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tranquil-turbulence · 10 months

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SS Month ‘23 - Day 17

Day 16 | Day 17 | Day 18

Prompt: Bending

WARNING(S): Mentions of war

Another peaceful day in the countryside of Earth country - or as peaceful as it could be with war looming on the horizon.

Sakura hummed a quiet tune as she tended her father’s garden. The family had fallen on some hard times as of late, and her mother had been forced to return to her tailoring business while her father continued to peddle his wares in the city.

The plants were coming along nicely; midsummer was always one of the best times of year for fresh, delicious fruits and veggies. The orange trees were ripe with tart, sweet oranges, and the carrots were so crisp she could almost sit in the dirt and eat as many as she pleased.

Her ears perked up as she heard her father’s grunting as he pulled his cart back down the road. Straightening up and dusting off her apron, she turned with a smile and a greeting on her tongue - only for it to turn concerned as her father lugged back a cart full of dirty - and some smashed - produce.

“Father, what happened?” She exclaimed, rushing to aid him.

“Some troublesome kids… in the square,” he puffed, nodding his thanks as she took over pushing the cart. “They knocked over my cart… and they ruined my cabbages!”

Dabbing at his forehead with a handkerchief, he grumbled to himself as they made their way back to the house. “Well, no use throwing them out. We’ll have to make soup out of ‘em tonight. Is your mother home yet?”

“Not yet. She got an emergency call from a client and has been gone all afternoon.” Sakura gently wheeled the cart to a stop and started gathering bunches of cabbage heads into her arms. “Here, Father - go sit down and drink some water. I’ll handle the cabbages.”

“You’re such a hardworking daughter.” Patting her cheek, he gave her a fond smile, the corners of his eyes crinkling. “What would we do without you?”

“Be forced to work the fields yourselves, I guess,” she joked, causing the two to share a laugh.

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Night fell across the countryside stubbornly slowly, but as soon as the sun had faded from sight and the moon was making its voyage across the celestial skies, Sakura crept out to the well with a bucket in hand. The warm, cheerful summer breeze tickled her cheeks and tousled her hair; she hadn’t bothered putting it back up given how late it was.

Humming quietly to herself, she pumped fresh water into the bucket. She would have to rise early to get started on the vegetable stock; her mother had been terribly upset when they told her about the incident in the city, but was placated when Sakura had said she’d take care of the soup herself. They’d been getting too little sleep lately; she figured she could do at least this much.

As soon as she was done filling it with water, she hoisted it into her arms with a grunt. Once she was sure she had filled it full, a rustling in the bushes made her whirl around with a startled sound - and with a gasp, she dumped the entire bucket onto the figure creeping around in the garden.

A muffled shout hit her ears almost instantly, and a head popped up with a glare like fire. “What-- what the hell--?!”

“Shh!” She shoved a finger to his lips. “Would you be quiet? My parents are getting one of the best nights of sleep they’ve gotten this week! If you wake them up I’m not saving you!”

The sopping wet figure - a man, she presumed from the timbre in his voice and the way his hand grasped her wrist - only gave her a heated look in response. “That doesn’t mean you had to soak me!”

“You’re snooping around my father’s garden in the dead of the night, and you expect me not to douse you?”

Grumbling a little under his breath, the young man heaved a sigh - and to her surprise, steam escaped his nose. “Fair enough, I guess. I didn’t mean to startle you, I’m only looking for shelter for the night.”

Straightening up, she extended her hand with a huff. “Well, you could’ve started with that. Can I ask your name?”

The stranger paused, examining her with a critical eye.

“Look, I’m not gonna turn you in if it happens that you’re some kind of wanted criminal. Unless you’re on the run for rape or serial murder, or something. Then I might get a little… concerned.”

“I’m not on the run for that,” the stranger balked, finally taking her hand. His was calloused, larger, with a warmth that felt too strong for a normal civilian. “I’m… Sasuke. I am on the run, but… just until I can make my way home.”

As she helped him to his feet, she hummed thoughtfully under her breath. “Sasuke… hm, that doesn’t ring a bell. Wait one minute, would you? Let me get you a towel and a robe.”

Hurrying away, she slipped into the house and went straight for her parents’ room. Her father was a naturally heavy sleeper, and her mother had come to tune out everything as she slept - especially her husband’s snoring. She was able to creep in, grab one of her father’s smaller robes, and get back out, stopping by the bathroom to get a fresh towel.

She was more than a little surprised to see that Sasuke had done as she’d asked, standing there patiently as he scanned the landscape with a critical eye.

“Here,” she began, making him turn back to face her as she held out a robe and a towel. “You can change under the awning. I won’t peek.”

He murmured a thanks and did as directed, his shoes squeaking and sloshing with water every step as he began drying off his long hair. It fell heavy along his shoulders and back, thick and unruly, and briefly the young woman wondered about what it was like to comb through it.

Shaking her head to clear it of those thoughts, she turned away as clothing rustled and dropped to the dirt. She waited until he called softly to her before turning around, cupping her hand over her mouth to conceal the amusement as she saw how her father’s robes hung off of his frame. Lithe he was, but there was a hint of muscle in his arms underneath the heavy fabric.

“Sorry,” she said, voice colored with humor, “that was the smallest one he has. I didn’t think it would be too big of a difference…”

“It’s fine for now,” Sasuke sighed as he gathered his clothes up into the towel. “What do I do with these?”

“Well, I have to do laundry tomorrow morning anyways, so I’ll put them with my clothes for now.” At his skeptical look, she added, “Don’t worry, I’m not gonna do anything bad with them. It’s better I hide them among my things than have my mother question me tomorrow.”

Nodding slowly, he shuffled from foot to foot. “So… would you mind letting me stay here for the night? Just until tomorrow - I have to keep moving.”

“I don’t see why not - I mean, it’s the least I can do after soaking you.” Lips tugging into a smile, she gestured towards the shed. “I’ll get some of my bedding so you won’t have to sleep on the cold floor.”

He watched as she turned to go, before a thought struck him and he reached forward to grasp her elbow. “Wait.”

She turned, confusion in her face.

“I, uh, I never got your name,” he added quietly.

“Oh, that’s right. I’m sorry, I’m a bit scatterbrained. My name is Sakura.”

“Sa- ku- ra…” he tested it out on his tongue. “Ah. Like the flower?”

“What gave it away?” She inquired wryly, tossing her petal-pink hair over one shoulder. To her delight, he chuckled. “I’ll be right back with some blankets. You’ll have to wait until my parents leave early in the morning, but when they do you can come in for some breakfast before you head out.”

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Morning came all too quickly. Sakura rose before dawn, beginning with the clothes as her mother cooked breakfast. By the time she sent her parents on their way with a kiss on the cheek and a lunch for her father, she was heading to the garden shed with a basket of clean clothes.

“Sasuke?” She knocked gently on the door. “They’re gone, if you want some breakfast.”

There was some shuffling from inside, before the door opened and Sasuke blinked down at her, still seeming a bit sleepy. (She swallowed, fighting to keep her eyes on his face and not wandering down to the delicious trail of muscle peeking out of his robe.)

“H- here!” She offered up the basket of clothes with a flushed face. “Just come in whenever you’re ready!”

Hurrying away from the shed, she went back into the house and into the kitchen. Stirring the leftover rice, she fried up more egg and fresh vegetables before turning her attention to the stock still simmering over the fire.

Her impromptu visitor was certainly mysterious. Only a handsome visage and a first name? She’d never seen him around before, nor his exotic features - and judging by the fact that he was apparently a wanted man, she wondered just what it was that would make him go through the countryside. What had he done to invoke the wrath of the law?

One part of her huffed at that question. The better one would be what hadn’t he done; the governors were getting much, much stricter these days, and the looming threat of the Fire Nation invading and conquering their land was good cause to lock down their citizens, she supposed. But for such a man who appeared to be a foreigner? Where had she seen his features before…?

Her train of thought was interrupted by the young man himself walking into the kitchen, rolling up his sleeves.

“O- oh, Sasuke!” She turned and paused, confused. “What are you doing?”

“Helping,” he answered, as if it were obvious. “What do you need me to do?”

She shifted from foot to foot, glancing at the broth before going to the eggs. “If you don’t mind keeping an eye on the egg, I’ll take care of the soup.”

Nodding silently, he walked past her up to the frying egg while she moved towards the fire. His long, dark hair had been pulled back with a ribbon, accentuating his pale features.

She absentmindedly stirred the soup as she looked him over with a critical eye.

“Something on your mind?” He inquired, glancing up at her. His piercing midnight irises seemed to click with a memory, and she blinked rapidly.

“H- huh? Oh, it’s nothing,” she answered, shaking her head and waving it off.

“Well, the egg is done cooking.” He moved the pan off of the stove.

Working quickly, she grabbed a bowl and portioned off some rice, then the egg, and finally a smaller bowl of vegetable soup. She set them all in front of him with a steaming cup of tea.

She sat down before him as he ate, propping her chin up in her hand.

She waited for him to look up from his food, swallowing, before commenting, “I think I remember where I’ve seen you before.”

She watched as his body tensed, eyes growing wary as they searched her face.

“You’re… you’re him, right? The runaway…?” She trailed off, mimicking the Fire Nation salute.

Sasuke looked around the room before heaving a sigh through his nose. “I knew you Earth Kingdom folk were too clever for your own good.”

She waited for him to swallow the last of his tea before getting up to fetch the kettle. As she sat back down, he spoke. “Yes, I am. I’m not supposed to be here at all; I’m supposed to be finding the fabled Son of the Winds, but along the way I realized… I’m just on a wild goose chase.” He shrugged his shoulders loosely. “So I’ve been trying to make a new life for myself here as a refugee. I guess I got too careless though - some guy found out I’m--” he mimicked the salute, more accurately than she had, “-- so he turned me in to the Dai Li. I can’t stay in the Earth Kingdom lest I want to go to prison, so I’ve been making my way south. I’m hoping I could settle in a forest somewhere, a place where nobody will recognize who I am.”

“And… the hair is supposed to help hide you, right?” She gestured to his untamed locks. “Because I have to admit, I never would have realized who you were had you not looked at me exactly as the wanted poster.”

His cheeks flushed a pale pink, and he nodded. “Y- yeah…”

“Well.” Heaving a sigh, she leaned back on her knees. “I’m gonna be blunt, I don’t think there are a lot of good options unless you want to go full hermit and bunk down in a cave somewhere.”

Taking a sip of soup, he murmured, “That’s the plan, I suppose.”

Shifting from side to side, she looked back at him intently. “... I might have a good solution, if you’d like.”

He swallowed the bite of rice he’d taken, curious.

“If you wanted… it’s a small place, but I’d love some extra help around here.” Gesturing around the room, she gave him a crooked smile. “It’ll take some adjusting - especially for my father - but we could make room . You could stay here, if you wanted.”

Sasuke’s eyes widened a fraction in surprise, and he quickly ducked his head. “I wouldn’t want to impose.”

“Nonsense, there’s no such thing.” She waved it off. “You know how much needs done around here? I’m lucky if Mother gets a day off just to help me with the laundry. I’d love an extra pair of hands on deck.”

The young prince said nothing for a long while, taking another bite and chewing slowly. His brow was furrowed in thought.

Finally, he swallowed, and looked up at her. “What do you want in return?”

“Except for someone to help me out? Not much,” she admitted with a shrug. “Just because I know who you really are doesn’t mean I’m inclined to turn you in. My parents aren’t massive fans of the Fire Nation - hell, nobody around here really is - but they won’t care if a refugee needs a place to stay.”

Nodding his head jerkily, he hummed. His voice rippled in his throat and sent a pleasurable shiver across her shoulders.

“If you breathe a word about my identity, I’m gone,” he stated firmly, fixing her in place with an intense stare.

“My lips are sealed,” she answered, just as seriously.

After another moment, he got up from the table, bowl in hand. “Very well. In exchange for hiding me here I’ll lend my services, starting with the dishes.”

#sasusaku month 2023 #the last airbender au #atla au #missing prince #war mention #sasusaku

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shatteredminds · 2 years

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@taterswithranch

Word- Apple

Letter- B

Character-

Bast Levana Howell-Lokison

Others-

Vulcan Brandeis Rhaghverii Lokison/Infurlion Burnvaru Kisharnva

Koray Val Infurlionii Lokison

Iskra Allyriane Infurlonala Lokison

Category- I don't know what to categorize this as tbh

Words-

Söl- Sweet

Söly- Sweetie

Mánáy- Mommy

Ařaly- Little ones

Wáhłaaň- Wife

Fánřa- Father

Sítűe- Night

Apples

The vampires citrine orange eyes glanced out the window, checking on her fledglings as they played outside. The edge of her sharp knife slicing threw the crisp, ruby red skin of the apple on the counter in front of her.

Her daughter Iskra and son Koray were playing catch the fireball. Truth be told, she was thankful for then being fireproof like their sire.

Popping a slice into her mouth she continued what she was doing, cutting up apples for some pies she was making via her children's request, her mates love of her baking, and her cravings of the past year.

Apple pies used to be a rarity in this den due to the fact that she used to hate apples with a passion. The smell, the taste, and the texture of them would make her ill.

But these little twins she's been bearing for the past ten months gave her a craving for the fruit she hated so much prior to their conception.

She popped another hunk of apple into her mouth amd finished cutting up the rest in the sack. Doing what required to makenthe pies before putting them in the oven.

It wouldn't take long for them to bake due to where their den is. The Kingdom of Iňfěrína happend to be the closest of the Kingdoms to Därvánír, the active volcano in which the palace of the emperor was carved into.

Iňfěrína was settled near the base of Därvánír. The molten lava that flowed around it's villages was used as a means of defense as well as a means to cook and bake.

Looking at the time she noted that it was getting late and that her mate would be home in the next hour. She went to the open door she called to her children. Telling them to come inside since it was late.

"But Mánáy..." Iskra pouted.

"No but Ařaly. You know the rules, when Uncle Hyperion lowers the sun and Uncle Jericho and Auntie Artemis start raising the moon it's time to come inside." Bast says, a hint of warning that punishment via extra chores could be applied if either of them complain.

In a huff, the fledglings come inside. Closing the door behind her she went back into the kitchen and took the pies out, careful as to not burn herself. Once they were placed on the counter to cool she made supper.

"My wáhłaaň, I'm home." Said a male voice as the door to the den opend and closed. Soon large arms gently wrapped around her waist and a kiss was softly placed on her neck.

"Söly, you should know better then to do that when I have a knife in my hand." Bast scolded as she continued chopping up the veggies for supper, a blush spread on her face from the kiss.

"I know my Söl, but how could I resist." Vulcan purred before he nuzzled his face into the crook of her neck. "It feels like I haven't seen you in centuries."

"You were only gone for twelve hours my love." She states as she dumps the veggies into the pan with the meat to fry.

"Twelve hours of having to be away from my beautiful wáhłaaň." He murmers, letting her go so she can move and watching her dump the vegetables onto the pan. "Can't we just have meat tonight my love? Raw meat to be exact."

"You know Korays stomach is still to sensitive for raw meat Vulcan." She says, gathering up the dirty dishes and going to the sink to wash them.

"I know, but the ařaly's don't have to eat it." Vulcan points out, eye drifting across the counter he noticed two little heads peaking over the island. One had a hair of blond and the other black. They were trying to reach the pies on the counter.

"I know you've been craving raw meat my love, but if we were to just eat it right now what I'm cooking would go to waist." She explains, scrubbing the hell out of the cutting board.

"True. I'm going to go check on the ařaly's ok." He tells her.

"Ai, I'll call when suppers done." She says with a nod.

So Vulcan left, taking one of the five pies, picking up his children with his tail as he walked past and went to their room. After he put them in there he went to his study and ate it.

Later they ate. Bast noticed that while Iskra and Koray ate as much as they normally. Vulcan didn't even eat as much as he normally does amd he eats a lot.

Half an hour later, the fledglings were in bed. Bast just got out of the shower, wearing one of Vulcans shirts like she usually does for sleep while she's pregnant. The shirts acted like a nightgown of sorts with how big they are.

With still damp hair she exited the the bathroom. Noticing the mess of clothing inthe chair near the door she cleaned it up. On the bed Vulcan laid waiting, laying on his side with his head proped up on his hand. Gems and gold scattered on the bed around him.

When she surned around a goofy grin formed on his face and he wiggled his eyebrows. Seeing this and knowing exactly what he was trying to do, Bast threw a pillow that was on the floor at him. Hitting him in the face, he wheezed.

"I'm to far along to be doing that Vulcan and you know it." She scolds her mate.

"I know, I just wanted to see your face when I did that!" He managed to say as he laughed. Shaping his fingers the gold and gems vanished of the bed.

Shaking her head she climbed into bed, Vulcan snuggled up to her once she settled and one of his hands rested gently on her belly where their twins resided.

He felt a little kick from one of the twins, his eyes were bright with excitement and full of love as he looked at her belly.

"They know who their Fánřa is Söly." Bast purrs, her hand now resting on top of his. These twins were her third pregnancy, but the looks that Vulcan had during them were always adorable.

"They do don't they, my little břońjün." He says, a deep rumbly purr resonates from his chest.

Smiling she says, "Ai, now let's get some sleep. You're training some new warriors tommorow remember?"

He hummed in agreement, wrapping his wings around her and kissed her. "Sítűe my wáhłaaň." He purrs before laying his head on his pillow and closing his eyes.

She kissed back. "Sítűe my söl." She says, resting her head on his chest.

She licked her lips. 'His kiss tasted like apples..." She thinks. 'But why?'

Her eyes widened when the realization hit her. "It was you who ate the missing pie!" She exlaimed as she sat up and yanked the pillow out from under her mates head and smacked him with it before rolling over in a huff. Her back towards him as he proped himself up and sleeply looked at her before going back to sleep.

This had been a recurring event in the den for the past ten months, and it's always been over apples.

#bast howl-lokison // infernos hyper wáhłaaň #bast levana howl-lokison #npc // bast howl-lokison #iskra lokison // eternal flame #iskra allyriane inferlionala lokison #npc // iskra lokison #koray lokison // ember moon #koray val inferlionii lokison #npc // koray lokison #vulcan lokison // lord of fire #vulcan brandeis rhaghverii lokison #splotches of ink // muns writing #shattered minds

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bobfloydsbabe · 2 years

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Sorry about your crappy day. So, your Top Gun OCs are going on a roadtrip. What snacks do they take with them and what tunes are on their roadtrip playlist?

Koi, you’re a darling. Working in retail is not always fun, and this particular customer really takes the cake for shittiest customer ever. It was a lot™

Thank you so much for asking. I love this question!

Kennedy would bring crisps and get the whole steering wheel greasy, much to Max's (her best friend and another one of my OCs) dismay. She’s driving, and he’s navigating, much like they would if they were in a jet together. Just a pilot and her WSO in the air and on the ground. Max is a trail mix kind of guy. Healthy and simple. They would jam to Taylor Swift because that’s the kind of friends they are.

Abby is a fresh fruit and cut-up veggies sort of gal. She doesn’t get much exercise in her job as an administrator, so she likes to eat healthy. Abby would listen to a mixed playlist with soft indie and pop music on it. Quiet and sort of mellow like herself.

The only way Jas would ever go on a road trip is if someone else drove. She’s a terrible driver. She would bring all the snacks, like sweets, crisps, trail mix, fruit, veg, water, soda, and energy drinks. All of it. She would listen to 90s and early 2000s rock and punk music with some classic 80s rock thrown in there for good measure.

Thank you again, Koi ❤️

#koiwrites #answered #questions from friends #kennedy asks #max asks #jas asks #abby asks #mail

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40sandfabulousaf · 9 months

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大家好! Where red meat is concerned, pork is mentioned more in this blog; my preferred red meat though, is duck, specifically roasted duck. Pork dishes are more accessible - many places sell them, which is why I eat pork more often - also, I love xiao long bao (soup dumplings) so... 😋 Once in awhile, the craving for my preferred red meat grows too strong and I dash to the nearest dining place for ya mian tang (duck noodle soup) with additional choy sum (Chinese flowering cabbage). After a satisfying meal of ya mian tang, it was time for guava juice.

Morning errands took me to a different part of the country; since I was there, might as well try the food. Their hawker centre was crowded and busy even on a Wednesday after most had started work. After searching for moderately healthy fare, I settled for jian cai yu pian mi fen tang (Chinese water spinach, sliced fish and vermicelli soup) since it was raining and soup is my comfort food. There were lots of veggies, the fish was tender and the clear broth was very tasty. My exploring mood took over, so after the meal, I headed to somewhere else and had soy bean drink instead of coffee.

I returned to the same hawker centre to try the other food stalls although I may not return that often since it's very out of the way. A meatless meal for me this time, comprising stewed fu pi (tofu skin) and tofu, fried tofu, stirfried cabbage with bean sprouts and carrot strips as well as stirfried okra and bee hoon (rice vermicelli). I've eaten better bee hoon, but it was still tasty and most importantly, moderately healthy. Star fruit and pear juice completed the meal. I may consider having more vegetarian meals since they taste pretty alright and can be very filling.

youtube

Grace had enough of drooling over photos of anago and unagi and asked me to take her to the restaurant; yes ma'am! She loved the thick ika (squid) sashimi slices as well as their unagi tamago donburi, but like Pa and me, she loved their anago donburi much more. Tender eel was simmered to feathery perfection and, without too much sauce, we tasted its natural freshness and fragrance. Grace ditched the car and we took the MRT together to and from the restaurant. She enjoyed the experience so much, she'll consider reducing her reliance on travelling by car in future.

youtube

How will I eat more vegetarian meals moving forward - I haven't thought about it but first and foremost, I hope to share 1 meal per post or at least once a week. The reason I'm willing to do this will be shared in the next post. If it all goes smoothly, the final goal is: 3 days' worth of meals will involve plant-based protein, 3 days' worth of meals will involve fish/seafood/eggs and 1 days' worth of meals will involve meat in any order. It will be a gradual process to give me time to get used to eating less fish and seafood, which I love; I'll also need time to tweak quantities since plant-based proteins usually lead to weight loss and I'm not looking to reduce my weight. 下次见！

#Youtube

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theydontknowaboutusimagines · 3 years

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This Christmas - A Harry Styles Christmas Series (Part 3)

Two life long friends. Secretly in love. Home for the holidays. Will they risk everything by telling the other how they feel? Or will they spend another year loving from afar?

Read these first Prologue Part 1 Part 2

It was now morning and you stared at the blank document in front of you. You have now written the first twelve chapters and you’ve hit a wall. A big, huge fucking wall. You had been trying to write now for well over an hour and you just couldn’t come up with anything. You made a few notes as to what you wanted to happen, but figuring out how point a leads to point c… you were blanking.

You finally decided to take a break, sneaking inside the house and making breakfast. It was still quite early, so you thought it would be nice to do the cooking while you were staying there. You searched around for ingredients and pans you would need. Of course, there was something on the very top shelf you couldn’t reach. You sighed, standing on your tippy toes, barely able to grab it. You just needed a few more inches and you would have been able to get it.

However, just before you decided to go and grab a chair, you felt a heated weight pressed against you and a tattooed hand grabbing the item for you.

“I see you haven’t grown much since we were twelve,” Harry smirked in your ear.

Goosebumps covered your skin while your face heated up, “Fuck off,” you smirked back, pushing him off of you.

You turned around seeing him standing there wearing nothing but a pair of jogging pants and some crazy bed head.

“New style you’re going for there?” You smirked, walking past him and over to the counter.

“I still haven’t heard a thank you,” he pointed out.

“Thank you for being a foot taller than me, so that you could reach the flour for me,” you joked.

“I believe you should be thinking my Mum and Dad for that,” he winked.

“Whatever,” you rolled your eyes. “What are you doing up this early anyway?”

“Jet lag,” he shrugged.

“Right,” you said. “So, what part of the world did you travel from this time?”

You poured out each of the ingredients while Harry watched you.

“LA,” he said.

“Oh, that’s right, the movie,” you said, nodding. “How’d that go?”

“It was great,” he said. “I loved it.”

“Any spoilers?” you asked, raising an eyebrow.

“I could ask you the same thing, Ms. Netflix special,” he said, leaning up against the counter. “Congrats on that by the way.”

“Thank you,” you smiled. “And I would totally give you spoilers but nothing is going on with it yet. They’re still casting some of the characters.”

“Speaking of, I’m hurt you didn’t offer me the starring role,” he joked.

“And make your head even bigger, no thank you,” you giggled.

“Well, I mean I do seem to have an awful lot in common with your main love interest,” he pointed out.

You froze, staring at the mixture in the bowl, trying to figure out what the next step would be. However, your hesitation pretty much proved he was right.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” you squeaked.

“I’m just teasing you,” he smirked, knocking your shoulder with his. “But you have to admit there are a few similarities.”

“Your point?” You asked.

“No, point,” he said. “Just dropping a hint on the next time Netflix comes your way, I’m available.”

“Wait… is The Harry Styles coming to me for a job?” You gasped. “Is the bank account drying up that quickly?”

“Ha. Ha,” he rolled his eyes. “Since you’re going to make fun of me, I guess I’ll just go back to sleep and let you make pancakes all by yourself.”

“That was the plan all along,” you pointed out.

“Okay then… I’m going,” he said, staring at you.

“Okay, then go,” you smirked, shooing him out.

“Oh, come on,” he whined. “You know you want my help.”

“You can put the flour back on the top shelf,” you told him as you finished mixing the batter for the pancakes.

He rolled his eyes, grabbing the rest of the ingredients and putting them back in their proper places. As he did this, he caught himself glancing over in your direction. His gaze dropping down the length of your body and back up again. You were wearing leggings and a large jumper with the sleeves pushed up. Your hair was yet again in a messy bun with strands of hair sticking out around your face.

The real reason Harry was awake so early wasn’t purely from jet lag, but from having a dream about you. The last few weeks, you had been on his mind more than usual, but ever since seeing you again you were all he thought about. More specifically, he thought about the time he walked in on you in the bathtub the other night. He thought what it would have been like to join you to feel your skin against him.

And there he was again, thinking about you. He really needed to stop or else he was going to have another problem.

“Harry!” You snapped your fingers in front of his face.

“Oh, yeah, what? Sorry,” he said, shaking the thoughts from his head.

“You okay over there?” You asked. “You kinda spaced out for a bit.”

“Oh, yeah, great,” he said as his face blushed a shade of pink.

“Can you heat up the veggie sausage?” You asked.

“Sure, sure,” he said.

You looked over at him as he fumbled around. You held back a giggle as you watched him. While you were finishing up the pancakes, your mind started to wander into the thoughts of if mornings would always be like this if you and Harry had ever given a relationship a try. You may never know in real life, but this was your little glimpse into what could have been and you weren’t sure if it was a good thought or a bad one.

Later that afternoon, you finally managed to write and finish an entire chapter. You still weren’t where you wanted to be, but progress was progress at this point. It was around lunch time, so you were just finishing up getting ready to go out with Harry. You weren’t sure what was on the agenda, but you were looking forward to it. You also made a mental note that tomorrow you needed to visit your mum for a bit because it was kinda rude that you were spending time with Harry and Anne when you told your mother you were going to be working the whole time.

Which you were, most of the time, but you still needed to go see her. Anyway, while you were getting ready you received a text from your editor asking about how things were going with the book.

Hey, Y/N! Just checking in to see how things are coming along.

Hey! Things are… going. I am writing and I’ve gotten quite a bit done in the last few days. Once I’m finished with the first fifteen, I’ll send them your way, sound good?

Perfect. I can’t wait to see what you came up with!

Let’s hope you still feel that way once you’ve read them. Ha!

After a few more texts back and forth, you double checked yourself in the mirror before grabbing your coat and heading out to meet Harry. You didn’t have to walk very far because he was already out the door of the main house, carrying a few bags with him.

“Um, are we taking a road trip for lunch?” You laughed.

“Nope,” he said. “But we do need some essentials.”

“Food better be included in that because I’m starving,” you said.

“It wouldn’t be lunch without food,” he said in a duhh tone.

You rolled your eyes, “Anyway, where are we going that we need all of these essentials, whatever that means.”

“You’ll see,” he smirked. “Now, let’s get going.”

The two of you walked out of the backyard and walked towards the walking trail that connected to the end of the street. The walk was filled with silence from the two of you, but it was refreshing. Any awkwardness that started out between you was now creeping away and everything felt like no time had passed.

It was strange really, but then again it was you and Harry. About twenty minutes later, you and Harry arrived at the nearby park, where he placed the bags on a picnic table. He took out a blanket that he used to cover the table in two shorter ones to place on the benches connected to it. Next, he took out containers of food filled with fruit, sandwiches, and crisp spreading them over the table. Finally, he took out some drinks before looking over at you.

“Lunch is served,” he smirked holding his hand out.

“Wow, you really went all out, didn’t you?” You laughed sitting down on one side while he took a seat across from you.

“Eh, I figured this was better than going into town,” he said.

“Do people still come up to you here?” You asked, popping a strawberry in your mouth.

“Sometimes,” he said. “Most of the time things are pretty chill and people just want to chat me up, see how I’m doing. And then others, usually the younger generation are the ones who are a bit more… uh… “

“Annoying? Bothering you?” You added.

“Basically, yeah,” he nodded with a laugh.

“One… hearing you say the younger generation really makes me feel old,” you laughed. “And two, how do you get used to random people just coming up to you like that. Occasionally, I’ll have someone say hi to me… but that’s very rare.”

He shrugged, “I don’t know. It comes with the territory I guess.”

“I guess you have been dealing with it for over a decade,” you said. “Which is still hard to believe.”

“Tell me about it,” he said. “I still can’t believe it and I’ve lived it. There’s so much I’ve already done that sometimes it’s hard to remember that I’m only twenty six and still have a lot of life left to live.”

“You’ve definitely done and seen more than most people our age,” you nodded. “Is that why… you tend to spend more time with other uh… celebrities because they understand that part of your life?”

Harry sighed, putting his sandwich down as he thought over his words, “In the beginning yes. I had all these thoughts of who I was supposed to be, or where I was supposed to be or who I was supposed to be seen with. I kinda lost myself and what I wanted to do in it. Like I used to think I had to live in LA because that’s what everyone did when they made it, but now I can’t stay there more than a few weeks at the most.”

You nodded, taking a bite of your own sandwich in response.

“I don’t want to say that’s what happened with us,” he started. “But I can’t lie either. The truth is, I don’t know what happened, really. Things got overwhelming and I just... “

“Stopped calling?” You finished for him.

“Yeah,” he sighed.

“I’ll admit, when our friendship kinda just ended… I was pissed. I was hurt. I hated you for a good little bit. I was jealous whenever I saw you out with other friends or at all these exclusive parties. I thought I wasn’t good enough to be in your life anymore. Like I was the past and that’s where I was supposed to stay,” you whispered. “But then I realized, I was also to blame. The phone works both ways and I never tried to call or text you again. I could have tried one more time and maybe that would have been the time and we wouldn’t have lost years out on our friendship.”

“Maybe,” he shrugged. “Or maybe I would have still been an ass and everything would have stayed the same.”

“Guess we’ll never know, huh?” You asked.

“Good thing that’s in the past, right?” He asked, hopefully.

“Yeah, it is,” you smiled.

You and Harry spent the rest of the afternoon at the park talking about everything. It was like you two were trying to make up for all the years you hadn’t talked and in a way you two were. When you were done talking, you walked along the park, which quickly turned into a little game of running around and jumping on his back, just like old times.

By the time you both headed back home, it was getting dark. Houses covered in Christmas lights lit up the night sky and the two took a bit of a detour looking at all of the decorations. There were times you caught yourself looking at Harry more than looking at the different lights and decorations set ups. Your head and your heart were having a severe disconnect at the moment.

Your head was trying to be all logical and warning you about letting your guard down. Old feelings you had previously suppressed were slowly coming up, but your head kept trying to push them down. Your heart, however, kept fluttering whenever he would laugh or your hands would slightly brush up against one another. After a bit, you found yourself clenching your fist because the want to grab his hand and lace his fingers with yours was becoming unbearable.

If only you knew, Harry was feeling the same way. He glanced at you, smiling to himself as he watched the lights glowing over your skin. Being with you today further proved that he was in love with you. He realized then, he couldn’t hold back his feelings from you much longer and he didn’t want to, he had to get them out.

Harry stopped all of a sudden looking over at you, “Y/N…”

“Yeah, H?” You asked, turning around to look at him.

“I-” he started.

“Everything okay?” You asked.

“I-I,” he stuttered out. “I’m really glad we’re doing this…. Reconnecting… and shit.”

“I am, too,” you smiled.

Harry forced a smile, mentally kicking himself in the ass for chickening out as the two of you finished the rest of the walk back to the house.

Uh oh! Who do you think will be the first one to finally admit their feelings?

Find out in PART 4, posted tomorrow at Midnight CST. :)

#Harry Styles Imagines #Harry Styles Fanfiction #Harry Styles Fics #Harry Styles Christmas Series

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mxvladdy · 3 years

Text

Little Stardew somethin’ somethin’

*Barges into your house with fluff nobody asked for* In this house we LOVE and RESPECT our sad boi and wish him well.

Hopeful Fluff of Shane getting better. Idk what to call it but I wrote it soooo-

TW: Mentions of alcoholism and withdrawals symptoms

Mornings were your favorite. The crisp mountain air coming in from your open windows. Helping erase the slight bitter tinge of mead and wine fermenting in your basement before the next festival. Pouring another cup of coffee you watch the sunrise from your kitchen window. It’s golden rays bounce off the river water flowing lazily outside your garden wall. A few fat salmon jumped out teasingly, scales shining in the cool fall air.

“Whatca think Salem?” You pat your shepherd's head. “Fishing after herding the sheep? Or a horse ride into town? I think Gus has got some new treats for ya.” Salem woofs, wagging his tail once before trotting to his dog bowl. He eats quickly then eyes the back door expectantly. “All right, herding it is.” Checking the breakfast casserole in the oven and peeking in on your boyfriend’s sleeping form you tiptoe out the house to get your morning started before breakfast.

Watering and harvesting took longer than usual. The fruit trees hung low and groaned under the weight of their labor. The peaches looked exceptional this harvest too. You pick them, making a mental note to preserve some for Evelyn and Abigail then sell the rest to Pierre. After the harvesting and several trips to the storage shed you go to check on all your babies.

Several new chickens had hatched overnight too. Three brown, a white, and another void. You tuck the little black chick into your hoodie and give it a smooch. As useless as their eggs were for eating you always had a soft spot for these tiny goth chickens. Taking it to the coop you had specially built for your void-born feathered friends you deposit the little one amongst its brethren. It peeps in thanks before waddling off to peck at the fresh feed.

Morning chores done, you jog back to your house hoping your casserole hasn't burned. The house smelled of spiced ham and fresh garlic when you reentered. The rest of the windows open to let in the river breeze and faint scent of your flower patches. The fireplace roared in its corner, chasing away the frosty nip that clung to your cheeks. “Shane?” You follow the noise from the mudroom to the kitchen entrance.

“Ye?” He poked his head around the corner. Warm brown eyes blink at you blearily. The corners of which were still crusted over with sleep. He must have just rolled out of bed. “Morin’.” He yawns widely scratching at his rumpled old gridball hoodie. Exchanging a brief morning breath laden kiss you smooth down a few of his more wild strands of bed head.

“Thought you were taking the day off?” Your lips touch again, pulling a happy little hum from him.

“I am. Just thought I would finish making breakfast so you could put your feet up faster. Plus, I think I finally figured out your ham recipes.” He drags you to your favorite spot at the breakfast nook before going back to the oven. “It’s the clove to cinnamon ratio ain’t it? Too much of either distract from the flavor of the fat.”

You nod in approval at his deduction. He pours you another cup of coffee, his hand shakes on the carafe handle. He was jittery today. Whether it was his anxiety spiking or just the jitter after a decent night of sleep you don’t know. But he’ll tell you when ready. He catches you staring when he turns back with two steaming plates of your eggs and veggie casserole and a thick slice of ham. “Tell me what you think.”

“I’m sure it's fabulous. Gus better watch out or there will be a new chef in town.” Shane practically glows at your praise watching you like a hawk as you eat. You inhale it, the morning exercises catching up with you. He lets you eat in silence, his previous twitchiness evaporating into a nervous silence. “Everything good?” You ask in between bites. You hated to pry or push but sometimes he needed a little nudge to get talking.

Shane stares into empty space above your head worrying his low lip. His fluffy brows dipping low. “Shit-ye- I got something to talk to you about.” He rose then, shuffling off to your shared bedroom. You exchange a worried look with Salem. He whined low in his throat then followed Shane. Since Shane had moved in Salem had stuck to him like glue. It tickled you, as he was not the friendliest dog to people that took your attention away from him. But, with Shane, he found a couch companion and a late-night walking pal. It worked out great for Shane’s mood and recovery.

Your boyfriend reappeared with a black binder and several stacks of paper. He places them in front of you. “I’ve been thinking over what you’ve said.” He stuffs his hands in his hoodie pockets burrowing himself deeper into the thinning fabric. “Between you and Harvey I-I want to have a go at it.” His eyes are downcast in shame. You riffle through the brochures.

Brentforest Care Facilities

“It’s a three-month inpatient care program. Harvey helped me set up the initial psych evaluation and has vetted for it. He’s got some friends that work there too. He-we think it would be good to work on a few hold-ups I’m having.” His stomach turns sour at the downward tug of your lips when you see the zero’s on the page. “Marnie is helping me cover the cost, an’ after the first few weeks I’m even allowed guests.” He pitters out, the overwhelming need to fill the dead air as you read disappeared as quickly as it had come.

“You got it all sorted out huh?” You look up from the documents. Shane nods. You look back at the books, then him. He forces himself to breathe through his nose. This is it. This was the last straw, it had to be. He couldn’t blame you though- he wasn’t worth the effort.

No-nope. Not starting this again. He fought with himself shaking the thoughts right out of his head. He trusted you. Dr. Martina trusted you. You were there during the worst of his withdrawal symptoms. The fevers, and shakes; you never flinched from his unwarranted shouting and irritability either. How many sleepless nights had you spent comforting him as he wept over things he wasn’t ready to talk about. You had gone through a lot with him and still was. You wanted to see him healthy. This was just another step.

“Dr. Martina- my therapist- and I have been working on this for a bit. I just need a few more signatures and to make the initial payment. Then- then I’m good.” He raises his eyes to meet yours, pushing the fear he felt further down in his chest.

His arms were suddenly filled with you. Your warm body flush with his. Soft skin and fresh windswept hair flooding his senses with your hug. “I’m so proud of you.” You mutter into his jacket. Farm callus fingers grip him close inviting him to hug you back. Shane let out a shaky breath he hadn’t even known he was hiding and reciprocated. He held you close and rocked you both side to side. “What do you need me to do?”

“Mmm?” He pulled you away from his neck. You loved burrowing your face there for some reason. Months ago he had hated when you did that. He always thought he smelt of stale sweat and the recycled air of the JoJo Mart. It had clung to every part of him for years. Hardly attractive by anyone's standards. But now, working out in the coops and fields alongside volunteering at the Community Center, it had all but disappeared. Now you swore he smelled like earth and like the pine trees that grew around your house. You had even admitted his sweat smells better too. Perhaps his alcohol sweats were finally lifting. Or maybe it was the better diet you made him eat.

“What do you need of me?” You kiss his scruffy cheek. Eyes alight with determination and affection.

He returns your kiss with a light peck of his own. “A few signatures- to show you can visit. An’ if there was an emergency you would be a contact. If-if that’s ok with you?” He asks.

“As if you had to ask.” You beam putting your forehead to his. “I’ll miss you.” You whisper between feather light kisses.

Shane sighs in utter relief around your coffee scented lips. “Promise to write?” He asks cupping your cheeks to rub his thumbs over the sun kissed skin. “And feed Charlie too?” You laugh, nose scrunching up in delight at his joke.

You seal the deal with a kiss.

#stardew valley #fan fic writing #stardew shane #It's fluff #i wanted it so I made it #tw: alcohol #just in case #shane x farmer #gn!farmer

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thessalian · 3 years

Note

Top five snacks?

Please keep in mind that this list is brought to you by someone who can tolerate neither gluten nor lactose (though milk products I can risk with sufficient prep time, and in small doses) and whose migraine triggers include chocolate. That said:

Rice cakes - I know, I know, but some of them are pretty good if you top them with the right things. Currently my favourite is these things M&S do that are coated with yoghurt and freeze-dried strawberries. I take a Lactaid before I eat those and I’m good

Dried fruit - mango for preference, but also apple, apricots and raisins. Not much on dates or prunes, mind.

Potato chips / crisps (depending on regional dialect) - I have to be kind of careful about these - like, I can’t eat Pringles anymore because apparently they have wheat flour in them - but I do enjoy a good crisp. Plain sometimes, but smoky bacon’s a favourite. Besides, I can’t help but love a snack food that was invented out of pure spite. (Story is that some dude complained to a cook at a diner that his fries were too thick and so this guy just went, “He wants ‘em thin? They’ll be thin” and cut paper-thin slices of potato and dumped ‘em in the deep fryer. Thus, the humble potato chip was born. Also note: the guy who first made them was Black.)

Raw veggies - mostly tomato and cucumber, I admit. I am a very big fan of tomatoes and used to eat them like one would an apple when I was a kid - tomato in one hand, salt shaker in the other. But carrots and celery too sometimes.

Gummy sweets - I don’t know what it is about gummy sweets - texture, flavour, whatever, I dunno - but I love me some gummy sweets. Absolute favourite are Sour Patch Kids - the American versions, thank you very much (the ones they do here are okay but the texture’s wrong for both the gummy itself and the sour sugar) - Randoms (those are just fun), Swedish Fish (sometimes I will go to the speciality stores that stock American sweets and pay well above the odds for those little red buggers, and miss me with the “multicoloured Swedish Fish” bullshit) and the sour cherry ones in the Haribo Tangfastics bag (which they now do separately because apparently they’re everybody’s favourite).

#Thess vs Memes #This makes me sound way healthier than I thought I was #brisaveloz #Note this is coming from a coeliac sufferer and lactose intolerant

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simonxriley · 3 years

Text

Fall Family Fun

Pairing: Alexsandr “Tachanka” Senaviev x Skylar “Phoenix” Jackson

Summary: Tachanka, Skylar, the kids and some of the family go out to an orchard for some much needed fall family bonding time.

Words: 4,501

Russian: Kotyonok = kitten. Moya sladost’ = My sweetness. Da = yes. Printessa = Princess

Ao3

The air was crisp, the weather was perfect and Skylar was looking forward to this much needed family trip to Treworgy Family Orchards. It was only an eighteen minute drive from Bangor and she was looking forward to seeing the twins explore the orchard and pick out pumpkins since they were now almost two and much more alert and less scared than they were last year. Last year's pumpkin picking was a mix of fun and a disaster.

“Did you really go here every year?”

Skylar looked into the rearview mirror seeing Grace sitting in the middle between her younger siblings. “I did, it was a family tradition even before I was born.”

“Cool. Are there any animals?”

“Yes there is.” She laughed. “There’s also a corn maze, and you can pick your own fruits and veggies along with cutting your own flowers.”

“Can we do that? Are we going to do that?”

“Absolutely, I’ll see if anyone can take the twins for a bit so we can pick the flowers in peace.”

“Yay!”

Skylar chuckled and glanced over at Alex who was driving, giving him a small smile. This was their first Halloween back in Maine since the twins were born, last year work was too hectic to find time to fly out so this year they decided to take a few weeks off and spend some time with her family and for her parents to spend more time with their grandkids. And she knows her sisters’ would love to spend time with their nieces and nephews.

Both of them were actually happy with how well the twins were doing in the car, surprisingly not getting restless and instead looking out the window at the colorful trees passing by. Maybe it was a good idea to have Grace sit in the middle, so the twins couldn’t try to fight one another sitting side by side. They never really fought until you placed them next to each other in their carseats. Neither Skylar nor Alex understood why.

It also just felt nice to be back in Maine for a little bit, seeing her family again and catching up, as much as she loved living in England and making a home with Alex she still missed Bangor from time to time.

Another ten minutes passed by and they finally made it to the orchard. Skylar got out of the car and stretched, hearing her shoulders crack in the process then went to go get Konstantin out of his carseat while Alex got Marianna out of hers.

“There’s my handsome lil man.” Konstantin smiled and leaned forward so she could pick him up. “Are you ready to pick a pumpkin?”

He nodded his head and she placed him on her hip as she shut the door, walking over to the other side of the car where Alex and the other two kids were. Just in time to see her parents pull into the parking lot, followed by her sisters Chloe and her husband Jack, unfortunately her other sister Valary and her husband Evan couldn’t make it due to work, but she’ll see them tomorrow. They all waved over at them, minus the twins who were too busy giving each other funny faces and laughing.

“Hi mom and dad!” She walked over to their car, followed by Grace, Alex and Marianna. “It’s nice to be doing this again. It seems like forever ago.”

“It has, the last time you were here you were sixteen and now look at you, married and have a family of your own.” said her dad “And oh Grace I have a present for you!”

“Really?”

Grace walked over to where Carl was on the other side of the car so Skylar nor Alex could see what he was giving her.

“Hi Sarah, it’s nice to see you again!”

“It’s nice to see you again too Alex.” She went in for a hug and couldn’t help but smile. “My how the kids have grown.”

“I know, the last few years have flown by.”

Alex handed Marianna over to Sarah with a smile. Skylar loved watching her parents be grandparents and how much love they gave the kids. She never thought she would have children first, expecting at least Chloe to have one before she did, but the universe had other plans for her and she’s grateful for that.

“Oh my God, look how big they’ve gotten.” said Chloe as she walked over to them, her husband Jack trailing close behind. “Okay you were right, Marianna is a spitting image of her dad.”

“Da, she is!”

Chloe scoffed and went to hug Skylar. “I missed you, I’m glad you could get some time off.”

“I am too, it was much needed anyways.”

Konstantin was looking up at his aunt with his stuffed bunny in his hands, not being too sure of who she was. Skylar looked down to see him in a daze and laughed. “That’s your aunt Konstantin. I know, it’s been a while since you’ve seen her.”

Chloe held out her hands to see if he wanted her to hold him, when he turned away from her, clinging more to his mom she let her hands drop to the side. “It’s okay, I’ll let him warm up to me first.”

“It shouldn’t take long, he is the more shy of the two but he does warm up to people quite quickly.”

“Mom, look what grandpa got me.” Grace jogged over to the other side of the car showing her the brand new skateboard she has. It was the ATM Galaxy Wing one that she’s been dying for since she broke her other one a few months ago. “I love it!”

Skylar and Alex were planning on taking Grace to the nearby sporting goods store for her to buy it but work always got in the way. That she hated, she knew work could potentially get in the way, that was something she was expecting. She wasn’t expecting to be called or for Alex to be called for work almost every time there was a mission. Rainbow is filled with plenty of other operators, why couldn’t Six call them? She was just happy that her dad bought the skateboard for her.

“I knew you would love it! Since Alex and I couldn’t take you ourselves to buy it due to work, we thought we’d surprise you here.” She gave Grace a smile, glancing down at the skateboarding deck that fit her personality well. “At least you’ll have some time to use it before winter gets here.”

“Seriously? Thank you!” She went to hug Skylar, a smile spreading across her face, then she went to go hug Alex and thanked him as well. “Can we put the wheels on when we get home?”

“Of course! Now why don’t you put it in the car and we go pick some pumpkins?”

xXx

All nine of them were walking through the pumpkin patch looking for the perfect pumpkin. Grace was with her aunt and uncle talking about her skateboarding mishaps that happened over the summer and the twins were with their grandparents not too far up ahead. Skylar and Alex were slowly strolling behind everyone hand-in-hand, taking in the view of the family being together.

“I’m glad we took the time to come out here, the kids seem happy.”

“I am too, and your parents deserve to see them anyways.”

She looked up at him with a small smile, the sun shining perfectly behind him in the pumpkin patch. “Yes they do.” she chuckled. “It’s nice to come back here anyways, brings back a lot of memories.”

“What kind of memories, kotyonok?”

Skylar let go of his hand to link their arms together, pulling herself a tad closer to him. In the distance she could see Grace and Chloe laughing and the twins climbing on a big pumpkin, it made her smile.

“Running down this same pumpkin patch, climbing on the biggest one I could find, like what our children are doing right now. Picking flowers with my mom, apples with my dad. This place holds a lot of good memories.”

Alex chuckled, a smile spreading across his face. “It’s cute picturing a little kotyonok running down these pumpkin patches.”

“I’m sure there’s pictures.” she laughs. “As much as I love the old memories, I’m more excited for the new ones moya sladost’!”

“As am I, kotyonok!”

They walked over to where her parents and the twins were, just watching them in silence as they climbed on a pretty massive pumpkin. Skylar was only waiting for them to ask to bring it home with them, in their limited speaking voices. For nearing two years old they could talk in short sentences, but they did always find a way to make what they wanted understandable. Even if it was by pointing.

“Mama, cunkin!”

“Yeah it is a pumpkin. A big one.”

“Like me.” Marianna gave a big smile and began climbing on it again, making everyone laugh.

“No printsessa, I think the pumpkin is a bit bigger than you.”

“No papa, I bigger.”

Alex laughed at the mad look on Marianna’s face and her arms crossed against her chest. “Okay, da printessa you are bigger than the pumpkin.”

Her demeanor changed and she let her arms fall to her side. “Da, I am.”

Skylar chuckled, turning to him. “Please don’t make her upset, I don’t need her throwing a tantrum.”

“Sorry kotyonok, she’s just so cute when she’s mad.”

“No argument there. It’s a good thing she can’t stay mad long.”

Alex wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her closer to him, a small chuckle coming from his lips. “That’s true. I’m positive she forgets a few moments later, such an easy life being a toddler.”

“Oh yeah, they get to be carried, they have nap time. No responsibilities, just fun.”

Skylar watched the twins in silence, they were both joined at the hip and never left each other’s side. It’s been that way since the day they were born, they couldn’t even keep them in different cribs because one or both would cry if they were separated. Now their cribs are side by side in their shared room, and when either her or Alex goes to get them in the morning they are always in the same crib together. She would be lying if she didn’t say she loved it.

This was one of the things she was looking forward to once she had kids, doing all the family traditions she did as a kid with hers. And knowing the more the kids grow the more stuff they’ll be able to do in the future.

“I found a pumpkin.”

Skylar and Alex turned towards Grace who was holding a medium sized pumpkin that looked quite perfect. No bumps or bruises, she has a keen eye for things like that.

“That’s a nice looking one.”

“I think so too Alex, I’m going to carve a scary face into it or maybe a cat. I don’t know yet.” She placed the pumpkin into the wheelbarrow nearby and sighed. “Chloe and Jack wanted to know if they could take the twins for ice cream?”

“Yeah I’m fine with that.” She looked up at Alex to see what he thought, and all he did was nod in agreement. “I think it’ll be good for them to spend some time with their aunt and uncle.”

Not a moment later Chloe and Jack came over to them with their pumpkins, placing them into the wheelbarrow. Chloe walked over to Skylar’s side, linking their arms together.

“Grace said you wanted to take the twins for ice cream?”

“If that’s alright with you guys? We could take them for some ice cream while you, Alex and Grace go pick out some flowers.”

“I’m fine with it. Alex?”

“Same. I’m sure they’ll enjoy it.”

“Oh yeah, they do love ice cream. Chocolate is their favorite.”

Chloe let go of Skylar’s arm, watching the twins play around the pumpkins. After all that her little sister has gone through she was abundantly happy that she found happiness and a man that truly loves her. Skylar deserved every single ounce of happiness she could get, and she has a beautiful family to show for it.

“I’m proud of you!”

“Huh?” She looked up at her sister, slightly confused. “Why are you proud of me?”

“That you’re a good mother and a good person! Grace wouldn’t have this life right now if you didn’t adopt her. You took her in because you didn’t want to see her go into the foster care system, knowing you and Alex could give her a good and loving home. The twins are sweet and caring, well behaved most of the time. That tells a lot Skylar. After everything you’ve been through, I’m happy about the woman you’ve become!”

Skylar wiped a few tears from her eyes and laughed. “Thanks Chloe, but don’t make me cry.”

“Da, please don’t make my kotyonok cry. I do agree with your sister, I’m proud of the woman you’ve become after the horrors we dealt with. Not that I wasn’t proud of you beforehand, it just shows how strong you are.”

“Okay both of you, I don’t want to cry.” She chuckled as she wiped more tears from her eyes. “Thank you though, both of you!”

They both chuckled and squashed Skylar in a hug, making her laugh. “I love you guys!”

“We love you too!” said Chloe.

They both let her go and she felt quite happy and content, more so than she was when she got there. She just felt happy.

“Hey Grace, do you want to go pick some flowers?”

“Yes please.”

Skylar nodded and turned her head back to Chloe. “The twins are all yours.”

xXx

After they got their vases and clippers they went out into the field of flowers. There were sunflowers, amaranthus, cosmos, bachelor buttons, snapdragons, zinnias, and even eucalyptus and wheat. Skylar already knew what she was going to make. A few sunflowers in the middle with a bunch of cosmos and bachelor buttons surrounding them.

“Are you sure you want to get some flowers, kotyonok? You’re not that good at taking care of plants.”

She gasped. “I may not be good at taking care of plants, but they’re pretty. What do you have against flowers Alexsandr?”

“Nothing.” he laughed. “You’re the one that gets sad when they die.”

“God you’re such a married couple.” said Grace from nearby.

Skylar and Alex looked at each other, both of their mouths going into a thin line. She chuckled and walked over to where Grace was. “That’s because we are a married couple, Grace. You know that.”

“Really? I never knew.” she laughed. “It never crossed my mind that the ring on your left hand was a wedding ring.”

Skylar laughed and shook her head. “Sometimes I think you’re too sarcastic for your own good.”

“I know!”

She chuckled, a smile spreading across her face. “I’ll be in the sunflowers.”

“Okay.”

Skylar walked over to the sunflowers with Alex trailing behind her. He wasn’t much for flower picking but he’ll take anything to spend time with her.

She looked through the sunflowers, trying to spot the perfect one. “When do you want to carve the pumpkins?”

“Whenever you want.”

“I was thinking about tomorrow.” She clipped one of the sunflowers and placed it in the vase. “Grace will want to play around with her skateboard and the pumpkins will last a bit longer.”

“That seems good. The twins will forget about their pumpkins once they’re out of sight anyways.”

“Oh yeah.” She chuckled, clipping another flower. “They’ll forget about the pumpkins but they won’t forget about the chocolate we keep hidden on top of the cupboards after they’ve had enough.”

“That’s because it’s chocolate, kotyonok. Every kid loves chocolate.”

“That’s very true.”

She went back to picking her flowers, moving from the sunflowers over to the bachelor buttons. She loved how pretty they looked, the lighter purple mixed with the darker purple, wishing she could plant some back home. The next were the cosmos. They were a light pink flower with a yellow middle, she used to find them when riding her horse Midnight through her aunt's farm. She always thought they were pretty and would pick some on the way back.

“Oooh those are pretty. I’m done.” said Grace

Skylar glanced over at her as she placed the last two cosmos into the vase, finishing her bouquet. “Thank you! And so are yours, I see you even added a bit of greenery.”

Grace made a beautiful bouquet of most of the flowers, on the rim were a bunch of equalyptus, and filled in the middle was a bunch of snapdragon’s, amaranthus and zinnias. With a touch of bachelor buttons and cosmos for more color.

“Thanks! Yeah I thought the greenery would look nice with it.”

“It does!”

“Kotyonok, can I use those clippers for a second?”

“Yeah.”

She handed him the clippers and they both watched him walk away for a moment, back towards where the bachelor buttons were. He looked over them for a moment until he clipped one, jogging back to them and placed the flower in Skylar’s top knot she was wearing.

She chuckled and smiled up at him, even though she knows it won’t stay in her hair much longer once Marianna sees it. “Thank you, moya sladost’!”

“You’re welcome, kotyonok!”

They began to make their way back to the café where the rest of the family was, Grace occasionally sniffing her flowers with a proud smile on her face. For Skylar she was just happy to have the family together and make memories.

As they walked to the café they could see the twins by the window, eating their ice cream. They walked up, placing the flowers on the table and sat down with a sigh.

Marianna pointed at her mama, ice cream covering her face. “Flower.”

“It is a flower, your papa put it there.”

“Why?”

Skylar shrugged her shoulders and looked over at Alex. “That’s a good question, why did you put a flower in my hair?”

“I just wanted to!”

“Fair point.” she laughs. “Are you guys hungry?”

“I’m starving.” said Grace

“Me too.” She glanced over to her family, seeing that they’ve already eaten. “We’ll be back.”

All three of them got up and headed towards the line of other people trying to get their food. As they stood in line, reading the menu up on the board Skylar glanced over at the pizza’s hoping they had what she wanted on display since she didn’t want to buy a whole pizza just yet.

“Apple bacon barbeque, have you had that? It sounds interesting.” asked Grace

“That’s what I’m getting, it sounds odd but it’s good.” She looked up at Alex who was still looking at the menu. “What are you getting moya sladost’?”

“Probably pepperoni, unless there’s a meat one available?” He glanced over to where the pizza display was. “Okay there is one, I’m getting that.”

The line was pretty long and moving at a snail's pace, that didn’t bother them. It was lunch time after all and walking around a big orchard can make anyone hungry.

After looking at the menu some more Grace turned around to face them. “I know what I’m getting, plain cheese. I can’t wait until I can break in that new skateboard.”

Alex chuckled, a small smile spreading across his face. “I’m sure you are milaya, now try not to break this one.”

“I will. And hey it wasn’t my fault I broke the first one, I wasn’t the one to run over my own skateboard.”

He went quiet for a moment, looking down at the floor, it made both of them laugh. The whole incident was an accident, Konstantin was playing with it in the front yard and decided to push it right at the moment Alex drove into the driveway, running right over it. It did freak him out for a moment until he realized what he ran over.

“Technically it was Konstantin, but he’s a baby and didn’t know better.” said Skylar “To him he was just playing. However, someone should have been watching the road a bit better.”

“Da, kotyonok. To be fair I didn’t see it go in front of the car.”

“I’m aware, you were busy waving at Marianna.”

They finally got to the front and ordered their food, returning to the table with the rest of the family. The twins were still eating away at their ice cream, with some of their own pieces of pizza nearby.

Skylar took a bite of hers, satisfying her growling stomach. “I’m surprised you got them to eat before giving them the ice cream. What’d you bribe them with?”

She chuckled when she saw the blank stairs looking back at her. She knows her children and knows that if there’s ice cream in play they’ll need a lot of bribing to make them eat their normal food beforehand.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about Sky, we would never do such a thing.”

“Sure Chloe.” She chuckled. “I know my kids, it takes us a few bribes just for them to eat before dessert is served.”

“She bribed them with buying them a new toy.” said Evan

“Ah.”

Chloe gave Evan a glaring stair, making everyone chuckle. It wouldn’t be the first time Alex had to bribe them with a new toy to make them do something or eat something. For the most part all they have to do is tell them they have to eat their food before they can have dessert, sometimes it might be a toy if it’s important.

“Thanks Evan.”

“Hey it’s alright, wouldn’t be the first time we had to bribe them with a toy. However it was for that one appointment to make sure Konstantin wasn’t deaf and he wasn’t having it. Mostly we just tell them they have to eat their food or they don’t get dessert.”

“You never mentioned that, Sky.” said Sarah.

“There wasn’t much to mention.” She took a bit of her pizza, speaking a moment later. “We all know he’s a bit shyer than his sister and doesn’t talk that much. His doctor thought he might be deaf and wanted to run a few tests.”

Skylar glanced over at Konstantin eating a piece of his pizza, ignoring everything around him at the table. They all knew he could hear because he would look over if someone dropped something or if his name was mentioned. All because he was a little bit underdeveloped than his sister.

“All of that was a load of crap, he could hear us whenever we said his name or he looked over when something was dropped. No matter how much we told them they still wanted to do the tests.” said Alex

She reached over to grab his hand, giving it a small squeeze. “At least the tests weren’t bad, he just needed to sit in a room and look over at the speaker that made a sound. Being alone was the thing that made him cry and freak out. After talking with the doctor I could go in there with him.”

“What did you get him?”

“A horse he could ride in the house.”

She grabbed her phone from the table, searching through her videos until she found what she was looking for, then handed it to her mom. The video shows Konstantin on his horse, powered by him to make it move. The feet of the horse instead of hooves were wheels, making for a fun activity. It was also easy for him to navigate and use even for his young age.

“Awe that’s so cute!” said Chloe

“If only they had them when you were a child.” said her mom as she handed back the phone. “You would’ve loved that.”

“I’m sure I would have!”

xXx

A few hours passed and they were now home, with a few hours of daylight to spare so Grace could break in her new skateboard. And while Grace placed the wheels on the new skateboarding deck in the living room, Skylar was in the kitchen putting the apples that they picked into the fruit bowl, minus a few she was going to use to make some apple pie.

She was happy the day went well, the twins never had a tantrum and they got to spend some much needed time with the family.

A tug on her pant leg forced her to look down, seeing Marianna standing beside her. “Apple?”

“You want an apple?”

Marianna nodded her head and let go of her pant leg.

“Okay, I’ll get you an apple.”

Marianna ran back into the living room while she grabbed an apple and a knife. From her peripheral she could see Alex walk into the kitchen and over to her, leaning against the counter. She looked up, giving him a soft smile that he mirrored.

“I think today went rather well.”

“I do too, kotyonok.”

She began to cut the apple, placing it on a plate. “I was thinking we should go costume shopping tomorrow for the kids, it’s already pretty close to Halloween and they need costumes.”

“Okay, what were you thinking for the twins?”

He grabbed the plate with the apples on it for Marianna, waiting for Skylar to throw away the pit and place the knife in the sink before heading back into the living room with everyone else.

“I’m not sure yet. Do you have any ideas?”

“Ideas for what?”

“What costume the twins should wear for Halloween.”

Grace placed the screwdriver on the coffee table, finally done with putting the wheels on her skateboard. “Since Konstantin has the horse he should dress up as a cowboy, maybe Woody from Toy Story?”

Skylar sat down on the couch next to her with a sigh. “That is a good idea. Konstantin do you want to be Woody for Halloween?”

He looked up from the car he was playing with and nodded his head. Toy Story was one of his favorite movies, it would only be right for him to dress up as Woody.

“Well we figured out one, what about the other?”

They all went quiet for a moment, thinking up what to dress Marianna as. She was a bit more tricky on picking out a costume for, being much more picky on what she likes. One moment she can like something, and another she hates it. But the one thing she’ll always like are butterflies.

“What about a butterfly, kotyonok?”

“Oh, good idea moya sladost’. She does love butterflies.”

The rest of the night was followed by watching Grace break in her skateboard, followed by watching a few horror movies with some popcorn after the twins went to bed. All in all it was a good day!

#otp: the tachanka and his kotyonok #oc skylar jackson #alexsandr senaviev #tachanka #rainbow six siege #r6s #y'all better reblog this asdfghjkl

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clockworkflicker · 4 years

Note

Hi! Can you do 30 for any pairing? Maybe something f/f? :)

Hi and thanks for the prompt!! Because they live in my brain rent-free, I wrote more of Hapi and Constance! As always, no background on the characters needed.

~~~

“Oh. My god.” Constance zips away from their shopping cart.

“Oh my god,” Hapi deadpans with a smirk and an exhaled laugh. Oh the joys of dating someone with the soul of a valley girl.

“It’s pumpkin spice season! Hapi! Look at this candle selection!!”

“Mmm.” She looks like a kid on Christmas morning, Hapi muses as she strolls over to join her girlfriend next to the candles. They really do smell nice though.

“We should get a few for the apartment, don’t you think? Are you more of a pumpkin or apple person?”

“Uh, pumpkin, I guess, but they’re both nice. I really like outdoorsy scents too.”

Constance rummages through the shelf of candles. “How does ‘Crisp Fall Night’ sound?” She unscrews the lid and hands the black candle to Hapi.

“I’m sorry, it’s ‘Crisp Fall Night’ scented?” Hapi chuckles, accepting the candle. “What does that even mean?” By some sorcery, however, Hapi finds that the candle smells exactly as advertised.

“What do you think?” Constance asks, still looking through the rest of the candle selection. She lingers over one labeled “Cinnamon Apple Pumpkin” - a much more straightforward name than “Crisp Fall Night.”

“It’s nice. I don’t know how they managed to get it to smell like that, but it’s nice. All earthy and woodland-y with a hint of smoke.” She leans over to get a better look at the sanguine candle her girlfriend’s holding. “You found one to satisfy your inner basic white girl?”

“Oh, hush, as if you don’t love the aroma of cinnamon yourself!”

“So that’s a yes, I see.” Hapi ambles back to their cart with a small smile on her face, and places the “Crisp Fall Night” candle beside their sweet corn.

~~~

Dawn sifts through their bedroom curtains the next morning. Hapi wakes to the sound of singing birds outside. She runs a hand through her bedhead and glances over. Constance is out like a light beside her, golden curls framing her quietly snoring figure. Adorable.

She gingerly crawls out of bed and adjusts the blankets around her girlfriend. With a yawn and a stretch, Hapi goes about her morning routine, turning on the kettle for tea and throwing a few slices of sourdough in the toaster.

Hapi’s day at work is uneventful, though she at least has the enjoyment of being tasked with providing enrichment for the raven they’ve been rehabilitating. He’s a real sweetie.

She comes home to an empty apartment that evening - looks like Constance is still at the lab. Hapi lights a candle - the cinnamon apple pumpkin one - and sets some water to a boil for pasta. Her cooking skills are pretty rudimentary, but since moving in with Constance, she’s been attempting to make more actual nice dinners, rather than just settling for sandwiches and snacking on whatever fruits and veggies are around. She’s in the middle of sautéing some mushrooms when she hears the front door click open.

“Hey, welcome home. You have a good day?”

“Mmm,” Constance quietly affirms, stepping into the kitchen. “What are you making?”

“Mushroom fettuccine.”

“Sounds lovely. Thank you for cooking.”

Hapi frowns a little, shifting the mushrooms around in her pan and using her other hand to stir the pasta a little. She turns around to see Constance poking through the fridge, eventually settling on pouring herself some orange juice. She looks tired and pale.

“Coco? You doing alright?”

Constance takes a swig of orange juice and winces a little as she swallows. “I’m okay, I think I’m just getting sick. Is it that obvious?”

“It’s obvious in the small ways,” Hapi says, pressing a gentle kiss against her girlfriend’s head. “You’re a lot quieter when you’re not feeling well. And you haven’t remarked on the Basic White Girl Candle I lit, so I can only assume that means you can’t smell it.”

“You lit that because you knew I was coming home soon? God, you’re the best girlfriend, whatever did I do to deserve you?”

“Aw cut it out. Here, I should go put it out if you can’t smell it right now. Save it for later and all that.”

“No, wait! I’ll go, uh, take a steamy shower and get cleaned up.” She follows her statement with a damp sniffle that does little to convince Hapi that she’ll have much luck regaining her sense of smell tonight.

“Mind if I join you, actually? ‘M kinda sore and a hot shower would be nice.” Hapi glances back down at the pan of mushrooms in her hand. “I can, um. Put dinner on hold for a few.”

“Sure.” Constance blushes a bit. “As long as you don’t mind me being a bit, uh.” She gestures to her face and sniffles again.

Hapi wraps an arm around her girlfriend’s waist as the two walk over to the bathroom. “You’re beautiful, Coco. Always.”

#my writing #hapi/stance #answered ask #fic #wlw #in this house we love Basic White Girl Pumpkin Spice Candles

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viranlly · 4 years

Photo

Viranlly hosts Thanksgiving Dinner.

in partnership with Wines of British Columbia.

IT’S CRUNCH TIME Y’ALL!

I don’t even where time went but here we are now, just over a week before Thanksgiving. The aroma of PSL is in the crisp fall air, the days are getting shorter, and the meals we preppin’ are getting cozier each day. The holidays are upon us and so is the (grape) harvest month.

To celebrate both festivities, I’ve teamed up with the Wines of British Columbia to come up with some fun thanksgiving recipes and of course delicious BC wine pairings to go with them. I’m skipping the turkey, because let’s be honest, I don’t trust myself with a bird that size, nor that I have the space and capacity both physically and mentally to handle a turkey. I want to make sure that this holiday cooking will be as stress-free and as boozy as possible, because we all deserve that kind of holidays.

Please note that these recipes serve 4-6 people.

First thing first, it’s not a dinner party at Viranlly’s without a damn-well-put-together CHARCUTERIE AND CHEESE BOARD. Here’s the fun part about this board: there’s no recipe. The trick is you want to make sure you have a balance in flavours, textures and colours (because ya know.. aesthetic).

THE MEAT : variety of cured meats with different flavour profiles - hot genoa salami, prosciutto, iberico ham, chorizo, and capicollo are always a great start.

THE CHEESE : make sure you have at least hard and soft cheese, everything in between never hurts either - jammy brie or camembert is a crowd pleaser, manchego is delicious, especially when you can find the truffle-y ones. Can never go wrong with parmigianio-reggiano, or a nutty pecorino. Aged cheddar and smoked gouda if you want a little funk. The possibility is honestly, endless.

THE FRUITS AND VEGGIES : grapes and olives (olives are veggies, right? I prefer unpitted Castelvetrano) are staple on my board. Seasonal fruits and veggies always add amazing flavours to the board : pears and figs in the fall, peaches and berries in the summer.

THE EVERYTHING ELSE: honey, hummus, nuts, preserves, bread, crackers, pate, and everything your heart and stomach desire.

I always love to start the night off with a bottle or two of bubbly, something really crisp, citrusy and refreshing. The Howling Bluff Faux Paw has a ton of berry notes with a just a zest of spice, perfect to be enjoyed with everything on this board. Another great bubbly is the Haywire Pink Bub, which, we consumed throughout the summer.

The next two dishes are heavily inspired by my friends’ thanksgiving last year, with a view adjustments to meet what I have readily in my, and most kitchens.

This RADICCHIO AND SQUASH SALAD is my definition of the perfect autumn salad: rich and nutty, a hint of bitterness and lots of crunch.

THE VEGGIES:

1 medium-sized delicata squash, sliced up to half-an-inch-thick half moons (wow that’s wordy). Toss them in olive oil, salt and pepper before hitting the 450F preheated oven for 25-35 mins, or until fork tender. Occasionally turn your sheet tray to make sure they’re cooked evenly, and flip the squash over halfway.

Tear up and cut one head of radicchio into quarter, soak them in ice bath for a couple minutes before assembly.

Thinly slice one medium-sized asian pear, toss in the juice of half a lemon and season with salt and pepper.

THE DRESSING:

Toss half a cup (minus a handful for later) of pecan, or walnut, or hazelnuts (really, any nuts you have around -- 2 tablespoon peanut butter work too), 1 small shallot, juice of half an orange and one lemon, 1 tablespoon dijon mustard, a splash of red wine vinegar and 2 tablespoon maple syrup (or honey) into a blender. Blend together and gradually add in a 1/4 cup of olive oil until a silky consistency is achieved. Season with salt and pepper.

THE ASSEMBLY:

Spread leftover nuts in a small sheet tray, drizzle with olive oil, salt and one tbsp maple syrup.Put them in the still-hot oven just enough to get them slightly toasty. I tend to forget about them and burn the nuts to the ground, so leave this step until the last 5-10 mins before assembly.

Combine squash, radicchio in a big bowl, coat with dressing. Transfer to serving plate.

Sprinkle the toasted nuts, and the asian pear allover squash and radicchio.

Shave some parmesan or piave.

Drizzle with some more olive oil and lemon juice, and crack some more black pepper.

I thought this salad can use the brightness and the blossoming freshness of the Orofino orange wine: stunning colour, burst of tropical fruits and elegant floral notes. My mouth is watering as typed this.

This SAUSAGE AND CORNBREAD STUFFING changed the stuffing game forever. Honestly, you’d never want to eat another crusty, white bread stuffing for any holidays ever again. It’s so very indulgent, buttery, and loaded with aromatics. Crispy up top, soft and moist -- yes, moist inside.

THE CORNBREAD:

I am obsessed with the cornbread from Boulevard Kitchen and Oyster Bar. And since this recipe relies quite heavily on the cornbread, trust me, you’d want to use the best cornbread you can find. In this case, I’ve found the winner. Cut up 1 1/2 lb cornbread to 3/4″ pieces and leave them in a 350F oven for 40 mins or so until they’re dry. Don’t worry we’ll the moisture back later. Transfer cornbread to a big mixing bowl.

THE STUFFING:

Cook and a lb or so of breakfast sausage in a skillet. Break them apart with a wooden spoon and let brown about 8 minutes. Transfer sausages to a plate.

In the same skillet, leaving the sausage brown bits, add 1/4 cup of butter and cook one diced onion and two stalks of cubed up celery until softened. Add three cloves of chopped garlic and one sliced japaleno, cook for another minute or so. Add 1/2 cup of dry white wine and another 1/4 cup of butter and let the liquid evaporate. Add thyme and chopped sage.

THE ASSEMBLY:

Combine cornbread and stuffing in the mixing bowl, add 2 eggs and 1 1/2 cups of chicken stock. Stir them occasionally until cornbread absorbs most of the liquid.

Lightly butter a cast iron pan, or baking dish and transfer mixture in.

Put the pan in the 350F oven for 40-ish minutes then turn up the heat to 425F for 15-20 mins until the outside is crisp and golden brown.

The VinAmité Chanson d’Amour is quite a delightful pairing for this dish. The chardonnay in the blend gives that soft minerality while keeping the palate fresh and peachy. Another great option is the Unsworth Pinot Noir: plum-y, dark cherry, a swift hint of earthy herbs - brings out the thyme aroma in the dish.

The last recipe is a simple, choose-your-own-adventure kind of recipe to replace the boring old sweet potato casserole. It’s a BYOB: Build Your Own Baked sweet potato bar!

THE SWEET POTATO:

Cut 4 medium-sized sweet potatoes into half and coat them in olive oil, salt and pepper. Put them cut side down on a sheet tray and into a 425F oven for 30 minutes or until they’re fork tender.

THE TOPPINGS:

The toppings, again, can honestly be anything you’re in the mood for buuut these are my three favourites:

Spicy chorizo cooked in vermouth and butter. It’s as simple as it sounds. In a skillet, heat a tablespoon or so olive oil and bloom chili flakes in it. Slice two links of spanish chorizo and toss into the chili oil. Add vermouth and butter and cook until sauce thickens.

Spicy soy garlic tempeh. Dice one slab of tempeh (I used tempea) into 1/2 cm cubes and season with salt and pepper. In a skillet, add one table spoon of oil and add 2 cloves of chopped garlic. Toss the tempe in, and add 1 tablespoon of soy sauce, and 1 tablespoon of kecap manis. If you like the heat, add 1-2 sliced up birdseye chili. Serve with cilantro and green onion.

Lobster salad. Cut 2 lobster claws into chunks, add the juice of half a lemon and season with salt and pepper. Add 2 tablespoon of kewpie mayo, one teaspoon of honey, and mix together. Add 2 stalks of thinly sliced celery and top it off with dill. Season with salt and pepper as needed.

THE SAUCE:

As simple as sour cream (or plain greek yoghurt), lemon juice, olive oil, grated garlic cloves, seasoned with salt and pepper.

The salad dressing leftover works well too!

THE ASSEMBLY:

Go wild ;)

The wines for this particular dish can be as playful as you want them to be buuuut I decided to go with something a bit more crisp, fruity and floral like the Tantalus Vineyard Riesling especially if you go on the lobster route. Another great option is the Bartier Bros Merlot, which, is a slightly nutty, savoury with a touch more of cherry and dark fruits.

Hosting a holiday dinner is a pretty big job and I admit, it can get really stressful but I hope these easy-ish recipes and the wine (I know the wines work) will help you guys through. A MASSIVE thank you to the team at Legends Haul for making my grocery shopping for this dinner SO. MUCH. EASIER.

And just another PSA that the holiday is the PERFECT time to support you local wineries and enjoy the delicious wines BC has to offer. And BC has A LOT to offer. So, explore, sip and savour your way throughout this Harvest month. Find more information about BC Harvest Month here.

#thanksgiving #cooking #homecooking #BCWine #Local wine #wineries #wine #British Columbia #BC #foodie #foodblog #bonappetitmag #radar #popular

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paullahotes · 4 years

Text

Incalescent- Chapter Two

Pairing: Paul Lahote x Fem!OC

Summary: Em just wants to be loved and have a family for once in her life. But nothing has ever gone right in her life before so why should it now?

Word Count: 7.6k

Warnings: semi-abuse from father figure, gross feelings

A/N: Listen, I don’t think I’m a good writer so this could be terrible! Let me know what you guys think of it!

Three periods had crawled by, each one continuously going slower than the last. I was now sitting in my algebra class, watching the clock tick by slowly. This school was shaping up to be different than the others I had been to, everyone wanted to know me here. A couple different boys, whose names I didn’t remember, had all introduced themselves to me. They were all eager to meet the new girl, they rarely got new people in this town and I was ‘front page baby’. Of course I was not too eager to meet any of them and vehemently denied an interview for the front page of the school newspaper.

When I had gotten home this morning before school, my dad wasn’t there but the house was a mess. Our couch was shredded, pieces of wood and clumps of foam covered the living room. The pan he was cooking dinner in was burnt to a crisp, too far gone to be saved. When I threw it out I made sure to double bag it and bring it right to the can to make sure the smell didn’t linger in the house. The only thing I could do for the rest of the smell in the house was open a few windows and leave them for the day to air everything out.

Thankfully Emily had given me a new outfit and food for school because I had no time for either when I looked around at the mess before me. Though, currently the wolves were the last things on my mind. The one thing at the forefront was that I had killed my mother and my father hated me for it. There would be no getting out of talking about this with him, maybe he would want to work things out. I knew though that that was far fetched, in his mind, I had killed the woman he loved. I had sucked the life out of her, leaving her dead and me a burden on him. My face practically mirroring hers a constant reminder of the tragic events.

“Miss Abbott?” The teacher called from the front of the class, his hoarse voice pulling me from the self hating thoughts. He was staring me down, waiting for a reply so I shrugged at him. The class was turned looking at me now, every pair of eyes trained on my face. “Miss Abbott, you’re new here, so I’ll give you some leeway this time but from now on you have better be paying attention.”

“Yes, sir,” I muttered back copying down the notes from the board that I had been neglecting. I had already taken this math class three times, I could probably teach it by now. Taking the notes however proved to be a good distraction from my thoughts and before I knew it, the bell was ringing for lunch time.

Paper bag in hand I made my way to the cafeteria and found a table in the corner that no one was sitting at. I sat in a seat so I wouldn’t be facing everyone but so I could still see if I was going to be ambushed by anyone. The few boys who introduced themselves to me this morning all stared me down as they say at a different table. I could hear them muttering about how anti social I was and how even Bella, who had ditched everyone for Edward, was still better than I was coming off.

I didn’t think much of it as I propped my right leg up on a chair, to help with the swelling from the bite from Paul and scrolled through the apps on my phone. The lunch Emily packed me was delicious, with a good mix of veggies and fruit. I usually bought school lunch and picked at it because it was gross so this was a good change. There was nothing interesting on my phone except for a few texts from my dad begging me to come home and apologizing but I wasn’t ready to open up that can of worms over text with him.

“You’re back!” someone said, sarcasm was practically dripping from their mouth. When I looked up one of the girls sitting at the tables with the boys from earlier was looking at some newcomers. If looks could kill the three new people who were standing waiting for seats would be dead.

Two of them were clearly vampires, the small girl with black spiky hair had the palest skin I had ever seen, even for a vampire. She had a sincere smile on her beautiful face, looking as upbeat as ever even with a whole table of people glaring at her The other vampire was a guy, he was standing behind the vampire girl and the other human girl. He was wearing a beige sweater and khakis, his hair disheveled but there was evidence of gel suggesting he wanted to look disheveled on purpose.

The third one of them was a human, if she didn’t have deep brown eyes instead of golden like her two companions I might mistake her for a vampire too. Her skin was so pale it was almost grey. Her long brown hair hung over her shoulders, held back by a plain brown headband. She kept looking up at the male vampire like he was a Greek god with the sun shining out of his butt. He seemed very plain to me, with his beige outfit and brooding look on his face. He looked like he was ready to cry and recite poetry about something sad.

“Our family just loves Forks so much, we couldn’t stay away!” the small girl said excitedly, taking a seat at the table. Her two friends following suit while everyone else at the table shifted uncomfortably in their seats. The rest of the group fell back into their conversations, the girl who was fake excited turned away from the newcomers to talk with everyone.

The table next to me began talking about the three people who showed up at the other table across the cafeteria. One of the people whispered something about doctor Cullen’s wife not liking the big city so they all came back here. The word ‘cult’ was thrown in as a reference to their family because none of them ate or really tried interacting with anyone at this school. I found out from eavesdropping that there were three other siblings that came here last year but graduated. I wondered to myself if Sam and Paul knew that the Cullens were back since just this morning, they told me that they had left.

I studied the two vampires as they pretended to eat their lunch. The girl picked her food apart trying to make it seem like she was taking bites but the guy was actually taking bites. I’d seen my dad eat food to pretend to be human over the years but he said it tasted like ashes. He told me that he assumed the venom in his system just burned it up so why not just take a few bites to blend in with the humans.

The human girl with them also picked at her food not eating it. Maybe she was trying to make the vampires look more normal or maybe she wanted to be one so bad she picked up their habits evan as a human. One of the boys called her ‘Bella’ as she was picking apart the bread on her tray. This was the girl they were talking about earlier, comparing me to her. Which would probably make the guy vampire Edward.

My first thought when finding out that this was the girl everyone thought was better than me was petty. She was plain and from what I could tell didn’t give a damn about anyone else besides the vampires she was with. She was listening and contributing to the conversation with everyone at the table but her eyes barely left the guy. The whole thing gave me secondhand embarrassment.

It wasn’t too long until the bell rang and I was heading to my next class. I pulled my hood over my head to keep my hair from getting wet as I crossed the courtyard to get to the little buildings scattered along a paved sidewalk. This was the first school I had been to where it wasn’t one whole building but a bunch of little ones placed around a campus. Everyone rushed alongside me, most had umbrellas and the ones that didn’t, ran full speed through the crowd to get to their class faster.

I left my jacket on the coat hook by the door when I got to class and found a seat toward the back so that I could be left alone. The assignment for the beginning of class was written on the board, the rest of the class had started writing about it in their journals so I pulled out my notebook. Writing isn't my strong suit but the prompt on the board read ‘write a narrative about something upsetting’ and I knew exactly what to write about.

While I was writing my narrative I glanced up as two people sat at the desks in front of me. Bella and Edward were sitting there, both turned facing each other with their notebooks out. She was glancing over at him every few seconds and I could hear her breathing hitch every time. I had to suppress an eye roll at the sight of it. Sure I had been lonely my whole life but I couldn’t imagine being that into someone. Though how would I even know since I’d never been in that situation.

The class got started and a couple people shared what they had written. I didn’t volunteer to read mine because of how emotional it sounded. Bella and Edward didn’t volunteer either and every once in a while I thought I could see Edward turn and glance my way. After the first couple times Bella noticed and turned back to me and gave me a questioning look. I made sure I looked like I didn’t know what was going on and just sat there doodling in my notebook.

“Are you new?” she asked me when the bell rang, signalling us to leave and head to our last class. This school and everyone in it was going wildly out of their way to talk to me and I wasn’t having it.

“Yeah,” I told her bluntly and quickly walked away. I grabbed my jacket off the hook and shrugged it on going to my last class. I got there before everyone else, having sped off as fast as I could. I could feel my calf throbbing as I sat down. The bite mark wasn’t an open wound anymore but the teeth outline was still there surrounded by bruises. If I didn’t think about it the pain would go away but since I was reminded of it I had to limp to my seat.

I found a seat in the back of this class as well, internally thanking the universe for giving me the best seats as this school. As I sat at my desk waiting for the other students to arrive I stared out the window. The rain had subsided for the time being, the sky still covered in dark clouds. The day had gone much different weather wise than what it had been this morning when Paul was walking me home.

The early morning sun was peeking through the trees as Paul and I walked side by side to my house. His hand kept bumping into my arm as we went. I had seen a couple cheesy movies where the boy and girl would be walking and the boy would bump his hand into hers on purpose because he wanted to hold it. But Paul and I had just met. He was probably so close because my leg was threatening to give out at any second. Emily had thankfully cleaned and bandaged it well so I wouldn’t have to worry about it for a couple hours.

The walk back through the forest was different than last nights run through it. It had been dark and stormy, a combo that hadn’t let me really appreciate how beautiful it was. Though my mental state probably wouldn’t have let me appreciate it either even if it hadn’t been dark and stormy.

The scenery was gorgeous. The entire forest floor was covered in old fallen tree trunks and moss. The green had overwhelmed me on the drive in but being here with the sunlight peeking through the tops of the trees was amazing. You could hear birds chirping and if you listened close enough you could hear the river rushing over rocks a little ways ahead.

Paul nudged me and smirked as we approached the river. My mouth set into a tight line as I thought of having to jump over it with how badly my leg hurt. I frowned up at him and he still had a smirk on his face.

“Do you think I’d make you jump this after trying to take a chunk out of your leg?” He asked me, his eyes twinkling with delight.

“Yeah, actually,” I mumbled back to him. His smile was so bright as he looked down at me. He shook his head and stepped back a bit before putting his thumbs in the waistband of his shorts and pulling them down. I looked away quickly as blush spread over my cheeks.

“You should watch this, I think you’ll think it’s cool,” I peeked back over at him making sure not to look down but directly at his face. His smile grew wider as he spoke again. “You’re cute when you blush.”

My face got even redder than before, I could feel the heat spreading across my face rapidly. Before I could even think of anything to say and let alone say it, Paul was visibly shaking. Then suddenly he exploded into a grey wolf five times his size. I stood there with my jaw practically on the ground. He grabbed his shorts in his teeth and walked them over to me.

“You were right, this is pretty cool,” I told him patting his head like I would a regular dog. He didn’t seem to like it so he nudged my hand out of the way and flung his shorts at my face. “Alright, alright I’ll carry these but I don’t know how you being a wolf is going to get me across the river.”

Paul laid down on the ground and gestured with his head for me to get on his back. My eyes widened and I took a step back and muttered ‘no way’ quietly. Then before I could do anything else Paul jumped up and ran at me full speed. I let out a shriek as he charged at me and jumped, my leg kept me from going to high and I was suddenly on his back. A low rumble from his chest alerted me to him laughing.

“I’ll remember this,” I growled at him, gripping onto his fur. The wind whipped passed up as he ran forward, faster than I could run even when my leg was healed. I made a mental note to work on my speed so he wouldn’t have an edge on me. We got to the edge of the river quickly and he leaped across it like it was nothing, landing gracefully on the other side.

“So how’d you like it?” Paul asked smugly a few moments later as he was pulling on his pants. It had been such a rush not being the one who was jumping. I was able to just sit back and let the wind whip through my hair and relax. Him turning into a wolf was pretty cool too, way better than being half vampire.

“It was alright, I’m glad I’m half vampire and can’t turn into some dog,” I tried ending my sentence sounding like I was teasing him. I wasn’t used to feeling anything but empty. I had never come close to even a sliver of happiness. The feelings I felt being around Paul and the feelings I felt back when we were at Sam and Emily’s house were foreign. My life had never known anything like this and as my stomach turned itself into knots I knew it couldn’t last forever.

“I know that you secretly wish you were as cool as me,” He taunted me, the bright smile back on his face. I tried not to look directly at him now that I knew I would blush at everything he did if he had that smile.

“Please, I could find someone cooler than you without even trying,” I shot back, the words tumbling out of my mouth before I could stop them. This was the longest interaction I had ever had with anyone in my whole life. Even longer than anything with my father. I didn’t even know that I knew how to interact with anyone like this.

“Hey now, you gotta be nice to me or we can’t be friends,” Paul joked back, bumping into me. I looked up at him, my mouth opening then closing because I didn’t know how to respond. The look on my face must have worried him because he grabbed my hand and said, “I was just joking, we just met but I think we’ll be the greatest friends.”

“I’ve never had one…” I mumbled looking up at him. My forehead was furrowed as I looked up at him. It was pretty pathetic that I hadn’t had a friend but it was all part of keeping the family secret.

“You’ve never had a friend?” He asked sounding like he didn’t believe me. I shrugged as we kept walking and didn’t look up at him.

“My dad never let me have one, he wanted to keep our existence a secret and thought that if I ever had any friends that they would somehow find out about us,” I explained, the more I thought about it the more dumb it sounded.

“Your father sounds like a dick,” Paul muttered. He was right, that is how my dad sounded. Why else would he keep me from having friends? Why else would he keep me from being happy? Maybe it all went back to him blaming me for my mother dying, though if I could go back in time I would change things. I would never kill anyone consciously, that wasn’t me.

“That doesn’t matter anymore, we’re your friends now!” Paul said trying to pull me out of my thoughts. We were coming to a clearing and Paul slowed down his walk. “The whole pack is like one big family, we fight like real siblings and we have bonfires together. I really think you’ll get along with everyone once they see past you being a vampire.”

“Everyone?” I asked sounding a little uneasy. “There’s more than you and Sam?”

“Yeah! There’s actually ten of us that are wolves, two more phased for the first time the other day which indicates that more vampires are in our area.” He explained to me as I wrung my hands together. There were ten wolves in the ‘pack’ he was telling me about. Less than twelve hours ago I didn’t even know wolves existed and now I knew about ten.

“There’s a lot of you…” I quietly exclaimed. “How do you know when to phase? How can you tell that vampires are near?”

“You’ll have to come out to a bonfire sometime and hear our tribes stories. They explain it all but in short and to quote the stories ‘we have always had magic in our blood’,” Paul explained to me as we walked along somehow even slower than before. Meeting him had been a good distraction from my feelings and the pain in my stomach told me that as soon as I was alone I would spiral.

“That sounds fancy, I don’t think there are stories of how vampires came to be,” I muttered to him. “Though if there were they would probably be dark and contain no magic.”

“Don’t sound so negative about vampires, you aren’t so bad,” he emphasized ‘so’ and wagged his eyebrows at me jokingly. I let out a small chuckle, rolling my eyes at him.

We made our way out of the thick trees and into my backyard greeted by the sun being out fully. There were no clouds in sight. The warmth spread over my skin and I let myself smile widely. The weather had been disastrous since our arrival yesterday and the sun was a welcome change.

“You don’t sparkle,” Paul commented from behind me. When I turned to look at him he sounded surprised, the look on his face was priceless.

“I am half human, silly,” I told him. He cocked his head to the side watching me. “Maybe that makes me deadlier than a regular vampire. I look completely innocent.”

“It sure does,” He muttered before shaking his head and giving me a small smile. “I’ll see you later right?”

“Of course, what else do I have to do? Stay home and hang out with my dick of a father?” I asked him referencing what he said earlier. He was beaming now and waved me off. As I turned to walk to my house he was pulling off his shorts again and phasing into a wolf. I heard a loud howl in the distance as I was opening my front door, bringing a smile to my face.

“Miss Abbott,” someone said pulling me out of my daydream. I snapped back into reality and saw that this teacher was catching me for not paying attention too. I stared at him until he spoke some more. “Miss Abbott, I was wondering if you would like to introduce yourself to the class but if you’re too preoccupied don’t let me bother you.”

“My name is Em and I’m new. That’s all you really need to know,” I replied, sounding sarcastic. I didn’t mean for it to come off bad but I was irritated. More so with myself than the teacher who interrupted.

“Great,” He muttered back, the edge in his voice sounding like he was ready to retire any second. None of the students were staring at me this time except for the two who were sitting directly in front of me, again. Bella and Edward stared back at me, both looking different levels of shocked. Edward looked like he was shocked and frustrated. Who knew a vampire could be so uptight about a new student with an attitude problem?

“Mr. Cullen, one student not paying attention is enough for me for one day,” our teacher called from right beside our desks. I gave the teacher a quick glance and then looked forward to the front of the room where he had our lesson up on the board. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Edward stiffen and turn around, clearly upset as he clenched his fists.

Besides a few snide whispers among the other students of ‘the new girl must already love Edward’ and ‘god she’s JUST like Bella, amazed by Edward already’, the class went by quickly and I was out the door while the bell was still ringing. The walk home was brutally cold with the wind whipping at my face, numbing it. With the way Edward already seemed interested in me I didn’t want to risk running home and being found out that I was some type of vampire.

Each step I took brought me new anxiety, that tightened my chest with every breath. There was no doubt that my dad would be home now, waiting for me. I had no idea what to expect from him since everything was on the table now. His mood had changed rapidly during our confrontation that I didn’t even know what to expect from him in that sense when I walked through the door.

When I turned down the street I lived on I could see the car out front of our house but I couldn’t remember if it had been there this morning or not. If he was home he would know that I was close by now, he could probably hear my footsteps and he could definitely hear me breathing hard. The door to the house swung open as I started up our front steps, he wasn’t there but I could hear him walking in the kitchen. My ears picked up on the soft sound of clothing moving against wood, telling me he had taken a seat at the kitchen table.

Once I was down the hallway and into the kitchen I could see him. He was sitting with his elbows on the table and his hands clasped in front of his face. He didn’t look up when I came into the kitchen or as I took my time placing my backpack on the island and taking my jacket off. I took a seat at the table across from him and sat silently, waiting for him to talk.

“I didn’t mean for you to ever find out about your mother,” he stated after a while of silence. His face was unreadable, blank. This terrified more than if he was showing any emotion at all.

“Don’t you think it’s unfair of you to have kept that a secret from me? Don’t you think it’s unfair to treat me the way you do? Don’t you think it’s unfair keeping so much from me?” I asked him those questions with a shaky voice. My body felt like it was vibrating, heat spread from my stomach throughout my whole body. I kept myself from crying but the rest of my body was reacting. A slight sweat was building up on the back of my neck and scalp.

“Everything I have ever done was to protect you,” he said a little bit of emotion breaking through. The way he said it made me want to believe him but he had kept me not only from knowing the truth about my mother but also from knowing anything outside of our little bubble. I didn’t want this to keep happening. As much as I hated myself for now knowing what I did to my mother I wasn’t ever going to die so I had an eternity to go out into the world and explore and I wanted to start doing that soon.

“I can understand that to a point but you’ve never talked about my mother, not once. I didn’t even know what a mother was until you put me in school and I saw that almost everyone else had one. I grew up thinking it was only something in movies, I thought mothers were fictional!” My voice wavered in the end, a few tears spilling out and rolling hotly down my cheek. He sat back, crossing his arms across his chest and looked like he was thinking for a minute.

“You seem to have given this a lot of thought, I guess your little run gave you a lot of time to think,” he was calm now, back to showing no emotion. Though there was a slight edge to his voice. I took in a shaky breath, an indication of how worked up I was about this.

“I’ve been thinking about having this conversation with you my whole life. Do you know how hard it is to not have friends? How hard it is to have the only real interaction you have be with your father and even those interactions are few and far between?” My voice was beginning to crack with every emotion I had felt over the last twenty-three years coming to the surface.

“Em,” he let out a long breath, his eyes almost rolling. “You know how important it is to keep our secret! If anyone found out that we were vampires there would be terrible consequences.”

“How would they find out? What harm would it be for me to have a few friends? Do you think I would go to a sleepover and just tell them I was a vampire? Do you think I introduce myself as ‘Em, the vampire’?” This was when I began to raise my voice. The tears were flowing freely down my face as my father was glaring daggers at me.

“Do you know how hard it is to have the love of your life taken away by a child that you never even wanted?” He shouted at me, standing up so quickly the table lurched forward and shoved me back. The chair tipped back from the force and I hit the floor, not bothering to use any of my enhanced abilities to stop myself. I was lying on the floor when he continued. “You have no clue what I’ve been going through every single day since you were born. I can barely look at you, your face is just like hers, you remind me of her so much. It’s unfair that you get to live when she’s dead!”

“Why didn’t you kill me then? Why did you let her have me?” I sobbed out, tears blurring my vision so that I couldn’t see anymore. The only thing that could be heard for a while the crying, each hiccup-like intake of breath echoing off the walls.

“She wouldn’t let me, she wanted you so bad. She wanted to start a family with me. She was so optimistic, she thought she would live and I could turn her into a vampire and we could raise you. The perfect little family that she always wanted and I was willing to give her anything,” his tone was different now, almost like he was crying too but I still couldn’t see him. My tears wouldn’t stop. “I’m going to leave for a while, to give you some time to breathe. You have my cell phone number so if anyone needs you to confirm you have a dad or anything, just call. Follow the rules while I’m gone, I’ll know if you don’t.”

With the last threat he left, the door slamming so hard behind him that the whole house shook. It felt like years before I could calm down and pick myself up off the floor. My body was stiff as I stood up and put the table and chair back where they belonged. That was when my brain decided to rearrange things and not think about or process anything that had just happened. With the couch from the living room destroyed I decided to move some chairs around to make up for it.

Once the house was completely rearranged and the sun had set, I began to cook my myself some dinner. Though my stomach currently felt like lead I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep at any point tonight if I didn’t eat. When the house began to smell like the food I was cooking, I started to feel better. I let myself breathe the delicious scents in as I stirred my food around the pan.

All the movies and tv shows I had seen over the years told me that this is what your home should always smell like. Your parents should be cooking in the kitchen while the kids are scattered around the house doing homework or other activities. Though I was fully grown now, I had been since I was around 7 years old, but now I was considered a real adult and most people at this age don’t live with their parents anymore. I had never had that and I felt like no matter how many years passed I would still crave a family.

The loneliness crept back in as I stared down at the suddenly inedible food in the pan. The once delicious smells were making my stomach churn, my nose crinkling in disgust. Before I could even register it I was dumping my food out in the trash and scrubbing the pan violently in the sink. I hadn’t even finished my second day here in Forks and I was crying again, the tears running down my face as I splashed the sink water everyone in anger.

How could my father do this to me? Why would he spend over two decades with me, raising me, if he hated and resented me so much? He didn’t seem to give a shit about what my mom had wanted since he barely even acknowledged that I was around so he wasn’t doing it for her in any way.

A sudden knock on the back door pulled me out of my angry thoughts. I jumped at the sound making the soapy water in the sink spill over the edge and on the floor, soaking the bottom of my pants and shoes. The sun had set by now so I couldn’t see out onto my porch but my ears picked up on a rapid heartbeat and a familiar scent was beginning to seep in through the crack in the door. When I flicked on the porch light I was proven right, Paul was standing there soaked from the rain I hadn’t even noticed. I slid the door open silently, letting him in.

“What’s wrong?” His hands came to my face as he asked, palms cupping my cheeks and thumbs wiping my tears away. Part of me knew this behavior was odd from someone I had just met-been attacked by, yesterday. But another part of me wanted to be cared for like this, craved the soft, caring touches.

“My dad left to give me some space to breathe for a while,” I choked out trying to calm down. Paul pulled me into a hug and I didn’t protest, pressing my cheek to his bare chest. The heat was coming off of him in waves, practically burning my cheek.

“Maybe this is a good thing,” Paul tried to assure me, rubbing a hand up and down my back while his other was placed on the back of my head. “He is a dick after all.”

We stayed like that for a while, until reality kicked in a told me I shouldn’t be hugging a complete stranger. I couldn’t tell why but I felt a strong pull to Paul. If I had been in my right mind at all yesterday when he was carrying me through the woods or this morning when he walked me home I would’ve realized it earlier. The second he wasn’t touching me a part of me felt empty, having not realized I felt anywhere near whole when we embraced. I hadn’t even know him for a full twenty-four hours yet so I would be keeping these feelings to myself.

“Are you hungry?” I found myself asking him, gesturing awkwardly to my kitchen.

“Actually I came to see if you wanted to have dinner at Emily’s,” he told me looking around my kitchen. “You said you were going to come over after you got off of school but you never did. I didn’t have a real reason to come and check on you since we just met yesterday and I shouldn’t be worried so Emily suggested that I come and invite you to dinner.”

“I’m sorry, I totally forgot about it with everything that happened when I got home,” my cheeks flushed, the heat pooling in them immediately. Maybe my dad kept me from having friends because he knew I’d be a terrible one.

“Don’t even worry about it, I just really wanted to see you again,” he said the last part unsurely, like he didn’t know that he should actually confess that. His cheeks turned a little red after he spoke and he rubbed a hand awkwardly on the back of his neck.

“Yeah, I would!” My feet squeaked as I walked forward to go with him. I had forgotten about my soaked pants and shoes. “Let me just change real quick.”

I flew up the stairs as fast as I could, throwing open my bedroom door and searching through my boxes of clothes for new pants and shoes. It felt like I had been up there forever once I came downstairs in my new clothes. Paul was waiting for me outback already in wolf form, his shorts in his mouth.

“I can hold those for you,” reaching out I took the shorts from him and climbed on his back, gripping his fur tightly. He took off as fast as he could through the woods, it was so dark out tonight that even I could barely see. The way he ran showed me how sure of himself he was, whipping between trees and over fallen ones without hesitation.

The sound of rushing water filled my ears as we neared the river. Paul never thought twice as he picked up speed and suddenly we were soaring over the it. The water was rushing violently from the heavy amount of rain we had gotten, mist spraying up at us as we went. We hit the other side of the river with a thud, without missing a beat Paul continued forward until we were outside Emily and Sam’s house. Their small cottage lit up the small clearing it was in. I could hear several people laughing inside as I waited for Paul to turn back and put his clothes back on.

“Come on,” Paul said from beside me. He was now dressed and holding out his hand for me to take. My face flushed as I took his hand, feeling more comfortable than I ever had as we walked into the house with our hands intertwined by our sides.

“Welcome back!” Emily called out to me when we walked in. She crossed from room quickly and was pulling me into a hug away from Paul within seconds. When she pulled back she kept her hands on my shoulders and looked me over. “Is everything all healed?”

“For the most part! My leg is still bothering me a bit,” I told her. She looked passed me over to Paul and gave him a sympathetic look. When I glanced back at him he looked like he was on the verge of tears. So I quickly said, “At least you guys know now that I’m not a dangerous vampire, I’d want to keep my people safe too if I were you guys.”

“What kind of bloodsucker are you then?” A boy asked from the kitchen. He was sitting next to Sam and another girl I had never seen. His face was round and youthful but his eyes were hardened like he’d been through a lot. Even though he was sitting I could tell he was a few inches taller than Paul but not as tall as Sam, the three of them the tallest people I have ever been around. The girl next to him that I had never seen was beautiful, her long black hair was pulled into a braid that she had over her shoulder, a scowl on her face as she looked at me. I wondered if they were two of the other wolves Paul had been telling me about earlier.

“I don’t really know,” I replied honestly, shrugging at all of them. “All I can say is I may be half a vampire but I’ve never killed anyone for their blood.”

“Never?” The girl asked me sounding skeptical. No one except for my mom but this wasn’t the time for that. I shook my head at her, everyone in the room looked a little shocked.

“I do steal things though, like blood bags from hospitals so I don’t have to feed directly off of a human. Sometimes I hunt animals…” I trailed off, looking between everyone’s faces. Beside me Emily grabbed my hand and led me to the table and pulled a chair out for me. I was sitting beside the boy I had never seen with Paul on my other side. I could tell that he didn’t like me already from the way he stiffened when I sat down next to him.

“Enough about this! Em is welcome here anytime and she is to be left alone unless she decides she wants to be interrogated.” Emily informed everyone, her eyes landing on the boy next to me. He huffed and sat back in his chair, crossing his arms,

“Don’t mind, Jacob,” Paul leaned in to whisper in my ear. “He’s still in highschool and in love with a girl who doesn’t love him back.”

“Shut up, Paul!” Jacob barked from beside me, getting up so quickly his chair flew back and slammed into a wall. The girl I didn’t know looked like she had gone through this before, Emily wasn’t paying attention as stirred some food and Paul was laughing next to me so hard the table in front of me was shaking.

“Just sit down, Jacob,” The girl said before Sam could say anything, though he was poised and ready, his fists pressed to the table. He took a few deep breaths and picked the pictures off the floor that he knocked down with his chair and came to sit back down. This time he made sure his chair was further away from me and closer to the girl.

“Thanks, Leah,” Sam told the girl, giving her a nod. She nodded back and then went to get some food like nothing happened. Paul started to put food on my plate without saying anything, then began to hesitate when I looked over at him to ask him why.

“I didn’t know if you felt like you should help yourself or not,” Paul explained, continuing to put more food on my plate for me.

“Thank you, I’ve just never…” I trailed off not knowing how to explain this to him and the rest of the people who were now staring at me.

“You’ve never had dinner before?” Jacob asked snidely beside me, a laugh coming out of him.

“I’ve always eaten dinner alone, my father doesn’t eat and he’s my only family,” I began to explain. What I said made the expression on Jacobs face falter, some food threatening to fall out of his mouth as it hung open.

“Haven’t you ever been invited to a friend’s house?” Leah questioned, stopping to ask before she took the forkful of food she had.

“I’ve never had a friend,” I told her quietly. My life was starting to sound pathetic to them and I could tell. I felt Paul’s hand press against my back and rub gently. Everyone was silent for a couple minutes, quietly taking bites of their food. I pushed mine around my plate, taking small bites here and there. Even Jacob was quiet next to me, his face no longer pinched in disgust at my presence.

“Hell yeah another blood sucker free day in the books!” A voice giddily announced walking through the door. I stiffened waiting for them to notice me. The person who announced it stopped in his tracks when his eyes landed on me, the three boys following in behind him stopped too and followed his gaze to me. The youngest boy who followed in the first boy looked between Paul and I and gave me a small smile and a wave.

“Sorry to ruin that for you,” I dead panned, our eyes never breaking contact. The young boy who smiled at me laughed quietly to himself, the two others cracking a smile.

“Yeah, you should be,” He said walking over to the table and grabbing a seat directly across from me. As he filled his plate he began to talk to me, “I’m Jared, by the way. You must be Em, the girl Paul im-” Paul growled and kicked him under the table. Jared and Paul stared each other down for a minute before Jared finished filling his plate and began eating. I took a bite of my food as Paul calmed himself down, he didn’t seem angry but worried about whatever Jared was going to say. Though all he could’ve been saying was that Paul attacked me but he did seem to get upset when that was brought up.

“I’m Seth and these two are Quil and Embry,” the youngest boy said with a mouthful of food. He smiled at me and some food fell from his mouth and down his shirt. He began to laugh, causing more food to spill out of his mouth. I slapped a hand over my mouth as I tried to stifle my giggles. That’s how the rest of the dinner went, filled with laughter and happiness. They showed me how a real family was supposed to be and surprisingly I wasn’t sad, I was the happiest I have ever been.

After everyone was done eating we sat around Emily and Sam's small living room talking and laughing more. Everyone except for Jacob, who was sitting outside on the porch in the dark, were sharing stories. Even Leah, who had been scowling lame when I arrived, seemed to be warming to me as I sat quietly next to Paul on a couch. The heat was radiating off of Paul in waves, warming up my body as I sat snugly against him. I felt happy here, at peace. A bunch of people I had just me were accepting me into their home, into their family. Between the heat and the melodic laughter my eyes began to get heavy and before I could even register it, I was asleep.

Tagged: @angelenemies @twilightxcx

#paul lahote #paul lahote fic #paul lahote smut #sam uley #jacob black #quil ateara #embry call #seth clearwater #leah clearwater #jared cameron #twilight fic #twilight #twilight fan fic #new moon #eclipse #breaking dawn

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love-fireflysong · 4 years

Text

Day 23: Camp

Fandom: Tales of Phantasia Character(s): Chester Burklight, Arche Klein, Mint Adenade, Cress Albane, Claus F. Lester, Suzu Fujibayashi Words: 2527 Rating: General Author’s Notes: Oh shit, that’s right. We finally dealing with the whole cast this time, and since the prompt is Camp, I think you know what to expect...

“So, whose turn is it to cook this time?”

Claus looked up from the book he was reading, and rubbed his fingers along the brim of his hat as he thought out loud. “Hmmm. Well, Mint cooked last night, I made some curry the night before, and Suzu did something before that, can’t remember what though. So it’s down to either Cress, Arche, or Chester.”

Arche’s head popped up from where she was digging around in her bag and opened her mouth, but Chester butt in before she could say anything. “I am not letting you cook anything. I will cook both tonight and tomorrow if it comes to it.”

“You say that as though your cooking is any better than mine!”

“It’s leagues better than anything you’ve ever done, and you know it!”

Before their argument could get anymore off the rails and attract some of the local beasts to their campsite, Cress interrupted. “I’ll cook tonight, if it’s fine with everyone.”

Everyone else murmured their agreements and nodded their heads, except for Arche who batted her eyes in Cress’s direction. “Oh, that’s so nice of you, Cress—”

“Laying it on a bit thick don’t you think?” Chester grumbled under his breath.

“—you’re so much more of a gentleman than somebody I won’t name.”

“Oh, and who exactly is that supposed to be?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Why don’t you go ahead and guess, or are you too stupid to figure it out?”

Cress turned away from his best friend and the half-elf witch, ignoring their usual bantering and fighting, to look at Mint helping Suzu to start a fire. He smiled softly in her direction. “What ingredients do we still have on hand?”

Mint paused her assistance with the young ninja to stand up and dig through the pouch of cooking supplied she always carried. “Well, we are beginning to run short on a few things. We used the last of the bread and eggs when we stopped for lunch after fighting that pack of Timber Wolves earlier in the day.”

Claus took her place next to Suzu, and helped to try and start the fire going. “Probably be a good idea to stock up again soon. Thankfully, Alvanista's only another day or so away, so we can at least fill back up on bread and eggs. We’re gonna be out of luck for if we want any quality seafood or fruit though.”

Cress thought for a bit. “We got the stuff for beef stew?”

Mint shook her head sadly. “Sorry Cress, but we ran out of potatoes a couple of days back when Claus made curry.”

“You made the curry too hot, Claus.” Suzu interjected casually. “You used way too many spices, so you should be more careful with that.”

He sighed. “It wasn’t that hot Suzu, everyone else was fine. Though I will try to lower the amount that I use for you.”

Suzu nodded, seemingly happy at the compromise and returned back to the fire.

“We still have some spices though, right?” Cress waited for Mint’s nod of approval and continued. “Well, what about spaghetti then?”

The cleric narrowed her eyes in concentration as she continued to dig around in the bag, before looking at him with clear victory in her eyes. “We still have a couple of tomatoes left, though this will definitely finish those off.”

Cress let out a sigh of relief and looked down at the still empty fire pit that Mint and Suzu had made. Squaring his shoulders, he turned back to Arche and Chester who had now started pulling at the others hair, while still calling the other names.

“She-demon!”

“Shifty eyes!”

“You’re so annoying you know that?!”

“Hey!” The two of them paused in their banter to look over at Cress, though they never actually let go of the other’s hair. “You think you can give us a hand with this fire, Arche?”

Chester just stared at him agog. “Are you nuts dude? She’ll burn the entire forest down if we’re not careful!”

Arche harrumphed as she let go of Chester, nearly shoving him backwards as she turned back to the fire. “I’ll show you...” she started to whisper words of arcane power under her breath as Cress, Mint, Suzu, and Claus all backed away from the the make-shift firepit. With a quick movement of her hands, the spell finished with a small, bright red spark cupped between her open palms. With a cry of "Fireball!" she let the spark go and it expanded into a small, blazing ball of fire that collided into the dry twigs and leaves, and set it ablaze instantly. Victorious, she turned back to Chester, hands proudly resting on her hips. “Well? Got nothing to say with that smart mouth now?”

Chester snorted and rolled his eyes as he crossed his arms over his chest. “You got lucky. Could have burned us all to a crisp if you weren’t careful.”

“Excuse you, I am always careful with my spells. I never miss my targets!”

“Really? So you were meaning to miss those Killer Bee’s and bean me in the back of the head with that Storm earlier?”

“Like I said, I never miss.”

“Why you—”

“They act like children sometimes, I swear.” Cress turned back to look at Claus shake his head in an odd mixture of exasperation and fondness. “Can’t take them anywhere together.”

Mint smiled and shrugged. “I don’t know, I think it’s sweet. I mean they never seem more alive or happy as when they’re teasing each other.”

Cress snorted and stuck his thumb over his shoulder at Arche and Chester who had begun to childishly pinch each other on their arms. “You call that happy? Or alive? I’m surprised that they haven’t tried to kill each other yet, honestly.”

Suzu shook her head in agreement. “I will never understand their relationship. I don’t understand why two people who are clearly very fond of each other would say such mean things.”

“You’ll understand one day, Suzu. Some people just show their affections differently that’s all.”

“Oh, you mean like you and Mirald, Claus?” Mint said innocently. Her smile only became more angelic when he pulled his hat further down to hide his red face.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about Mint.”

Suzu just watched all of this nonplussed. “I don’t think I want to understand.”

Cress sighed in agreement, clapping his hand onto her shoulder as he began to collect the ingredients needed for spaghetti. “Neither do I Suzu, neither do I.”

Seeing that Mint was busy with helping chop up some of the veggies for the sauce and Claus had returned back to his book, rubbing at one of the many, many rings on his fingers, and not having the energy to interrupt whatever it was that Chester and Arche were doing for a third time, he turned back to Suzu. “I think I remember seeing a creek or river or something a little further back, do you mind going to fill this pot up with water for me?”

Suzu leveled him with a serious look, nodded once, and in a swirl of leaves vanished from sight with the pot in her hands. With that done, he went to sit down beside Mint and joined her in cutting up veggies and peeling the tomatoes for the sauce. The soft, appreciative smile she gave him as he did so sent his stomach doing pleasant little flips. Arche and Chester could keep whatever it was they had going on, he thought that this was much nicer.

Speaking of, Cress turned his attention to the bickering duo when he started to stir the pot of peeled and crushed tomatoes and spices when he realized how quiet it had suddenly gotten. Only to see that they had stopped their arguing at some point, and were now going through their own packs. Chester stopped his rummaging and turned to his quiver.

“Hey, Cress? Do you remember how many arrows I started with today?”

Before Cress could respond that he wasn’t sure, Arche already had, not looking up from her own pack as she continued her own digging. “Thirty-two,” she replied matter-of-factly. “There are a few sticks over that way that you might be able to use to make some new arrows. I managed to save a couple of feathers from the various Chirpees and Scavengers we killed earlier that you can use for fletching, too.”

“Sweet, thanks Arche.” Chester turned his head to talk to her over his shoulder. “If you’re looking for that new spell book you found near Suzu’s village, you gave it to Mint to hold onto last night. It should be in her bag.”

“Oh right! I totally forgot!”

Cress just looked at Mint and Claus bemused, but both only shrugged at him as they continued their own duties for the night, but not before Mint handed Arche the Fire Storm spell book she had been looking for. Soon enough, Suzu returned with the pot full of water, and Cress placed it off to the side while she used her skill to once again vanish, this time appearing at the top of a tree. There she opened the scroll that they had bought off of the kunochi at the summit of Lone Valley.

The rest of the time passed in relative peace as Cress continued to make supper while Mint assisted him. Claus mumbled under his breath as he continued to twist at his rings and add new sections to his book while Suzu never moved from her spot in the tree above them. Chester sat on a nearby log as he slowly and methodically carved and fletched new arrows, and Arche sat behind him, leaning onto the log and resting her head on his back as she frantically flipped through pages of her spell book. All in all, it was as peaceful an evening as Cress could have hoped for.

Finally though, the sauce finished and he was pleased to announce as such. “Alright guys, looks like it’s about done!”

“Finally,” Arche whined as she tucked her book under arm, accepting Chester’s hand to help her up. “Thought I was gonna die of starvation over here.”

Chester nodded solemnly. “It’s true. I could hear her stomach the entire I was making arrows. It was very distracting, almost stabbed myself with my knife a couple of times it was so loud.”

Once Mint handed Arche her bowl and fork, she didn’t hesitate to jab her fork into Chester’s side. “It’s not nice to take about a lady’s stomach like that.”

“What lady? The only lady I see here is Mint, and I’ve never once talked about her stomach.”

Claus groaned in exasperation. “Can we please have a meal in peace for once? You two can continue your flirting after we finish eating.”

Instead of appearing embarrassed though, Chester only laughed. “Who’d flirt with her? I’m not interested in shrill, annoying, pink, brats.”

Arche only nodded in agreement. “Exactly. My type is tall, dark, and handsome. Not blue, loud-mouthed, and hot-headed.”

“Who're you calling loud-mouthed?”

“Well, who were you calling annoying?”

Mint giggled quietly behind her hand as Cress gave out a serving of sauce to Suzu. Who looked askance at her bowl, and then at Cress. “You didn’t put in too many spices did you?”

He shook his head fondly and patted her on her own head. “No, I made sure to go light on them this time. You should be fine.”

“Good. Thank you.”

After getting his own bowl filled, Claus lifted the brim of his hat to take a look at the now very dark sky. “We should probably figure out our watch order while we eat. It’s getting late and we should all be heading to sleep pretty soon. I’ll take first watch though, I want to get some more writing done before I hit the hay.”

“I can take the final watch,” Suzu offered. She noticed Mint make a face of concern but raised her hand. “It’s fine. I’m used to early mornings anyhow. It’s when I do my training.” She stuck a forkful of spaghetti into her mouth and made a satisfactory nod at the taste.

“Oh,” Mint said instead. “If you’re sure, Suzu... I can do third then.” She turned to Cress before he could say a word, giving him an uncharacteristically stern look. “You made supper tonight, Cress, not me. I only helped to cut some veggies so that doesn’t count. Which means you’re exempt from watch duty. It’s your own rule after all.” Cress shrunk back a little at that. She wasn’t wrong, she was just using the rule he had made for her when she had had to cook every night against him.

“Oh! I’ll take sch-econd vatch zen!” Arche butt in with an excited grin, mouth full of spaghetti that she frantically swallowed down. “Maybe I can finish reading my spell book tonight and have a new spell to try out in the morning.”

“Welp, guess it looks like I’m on second watch with you then.” Chester sighed like he was being put-upon to do this. “Someone’s gotta babysit you after all. Make sure you don’t get lost when you go out for a midnight flight or something.”

“I think if anyone here needs babysitting its you, but suit yourself.”

Cress, Mint, and Claus all shared a look of puzzlement. This was unusual, the two of them rarely agreed to take watch together, and if this was the only the first time it would be one thing. But it wasn’t. This was almost the fourth time in a row that they offered to do so. Something was up, and Cress wasn’t sure he wanted to know what.

With a confused shrug, Claus stuck a forkful of spaghetti and sauce in his mouth and made a face. “Are you sure you put enough spices in, Cress? This is kinda bland.”

Mint sighed as she handed the spice bag to Claus. “It’s harder then you think to make meals that both you and Suzu will eat, you know.”

“Yeah,” Chester butt in as he elbowed Arche with a snicker. “Why can’t you be like this one? She’ll eat anything as long as it’s vaguely edible.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you ever insult your own cooking like that, Chester.” Cress fired back casually from next to Mint as he picked at his bowl. “Not usually your style.”

Chester just stared dumbfounded at Cress while Arche nearly fell off the log she was sitting on she was laughing so hard. Even Claus snorted into his spaghetti and Mint hid a smile behind her fork as she took a bite. Suzu seemed to be the only one unaffected, but Cress could make out the amusement in her eyes and the slight upturn of her smile.

“Cress, dude. What the hell, man?”

Cress just shrugged with a grin on his face as he took his own bite of supper tonight. Sure, camping was chaotic whenever they had to do it, but it was definitely his favourite part of them travelling together.

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