#I think I am the guy at work that makes weird pipes. bc so far I’ve also made a Cardinal copia shaped pipe & a horse shaped pipe(both from | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

twink-appreciation-posts · 4 years

Text

Human Behavior - Spencer Reid x Reader

chapter thirteen of “all bets are off”

feelings are so complicated i think we should just abolish them, everyone feels nothing forever.

warnings: semi-public stuff, teasing, angst, feelings feelings feelings, spencer is lowkey an asshole but it’s okay bc it’s hot

“Hey, if it’s not too much trouble, wear a skirt tomorrow.”

Those were Spencer’s final words to you that night as you walked him out of your apartment. At the time you had barely responded, still feeling quite upset about nothing, but when you awoke in the morning you felt a bit bad about kicking him out, so you opted to at least do something nice and follow his instructions.

You tugged at the skirt a bit as you walked into the lobby of your office building. “You listened.” Spencer grinned as he noticed you walking in, approaching you. You gave him a tired smile, wishing you had had a bit more time to prepare before being thrust right back into the fire that was your interactions with him.

“Yeah, yeah. I didn’t wanna deal with being reprimanded all day for not doing what you asked.” You replied a bit too snappily. Spencer looked at you quizzically.

"Are you okay?” He asked, seeming confused.

You nodded. “Totally fine, Spence. Tired, but fine.” You assured him. It was true. You were fine, your head just kind of… hurt? Like a bit of a physical headache, but also just mental exhaustion. Damn. You hadn’t taken into account the fact that rough sex for a week and a half could cause some fatigue. Oh well, you had dealt with worse in your life.

Spencer hesitated, analyzing you. “Are you sure?”

“100%.” You fiddled with the fabric of your shirt.

He frowned a bit, not quite believing you, but not wanting to push it. “Well, hey, I have something to give you!” He perked up a bit, and you found yourself perking up as well. A present? He ruffled through his bag. “Take the stairs with me?” You tilted your head curiously and nodded, treading behind Spencer as he walked into the stairwell. He pulled a little box out of his bag, and you watched, eyes locked on as he opened it to reveal a dainty little choker. You felt all sorts of emotions, the overwhelming one being confusion, seconded by some form of excitement.

“What’s that?” You asked, a stupid question considering it was obvious.

“A gift.” He grinned, picking it up out of its box and allowing you to take a better look. “I know you said something about one with a little bell, I was considering maybe taking it a step further and adding a tag with my contact information in case you get lost,” He teased, and you felt yourself turn pale. Oh yeah, you had teased him about a collar. But this? You should have been embarrassed, but it was kind of pretty. And it was a gift. From Spencer. Spencer had bought you a gift. You blushed. “But, I thought this would be a bit more suitable for day-to-day life. A bit more subtle.”

You nibbled your bottom lip a bit. “Ah, so this is the notorious collar I’ve been dreading?” You chuckled a bit. “It’s um, it’s kind of pretty. Definitely not as bad as it could have been.” You stuttered.

“Can I put it on you?” He asked, almost excitedly.

You couldn’t help but grin. “Am I allowed to say no?”

He laughed. “You are, of course, but if you do accept this gift, there are some rules that come with it.”

“Oh, hooray. More of your infamous rules!” You exclaimed sarcastically. “Can I ask what they are before I let you trap me in them?” You questioned.

“Of course,” he tucked your hair behind your ear gently. “You should keep the collar on at all times unless you get my permission to take it off. This doesn’t include when you shower, of course, but even when you’re at home alone or at work it should stay on.”

You considered this for a moment. “What about when I sleep?” You asked.

“I think it should be more than comfortable to sleep in, but if not we can talk about it.” He assured you, fingers running over the fabric of the choker.

You shrugged in defeat.“I guess the only way to know is to try it on, yeah?”

That was all it took for him to move towards you, clasping it around your neck. Your hand went up to touch the new jewelry. “Velvet,” you chuckled knowingly, fingers grazing the soft fabric. “Still your favorite, huh?”

His eyes were locked on your neck, “It looks good on you, what can I say?” His breathing became a bit heavier as he took in the sight.

It was almost weird seeing him so openly affected by you. You felt a surge of power. “Mm, I think this whole collar thing was more for you than me, huh?” You teased.

“I like seeing you wear a physical reminder of who owns you.” He admitted, running a hand through his hair.

You had one goal in mind as you watched him grow more flustered by the second. “Of course you do. You like the power you have over me, don’t you daddy?” His eyes snapped up to meet yours, and you felt your knees weaken. “But we should get to work before we’re both late, don’t you think?” You walked past him, shoulder brushing his, as you began walking up the stairs. You didn’t make it far, though, before he grabbed your arm, stopping you in place.

“Where did this confidence come from all of a sudden?” He asked, voice low.

“I can enjoy my power over you just as much as you can enjoy your power over me.” You replied, attempting to gently tug your arm away.

You waited for another snarky comment, but instead were met with a tug. Spencer turned you around, lips slamming onto yours almost painfully, and his other hand moved to your jaw, forcing your lips apart further and granting his tongue access to your mouth. You kissed him back, of course, hands running through his hair. It didn’t take long for his hands to begin to wander, one finding t's way down in between your skirt, caressing the bare skin of your thighs. You whimpered into his mouth, flinching away, scared to make too much noise even in the stairwell. Spencer pulled his lips away from yours, using his knee to push your legs apart, widening your stance, hands wandering higher, rubbing circles on your inner thigh.

“You suck.” You breathed out.

He didn’t reply, only pushed his leg further between your legs. You felt your body began to grind against it automatically, craving the friction. You let out a huff of frustration and pleasure, angry at your body for giving in so easily. “What are you doing, Y/N?” Spencer asked.

You looked away, face red, and stopped. His hand moved back to your jaw, forcing you to look at him as he spoke. “Did I tell you to stop?” You shook your head, or at least tried to considering he was holding your face. “Then why did you?”

Why did you stop? Because you were embarrassed? Because you were going to be late for work? There were plenty of reasons.

"I dunno.” You settled on. That didn’t seem to be the correct answer though.

“I think you do know. I think you’re embarrassed.” He placed a hand on your hip, pushing and pulling your body against his. You didn’t reply, eyes pointed at the floor. “No? Am I wrong?”

You stopped fighting your desire a bit now, allowing yourself to grind down a bit more onto him. You held back your moans as best you could, biting down on your lip to suppress them.

“I guess if you’re not embarrassed,” Spencer leaned down a bit, leaving a single kiss on your neck. “You’d be fine begging me to let you finish right here on my thigh.”

You gulped. No. God no. You were embarrassed. You were totally definitely embarrassed. “N-No-“

But it was too late, he was holding your waist, keeping you perfectly still. You groaned at the lack of stimulation, pushing against his grip to no avail. “Beg.” He repeated.

“P-Please, daddy?” You mumbled, looking up at him with your best and most convincing face of desperation.

“Please what?” He replied, showing no signs of sympathy.

“Please let me, um...” You trailed off. Did he seriously need to hear you say it? “Um... you know.”

He laughed a bit. “You’re going to have to be more specific than that, baby.” He cooed. Fucking hell could he get any more annoying?

You inhaled deeply. Fine. “C-Can I please ride your t-thigh?” You said quietly, staring at the ground.

“Of course you can.” He eased up his grip, allowing you to resume your previous movements, and you were grateful for it. He was kissed your neck, a hand firmly rooted in your hair, but it was short-lived. As you began to inch closer to release you felt him pull away a bit. Oh fuck no. He was not about to pull this again.

Except he was.

He moved his leg away from your body, leaving you without anything. “We’re late.” He said simply, glancing down at his watch, and you stared at him, anger and desire bubbling up inside of you.

“No. Spencer, no. Don’t do this, come on.” You whisper-yelled.

“Do what? You asked if you could ride my thigh, and you did, didn’t you?” You swore you could punch him right in his perfect face. You could shove him down the stairs, perhaps.

“Don’t argue semantics with me. You’re the absolute worst.” You seethed, pouting.

He paid you no mind, walking up the stairs. “We should hurry, we might miss the briefing, don’t you think?” You didn’t move, staring in disbelief, until it dawned on you that he genuinely had no intention of coming back. You groaned in frustration, walking up the stairs behind him in defeat.

You guys were, luckily, on time for the briefing, walking into the meeting room alongside the rest of your colleagues. Spencer took a seat next to you, and you scooted your chair away from his, crossing your arms. He glanced at you and raised a brow, amused. You glared. Who could blame you for feeling mildly angry at him and slightly petty? Especially after what he had just done. JJ began to explain a couple of new cases she was keeping her eye on, and you tried your best to pay attention to her rather than the man next to you who was clearly looking your way. He piped up eventually, citing some statistic that was relevant to the conversation, and used the opportunity to casually adjust his chair and the position he was sitting in, a hand nonchalantly brushing your leg. You knew it had to have been on purpose, right? No way this wasn’t one of his calculated moves. You pulled your leg away, crossing it over your other, and ignored him. The rest of the briefing really only consisted of you trying to control your thoughts, some of them horny and some of them about the violent things you wanted to do to Spencer for fucking you over like that. As soon as the meeting was done you made a beeline to the door, avoiding any chance of giving him time to talk to you.

“Hey, Y/N!” JJ called out, catching up to you.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Nothing! I just noticed that necklace choker thing you’re wearing and I don’t think I’ve ever seen it before. Is it new?” She asked, examining it.

“Oh, uh, yeah,” you chuckled. “It is new. You like it?” You smiled, trying to appreciate the comment without thinking about everything else associated with the new gift.

JJ nodded sweetly. “I do. It really suits you.”

“Where’d you get it? You have a special someone in your life?” Emily was approaching you now, teasing, and you scoffed.

You rolled your eyes, shaking your head. “With this job? I barely have time for myself, let alone someone else. Plus, men aren’t worth the stress. I mean, there’s nothing they can do that a good ole’ piece of silicon can’t do better.” You joked.

Emily and JJ burst out with laughter, echoing sentiments of agreement.

“I don’t get it.” You whipped around at the sound of Spencer’s voice behind you. He was staring at you, feigning some sort of innocence, but you knew. You knew he was doing this to mess with you.

“Oh, don’t worry about it Spence.” JJ giggled. “It’s not something you need to get.”

He shrugged in response, locking eyes with you before walking away.

"Can you imagine him in the bedroom?” Emily lowered her voice to be quieter. “I mean, he’s a human super-computer.”

“Before you joined the team he made out with some girl in a pool while he was supposed to be acting as her bodyguard. You’d be surprised.” JJ gossiped back, nudging you. “Remember that?”

You hadn’t actually remembered that event until now. It wasn’t really relevant to you, so you didn’t particularly keep it in mind. You had only heard a few jokes and stories about it, anyway.

“I don’t know what’s more surprising, the kissing or the choosing him as a bodyguard.” Emily chuckled.

You were tuned out of the conversation. How long ago had that been? You couldn’t remember exactly. Was he still in contact with her? He had never mentioned her before, sure, but you guys never really talked about that type of stuff.

“She was some superstar actress too,” JJ elaborated. “Famous from being on some beach bikini babe TV show. Typical upcoming Hollywood starlet. I don’t know how he managed to do it.”

You frowned. Fuck. Yeah. That girl had been gorgeous. And famous. And now he was messing around with you? “Do you think they still talk?” You tried to ask as casually as you could.

JJ thought about it for a moment. “Well, I’ve never heard anything about it, but he’d have been stupid not to keep in touch. I know she gave him her number.”

“We should get Garcia to hack his phone records and check for any California area codes.” Emily laughed.

"Maybe we should.” You half-joked back absentmindedly. You weren’t even sure if you really wanted to know if he still talked to her. It probably would’ve been better if you hadn’t remembered their whole affair altogether.

The three of you went your separate ways, walking to your desks, and you just sat and thought. A hand played at the velvet on your neck, fingers tracing over it. This whole thing with Spencer had made you feel more confused than any case you had ever worked in your life. Your job was to understand human behavior, and yet you were at a loss. You couldn’t understand him, but even worse, you couldn’t understand a thing about your own thoughts and feelings. Why were you so attached to a dude you had fucked a few times? Was it all just that weird post-sex sadness Spencer told you about? Was this normal? Or were you going insane, maybe? You couldn’t tell. Or maybe you could. Maybe you had just been suppressing the answer to all your questions, shrouded in denial. Maybe you weren't bad at understanding your own behavior, maybe you were just bad at accepting it. You needed coffee, you decided, so you got up, walking past Spencer’s desk, avoiding looking at him at all costs. He watched as you walked by and you almost laughed. He was a genius, but he was so unaware. You couldn’t blame him, you had been unaware of it too for a long time. But it seemed, despite your greatest efforts, it seemed you had fucked up. You thought your biggest mistake had been hooking up with him, but your mistakes had gone far beyond that. Oh, no. You had a much larger issue at hand. You had caught feelings for Spencer Reid.

taglist <33

@101donuts @annestine @spideyboix @babybloomer @welcome-to-hoeville @eldahae @brokenanxiety @andiebeaword @spencerwaltergubler @la-vie-en-amour1 @rainsong01 @taekwinkle @dreamer7black @guessthatswhyiliveinhell @creepingfromthecorners @joyousreid @slutforthegubes @cluelessnitwhit @downondilaudid @screeching-student-unknown @gretaamyk @thegingerfairchild @criminal-minds-reider @spencerrreid-cm @collegestudentvevo @pastathighs @midnightsubmissives @spencer-reid-enthusiast @emilyxprentiss @drreidshands

#all bets are off #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid #spencer reid smut #spencer reid x reader smut #criminal minds #criminal minds smut #matthew gray gubler smut #mgg smut #matthew gray gubler x reader

287 notes · View notes

nat-20s · 3 years

Note

PROMPT! the first time the s1 archive gang hangs out outside of work (any variation of the group, doesn’t have to be All of them)

This is only the Archive Assistant sqaud, bc I’m sorry Jon, but no bosses allowed. Also it’s VERY silly and soft bc sometimes u just wanna write nice things u know

(also also fuck I lovecompletely missed that this said “first time” they hang out but uhh. I hope u like it anyway.)

Tim Stoker like to think that, sometimes, not to toot his own horn, but he can be something of a genius. When a cousin’s cousin had offered to let him use their cozy little cabin for a night or two in exchange for help with moving, he had been struck with what could only be humbly described as “inspiration of the most divine nature”. For, as nice as a Friday evening away from it all by himself sounds, it’s so much nicer for a Friday evening away from it all to serve as Archival Assistants Bonding Time™. Or well, more like Tim and Sasha, Who Are Already Best Friends Forever, Figure Out What Martin’s Deal Is, Because For A Guy So Chatty, He Sure Is Mysterious Time™, but that’s not nearly as catchy. Truly, his plan was brilliant, bringing two compatriots and an excessive amount of food and drink to a spot away from the prying eyes of the world and bosses, and feast in the openness and silliness that comes from having a great fucking time.

His plan, and his genius, were tragically derailed. While he knew on their drive up that the air was rapidly getting cooler, Tim couldn’t have even pretended to predict that an hour into their stay would bring a freak blizzard that means they’re snowed in for the next three days, which was 3 times longer than he had accounted on spending with his coworkers/friends. There was more than enough food to last them, and almost enough alcohol, but as Sasha so kindly put it:

“First you make us reenact the first scene of every bad teen slasher movie, now there’s a fucking white out. If we lose power, I’m telling you, there is absolutely going to be a murder.”

“Pfft, no way. The guy who owns this place is one of those weird ass prepper types, there’s a back up generator for the back up generator. And even if we did lose power, we’re all much more the “huddle for warmth under a shared blanket in front of the roaring fire” types than the “get panicked and stab someone in darkness” types, right? Back me up here, Marto.”

Martin, who at three shots in is both hilarious and mean, directs his response to Sasha. “in the event of a black-out I vote we kill Tim. I can take him down and you can finish the job.”

Sasha tips her cup at him, saying, “I like the way you think,” at the same time that Tim yells out, “Hey! Why am I the one dying?!”

Sasha tells him, “Duh. This whole thing was your idea, which makes you the Dr. Black* of this situation. Any good mansion murder mystery dictates the the host dies first. Then, in a moment of entirely unplanned synchronization, her and Martin start chanting, “Host dies first! Host dies first!”

“Okay, you know what? Fuck both of y’all, it’s not my fault that you’re both thoroughbred city slickers that can’t handle being in a cabin with plumbing and running water and electricity. Didn’t either of you go camping as kids?”

Sasha replies “No I’m far too pretty for that,” while Martin bursts out laughing. It takes about 20 seconds for him to settle down. Wiping away a tear, he elaborates, “Sorry, sorry, just. Can not imagine my mother on a camping trip. I mean, sure, she probably hoped at one point or another that I’d be lost in the woods as a child, or maybe even now, but I think that’s a bit different.”

Tim leans over the kitchen counter, placing his chin in his hands as he says, “Oh shit, Martin lore. Spill the deets.”

Sasha, who’s loyalties tend to sway towards whatever’s most interesting in the moment, piles on with, “You called her your mother, not your mum. That’s means she’s pretty much a right bastard, or a member of the aristocracy, which is just another term for right bastard but you got to grow up as a rich kid. Am I right?”

It’s clear the the two of them have made a grave mistake. All joviality flees Martin’s expression, and he shrinks down both his physical presence and his voice to something that could easily be overlooked if someone wasn’t paying attention. “Oh, um, well, I definitely didn’t grow up as a rich kid. And, it terms of the ‘right bastard’ thing, she’s not- er. That’s to say, she’s- she’s sick and. She’s doing the best she can, given, given everything.”

Martin pointedly looks at his hands while Tim and Sasha panickedly look at each other. They go to either side of him, and when he doesn’t flinch away, they each place a comforting hand on his shoulder. Tim immediately feels the itch to fill the heavy quiet, and he happens to know he has quite the talent for blazing on ahead after these kinds of moments. It’s how he’s survived basically party for the past decade. “Ooookay, I’m gonna go ahead and say that all depressing familial reveals shall be held off until at least the second night of being trapped. While Sasha may have irritatingly few skeletons in her closet in that regard-”

“I have Tory grandparents?”

“We all have Tory grandparents Sash, that’s absolutely nothing. As I was saying, while Sash’s family is boring and semi functional, you and me are gonna do some fuckin’ commiserating on our journey from work friends to friend friends. However, I’m going to have to be 40% drunker, go through a decently strong hangover, and then once again get hair of the dog drunk before I can even start to consider heading down that path. And in that spirit, I think it’s time to start up the drinking games. Truth or dare might end up a bit too heavy for our needs, but Never Have I Ever should suit us just fine. I know I’m gonna regret saying this considering Sasha is 100% going to target my ass, but I think we should establish that whoever puts all ten fingers down first has to chug the rest of the box wine.”

Sasha pipes up with, “Ugh, no, not drinking games, that’s such twenty-something bullshit. I expected better from you.”

“Hey, Martin is a twenty-something, so that still works fine actually-”

“Tim!”

“What?”

Martin’s directing wide, bordering on frantic, eyes at him, and Tim is almost certainly missing something, though he can’t for the life of him figure it out. Sasha’s head is bobbing slightly between the two of them, and shes apparently able to parse what Tim has not. “Oh! Martin, uh, I already know that you’re 2, and it’s cool.”

“Did..did Tim tell you or?”

Tim scoffs out an “I wouldn’t!” even though there’s a distinct possibility that, entirely on accident, he would, and Sasha makes a reassuring coo. “No, no, babe, nothing like that. It’s just that, uh, the Magnus Institute is kind of notorious for not doing any background checks pretty much ever, so when I get a new coworker, I..do it myself.”

Martin’s face blanches, and his eyes somehow get even wider. “Oh god, please don’t tell Jon or Elias, I know I don’t have the credentials, but I really need-”

“Woah, woah, I’m not gonna do that. First of all, archival assistant squad, we ride together we die together in a snowed in god forsaken log cabin, secondly, it’d be hypocritical as fuck if I got up your ass about qualifications. Not a single one of us is qualified for our jobs, not even Jon. Maybe especially not Jon. It’s like, raise your hand if you have a degree in library sciences. No one? Okay, cool, that’s not weird at all for an archive. Actually, maybe bring that up next time he gives you shit. He’ll be all like ‘bluh bluh, you didn’t document this spooky bullshit well enough, it’s not up to the High Standards here at Spooky Bullshit Emporium’ and you can be like ‘whatever buddy, you’re an English major, what do you fuckin’ know?’. It’ll be devastating. He’ll be devastated.”

Martin laughs in the manner of someone who knows that they shouldn’t be, and his shoulders relax into a lower position. “Why would you want me to devastate him? I thought you guys were friends?”

“We are, which is why we all collectively need to get back at Jon for acting like such a prick. He’s always been a bit temperamental, but I honestly don’t get what his deal is, especially with you. I mean, c’mon, you’re great, being mean to you is like kicking a puppy.”

“Thanks? I think?”

Tim pipes up with, “Oooo, since drinking games are apparently too childish for Sasha, what if instead we play ‘What’s Jon’s Deal Anyway, Featuring, Seriously, Why Target Martin, The Baby of The Archives’-”

“-That feels a bit reductive of who I am and I also I think I’m technically older than Jon?-”

“-Whoever comes up with the best explanation, and by best obviously I mean most entertaining, gets an all expense paid trip from the other two to one of the charity shops I know we all frequent.”

Sasha snorts, “Wow, a whole twenty quid, who could resist such temptation. But also, I’m in, I think I have a winner and I have a violent need to out-cardigan Jon.”

Martin’s relaxation is gone again, which Tim thinks need to be fixed through aggressively passing a glass of wine towards him. He takes it without protest, takes a long drink, and says, “This seems more like 3 am conversation than a 9 pm one.”

Sasha gives an encouraging nudge, prompting another drink, and replies, “Yeah, well, I am not gonna make it to 3 am. I’ve got about an hour until the Alcohol Sleepiness sets in, and I know Tim will be right behind me.”

“Sashaaaaaa, you’re ruining my reputation as a young-at-heart, party-all-night kind of guy.”

“Babe, you’ve complained about your bones aching often enough that you’ve never had that reputation.”

“Surrounded by mean drunks, that’s what I am. I should be pitied.”

Martin shoots a glance towards Sasha, then replies, “You’d be more pitiable if this entire thing wasn’t, you know, entirely your own fault.”

Sasha nods sagely, “It’s true. If you were pitiable then maybe you wouldn’t have to die first.”

“You know what? I am uncomfortable with the energy that’s been created in this room, how about we divert some of that towards complaining about our bosses, as coworkers who are hanging out and having a good time and not bullying me are supposed to do.”

Sasha giggles slightly as she leans down and presses a kiss to Tim’s cheek. “Aw, sorry, Tim. I promise to double cross Martin when if becomes killing time.”

Tim melts a little, even as he’s replying, “Wait, when?” Martin takes another sip and says, “Whatever. I could take you both.”

How the hell are you supposed to resist a set up like that? With an over the top wink and cheesy grin, Tim says, “I bet you could, big guy.”

He’s expecting a slightly flustered reaction, maybe a higher pitched voice and a blush, if he’s lucky. He gets all of those things, but it’s Sasha saying, “Oh my god.” Martin only gives him a raised eyebrow and level stare, and Tim makes a mental note to reevaluate his dedication to only considering Martin in a strictly platonic fashion. Sasha continues talking, cutting through the..tension? with, “Okay, now I am uncomfortable with the energy that’s been created in this room. Tim, tell the studio audience what you think is up with Jon.”

Tim blinks, hard, gives a shake of his head, and says, “Oh, obviously the Jon we know is dead. His ‘promotion’ to Head Archivist was actually Elias killing him off and replacing him with a robot that has the command If: see Martin Then: be dick. Don’t worry Marto, now that Sasha is aware of the issue, she’ll surely be able to reprogram him.”

Sasha hums a bit, then says, “I buy it. I think my explanation’s better, but Elias does seem the “kill a dude and replace him” type. Like if I was gonna suspect any particular person of murder he’s in the top five.”

“Seriously? Elias? Somehow has middle manager vibes even though he’s the head honcho Elias? Mr. ‘I probably wore boat shoes and khaki shorts for the entirety of university’ Bouchard? Voted most likely to put a thin layer of mayo in between two pieces of white bread and claim it’s a sandwich Elias? The area man that’s almost certainly gone on record as saying that golf and networking are his favorite hobbies Elias? He’s far too boring to have committed a murder.”

Tim’s looking at Martin with shock and delight, and he knows Sasha is wearing the exact same expression. “More of this. Please describe more of the things that Elias is.”

“I mean, sure? Uhh, guy that would pay $80 for a dime bag because you told him it’s a premium strain. Person that ironically says things like “kids these days” and “the youths” and you know he’s talking about people well into their 30s. Genuinely believes that if you can afford a cell phone then you shouldn’t be complaining about being poor, because apparently a one time purchase of around a hundred bucks is the same as trying to pay monthly rent. Tells people to haul themselves up by their bootstraps. Thinks he got to where he was ‘without anybody’s handouts’ even though he’s had a trust fund since he was 15. Writes weekly editorials to the local newspaper complaining about the liberalization of media, and they’re like ‘sir, please stop submitting to us, we’re just trying to talk about Lisa’s gardening club’ because they can’t professionally tell him to fuck off. Thinks salt and pepper are the only spices one could ever possibly need, everything else is simply excessive. Somehow gay and homophobic. Like, yes, he’s taken a male lover, but he’s also seconds away from calling you a slur at any one time. Actually, no, that’s too interesting, and I refuse to believe he’s had a lover. Legally, he cannot have a lover, I’ve decided, so just gay and homophobic, both in theory alone. Has said that Boris Johnson is “a bit much, but really not so bad, and much better than any of the alternatives, really.” All of the cousins in his family banded together and officially got him banned from any sort of major holiday dinners. Basically every shitty boss you’ve ever had, especially if you’ve worked retail, rolled into one.”

Tim lets out a low whistle. “Damn, all right. Get fucked Elias.”

Sasha emphatically agrees, “Get fucked Elias.”

They all clink their glasses together, and then there’s a beat of silence before Martin says, “I’m pretty sure robots can’t get eye bags.”

Tim and Sasha let out a “huh” and “hmm?” respectively, so Martin elaborates. “You posited that Jon had been replaced with a robot. Pretty sure robots aren’t able to look that tired.”

Tim snaps. “Drat, you’ve pointed out the one flaw in my impeccable logic. So what d’you think is up with him? I know you don’t have the Before The Archives comparison, but I think you could provide a fresh perspective.”

“Oh, fuck, I don’t know. Two months ago, I might have had some choice words, but first off, you all genuinely got on, so it didn’t really make sense for him to be awful all the time, and secondly ever since the, um, worm thing, he’s actually been pretty nice? I haven’t heard any snide comments, and whenever I mess something up he’s a lot more, um, gentle about explaining what wrong. He actually complimented my work the other day so. I guess I think Jon’s deal was that he was stressed out and I was very nervous and not very good at my job and he picked up on that?”

“So you think he’s like a horse.”

“Explain.”

“He sensed your fear and he became skittish and irritable in kind.”

“Horses can sense fear?”

“Horses can sense everything.”

“That’s fucked up.”

“Right?”

“Guys, we’ve gone on like four different tangents in one conversation. Martin, I’m very glad to hear that Jon’s changed his behavior towards, because it means I don’t have to yell at him on your behalf, you’re getting to see the person that me and Tim both know who is actually pretty cool, and also mostly because it feeds perfectly into my winning theory.”

“What, you’ve got something better than Martin’s ‘accurate but boring’ reasoning or my ‘super cool but now that I think about it for .5 seconds actually kind of a bummer robot’ knowledge?”

Sasha’s incredibly self-assured when she says, “I sure fuckin’ do. Jon’s secretly been in love with Martin the whole time, and he’s been previously overcompensating by acting like he hates him.” which makes Tim choke on air and Martin emphatically reply, “Fuck off, he is not.”

“No, no, hear me out, I have, I have receipts, as the kids say. First point of evidence: Martin’s stupid hot, and there’s no way that Jon is straight, so obviously he’s not gonna be impervious to that.”

“What?”

“Oh come off it Martin, it’s just a fact. Like, me personally? I don’t even do the whole romance thing, but the first time I ever saw you I blacked out slightly and thought ‘Now there’s a man I could raise some ferrets with.’.”

“I, um, I, well. Is that...supposed to be a euphemism for something?”

“What? No, I’ve just always wanted ferrets, and asking someone to raise pets with you is like the height of romance, I’m pretty sure. Back me up here Tim.”

“On the ferret thing or the Martin hot thing?”

“Either? Both.”

“Aight. Yes, asking someone to raise ferrets with you is basically a marriage proposal if that someone is Sasha, and I hate to break it to you Martin, but you’re incredibly good-looking. We’re all incredibly good-looking, to the point where I think the only qualification for the archives staff is being a straight up hottie. OH! We should name the group chat “straight up hottie squad”. Anyway, yep, point for Sasha.”

“Not a point for Sasha, even if I believe you about about my, em, physical attractiveness,-”

“-Don’t have to put belief in a fact, Marto-”

“-that doesn’t mean anything. By that logic, he’s equally as likely to be in love with either of you, and my money would be on Sasha if it was anyone, because you’re clearly his favorite.”

“Ah, but that’s exactly why it isn’t me, but thank you for the transition into my second point which is: Jon is the kind of person that sees anything that might make him vulnerable and starts aggressively defending himself against it, and what’s more vulnerable than a crush? He’s not crushing on Tim, because Tim’s fucking great, but sometimes he’s also the walking, talking embodiment of sensory overload, and while I myself I love that, Jon clearly gets a bit overwhelmed by it at times. He’s not into me, because he knows better than that, and overall I’m pretty non-threatening to his whole thing, so of course he’s going to be the most relaxed around me. You, on the other hand, are single, hot, kind to animals and people alike, and make a great cup of tea. Incredibly crush worthy, thus incredibly threatening, thus Jon acting like That.”

“Hmm, this still seems like something that comes from watching one too many corny rom coms, and that’ s coming from someone who loves corny rom coms.”

“I also love corny rom coms, but that’s completely beside the point. Because, okay, sure, if Jon had just been a weird asshole to you, I wouldn’t be like ‘oh, yeah, that’s a classic case of covering for something’ but you’re right about him being nicer since the worm thing. So nice, in fact, I shall be bringing in Timothy as my star witness that’s going to blow this whole case wide open. Martin, you may not have heard how Jon has started to talk about you, but me and Tim sure have.”

“God, yeah. Like if we thought he wouldn’t shut up about you before-

“-which he wouldn’t-”

“it’s gotten way worse now.”

“I think the whole life threatening worm woman flipped a switch for him and now he’s all fuckin. ‘Oh, Martin should stay in the archives, let me give him the place that I sleep.”

“Oh, Martin, I don’t think he should go out on too many research trips anymore, I’d much prefer for him to be ~nice and close~”

“Oh, Martin, good lord, did you know that his tea is quite good? I’m think it might actually be the best I’ve ever had.”

“Oh, Martin, his work’s rather improved, don’t you think? It’s really quite impressive, especially considering all the stress he’s had to endure.”

“Oh, Martin, I just want him to take me into his big, strong arms and whisk me away from all of this.”

“He did not fucking say that last one.”

Sasha throws her arms up in the air. “He may as well have!”

Nodding sagely, Tim replies, “This whole thing holds water. I vote Sasha gets the shopping trip. Martin?”

Martin stares at his drink as if it has any ability to give him any sort of answers, then lets out a sigh with his entire body. “You know what? It’s probably nicer than whatever the fuck is the truth, so sure, why not? Let’s get Sasha her cardigans.”

Sasha lets out a whoop. “Hell yeah! Can’t wait for spree, assuming all three of us get out of this cabin alive.”

“Okay, nope, clearly Sasha needs another distraction. Got any suggestions, Martin?”

“Uh, wasn’t a karaoke machine part of the sales pitch for this place?”

“Martey babey, yes! I wouldn’t have thought you’d spring for that sort of thing!”

“If this were a public bar or something where I’d have to listen to drunk strangers and they’d have to listen to me, then no, I’d rather have my brain pulled through my nose a la mummification. But with only you guys and fourish drinks in? I’m down to clown.”

“Sash, you with us?”

“Dunno, what songs are there?”

Tim shrugs, and heads to the storage closet that contains all the various entertainment equipment. It takes a bit of searching, and a bit more digging, but he’s able to unearth the ancient portable karaoke machine. He also grabs some of the jigsaws, mostly on the thought that sometimes a bitch just wants to hang out with their friends and do a puzzle. Also because in light of the fact that they’re stuck inside with no sort of access to the outside world for two days longer than planned, there’s pretty much no way that they’re not going to reach a point where they all say fuck it let’s do a puzzle.

Plugging in the machine, it takes a solid several minutes to boot up, which is the perfect length of time to take it upon himself to take one for the team and chug the box wine himself, with Sasha and Martin chanting in the background. When he finishes, they cheer, and then Martin immediately shoves a glass of water for him to down as well, muttering something about how he wants him to be alive in the morning. Tim can tell he’s well inebriated by now, because the simple thoughtful gesture is enough to make him a little bit misty-eyed, and Sasha can attest to alcohol turning him into the world’s biggest sap. In order to avoid prevent himself from becoming the kind of person who says “I love you” in a gradually more sloppy repeat, he starts flipping through the discography of the now running machine. “Alright y’all, it looks like we got 80s songs or...80s songs. Ooo, they have the Grease 2 soundtrack.”

That gets him a well deserved “No!” from both parties, with Sasha adding on, “Not even if it was Grease 1. I’m putting an embargo on musical theater in general.”

“Oh come on, some musicals are better than other. Right, Marto?”

“I’m with Sasha on this one.”

“Boo. But fine, what do you want?”

Martin and Sasha glance at each other, and Tim’s amazed at how well the bonding night-turned-long-weekend has gone so far, considering they seem to have already mastered the art of silent communication. Martin speaks first, with, “They got Dolly Parton?”

The process of scrolling through individual letters to type is achingly slow, but luckily all he needs to get through is “DO” before she shows up. “They do.”

Sasha says, “Do they got 9 to 5, by Dolly Parton?”

Tim’s eyes light up with realization as he says, “They do,” and in a moment of spontaneous understanding, all three of them know that they’re not simply going to sing 9 to 5. No, they’re going to do a full blown music video for the benefit for nobody but themselves, because why the fuck not.

The next hour is spent in a very silly fashion. They figure out how to use the cabin’s layout to their advantage, assign various parts of the song to each person, and practice their inexpert choreography a few times with the song tinnily blasting from Sasha’s phone. The final result is hardly of professional quality, but it is of making them all giggle quality. It starts off in a relay like manner, each of them in a different area to coordinate with “Tumble of out bed and stumble to the kitchen” (Sasha on the couch), “Pour myself a cup of ambition”, (Tim at the coffemaker), and “Yawn and stretch and try to come to life” (Martin at the fridge), with them finally crowding around the karaoke machine together to scream sing the chorus. Despite their practice, they quickly go off key, and while they might end up with low points for accuracy, they get full marks on enthusiasm.

When the song ends, it takes them a few minutes to settle down into something less giddy. As they do, Sasha, out of breath, says, “Fuck me, I’m sleepy now. What the hell?”

Tim hums in affirmation. “Goddammit, I’m tired too. Let me guess, Martin, you’re young enough that you could go all night?”

“No? I’ve never pulled an all-nighter in my life. Actually, I know that it was supposed to be in case the power went out, but huddling together under a blanket in front of a fire sounds really nice? I mean, um, if you guys were down.”

Sasha leans her head against Martin’s shoulder and takes on the expression of a deeply content cat. “Mmm, I call Martin, he’s warm.”

“Absolutely not, I also want to leech Martin’s warmth. You good with being in the middle?”

Martin’s practically beaming, but his voice manages to almost fake being put upon. “I suppose it’s a sacrifice I could make.”

With Sasha already half asleep, Martin brings her over to the couch, while Tim gets them all set up. He manages to find the kind of big, fluffy blanket that all cabins should contain and wraps it around their shoulders. Luckily for them, the fireplace is gas lit and can be put on a timer. He sets it for 30 minutes, even though all three of them are going to be long passed out before them. Sasha is already softly snoring away, and Martin’s head keeps drifting down and snapping back up. Tim curls up against Martin’s other side, and even though all three of them are going to wake up with aching backs and worse heads, he thinks he really just might be a genius after all.

*Why is Mr. Boddy’s name Dr. Black in the UK. I hate that. Why would you not have the dumb joke of naming the victim “boddy”. Hey brits explain your crimes.

#anon #replies #nat fic #tma #martin blackwood #tim stoker #sasha james

8 notes · View notes

bronanlynch · 3 years

Text

I enjoyed doing this last week so this is. a thing now I guess. click through for roundup of whatever media I’ve been into in the past week (will normally be on thursdays I think bc that’s the day I’m usually free but my schedule this week was weird) (inspired by the tuesday again thing that @girlfriendsofthegalaxy does)

listening: the new Mountain Goats album Getting Into Knives is very fun and full of bops, for a given value of both “fun” and “bops” because it’s The Mountain Goats so it does have that edge of depression but quite a few of the songs are a bit more. cheerful? than a lot of their other stuff, for lack of a better word

favorite track is probably The Rat Queen

listening (podcast edition): this very fun episode of Overinvested tearing apart the new movie adaptation of Rebecca which I have not seen and was not planning on seeing but I do enjoy people smartly analyzing why things aren’t good and also I do love discussions about Gothic romance

reading: The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea by Maggie Tokuda-Hall is probably a very good book that someone else will enjoy very much, as lots of people whose opinions I generally trust already have enjoyed it. and I possibly will enjoy more if I give it another chance, once I’ve gotten over being disappointed that it wasn’t what I was looking for right now. the premise is neat! the worldbuilding is cool! the characters are interesting! mermaids, witches, and seas are three of my favorite things and also there are pirates, my other fave thing!

the reason I bounced off of it so hard is that I kept seeing it hyped up as a trans/nonbinary book, and then felt kinda let down when I started reading it and realized that the main character whom I’ve seen described as genderqueer is 1) dressing as a guy because someone else suggested it for safety reasons and 2) this was several years before the story starts and this character still refers to herself exclusively (disclaimer that I didn’t read the full thing but. as far as I got and also I skimmed toward the ending) as she and by her feminine birthname. and those things are fine, that’s a valid gender story, nonbinary people can absolutely keep their old pronouns and names and it doesn’t make them any less nonbinary, but the way it was framed in the parts that I read felt to me more like the old classic ‘girl dresses as guy for plot reasons’ thing, which isn’t something I personally wanted to read more of right now, especially not when I went in expecting something that would resonate more with my gender experience

watching: I’ve been rewatching Leverage, since I only ever watched the first season many years ago because that’s what was free on hulu at the time, and the thing that’s really getting to me is how fundamentally hopeful it is. like, yeah, sure, the premise of it is about how capitalism is designed to fuck people over and there is A Lot about specifically health insurance being really really awful. so there are parts of it that are a lil bit too real, but then at the end of the day they always win and punish the rich capitalists and help their victims and it’s just. nice to see that kind of happy ending

the specific episode I’m having lots of thoughts about is the Mile High Job, which is about the team is trying to protect a potential corporate whistleblower from being murdered by her coworker while on an airplane. at first they’re not sure what’s going on because they weren’t expecting two people from the corporation to be on that flight, so they don’t know which person is the one they should be focusing on. one of them is an anxious younger woman and the other is an extremely generic man, and from the moment they decided that the woman was the one they had to protect I was dreading the plot twist of “no actually you just helped her take out her target and you should’ve been protecting the other guy” which would’ve felt just. so mean-spirited and cynical but it’s the kind of thing I expect from media I guess. and then once it was clear that nope, that twist wasn’t going to happen, I expected her to turn around at the end and be like “actually no I’m not gonna testify against the corporation because I’ve realized how dangerous it is.” and I kind of hate that I’ve become so jaded by both media and also the real world that I’m so ready to expect the most cynical option, because I’m not used to stories about how even though the system is corrupt and oppressive and exploitative, people can still help each and they do and sometimes they make things better

playing: got back into playing Dishonored after taking a couple weeks off because I got stuck and frustrated and also kept playing for too long at a time and giving myself headaches. Lady Boyle’s Last Party (which I am going to completely and entirely spoil so if you don’t want that this is your warning) is probably the mission that I have the strongest mixed feelings about. I love the approach to the party, I love the concept of sneaking into a masquerade ball, I love signing the guestbook with your actual legal wanted fugitive name while wearing the mask that you commit all of your crimes in, I love a good fancy party mission I cannot stress that enough it’s the sexiest possible setting

HOWEVER. trying to sneak around upstairs fucking sucks because the ceilings aren’t high enough for there to be places to hide, like convenient hanging lamps or pipes to blink up to. my least favorite room in this entire game is that art gallery because you can get on top of the cases and you think you’re safe because you’re Up but then the guards spot you instantly and sound the alarm and the entire party shuts down and then you let them kill you so that you can go back to your last save

ADDITIONALLY, fuck the nonlethal option for this one. I hate it so much and feel so incredibly gross about choosing it but I also feel extremely not great about tricking her into meeting me alone and then actually assassinating her. the conversation is so uncomfortable that I tried to be like “actually no nevermind” which causes her to think you’re weird and creepy and she has the guards ““throw you out”“ which apparently in Dunwall is just how you say that she’s gonna have the guards murder you. but anyway. she's a shitty rich lady but she doesn't deserve either of the things that could happen to her and she's only a target because she's sleeping w a guy who sucks. she hasn’t done anything! she isn’t actually responsible for what happened to Jessamine or Emily! which works on a narrative level in my opinion because this is the last mission before you go after the lord regent and it’s becoming clear that the loyalists are just using Corvo for their own agenda and don’t actually care about Jessamine. but it’s still unpleasant to be the one enacting it, y’know?

also on a narrative level, I really like the concept of doing a clean hands run except killing each of the actual targets, because I feel like that would be a cool inversion of the trope where the hero kills a bunch of mooks and then refuses to kill the big bad because murder is wrong. on a gameplay level, I’m still gonna do the nonlethal options because I refuse to risk getting the bad ending, and I’m proud of the fact that I haven’t killed anyone since getting out of prison. I do wanna do a high chaos playthrough at some point though just to see how it goes, since I went low chaos last time too

sorry for writing an entire essay about Dishonored but. the funniest thing from that mission is that apparently if you get spotted by one of the maids in the basement where you are not supposed to be (the guards will immediately attack if they see you) instead of raising the alarm she just says “welcome to the party.” love that solidarity.

making: none of my cosplay stuff is at an especially picture-worthy stage and I didn’t get pictures of the pesto I made for dinner last night so there’s not gonna be much that’s interesting here but I did go to Spirit Halloween after Halloween when everything was on clearance and got a bunch of stuff that I’m gonna use for cosplay eventually

writing: soon I will finish the Eddis/Attolia Queen’s Thief fic that’s been rattling around in my brain ever since I finished the last book. hopefully.

#dreaming.txt #wednesday again no problem #long post /

4 notes · View notes

snakefaerie · 4 years

Note

🍁 - How did your f/o and s/i meet?

Okay, so I made this into a short dumb story of how they actually met. A bit lovey-dovey but no smooching in this one. It's not as great bc I'm tired but I can write stuff much longer than this if I'm being honest. I'm still trying to fit Dan's words in character and I made sure I was able to hear everything in his voice. Sorry if you guys don't but aaaaa I still am open to get more practice.

---

It was somewhere towards the end of October, near Halloween except the day is pretty frigid. Zephyr sat in the table that was out of the coffee shop. She is not that keen on the current flavor, but she also never cared much for it. A few sips we're provided, of course. Things have been chill and not much has happened yet. The coffee table had a white cover over it, a tiny plate where the drink is usually set, and another gray chair that is sitting across from the lady.

There was something that did grab her attention. Something that was hardly far across the distance of her current area. But what was it?

"Hm?"

She quietly mumbled and squints for a more understanding picture.

Her hair was black with purple highlights, a bit of magenta was still noticeable. She was currently wearing a delicate white jacket with a gray scarf draped around her neck. Zephyr was also wearing black jeans and boots that were the exact color. Her eyes were a ghastly version of the color blue, more like turquoise when you think about it but darker.

It just stood there for an entire minute. What a waste of time. What was detected was not too intriguing. Zephyr scowled, stealing one final sip until the figure abruptly appeared in front of her eyes. She spat out her drink, immediately onto the table. Who was he?! What is he doing?

He decided to go into a seated position on the chair, casting an extended gaze. Zephyr's eyes glimpse into him to examine his body. She was already dripping, her face was growing hot. She liked him... And how gorgeous he was to her. She was embarrassed but also a blushing predicament all at once.

He wore a shirt and part of his chest was exposed. The clothing went past the belt, an extension was over his groin. The shirt does have sleeves that are a dull color of blue, which would match his pants pretty well. His hair is shoulder length, just like Zephyr's, similar hairstyle as it frays out on each side. His eyebrows were like shaved specks. The eyes? They're pretty... Red is in fact, one of her beloved colors.

She tried to prevent herself from getting caught blushing, which wasn't going to work out very adequately.

He finally piped up.

"Heeeeey why is your face all red? I get that it's cold out but I don't think that's it. We just met for the first time and you're blushing?" His voice was soft, but it was pretty soothing to Zephyr as well. She needed to hear more words from him.

"S-Sometimes I'm just shy when meeting new people... Ehehe. Nothing that important really." Zephyr beamed, her eyes are partially shut. "And attractive idiots like him." She guessed. "Oh, and I was only staring because I didn't know what was going on, or who you we're... I don't think you would believe me whatsoever."

"Why would I not believe a cute girl like you? You know y-"

"Mind introducing yourself to me? That would be really nice." Zephyr postponed his sentence with a little favor. She was dying to know who he certainly is, what his name was. Hell, even more information he's a beauty!

"Well, that was sudden... You can call me Dan. Some people might call me 'Dan Of Steel', but for you... You're free to call me whatever. Your turn." Steely Dan introduced as he anticipated for Zephyr's acknowledgment. He stood up to pull the chair much closer to the flushed girl, sitting right back down. Her face was extremely hot. Why did Dan have to move so close to her already?

"Why it's a p-pleasure to meet you, Dan! I-I'm Zephyr, I also like to draw, play video games, and do whatever pleases me ya know? I also... Don't know what more to say at this point. I do enjoy looking nice in public, no matter where I'm at." Zephyr inaugurated and stuttered. "Cute." Dan speculated. "Well, it's certainly a pleasure to meet you Zephyr. I must say you're really attractive, you see. I'm the type of guy that can easily make any girl fall head over heels." He jabbed his elbow into her arm with a wink. "Okay, Dan. I'm not as adorable as people might think I am, second... Are you implying that you think I have some sort of crush on you?"

"'Implying'? I'm not implying anything. Seriously, you should look at how hysterical your face is!" Steely Dan cackled, the lady glared while it was suspended with a smirk. "You motherfucker-"

His arms curved around her body, incapable of moving. Frozen. Totally frozen. Zephyr's face was pushed into his chest. She shuddered and squeezed him right back, his two fingers brush the top of her strand. "How soft... I honestly enjoy the colors." Dan admitted, seeing the purple streaks that are in specific areas of her dark hair. It was mostly black, just like his. She's had purple, he did not.

"Miss, I can even feel how hot your face is. You don't have to say anything, I can tell you're that in love with me. Besides, I think out of all of the ladies out there you're by far the cutest I've seen." He teased, glancing down at Zephyr. "Fine Dan. I know it's weird that we just met but... Your personality is interesting already. I'd love to know more about you if you stop teasing me like that." She rolled her eyes at him and sighed.

He smiled, standing up with her being held up. There was a feeble tinge of red hitting his cheeks too. "I'll be more than willing to get to know you too. Are you wanting to go anywhere else? Like someone's house for example..." He polled.

Zephyr answered back.

"Of course. I'd love to see what your house is like."

Dan smirked, his arms were still hugging her while her entire face was now planted into his chest.

"Alright then. That's acceptable."

#zephyr writes #steely dan #jojo's bizarre adventure #zephyr #romance #kind of #how tender.#self ship

4 notes · View notes

jennycalendar · 5 years

Text

arch-nemeses

read it on ao3!

“Oi, wanker,” Ripper was shouting after him, “your band can’t play for shit, you know that?”

Spike turned, long coat whirling out in a way that combined grace and manliness, and shot back, “My band plays a damn sight better than your band. What do they call you? Wretched? Sounds about right, doesn’t it?”

for @jackalopingintothevoid!!! i’m pretty sure you’ll know what this is from the summary.

this is a horribly short thing, and i will have to eventually write u one or more very long fics, bc i have a few ideas. left u a longer note on ao3; love u bunches <33

there is no actual resolution or character growth because this is ethan and he learns nothing, ever. i love him.

Ethan wasn’t threatened by Ripper’s girl. He’d met her a handful of times, showing up to cause a bit of havoc just because he felt like it, and she’d always struck him as a girl with an uninterestingly kind heart, which didn’t really threaten him. He wasn’t bothered by Ripper having some annoyingly pretty little angel of a girlfriend, largely because he knew that he was still Ripper’s unbelievably sexy arch-nemesis, and really, that worked better for him. All the delicious sexual tension, the lingering animosity…it suited him much better than the nauseating domesticity that was Ripper and his girl.

And then came Spike.

“You fucking ponce,” Ripper was shouting as Ethan entered the Bronze, held back by his Slayer, his girl, and that annoying boy who was always wearing heelys. “You dye your hair, you piece of shit, c’mere and tell me to my face that I’m a poser!”

“Seriously?” said Ripper’s girl, who appeared to be trying to hold Ripper back and check her Snapchat at the same time.

Ethan, of course, operated under the reasonable assumption that these threats were directed at him. After all, who else would Ripper be threatening? No one else inspired that level of anger, or that delightfully sexy look of bone-crushing fury in Ripper’s eyes—

“You’re. A. Poser.” A British bloke with bleached hair, unbelievable cheekbones, and a clearly-vintage leather jacket stalked over to Ripper, all but growling. “And don’t get all up in my face with me, Watcher-boy, I could snap you like a twig!”

“You’re not half as able to snap me as you think you are,” Ripper shot back.

“You sure you don’t wanna just compare dicks and be done with it?” snarked Ripper’s girl, adding a determined tug to Ripper’s arm for emphasis. “Rupert, seriously, this is such a waste of time—”

“Fuck off, Janna,” said Ripper.

“What was that?” said Ripper’s girl, raising an eyebrow.

To Ethan’s amusement, Ripper winced, reconsidered, and said solemnly, “I love you, Janna.”

“That’s better,” said Ripper’s girl. “Spike, do you really have to start this bullshit after he’s had a few beers? He always starts getting punchy when he drinks—”

“I have had more than a few beers,” Spike announced, “and I should like to punch something. And I think it should like to be your boy toy’s face.”

“I’m not her boy toy,” Ripper objected. Behind him, the Slayer and the heely-boy exchanged doubtful looks. “And I’m gonna punch your face first. With my face.”

“Does that mean they’re gonna make out?” the Slayer asked Ripper’s girl.

In response, Ripper’s girl smirked, sort of shrugged, and went back to her phone, as though this sort of confrontation between Ripper and Spike was par for the course. And that infuriated Ethan, because how dare Ripper have regular confrontations with someone who wasn’t him? He’d barely been out of Sunnydale for two months this go-round, and this time he had something really terrible up his sleeve, and now he was here only to find Ripper ready to fight and/or drunkenly snog someone who wasn’t him?

It was time for direct action. Ethan strode up to the group. “Hello, Ripper,” he began, flashing his most winning smile.

Ripper, however, didn’t so much as turn around, because Spike was stalking away in the direction of the stage. “Oi, wanker,” Ripper was shouting after him, “your band can’t play for shit, you know that?”

“IT’S A FUCKING STATEMENT,” shouted Ripper, and took advantage of his friends’ distraction to charge after Spike. Grinning furiously, Spike shoved his way through the crowds, jumping up onto the stage before Ripper could reach him.

“Yeah, I’d give that one up if I were you,” said Ripper’s girl, smirking at him like she knew what he was trying to do.

“Go fuck yourself,” said Ethan.

“Always good to see you, Ethan,” said Ripper’s girl, whose name Ethan was still refusing to remember. “Sucks that Ripper isn’t paying attention to you, huh?”

“He’s not paying attention to you either,” Ethan shot back savagely.

“Of course he isn’t,” said Ripper’s girl, looking at Ethan like he was a complete idiot. “He and Spike have this whole weird thing. He and I have a whole not-weird thing. It’s a thing.”

“Yeah, Ethan, get with the times!” piped up heely-boy. Ethan really, really hated heely-boy.

“I’m his weird thing,” Ethan persisted. “Not this Spike pillock. That accent is rubbish, and that coat is a fake, and, and, cheekbones,” he finished furiously, glaring at the stage. Spike was playing the drums very badly and pretending to ignore Ripper, who was jumping up and down in the crowd just to repeatedly flip him the bird.

“Aww,” said Ripper’s girl. “Are you jealous?”

“Shut up,” said Ethan.

“You so are!” said Ripper’s girl. She was grinning like Christmas had come early. “You think your position as his idiot arch-nemesis is usurped by a guy who looks way cuter than you!”

The Slayer gagged. “Jenny,” she said, “I have said this before, and I will say it again: you have terrible taste in guys.”

“I’m not saying Spike is cute,” said Ripper’s girl. “I’m saying, objectively, as a guy, he looks incredibly attractive.”

The Slayer considered this, then nodded. “Fair enough,” she said.

“He is not attractive,” said Ethan. “You could cut glass with those cheekbones. He looks emaciated.”

“He’s a vampire,” said heely-boy helpfully. “That kinda adds a good twenty points to the hotness factor.”

“Well—that’s—I could be a vampire!” Ethan sputtered.

“Yeah, but you’d actually look emaciated,” said the Slayer. “Spike was probably born with those cheekbones.”

“You’re just talking him up to make me angry,” said Ethan stubbornly. “He’s boring. Anyone can prance about onstage with a guitar—”

“Wait wait wait shut up,” said Ripper’s girl, smacking Ethan’s arm and holding up her phone. Ripper was throwing empty plastic cups at Spike. “I need this on video,” said Ripper’s girl.

Ethan stared, infuriated. “HE’S PROVOKING A VAMPIRE,” he shouted. “AND NONE OF YOU ARE BOTHERED BY IT?”

“Spike and Ripper cut a deal,” said the Slayer. “Kind of. He doesn’t feed on people in the Bronze, and I don’t stake him when he’s onstage playing his loud, annoying band music.”

“Plus he has a pretty serious girlfriend,” added Ripper’s girl. “They’re really cute. You know. For a murdery vampire couple.” She smiled a little. “Dru gave me a dead bird once.”

“I am not threatened,” said Ethan. “I am not threatened by Mr. Cheekbones and his stupid drums.”

“Suuuure,” said Ripper’s girl, drawing the word out into an American drawl and ending it with a lipsticked grin.

Ethan Was Not Threatened By Mr. Cheekbones And His Stupid Drums. Ethan could set a whole bunch of things on fire, more than bloody Spike and his bloody leather jacket and how dare Ripper throw empty plastic cups at Spike? Throwing relatively harmless objects at each other was strictly Ripper-And-Ethan territory, not Ripper-And-Spike territory, and Spike should go step into a well-placed ray of sunlight.

He made himself feel better by turning all the toothbrushes in Sunnydale’s local dollar store into flesh-eating slugs that grew every five minutes.

“Ethan, for the love of fucking god,” said Ripper, rounding the corner with a flesh-eating slug somehow affixed to his jacket, “what is the point of this?”

“Chaos,” said Ethan, tried to whirl in that graceful-yet-manly way Spike had managed, and fell into a lamppost.

“Yeah, I figured that,” said Ripper, waving his arm to try and shake off the slug. It didn’t seem to be working. “But your plans are usually more—”

“Dramatic?”

“I would’ve gone with fucking obnoxious, but fine.” Ripper waved his arm again. The slug came off and hit a wall, growing by a good five feet in diameter and leaving a small crater in the cement. “Dramatic works just as well, I s’pose. Why the fuck—”

“It was the first thing I could think of,” said Ethan. “Not exactly up to par, but then you seem to have lowered your standards, haven’t you?”

“Is this another dig at Jenny?” said Ripper sharply, already raising his fists. “Because if it’s another dig at Jenny—”

“I’m not talking about the boring little American,” said Ethan, rolling his eyes. “I’m talking about your new boyfriend Mr. Cheekbones.”

Ripper dropped his fists. He looked genuinely bemused. “What?”

“The vampire?” persisted Ethan. “Poncy boy? Billy Idol knockoff?”

Ripper rolled his eyes. “You’re not serious,” he said. “Spike is a pain in the arse, is all. I’m with Jen and she’s with me and that’s as far as seeing anyone goes—”

“Nauseating,” said Ethan, who had forgotten how annoyingly much Ripper talked about his girl. “And don’t feed me that garbage. All you did last time I was at the Bronze was shout at Cheekbones and tell him how terrible his hair was.”

Ripper stared at him. Slowly, he said, “Ethan, I don’t know if you know this, but telling someone that their hair is terrible doesn’t automatically mean you want to snog them in an alley.”

“I just wanted to make sure you were aware,” said Ethan, “that you already have an arch-nemesis with intense sexual tension. Do you want to know who it is?”

“No,” said Ripper, and started walking away.

Ethan followed. “It’s me,” he informed him. “Me. I’m your arch-nemesis.”

“It’s not a self-appointed bloody position,” said Ripper. “Stop trying to make yourself my arch-nemesis. It’s annoying.”

“That’s the point,” said Ethan, and picked up the flesh-eating slug, lobbing it at Ripper’s head before it could start eating him. It latched onto his jacket.

“For fuck’s sake,” said Ripper, balled up the jacket, and threw it at Ethan, beginning to walk faster. Ethan dodged the jacket, continuing to follow.

Ripper rounded a corner, then grinned; his girl was straddling a motorbike, giving the both of them an impatient look. “Here’s my ride,” he said. To his girl, he added, “Jenny, you were right. Ethan’s jealous of Spike.”

“I’m right about everything ever,” said Ripper’s girl. “How is this a surprise?” She leaned over, grinning as Ripper kissed her, and moved up on the motorbike so he could get on behind her. “Don’t worry, Ethan,” she said. “We all still think you’re terrible and evil and shit.”

Ethan resented the fact that he liked Ripper’s girl a bit more for saying that, so he just glowered in return. “I could hex your motorbike, you know,” he told her.

“I put wards on it for that exact reason,” said Ripper’s girl, and made a pleased little noise as Ripper wound his arms around her stomach. “Ready?”

“As I’ll ever be,” said Ripper. To Ethan, he added, “You are an annoying little shit and you need to get your nose out of my business,” and then buried his face in his girl’s shoulder as the motorbike set off.

“You’re not wearing a helmet,” Ethan shouted after him, which wasn’t particularly witty, but Spike had thrown him off his game a bit.

The next time Ethan showed up at the Bronze, Ripper and Spike were sloppily making out in one of the secluded couches. Delighted at the potential to sow seeds of chaos, he immediately started looking around to see if Ripper’s girl was anywhere near the scene.

She was. She had her phone out and was snapping a picture of them.

“For fuck’s sake, Calendar,” said Ethan, too infuriated to remember that he had been determined not to use Ripper’s girl’s name. “You don’t care that your boy toy’s snogging Billy Idol?”

Pocketing her phone, Calendar gave the pair a fond smile. “They pull this shit all the time when they’re drunk,” she said. “Then they pretend it never happened, so I have to get photo evidence to tease Spike about. If I could, I’d tease Ripper too, but I can’t really tease Ripper about dumb choices he made when he was drunk, ‘cause, uh,” and then she touched her lips and got a strange smile on her face, “I’m definitely a good percentage of those dumb choices. So.”

“Spike is usurping my position,” said Ethan.

Calendar snorted. “Please,” she said. “Spike couldn’t usurp your position if he tried. You’re the actual worst, Ethan, and we all know it, so would it kill you to let Ripper have a generally harmless rivalry that sometimes ends in drunken makeouts?”

Ethan decided to focus on the part of the sentence where Calendar called him the actual worst. “You’re all right, Calendar,” he informed her.

“Wow, and your good opinion means so much to me,” said Calendar, who was already heading in the direction of the dance floor.

Ethan watched her go, nodded to himself, and decided he would come back in a month and try to set her hair on fire.

#fic #ripper au #ft. ethan being a dramatic dumbass #spike being loud and bisexual #ripper existing largely to threaten and/or kiss things #and jenny Giving 0 Fucks

12 notes · View notes

survivor-mesopotamia · 4 years

Text

Ep. #2 - “Shit ain’t over till the fat lady sings and I didn’t warm my pipes.” (Cameron)

Day 4: Well. I survived my first tribal council of the season, and even though it went exactly according to plan, while I slept my entire day away, I'm still really hesitant to tell myself that I'm doing well on my tribe. I'm really nervous that my tribe mates are playing me, and that I'm really boo boo tha fool here. I called Megan post-tribal, and I was finally able to get some closure on something that happened between us in our personal lives, which felt really good. After that, she asked me about the idol, to which I had responded "Wait, Julian didn't tell you?", which hopefully sows some seeds of doubt in Megan about Julian. Ideally, if the Enlil tribe has to go back to tribal council, the four of us can bear witness to a Megan vs. Julian war. Because unfortunately, the connections I have outside Enlil, are shared with either Julian or Megan. If Megan and Julian are going after each other pre-merge, or during a swap scenario, I don't have to share those connections anymore. After that, Megan and I just talked about the nudes we received during quarantine ~ I then promptly ran to Will to tell him about the potential crack I just formed between Julian and Megan, which was met with genuine excitement. I think I'm really gaining Will's trust, and I think we vibe so well together. Love that guy! Overall, it wasn't a very productive day because I woke up at 4:30p PST. Love that for me, thanks for shading me @ Tribal Bodhi.

going into this scavenger hunt as the tribe that went to tribal last is worrysome. It's a challenge that's fully dependent on our activity, so we are at a serious disadvantage against the other two tribes that get to choose someone less active to sit out. We don't have that luxury. The point/life system eases the blow, however, since we can get less active players 1 life while more active players can get 3. In case we lose, I'm trying to connect with everyone on the tribe. I really don't want to vote anyone out though. I have an alliance with Julian and JJ, and one with Will on the side. Chrissa wants to work with Julian, JJ and myself, and I think Megan and JJ have something on the side. I'm nervous for who would be the target in the vote, and any vote would hurt all of our games collectively. Hopefully we win because the next vote will not be easy AT ALL.

Done w typing this sheet

youtube

jj and zachary are so fucking annoying to this challenge and if i vote for you first at the swap, its probably because youre typing too much during this challenge sorry not sorry xoxo - sincerely johnny a month from now

let me be clear with andrew I was not calling his hosting unfair i was calling the fact that a majority green item giving him a point unfair not the hosting but lack of yellow, also i have a headache i don't feel that good. and I just don't think zach should have had a point for it nothing against hosting obviously i watch a movie trivia thing where literally they have a challenge to challenge any questions that are unfair, that doesn't mean they are calling the question writers or the answer writers unfair.

Zach just won the tribal challenge for us which is fantastic. We can maintain the illusion of a unified tribe longer, which keeps us together in a swap situation, and Zach has clearly painted a challenge target on himself over the last two challenges which will make him go before me if our Triforce ever becomes the minority. I'm really happy with my position in the game right now

youtube

me and monty trying to find the idol and decode this annoying ass video https://imgur.com/a/lu7sbMu

Forgive me father for I have sinned it's been approximately three days since my last confession so far can't complain really we be winning they hating we be riding pretty damn clean I've got a majoritu alliance I didn't start so odds of it falling around me and being the first voted out slim to none thank the sweet baby jesis and all that good shit. Oh well that's all for now

JULIAN’S HOST CHAT GUEST, ZEE:

I am filling in a confessional because you told me to. I am in front of my fan because it's hot. I'm thinking that it seems pretty stupid to ask me for a confessional. Julian's prod chat isn't very interesting because he's distracted.

youtube

also just threw out madison's name to johnny. if this shit backfires on me ill be ):

https://youtu.be/Pqck1gayfJU

https://youtu.be/FMay7NycsPw

yo yo yo homies!!! fuck the scavenger hunt and the mobile Skype app !! Lowkey scared but I think I’m close with everyone on the tribe except madi soooooooooo that’s probably who will go tonight. I’ve connected a lot with Monty and am hoping we can work together closely moving forward 💕not sure how useful my relationship with Zach is going to be come swap/merge bc it seems like he’s ALREADY making himself a target like the big doof he is. More later 💋

https://youtu.be/Qg47yupj1bQ

https://youtu.be/vUK8A1qWVoA

Hello tumblr survivor world! Sorry I didnt confess for episode 1, I was going to but i accidentally exited out of the page when i almost finished writing it. Anyways, it was just a cast assessment for my tribe so tl;dr everyone on my tribe is great and its really sad that we have to vote someone out now. So this whole weekend I was away so I was REALLY worried that I would be voted out since I sat out of the challenge. But after talking to Johnny and Isabelle, it seems like Madison will be voted out tonight. Which is so bad bc this her first game in a year, but hey it's our first vote and it's not me so it's not really the time to make a stand. _________________________________________________________________________________________ Okay I took a break from writing this confessional and there's moreeeeeeeee so part 2 I guess. So I had a call with Johnny and we came up with an alliance of me, him, Isabelle, and Benji. What an iconic alliance, right? But also while Johnny and I talked we got onto the topic of idols and why it is that there hasn't been an idol post yet. I brought up that wayyyyyy back when in Malaysia and some other games around that time, some of the idol hunts were less clear cut. We ended up looking at the blog and clicking the "idol system" tab and it brought us to some weird crab video with audio that sounds like a pokemon cry? Idk part of me thinks its just a joke but I also have to consider that it might be SOMETHING. It said remember to like and subscribe so I sent a screenshot of me liking and subscribing to see if that would do anything but nope. Johnny said he'd do some thinking about it and get back to me later if he figures something out. Also tribal seems super clear cut so I'm a bit less worried now but y'know how it is I can't not worry about tribal.

i just spent $8 on a spectogram and STILL cant find this fucking idol im gonna kms... monty im sorry im steam rolling ahead looking for this thing without telling you, but thank you for the first clue xoxo... if i get stumped in the future ill reach out for SURE (but idt you trust me that much so this seems kinda valid to me) ((FOUR HOURS LATER: i told monty lololol)) ALSO FOR FUCKS SAKE I think madison is gonna go, and truthfully, im fine with it because it's the easiest thing to do due to her poor performance in the past few challenges and just being the least AROUND the tribe, but i know that it'd probably be better for me long term to get rid of abby because i just dont see her as a long term ally for me. i think she's close to JJ and Megan on the other tribe, and she's becoming much more acclimated to the tumblr survivor community that i just BET that she maybe has an additional connection on the rookie tribe. If I can attempt to break that up before we get to a swap, I think that's what im going to have to do figure out if we lose another challenge before a swap... i dont really want to see ANYBODY else go besides abby if im thinking about a second boot. i bet it wont be easy to take her out tho also, if madison goes, this is like...... lowkey vindication for game changers???? last night i talked about this with monty and i was like hmmmm "is it ugly to bring up past game history?" and his response was "not if it's within the same series" .... so. vindication

---

omg i just told madison how to find the idol system thing i hope she doesnt tell anyone i told her about it LMAO........ this almost seems too easy.i got added to two alliances today. why do i not feel safe? is it me going? WTF IS GOING ON

excited to be first boot because no one will TALK TO ME!

Things haven’t changed much since my last confessional! As far as I know the tribe hasn’t started into alliances and we’re all riding some excitement at having so far avoided tribal. I think the rest of the tribe and I are all feeling good and just focusing on making the tribe switch without losing any members.

from round 2 https://youtu.be/fk002uG2HoI

Hi sorry I forgot to do a confessional this round so this will be short imma just say a few things 1. I don’t trust julian one bit he can stop being shady to me 2. I can’t believe we aren’t going to tribal I’m so fkn happy i was able to pull out the win for our tribe because I didn’t want to lose anybody else 3. I love and adore will with all of my being and he’s my number 1 ally right now 4. I find it highly doubtful that there’s only one idol in this game and that you can’t find it until merge but that’s as far as I can get in the idol search for now so I guess there’s nothing I can do about it 5. I’m still having fun can’t wait to fuck up another flash game yay!!!

My Purple edit is amazing right now. But having played more games than most of these newbies, I have decided to take on the role of teacher and becoming more of a "role model" for these newbies. I feel like I have the closest bond with Zach, and I need to get a little closer with Collin. I have Grace from past games, and then there are the others who I do not really have any strong bonds with at the moment. I guess I need to start going to them more and show that I want to work with them.

https://youtu.be/yhwXzqrTcsA Confessional 2 for round 2

https://youtu.be/TVnpwqc8XLY

Madison voted out 6-1

#nomorethings

0 notes

artificialqueens · 7 years

Text

Just The Game We're In- Chapter 5, Part I- Ortega

A/N: HELLO YOU BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE!!! Do you see how quickly I can work now that I don’t have uni???? (yes a month and a half is quick work in terms of this fic). I have been so excited to bring you this chapter for ages, but i’ve actually split it into two parts because even I draw the limit at submitting 17.000 words all at once, there is only so much mobile users can take. Anyway, this evening we head to Alyssa Edwards’ charity ball. Enjoy! I love you all so much! i have the best readers in the world bc you are always both patient and forever excited and i love you for that. shoutout to my AQ Brit cheerleader hoes ur literally the best

Plot Summary: Willam is a senior political advisor to the government’s minister for social affairs and citizenship, Sharon Needles. Throw in a crush on co-worker Courtney, Sharon acting weird around Willam’s colleague Alaska, an incompetent press department headed by Actual Living Zombie Jinkx Monsoon, and Willam’s job couldn’t get much more stressful. No wonder spin doctor Bianca Del Rio is permanently at the end of her tether…

Question: How do you draw attention from a terrifyingly massive fuck-up of an interview?

Answer: Find redemption.

Except nothing was happening in politics the week before Christmas Day, so there was no way to find this redemption. Willam had already bore witness to the verbal colonic Bianca had thrown Sharon’s way in the wake of the Five Live interview, slapping down the day’s newspapers on her desk which had both Sharon and Phi Phi’s faces on their front looking incredibly sheepish. So Sharon had stayed low for the past week or so, the girls in the office flinging all their efforts behind her refugee housing policy ready for its release by New Year, when Sharon, Alaska and Violet would make the trip over to Brussels. Jinkx had even been behind its horrifically cheesy slogan- Sharon is caring- which made no sense if it wasn’t read in an American accent, but was sadly still the best efforts of a collective group of 5.

Willam was glad, though. Work had been incredibly high-octane of late and it was nice for the department to go into Christmas without feeling as if Bianca was throwing them at a hundred miles per hour towards a wall made of nails, broken glass, and fire. She didn’t know it was possible for the comms team to be even more laid-back than they already were, but they were; Trixie and Katya both on Amazon for each other’s Christmas presents whilst the other wasn’t looking, Jinkx on the phone to someone enquiring about Christmas turkeys, and Violet and Adore not even remotely disguising the fact they were watching Love Actually instead of doing their job. Occasionally an email would be sent or a phone would be picked up, but overall it was all quiet on the Westminster front.

It was great to see Courtney relaxed and happy again too. Their friendship was now completely mended and back to normal after the wobble of before, Courtney now even seeming a little more warm and like her out-of-work self, although that was probably down to the fact it was so close to the holiday season. Every day she would come into work more excited for Christmas than the day before and her cheerfulness was beginning to rub off on Willam, despite the fact that she hated the 25th of December with a burning passion. The pressure to be happy, especially with family, on Christmas Day was frightening and Willam dreaded it more and more each year. But somehow Courtney made her feel a bit better about it all, her voice lilting through the office and making Michael Buble that bit more bearable.

Their work wasn’t completely over, however. There was still one tiny little hurdle the department had to jump before they could celebrate Christmas, and that was Alyssa Edwards’ charity ball at the Dorchester. Alyssa was a Baroness, extremely wealthy and a member of the House of Lords, and yet somehow she wasn’t a complete and utter arsehole. Alyssa was well-renowned for using her money for good, setting up two childrens’ charities and using her wealth and notoriety to encourage everyone who was anyone in politics to donate to them. This ball was no exception, and there would be a lot of big names attending. Willam couldn’t help but feel a little excited. Darienne had never been extended an invite before, and therefore neither had her advisors. But presumably Alyssa had seen something of worth in Sharon, and so this was the first year that Willam had been invited to attend too. Sure, the whole night would really be about politics but she would rather be business networking surrounded by champagne and canapes than the same old scenery of the office.

It was for that reason that Willam arrived to work on the Friday morning absolutely buzzing for the evening ahead. It had been ages since she’d had the chance to dress up and admittedly she was looking forward to a night of mingling and experiencing how the other half lived. Walking from the lift to the corridor and into Dosac’s offices, she felt there was a similar sort of buzz in the air. Even the comms team were chatting excitedly.

“Morning, slagbags,” Willam hollered into the office, met with a couple of yells back. As she flung her bag and coat down on her desk, Courtney shot across the office on her wheely chair, making a beeline for where Willam stood.

“Will, oh my God! I’m so excited for tonight, I’ve been looking forward to it since literally forever,” she babbled, speaking at about seventy miles an hour and causing Willam to simply blink at her with both amusement and affection.

“Yeah, you sound it,” she joked, flinching as Courtney walloped her on the arm.

“Let me have my moment! It’s a Baroness Edwards ball, Willam. This is a big fucking deal!!”

“Baroness Edwards. Girl, it’s Alyssa,” Willam laughed at Courtney’s formality.

Courtney looked up at her with one eyebrow raised, a look of disbelief on her face that Willam noticed made her look cuter than ever. “I’m just being polite. Have you met the woman? Has she said it’s okay to call her by her first name?”

“No, but you’ve seen her interviews. The woman is batshit mental,” Willam shrugged. Courtney mirrored her body language, clearly concluding that Willam was right. Alyssa was a little bit kooky and not by any means a stereotypical baroness; always joking and laughing in the House of Lords, acting as if every interviewer was her best friend, screeching and squawking and generally acting like a big joker. Many of her colleagues hated her, but she was so well-loved by the public that there was never really anything they could say. In Willam’s view, Alyssa Edwards was the best argument against abolishing the House of Lords that they had.

Turning her attention away from Courtney, hard as it was, Willam addressed the comms team who were still chattering like an excited flock of birds.

“What’s got you guys so hyped, anyway? It’s not like Alyssa extended her invite to you guys.”

“Shut up, you elitist cunt,” Katya laughed, throwing a pen at Willam from halfway across the room.

“If you must know,” Trixie leaned over in her chair and batted her lashes. “Us and the comms team from the opposition are having our own little ball this evening.”

“Trixie, stop calling it a ball,” Adore laughed loudly at her friend. Turning to address Willam, she explained. “We’re getting dressed up, eating at Wahacca, drinking until we can’t see and then going out.”

“Wow, guys. Dream big,” Willam said blankly, earning her a packet of staples, this time from Violet.

“It’s a ball because we’re ballers,” Trixie said proudly, leaning back in her chair and receiving a disgusted glare from her girlfriend.

“I’m breaking up with you,” Katya said in her own deadpan way.

Jinkx piped up from behind her own monitor. “I have to say, I’m slightly jealous. Your evening is going to be far more fun than mine.”

“Jinkx, you’re getting to attend an Alyssa Edwards ball. Shut up,” Adore rolled her eyes at the senior press officer, Jinkx’s job title bagging her an invite too.

“Yeah, I’ll take your invite,” Violet offered playfully.

“Rather you than Jinkx, to be honest,” Willam quipped, laughing with Violet as Jinkx shot her a glare.

“I’d throw my post-its at you but I’d like the comms team to at least have some items of stationary left by the time Sharon arrives.”

“Shit!” Courtney looked at the clock and shot up from her chair. It was too late, however, as just then Sharon came round the corner and into the offices with her two red briefcases in her hands and Alaska just at her back.

“Courtney, I really would love to be met at the doors tomorrow. I mean, I am a cabinet minister, not a fucking bag lady,” Sharon chastised her, Courtney pulling a face as Alaska sat down at her desk.

“Why couldn’t you do it?” Courtney hissed at her friend as she sat down. Alaska sighed and shook her head.

“I was late. I had my own bags,” she said not-quite-apologetically as she logged in to her computer. Courtney rolled her eyes as she dragged her chair back over to her own desk and sat down on it.

“You’ve been late more than you’ve been early recently. Lask, I love you, but as your friend and your workmate, get your head out your ass,” she continued, typing forcefully into her own keyboard.

Willam momentarily thought to herself that it wasn’t her own ass Alaska needed to remove her head from.

“I mean, what must Sharon think?” Courtney tutted, her face now nervous. Just then, Sharon’s voice could be heard calling the girls through to the meeting room.

“Well we’re about to find out,” Alaska drawled lazily, swinging her chair round and leading the way towards the room at the top of the department, Willam, Courtney and Jinkx following behind her.

As soon as Willam entered the meeting room, she could see Sharon sitting at the head of the table, a massive excited smile on her face.

“Oh, Jesus, not you too,” Jinkx sighed as she sat down. Sharon raised an eyebrow at her, her expression completely changing.

“What me too?”

“Everyone’s pissing their pants for this charity ball but nobody’s actually seeing it for what it is, which is a massive money-making scheme for Alyssa Edwards’ businesses,” Jinkx sighed, crossing her legs lazily. Alaska snorted.

“They’re not businesses, Jinkx, they’re charities! They help kids.”

“Well, all I’m saying is that if Sharon ends up drunk and paying ten thousand pounds for a Birken bag at the auction, don’t come crying to me.”

“There’s a charity auction?! Ooh!” Sharon gasped excitedly, her pitch rising about an octave. Rolling her eyes, Jinkx pointed her pen in Sharon’s direction.

“Case and point.”

“There’s also poker and roulette tables!” Courtney chimed in, her excitement now reaching boiling point. Jinkx and Willam shared an exasperated look.

“Anyway,” Willam cut in before any more of the meeting was spent on anything else off-topic. “Why are we here, exactly?”

“Right, well,” Sharon started, at once business-like again. “Bianca’s heading here in ten minutes for a meeting, and I’m assuming it’s to brief me about tonight. So I want to be one step ahead. Ladies, give me the info.”

“So the main thing is that even though this night may be guising as recreational, it’s not. It’s all business,” Jinkx began, as the other girls nodded.

“We’ll introduce you to some big names and try to get them onside. Kimora Blac is very up-and-coming, it would be good to get in with her,” Courtney mused, leaning on the table with her elbows.

“Isn’t she just a Buzzfeed journalist? Do we really need Sharon’s coverage to be a listicle entitled ‘TWENTY REASONS WHY SHARON NEEDLES IS #MOM #BAE #QUEEN’?” Willam cut in with a sneer. Courtney frowned at her.

“Hey, she might work for Buzzfeed but she seems very astute. Her articles are really interesting, and she’d be good with The Independent if she ever decided to apply there. Her tweets always blow up too, she might come across as an airhead but she’s actually very sharp. We’ll get you talking,” Courtney insisted to Sharon, Willam shrugging and trusting her faith in the young journalist.

“Anyone else?” Sharon asked hopefully.

“We’ll get you talking to Michaels again, she seemed keen last time and it’s good to keep up appearances,” Alaska suggested, earning her a nod from both Courtney and Jinkx. “We’ll try and introduce you to Raja Gemini too before she inevitably interviews you. She has a tendency to go ham on ministers she doesn’t see eye to eye with, so it’d be good to make a first impression in a more chilled environment.”

“Christ, no pressure,” Sharon exhaled loudly.

“It is a charity ball. That being said, don’t spend mad amounts of money,” Jinkx advised. “Just stay away from any opportunity to spend. The fundraisers are for the rich kids and for the parties who can afford to be seen spending money. We’re the working people’s party, not the spending people’s party.”

“It’s for charity, for fuck’s sake. Would the media really object to me spending if it was in aid of poor little kids with cholera?” Sharon sighed, kicking her feet up onto the table in front of her.

“Trust me, Sharon, it’s maybe not the best idea,” Courtney reasoned.

“Oh, and don’t be seen with a drink in your hand. You take one glass of free champagne and that’s it,” Willam said, her mind suddenly filled with nightmarish images of Sharon vomiting on the red carpet for the world’s media to see. Sharon’s face instantly grew disappointed. Alaska and the other girls laughed.

“Come on, Willam. Everyone will be drinking!” she chuckled, leaning back in her chair. Willam gave her a side glare.

“Well, do what you like. I’m not sold on it, but we can’t control you,” she shrugged, throwing her hands up in defeat.

“So champagne all round then,” Sharon cheered, Courtney clapping excitably in response. No more could be said, however, as a harsh voice rang out through the department and the unmistakable sound of stilettos on a carpeted floor came closer and closer to the meeting room.

“No, I don’t care that he’s saying no. Well just get it done, right? Or I’ll turn you into a human fucking plug socket. And I can do that, by the way, I took all three sciences to A level,” Bianca hurtled into her phone as she arrived before swiping swiftly across the screen, the conversation clearly over. Pocketing her phone, she then turned to address the room. “Okay, good morning ladies. I hope you’ve all had a good night’s rest because the information I am about to impart to you is probably the most important thing you will hear all day, and I need you to retain it.”

Sharon leaned back in her chair lazily. “Bianca, it’s fine. These guys have briefed me already. The ball will be fine. It’ll be just like playing Sims. Mash the Schmooze button with every fucker I see.”

Bianca’s face was immediately painted with a sneer. “This…this is not about Alyssa Edwards’ fucking ball! I don’t care what you do at that, as long as you’re not seen sniffing ket off of the foreign secretary’s balls.”

“Well there’s no danger of that.” Jinkx piped up, bristling a little.

“What is this about, then?” Willam asked, suddenly intrigued. Bianca’s face did look very foreboding, as if she was about to impart knowledge that would make the fabric of reality split in two. Bianca took a quick look out of the glass-fronted office to see if anyone was hovering nearby. They weren’t. Seemingly satisfied, she leaned on the table and lowered her voice.

“The Prime Minister has finally decided to do something about the refugee crisis.”

Sharon’s face lit up. “Oh, thank God! This is amazing, we’re fina-”

“Hold your horses,” Bianca shut Sharon down, lifting one hand up to pause her. “It’s not what you’d expect. He’s…well, within the next few years…wants to take immigration out of government hands.”

There was a silence in the room. Willam was completely confused. Courtney was the first to speak.

“What so like…military control?”

“Privatisation.”

The mood in the room shifted considerably. Willam and Sharon shared a glance. From what Willam could gather, Sharon seemed tense.

“This…” she began, then stopped. Her brow was furrowed, and she appeared to be deep in thought. “I don’t understand how this is going to work.”

Bianca leaned against the glass door. She seemed not 100% at ease with it all either, as if she was the bearer of bad news. “Well, it’s standard privatisation. The government offer a contract for border control. Companies make offers. Lowest offer wins. They control the borders and immigration is out of government hands.”

“This surely isn’t-”

“Yes, Alaska. This is the PM’s legacy. He’s-”

There was suddenly a knock on the half-open glass door. As Willam craned her neck she saw Adore hovering nervously. The room fell silent and she seemed to take that as a cue to take one tentative step inside.

“Sorry to interrupt,” she said quietly. Then, as her eyes rested on Jinkx, she seemed to relax a little. “Jinkx, we’re getting some calls about Alyssa’s ball tonight? There’s rumours that security are going to be keeping Sharon and Phi Phi away from each other?”

Jinkx gave a biblical roll of her eyes. “Who is it that’s phoning?”

Adore pulled a face. “The Sun, The Star. The Daily Mail potentially?”

“Tell them to stick a goose up their arse,” Jinkx snapped back. With a hasty nod of her head, Adore retreated. All focus was back to Bianca, whose face had suddenly taken on a suspicious glare.

“How long had she been there?”

“Oh, Bianca, for fuck’s sake. She’s just a civil service puppet, don’t worry about her. Who you should be worried about is me,” Sharon’s tone was suddenly dark as she looked Bianca dead in the eye. Willam was a little shocked, and judging by the panicked look she shared with Courtney, she wasn’t the only one. “Because I will be fighting this tooth and nail in parliament. This is not happening.”

“It’s sweet how you think this is up for debate. It isn’t. I came here to inform you of this because it will hit the press after New Year, and I want you aware of the line which is obviously that this is the greatest fucking idea since sliced bread. Except it’s better than that, because as good things go sliced bread is a bit fucking shit. Just say it’s the best thing since cocaine and strippers,” Bianca ended flippantly. Sharon narrowed her eyes.

“Bianca,” she began coldly, her voice shaking a little with anger. “I need you to understand that I am going to do everything in my power to ensure that this doesn’t go ahead.”

Bianca lowered her voice and drew her brows together, her face snarling in a scowl. “And I need you to understand that it is your job to ensure that it does go ahead. This is not up for debate, Sharon. ”

Seething, Sharon threw herself back in her chair, her head ricocheting off its headrest as if she was a crash test dummy. She folded her arms across her chest and her face looked deep in thought. Bianca ran a frustrated hand through her caramel curls and exhaled noisily, glad the conversation was over.

“Well. That’ll be that then. I’ll see you lot this evening, you’ll be able to find me at the bar drowning myself in amaretto and trying to pretend I’m interested in what Lord Huxby drones on at me.”

With a few muted goodbyes, Bianca was off again back through the department. As soon as she was out of earshot, Sharon instantly flew out of her seat.

“What the fuck is the PM playing at?!” she yelled, pacing around the small space of office that wasn’t taken up by the huge table. “Privatisation? That’s meant to be Phi Phi’s fucking mantra, I mean what is this party turning into?!”

Nobody else in the room really knew what to say, least of all Willam. It did seem a strange move from the Prime Minister, and one that the public would surely pick up on. Sharon was still pacing, her entire aura one of rage.

“Minister, would you like me to prepare a statement to put out when the announcement of the legacy goes through?” Jinkx asked hesitantly, looking with anxiety at Alaska as she did so. Sharon stopped pacing, waving a hand at Jinkx dismissively.

“No, no thank you, Jinkx. I just need time to think, if everyone could maybe just give me some time on my own,” Sharon sighed, rubbing the back of her neck in agitation. “This is not happening. There is no way I’m letting the lives of immigrants get put in the hands of some company that’s just going to cut corners wherever it can. I just need to think of a way to oppose it without making too many waves.”

Willam let out an incredulous snort which turned all the heads in the room her way. She was a little taken aback, then explained. “Sorry, Sharon, I just don’t know how you’re going to fight the Prime Minister’s legacy without making too many waves.”

Sharon paused, then shrugged and gave a little half-smile. “Well maybe I’ll just have to capsize some motherfuckers.”

Giving her an amused smile, Willam got up and dutifully made to leave, Courtney and Jinkx following behind her. Willam didn’t miss the way Alaska hovered at the door as if to make sure Sharon didn’t want any company, but a reassuring glance from her girlfriend resulted in her leaving the room and shutting the glass door behind her. As they walked back to their desks, Courtney huffed a huge sigh.

“That was a lot,” she said, raising her eyebrows a little.

“Yeah. I’m concerned. I hope Sharon’s not going to do anything rash,” Alaska frowned, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. Willam gave her a sideways glance.

“Come on, girl. She’ll be fine, she knows what she’s doing.”

Alaska’s shoulders slumped a little. “I just wish I could talk to her.”

Willam tensed a little, wondering if Courtney would pick up on the implications of Alaska’s statement. She didn’t seem to.

“Well, let’s just hope she’s out of her huff before Alyssa’s tonight. I don’t suspect the Baroness will take kindly to Sharon if she’s in a massive mood. Ooh, speaking of Alyssa’s!” Courtney beamed suddenly, an idea only just seeming to come to her. “Why don’t you guys come round to mine before we head to the Dorchester? Then Sharon’s car won’t have to go to every flat before arriving. We can get some cava or prosecco and have a chill. It’ll be cute!”

Willam felt like she’d been shocked by a defibrillator. Why was she suddenly nervous? It was just spending time with friends, she’d done it before, but never in Courtney’s flat. The suggestion of this new setting panicked Willam a little, made everything feel a little more intimate. It shouldn’t have scared her so much.

Swallowing her nerves, Willam forced a smile on her face which she hoped made her look carefree and not constipated. “Sounds good, yeah. I’m down.”

“Same! It’ll be fun,” Alaska beamed, managing to sound ten times more relaxed than Willam felt. Excitement painted on her face, Courtney turned to the comms team.

“Jinkx? Come to mine before Sharon picks us up? We’ll have bubbles!”

Jinkx leaned back in her chair and gave the three an amused smile. “It’s a lovely offer, Courtney, but I think I’ll just get ready with a cup of tea and Nina Simone and Sharon can pick me up before yours. I’m staying off the bubbles this evening, just in case I’m needed.”

“Yeah, who knows. There might be a political emergency where they need someone with an extensive knowledge of televised Poirot murder mysteries,” Willam smirked, leaning back on her desk. Jinkx simply gave her a roll of her eyes. Secretly, though, Willam was glad they’d have two guaranteed sober members of Dosac there this evening. She should probably make it three. Willam was suddenly jolted out of her thoughts as Courtney grabbed both her and Alaska in an animated hug.

“This is going to be such a good night!” she squealed, squeezing them both tightly before legging go. As she returned to her desk, Willam walked back to her own in a slight daze. It didn’t make any sense for her to be nervous. Taking a deep breath, she tried to convince herself that there was nothing to get worked up about; tonight would just be a nice night with friends, and there was no real scope for anything to go wrong.

Casting an eye back up to the meeting room and seeing Sharon still deep in thought only made her worry increase tenfold.

***

Willam stood in front of the full-length mirror that had been crammed into one corner of her studio flat. Sighing and sucking her stomach in, she scrutinised herself ruthlessly. Her hair was good, that was a given. She’d managed to tame it and barrel-curl it into huge waves, then pin it over one shoulder in a sort of Jessica Rabbit style. It wasn’t really her. But it still looked good.

Her makeup was adequate at least. Anything that had gone wrong had been concealed over; one corner of her eye where her eyeliner had decided to backstab her now sported about 15 layers of the damn thing. She cursed herself for how basic she’d gone as she stared down her burnt gold smoky eye and red lip. Casting an eye down the rest of her body, that was where the real insecurity began. She’d fallen in love with her dress when she bought it, but with every passing second the doubt in her mind grew. The bodycon mid-length, long-sleeved cream dress with little dimantes all over it now seemed a horrific choice, like some tacky girl’s prom dress and not a smart ballgown meant for an incredibly opulent evening. Willam grabbed her invite from her adjacent dressing table and read it over again. Was this dress black tie? What even was black tie?! She didn’t wear a fucking tie!

Sighing, she acknowledged there wasn’t much she could do to change it now. Still, the apprehension and panic was eating her up inside. She knew this was still basically work; a massive ass-kissing event to try and get Sharon networked, but Willam also knew this meant she would get to spend an extensive length of time around both Courtney and alcohol and she tried to avoid those situations as much as possible for fear of her stupid mouth opening and saying something she shouldn’t. Thinking back to her uni days, she gave a little shudder at the sheer extent of things she could blame on just that. For a moment, she felt her throat go completely dry as she thought about what Courtney might wear.

She’d not been this nervous in a long time, in fact probably not since she started the job at Dosac all those years ago. She absolutely hated the feeling of not being able to control her palpitating heart, or her shallow breathing, or her pulse that was now thudding underneath her skin at the speed of a freight train. Anger was fine; she could generally channel that into something productive, and Willam never allowed herself to get sad (or at least that’s what she’d tell everyone), but nerves were different. No amount of logical, motivational internal speeches to herself would help. Sighing an incredibly shaky sigh, Willam peered at her phone and checked the time. She’d left enough minutes to allow for traffic so that she would get to Courtney’s bang on time, but now she was overthinking that too. If she was too early, that would seem weirdly keen. If she was late, she would seem rude. If she was on time it would seem like she’d overthought the situation, which she definitely wasn’t doing at all. With a sort of gulp of an intake of breath, Willam began dialling a taxi company to book, managing to speak to the operator despite the fact she felt her vocal cords would crack with how dry her throat was. After she’d confirmed the taxi, she did a double-check of her clutch bag to make sure she had her survival kit for the night. Phone, cards, a few twenties and tens. Keys, caffeine tablets. A miniscule sample bottle of perfume and her lipstick, as well as tissues just in case. She cursed whoever invented clutch bags for making it acceptable to carry a fucking tiny rectangle around under your arm of an evening. Suddenly remembering her invite, Willam folded it in half and stuck it inside her clutch, which was slowly beginning to resemble Mary Poppins’ carpet bag.

As her phone began to ring signalling the arrival of her taxi outside, Willam hurriedly slipped on a pair of nude heels- which she’d later realise didn’t go with her dress- and took one last look around her room of a flat before leaving. It was a total mess of clothes, makeup and hair products, but future Willam could deal with it. Opening the door and then clicking it closed, she carefully made her way down her stairwell and into the black cab that was waiting for her.

Now that she was on the road and on the way to Courtney’s Brixton flat, Willam felt herself calming down just a little. At least she was now on the move, and it wasn’t as if it would simply be the both of them alone together; Alaska would be there too and Willam supposed it was quite impossible to be nervous around the most relaxed human alive. Willam shot a quick text off to Courtney just to let her know she was on the way, and then decided to let herself relax just a little. She couldn’t at all, but at least the effort had been made to try.

Soon enough the taxi pulled up outside Courtney’s unthreatening-looking apartment building. Willam crammed one of her notes through the little pane of Perspex glass that separated driver and passenger and stepped outside, clip-clopping up to the front door and pushing the buzzer for Courtney’s flat. She was met around five seconds later with a loud buzz as the front door was opened, allowing Willam to walk up one flight of stairs. She felt as if she was walking into either heaven or hell; the giddy excitement and the underlying feeling of dread she felt simultaneously made it hard to tell which. Reaching Courtney’s door, she almost felt like the breath was being knocked out of her lungs as it opened, only to find Alaska on the other side of it smiling widely and holding a champagne flute full of orange juice.

“Hiiieee, girl!” she squealed as she wrapped Willam in a welcoming hug, her signature greeting providing Willam with a sense of comfort in the chaos that was currently her mind. “Come in, Court’s not ready yet. Shock.”

Stumbling slightly as Alaska showed her to the living room, Willam quickly scanned her surroundings. Courtney’s flat seemed small but modern, although it had definitely had a couple of previous owners judging by general wear and tear- a scuff on a skirting board here, a chip out of the plaster in one wall there. Then again, Willam would be loath to judge her based on the state she left her own flat in. Alaska ushered Willam through to a bright, airy-looking living room, with two medium-sized leather sofas providing bookends for a coffee table with a few bottles of nail polish, some empty champagne flutes, an open bottle of prosecco, and a few crumpled pieces of cotton wool sitting on top of it. There was a wall-mounted TV sitting at one end of the sofas, and at the other end of the room there was a simple dining setup with a table and six mismatched chairs.

“You look beautiful, girl,” Alaska smiled at Willam, picking up an empty flute and filling it with prosecco.

“Thanks, so do you,” Willam simultaneously accepted and returned the compliment, still getting used to her new surroundings as she accepted the glass that Alaska shoved into her hand without even thinking. She hadn’t planned on drinking anything tonight, but she was beginning to feel as if she’d need just one glass. Realising how flippantly she’d given the compliment back, she examined Alaska’s outfit more closely. She’d gone for a floor-length dress, a simple strapless royal blue number with a fishtail lower half. Her hair was pinned up, but not in its usual bird’s nest; instead it was arranged in an elaborate set of plaits and twists that made for an intricate bun. Her make-up had clearly been well thought-out, and was immaculate as a result.

“So how much of tonight is really going to be about work?” Alaska asked dryly, raising one perfect eyebrow. Willam let out a laugh.

“A solid 100%,” she instantly replied, pausing as she took a sip from her glass. The prosecco was good. “All it’s going to be is us introducing Sharon to various wankers from the media and hoping she goes down well.”

“Well there’s no question around that, of course she will,” Alaska shrugged, leaning back on the couch. Willam felt her top lip curl in disagreement.

“Alaska you’re biased as fuck,” she said simply, Alaska rolling her eyes as she was met with words she clearly didn’t want to hear.

“Yeah, but come on Will. Even you have to admit she’s likeable, and I know you don’t even like many people.”

Willam simply shrugged and took a sip of her prosecco. It was working wonders to loosen her up, although she was still acutely aware of the fact that Courtney hadn’t emerged from her room yet. Alaska seemed to think the same thing in the silence.

“COURT! Hurry the fuck up, Willam’s about to drink all your alcohol,” she yelled through the walls, Courtney giving a muffled reply that Willam couldn’t really make out. Alaska shook her head and laughed long-sufferingly, then seemed to pick up on Willam’s anxiety.

“She looks beautiful, by the way,” Alaska mentioned nonchalantly, avoiding Willam’s death glare by staring into her glass of orange juice.

“Don’t you dare,” Willam pointed one fake-nailed talon towards her friend as a simple warning.

“I’m not doing anything! I’m just saying,” Alaska smiled smugly, tipping a little more of her orange juice into her mouth. Swallowing, she continued. “Do you think you’ll say anything to her tonight?”

“No, and I won’t be saying anything to her for a considerable amount of time. This conversation is ending now,” Willam barked a reply, Alaska’s questioning only putting her further on edge. She didn’t mean to upset her friend and snap, but she was already so anxious and nervous that talking about the situation would surely make it worse. Alaska seemed to take Willam’s nerves on the chin though, simply raising her eyebrows in amusement. Relaxing her face, she then took out her phone, glancing at it for a few seconds. Willam watched as her face grew disappointed.

��You alright, girl?” she asked, concerned about her friend who now seemed to be attempting to conceal her feelings.

“Oh, yeah. Sure! I just…Sharon. Just sent me a photo. And she looks so amazing, and I’m so proud to call her my girlfriend, you know?” Alaska sighed, Willam feeling the weight of her heavy heart hanging in the atmosphere.

“Well that’s good, right? Nothing about what you said is something to be sad about, unless I’ve taken a bump to the fucking skull and woken up in a world where happy is now sad, and sad is now happy, and Lorraine Kelly is the president of Iran, and cous-cous has been privatised,” Willam joked, trying to lighten the mood. It earned her one very weak smile from Alaska.

“No, I’m happy! Of course I’m happy. It’s just…well, I wish I could show her off to everyone tonight and be public and proud of her and disgustingly PDA,” she shrugged, her shoulders radiating disappointment. Willam was confused.

“Girl, not that it’s any of my business but when are you gonna go public? You and Sharon can’t stay under wraps forever, she’s a politician. The media are on her like a hawk 24/7.”

Alaska rolled her eyes. “I know that, Will, of course I know that. It’s not without want of trying. I mean, our whole first date we couldn’t do anything like what couples would normally do in case there were paps somehow nearby. She was so paranoid. She still is.”

Remembering her political stance, Willam pulled a face. “To be fair, I guess she’s trying to keep the professional balance. You have to remember she’s still your boss, girl.”

Sighing, Alaska nodded and picked at a piece of her nail polish that had already developed a chip. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. And I mean I’ll always support Sharon’s career, she’s good at what she does, and that’s not me being biased. I knew what I was getting myself into when I fell for her, I’ve only got myself to blame. I just…sometimes wish we were a normal couple, you know?”

Willam gave a nod of support, and the two sat in companionable silence for a while. Willam was worried for Alaska. She was such a sweet friend, and Willam had never seen her with someone before. She was so conflicted, the professional and personal sides of her brain sitting like a small devil and a small angel on her shoulders. On the one hand, it would be hell for the party if it got out that Sharon was seeing one of her advisors, but on the other all Willam really wanted was for Alaska to be happy, which was clearly what she was. Willam couldn’t help but wonder, though, how long such a relationship could go on for. From her calculations Sharon and Alaska had been together for a month now, a month of sneaking around together and doing everything secretively and privately. It was a little what Willam imagined cheating to feel like, except she couldn’t quite work out who the two women were actually cheating on. It had only been just over two weeks when Willam had found out about them and even that was completely by accident. If the media even got a whiff of an inter-party relationship and made the effort to investigate it, who knew how long it would take before they could raise hell with the information. It made Willam shudder a little.

“You are being careful though, right girl? You and Sharon,” she said quietly, breaking the silence. Alaska snorted playfully.

“Yeah. She uses condoms and I’m on the pill and neither one of us is pregnant.”

Willam couldn’t help but splutter a laugh mid-way through a sip of prosecco. “Bitch, shut up! You know what I mean. I’m only looking out for you. I don’t want the media treating you guys as their chew toy.”

Clearly not in the mood to be serious, Alaska rested her head in her hands and looked affectionately at Willam. “Aww, is Willam Belli actually being…nice? Showing concern? This is impossible. Next minute she’ll be surrounded by bluebirds and shedding tears.”

“You know I had my tear ducts cauterised shut at the age of 12,” Willam joked back, leaning back in her chair and finally relaxing, trusting Alaska’s judgement. She felt her heart give a little judder, however, as she heard a pair of heels approaching from the corridor behind her and saw Alaska’s eyes dart to just behind Willam’s shoulder.

“Well this was a weird point to enter the conversation,” Courtney’s voice suddenly filled the living room, and Willam had to steel herself before she turned round and saw her.

Courtney looked so stunning that Willam momentarily lost her breath. She was wearing black, a colour that she never really wore regularly but which suited her immensely. Her dress was floor-length with a little black lace train at its back, and the bodice was slightly corseted which served to pull her in at the waist. There were little patterned black flowers adding texture here and there, and her shoes could barely be seen under the sheer length of the gown. Her makeup was dark and smoky, a style which Willam was sure Courtney had never worn before but she looked beautiful for it. Her hair cascaded in curls that framed either sides of her face. Willam very suddenly became acutely aware of two things: one, that she now felt like a tramp compared to her two friends and two, that she was now more nervous than she’d ever been in her life.

Courtney seemed to pick up on Willam’s awed stare, as her expression became a little apprehensive. “Fuck. It’s too much, isn’t it? I knew I’d be overdressed, I fucking told Trixie I’d be overdressed, but she made me buy it and ugh, I need to go and change because everyone’s going to be staring at me and-”

“Court,” Willam found herself yelling slightly at her worried friend, if she could even call what she felt for Courtney friendship any more. Courtney stopped talking abruptly, looking at Willam with a little shock in her eyes. Willam tried to summon moisture from somewhere to save her mouth, which now was so dry that it could’ve rivalled Ghandi’s flip flop. “Don’t change. You look really good.”

Willam felt like kicking herself for how feeble the compliment seemed. She’d wanted to say beautiful, or stunning, or incredible, but everything seemed too strong and Courtney would have suspected something. She needn’t have worried, though, as Courtney’s face instantly lit up, pleased that she had the approval of her friend.

“You look amazing, girl,” Alaska chimed in, handing Courtney a glass of prosecco that Willam was unsure when she’d poured. “Come sit, Sharon’s car isn’t meant to pick us up for another half hour at least.”

Obliging, Courtney opted to sit beside Willam on the couch facing Alaska. Willam noticed that Courtney must have been wearing new perfume, one that smelt of vanilla and jasmine and made Willam’s heart hurt at how much she wanted to just blurt out something she shouldn’t.

Draining her glass and reaching for the prosecco bottle, Willam looked up at the wall-mounted clock. Half an hour until they were picked up by Sharon. She could get through this.

***

Willam was happy. Really quite pleasantly happy in fact, as if there was a warm blanket that had been draped over her after her third glass of prosecco. She should probably stop drinking soon. She’d have to have some champagne when she got to the ball, otherwise it would look odd. But when Courtney had unearthed two more bottles of fizz from her fridge, it became increasingly hard to say no.

She was a lot less nervous as well, although she wasn’t sure how much of that was thanks to the prosecco. Willam wasn’t sure why she’d been nervous about coming round to Courtney’s flat. Courtney was so lovely and relaxed, and definitely generous with the top-ups. Every so often Alaska would make a joke, or do an impression of Bianca or Jinkx, and Courtney would laugh so hard she would flail her arms and her hands would come to rest on Willam’s arm, or her thigh, or her hand. She supposed any other time it would have made her even more nervous, but now she simply reciprocated, mirroring Courtney’s hands and making them look a little like Siamese twins. Every time Courtney shot a smile Willam’s way, she felt her heart melt a little bit more, but the feeling wasn’t like how she felt every day at work. The prosecco gave her a little buzz and made her a little more hopeful that Courtney reciprocated her feelings, and only reinforced the sense that this night had something magical about it. Every so often Willam felt that the energy between her and Courtney was electric, especially when Alaska left the room to pee at one point and left the two girls alone together. They were both so giggly and touchy and flirty, although Willam wasn’t sure how much of that was in her own head, and she’d often been very close to closing the ever-decreasing gap between them and kissing Courtney like she’d wanted to all this time.

It was a good thing, then, that Sharon’s car arrived when it did. Around ten minutes late, Courtney heard the sound of the car horn from her window long before she heard her flat intercom buzzer, and started hurrying Willam and Alaska out, Willam sort of blindly grabbing her clutch bag and her coat and hoping she had everything she needed.

She had Courtney, though, and she supposed she’d be alright with just her.

Rushing out of Courtney’s stairwell and clip-clopping into the taxi, Willam was met by Sharon and Jinkx already inside. She couldn’t really see what either of them were wearing, but from what she could see they both looked good; Jinkx scrubbing up well in an off-shoulder black and white striped dress and Sharon in what seemed to be a black sequin dress which complimented her figure. As she raised her arm up to wave, Willam could see it was long-sleeved. Sitting in the far right hand seat, Willam watched as Alaska’s eyes widened when she saw her girlfriend, Sharon smiling shyly at her as Alaska clambered into the car.

“You look…amazing,” Alaska said, her voice full of awe as she took her seat beside Willam. Sharon looked to the ground momentarily, clearly flattered by her girlfriend’s reaction.

“So do you. Absolutely beautiful,” she replied. Willam could see that the both of them were desperate to hold each other’s hands or do something that any other couple would do upon seeing the person they loved looking their absolute best. It was the sort of thing Willam had been contemplating earlier and now she was seeing it played out in front of her, a sad sort of tragedy to the whole scene. Sharon seemed to snap out of whatever spell she had been under and instead turned to compliment Courtney who was climbing into the back seat. Willam didn’t miss the way Alaska looked to the floor, her eyes a little disappointed. Nudging her, Willam gave her a sympathetic smile. Alaska smiled back gratefully.

“Jinkx! You look incredible!” Courtney exclaimed, each syllable more drawn-out than the last as she reached over and planted both her hands on Jinkx’s knees. Raising one eyebrow, the senior press officer gave Courtney a suspicious look.

“You look drunk,” she replied dryly. With that, the other three girls in the car burst out laughing, the amount of prosecco Willam had drunk making everything seem that little bit funnier. Jinkx didn’t seem impressed. “Ladies, please! Pull yourselves together, what is Baroness Edwards going to think?”

“She’s going to think we’re total legends,” Sharon smiled smugly, Willam only just noticing the slight smell of white wine from her indicating she’d done a bit of pre-drinking of her own. A sudden sense of dread began to form in the pit of Willam’s stomach, making her feel as if perhaps she shouldn’t have drunk all that prosecco after all. On the plus side, Sharon seemed a lot more relaxed and carefree that she’d been earlier at work, so if anything at least she would be a happy drunk.

“Sharon, ask your driver if we can put some Cascada on!” Courtney practically yelled. As Sharon turned to face the driver’s seat, Alaska put a hand out to stop her.

“We’re not turning up to the red carpet with Cascada blaring out the car,” she admonished her, Willam glad that Alaska was another representative for sobriety. As Sharon and Courtney both pouted, Willam found herself wondering how long the car journey had to go. Roughly twenty more minutes of Courtney and Sharon begging for some “sick bangers”, Alaska and Willam almost wetting themselves with laughter, and Jinkx attempting to be the voice of reason was followed by the car coming to a complete stop with the driver getting out of the front seat and opening the side door, exposing the five of them to one long strip of red, the Dorchester’s glamorous entranceway, and a border of bright flashing bulbs. Willam felt her throat close up slightly. The nerves were back in full force as she realised the sheer scale of what they were about to enter into. Sharon got out of the car confidently, followed by Alaska and then Jinkx. Only Willam and Courtney remained in the car. Glancing at Courtney, she looked as nervous as Willam felt.

“Hey,” Willam caught her attention, Courtney’s doe eyes wide in fear. “We’ll be fine. This evening will be fine.”

She couldn’t help that she instantly wanted to reassure and protect Courtney. It seemed to kick in in situations like these, almost instinctive. As Courtney smiled at her, Willam felt her heart almost explode as Courtney suddenly reached for Willam’s hand and took it in her own.

“You know, Will, I never told you how amazing you look tonight,” Courtney said, her words slurring only a little bit. As she gave Willam’s hand one final squeeze, let it go and began to leave the car, Willam felt as if her palms had never been sweatier. In her alcohol-soaked mind, she had no idea whether or not Courtney’s compliment was sincere or just as a result of all the alcohol she’d drank herself. With her heart beating so fast she felt she would faint, Willam clambered out of the car in a daze.

Walking a red carpet was something Willam had never done before and something she never really wanted to do again. It was a weird experience, with too many bright lights and people shouting and fake smiles and awkward poses. Sharon, however, seemed in her element, stopping every so often to have her photo taken and each time making Willam pray she was sober enough to decide against pulling out a peace sign or a dab or something akin to the two. By a miracle, the five managed to make it inside the Dorchester without any PR disasters.

Immediately, the elegance of the entire place was apparent. The marble floor glistened as if it was glass, and identical marble pillars stood at either side of the doorway welcoming them. The wallpaper was cream and completely pristine without a single scuff or scratch on it. Willam scarcely had time to take in the rest of her surroundings as a large doorman prompted them for their invitations. Willam dug inside her clutch bag and handed it over, a little embarrassed by how crumpled it had become. Having established that none of them seemed to be gatecrashers, the doorman gave them a friendly smile and unlocked the small red velvet rope that separated the entrance from the grand ballroom.

Here, Willam felt even more overwhelmed, and by the reactions of the others she wasn’t alone. The ballroom looked exactly like something from a Disney film; the marble continued from the hallway, leading down an ornate staircase and onto an ornately patterned floor where hundreds of glamorous media presences stood and chatted to one another. The walls were just as lavish, the champagne-coloured wallpaper interrupted every so often by a vase full of white lilies on a marble plinth, or a stone mantelpiece, or a section of wall covered entirely by mirrors. There was another room just jutting off to the left hand side, which Willam could see held a bar and the promised roulette tables. A small orchestra sat on the opposite side of the room, playing something classical that Willam couldn’t even begin to recognise. As she stood and drank in her surroundings, she turned to face the others. Alaska looked very similar to when she first saw Sharon. Jinkx was practically slack-jawed. The fear was very much back in Courtney’s eyes and Sharon was frozen still.

“Maybe there’s a mistake. Maybe we shouldn’t be here,” Sharon muttered, clearly overwhelmed by her surroundings. Alaska immediately protested.

“No! No mistake. You deserve to be here, Sharon, you’ve made a good impression and tonight is about that! Look at you,” she finished quietly, gesturing to Sharon’s dress. “You have every right to be here.”

Taking a deep breath, Sharon seemed to swallow her anxiety and nodded, taking Alaska’s hand and giving it a quick squeeze.

“So. What now?” Jinkx asked, shuffling a little on the spot. No sooner had she asked that question was Willam immediately alerted to a cry that appeared to come from the middle of the ballroom.

“There she is!” came the unmistakable voice of Baroness Edwards, who seemed to half-elbow her way through the crowd and up the stairs to where Sharon stood. Willam was a little taken aback- Alyssa was a huge presence, her smile so hugely bright and giving the impression that Sharon was an old friend and not just someone she’d never met before in her life. Her gown was equally as loud as she was; bright yellow and patterned with glittering jewels. Her light brown hair was swept up into an elaborate bun, making absolutely nothing about her outfit understated at all. She was intimidating, but not necessarily in a bad way.

“Baroness, it’s such a pleasure,” Sharon replied humbly, Willam glad that her surroundings seemed to sober her up a little. “Thank you so much for inviting us here this evening. Everything looks beautiful!”

Alyssa howled in protestation, smacking Sharon on the arm and causing her to flinch. “Don’t you give me all that Baroness nonsense! It’s Alyssa to you, darling.”

Tuning out of Alyssa’s ramblings, Willam looked over to Courtney and gave her a smug smile, reminded of their earlier conversation. Courtney stuck her tongue out in retaliation, the two both giggling like children.

“I just had to have you here after the big splash you’ve made ever since you came on the scene, Miss Shamu! Oh no, that makes it sound like I’m calling you fat,” Alyssa reeled back in horror, then howled with laughter. “But you know what I mean, Miss Thing! You’ve been causing a commotion, like Madonna. There we are, see, Madonna’s a better comparison.”

Willam was nothing short of amazed that Sharon was managing to follow the conversation without being slightly horrified.

“Well, you and I both know how frantic politics can get, Miss Edwards,” she shrugged, keeping her tone formal. “And sometimes it’s necessary to rock the boat a little.”

“Yes, ma’am! Guys and Dolls style,” Alyssa vehemently agreed, nodding so hard that Willam thought her bun would come apart. “Well, keep up the good work, Miss Needles. The world needs more politicians like you, that’s for certain. Now, you enjoy this evening, won’t you? That’s one thing I want the most from everyone here. That and their money!”

With that, Alyssa gave another yelp of laughter, gripping Sharon’s arm for dear life as she got her breath back.

“It’ll be a lovely night, Miss Edwards, and thank you once again for the invite,” Sharon smiled at her. With an affectionate smile back and a quick hug, Alyssa was gone, now shouting down the corridor as she spied another new arrival. As she watched the Baroness retreating, Sharon turned to the others and gave them all a look of sheer disbelief.

“I feel like I just met the human incarnation of caffeine,” she said blankly, still slightly dazed. Just then, a smartly-dressed waiter with a silver drinks tray approached the group. Sharon gratefully took a tall glass of champagne, Courtney following after. Willam decided to decline.

“You did very well, Sharon. I think you made a very good first impression,” Jinkx praised her, Courtney and Alaska nodding proudly.

“Just do that with everyone you meet tonight and we might have world domination on our hands,” Willam smiled, admittedly proud of the minister. Sharon had done well. Maybe she didn’t need to be so worried. Suddenly, Willam became aware of a presence behind her.

“Oh, well, let’s not get carried away,” a voice laughed rather affectedly. Whipping around, Willam was faced with Phi Phi O’Hara and the Satanic Tweedledee and Tweedledum themselves, Roxxxy and Detox. Their dresses were all equally brash, a mismatched colour chart of hot pink, cream and some pattern made up of lime green and blue. A suited man hung on Detox’s arm, which Willam had an infinite number of questions about. None of them could be answered, however, as Sharon was already giving Phi Phi a faux-pleasant smile.

“Phi Phi, what a tremendous, massive, overwhelming pleasure this is,” she smiled sarcastically, punctuating the end of her sentence with a sip of champagne. Phi Phi simply laughed a little in response.

“I trust you’re enjoying the evening so far? It must be really intimidating, you know, coming and seeing the elite of society all mingling together in one of the most elegant settings available. I’d feel quite out of my depth if I were you,” Phi Phi shrugged, Roxxxy smirking behind her. “The ballroom is quite overwhelming for anyone who hasn’t visited before. I’m not so unfortunate, I mean I actually had my 21st birthday party here. And my 16th.”

“Was this before or after your Dad kicked a homeless man in the face?” Willam found herself saying, shocking herself slightly but only blinded by the anger she felt coursing through her veins. Or maybe it was the alcohol. Willam heard a splutter of laughter from behind her, but she couldn’t tell who it had come from. Phi Phi looked as if she’d been slapped. Detox spoke up from behind her.

“You know there’s a lot of journalists here this evening, Willam. You should watch what you say.”

“Oh, hey Detox. Nice date, where’d you get him? The fuckin’ pound store?” Willam continued, the words tumbling from her mouth like vomit. Someone behind her was now fully cracking up, and from the laugh she recognised it as Alaska. All four guests in front of Willam were now looking suitably shut down, looking as if they wished to be anywhere than in front of their opposition. Phi Phi gave a little sniff of derision.

“Yes. Well. Enjoy your evening. I hope you don’t make any horrific social faux pas, Sharon. Would be a shame to see your face on the front pages tomorrow, especially when I’m announcing my new policy.”

“Turn your policy on its ass and spin on it,” Willam snapped, heartily sick of the sight of the people in front of her. With a raise of her eyebrows, Phi Phi led her small clique away down the stairs. Still full of rage, Willam breathed a huge sigh and turned around to face her friends. Courtney, Alaska and Sharon were beaming at her. Jinkx looked vaguely ill.

“Willam, don’t ever-”

“Oh, Jinkx, shut up! That was fucking amazing. I want that on tape,” Alaska cried excitedly, happy that the opposition had been put in their place.

“Did she say she was announcing tomorrow? Why haven’t I heard about this?” Jinkx questioned, her tone full of concern. Courtney gave her a smile of reassurance.

“Don’t worry, Jinkx. She was probably just bluffing, the big sack of wind that she is.”

“She’s a big sack of a lot of things,” Willam practically hissed, still absolutely livid. She calmed a little as Courtney stroked her arm in an attempt to calm her down.

“Shh. You’ve shut her up now, Miss Hero of the Night,” Courtney giggled, her voice having the same effect on Willam’s rage as water on fire. “Should we go find Bianca? I kind of want to see what she looks like in a ballgown. Morbid fascination, you know?”

As Willam nodded and made to move away, she was interrupted by a smart waitress with another drinks tray full of long flutes of champagne. Shrugging, Willam reached out and took one from the shining silver platter, thanking the girl as she left. Taking a sip, the cold, slightly metallic taste soothed her anger a little more.

What harm would another drink do, after all?

#ortega #just the game we're in #witney #shalaska #au #group fic #willam belli #courtney act #sharon needles #alaska thunderfuck #bianca del rio #rpdr fanfiction #submission #jtgwi #lesbian au

58 notes · View notes