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#I made it through all of the quarantine seeing people daily for work without getting sick
segemarldoodles · 8 months
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I was fine all weekend while we checked in 2500 people in reg, we go to the fucking staff dinner after pack up and then my throat starts feeling scratchy. Turns out one of the other staffers had COVID, and guess who caught it.
Pros: I'll technically be home this weekend to see how starfield is
Cons: I had other shit to do this weekend, including a doctor's appt today, and was going to go to a museum with Jen tomorrow after work, but I guess that's not gonna happen now.
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asmo-ds · 3 years
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this is kind off relatable for everyone tbh. mc got pissed off when another quarantine was announced so they packed their stuff and found a way to go to the devildom on their own. none of the brothers knew that they would be staying with them, how would they react? i can imagine asmo being shocked when he sees how irritated mc's skin is because of the masks!!
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There Is No Pandemic in Hell
Obey me Crack
Word Count: 2534
Summary: when the government announces the quarantine has been extended, MC decides to pack their bags and head down to Hell, but they were so desperate to leave they didn’t wait for permission and instead grabbed their bike and rode all the way to their real home.
A/N: Ok so the brothers aren’t really in this fic until like the end and its mostly MC riding their bike through the layers of Hell and almost dies like 10 times. And they fight a cult. That happens too.
“The governor has announced that we will be once again shutting down most businesses and we will be required to wear our masks no matter where we are, that includes restaurants, which will be closing due to the inability to eat with a mask on. Furthermore, we-” You turned off the television, groaning pulling on your mask before you headed to the market. You couldn’t believe that so many people had refused to wear masks and now you were forced back to square one of the world’s recovery from COVID-19.
As you walked down the aisle of the grocery store, you got lost in thought. Did demons ever get sick? Surely they wouldn’t be affected by COVID and they definitely wouldn’t be trapped inside their home for 95% of their day (unless you’re Leviathan and then you will happily do so). You realize you passed half of the aisles you had meant to go down, effectively missing half of your grocery list.
You feel your D.D.D vibrate in your pocket and rip it out wondering if you had missed your daily call with one of the brothers only to see the group chat was being talked in.
Horny Man: Heyyy anyone wanna go shopping with me?
Horny Man: Except Mammon, I’m not looking to go broke from his shopping trip
Gambling Addiction: Oi! I was gonna go with ya but now I think I’ll stay >:(
Otaku Snek: yea that was what Asmo wanted lolz
Mom: I have council business with Diavolo today.
Bookworm: You can call it a date y’know?
Mom: Satan, come to my study immediately I want to have a talk with you.
Gambling Addiction: Ha! It ain’t me in trouble for once
Otaku Snek: Anyway I can’t I have an in-person meet up with some of my teammates
Hunger: Asmo, may I come along so we can stop at Madame Screams?
Horny Man: Of course Beel ~
You silence your phone and put it in your pocket. You couldn’t stand to watch them make plans so casually. It was unfair. You wanted to go out and have fun without your mask or risking your health.
You wished you could be in the Devildom walking around breathing fresh air and not walking through eerily empty stores yelling through two masks and some plexiglass. That’s when it struck you. 
Diavolo had told you that you had a home in the Devildom and were always welcome. So why could you not just go back now? Spare yourself the acne you gain from masks and the annoyance of not being able to hang out with anybody but your reflection every day. 
You abandon your cart in your excitement, silently thanking whoever has to clean it up and apologize as you run out of the store. You make it back to your home, pulling a backpack from the depths of your closet and opening it, throwing your most needed items in, and attempting to zip the overfilled bag as you try to think of how you’d get there. 
You know that Lucifer would never allow you to come on such short notice, so you knew asking them was a no-go. You suddenly remembered someone mentioning how to get to the Devildom by foot you had to walk through the seven layers of hell and you groaned knowing it was going to be a rough journey. 
You try to figure out where the entrance to the seven layers would be, googling all sorts of demonic places where worshippers would gather. You find one that seems like a good option as it is nearby.
You get on your bike and ride to the area and start to look for any worshippers that would be willing to help you find the gate. You wander the dark woods watching carefully for raised tree roots or rocks that would cause your bike to break. 
“Stop right there !” A man in a blood-red hood calls out. “State your business.”
“Listen, dude, I know Lucifer and I wanna go see him but he can’t know yet. So tell me where the gate is,” You reply impatiently. 
“Why should I help you? You don’t even know how to open the gate! You do not deserve the help of Satan’s worshippers-” You climb off your bike putting up the kickstand and walk towards the robed stranger. You grab his collar with one fist and pull his face close to yours.
“Show. Me. The. Gate. Or so help me I’ll summon all seven lords right now and have them disembowel you and gouge your eyes out as the life leaves them. You won’t get to work for Satan as you wish for, instead, you’ll be eaten by him in the most painful torturous fashion. I have to say few words to get him here so I suggest you send me down right now, bud” You growl. The man looks as if he is about to cry and points behind him. 
“T-the cave at the end of this path. You s-should walk into it and keep following the path of torches down. There you’ll f-f-find my cult and they’ll help you out, just tell them I sent you.” The man cries out with teary eyes. You let go and take a step back, giving a sweet smile. 
“Thank you, sir! I’ll put in a good word with Satan for ya,” you wink at the man before getting on your bike, carefully continuing down the path. You were getting back to the Devildom if it killed you.
Thankfully the cave’s path was fairly smooth and you were able to ride your bike to the group the stranger had spoken of. They asked you to stop and you had a repeat of the process you took with the stranger.
“... Fine, we’ll send you down but we need a goat,”
-
The ritual was performed and you were engulfed in a dark shadowy mist. You appeared in an area clouded with a purple fog and you felt sudden drowsiness overtake you. Sloth, the closest layer to the human realm.
You smack your hands harshly to your cheeks and shake your limbs to wake yourself up. You then remember you had packed a pack of Redbull. You stopped your bike and pulled the backpack onto your lap, pulling a can out and opening it as you continue on your way. 
By the time you reach gluttony, you had downed 5 Redbulls and were sure, if you even survived the demons that eyed you hungrily in the land with red fauna and food everywhere, you’d have a heart attack when you finally get to the House of Lamentation. 
You slow your bike down a bit, knowing demons were sneaky and fast. You take off your jacket as it gets increasingly hot the lower you go. Demons lurk in shadows and eye you hungrily and you shiver. Instinctively you place a hand on your stomach as it rumbles. Gluttony.
You suddenly remember the human world snacks you had packed since you knew how badly you missed them last time you were down here. You once again pull your bag onto your lap, ripping the packaging open. The crinkle and sudden smell of food caused multiple demons to charge at you, drooling and feral looks in their eyes. You put the food in your mouth and speed off, pedaling as fast as you can to the fifth layer. 
As the sky began to turn pink you let out a sigh of relief. Until you felt a small creature
on your shoulder. You had failed to notice it when you arrived in Beel’s layer, but it was a small demon that had fallen asleep under your coat and on your shoulder in Belphegor’s area. 
“Hey there, little guy~” You coo at the creature giving it a small pet. “You wanna come back to RAD with me?” The creature nuzzles into your neck with a demonic purr. 
You were glad to at least not be alone anymore.
Entering Lust was awful as you suddenly felt hot and bothered, barely able to keep pedaling. We’re almost to Wrath, just a bit further. Ignore the horny man’s power!
The clouds in the sky begin to turn a sort of green color, making the sky look a bit like a watermelon. Too caught up in staring at the sky you suddenly hear a small caw from your shoulder opposite of the one your newest companion rested on. 
The black crow with yellow eyes stared at you tilting its head. Mammon knows I’m here you thought giving his pact mark on your collar bone a soft touch to let him know you were okay, glad it was him that knew and not another brother who was bound to tattle on you. You nodded at the bird as it fluttered its wings and flew above you.
As you paid attention to the bird and the way it kept pace with you an angry demon jumped at you, knocking you and your bike over as your small friend and the crow both made noises of surprise. 
“Hey, Kevin, it’s alright if I call you that, right sleepy head?” you looked at Kevin as he made a happy noise in response. You turn your attention back to the angry demon that had taken the form of a large feline. “Yup… this is definitely Satan’s realm,” you sigh before sprinting off in a different direction trying to get the demon off your trail. You swerve through trees for quite a bit before you are able to get back to your bike, you, Kevin and the crow taking off at high speeds, approaching the orange wetlands. 
Its so unfair I have to go through all of this, your mind wanders, they all get to have this life without this stupid journey. So stupid.
You shake your head, urging away Leviathan’s envy and continuing to pedal down the dry path that was surrounded by an orange sea for miles. You focus on the path and stare straight ahead. 
Suddenly, Mammon’s crow caws in a panic as the water splashed upward with a creature that lunges for MC who manages to swerve and avoid the attack, pedaling faster and breathing heavily. At least I don’t have to wear the stupid mask while riding my bike anymore. 
The sky gets lighter, turning yellow and the crow flies in circles above your head cawing with the excitement of being in the layer of Greed. Gold littered the grown, jewels scattered about. It was bright and you had to squint but it was beautiful. 
Suddenly you stopped, an overwhelming urge to scoop piles of gold to bring along with you. Mine, Mine, my mind raced with selfish thoughts I need all of it. 
Your eyes shimmer with the reflection of gold as you reach out fingertips brushing a shiny Grimm before Mammon’s crow bites your ear, causing you to jerk back and place your hands over the targeted appendage
Wincing you move your hand and see the blood. “What the hell asshat! Do you know how much the straps of my mask are gonna hurt to put on now, stu- oh that’s right I won’t need the mask. BUT STILL THST HURT, YOU JERK!” The crow seemed to give you attitude and you realized it probably just saved you from succumbing to the sin and being trapped in this realm forever. You start pedaling again seeing a royal blue fog ahead. 
You take a deep breath and keep going forward, trying to stay as quiet as possible, knowing any demon in Lucifer’s land would be the strongest out of any you’ve encountered thus far. 
You failed to consider the blood dripping from your earlobe attracting demons to you. Suddenly a demon tackles you, throwing your bike to the side as it pins you down, mouth watering onto your face as it stares at your bleeding ear. You scream and kick attempting to free yourself to no avail. You feel tears welling up in your eyes as sudden regret runs through you.
Why hadn’t you just asked Lucifer and waited a couple of days? Why were you so desperate to escape Corona that you literally biked to hell?
“Kevin… Crow… Thanks for coming with me,” you whimper as the demon opens its mouth wide ready to bite.
Suddenly before it can attach its mouth to you’re flesh a sword goes into its mouth and out the nape of its neck. You shiver as its blood drips onto you.
“I should’ve known why we hadn’t heard from you in weeks,” a familiar voice says as he kicks the dying demon away from your trembling body. 
You jump up and wrap your body around the torso of Lucifer, squeezing and crying. “LUCIII THAT WAS SO SCARY WHY DIDN’T YOU GET HERE SOONER” you sobbed as he took his handkerchief and wiped your tears and snot.
“Well, I wouldn’t even have known you were here if it weren’t for that idiot Mammon bursting into my office screaming about you biking your way through the layers.” He sighs and suddenly picks you up, throwing you over his shoulder as he lectures you the whole way, dragging your bike with the hand that wasn’t keeping you steady as the crow let Kevin ride on his back.
“Wait hold on did. you say weeks?” you interrupt him.
“Yes time moves slower in the seven layers than it does in any of the places you’ve been to. So you were in there for about two weeks in our time, but to you it should have felt like maybe a few hours.”
-- 
“Ya should be thanking the GREAT Mammon for finding you and sending his best crow to find ya!” Mammon scolds as you sit on the couch, head hung in shame with Asmo and Belphie at your sides. 
Lucifer had left to go speak to Diavolo on the matter of the human exchange student walking through all seven layers of hell. 
“These guys are my favorite part of my layer,” Belphie reaches to your lap and pets Kevin, “They’re really sweet, y’know, for demons.”
“MC those masks were so bad for your skin,” Asmo puts his hands on your cheeks, twisting and turning your head to get a better look at the damage. “Tonight we will dedicate to fixing that skin of yours!”
“No way! MC obviously wants to come to play the new game I got today with me!” Levi shouts.
“Nuh-uh, they owe me and gotta come with me to the casino tonight!” Mammon yells back, as all the brothers grow irritated.
“MC, would you like to watch some detective movies with me, one of my larger felines attacked you and I feel as though I owe you,” Satan puts a hand on your shoulder. 
Belphie smacks Satan’s hand away and pulls MC against him, “guys they’re exhausted can we not do this right now…”
When Belphegor goes to ask what you want to do he is met with your closed eyes and steady breathing, mouth hung slightly ajar.
“...Yea we should have expected that but I get MC first when they wake up I call dibs, you can’t go against dibs!” Asmodeus continues the argument over who gets to hang out with MC first as Belphegor lays down and falls asleep with them.
You were just really fucking happy that you didn’t have to wear your mask and you could cuddle with people for the first time since March.
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gucciwins · 3 years
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Three Time
The one where Harry, Atticus, and Y/N celebrate. 
Word Count: 2,988
A/N: Hello friends, this is a little continuation to my story Adore You.  Harry is now a three time grammy nominated artist and i think that is beautiful. This is something short and i really do hope you enjoy it. 
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There is a lot that happened this year that she never saw coming. 
First, a worldwide pandemic that would keep everyone locked indoors and having to wear masks. Secondly, Harry's Love on Tour getting rescheduled to 2021, but even that isn't looking good now. And lastly, being in Los Angeles in November as Harry is filming a movie as the lead male actor. 
Ever since Fine Line was released in December, time seemed to fly by for them.
Harry was overjoyed at how loved Fine Line was by his fans. He was getting support left and right. He was a humble man, never letting it go to his head, always saying he couldn't do it without the help of the people on his team. 
There have been rumors flying around speculating Harry having a girlfriend, a famous songwriter, but they have learned to ignore it. Harry doesn't feel the need to address his relationships because it's theirs. He would love to shout his love for Y/N to the world, but as long as she knows, he's content. 
They celebrated their one year anniversary in Italy for a week before flying back home, they would have stayed longer, but they missed Atticus too much to do that. As soon as they got home, it felt like everything changed. Not between them, but with the world. It was madness to see a lockdown, fear had spiked, but safety was a priority that they took seriously. Meaning they had to take it day by day.
Ever since the worldwide lockdown in March, Harry discussed staying in Los Angeles with Mitch and Sarah for a few months. Atticus was quick to agree, but Y/N really wanted to go home. Harry reminded her it was better to be surrounded by a good group of friends than to be distanced from everyone in London's separate homes. She was quick to agree after. 
Y/N didn't mind it much after; they all always helped each other out. There was also a lot of music playing, as well as creating. Harry said they might just have to get Mitch to release a quarantine album, which got Harry hit in the head with a pillow. 
The one who was taking this the hardest was Atticus, missing Anne and Gemma, who was back in London. He missed going to the park to play, he missed running around free, and honestly, she did as well. They would go hiking and on walks, but it was not as open as before. 
This is why, by June, they returned back home to London, and after a week of quarantine and negative test results, they went on the journey to visit both families. Y/N separated from them to visit her mother and step-dad even though Harry tried to convince her they could go together, but honestly, as much as she loved Anne and had started to see her as a second mother, she really needed a hug from her own. She promised Harry and Atticus she would see them the day after as she was coming to see Anne and they would stay the week with her. 
During this time, Y/n started knitting, something she learned at a young age but would only do when she was stressed. She began teaching Atticus, but he could only keep still for a little bit before he had to run off and do a new activity. She knitted socks, hats, and blankets for their family and friends and shipped them off to them. Y/N even made Atticus and herself the JW Anderson Cardigan. It was a lot of work, but it came out lovely. Harry made them do a little backyard photoshoot because he loved it so much.  
Harry had even surprised her when he told her it would be on the cover of Vogue. She was in shock, but she never stopped hugging him, telling Harry how proud of him she was. The day of the shoot was gorgeous, she had to remind herself to breathe a few times, or she would have passed out. Atticus was in the shoot with Gemma and Harry as they did a family shoot to surprise Anne. Harry kept asking her if she was enjoying it, and honestly, her smile said everything. That she was proud of him, that he was doing fantastic but most importantly, that she loved him. The skirt had a lot of filthy thoughts floating through her head, and she really hoped they'd lend it to Harry if she told him everything she wanted to do with him, specifically her under that skirt touching him. 
Harry had her join for a few photos, Lambert pulling out a surprising look just for her. Harry promised these photos were just for them, even if he wanted to have them put one in just so the world could know how much he loved his family. 
It's November now, and they are in Y/N's Malibu home, which they have been staying at since October. Harry has started filming "Don't Worry Darling," in Olivia Wilde's film. It was surreal when they found out; she couldn't be any prouder. Staying in her home was an easy choice; not many knowing where she lives, only a few friends, and Atticus loves having the beach so close even if it is a little too cold to go in now. 
Y/N and Atticus can't go to set due to safety and regulations, but Harry calls and facetime them every time he gets a break in his trailer. He lets them know he misses them, but he really loves everyone he's working with. That the cast is incredible and kind. Harry would not stop teasing Y/N for her reaction when she saw the wedding ring on his left hand. It made her stop mid-sentence. Husband Harry is something she wishes to one day get because Dad Harry is an angel to his sweet son. 
Harry has recently gone back to filming as it was postponed for two weeks because someone on set came out positive to make up for the lost time they started filming on weekends, which bummed out Atticus. Still, Harry quickly told him it wasn't his choice and that they would watch movies of his options as soon as he was back. Atticus loves Y/N a lot, but he's never going to love anyone more than his dad, even though Atticus does push Harry second sometimes. 
More times than not, Harry will get home and find Y/N and Atticus napping in a new place of the house; the last time was outback in a little tent Y/N set up with fairy lights and had many pillows and blankets to stay warm. Harry was quick to climb in and wrap his arms around Y/N, who quickly woke up due to his cold hands, but he apologized quickly with kisses. She's a sucker for his kisses.
Every moment together is special for them. 
Atticus called her 'Mum' a week ago and ran off, feeling embarrassed would not talk to her all day. Which was hard to do, seeing that they were the only three people in the house. Harry saw how sulky she was and talked with Atticus because neither would tell him what happened. Harry was surprised when Atticus told him what he said, but he was mostly filled with joy and a bit of fear. A fear that she could leave any day and not only would he be left heartbroken but so would his son, but he knows Y/N and the love she has for them. She's here forever, she might not say it, but her actions say enough for her. How she tucks in Atticus to bed with a kiss and an 'I love you.' Asking Anne and her mother on first time parenting tips when she thinks Harry isn't around. How much she cried when he got a scrape on his knee for the time in her care. There isn't anything stopping her from leaving, but she stays because she loves all she has. In the end, Atticus apologized for not speaking with her, and she hugged him and cuddled him all night long. Harry told Atticus that Y/N wasn't his mother, but she loved him like one and that it was okay with him if she called her that. Y/N was fearful of being a mom, but she loved Atticus like her own; even if she hadn't watched and cared for him since he was born, she was here known and would do so for as long as Harry and Atticus let her. 
November 24th, a long-awaited day for artists in the music industry. Harry has to be on set at 11AM today, meaning they will be watching the live stream together. Jeff is with Glenne and is on facetime with Harry. He has his phone perched up against a candle. Harry is sitting in the middle, Atticus to his left and Y/N to his right. He's in sweats and a plain white tee, not needing to be dressed up, seeing as it only is nine in the morning. 
The live stream is an hour-long. Y/N truly forgets how many categories they have until she watches. They woke up at eight am, had pancakes for breakfast, and spoke of their daily plans letting time go by them, allowing them to enjoy breakfast together as they do each morning. 
Atticus can barely sit still, just wanting to hear his daddy's name being called. Harry is surprisingly quiet, just sitting back with his arms crossed as the live stream goes on. Honestly, Y/N is the only one showing emotion. She cheers as she hears HAIM and Phoebe Bridgers get nominated. She itches to grab her phone to shoot them a congratulations message but fears she'll miss something, so she just gives herself a silent reminder to do it after. 
Sharon Osbourne had just begun to say the nominees for Best Comedy Album, and Y/N knows what is coming up soon. She isn't even listening to the nominees, just waiting for her to name the Best Music Video nominees. 
As soon as she says, "Brown Skin Girl, Beyoncé," Y/N feels Harry's hand on her thigh tighten, and she feels for him. His nerves must be out of the roof, but he tries his best not to show it. Y/N shuts her eyes tight, putting her hand over his to let him know she's there for him. 
When she hears the words "Adore You, Harry Styles," she feels her heart speed up. She opens her eyes wide and looks at Harry; his face is blank. Atticus is running circles around the couch, just cheering and yelling nonsense. Jeff and Glenne are cheering from the phone. 
Harry lets out a big smile when he finally meets her eyes. "Adore you did it, angel." She whispers.
He nods. "That's unreal. To hear my name." 
She leans in to give him a quick kiss as they settle back down, ready to listen for the upcoming categories. Megan the Stallion is starting the new section of categories, and Y/N isn't sure how to feel because she won't be able to take it if they don't name Harry again. 
"Best Pop Solo Performance, Watermelon Sugar." This time they all break out into cheers as soon as they hear them call Harry's name after Dua Lipa's. "Watermelon Sugar" had been a hit from the day of its release. Now it has been nominated for a Grammy feels unreal to Harry. Two nominations, he would have never believed it. 
Y/N's buzzing waiting for Megan to announce Best Pop Vocal Album. Harry is now leaning forward, knowing this is another category he could potentially be nominated for. 
"Fine Line Harry Styles" As soon as she hears those words, the tears start running down her face; he did this. His album was nominated. Harry can't stop smiling as Atticus hugs him tight around his neck. He lets out a small chuckle as he sees her tears. He pulls her in, kissing her head repeatedly, smiling at Jeff's congratulations but mostly basking in the joy of three nominations and that he has the opportunity to share it with those he loves. 
Harvey Mason JR. is here once again to announce the general field categories. Harry and Y/N nod along as the names of the nominees are called out. Jeff let out a cheer hearing HAIM nominated for album of the year. Y/N sighs, not hearing Harry being nominated but continues ready to hear Adore You for record of the year. Only it doesn't happen. Harvey Mason JR. bids everyone goodbye, and just like that, it's over. 
Jeff breaks the silence, congratulating Harry before hanging up. Harry sits back with Atticus in his lap, a big smile on his face. 
Harry is happy. Extremely happy, this has always been a dream of his, one he never knew would come true. 
His second album got him three Grammy nominations. Atticus has no clue what these awards mean, but he's happy just seeing Harry and Y/N happy.  Atticus climbs off Harry's lap, kissing Harry and Y/N's cheek, saying he's going to his room now. 
Harry turns to look at Y/N, and the smile she had has now left her face, and now she sits there, lost in thought. This worries Harry; she was fine moments ago. He's got to go soon, so he needs to figure this out now. 
"Honey, you alright?" Harry places his hand on her thigh, and she looks at him, nodding. 
"Fine." She kisses his cheek. "Really happy for you." 
Harry knows she is, but there's something else. "Spill." 
She sighs, knowing nothing gets past him. "You weren't named for any general category. I'm proud of the three you got, but I was sure you would be at least nominated for record of the year." Awards don't mean much to Y/N anymore, but she knows how important this is for Harry. "I'm sorry, ruining your mood." 
"You didn't. Thank you for caring so much." His smile is sincere, and she knows he wouldn't lie to her. 
"It's okay," Harry tells her, wanting her to repeat it with him.
"But Harry," He puts his hands on her cheeks to get her to stop and look at him. 
"Honey, it's okay. Three nominations are amazing, and I couldn't be happier." 
"I know," She deflates. "3-time Grammy Nominated Artist Harry Styles has a nice ring to it." She smirks, noting the blush on his cheek. 
"Dork." He leans in to kiss her nose. 
"Fine Line is still my favorite album, you know, from everything released, named number one." 
"You're just saying that." 
Y/N shakes her head no, "Of course not. Yours is the one album I had on repeat the most. My Spotify wrapped will prove just that." 
Harry snorts, "You're too much." 
He pulls her in to lay on his chest, her arms snake around his waist. They hold each other tight. 
"I'm proud of you," Harry whispers in her ear. 
Y.N leans back, but Harry's hold is tight. "I did nothing; you just got nominated. For your second album, you deserve all the praise today." 
"Honey, will you let me continue." Harry laughs. 
"Sorry, H." 
"I'm proud of you because, without you, this album would have never been finished. I would have never had the inspiration to finish Adore You. Would have never had the idea to make a fake island and promote it without ever adding my name to it. I would have never thought to film using a CGI fish, as my friend in the story. I would have never had the released "Lights Up," the song that started this new era for me but most importantly, I would have never found love. A love that is bigger than me that fills me with so much joy. A love that leaves me scared. A love that will forever keep on growing." Harry smiles as he wipes away her tears. 
Harry loves Y/N with all he has. This album was his, but it was also hers. It's what truly brought them together. 
"You made me cry, you jerk." She says, laying her head in the crook of his neck.
Harry laughs. "I just poured my heart out to you, and I'm the jerk." 
"I love you." Harry grins. That's all he wants to hear. "I'll love you, today, tomorrow, forever for as long as you let me. 
Harry can't contain his happiness and needs to show her. He connects their lips. It's a hard, fast kiss full of passion. They pull away because their smiles don't let them continue much. 
"You've got to go." Y/N reminds him as he continues to press kisses all over her face and neck. 
Harry settles down, smiling down at her. "I know." She leans forward, kissing him quickly. "We'll celebrate more when I get home tonight." 
"Three nominations, wow!" Y/N says, standing up. "We're in for a long celebration once we get Atticus down to sleep." She wags her eyebrows at him.
Harry very quickly gets the hint. "I can't wait, honey." 
Atticus comes bouncing down the steps giving his dad a kiss goodbye, walking him to the door, barefoot. Y/N follows Harry, giving her one last kiss goodbye as he walks to his car. 
As he gets in and pulls out of the driveway, he sees Y/N and Atticus waving goodbye to him. Harry has a big smile on his face that no one can see. He's thankful to now be a 3-time Grammy-nominated artist, but what he is most grateful for is getting to be the person who gets to love Y/N and Atticus forever.
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Thank you for reading! This was just a small little piece for a beloved piece I wrote. If inspiration strikes, I shall be revisiting this story. 
Please let me know what you thought!
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rebel666 · 4 years
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Confessions of  a Joann Employee
UPDATE: If you want to send more confessions and/or report what’s happening at your Joann anonymously, there’s EmployeeJoann on Twitter that is responding to messages. They are constantly sharing and updating more as it becomes available to them!
A confession from a Joann employee that is in one of the Covid-19 effected areas and has so much to say about it:
-We are staying open until told by the state otherwise. Even though they declared a State of Emergency and all non-essential businesses must be shut down by 5pm on Saturday 3/21, our company is refusing to. Because Joann themselves is trying to deem Joann as an "essential" store. They even put it all over their website that we are here for the people making masks and small businesses who need fabric to continue. They quote that we are here for the customers and that we as United States Americans have a responsibility to fill this need. They aren’t looking at curbside only as an option, they aren’t looking at offering more benefits for shopping online, they want us open and people in stores. They are sending us emails with pieces of paper (unofficial, not state made) to print out and put in our cars to say we are on the way to work at an "essential retailer." Anything to make it so we can remain open.
-This sucks for employees and here’s why: The way Joann is set up is if we get sick, if we have to leave to take care of someone who is sick, if we want to self-quarantine (because of our health or the health of our loved ones), we either quit or ask to be put on Leave of Absence and cannot return without medical clearance. If we come into contact with someone who has Covid-19 (even if they came into the store), they request we stay home while the rest of us have to work even if we were standing right next to them. As long as we don’t display symptoms, we are expected to show up or we can request LoA. LoA does not pay us. The only way we as employees will be taken care of is if the store closes AND if we have two weeks of schedules set up. I was hoping the company was on the path to this when they had us cancel all the classes until May and then limited hours but all that went out the window today. Right now Joann is doing everything to prevent us from closing and in turn take care of their employees. Every single time I bring up our well-being, I get reminded that we need to think about the customer first.
-Our store is step up to have daily conference calls to talk about the current status and to express any concerns we have. I brought up the status about my county (our major has declared everyone be shut down as of 5pm tomorrow or the police will be involved) and that I am deeply concerned for us and they told me that we have a responsibility as a leader to keep everyone calm and to keep working through this. ***When I asked what if everyone in my store requests a Leave of Absence because we are all very much concerned about our health, they said, "We will replace you with team members from other stores. There are service industry people and travel workers looking for jobs and we will fill your positions with people who will work it."*** They straight up told me that we are replaceable/expendable because they value their "customers/money." It doesn’t matter how long we’ve been with the company. It all means nothing to them.
-They are sending out emails about what Joann is doing as a whole for Covid-19. Saying we are cleaning every hour and whatnot. What they fail to mention is we are a fabric store with no means of washing fabric. I see people on a daily basis cough into, wipe their snot on, kids place in their mouth, and all sorts of other nasty things into these bolts of fabric (seriously, wash the fabric you buy from Joann before doing anything). We have the basic cleaning supplies to wash floors and wipe counters with but that’s pretty much it. They are telling us as employees to bring in our own supplies if we can. An employee brought in gloves long ago just so we can use them to clean the bathrooms. Today I provided face masks for my fellow coworkers. Our store may look clean but we know its dirty little secrets.
-We are supposed to follow the whole 10 people rule but they do nothing to stop or limit people at the door and won’t do anything to enforce it. All while wanting us to cut hours to which is barely 2 people running the whole store for smaller Joann locations. It’s not safe for us to be on a bare-bones crew especially if they want us to remain an essential store.
-Joann before this was a great place to work. At least for my store. I love my store, I love the people I work with. Other stores I have heard horror stories from but mine was one of the good ones. I see them being bombarded on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to close. Not just by employees and families of employees but by concerned customers. And this pleases me because they need to take this seriously. What they do in the next 3 days will speak volumes on how much they listen to and care about us. This is a serious issue and we as employees are suffering.
As they report more, I will continue to add to this.
UPDATE 3/21: They emailed and made copies of this for employees to carry with them in their cars:
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Now the CEO of Joann is also a piece of work. All you have to do is google his name and you’ll see the Walgreen’s lawsuit, his DUIs (yes, plural), and his impact on Joann since joining - which includes increasing prices because of the tariffs. One employee confirms that when tariff thing went into effect, the entire store was repriced. Some markups were a few cents but some were a few dollars. Since then the prices continue to fluctuate.
There is also a petition going on Change.org asking for Joann to Close Their Stores And Pay Employees
If you get a chance, read some of the comments people are putting in support of this:
I no longer feel safe in my workplace. The greed is sickening.
My employees deserve to be treated like people and make a livable wage and have benefits! Our health over their profit!
Staff at my local store have been asked to bring in their own gloves for cleaning. Hand sanitizer expired in 2012. Employees are reporting little to know cleaning supplies in a store that targets the elderly as a primary demographic. The material used in the masks is not medical grade. This company is shamelessly profiteering from the pandemic.
As a former employee and manager I know the company does not follow any real cleaning guidelines. They understaff their stores, overwork their employees and frown upon time off. Fabrics and crafts are not essential items at this time and since the majority of the clientele there are elderly i think they are creating more risk. Finally do something good for your employees and send gem home with pay
As a previous manager, I'm sad to say that this company does not value its workers. To see that they are putting their workers, and others who visit, at a continued risk is unbelievable and is extremely selfish. Now is the time to act and stop the spread of COVID-19 and to keep Joann's open does not help stop the spread in anyway shape or form.
Over the last two days, my local store decided to carry on with inventory. They brought in an inventory team from the area of our state with the vast majority of cases. It's one thing to not close and continue to expose the public to the risk, but decisions like these show that Jo-Anns has a blatant disregard for the wellbeing of its employees and customers. Even more telling is the fact that we know that you are seeing our pleas to do the right thing, but continue to ignore us on social media. There is only one reason that you are pushing to categorize Jo-Anns as an essential business, and that is greed. In fact, I had to spend my own money on gas to drive all over the city looking for more cleaning supplies after my manager ordered me to. Your employees do so much for you, and we are compensated very little. I have been at Jo-Anns long enough to know that you would never compensate us for our time off, but at least join the other non-essential business and shut down for the time being.
joann’s customer base is primarily elderly or otherwise at risk people, and many employees are also older or immunocompromised. employees are overwhelmed as we can’t keep up with the cleaning guidelines while also taking care of customers, not to mention we’re severely lacking in cleaning supplies in the first place. joann is encouraging people to come in for supplies to make face masks, yet these masks aren’t sterile since people touch and breathe on the fabric all day, and it’s then laid on the counter to be measured and cut. employees themselves aren’t even allowed to wear masks or gloves. joann cares more about profit than the safety of both their team members and customers.
There are so many comments I want to share. These are just a few. This is Joann. They care more about their image and their financial gains than the backbone of their stores. The people who put up with their ridiculous requests day in and day out are now at risk and putting others at risk. Places like Hot Topic closed down and took care of their employees, places like Joanns should too!
But also lets not forget, Hobby Lobby is also not taking Covid-19 seriously.
UPDATE 3/22: “We have signs saying we're cleaning more but found out Friday that we're out of supplies in the distribution center. They claim they will send them out once they receive any but I found out today from a truck driver the company that supplies everything for Joann (from inventory to store use items) is closed for 2 weeks... because of this they're telling us to use the bathroom cleaner as a substitute.”
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From Joann Employee Confessions on Twitter:
Confession 17 - Our Joann was closed! We received a C&D from the Chief of Police! We were so ecstatic as employees when they came in and told us to cease all business operations! Not even curbside! BUT then we had to tell our District Manager... and everything changed.
Our DM told us to come back to work tomorrow because he was going to have Joann's lawyers work on it. My heart sank. Them being open was more important. So I went into work and it was so nice not being open to the public. We finally caught up on recovery and cleaning! All things we have neglected the past week because it's been too busy for us to keep up! All of us were in great spirits and it was the best day ever. Until our DM called... and he told us to section off all the "non-essential" parts of the store.
Fabric and sewing notions were deemed essential and we would be open to the public the next day. No curbside only. Nope. People were to come right back in and nothing about limitations. Nothing about cleaning our disgusting fabric. Just to section off half the store so the public could come in and buy all the fabric and sewing supplies they could want. And to add to that... they are doing a remnant promotion where all the spare pieces are free to the customer now! Another thing for our already spare crew to do when we don't have time!
I am honestly so shattered over how the Chief of Police who seemed so interested in our well-being backed out of this. We are exposed once again. 3 of us tonight took Leave of Absence papers tonight because we don't feel safe. This was the final nail in the coffin.
UPDATE - My coworker messaged me, “Got up at 10:00 to get ready for work. A text came in saying the store is closed and I don't have to come to work. Seems there was a conference call. It appears the state is involved and overrode the mayor!” But Joann is still fighting it. This is a day by day thing. They are telling us if we want hours we have to go to another store. If not, we have to put in our leave of absence. 
More articles coming through right now: 
These Retailers Refused To Close During The Pandemic, So An Illinois City Shut Them Down
Joann Fabrics' mask-making promotion raises questions
Gregory said the masks were being donated to Rush Oak Park Hospital in Oak Park and to Northwestern Medicine Delnor Hospital in Geneva – but spokespeople for both those hospitals said it was not true.“Due to infection control measures, Northwestern Medicine cannot accept donations of handmade masks, gowns and other medical supplies,” according to an email from Kimberly Waterman, spokeswoman for Northwestern Medicine Delnor. “Only factory-made, hospital-quality supplies, including N95 masks, face shields, gloves, gowns, sanitizers and swabs can be donated.”
“There is no barrier,” White said. “Once [handmade cloth masks] get wet, I don’t think they’re that effective.” (I can confirm. A RN confirmed with me that cloth masks collect moisture which acts as a magnet for infections.)
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petri808 · 3 years
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Quarantine memories fic hoarding craze for @thenaluarchive
— thank you to @phoenix-before-the-flame for helping jump start this fic 💜
It was Natsu Dragneel’s absolute favorite time of the day. 1 pm for him, and 8 am for Lucy, his… well, right now they were just online friends separated by distance and priorities. But judging by how he talked about her to friends, you’d never know it. They’d met three years ago on Twitch through a random chat stream about an anime series, and he continued following Lucy on her writing streams. Three years ago, she was a sophomore in college while he was in his senior year. Lucy later moved on to a graduate program, but they stayed in touch, growing close. To Natsu, she wasn’t just some girl online but a real friend he cared very much about. His friends called Lucy his online girlfriend. Pfft. He wished he could call her that.
Roughly two thousand miles away, Lucy Heartfilia was hating life. Her curtains were drawn, and a blanket was pulled over her head to drown out the light. The air conditioner was down to 60 degrees Fahrenheit, working against the low-grade fever and pounding migraine born yesterday. Migraines… the bane of her otherwise healthy existence. It was her fault after all, the temptation of a chocolate dessert knowing full well it was one of her triggers brought on said migraine and all she could do was bear it.
Why?
“Stupid hoarders!” Lucy groaned to herself.
As if dealing with a pandemic wasn’t bad enough, people’s selfish reactions to it were worse. A government agency had claimed that acetaminophen products could help with the virus’s symptoms, so what did people do? Panic buying anything and everything they could find containing that drug! The problem for people like Lucy, is the one over the counter medication that helped with her migraines was Excedrine… an acetaminophen product! And she’d just. run. out.
Lucy’s phone rang and she knew exactly who it could be based on the time. So, she clicked the answer button without opening her eyes.
“Hey, Natsu,” she groaned out.
“Morning Lucy! Oh geez, you sound like a frog.”
“Thanks,” she retorted sarcastically. “I’ve got a migraine.”
“Ouch.” Natsu genuinely flinched. He rarely got headaches, but this wasn’t the first time he’d talked to Lucy when she was going through one, so he knew what she was going through. “The meds aren’t helping?”
Lucy sighed. “I ran out. And did you see the news about all the hoarding? Every store here is bought out. It… sucks.”
“I could check around here and send you any I find,” he offered.
“Aww, that’s sweet of you Natsu, but I don’t wanna trouble you.”
“Pfft. Nonsense. I’m sure you’d do the same for me.”
“Thanks, Natsu. I appreciate it.” Lucy smiled through the pain. There’s a good reason her feelings for the man had grown over the years. His sweet and caring, yet fun and goofy, positive personality was an easy drug to get hooked to.
“Anyway, I gotta get back to work.” Natsu whined. “Good morning again, stay hydrated, and I’ll check on you again when I’m finished for the day, okay Lucy? Get some rest.”
“Have a good day at work Natsu.”
“Will now, after hearing your voice. Talk to you later Luce.”
She giggled softly. “Bye, Natsu.”
Lucy shifted under her blanket as she clicked off the phone to lie on her back. His sexy voice did wonders for her mood despite the pain still ravaging it. Now all she had to do was drag herself out of bed to eat something and drink water. She never had an appetite when she got these migraines, but it was a necessary fuel to fight it. All Lucy had left were extra strength Tylenol, so she could only hope it would at least take the edge off until the migraine ran its course.
Like so many others, this pandemic had really taken a toll on Lucy’s psyche. It’s not as if she went out a lot before it took hold, but just the fact it made going out dangerous brought different emotions to the situation. School had moved online which sucked all its own, she missed casually hanging out with friends on campus, and simply longed for the freedom of leaving her apartment as she pleased. But she understood the precautions of a quarantine. Frankly, she agreed with the city’s efforts to keep them as safe as possible no matter how many grumbled about it. Did it make it easier? No. But it was a necessary evil.
They weren’t completely trapped, could shop for necessities, visit family or friends, just encouraged to limit such gatherings as a safety precaution. If you went out, wear a mask, and just don’t stand too close to other people. Well, unless Lucy knew the person, why would she want strangers in her personal bubble anyway? And the mask thing? Have you ever been out shopping, and someone just sneezes without covering their mouth? Yeah— seriously, would it kill people to use one?! Why were people so selfish during times like this? Not everyone, but too many. Just like with all the hoarding frenzies that swept through cities, it was frustrating and— “Ugh…” being in a pain-driven bad mood was sure bringing her down today.
But despite all the external frustrations, the feelings of isolation from being in a quarantine for months were probably the most mentally exhausting part. It was lonely being so far away from home during a pandemic. Lucy’s been in college for five years and while she’s made friends in the new city, she was starting to crave comfort instead of an empty apartment. Her life online was one of the few things that made her happy, like Natsu’s daily calls, and kept her sane.
Natsu… her face heated up every time she thought about the man. They didn’t have a lot of hobbies in common, but he was always so supportive and made her laugh like no other could. Where they lacked in commonality, was made up in ease of conversation. It hadn’t taken very long for their online chats to feel more like an old friend and less like a faceless stranger. Over the years they’d talked about meeting in person one day after she finished school. It also helped that he was from a city not too far from where she came from, so if she chose to move back it would be convenient. But she also loved the new city she called home. Oh well, Lucy sighed. It was a decision still a couple of years away to make.
The next morning, Lucy woke up to find her migraine had finally given up. She could still feel the little bastard hiding, simmering somewhere ready to strike, but if it stayed mellow, it was something she could tolerate. Throughout the day, Lucy wasted no time in catching up on the homework she couldn’t finish the day before and making sure to stay hydrated with food in her stomach.
Lucy’s phone rang around 2pm.
“Hi Natsu, how was work?”
“Same ole, same ole,” he chuckled. “And how are you? Still feeling, okay?”
“Yeah, it hasn’t come back.”
“That’s great!”
Lucy could hear a lot of background noise, so she asked about it. “Oh, you’re not home yet?”
“Nah, and the commuters are being extra noisy today,” he responded benignly. “Anyway, tonight I won’t have time to talk cause I got a project due for work I need to finish.”
“Oh, that’s okay. Yeah, I’m still catching up from yesterday too and Levy’s dropping by for dinner.”
They chat for a few minutes about their day as Natsu waited for transportation. Lucy knew he used the subway to and from work, but today it sounded a little different, noisier and she swore there were engines instead of the normal train sounds. Maybe it was static. Finally, Lucy caught the muffled words now boarding.
“Shucks, time for me to go,” Natsu cut through. “Sweet dreams Lucy! I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Good night, Natsu!”
Lucy spent the afternoon relaxing online, chatting with friends and gaming. Her friend Levy McGarden later dropped by with take-out food for dinner and the two women caught up on random topics while movies droned on the television. They were both in grad school, so during the semester there wasn’t a lot of time to hang out, but they made do. Lucy was also doing a paid internship at a local magazine 4 days out of the week as part of her master’s program. She really enjoyed working there under one of the senior editors. He made it a fun learning experience.
Life was almost perfect except for the background isolation of the pandemic. Lucy was glad she wasn’t one of the individuals affected by jobs cuts, but it still got under her skin to feel trapped in a way. It was nice with her friend over... ‘Maybe I should see if Levy wants to become roommates?’ She wondered as she drifted off to sleep. The apartment would sure feel a lot less empty.
A knock at the door roused Lucy from her sleep. She blinked and yawned, looking at the alarm clock and that said 9 am the next morning. ‘Natsu didn’t call,’ she thought how odd. Maybe he slept in after working late.
Lucy dragged herself out of bed, throwing on a robe to answer the front door. “Gimme a sec,” she called out as she neared it.
“UPS delivery, ma’am.” The male voice responded.
‘UPS?’ Lucy grew confused. She didn’t remember ordering anything through them, but maybe she’d forgotten?
She peaked out of the peep hole, but all she could see was the box being held up. Okay a little weird, but some of the delivery people did that to show they were legitimate service people. Lucy slowly opened the door but kept the chain lock on while peering through the gap. But what she saw next brought on instant tears.
“H-How?” Her voice stammered out as her fingers quickly undid the lock and opened the door wide.
There Natsu stood holding a small brown box, dressed in a uniform of sorts, with a mask hanging under his chin, and wearing a goofy grin.
Lucy snorted a laugh as her eyes crinkled in happiness. “Is that a Halloween costume?”
“Yeah,” his smile widened, and hand scratched his head. “Surprise delivery,” Natsu held out the box, “for Lucy Heartfilia.”
“What is it?” She asked as she took it from him.
“Oh, I um found you Excedrine.”
Lucy opened the box to find 4 bottles. “You certainly did,” she laughed. “But why’d you bring it yourself?”
“It was quicker than the mail and… I hoped…” Natsu’s mannerism grew sheepish and tentative, “it was about time we finally met in person?”
Her face softened with a smile. “It truly is.” Lucy gestured into the apartment. “Please, make yourself at home.”
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alovevigilante · 3 years
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We were at the pool today. My ma took a few of the worst pics of me, as of late. I hate posing for photos. I look at them, and judge myself harshly. I looked nothing like I look here, when I have control of the camera. I don’t show you my extra, I got going on all around all over here, on me. The quarantine…. Let’s just say I ate my way through it… and it kinda snuck up on me and hit me like a ton of bricks when I couldn’t put on my old jeans comfortably without the additional muffin top, because I favored my spandex instead of them. (See next post for details…)
I was trying to figure out how to change my negative thought process about how I see myself physically. How do I look at ass photos of myself, without judging myself harshly? I’m asking. Seriously. It’s not a rhetorical question. Well, maybe I can start by not calling a picture of me, ass.
The other day I thought I’d try to find something to love about the things on my body I don’t. And I thought I’d try my hand at writing a love letter 💌 to my cellulite and extra lbs. but I can’t just say nice things and lie. I have to be completely honest, and choose things I can say that I will believe. That’s a tall order. How do I change the way I perceive this situation when ever since I can remember it’s been a really tough thing for me to appreciate? And if I lie, I’ll know about it. And I won’t buy into it, and I’ll feel worse. So, this is a great exercise for me, without busting my ass any more than I physically already have today. Ok?! Ok! So join me, won’t you? Here goes:
Dear cellulitis and other extra lbs on me,
Hello darlings…
Ok, I’m already in trouble, as I am not fond of cellulite or extra pounds, so they are not darlings to me. But saying, “hello assholes” isn’t nice to me either. What do you do, when you have things you can’t immediately control, about yourself that you don’t appreciate? Can you appreciate them? How do you focus on fixing what you deem as a problem without getting lost in “the problem”?
My, this is a conundrum… well, I did what I could do for today. What the hell else do I want from myself?! I can’t change it overnight! Jeez! Come onnnn, me! Give me a break! I went on a walk with my son, I did the brutal but eventually effective “Tracy Anderson” murder mat tape, which I could define better. I will call it, “yay tough for now but easier later sooooo good for me probably will not be able to walk or move for a week afterward but god bless here’s hoping I will feel less pain eventually and work out the lactic acidosis well Tracy may be wee, but she’s fiercely strong for a small woman, but that’s her job, she ducking MADE it her job, and she’s successful. Why don’t i make it my job too?! Cause I’m not built like her, and being a fitness expert isn’t me. Why don’t i get a job?! I can’t figure out what to go back to. Why aren’t I a success too?! I don’t have a good answer for that. And why doesn’t she have rolls like me when she sits down I sometimes have to tuck my belly into the elastic of my underwear when I decide to wear it. yes! I do that, harsh judges of me both internally and then subsequently externally! Do I got a problem with extreme honesty about myself?! Huh?! Huh?! Yeah! Yeahhhhh that’s what I THOUGHT (holy crap)” tape. And I did think that. So, I can choose to once again, think differently, and more positively.
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Seriously… she looks amazing! Tracy is a woman whose exercise videos are great, and are challenging for me to do on the daily because I’m out of practice. So Tracy Anderson isn’t the issue. The issue is me. The issue is what and how I feel about myself. I went on the treadmill after I saw this photo…. Inspired action, yes. But what was the inspiration? Fear of rejection or self love? A little mixed bag, I think.
So, because I feel the way I do, I am also avoiding grains and sugar like a mother that I am. And I’m drinking so much water that I’m spending 20 out of the 24 hours, peeing! What more can I do?! Well, maybe I can give myself a ducking break in the meantime. Maybe, I can do something else and not think about my bigger arms, stomach and thighs. Breaking from that train of thought will allow me a brain vacation away from judging my extra pounds and cellulite, and from hurting my own feelings. Maybe, in the meantime, I can appreciate my new boobs, which grew a whole cup size with the weight gain. Yay boobies!!!!
Well, that’s one way to look at it. Another, is not to look at it for awhile. Maybe I can go listen to music, or dance, or learn how to play the accordion or buy up all the tickets to a blue grass concert and give them away for free like some super cool people do. Whatever I decide, I’m going to choose to do something that is actually good for me, that I can enjoy and appreciate while I change for my more desired results! I can decide to think better about myself, so I can make choices, that will lead to better options to aid in my happiness down the line.
Now, I was just reminded by myself, that my ass is bigger too. That is a subjective thing whether it’s good or bad, but since we’re trying to make better thought choices let’s say, like Martha Stewart says hopefully about her ass, that it’s “a good thing”. Since my boobies are now huge, I’m now balanced. Bigger boobies, bigger culi too. Stands to reason. Ok! Great! I’ll start my letter again…
Dear extra on me that I once didn’t appreciate,
Guess what?! I like my bigger boobies! You’re still pretty perky. Also, to my culo, yes, you are bigger, but now we can wear tighter clothing with a greater effect! Yes! We are more pronounced in our lady regions…. Nice! And I’m actively toning the rest nicey nice like to match the other parts I enjoy, so, that’s cool too! Healthy me? Yes please! Ok! Great!
Hugs n kisses,
Me
See?! I’m going to figure out how to get right with me now if it kills me! No. We don’t want it to kill, we just want to be happier, right ladies who judge their bodies on the regular like me?! Don’t let this happen to you! Choose to find something about you to appreciate, and bolster the crap out of that until you notice that you’re happier. The rest will fall into place. But don’t let it fall too far down, otherwise you’ll need a bra, and I’ve given up bras for quarantine. And I’m not mad about it. There are positives to everything. Yes. And if you deem a photo of yourself ass that people take of you, don’t look. That’s one way to lose the weight. You can also make healthier choices, which includes thinking kinder thoughts about the things that you aren’t wild about in your life, or not wild about in you. 🙈🤷‍♀️😉🤣💕
Appendices: Openness to experience, is one factors of the 5 factor model, aka the 5 main personality traits in psychology. And there are 6 facets of openness (see below). I enjoy stretching my brain, and stretching my own blocks to honesty about myself, and my own personal blocks to love. Thank you, for coming with me on my journey to becoming more open about myself only. 😊
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(The pie charts above and below are not mine. The openness chart below does not represent me. It’s only meant as an example of the 6 facets of openness to experience that I enjoy experimenting with on myself in a rudimentary way in my life.)
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P.P. S. For those of you like me interested in learning more about how your brain structures affect your personality and how your experiences affect it as well, check out this article about how the 2 are linked. Cool stuff! It won’t let me cut and paste from safari or add the link, but the article is called, “brain structures correspond to different facets of personality” from psypost.org.)
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1ddiscourseoftheday · 3 years
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Wed 17 March ‘21
Did we really get a SHOW from Niall AND a new song with Zayn on it AND a Zayn interview and photoshoot? I guess it is a lucky day, Happy St Patrick’s Day to us!
“Happy Paddy’s day to my fellow Irish and anyone who celebrates our great country today,” said our resident leprechaun Niall, and “love how I’ve got more texts today than I got on my birthday,” haha well glad he’s getting the Irish love- and he played a show!! He streamed from the Toucan pub in London- it’s short, not even 15 minutes and only four songs (you can watch the part of the stream right before it where they… make a sandwich?? though if you’re wanting to stretch it out), but damn so good! He opened with two old favorites from Flicker, aw nice to hear you, somehow makes the fun poppy Black and White sound like it was always meant to be a tearjerker slow song, and then worked everyone into a frenzy by covering U2’s With or Without you and rightly so, that’s an awesome cover! No complaints about that set at all, heck yeah!
Zayn’s new song came out today, not last night; I thought I just got confused by timezone stuff but actually it wasn’t me! Something weird happened and they delayed it and it was super confusing (the term ‘technical difficulties’ was used so that clears up nothing) but anyway it’s out now! Technically it’s not Zayn’s new song but Ingrid Michaelson’s with a Z feature but anyway it’s so pretty, worth the wait. Ingrid said she wrote the song the night Biden won the election, about the intense relief she felt, that she hopes it can be a song of hope as we come out of COVID, and that Zayn reached out to her to let her know he was a fan and he’d like to work together. Merch for the song is available in Ingrid’s shop, and that’s really pretty too!
And NOT ONLY THAT, Zayn’s INTERVIEW is out as well plus PICTURES and wow they are, yes you guessed it, also extremely pretty! He’s always a model but we see him so infrequently that it’s always shocking all over again to be confronted with just how damn perfect his face is, and they show him off very well indeed. And he SPEAKS; it’s very brief but the few glimpses inside he allows us are always a gift. He says, "I feel like, in general, no one is listening at the moment. With everything going on, and in a world of unnecessarily overexposed opinions, with people yelling at each other to see who makes the most noise, I feel like no one is being heard. People love to talk, but nobody likes to listen," "I think the quarantine has affected me in the same way as everyone else. I am not a person that spends too much time outside home or outdoors and I like to have my own space, so that is the only advantage, other than that now it is also driving me crazy," and less thoughtful but my personal favorite, I love salty Zayn telling haters what’s what, “if I haven’t worked with them, it’s because I don’t want to work with them yet.” Plus: "It really is not easy to have some form of creative freedom or control. The truth is that I have to continually go against the grain when people tell me to do things a certain way, but my stubbornness and my willingness to want to do things differently help me get through it.”
An article about Harry talks to Kid Harpoon, who Harry continues to outsource that part of Fine Line promo to-- as Harry’s stand in he talks about songs they wrote together in Japan that didn’t make it on FL including one that “nearly made it to the record” that “he and Styles are still obsessed with,” saying “it’s the same as the Watermelon thing with this song, it’s got… there’s a certain feeling in it, we’re just going to have to chip away at it and hopefully get it.” Fans-- HS3 is coming? Lol WHAT?? Like someday yeah but as usual I do NOT know how you got from that point A to that point B kids, it is not coming anytime soon. We also saw a video of Harry (via a dad!) saying “hi I’m Harry” for a fan, we KNOW Harry, and looking super cute, we also know that already, truly nothing new there, but news to me was that after Harry’s performance there was a spike of interest in leather pants and boas, I look forward to the fashion I see at the grocery store getting wild in the coming months; nothing about interest in Clueless jackets though, sorry Harry. Mitch posts to say, “as the grammy hangover wanes, just want to say how proud I am of my friend Harry,” and the Daily Mail included Harry in a layout of “pop princesses” at the grammys, nice to see the tabloids printing some TRUTH for once!
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Terrible to Meet You - A Harry Styles One Shot - Act 4, And love blooms in hearts not fields
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Harry wants to get out of the house. Alex wants to get home.
Alex meets Harry at at crossroads. Harry meets Alex on a one way street.
A coffee shop OU fic feat. lattes, lamingtons & that Great Unfathomable Feeling.
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Story Page Here Terrible to Meet You Playlists My Masterlist Here
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7 Minutes 'It doesn't seem like long, but my whole world has changed'
Harry's insides were shaking.
He could feel it vibrating up and down his spine, circling his ribcage and then settling uncomfortably at the back of his throat. The nerves and anxiety sped around his body the closer to the Heathrow they got.
Tears threatened to pierce his eyes each time he looked over at Alex beside him. She was staring out the window saying silent goodbyes to London as they drove. 
Harry really didn't understand how this moment came so quickly. He knew that Alex's feelings were as mixed as his. Harry wanted her to go home, she'd been trying all year. Heartsick and homesick, she'd pushed through living on the other side of the world to her family as the world suffered through something horrifying.
After getting the email, her last week in London was bittersweet. It was spent packing up her room and saying goodbyes for the second, third times. Harry helped her organise herself, and then put himself in isolation with Alex for her final 48 hours. She needed to present a negative COVID test to Australian officials before she could fly. Getting tested and locking themselves away together for two days was a special kind of magic, really. They didn't have to share each other.
After Harry, Alex was saddest to say goodbye to The Daily Dose. 
She was going to miss Paul. Despite his eccentricities, he somehow managed to always keep the tone light and playful with her, and generally, the days passed quickly. Alex left Sydney for London after a gruelling university course left her feeling unmoored and unsure of herself, her time working for Paul had been an enormous time of discovery and healing for her. 
He'd been a source of comfort and support for her, especially in the last year, and he was the shoulder she'd cried on far too often. Alex loved making coffee despite how most people saw the job. There was a satisfaction in the process, even in the daily grind—the cleaning, the busyness, the dead patches—and Alex liked leaving the cafe in the afternoon with the smell of coffee seeping out of her but a clean shop locked up ready for the next day. 
She was going to miss that. But at the same time, Alex felt ready to go on and do more with her time now. The university degree hanging in her parent's study didn't feel like a straight-jacket anymore, and she was looking forward to finding work in her field. 
 London had been home for four years, though. She had many great memories here, not the least of which it was the city she flew the coup and found herself in. And the magic she thought was lost seemed to have redeemed itself in the final months of her being there.
She found herself, and then, she'd found Harry.
&&&
Saying goodbye to Harry was the hardest thing Alex had ever done. 
They'd both cried the night before, but when it was time to part at the airport Harry was steadfast in his encouragement of her leaving. (Despite himself) He'd never once said he (seriously) didn't want her to leave, or that she shouldn't. He'd never implied it would spell doom for their relationship. Harry was 100% sure that Alex going back home to Australia was just the next line in their story, and certainly not the last one. 
"You get home safely, okay?" Harry told her sternly, holding her face between his hands at the drop-off line. Both their masks were down around their chins, and Harry hated the tears he couldn't stop Alex from shedding, "This is a good thing, Al, you need to be home right now."
"I know," she nodded bravely, frowning as her chin wobbled, "But I don't want to leave—
"Shh, no," Harry shook his head and leaned closer, "You're not leaving me, you're going home.”
"When am I going to see you again though," she cried out, finally giving in to the (slightly) hysterical emotions that were bubbling just below the surface. 
Harry's heart rattled watching the wave of doubt hit her. He pressed his lips into her hairline and held her for another long moment.
"You'll see me in Dubai on your stopover," he'd said, rocking her against his chest, his words hurried against the material of her shirt, “You'll land, use the bathrooms, and then FaceTime me. That's when you'll see me next. And then, you'll see me when you get to Sydney and call me again. Okay?
"Okay," Alex parroted quietly.
"Okay … You really have to go now," Harry looked behind her to where the doors to the terminal were.
She nodded and reached up onto her tippy toes, letting Harry press his warm lips against hers once last time. Alex squeezed her eyes shut, trying to hold in tears but also the feel of him. His smell, where his body began and ended, how it measured up next to hers. 
Their hearts reached out, trying to feel the other pressing through their chests from the other side. You're mine, you're mine, they said to each other.
"I love you," Harry told her, not for the first time.
Seeing the red wetness around Harry's eyes, Alex threaded her hands through his hair, "I love you, too."
He pressed a quick kiss to her lips again, "Go."
Harry's belief that they were going to be okay was unwavering. 
If 2020 taught him anything, the whole world could change in a matter of weeks, so why not the entire outlook of his life as well? Why couldn't his meeting Alex change the course of both their lives moving forward? Something about meeting her felt like a one-time event, like something worth risking everything for. And he would, Harry told her numerous times that last week.
And as she walked away from him and into Heathrow, and Alex believed him.
&&&
Alex cried as her flight landed at Sydney International Airport. 
She'd watched the harbour out her window as the plane circled the city, that perfect Sydney turquoise blue gleaming back up at her and it made her chest ache with relief. 
Home.
Sydney airport was a stark change from the Heathrow she left behind. Their flight was met by police, abundance and army officers. It wasn't frightening though, Alex found herself swallowing back tears this time because she was so soothed by the fact she was back in Australia. Everyone was friendly and helpful, getting the flight of returning citizens through the airport and onto buses to the quarantine hotels. Alex's drove straight into the city centre and as soon as they started going by familiar places and landmarks she wasn't the only one teary in their seat. 
"Well, here it is," Alex said to the phone screen not long after, tilting it around to show off the hotel room around her, "Home for the next fourteen days."
"Snazzy," Harry whistled as she pulled back the sheer curtains to reveal a staggering blue sky and then bright green treetops. He was sitting at his kitchen table with a cup of tea and a drizzly London morning just beginning, "And a view! Is that a balcony? Or a window?"
"A balcony but it's locked. I did get to smell the salty, beautiful harbour in the two-second walk from the bus into the hotel though." Alex settled on the bed in the middle of the room, the bedding crisp and clean underneath her, "I am literally inside this room for two weeks. No outside time. But I can see people outside walking around and having picnics in Hyde Park without masks on, so it'll be worth it."
"That seems unreal."
"It's like another world here," Alex agreed, yawning and finally feeling her body start to relax. "Anyway, how was your day yesterday? Wait, no, today?"
Harry laughed, "You've lost two days, I think. But it was good. I went and saw Paul, we had a cry together."
"Don't," she warned him, feeling the combination of over-tiredness and emotion simmering in her throat, "I've just travelled thirty-six hours, and I fucking miss you already, I'm not beyond completely losing it right now."
He smiled gently, "Have a shower and get into bed. I'm so glad you're there. Does it feel good to be home?"
"So good," Alex admitted, almost feeling like it was a dirty thing to be admitting to Harry, "Jess is going to come and wave at me from the park tomorrow with Noah. My mum's already sent a bunch of food to my room."
"You're exactly where you need to be," Harry told her. 
Alex couldn't hold back her tears any longer, the guilt she felt—the pain of leaving Harry—wasn't any match to finally being where she'd wanted to be all year, "Yeah, I am."
&&&
Figure 8 'Lovers hold on to everything'
Four days into her quarantine, Alex started training herself to do headstands.
"It's harder than it looks! But I'm getting there now," She laughed, propping her phone up against the leg of the bed and crawling to the wall opposite. She was now on Day 11, and Harry had been getting an update daily.
"Please don't injure yourself," Harry moaned, getting a great view of her bum as she crouched down facing the wall and then rose up, kicking her legs up with her palms flat on the floor.
"See?" The blood all rushed to her head, and Alex's hair fell down over her face at the same time her t-shirt moved, revelling her belly and bra to Harry. 
"Much better than yesterday," he told her, "Maybe tomorrow we could lose the bra?"
Alex laughed, her arms shaking as she came crashing to the ground. She was still working on the landing. 
Just as she was about to reply, she heard a knock on the door, "Oh!" 
"Dinner?" Harry guessed, watching her leap to her feet and disappear from view. A moment later, her legs walked across the screen, and Harry rolled over in bed to try to rid his phone screen of the glare coming from his windows open to the new London morning. "Oi!"
"Calm your farm," Alex tutted, retrieving her phone and grinning at Harry, "You'll never guess what I've got today."
"Hmm," Harry hummed in mock thought, "Let me guess, chicken and rice. A cookie and a ridiculous allotment of fruit?"
"Two bananas, an apple and four apricots."
"S'practically a fruit basket!"
"Tomorrow I get a glass of wine," Alex was already chewing, "Friday night drinks!"
"Friday date night?" Harry suggested, his fingers twitching with the want to be feeling her body between his sheets again, "You're fun when you're a little tipsy."
"Excuse me, I'm always fun!"
Harry laughed, "I can't believe you're so upbeat still. I'd been expecting a dip at some point. I would think a lot of people don't do so well in isolation for two weeks."
"I've got Australian daytime TV and a boyfriend who sends fun gifts,” she eyed the collection of books and puzzles Harry had organised, “I am looking forward to Sunday though."
Harry couldn't imagine how much Alex was looking forward to getting to see her family and friends when her time in quarantine ended, "Did you get tested today?"
"Yes," Alex screwed up her face, the memory of the swab up her nose still fresh, "Fucking hurt."
"Last one," he encouraged. "What's the first thing you're going to do with your brother when he picks you up?"
She halted before putting the next mouthful of warm, lacklustre dinner in her mouth, "It's supposed to be sunny and warm on Sunday, but I don't get released until the evening. So I think we'll just go to mum and dads for tea. Jess and Matt are going to be there."
"A large gathering in the home!" Harry looked scandalised, but he was smiling. 
"I know, it's all very 2019," Alex joked. 
Harry let out a long sigh from his chest, "I'm so happy you're there, but I miss you."
"You too," she said quietly.
"Hey," Harry called out, not having meant to dampen the mood, "Three sleeps until you get to meet Noah."
The mention of her nephew made Alex smile, "I'm gonna squeeze him so hard."
"Will you FaceTime me there?"
"O'course," her mouth was full, but she nodded emphatically. "My mum asked if we were going to have live music at all family events now."
Harry's laugh exploded out of him, he liked Alex's family very much already, "Happy to oblige."
"Because of you she's also back on Nathan about giving up the trombone in Year 8." Alex told him, "He was previously the musical hope for the family, but he stopped when the girl he liked at fourteen said she would only date a rugby player … Consequently, that girl is also responsible for how Nathan broke his nose."
Harry could sympathise with Alex's older brother, "We do crazy things for love."
&&&
"Could you say that again?"
"Were you not listening?"
"No I was, I just like hearing it in your accent."
"Harry," Alex complained, "I'm already shit at this."
"You're not!" He insisted, trying desperately to keep the grin at bay. 
Alex frowned at him and pulled the hotel duvet up to her chin, crossing her legs and slipping her free arm across her chest. Harry's heart was racing, hearing her talk about how his words were making her feel was incredible. Almost as good as physically having her. Almost.
"Al," Harry stilled at the defeated look on her face. His smile disappeared, "Sorry, I wasn't teasing."
"I'm no good a phone sex, it feels weird."
"I know it does at first," he tentatively reassured her, hoping not to draw attention to the fact that over the years Harry had become sort of good at phone sex. By virtue of necessity, such was his regular travel schedule. "I promise it can be great, and we can only get better at it. You're not no good. On the contrary, I'm enjoying myself very much."
She was finding it difficult. And even more so, trying to learn Harry and what he liked—how his body responded—without actually having his body physically there felt impossible. Phone sex was awkward and difficult, and Alex was more self-conscious then she'd ever been, trying to navigate intimacy with Harry through a phone screen. There was a divide there. He was right though, the undercurrent to what he said was that they'd have to get better, there was no other choice. It was all they had.
"Show me what you were doing," Harry beckoned gently, sensing Alex relaxing back into the moment. "And just imagine I'm there, don't apologise for angles or lighting. I don't care."
It was her last day in the hotel, and Alex had woken up with an ache between her thighs. Harry Facetimed her the instant he got the photo of her lying in the sheets, her torso exposed and wishing for his touch. He'd been sitting at home on his Saturday night, watching the first five minutes of half a dozen things on Netflix yet not finding his mind was able to focus on any. 
Alex he could focus on though. 
Her five seconds of bravery felt far away now, but Alex slowly pushed down the bedding again, "I was thinking about you going down on me."
Harry smiled, "Go on."
&&&
Nineteen 'I felt you in my life before I ever thought to'
Three months passed. 
The dreaded milestone ticked over which meant Harry and Alex had been separated the same amount of time they'd spent together in London.
It hadn't ever felt like this for Harry before.
He'd never known what this kind of missing someone was. Previously, he'd missed people, but not with a yearning or a longing that made his chest ache. Not with the kind of force that had him lying in bed at night unable to switch off the channel tuned to Alex.
What time was it in Sydney? Had he already sent her that link? Did she say she was spending the day with her dad? What could he say to get her back in that bikini from the day before? 
Missing Alex felt like having an itch inside his mind he couldn't scratch.
But in a sense, how much he wanted to be with her only made his consequent decisions easier. 
"You're hopeless!" His manager laughed him from LA, the whole team on the weekly check-in Zoom call. Generally there wasn't a lot to report between them, projects were on hold or cancelled. Harry had decided not to go back to the States to work on a few smaller things—a fashion shoot, a TV guest appearance and a small role in a film—giving his legal team some work in getting him out of contracts, but that was mostly sorted now. 
If he was going anywhere, it sure as hell wasn't across the Atlantic. 
"Not hopeless," Harry replied diplomatically, "It's something else … But it's not hopeless. It almost feels like having the answer and being the little kid jumping up and down on the spot, dying for the teacher to hurry up and ask the question."
A series of blank looks came back at him. Harry sighed. He'd never been bad at explaining his personal life before. It was always so rational, the relationships made sense or happened in a usual way. He just couldn’t shake the notion that all along, people had been right. 
When you know you know. 
He'd found Alex. 
That was as simple as it was to him. But it didn't settle everyone else the way it settled Harry. 
Alex. 
Did the name not tick a checkbox in their heads too? 
"So, you're going to Australia?"
"I just want to know what it could look like," Harry amended the assumption, but yes, he was going to end up wherever Alex did, and if that was Australia then that was that. 
"Who's in Australia?" 
The question wasn't to Harry, it wasn't about who he was going to Australia for., they all knew who Alex was. The question was about the industry—about Harry's career. It was who was in Australia for him to work with? Frankly, he didn’t see why the same people he worked with now couldn’t also be the people he continued working with either remotely, or with short trips abroad when travel allowed. 
"Obviously, it's not like everything can be done there," Harry offered diplomatically, "But at least for the foreseeable future, with the world how it is … Music as the primary focus, I want to write the next album there. Spend some time seeing the country too, I've always wanted to."
He got a collection of nods, and a few spoken agreements, assurances that it could work.
"This isn't a temporary thing," he said of Alex, looking at the faces who helped him run his life, "We're going to be navigating this for the rest of my career. So everyone's going to need to add Sydney time to their Clock app."
&&&
When he met Alex, Harry knew. 
When he landed in Sydney, Harry knew again. 
It was the right choice, it was the right place for him to be. All he wanted was to be moving in her direction; in the same direction as her. 
It was warm despite the late hour, the air was fragrant with it, in stark contrast to the London he left behind. 
He tried to think back to the last time he’d been in Australia, to what it felt like back then. 
If only he’d know then …
Harry opted not to apply for any special considerations or circumstances. He didn't want anything to jeopardise him being able to enter what was likely the world's most difficult country to get into now—especially seeing as Harry wasn't a resident, much less a citizen. Harry didn't want to hit the news. And despite evidence of people he knew in the industry being able to dictate where they quarantined on arrival, Harry requested nothing. He just wanted to fly in, go to whatever hotel they told him to, do his two weeks quarantine and then be with her. 
"Have you landed?" Alex's voice was urgent and tinged with excitement. 
Harry laughed, "Yes, how do you think I'm calling."
She squeaked, "You're here!"
"I'm here," he smiled under his mask, following the flow of fellow travellers walking through the empty airport, "Who ever heard of an International Airport having a curfew though? The pilot made the joke that if we were projected to land even a minute after 11pm, he'd have to turn around and go back to London. Which was like, a joke, but also not funny?"
Alex chortled, "You'll have to get used to the sense of humour here."
"Hang on," Harry saw a checkpoint of sorts ahead of him, "I have to go. I'll call you back."
"Call me from the hotel," she said, "I love you."
"I love you, too."
&&&
"Go to the window."
“Hi. What?" Harry could barely move his head off the pillow as his eyes struggled to open.
"Go to your window," Alex repeated, "Were you asleep?"
He sat up, heart thrumming quickly at the possibility of what he was going to see. A second before his mind had only barely been able to scramble together the cognitive function to swipe to answer the call. 
When he got to the window, Harry pulled back the curtains—he'd ended up at the same hotel Alex had been in too—his room looked out over Sydney's Hyde Park, the fountain and cathedral framing his window. Although his top floor room with a (locked) balcony was a little bigger than hers had been he still felt as if he was living in their FaceTime calls. He was sure he'd become more acquainted with the trees and greenery out his window as the days passed. 
"What am I looking for?" He asked, but Harry knew.
"I'm down here, can you see me? Blue jeans shorts … Yellow top? I've got a sign!"
Harry's eyes scanned the footpath opposite the hotel, there was a main road between him and the park. He'd been in the room less than 12 hours though, so he wasn't familiar with the foot traffic. 
"I can't… Wait, I see you," his mouth opened in a huge smile, "Hi!"
Harry waved and pressed his hand to the window as his heart waved down at Alex's. He felt like his insides were being swapped around inside him as he took his first look at her in the flesh in nearly thirteen weeks. She had sunglasses sitting up on top of her head and a The New Yorker tote bag over her shoulder. He bit his lip at all the exposed skin he was looking at, feeling it a cruel injustice in the fact he would be touching his girlfriend for a fortnight.
Alex was squinting up at the hotel, one hand to her forehead, blocking the sun while the other held her phone to her ear, "How high up at you?"
"Next to the yellow and red flag," he said, looking for a distinguishing feature. He'd fallen asleep to the sound of the rope flapping against the building.
Alex's voice took a teasing tone, "Oh, who's that sexy man with his shirt off in the hotel window?" 
"I can't read your sign."
"I only had a Biro," she lamented, shoving the makeshift sign under her arm, "It just says Hi."
"Hi," Harry leant his forehead into the window, "You look beautiful."
"So do you."
"You going to stand out there for the next two weeks?"
"Would you like me to?"
"Yes, please."
Harry watched her take a step back and lean against the wall to the park behind her, "I'd better get comfy then."
&&&
There was a couple in the room next door to Harry.
"I'm telling you, it's relentless," he implored Alex with his eyes, pausing for a second to listen to the sound of their bed hitting the wall, "They're at it constantly."
"Embrace it, some people are into that," Alex giggled from her parent's kitchen. She was making dinner for the whole family, with her AirPods in and Harry chatting to her as she chopped vegetables. "Let it get you in the mood, Harry. Is that voyeurism, or exhibitionism? I can never—"
"—Okay," He rolled his eyes, "Thank you, Comedian."
"You're just jealous you're not getting any."
"I really am," Harry said seriously, "If I have to wait, so should they."
Alex's laugh filled his ears, "It's alright, less than a week to go now."
"I cannot wait to be holding you," he said, longing in his voice. 
Harry had mixed feelings leaving London. He didn't know when he'd be back, but at the very least he was going to miss his first Christmas with his family. With England in lockdown, it was unlikely that even if he had stayed, he would be able to spend it with them anyway, but Harry would miss them. He already missed them. 
It wasn't like he missed Alex, though. And in all the conversations he'd had with his mum, or his sister, or anyone else, they'd all told him to go for her. They saw it in his eyes and heard it in his voice when he spoke about her. Or maybe their hearts knew as well, as though Harry meeting Alex had been locked away in them all and now the light to that room was switched on. 
So there he was, in Australia. To be with his love.
&&&
Ten Days 'Time has changed nothing at all, you're still the only one that feels like home'
Harry asked the nurse who took his last COVID swab to help him.
He hadn't requested anything up until that point, but he knew, even behind her protective gear, she was a friendly face. And he also knew that there were rumblings online that he was in Sydney. (All those spare and jet lag hours, he'd tried to stay off the internet, he really had) 
The good news was it was just rumblings, because why on earth would Harry Styles be in Sydney.
All it would take was one photo to confirm it though, which in a sense, was fine, he didn't care.
But Harry didn't want that photo to be of any of his first moments back with Alex.
Let someone snap a picture in a couple of weeks, on a random beach or coming out of a cafe somewhere. Just not his first day. Not when he hadn't seen her since the beginning of September almost three months ago.
He asked if the nurse could help him arrange Alex for access to the hotel car park because the discharge information pack he'd received directed him to organise pick up on the street. 
The next two days went slowly, those final 48 hours, waiting for a negative result and trying like anything to bat away fears that it wouldn't be the same. That somehow Harry and Alex would've lost the something that lit the spark in London. 
He hated that feeling—the doubt—and when he confessed it to his sister, she batted it away as nerves. She said life was always full of uncertainty and risks, the idea was to choose the ones you thought were worth taking. 
&&&
Alex stared at her legs as she sat, waiting for Harry in her dad's car.
It hadn't taken long to get the colour back to them, although mostly she was fixated on how she should have dressed a little nicer for the first time seeing Harry in months. She didn't even have proper shoes on, just the thongs that she'd kicked off the night before after coming back from the park with the dogs. 
Harry hadn't seen this side of her. This casual, probably more Australian sounding Alex. The one with bare feet and sunglasses holding her hair back. He'd met her family over video calls, but what would Harry think when he was in a room full of them? They were loud and could have distasteful senses of humour. There were family jokes that Alex had never thought twice about before but now worried Harry wouldn't appreciate. 
She'd slipped back into the comforting hum of life in Sydney so easily. Her friends, her family, her city. When she left Sydney hadn't felt like home, but as soon as she stepped back into it something in Alex let out a sigh of return. It was strange, leaving London just at the end of the summer months and falling straight into the beginning of a new summer here. 
In front of her, Alex sensed movement. The door she'd been instructed to park in front of opened, and a very tall man in an army uniform stepped into the underground car park, propping open the door with his foot. He pointed to Alex in the front seat and said something to Harry, who was the next person to appear, followed by a nurse in full PPE.
Alex felt an explosion in her chest, an electric shock or a bolt of lightning. Two hearts jumping up and down in excitement. 
She cracked the car door open and heard Harry thanking the two people escorting him, his hands moved as though they were itching to add a handshake to the gesture.
As soon as Alex was in his eyesight though Harry didn't think about anyone else. 
She emerged and hovered by the front of the car, waiting for Harry to approach her, as if unsure what she was allowed to do. The sight of her in an oversized hoodie and small athletic shorts warmed him instantly. She looked perfect, with a tan that evaded her in London and a brightness behind her eyes Harry was addicted to already. He liked the thought that he was an errand, that picking up her boyfriend was on a list of things for her to do that day. The word 'normal' flashed in Harry's mind, and any worry he'd had about her or him or them together being different from how he remembered it disappeared.
"Hi," he smiled wide as he tugged down the mask covering his face and stepped right into her personal space, his bag and suitcase abandoned behind him. 
Speechless, Alex breathed Harry in deeply through tears as she was tightly wrapped up in his arms. She couldn't bring any words to the surface, and so they just stood in silence, holding each other. 
After a moment Harry turned his face into her neck and pressed a slow, warm kiss below her ear, "Hello, hello, hello," he said between kisses. 
It only made Alex's crying increase, and she squeezed him tighter while leveraging herself higher up his body, not yet willing or able to step away. 
"Alex," Harry said her name gently, "Let me see you, please."
She leant back but covered her cheeks with her sleeves, peering over at Harry through blurry eyes, "Wait a sec."
He smiled and pulled her hands away by her wrists, "Give me a kiss."
&&&
"You're such a tourist," Alex laughed as she drove, watching Harry lean forward in the passenger seat and try to take a photo through the windscreen of the Sydney Harbour Bridge above them. 
"You know bridges are my passion," he said dryly. 
She smiled as he sat back and slipped his hand back into hers. 
"I quite like you driving," Harry said, eyeing her in the drivers' seat, "Look at you knowing your way around."
Alex grinned under her sunglasses, "We're in my city now, baby."
&&&
Harry's mouth hovered hotly over the skin below Alex's breasts. 
"Harry," she ran her fingers through his hair, hating the anticipation. 
His lips upturned at the impatience behind her saying his name. He pressed a kiss to the skin there, then another half an inch further down her tummy, "M'not in a hurry."
"I am," Alex urged.
"Oh?" Harry stopped and looked up at her, his elbows on either side of her hips as he held himself over her, "You are?"
"Yes."
"Going somewhere after this?"
She whined, whined, "No, Harry."
Alex hadn't taken him home to her family. Not yet. 
She drove an hour out of the city to a beach suburb with what Alex had deemed the nicest Airbnb. It was private, and without Sydney's usual cohort of international tourists, the area was deserted except for locals. They could hear the ocean from the bedroom and see if from the kitchen. She'd booked them two nights; two nights to reconnect and just live in the presence of each other without her family stepping in and inevitably stealing Harry's heart.
(Except, of course, it was Alex's heart who has his, all this time)
"Look at you, fuck," Harry said, tilting back up to take her lips in his, pressing his torso, his thighs, his stomach, his hardened crotch into her. "Fucking gorgeous."
"We can do slow later," she all but begged, her fingers digging into his exposed back, "Please. Just … Just please, Harry."
Alex felt his hand brush over her thigh, deliciously trailing over the sensitive skin just below her hip bone and down between them. His eyes dipped down between them only briefly before Alex was feeling the tip of him pressing into her exactly where she needed it. 
"Yes," her body relaxed into the feeling, remembering the London nights, the mornings and that first time in his living room. 
"Alex," Harry said her name like he could hardly believe it, and at the same time as wanting to savour the moment he was thinking of their first, hurried time as well. His hips snapped forward, remembering that time the rush came from wanting to taste, to experience something new and to have Alex's body for his own the first time. 
The urgency behind Harry's movements this time were for want of something had and sorely missed, something already claimed but given up for a time.
Alex's head was stretched back onto the pillow underneath him while she felt her body shift and squeeze around him. She wrapped her arms around his chest to feel him closer, wanting to hold onto him as he pumped in and out, sighing against her neck, trying to regulate himself.
"God, Al."
"Harry."
&&&
Four nights later, tucked into the spare room at her parent's house, Harry rolled over and took her hand. 
"I think we should get a place here."
"A what?"
"A flat, a house, we should rent something in Sydney." 
"Sydney?" Alex's tone elevated, almost touching the spinning ceiling fan above them.
"Yes, Sydney," Harry repeated, "You mentioned a job you liked the look of a few weeks ago, did you apply for it? "
"But what about London? That's where you live, God, what about your work, Harry."
"I want to be here, I'm not in any hurry to go back to what normal was. Normal didn't have you," Harry said, throwing out the script he'd built in his head the last month. His heart was doing the talking, extempore, "I've watched you this week, Alex, it's like you're a whole different person here. You're so happy and settled and joyful, which, by the way, I already thought you were but here … Do you really want to go again? Could you leave your family again?"
Alex felt her chest going into overdrive like everything was whirring around too quickly. She felt had to be honest, though, despite the way it made the fear climb further up her throat, "No. I don't want to leave."
Harry brought her knuckles up to kiss, "I don't want you to leave, either. So, what if we stayed? For as long as it's where you need to be?"
"But your family—
"—Doing this means one of us is always going to be away from someone," Harry told her, "I can handle missing my family, Al, I can't handle missing you. You're it."
"It just seems like too much to ask you to do, Harry."
"You're not asking," he insisted. "I can figure out how to work from here. London was my home base, I spent a lot of the year away anyway. And it's not that much further to LA for stuff, I … I'm saying I can make it work here, Alex. I want to make it work with you."
Alex's heart did a cartwheel, "You want to stay in Sydney?"
Harry's somersaulted, "I want to stay with you, yes."
The End.  &&&
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Thanks for reading, everyone! x Kate
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kyle-valenti · 3 years
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burnout only feels like burning
2.7k / Summary: kyle valenti doesn't have the same quarantine as his friends; an exploration of kyle's trauma during covid as a doctor. (tw depression & other triggers you’d imagine with this subject)
read & comment/ ao3
A little like the virus itself, Kyle’s relationship with his mask begins with worry, annoyance, and then pain. He’s more than happy to have the proper N-95 mask as they begin to get their first case at Roswell General but then a couple more patients trickle in and within a few days his skin is irritated and itching. Maybe it’s the news, maybe it’s the texts from his friends that he’s increasingly missing, but when the Regiment starts spouting off about how COVID is a joke he thinks it might be affecting his nerves too. By week three his former red mark left by the mask has become a permanent feature to his face and by week five it’s not a mark but a bruise instead. Blisters and cracks in his skin litter his hands from over-washing. His feet become so overused the pads of his feet feel numb and bruised and he wears through an entire pair of shoes.
Positivity has fled from his life by week seven and now he’s inside of a survival mode he’s never experienced. He thought after last year he’d be used to anything the world (or universe, rather, given all these aliens) could throw at him. Now what feels foolish, he had believed that there was nothing that could be worse than the previous pain of losing a patient or finding out his father had experimented on people’s lives. 
When he’s out of ventilators and CPAP machines because Albuquerque needs them more and he has to choose whether or not to save the life of an eighty five year old or a thirty two year old he remembers from high school, he breaks.
 Guilt is one thing, grief is another, but the pure rage he feels knowing that Max Evans is out on the town patrolling as some fucking cop and not someone who could heal most of this hospital makes him want to commit actual murder. Maybe trading the blood of an alien on his hands would feel less heart-wrenching. But no. Max had brought back Rosa and had paid the price. Quelling his anger, he went back to work.
 He slept at the hospital most nights in the height of it. Sure the couch was rough, but it was better than the other on-call doctor beds down the hall. Three twelve hour ER shifts of a usual work week doubled to five days of thirteen hour shifts. Soon there’s a week where he pulls double shifts for an entire week when one of his nurses is urgently hospitalized herself. Hospital directors had left them with no PPE except contaminated masks to reuse. Maria, Isobel, and Rosa are in the forefront of a drive to make and donate masks to his hospital after some social media posts that he doesn’t even see until the cloth masks arrive and his medical assistants give him their handwritten note. It makes him smile, but smiling feels so foreign that he almost wants to break from that.
 Visitors are no longer allowed which means Kyle isn’t allowed to use his bedside manner to comfort the family of patients. He has to facetime mothers, spouses, and children and hold the phone over a patient who can’t breathe without machine assistance and pretend that everything is fine and that there’s still hope despite the hypoxia and lack of rising vitals. Ignore that if the patient goes into cardiac arrest more than once, the kindest thing to do given prognosis is to let the patient pass. Resuscitation and DNR (a patient’s begging request to not be resuscitated) becomes a word he uses in his daily work and not simply for intense surgeries.
 Exhaustion isn’t a deep enough adjective to describe the fugue state he goes into. File to file, room to room, ventilator to next… he isn’t surprised when his body starts to wear down. When he no longer feels hunger and instead feels all too hot and dizzy. Telling himself it’s just because of how much he’s exerting his body while covered in layers and layers of protective clothing doesn’t help the fact that he’s starting to have more trouble breathing as he walks the hallways at a fast pace. When he begins to cough, he does what he promised himself he wouldn’t do and drives out post-shift to the desert cabin of Max Evans.
 Part of him is too desperately tired to knock, but when he arrives on the property with the cop car idle and the house dark and at peace for the night, his fury greets him with the embrace of a long-lost friend. Knuckles pound at the wood and Max answers the door with surprise and a general look of defense, and Kyle tries not to immediately punch him in the face at the fact he looks like he had woken up from a comfortable sleep.
 “Heal me.” Kyle manages to spit out.
 “I—what’s wrong?”
 “Beginning stages of respiratory distress, fever, nausea—what do you fucking think?”
 “Kyle—,” Max starts to say, the hesitation deepening, and that does it.
 “No. I have not asked you for anything in all of this, Evans. Anything!” He shouts, voice hoarse. “Not when people got sick, not when they started dying, not even when we started having to let people die on purpose. And you know what? I wasn’t going to even come and ask you now, but I can’t get sick when I’m the one here fucking saving lives out of the two of us and you’re just cruising the streets handing out goddamn traffic tickets.”
 Max’s face isn’t stony like it usually is when Kyle’s yelling at him; this time it’s crushed and guilty but not nearly enough. “What kind of hours you work this week, Evans? A nice 8 to 4? Did you get facetime with Isobel or your mom, maybe binge through a few books and movies after you’re home? Did you sit down and eat a nice dinner and or go over to drink a few beers with Guerin since you can’t get sick? Even get a nice eight hours of sleep in your own bed in your nice quiet home?”
 No response.
 “I am not asking to sequence your DNA like Liz. All I am asking is for you to let me heal people since you don’t want to.”
 A night breeze is all that makes noise for a moment as Kyle catches his breath and glares at Max, who stands quietly but is staring down at his boots before he finally looks up and nods. Max steps forward then, and Kyle sees that his eyes are actually filled with tears. Temper deflating, but still not subsiding entirely, given that not much else is able to be done; Kyle lets Max place a hand on his shoulder and feels the extremely weird feeling spread throughout his body. Something more electric than anything else, which God knew made a lot more sense concerning his powers and how the body operated with electrical nerve impulses, but that is a train of thought better left for another day. He wants to just walk away, and he almost does, but he still mutters a “thank you” before he does so.
When his nurse dies a few days later and he watches as the staff double bag her body to take to the morgue, he escapes to his office and crashes on his couch with sobs. There’s no one here to support him. He can’t go to his mother’s home and collapse into one of her comforting embraces without risking infecting her. He can’t get wasted at the Wild Pony with Maria when it’s closed. He can’t visit Rosa or Arturo at the Crashdown. Keeping his friends and family safe meant keeping them away from him. Keeping them safe meant he needed to stop pushing his head into his hands to try and control the sound of his crying and get back to work at saving the lives around them.
He gets put on leave by the hospital administrator when he’s almost arrested for decking Wyatt Long in the hospital parking lot as the idiot stood outside with a sign rallying Regiment members to make sure the hospital was told it was killing people on purpose for the election. If Jenna hadn’t been the officer on duty he would have been cuffed and put on record, jeopardizing his license, but there was some self-preserving part of him that desperately wished for his practice to be over anyway. He’s not even sure how Jenna handles it, honestly, all he remembers is her dropping him off at his house from her patrol car like she had been nothing but an uber. No matter how angry and adamant he gets, his boss refuses to bend, saying it’s for his own good given the connections the Long’s have in the town and how Kyle has worked almost 74 of the past 76 days.
Alex is the first to visit him, unannounced. When the doorbell rings Kyle is mindlessly pretending to watch some tv show in his living room that’ll distract him from his consuming thoughts about patients, so he doesn’t get up to answer. He checks his silent phone to see if he was forewarned of a visitor but sees nothing. Unsure if it’s his boss or a patient’s family, he forces himself up onto his sore feet and opens the door after grabbing a regular mask off the coffee table. Black face mask on and standing further out from the door on the porch is Alex, the usual gruff hello turned into something soft. “Hey.”
Kyle heaves a sigh. He had wondered when the pity visits would begin. “Hey. You really shouldn’t be around me, you know.”
“I’m clearly a minimum of eight feet away in an open space while masked.” Alex smarts back. “Either way, I’m worried about you.”
Scoffing, he shakes his head. “Don’t fucking worry about me. Worry about getting sick, because if I have to see another person I care about die, I--,”
“Kyle.” the other says too kindly, the sort of pacifying voice Alex reserved for only the most dire situations. “I have no idea what you’re dealing with in specifics, but my experiences do overlap with yours in some places.”
“And?”
Maybe it came out a little too rude, because Alex raises a brow, but then sighs instead. “And I’m just checking in to make sure you know people care about you.”
“Thanks, Manes.” Kyle huffs in return, managing not to roll his eyes because focusing on being blunt and abrasive was so much easier.
“Just be careful.” Alex interjects before Kyle could close the door and turn back to his show. “Dealing with the trauma of what you’re dealing with gets dark very quickly.”
“Because I punched Wyatt Long?” he spits back sarcastically.
“No, because the suicide rates for healthcare professionals are drastically increasing along with the rates of PTSD diagnoses.” Alex says flatly, ever one to be unfazed by sarcasm. “And I’ve lost more active duty members to suicide than I have combat.”
Kyle pauses, caught. Maybe Alex had known he would be, because there isn’t some way he can give a smile and reassuring wave with him like he could his mother or Liz. While Kyle hadn’t actively thought of a plan, he couldn’t pretend he had noticed signs of depression the second he was alone in his house. 
“The quiet is the worst part, right?” Alex says, all but reading his mind. “Not always because of the flashbacks, although those are horrible, but because if things are quiet then--,”
“--people are dying.” Kyle finishes, his voice raspier by the end of the three words. “Yeah, well, mine still are.”
“They’re going to.” Is what felt like a cold response, but somehow gave Kyle the understanding he’s been craving. “They’re going to die and because of your profession you’re going to be able to save some of them. Which will make you think you’re responsible to save all of them and because you’re a good person you’re going to feel guilty in ways that no one will understand for being human and failing to.”
“Failing is all I do lately.” Kyle replies. “Usually the wins feel higher than the losses as a doctor, but with this-- and no one outside of it cares. They go outside and yell about how this is about a fucking election and when it’s not the patients, it’s the hospital pretending they don’t have enough money to buy us proper protection. Or the government saying this will all go away and that it’s just a light cold.”
Alex gives a small nod. “I know. I also know telling you the same advice that you’d give another doctor of trying not to burn out and instead taking a small rest is useless. So I’m just going to drop off these dvd’s and make you report back to me the difference when you’re done.”
Star Trek and Star Wars. Kyle finds a smile tug on his lips. Alex leaves with one on his as well.
When he gives a response to Alex a few days later on how Star Wars is better not more than a few minutes later Deluca is texting him with recommendations on joining her Buffy the Vampire Slayer rewatch. There’s something sweet about the fact that people have been clearly talking about him, even if definitely borderline creepy with how nosy his circle of friends can be, but he sighs and lets Maria add him to the group chat she has with Rosa and Liz where they review each episode after the fact and even chimes in every now and then. Isobel gets added not long after due to an Instagram story Maria shares and then the group has moved onto Friends after everyone shoots down Liz for suggesting Grey’s Anatomy on behalf of Kyle. Alex is also in there, even if it’s rare he chimes in with an opinion, but once they start Friends his commentary about how much he hates Ross that gets the entire group riled up does tend to make him laugh. Even Kyle agrees with Forest-- whose opinion had been shared by Alex-- that Chandler had all too many queer-coded scenes with Joey.
His mother facetimes him daily, which given how they both don’t exactly go out much starts to become monotonous, until she begins to give in and talk about memories she has of their father. Tidbits she never would have shared with him about their adult life when he was a child or teenager. He in turn facetimes Rosa and shares some of the memories of their father as well, which as much as she tries to pretend she doesn’t want for Arturo’s sake she clearly does with the million questions she asks every single time and the small smile she gives him at the end of their calls.
Liz updates him on her work which is a nice reprieve from everyone’s normalcy and lack of medical jargon sometimes, especially when she gives him inside info on covid vaccine studies not yet published to the general public yet. Everything in him wants this more than anything else in the world right now and he texts her almost every day asking if she’s heard more news even when he knows things take time. She’s a good sport about everything, even when he shares in a very angry rant about Max Evans and how they could have helped so many more people so much more quickly with his DNA-- however selfish that might have been.
When he goes back to work, he feels refreshed, even when it makes things hit like a freight train once more. Lost in a sea of inadequacy, his feelings extend past the pandemic. Even when things return to a level of normalcy and the cases subside he gets alien medical drama thrown in his face once more, and he starts to wonder if he’ll ever recover. If he was wrong to choose this calling. If the fact he can’t help Max or Maria is a sign from above or his father that it’s time to make some career move or change location like his mother and Liz. But, like he tells Michael Guerin. He can’t think he can face his future children and say he walked away from this. Or let people die by quitting, just like Rosa warns. And so he stays and tries to heal both other people and himself.
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stylesberries · 4 years
Text
Wooden Floor
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Summary: Reuniting with Harry after being apart during the quarantine made you realize something.
Genre(s): mostly fluff with a sprinkle of angst
Word Count: 1.2k
Warning(s): none
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I was standing in the kitchen at 6 p.m still wearing my pajamas. As the quarantine started, my daily routine was quickly thrown out of the window and replaced by this. Well, whatever it is. Pajamas is the only thing I wear now, as I rarely leave the house or have to face a human being. Speaking about facing human beings. More precisely my favorite of them - Harry, my boyfriend.
I haven’t seen him for a bit over two months now, and I think I’m going insane. Having dated him for a year and a half, I was completely and utterly in love. You know, that kind of love they try their best to describe in books? Yeah, that kind of love.
Harry would FaceTime me multiple times a day, in the morning, before going to sleep and sometimes during the day. Despite the fact that he was stuck in Los Angeles, and we had to come up with a schedule to be able to talk with an 8-hour time difference, we would still find a way to make it work. However, it would never be enough for me.
As long as I can remember, I’ve always been a lover. I would love too much and trust too much. I would always end up hurting over people that just kept torturing me with their indifference.
When I met Harry, and we started dating, I promised myself to give him space and not suffocate him with my love, for I was scared, that he would leave me like everyone before him did.
I had never been loved so much. I had never experienced what I gave people myself. The endless love and loyalty. Harry gave me his all, and I started feeling bad for not showing all of the love I had for him, and yet I still feared losing him because of my obsessive nature.
I sat at the kitchen table and scrolled through our texts with Harry.
Harry: Jeff is talking to people, trying to get me a private jet flight to London.
Y/N: That’s great, love. I hope he comes up with something. I can imagine how much you’ve missed family. Anne is talking about you the all the time. She’s devastated that you didn’t get to come home.
Harry: I am upset too, baby.
Harry: Mom says you’ve been in a gloomy mood. Is something wrong?
Y/N: It’s just quarantine. Don’t worry about it, lovie.
It wasn’t “just quarantine”. I just fucking miss him. To the point where I cannot properly function without him around. I sound sick.
Harry: When I get back home to you, we’ll find a way to get my baby back in a good mood, yeah?
You just get back home and everything will be fine.
Y/N: Okay, baby.
He hasn’t answered yet. Probably fell asleep. I text one more time just to check.
Y/N: H?
Yup. Sleeping. Now he’s gonna wake up and think that I can’t be without him for a second. Great.
If he’s coming soon, I have to make sure that I don’t freak out too much or he’ll think that I’m obsessed.
That evening was spent overthinking in the bed, a mug of my favorite hot chocolate and some random movie that I played in the background to keep me company.
I was awoken by a loud thud coming from downstairs. Who the hell is in the house?
I quickly get out of bed and look around for something heavy I could use as self-defense. Let me just say, looking for something specific in the dark, two minutes after you woke up isn’t the easiest thing I’ve done in my life.
As I begin to lose hopes to find anything to protect myself with, I catch my metal horse statue glimmering in the dark. Perfect.
I grab the heavy statue and tip-toe my way out of the bedroom.
I stood at the top of the staircase and looked around, listening closely to any sound indicating where the intruder might be.
Hearing clatter coming from the kitchen, I slowly make my way down the stairs, making sure that the statue is up and ready to make a hit.
As I come closer to the kitchen doorway, I can now see faint illumination coming from the downlights on the ceiling.
The next thing I know is the metal horse falls from my hands and probably leaves a dent in the wooden floor.
No matter how sleepy I am and no matter how dark it is, I could recognize this faint scent of vanilla lingering around me and this breathing pattern anywhere. Harry is home.
As the metal horse touched the floor I hear the clattering abruptly end, being replaced with loud footsteps. The sound of which I know too well.
“Y/N? Angel, why are you up? It’s so late. As soon as Jeff told me I could fly out, I took the earliest flight home. I was going to surprise you, baby. I’m sorry I didn’t mean t’wake you. Fuck. I’ve missed you so much.” He rambled cutting the distance between us shorter and shorter. I looked up at him and I couldn’t believe my eyes.
He’s home.
“Hey, hey, baby, no. Please don’t cry, bubby... C’mere.” He cooed as he wrapped his arms around me.
Only now I’ve noticed the warm drops making their way down my cheeks, as I stared at the man I loved so dearly.
The plan I came up with was long forgotten, and the only thing I wanted to do was to cling on to Harry and just breathe him in.
“My angel. M’beautiful. Everything’s okay now, yeah? I can’t believe you’re back in my arms. Y’know it’s the only thing I could think about in these two months? I couldn’t work properly without having my muse by my side.” Harry kept kissing the the top of my head, as he swayed us from side to side.
I squeezed my arm in between us to wide my tears away to look at Harry properly. He took a step away to let my eyes absorb him.
“It was more than two months.” I look into his emerald eyes that I’ve missed so much.
“72 days and-” He pulls his phone out of his back pocket and looks at the time. I stood in shock, taking a glance at the screen of his phone. It was in the British Summer Time zone.
Knowing Harry for over two years, I know that he doesn’t change his time for about a week after he lands in a new place, because he keeps forgetting to do so. Does this mean he’s had London time on his phone the whole time?
“4 hours and 23 minutes.” He announced to me and looked into my eyes, that were filled with doubt and insecurities, with his - full of love and adoration. His eyes stared into mine, as if assuring me “Yes, I fucking love you, stupid”.
Now the only thing I had left to worry about was the dent in the wooden floor.
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© all right belong to stylesberries. do not repost or modify.
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The Great Jewish Cook-off
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Pairing: Walter Marshall x Jewish Reader
Prompt: Latkes from the 8 Days of Henry-kkah
Word Count: ~1.8k
Warnings: Mentions of sadness and depression in regards to the holidays and the current pandemic.
A/N: Happy Hanukkah. I wanted to get this done for the first day, but my depression reared it’s ugly head. I decided to start off this challenge by writing for my favorite bear. I’m feeling a bit homesick due to the fact I’m normally back home with my family at this time of year. So this piece reflects a bit of that.
A delicate blanket made of snowflakes had nestled itself over the streets of Minneapolis. Normally by the time Walter was evicted from his office at the station, this picturesque scene would have been turned into mucky slush. However, with the impending snowstorm on top of the current stay at home order, the snowy streets remained relatively undisturbed. Walking towards his car, he took in the sight before him; it was different to be caught up in it rather than watching this winter wonderland from his office window.
The tired detective let out a groan as he clamored into his freezing car. The sun was just beginning to set and bright oranges and reds danced across the wintery whiter stage that was this city. He quickly turned on the ignition and peeled out of his parking spot, eager to be out of the cold and in the arms of his girl. The ride home was rather uneventful due to the denizens of this icy city finally listening to restrictions set in place. At least, that’s what he had hoped. The amount of times Walter had been called to break up a party in the past few months would have astounded him had he not been dealing with humanity’s worst of the worst in homicide.
In addition, Faye had been participating in remote learning, which allowed her to blow up his phone throughout the day. It was bad enough that he had be relegated from homicide to deal with those covidiots, but having a stir-crazy teenager attached to her phone when she should be paying attention to her classes was surely wearing him down. He went from having a phone that could stay charged for a few days straight to having to charge it nightly due to his daughter’s antics. In hindsight, it was better than her spending her ample free time messaging strangers online. All he wanted now was a quiet night at home with his girlfriend; perhaps, cuddled up on the couch with some wine and watching whatever silly holiday movie piqued their interest.
The first thing he noticed as he pulled into the driveway was that your car was parked out front, yet the lights were off in the house. It was still rather light out so it wouldn’t have been the biggest deal in the world if Walter wasn’t a cop. Nevertheless, it caused the hairs on the back of his neck to stand up as he exited the vehicle. The curly haired man quickly removed his gun from his holster and began to walk towards the front door. With a swift turn of the door knob, he could tell that you had once again left the door unlocked. This was a continued point of contention in the relationship as the horrors of that dreadful day a few years back were ever present in his mind.
Granted, the two of you had not even met yet and most of the details of that brutal case were never to be disclosed to the public. Walter carefully opened the door and stepped into the house. He heard the crackle of the fire in the next room and quickly ascertained that his worst fears hadn’t come true. Sliding his gun back into the holster, Walter quietly toed off his boots and hung his jacket up in the closet. Then he took off his mask and set it on the table by the door. His sock covered feet padded against the hard wooden floor of the entryway as he made his way towards the living room. The electric fire was the only source of light in the room and he could scarcely make your sleeping form out on the couch.
It wasn’t like you to be asleep this early, but ever since the world shut down, things have been rather different around here. Walter silently leant down to give you a kiss on the cheek and to check to make sure you weren’t suffering from a fever. Grabbing his phone from his back pocket, he made his way over to the kitchen to get started on dinner. Just as he was about to go through the sea of texts from Faye, the detective noticed a faint smell of burnt food. He set his phone on the counter and quickly flicked on the lights.
Walter immediately saw the culprit of the smell sitting on the stove. The pan that was there had something black seared to its insides, yet it was too charred for him to tell further. Whatever you had made had clearly gone awry and you had quickly cleaned up almost all traces of your failed attempt. You were a good cook and always roped him into whatever cooking show was on tv; even Faye would join the two of you whenever she would stay over. You had spent your down time during the quarantine trying out new recipes; some were good enough to be added to the meal rotation, while others had failed to win approval across the board.
It was no bother to him to take your place as the cook tonight if it meant you had one less thing weighing you down. This time of year was hard on most people and adding in a pandemic only made things more difficult. Tossing the pan into the sink for a well deserved deep cleaning at a later time, Walter noticed his phone light up on the counter. Another text from Faye joined the countless others and now was as good a time as any to go through them.
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Walter had to thank whoever blessed him with his daughter and her daily text spams. The mystery of the burned food had been solved without having to wake you. Clearly, you had a bit of trouble with the latkes, but luckily for you now he was home to assist in anyway you needed. Hanukkah dinner could be a team effort. The curly haired man made quick work of getting the pan you had been using clean before he made his way over to the couch you were on. Getting down on bended knee in front of your sleeping form, he gently placed a hand on you to wake you up.
“Sweetheart…would you consider rejoining the land of the living?” He whispered.
“Too cozy,” you grumbled as you pulled an arm up to cover your eyes.
“I bet you are, but you won’t be if I take this blanket,” Walter chuckled.
That got you to sit up and stare blearily at him. “You wouldn’t dare let me freeze” you replied to which he raised an eyebrow at you as if to say try me.
You sighed heavily and pulled the blanket off you before folding and returning it to its spot over the back of the couch. Your bear of a man sat down beside you and gently pat his thigh, the universal signal for you to come cuddle up on his lap. You eagerly shot up and made yourself cozy on his lap, burying your face in his neck and breathing him in. His hand came up to slowly stroke your back as the two of you cuddled in silence.
“What’s on your mind, love?” He questioned as he kissed the top of your head.
You tried to hold back the tears that were eager to pour out, “I miss my family, Walt. I’m so used to spending at least some of the holidays with them. Then my cousins decided to have a latke cook-off since we can’t get together and I burned them. I have no idea how I did it. It was awful and it made me wish that my gram was here to help me fix it. B-b-but she’s back home and I’m here and I don’t know when I’ll get to cook with her again.” The last part came out in as sob.
“Shhhhh honey. Shhhh. It’s ok,” Walter murmured into your hair and he hugged you tightly as you cried into his neck.
It took a few minutes for all your sadness and frustration to be sobbed out. The detective remained the strong beacon of light that his girl needed to get through this storm of emotions. He whispered his love and praises into your hair, never letting go of you even for a second. You needed to get everything out that you been bundling up in inside. When the last remaining tears had fallen and your sniffles had abated, you slowly lifted your head to look at him.
“Well I think together we can try and kick those cousins of yours’ arses, sweetheart. What do you say?”
“I’d say let’s try to save Hanukkah.”
“Good. Up we get,” Walter said, giving a small swat to your butt.
You quickly clamored off of his lap and hurried into the kitchen to get out the supplies. Walter followed after you and waited for further instructions. The two of started cleaning and shredding the potatoes. You even turned it into a game to see who shred the most potatoes the fastest and it turned out a tie. Soon you added the rest of the ingredients to the bowl while he heated the pan. Walter and you worked together as a perfect team; joking around and laughing as you fried the latkes.
Walter set the table as you continued to cook up you Hanukkah meal. He grabbed the applesauce and ketchup since that what you recommended to accompany them. When you had finally finished cooking the last few and added them to the growing pile, you took the precious cargo over to your eager boyfriend. Each latke turned out a perfect golden brown that was hard on the outside and softer in the center. With the first bite, the two of you moaned at the salty, oily goodness.
“Now you see why we only make them once a year,” You hummed in between bites.
“I do indeed. Faye asked you to save her some.”
“Well we did make enough to feed an army. The only issue is you big guy,” You teased,” But yes I can save her some.”
You finished the latke you were on and padded over to the kitchen to grab a container before returning. You carefully placed the latkes inside and headed back to the kitchen to stick them in the freezer for the next time Faye was over. The two of you contentedly ate as many latkes as your stomachs could handle. With your stomachs and hearts full, the table was cleared and you both returned to curl up by the fire.
“Hey Walter,” You started, smiling up at him.
“Yes, love.”
“Thank you.”
140 notes · View notes
fxcking-anon · 4 years
Text
Red Cardigan
Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader
Category: Fluff
TW: None :)
Word Count: 2,017
A/N: I just can’t stop thinking about how cute this would be and I’m touch starved from quarantine, what else can I say? (@random-ravings you asked and you shall receive.) Also, it has been years since I’ve written so cut me a tiny bit of slack as I get back on the horse...also I’ve never written a reader insert before lol. 
P.S. I did proofread this but I’m also tired and maybe a little tipsy so....
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Your eyes fluttered open, met with bright sun streaming in between the slats of your bedroom blinds. You squinted and stretched, letting your back crack as you sat up. You instantly regretted it. The covers had fallen from your chest, leaving you exposed to the icy temperatures of your apartment. Looking around, you found something red and soft folded on your nightstand. You quickly pulled it on, buttoning it as fast as you can with your numb fingers. 
As you covered your hands with the sleeves, you realized this was Spencer’s cardigan. His cologne lingered, making you smile as you took in a deep breath. You looked to your left to see him, still asleep and hugging his pillow. His face was always so peaceful when he slept. Spencer cared so much about his cases, something you absolutely adored about him. However, it did make you sad to see how he carried that stress with him. So often you caught him staring off into space, brows furrowed and fingers tapping on his thigh. Asleep, Spencer’s whole body was relaxed. His breaths were deep and even. He didn’t clench his jaw or his shoulders. He just...was. You smiled as you stared at him. It was hard not to, he just looked so soft and small. 
He let out a small sigh and squeezed the pillow a little tighter, making your heart flutter. You leaned down to place a soft kiss on his temple. He smiled in his sleep, making your heart swell even more. You glanced at the clock on your nightstand. 9:13 am. You and Spencer rarely had a morning to sleep in together. Your work schedules were unpredictable, both of you often getting called in at the last minute. So you decided to make the most of the morning. 
You braced yourself for the cold of the apartment as you peeled off the covers and stepped onto the hardwood. Pulling out the drawer of the nightstand, you pulled out your thickest pair of fuzzy socks slipped your feet into them. You then slid over to the dresser to pull on some underwear. Spencer had rid you of those early last night. When you both knew you had the next morning off, you made the most of it the night before. You glanced briefly at the bit of exposed skin on your chest, finding it littered with love bites, and giggled. Spencer had a habit of leaving marks. He would never say it, but he liked seeing physical proof you were his. And honestly, so did you. You always found yourself disappointed as they faded. 
You tiptoed your way into the small kitchen of your apartment, lightly shutting the bedroom door on your way. Knowing there were fresh blueberries in the fridge, you decided to whip up one of Spencer’s favorites, blueberry pancakes. Before you pulled out the pancake mix, you started a pot of coffee. Your boyfriend’s caffeine addiction had gotten to the point where he couldn’t function without at least two cups of coffee. Rather than try to have a conversation with a walking zombie, you learned to have coffee on hand when he rose from the dead. 
You were just about finished stirring the blueberries into the batter when you heard shuffling behind you. “Y/N?”
You turned around to see Spencer, wrapped in a cable knit blanket, standing in the kitchen door frame. His eyes were half shut, resisting the natural light pouring through the kitchen windows. It certainly didn’t help that two inches of snow had accumulated the night before, reflecting everything off of the bright white surface. 
“Good morning sleepyhead,” you smiled at him as you turned back to your batter. You quickly ran your hand under the faucet and flicked a few water droplets onto your frying pan. Hearing them sizzle, you rummaged around a drawer for a ladle. You could hear Spencer shuffle over to the coffee pot and pull a mug out of the cabinet. You ladled the first three pancakes into the pan before turning to your boyfriend again. He was in the middle of adding a fifth spoonful of sugar to his coffee when he sensed your eyes on him and turned.
“Hi,” he said, his voice raspy and low. You stepped to him and wrapped your arms around him, letting him pull his blanket around the both of you. Between the blanket, his sweater and him, his scent flooded your body. You wanted to freeze that moment and stay there forever. It wasn’t that you didn’t love the more spontaneous moments of your relationship. There, right in that moment, you were just completely at peace. You could hear the steady rhythm of his heart beat and his warmth radiated into you. This was true contentment. This was peace. “Baby, as much as I love your hugs, your pancakes are going to burn,” Spencer said, releasing his hold on you. You leaned up to give him a quick peck before grabbing your spatula and flipping the pancakes over. 
“Do you want to grab some plates? I was going to set the table before I went to wake you up. Seems that coffee went and did that for me instead.”
Spencer just hummed in agreement before beginning to set your kitchen table. You flipped the pancakes one more time, making sure they were golden brown on both sides. Right as you were piling them onto the spatula, you heard Spencer take in a sharp breath.
“Is that...is that my cardigan?” His stare was intense as he raked his eyes down your body from your semi exposed chest to where the cardigan rested at the tops of your thighs. 
You rounded the table to place the three pancakes on his plate, standing between his legs. “It is, you left it on the nightstand and it looked so warm. It’s freezing in the apartment today,” you leaned down to peck his nose when he lightly grabbed the back of your neck and guided you into a deeper kiss. Pulling you onto his lap, he started to pepper kisses down your neck. You let out a light moan as he lightly sucked on one of the marks he’d left last night. 
Bringing his lips to your ear, he mumbled in his gruff morning voice, “I knew I liked you in my clothes Y/N, but this has to be my new favorite.” You lifted a hand under his chin to pull his lips back to yours. The kiss was soft and slow, making you feel just the slightest bit lightheaded. 
Reluctantly, you pulled away, moving to get up to flip the second round of pancakes. His hands slid to your hips and held you for a second. “The pancakes,” you whined at him, shuffling a little bit to try and wiggle from his grip. He pressed another kiss to your lips before releasing you. Even as you turned your back to him to tend to your breakfast, you could feel his eyes on you, boring holes into your back. You flipped the pancakes smoothly, refusing to let yourself turn around to meet his gaze just yet. As badly as you wanted him, your anxiety was screaming that the apartment would catch on fire if you left the frying pan unattended again. So you stood there, still, feeling his eyes on you as you waited for the second round of pancakes to brown. When they finally did, you stacked them on your spatula again and turned off the stove top. 
Turning around, you found Spencer halfway through his pancakes. You deposited your pancakes on your own plate and sat down. Your pancakes, however, remained untouched. Now it was you who was staring. His hair curled around his face and stuck up at strange angle in the back. He hadn’t yet had his daily fight with his cowlick. He’d tied his blanket around his neck like a cape so he could have his hands free to eat. It amazed you sometimes how he could be both adorable and drop dead sexy at the same time. Noticing you were staring, Spencer’s eyes flitted up to meet yours. His fork hovered halfway between the plate and his mouth. It took him a moment before he decided to set it down. He sat upright and continued to hold your gaze.
“You are so beautiful,” he said. You felt the blush rush to your cheeks as you broke the gaze. You turned away from him, fixating your eyes on the grout between the kitchen tiles. “Y/N,” Spencer said, urging you to look at him again. You turned back to him hesitantly, barely meeting his gaze. You knew Spencer loved you, that he thought all those wonderful things about you. However, it didn’t make it any easier for you to accept his compliments. Years of insecurity and toxic relationships will do that to a person. 
You met his eyes tentatively. “Yes?”
“You are so, so beautiful,” Spencer said again. “Your mind, your soul, your body...they’re all so very beautiful.” You blushed even harder this time and forced yourself to maintain the eye contact. “Every day,” Spencer continued, “I’m amazed by how beautiful your heart is. You care so much about people and you would give any and everything for the people you love. It makes you radiant. You just radiate love and kindness and positivity.”
You wanted to go to him. You wanted to take his face in your hands and kiss every square inch of it. You wanted to show him just how deeply you loved him. Spencer was always better with words than you were. It certainly helped that he had every word in the dictionary permanently imprinted in his brain. 
You decided to go to him. You stood and walked around the table before perching on the edge of the table right in front of him. “I love you,” you whispered, cupping his chin in between your hands. He leaned forward to catch your lips in his again. He kissed you slowly, taking his time. He tasted like maple syrup and coffee and in that moment, that combination was the most divine taste in the world. It was your nectar of the gods. He ran his hands up your sides, once again pulling you into his lap. He chuckled into your kiss and you pulled away to look at him quizzically.
“You feel so soft,” Spencer said, chuckling again as he ran his hands over the fabric of his cardigan.
“Babe, this is yours. You wear this. All the time.” Your brow was furrowed as you cocked your head to the side to stare at him.
“I know! But I never feel the outside of it like this. I like it, it’s warm.” He proceeded to bury his face in your chest to press the soft fabric to his face. You laughed as he pulled you closer, his face settled directly between your breasts.
“Spence!” you giggled, “That tickles!” His hair was brushing lightly against your skin as you squirmed against him, just tickling you further. Somehow, you managed to slip from his grip and hop off the table. 
As you ran from the kitchen, Spencer jumped up to chase you. “Y/N,” he whined, “Baby, come back!” He caught up to you quickly. His long legs gave him that advantage in your tiny apartment. He grabbed your waist from behind, tugging you into his chest. You spun around to face him and roped your arms over his shoulders. 
“I like you in my cardigan, Y/N,” Spencer said again, softly as his lips pressed to your ear. 
“Funny, I thought you’d like me better without it,” you said, a coy smile creeping onto your face. His expression darkened slightly. You knew what buttons to push to get a reaction out of him. Spencer liked to be right, he always had to come out on top. 
“Oh, so you want to play dirty?” Spencer challenged back. Before you knew what was happening, he’d scooped you up over his shoulder and started towards the bedroom. “Fine, let’s play dirty.”
519 notes · View notes
cocochannel00 · 4 years
Text
Quarantine Date
Boyfriend!Harry plans a date in the era of social distancing...
A big PSA to all of my lovely followers: PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE WEAR A MASK AND SOCIAL DISTANCE WHEN IN PUBLIC. DON’T PUT YOURSELF AND OTHER PEOPLE AT RISK
Harry knew how important your work was to you. You were an essential worker during the COVID pandemic and had been working rigours 12+ hour shift at the hospital. You had barely seen or talked to Harry over the last couple of months, mainly because he had been locked down in LA for the first half of quarantine and you had been basically living in the hospital lounge. You had been dating Harry for almost a year now so you knew what it was like to have him far away, but this time it felt different. This time all you wanted to was spend your day off curled up in bed with Harry and watch as he tried to imitate Heath Ledger's accent in 10 Things I Hate About You instead of watching it by yourself. I guess you’d just have to spend the day wallowing in self pity with your tub of ice cream. 
You were half way through your movie when your phone rang. Too lazy to look at who’s calling to picked up the phone and spoke a quick hello.
“You. Me. Date tonight. No excuses” the person said through the phone.
“Why Tom Holland I’m flattered, but I’m sorry, I have a boyfriend already” you replied back as a joke.
“Ha ha very funny (y/n) and besides I know you don’t have Tom’s number yet. But seriously, I’ve been home nearly a week and I haven’t seen you in person.” Harry spoke.
“Haz, 4 patients on my floor tested positive for COVID this week. I don’t want to expose you or god forbid Anne or Gemma to it”
“We can do a social distance date, I’ll plan the whole thing,” Harry practically begged.
“Harry I don’t know...” you stated with a sigh.
“I know today is your day off and you’re probably curled up in bed with some ice cream right now so hear me out. You stay in your room and relax for the rest of the day and I’ll spend the day planning our date tonight. Please, love, I really want to see you even if it’s six feet apart and with a mask” Harry pleaded.
“Ok ok fine I’ll go on a social distancing date with you but only if you promise to stay 6 ft away” you said sternly.
“I’ll bring a measuring tape so you can double check” he replied as you laughed.
“Wonderful, I can’t wait. Do I need to wear something special to this date tonight?” You asked curiously.
“That’s a surprise for later”
“Harold you know I hate surprises” you whined over the phone.
“I know that’s why I love them. Now I need to go, I have lots of planning to do for tonight. Love you”
“Love you too, H. See you tonight” you replied before hanging up the phone.
You were excited yet nervous to see Harry in person. Seeing his face through zoom was one thing but seeming all of him in person without being able to run up and hug him could very well crush you on the spot. All you knew for sure was that thinking about this date was take up your entire day. You weren’t one for grand cheesy gestures and you hated being the center of attention so you prayed that Harry didn’t go overboard on the whole evening.
You groaned quietly as you rolled over the the other side of your bed (usually Harry’s side) and checked the alarm clock to see it was only 5 pm so you had at least another 3 hours of wallowing in self pity until Harry came back. For once you just wanted the clock to move faster. Sinking back down into your sheets you ran a hand through your wet hair from your morning shower. You knew you should have brushed it earlier so that it didn’t frizz , but you hadn’t been expecting company and you didn’t really care what you looked like under all your PPE at the hospital. Just as you were beginning to detangle your hair you got a message from Harry.
Harry: Wear pajamas tonight, we’re going extra comfy. Love you - H
You smiled at the message and placed the phone back onto your lap. Nothing could ever put a smile on your face faster than Harry’s name popping up on your screen. Back when you first started dating and you had been stressed about going back to work after visiting him on tour he would send you pictures of puppies every morning just to cheer you up. Now he’s resorted to other much less innocent tactics to try and cheer you up when you’re have a bad day, but you couldn’t complain (especially during quarantine). With all that said, Harry continues to surprise you daily so to say you were excited for your date night would be an understatement. The only thing getting you through the wait was knowing you needed to take at least a 2 hour nap before he got there otherwise you would pass out during your date tonight.
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You woke up to the sound of “Kiwi” blasting in your ear as the timer you had set went off. Carefully, you untangled yourself from your excessively long phone charger before check the time and realizing you only had ten minutes to get ready. How many times had you pressed snooze in your sleep? You were in too much of a rush to figure it out as you raced to your closet to put on a comfy pair of pajama shorts and an old college t shirt. Even though Harry said it was going to be casual you decided to still go through the effort of putting on a bit of concealer and foundation to try and cover up the bags under your eyes. You were just rubbing in your moisturizer when you got another text from Harry.
Harry: I’m downstairs, don’t look out your window. Come to the backyard when you’re ready because our date night is about to begin. - H 
You grinned widely at the message and quickly finished putting on the rest of your make-up while also running a brush through your hair. Your hair had definitely had better days but it was too late to do anything besides put your hair in a bun to try and keep the frizz down with the growing humidity. With one last look in the mirror, you went downstairs to go meet Harry.
You carefully made your way to the door and grabbed one of your cloth masks off of the counter before putting it on and opening the door to your backyard. Your porch had been covered in fairy lights and two mountains of pillows had been placed on opposite sides of the backyard. In the middle their stood a giant sheet with a projector set up underneath it. It looked like something out of a rom-com and you were shocked that Harry was able to set all of this up without you knowing. Just as you were about to call out Harry’s name you saw him walk in through the back door with a mask on, a bottle of wine in his hands. He was wearing one of your favorite striped shirts that you said made him look like Where’s Waldo’s cousin. 
“I know it’s not exactly how I would have liked to see you on our first date in months, but I made sure to measure out the 1 meter (6 feet) for the cushions” Harry stated as he placed the bottle of wine down on a table next to a box of pizza. 
Your eyes began to water at the sight of him in front of you. It had been so long since you had seen him in person and so much had happened in your life in the last couple months that all you wanted to do was run up and wrap your arms around him. You impulsively put your arms out and took a couple of steps forward before you remembered that you couldn’t touch him and put your hands down. A tear fell down your cheek just as Harry looked up from the bottle he was attempting to open.
“Y/n what’s wrong love. Did I do something wrong?” He asked cautiously as you shook your head.
“Just missed you a lot. Wanted to give you a hug, but I don’t want to risk it” you replied softly as you took off your mask and wiped the stray tears from your face. 
Harry slowly took off his mask and gave you a sympathetic smile, “Wish I could run up and hug you too, love. Missed you so much these past couple of weeks. Thought I was going to go crazy with Jeff and all that baking in LA”.
You chuckled softly at his efforts of lightening the mood before scrunching your nose the extensive facial hair you didn’t remember seeing before.
“When did you grow that fuzz ball on your face?” you questioned sarcastically as you made your way over to one of the pillow piles. 
Harry scoffed at your remark and ran his hand across his face, “Excuse me miss [y/l/n] but this has taken me nearly four months to grow and I’d say it is much more than just a fuzz ball” 
“You’re right Har, you definitely grew it out to pornstar level. Proud of you baby” you said with a giggle as Harry glared at you. 
“I did not come here to get harassed about my new look” Harry grumbled jokingly as he gave you his cheshire smile. 
“You’re right, you’re right, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t make fun of your tremendous accomplishments. Thank you by the way, for putting all of this together. This was really sweet. Oh my god, stop, is this your fuzzy sweater” You said with a squeal as you put on his multicolored cardigan he had placed on top of a blanket. You inhaled the smell of his Tom Ford cologne and smiled.
“I figured since I can’t give you a hug yet, you could wear that” he replied back as he carefully opened the box of pizza he had placed on a small table in the middle of the porch. 
You moaned softly as you stared at the pizza just a few feet away from you. 
“Why have I never heard you moan like that for me in bed?” Harry joked as you glared at him.
“That was my foodgasm moan. You know damn well I don’t keep quiet with you so I don’t want to hear any complaints. Now, give me two slices of that delicious pizza please” 
Harry laughed at your response as he placed his mask back on and put on some hand sanitizer before placing two piece of pizza on a plate and pouring you a glass of wine. He walked over to you carefully and placed the food and the glass on a tray next to you that you hadn’t seen. You thanked him before placing the tray in your lap and taking a sip of your wine. Harry began to grab himself a slice when you shouted his name and took out your phone. 
“Wait I want to get a picture of you in person. I can’t keep stalking your fans’ accounts to get pictures of you.” you mumbled as you tapped on your camera. 
Harry nodded grudgingly before he took off his mask and began posing with the bottle of wine. 
“I think I could be one of those influencers” he joked as he nearly spilled the wine onto his shirt. 
“I think maybe we should leave that to the pros” you replied jokingly as you curled up into your pillow fort and began munching on your food. 
Harry sat down in the the pillow fort adjacent to yours on your porch. The two of you talked as you ate and tried to catch each other up on anything that you had missed on your various facetime calls. It was nice to be able to see him in person and know that he was okay. You had been so worried he would catch it while in LA and even though he wasn’t in one of the high risk categories you had witnessed several health people die of the disease and you didn’t even want to think about Harry in that situation. After you had both finished your meals Harry decided to put on “10 Things I Hate About You” and proceed to jump up next to the sheet you guys were using for a screen and act out the entire bleacher serenade live. 
You could not keep the smile off of your face that night. Harry had this way of making you forget all of your problems when you were with him and you were grateful to have found someone as caring as him. 
“ I love you H, thank you for a wonderful night” you whispered as the credits rolled onto the screen. 
“Anything for you love. Glad I got to see for a bit even if you did fall asleep on me halfway through the movie.” He replied back with a grin.
“It wasn’t my fault! You made my pillow fort to cozy, how could I resist a cat nap?” you stated as you smiled at him.
“Can’t blame you for it. Got a couple of cute pictures of you sleeping for my lock screen though.” He replied with a smirk as you groaned.
“Harry I was definitely drooling, you need to delete those” you said as Harry shook his head. 
“Can’t do that. Got to show mom our lovely date night”
“Fine, but no one else sees that picture besides Anne. I can’t have Mitch and Jeff teasing me everytime I see them like with the whole ketchup fiasco.” you mumbled as you began to fold the blanket you had wrapped around your body during the movie. 
“Leave everything there love, you need to go get some sleep before your shift tomorrow. I’ll clean all of this up, you just head inside for me” Harry stated as he turned off the projector and began taking down the sheet. 
“Are you sure?” you asked hesitantly. 
‘Yes, love, you need your rest. Go, come on. I can’t have you falling asleep while taking care of your patients.” Harry replied.
You hesitated for a minute before buttoning up the sweater Harry had given you and putting your mask back on. 
“I don’t want to leave here without giving you a hug” you stated softly as Harry looked at you with a small smile.
“(Y/n) if you want a hug all you have to do is ask, would have given you one the minute I got here. Let me grab my mask.”
“You’re sure you’re okay with this? I got tested two days ago for COVID and the last 6 have been negative but I don’t get the results till tomorrow and I don’t want you to get ill” you replied with a hesitant look. 
“Love I think with all of the hand washing and the masks we’ll be okay, but I’ll only give you one if you want it” he said as he put on his mask and adjusted the nose wire. 
“I want one” you said as Harry opened his arms up for you.
You practically jumped into his arms and nearly started sobbing from the first really physical contact you’ve had with anybody in weeks.
“God I love you so much (Y/n)” Harry stated as he tugged you closer and placed a kiss on your temple through his mask.
“I love you too H” you replied back as you closed your eyes tight and tried to hold on as long as possible.
“Good now come on, get to bed so you’re well rested for tomorrow. I’ll come back tomorrow night with some dinner after your shift so we can eat together again. Would that be ok?” he asked as he placed his hands on your hips.
“That would be lovely. I get off at 8 tomorrow”
“I’ll be waiting for you here, don’t worry” Harry stated. 
“Ok, I’ll go. I love you” you replied as you carefully untangled yourself from Harry and slowly made your way inside.
“I love you too. good night Haz” 
“Night love, see you tomorrow”
———————————————————————
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@thereal(y/n) Someone tell my boyfriend that he’s not cool enough to be sponsored by this amazing wine
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@harrystyles Tell that to Gucci
@annetwist You two are too cute
@jeffazoff Sharing is caring Harold
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319 notes · View notes
ahopelessromantic · 4 years
Text
Love in the Time of Corona ➳ S. Reid
Pairing: Spencer x Reader
Warnings: Some mentions of anxiety, Spencer is in love and forgets how to act like a person
Word count: 2,5k 
Prompts: 23, ‘You love me?’
Getting locked in a hotel with your colleague hadn’t exactly been in your plans. But maybe spending quarantine with Spencer wasn’t even that bad of a thing.
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“Are you sure?” Chewing on the insides of your cheeks, you watched Spencer talk to Hotch on the phone. “Alright, call us if anything changes.” With a sigh, he hung up and turned to look at you. “Hotch is trying to pull some strings to get us back home, but for now we’re stuck here.” You nodded, your gaze darting around the hotel lobby. “I need to call Garcia, she needs to know where my spare key is so she can get in and feed Goblin, and shit, I probably don’t have enough food for him for two weeks at home, someone needs to-“ Spencer calmed you down with a hand on your shoulder. “Hotch said Garcia already went to your apartment and fed him, she knew where the key was from when she watered your plants last time you visited your parents. Goblin is well taken care of.” You exhaled and looked into his eyes, scanning them for any form of anxiousness. But there was only kindness in them, and you relaxed. If Spencer wasn’t freaking out, then why should you?
“Come on.” He said, a light smile on his lips. “Let’s go check out how badly assorted the hotel library is.”
Goblin was your cat back home in Quantico, a spoiled diva you loved unconditionally and worried about endlessly. You hadn’t exactly expected the state you were in to go into corona lockdown so suddenly and the whole ordeal made your whole body buzz with anxiety. Of course you wanted to protect as many people as possible from getting sick, and under normal circumstances you would have gone into quarantine without a word of complaint, but you just really wanted to go home. You normally didn’t have a problem with the middle-class hotels your employer booked for you when you were away on cases, but then again you also normally didn’t have to spend long amounts of time in them. Spencer and you had been sent ahead to go check out a possible serial killer case, and the rest of the team would have followed once you had confirmed there were lives at stake. But now, instead of investigating, all you could do was aimlessly roam the hotel’s dull hallways, wishing for a change of scenery or at least, your own four walls. The only distraction and good thing in all of this was Spencer, who was doing an amazing job at keeping you sane. Being alone with your thoughts so much wasn’t exactly the best for your mental health, and if anyone in the world could understand that it was Spencer. He knew what it was like when your own thoughts became a weapon sharp enough to destroy you.
“Look at this idiot.” You chuckled and turned your phone so Spencer could see the picture Penelope had sent you. “He knows exactly that he’s not allowed on the kitchen counter.” Spencer smiled, zooming on the picture of your cat passed out in the sink. “Looks like you raised him well.” He teased, causing you to throw your napkin at him. “Hey! I’ll have you know that I am a very devoted cat mother.” You both laughed, only to be interrupted by the maid that was on breakfast duty. She sighed and sent you both a dreamy look before pulling out her notepad. “Such a sweet couple you two are, makes me miss my younger days. Can I bring you anything else?” Instead of telling her about the second tea you had been meaning to order you just blinked at her in shock. Spencer across from you seemed just as frozen, the two of you probably looking utterly stupid to the hotel’s staff member. She just rolled her eyes and started loading your plates onto her tray. “Not there yet? Okay, I’ll leave you to it.” Once she was gone you both erupted into baffled laughter. It had been eight days in the hotel already, and you were slowly starting to make friends with the staff, but so far you hadn’t really been that close with them. Each day was a mere repetition of the one before, and you were barely clinging to the last shreds of normalcy and sanity anymore. Spencer and you met up for breakfast in the mornings, tried to work on the case for a bit just for the sake of feeling like you still had something meaningful to do, went to lunch, sought shelter in the tiny library that was mostly there for show, had dinner and then, sometimes, you went for a drink in the hotel lobby bar. The two of you were growing closer by the day. It was slowly beginning to feel like Spencer was just an extension of your own limbs instead of a whole different person. You had learned long ago that once Spencer felt comfortable around someone he latched onto them, but now it felt like your souls were truly melting together.
“There you are.” He spoke softly, sitting down across from you. You just acknowledged him with a smile, playing with the coaster of your drink. “I went ahead and ordered your favourite.” You mumbled and watched him nod. Spencer could tell something was off, feeling slightly helpless over how to help you. “You look awfully lost in thought today.” Surprised at his words you looked him in the eyes, not yet used to him being so tuned into your emotions. “I just-“ You stopped yourself to sigh heavily. “I feel like I’m slowly losing my mind. I can’t sleep properly and when I do, I have these really vivid, weird dreams, I miss my apartment and my cat… this just isn’t exactly how I expected this case to go.” Spencer nodded in understanding. “According to a research centre in France, there has been a 35% increase in dream recall, and participants of the study are reporting 15% more negative dreams than usual. Dream experts believe that the withdrawal from our usual environments and daily stimuli forces our subconscious minds to transform the invisible virus into a lot of different things in our dreams. Actually, it’s perfectly normal to be having weird dreams right now. I have them too.” You felt a warm feeling bloom in your chest. Whenever your mind got the best of you these days Spencer was there to bring you back to reality again. He was the ratio to your emotio. “Thank you.”, you mumbled shyly. He smiled. “Come on, let’s get you to bed. You need to get your mind off things.” Conveniently, your hotel rooms were right next to each other, so even after you parted ways for the night you didn’t feel too far from him. For some reason though, that specific night was the worst one for you since being quarantined in the hotel. Even after two hours of shifting you couldn’t find into the realms of sleep, despite feeling exhausted and drained from doing nothing all day. You finally decided to get up and make yourself a cup of tea, loudly stumbling over one of your shoes on the way to the electric kettle. You groaned when your behind met with the floor, not even the carpet properly cushioning your fall. Great. You had quite literally arrived at the bottom of things. A knock at the door ripped you out of your thoughts and, limping slightly, you made your way to your room’s entrance. When you opened the door your face was met with none other’s than Spencer’s, a worried look on his face. “Are you okay? I’ve been hearing you shift around for ages and then I heard a loud thump.” You smiled sheepishly. “I’m good. I just couldn’t sleep again and tripped on my way to make myself some tea.” He looked at you, something like worry in his eyes. And then, suddenly, he hugged you tightly. “Spence, what are you doing?” You asked with wide eyes, face smushed against his chest. “Did you know that hugging releases oxytocin? It’s a powerful hormone that works as an antidote for depressive feelings and anxiety. It also underlies individual and social trust. Hugs even affect our physical well being, for example by lowering our blood pressure. Scientifically-“ “Spencer, I love you, but for the love of god please shut up now.” You murmured, long having closed your eyes and leaned into his warm embrace. It was only then you realised what exactly you had just said. You felt him tense up. “You…” His hand on your back suddenly felt like it was going to burn through your skin. “You love me?” You leaned slightly away from him to look him in the face, surprised about your own words. “I think I do.” You spoke in wonder. Apparently, your subconscious had already known about your feelings for Spencer for way longer than your conscious self. But instead of answering, Spencer stepped away from you, a frazzled look on his face. “I… excuse me.” Helplessly, you watched him disappear back into his room, fear speeding up your heartbeat. What had just happened? Had the lockdown madness finally gotten to you? With trembling fingers, you closed your door behind you. That night you didn’t catch a minute of sleep.
The whole next day you couldn’t find Spencer anywhere. It seemed like he was actively hiding from you, and it made your chest hurt from rejection. He was smart and most of all he was your friend, you had really expected him to at least talk it out with you. But no, rather than that it seemed like he had never stepped foot into that damned hotel. It wasn’t until the late evening hours, when you had already gotten ready for bed, that you saw him again. He had knocked on your door, standing in front of you with an apologetic look on his face and three flowers clutched in one hand. They seemed oddly familiar to you, and at second glance you realised that he had stolen them from the hotel lobby. Before you could even begin to ask, he sent you a pleading look “Please, please don’t say anything right now. I want you to know exactly how I feel, and I practised it in the mirror but quite frankly I have never been this nervous in my life and I might forget something if you start speaking.” His voice was shaky, he was stumbling over his words like you had never seen him do before. “I’m sorry. For running off yesterday. I’ve been trying to figure out a way to tell you this for the longest time and then you just said it so casually and for a moment all my fuses burnt through. I’m so in love with you and I am so terrified because I’ve never felt like this, and I know that once I tell you this it will be real, and my life will change forever. I didn’t think there was a person out there like you, a person for me. There is no scientific proof for soulmates but you just… fit with me. I love you too, (Y/N). I love you.” His words had rendered you speechless. You felt tears run down your cheeks, and it was only when you felt Spencer’s hand wipe them away that you returned to reality. You placed your hand on his, further leaning into his touch, and sobbed. “I didn’t mean to make you cry, I’m sorry. This isn’t really my strong suit.” You laughed and pressed a kiss to his hand. “It’s not mine either. And don’t worry Spence, you were perfect. Thank you for having the courage to tell me. Just please, never run off on me like that again.” He leaned his forehead against yours and closed his eyes, a serene smile on his lips. “I promise.”
From there on, the rest of quarantine passed by incredibly quick. Now, you were actually glad you were locked in with Spencer. It gave the two of you the perfect time and opportunity to explore the very nature of your relationship. You started sleeping over in each other’s rooms, wearing each other’s clothes, at night Spencer lulled you to sleep by reading to you. When Hotch called once the two weeks were over to tell you that you would be able to return home with the jet you were almost disappointed. But at least this you could board the jet holding each other’s hands without worrying about anyone seeing. And it wasn’t too bad either that you had had your first time with each other and joined the mile-high club at the same time. You were never going to be able to look at those leather couches the same way again. Touched down back home in Quantico you had the orders to return straight home and quarantine for another fourteen days. Stood in front of your car you could tell that the two of you were trying to prolong your time together, rambling on about the most random things just to avoid having to say goodbye for two weeks. But watching him walk away after one last, long kiss filled your heart with such aching that you called out for him to stop. “Wait, Spence!” He turned around, an almost relieved look on his face. “Yeah?” He walked back to you, gripping the strap of his bag. “I know this is crazy, and maybe it’s too much considering we haven’t even officially talked about whether or not we’re dating now but… I just… hate the thought of suddenly not seeing you for two weeks straight after seeing your cute face every day for what feels like so long. So… do you want to quarantine at my apartment? We can get some of your clothes on the way there, and I promise I’ll cook whatever you want. I just don’t want to miss your morning cuddles anymore.” A wide smile had spread across his features while you had talked, and before you had even fully finished he had already nodded enthusiastically. “Thank god you asked, I didn’t know how to.” Both laughing, you got into your car.
“Oh, you gotta be kidding me.” Morgan groaned when he saw you and Spencer enter the BAU together once quarantine was over. You didn’t even have to hold hands for everyone to see that you were a couple now. “When did they start dating??” Emily looked at you with a grin, crossing her arms. “Technically, it doesn’t look like they started dating. They were just locked in together for so long that they fell in love.” Hotch joined your little group, the usual frown on his face. “Enough about the lovebirds, we have a case to get to. But-“ He turned to look at you and suddenly there was a teasing grin on his face as well. “Looks like quarantine treated you well, right?” You just rolled your eyes, burying your face in your hands. “Not you too, Hotch, not you too!”
Spencer actually didn’t even end up leaving your apartment once quarantine was over. In fact, he had gotten so comfortable that after two months, he terminated the contract for his own flat. Now, every Sunday morning, it wasn’t just you spread out on your couch with your cat anymore. It was the two of you.
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shelby-love · 4 years
Text
JAY HALSTEAD
NF Quarantine Visits
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Requested: yes
Prompts: none
Warnings: none
Authors note: NF stands for necrotising fasciitis; Riley is your partner
"Look we're doing everything we can but there's no strong leads we can use right now." Jay informs Sharon Goodwin of CPD's latest news about the state of emergency the city of Chicago was currently in.
"I have people in quarantine Jay and the press isn't helping us at all." Sharon told him. "This isn't something out of the blue. Someone has to be behind this mess."
"We're doing everything we can but that's all I can give you right now."
"Incoming!" Maggie calls out. She swiftly joins the group. "We can't keep up Sharon."
"Is it NF?"
"Yes it is. Y/N and Riley are bringing them in."
At the mention of his girlfriend Jay's heart sunk. He knew how dangerous your job was on the daily but now he truly understood the pressure you had on your chest.
It only made him work harder in figuring out who is behind this mess.
He saw you a lot but never for long enough. After it was debunked that the virus is spread airborne or through contact, you were able to hug and kiss Jay quickly whenever the two of you saw each other at Med. But nothing more than that.
Jay worked late at the District and your 24-hour shifts were long and hard as they were. Adding the outbreak heavied on the both of you.
The sound of heavy footsteps coming from the entrance alerted everyone and soon people stepped aside to let you and Riley through.
"Jasmine Black. 23 years old with necrotising fasciitis. I think we'll need to amputate her leg. It's... Gone." You informed the nurses. They did their job with you and called Crockett Marcel, hoping that he will be able to save her.
Your worried eyes spot Jay and the only thing you can do is nod sadly. You've been exposing yourself to the bacteria continuously, and each time you risked your life for someone else's it never ended well. So far, you didn't bring anyone who came out of the OR alive.
And that broke you.
"Do you think she'll make it?" Sharon asked Riley and you when you joined their little circle.
"No we don't think she will," Riley started to explain. Jay wrapped his arm around your shoulder and supported you for as long as possible. Soon, you and Riley will be back in the outside world in the heart of the outbreak. "The bacteria spread out in her leg, it's impossible to try to save her without amputation. And even with that we can only hope that she survives."
"Oh God. How are you girls feeling?" Goodwin placed her hand on your forearms in a soothing matter.
"We're tired but okay." You told her.
"I should probably get back to the District. If you find anything that can help us call me." He squeezed your shoulder and removed his arm before you could even stop him.
On que, your radio informed you of your new victim. "That's our que."
***
"Sir you need to lie down!" You command the man you're currently bringing into the ED. His arm is infected but he doesn't waste a beat when trying to get off the gurney.
"N-No!" He screams. Like a fish, the man flops off the gurney and tries to get away in a wonky run chase.
"For God's sake!" Riley exclaims. "Sir you are stuffed with anesthetics! You can't get away from us!"
You shoot her a look of pure invitation to help and she joins you in the chase. Using your running skills you accomplished by taking daily morning runs with your boyfriend, you appear in front of the drowsy man and once again command him to stop.
He does not in fact listen to your sane reasoning and throws his weak body onto yours. That wouldn't be a problem had he not collapsed unconscious on your unprotected body.
***
"Seriously Nat I'm fine." After the intense chase with an angered-drowsy-on-anesthetics patient you're stationed in one of the trauma rooms with Natalie Manning.
While Nat keeps checking you for any cuts or scratches you stay still and think about what happens next. "Will you put me in quarantine?"
"Only if you have any cuts that can catch the bacteria." In that moment her eyes land on your palm. There's a small scratch and blood over the wound.
"I-I always wear gloves." You try to reason with her. You can't be stuck in quarantine. Not now. Not when they need you.
The look on Natalie's face is enough to tell you otherwise. "I'm sorry Y/N."
***
"Welcome Y/N. Trust me, it's cosier than it looks." You join Hailey in your separate four walled vertical rectangle box. Supposedly, this will keep you from spreading the bacteria if you have it. You won't know that until you get your cultures back. "So. What brings you here?"
You laugh lightly, suddenly realising how poor your luck is. "A dude with anger issues that was high on anesthetics with an arm eaten away by the bacteria threw himself on me during one of his many aggressive episodes, and collapsed unconscious. Leaving me and my scratched bloody palm alone in quarantine."
"Correction. You're not alone." She says laughing. "I take it Riley got away."
"She had her protective gear on. And since we're low on paramedics that go on these runs, they let her go." You bring your palm in the air and wave it around. "My palm and I are stuck in here until the cultures come back."
And that's how you spent countless of hours in deep discussion with your boyfriend's partner in crime. While Hailey wanted to join Jay in finding out who did this, you wanted to get back into your ambulance and help save lives.
Neither of you could do what you wanted so you took that time and started to get to know each other. You already have three girlfriend dates scheduled and a whole birthday party for Riley and Jay planned out in bits.
After your conversation faded into comfortable silence the two of you were lost in your own thoughts. You let yourself think about how Jay will react once he finds out. A part of you wants him to visit you as much as it wants him to stay away from you and stay safe.
You're halfway on the road to dreamland when you hear his voice. "Y/N?"
You watch him make his way towards you with only one eye opened. Opening both of them would mean taking 100 steps back from dreamland and that's the last thing you wanted to do at the moment.
But seeing him stand in front of you, separated by only a thin clear foil looking curtain, killed your wish for sleep making you stand up and almost sprint towards him.
"Are you okay? How did this happen?" He asked you, worry dripping from his voice.
"I'm fine and it's a long story."
"I have time."
"Baby no you don't." You tell him sternly. When the two of you enter a silent battle of eye emotions, he comes out of it as the winner. Sighing in defeat you start to explain what happened to you.
"We already went through a breakout attempt since certain people act like they're prisoners." You throw a nasty look toward Sharlene, the crazy lady who started a revolution within her rectangular box of protection. "Jay I'm fine! I'll stay here and take a few naps and be out before you know it."
Both of you lean against the colorless foil of protection until your foreheads meet. A part of you wants to escape your cloud of safety just so you can press your lips against his but you know better than to do that. Both you do.
"Call me when you get out?"
"Geez you make it sound like I'm in jail." Your attempt at being subtly funny an lightening up the mood falls in the water when you notice his stare. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll call you don't worry."
"Good." Jay gives you a smile he reserves only for you. "I'll keep you posted."
"You better!!!" You exclaim. Your boyfriend is your only connection to the outside world.
"And I'll try to sneak in some food for you."
You almost shed a dramatic tear at his words. "Oh, Jay you're..."
"The best boyfriend ever?"
"The best boyfriend ever ever ever everrr!"
You spend a few more minutes with your boyfriend discussing the current situation before he talks to Hailey and eventually leaves.
Still dazed from love, worry and excitement, you return back to your sleeping position and walk back towards the road that's sure to bring you to dreamland.
MASTERLIST
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jtargaryen18 · 4 years
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All Heaven in a Rage
Chapter 1
Story Rating: Explicit, 18+ only Warnings: Non-con,  Kidnapping, Stalking, Explicit Sexual Content, Dubious Consent. Please read responsibly.  Relationships: Steve Rogers/Reader
On AO3 Jtargaryen18/SnowQueen79
A request for a dear friend. This takes place after the Infinity War but before Avengers 4. Steve Rogers has lost most of those he had left to the snap and loneliness is battle he's losing. What starts out as an honest intention to help a girl who has caught his eye in daily life becomes a dangerous obsession where the lines of what's real and what's fantasy are blurred.
I do not consent to have my work hosted on any third party app or site. If you are seeing this fanfiction anywhere but archiveofourown or tumblr, it has been reposted without my permission.
A/N: I caved. Several of you asked and since most of us are quarantined... If you haven’t read it, I hope you like it. Apologies. This was my first reader insert story. 
~~~
The world was a different place following the snap.
It had taken months for the world’s routine to even resemble anything close to normal. Half of the world’s population had been eliminated in the snap and that had been devastating enough. To make matters even worse, so many people died that day as a result of the snap.
If pilots were snapped, their crafts went down with no survivors among those who’d been left. Engineers of trains, bus drivers, cab drivers, Ubers. There were endless reports of car crashes, freak transportation accidents. Clint’s family had apparently made it through the snap. They were killed when they were hit on the highway by a driverless car, its driver snapped. It had veered off into their lane and hit them head-on.
Clint had been stuck at home on house arrest. Steve Rogers knew his friend and fellow Avenger had to have been completely destroyed by his family’s loss. Steve would have been there for him. Only Clint had disappeared without a trace immediately after…
There were hundreds of deaths at hospitals, shelters, and nursing homes. Even more in everyday situations. Amusement parks, at schools, on battlefields, in shopping centers…
Everywhere…
Steve had been through a lot of loss in his life only to have Thanos take most of what he’d had left. He’d lost Bucky, and that was a bitterness that nearly consumed him at night as he stared at the ceiling in those long, dark, sleepless hours. Bucky had been his best friend, the one person he could never get over losing. It had been a miracle when he’d found him and he’d fought so hard for him, scoured the earth for him with Sam’s help.
Losing him for a second time had almost finished Steve off.
He’d lost Sam too. And Tony, though that had apparently happened before the snap when he’d left the planet accompanied by Dr. Stephen Strange and young Peter Parker. They’d lost Scott Lang, King T’Challa and his sister Shuri, Nick Fury and Maria Hill. So many good men and women were lost that day in a variety of ways, leaving a new broken world that was on the edge of chaos. They’d be years yet cleaning up from that day.
They’d never truly recover from the losses.
Steve had just left a support group he’d been sitting in on for the last few weeks. Natasha had been well-intentioned when she’d recommended it to him. Honestly, he hadn’t gotten a lot of benefit from it. It was hard to take in the coping mechanisms that the group leads shared when you were too busy picking apart your actions from those events, from that day.
Could he have done anything differently? Could he have stopped Thanos and saved his friends? Bucky? Everyone? There had to have been something he’d missed.
The questions haunted him endlessly. Sometimes Steve felt like he was losing his mind.
Life had resumed. People went on and most things you could do or have were still there, still available. The Avengers trudged on, missions much fewer now. Situations were less dire. Even the bad guys had taken losses, seemed to struggle with how to move forward.
There were shadows behind the eyes of every survivor he passed or encountered. Loss and grief swam in the eyes of men, women and children alike.
Steve was so lost in his thoughts that instead of taking the elevator up to his apartment at the front of the tower, he walked in through the lobby. When he got so far into it, he decided coffee might be nice. He wasn’t likely to sleep anyway, and the autumn air had been chilly. It would be a nice warm up.
Steve was almost ashamed to admit that he couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in the lobby. It had been months, since way before the snap. The coffee shop was just about to close, and he saw a young man and woman working there as he waited in line. The young man he hadn’t seen before, looked like a nice kid.
The young woman he’d noticed before. She’d worked there for at least a couple of years. Steve had always thought she was a beautiful girl, but it was more than just her physical appearance. She had a friendly smile that reached her bright, clear eyes. He’d admired the way she didn’t treat him any differently even though the slight tremor of her hands and the nervous lilt to her laugh when she waited on him told him she was very aware of who he was. Yes, she was shy, but her manners were exceptional for a girl nowadays. Even though Nat would probably call him a sexist asshole, her demure behavior appealed to him.
Steve was happy to see that she’d survived.
“What’s your number, sweet thing?” the man in front of him asked her in a tone Steve didn’t care for.
She handed him his order and tried to smile. “That will be $9.57 please.”
“Give me your number,” the man insisted now. “Then I’ll give you the money.”
“I don’t even have a phone,” she muttered, nervous now. “I’m sorry. Please let me finish your transaction so I can wait on our other guests, okay?”
“You lyin’ to me?” the man tried to sound like he was playing but he didn’t quite hit that note.
“No,” she said, her discomfort obviously growing.
She didn’t owe him an explanation. She didn’t owe the man anything.
“You sure?” the man pressed, moving closer to the counter.
“Pay for your order and move along,” Steve broke out his Captain’s voice, watching with amusement as the coarse-looking man, he wasn’t a lot bigger than her to be honest, angrily turned around to face him. It took him all of three seconds to recognize Steve and he enjoyed watching the other man diminish as she watched.
“Sure, yeah,” the man mumbled, nervously digging his wallet out of his jacket and slapping a ten down on the counter in front of her. He mumbled something that sounded like “keep the change” but he didn’t look at her again. Instead, he made a beeline away from the coffee shop in the direction of the front doors.
“Are you okay?” Steve asked stepping up to the counter, gazing down at her. No one was behind him. The young man grinned at him before dashing behind the counter, probably getting ready to shut down.
Her wide eyes had watched the retreating figure of the man for another beat before her gaze shifted to him. Steve loved her wide expressive eyes, especially when they shifted back to him.
“Thank you,” she said, smiling at Steve. “Yeah, I’m okay.”
“Has he done that before?” Steve asked her.
She swallowed hard, he could tell she was scrambling for an answer when the young man she worked with came up behind her.
“Yeah,” he explained. “Not often but…”
He got back to his efforts as she waited at the counter.
“Hopefully he won’t be back,” Steve told her, making a mental note.
Nodding, she dropped her gaze for just a second before glancing back up at him.
“What can I get for you?” she asked sweetly.
Was it wrong that he loved her demeanor? No artifice, no guile. She didn’t seem to have the snark and entitlement so many young people had these days. It was refreshing.
Steve ordered what he normally did, simple black coffee, and he watched as she went about getting it ready for him. She moved quickly, almost apologetically. When she had his order ready, she placed it gently on the counter before him.
Steve smiled. “What do I owe you?”
She shook her head, the lights shining off her hair. “On the house. With my thanks.”
Steve nodded, accepting it. He didn’t want to hold them up because he knew they wanted to get home, but he had one last thought. He reached for the order pad and pen lying on the counter next to their register and wrote down a number.
“If he shows up again, or you have any trouble,” Steve explained, “send a text to that number. It will get handled.”
Those eyes widened. It was delicious and it was working on him. He watched her pick up the slip of paper with a trembling hand, reading the panic that flashed in those eyes for just a split second. Then her gaze returned to him and she nodded.
So had she been telling the rude bastard he’d gotten rid of the truth? Did she not have a phone?
That wasn’t safe. What if she needed to call for help? For a ride?
“Thank you, Captain Rogers,” she said that sweet smile back in place. “Have a good night.”
“Good night,” he told her, taking her in for another beat before heading for the elevators.
His mind was swimming with questions, and he had to admit, it beat the hell out of obsessing about the snap and the aftermath of dealing with that as he had done for weeks.
Steve had just reached the elevators when he realized that he was concerned about her getting home. Would it hurt to follow her? He could easily do it without her noticing. If she had a phone, she’d likely check it on her way home from work. If she didn’t, well, he could make sure she made it home okay. He wasn’t doing anything else at the moment.
It only took about fifteen minutes for her to head towards the front door of the tower. She never noticed him where he’d tucked in near the elevators. Steve fell in behind her, tightening his coat around himself. His coffee had been perfect, and he’d already finished it.
She should have been wearing a coat as cold as it was. Only a thin jacket covered her as she walked along in her jeans. No sign of a phone. She walked with her head down, again looking for all intents and purposes like she was trying to avoid anyone’s notice.
The problem was such body language often had the opposite effect. Muggers and worse selected those they didn’t think would fight back and she definitely fit into that category.
Finally, she turned at a rundown apartment complex and Steve’s hopes sank. Poor thing. He didn’t know her story, what happened that left her living in the dark, dingy set of buildings heading for the bad side of the city. Probably all she could afford. He did know that a lot of drug and prostitution calls came out of the place and it left him feeling even worse about her situation.
Maybe he shouldn’t have followed her.
She wasn’t his problem after all.
But as he stopped, watching her pace pick up with her destination in sight, he remembered the warmth in that pretty face, the warmth in her eyes. It stirred feelings in him he hadn’t felt in many years.
No, he couldn’t ignore her or her situation now. He wanted to help.
But how?
Steve pondered that question long into the night.
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