#I just do not have the editing talent or patience anymore

[raytm]

I was talking with a friend about this earlier but as much as I would love to be a blog with pretty graphics and aesthetically pleasing writing I don’t have it in me to make icons anymore. like ? I could waste a whole half an hour trying to cater an icon to the thread and it would drive me absolutely insane.

#I’m even too lazy for coloured text these days #it’s my hope that I can write in a way that potrays the expression enough that it doesn’t need icons #but I do miss having like a header / icons / page breaks #I just do not have the editing talent or patience anymore #ooc.

[chezzywezzy]

Yandere Kurt Kunkle (4/4)

Word count ; 4.2k

*Edited.

*Sorry for being an hour late! Jut woke up. I decided to sleep in today :)

“Are you guys ready?” Jessie hyped from the stage, charismatic, charming, and incredibly sarcastic. 

If Kurt wasn’t as jealous as he was, he would’ve been a fan. What fueled him more was seeing his girlfriend in the audience, near the front. She was adamantly watching. Kurt had his stream up. He only glanced at his reflection, and he had to admit, the car crash did a number on him. He had a bash in his skull and she blood dribbling from his mouth. His left eye was black and bruised. His shirt was torn. Even Kurt knew he looked unhinged.

Jessie did her mantra, and it irked the man. He was somewhat dazed, fingers twitching as he waited. He wanted it to be a spectacle. For Jessie to drop dead at the end of her show and to have Y/n flock to him for comfort the minute he saw him. It was just so unfair for Jessie Adams to have everything. The fame, the shows, the love of his life.

“All eyes on me. I want to be seen,” Kurt giggled.

He notice this chat was calling him a psycho. Delusional. Insane. It was funny, because he was the victim in the situation.

“Great. Get your phones out like we do every time. This is our favorite part, right?”

Kurt couldn’t help but pull his phone closer to his face, even though the overhead light blinded the camera. He pulled the gun to the stream, showing it off.

Jessie was prancing around on stage. She wasn’t even telling jokes anymore. It irked him that she was a ‘comedian.’ The woman was stalling. She completely lacked talent. How did Kurt just now blow up, after ten years of hard work, but Jessie squired thousands. In a matter of a few years?

Kurt’s gaze flitted back to the camera. He received a donation. ‘I made a Kurt Pepe to celebrate his survival.’ He didn’t say anything, though, returning his attention to the gig.

“So, if you follow me on social media, you probably know me and my girlfriend had to put some skeezy bozo, the driver included, in their places during a Spree ride today. The bozo, though, was all like ‘Come on, girl, give me a smile.’ Ugh, I mean, that’s not breaking news to any woman in this room. We go through this shit every day.” Some woman cheered from the audience in support of this statement. “What really grinder our gears was the slurs. I have to applaud him, though. It’s not every day a guy ticks all three boxes : I mean, any girl would be lucky to have him. Racist, misogynist, and homophobic?”

“Fuck that guy!”

“Right? Fuck that guy,” Jessie hollered. “He was a date-rape drug in person. And I was angry at this guy, but then I got sad. Because of the driver. The Spree driver.” Kurt turned the camera back to him. He was baffled. Maybe Y/n did have a point in their call earlier. “First of all, he was hitting on my girlfriend - and terribly, might I add - since they were real life friends. But second, he was like, ‘how’d you get suck a big following? We should share tips.’”

Kurt felt numb and angry at the same time. She was making a complete mockery of him. He raised the gun, his hands trembling. His patience had been tested all day. Oh, it was hard not to pull the trigger.

“And then he was kind of, like, soft begging, like,’ Oh, please, lord, tag me.’ And it was so sad and pathetic. And…” Jessie’s expression completely changed. Kurt was taken aback. “It was just like me.” That made Kurt pause. He finally started listening to what she was saying. Deeply. “I went to my granny’s house after with my girlfriend. My… my safe place, like my pre-show sanctuary. And I could not shake that ride. Like, I was so pissed. And I was thinking about that guy, and that ‘please tag me’ energy. And I was like,’ ugh god, that was pure me.’ Like, he was me. I’ve done that shit before. 

“And then I just, like, reckoned with myself. For the last two years, I’ve been saying,’ All eyes on me.’ Now I finally have what I want, and I am creeped the fuck out. I’m serious. It’s like, whether you have twenty-million followers or twenty follower, we’re all being watched and judged and hated. And you love it, you love it. You need it. You’re all addicted to it.”

Kurt completely zoned out. This horrible, unfair woman… was right. For years, he had been trying to get the girl. But was the answer in front of him all along? Did he just… have to put down the camera —?

No. This woman knew he’d be watching. But he couldn’t deter himself now. How tens of thousands of followers he’d now acquired made the difference. He was making a difference. And at the end of the night, he’d get that girl. No doubt was in his mind.

“…And that’s why, when I wake up tomorrow, I’m going cold turkey. No more social media for me.” Kurt was stunned. She couldn’t be serious. Nobody could live without it. Not Kurt, not Y/n, and certainly not the woman who made a career of it. Kurt’s hands were trembling. He had to shoot. He needed to shoot.

“Okay! All eyes on this, bitch!”

That was all Kurt needed. It was like a lightbulb went off. He couldn’t do it here. Not now. He had to get Y/n and Jessie Adams alone. He had enough eyes on him to commit the deed. He was considering it as a… subscriber-only special.

And so, he darted out of the room to continue with his plan B.

~~~

Spree was down. Because of a murderous Spree driver. I was almost relieved our Spree Social was with Kurt and a total asshole. It could have been us that were victims. So, instead, Miles rang up a GoGo. I knew what Jessie was doing; she was a lesbian flirting with a man. But, apparently Miles was too obsessed with her to realize that we weren’t just setting up for a threesome.

“It’s a white coupe!” Miles informed, flashing a sloven grin. 

Jessie wrapped her arm around my shoulders her fake smile dropping in a flash. Miles was called over by some ‘bro’s, but that was enough for us to make our mighty escape. We exited through the back and dashed up to the white coupe. Miles calling out to us from the outside.

I slipped inside, and slammed the door. The window was down, so as Jessie exclaimed,” Drive, drive, drive!”, she flashed a middle finger out the window.

I laughed loudly, a little tipsy from drinking all night. Jessie was also drunk, but she was better at hiding it. If anything, her mind was clearer after a few beers. I leaned against the window, a grin permanently glued to my face as the driver took off. 

“God, at least he can’t spam me anymore, seeing as I broke my fucking phone,” Jessie sighed, leaning against the headrest. She was already on the verge of dozing off, but since we were going to her place, it wouldn’t be worth napping.

I nudged her playfully, and she reached over, intertwining our fingers. The city was dark and the roads were vacant. Jessie suddenly spoke up, incredibly alert,” Wait, what address did he give you?”

“Three-seventy-five south Hobart.”

“Okay, good.”

“Good.”

My heart froze. Maybe I was just drunk, but I leaned into the front, peering at the driver incredulously. I was… terrified when I saw the driver was Kurt. It may have been dark, but his jawline and dampened bangs were instantly recognizable. He glanced at me, flashing me a smile. I instantly withdrew into the back, blinking in surprise.

“Kurt?”

“The one and only.”

“H - how…”

“It’s my job, Y/n.”

“Wait, Kurt - oh, my god. Are you stalking her —“

“Yeah, you literally work for Spree —“

“Well, I’m sorry I’m not a super famous comedian and I have to work two jobs to pay the bills,” he suddenly snapped. He glared at us in the rear view mirror, and a pang of guilt hit me. But, although he was still displeased, he returned his gaze to the road. An awkward silence fell over us.

“I’m about to pass out. Fuck, I’m stressed.”

Shivers rolled down my spine. Kurt had made me incredibly alert now, but Jessie was clearly winded from the show. I let her lean her head down. I stared out at the passing traffic, hand on my chest to calm my pounding heart.

“Jessie,” Kurt suddenly spoke up, an eerie smile on his face,” I liked your set tonight. It was… it was inspirational.”

That was what made Jessie alert. She didn’t have her seatbelt on, so she scooted closer to me. She had a deathly grip on my hand. I squeezed it, as a silent ‘everything will be okay.’

“You saw it?”

“Hell yeah. I was there. It was awesome. Jessie, I think you’re actually a genius.”

“Thanks man. Uh… don’t take what I said to heart. If anything, take it as a compliment. I, uh, broke my phone for you…”

“I’m so glad you didn’t take that water bottle earlier. That would have been…”

“Why, Kurt?”

My question fell on deaf ears. Jessie was fading, and Kurt was selective with his hearing. I didn’t like that he chose not to answer it. “You know, Jessie, when you were talking up there, I realized inside of me, it was like this activator. And it, like… whoa, all of a sudden, the things that you were saying, I realized they were in my head, but I just had not thought them yet.”

“Okay… cool.”

I pulled my dead phone from my pocket. “Um, Kurt, do you have a phone charger in here?”

Kurt glanced at me, and I noticed something was dripping from his hair. He turned back before I could recognize it, though. “Um, nope. I need to charge my phone for work.”

“My phone’s dead. If I could use it for just a minute —“

“No.”

Ouch. Maybe he was holding a grudge from earlier. But something was off. Jessie was doing her darndest to stay awake, and somehow, she asked the fundamental question :

“Why are we going east? We need to be going west.”

“You know what I’m all about now, Jessie? I’m all about love. That was the fundamental issue me and Y/n had. But I’m a man of love, now.” It was like I wasn’t even in the car. Jessie was petrified, and Kurt was motioning like a madman, grinning ear to ear.

“You can just… just pull over here and let us out —“

“Okay, just listen to me,” Kurt interrupted. “It’s good for you to hear this before you die. Love is more powerful than anything.”

We both fell silent. I clung to the woman, petrified. 

“Love is seriously the way to go. I mean, I’ve been in love with Y/n for years, but I just wasn’t showing it the right way. Imagine how happy she’d be from the audience growth I’ve had. And the audience growth we’d have for a leaked sex tape! I mean, having sex. We’re beyond having sex at that point. We’re, like, making love!”

“Where are we going, Kurt?” I squeaked fearfully, tears threatening to fall.

“Oh! I’m taking you home,” he said, confused. He turned completely, and I could see that what stained his face was blood. It glimmered in the street light.

“This is not the way to my fucking house, Kurt!” Jessie shrieked, having lost her temper once again. Understandably so, because the man was a maniac. And I felt guilty for creating it.

“Oh,” he sighed. “Not your home. My home.” He turned, looking at me again. His face was stone cold serious, and I couldn’t help but squeal quietly. 

“My home.”

Jessie, with flared nostrils, turned to look at me and I at her. The reality of the situation was setting in. Kurt was a fucking psycho. And we were going to die. And probably get raped first. For content.

This wasn’t the Kurt I knew. Or had he always been this way?

We continued driving in silence. Kurt turned into a deserted neighborhood, dark and dismal, but I knew the streets well. We were close to his home. Jessie pulled away, quietly shuffling through her purse. She withdrew a phone cord, wrapping her hands in it. Kurt was humming to himself.

I recognized the song. It was our favorite in high school. I knew it well.

 Grunting, Jessie suddenly pulled the phone cord over Kurt’s head and around his neck. Kurt kept one hand on the steering wheel as the car swerved, the other going to tug at the strong cord. I was left to sit back, not wanting to compromise Jessie’s plan in the slightest. Kurt was struggling, and struggling badly.

He was gasping for breath, finally releasing the wheel. His foot was slamming on the breaks, and that caused my head to skyrocket against the window. My vision went blurry and I lost control of my body as we swerved onto Kurt’s front lawn. 

Kurt finally shook himself free, and Jessie fell back, screaming. I took my foot up and went to kick his red face. He took it, but at the same time, caught my foot. I screamed trying to pull back. However, he tugged on it, maiming me in the backseat.

He undid his seatbelt with his free hand. He looked pained as I swatted at his leering body. He grabbed me by hair and bashed my head into the window. It didn’t knock me out completely, but I was winded. I didn’t have enough strength to stop him as he surely attacked Jessie the same.

Silence fell over the car, except for the ringing in my ears. And that’s when I felt Jessie’s side of the car open. I glanced over, fingers twitching, as I watched her body fall out the car. Kurt was paying me no mind, talking to his stream, as he hoisted Jessie up and started dragging her to the middle of the field.

This was the time to escape. Y/n, please, wake the fuck up.

I sat up abruptly, screeching out of terror when I saw that Kurt had dragged Jessie’s body into the middle of the field. He was waving a gun in one arm, and a phone in the other. I must not have alerted him. 

I tried opening the door, but then I noticed a certain red light on the handle : the child’s lock was on. I stomped my foot and began attempting to climb into the front. I noticed, though, that this drew Kurt’s attention back to me. He began walking over to the car, but I noticed Jessie twitching from behind him.

Good.

I was half in the front seat. He was almost there, but in a last ditch effort to save my skin, I reached over and locked the driver’s side door. Kurt, with a pouting expression banged on the window. I flinched, trying to push myself up further.

“Y/n, unlock the door. You’re acting irrational.”

“Me?” I shrieked, banging on the window back. “You’r the one fucking killing people, Kurt!”

I kicked, pushing three-fourths of my body into the front. Kurt, with a strained face, was now slamming the back of his gun into the window. And yet, just as I clambered into the front seat, a shot was fired.

But not at me.

I covered my head instinctually. Silence fell, but then I heard roaring laughter and an ‘oops!’

I looked up, trying to reposition myself. But, as I looked up, I realized what he’d shot. Jessie.

A scream bubbled but could not escape. I was frozen, even when another gunshot fired. It was muted, probably due to the silencer clipped on the front. Tears were streaming down my face. I suddenly flinched, though, my gaze flitting away from Jessie’s corpse as glass shattered on me.

Before I could react to the shattered window, though, Kurt reached in and unlocked the door. I tried scrambling to the other side, but as my body turned, he grabbed my ankle and dragged me out. My head hit the step on the way, and the ringing got louder.

I felt the world underneath me move. I heard vague, enthused chatter as two warm arms hooked under mine and pulled me off the ground. I couldn’t will my eyes to open, but I also wouldn’t allow myself to pass out. Jessie had died fighting for her life because of my friend. The least I could do was escape, too.

I felt grunting as I was hoisted over a back. Footsteps ensued, and I couldn’t help but bury my blood-stained face in the crook of Kurt’s neck. I was aware of what was going on around me. I just couldn’t move my body in the slightest. 

A door opened. I assumed we were entering his house. I was in so much pain. And yet, Kurt was still humming our song. He was stronger than I ever gave him credit for. But that was beside the point.

I was dropped on a cushioned area. The couch, I think. My head lulled back instinctually, and I tried to tune into the one-sided conversation. Fingers poked and prodded at my face gleefully.

“…Now, I see you certain psychos in the chat begging for me to kill her,” Kurt chirped. “Sorry, not happening anytime soon. Right now, I’m thinking about finishing off dad and then getting the fuck out with her. You guys might not have a stream from us in a while, on account of escaping the police. That’s tough luck you know?

“But god, just look at her. All sound asleep… I should clean her off a bit before we get going.”

Kurt pulled away, but just then, I heard a manic, deep cry. I muttered under my breath, finally having feeling return to my twitching body. Chris’s voice rang out. 

“Kurt…! Did you do this to your mother? Who did this?”

I heard him adjust his gun. “Sorry, dad. I just had to get her out of the way. I’m going to make this quick because Y/n and I are heading out soon. I’m thinking Nevada. I don’t want to be too far away from home, after all —“

“What the fuck are you talking about, man? Just put the gun down. We can talk about this —“

“We had an entire fucking lifetime to talk about it! We had tonight!” Kurt was pissed. I knew he always hated his father, and rightfully so. But nobody deserved to die in this situation. “But no-o-o, you cared more about your shitty soundtracks and drugs and alcohol. I’m done wasting my time being unhappy, I’m done wasting my time on you and mom!”

“Kurt, please… just think rationally. What would Y/n think —?”

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Just like that, it was like I had found life. But instead of immediately springing to my feet, I remained still, with my eyes closed. I heard blood splatter across the walls, and some even hit me. I heard Kurt laugh, satisfied.

“Wow! That was easier than I thought it would be. He didn’t even put up a fight. You’d think a selfish asshole like him would.”

He thudded back over to me, gripping my cheek and tilting my head up. I assumed his phone was in close proximity of my face. “Isn’t she cute, chat? I can’t believe some of you wanted her dead. I stole this wedding ring from mom. I plan on proposing when she wakes up, just to show you guys how much we love each other.”

His words made me sick to my stomach. Kurt had lost it. I scanned my brain for signs. When? How? Why? I couldn’t believe he’d always been this way. Maybe the change was so slow that I never could’ve called it. But I should’ve. Because lives would’ve been saved if I spotted the insanity sooner.

“Welp, let me give you guys a house tour while I pack.”

I heard him stomp away. The house became silent, except for Kurt’s distant, cheerful chatter. That was my queue. I hopped to my feet as quietly as I could, stabilizing myself. I’d taken too many blows and had sustained a limp. My face felt sweaty, but I knew better. It was caked blood.

I sent one glance over my shoulder, which confirmed that Chris had bled out right beside Kurt’s pale and deceased mother. I wanted to throw up on the spot, but I knew this was my chance to escape and call for help. I limped over to the front door, which had been left wide open. 

I almost laughed as I passed through the door frame. But it was all for nought, as Kurt’s shout of surprise echoed the living room behind me. That was enough to send me running, even though a jolt went through my body with every step.

Kurt’s house was in the middle of butt fuck nowhere. However, as I got closer to the road, preparing to scream, my leg caved. I let out a scream, but it was from pain. My leg had finally caved, and I facepalmed in the dirt. My immediate reaction was to claw myself back onto my feet and keep screaming, but a body tackled mine.

I let out voice-cracking sobs from the pain. I definitely twisted an ankle and got a concussion at the minimum. However, as a hand covered my mouth, I could only hear some loud hushes emitting from the psycho straddling me from behind.

“Calm down, Y/n. You’re safe now. Stop being so silly,” he comforted, pressing something metallic to my hair as he ran his fingers through it. His fingers were slimy and wet. I released mangled sobs into his hand.

His weight lifted off me for but a moment, and I was flipped onto my back. Even with a streetlamp shining on us, there were still black pots in my vision. I blinked furiously, finally being met with Kurt’s manic expression. He was so happy.  He shouldn’t have been. I didn’t see anything on his features betray anything else. He loomed over me, like a predator and prey.

“There we go. Nice and calm. This is how things are supposed to be, right, Y/n? Things are supposed to be fair. And now they are.” There was a hunger present in his eyes. He leaned closer, andI felt his breath fan across my face. “Now, I’m going to remove my hand and you’re going to be calm. Otherwise, I’ll have to knock you out. And that’s not how I want our first kiss to go, you know?”

My blood ran cold, but I resigned myself to what would happen next. I nodded.

He removed his hand, and I opened my mouth. He was on edge, preparing to hit me with the butt of the pistol. Instead, I meekly croaked,” Kurt, stop.”

He completely blanked before tilting his head in confusion. “What’s wrong, Y/n? Stop what? Do you need a shower? Oh - are you hungry —“

“Kurt! This is insane. You’re insane,” I sobbed. “I can’t believe I used to have a crush on you. If only I knew what you were really like.”

Kurt’s brows furrowed, and I almost laughed. Of course he was that stupid to have never known. He was too obsessed and demented. The way he must see the world…

“You… used to have a crush? On me? When?”

I snickered. “Like, tenth grade. Back when you used to be a good person. Honestly, Kurt, just fucking kill me. I’m tired. I’m hurting. I’m sad and everything bad. If you like me so much, just end it for me.”

Kurt frowned, once again stroking my hair with gun in hand. I tilt my head away over so slightly, making him twitch in dissatisfaction. “Well… if you really don’t like social media that much… we’ll go off the grid. A road trip. Just you and me. Doesn’t that sound nice?”

He’d twisted my words to his own satisfaction. He never listened. I couldn’t help but resign myself to what happened next. He crashed his pistol into the side of my head, and it all went blank.

#yandere #x reader #x y/n #self insert #joe keery x reader #joe keery #joe keery imagines #joe keery one shot #yandere spree #spree #spree movie #yandere x reader #kurt kunkle x reader #yandere kurt kunkle #kurt kunkle #kurtsworld96 #yandere horror #horror #horror films

[issuesdolly]

Your Jonathan Davis Meet & Greet Gets Kinky

Content warning: 18+ Smut, handjob, oral, unprotected sex, p in v, jealousy/teasing sex, finishing inside 

#jonathandavis  #jonathan davis #korn #jon davis #fanfic #fanfiction #smut #edging #degredationkink #degredation #jondavis #degredationkink #exhibition #publicsex #exhibitionkink #edging #edginganddenial 

Summary: You are Jonathan Davis’s girlfriend and you accompany him to a Meet & Greet where fans get to interact with him. You generally don’t get jealous but this particular Meet & Greet tests your patience as some fans get way too friendly and flirty with him, touching him to the point of making him aroused. After you get angry, Jonathan decides to make it up to you in a very hot, kinky way.... to reassure you.

Side note: I have a TikTok where I make sexy/funny Jonathan Davis edits and thirst traps if y'all are interested. My Tiktok is not for clout/promotion btw this dude is my hobby haha...

Example of one of my videos:

Link to my TikTok channel:

Story:

You had accompanied Jonathan to several of his Meet & Greet events before. They were generally pretty tame as people were extremely excited to meet him but pretty respectful when they actually do. This Meet and Greet was a bit different. It was an event inside a mall outlet store music shop where it's just a meet with Jonathan and not the other band members. He was promoting his solo project and each fan gets a 1 minute chat, a picture and something signed. The two of you had planned to go out to dinner together after the event so it was easier to follow him to the one hour Meet & Greet and go to dinner together after than to wait at home. 

Security and entourage were all around, chaperoning the interactions and giving each fan the gentle "time's up" escort after they had their moment. You stood in the corner with a cup of coffee, watching it all go down. You were so proud of him. You loved how radiant his smile was and how kind he was to everybody. No matter how long he has done these kinds of events, he still has a bit of giddy social awkwardness so when a fan is lost for words and over-excited, there's still a bunch of awkward laughter and pauses from Jonathan as well. 

And of course, people LOVE to touch him and give him hugs. You've generally accepted this. He's very talented and equally turns people on and has for decades with his sexy stage presence. It's totally undeniable that women, men, transgender and folks of all pronouns are desperate for a picture snuggling him and giving him a big hug. People pull out all sorts of body parts in hopes he will sign them so they can get it tattooed. It's overwhelming just how much people want him to leave a "mark" on them in some way. It's also funny when the men try to play it cool with a civil handshake but clearly wish they could grab him in a hug like the female fans do. However, NO ONE is more forward, aggressive and borderline disrespectful than the female fans. They have no shame. In your heart, you can't really blame them. If this was your only moment with him, you'd probably act the same. 

Jonathan always does his best to play it cool though. He'll give them a nice hug, call them "hun" or "sweetheart" and let them embrace him but hasn't crossed any lines anymore. Since he's been with you, he's not hooked up with groupies on tour or taken advantage of the same "opportunities." Generally you both were amused when you'd watch a fan totally lose their cool. For example, one women got her moment with Jonathan for a picture and was so afraid to touch him she was shaking. Jon took the lead and wrapped an arm around her waist and she accidentally let out a giddy moan followed by inappropriately loud laughter. After her picture she went to turn around and shake his hand goodbye and managed to trip over his foot and fall. Security helped her to her feet while Jon said "oh shit sorry hun, are you ok?" All she could do was smile and nod and skulk away as her friend laughed her ass off. Jonathan gave you glances from time to time as the two of you grinned at each other and laughed. People's reactions were sometimes pretty damn funny. 

It was getting towards Jon's 20 min break before the next round of Meet & Greet fans got their turn with him. Next up in line was a young lady who looked to be 18 to 20 or so. You smelled trouble. She were dressed beyond provocatively and had a gorgeous see-through goth-lace shirt with a lace bra underneath and a short plaid miniskirt with chains on it. She paired this with thigh high fishnet stockings and heeled boots. She had long and shiny, gorgeous, wavy jet black hair and amazing makeup and piercings. She looked like a pornographic version of Wednesday Addams. Unfortunately you knew this was EXACTLY Jonathan's type and that this girl looked sexy as hell to him. 

She slowly approached him with a seductive walk, keeping her cool FAR better than the other fans. Jonathan paused, watching her in a kind of stunned amazement and smiling. 

"Hi hun, what's your name?" Jon asked quietly. 

"Emilia," she said in a sultry, low voice, while shaking his hand and not being quick to let go of it. 

"Nice to meet you, Emilia," Jon replied meekly. 

"I can't believe I'm finally meeting you, I listened to your music all the damn time this year, I love you so much," she continued in her soft, beautiful voice. 

"Awww, you're too kind hun," Jon said while trying to avoid eye contact with her. She had gorgeous eyes and was giving him the "fuck me" stare and he was definitely trying hard to dodge it while smiling at the ground but stealing glances at her gorgeous body. 

Jon tried to break the silence. "So, did you bring something you'd like me to  sign or?" Jon said in a giddy tone. 

"No. Actually, I'm doing kind of a bucket list thing. I missed my prom. I was sick that night. Stayed home in bed listening to your music all night instead," Emilia continued while forcing eye contact with him and stepping closer. 

"Y...yeah? Sorry about your prom. Um. That sucks you missed it," Jonathan said trying to keep his composure. 

"That's alright," Emilia said. "I had a MUCH better night in bed listening to you," she said while giving him a naughty smirk and touching his shoulder. Jon couldn't help but let out a dark, dirty chuckle. She chuckled in response.

You were getting flustered by now, wondering just how much further this lady was going to push and tease him. 

"So my bucket list idea was if I meet you, take a prom style picture with you, if you're down," Emilia continued cooly, while moving her hand off his shoulder and pointing to her friend, who had her phone ready. 

You knew what she meant. She wanted Jon to stand behind her, with her back up against him and his arms wrapped around her from behind, to  reinvent those cute “couple's prom night” pictures. You were getting QUITE irritated by now. She'd made him an offer he can't refuse. People in line overheard her request and went "awww! Do it Jon!" 

Jon paused awkwardly and looked at her, grinning and sort of wringing his hands a bit, thinking about it. 

"Um. Sure hun, it's all good," he said. 

She wasted no time turning around and pressing her backside against him. As her friend got their cellphone camera positioned to take the picture, she pressed her short skirt up against the crotch of his pants. He briefly froze just staring down at her ass, pressed up against him in a skirt that barely covered it. Then he awkwardly moved his arms towards her waist for the "cuddle pose" picture. She was bold enough to grab his hands and place them firmly on her hips and hold him in place. She tugged his whole body further against her, pushing her ass into him harder. He tried to loosen her grasp on him a little. He shifted his body against her and briefly lost his balance, stunned by how forward she was being. He touched her hips gingerly with his fingers and tried hard to resist the urge the caress her. He clearly wanted to though. He let out some very nervous laughter while her friend said "ready?" and held up her phone.

Jonathan looked really flustered, even a bit red in the face, and smiled a big awkward smile while the camera flash captured their "moment." People applauded and went “aww” and a few cheered and went “woooo!” and whistled "whe-whewwww!" because it was a pretty damn sexy/cute picture. 

You'd seen enough. You were finally pissed. You stormed off into the breakroom and as you walked by security you heard two of them chuckle and one say "told you so man! He shouldn't have brought his girl haha." Sounded like they had wagers going on how long before you lose your cool over thirsty groupies. 

You overheard break-time being called shortly after and Jonathan entered the dressing room with a few people from his entourage. He saw you sulking and standing in the corner with a dark expression on your face. He asked them to give you guys some time alone. They agreed and stepped out. 

Before you said ANYTHING, Jonathan said "look.... I KNOW. That went too far, I'm sorry. I didn't really know what to do, she caught me off guard." Jon stepped towards you and went to give you a big hug. You rejected it, stepping across the room to sulk some more. He trailed after you, pulling you in closer while trying to give you a big reassuring embrace. "I'm sorry! I should have thought about it!" Jonathan continued. You let him hug you finally.

However, as you were hugging him, your fronts were pressed together and you could feel a bulge in his pants. You let go of him and looked down and could see his very obvious erection. He immediately realized you had noticed and tried to adjust himself while looking embarrassed. You locked eyes with him and gave him an angry scowl. 

"You already had a hard-on when you fucking came in here, didn't you?!" you demanded. 

Jonathan squinted with embarrassment and put his head in his hands, groaning and sighing, while slowly nodding in acknowledgment and stepping away from you.

"She fucking turned you on! You got a damn boner! I knew it" you said, very flustered at this point. 

"I don't know what to say sweetheart, dicks are stupid! She smelled amazing, she was down to fuck and she was batshit crazy, I'm SORRY. You know I wouldn't though! It's- it's biological ... it's-..... DICKS ARE DUMB!!!" Jonathan repeated, stumbling over his words and stuttering with apologies and humiliation.

You stormed over to the couch and sat down. You weren't going to admit it yet, but you knew he was right. Women are ALWAYS trying to seduce him and beg for it and just because he CAN doesn't mean he would fuck them anymore. 

"Just fu--- fu... I don't know! Put yourself in my shoes," Jonathan said while sitting down next to you on the couch. You scooted away from him as he tried to touch you. "Imagine there was a literal line out the door full of super hot dudes desperate for even one minute with you, trying to seduce you, tease you and fucking feel you up. Maybe your pussy would get wet or something. Maybe your n-- nipples would get hard! But you wouldn't act on it! It's fucking crazy! It still trips me out anyone is that into me! But- but it’s biological... humans.. we ... fucking suck! Someone grabs you like that and you get horny! Then you gotta fight with your conscience! It's just fucking nature vs. your willpower and it's embarrassing. I'm sorry!! I’m SO, SO SORRY!!" Jonathan said while still trying to pull you in for a hug on the couch. 

You reluctantly allowed him to hug you and pull you closer. He caught his breath and breathed hard while pausing, knowing there's not much else he can say. He gave you a very firm, loving hug. You finally returned it and looked him in the eye. You were on the verge of tears. He looked genuinely upset and embarrassed and deeply sorry. 

"I LOVE you. I'm not gonna fuck that up over some stranger. I don't do that shit anymore. I don't want to live with that kind of guilt anymore. You've made my life so much better. I'm not gonna throw that away just cuz someone rubs up against me, OK?" You didn't say anything. 

"OK?" Jonathan pleaded, while putting his hand on your chin and forcing you to make eye contact with him. His eyes looked like he was half ready to cry he was so embarrassed and upset he’d hurt you.  

You locked eyes with him and his eyes bore into you searching for an answer. 

"Ok," you whispered. He gave you a big, slow, deep kiss. 

"The difference is, YOU are the one I want to touch. YOU'RE the one who I want to come home to, ok?" 

You held him and shifted your position on the couch to face him. You draped your legs across his lap as he continued to hold you. Jonathan leaned in and kissed your lips, cheek and then your neck. 

"I'm all yours baby," Jonathan said quietly, right into your ear before slowly licking and biting it. You were still flustered and pissed but you weren't about to reject him. You immediately felt yourself shiver and your nipples tingle while he licked and nibbled your ear and neck. He made soft moaning noises as he put his hand on your neck and stroked it, gently grabbing it and pulling you in for a longer, deeper french kiss. 

He let you out of the kiss for a moment and breathed against your neck while slowly licking it and moving back up to your ear to whisper into it again. You felt your body tingling and your pussy starting to drip into your panties. 

"I'm ALL yours," he repeated. He took your hand with one of his and placed it on his lap, where his dick was still hard.... MUCH harder now. 

"And THIS, THIS….. is all yours too," he said in a deep, naughty, quiet voice as he pushed your hand against his dick. You moaned and your thighs shook a bit as the adrenaline shifted from rage adrenaline to insanely horny adrenaline. You started rubbing his hard cock through his pants and he groaned deeply. 

You rubbed his pants more firmly and were surprised how animalistic this whole jealousy thing had made you. You grabbed his dick through his pants and he encouraged you to, spreading his legs and sitting back on the couch, locking eyes with you and smiling while pressing your hand hard against his dick through his pants. He grunted and panted. It was clear he really wanted to take all that frustrated sexual energy the fans had left him with and give it all to you. 

"Let me make it up to you baby, RIGHT now," Jonathan said in a low voice. 

You moaned against his face as he nuzzled you with his beard and you just nodded in agreement. Without a word he got off the couch and knelt in front of you. You were wearing a skirt and a v neck shirt. You opened your legs as he knelt in front of you and parted your thighs. First he pushed his hands up into your shirt, squeezing and caressing your breasts while pushing you back against the couch and letting you whine and grab his dreads. He pushed your shirt up and took one of your breasts into his mouth, licking, sucking and nibbling your nipple. Your breasts tingle and your nipples hardened with arousal and your pussy got more soaked. You had to stay aware of where you were. In a BREAK room with entourage right outside and fans in the lobby waiting for him to return. You tried to stay quiet and keep your moans soft as you gripped his hair more firmly and he went on sucking your breast. 

He pushed his hand up your thigh and under your skirt. His hands were so big and warm and you were losing your mind. You had been so furious/jealous and now you were getting everything you wanted and needed. He reached your panties and gently rubbed your pussy through them. His hands felt the heat of your pussy and the fact the crotch of your panties was soaked all the way through to the outside. "Ooohhhh, so hot and bothered," Jonathan said while looking up at your face with a smirk. You had to laugh together. The two of you exchanged a naughty chuckle as Jon continued to rub your clit and pussy through your panties, which were now saturated at the crotch. "Mmmmff... my girl," he whispered at you while dragging his lips across your inner thighs. "Are you going to let me make my girl feel better now?" he asked in a soothing, naughty voice. 

"Yes... fuck yes!" was all you could reply as you held his head and stroked his hair. He gingerly rubbed his fingers against your pussy through your panties, before pulling them aside at the crotch. He knelt further into your inner thighs and braced himself against you and the couch. He plunged his face fully under your skirt and started taking deep licks into your pussy. You instinctively moaned... TOO loud.  Jon ALSO had to remember where the two of you were. 

He kept one hand on your thigh and raised another up to your mouth to cover it while he continued lapping your pussy and shaking his head rapidly against it so he stimulated your clit even more. You moaned loudly into his big hand as it covered your mouth. You felt faint, and when you opened your eyes and looked around the room, you realized your vision was practically hazy. It wasn't until then you realized that level of jealousy followed by actually fucking him was getting you off more than you could ever imagine. You pushed his face harder into your pussy and he let his tongue slide deeper into it as you continued moaning into his hand and breathing hard. 

Just then, there was a knock on the break room door. Both of you froze as you were a bit too lost in the moment. Neither of you responded quick enough and the door came open as one of Jonathan's managers stood in the doorway. "Jon, you're wanted back in 10 mi------ ah... SHIT." There was no denying what the two of you were doing.

His manager had walked in on Jon knelt in front of your open legs with his head buried under your skirt. The manager closed the door wordlessly. A moment passed as Jon pulled his face out from between your wet thighs and you pushed your skirt back down to cover yourself. On the other side of the door you could hear two of his entourage muttering to one another and one say "FUCK, not again!" This wasn't the first time the two of you had gotten carried away while he was doing something important. 

The door cracked open again as the manager reluctantly stepped back in while avoiding looking at what was going on in the room.

 "Do you think you could get your shit together, Jon? You're wanted back in 10 minutes" they said in an annoyed but resigned tone. 

"Y---yeah. YES. Sorry," Jonathan replied. 

Your cheeks were red and hot and all you could do was look at the ground and cover your face and bury it in your hands with embarrassment.

"Thank you. OK? 10 minutes," the manager reiterated before shutting the door. 

You shook your head and were extremely sexually frustrated now. His dick was still hard. You stood up from the couch as you said "we should stop. I'm sorry." 

Jonathan stood up and pushed a chair against the door, wedging it against the door knob. 

"FUCKIT," Jonathan said in a confident tone. "They aren't gonna do a Jonathan meet and greet without Jonathan!" He stepped back towards you and grabbed your waist. You couldn't believe it. He REALLY was determined to fuck you. But you weren't about to fight him off. "We'll have to make it quick.... but.... I want to finish what we started" Jonathan said with a dark smirk. You returned the smirk and nodded. 

Jonathan wasted no time. He kissed down your body and firmly grabbed your thighs, plunging his face back under your skirt and pulling your panties to the side again, licking your clit hard and firm and massaging it rapidly with his tongue. You couldn't help but moan and yelp and feel dizzy, using his shoulders for balance as he gripped your hips, making sure you didn't fall over. He bit the side of your panties and pulled them down your legs with his teeth. You moaned louder, watching him do this. You  moved your feet and stepped out of your panties, crushing yourself up against his face. He sucked on the lips of your pussy, pulling them gently with his lips and giving them gentle nibbles. He pushed a finger in and swirled it around inside you while gripping your hip with his other hand and sucking on your clit with his lips. You couldn't take it anymore. You NEEDED him inside you.

"S-s-stand up, come here!" you said. He obeyed you and rose up from where he was knelt in front of you. You breathed hard, staring at him. The two of you were pressed together.

"I wanna fuck you so bad right now," you whimpered. 

'So fuck me," Jonathan said in a quiet, calm voice, with a big grin on his face. Instead of doing ANYTHING to you, he let you take the lead. You saw his hard dick through his pants and instead of him undoing his own pants or pulling you into him, he placed both of his arms behind his back and folded his hands together as if he was handcuffed. He just stood there in front of you, waiting to see what you'd do to him while locking eyes with you. He looked down at his pants and then back up at your face, grinning. 

You went wild. You grabbed his waist and hungrily undid his belt buckle and undid the button and the zip on his pants. You pushed him against the wall of the break room and reached into his boxers, grabbing his hard dick and jerking him with one hand while pulling him by the hair with your other hand to bring him in for a deep kiss. 

He moaned and grunted into your mouth and his cock twitched in your hands. You rubbed the tip of his big dick with your thumb and could already feel precum leaking from the tip. He was as hard as he ever gets, clearly also insanely turned on by how much you desperately wanted to lay claim to him. He was definitely going to let you do whatever you wanted to him. You pressed yourself against him and kept giving him a handjob while the two of you exchanged sloppy kisses and an off-balance, dizzy embrace. 

Eventually HE too lost his cool. Witnessing your jealous rage and horniness for him had turned him on to the extreme as well. He was definitely getting off on knowing how bad you wanted him all to yourself. He pushed you back onto the couch. The couch was  too narrow to properly climb on top of you so instead, he grabbed your legs up in the air and pulled your body to the side so you were facing him on the couch.

He pulled your legs apart and placed your legs on each of his shoulders, lowering his pants and boxers more. He knelt in front of your pussy in a crouched position on the couch.... He paused for a moment, taking in just how bad you want it. You were gasping in anticipation. You gripped the front of his shirt, pulling him towards you and said "FUCKING DO IT!" you whined. He groaned and pushed his long, hard dick into you. You couldn't be quiet, but you tried. You placed your own hand over your mouth while he fucked you, deeper and deeper with each pump. 

"AGGGGHhHH.. S--SHHIIIIIIITTT" Jonathan sputtered while pushing further into your pussy and feeling it grip around him. You were so wet and slippery and still a bit enraged so you returned his firm pumps by aggressively bucking your hips forward against him. You looked at each other's flustered faces while he pushed deeper into you and he picked up speed. You were surprised you already felt so close to coming. I guess something about the adrenaline of rage and jealousy paired with the heat of the moment really had you going. 

You gripped his dreads and pulled him closer against you. You don't usually yank his hair this hard but you were still a bit enraged with him. He pressed on top of you, crushing you up against the couch and pumping hard into you. "FUCK. FUCK. SHHIIIITTT.... You really f--fu-ffucking wanted it hmmm?" Jonathan said. You groaned and nodded in return, pushing your hips forward against him.

Jon ground his crotch hard into you and held it there as you still had a firm grip on his hair. "Mmmmmmm... maybe I should make you jealous more often," Jon said in a naughty voice. You didn't like the thought of that…at least you didn’t THINK you did. But now, you were so close to coming you couldn't stand it. You squeezed your pussy tight around him and he winced and went "AGHHH!!! mmmmm" and pumped faster and faster. His huge cock was seeking your deepest regions and you desperately needed to cum with him. You pushed hard against him one more time, impaling yourself on cock. Your pussy pulsated as your orgasm hit you in delicious waves and you couldn't stop yourself from moaning and grunting loudly. 

Jonathan wasn't far behind. However, he slowed his pumps briefly while you came, just watching you, almost taken aback by the intensity of your orgasm. All he could do was moan and whimper watching your face and feeling your pussy squeeze and throb around his leaking dick as he was about to bust. "DAMN baby," Jon said as you opened your eyes slowly. You had squirted a little when you came and gotten his crotch extra wet.  You had definitely gone full animal on him. You REALLY needed that orgasm. "DAMN," he repeated, realizing just how hard you came all over his cock. He shook his head while smiling gleefully.  

Jonathan caught himself and continued pumping nice and hard. It  felt amazing as he fucked you in your post-orgasm bliss while your pussy and clit were drenched and super sensitive. However, Jonathan wasted no time pumping harder and faster into you, slamming you against the couch. You could hear the wet slapping of his balls against your drenched cunt and distantly, you could hear people outside the break room as they were getting more impatient. "AHHhhhhhh.... shi--I'm gonna cu- cum!" Jon groaned as his body started shaking. "Cum for me baby," you said while wrapping your legs tightly around him and pushing him as far into you as he could go. "AHHHH!!!! SHHiiiiiiiii----" Jon sputtered as he whimpered and blew inside you. His whole body shook as you hugged him tightly against you and he unloaded his full dick deep inside you. He lost his balance and fell against you on the couch as he came. The two of you blanked out together for a moment as he just emptied and emptied and tried to breathe. It sounded like he was literally having a difficult time inhaling new air.

There was a heavy quiet for a moment as the two of you just froze in that position until he was done pumping and leaking every last drop. You loosened your grip on his dreads and slowly parted your thighs, letting his crotch out of the lock you had him in while he'd come. He was lethargic and dizzy, while shaking and panting. The two of you slowly and reluctantly let go of each other as he pulled out of you. He whined and groaned as he tried to stand up, only to stumble and quickly fall back down on the couch with his dick still out of his pants, still leaking and dripping. The two of you sat side by side on the couch, catching your breath while dripping juices onto the fabric of it.

"Well SHIT, baby!" Jonathan eventually said with his voice breaking, as he began to giggle, trying to figure out how to clean up this mess. You locked eyes with him and giggled back. Just a few moments later there was an insistent knock on the door. The manager knew better than to open the door this time but they said in a pissed- off voice, "JON! You are wanted back at the meet and greet table... NOW."

"OK! ON MY WAY! SHIT MAN!" Jonathan said with his voice cracking as he slowly staggered to his feet, looking dazed and confused. Jonathan looked around the room for something to clean the two of you up with.

There was a tissue box on the table. He grabbed a bunch of tissues and wiped his leaking dick  and the front of his pants before handing some tissues to you for you to clean yourself up with. Your legs were shaking as you wiped your inner thighs and pussy and stumbled across the room to locate your panties and put them back on. As you put them back on you realized how soaked they were and thought of just throwing them away, but figured you'd better just wear them. His cum was leaking down your thigh so you lined your wet panties with some tissues so it wouldn’t leak all the way down your leg. 

The two of you embraced and slowly kissed one more time. 

Jonathan sighed, still breathing hard and beads of sweat coming down his forehead, as he pushed his sweaty, tangled hair out of his face. He leaned against your ear.

"I love you. Like I said....I'm All yours baby, I promise. Always," he whispered as he gently felt you up and kissed your cheek. 

"I love you too, Jon," you quietly replied.

You looked at his face. His beard was still a bit damp from him having gone down on you. You giggled and said "you should probably wash your face."

Jon pressed his hands against his face and gently mopped his beard while laughing and grinning. "Probably," he said while smirking. 

"Or maybe I'll just go back. There's probably not time anyway. You and I can just know you left your mark on me," he said while winking and smirking. 

The thought of him going back out there smelling like you turned you on incredibly. You grinned and just nodded your head. 

The two of you held hands and hobbled out of the break room unsteadily together, looking rather dazed and elated. Reluctantly you let go of his hand and stood back in the corner of the Meet & Greet room. He took slow, unsteady steps back to his Meet & Greet desk and the queue of fans continued to approach him one by one. He had the biggest goofy smile on his face and looked very exhausted now, still trying to catch his breath and play it cool.

Any chance he got, he exchanged a glance with you and you returned it with a naughty smile and a wave. Distantly you could hear his managers angrily muttering.

All you could make out was "someone's gotta tell Jon to stop letting his girl tag along to these damn things, man."

#jonathan davis x reader #jd korn #jonathan davis #jonathan davis korn #korn band #fanfic #fanfiction #jon davis #jonathan davis fanfic #smut #fem reader #edging kink #edging and denial #public exhibition #exhibition kink

[stormxpadme]

​Whumptober 2022 No. 24 - Blood covered hands & “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

1969

“I don’t want to do this anymore."

 "You should have thought of that before we left." Charles' eyes narrowed in a brief moment of focus on his abilities, two fingertips stretched away from the leather reins in his hands towards his horse's head when Guinevere threw it up in annoyance at Erik's sharp tone.

 A soothing touch to the primitive animal's mind immediately stopped it from prancing in its dramatic nervousness but the mare kept her ears firmly set back against her head. The newest pride and joy in Charles' stable didn't have a lot of love for Erik; a feeling that was wholeheartedly mutual.

 That necessary intervention dealt with, his partner threw Erik a partly mocking but mostly very exasperated side-glance from under his helmet. "I've got to teach in two hours. The lady and I have to use the time until then. I'm not going to pony Lance the rest of the way, so suck it up."

 "You know exactly that's not what I mean." His face only darkening further, Erik drew his own helmet deeper into his face. As much as he hated the thought, sometimes he couldn't put it completely behind Charles to use those powerful abilities even against him if he thought it necessary. Lately, his own gift had offered Erik a promising kind of protection against that kind of thing if he used it right. Something that he hadn't quite around to tell Charles yet, and on some days it was harder than on others, making himself believe that was only because he wanted to perfect that new skill first. Trying it out with the only person he shouldn't have to fear anything from shouldn't have been necessary in the first place. Offering to go on this ride with his partner on his part, freely albeit grudgingly because Erik lacked both talent and patience for this ancient means of transportation, had been the only chance to finally spend some time with his lover again, thanks to all their current stressful projects and their school filling up with more students by the month. Erik finally wanted to get some of that disunity and confusion between them out of the way.

 But unlike him, Charles didn't even seem to be willing to fucking try anymore.

 "Well, with everything you've been complaining about lately, you're gonna have to be more specific." Unfazed by Erik's offended huff, Charles steered his mare into the undergrowth of the woods behind their mansion, giving her still-so-young legs a proper uphill warm-up workout before the real exercise. Straightening up in the stirrups, he slightly bent forward to take his full weight off the animal's back.

 While there were worse sights to enjoy than his lover's firm behind in skintight pants right in front of him, Erik wasn't about to let Charles out of this discussion so easily by him trying to make sure, they didn't have any air left to speak. And he also wasn't ready to resort to silently trading thoughts right now as Charles might see a few things in his head that Erik wasn't ready to share yet before he'd finished pondering about them himself. "I'm not in the mood." Therefore, once they'd reached the top of the small hill, Erik simply steered Lancelot sideways in front of Charles' mare, with an impatient tug on the reins that earned him an unwilling snort from his horse. Animal sensitivities, he couldn't take into account right now though. The whole annual edition that was Charles' issues was too much to deal with this afternoon as it was.

 "I'm hearing that an awful lot lately." His lover still didn't take him seriously. He even had the nerve to pass Erik by on a path actually far too narrow for that and give his behind a provocative squeeze through his jeans while he did, leaving no doubt about what he meant.

 Another time, it might have worked, provoking pleasant memories of nights that in some moments felt like a thousand years ago instead of just a few months ... Right now, the lewd gesture only angered Erik even more, because knowing it would probably be the last touch today was one of the most alarming signs, things weren't going the way they should right now. Hadn't been for far longer than he cared to admit. "Bold of you to say after falling asleep on me half of the time we try. We have bigger problems. Try calling your alien girlfriend if you need more sex."

 The fact that only now, at the mention of someone who kept on causing trouble between them without all of them even being in the same galaxy, that unimpressed levity on Charles' face made room for a scowl, did nothing to soothe Erik's anxiety. "It's been seven years. And it's still only a professional relationship. Mind telling me what's really wrong? We don't need more sex, Erik. What we need right now is focus on and faith in our plans."

 "I have plenty of faith in us." With a little more practice, Erik thought, that lie could sound like he even believed it himself at this point. Like they weren't both taking every excuse within reach to keep as busy as possible, just to avoid arguing the whole time. And always about the same tiring subject. "Just not in them."

 "Some things take time." Charles immediately sounded absent, detached almost, as usual, when what was their most fundamental difference of opinion emerged. Dull spurs on polished boots pressed into Guinevere's slender sides, getting her into a fast trot that this overgrown, uneven path was actually not suited for either, just for Charles to get some distance between them.

 Erik gave his gelding an admonishing little slap with his crop so that the animal might actually remember the speed he'd used to race for Charles with in Ascot not too long ago until they were making their way between broad trees and thorn-studded bushes side by side. Not today. He was no longer willing to watch this thing eat them up from the inside, threaten everything they'd built between themselves and in that damn mansion back there together, not in a period when they had to be stronger than ever together. "Time is what we're running out of right now. You know that as well as I do."

 "You can't force humanity to accept something they don't understand yet." Reluctantly, Charles reined in his mare again when they neared a gravel pit that had been supposed to become a new building here long ago before Charles had manipulated someone on the city council enough to sell the whole area to him. Not a good ground for a race, if you didn't want to risk injury, especially if you were so dead set on winning yet another prestige title soon to advertise your breed further. All just to keep up appearances of their house, to keep finances stable, to not make any too-high waves.

 It was a drill Erik was growing increasingly tired of, given there were billions of people out there refusing to let those among mutant race who weren't as privileged as Charles and he, even exist among them. "Watch me. How do you expect them to understand if you never let them see us?"

 Charles wiped the soft sheen of a too-hot afternoon from his forehead with his glove and pushed his helmet back slightly to finally look Erik in the eye, for the first time in what felt like days. "We're not hiding. We protect those who can't do that yet themselves. This is what we made this school for."

 "You sure as hell hide enough from me," Erik gritted out before he could stop himself though he'd meant to keep at least that argument for another day. And yet it was part of all this. How was this whole thing between them supposed to work, how was Erik supposed co-run this damn place when he didn't understand half of what tech and information it was built on? The moment Charles had shut him out of this part of his life, they'd stopped talking as much as it would have been necessary. That made it increasingly difficult to ignore who was responsible for that abyss between them a thousand times larger than that empty pit right there.

 "I'm under oath," Charles said with the exhausted emptiness of a fact a thousand times repeated and not once offering any kind of consolation. "I don't like that but for the good of Earth, it was necessary to swear it. Lilandra's and my minds are closely enough connected for her to know if I told you what she wants to keep between her and me. I don’t know what about that is so unclear."

 "You chose her over me, that’s what." It was Erik's turn to steer his horse away, drive it along the unsecured pit edge to get to the trail on the other side that would lead them back to the mansion, on a far straighter and less challenging path. Perfect for a couple of long canter stretches to prevent any more talking that made no difference anyway.

 "I'm choosing the greater good over us when I am forced to," Charles called after him, suddenly sounding honestly angry himself. Good. That was more emotion than he'd allowed smoldering between them for a year or so. "Wasn't it you who taught me that in the first place?"

 Erik pulled Lancelot around, impatiently slipping back to balance in the saddle when his gelding bolted to the side, done with his clumsy aids for the day. He hardly noticed how Charles reached out to his horse for a calming touch inside its head this time. Glaring red particles were glistening in his vision; it took him all he had not to yell at his lover and drive the damn horses crazy for good, because fuck, no, Charles did not get to turn this around on him, not after everything Erik had given up for this far too tame dream of theirs. "If you want to protect our kind as I do, stop holding everyone back, and help me teach them how to survive. That’s what they need, Charles. Not some pretty illusions of a better world."

 Charles' face' under the shadow of his helmet tightened, his posture so stiff suddenly, Guinevere took a step or two backward. "They're traumatized children, not soldiers. They, too, need time before they can prepare for what's to come. You know what I'm no longer in the mood for? You trying to sabotage each of my goals. You going behind my back and getting uniforms for teenagers who don't even know if they ever want to wear them. You trying to hire serial killers for our staff …"

 "We are short on staff options, in case you haven't realized," Erik interrupted him, maybe a little too fast, with a slight blush on his cheeks, because fine, admittedly … That one guy he'd almost brought on Westchester's trail lately would have been too much of a risk to work with. Living a life like theirs never came without any of it, though, and certainly not without sacrifices. There had been a time when Charles had known that. "And we're all killers. Each of us in our own way."

 "Only if we choose to", his lover said, with his chin held high, as if Erik had not seen him drive people to suicide on more than one recruitment flight before, with but a single thought, to keep them from taking yet another innocent child's life.

 Sometimes Erik envied Charles for his gift of rarely having to physically step in during a battle, but on days like this, it became painfully clear how quickly such comfort of working from the bench could lure you into false safety. Erik would take using barbed wire to rip the windpipe out of some berserk racist with a gun aimed at a teenager over that anytime. "A telepath trying to lecture me about morals, you know … That’s rich. You won't be the only revolutionary with clean hands in history. They’ve taken that choice from us the moment they chose violence instead of acceptance. All we can do now is show our people how to hold on."

 "I don't want that any less than you. Do you not know that?" Charles finally got Guinevere going again with a smooth, light thrust of hips the sight of which was another good reason to go on these suicidal hikes with him from time to time. They'd said their part each; their boiling emotions were already starting to turn into sadness once more. Maybe they actually would end up having some time for each other tonight, if only to chase all these aimless considerations away from each other's heads. Until the next fight. "I don’t want this to divide us, Erik." Stopping next to him, Charles reached over to rest his hand on Erik's on the saddle. "We knew none of this would be easy, from the start, but our goal has always been the same. Safety and peace for everyone."

 For once, Erik found, he was grateful for Charles' newest favorite mare being such a typical specimen of the female population of her species, being irritated enough by standing too close to a herd mate that she usually couldn't ever cuddle enough with, to give Lancelot's well-padded behind a harsh bite.

 That was as good an excuse as any to steer his gelding aside, no matter how much the missing touch of the back of his hand burned in yearning immediately. Not yet. On the way home, Erik wanted Charles to think about what made life at the Institue so difficult right now before it really did become too late to change anything about it. "Why do you keep hiring people who are actively trying to damage us then?"

 "Hank isn't forcing his choice on anyone either." There was a sad plea for the case of one of his closest friends in his lover's grey eyes that had long stopped reaching Erik's heart, at the latest when McCoy had started to experiment on his own damn body in the name of some pseudo-science.

 The pure possibility of such a possible cure for what made them all superior was an affront Erik would have killed more important people than some feral for on a bad day. At least if Charles and he could finally find any other doctor even half as competent to help them out when they needed it. But in some regards, he'd still not managed to cure his lover of his damn bleeding heart, and sometimes he doubted he ever could. Sometimes he doubted he should. At least one of them keeping a faint connection of empathy to this world that tried to wipe them all out every day over might be the best way to ensure, Erik wouldn't just wake up one of these weeks and reach out for the magnetic field keeping this whole ball of dirt going and rip it to pieces. Not while there was still hope. For all of them, for Charles and him.

 Maybe even for lost souls like McCoy who didn’t even realize how lucky they were to have someone like Charles championing for them. "He just wants to live the way it's best for him. You can't make everyone a soldier for your goals, Erik."

 "Soldiers is what we'll need plenty of soon. I thought we agreed on that at least." That started to sound far more resigned than annoyed already. It was getting late, and they both had classes to teach, Erik's consisting of exactly the kind of lessons of combat Charles refused to see were the most important skills any of them had to learn right now. Erik couldn't wait on his partner to catch up with the future before preparing for it.

 "I never asked you to cancel the special unit program, did I?" Charles tiredly shook his head, his pale cheeks suddenly looking very hollow and wrinkled in the too-bright afternoon sun. Accepting something against each of your convictions was always draining. That experience, they'd both had to make in the course of their relationship more than once. "I'm just asking you to let me do my job, too. Which is to ensure a secure, hidden base of operations for us. And part of that is keeping our façade towards the world. So why don't you just stay with your ass on your horse for the rest of the afternoon for once, let me finish preparing for the military riding tournament next weekend so that I can get the stud for two of our mares I need for next year's dressage offspring and stop questioning each of my steps for five minutes?" Charles' warm, bright voice only softened, when Erik showed him a tired shrug. He rode close enough to him once more to bury his hand in Erik's shirt and pull him in for a brief but very tender kiss. "And when we get to be alone in our apartment tonight? I'll have a coffee or two more than usual and then make you remember you're the only one I love. You do know, make-up sex is the best invention since they came up with telephones, right?"

 Erik returned the favor from earlier only too gladly, slipping his hand between Charles' perfect behind and his saddle for a tight squeeze, enjoying that warm tingle in his midsection that promised a few long hours of mindless closeness soon indeed. Which was maybe exactly what they needed to get their slightly disarranged harmonics back into line. "Tell you what, you make that gap to the other side, you even get to top."

 Charles' eyes immediately lit up at that challenge that wasn't even one, not for such a good rider and a young but also extremely talented thoroughbred. It would at least be a good exercise for that damn tournament, and that was one reason why they were out here, after all.

 While Erik wasn't suicidal enough to rely on his horse having some accidental mountain goat genes hidden somewhere in its cells, it was always a pleasure watching his lover work … Not least thanks to knowing for quite certain, the reward for losing yet another bet of that kind would be waiting in their bedroom in the shape of a couple of scarves, lots of oil and maybe the kind of crop that had never seen a stable before.

 "You know, you can just tell me if you want me to fuck you, right?"

 "Where would be the fun in that?" Erik just winked at Charles with a grin and steered Lancelot backward once more, for once remembering the right aids to not pull that bit half out of his horse's mouth, and jumped to the ground then. Lazy or not, these creatures still were herd animals and sometimes were only too eager to be affected by the enthusiasm for running by one of their mates, no matter how unsuited the path before them was.

 Guinevere had already sensed what was in the air, having done that little stunt before many times, her large mule-ears pointing up and forward in eagerness for a change. She jumped into canter almost from a standing position and started climbing down that descent, leaving a cloud of dust and squirting rocks under her hooves, with Charles high in his stirrups once more, clinging to her long black mane like a cat, his cheeks flushed, a wide grin of adrenaline on his lips. When it happened, it came so fast, none of them would be able to tell in the end, why. Maybe a loose spot in the uneven ground that hadn't been there two days ago, from someone else climbing the damn pit, or the stupid horse had been startled by its own shadow and lost its step. All Erik knew was that Charles was suddenly no longer sitting in his saddle, that Guinevere had slipped for some reason, right before reaching the pit's bottom and reared up in fright, and Charles was falling … Only Charles wasn't falling at all because the strap of his goddamn stirrup wasn't tearing off as it should, and his foot was caught in the damn thing, and when the horse was back on all fours, its rider was caught in a highly dangerous position by its side upside down.

 His eyes wide with shock and fear, an ice-cold fist of dread punching into his guts, Erik reached out to the ugly scene with his powers, already about to grab the damn stirrup, do something … Only he couldn't because he was too far away for such fine manipulation on a wildly moving object, and if he made only one wrong move now, he would injure Charles' already painfully twisted looking leg even more … That damn strap had to give in any second now … He waited just for one second too long, a second that would haunt him for the rest of his life.

 When Charles' horse leaped into a run again, scared by the situation and Erik reached out again with a curse, he didn't manage to grab the stirrup anymore for far too many long moments. Instead, he was forced to watch the mare drag his lover through the sharp-edged field of rocks and earth and debris that was the pit's ground, Charles' body trapped like a doll's by its side and being flung around easily as one.

 Getting back on his own horse and following Charles would undoubtedly have meant facing the same fate. In his growing horror, all Erik could think of, especially since he'd never had less focus on his own powers to be able to levitate with the necessary speed, was to reach out for all he could manipulate with his gift in reach and try to stop the panicked animal in the distance with a brutal pull back against both the stirrups and the sharp bit in its mouth. It should be the last mistake today.

 Only even more out of her mind with fear and pain, Guinevere reared up once more, almost vertically. Charles finally came free of that damn stirrup, crashing down hard right beside his horse. Free of her upsetting ballast, the mare started to run off again immediately, her left hind leg hitting square into Charles' back as she did.

 By the time Erik got there, shaking from worry, with anger on himself, in a panic he wouldn't allow admitting even to himself when he realized, Charles wasn't getting up, the horse had climbed the other side of the pit and was nowhere to be seen. His own might probably have fled too at this point, and Erik had no fucking idea how he should get his badly injured partner at home immediately if he didn't find back his focus on his damn powers right away … But none of that counted at the first moment, not with Charles laying in front of him unmoving, half his clothes in rags from that grinding, his back cut open in dozens of spots so badly, Erik's hands were dark red with blood by the time he'd hectically ripped some makeshift bandages from his own shirt and pressed them down on the wounds with as much pressure as he dared. "Charles? Talk to me, please …" He knew he should be moving, that they should basically be half-home already, but a warning voice in the back of his head whispered, after a fall like this, he couldn't just pick Charles off the ground if he didn't want to risk even more damage than what he could see right now. More than far too much raw flesh and at least a very badly sprained or maybe even broken knee and ankle.

 His trembling voice seemed to have got through to his lover somehow anyway, because his lids started to flutter, a tortured groan coming from his lips. "Erik …"

 "I'm here." Erik quickly reached for his partner's aimlessly scrambling hands and rested his own against the side of Charles' far too pale face. His lover was orientated, he was at least not screaming his lungs out so maybe that whole thing had looked worse than it was … Erik just had to give him a minute to catch his breath and keep him from going into shock, then he could bring him home, and the next moral discussion they'd have in their damn bathtub. "What was that about staying on your horse with your ass, huh? And here I was promised make-up sex tonight."

 Charles didn't smile. Charles looked more afraid than Erik had ever seen him in his life. "Erik, I can't feel my legs."

     "So you're telling me, you're being entirely useless. Again." Hank found with cynical surprise that he preferred unhinged, aggressive Erik to this heap of pure despair crouched on some chair next to his patient's bed, his whitish face buried in his hands, his riding clothes still stained red and his voice an empty echo of lingering shock. When the guy wasn't even in the mood to criticize Hank for his pure gall to live, things were really bad.

 "Says the one between us who watched him shatter three vertebras." Hank's own voice was missing a lot of its usual bite toward the guy as well. He finished a last note in Charles' patient file before storing it back in its pocket at the bed, then got rid of his lab coat, suddenly extremely eager to get to his car. He'd never been able to deal well with the taste of defeat on his tongue.

 "You didn't even try," Erik spat his way, with so much helpless wrath of the heavens in his face, Hank might have been unsettled any other day, given the guy had more than once threatened him in these very rooms with a blade before. But today, neither of them was in the mood to fight. Today, both of them would have to live with the knowledge of having failed.

 "I know every single device in this room, Lehnsherr, both ours and the Shi’ar equipment." Hank tiredly leaned against the wall on the other side of the bed, not even trying to make eye contact that neither of them could have been able to stand right now. He rather stared at that half-naked, awfully thin, and pale-looking shape of the man between them who would spend the next few days sleeping off the worst of the pain before the much worse kind of agony would start to set in.

 The agony of the first time afterward. The beginning of a kind of life where nothing was like it had used to be.

 Hank would have given a lot to spare someone he liked to call a close friend, in spite of his sometimes murky methods of working, that kind of fate. But sometimes, regardless of all, they were all capable of and even all the powerful help they'd got for their cause in the course of the years, they were powerless against the laws of nature. Against a kind of biology that a body without a healing factor like Hank's was not able to trick. "I checked and repeated everything his doctors did. Thrice. As much as it pains me to say, there's nothing on this planet that can make him walk again. You know exactly, Empress Lilandra only gave us a fraction of her tech. She thinks humanity is not ready for the rest."

 "Then we go to her." Erik gritted his teeth only harder. "If she cares for him as much as she claims, she'll have her people heal him."

 "And how do you think we'll get there? By zeppelin?"

 Hank was too tired even to flinch at Erik's aggressive growl or the way he punched out with his powers, leaving a remarkable dent in a filing cabinet in the corner. For once, he didn't hold his lack of rationality against the guy.

 Hank felt a little like punching things himself right now. "There's no one who can take us. No ship on this planet is capable of flying us even out of this galaxy, even if Charles was willing to manipulate an organization like NASA for his own personal needs, and you should know best, he never would. Besides, the Shi’ar are millions of lightyears away. From what I gather, he has no way of contacting the Empress. We'll have to wait until they decide to stop by Earth next."

 "That can take years." Erik buried his face in his hands again. This time it wasn't only anger that had his shoulders shake as the faint scent of salt in the air revealed.

 "I'm sorry. I truly am." Hank forced himself to turn away because, for the moment, he'd done all here that he could. Reaching the exit, he hesitated for the first time ever since he knew this house, wondering if he should stay for a couple of nights. Charles' and especially Erik's goals were too far from his own to think about switching jobs permanently but given his old friend's condition, he wasn't sure he wanted to trust Erik with taking care of his partner, even with machines that were doing half the work for him anyway.

 He wasn't sure he wanted to trust Erik, period. For that, he'd seen the guy turn his back on people no longer of use to him too often.

 "You're not gonna leave him over this, are you?"

 "Not all of us run as soon as things get difficult, McCoy." Well, that at least sounded like Lehnsherr again. Maybe such a bitter kind of consolation would have to do tonight.

 "I'll hold you to that." But when it came to the inevitable, many years later and, in Erik's defense, over nothing that had to do with Charles' handicap, Hank never did.

*******************************************************************************

@whumptober | @whumptober-archive​

#no.24 #Blood covered hands #“I don’t want to do this anymore.” #x men #fic #everything after x2 didn't happen sue me #x men original timeline movies #cherik #magneto #charles xavier #long post #aka the riding accident #more screaming into void #hank mccoy #stormys fanfics #all the credits for the horsenames go to dear akira #whumptober2022 #whumptober 2022

[bluwails]

Ive been real inspired by @chipper-smol 's au. I find myself snickering at Ghost/feral's antic mainly because I have young siblings and in my home there is never a dull moment. Child antics are literally my life rn and I cant help but relate.

So while on a nostalgic trip i was struck with this poorly written fic. And I hope you enjoy.

No edits because we die like men!

The time for rest had asserted its hold over Hallownest again as bugs wound down from the days toils. The servants and knights had quietly excused themselves to their personal quarters and the kingsmoulds that marched dutifully down each hall had slowed to a silent pace.

The white Lady had taken in the idea to walk the palace before retiring to her personal quarters for the evening. Dryya, her most respected and loyal guard, walked quietly behind her as she stiffled a yawn much to the white lady's amusement. She had dismissed her hours ago to rest but she stubbornly stuck to her and insisted on being around to protect her on her leisurely stroll.

" Your majesty, you need not worry for me. I will-" Dryya gaped stiffling another sign of encroaching sleepiness," -be with you until you retire to your bedroom."

She still felt fascination bubble under the surface as she observed her; a warm aura seeping off of her.

As a higher being they will never need these things like rest or daily meals. But they merely adopted the actions to blend more with the society around them. Just like her dear wyrm, Things like sleep were never on the forefront of their mind. They could spend decades awake and unbothered by the need. But they made resting a habit to demonstrate that one should rest after work.

Shuffling down the halls toward her favorite veranda befor she heard an unfamiliar scuffling. It was hurried but small. Most likely a small bug.

"Behind me your majesty." Dryya hissed pulling her nail from her side her alert instantly raised. As late as it was not many would be awake, much less in the halls working so fervently.

As they turned the corner they spotted two familiar horns working quickly with a brush and bottles of ink.

It was the feral vessel.

" You cheeky Sqwib! " she screamed shocking the little vessel. Their small hand dropping the brush they'd use to vandalize the walls. "You are at it again!" Dryya huffed indignant at the vessel as she marched over, sheathing her nail, and quickly bonking them between the horns.

" Do you know how you terrified the Queen?" She growled seizing their ink colored hands. " and to top that, you dare vandalize the white palace yet again!"

"Dear knight, there is no reason to be so harsh. " the white Lady softly appealed. "The walls can be cleaned and the ink replaced but the trust from a child cannot." She calmly lectured using a branch to pet the vessel.

"You are to lenient with them my lady." She huffed releasing them. Dryya was no fan of the feral vessel. Time and time again they'd watch and suffer their pranks. Many a time her nail was stolen only for it to be returned muddy or, miraculously, bent at the tip.

She was not the only one of the five knights to have their belongings weaseled from them and returned in less then favorable conditions.

"They are just being a child Dryya." WL cooed as she slowly squatted in front of them. "Soften your heart towards them. If only for me."

The knight reluctantly huffed again as she faced away. "Praise the Queen's endless patience, you little tyrant, you are saved for now. "

The white Lady smiled warmly as she looked the small vessel over. At this time they were meant to be tucked away in bed. The schedule their father made, though strict was optimize for their healthy growth. She suspected in full that the pure vessel had curled themselves into bed without a second thought, while their sibling ran through the halls causing their daily commotion.

In all honesty, she found their outbursts charming. Each trick, prank and shenanigan they pulled continuously showed her how lively they truly were. When they'd arrived from the abyss with their sibling, she lamented at their sight. Seeing them as nothing more than walking corpses until she heard of what would honestly sound like a farce. They'd barely stepped foot into the white palace before they entered a meeting between the dreamers, with no command or reason, and unleashed the most ungodly revolting smell. Shocking and disgusting the entire gathering forcing them to vacate the room entirely.

When her wyrm ranted about them that evening on how they indignantly, stomping their tiny grub feet and blantly ignoring him, forced them to clean the entire room alongside the retainers as punishment she could not help but laugh in an odd mix of relief and joy releasing a knot in her chest she did not know she held.

Looking again to the picture on the wall it was of clearly her dear wyrm. Her giggle chimming like bells as she observed it further. It was simple and childish as but it was an accurate representation of her wyrm. His elegant crown like horns now simple zigzags, their fangs drawn large and silly, with their tongue poked out in a not very gentlemen manner. (She suspects this is how they saw their father when they ranted at them.) It was crude, hurriedly painted, and was encompassed by tiny hand marks and had all the makings of a goofy Caricature and she wished she could save it.

"I see the throws of art beckoned you from your deep sleep small one." knowing full well they did it to mess with the king again. "maybe we should have Lurien tutor you to bring out your talents?" She questioned aloud watching the vessel furiously shake their head from the corner of their eye.

"Then what brings you from bed?"

The child twisted at their fingers looking down as they snuck peeks at her face.

They signed quickly keeping their ink covered hands slightly in sight. But It obvious it was something else. It was no news to her that they held many things back from them. And the curiosity of what it could be danced in the back of her mind, but she refused to force them anymore than they'd allow.

"You know you require rest in order to grow." She purred gently as she angled her small one's mask toward her.

Their mask tilted in a way that mimicked a pouty huff. Her heart swelling at how cute they were. She could not help but poke a small amount of fun.

"So you do not wish to grow anymore?" She questioned exaggeratedly tilting her head and placing a branch to her cheek.

They seemed to freeze at the and mull the thought around in their head. To her, this was the sweetest gesture. She'd remembered when the two vessels first molted and got their bearings. Though they thought no one was watching, she caught them do a small jig in celebration of their new body. Wiggling their newly formed fingers, touching their more angled faces and observing their budding wings.

" I'd say you'd want to." She whispered calmly retrieving her handkerchief to clean them.

"How can one so small hold such large secrets?" She hummed wiping the pink ink from them.

The vessel signed, a cheeky air to them as they flexed their arms nearly rupturing her heart from cuteness alone.

"Dryya please get someone to assist in cleaning up. " with a bow Dryya reluctantly left grumbling to herself.

"Now as much as I would love for you and to stay up and get into all kinds of mischief. I would say its time for bed. " She cooed admiring their clean face.

The vessel gestured again with more emphasis.

"I see." She hmmed making a show of thinking of what to do. In reality she had an idea of what to do. Somewhere deep in her memory was a song that. She could not remember the face that sang it to her but she remembers it working nearly every time. Ushering her to sleep. "Then would you care to accompany me on the veranda?" She asked pointing to the large glass door not far behind them.

Nodding they streched their arms up towards her. Obligating the gesture she swept them up in her branches as she walked slowly to the door.

she allowed small blooms to bloom on her creating a pleasant perfume before sitting on her stool already set up outside.

The vessel signed again gesturing at themselves.

Chuckling she squeezed them close to her. "Not essentially. You are of two pale beings and void." She murred quietly; her light warming them as they sunk into her lap. "You don't really need sleep. But its good because it helps you grow." She hummed wrapping her branches around them.

They gestured wildly again wiggling their fingers above their head causing her to erupted in laughter.

"Yes." She snickered "maybe if my wyrm slept and rested more they would grow as well I will be sure to suggest it to them later." Feeling the small ones shoulders shake in signs of laughter she hugged them.

" you remind me much of him in his younger years." She thought aloud as the vessel shook their head furiously. " well the both of you refuse to sleep on time so I imagine you two are similar in that sense." She mused as the small threw a small tantrum.

"Very well, shall I sing you something to assist you to sleep?" They nodded sinking back into her lap, placing their head on her chest.

As they sat, staring out into the lush garden and flickering lumaflies below she hummed a quiet tone shutting her eyes calling upon the memory.

Her branch rubbing small circles into their child's back as her voice trilled lyrics long thought lost to her:

Lay down your head and I'll sing you a lullaby

Back to the years of loo-li lai-lay

And I'll sing you to sleep and I'll sing you tomorrow

Bless you with love for the road that you go

May you sail far to the far fields of fortune

With diamonds and pearls at your head and your feet

And may you need never to banish misfortune

May you find kindness in all that you meet

May there always be angels to watch over you

To guide you each step of the way

To guard you and keep you safe from all harm

Loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay

May you bring love and may you bring happiness

Be loved in return to the end of your days

Now fall off to sleep, I'm not meaning to keep you

I'll just sit for a while and sing loo-li, lai-lay

May there always be angels to watch over you

To guide you each step of the way

To guard you and keep you safe from all harm

Loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay, loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay

Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay

Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li lai-lay

Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li lai-lay

Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li lai-lay

Loo-li, lai-lay

Only the soft breathing and the feeling their body relax and their shoulders ease indicated they drifted off.

"Sweet dreams my small one."

Thanks so much for reading. In all honesty i have only played hollowknight for about a month and half and im already so invested in the fandom. (I'm still getting my butt handed to me by ogrim. Please dungy boi stop throwing sh!t at me long enough so i can hit you. You broke all my fragile charms alreday!-🥺😢) You guys are so creative and fluffy and have no problem hurting my tender sensibilities.

For those curious the song is called sleepsong by secret garden. I used to listen to it ages ago before bed.

#hollow knight #the pale king #hk #the pure vessel #hollowknight #hollowknightfanart #fanart #hollow knight ghost #hollowknightart #hollowknight au #fearlvessel au #feral vessel #shitlordau #shitlord au #hk little ghost #hk fanart #hk pure vessel #hk pale king #hk white lady #Youtube #my art

[ncssian]

A Favor: Part Ten

Nessian Modern AU

Masterlist

warnings: NSFW (!!), light abuse mention

this chapter is dedicated to the amazing showstopping talented @duskandstarlight for reviewing my writing and helping me successfully edit the sexy times!! she's so cool yall ❤️

***

The first thing she notices when she steps inside is the sound of crackling, followed by a warm glow from the living area. The lights are all off, but the fireplace is ablaze.

Nesta’s brows furrow, confused, but then she sees on the couch— “Cassian?”

Cassian’s eyes widen at the sight of her, and he stands quickly from the couch. “Nesta.” He’s breathless. Like he ran a great distance to get here.

Nesta is worried that she had one Jello shot too many. That maybe she’s still in Eris’s car, dozed off and dreaming. She can’t remember falling asleep, though.

“What are you doing here?” she whispers. If she’s too loud, he might disappear.

“I came back.” His hands flex at his sides, and Nesta wishes for the millionth time that she was better at reading emotions, because she’d give anything to understand what’s going across his face right now.

“You’re supposed to be in Velaris for the weekend,” she says dumbly.

“Fuck the weekend. I couldn’t even make it through dinner.” Are his eyes red?

Nesta’s mouth opens and closes, and she turns toward the burning fireplace. Weirdly enough, she’s grateful for the lack of lights. She can’t see the depth of Cassian’s expression under the firelight alone, and he can’t see hers.

“Why?” is all she can say.

“I…” He scrubs a hand through his hair and blows out a harsh breath. “Shit, we promised we would take things slow just a few days ago.” He laughs derisively. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”

Nesta’s head swivels to Cassian, eyes focused on him in that intense way of hers. “Tell me. I want to know what you were thinking.”

He drops his head, staring at his shoes. “I missed you,” he says lowly. “Even though I knew you were doing perfectly fine without me, I drove all the way back here like an idiot because I wanted to see you.”

Nesta’s throat tightens the longer she stares at Cassian; it’s getting hard to breathe.

Cassian clears his throat in the silence, attempting to sound lighthearted. “So, that’s how I’m doing. What about you?”

“I had fun,” Nesta says, somewhat quiet.

“I saw.” He tries to smile. “You looked so happy in that picture. It made me happy.”

He’s telling the truth and lying at the same time, Nesta can tell. “I felt weird tonight, too,” she admits, swallowing. “Happy, but… lacking."

Cassian looks up at that.

“I’m really glad you came back,” she whispers. “I missed you too.”

“Nesta,” he breathes.

She takes a step closer to him. “I didn’t want to be clingy. Tell me if I’m being clingy.”

He shakes his head quickly.

“I don’t think you should leave me alone again,” she says into the dim glow of the room. "Not for a while, at least."

"I'm thinking the same thing."

He's right in front of her now, just inches away. She swallows; when did he get so close?

"If you want me to stop, I need to know now," Cassian says, voice low. His hands hover in the air between them, like he has to physically restrain himself from reaching out and touching her. "Because in a minute I won't remember why we agreed to take this slow."

All the air leaves Nesta's lungs in a straight whoosh. "I already forgot."

This kiss happens faster than the last one, but is somehow still slow— Nesta doesn't know which one of them moves first. All she knows is that one moment she's a lone figure, and the next she's joined with Cassian, his arms being the only thing still holding her upright.

He wasn't lying when he said he missed her, she finds out quickly. He kisses her with a drawn-out desperation that makes her head spin, using the distraction to ease her out of her coat and drop it to the floor. He pulls back for a sharp breath, only to take a look at her. "I can't believe I missed seeing you in a dress."

"I have more, we can look at them later," Nesta assures, her hands already reaching to tear the dress up and off of her. Cassian's hands catch hers at the last moment. "Easy, baby." He laces his fingers through hers. "I'm not going anywhere."

He pulls her in for another kiss before she can even process how much she likes the word baby. She latches onto his promise the way she latches onto his lips, like the string of a balloon about to fly away from her. He's not going anywhere. Not even to the next room.

The next minutes are the gentlest battle of wills Nesta has ever fought: every time she tries to speed things up, Cassian grounds her with his hands and mouth and towering form. When she becomes too impatient and reaches for the button of Cassian's jeans between kisses, he sweeps her right into his arms, forcing her legs to wrap around his waist and her arms to cling to his neck. His own hands slip right under her skirt, straight to her ass and squeezing.

The new angle presses her center firmly against his hard length, and she greedily accepts the simple pleasure he grants her with a choked gasp. "Can we please—"

"Don't rush this," Cassian murmurs into the underside of her jaw, walking them to the stairs. He stops to press her into the banister, rubbing his hips lazily into Nesta's. "I've waited a long time for you. Now it's your turn to wait." He bites down on a soft spot of skin.

This is real, Nesta finally realizes. This melting heat turning her limbs into jelly— it's not her mind wandering off to involuntary thoughts about Cassian's dick. The kind of thoughts that have her pinching her wrist hard enough to hurt. No, this is infinitely better than any three a.m. fantasy she's had so far.

He's carrying them upstairs now, but Nesta barely notices with how she's clasping his face, demanding all of his attention with her hungry kisses. It's a wonder they both don't topple down the steps with how starved she is for him.

How long has this need been building up in her? She doesn't want to know, even as the ache between her legs intensifies and she's eased onto a mattress. Blinking, she notices they're in Cassian's room. She hasn't been here since that night she was sick, and even then she didn't get a good look at the place through her haze of pain.

It's decorated with art and personal photos, big enough to carry a fireplace and a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows. Her own room isn't half as nice. "You've been holding back from me," she accuses.

Cassian looks up from where he's kneeling between Nesta's legs at the foot of the bed, realizing that she's talking about the room. "Why?" he smirks. "You looking to move in?"

As if she can even consider such a thing right now when she's seconds away from combusting.

Like he knows exactly how she feels, Cassian pushes the hem of her black dress up until it bunches around her waist, leaving her painfully exposed. His eyes glaze over at the sight of her plain gray panties, narrowing on the darker damp spot over her slit. A predatory look crosses his face, one that makes goosebumps pebble along her thighs. He tugs her even closer.

"Cassian..."

It's too late for whatever Nesta is about to say, because Cassian isn't listening anymore. Leaning forward, he noses at her clothed crotch, placing a slow kiss on the wet fabric of her underwear before dragging it off entirely and tossing it aside.

Nesta gasps and squirms when he pulls her legs firmly over his shoulders. "Um," she tries to say, "I don't really have a great history of getting off to oral—"

She's interrupted by a long lick up her center, from the wetness pooling at her entrance to the tip of her clit. Her hips jerk involuntarily, and then Cassian is outright feasting on her, all his words of patience suddenly as meaningless as a snapped leash.

Nesta's head falls back against the mattress with both overwhelming pleasure and unexpected surprise. Getting eaten out has never done much for her in the past— most of the time she just ended up wet and frustrated, and not at all in a good way. She believed coming on someone's tongue was an activity best reserved for her romance novel heroines, never herself.

So when her legs start trembling around Cassian's head after not even a minute of calculated licking and openmouthed kissing—

"Oh— ah," Nesta stammers, hands fisted desperately in the bedsheets since she doesn't know where else to put them. The only thing stopping her from rubbing herself all over Cassian's face are his broad hands, pinning her firmly in place while he gives her what he wants.

His deep groan rumbles through her heated core, right down to her bloodstream. "There's no fucking way," he says against her folds, shaking his head. "Your fucking taste—"

At the same time his hands find hers, interlacing their fingers together, his lips wrap around her swollen clit, sucking hard.

A breathy whimper tears out of Nesta's throat as she's thrown into release, every last nerve in her body shot through with electric pleasure. Cassian keeps licking and toying at her folds, until she can feel the overstimulation all the way down to the arches of her feet. It's only then that she tries to squirm away, feeling too much at once.

Cassian relents, wiping his mouth with the back of a hand, but the dark glint in his eyes says he has a new objective. "Aren't you glad you waited?" he rasps as he stands.

In Nesta's haze, she feels a tug of fabric, and then her dress is being pulled over her head. She can't remember if the bra she's wearing is a particularly sexy one, but before she can lift her head to check, it's being flung to the other side of the room to join the rest of her clothes. She doesn't even shiver, but sits up so she can grab at Cassian, any part of him—

He tries to catch her wrists before she can tear his clothes off, but Nesta isn't having any more of his waiting. Her hands dive under the hem of his sweater, his bare skin burning hot to the touch with arousal, and then he's shirtless. Her eyes rapidly skim over his scattered tattoos, not sure which one she wants to take in first as she fumbles with his pants.

"I'm going to learn all of you by the end of the night," she threatens, her focus catching on a pattern of thick black lines inked onto his ribs.

Cassian huffs a laugh at that, but the sound turns strangled when Nesta slips her hand into his jeans, palming him through his boxer briefs. He's— larger than she expected, but whatever apprehension she has quickly turns into nailbiting anticipation. This is real, she thinks for the hundredth time that night.

"You're one to talk," Cassian breathes as he lets Nesta rub and squeeze at him. He catches her slim wrist in his large hand, pulling it away from his cock despite her whine of disappointment. "I've been wanting to learn about you from day one."

His eyes narrow on a spot beneath her left tit, and he reaches out to brush the small mole there. "How many more of these do you have hidden?"

"You'll have to find them."

Cassian's gaze darkens, and Nesta can nearly feel time slowing down around them as he regains control of the pace, the tempo. Leaning forward with predatory intent, he crowds her until her back is once again pressed into the mattress. She shudders with expectation, her legs unconsciously parting wider around him. He bends his head until his breath fans over that mole, his lips about to brush it—

At the last moment, he pulls away, standing off the bed to strip the rest of his clothes off. Nesta scrambles onto her elbows, stretching her neck to get a look at his erect cock as it springs out, a furious shade of red.

She swallows roughly at the sight.

Cassian doesn't bother hiding his satisfaction at the look on her face. "Maybe it's for the best that I didn't know how much you wanted me earlier. I don't think my ego could have handled it."

"I..." Nothing comes to her mind for a witty comeback. She must look struck stupid, because Cassian chuckles, "Okay, my ego definitely can't handle it." He tugs at her legs so her elbows collapse beneath her.

Before they can do anything else, he seems to remember: "Condom."

Nesta shakes her head rapidly, unwilling— or unable— to give up even a second of the time between them. "I'm not on birth control for nothing."

Technically, she's on birth control to regulate her periods, but this is definitely an unexpected benefit.

Cassian's answering grin is both cocky and reverent before he moves. And as he crawls over her body, it strikes Nesta how far she's come to reach this place— this haven of warmth and safety. Because the last time she was in this position, she couldn't have imagined ever being able to feel like this. She never thought she could find or earn the adoration that shines in Cassian's eyes before he buries his face in her neck.

There's a kindness in his touch that takes her breath away.

"I think I fell asleep on the couch earlier," he whispers into the crook of her neck. "I think I'm dreaming right now, and I don't know how far I can take this without waking up."

Before Nesta can show him how decidedly awake they both are, her entire body freezes up as his roaming hands near the soft flesh of her sides. Muscle memory makes her abdomen clench in defense, and Cassian stills instantly, pulling away to look her in the eyes.

No, no, no! This is not the time for her body to overreact, not when she's so close to everything she's been wanting, needing for weeks. And still, her hands fly to grasp Cassian's wrists at her sides.

"Nesta?" His calloused fingers scrape against her skin, so different from Tomas's hands when they touched her. She shuts her eyes and takes a breath, trying to force herself back to that heartdropping state of arousal.

"Just—give me a moment," she promises. Her body is awake in anticipation, not of a good fucking but of being pinched and bruised blue.

"Nesta," Cassian says again, lower now. There's a hint of warning in his voice, but it's not directed at her.

She peeks open her eyes. Cassian looks deadly serious above her, and he peels his hands away from her sides to place them on the mattress instead. "What's wrong."

She clambers for something to say that won't completely kill the mood. "I'm ticklish?"

He isn't buying it, scanning her face intently for the truth instead.

It's not that Nesta doesn't want to tell him. It's that she doesn't want to tell him now, when she's already learned what an orgasm from Cassian feels like and she's been promised another one.

No way in hell will her ex-boyfriend get in the way of her first hookup since she left him. The unjustness of it ignites a frustration in her that burns away any lingering anxiety.

She places her hands on Cassian's, bringing them firmly back to her sides. Softly, she tilts her head up to peck his lips and whisper against his mouth, "You still have time to learn everything about me. I'll teach you myself. But right now..."

Her hand snakes down his hard abdomen, finding his thick length and squeezing. "I want to be fucked."

This truth, Cassian believes.

"I'll hold you to that promise," he warns before he dips his head, taking a pink nipple into his mouth and suckling hard. Nesta's damn eyes roll back at the perfection of this scene, this sensation that goes beyond physical pleasure, as he releases her nipple with a pop. "I'll learn everything." Not just her body, but her secrets, her soul, the way she breathes and feels and thinks.

What a terrifying vulnerability, yet her core tightens at the thought of it.

Cassian slips his hands beneath Nesta's thighs, supporting her as his cock finally, finally settles between her legs, pressing insistently against her slick entrance.

Nesta can't describe the sound she makes when he finally pushes into her, the luxurious stretch snapping an emotional cord in her. In Cassian, too, from the way he has to bow his head for a moment, his face pressed into her chest as they both catch their breaths.

After a long moment, he begins to move inside her at a steady pace that nearly makes her keen. Nesta can only let him grind her into the mattress, let him explore and play and touch while she writhes beneath him, head spinning so fast she's on the verge of blacking out. She couldn't have predicted such— closeness.

Clenching tight enough around his cock to make him swear, Nesta attaches her lips to the line of a compass tattoo on Cassian's bicep, shutting her eyes against the intensity of his gaze.

"Can't believe I don't have to pretend not to be obsessed with these anymore," Cassian rasps, palming a full breast. He rolls his thumb over her stiff nipple in fascination.

"As if you ever hid it," Nesta grits out, shuddering beneath him. She swallows down the obscene sounds rising up her throat. Not that it matters— her desperate panting seems to be doing more for Cassian than loud moans ever could. Raw tension laces his body as he pumps harder into her.

His thrusts hit so close to a spot she didn't know existed before now, awakening a greedy new ache—

"Lift your hips for me, baby." As if he can read her mind. Nesta arches her hips off the bed on instinct, allowing Cassian the angle to slide deeper than she thought possible, to grind against that sensitive patch of skin and fill her completely.

Holy shit. She doesn't know if she says the words aloud or not, because her face is pressed into the sweat-dampened pillow, eyes fluttering rapidly as she withstands this new immense pleasure.

Cassian's low moan tells her he knows how she feels. She's so close.

"Look at me, Nesta," he demands.

Nesta shakes her head fiercely into the pillowcase, unwilling to meet his gaze when she's strung up this tight. She might explode if she even breathes wrong.

"Open your eyes," he orders more urgently this time. His hand finds her face, forcing her to turn to him. She gasps at the next thrust, her eyes flying open to meet Cassian's dark hazel ones. The way he's looking at her—

He rubs a thumb down her cheek. "Beautiful."

She isn't prepared for the intensity of the release that barrels through her. She isn't aware of the sounds she makes as she clenches repeatedly around Cassian, hands scrabbling for a way out of this neverending rapture. It's too much, more than she can handle, and she can't—

Cassian clutches Nesta like a lifeline, his hips picking up speed. Through the last ebbs of her climax, Nesta winds her fingers through his hair, bringing him down for a final kiss. She holds him tight as he spills inside her, groaning desperately into her mouth.

Later, when dopamine floods her system and her muscles turn numb with relaxation, Nesta will think that there's a word for how she's feeling right now. She won't know what it is, though.

***

Cassian can't help but be proud of himself for keeping his cool. For not coming within five seconds of getting Nesta in his arms and around his cock, but also for not blurting anything embarrassingly vulnerable during their first time together. Or their second and third times.

Nesta isn't great with vulnerability, even now. But he's watching her try to grow comfortable with it as she traces one of his tattoos, her naked body propped half on top of his.

"I usually hate tattoos," she murmurs softly, almost to herself. "I cringe every time Feyre gets a new one. But these are nice."

Cassian glances down to where her finger points at the elaborate phoenix tattoo on his pectoral. "What do you like about them?" he asks. With Nesta, there's always a reason.

"I like their placement." She trails that finger down his chest with studious focus. "I like the dark lines; it reminds me of my coloring books." Her finger stops on a Celtic knot on the side of his ribs. "Overall, very aesthetically pleasing."

He chuckles. "Thank you for the stellar review."

She glances up at him then, those blue-gray eyes even more arresting now than the first time he saw them. He's never understood how they can be the same color as Feyre's yet so different.

"I still can't believe you walked out in the middle of Thanksgiving dinner to be here," she whispers. "What will your friends say?"

Cassian’s arm tightens around her. He's still not sure of the answer to that question. His phone blew up with so many texts and calls on the drive here that at one point he just turned it off, but he'll still have to come up with some believable excuse for his behavior.

He tries to find an answer to Nesta's question.

"I’ve known most of those guys for fifteen years," he finally says, "and I’ve only had you for a couple of months. I wanted more time with you." It's the best reasoning he can provide right now.

“Maybe I should feel bad.” He stares up at the ceiling. “But I just can’t.”

Nesta hums in thought. "You must really like me."

Cassian swallows. "Yeah. I do."

"You have for a long time, according to your words." She rests her chin on the crook of his shoulder and looks up at him. "How long? Since I first moved in?"

He thinks back to that fateful night, Nesta standing rainsoaked in his foyer with wary eyes. A turning point in his life, yes, but there was a night before that.

"Do you remember our first meeting?"

The overpriced restaurant that Feyre chose to introduce her blood family to her chosen family. The dim lighting that glanced off the silver pins in Nesta's hair, and her solemn stare as she inspected Cassian and his friends in her detached way.

Her eyes narrow, but she nods.

"I noticed you before I even noticed Feyre or Rhys," Cassian says. "You just... demanded attention. You never gave it, though. I spent all night being louder than usual, sneaking looks at you, but I couldn't even get a second glance in return."

Nesta's mouth tightens. "And what then?"

"The night ended. I forgot about you and moved on." She was like a shooting star: fascinating and beautiful for the brief moment she passed through his life, but quickly dismissed afterward. That initial impression of Nesta faded so much over the years that when Cassian finally reunited with her in his cabin, he was shocked by the magnitude of her existence all over again.

Nesta stays quiet, thinking. "You did get my attention," she finally says.

Cassian's brows raise, but she continues, "I thought you were too loud, too absorbed in your own friends to ever be worth having a conversation with. But I was just being snooty and... jealous." She looks down at the planes of his brown skin. "If I wasn't busy being comfortable in my role as social outcast, I would have thought you were kind. You looked like you wouldn't mind being my friend— that's why I noticed you. But you weren't my friend, and you couldn't be, and that's why I made myself look down on you."

Her eyes glitter when they dart back up to him, and her hand starts absentmindedly tracing another tattoo. "I do that sometimes," she murmurs. "Build a whole relationship in my head with someone I've just met, and then get mad when it isn't reality."

Cassian pulls a strand of hair back from her face. "That's called wanting to make friends, Nes. It's just that that part is usually followed by, you know, actually making friends."

She pouts adorably. "That's the part I suck at."

He can't help it. He leans forward and kisses the little beauty mark at the corner of Nesta's mouth, the mark that nearly received more attention than her lips tonight. Memories of the rest of the moles scattered along Nesta's body flood Cassian: her shoulder blade, her ribs, below her ass cheek, and that damn spot on her thigh he's been eyeing since week one. He's tasted every single one of them several times by now.

"You finally did it," he says against her mouth. "You got me as your friend and more, and now you have all those guys from school, too. You can get whatever the hell you want when you aren't holding yourself back."

She rolls her eyes, but evidence of a smile pulls at her lips. "Save the motivational speeches for my therapist."

Another thing Cassian is eternally proud of: Nesta finding a professional she's comfortable with and having her first session coming up soon.

"And what do you want?" she asks before his thoughts can trail off.

He blinks up at her. "Hm?"

She shifts on top of him to face him better. "We're always talking about my feelings and wants and needs. I don't think I've ever learned about what you want."

What does he want? He opens his mouth, but doesn't know how to answer. Shit, he's never had to answer that question. He's never been asked it.

"Take your time," Nesta assures him after a moment of silence. She's not being sarcastic.

He inhales the scent of her hair, thinking.

"You know," he finally says, "I'm always talking with my friends, and I always leave the conversation feeling like I didn't say a thing that was worth anything. Nothing serious, nothing weighty, nothing thoughtful. And it's not a bad thing, technically, but sometimes I just want to have a real conversation with them. Like the ones I have with you."

He doesn't know when he and Nesta started having those types of conversations. Maybe they fell seamlessly into it: she would ask him how to interpret different tones over text, and he would ask her about whatever legal concept or romance novel she was currently obsessed with. The topic didn't have to be serious, as long as their words were. It was the flawless exchange of intelligence, ideas, and opinions that he wasn't even aware he craved.

"What else do you want?" she says.

To not be relegated to comedic relief all the time. To be chosen first.

He boops her nose. "You've ruined me. I have everything I want now."

Nesta sneers down at him. "God, you're predictable." She's about to push off his chest when he pulls her back in, rolling them over so they're on their sides.

He tucks her head under his chin. "Nesta?"

"Hm."

"We're not gonna backpedal after this, right?"

She sighs into the crook of his neck. "No. We like each other. You're my boyfriend now." She says it like she's telling him the time or the weather.

Into her hair, Cassian starts to smile, any lingering doubts at once assuaged.

Some things you just know instantly, like how Cassian knew the minute he met Mor that they would be friends for life, or how he knew Feyre wouldn't have any trouble fitting into his family. Like how he knows now that he loves Nesta, even if he can't tell her just yet. He'll just have to keep pretending he only likes her.

***

a/n: the tattoo artist that designed the new acotar covers has some sick work so a lot of cassian's tattoos are based off their art (but smaller) :)

taglist: @ladywitchling @sjm-things @thewayshedreamed @drielecarla @sensitiveillyrian @superspiritfestival @aliveahaahahafuck @cupcakey00 @sayosdreams @rainbowcheetah512 @claralady @thebluemartini @nessiantho @missing-merlin @duskandstarlight @lucy617 @sleeping-and-books @everything-that-i-love @cassianscool @awesomelena555 @julemmaes @wickedqueenoffantasy @poisonous-bloom @observationanxioustheorist @gisellefigue08 @courtofjurdan @theoverlyenthusiasticwriter @wolfiixxx @cass-nes @seashade @royaltykxx @illyrianundercover @queenestarcheron @monstrousloves-explodinggalaxies @humanexile @that-golden-lyre @agentsofsheilds @mercy-is-alive @cassiansbigwingspan @laylaameer01 @verypaleninja @maastrash @bow-dawn

#a favor #ncssianwrites #nessian #nesta archeron #cassian #nessian fic #nessian au

[alarawriting]

52 Project #24: The Princesses and the Peas

(Inspired by a post on Tumblr and if I can ever find it again I will link it here.)

(Not proofread, beta’ed, or even read through a second time because this is massively late and if I don’t post within the next hour it will officially be next week everywhere in the United States and I will have failed in my mission. I’ll try to re-read and proofread and edit next week. Also this note is highly unprofessional, but I learned my relationship to my audience through fanfic, so this is how I roll.)

***

Surely you have heard a similar tale before, almost but not entirely like this one, of the queen who sought the perfect wife for her son, the crown prince.

The queen had ruled the land alone since the death of her husband. She was praised for her wisdom and her benevolence toward her people. But she was no longer young, and it was time to make sure her son made a politically beneficial marriage, to strengthen his position when it came time for him to take the crown. Many in the land whispered that the young man would make a terrible king, and wanted him to abdicate in favor of his younger sister, who was beautiful and bright and smiling. Celia, the young sister, could look anyone in the eye and make them believe that in that moment, they were the most important person in her world. Arien, the prince… could not do that.

The prince had a talent for mathematics, and it had expressed itself very young. Some said he should be the chancellor of the exchequer rather than the king. But Queen Leyta knew her son would make a compassionate and wise ruler as well as a prudent one. He also had a gift for seeing the humanity behind the numbers he calculated, of being able to think of the impact they would have on the people he would one day rule.

Once, when he was a child of six, his nursemaid lost him. Leyta found him behind the kitchens, picking through the garbage bins to find table scraps. She would have punished the kitchen staff for allowing such a thing, but Arien insisted that she should not. “It’s not their fault, Mother. I ordered them to let me, and I’m the prince, so they had to obey me. I told them that if you became angry at them I would tell you that they were only obeying my orders. They can’t get in trouble for obeying their liege.”

Leyta sighed. She could punish them for obeying their liege, when their liege was 6 and the thing he wanted to do was eat garbage, but she wouldn’t, because she knew why they obeyed. When the prince was thwarted, he would ask why. And if he received an answer, he would argue with it and present his position. Sometimes, this debate would lead to him accepting the necessity, and calmly going about his business, seeming to forget all about what he’d asked. More often, if he didn’t get an answer to “why”, or he didn’t like the answer and thought it didn’t make sense, and he was still thwarted, he would start to scream and hide under tables, or scream and run around and break things, or scream and slam his head into the wall, and he wouldn’t stop even when offered the thing he wanted. It was very, very hard to calm him once he started shrieking. So instead of punishing the kitchen staff, she asked Arien, “Why were you eating garbage?”

“Our food is bought with the taxes we take from the people,” he said seriously. “If we wasted less food, we wouldn’t have to tax the people as sorely as we do, and they would have more money to buy things for themselves.”

So she took him aside and told him that the scraps were fed to the dogs, who helped the palace huntsmen bring down game, or the goats and fowl, who gave the palace milk, meat and eggs, or they were tilled into the ground to make the fields around the palace more fruitful. They did not, in fact, go to waste; food that wasn’t wholesome for humans to eat could still feed animals, who would turn it back into wholesome food.

Then she had a lengthy discussion with him about tax policy, and listened gravely to his suggestions as to how they could ease the burdens on the people, and told him what the problems with his ideas were. And when some of his ideas didn’t have significant problems, she told him so, and discussed them with him, and even implemented a few as policy.

Arien also had a great love for bugs. He spent much of his days wandering the grounds, sketching every insect he saw, capturing some to study them and figure out what they ate. When Leyta learned of this, she found a learned scholar of insects, and hired him to be Arien’s tutor in the matter of insects, only. The man was at first openly resentful of being required to work with a small child, assuming that Arien would be a spoiled princeling with no real interest in learning, but when he discovered Arien’s love for the tiny creatures, he embraced the boy wholeheartedly and tutored him as well as he could.

The prince had few friends. He was open and innocent, happy to make friends with any child close to his own age, but the honest children who truly wanted a playmate were put off by Arien’s tendency to talk about bugs and math almost constantly. The children who put up with Arien’s chatter were, to Leyta’s eyes, obviously coached by ambitious mothers, pretending to friendship with the strange young prince to improve their position at court. She arranged for most of these children to be sent away – either their mothers dismissed, or the family sent to one of the crown’s holdings with some duty to perform or another. Arien was saddened by the disappearance of his playmates, since he didn’t realize they saw him as mere stepping stones to power. Celia knew, and would comfort her brother as well as she could… but she didn’t have a lot of patience for math, tax policy, and insects either.

As he grew up, Arien continued to display a strange mixture of wisdom and childishness. He would run around the palace grounds, playing with children far younger than he was, and they were not old enough to try to manipulate him, so Queen Leyta left them alone. He enjoyed riding his horse and taking care of it, and was often found at the stables, for he believed his horse needed to cared for in just the exact way he did it, and he didn’t trust the stablehands to follow his instructions exactly. He would spend hours discussing the politics of the land and the problems facing various groups of his subjects with Leyta and her own advisors, and then he would scream and throw himself on the floor at dinner because a chef had put visible onions in his soup, and he would need to be put to bed with his favorite blanket and a knitted doll of a dog that he’d had when he was four.

People said that the boy was touched in the head, that he was slightly mad, and also, that a future king who threw temper tantrums over onions was not to be trusted. But they weren’t, exactly, tantrums, as Leyta saw them. They didn’t stop when the problem was solved, they usually didn’t include demands – in fact, usually it was hard to get the prince to explain what was wrong, because he seemed to lose much of his ability to speak when these fits came on him. And she could see in his eyes that he was terrified and overwhelmed, not angry and demanding. Arien needed the world to work a certain way, and when it did not, it left him adrift, frightened and lost in a world that seemed to make no sense to him anymore.

Some of these ways that the world needed to work involved food, and the importance of not being able to see onions, for an onion large enough to see was large enough to crunch in his mouth in a way that apparently was so disgusting it would make him lose his ability to eat all day. There were similar rules regarding peppers, and certain cream dishes. Other ways the world needed to work regarded his mother’s advisors treating him like their future king, not in terms of obsequious deference but in terms of actually listening to his ideas and explaining things to him – even when he was merely eight. And then there was the care of animals – his own animals needed to be cared for in an exact way, and if he saw anyone being cruel to an animal, he might actually become violent to that person. The same was true of stronger people being cruel to weaker ones. When he was fourteen, he heard a maid crying, and asked a kitchen maid to find out for him what had happened. And then, when he learned that a nobleman under his roof had ill used her and cast her aside, he went to his mother and demanded the man be whipped for his crimes. The political explanations she gave for why that couldn’t be done fell on deaf ears; he was a cruel man and he’d harmed someone he had power over, and that was all Arien cared about. Leyta only managed to satisfy him by sending the man on a probably futile sea expedition to try to find a cheaper source of rice.

This was the boy that Queen Leyta had to find a proper bride for.

Her mother-in-law, the Dowager Queen, had ideas, but it had been many years since the Dowager Queen had actually held any power; she was one of Leyta’s advisors now, nothing more. So the idea would have to be one that Leyta agreed with, herself.

A ball to introduce eligible young women with powerful families to the prince? No. The prince didn’t handle crowds or parties well, or meeting a lot of new people in one evening.

A series of daytime salons, where a small group of eligible women would converse over luncheon with the prince? No. That was still too many people and the prince  was self-conscious about people watching him eat.

Individual visits from each eligible young lady and her chaperones, to the palace, to meet with Arien, and also to be approved by Leyta? Yes! An excellent idea. Leyta had her secretary write up the invitations, to all the young women whose parents had written to her or the Dowager to express an interest.

In the palace was a suite of rooms that had been Leyta’s, once, when she’d lived in this palace to learn its ways before marrying the then-prince. She had that suite cleaned and prepared for the guests. Sleeping quarters to either side for the princess’s guards. Ladies-in-waiting to sleep in the antechamber outside the princess’s bedroom. And inside the princess’s bedroom, a bed heaped with several thick eiderdown duvets and pillows, incredibly soft, with sheets made from the finest linens.

And under the second eiderdown duvet, dried peas.

Queen Leyta tested the peas. When she sat on the bed, she couldn’t feel them. If she laid in the bed, she could barely tell they were there. But when she had Arien try it, he said, “You’re going to take them out before the guests come, right? The peas make the bed much too uncomfortable.”

“The peas,” Leyta said, “are to test whether a girl is right for you or not. It’s magic.”

Arien looked at her skeptically, unsure whether he believed in magic or not. “How are dried peas supposed to find me the right wife?”

“Magic,” Leyta said. “I can’t tell you exactly how it works. But it’s very important that you not tell them about the peas, or the magic won’t work.”

“Mother, I’m sixteen. I’m not a child. This whole story sounds ridiculous.”

“All right,” Leyta admitted. “It’s not magic, but I won’t be able to explain it to you until after it’s proven that it works, or doesn’t. But it is very important that you not tell any of your guests about it.”

Arien looked like he wanted to argue some more about it. Leyta said, “Trust me,” and he sighed, plainly remembering the number of times his mother had stood up for him or had come up with some scheme to help him.

“All right, Mother, but I’ll want that explanation afterwards.”

The Dowager Queen had her own theories. “You want to see if they can tell the peas are there?”

“To a certain extent,” Leyta said.

“You know that old wives’ tale about princesses being true and refined if they’re extremely sensitive is just a myth. I wasn’t a fragile flower who’d lose petals if you looked at her hard, and neither were you. And neither will Celia be.”

“I know that, Mother,” Leyta said – it was custom to address your mother-in-law as Mother, and Leyta’s own mother had died shortly after her wedding. The Dowager Queen had been the closest thing to a mother she’d had the entire time she was Queen. “I’m not testing for extreme skin sensitivity. Trust me.”

“It’d be hard for him to get an heir on a princess that fragile, don’t you think?” The Dowager chortled.

Leyta sighed. “No need to be crude about it. I have my reasons, and I’ll explain them to you, eventually. Let’s see if it works, first.”

***

The first princess was from the west. She had long straight hair and delicate-looking eyes with folded lids that left them shaped like almonds, rather than the eggs that the people of this realm wore in their face. She had pale creamy skin with a golden undertone, and she was demure and very polite, her etiquette perfect. She sat with Arien for hours, smiling at him with a face that expressed great interest, as he explained to her the complexities of life in a beehive.

In the morning, Leyta asked her, “How did you sleep?”

“Oh, wonderfully,” the princess said. “The bed was perfect! So soft! Your hospitality is wonderful.” She bowed her head.

Leyta saw her and her entourage off. When she returned, she asked Arien, “What did you think of her?”

“She was nice,” Arien said. “She listened to me. I’ve only had a few friends who listened to me, and they all moved away.”

Privately, without Arien present, the Dowager asked, “So what’s your verdict?”

“Unless none of them pass the test, she’s a no.”

***

The second princess was from the land immediately to the north. Her skin was tree- brown but as smooth as a tranquil lake, her hair floating around her head in a soft, curly cloud. Arien talked to her about beetles. She made excuses of not feeling well about half an hour into the beetle discussion.

When Leyta asked her how she slept, she said, “Your rooms are very nice. And the food last night was excellent, I’m so sorry I had to cut the evening short. But I feel fully rejuvenated today.”

Arien said, “She seemed okay, but she kept looking around while I was talking to her, so much that I think she gave herself motion sickness. I think that’s why she got sick.”

Leyta said to the Dowager, “A definite no.”

***

The third princess was from the far south. She had beautiful straight golden hair, cut short and asymmetrically, where it was shorter in the back than front and where it was parted on one side rather than in the middle.

She complained about her soup being cold. She complained about her roast beef being too bloody. She complained that the dessert course had small portions and also that it was too sweet. She screamed at servants for not bringing her wet towels for wiping her hands quickly enough and for refilling her wine glass too quickly. She insisted on talking to the seneschal about the servants who had served her, demanding that they be banished from the castle for incompetence. When Arien tried to talk to her, her demeanor was sweet, but every time he tried to talk to her about something he liked, she insisted that he show her another part of the castle. She made plans for room redecoration as if she had already become Arien’s queen.

In the morning, she was sickly sweet with Leyta, saying it was only a minor thing, really, but surely more competent servants could be found to make the bed? It was extremely lumpy. Leyta found out that she’d woken the chambermaids at 1 in the morning to demand an additional five featherbeds piled on top of hers.

Arien didn’t look at his mother. “Um… I don’t want to be impolite, but… I didn’t like her very much.”

The Dowager Queen said, “Please don’t tell me you’re considering that young harridan just because she could tell there were peas in the bed.”

“Oh, no. Not even for a moment,” said Leyta, and drew her quill through the name “Princess Carinna” on the list.

***

The fourth princess was actually the daughter of a powerful merchant, not an actual princess at all. She had deeply tanned skin and thick black hair, and beautiful dark eyes. She and Arien talked for hours about tax policy and accounting techniques, and she seemed genuinely interested.

She said the bed had been wonderful, and there was nothing wrong with it. Arien liked her. But Queen Leyta marked her as a provisional choice, the first on the list if no one passed her test.

***

And so it went with princess after princess. Most of them showed at least some slight sign of impatience when Arien monopolized the conversation, but none of them admitted to it, and few even tried to change the topic. No others were as rude as Carinna. No others admitted to detecting the peas, either. Leyta was on the verge of contacting the merchant to make an offer for his daughter to wed Arien. And then Princess Inaya arrived.

Princess Inaya was from further north than the second princess had been, her skin darker and her hair in braids that lay directly against her head, with ribbons and beads woven into them at the bottom. She didn’t look Leyta in the eye – or anyone else, really, keeping her head bowed demurely. She picked at her food, more or less eating only the potatoes, and she barely spoke… until she met with Arien.

He offered, diffidently, to show her the garden, and she accepted. He started to point out interesting bugs that he saw in the garden… and she began to point out interesting rocks. They soon began an animated conversation that sounded to Leyta more like two separate threads, where Arien would say a sentence or two about insects, then yield to Inaya, who would say a sentence or two about rocks. Sometimes they had a genuine back-and-forth when they talked about the habitats of pillbugs, who lived under rocks, or other areas where rocks and insects somehow intersected. Arien showed Inaya the notebook where he drew bugs and made his observations, and Inaya seemed to be thrilled with his artistic skill. She showed him her own notebook, with no art at all, where she wrote down the properties of rocks she had discovered and outlined the tests she did on stones to see what they were made of. Arien was fascinated with the efforts she’d gone to and how thoroughly she’d documented her findings; he’d never thought of doing anything to research the insects aside from looking them up in his tutor’s books.

At no point did she ever look Arien in the eye. At no point did he seem to care. He relaxed enough with Inaya to flap his hands when he grew excited; Inaya had a chain of polished stones that, instead of wearing around her neck, she tossed in the air as she paced.

In the morning, when Leyta asked Inaya how she slept, she squirmed.

“I, um. The bed was mostly very nice. Very good linens, nice soft down. But, uh. It felt like maybe there were… tiny pebbles in there somewhere? I’m not sure, I didn’t want to be rude and strip down the bed to look, but, uh. It was kind of uncomfortable.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that,” Leyta said.

She made arrangements to ask Arien his opinion before Inaya’s entourage left, this time. He spoke very simply. “I love her. Pick her, she’s the one.”

“I thought you would say that,” Leyta said, and she finished drafting the offer to Inaya’s parents, and signed it. “Take this to her lady-in-waiting before they leave, to give to Inaya’s parents.”

“I can’t!” Arien said, looking all around. “I can’t be the one to do it because I have to give her a parting gift if I see her and I don’t have any nice rocks!”

So Leyta gave him a bracelet with a large inset opal, and smaller jades all around it. “Take this to her and tell her which kinds of stones are in it, and tell her she can wear it as a bracelet if she wants, or take it apart for the stones, whichever she prefers.”

Later she heard that Inaya collapsed on the ground crying when he made the offer, but that her lady-in-waiting reassured Arien that this wasn’t abnormal – that she did this whenever her emotions were too strong to control, even if they were happy emotions. Inaya confirmed that she was crying from relief and joy, because she had always thought that no man would ever want to marry her and if one did, he would hate her rocks and want her to do normal womanly things like embroidery or something, which she wasn’t good at in the slightest because her coordination was bad and she was always poking the needle into the wrong place, and she had never imagined that she would ever find a man who understood her and didn’t demand that she look in his eyes and liked to listen to her talk about what she loved. Then Arien asked her very gravely if she liked hugs, because most of the time he didn’t like hugs, especially when they were a surprise, but if she would like a hug he really wanted to give her one. They hugged, and declared mutual love (“as far as I can define the feeling of love, anyway,” Inaya said, “because I don’t think I’ve ever been in love before, so how can I know for sure that that’s what this is?” Arien had agreed with her, but said “I think that even if what we’re feeling isn’t the same kind of thing as other people feel when they’re in love, it’s close enough that we can use the same word, because who wants to have to make up a new word?” And then they spent several minutes amusing each other to the point of hysterical laughter in making up new words that sounded ridiculous, sometimes repeating them to each other ten or a dozen times.) When Inaya finally had to leave, Arien cried.

Leyta wasn’t there for any of that, but her spies were everywhere in the castle.

***

When the Dowager demanded that she explain her test, Leyta summoned Arien, who had washed his face so it looked more as if he had had a terrible runny nose and sneezes than that he’d been crying.

“You asked me about what it would prove, to put peas in the bed,” Leyta said, “and I was looking for two things, but one was more important than the other.”

“What were you looking for?” Arien asked.

“Arien… you know that you’re a special young man, and different in some ways than other people your age. I’ve consulted with many scholars. Children like you are often strangely sensitive to things that other people don’t notice… often to the point where it’s unpleasant. Such as your feelings about onions.”

He shuddered. “Please do not remind me of the existence of those devil vegetables.”

Leyta laughed. The Dowager scowled. Leyta knew she preferred that a king, or a crown prince who’d just been betrothed, have a serious demeanor. She also knew that Arien would be who he was, no matter what anyone asked him to be.

“So I thought, the peas might be noticeable to some of the girls, but they would be especially notable to a girl who was like Arien. More importantly, if a girl noticed it but claimed she didn’t… Arien, I know you are often taken off guard by lies, and you’re a very honest man yourself. I know you would prefer a wife who will tell you when something makes her unhappy, rather than her trying to guess how you feel about it and then telling you what she thinks you want to hear.”

Arien nodded. “Nobody can see inside someone else’s mind, so why would anyone even do that?”

“I wanted a girl who would be honest about something she found unpleasant, even if she had to offend her host to admit it. But, obviously, kindness and compassion and a lack of malice about it were necessary as well… we don’t want a Carinna anywhere near the rulership of the kingdom.”

“You can say that again,” Arien said. Leyta suspected he was setting her up so she could tell a joke.

“But I won’t, because I know you heard it the first time,” she said, smiling.

The Dowager frowned. “So you picked a girl who has the same kinds of problems as Arien? Was that wise? The kingdom may need rulers who understand the idea of telling lies when they must, who can be charming and adept with politics. I thought you’d pick a girl who would cover Arien’s weaknesses, not one with the same issues.”

“Your son understood me,” Leyta said simply. “It was an arranged marriage, but we quickly grew to love each other, because we respected and we understood each other. I don’t want the kingdom to have a queen who resents her husband because she thinks he’s strange… who may play politics behind the scenes to have him killed so she can take power. Or who takes lovers, so we don’t know if the royal blood is even in the heirs. It’s more important to me that Arien’s wife respects him and understands him, and that he understands and respects her, than to have rulers who can detect all the subterranean undercurrents of a conversation. That’s what spymasters are for… and Dowager mothers and grandmothers, and perhaps even younger sisters.”

“Mother,” Arien said, “thank you. I know the people think I’m strange, and maybe I am, but you’ve always watched out for me. I didn’t even know I needed to find a wife who wouldn’t lie to protect my feelings until you pointed it out, and now it’s obvious.” He looked at the Dowager. “And Grandmother, Inaya does complement me. I understand mathematics, and finance, and things like that. She was trained by her parents to understand logistics, so she could run the castle, but she went deeper with it; she understands things about what kind of weather will do things to the crops and what will happen to the farmers when that occurs, things I never even thought about asking. Together I think she and I can make our country one of the most prosperous and happy nations in the world.”

***

And so it came to be. Prince Arien and Princess Inaya were wed in a lovely ceremony that they immediately fled to go on their honeymoon as soon as the marriage vows were taken. They understood the economics of the nation, and other nations, as few kings and queens ever did, and when they needed someone to tell them that someone else was lying, they had the Dowager Leyta and Princess Celia. The country prospered as it never had before, with no beggars on the streets of the cities, because the King and Queen gave homes to those who had none, and living expenses to those too sick or weak or lacking in some ability so that they couldn’t work.

It would be a lie to say they lived happily ever after, because no human can be happy all the time, and they had arguments and problems in their relationship from time to time. But even Arien the Honest and his Queen would agree that we can say they lived mostly happily for the rest of their lives.

#52 project #i'm late! i'm late! #fairy tales #autism #altered tales #the writer is autistic

[somuchnonsense]

Idol AU Wangxian Drabbles

I wrote an idol trainee AU Wangxian drabble (of 900 or so words) last year and now I wrote another 700 words of post-debut Wangxian in the same universe so I’m going to post them both together here:

Moving

Lan Zhan is so perfect and Wei Ying is torn between being impressed and being jealous. He works hard—they all do or they won’t last long—but Lan Zhan has more talent in his pinky finger than a lot of the guys here, and a lot of experience too, making him much closer to the goal of being a polished idol than most of them. Wei Ying has talent too, but the mentors keep telling him that he lacks polish and discipline and that, essentially, if he doesn’t get his shit together, he won’t make it to the end—or if he does manage it on the power of his charm, he won’t be successful after.

The trouble is that Wei Ying has never in his life been good at discipline, at least not the kind Lan Zhan has, where you speak respectfully to your teachers and don’t interrupt practice to make jokes, even when everyone is stressed out and a joke will help diffuse the tension. He’s never been good at doing things the way he’s supposed to if he doesn’t think it’s the best way, if a different dance move would make it more interesting or a change in the lyrics would make them them flow better, or if goofing off will keep him sane during the long hours of practice.

When they get put in a group together for the next challenge, Wei Ying suspects it’ll be a disaster, but he also sees it as an opportunity. Lan Zhan is the top trainee, after all, and Wei Ying’s been up there too. They have a good song and good choreography. If they pull it off, it’ll get them a lot of attention, and with it a lot of votes. They just, you know, have to not kill each other in the process. Unfortunately, that’s asking a lot, because Lan Zhan is respectful to their teachers, but he has very little patience for Wei Ying, especially after hours and hours of draining practice.

“Why can’t you take anything seriously?” Lan Zhan roars when Wei Ying trips him, which was both funny at the time and, in retrospect, a really stupid idea when they can’t afford any injuries. “Do you even want to be an idol?” It’s some ungodly hour of the morning on their third night practicing until almost dawn and even Lan Zhan is too exhausted to manage himself in front of the cameras. If he’s lucky, they’ll edit this out or frame it in some way that doesn’t make him look too bad, but Wei Ying’s more likely to get the villain edit if he’s not careful.

The thing is, Wei Ying does want very badly to be an idol, and he also wants Lan Zhan to like him, or at least to respect him. He wants to work side by side with Lan Zhan and put out good songs, good performances. He wants Lan Zhan to understand what not enough people understand: that he’s very serious about this, even if he shows it differently. He’s exhausted too, and it’s too hard to explain himself and too revealing even for the middle of the night to show how much he wants this.

“Hey, let’s all calm down…” says Nie Huaisang, fluttering nervously between them.

“I want to be an idol,” Wei Ying says flatly, looking Lan Zhan right in the eye. He can’t say anything more—how this is his last chance, how hard it was to get here without support, how all the criticism doesn’t roll off his back as easily as he pretends it does. He only looks at Lan Zhan, who for a long moment looks back at him, really looks at him for the first time and finally sees him. It’s a scary thing, being seen, and scarier still realizing how much he’s wanted Lan Zhan to see him.

None of their groupmates say a word, a heavy silence persisting until Lan Zhan finally looks away and Wei Ying can breathe again. “Let’s continue,” Lan Zhan says gruffly.

As they move into formation, he catches Wei Ying’s eye one more time and there’s understanding there, at last. He gives a curt nod, and just that acknowledgment surprises a broad smile out of Wei Ying. “Let’s do this!” he yells—and they do.

Beyond

Debuting is everything and nothing that Wei Ying dreamed of. It's live performances that make his blood hum, but never enough of them. It's appearing on shows and having people all across China laugh at his jokes but also worrying that people will misunderstand and judge him. It's fans screaming his name in excitement and anti-fans screaming his name in anger, with posts all over the internet praising him and just as many insulting him.

And it's Lan Zhan in his group, at his side through long days and stressful nights being reminded of every flaw, through the happy moments and the painful ones. It's Lan Zhan always with him but never his, and not likely to be his any time soon, not with so much riding on these two years of their limited idol group's activity. (He doubts, really, that Lan Zhan would ever want to be his, as much as they've fallen into a strange but comfortable sort of friendship. It’s asking too much of life to fulfill his idol dreams and have someone as perfect as Lan Zhan love him.)

Some nights, Wei Ying can't believe how lucky he is to be finally living his dreams, to get to sing and dance and go on all the TV shows he grew up watching, to be surrounded by his fellow idols who understand how much he loves performing in a way so few people ever did growing up. But some nights, he just wants to let it all go, to move to a foreign country or a farm in the countryside where no one has ever heard his name or thinks they know anything about him and no one will see it if he fails. Everything is so extreme now, the highs blissfully high and the abrupt falls to the lows jarring and frightening.

It's on one of those difficult nights that Lan Zhan finds him half-heartedly fiddling with his phone and sits down beside him. He doesn't say anything at first, but Wei Ying is so aware of his presence, of the too-small-and-yet-too-big distance between them. He's aware of how he was all smiles at their late dinner and yet Lan Zhan knows that he's upset, knows that Wei Ying isn't as impervious to self-doubt as he pretends to be.

"Wei Ying," Lan Zhan says at last, low and calm and steady. It makes Wei Ying feel steadier too, just hearing his voice. Lan Zhan is amazing like that, and Wei Ying wants to tell him that, but he's afraid of what Lan Zhan would think, of how he'd feel if he knew that Wei Ying deeply appreciates his friendship but wants so much more.

"I thought it would be easy," he says instead, though that's scary too. "I thought that once we debuted, I'd have to work hard, but I'd know what to do. But maybe it's never easy. Even if you're successful, you can always fall."

The silence stretches out long enough for Wei Ying to regret his words, to regret letting Lan Zhan see the depth of his fears, but then Lan Zhan says, "I'll catch you." His voice is still steady, but when he turns to Wei Ying, there's a fear in his eyes that's different but also similar, a fear that he's exposed too much.

"Lan Zhan." Wei Ying can't believe what he's hearing, or at least that it means what he thinks it does. But Lan Zhan's eyes hold his and he knows, because it's never taken many words for them to understand each other.

Wei Ying doesn't know who moves first, only that soon they're kissing, as soft and steady and full of promise as Lan Zhan's words. Then they break apart and he can't stop smiling; his fears haven’t disappeared, but they feel so much more manageable, more conquerable than they did before. Lan Zhan is smiling too, small but sure. "I thought..." Wei Ying starts, but none of that matters anymore. Instead, he says, "We'll get through this together. All of this, however long our careers last."

"And beyond," Lan Zhan says firmly.

Wei Ying's heart stutters and squeezes and he wonders how he could have misjudged Lan Zhan almost as badly as Lan Zhan misjudged him when they were training. "Yes," he agrees. "And beyond."

#wangxian #wei wuxian #lan wangji #au #fic #mine #idol au #idol trainee au #i watched too much chuang #cql #the untamed #mdzs #mo dao zu shi #wangxian fic #mdzs fic #cql fic #the untamed fanfic

[bitchesgetriches]

Noble citizens of the aspirationally decadent Conglomerated Nation of Bitches Get Riches: let’s have a lil’ chat, shall we? It’s been a while since we chatted about our favorite topic: ourselves!

We hope you’ve enjoyed season two of the Bitches Get Riches podcast. Recording it was a bright spot for us during this dumpster fire of a year, so thank you all for listening.

As we wrap up another season, we had a few notes to share with you. Including some more personal reflections about how we’re doing, where we’re at, and what the future holds.

Let’s get into it!

Merch is back online

If you visited our Etsy shop in the last few months, you might’ve noticed the physical merch—tee shirts and coffee mugs and tote bags and such—wasn’t listed anymore. Basically, when lockdowns started, it caused a lot of disruption and delays on orders. Not wanting people to be stuck waiting for stuff, we decided to take it all offline, and only offer digital merch.

As of today, we’ve reactivated everything! But please keep in mind that there may still be delays, depending on what’s happening in the world! We appreciate your patience, if patience is indeed called for.

Visit Our Etsy Shop

Season one transcripts

Next, we wanted to let you guys know that we now have transcripts available for season one of the Bitches Get Riches podcast!

We’re committed to making BGR as accessible as we possibly can. We know that some people can’t hear, or struggle to absorb information aurally, so transcripts were something we’ve always wanted to offer.

… But, you know, at the end of the day, we’re just two people! Transcribing and editing audio is time- and labor-intensive work, and there just aren’t enough hours in the day for us to do it along with the fifteen million other things we have to do.

We were able to offer season one transcripts thanks entirely to A Purple Life, a peerlessly talented and wonderful fellow blogger who selflessly made it happen. (If you don’t already read her stuff, you’ve already disobeyed us, as we commanded you to in 10 Rad Black Money Experts to Follow Right the Hell Now. And for that, we’re strongly considering smiting you.)

We’re incredibly thankful to Purple for her hard work on this. But we also feel strongly that this DESERVES to be paid work! So the release of season two transcripts is dependent on getting more Patreon donors to offset funding it.

Season 1, Episode 1: “Should I Tell My Boss I’m Looking for Another Job?”

Season 1, Episode 2: “How Should I Behave on My First Day at Work?”

Season 1, Episode 3: “My Parents Have Bad Credit. Should I Help by Co-signing Their Mortgage?”

Season 1, Episode 4: “Capitalism Is Working for Me. So How Could I Hate It?”

Season 1, Episode 5: “I Don’t Love My Job, but It Pays Well. Should I Quit—or Tough It Out?”

Season 1, Episode 6: “I Lent My Boyfriend Money. He Took It to a Casino.”

Season 1, Episode 7: “I’m Terrible at Budgeting. Do I Suck It Up—Or Is There Another Way?”

Season 1, Episode 8: “My Mother Demands Information About My One-Night Stands.”

Season 1, Episode 9: “I’ve Given up on My Dream Career. Where Do I Go From Here?”

Season 1, Episode 10: “I Want a Pedigreed Dog. She Wants a Rescue Mutt. It Turned into a Fight… and the Fight Got Ugly.”

Season 1, Episode 11: “I Feel Cornered by a Friend Who Keeps Asking to Borrow Money.”

Season 1, Episode 12: “Should I Believe the Fear-Mongering about Another Recession?”

Bonus Episode: Merry Bitchmas! The 2019 Star-Studded Holiday Spectacular

For transcripts, scroll to the bottom of each episode and click “episode transcript.” Or read them directly in the podcast player of your choice!

Podcast reviews

We also super wanted to thank all the people who’ve etched their names in blood upon the dusty pages of our dark grimoire written reviews for the show on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and other places!

We are beyond flattered by the kind things you guys have said about us. Like MoonPetalLily, who described us as “the snarky older sisters [they] wish [they] had.”

FunshineKelly said our “advice helped [them] land a $20k raise and a signing bonus without crying even a little bit.” GOOD! We don’t support tears in the workplace! Not even in the sanctity of your car parked way in the corner of the parking lot. Keep it together!

And God bless MelHubbs, who said, and I quote:

They’re prepared, and still relaxed; informative, and still light-hearted; comforting, and still sexual. It’s everything you could ever want in a podcast, in an internet personality, in your sisters-in-arms against the terrible war between capitalism and what humans actually need to survive & thrive. One of my favorite things about them is that they don’t have any corporate sponsors or ads, so you know what they’re saying is what they mean, not what their advertisers want them to say. If you’re able, support them on Patreon! If you’re not, listen to their podcast, take their advice to heart, reflect on your options, make your moves, then, with your newfound financial independence, become a patreon!

MelHubbs, you joyful sonnet!

Your review is so good that it reads suspiciously like something we paid you to write! But we’re too cheap for that—IT REAL!

Bitches Get Riches at the crossroads

All right. Time to level with you guys.

In keeping with 2020’s overarching theme (“everything is pure shit”), this year has become a real “shit or get off the pot” moment for the two of us.

Although I’m comfortable and doing fine, Piggy is still unemployed. And last week she received the last unemployment check she’s entitled to. It sucks. And it’s scary.

Being a partnership is awesome in almost every way. But one way that it sucks is that we have to earn double the amount of money to be truly profitable! (And no, before you ask, it’s not possible for us to only pay Piggy. Believe me, that was our original plan—but it turns out that’s not allowed in a 50/50 legal partnership. We must pay ourselves equally, or Uncle Sam will spank us. And he doesn’t do it in the sexy way—only the traumatic way!)

Piggy is doing okay for now. She has freelancing work, and an intact emergency fund. But understandably, anxiety and worry take their toll. She’s pushing through it, but it’s hard. Creativity and passion can’t thrive for long without some measure of safety and stability.

During these scary times, our Patreon community has been a lifeline. As more and more of you have joined us, it’s slowly crept up from grocery money to grocery and utility bill money! So thank you, thank you, from the bottom of our hearts thank you to those who’ve stepped up and joined.

But we’re kind of at a crossroads. Because of Piggy’s situation, we really need it to become “paying the mortgage” money. And it’s gotta get there pretty fast. Otherwise, it’s just not fair to ask Piggy to invest so much of her time in Bitches Get Riches, when she could be taking on higher paying freelancing work to keep herself afloat.

And trust me, you do not want a BGR that’s too Kitty-heavy. I am longwinded af, slowly losing my abilities to think and spell, and take every possible detour to inject disgusting sexual comments wherever they are least germane (although idk maybe you’re here for that).

Our new goal for ourselves, and you

With all of that in mind, we have a new goal: to produce season three of our podcast, we need 500 total Patreon donors.

Today we have… 294. So that’s, uhhhhh… a really ambitious goal!

It’s probably too ambitious. We’re probably gonna fail. Who cares, it’s 2020! The planet is on fire and god is already dead, so we have no reason not to give it our all!

We are leaving this in your hands. We—Piggy and I—believe that the world would be a better place if people could hear reliable, relatable financial wisdom funded by regular people, untainted by corporate sponsors with deep pockets who want us to push their capitalist crap upon you. And 294 of you have already demonstrated that you believe that too. Thank you, thank you, infinity thank yous to all of you who are already a part of our Patreon community. You are shining stars that smell faintly of vanilla.

For the rest of you: if you like what we do and you want us to keep doing it, please show us that you believe in it too. You can do that by joining us at the Bitches Get Riches Patreon.

We hope to be back soon for a third season. Until then, stay safe, stay sane, wear your masks, triple-check that you’re registered to vote, and save room for dessert. (What’s for dessert? So glad you asked—it’s the rich!)

For now, Bitches OUUUTTTTT!

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[taetaespeaches]

“Aren’t they supposed to be happy little clouds, Mr. Ross?”

jungkook x reader (or oc) genre: fluff word count: 1.5K

a/n: Ok, so this isn’t much and I don’t know how good it is, but it’s just a small little moment in time while Guk is painting and him and Holly start flirting, as per I kind of wanted to end Jungkook’s two-weeks of uploads with a simple drabble that shows Guk/Holly at their easy-going finest. Oh! And I mention Holly’s dog again for the first in ages because I kind of forgot I made her have a dog in a past drabble. As always, thanks for reading and I hope you all enjoy! :))

ILLUMINATED in the golden rays through the living room window, Jungkook sat back in his chair as he scrutinized the shapes on the canvas propped up on the easel. From your spot in the kitchen, leaning against the counter, you watched your boyfriend as he adorably squinted at the painting, which was still in its early stages. Flicking the paintbrush in quick motions, he filled in the outer edge of the soon to be cloud against a light blue sky.

Grabbing an apple from the fruit bowl, you started toward Jungkook, your form in his peripheral making him snap his head toward you. You took a bite from the apple just before flashing him a close-mouthed smile.

“Hi baby,” he smiled, turning in his chair to offer you his lap. Happily taking the seat across his thighs, you wrapped an arm around his shoulders. Directing your eyes to the canvas, you appreciated his talent for the newly adopted hobby.

“You’re good at this,” you told him, Jungkook wrapping his hand around yours that held the apple, bringing the fruit to his own mouth to bite a chunk out of it. You shot him a small glare, though his cheeky grin immediately made your lips curve upward.

“I’m alright,” he told you, “I’m still learning for sure.”

“You’re a fast learner,” you mumbled, leaning closer to look at his use of color. He had a patch of light blue sky next to the cloud, which was only partially painted, just one white color being used so far.

Jungkook watched you for a moment, admiring the way you always supported him, even in his array of hobbies. Whether he was editing videos, drawing, or playing video games, you could be found nearby ready to watch any clip, compliment his shading, or cheer him on as he killed opponents on the screen.

“Wanna try?” He asked you, you shrugging.

“I wouldn’t mind brushing up on my 13-year-old painting skills,” you joked, Jungkook chuckling at your terrible pun.

“You’ve been spending too much time with Jin-hyung,” he shook his head. “No more ice cream dates.” You giggled at the comment, Jungkook nudging a paintbrush in your direction. “Here.”

“Wait, what? You want me to paint on your painting?” You asked, your eyes wide and concerned.

“Yeah, show me what you got,” he grinned, taking the apple out of your hand and replacing it with a paintbrush.

“I’ll ruin it,” you told him, looking from the paintbrush to the canvas and back to your boyfriend.

“No, you won’t,” he insisted. “What are you talking about? You’re literally an artist, you’re amazing at drawing.”

“Painting is a totally different medium though,” you pointed out, Jungkook rolling his eyes making you raise your eyebrows at him.

“You’ve painted before,” he reminded you, as if that meant you could readily jump right into an already started painting successfully.

“Yeah in an extracurricular class when I was 13,” you giggled. “Jungkook, I am going to ruin this.”

“Just try,” he nodded to the canvas, dismissing your self-doubt as he took another bite from your apple.

Scoffing at him, you looked at the half-eaten apple. “You know, I was eating that.”

“Mhmm,” he grinned. “Get to painting, Holly.”

Sighing dramatically, you turned to the canvas. Looking at the cloud you decided it needed more coloring and shading. Cocking your head at his palette, you mixed some of the white with a gray, creating a lighter shade of gray.

Moving the paintbrush to the canvas, you applied some of the paint, immediately pulling your hand away quickly with a small gasp. “I already ruined it.”

“What? No you didn’t,” Jungkook chuckled, kissing the side of your neck before he took a closer look at the painting. “What’s wrong with it?”

“The gray is too dark,” you pouted, Jungkook smiling as he leaned toward you, pressing a sweet kiss to your pouted lips. “I fucked up,” you whined, the air from Jungkook’s giggling fanning across your face.

“Hey, we don’t make mistakes, we have happy accidents,” Jungkook quoted Bob Ross to you, you giggling as you wrapped an arm around his head, pulling him into a hug.

“Ok, stop being so cute,” you mumbled into his hair, leaving a kiss to the top of his head.

“We’ll just turn them into storm clouds. Darken the sky a bit, it’ll look great,” he told you, you pulling away from his body to look at his adorable doe-eyed expression.

“Aren’t they supposed to be happy little clouds, Mr. Ross?” Jungkook smiled at the question before resting his chin on your shoulder and looking at the canvas once again.

“Who says storm clouds can’t be happy? I like storms,” he noted cutely, you watching him fondly as his honey brown orbs sparkled.

Nodding, you leaned your head on top of his. “I do too.”

A crunch of the apple, Jungkook jaws chomping on the piece of fruit ruined the cute moment, you giggling as you lifted your head, shoving against him, Jungkook cackling at himself. Taking the brush, you dabbed it on the tip of his nose, your boyfriend’s eyes widening comically.

The man gasped in complaint, though he was smiling widely, beyond amused by your action. “How could you?”  

“Here,” you giggled, grabbing a rag off the table as he set the apple down. Jungkook had other plans for paint removal.

Grabbing the sides of your face, squishing your cheeks, he told you, “nah, I got it,” before rubbing his nose against yours, you squealing as you tried to move your face away to no avail.

“Jungkook,” you whined, dragging his name out.

“What?” He asked, feigning innocence

Pouting at him, he pulled away to see the paint spread all around your nose, giggling fondly at your feigned saddened expression. He leaned in, kissing your lips tenderly. “What’s wrong, baby?” He asked teasingly in the small series of seconds that he pulled his lips from yours, you giggling against his mouth just before deepening the kiss.

Jungkook easily fell into accordance with your move to further the intimate moment, his hands dropping from your face to your waist, your arm curling around the back of his neck as your other hand cradled his jaw.

“You taste like apples,” you whispered against his lips, Jungkook smiling into the kiss. He was very clearly trying to deepen it, getting worked up and wanting more of you. However, that just made you want to tease him. “Wait, are these acrylics or oil paints?” You questioned suddenly.

“Shhh,” Jungkook silenced you, accompanied with a small giggle as he tried to deepen the kiss once again. He lowered one hand down your hip and onto your thigh, soothing it over your flesh, giving you silent hints that he wanted things to progress. Of course you wanted him too, but sometimes messing with his patience was just too fun.

“They’re oil right?” You asked, Jungkook pushing his mouth to yours harder in an effort to silence you. “Kookie,” you mumbled into the kiss, “I don’t want oil paint on my face.”

The man mumbled, “Just kiss me you brat,” against your lips, you smiling as you allowed him to deepen it just for a moment. A small moment.

“Did you feed the munchkin?” you asked, nearly incoherently, into the kiss suddenly. You were referring to the dog you adopted just a few weeks ago, who was currently sleeping on the sofa a few feet away from you both. Jungkook groaned against your mouth before pulling away and resting his forehead on your chin, you giggling as you placed a quick kiss to the top of his head.

“You’re impossible,” he chuckled lightly, you pressing a few more quick kisses to his forehead. “I did feed the dog by the way,” he mumbled before looking up at you, you giggling as you ran your fingers through the hair at the back of his head.

“I know, I saw,” you teased, Jungkook poking his tongue to the inside of his cheek.

“Stop being such a brat,” he warned you, making you raise your eyebrows at him.

“Why? What are you gonna do about it, Fred?” You challenged him, knowing you were close to making him snap.

Shooting you a warning glare, he asked, “really?” his tone pointed.

“I thought we were painting,” you smirked, Jungkook scoffing before smacking your ass lightly, you feigning a gasp.

“Not anymore.”

Even the most wholesome of hobbies could end up corrupted when you and Jungkook were together. Not that you were complaining. You could always paint some storm clouds later, but in that moment, Jungkook’s darkened gaze and the feeling of his hands running along your body was all that mattered to you.

#jungkook #jungkook x reader #jungkook fluff #jungkook drabble #jungkook drabbles #jungkook fic #jungkook fics #jungkook imagine #jungkook imgaines #jungkook scenario #jungkook scenarios #jungkook oneshot #jungkook oneshots #bts #bts jungkook #bts x reader #bts fluff #bts drabbles #bts fics #bts imagines #bts scenarios #bts oneshots

[axwalker]

Happy Birthday, Maskaneko! A Tears in Heaven one-shot.

The beautiful edit in the moodboard was made by the talented, creative  birthday girl @mskaneko​  💕💕💕

Happy birthday again!!! As I said earlier, I’m so grateful to have you in my life. I hope you’ll spend an amazing day.

I love youuu ❤️❤️❤️ @mskaneko​

You said you’d be happy with a peek into Drake and Lexie’s life in Tears in Heaven.  So here it is. I hope you’ll enjoy it. 🎉🎉🎉

Warnings: Mention of the death of a child, grief. Language and smut. 

It’s been a tough year. Lexie and I have been working hard, and between our demanding jobs and Lennie, we’re exhausted. It’s a miracle we were both able to clear our schedules for a few days to come to Corsica to Max’s and Rashad’s house for a short vacation. We need this much more than we’re able to admit. I miss my time with Lexie. I need more of her. If there is one thing I can admit to myself, it’s that. That there is nothing more fundamental, more important to my happiness, than my wife and my little girl. 

A roar of laughter interrupts my thoughts. I look through the window, and I can’t help but smile at the sight down by the shore. Jaiden is chasing Lena to the edge of the ocean, and every time the water splashes up on her little legs, she squeals and runs back, her face animated with some mix of terror and delight. 

A throaty laugh harmonizes with my squirt’s high-pitched giggles, and Lexie walks into view. Her dark hair is scooped up into a messy bun, and she’s all long, sun-kissed legs and rounded baby-belly in her orange bikini. It will never get old, how my heart thumps a little harder when I see her. Desperate to get to her. I leave the home office and walk barefoot and bare-chested over to the windows and sliding door. Lexie and I wasted too many years and made too many mistakes before we came together again. We both had a lot of growing up to do, a lot of pain to overcome but seeing her with our little girl and Maxwell’s boy chasing the waves, seeing her pregnant again, this good life was worth all the patience in the world. She is worth the wait. I press my palm to the cool glass and let years of memories wash over me, all the painful years spent apart. Being with my family always provides perspective. I might feel exhausted sometimes, but my heart, my life is whole. The axis of my existence it’s those two people down there playing in the ocean like they don’t have a care in the world. Seeing that lifts my burdens, too. And it reminds me that we can’t let life interfere with our lives as a family. Work can’t take so much room in our lives, is not who we are. 

After turning my laptop off, I cross over to the sliding door, slipping out and not bothering with anything other than the blue shorts I’m already wearing. Lexie is laughing as Lena tries to lift Jaiden and they both collapse into the water. I walk toward them, silent until I’m close, and then run past Lexie, playfully slapping her ass. She squeaks, jumping a little, her face lighting up when she sees me. 

“Where’d you come from?” She laughs. I back my way into the cool waves and wink at her as an answer before turning to scoop up both Lena and Jai, one under each arm. “Daddy!” my girl screams in her sweet voice. I keep running until the ocean stirs around my waist and dunk them both to the neck, making sure to keep their heads out of the water. Their giggles and squeaks occupy the next five minutes of what suddenly feels like a perfect day. 

“Uncle Dake,” Jai says. “Put me up on your shoulders.” Lexie takes Helena so I can lift Jaiden. The heels of his little feet kick against my chest, and he squeezes my neck as we go deeper into the water. 

“I can swim, Mom,” Lena says from behind us. “Put me down.” 

Lena’s five, and while she still likes me to toss her around, she doesn’t tolerate it from her smaller mother all that much. I’m not crazy about it either, considering Lexie’s six months pregnant. 

“It’s deeper than you think, Lennie,” Lexie says. “I don’t think it is a good idea.”

Alexis and I went back to therapy when Helena turned three. Slowly, almost without noticing it, we were turning into overprotective, smothering parents. Lexie refused to go anywhere without her, and she’d have horrible panic attacks when her work forced her to travel. Therapy certainly helped a lot, but as much as I would love to say that it was like turning on a switch, that we don’t suffocate Lena anymore, it would be a lie. We would never be those two carefree parents we were ten years ago. But we’re trying; we both want our kids to have the best possible life. 

After begging a little more, Lexie gives in, and sure enough, in seconds, Lennie is swimming past me, her skinny arms and legs slicing through the waves, her hair in two small braids. 

“Baby, that’s fair enough,” I call out. The ocean isn’t turbulent today, but I don’t want to take any chances. It can change fast. Calm one second and treacherous the next. Lena turns, doggy paddling to stay afloat, her cute face wet and frowning. 

“But, Daddy—” 

“Do I repeat myself, Lena?” She frowns the brown eyes so like Lexie’s widening. She shakes her head. 

“No, sir.” 

“Then that’s far enough.” I gentle my words with a smile, take the few steps separating us and tap her head with Jaiden’s foot. She giggles and swims a circle around me, disappearing for a second underwater and then popping back up, laughing again.  

“I need to learn that trick,” Lexie says wryly. “I tried last week, asked her if I repeat myself, and she just stared at me and said, ‘What’d you say, Mommy?’”

 I can’t help it, I laugh, and Lexie glares at me. 

“You know she loves pressing your buttons. Every time she finds a new one, she just has to push.” 

“Looking forward to her teenage years.” I pull her close, anchoring Jaiden by one leg and looping an arm around her, cupping her stomach. 

“If she’s as sassy as you, baby. I’m not looking forward to them either.” Lexie leans her head on my shoulder, covering my hand with hers on her stomach. There’s a subtle movement beneath my fingers. 

“Lexie,” I breathe. “Did you feel that? They’re moving.” Of course, she felt it. It’s her body, but she just laughs. It’s not the first time the twins have moved, but I always seem to miss it, so it’s the first time I’ve felt the life growing inside Lexie for myself. 

“One of them is moving.” She guides my hand to the other side of her stomach. “This guy has been quiet all day.” 

“Guy?” I raise one questioning brow. “I thought we agreed we wouldn’t find out. You got some divination powers I know nothing about?” 

She shrugs. “I just have a feeling they’re both guys. God save me. Lennie and I will be outnumbered.” 

I chuckle “You hear that, Lennie? Your mom says we’re getting two boys. What do you think?” 

“I want sisters! Boys are yucky.” Jaiden jumps to the water, and they start a water war. 

“You heard the girl,” I tell Lexie. “Boys are yucky. I sure hope she’ll think like that for a long time.” 

Lexie laughs. “I honestly don’t care.” She grimaces and rubs the small of her back. “I’m so big this time, I just want them out . I’ve already gained as much weight as I had by the end with Lena. I’m huge.” 

I lean over to whisper in her ear. “You’re sexy as hell, Lexie. Always.” 

She turns her head so our mouths are mere inches apart, our lips separated by a single breath. “You think so, huh?” 

“I’ll show you tonight,” I whisper over her mouth. 

“Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!” Jaiden chants. We glance down at our godson, and both laugh. 

“You kiss all the time,” Lena mutters from a few feet away. She’s not wrong, but in my defense, her mother is irresistible. 

“Lena, we need to get back inside,” Lexie says. “We’ve been in the water all day, and you need your lunch. I bet Max made the grill sandwiches you love so much. After lunch, we can get ice cream from Amorino.” 

“A few more minutes, Mommy, please? So, Daddy can swim with me?” Lena asks, lips pouty and huge eyes pleading. If she figures out, she has me wrapped around her little finger, we’re doomed. Who am I kidding? The girl was born knowing. “You think you can keep up with me? Okay squirt. Let’s go.” 

After a while, we get out of the water and join the others for lunch in the terrace. Lena claps and rocks her shoulders, some little move she and Jaiden made up. The two are thick as thieves. Jaiden’s at our house as much as Lena is at Rash and Maxwell’s. 

“What’s that you’re drawing, Lennie?” Liv asks. She might not like kids, but she sure is crazy about her goddaughter. 

“It’s us!” Lena grins. 

“Let me see.” I reach for the paper. Lexie walks up beside me and looks down at the drawing in my hand. It’s a man-stick figure with which I assume is a stethoscope around his neck, obviously me. A shorter woman-stick she’s colored caramel and who has brown lines drawn around her shoulders for hair. Jaiden made Lexie’s stomach a circle and there’s two orange round things inside. 

“Grapefruit,” Lennie says. “Mommy said the babies are like grapefruits now.” 

“Ahhhh.” Lexie purses her lips against a smile. “You got them perfectly, baby.” 

In her drawing, she is standing between Lexie and me, holding our hands. I tilt my head, staring at what Lena’s holding in the drawing. A white bird?

“What’s that white thing your holding, squirt?” 

“It’s Tom!” She says, her smile wide and proud. “He’s an angel, like mommy said.” Tom’s name, said so unexpectedly, causes the adults on the terrace to hold their breaths collectively. Lexie goes perfectly still beside me, and her hand goes instinctively to her stomach. That old fear lives in the back of both our minds. As much as losing Tom still hurts, we talk openly about him to our daughter, making sure she knows she has a big brother looking out for her all the time, even though she never met him. 

“You can have it, Mommy,” Lena offers, her beautiful smile slipping, his childish intuition sharp enough to pick up on the shift of mood in the terrace. “I-I drew it for you, so we can put it in the twins’ nursery.”

 “It’s so good, Lennie. That’s a great idea,” I say, glancing at Lexie, who stares down at the paper. Even though she isn’t crying, her eyes have that look of shattered glass she sometimes gets when she thinks of Tom. Unfortunately, therapy doesn’t eradicate pain. Not for the first time, I wish I could carry it for her, but I can’t.

“This is your most beautiful drawing yet, Lennie,” Lexie says after clearing her voice, reaching down to caress the angel on it. “I love it very, very much. It will look perfect in their room.” She bends to kiss her hair, closes her eyes tightly and then cups Helena’s little head and kisses her forehead, too. She clears her throat and pulls back to spread an overbright smile and says, “Who’s ready for ice cream?” 

 ALEXIS

 Accident. That’s how everybody described what happened to my baby boy. An accident. It does hurt less than it used to. At first, I couldn’t think about Tom without aching and falling into a black hole. Five horrible years, where I needed to numb myself or ignore my pain to keep breathing. An empty shell that had trouble breathing. I would cringe at the sound of Tom’s name, incapable of pronouncing it myself. Not because I didn’t want to hear it, but because I wanted to hold him so badly. It’s been years, but my body perfectly recalls the sweet little weight of him in my arms. His scent still fills my nostrils if I draw a deep enough breath. I remember the dark tangle of curls brushing against my cheek. His little voice calling me mommy. Some days my head and thoughts are locked in a room with those last memories, and I don’t want to leave because he’s still there. As difficult as that day was, in that memory, he’s still there. But life goes on. It has moved on, and I’m a baby two and three. I’m years into a marriage full of love I spent five years thinking wasn’t even possible. 

“You okay?” I glance up from the table, from Lenna’s drawing, which I’ve found myself thinking about all day, to see Liv, wearing concern on her intense green eyes. The terrace is clear of dishes from tonight’s meal, and everyone’s gone to their respective corners. It’s just Livvie and me. 

“I’m fine.” The concern on her face stays. “I swear; I’m fine,” I say. “Just thinking. Remembering.” 

“Anything you want to talk about?” Her voice is unusually soft. Her gaze, as usual, is knowing. 

“I’m all talked out. A lifetime of expensive therapy will do that to a girl. I guess I’m feeling more than thinking, but I’m good.” 

“Okay. I’m here if you need me.” 

“I know Liv. I don’t know how I would have done otherwise.” 

“I think I will go join Maxwell for a nightcap”  

“Now you’re talking.” I sigh and stand from the table, squeeze her hand. “I’m going to turn in. Take a quick bath since Drake is putting Lena to bed.” 

“Alright. I’ll see you in the morning.” She gives me a wry grin. “I may even cook breakfast.” 

I deadpan, and Liv chuckles. “Did I say cook? I meant order.”

I laugh. “That’s more like it. Good night, Liv,” I say, grabbing Lena’s drawing.

After just a few minutes in the bathtub, I dry off and belt a terry cloth robe over my nakedness, smiling when both babies move. “Hello, boys.” I don’t care what Drake says, I know what I feel. “I’d love for Daddy to feel both of you move. Can we make a deal that you’ll let him feel you both at some point?” 

“Daddy would love that, too,” Drake says from the doorway. Leaning one shoulder into the door and wearing a white shirt, sleeves-rolled-up, he looks so attractive, my husband. His face grows more handsome the older he gets. He has that strong virility that somehow converts years into sexual magnetism. I walk over and reach up to caress his jaw, shadowed with stubble. 

“You have a little gray in your beard, Mr. Walker.” I close the space between us and tip my toes to kiss him. 

He grunts, closing his eyes and leaning into me, his hardness pressing into my belly. I want him so badly. The restlessness I’ve felt most of the day needs an outlet, and I know the best, most pleasurable way to get it.

 “Lie down,” he says, leading me to the bed. My hand goes to the belt of my robe, but he stops me. “I want to unwrap you myself,” he says.

 I lie on my back, and he hovers over me, connecting our eyes. I see desire there, yes, but concern, too. 

“Drake, I’m okay,” I tell him, grabbing his hand and kissing it. 

“You sure?” His dark brows form a frown. “The drawing—” 

“It took me off guard.” I pull his hand into the neck of my robe, passing his palm over my nipple until it buds beneath his fingers. “But now I want you.”

 He hesitates, searching my face and eyes before nodding. Our eyes meet, and beneath the desire filling his stare, a question lingers. 

“Drake.” I place his hand on my stomach. “I’m fine.” 

He bends to kiss my stomach, the underside of my breast. That restlessness needs attention, try to disturb my desire, but before I can allow myself to be distracted, the lights in the bedroom dim and my husband’s hands are on me. Drake opens the robe as if it’s a gift.

“Fuck baby, you’re so gorgeous.” 

He lies down to spoon me, brushes my hair aside, and kisses my nape. 

“You okay?” he asks. I know Drake well enough to hear the restraint he’s exercising. The restlessness caught him too, and in days like this, he needs wild, unbridled fucking, but he doesn’t want to hurt the twins or me. As many times as I reassure him, it’s hard for him to believe it’s okay to be as rough with me as we love sometimes. 

“Drake, please, fuck me hard. I need it as much as you do.” 

“Lexie,” he rasps, dropping his forehead against my hair. “Don’t ask. . .I can’t. . .the way I feel right now . . . I wish you knew what you do to me.” 

“Show me.” 

And he does; he takes me hard and rough. He fucks me into oblivion, until there’s nothing else but him and me. I’ve needed this desperately, craved the feeling that comes when we make love, when we’re like this, when we have this together, when he’s inside me. 

“Fuck, Lex,” he growls. “I love you.” 

Tears fill my eyes. The tears I wouldn’t allow myself earlier because Tom was years ago and I should be over it. I could hide that from myself, but I can’t hide anything from him. The tears run down my face, and they aren’t all grief or sorrow. They’re tears of gratitude for my little squirt sleeping down the hall. Tears of hope for the twins growing inside of me. Tears of happiness for the love of a man like Drake. 

“God, Drake,” I sob. “I love you, I love you.” 

Hours later, we lay together side to side, exhausted. All my restlessness gone, forgotten.

“Wow,” he says.

“Wow, I repeat. You have a magical dick.” 

We both laugh at that, and he tickles me, making me wriggle in his arms. Suddenly, we both go still, feeling the movement in my belly at the same time. Like tiny synchronized swimmers, one of my boys moves on my left and the other on the right. 

“Shit.” Drake’s gaze meets mine. “Both of them are moving. That’s. . .that’s amazing, Lex.” 

“It is. I wanted you to feel that so badly. I feel them do that all the time, but I wanted . . . I’m so happy . . .” I stop, emotionally exhausted. 

“Our life,” I say suddenly, toying with the hair on his chest.

 “What about it?” he asks, kissing the top of my head. 

I reach up to touch the flecks of gray in his stubble. “I’m so glad we met when we were young. That we will grow old together. That I’ll have a life with you. Despite all the years we spent apart. We lost so much, but now we have this life, our marriage, our kids.” 

He tenderly rubs my belly. “These kids, all worth the wait. And no matter what comes, we’ll face it together.” I turn around, he pulls me tightly against his chest, and we fall asleep together.  

#axwalker writes #tw mention of grief #tw mention death child #n*sfw

[icypantherwrites]

How do you get people to interact with your work? Especially on something that you spent hours slaving over and not a single person has interacted with it (except for the exception of my friends, who I'm very thankful for)? It's very disheartening. You know, I used to be kind of against the fact of 'interact with artists/writers/etc because it inspires them' because I thought 'why not just do it anyways, who cares if you get interacted with? You don't need to beg for comments' but now I totally understand what that means. I still want to write, I'm starting to love it honestly, but I wrote almost 2,000 words (which is a lot for me) and it took hours and no one seems to like it. I'm not sure how to feel about that yet. Did I post it at the wrong time, or do people just not care?

Ah, you have found the largest difference between "writing" and "posting." Writing, as you noted, is something you love to do, as do I. It's a fantastic feeling to get ideas down on a page, to pull together ideas, to write that line that just speaks to you. Writing is glorious and I'm glad you've found the beauty of it ♥

Posting, however, is very different and just like how they say everyone should work retail once in their life to understand it and learn some patience and empathy for those workers, I honestly I think everyone should have to spend hours creating something -- whether it's a story or a piece of artwork or a music video or even an in-depth analysis -- to post online and then get to experience that awful feeling of barely anyone (or even no one) engaging with it.

You write for you. You post for others. And that is a huge difference. People, even yourself as you noted, don't feel that they should have to engage with a creation. The person creating it should just enjoy the process and not care if no one stops by to say if they enjoyed it, what it made them feel, that they appreciate you sharing your time and talent and craft. But as you learned, we do care. And so we ask ourselves, why bother posting if there's no one there to appreciate it? You may as well just keep a personal folder of your works like a dragon and their hoard and never share it with anyone. I posted this quote a bit ago and I'm gonna paraphrase here, but if you have an audience of 1,000 people but no one engages it may as well be an audience of zero because you don't know those people are there. You don't know you have fans. You don't know people are looking forward to what you create. You have no idea they exist and it's a terrible, awful feeling.

It's why I so strongly advocate for reader engagement, in making that author, artist, creator feel appreciated. They spent their time to create something and they had the urge to share it, to connect to others. That's what being human is: connecting with others. And in this case it's connecting with others through art and a shared love of something (fandom) and wanting to get back just a little bit of what you put out. Because when a creator does get that engagement they crave it's amazing. Wonderful. Inspiring. It makes them want to create more (or maybe just post more often, cough, me) because they have an audience saying that they're here and that they appreciate you and it makes you want to continue to share your works rather than hoard them because you have now connected with someone.

And so now that you know firsthand how important that engagement is, be a part of the solution. Engage with stories and artworks and edits and whatever may have you that you enjoy. Tell that creator thank you. Quote back a favorite section or pull out a specific detail because that tells that creator you don't just care about quantity but about quality, that you see them and their efforts. I've made a post previously about some ideas to try to encourage engagement if you were interested and maybe a couple will give you some ideas to try to help with engagement on your stories. I can't say I use all of these things anymore myself, but sometimes all you need is a launching pad and some ideas. To your question about the time to post, I struggle very much with the timing as I've done polls and seen every day and hour suggestion there is so it's very difficult to say when to post, but I know for myself I do prefer posting earlier in the day.

I hope things improve for you and good luck with both your writing journey and your future engagement :)

#icyanswers #writing #fandom

[thenexusofsouls]

Muse: Aurelien

[Bio and other information below the cut!]

Type of Character & Fandom/Source Material: Aurelien is a shade, a species of shadow creature or shadowkin. He was born human and by his twenties became a paladin, which he remained until his late thirties. But after being captured by a priest of a rival god to his own, Aurelien was forcibly transformed into a shade through a dark ritual. He is immortal and stuck in shade form forever as a result. I used to write him over at @a-very-proper-shxde​.

Random Mun Notes: Aurelien is from a fantasy novel and group of short stories I wrote years ago. He is from the same world as Jix ( @xleafyheartx​ ) and Strychthia ( @strychthia​ ). He has absolutely nothing to do with my Apparition muse that haunts another muse on this blog, Ethan, however Aurelien is a similar creature to the Apparition. He has a much nicer and more pleasant demeanor than it does, though. In Aurelien’s world, shades do exist as naturally-occurring creatures native to the Shadowrealm, a dimension that parallels our own. Through mishaps of magic, deliberate tampering by a priest or mage, or the talents of a shadowwalker, the Shadowrealm can be accessed and humans can pass to and from it. So, too, can shadowkin. I am fine with saying that the Shadowrealm is the same dimension the Apparition comes from, if anyone wants to talk to Aurelien about the Apparition or Ethan’s situation and cross these two muse worlds/verses.

FC: This being a fantasy creature OC, I don't have a live action FC. I have a few pictures I have found over the years that fit how I visualize him in my head (such as the one above which I edited to have the right color eyes), so I just use those. Below are some examples:

And my personal favorite... being caught on someone’s security camera in their apartment. XD

He can change his shadowstuffs at will to resemble a certain shape or not, so sometimes he has arm- and leg-like appendages and sometimes he is just an amorphous cloud.

VC: Aurelien's voice claim is Grimoire Weiss from NieR. You can listen here if you aren’t familiar with the game. He’s the floating book character. (You don’t have to listen to the end, just from 5:15 to 6:05. I’ve linked it right where he talks for a bit to other characters so you don’t have to hunt around.) So although your muse can’t see a mouth moving with Aurelien when he speaks, he’ll just float before them and they’ll hear this voice as if it were a person speaking. And yes, he has the same level of sass as Grimoire Weiss. Oh man is Aurelien a sassy shade, haha.

Race: A shade, which is a shadow creature of intermediate power. A shadeling would be weaker, and a Penumbral Sentinel would be far stronger, but all are under the mantle of shadowkin. 

Gender: Mentally he identifies as male, since that’s what he was as a human being, but physically he is without gender.

Eyes: Two glowing, red, floating rubies

Height: It varies depending on the concentration and strength of his shadowstuffs, but usually 5-5.5 feet or so.

Age: He doesn’t really know, but more than several hundred years at this point. He was in his 30s as a human when he “died” and became a shade.

Sexual/Romantic Orientation: Asexual

Occupation: Curious wanderer? Sassy interjector? That person who comments when you never asked? Haha. And often, a friend.

Family: None anymore.

Potentially Triggering Material in Threads: Ritualistic murder and child harm (only in terms of how he was created as a shade, should a muse ask and he be willing to explain). Maybe loneliness and depression as well. Definitely survivor’s guilt.

Negative Personality Traits: He can be very arrogant and entitled at times. He also lacks patience and is easily frustrated. And he’s incredibly stubborn.

Positive Personality Traits: He is genuinely good-hearted and inclined to help those who need it. He is also empathetic, even though sometimes he may act like he doesn’t care. That’s just an emotional defense mechanism.

Background & General Info: Aurelien is a shade, a species of shadowkin. Shadowkin are creatures made literally of shadow, which is actually concentrated negative energy. I don’t mean negative as in bad or evil, although it can certainly take on that character. Negative here means literally negatively charged, cool or cold, and dark sometimes to the point of blocking out all light if dense enough. Shades “live” due to a power source, usually found in their eyes. Their eyes are typically magically charged gemstones, in Aurelien’s case two rubies. This can happen naturally, because of divine intervention, or as a result of humans tampering with powerful magicks. The gemstone eyes are suspended in a cloud of black, cracking, cool/cold, negatively charged material that look and feels like mist or smoke. It is called shadowstuffs. Shades can be severely injured and rendered dormant if they are attacked with positive energy or holy magic and their shadowstuffs are burned away. In that case, their eyes will remain and he shadowstuffs will slowly regenerate over time. If the eyes are dispelled, meaning the magic in them is dissipated or gotten rid of, the shade will “die” and cease to exist.

Aurelien was transformed into a shade by an evil priest who captured him for use in a dark ritual. The priest served a god of corruption, so capturing a paladin of Light and imprisoning him for eternity in the body of a shade is corruption at its finest and gained him boons with his god. The ritual involved two innocent sacrifices (in Aurelien’s case, an old woman and a six year-old girl) whose souls were used to fuel the transformation ritual. This is always how shades are artificially made through magic, which makes them not only tragic but also carry with them some remnants of the consciousnesses of the people used to create them. So Aurelien has his main personality and mind, but then in the background there are faint remnants of the old woman and he girl. They are forever bonded together and he cannot set them free. As a paladin, the knowledge that two innocent people were killed because of him is extremely painful for Aurelien and is very difficult for him to talk about. He has survivor’s guilt and feels immense shame as a result, even though his own existence after the fact was very tortured and he suffered as much if not more than they did.

Shades are not killed by light, but they have an aversion to it, mostly because it tends to also carry warmth with it which can dry out and begin to reduce the size of their shadowstuffs. The greater and denser their cloud of shadowstuffs, the more powerful shades will be. When thriving, shades are capable of some magic, can pass from the Shadowrealm to the Real and back again with ease, and can attack and harm humans.

Aurelien is not a natural shade, so his situation is unique. Natural shades behave much like demons, perpetrating mischievous or harmful acts against human beings. Aurelien, however, has the soul of a human paladin, a warrior for Light. This clash between his mind and “heart” and the natural inclinations of his shadowstuffs is a painful one, but it’s a fight Aurelien is winning. Sometimes he has a short temper or can become irritable, but largely he remains in full control of himself and thinks, speaks, and behaves like a human paladin, not a harmful shadow creature.

Aurelien is intelligent and rather a proper sort, as his former url suggests. (See his VC listed above to hear how he sounds when he speaks.) He will err on the side of propriety and politeness, maintaining a level of civility and etiquette rarely seen among his kind.

Potential Starter Ideas:

Anywhere there are shadows, Aurelien can travel. He might pop up in an alley. Or in your muse’s apartment. Or literally anywhere else where there is even a sliver of shadow available.

He could be snooping around where your muse lives...

...or your muse could startle him or otherwise run into him accidentally.

He could also save your muse from harm somehow, or direct them if they are lost.

Or... maybe he was attacked and rendered only a pair of dimly glowing rubies... that your muse thinks are pretty and takes home...

Fun facts: 

Aurelien gets perturbed and annoyed in a rather amusing manner whenever humans get to close to or even pass through his shadowstuffs. Although it causes him no pain, it is a strange sensation, and he will usually go off on people who do, citing the need for personal space and telling them to be more considerate. If he gets to the point of trusting someone very much, he may let them touch his shadowstuffs, but he prefers a warning first. For anyone who does touch it, it feels like cool mist or fog, it’s a little moist, and sometimes it results in goosebumps or a feelings of static energy on the skin. It’s otherwise harmless, though, unless Aurelien chooses it to be, which he almost never does to humans.

When Aurelien gets really excited or happy about something, he will vibrate. This is the result of the atoms within his shadowstuffs becoming energetically excited and causing the molecules to oscillate at high rates, and is entirely involuntary.

When he gets angry or very scared, his eyes glow even brighter, a sign that he is bolstering himself and preparing to attack if necessary.

If his shadowstuffs become depleted, your muse can help him by giving him cold, dark, moist places to reside. Such places will allow him to accumulate more negative energy and thus replenish and grow his shadowstuffs. So for example, a dark closet, a refrigerator that has its internal light disabled, or a basement.

#muse: aurelien #about the muses

[hawopro]

i’ve been thinking a lot about what yonghoon said and honestly it's been weighing my mind bc i relate to it so much

whether you're an artist, writer, gif maker, or in this case, musician, when you put your effort into something you love so much but no one can recognize it, it can really be demotivating

it's so easy to spiral down to 'whats the point no one will see it anyway'

‘whats the point of writing this fic for a 15 yr old fandom that no ones gonna read’ ‘whats the point of giffing mubo when a set that took 6 hours gonna get like 4 likes and maybe 2 rb 1 of which is mine to bump’

and if you're a creator, maybe a small fandom creator, you probably have thoughts like this before

and it's completely valid

but i found what helps is going back within yourself and thinking about why you're creating in the first place

go back and remember about the satisfaction you felt completing a work, the joy of learning new things for a project, the freedom of creating purely because you want to

go back and remember about how happy you are seeing that clip of your fav over and over again while you were subbing or editing; or that time someone said nice thing in the tag of what you thought was a flop set

and at one point you will be content to create for yourself and it's okay to just create for yourself

it’s also okay to stop if creating for yourself doesn’t make you happy anymore

but it’s hard, that’s why i like to use the word self-indulgent as much as i could to remind myself that i create for myself foremost, and if other ppl like it, thats great, if not, that’s okay too

i hope one day he can find peace within himself just to create his music without thinking about being more well-known to the public

but i think what makes me feeling all these feelings is

i have fallen out of love with music before

i still cant pick up the violin without thinking about being sleep deprived in the practice room at 2am, eating dinner that i packed in the morning bc i havent gone home while looking over sheet music, about the disappointment on my teacher’s face, about failing my jury

to put in so much effort, and still not being enough? to slowly fall out of love with something you spent years pursuing?

like he said, you really can’t keep going with persistence alone, so i get it, i get what he’s saying

thats why it makes me sad that such worries are on his mind on top of everything else he’s doing

of course he’s human, he gets sad and he worries, and im glad he’s sharing them with us

i just wish i could somehow let him know that we can hear him, we hear what he wants to say in his lyrics, in his melody, we can see the effort he puts in

that it’s okay if he’s not superstar famous, that he’s not failing anyone bc he feels like he can’t repay their love or support by being less known or whatever

i think yonghoon is fortunate to have four members accompanying him in this journey, he isn’t alone, and i hope they can pull him out of his head when he gets like this, that they can help each other in time like this

all i want is for them five to be happy and healthy

however, i sincerely believe onewe will get their due recognition with time bc they're so very talented speaking objectively

we just need a little patience

and if you’re a small creator, with time, you’ll also find someone out there who is into the same thing as you are

and you won’t feel so lonely anymore, and you won’t feel as bother with notes and comments when that one person have seen your work, hear your voice

i just think it would be neat if that one person is yourself you know

idk where i was going with this _(:3」∠)_  thinking about love and falling out of love got me in a mood, so i just want to get it out...

#personal #rambles #was gonna say on twt but it got long real quick

[doomonfilm]

Ranking : Martin Scorsese (1942-present)

Of all the places in the world that seem to be hubs for creative energy, New York stands high on my personal list of favorites, and when it comes to iconic New York filmmakers, there aren’t many that can hold a candle to the prolific career of Martin Scorsese.  His appreciation for films, art and music blasts off the screen with the same energy as his kinetic cinematography and vibrant editing.  Once he established himself as a mainstay in the industry, his list of collaborators evolved into a who’s who of acting legends, both old and new.  His career spans just over 50 years, and even his latest film (his 25th in his catalog) went head to head with other contenders for the top awards of the year.

To put it bluntly, there is Martin Scorsese, and then there is a long list of imitators and those influenced by his genius.  To rank his films is a true test of logic, patience and decision making, but after a few weeks of catching the 7 or so films I had yet to see, I think I can stand behind this list as my definitive ranking (from least to most favorite) of a director I hold in the highest regard. 

25. Gangs of New York (2002) An honest attempt at an epic flick, but at the heart of the matter, I simply don’t care about either side in the battle Scorsese presents us.  Set in New York City in the mid 19th Century during the Civil War, we are thrown into a generational battle where the two key figures have different goals... Bill the Butcher stands as antagonist in his fight to maintain power and control, while Amsterdam is our protagonist charged with a mission of revenge.  In the end, neither side ends up mattering, very much like my personal experience with this all flourish, no foundation exercise in style.

24. Bringing Out the Dead (1999) Nicolas Cage was gearing up for the run that most people know him for now during the release of Bringing Out the Dead : he was coming off of Golden Globe and Academy Award wins for Leaving Las Vegas, but was quickly leaning towards films of a more exploitation-based style.  This film marked a refinement of his wild-man persona, while simultaneously being one of the last high-level actor/director combinations he would be involved in before his mad dash to accept every film and avoid bankruptcy.  New York is captured in a mid-transition point between the darkness of the 1970s and 1980s versus the Disney aesthetic of the new millennium, and while heavy on the entertainment factor (as well as visually striking), there is ultimately not enough on this plate to push it higher up the list.

23. The Color of Money (1986) If you had to do a quick gander at the Scorsese list and pick the film that, on paper, screams Hollywood, it’d be hard to argue against The Color of Money taking that top spot.  A soft sequel to The Hustler, Scorsese picks up the Fast Eddie story in the 1980s (an era that oozes out of each and every frame of this film), and yet, despite this legendary move, the film is ultimately the Tom Cruise show.  Scorsese’s trademark dollying and trucking camera shots work beautifully in the context of this film, but in a story that shines bright, the star of Cruise ultimately outshines all that remains.

22. Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1974) After a few exploitation-based projects, it seemed that Martin Scorsese wanted to provide a slightly different change in perspective, albeit one that still dwells in the darker corners of life.  Rather than deal with the streets of New York or crime, Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore is a study on broken homes, single parenthood and domestic violence that oscillates between the view of the titular Alice and her young son.  Harvey Keitel gives another strong performance as a Scorsese regular, while Ellen Burstyn shines in a transitional role towards more mature performances.  Seeing Scorsese camera movements coopted into a more down to Earth story was refreshing.

21. The Departed (2006) Many people would have assumed that The Departed would be higher on a list of Scorsese films based solely on the cast... pairing Leonardo DiCaprio opposite Matt Damon in a tension-filled triangle with Jack Nicholson is a bold combination in its own right, but surrounding this nucleus with Martin Sheen, Mark Wahlberg, Alec Baldwin, Kevin Corrigan, Anthony Anderson and supporting actors of that ilk creates a rich showcase of talent.  Stylistically, everything you need is there too, as Scorsese proved time and again that films of this nature were his wheelhouse.  That being said, the story itself, an adaptation of the 2002 Hong Kong thriller Infernal Affairs, takes a few liberties in its adaptation that ultimately are to the detriment of the narrative.  Kudos to Scorsese for putting this one together, and too bad for him that the choices of William Monahan knocked what could have been a mega-classic way down the list.

20. New York, New York (1977) New York, New York is one of the most unique offerings from the Scorsese canon for a number of reasons.  Of all his films, this one is probably the one that can be considered a “style exercise” more than the rest, as it oscillates between obvious sets and real locations before blurring the lines between the two.  Long gaps of time are given to fully executed musical numbers (a must when a talent like Liza Minnelli is involved), and traditional methods of songwriting and performance are given their due respect.  The exercise portion, however, comes in the newer acting styles that are infused into the old school structure... improvisation and aggressive physicality are used to put a deeper, disturbing red tint on an era often presented through a rose-colored lens.  While interesting at times, the nearly three hour run time of the film begins to wear on the limits of the style, which ultimate leaves the film feeling more like a personal indulgence than a statement on changing times.  For the iconic title track alone (and the buildup to its release), this film is worth seeing, but in terms of its placement in the realm of other Scorsese films, it may have to grow on me a while to find a higher placement on the list.

19. Boxcar Bertha (1972) Originally, this film was much lower on the list, largely due to its chronological placement between Who’s That Knocking at My Door and Mean Streets seeming odd to me.  Upon revisitation, however, it stands clear and present that this film served as an exercise in the process of directing and organizing a shoot.  With its period-specific placement, ensemble cast and action sequences, it was bound to be compared to (and ultimately overshadowed by) the formidable Bonnie and Clyde, but Boxcar Bertha has a few key moments in it (including a stellar final action sequence) that places it near the middle of the Scorsese canon, even with it being his second film.

18. Who's That Knocking at My Door? (1967) For all of the refinement that Scorsese found in his second film, his debut film, the stunning Who’s That Knocking at My Door?, stands as testament to the fact that Scorsese brought his many gifts to the table from day one.  What started as a student graduate film grew into a speculative project, only to find 25th hour funding that allowed it a festival run and a proper release.  The film took many years to complete and release, to the point that keen viewers will notice Harvey Keitel’s boyish, soft good looks morph into the sharper, edgier intense profile we came to recognize in Mean Streets and the films that followed.  The energetic cinematography, respect of film as a medium, stellar music choices, defiance of youth, toxic masculinity and realistic look at relationships are all here, making this debut a hidden gem in the Scorsese canon.

17. The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) Seeing Scorsese retread old stylistic ground (as opposed to infusing his style into newer projects) is an interesting take, and for what my opinion is worth, The Wolf of Wall Street feels like Goodfellas for white collar criminals.  In theory (and, in some aspects of the film, in reality), the experiment does work, but ultimately, this film finds its placement in the middle realms simply because we are given infinite sizzle off of what amounts to a very thin steak.  Goodfellas works because it is carried by the weight of omerta, but The Wolf of Wall Street focuses on a culture where status comes from self-appointed importance, which ultimately makes for an attempted redemption story for despicable people.  

16. The Irishman (2019) Seeing actors the stature of Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci and Al Pacino combine forces for a film is always a major event, but until 2019, those combinations have been limited to duos.  When Netflix announced its intention to release The Irishman in 2019, people were not only intrigued on Scorsese’s take on the Jimmy Hoffa story, but seeing De Niro, Pesci and Pacino in the same film for the first time.  For what it was worth, the trio lived up to all expectations, with the only bittersweet criticism being wishes that the three could have found a way to work together prior to the twilight of their careers.  The historical drama is high quality, with Hoffa’s larger than life persona captured perfectly by Pacino, and bolstered by the dramatic chops brought to the table by De Niro and Pesci.  The film is a tad on the long side, and the de-aging process tips into the realm of the uncanny valley due to the older actors’ physicality, but for a 25th film 52 years into an illustrious career, The Irishman must be recognized for the triumph that it is.

15. The Aviator (2004) Much like The Wolf of Wall Street, I avoided The Aviator for years simply because I have no interest or fascination with Howard Hughes.  I was very much aware of his financial stature, his innovations as an aviator, his rocky love life and his personal demons that plagued him, but for my money’s worth, I was fine without seeing it presented on the big screen.  In an effort to cover all the bases for a director I hold in high esteem, however, I made the decision to finally check out The Aviator, and for every element of the film I previously had no interest in, an element was presented that won me over.  Cate Blanchett and Adam Dunn put on two of the strongest performances in the entire realm of Scorsese films, and the XF-11 crash sequence is possibly one of the grandest and well executed in any Scorsese film.  Leave it to Martin Scorsese to make a powerful film about an individual I care nothing about and nearly crack the top ten with that effort.

14. Hugo (2011)  Up to the point of watching Hugo, I knew nothing about it.  About halfway through Hugo, I had to stop and look up how the film was received, as it was simply stunning, and sure enough, it was a monster in terms of award nominations and wins.  I never would have pegged Scorsese as the type to direct a kid’s film, but in all honesty, that ‘kid’s film’ title is used as a façade for a love letter to film in general, and the groundbreaking work of Georges Méliès specifically.  The look of the film is otherworldly, the energy is light, kinetic and infectious, and even a mostly slapstick performance by Sacha Baron Cohen yields surprising emotional depth when given the opportunity to do so.  While just missing the top ten, Hugo easily stands as the number one surprise on this list in terms of pre-viewing expectations (of which there where none) versus post-viewing thoughts (of which there are many).  Knowing that Hugo exists lets me know that one day, if I have children, and they want to know why I love film so much, I will have a film on the level of Cinema Paradiso to share with them and (hopefully) help foster a love of film they can call their own.

13. Casino (1995) For a time, this film stood as the last work containing the vibrant combination of Martin Scorsese, Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci, a trio of high energy creatives known for putting their all into their projects.  Casino felt like a spiritual successor to Goodfellas, focusing on a lavish but secretive lifestyle with high stakes and even higher consequences.  An instantly iconic movie,  Casino felt like the end of an era in regards to gangster fare for Scorsese, opting instead for more challenging projects, adaptations of other books and films, or personal passion projects.  It would be nearly 25 years later before Scorsese would touch similar subject matter or work with these actors again, but had Casino been the last of Scorsese’s so-called “gangster” films, I believe the world would have been happy with that.

12. Kundun (1997) To make one religious-based film in a career is a bold move to some, but I am hard-pressed to think of any director that made films on two different religions who didn’t explicitly make religious films.  With that in mind, it is incredibly impressive that Martin Scorsese was able to make a film as moving and objective as Kundun after making such a bold take on religion as The Last Temptation of Christ.  The film centers around the discovery, growth and eventual escape to India in light of growing aggression from China.  In all honesty, I had my doubts as to whether or not the Scorsese style would work for this story, especially in light of the lack of cooperation from Tibet and China, but somehow, Scorsese’s amazing signature camerawork captures the unique spirit and essence surrounding the Dalai Lama.  I’d heard of this film for years, but never got around to it until it was time to make this list, but I will almost certainly try to find a copy to own in the near future. 

11. The King of Comedy (1982) What an odd left turn in regards of career trajectory for both Scorsese and De Niro.  With three collaborations already under their belt (not to mention The Godfather II already being a well-established classic), it would have been easy to imagine the duo putting another notch on the gangster film genre belt.  What we are given, however, is the yang to the yin of Taxi Driver : our protagonist is a statement on personal conviction and the trappings of instant stardom, our antagonist is a statement on star fascination and the high costs of celebrity, and our satellite characters directly reflect the toxicity certain fandoms can be capable of.  Scorsese sets aside his normal flourish and camera moves for a mixing of film and video mediums, as well as a completely new sense of freedom in regards to the highly improvised nature of the film.  Its influence on recent successful films like Joker is undeniable, but I’d argue that Joker lacks the heart, sincerity and realistic bite present in The King of Comedy.

10. After Hours (1985) Of all the “new to me” Scorsese flicks I finally viewed while preparing this list, After Hours stands as my favorite discovery of the bunch.  I was marginally familiar with the film, both from my younger days in video stores and from friend recommendations, but for some reason, when Scorsese time arrived, After Hours seemed to never be on the docket.  That oversight, however, will now be a thing of the past.  This film feels like a personal challenge to Woody Allen in regards to how one should make a New York-based romantic comedy, and I’d be hard pressed to share any shortcomings or failures present in this comedic masterpiece.  One of the few films that can be both a product of its era and a timeless classic, and one that should be much more recognized in the Scorsese canon.

9. Shutter Island (2010) Me hesitating or not getting around to Scorsese films seems to be a bit of a common theme here, but there was literally no excuse for me to take this long to get around to Shutter Island.  Despite knowing the premise of the story (and even having the ending somewhat spoiled for me), I still found the impact of the final moments just as powerful as I imagine I would have going into this film blind.  Some people will likely argue this statement, but in my opinion, this was the best Leonardo DiCaprio performance captured by Martin Scorsese.  The asylum setting is wonderfully bleak, and the psychological horrors it infers create a vibrant playground for some of the most stunning visual symbolism that Scorsese has ever committed to film.  Don’t be like me if you’ve not gotten around to Shutter Island yet, because it’s a thrill ride more than worth the price of admission, and a rewarding repeat viewer. 

8. Mean Streets (1973) Mean Streets may have been Martin Scorsese’s third film, but for many fans, it was the first true indicator of the brilliance that was to come.  A true New York film through and through, it not only presented fans with a stronger Harvey Keitel performance than Who’s That Knocking at My Door?, but it introduced the world to the palatable tandem of Scorsese and De Niro that would go on to lead to years and years of iconic performances.  The use of altering aspect ratios is something that I wish Scorsese would have continued to use more often, but in all honesty, Mean Streets has style to spare.  This the film that I love to recommend when people start ranting and raving about Goodfellas, and more often than not, it impresses those unfamiliar with it just as much.

7. The Age of Innocence (1993) Martin Scorsese’s love of film is widely known and well documented, but The Age of Innocence goes an additional step further by displaying Scorsese’s love of art.  The film also is one of the most touching displays of unrequited love that Scorsese has committed to film, a slight alteration from his normal infusion of love stories trying to sustain in the surrounding chaos of gangs, crime, religion and so on.  Daniel Day-Lewis, Michelle Pfeiffer and Winona Ryder all give standout performances in this masterfully directed film.  If Gangs of New York was meant to be the definitive old school New York film in the Scorsese canon, then The Age of Innocence is the unintended definitive New York film from Scorsese, with some European touches thrown in for good measure.

6. Cape Fear (1991) Of the many, many iconic performances that Robert De Niro has given Martin Scorsese, I’d be hard pressed not to put his characterization of Max Cady at the top by a clear margin.  Cape Fear was already a classic film adaptation of The Executioners when it was first released in 1957, but De Niro pulled two fast ones with his update : in terms of casting, especially with the aforementioned De Niro, Scorsese brought the harrowing story into a much darker, recent world, therefore increasing the tension by upping the ante for violent retribution, while at the same time, paying direct homage to the original by having Elmer Bernstein adapt the original Bernard Herrmann score.  Juliette Lewis also provided a breakout performance in this modern day classic, and possibly the film that provided the most tense debate in terms of placement, as we will get into with the next film.

5. Silence (2016) Despite being one of the most recent Martin Scorsese films, this one’s limited release meant that I missed it during its initial run, and the lack of streaming service placement essentially erased it from my memory.  I was certainly intrigued about watching it for this list, and it ended up being the last film viewed.  Going into it, it felt like a sort of religious take on Saving Private Ryan, but it didn’t take long for the film to start dealing out much heavier cards in terms of faith, belief systems and cross-cultural contamination.  The Last Temptation of Christ showed that Scorsese could find nuance and secular drama from a holy tale, and Kundun showed that he could make a religious icon a relatable human figure struggling to grasp his divine appointment.  Silence is the work of a wise, steady hand, however, like some sort of cinematic parable or testament to faith in the face of crippling doubt and danger.  Scorsese is certainly still moved by the idea of faith, and he uses Andrew Garfield to display this in some of the most powerful moments that he has ever created or captured for his films.  For those who have not seem the film, this placement may feel a bit high, but I would not be surprised if, given time and proper amounts of reflection, it makes its way higher.

4. Raging Bull (1980) The placement of Raging Bull and Cape Fear was the biggest hurdle I was forced to overcome in the creation of this list.  Robert De Niro is powerfully captivating in both films, though I would personally give his performance as Max Cady the nod over his embodiment of Jake LaMotta, but when it comes down to the brass tacks of it all, Raging Bull is ultimately the better of the two films.  The raw, black and white look of LaMotta’s life already provides a gritty, unflattering portrait of a savage and uncouth man looking for beauty in the world, but that beauty he searches for appears in the boxing sequences with no apologies.  The airy look, mainly caught by dynamic slow motion photography, works in tandem with the abrasive first-person views of the combatants, not to mention the direct nature of the combat itself as the viewer is often placed directly in the line of fire.  The involvement of the real LaMotta within the film provides a nice button to the superb acting put on display by De Niro, Joe Pesci, Cathy Moriarty and the numerous actors used to portray the opponents of LaMotta.  

3. The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) Call it a trope if you like, but it feels like every great (or aspiring) director has a film in them that is driven by religion in some capacity.  The Last Temptation of Christ is unique in this sense because it takes the story of the accusations, betrayal, trial and eventual crucifixion of Jesus and turns it into a deeply faith-based suspense thriller.  Many of the familiar beats we know from the Bible are re-contextualized as visions, mystic tests of faith, carnal desires driven by lust, and nihilistic views infringing upon deep indoctrination.  Willem Dafoe plays a Jesus that is bitter in his acceptance of his fate, Harvey Keitel plays a wonderfully opportunistic Judas, and Barbara Hershey plays a very modernized version of a woman forced to use her body for survival that is suddenly trapped between necessity and passion.  The film hinges on the verge of becoming a soap opera without falling into the trappings that come with such high drama, and the walkup to the film’s amazing final sequence puts you in the emotional passenger's seat while Jesus takes the wheel and steers directly into his fate.  A dramatically powerful yet brutally sincere take on an iconic, revered and sensitive subject matter.

2. Goodfellas (1990) Is there any original praise left to bestow upon this movie?  To focus on the imperfections of this film is an act of futility, as they are mostly non-existent.  Some of Martin Scorsese’s best examples of his iconic camera movement, editing techniques, still frames, writing gleaned from personal experience, soundtrack use, loose historical connections and dark humor are found within the confines of Goodfellas.  If you’ve seen in actor in any television show or film that had any connection to the mob prior to Goodfellas or since, it is more than likely that that actor was in Goodfellas, even if only briefly.  Using Henry Hill as both an outsider and insider perspective is a brilliant narrative stroke, as he can get close to the top, but can never have it all, making him essentially a fly on the wall bursting with charisma and personality.  They highs are as epic as the lows are tragic, and for most people, it is the first film that comes to mind when the name Martin Scorsese is mentioned.  This could have very easily been the number one film on my list, but anyone who has been visiting this blog with a keen eye for detail probably figured out my favorite Scorsese film the first time they visited the DOOMonFILM blog.  

1. Taxi Driver (1976) Since the day that I started this film blog, there has been one image at the top of the page : Travis Bickle in the porn theater (with his face replaced by my logo) from the iconic Taxi Driver.  There’s not a single element that I can put my finger on for this film, but there are certainly a number of elements that do speak to me : the isolation that Travis faces, the journal-like narration that drives the story forward, the hypnotic nature of both Bernard Herrmann score and the repetitive taxi cab shots and the vivid camera movements are all burnt firmly into my brain.  Everyone that makes up the main cast for this film kills in their performance, and the ending of the film is not only a brutal one, but an ironic one in regards to where Travis lands in the eyes of those who make up the world of the film.  Martin Scorsese has made more amazing films than some directors have made, period (amazing or otherwise), but for my money’s worth, none of them are as powerful or well put together as Taxi Driver. 

#ChiefDoomsday #DOOMonFILM #MartinScorsese #Who'sThatKnockingAtMyDoor #BoxcarBertha #MeanStreets #AliceDoesn'tLiveHereAnymore #TaxiDriver #NewYorkNewYork #RagingBull #TheKingOfComedy #AfterHours #TheColorOfMoney #TheLastTemptationOfChrist #Goodfellas #CapeFear #TheAgeOfInnocence #Casino #Kundun #BringingOutTheDead #GangsOfNewYork #TheAviator #TheDeparted #ShutterIsland #Hugo #TheWolfOfWallStreet #Silence #TheIrishman

[fictionalrambles]

Shadowhunters Fandom Story -  Part Three

Submitted by @notcrypticbutcoy

Five Favourite Stories

1. Magnus Bane’s School For Young Warlocks by @miasunri​

Why I love this fic: It’s a stunning piece to read. Max and Rafe (the kids) are featured prominently with single-dad Alec, and they feel like actual people with well-developed personalities - like real, authentic children - which is something that I almost always feel is missing from fics featuring kids. The mutual pining between Magnus and Alec is gorgeous, the tension is blissful, there’s a perfect blend of Actual Plot (the politics is SO GOOD) and Feelings, and I found myself just as invested in the relationships between Magnus and each of the kids as I was in Magnus and Alec. Magnus and Alec’s relationship blossoms like the petals of a flower unfurling. I cannot overemphasise how much I smile whenever I read this fic - except during the angsty parts, of course, but those are the best sort of hurt/comfort, and the drama always gets excellent payoff. This isn’t finished, but don’t shy away from it. It’s such a wonderful fic. 

Favourite Quote:

An ocean spreads under his feet and swallows him whole.  Jace goes up to stand with the newly wedded brides to deliver his speech, and Alec hears exactly none of it.  Magnus’s lips fill out into a cascading grin, lighting every inch of Alec’s body, from the root of his heart to the dendrites of each nerve, from his fingertips to the bottom of his feet.  The slowly sinking sun and the moon fill the lines on Magnus’s face, make the glitter shine and dive down into the depths of his cat eyes, reflecting all the flecks of yellow, even from here.

He’s beautiful.

This is one of many quotes in this fic that I adore, but it’s right before the culmination of weeks and months worth of tension. The chapter it’s from, and the couple following, are my favourites. 

2. Traveller by bumblebeesknees

Why I love this fic: This fic manages to marry light and heavy with absolute ease. It’s sweet and funny, in places (140 year old Max is an interdimensional bounty hunter who’s accidentally time-travelled - need I say any more?!) and incredibly serious and sad, in others (bounty hunter Max really misses his dad and wants validation of his life choices, okay?). I love the care and thought given to how the immortality issue is handled here - there’s no fix, but the emphasis is on love and communication now, to prepare for what’s to come. It helps that the prose is lovely and the dialogue extremely heartfelt! It’s a really touching piece, and it reads effortlessly. 

Favourite quote: 

“Because I love you, and I don’t want there to be any uncertainty as to what that means. I know you know that I care for you, that I would move heaven and earth for you – but you’re also a part of me. You know things about me that I had left buried for centuries, rekindled parts of my heart I thought had been burned to ashes. There’s no page in my life that doesn’t have your fingerprints on it, no hidden corners that you haven’t brightened with your presence. It took me four hundred years to find you and I’m not – it’s not going to happen again.”

Sue me, I have chosen the most sappy and self-indulgent quote possible. But the way it’s written is stunning and it hurts so good! 

3. Universes of You by giidas

Why I love this fic: I’ve waxed poetic about this fic a lot recently, and for good reason. Alec universe-hops and finds his life intertwined with Magnus’ in every one. Some of the universes are tragic, some are the epitome of a happy ending, and some made me laugh endlessly. My favourite detail that threads through every universe in this fic is that Alec always recognises Magnus, always knows him, always sees the many similarities, but he never smells quite right; he doesn’t quite smell like Alec’s Magnus. I thought that was a really beautiful touch. The end is agonisingly sweet, and so worth the pain. Alec’s relief when he gets home is palpable.

Favourite quote:

Alec lets his full weight settle on Magnus’ thighs, allows his muscles to relax. His nose is filled with sandalwood, the earthy smell of the remnants of the memory spell that still linger on Magnus’ skin and the salty tang of sweat. His hand has a mind of its own and is settling on Magnus’ neck, tilting his head back, exposing the line of his throat to Alec. The memory of the alternate Magnus, sheen of sweat on his skin, flashes through Alec’s mind, and he does what he wanted to do then, licks from the base of Magnus’ throat all the way to his ear, biting his earlobe, burying his nose there when he’s done. Magnus shudders, makes a soft hurt noise.

Like I said. The end is my favourite brand of comfort after a fic full of sweet sweet hurt.

4. as your sun sets (i know you in bleary-eyed 3AM) by @the-prophet-lemonade​

Why I love this fic: This is a slow-burn (as much as is possible in 50k), but it burns like the sun. One of my favourite things about this fic is the found-family feel, and how well-developed all the relationships are. It’s a Sense 8 AU, and it’s seamlessly merged with the SH characters. Magnus is enigmatic but endlessly kind, and Alec is prickly but cares deeply about the other characters. I love the friendship and shared desire to protect that underpins Magnus and Alec’s relationship in this. This fic is unique in how it made me feel while reading, and I urge everyone to curl up somewhere and immerse themselves in it. The storytelling is unparalleled and the prose is extremely rich.

Favourite quote: 

“I’ve been waiting for you to visit,” Magnus says, soft. “Man in my head.”

“I’m … sorry it’s taken so long,” Alec replies.

It’s extraordinary - existing in two places at once. Here, there, his own apartment - and then, where Magnus is. He wants to tell Magnus: you make me feel things I haven’t felt before, how is that possible? He holds that need tight against his chest. Magnus looks at him like he’s hung the sun in the sky. 

Alec doesn’t feel so broken anymore.

“Man in my head” and “3am” now trigger extreme emotion in me.

5. Hath No Fury by @trellanyx

Why I love this fic: A slightly different pick, but still my favourite theme of angst with a lovely payoff. Magnus in this fic is definitely a little bit morally grey, in a way, but it’s written so well. He’s uncompromising and unashamed about his desire to protect and enact revenge when those he loves are hurt. This slightly brutal characterisation of Magnus is one of my favourites, and I really love the exploration of his darker side. Alec’s gradual realisation of what Magnus is willing to do for him is lovely, too. 

Favourite quote: 

Magnus spoke to his rings, unwilling—or unable—to make himself watch Alec’s reaction to what he was saying. “It’s something I’ve had to come to terms with, to accept in all its ugliness, because it is as much a part of me as your Nephilim heritage. Nothing is too vicious—too demonic—when it comes to protecting what is mine. And if I fail in that protection, I will gladly let entire worlds burn in punishment. I’m not proud of it, but I’ve long stopped fighting it.”

This quote really sums up what I most love about this fic!

Author Story

These characters feel like they’ve been a part of my life for a long time. The show gave them exactly the new, modern lease of life that they so desperately needed, and I am eternally grateful. Writing is and has always been a reprieve for me, and writing fanfics even more so. I always say that the best way to improve your writing is just to write, as much as you possibly can, and that’s certainly been true for me. I would like to think that my writing - and definitely my patience for editing and proof-reading - has improved since I started writing for this fandom! 

This fandom was also the first fandom I found that so wholeheartedly and enthusiastically embraced queer characters, and headcanoning probably-straight characters as queer (which says a lot about the fandoms I’ve frequented before, but I digress) which has been lovely. I never have to worry that someone will get annoyed that I’ve written about a bisexual Isabelle, or tell me that they like my writing, but not if I’m going to include explicit depictions of queer sex.

I’ve had so much fun writing in this fandom, and I’m thrilled by the response to my fics and by how much talent there is from other writers, freely available to us all. I think I’ll be sticking around for a few more years!

#shadowhunters #fanfiction #shadowhunters fanfiction #fanfiction blog