exercise and play that has become a gaping mental chasm that Simmons cannot cross.

That’s when he actually does the work. Simmons’ lack of progress on the offensive has led many to speculate (and point to his Instagram account as evidence) that he cares more about his flashy cars, dogs, and game than going to the gym and busting his Repair sweater.

ESPN’s Stephen A Smith said this week he received a text message through Simmons from someone close to the Philadelphia situation:Quote, he doesn’t work, he doesn’t listen, and everyone around him is a family and he is becoming babies all the time. “

Smith then added on SportsCenter: “They asked him for four years to improve his jump shot. He ignored coaches, he ignored assistant coaches, he ignored teammates, he ignored his agent, he ignored family members because he loved being in LA, in South Beach likes to say he went to the gym to play instead of the gym to go to work on my game. And it came back to bite him – because the only thing you can say about Ben Simmons is that he can’t shoot. “

Who knows if that’s true, but it seems likely that it was always a little too easy for Simmons. He grew up a supernaturally gifted player with absurd abilities for someone six feet tall and is the best player on any team he has ever played on. He never really had to fight, which resulted in complacency about his game and possibly a shaky work ethic. Compare him to Hawks’ point guard Trae Young, who is similarly gifted but only 6’1 inches tall. Young was told he was too small since he was a child. He had to fight every step of the way. As a result, as he showed first against the Knicks, then against the Sixers and now in Game 1 of the European Championship final against the Bucks, he is an ice-cold killer on the pitch.

Sometimes Simmons seemed a little too pleased with his game. During our interview he was defensive about his shooting and cited his stats as evidence that his game was in good shape. He seemed to be saying there was no need for improvement. “I don’t worry that much because my average is 17, 8 and 8,” he said at the time. “Boys haven’t done this in their entire careers, so if I do that in 50 games I think I’ll play well.”

But while the mental side of Simmons’ game seems to be in free fall at the moment, it’s possible that the ultimate source of his struggles lies in a mechanical problem that has evolved into a psychological problem over time. One theory popularized by The Ringer’s Kevin O’Connor is that Simmons shoots with the wrong hand. The statistics prove it: Simmons dropped the ball 67 shots with his right hand this postseason, compared to just nine shots with his left hand. That rate coincides with his career rate using his right hand, which dates back to his time at LSU, writes O’Connor.

Simmons told The New York Daily News in 2016 that his father encouraged him to photograph left-handed as an adult. “I think I should be right. But now everything is natural ”. I asked Simmons about it right away. He scoffed, then sighed in annoyance as if I’d asked him if the world was flat. “People like to make up shit,” he said. “Maybe I’m writing with the wrong hand?” There are reports that the Sixers are finally trying to address this and get Simmons to shoot with his right hand. They can do that too, because it can hardly get worse.

It is also reported there that he will use the off-season to work on “skill development” instead of representing the Boomers at the Olympics. It reminded me of what Simmons told me in 2018 when I asked him about his goals. He replied that you should win a championship, win a gold medal in the Olympics and be “the greatest player of all time”. “You have to set the bar high,” he said. Back then, those goals seemed lofty; today, they seem like pipe dreams.

The problem is, when it comes to his offensive play, I think Simmons may have set the bar too high. So high that he was afraid he would fail. Whatever your sport, once that particular seed takes root in your head, you are in mental quicksand. Simmons fired a total of four shots in Game 7 against the Hawks. You have to shoot to score. You have to take risks to progress and sometimes you have to fail to build the chip on your shoulder and the mental resilience you need to succeed. Now that he has failed on the biggest stage of all, we hope that Simmons is finally ready to overcome his physical and mental blockages. He may be in a bad position right now, but the chances are that after falling this deep, Simmons is right where he needs to be: a player with nothing to lose.

source https://livehealthynews.com/whats-behind-ben-simmons-epic-playoff-meltdown/

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