#I’m gonna get a good grade in fandom

[izzywantscheesecake]

end of the semester

Pairing: Roommate!Hobie x RoommateGN!Reader🕸🕷🎸 Fandom: Into/Across/Beyond the Spiderverse Quick Synopsis: Your final grade in a class was poor, so Hobie is there to give you a pep talk. Tags: Drabble, Use of Y/N, no specific physical description of the reader (besides maybe slight height mention?), reader can be male/female or none, Hobie and reader can be read as a platonic or romantic pairing, Fluff, Comfort, very slight use of british slang, kind of self indulgent.

It was a chilly Tuesday afternoon, the perfect day to use whatever was in the fridge to make something instead of ordering food like Hobie was doing for the past week.

He grabbed lettuce, already cooked leftover chicken, tomatoes, carrots, and cucumbers and placed everything to the side while he got started on cutting the latter.

It had been a good minute since he washed the veggies and began cutting, but his pace started to get slower and slower.

Something felt off. He just knew it.

Suddenly, the front door swung open, and there you walked in, hands covering your eyes as you let out the loudest groan known to man. 

In an instant, you grabbed onto your bag barely attached to your arm, and threw it towards the side of the ottoman, where it landed and fell over, exposing your pencils to the carpet.

You then kicked off your shoes and plopped yourself face first onto one of the couch pillows.

Hobie redirected his focus from the salad he was making to your pretty depressed state. “What happened to you?”

“I’m dead.”

“Alright, ‘Dead,’ can you explain what’s going on with my roommate right now?”

“Ha ha.” You lifted yourself up from the pillow, with the emotion ‘upset’ practically plastered onto your face like gum on pavement. “Grades were put in today.”

“I know, haven’t checked mine yet. Just trying to enjoy the last meal of my day before it all turns to shit,” Hobie chuckled, pouring his cut cucumbers into the bowl with a knife.

“Yeah.”

“I’m assuming you checked yours?”

“Mhm, I did great in everything, you know, the standard A minuses and A pluses, but..” You paused.

“But?”

“..I did great in everything but calculus.”

“What'd ya get?” 

“C.”

Hobie went silent for a few seconds, before giving you a short round of applause.

“Not bad. At least it wasn’t an F.”

“I know, but..”

“But what?”

“I’m just disappointed ‘cause I worked so hard this semester. I took notes, spoke to teachers, bought extra material and even got a tutor at some point. All that just for a C. Maybe I should’ve studied longer, crammed more..”

You hadn’t even noticed Hobie move from his position and begin to walk towards you as you rambled.

When you snapped back to reality and saw his loud and obnoxious pajama pants standing in front of you, you paused. He kneeled down to match your height, and put both of his hands on your shoulders.

“Listen, Y/N. I know you’ve worked hard, I’ve seen it, but this is way more trivial than you think.”

“I-”

“I know a C isn’t usually considered the best grade and all, but.. It’s calculus. You got stuck with this class. Some people go through the entire four years of schooling without doing calculus, me planning to be one of them. I think the fact you passed this semester with an okay grade and even better grades on everything else is incredible.”

You stayed silent as he searched your eyes, waiting for any type of reaction.

“I’m just saying, don’t beat yourself up about this, love. It’s just one C in a sea of A’s.”

You smiled at him. “I guess that’s true.”

“Bloody right it is.”

He stood up, and walked back towards the mini-kitchen.

“Any road, pop on your PJ’s and find something for us to watch. We’re gonna need a good laugh before we see how I did.”

A/N: can you tell i'm about to fail my classes and this is my last ditch effort in creating happiness before shit hits the fan

#drabble #one shot #hobie brown #hobie brown x reader #hobie x reader #spider punk x reader #hobie brown x y/n #hobie brown x you #atsv hobie #hobie brown x reader fluff #hobie brown fluff #self indulgent

[nhasablogg]

Why do you hide?

Fandom: Criminal Minds

Characters: Reid, the BAU team

Summary: Reid avoids going to his yearly check up for the third year in a row, only this time his team members notice and try to help.

A/N: I admittedly have no idea if yearly check ups are a thing you have to do for work, but pretend it's a thing lmao.

Words: 2.1k

Reid knew what JJ had on her mind the moment he saw her crossing the office to get to where he was standing in front of the closing elevator, and because he knew what was on her mind he did the only thing his semi panicked mind could think of: he turned around and ran, if you could call walking slightly faster than usual running.

“Spence!” Her voice was muffled, which meant she was still inside the office which was good for him. He had absolutely no idea where he was going which in turn made him walk right past the most obvious escape routes (stairs, doors) and instead round the office area over and over. He could hear her behind him now, laughing because this surely looked ridiculous.

“Why are you avoiding me?” She grabbed a handful of his shirt, always stronger than you’d expect, and pulled them both to a halt. “What are you doing?”

“Oh hey.”

“Don’t ‘oh hey’ me.” She was still laughing, caught between concern and amusement and most likely stuck on incredulousness. Reid couldn’t blame her. “Why did you run?”

“No reason.”

“Oh my god, you’re not even pretending to genius your way out of this.” Her expression melted into proper concern. “What’s wrong?”

Guilt seized him, pressing into his chest. “It’s nothing, I promise, I just- Well, I know what you were coming to talk to me about.”

“How could you know that?”

Reid shifted. “Well, statistically it is around autumn time that we do our annual check ups, seeing as most people have recently come back from vacation, flu season is approaching, and the bureau wants to get all of those menial but necessary tasks out of the way before the holidays. It makes sense that you would want to talk to me about it even though that is not technically your job, but with your maternity leave getting closer and Gideon gone I think more tasks like these have ended up in both yours and Hotch’s hands and you probably realized that I-”

“Have skipped your yearly check up for the past three years? Yeah, we noticed.” She softened, something almost maternal crossing her features for just a moment. “Spencer, you know you need to do them. We all do.”

He fiddled with the hem of his sweater. Gideon had been kind about it when he’d realized Reid hadn’t gone to his appointment. He’d not asked. Had figured Reid had his reasons. In the back of his mind, overpowered by the neverending grief of Gideon’s departure, there was a small part of him which had been worried about this exact thing happening. He wasn’t sure what to even say if anyone asked.

But JJ didn’t ask. JJ was also kind about it.

“Tomorrow morning, Spence,” she was saying now, pointing at him. “Don’t let me hear you skipped it this year too.”

“I won’t let you hear it.”

“Spencer.”

He deflated. “Fine.”

“Good. Coffee?”

“Tons of it, please.”

*

Reid wouldn’t call it luck more than a momentary distraction that they needed to be in the air only hours later to fly to Pennsylvania, because he knew neither JJ nor Hotch would be dropping this. He avoided their eyes as if he’d committed the murder himself during the entire flight, but it was easy to have his face stuck in all the files. No one really questioned it.

“The doctor told me I have hypermobile shoulders,” Morgan was saying to Emily.

“Better than the opposite, I guess,” Emily replied. “I’ve gotten better at stretching this past year so she was very happy with me.”

“Wouldn’t want to get a bad grade on your yearly check up,” Morgan laughed. “Hey, Reid?”

Reid, who had stiffened the moment the conversation had started, jumped. “Y-yeah?”

“Sorry, did I scare you?”

“Well, I’m kind of busy.”

“Okay, testy. I was just gonna ask about your check up grade.”

“Oh, he’s not had his yet,” JJ said, sending him a look which he refused to interpret. “We’ll have to reschedule it.”

“Ah, that’s the worst. I’d be overthinking it. Like what are the chances of me developing asthma overnight or something.” Emily’s tone was light, laughter-laced, but Hotch seemed to grab onto her words much more tightly than she’d probably assumed.

“Is that something that worries you?” He was speaking to them all. “The yearly check up?”

Scratch that. His gaze was on Emily, but he was speaking only to Reid.

She shrugged. “Not really. I reckon you’d notice if something’s off before it, although I agree it’s a good system to have. You can never be sure.”

Hotch nodded, seemingly content, but when he dragged his eyes from Emily back to his own file it landed briefly on Reid, holding his gaze for a second too long.

Reid, stupidly, unnecessarily, flushed and lowered his head again, all but touching the file with his nose.

This was gonna be a long week.

*

“Hey kid.” He looked up from his desk to Morgan hovering over him. “JJ told me to tell you your check up’s at three today and to not be late.”

Reid shifted in his chair. They’d only been back for a few hours. He’d hoped that JJ would’ve given him another day at least. “Okay.”

“You seem nervous about it.” Morgan tilted his head, as if something clicked. “Come to think of it, you seemed tense about it earlier this week too. You okay?”

Reid waved him off. “I’m fine.”

“No, seriously. Do you have a fear of doctors?” Morgan leaned closer and lowered his voice. “Is it because of your mother?”

Reid had once confided in him that he was scared the doctors wouldn’t be able to detect it in time if his mother’s schizophrenia had been passed down to him. In retrospect it did sound as if he had a general distrust for doctors because of his mother, who’d not gotten the help she needed early enough. Maybe Reid could use that, only it didn’t feel right. He trusted medical doctors. He trusted they knew much better than him.

He shook his head. “No, no, I just-” He shrugged. “It’s nothing. It’s stupid.”

“I’m sure it’s not stupid.” But Morgan seemed okay about dropping it. It really wasn’t the place to push it anyway, with the office just returning to life after lunch. Reid was grateful for that, only it meant his check up was in two hours and he wasn’t sure he was ready. Felt the first surge of panic about it grip him.

And the worst part was that it really was stupid.

*

“I knew you’d be here.”

Reid knew Hotch would find him and so he wasn’t surprised, only a little shameful, when he looked up to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

Hotch pulled a chair out, one far enough that he wasn’t in Reid’s space, and sat. “Why don’t you tell me what’s going on?”

How the hell do you talk about something like this with your boss? “I’m not sure I can.”

“Okay.” Hotch said it slowly, as if waiting for him to elaborate. “How come?”

“It’s embarrassing.”

Hotch raised an eyebrow. “Embarrassing.”

“You’ll think I’m being silly.”

“I would never think that.”

Reid looked down. Crossed something off of the note he’d been writing when Hotch had entered. “You will.”

“Reid, you’re scaring me. Should I have reason to be worried?”

Reid looked up again. Saw something terrified behind Hotch’s eyes. “I’m not using again,” he said quickly, realizing his behavior was probably alerting a whole different type of concern. “It’s not that.” Not this year. It had definitely been part of it last year, although not the main issue. Hotch didn’t seem convinced and Reid couldn’t blame him. “I will pee in any cup you want. I promise you, Hotch.”

“Okay.” Hotch leaned back. “Then what is it? Because as far as I’m aware your check up was supposed to start twenty minutes ago and you’re hiding in here.”

Reid exhaled slowly. “Like I said. Embarrassing.”

“Reid.”

“I just don’t like being touched by strangers.” It wasn’t a lie. Not the whole truth, but part of it enough that it wasn’t a lie. “It makes me feel… uncomfortable.”

“Uncomfortable.” Hotch tilted his head. Did his best not to profile him. “Has it always been like this?”

“Pretty much my whole life. Nothing’s happened, in case that’s what you think. Nothing I can remember at least.” He shrugged. “It probably has something to do with my undiagnosed autism.”

“Ah.”

“You’re not surprised.”

“I’m not, no.”

“Good.” Reid exhaled. “It means you understand.”

“I do to an extent, but Reid-” Hotch cut himself off, visibly trying to figure out how to approach this. “You do realize that that is no excuse to not do a mandatory check up, right? If you had talked to me I could’ve arranged some sort of accommodation. Now it just looks like you’re playing hooky.”

Reid hung his head. “I’m sorry.”

Hotch checked his watch. “There’s still time to do it. I can go with you.”

“No, no, it’s okay.”

“It would be no problem. Maybe it will help you feel calmer.”

“Garcia can go with me.” Reid had blurted it out, but the moment he said it he knew he’d said the right name. Garcia wouldn’t judge. Garcia would maybe tease, but she’d never judge. “If that’s okay?”

“Of course.” If Hotch was hurt that he was picking someone over him he didn’t show it. “I’ll let her know.”

*

Reid sat in front of the doctor and felt like a child. Garcia was doing her best to not squeeze his hand to death or bounce a hole on the floor, because those were the courses of action she’d decided to keep switching between. “I don’t like doctors,” she’d told him in the elevator, but she’d not protested when he’d asked, and so he’d not offered to let her off the hook.

“I hear you were trying to avoid me,” the doctor said, her tone light but firm. “Is there anything in particular you’d like to ask about before we start?”

“No.”

“Okay then. Now, this does not hurt at all and will be over quick. Sit up straighter for me. Breathe in. I need to listen to your lungs. Just like that. Well done, doctor Reid.”

Reid endured the coldness of the stethoscope on his chest and back and only tensed up a little when the doctor touched his lower back. Garcia was watching him intently, which in retrospect was his own fault and made him feel all the more tense. Maybe that was why he jumped when the doctor suddenly touched his side, briefly but softly. And Garcia, who was doing everything in her power to try to be there for him, understood.

“You’re ticklish.”

“Shh, not so loud.”

“That is adorable, boy genius.”

Reid groaned as they entered the elevator. “I don’t like that procedures like that forces you to remain still as you’re being subjected to sensations that you’re not supposed to be still while being subjected to-”

“So you’re saying you’d be fine with it if you were allowed to squirm away?”

“Well, kind of-”

“Say no more,” Garcia laughed, her index finger in Reid’s ribs, only for a quick poke, but Reid jerked away from it nonetheless. “So ribs, sides. Where else are you ticklish?”

“Nowhere.”

“Oh, don’t lie to me now. You can’t have avoided going to your check ups for years just for two spots.”

Reid held up his hands, a smile already on his face and nowhere to really run. Still better than the doctor’s office. Much much better.

“If you don’t tell me I will try them all,” she threatened, taking a step closer to him. “I’ll give you five seconds.”

Reid took a step back and found himself pressed against the wall. “Please.”

“Five.”

“Oh my god, Garcia, I beg of you-”

“Four.”

“Don’t tell Morgan about this, please don’t-”

“Three, two, one.” She stuck her hand beneath his chin. “You ramble for too long.”

Reid was too busy giggling to reply, although he could hear her cooing as well as he could hear the elevator reach their level, knowing she wasn’t done with him by any means but was probably kind enough to destroy him in private at the very least. She was laughing when she backed off, a threatening, teasing laugh, and despite his sensitivity he appreciated the playfulness much more than the concern.

“Watch your back, wonder boy,” she said, pointing at him as she walked away.

Reid exhaled, catching sight of Hotch nodding as he received a thumbs up from Garcia.

He ran a hand through his hair before entering the office with his head held high, hoping his smile had melted into a casual expression and that he wasn’t too flushed.

Much better than the doctor’s office.

#tickling #ticklish!spencer reid #criminal minds fic #criminal minds #reid x the bau #tickle fic #n writes #why do you hide?

[incorrectbatfam]

Hi! Can I ask how you started your blog/started getting the attention of people on Batfam tumblr? I’ve just started my own blog and I’m completely at sea on what to do!

I'm secretly @staff

I didn't go in to try and do something new nor did I expect much of a reaction. I know everyone says that, but honestly some real-life stuff happened and suddenly I had a bunch of free time that I couldn't fill with my usual hobbies without violating my parole. (This username was a steal though, idk how no one took it.)

So I don't really have a solid approach, but I do keep a few things in mind:

Looks kinda matter. By that I mean putting at least some effort into your theme (including the desktop one—you can use Tumblr's preset or do the HTML yourself) and making it match the content you make. Also, good post formatting and tagging goes a long way or make it a car wreck they peer at while slowly driving by

Try to stay on topic. For me at least, one big reason blogs tend to blur together is because they have this fandom (or whatever I initially followed for), other fandoms, politics, aesthetics, memes, etc. all wadded up in one place like the communist eraser my friends and I made in ninth grade. And of course it's their choice, but if someone follows you for Batman, generally they're gonna look through your blog for Batman

Interact with people but don't be annoying. Don't be the follow-for-follow person, the one self-promoting in someone else's reblogs, or the one tagging 69,420 strangers in a post. Follow fans you like, take part in events, or join a fandom Discord. Get to know people and you'll automatically open up the fandomverse

Don't expect anything right away. Even if it's been a while and you only got 13 notes and 4 follows. This isn't Cloutsville, Muskachussetts. It's kind of a dice roll—one post might be the next @certified-iconic-post and another might not land the way you wanted. Also, don't be afraid to experiment and take feedback from others

Relax, have fun, and be true to your internet-curated self. It's easy to tell when someone's fixated on stats or when they're trying to be someone they're not (in terms of content, style, humor, etc.). Fandom is a hobby. It should be something laid-back and enjoyable for everyone. Steer clear of drama, learn to poke fun at your faves, don't dump your tragic backstory or recent divorce until you have level 12 hostages followers, and don't act like you're the greatest thing to walk this fandom because that's me and I will fight you in a Denny's parking lot

#batman #batfamily #batfam #batman family #dc comics #advice #bad advice #tumblr advice #tumblr #tumblr 101 #personal #opinion #fandom #ask #long post

[mrmaybank]

FEM ALLEGED DNI

Fandom: OBX

Title: Opposite Attract

Character(s): JJ, John b, Pope, Kiara

Request: No

Genre: Fluff

Masterlist

A/N: I’m so sorry if this sucks

(M/N) Cameron and JJ Maybank, two completely different people. (M/N) was a star student, he got good grades, was captain of the football team, he never drank, never did drugs. He was prince of the Kooks, every parent’s dream kid. While JJ barley passed his sophomore year of high school.

These two were completely and total opposite and said to hate each other. But you see that wasn’t true, the two were actually dating but they put up this act that they hated each other. Because if anyone knew things would be ruined for the both of them. So they kept things on the down low by meeting in secret, the occasional look in the during school or on the street, and stealing kisses while no was watching.

No one was suppose to know but nothing can stay secret forever especially not on the OBX. (M/N) smiled at JJ as he locked there hands together, it was around three in the morning and the two of them were just chilling on the druthers.

“This nice,” (M/N) told his boyfriend.

“Yeah, it really is,” JJ replied, he turned to look at (M/N) and smiled at the (E/C) boy. Everything was calm and peaceful until they heard the sound of a boat getting close and people talking.

“Well find my iPhone is wrong because theres no way JJ is here,” JJ knew that voice and mentally cursed, the voice belonged to John B. He quickly pulled his phone from his pocket, using the hand that wasn’t linked with (M/N)’s. He had five missed calls from John B, six from Kiara, and countless missed message from Pope.

“JJ?” He heard someone exclaimed. He looked to his right and saw the HMS Pouge and all of his friends. A flashlight shined on him and (M/N) to not only reveal them holding hands but the fact (M/N) was wearing JJ’s hoodie.

“What the fuck?” John B asked. (M/N) and JJ both scrambled to stand up.

“Uh hey guys,” JJ smiled.

“Whats going on JJ?” Kiara asked.

“Nothing,” JJ quickly said.

“That doesn’t look like nothing,” Pope said gesturing to the two of them.

“He was um, helping with fix the druthers,” (M/N) quickly said.

Now everyone’s eyes were on (M/N) who stood there awkwardly, “Really JJ is helping you fix the druthers?” John B asked crossing his arms.

“Mhm,”

“What was broken? Why didn’t your dad call me“ John B asked.

“Because I was in the area,” JJ told John B.

“Well that doesn’t explain, why he’s wearing your hoodie and you two were holding hands,” Kiara spoke.

(M/N) sighed and looked at JJ, “You gotta tell them, were caught,” He told his boyfriend. Who sighed, JJ looked to the white floor of druthers before looking up at his friends.

“Guys this is (M/N) Cameron, my boyfriend,” JJ told them. He locked his and (M/N) hands together. “And if you don’t like him, I really don’t care,” JJ adverted his eyes away from his friends once more.

“You’re dating the prince of the Kooks?” Pope asked.

“My worst enemies brother?” Kiara added.

“Yeah,” JJ replied.

“Good for you dude,” John B said.

“You better get me dirt on Sarah, (M/N),” Kiara told him.

(M/N) smiled, “Will do!” he replied with a salute, causing Kiara to laugh.

“You mean you guys don’t care?” JJ asked.

“No, if it was any other Cameron like Sarah or Rafe maybe but no (M/N) chill,” Pope replied.

“Good, good. Now why did you guys need me?” JJ asked.

“Were gonna go TP toppers house, wanna come?” John B asked.

JJ looked from his friends too (M/N), “Nah, i’m stay here. Next time though,” JJ told them.

“Okay, well goodbye lovebirds,” John B shouted, as he started to drive the boat away.

“Yeah, bye lovebird, use protection!” Kiara quickly added.

JJ rolled his eyes, “Fuck you!” he shouted.

“What can’t hear you,” Kiara replied as he gestured to her ear.

“Well that went better then expected,” (M/N) smiled.

“Yeah, it did,” JJ replied.

#jj maybank x male reader #jj obx #pope heyward #kiara outer banks #john b routledge #x male reader #jj maybank x kook!reader

[dem-obscure-imagines]

The Freak and His Witch

Eddie Munson x Witch!Reader

Fandom: Stranger Things

AU: Soulmate

Summary: The town of Hawkins has gone crazy, and all of the moms in town are pointing their fingers at none other than Eddie Munson, who may or may not be your soulmate…

Note: I’m so in love with Eddie it’s pitiful. Feel free to send requests, I just had to get this one out of my head.

Warnings: SPOILERS FOR SEASON 4!! Mentions of death, swearing

Word Count: 2.4k words

“Dustin, what is it now?” You said into the phone, twirling the phone cord around your finger. “Are you guys good or…?”

“Yeah! Uh, we found Eddie. I just—” You heard voices in the background. “I need a ride and also a favor. Your roommate is still out of state, right?”

“Yeah, she moved all her stuff out and went home for the rest of the semester. Why? Also what do you need?”

“Can you just—I’m on the phone with her right now. No, I—Shut up! Can you come to Skull Rock? Do you know where that is?”

“Yeah, I can, Dustin, what the fuck is going on?”

“I don’t really have time to explain. See you soon.” And with that, he hung up. You let out a long sigh.

You didn’t know Eddie Munson. You’d seen him around, sure. He was supposed to graduate from Hawkins High two years ago when you did. You knew he had trouble with his grades, but was pretty smart from what you could gather, you’d heard he was in a band, but you didn’t know if they were any good, and you knew he ran a DnD club named after an X-Men comics reference. In other words: a nerd in the shell of a long-haired eccentric punk rock-playing weed dealer.

And now he was wanted for murder. But if Dustin and Steve trusted him…maybe he could be trusted after all.

You’d still have your pepper spray on you just in case. Not that you needed it, thanks to your, uh, other abilities.

It wasn’t a long drive to Skull Rock. You figured that was why Dustin had called you in the first place. Well, that and the fact that their other friend with super powers was a plane ride away from Hawkins. You parked as close as you could before the trees hindered you from doing so, but made sure your car was out of sight of the road.

“Dustin?” You called, walking blindly out into the woods. It was especially hard to navigate when everything you saw was black and white. “Dustin?” You called a little louder.

“Shhh!” he hissed at you from somewhere ahead. “Over here.”

You continued forward until you came upon the rest of the group. Steve, Nancy, Robin, Dustin, Lucas, and Max were all standing around Skull Rock in a semi-circle facing Eddie, who was sitting on the ground surrounded by the remains of the snacks he’d been given while he was in hiding.

“And she’s cool, right? She’s not gonna—”

“I trust her with my life.” Steve crossed his arms and looked at you, giving a small grateful smile as you walked up behind him. “(Y/N), this is Eddie.”

“I gathered that much, yeah.” You nodded and finally looked up at him properly, at the exact moment he was looking at you. It felt like time stopped. It didn’t happen all at once like people had told you it would. Instead, the hues saturated slowly, first the blues of his vest, and then the shimmering emerald of the leaves on the trees around you. Then, finally, the warmer hues of his brown hair and eyes, the slight flush of his cheeks.

He stared up at you like a deer in headlights. “H-holy shit.” He stammered for a few moments, tears welling in his eyes before repeating, “Holy shit!”

“Did what I think just happened…happen?” Dustin murmured.

“Um…yeah. Yeah it did.” You brushed past the others and walked straight to Eddie, helping him off of the ground. As soon as he was on his feet, he pulled you to his chest, his arms wrapping around you without hesitation. You stumbled a bit, but held steady, your arms slotting beneath his and pulling him closer to you.

You felt him exhale a huge sigh, his head resting against yours for a moment. Right next to your ear, his heart hammered in his chest.

“You okay?” You asked, your voice swallowed up by his warmth.

“Y-yeah, I’m fine.” He nodded against you, one of his hands rising to cradle your head, stroking your hair, as if to prove you were really there with him. “It’s been a…really long week. Kind of an emotional rollercoaster.”

“I can’t believe I found you.” You whispered, pulling away the tiniest bit to look up at him, really take him in for what he was. He was a few years older than the last time you’d seen him, but so were you. He’d acquired some tattoos and some new patches and pins on his vest, but he was still rocking that Hellfire Club shirt, as usual. It suited him.

Eddie reached up and brushed some hair out of the front of your face, his hand gentle. “That makes two of us, sweetheart.” But that sparkle in his kind brown eyes flickered. “Fuck, I’m so sorry you’re getting dragged into all of this.”

“Don’t be.” You shook your head. “I’m happy to help.”

The little moment over, you turned to face the rest of the circle, stepping out of Eddie’s hold. His hand, however, slid into your own, his fingers fitting perfectly in the spaces between yours, and his rings cool against your skin. You gave his hand a squeeze, reassuring him.

“So, what do you guys need?”

“We need to kill Vecna.” Dustin said. “And we need a place to lay low for a bit. Your, uh, soulmate is kind of on the run, at the moment.”

“That, I do know. But what the fuck is a Vecna and why didn’t you call me when all of this started?”

“See, I told you we should have gotten her earlier.” Steve said, shaking his head, “but no one listens to me.”

“Vecna is…connected to me.” Max elaborated. “He’s a monster from the Upside Down. A stronger, smarter one.”

“He’s the one that killed Chrissy and Fred.” Nancy said.

“And Patrick.” Lucas added, his face falling a bit as he did.

“And he tried to kill me.” Max continued.

You listened, nodding and thinking through everything they’d told you. “Okay, yeah, we need to get back to my place asap. I’m parked over there.”

The others followed you back to your car, and everyone piled in as best as they could. Eddie sat on the floor in the back so he wouldn’t be seen from outside the car, but on the right side so he could still see you. Now that he had seen you for the first time, he never wanted to stop looking at you.

While everyone was getting settled, you reached back and touched his hand, soothing his nerves immediately. His thumb smoothed over the back of your hand for the few lingering moments before you had to focus on driving.

The drive back to your place was short. You pulled into the garage and closed the door behind you before anyone got out, just to make sure no one would see Eddie get out and call the authorities.

“I’ll go in and close the blinds.”

“I’ll help.” Robin, who was in the passenger seat, volunteered.

The two of you walked up the stairs into the living area of your townhouse-style apartment. It wasn’t huge, by any means, but it was far from tiny. You made quick work of closing the blinds, turning on the TV so the neighbors wouldn’t hear anything you said. After all, the walls here were paper thin.

“Did you know?” Robin asked quietly in the kitchen area that was separated from your living room by a long counter.

“Did I know what?”

“I don’t know, did you like…have a feeling on the drive over? That he might be your soulmate?” She said the word soulmate in almost a whisper, her eyes glistening with this fresh gossip.

“No clue. But uh…I have to admit, he’s pretty hot.” You felt your cheeks flush, even just saying it out loud. “He seems nice.”

“He is. I think. I haven’t really known him that long, either.” She shrugged, causing you to laugh.

You walked back down the stairs and signaled that the coast was clear. Everyone else got out of the car and started walking inside. Dustin was the first to make himself comfortable on your couch, Steve and Max following quickly after.

“Anyone want water or anything?” You asked, going to the fridge to get some for yourself.

“You got Capri Suns?” Dustin asked, causing you to chuckle, leaning into the refrigerator.

“I’m offended you would even ask that.” You said, reaching in and grabbing one before chucking it to him across the apartment.

“Thank you!”

“Yeah, yeah.” You grabbed a water bottle and turned around to find Eddie leaning against the nearest counter, a question in his eyes. The answer came to you before he could even ask it. “I went grocery shopping the other day. There’s a bunch of snacks and stuff in the cupboard over there.” You pointed and he nodded, gratefully.

“Thanks.”

“You don’t need to thank me.” You told him earnestly, reaching for his hand, which he readily gave to you. “My snacks are your snacks now.”

Rather than saying anything, Eddie squeezed your hand, leaned in, and pressed a quick kiss to your cheek before making a beeline for the snack cupboard. You didn’t know where he had been hiding out for the past few days, but you assumed there probably hadn’t been much to eat, given the circumstances. It was weird, you noted, how quickly your heart began to ache for him. Before this afternoon—hell, even thirty minutes ago—he had barely been in the peripheral of your life and now he was right at the center. His suffering was yours. And his fate seemed to be the most important thing to you right now, even if it was as simple as keeping him fed and sheltered.

“You good?” Steve asked, making his way through the kitchen for a drink.

“Never been better.” You replied, and you didn’t miss the smirk on Eddie’s face as you said it.

“Good. Good.” Steve glanced at the fridge behind you and then back at you. “You got any more of those Capri Suns?”

You laughed and moved out of the way so he could help himself, claiming a seat on the armrest of the couch. You noticed the news flashed on the screen so you changed the channel to the first cartoon you could find in an attempt to lighten the mood. Then, remembering the task at hand, you walked across the room and knelt down in front of your book shelf, searching it for one specific book, one about Moon Spells. And another, a bigger, thicker hardcover book. It was black with shining silver lettering, stars and a moon adorning the front and spine of it. You carried it to the coffee table in the middle of the room and sat on the floor.

“What’s that?” Eddie asked through a mouthful of chips.

Robin smiled softly. “It’s her spell book. (Y/N)’s a witch.”

“Nancy, go check my moon calendar in my room and tell me what phase the moon is in today.”

“On it.”

“Dustin, can you grab my deck?”

“Yeah where is it?”

“I’ll get it.” Robin volunteered, following Nancy up the stairs.

“It’s waxing!” Nancy called.

“When’s the full moon?” you called back.

“The 25th!”

You pondered the information for a moment and nodded, flipping through the book of moon spells and handing it to Dustin. “Find the protection ward in this section of the book.” You looked up at Max. “At the very least, I can shield the apartment for now. So long as you’re here, Vecna or whoever else won’t be able to find or communicate with you. It’ll buy us some time to sever his connection with you permanently.”

Relief hit the young red-haired girl all in a wave and she nodded gratefully. “Thank you.”

Eddie watched you work in awe, the focus on your features, the energy surrounding you. It really did feel like magic.

“Don’t thank me yet.”

***

It took about an hour to get everything in place and the ward cast. If Eddie had been a bit skeptical before, that had all faded when, upon casting said spell, the edges of the apartment all seemed to ripple, like a force field was protecting your slice of the building. And he also noticed that you looked exhausted immediately following this.

Once the feeling of safety settled in, even if it would only be temporary, everyone seemed to calm down a bit. Max was sleeping with her head in Lucas’ lap. Dustin and Steve were talking about whatever nonsense show was on now, and Robin was doing a little light reading, your giant book of spells in her lap.

“That was badass.” Eddie said when you took the seat next to him on the couch, his eyes sparkling when he said it. “You’re badass. I never really…took you for the witchy type.”

“Yeah, a lot of people don’t. In a town like Hawkins, that’s a blessing, especially right now. All of the moms in town would think I’m a satanist.” You wiggled your fingers mockingly and he laughed.

Eddie smirked. “Nah, right now, they just think I’m a satanist.”

“Fair point.”

He’s quiet for a long moment, thinking about the day he’s had. About you. “I remember you, you know. Before you graduated. I remember thinking you were the prettiest girl in the world, the Princess of Hawkins High. I never thought I’d ever have a chance with you.”

“Yeah, well, the universe had other plans, I guess.” You took his hand in your own, fiddling with his larger one, admiring the rings on his fingers. “And for the record, I always thought you were hot, Eddie. Even back then.”

He gasped playfully. “You think I’m hot?”

“Of course I do.” You leaned your head on his shoulder, your eyes heavy from the exertion of your powers. It would take some time to build your energy back up. “I don’t know how, but we’re gonna get through this shit. I promise.”

Eddie turned his head and pressed a long kiss to your hairline. “I know we are.”

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson imagine #stranger things

[everythingendsbutcomicsr4ever]

((This originally comes as my response to someone saying that ppl don’t like The Sun and The Star because it’s a middle school book and we were expecting the series to grow along with us.))

Valid point I keep finding BUT I recently read the PJO series again in preparation for TSATS and those books still slap!! They’re so good even tho I’m reading them as an adult even though they're meant for kids. (Also I recently read ToA because of course I’m gonna keep reading Rick’s middle school books until the day I die or they stop coming out lol. And that series while more goofy at points I still really liked) I also read one of Mark Oshiro's other books in prep for this book because I was excited for The Sun and Star to be released and I just COULD NOT get through it 😭 the writing was just giving me the ick and the characters where all kind of samie like that sassy talking wit. Which was a bummer because I liked the premise of the book “Anger is a Gift”, which was about underfunded schools mainly facing ppl of color and immigrants which leads to the school-to-prison pipeline because of the defunct way America funds public schools that keeps the poor poor and the rich getting richer & it was ACAB & had a lot of queer representation & etc. So I thought I’d really like it but I just couldn’t get through it because of the writing and I noticed this same writing style showing up in TSATS. Just because it’s for kids doesn’t excuse it from being bad. Like early Pixar and Studio Ghibli is still so good to watch back again and my 50+ yrs old parents like it. Book examples would be Harry Potter (screw JK Rowling tho fr) & the The Little Prince

Not to bash on ppl who say this is the main reason ppl don’t like the book but it feels like a straw man argument to say that the books not growing with us is the main reason ppl didnt like it. All tho I’m sure ppl have argued this but that is definitely their fault because Rick is staying in middle-grade fiction forever like that’s his thing! Why would ppl expect different 🤣 You think he wants to write a sex scene?! LMAO

(Here’s my review, it’s unhinged and not great because I should be doing productive stuff but am distracted until I can at least write down some of my thoughts on my disappointing experience)

Here are some things I didn’t like about it from a piece of art standpoint:

The pacing was bad

This book was filled with the first thing they teach you about writing which is: SHOW don’t TELL

It made me not ship Solangelo surprisingly like how??! I used to love Solangelo but I think this mainly is because of the collective consciousness of the fandom and because we wanted Nico to find happiness with someone. But if you really look back on their moments canonically from the books Will is a background character (who honestly kind of gaslights Nico by invalidating that ppl treated him differently as a son of Hades and that he didn't feel welcome at camp) and they kind of have a quick meet cute in the last book of The Last Olympian. They get together without us seeing their developing relationship and we now know they’re dating in The Trials of Apollo where we see them briefly in the first book and then more so in the last book. Honestly, this canonically alone doesn’t give me enough information or examples to really know or care about their relationship in comparison to Percy and Annabeth who we get to see develop. So TSATS just kind of felt hollow to me because I’m supposed to believe they’d die for each other but I DONT KNOW THE POWER OF THEIR LOVE?? This could just be a first love fling type thing like I was never shown the depth of their romance just told constantly in the book how much they love each other so it just felt kind of empty and emotionally unsatisfying to me.

Solangelo's relationship has always been in the background and the fans are what really made it cause we love Nico and want him to be happy. So when Will and Nico are fighting in this book all I can think is that this is just their relationship period.

So the reason it made me not like Solangelo was because Tarturus was supposed to bring out the worst in them and strain their relationship but, like, I haven’t really seen much of their relationship so I don’t have a “control group” to base this off of. So Will just seemed rude when he was so mean about Nico’s underworld home and about Nico's darkness which I also didn’t understand wtf he was talking about because Nico has killed just as many monsters as other campers and what else was his darknes based off of. cause he’s emo/goth?? Cause he can raise the dead?? Like guys we’ve discussed this just because a character wears black doesn't automatically make them the bad guy. I honestly thought Will just thought that was hot and they’d have that normie x alt relationship dynamic (that meme of: My hot witch wife. Me doing whatever she wants) I thought THAT was Solangelo not Will constantly trying to bring this light side to him and trying to change him. I agree that Nico needs help w his trauma and PTSD and things like that but this felt like if someone tried to “cure” a goth person, like actually screw you

I thought Will was supposed to look like a normie but be secretly a freak (in a good way lol) / goth interest. Cause this is meee I thought I was like Will as someone who looks like a normie and has a sunny disposition but I have a lot of alt/goth interests and I would let an alt girlie step all over me tbh lol. So does he like Nico for who he is or not?!

This is more in line w what I thought their relationship was like lol:

The flashbacks and forwards I thought were ok even if they took you out of the story a bit but this device is supposed to be used for an IMPORTANT event not just as a way to quickly give context to their relationship and when we got to the scene this was taking place in I was like that’s it?? He what? fell down and is suffering from sun withdrawals and this is the book's big moment to justify jarring flashback scenes?

Mark Oshiro is not a fantasy adventure or horror writer and it shows. Maybe it’s just me but their depiction of Tarturus and the nightmare and the journey were just not up to snuff with good horror and fantasy books I’ve read. (And if your gonna say something about how it’s for kids then I raise you the book series “Goosbumps”) So as a genre in itself, it was just disappointing. It was mainly a relationship guidebook book but I didn’t really like that or feel like it was done well, It felt lectury and also idk if that's the genre middle schoolers really like?? 😅

It had too many references which really dates a book, A lot of professional writers say not to use too much slang or modernreferences (unless you’re trying to make a book expressly about a time period) because it really dates a book and doesn’t make a story feel timeless for future generations if you use too many references (this doesn’t include political novels tho which are very much based in that time when the events happening) Anyways for future writers keep this in mind, you don't need to keep in touch with the youth through urban dictionary you can just write about the emotions of being young or whatever. If you’ve tried to read a comic book aimed at teens from the 50s like I have you’ll realise how funny that is.

(Also the carebear reference that I didn’t even understand and I watched carebear as a kid & Lil Nas video which if this was written for kids that music video feels a bit inappropriate for them 😂 it had a reference both too old and too young for middle schoolers AND how in the world would 1930s born, dropped out of elementary school, can’t use the internet or phones half blood, NICO DI ANGELO know these references???)

The writings giving:

Bad alt representation. (This is my most out-of-pocket opinionated bullet point rant so if you don't agree that’s a-okay :D ) This could be a whole post in itself but although I know ppl joke about Nico as the Emo kid I would really like to get into how Nico is actually, or it would be cool, as having some goth subculture inclinations. And ppl probably think of Trad Goths with the whole makeup and teased hair look but it’s mainly a music-based subculture and/or it just has a different idealogy around the ideas of death and what is deemed beautiful while most ppl see it as ugly. (Like listen to “Gallows Dance” or the Bauhaus's “Bela Lugosi’s Dead” & “The Passion of Lovers”, to name songs off the top of my head) This bullet point is definitely MY OPINION and doesn’t contribute exactly to the book being bad but aren’t those songs the vibe of an underworld kid like Nico?? Embracing the darkness and dancing in graveyard vibes fr!! Anyways most alt subcultures and especially emo are seen as a phase in life that you grow out of and then become normal. This book just really gives the energy of being written by a normie who would be confused by the choices of alt ppl and just doesn’t get it because it’s not their personal interest, which isn’t exactly bad even tho I want more philosophy from Nico on the chillness and acceptance of death (all tho greek mythologies view on the afterlife sucks fr and THAT is a whole other post haha) So this isn’t exactly a problem BUT what gives me the ick is WILL NOT ACCEPTING THESE THINGS LIKE SIR STOP BASHING YOUR BOYFRIENDS LIFE!! Will asking Persephonee, “How do you love someone from the underworld” SHUT UP!! 😤

Will was useless and I know what they were trying to go for but if I had a girlfriend (oh I’m a lesbian btw just in case ppl think I’m going harder on this book more than the other books because I’m homophobic bruh I swear I’m not I’m only disappointed in the art itself, NOT the representation which I actually liked) and if I was super good at fighting and they weren’t, I’m sorry but I wouldn’t take them BECAUSE of my love for them. If they were going to be useless on a mission of such life-threatening danger and importance I WOULD NOT TAKE THEM OUT OF KINDNESS. Like skills in medicine and art and music are great and there’s of course nothing wrong w not being a badass fighter (lmao this is me and most readers) but then DONT GO TO SUPER HELL!!! Especially if you have something that makes you more pathetic than being a normal human in Tarturus, his suffering from no sunlight is out of pocket and just makes the story draggg and makes him seem boring and the story more boring. I know they were trying to go for a fish out of water storyline and roll reversal but I think it wasn’t done well enough and overall hurt the story

Also, I’ve heard ppl talk about how it would have been nice to have a book focus on their relationship while at Camp Half-Blood. Like maybe it takes place pre Jason's death and we can just see them living at camp. It’d be chill and we can actually see them as a couple & It would give the energy of readers wanting to go to camp half-blood again like how everyone wanted to go to Hogwarts. Cause we haven’t seen the camp as a fun home since the very early PJO books ;-; (this is just a fun idea I like and I think would have been more manageable for an author but this is FR my opinion on a fun book idea i’d like to read) ALSO this would have been so nostalgic for the older readers who have been here since middle school gobbling up this universe 😌

I know ppl get mad at ppl making fun of Will for being pathetic in tarturous. As saying he’s a child and no one can be happy and sunny and doing well 24/7 which is valid but that’s not really my argument. I like watching characters put in situations where we watch them bend against what we thought they were when put in a hard situation (the masochist in me lol jkjjk). But this I think didn’t work for me because as I’ve said before he’s mainly a background character at the end of one book thrown together with Nico and we as a fandom have mainly made him up. Also, Tarturus was just not as scary or adventure-filled as like any of the other missions from previous PJO books, It didn’t feel as trauma-inducing as everyone in the series tried to explain it as. (again show not tell from the book) Also, I would have liked to have seen Will cool at least once or one reason for me to like him with Nico but I saw him as pretty bland as a character

The writing style felt bad to me because of the show don’t tell part for example telling as “it made him sad and traumatized” when showing would be, you know, actually showing the scenes and this book just felt like 80% telling what they were feeling instead of letting the reader feel the emotions of the scene for themselves

I think that’s another thing I really didn’t like related to the Show Don't Tell. And another hallmark of bad writing was this book was really telling the audience how to feel instead of allowing the story to be powerful enough to do that for itself. This book follows a trend I’ve seen a lot in TV shows where everything kind of feels like detached irony from being on Twitter where you hear everyone’s opinions so the story is written as a wink and a nod like we know what we’re doing and we know what your thinking and how twitter will react to it. Like it’s hard to describe this trend I’ve mainly seen in TV shows and movies recently which always gives me the ick cause it doesn’t feel funny it feels like I’m in a response piece that is breaking the fourth wall and reminds me that I’m in reality watching or reading something instead of actually feeling like I’m in the story. It’s like pseudo-wittiness or something. Tell me if you guys feel this way about some modern tv shows or books, I can't be alone please 😭!!

The stupid toast scene at the end lol The book is like: Do you get it? Did you get it?? They’re opposites! And they attract!! We did the trope you guys!! Also, the stupid Darth Vader scene to start off the book 💀

This whole book made me cringe where I had to constantly get up walk around and lie on the floor before I could continue, only to constantly repeat the cycle 😅

Anyway, idk how to end this review/rant I just had such strong emotions I had to get out probably because I was so excited for this book to come out for like over a year and got back into PJO for a bit and read some of Mark Oshiro’s books and greek mythology and stuff, so I think it wasn’t just me reading any random bad book it disappointed me more that it was poor quality because I wanted to love it so much.

It did have some actually good parts, the troglodytes were cute … I can’t remember the other stuff but it was there I swear lol! If you enjoyed it I’m happy for you! Don’t let me ruin a book you like, you deserve to feel joy 😘💐

#the sun and the star spoilers #the sun and the star #tsats spoilers #tsats #anti tsats #pjo hoo toa tsats #pjoverse #pjo #tsats rant #nico di angelo #will solace #solangelo #solangelo book #percy jackson

[katnissgirlsmakedo]

breaking my silence on what i’m reading (for this book. not for the last ones) because i decided i need to complain properly i’m so over speaking in stupid redacted code. and. ok i’m not Complaining. ok i have a lovers soul. i’m just saying that sometimes a book series needs to end. they can’t all go on forever and ever and spawn multiple spin off series and books and bad fucking disney plus adaptations. yeah it’s the gay percy jackson book. i don’t careeee about percy jackson but i used to in 8th grade so i’m listening to this book 🙄 and. anyway can i complain. not a question i was obviously going to do that anyway. so as you should have guessed, i am NOT caught up on this franchise, nor do i wish to be. i read the first one of those trials of apollo books when it came out and i didn’t care for it and i had grown out of the franchise by then and i never kept up with it after that. and then i found out via the internet that jason died and i won’t ever forgive that man for that. and then i found out via the internet that jason was apparently a fandom hated character. which was insane to me because he’s literally never done anything wrong… he’s a nice young man what’s so wrong with that….. you hated him for his kind realness and glasses swag. fuck you for real. anyway. um clearly back when i cared about this franchise jason was a favorite of mine. and i won’t get into it but to this day one of my favorite fanfics i’ve ever read was this jason and piper au where he was a teen pop star (sounds ridiculous putting it like that but dude just trust me). now i read that at age 14 and never again so perhaps i’m not qualified to make a quality judgement but that’s not what i said, i didn’t say it was good i said it was my favorite… anyway all that to say. i was a jason girl!!!!! i do not want to read a book where he dies!!! you will never catch me catching up on that franchise!!! well except that i’ll read THIS book apparently. anyway my complaint is that this book has already referenced multiple events of books i have not read (which i’m powering through) and now we’re talking about jason being dead. and i got sad about it. ok i might actually need to read a wiki fandom website page summary of events or something. or i could just pick up the vibes. i’m smart i can pick up the vibes. what ever. idk why i didn’t want to say i started this book you were gonna find out eventually. actually in hindsight i think i even told you all i was planning to read it. and now you’re gonna get an extra special exclusive sentence for the besties who have read this far. this reads like jegulus fanfic lowkey. ok peace and love on planet earth !!!

#i don’t care for this man’s writing style at my age. i am literally too old to be here. me personally #but WHAT EVER. #we literally will press on 🙄🙄🙄🫶 #🌟

[twiceasfrustrating]

When You Grow Up

Rating: General Audiences Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply Category: Gen Fandom: Twisted Wonderland Relationships: Deuce Spade & Ace Trappola & Epel Felmier Characters: Deuce Spade, Ace Trappola, Epel Felmier Additional Tags: fluff, Aged-up Characters (2 years) Summary: The more things change, the more they stay the same. Especially for Deuce, Ace, and Epel. Word Count: 481

Deuce sat in the grass of the field with a heavy heart and vacant eyes as he stared at the open textbook in front of him. His eyes faced the page but he wasn't processing anything – not the words or pictures. Even with the sun shining brightly from above, he was the picture of a perfectly gloomy apparition.

Ace stared at the sadness carved deep into his friend’s(?) face with a bored scowl, until he couldn’t stand the heavy atmosphere anymore. He stood from where he’d been sitting and stormed over to take Deuce’s book and slam it shut.

“You can stop the moping now,” Ace shouted. “So you didn’t become the housewarden. Who cares?”

Deuce’s expression didn’t cheer up any. In fact, he sighed so heavily that it seemed his spirit would leave his body altogether.

“I tried so hard.”

Ace clicked his tongue as he shook his head. “You were never gonna get it. Your grades suck and you can’t remember any of the rules.”

“You can’t remember them either!”

“But I’m not trying to be a housewarden. Who would do that to themselves?”

“Some of us don’t mind being housewarden,” a third voice said.

Ace and Deuce turned to the owner of the voice. A modestly-sized-but-still-short man with shimmering blue eyes crossed his arms as he stared at them in disappointment. His lilac hair that was tied back in a low ponytail was ornamented with a golden tiara that displayed a sword piercing a heart.

Epel closed his eyes and sighed. “Did you fail again? You look miserable.”

Deuce hung his head.

Ace shrugged. “He cares for some reason. We're third years and he wants to stress himself out more.”

“I wanted to tell my mom some good news.” Deuce pouted.

“Shouldn’t you raise your grades first?” Ace teased.

“Shut up!” Deuce yelled as he stood up and grabbed Ace by the collar.

“Make me!” Ace shouted back as he grabbed Deuce back.

“Boys, boys,” Epel said. “There’s no need to fight; you’re both idiots. It’s part of your charm.”

“Rude,” Ace and Deuce said in unison.

Epel’s words seemed to cut through the tension enough for them to let go of each other though.

“You don’t have to be a housewarden, Deuce.” Epel smiled. “We should just enjoy our third year while we can. I’m sure your mother would be happy if you told her all of your good memories, even if you aren’t the best of the best.”

Deuce’s eyes filled with wonder at Epel’s words.

Epel was right. It didn’t matter if he was the housewarden of Heartslabyul. What mattered was that he made the most of his time attending Night Raven College. He didn’t have long left to make memories with his friends.

Ace, on the other hand, cringed. “It’s weird to hear you being so mature.”

Epel shrugged. “It comes with the tiara.”

#mine #twisted wonderland #twst fanfic #deuce spade #ace trappola #epel felmier #twst fluff #fluff

[myfairkatiecat]

Kate Wetherall, Katherine Pulitzer, and your Keefe boy :)

Aaaaaahh yes yes yes these are really good ones ahdkdhsnbdjshssj

Kate Wetherall:

Ok so. The reason I say she works best as a part of a dynamic is because while she’s awesome on her own, she is MOST compelling with the rest of the mysterious Benedict society!!!the four of them together are so special to me

Also I’m a Kate apologist, she’s never done anything wrong and I stand by it :)

(And yeah if you see the way I write Kate you may see me projecting. It might have something to do with me being in sixth grade when I first read the books and going “omg we have the same name!!!”)

Katherine Pulitzer:

Look I relate to this girl SO MUCH you don’t even understand 😭

And the fandom has a tendency to villainize her or make her seem problematic simply for being complex, which… is a problem I’ve been seeing a lot of lately, actually.

I love her SO MUCH. She’s kinda scary but also she’s me

AND FINALLY

Keefe Sencen:

Once again flattered by your interest in hearing me talk abut my interests that you don’t share 🥹

Okay look. I LOVE KEEFE. And I initially colored in “they’ve never done anything wrong” cause I have tendency to be a Keefe apologist, but if I’m being real here he’s definitely done stuff wrong 😭 @phtalogreenpoison has heard me talk about his character in detail and knows EXACTLY what I’m talking about.

Why the tiny scribble on “too much screen time”? Well…….it’s technically true. He does get too much screen time, and for not being the MC, he’s started getting a lot of his POV in Sophie’s story. However, I EAT IT UP cause I’m a pretty standard basic Keefe girlie. So while I understand the side of the fandom that’s beginning to want more of some other characters, and I think that’s soooo valid, I also am totally eating up all the Keefe screen time. SO EXCITED for the Keefe book that’s coming out this fall. I love this boy. So much.

Also would I marry him irl?? uhhhhhhh if Sophie didn’t exist then YES he’s mine. But I’m a girl’s girl and he belongs to Sophie <3 they’re so cute together, too!!

Somebody is gonna come at me for saying he’s deeper than he seems cause we actually get quite a bit of insight into his character depth, but I think even what we do see doesn’t fully cover it. Keefe is more open with his friends than he’s ever been with anyone else… but he definitely has a LOT of defense mechanisms in place, which is why he has that cool-kid-doesn’t-care-doesn’t-work-only-flirts vibe going on in the first book, and the first time we REALLY get slapped in the face with “haha you knew he had a facade but here have a GUT PUNCH” is the quote in the beginning of book three when Sophie suggests they stop by Keefe’s house and he just sorta looks down and says “I…don’t bring friends home.”

Like. We knew his parents sucked. But something about seeing him vulnerable like that. Ahdkfhdjshdjdshs

I think the mischief making and flirting is also a real aspect of his personality, but a lot of the sorta bad-boy-ish reputation he’s got going on at school in the beginning books is a front to cover his ✨issues✨ and I don’t think we even see the full depth of how much the reveal of his mother as a villain and her constant attempts to make him “embrace the change” and have a “legacy” tied to her evil thoughts impact him. We know it’s hard for him and we totally see that, but even in Keefe’s POV he avoids thinking about it, and… honestly it’s up to us fanfic writers to really delve into that angst. Shannon sorta tells us it sucks for him, but doesn’t really show us (not fully, at least) cause Sophie is the main character, not him.

And do I project my issues on him? …maybe a little…his particular brand of the “using humor to cover up my problems” trope hits very close to home for me. I deflect with humor in the exact same flippant way, and just like with Keefe, sometimes it works and sometimes it gets me in trouble with my friends when I need to be serious.

(Yes I want to carry Keefe in a hand a like a tiny dog. Not elaborating.)

Wasn’t sure whether or not to say he gets done dirty by the fans. Historically, this fandom is head over heels in love with him, but right now there’s been a bit of a turn towards combating Fitz hate (another character that often gets pitted against Keefe unjustly bc of shipping discourse) with Keefe hate and saying he’s problematic when he’s really just complex.

So yeah I’m not normal about Keefe at all, if you couldn’t tell.

I managed to talk for a very long time about him

You can tell where the brain bees are buzzing rn can’t you

#kotlc #tmbs #keeper of the lost cities #the mysterious benedict society #newsies #kate wetherall #katherine pulitzer #keefe sencen

[she-karev]

Adventures in Babysitting and Singing

Age Rating: 12+

Fandom: Grey’s Anatomy

AN: So after all the angst and the family drama I decided to do a little fun chapter. Here Amber is gonna sing due to Liz Gillies being an underrated singer who deserves more recognition. The gif above is Amber's outfit at Joe's during karaoke.

Summary: Amber is tasked with babysitting Harriet Kepner-Avery and struggles throughout the day.

Words: 6254

I walk by Vik Roy in the lockers after getting my scrubs from the laundry to get started on my next shift. It’s day 13 and I am still learning the ropes of this place. You would think the directory would be extremely helpful, but it might as well be in Mandarin, and I only took ASL for my language requirement in pre-med. I open the locker and put my backpack inside when Vik opens his stupid mouth for some reason.

“You missed karaoke night last night Barbie.” I ignore his smug voice, “You should’ve seen me play that sexy little number Dream On. I think you would’ve begged to come home with me.” I feel him staring at my body after I take my white top off exposing me in my black lace trim bra, “And boy that would’ve been the best 40 minutes of my life.”

I snort at him, “40 minutes? Bitch please you’ll be lucky to last 40 seconds and that’s with performance enhancers.” The interns chuckle at my comment and Roy is persistent.

“Is that a challenge?” He grins at me.

Helm groans from across the room and comes to my defense, “Boundaries Vik you’ve heard of them, right? Have you not seen the news at all over the past year?”

I scoff at her and put my top on, “Helm I can handle myself and Vik think up new flirting techniques or the closest relationship you’ll have is with your hand.”

Vik chuckles and closes in on me, “Well maybe seeing me sing like an angel tonight will make you want to see what else this hand can do.”

Helm rolls her eyes, “The only reason your so cocky is because nobody else sings.”

“Yeah, and even if I did hear you sing there is no demon demented enough to possess me and want to take advantage of you and the 15 seconds your hardly capable of giving.” Roy rolls his eyes and is blocking my way, “Now get out of my way chunk!” I push him against the lockers to get him out of my way causing him to yell out in pain. I walk past him and wash my hands next to Helm. Suddenly we all get a page at once, I look and am elated that there is a massive car crash on the bridge.

Helm smiles, “Oh my god a massive trauma, I’m scrubbing in!”

“Not if I get there first!” I push Helm behind me and run out as fast as I can to the pit. All of the other interns fall behind because I’m the only one who’s athletic. Except for Casey Parker, his military training ties with me as we run side by side and arrive at the pit quickly grabbing gowns and gloves.

“I would be pissed I’m not the only intern here but I’ll give you props for keeping up.” I admit to Casey as I put the yellow gown on.

“Same. Where did you run like that? Track?”

“No I was an outside hitter for my volleyball team in catholic school there was a lot of cardio.”

Casey looks at me surprised, “I didn’t know you went to catholic school.”

I tie the strings on my back, “Good you shouldn’t know it.” I say it with venom.

Casey looks at me amused, “I get it. Your so mysterious and tough but I think deep down inside that hard shell is a big softie.”

I put my gloves on, “Think whatever you want buddy but I’m gonna get to scrub in before any of you losers do.”

“You were probably a girl scout and sold the cookies outside a grocery store in fourth grade.” Casey theorizes as the interns finally catch up and gown up.

 “Ha! Jokes on you I skipped fourth grade and ninth and I finished premed in three years.” I chuckled smugly.

“Maybe you’re just more annoying than tough.” Casey says as we wait for an attending to come. We hear a baby cooing behind us and look to see April Kepner approaching us holding her daughter Harriet in her arm.

I stand back, “Oh um Dr. Kepner good morning I didn’t know it was bring your child to work day I would’ve requested a day off.”

April looks at all of us and groans, “Well the daycare wouldn’t take her because she has a fever and they can’t admit her unless she’s fever free for 24 hours. Dr. Avery has a big surgery coming up so I need one of you to watch Harriet and make sure she’s happy and healthy. Who’s the lucky intern?” I look at her in shock and the others take a step back and single me out as the prime candidate, “She-Karev it’s your lucky day!”

My eyes widen in horror, “No, no, no Dr. Kepner I strongly advice against that ask anybody here I am the least maternal person of all, ask them! Guys help me out!” The interns stay quiet though and I don’t blame them. Just then the ambulance arrives with the sirens blaring and the baby cries. Kepner puts the crying baby in my arms and I automatically hold her by her armpits still processing.

“Okay monitor her temp.” Kepner gives me instructions that I listen to even though my stress has risen above a ten, “If it gets above 101, give her a teaspoon of acetaminophen and give her fluids. She needs milk in ten minutes bottle is in the bag you got this Karev.” Kepner plops the baby bag on the floor and rushes out to the bay.

“Have fun babysitting Barbie!” I hear Roy yell out as I look at this baby in front of me in horror as she continues to cry. I put her in a football position, bend down, grab the bag and head out groaning at what my day has suddenly turned into.

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I sit in a chair at the nurse’s station trying to feed Harriet but she won’t take the bottle. She just keeps crying and wiggling in my arms and people are looking at me like I’m a bad parent. I try to put the bottle in her mouth so she can latch but she won’t do it and it is frustrating me.

“Please, please eat I am begging you.” Harriet cries harder, “Oh god come on it’s milk from your mom straight from the breast you should love this come on man give me a break.”

“Well this is a scary sight.” I swing my chair around to find Alex and Jo looking at me with pity, “Whats Harriet doing with you?” Jo asks, “She doesn’t look like she’s having fun and neither are you.”

The baby keeps crying and I think a vein is popping out of my forehead, “She has a fever, daycare isn’t admitting her and Kepner stuck me with her brat. Now I think this baby is starving herself so she can die and her parents will fire me. Don’t do me like that Harriet come on!” I try to feed her again but Harriet won’t let me and her fussiness escalates to screaming and my eyes widen at the volume this kid is achieving. Alex stands in front of me.

“Okay come on let Uncle Alex take you away from the mean lady.” Alex takes the baby from my arms and takes the bottle. Almost immediately Harriet stops crying and takes the bottle Alex puts in her mouth to my shock.

Jo looks at us back and forth perplexed by how differently we handle the baby, “Are you sure you two are related?”

“What did you do?” I ask my brother as he rocks Harriet.

“Nothing. Maybe it’s just you.”

I furrow my eyes in question, “What do you mean maybe it’s me? I tried exactly what you did and that Chestburster was screaming at me.”

“Chestburster?” Jo asks.

Alex chuckles, “It’s a creature from Alien the one that burst out of that guy’s chest and killed him.”

“Well, I think that’s your answer on why she doesn’t like you.” Jo looks at me in dark amusement.

Alex moves toward me and I back up, “Whoa what are you doing?”

“I have a surgery in an hour and I need to map out the plan for the patient’s parents. This Chestburster is your problem now.”

I panic and try to sway him, “I’ll pay you to take her off my hands please I am begging you.”

“You’re an intern you couldn’t afford me, here.” Alex puts Harriet in my arms and she cries again and I whimper, “Don’t freak out so much babies can tell and then they freak out too.”

I look at him annoyed, “Can’t I just dip my finger in whiskey and put it in her mouth?”

“You do know that baby is an Avery, right? So, her entire family will come after you and sue you for everything your worth if you ply her with alcohol.” I groan at Alex being right, “I gotta go.”

Alex leaves me to take care of the crying baby and I look to Jo in desperation but she catches on, “No.” She then walks away and I lean back trying to rock the baby against me to calm her down.

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I sit on the single bed cross legged in front of Harriet who is also on the bed playing with her teething ring. After getting her fever down she started to calm down thank God. I was able to feed her a whole bottle and now I’m just watching her teeth on a rubber ring. It’s like Disneyland to her but to me it’s just watching a baby grind her toothless mouth against something. I sigh and look at her bored.

“So do you know any good jokes?” Harriet looks at me oblivious of what I asked, “I just figured some of the other kids at daycare told you some that are exclusive among toddlers. I probably wouldn’t get the joke anyway given how you can’t even make a knowledgeable sound let alone say knock knock.” I can’t believe my source of communication at the moment is a 1-year-old. I check my phone to see if Dr. Kepner or Avery paged me to bring her to them, “Well looks like your stuck with me a while longer kid, sorry.” Harriet stops teething and makes an unknown face and wince at me. I raise my eyebrows, “What is it? What’s that face for?” I catch a funky smell and I pause. I take another sniff and gag as I realize why she made that face, “Oh god!”

I immediately stand up and grab Harriet by her armpits so I don’t have her stinky diaper anywhere near me. I breathe through my mouth and try to open the door but I’m busy holding the baby and I don’t want to put her down as I see her diaper is leaking through her pants. I knock on the door with my foot and yell out, “Help! Someone open this door, this kid needs a diaper change!”

The door opens and Andrew comes in amused by the sight and laughs at my expense before closing the door.

"Fun day?" Andrew asks with a grin that pisses me off.

“Shut up and help me she’s leaking!”

“I got her give her to me.” Andrew takes the baby from me and goes to the single bed to lay her down by her bag, “Hello bambina does somebody need a change?” Andrew smiles as he starts to change Harriet’s diaper.

My eyes water at the fumes as I stand behind him as he kneels down in front of the bed, “Oh god it smells so bad.”

Andrew chuckles, “Yeah I think you broke Amber here Harriet.” I glare at him even when he does a baby voice for Harriet who giggles, “Who knew all it took was a leaking diaper from a very cute baby to break that Fort Knox of a woman. Yeah, you did Harriet.” Andrew laughs at Harriet’s giggle, and I marvel at how he’s so good with this baby.

I sigh, “How is everybody better than me with babies?”

Andrew looks at me curious, “You never babysat before? Or had friends with kids?”

“No.” I admit softly.

Andrew chuckles lightly while he wipes Harriet's bottom, “Oh that explains a lot. And I heard about the scene from this morning the nurses were close to calling the cops on you. Can you pass me a diaper?”

I look at him frustrated and dig in the bag to hand him the diaper, “Don’t patronize me you know just because I have breasts doesn’t mean I’m maternal at the first sight of a baby DeLuca.”

“Okay I’m sorry I was just saying there’s an underlying factor here at why you're not bonding with Harriet that’s all.”

“I may look it, but I am not Stacey from The Babysitter’s Club.”

Andrew raises an eyebrow as he finishes changing Harriet, “I didn’t think you read those books. I figured you for a Goosebumps kid.”

“Oh, I was but I finished the whole series and got bored.”

Andrew grins and focuses on Harriet, “Okay little lady let’s go for a ride!” Andrew lifts Harriet up and lifts her in the air like a rocket. She giggles and grins at him I roll my eyes at her that DeLuca catches as he set's Harriet down in a hip hold, “Come on you could take a note from Stacey and just relax around her babies can tell when your stressed and they get stressed too.”

I groan, “You sound like Alex.” Andrew laughs as he rocks the baby up and down, “Don’t laugh at me DeLuca nothing in my life has prepped me for this, Malcolm in the Middle had better parents than me.”

“Okay you make a good point. If you find it hard to relax just sing to the baby that works every time look.” Andrew starts to sing in Italian, and I don’t know the words, but I’m entranced at that gorgeous Italian man singing and so is the baby. He sings for a few moments and stops, “My sister used to sing that to me when I would have trouble falling asleep.”

I am still gawking at him, “What is wrong with you? Tell me now because no living person should be this perfect.” Andrew chuckles and he gets an alert from his phone ending this sweet moment.

“I’m about to tell you, I have to go the pit is overcrowded. Here take the baby.”

I give him my best puppy eyes and whine, “Please stay I am so bad at this and you’re hot and Italian and you can sing she loves you and she hates me. If you leave, we're gonna kill each other.” I say that last one in a serious tone to explain the gravity of my situation.

“I can’t stay I’m a resident and I don’t need a write up.” He gives me the baby and turns to leave.

I need to pull out the big guns, “If you stay, I’ll do that thing with my tongue you like so much.”

Andrew stops and turns raising an eyebrow, “Amber-”

“Twice. Three times!” I’m so desperate I’ll let him call the shots all night if it means getting this kid off my back.

Andrew’s eyes widen at the suggestion but he remains strong, “As much as I want to negotiate sexual propositions in front of a baby, I have to pass and save lives. Just remember what I said when in doubt belt a song out.” Andrew kisses me quickly and leaves the room.

I look at the bundle of terror in my arms and frown, “I don’t suppose you could do me a solid and not cry the rest of the day?” As if she heard me and wants to defy me she starts to cry and I freak out, “Oh no. No, no it’s okay the sexy Italian is gone but you still got me that’s something right?” Harriet starts to cry harder and I look around and find the teething ring, “Here do you want to teeth some more? Will that make you feel better?” I try to put it in her mouth, but she yells, and I keep it away from her, “No? Okay no teething got it.”

I bounce up and down with Harriet’s head over my shoulder to try to calm her down and she finally stops crying. I exhale in relief until I hear a gargled sound come out of Harriet and I feel a wet sensation along my shoulder blades. I stop bouncing and take a deep breath, so I don’t freak out about baby vomit on me.

The baby cries again and all I want to do is put her on the bed and get myself new scrubs but if I did that I would be arrested for child endangerment. I move her to a football position so I don’t get more throw up on me and try to soothe her.

“Shhh. Come on I fed you, I changed you, I patted you and now I have your lunch on me what else can I do?” Harriet keeps crying and I pat her back, “Okay you and I need to come to an understanding here. I am not a baby person until today I never even held an infant and you seem to sense that hence why you like everybody except me. And it’s pretty clear that you are just a baby and you can’t tell me what you want so here’s what I’m gonna do.” Harriet keeps crying as I explain, “I am gonna take that handsome man’s advice and sing to you if it will get you to stop crying and I walk out of here with my sanity intact. But if you tell anyone what I did in this room I will make your life miserable when you become an intern here and I'm your attending. Okay give me a second, I’m a little rusty.”

I clear my throat and take a sip of Harriet’s apple juice before starting with a song I practiced in front of a mirror for five months. I rack my brain to remember the lyrics to Hopelessly Devoted To You and start, “Guess mine is not the first heart broken, my eyes are not the first to cry.” I sing Olivia Newton-John over Harriet’s cries, “I’m not the first to know there’s just no getting over you. I know I’m just a fool who’s willing to sit around and wait for you.” It’s starting to work because Harriet is calming down and looking at me transfixed like she did with DeLuca causing me to smile and pause, “Yeah you like that huh? Well, your gonna love the chorus.” I sing the rest of the song praying the walls and doors are thick enough so no one can hear me.

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Casey stands outside the room grining as he hears a muffled Amber inside the room singing Greased Lightning from Grease. He was just walking down the hall to do scut when he heard a familiar voice through the door. He opened the door a creak and saw it was Amber sitting on the bed singing There are Worse Things I Could Do to Harriet in bed while holding and feeding her. He almost gave himself away because the sight was too shocking to take but he just closed the door before he could be caught. Now he’s been standing outside for 15 minutes listening to Amber singing like an angel in scrubs. Helm and Schmitt find him and look at him confused and approach him.

Helm starts, “What are you-”

“Shh! You’ll give me away.” Casey says in a hushed tone confusing them more.

“Why are we whispering?” Schmitt whispers as Dahlia comes up to them joining the crowd.

“Hey, what’s-”

“Shh!” Dahlia’s eyes widen at Casey trying to keep them quiet, “Listen.” They all press their ears against the door and listen to Amber singing the bridge. It takes them a minute until they recognize the voice.

“No!” Helm exclaims causing the others to shush her.

“Is it really her?” Dahlia asks in disbelief, “I mean it could be another intern Amber saddled the baby with.”

Schmitt shakes his head still in shock, “No I think it’s her it’s her voice she’s just not using it to threaten us.”

“I checked and it is her.” Casey confirms with a smile causing the others to chuckle lightly, “You should’ve heard her sing Summer Night it was like Olivia Newton-John transported in that room.”

“Oh my god this is the best thing ever.” Dahlia says with a squeak.

Casey chuckles, “I know right? I told her she was a softie on the inside and now it’s coming out inside that room.” Casey presses his ear against the door, “And now she’s singing Beauty School Dropout.” They all press their ears to the door pushing each other for a better audio.

Dahlia’s eyes shoot up as she hears Amber singing, “She’s actually pretty good.”

Schmitt agrees, “She’s not just good she sounds like an angel.”

“Even though she has a demon’s personality.” Helm groans, “She’s beautiful, she has a hot bod, she’s related to Karev, and she can sing. I would find her attractive if it wasn’t annoying.”

Casey nods, “Same.” They all stand there listening for a few moments until Andrew spots them by the door.

“What are you all doing?” They get startled and get away from the door trying to look normal.

Schmitt panics, “U-Um we were just um-”

“Heading to the pit to deal with the overflow?” Andrew asks sternly and they comply, running in the other direction to the ER.

Andrew walks down the hall and moves to open the door until he hears singing through the door freezing him in place. He puts his ear against the door and hears Amber singing to the baby. He grins at Amber taking his advice and opens the door finding Amber on the floor singing to the baby while she plays with a toy.

Amber stops and clears her throat as soon as she saw the door open, “Hey I finally got her to calm down. We argued a bit and there was some vomit, but we came to an understanding and now we’re girlfriends right Harriet?” Amber tries to act casual and DeLuca nods with a knowing grin causing Amber to close her eyes in despair, “How much did you hear?”

“Just ‘missed your midterms and flunked shampoo’ that was it.” Andrew chuckles and sits next to Amber on the floor, “I see my advice worked.”

Amber chuckles, “Yeah I had to sing Summer Night three times just to get her to hold still while I changed her.”

Andrew laughs, “Man I wish you paged me I could’ve been your Danny.”

“You do remind me a little of Danny.” Amber gives the teething ring to Harriet, “And if you ever tell anyone what you heard today I will never let you see me naked again.”

Andrew chuckles, “You know your better at this than you give yourself credit for. I mean I was afraid to leave you here alone but look at you Stacey.”

Amber groans at the state of her, “Yeah I’m sweaty, I’m covered in vomit, and I think I smell like feces.”

“You do I just didn’t want to bring it up.” Andrew grins and puts his arm around Amber’s shoulder drawing her towards him as they watch the baby.

"I should probably tell you she vomited on my back that you're putting your arm around." Amber informs him causing him to groan in disgust as he sees it rubbed off on his bare arm. She laughs at him while he rubs his arm with the baby wipes, "Harriet you just became my favorite person right now."

Andrew looks at her in amused offense, "Oh you think that's funny?"

"I think it's hilarious I'm not the only one covered in puke right now." Amber states with a chuckle causing Andrew to grin and dangle the used wipe in front of her face causing her to back away in fear, "No get that thing away from me or I will call the police." Andrew laughs at her reaction and throws the wipe away.

"It looks like you don't need me to babysit anymore. Are you good to watch her the rest of the day Stacey?"

Amber grins at him, "Yeah don't worry I got about four musicals to introduce Harriet to. I'll let you know if I'm doing a duet you can go now Danny." Andrew chuckles and leaves the room. Amber exhales exhausted and turned to Harriet who looks at her with a pleading face, "All right kid have you ever heard Cats?"

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I enter the locker room carrying Harriet against my hip with the baby bag slung over my shoulder. I’m tired and my throat is a little sore from all the singing but as long as it got Harriet to keep quiet, I would sing Spice Girl’s if she wanted. I sit on the bench exhaling in exhaustion as I hold the baby. I notice something is wrong in the atmosphere and look to find Helm, Schmitt, Parker and Qadri stealing glances at me and grinning.

I furrow my eyebrows and ask, “What?”

Helm shakes her head as she opens her locker, “Nothing.”

“We’re just getting ready to leave She-Karev that’s all.” Parker nonchalantly chimes in and I look at him confused but I go back to the baby in my arms dangling the teething ring above her playing with her.

“Summer loving had me a blast.” I freeze as I hear Parker singing under him breathe and Dahlia follows.

“Summer loving happened so fast.” I look up to find them both smiling as they sing mocking me and I keep a blank face.

“I met a girl crazy for me.” Casey sings louder with Helm and Schmitt snickering.

“Met a boy cute as can be.” I put the teething ring away and am frustrated there’s a baby in my arms stopping me from hitting these guys. Casey and Dahlia laugh and perform a duet.

“Summer days drifting away, to-ah! Oh the summer nights.”

Schmitt and Helm join in, “Well-a, well-a, well-a huh.” I glare at all of them.

“You have no idea how lucky you all are that there’s a child in my arms because you wouldn’t make it past the second verse.” After the threat I reach for the diaper bag and wipe the drool off Harriet’s mouth while the others laugh.

“When I accused you of being soft I thought you read an EE Cummings poem at your graduation and cried I didn’t think you memorized the whole Grease soundtrack.” Casey says with a laugh and I throw the baby wipes at him that he protects himself from.

Dahlia grins at me, “How did you get so good? I heard you and you sound like a pop star. Were you in choir?”

“Did you audition for Broadway when you were in New York?” Schmitt asks seriously.

“No glee! you were a gleek weren’t you?” Helm asks with joy and I roll my eyes as I stand up when the baby gets fussy.

Casey calls out, “Oh come on Karev we’re just messing with you don’t storm out.”

“I’m not storming out.” I say as I pace back and forth, “Harriet likes it when I’m moving although I wish she would like it when I break your faces off.”

Casey chuckles, “Come on we already caught you singing Olivia Newton-John tell us the story of how you got into singing.”

Dahlia turns and gives me her full attention, “Oh yeah come on we want the story come on tell us please!”

“Please!” Helm begs from her spot and I see Schmitt listening too.

I groan as I pace the small room, “Fine but this is the only time you will ever hear about my past, got it?” They all nod eagerly and I continue, “My counselor recommended a creative after school program so I could better my chances of getting a scholarship. I looked and…I signed up for theater club.” The group widened their eyes and chuckled, “One year we did Grease and I was cast as Sandy. And I was good.”

“I knew it!” Casey smiles, “I knew you were a big softie.”

“As soon as this child is out of my arms and in the comfort of her home, I will make your lives hell.” I hiss with a glare.

Casey shrugs and still grins, “No you won’t your too sensitive.”

Jackson Avery comes in and is surprised to find me with Harriet, “Ah She-Karev when Kepner told me she handed Harriet off to Karev I assumed your brother but he wouldn’t be at her disposal.”

I exhale in relief, “Okay this Chestburster is all yours.” I gladly handed him the baby.

“Hey sweetheart.” Jackson coos at Harriet, “Did you give the new intern a hard time today?”

I shake my head, “No she was pretty easy.” I lie to cover my struggle, “I fed her an hour ago and we just hung out nothing much.”

Jackson chuckles, “She gave you hell didn���t she.”

“Big time.” I say bluntly and Jackson nods confirming his suspicions, “Dr. Avery I know your my boss and so is Dr. Kepner and your mother is the overlord and you could destroy my career and kill me and get away with it. But in the future I do not babysit I am not Stacey from The Babysitter’s Club.”

Jackson raises an eyebrow at me and the other’s look at me confused, “Duly noted She-Karev, good night.” Avery leaves us and I turn to the group who look at me with doe eyes. I know their gonna ask me something.

“Just ask.”

“Please beat Vik at karaoke tonight.” Helm begs with praying hands.

“No!”

Dahlia groans, “Come on you know you want to give that snooty douche a kick in the ass. You just can’t do it physically or you’d get arrested.”

Schmitt nods, “He did harass you this morning that didn’t piss you off?”

“Of course it does but I’ve gotten use to it as a woman who looks the way I do.” I head to my locker and take my stinky top off and gag and the stain, “Remind me to tell cleaning services to burn this shirt. And no I am not going to sing in front of everyone just to emasculate that guy. I have dignity and I have a reputation to uphold.”

“You had a reputation.” Casey clarifies, “And that tough reputation was replaced by a theater loving nerd who reads kids books in her free time.” I growl under my breath for mentioning The Babysitter’s Club.

“It’s out now She-Karev and we’re gonna tell people and it will spread around like an STD.” Helm says with pride.

I look at her in disgust, “Why did you use a sexually transmitted disease as an example? You could’ve used wildfire you freak.” I put my clothes on and try to ignore them as they beg, “You know I could get my brother to assign you guys B-Team for spreading an embarrassing secret about me.”

Schmitt’s eyes widen, “Uh maybe we should find somebody else to do this, nurse Taylor hums pretty good.”

“Shut up Glasses.” Helm snaps and turns to me, “A nurse or an orderly heard you these walls are too thin I think the remodeling forgot to soundproof. The point is we need a singer to crush Vik and your our best shot.”

“We would do it but we don’t have your voice and Roy is subpar at best so you can take him.” Dahlia makes a praying hands, “Please what will it take for you to say yes and do this big favor for us?”

I am buttoning my jeans when an idea pops into my head and I look at them mischievous, “You really want to know?”

Schmitt get’s scared, “I think we made a mistake here.”

“No.” Casey persists though, “Name your price so you can sing your beautiful voice tonight and we’ll do it.”

I slam my locker and stand face to face with the four of them who look scared but stand strong, “Fine if I do this for you guys and you four rotate on every rectal exam I’m assigned to for the next two months.”

“Done!” Helm is the first to agree and the others nod grinning to my shock.

“Wow you guys really want me to do this.” I say surprised, “Fine if it’ll get me to eat lunch during work I’ll do it.” They cheer at my compliance.

Casey quickly slams his locker, “Grab your purse and let’s go to karaoke night!” I groan and sling my purse as the others practically drag me to Joe’s.

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I’m sitting in a small table drinking beer and eating nuts as I watch Vik on the small stage singing Maniac by Michael Sembello. He’s barely holding the notes and he’s never heard of singing from your diaphragm but he acts like he’s Sinatra.

I roll my eyes at the display and see DeLuca from the bar giving me a wink. I keep my grin to myself and I discretely text him, ‘not in front of them. Later at your place.’ I send it to him and he reads it and raises an eyebrow at me before typing. I get a text that says, ‘is the tongue thing still on the table?’ I inhale before texting, ‘well talk when there aren’t people who can see us making sex eyes’ I add a side eye emoji and hit send. He reads it and licks his lips in anticipation before turning his back away from my direction. I put my phone down and look at Vik on stage making an ass of himself.

Helm obviously saw me and asks, “Who were you texting?”

“None of your business.” I snap and she retreats. Vik finally stops singing and the audience scatters applause, I clap and yell out, “Yeah we’re clapping because it’s over.” Helm laughs and Vik rolls his eyes as he takes his seat at our table and the bar owner takes the stage.

“All right next up on karaoke night is a last minute entry, lets give a warm welcome to Amber Karev!” The audience cheers and I stand up before Vik makes a snide comment.

“Don’t choke.”

“Choke on the nuts.” I step onto the stage and browse through the selection and choose a song I’ve sung in the shower multiple times. The song starts and I sing the first verse, “Now that she's back in the atmosphere with drops of Jupiter in her hair, hey, hey.” As soon as I finish the verse the audience cheers and claps except for Vik who looks at me in shock at this surprise twist. I smile at owning that douche and continue the song, “She acts like summer and walks like rain reminds me that there's a-time to change, hey, hey Since the return of her stay on the moon she listens like spring and she talks like June, hey, hey, hey, hey.”

I see Vik shaking his head dissatisfied with me winning so far and he sips his beer. I look at Andrew gazing at me from the bar clearly enamored as well. I finish the rest of the song flawlessly and the audience cheer loudly and even bang the table. I chuckle, set the mic down and sit back at the table where Vik is still peeved.

“Happy now?” I ask them.

Parker laughs, “This was worth the rectals.”

Dahlia nods, “Same.”

Levi groans, “Can I back out of the deal please?”

“No were rotating and you’re taking the first.”

“Which is tomorrow I might tell you.” I chuckle and sip my beer.

“You all suck.” Roy says with a frown that makes me glad I agreed to do this. I sit around them for the first time feeling like their peers instead of acquaintances except for Roy he can go to hell. I feel someone touch my shoulder and I’m worried it’s DeLuca but it’s some frat guy in his looking at me like I’m a meal.

“Hey there what are you drinking?” I brush his hand off my leg and try to ignore him, “Maybe I can buy you another.”

“No thanks I’m gonna call it a night and go home.”

“Is that an invite?” The guy grins at me and I groan in disgust and Helm rolls her eyes annoyed as well, “I saw your little performance and I thought a night of relaxing would be good for that magic throat of yours. Is it magic in just singing or other things as well?”

The interns except Roy come to my aid, “Okay I think it’s time for you to leave buddy she doesn’t want to go with you so be a man and take the rejection.” I look at Casey in appreciation before speaking for myself.

“Yeah and I’m taken at the moment and he wouldn’t like you harassing me very much.” They look at me in shock over telling this guy I was seeing someone.

“Wait what is this? Who is the guy Karev?” Roy asks.

“Yeah who is the guy and where is he to defend your honor little lady?” The frat guy is persistent.

“Is there a problem here?” DeLuca overheard this and he’s come to protect me. I find it both barbaric and touching, “Karev?”

I clear my throat and speak casually, “No thank you Dr. DeLuca I am more than capable of taking care of myself and this asshole.”

The guy chuckles, “Oh come on baby I’m just having fun.” He puts his hand on my shoulder and I immediately react by grabbing his wrist and put him in an arm lock with his body against the table, “Ow, ow, ow!”

Casey looks on in shock and exclaims, "Damn!" The others look on in shock as I hold him down spraining his wrist.

“What the hell is your problem lady?!”

“You are!” I yell out and see Andrew looking at my self defense technique in quiet shock, “Now get out of my sight and keep your hands to yourself. The next woman you harass might have a gun.” I bring him back up and push him away roughly. He walks away and stand there looking at DeLuca who looks at me with an impressed grin.

“I guess you can take care of yourself. Have a good night, Dr. Karev.”

“Good night Dr. DeLuca.” I say with the same level of professionalism he used and he leaves us.

I sit back down sipping my beer as the others gape at me, “Oh yeah did I not mention that I traded theater for boxing?” I say with a grin at their horrified expressions as their renewed fear of me reignites my pleasure.

“…Yeah, I was wrong your just a terrifying force of nature with a good voice.” Casey admits in defeat. I clink my glass with his and sip my beer in satisfaction over how my hellish day ended.

#greys anatomy #alex karev #jo wilson #andrew deluca #amber karev #elizabeth gillies #liz gillies #headcanon

[druidgroves]

Chapter 01: Maybe I'll Say Maybe

Fandom: Fallout 4 Words: 6,208 Characters: Georgia Tate (Canon Divergent Sole Survivor), Nate Notes: Soooo I decided to rewrite the first chapter (01/20/2024) since it was originally written years before I started BLP proper. I'll still keep the old one linked somewhere for posterity, but going forward the story will start referencing more things from Georgia's life pre-war. Please let me know what you think! read on ao3 / read on tumblr

August 28th, 2075

Georgia Walker checks her watch for the ninth time in as many minutes.

It’s been over an hour, she thinks not for the first time, where the hell are you?

Beside her, sitting at one of the desks that didn’t even reach her knees, is Henry Tate, number twenty-three in her classroom. Henry had been working on a coloring book she’d slipped him while she had dealt with a truly inane series of phone calls (call home. Reach housekeeper? Learn Mrs. Tate is at the salon. Wait. Answer call from housekeeper, get details on pick-up. Uncle arriving ???). He didn’t seem worried about staying later than the other kids.

Maybe Georgia should talk with his first grade teacher, see if this was a pattern she should expect…

“Let me guess: alien giraffe?” she asks when he sets down his crayon.

“No,” he says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world and to him, it is. “He’s a sick giraffe. He’s green.”

Georgia smiles a little to herself and gently smacks her forehead. “Psht, of course he’s sick, silly me. What’s his outlook, doc?”

Henry got that same look on his face that he and the other kids who still needed extra help with their four-letter words shared. Still, she’d read it was good to use an expanded vocabulary with kids. Made them more curious.

She laughs. “Is he gonna get better?”

“I dunno. I don’t think he can get better by himself,” he says.

“Well, maybe you can color him a friend to help him out,” Georgia says as she stands up from her chair and checks her watch for the tenth time. She sighs and puts on a cheery voice, “Hey, kiddo, sit tight, I’m gonna try to give Mom another call, alright? Give me juuust a second and I’ll be right back.”

“Okay, Miss Georgia,” Henry says, barely paying attention to her now as he attempts to find the perfect friend for his green giraffe. She can’t help but ruffle his hair a little before she leaves.

She steps out of her classroom, careful not to bend the decorations she spent all summer making. Her door is covered in all the recycled newspapers she scrounged from the people in her apartment building, painted in varying shades of green. Pasted on top of them were individually cut sunflowers with her student’s names written in neat, bubbly print in the middle. Amongst the flowers are the words “Young Minds Bloom In Ms. Walker’s Classroom!” in white paint.

As she walks past her bulletin board, the real star of the show in her opinion, she feels a little pride go through her. “Blooming Great Work!” scrawled across the sky of an entire paper vegetable garden, squeezed onto a four by eight foot sheet of compressed wood pulp. A tiny pumpkin patch in the corner, tomatoes on the vine, corn in the stalk, all crafted from more recycled newspapers. The real part she was proud of, the one no one had commented on or even noticed, was the fact that she was able to find enough papers without sensationalized political headlines.

War dominated everything from the newspapers to the television to the cereal half her students ate for breakfast (sending your kids to school hyped up on Sugar Bombs? Great plan). Most of them had a father, an older brother, or an uncle in the military, the marines, or the air force. It had become such a permeable part of the fabric of their lives, starting way before they were even a twinkle in their parent’s eyes. On the first day of school, at least three had said that their daddy/brother/uncle died in The War. Kids overshared their big feelings. Georgia knew to expect that. So the very least she could do is try to take their minds off of it in any small way she could. That included keeping it out of her classroom of seven to eight year olds when it wasn’t necessary.

As she walked past the counselor’s office, she wondered just how many big feelings passed through their door on the daily. Not many schools in Boston still had counselors on payroll anymore. Frankly, Georgia was surprised they still had the teachers on the payroll with how many slashes there had been to the national education budget in recent years. Dollar bills for pencils, textbooks, and backpacks spent on bullets, tanks, and warheads. It had almost been enough for her to give up on her degree in her junior year of college, but she pushed through if only to make taking out those damnable student loans somewhat worth it.

All that was to say, that whoever was going to be picking up Henry Tate, they may have gotten stuck behind a military blockade somewhere in the city. It happened. Didn’t make it any less frustrating to deal with.

Georgia rounds the corner of the second grade hallway and runs straight into a cloud of minty smelling smoke. She coughs, not expecting her senses to be assaulted like that in a primary school, and waves it away as she realizes who brought it in with them.

A man with tousled brown hair, broad shouldered and lean, a cigarette between his scarred lips, stares at the trophy case in front of the main office.

“‘Most Patriotic’, eh?” he says aloud like he’d been waiting for her to appear so he could make his snappy quip. “How do they even measure that in kids? I doubt any of them can say the national anthem all the way through at this age.”

“You’d be surprised,” she says before she can think, remembering the first day of school when little Henry Tate himself managed to get through the entire thing, only stumbling over the word indivisible. “By the way, you shouldn’t smoke inside a school, sir.”

The man laughs and finally looks in her direction. She doesn’t miss the way his eyes give her a quick once over.

“Why’s that? Fire hazard?” he asks.

“Among other things,” she replies. “They say smokin’ is bad for your health. I read it in Massachusetts Surgical Journal.”

“A bunch of boring brainy types would say that,” he shrugs, but snubs his cigarette out on the heel of his boot anyways and slips it back into the carton in his shirt pocket. “No offense if you’re one of those brainy types, by the way.”

A laugh sneaks past Georgia’s lips. She’s been known to indulge in a smoke or two during her breaks. “No offense taken, but I might offend you by askin’…you wouldn’t happen to be here to pick up a child, would you?”

“I am, actually,” he confirms. “Sister-in-law sent me to pick him up. Henry Tate. You know him?”

“I happen to be his teacher. I came to make another call, but he’s back in the classroom working on a friend for a green giraffe. A sick giraffe, mind you,” she says seriously, wagging a finger at him and making him chuckle. She smiles. “I’ll show you the way.”

“Be my guest,” he replies, and follows after her.

Before they can even walk through the door, Henry is rushing his uncle like a linebacker. His uncle manages to swoop him up before he can run smack into his shins, making him scream with laughter.

“Uncle Nate! Uncle Nate!” he cries.

“Yep, that’s me, kiddo,” he says and puts Henry down. “Mom was too busy to pick you up—” Georgia catches the look he throws at her just in time that says all she needed to know about his opinion of the woman. “So you get me instead. Sorry to disappoint.”

“You’re not a dis’pointment,” Henry says with a toothy grin. Then, like he remembers Georgia standing not three feet away from them, excitedly shouts, “Wait, wait, Uncle Nate! This is my teacher, Miss Georgia. She’s really nice. I like her.”

“Well, that’s nice to hear,” Georgia laughs as he wraps his arms around her legs in a quick hug. She gives him a pat on the back, then takes Nate’s hand when he offers it to shake.

“From what I hear, he doesn’t stop talking about school, you especially,” he says. He rests an arm against the wall of cubbies nearest the door, running a hand through his hair as he talks. Georgia feels a little warmth pool in her face when she catches herself staring for a second longer than is polite.

“Well, that’s nice to hear as well,” she says after clearing her throat.

Then he winks at her, a split-second thing that makes her blush for real this time as he tells Henry, “Hey, little man. Why don’t you go get your stuff together and then we’ll swing by the Red Rocket and get us some sodas, okay? I wanna talk to your teacher for a second.”

At the promise of soda, Henry darts off with a cheer to gather his things. Nate then turns to Georgia, warm brown eyes giving her another quick once over. She shivers.

“So, is it Miss or Miz?” he asks, nodding towards the door to the classroom. “I wanna know before I make an ass of myself.”

She tries to keep her laugh quiet, putting a hand over her mouth but failing to contain her volume. Her cheeks feel hot already.

“It’s, uh, Miss. Miss Walker. M-I-S-S,” she clarifies, face growing redder by the second.

“Good to know, Miss Walker. But where’s that accent from? Down south? You sound too soft to be from here,” he continues, fiddling with the carton in his shirt pocket.

“Arkansas,” she nods, reaching up to nervously fidget with one of the curls resting on her shoulder. “Grew up outside of Little Rock, moved here for college and decided to stay. You?”

“Boston born and raised,” Nate says with pride. “Nice to know you’re not from around here.”

Georgia raises an eyebrow at him. “And why’s that?”

“Means I can show you somewhere neat on our date,” he replies with a crooked grin, her heart fluttering.

“Date?” Georgia repeats, almost sure she didn’t hear him correctly. She flounders like a fish out of water.

“If you want,” Nate concedes, holding up his hands but his grin never faltering. “C’mon, let me show you somewhere nice. Somewhere you’ve never been before.”

She tries to compose herself, giving him an amused but disbelieving look and crossing her arms. “And what if I have been there? What then?”

Nate snorts, dismissive. “Trust me. You’ve never been there before. So what do you say? One date and then I’ll leave you alone.”

Georgia considers his offer. In half a second she manages to justify either answer. On one hand, she has rules when it comes to dating, not to mention dating a family member of one of her students. It came with its own host of issues from a potential breakup ruining her classroom dynamic or even getting fired. On the other hand…She gives him her own quick once over.

He’s like a goddamn calendar man, all toned muscles in a white t-shirt and charmingly tousled hair. And that scar on his lip? All that was missing was some oil and the washboard abs he undoubtedly had under the shirt. Georgia remembers to breathe again after pushing the train of thought away. The pros quickly begin to outweigh the cons. She’d sooner stick herself with a pair of safety scissors than say no to him.

“Pick me up at six and it’s a date.”

-----

In hindsight, stabbing herself with safety scissors that afternoon might have saved Georgia no small amount of grief.

By her own account, their first date had gone well. Really well if their winnings from hustling his friends at pool in a veteran’s bar was anything to go by. That night she had learned Nathan “Nate” Tate had recently finished up his eight year commitment to the military, but now he was working in a Corvega factory his uncle owned. It was one of the many around the Boston area that had switched from producing its titular cars to jeeps and tanks in an effort to cash in on the war effort. He had his own sweet Corvega Blitz that he picked her up in, shiny and red as her lipstick.

Nate had oozed charm that night, enough to get her into his backseat on that first date, and the second one, and the third one, too. She’d become so enamored with him so fast that her mother had demanded she fly up and meet the man after a single phone call. She dragged her father along, too. Nate impressed them with flying colors. Her mother, albeit a little hesitantly, admitted she could understand her daughter’s feelings. Her father had clapped him on the shoulder and told him he was a solid man.

They were married within the next three months.

“And you’re absolutely sure you want to go through with this?”

“For the hundredth time, yes, Mama,” Georgia huffs, looking at her mother over her shoulder. “Besides, as you and Daddy keep remindin’ me, this weddin’ wasn’t exactly cheap. I don’t see the sense in backin’ out now.”

Georgia’s mother sighs and purses her lips as she finishes buttoning up the back of her dress. It was a simple thing, not much flair save for bits of lace and a tight sweetheart neckline her cousin said enhanced her “natural features” when the women in her family went wedding dress shopping with her. Her mother wears a blush pink dress with an empire waist and a knee-length skirt; she’d tried talking Georgia into a different color palette, but eventually acquiesced to her demands when it became clear she was indeed her mother’s daughter, headstrong and stubborn.

“A hundred percent sure?” she asks again. Georgia replies with a similar pursed expression. “Just makin’ sure, just makin’ sure…Is it such a crime for a mother to want her only daughter to be happy?”

“Mama, I am happy,” Georgia insists. She sighs then takes a deep breath, trying to calm herself. “I am perfectly happy with Nate. Last night I talked him into us gettin’ a dog when we find a house.”

Her mother all but throws her hands up in the air, exasperated.

“Hell, honey, if a dog is all it takes for you to be happy, I don’t see why we have to go through with all of this,” she says. “I mean really, Georgia, six months? Half the people out there think it’s a damn shotgun weddin’ for God’s sake.”

“Mama!”

“Well, it’s the truth! You’re not pregnant, are you?”

“What? No!” Georgia sighs again and refrains from playing with her neatly styled hair no matter how much she wants to fidget around. Instead, she takes one of her mother’s hands into her own and squeezes.

“I’m not pregnant—yet,” she tells her. “We’ve talked about kids. A dog is the first step, sorta. But I promise you, I’m happy with him. Ecstatic, even. Everyone outside? They can think what they want, I don’t care. I love Nate and he loves me. Isn’t that all anyone can ask for?”

She can tell her mother is biting her tongue. Instead of arguing, Georgia is pulled into a tight hug.

“Love and an expensive reception,” she says, then checks the clock on the vanity. “Almost time, hun. Let’s go.”

-----

May 1st, 2076

When Nate picks her up after work, Georgia just about makes it to the car before she starts tearing up.

“What’s wrong? Why are you crying?” he asks when she collapses into the passenger seat beside him.

“My decorations!” she sobs.

Nate gives her a sideways look as he pulls out of the school parking lot. “What about ‘em?”

“They ruined them!”

“Who’s ‘them?’”

Georgia wants to scream. Instead, she lets her nails dig into the leather of her seat and heaves a sigh. She hates crying.

“Remember those two teachers I told you about? The ones who kept makin’ snippy comments about my bulletin board?” she asks, trying to jog his memory. They always had something to say whenever they walked past her classroom. Something was always either out of place or over the top for them. For a while she had blamed it on them being bitter and uncreative, but today had been the last straw.

“Oh, yeah, them. So they ruined your bulletin board?”

“They didn’t just ruin it, they–I-I walked into the school this mornin’ and, and everything was a mess. They destroyed everything I worked so fuckin’ hard on!” she manages to get out between sobs, punching the glovebox in frustration.

It was the beginning of the last month of school and she had gone all out with her new decorations. She’d spent weeks on them in between house hunting with Nate. She’d sat at his kitchen counter cutting out buckets, shovels, and beach balls out of more newspaper, creating an entire beach scene for the wall outside her classroom with the words “We ‘Shore’ Are Ready For Summer!” above them. She stayed two hours late just to put them up, and even took a cab home so Nate wouldn’t have to wait on her.

When she walked in that morning, all of it was either ripped, crumpled, or on the ground. She hadn’t cried then, but when one of those teachers walked by and commented “Oh, too bad. Guess you’ll just have to settle for some more lowkey decorations, huh?” she nearly lost it. Instead, she had managed to hold her head high, salvage what she could, and resolve to put it up again when she had the time and the super glue.

“Well,” Nate says, eyes never leaving the road, “fuck them, right? Probably just a couple of jealous old hags.”

Georgia sniffs, not quite wanting to agree but not quite disagreeing either.

“Probably just jealous,” she says, wiping away the rest of her tears and checking her face in the sun visor. Streaks of mascara and eyeliner trail down her cheeks so she does her best to wipe it off, but her eyes are still red.

“In better news,” Nate starts, finally looking over at her during a red light, “I may have found our future house.”

“Really?” Georgia asks, snapping her head over to look at him. Suddenly her problems are miles away. “Where? How? When did you find it? When can we see it?”

“In about a month,” he replies and takes a turn he doesn’t usually take on the drive home.

“A month? Where are we going?”

“You’ll see. Just sit tight and look pretty, alright?”

They drive all the way out to Concord, stopping only to grab a couple of sodas at a Red Rocket before Nate is driving them over a bridge into a housing development. A temporary sign in block letters reads SANCTUARY HILLS, with thirteen prefabricated homes in different states of completion. They were all either yellow or blue, some with covered carports and some without. Only one home stands in its entirety near the entrance to the neighborhood and Nate parks the car in front of it.

“Is this it?” Georgia asks excitedly as she gets out of the car and onto the sidewalk.

“Not this one, but close,” Nate replies as he joins her, then nods further up the road, “ours will be over there.”

She turns on her heel to him, eyes wide. “‘Ours?’”

Nate only gives her a sly smile in return.

“You cannot be serious right now,” Georgia says but he just keeps on smiling down at her. “Do not play with me, Nathan.”

He opens the passenger door to the car and rifles around in the glovebox for a moment, coming back out with folded papers. He barely has them in front of her before she’s snatching them out of his hands, reading them over. She looks back up at him incredulously.

“Nathan Charles Tate!” she all but shouts, making him jump. “What was goin’ through your head?! Are you crazy? Why would you make this decision without me?”

“Relax a little, would you? Plots were going fast, it was in our price range, and we can move in in a month,” he tries to tell her but she can’t keep her upset from showing. “It was now or never.”

They had been looking for somewhere to settle down since before they got married and with the housing market as terrible as it was…Maybe this was a boon falling into their laps. Maybe she was still stressed from school and taking it out on him. That wasn’t fair. Georgia sighs and hands the papers back to him.

“I just…I would’ve liked to be in the loop, y’know,” she frowns.

“I would’ve told you sooner, but you’ve been busy with school stuff. I only signed the papers today. If you’re really pissed, I can try walking back the contract, but—”

“Okay, now I know you’re definitely crazy in the head. That’d be more pain than it’s worth,” Georgia says, a small part of her beginning to think about how they’d like to decorate their first house. The idea is starting to grow on her.

“So you’re not upset?”

“Oh, no, I’m furious. But I think that can be fixed if you tell me you at least signed off on a blue one,” she says and he gives her that crooked smile that still makes her chest flutter.

“All blue for you, baby,” he says, and a little smile of her own works its way onto her face.

With that, she wraps him in a hug, burying her face in his chest. He smells like sandalwood and smoke and is warm to the touch. His arms around her and his face in her hair is comforting in the best way. He kisses her on the forehead and lifts her up by the chin, something unknowable ruminating in his mind if she judges his expression right.

“So…” he starts, “I’ve been thinking.”

“Better watch out,” she jokes and he tweaks her nose for it, making her giggle.

“Seriously, just listen. I’ve been thinking about this while we’ve been house hunting,” he says, and she gives him all of her undivided attention, “and I think you should quit your job.”

Georgia’s pleased expression drops, her eyebrows furrowed as she squints at him in the fading sunlight. Streetlamps lining the road flicker on, one after the other.

“Excuse me?” He can’t be serious.

“Let me finish before you get pissed at me again,” Nate starts, releasing her from his hug to raise his hands in defense. “Look, we have a house now. Or we will soon and you’ve been complaining about that damn school for months—”

“So you want me to quit my job right as we’re taking on a bunch of new bills? Nate, I can’t, that’s crazy!” She has to put her foot down here. Yes, her coworkers were mean, yes, the pay was shit, and yes, being the sole caretaker of twenty-eight kids for eight hours a day was perhaps the tiniest bit stressful. But it was all nothing she couldn’t handle in the long run, and she hasn’t even finished her first year.

“Listen,” Nate says again, putting his hands on her shoulders. “I got a promotion today at work. I’m off the factory floor and in the office making more than enough, plus all of my military benefits.”

“Wait, you got a promotion today? You should have led with that,” Georgia says, crossing her arms.

“I wanted to, but you started crying the second you got into the car.”

She bites her lip and concedes to his point. She hadn’t even given him a chance.

“Think about it: you, at home, putting all your creative genius into some interior decorating. Doesn’t that sound more fun than making flimsy paper decorations only for some old bat to tear them down?” Nate asks her. “And hey, we can finally get that dog you’ve been talking about.”

She’s gone through a whirlwind of emotions within the last ten minutes and Georgia can’t clear her head of them while she’s still looking into his pleading eyes. He’s thrown so much information at her, but she can just about make out the specs of gold among the brown and in that instant she knows he has her just where he wants her. The more she thinks about it, the more she pictures them picking out new furniture, walking the dog around the neighborhood, cookouts with neighbors…Maybe she wants to be there, too.

“I’ll think about it,” she says finally and he grins like he’s already won. She holds up a finger, pressing it to his lips before he can try to kiss her. “Let me finish out the school year first. It’s only ‘til the end of May. After that, we’ll have plenty of time to move in and start decoratin’ over summer break.”

Nate just keeps grinning down at her, then surprises her when he scoops her up into his arms to spin her around.

“We have a house!” he cries out, his voice echoing through the empty neighborhood.

“We have a house!” Georgia shouts, laughing as he spins her.

He brings her down to plant one on her, dipping her when he does, and she can’t remember the last time she’s felt so happy after feeling so low.

-----

It takes a little less than a month before their house in Sanctuary Hills is move-in ready.

After a week of getting things unpacked and settled, Georgia tries to be neighborly. She makes a double batch of shortbread cookies with the few ingredients they have with the intent to go door-to-door and introduce herself, but it doesn’t pan out how she imagined it.

The only person who doesn’t turn her down is the man in the Hawthorne residence at the front of the neighborhood. To his credit, he was neighborly in his own way and offers to trade her the whole container for a box of Mentats that she only declines out of polite shock. Walking away, she can remember the taste of the orange ones from her college days on the tip of her tongue.

Coming home with a still-heavy container, sad and a little dejected, Georgia opens the door to her own home and walks past Nate on the couch and into the kitchen, setting the cookies on the counter.

“It’s either the new tax bracket or there’s somethin’ in the water makin’ everyone paranoid enough to turn down free food in a crisis,” she sighs, leaning against the counter and looking through their unopened mail. Bill, campaign soliciting, bill, bill, junk, paycheck, bill.

“No one wanted your cookies? More for me, then,” Nate shrugs as he watches the news.

After the news anchor reports on messages from the war front, the commercial breaks show fancy new Corvega Atomic V-8s, placement in a doomsday Vault, and domestic helper Miss Nanny robots. Then the anchor is back on screen and talks about the riots (some even inside Boston), the food shortages, and the chance that foreign spies could be anywhere. A rinse and repeat of instilled paranoia until the channel changes. It’s all so bleak that Georgia thinks she can’t blame her neighbors too much.

“Bring me one, would you?” Nate asks, gesturing over at her. “Those are my favorite.”

Georgia purses her lips at him over her shoulder while she opens the bills, “You have legs, mister. Use ‘em or lose ‘em.”

She turns back to the bills—surely the electric can’t be that high—and ignores his sigh from behind her. He walks over and pops open the tin, leaning against the counter.

“The boys invited me out to the bar this weekend,” he says through a mouthful of shortbread, then swallows. “You wanna come?”

Georgia’s eyes flit to him over the water bill. “I thought you wanted to go pick out a new bed frame this weekend. You made quite a few jokes about ‘breakin’ it in’, too.”

Nate almost appears to weigh the two options as he says, “Oh, yeah…”

“How about this,” he says, taking a bite out of another cookie, “bed frame in the morning, bar at night?”

“Maybe. I wanna take another crack at goin’ around the neighborhood,” she replies, thinking over her options. “Maybe these people just don’t like shortbread.”

Nate snorts, “Yeah, that’s it. Well, I’m going either way, so make up your mind by Friday.”

“Will do,” she nods absently, going back to calculating their bills in her head before she suddenly remembers the shortlist of chores she’d left before making her way around the neighborhood. “Hey, did you put the laundry on while I was out?”

Nate, covered in cookie crumbs, looks like a deer in headlights. She gives him a flat look.

“Sorry?” he tries, not looking the least bit guilty.

“Nevermind,” she mutters, and goes to do it herself.

-----

In July, Nate finally makes good on the promise of a dog (a sweet little Bichon Frise named Lady) and Georgia puts her resignation in. By December, regret hits her like a cast iron pan and a wooden spoon.

She sits on the couch, wrapped up in her robe as she reads her books from the library in the city. Despite all the fighting between them in the last few months, he still agrees to drive her into the city on Saturday mornings as long as he’s allowed to go out with his friends later that night. It gives her plenty of time to read, but it leaves her more than a little lonely, even with the dog, which is where the root of their problems lie.

In August, Nate told her that he was having to put in some overtime at the Corvega factory. Something about quotas not being met, workers threatening to strike, and not enough bodies on the floor. So he’s back on the line, but he assures her his uncle isn’t docking his pay. Georgia understands this and for the first few weeks she greets him at night with a late dinner and a warm shower. She even makes him breakfast to reheat in the mornings before he takes off and full lunches to share with the other men on the line. He called her his “perfect little housewife” and she ignored the twist in her stomach.

Georgia doesn’t think it would have gotten as bad between them if they had more than one car. As is, he drives it to work every day and it hadn’t taken long to get the house in order, so she was left to her own devices for the most part. She was a sociable creature, always had been, and being constrained to the house had done a number on her. The daily walks with Lady helped a little, but the dog wasn’t much of a conversational partner, and Georgia liked to talk. At one point she had even called up her sister-in-law, Margaret, and asked if she could babysit Henry, but she wasn’t willing to drive all the way out to Concord every time she needed to run an errand. So with neighbors that hated her and a husband that was rarely home, Georgia couldn’t help but feel lonely.

From the hallway, Nate stalks into the kitchen. His hair is wet from the shower and his clothes stick to him enough to show off every muscle underneath. Six months ago, she would’ve come up behind him and jumped his bones right there. As it stands, they haven’t had sex in four.

He opens the refrigerator and takes out last night’s lasagna before heading towards the side door to the carport. Georgia frowns.

“Where are you goin’? It’s nine o’clock at night,” she says and he stops at the door.

“Boys wanted to hang out,” he says quickly, “you know how it is.”

She dog-ears her book and puts it down, getting up from the couch. “Really? Why can’t you stay home tonight? Please?”

Nate’s sigh is agitated. She’s asked the wrong question.

“Why? So you can ignore me with your books then go to bed with another headache?” he asks her rhetorically. His words shock her nevertheless and she stands there, wondering what she did between now and this morning to make him bring that up.

“I’m sorry?” she says, less like an apology and more like a chance for him to take it back.

“Yeah, you should be,” he snaps, and goes for the door again. Georgia nearly flips the liquor cabinet by her side.

“Nate, are you serious? What the hell is wrong with you?” she demands, following him out to the carport.

“Just leave it alone, alright? Christ. I’ll be home before midnight.”

She doesn’t get a chance to say anything else before he’s inside the car and slamming the door shut. When he peels out of the driveway, Georgia refrains from screaming into the night and slams her own door on her way back inside.

-----

January 2077

“Fuck, ow.”

Georgia squints into the bathroom mirror, face pressed close enough to where she can pluck her eyebrows with surgical precision. A stray piece of wheat blonde hair that didn’t make it into the curlers piled atop her head falls in front of her eyes and she curses again, putting the tweezers down to fix the offending piece. As she does, her blush falls into the sink and cracks the pressed powder inside, staining the porcelain pink.

“Mary, Joseph, and Jesus, can I catch a break?” she mutters, salvaging what she can and closing the compact.

In the trashcan by the toilet are seven positive pregnancy tests she walked all the way to the pharmacy in Concord to get. She had tried to be discreet, but the girl behind the counter had congratulated her loudly enough to draw the attention of a few other customers, and hid a family planning pamphlet between the boxes. Georgia walked out of there sweating like a sinner in church.

She spies her wedding ring beside the hot water handle, and given that it’s pertinent she wears it tonight, she slips it onto her finger before it has a chance to fall down the drain. That was the last thing she needed.

Georgia is pregnant, and she doesn’t feel half as excited as she thought she would.

She and Nate had talked about having kids, of course. It was the main topic of their third date. He told her he’d always wanted a big family—a pretty wife, four kids minimum, and a protective yet lovable dog (they were still working on the dog, surprisingly. Lady ended up pissing on Nate’s side of the bed soon after they got her and was given to her mother-in-law a little while later).

Georgia wanted a family, too, of course. She had always imagined herself having kids someday, but she thought that reality was a little further away. Twenty-three still feels too early to become a mother even if most of her old college friends she hasn’t talked to in two years are starting families as well. It all feels so sudden, even if it’s exactly what she planned.

She files the thoughts away for later, and focuses on finishing up her face. Her makeup had gone untouched for a while after she stopped leaving the house as much, but she knew Nate liked when she dolled herself up. Hopefully it will help.

Once her face is powdered, her hair curled, and lips lined, she goes to their closet to pull out her best dress. Pink, of course, with flowery lace around the hem. She slips it on, careful of her curls, and debates on adding a blue belt just to be on theme before deciding against it. Besides, maybe the pink will help manifest a little girl. On the dresser is her eighth pregnancy test, sealed inside a plastic bag. She slips it into her pocket just as she hears a car pull into the driveway.

Things with Nate have been…better. Not great, but better. He’s stopped going out as much and she’s been less demanding of him. Their relationship was fractured, yes, but she knew in her heart that after today, it would be repaired and made to last.

She’s in the kitchen when he comes in, jumpsuit wrinkled and dirty. Georgia can smell the sweat on him from five feet away.

“Georgia, I’m—Oh, well look at you,” Nate says, giving her a long look from her head to her feet.

She smiles and gives him a little twirl and when he whistles at her, warmth blooms in her chest. He walks over and wraps her up in his arms. Georgia takes a deep breath, swallows the lump that forms in her throat, and hugs him back.

“What’s this all about?” he asks, looking down at her.

Her hand disappears into her pocket. When she pulls out the pregnancy test and sees Nate’s face, she almost wishes she could photograph it and save it forever.

She takes a deep breath, and her voice doesn’t even crack when she inhales the perfume on his collar. She puts on a smile.

“I’m pregnant.”

#fallout #fallout fic #fallout 4 #fo4 #fic: best laid plans #y'all i am so proud of this chapter & the effects it will have on the fic in later chapters pls give me feedback a;ldskjf

[marsidotcom]

i’m rlly sad that the detroit evolution fandom seems to be dying out but!! gonna be posting my brain rot anyway <3

Thinking about cold winter months, especially in detroit- it’s the coldest they’ve had in years. People avoid going outside with the freeze hurting their joints, as do androids as to avoid having to thaw their mechanisms inside them upon getting out of the cold to avoid damaging the metal or simply getting lockjawed.

Gavin of course is no exception, hands and their respective joints and bones worn from years of stress grips and fights. His is an easier fix, a thicker pair of gloves and a mother hen of a partner hovering over him with artificially warm breath to soothe his frigid hands under cafe stoops and in the doorways of the grocery store.

The two assume that with Nine’s advanced nature and quite literally military grade skin that he’ll personally be spared from the cold unlike other androids. That is, until they’re leaving from a night at Tina and Valerie’s, the walk home a short distance, and Nines begins to seem more stiff than usual. The real concern kicks in when he talks without his mouth moving and his legs begin to creek as they walk. His inner fan is working so hard to warm his insides, you can hear it from down the street.

There’s not much they can do where they are now, so they scurry home and the second the door is locked and the keys are away, Gavin is all but hauling his pole of a fiancé to the master bathroom and getting out the hair dryer they only keep around because Nines likes to dry Gavin’s hair after showers here and there.

Nines can’t quite sit properly, but he’s able to get his hips moving so he does a bit of an awkward sort of straight-leg-slouch. They focus on his knees until he’s bendable enough to get him in a warm bath. After soaking for a bit, he’s got barbie level mobility in his joints and mechanics and they maneuver him out of the tub and into their bedroom.

Gavin is careful as he goes, bundling Nines up in a long sleeve shirt and sweatshirt to top it off. He practically bullies Nines into a pair of his sweatpants, which run short on the ankles but is made up for with a pair of those dumb socks Nines loves. Though Nines still feels groggy and a bit chilly, he can’t help the ironic warmth that he feels. He, albeit awkwardly, presses a kiss to Gavin’s head as the shorter man ushers him into his side of the bed.

Gavin just continues huffing and tucking his covers in around his hips and waist, but Nines can see the quirk of his mouth despite his obvious worry. Eventually, they fall asleep (well, Nines goes into an earlier stasis then usual, used to staying up a bit later to read and ensure his partner is comfortable. What? He’s whipped, sue him.) and stay cuddled up the entire night. A cat or two ends up in the dips of the comforter behind their knees and when they wake, Nines will be good as new. But gavin won’t let him leave the house without a few extra layers anymore.

#detroit absolution #detroit awakening #detroit rk900 #detroit evolution #octopunk media #gavin x rk900 #rk900 #gavin x nines #gavin reed #gavin900 #reed900 #detroit become human #dbh nines #dbh gavin #dbh

[merryfortune]

Propeller Sprout

Title: Propeller Sprout

Ship: Zinniashipping | Aoi/Miyu

Fandom: yu-Gi-Oh! Vrains

Rating: G

Word Count: 1,254

Tags: Fluff, Flirting, Established Relationship

   “So cute…” Miyu mumbled to herself as she scribbled in her notebook.

   Aoi’s ears pricked up whilst she read a novel from the other end of the lounge. She felt Miyu squirm, her toes scrunched up and brushed up against Aoi. It wasn’t a very big lounge. Not when Miyu was sitting in one of end of it and basically laid out over it.

   “What’s cute?” Aoi asked.

   “You are.” Miyu flirted and poked out her tongue.

   Ever easy to fluster, Aoi felt her cheeks turn a rose pink.

   “You are!” Miyu insisted. How could she not as her girlfriend looked even more adorable than she did before?

   “Am not.” Aoi denied, though it was pointless to.

   “Are too.” Miyu continued to banter. “And,” she added, she began to get up, her chest all puffed out as she happily debuted her trump card, “I have proof.”

   “Alright, then, let’s see it.” Aoi replied.

   Exactly what Miyu wanted to hear.

   She really wanted to show Aoi what she was working on.

   Back at her school, Miyu was quite well known through a few of the different faculties over there. In the sports faculty, she was known for being a shark in the water. She was a swift and strong swimmer, the star of the swim club with many accolades conjoined to her name.

   Then in the arts department, she was also known for her talent and craft with a pen and paper. She was quite diverse when it came to what she was able to draw. Everyone in her classes knew that she could draw the cutest little anime characters or the creepiest portraits. Sometimes even both at once. She wasn’t good at non-character related mediums but she would give anything a crack once. Watercolours, acrylics, clay, it didn’t matter. Miyu loved to get creative.

   Though, conversely, she was known through the other departments of the school - like science, language, history, and mathematics, for example - for being an awful student. Flaky and undisciplined, rubbish at logic and recollection but shhh. This isn’t about the grades that Miyu was failing but rather the ones she was good at.

   Like art.

   “Tada.” Miyu said as she sat up, legs tucked under her like an eccentric genius detective from a certain supernatural-mystery anime, and flipped her notebook around so she could show Aoi her latest drawing.

   It was just a sketch. Nothing too serious, pfft. It wasn’t half bad. 

   But Aoi’s jaw dropped as she felt as though she were looking into a black and white photograph of… herself. The portrait was gorgeous, thin lead lines which overlapped here and there but that just added charm to the shading, all to make a somewhat realistic portrait of her: Zaizen Aoi.

   “Wow, Miyu, this is… oh my gosh.” Aoi stammered.

   “Aww, I’m gonna get a big head if you keep that up, ma’am.” Miyu smugly replied, like she wasn’t rolling around in glee on the inside.

   “No, really, thank you, I think its lovely, I hope you’re happy with it.” Aoi replied.

   “Oh, I am.” Miyu said.

   Aoi laughed. There was the lack of humbleness that she had been expecting.

   “Do you know what my favourite part of it is?” Miyu asked. 

   “Er, um…” Aoi erred as she was put on the spot.

   “C’mon, guess. It’s easy, I swear. Anyone could tell, I think.” Miyu egged her on.

   “Alright then.” Aoi replied.

   Miyu made sure she held her notebook steady so Aoi could get an extra good look at the drawing. Her eyes scanned left to right then up and down. She held her breath as she began her assessment.

   Was it her fringe? It looked so fluffy with just the suggestion of linework and some fuzzy shading. Or maybe her cheekbones? Miyu had rubbed out the lines there multiple times to get the curvature right, Aoi could tell from the eraser work but maybe she wasn’t that happy with it if it took multiple tries. It could even be her lips. That would make sense. Miyu had drawn them extra stylistically kissable, Aoi would think anyway but then of course.

   The delight of every artist, surely.

   “My eyes.” Aoi finally guessed.

   Miyu made a buzzer noise then chirped, “Nope. Close though.”

   “I see…” Aoi murmured as her brows furrowed together. She continued to study the portrait.

   Though that made Miyu impatient. She had been totally certain Aoi would guess correctly on the first try. 

   “Aww, come on, it's totally your charm point.” Miyu gave a hint.

   Aoi stared for another three seconds and then her shoulders slumped, “I give up.” she said with a defeatist sigh.

   “Your propeller sprout, duh!” Miyu said.

   “My what?” Aoi snorted quizzically.

   “Your propeller sprout!” Miyu repeated herself to little recognition.

   Aoi’s lack of response continued to be lacklustre. So Miyu sighed and with startling precision, for not being able to see her own drawing, she pointed on the picture of Aoi she had drawn what Aoi’s “propeller sprout” was: the little pokey-outie bit at the back of her hair. The bane of her morning hair care routine.

   “Ohhh…” Aoi said. “I call it my cowlick.”

   “Well it's very cute whatever it is.” Miyu replied snidely.

   Aoi laughed.

   “It is.” Miyu affirmed.

   “It's so annoying though, it never sticks down when I want it to! So many school picture days ruined by it…” Aoi complained.

   Miyu gasped dramatically, “How dare! It’s your charm point, or so says me.” 

   Miyu’s antics continued to make Aoi smile and laugh. A bit harder now to consider it an annoyance now, she supposed. But the point, already well and truly made by now, was still not made enough in Miyu’s eyes as she scooted in closer to her girlfriend, putting away her notebook.

   “It’s so cute and fluffy, see?” Miyu said.

   She reached out and Aoi’s heart skipped a beat. Miyu toyed with the so-called propeller sprout at the back of her head, proving just how fluffy - and bouncy - it was. With just a stroke of her pointer finger, Miyu had it swaying side to side.

  “Okay… it's a little cute.” Aoi grumbled.

   “Told you.” Miyu said.

   But instead of fully retreating her hand, she ran it through the rest of Aoi’s hair. It was soft and, well, fluffy. Her bob-cut slowly growing out, she wanted it to be long again, sort of like when she was a tiny tot again. Miyu smiled as she caressed Aoi’s cheek, though with clumps of Aoi’s hair through her fingers.

   “Are your fingers stuck…?” Aoi asked, embarrassed.

   “Ah, no, just thinking about how, well, all of you is cute. I shouldn’t limit your cuteness to just one charm point.” Miyu replied.

   Aoi’s face went strawberry red. Miyu’s words were so sweet and earnest, it was hard to consider them flirting. She just said whatever she was thinking. She was that kind of person, free and open as a book. 

   “You are so shameless.” Aoi squealed.

   “I can’t help myself.” Miyu giggled.

   Though she did let go of Aoi’s hair and picked up her notebook again. She had some more ideas on how to draw Aoi now. Though, she didn’t retreat into her end of the lounge, instead she changed how she sat and snuggled into Aoi’s side. Aoi let her and placed her arm over Miyu’s neck and shoulders. She could probably read with just one hand so long as she was clever.

   Meanwhile, Miyu began to draw some cartoony takes on Aoi’s physical appearance and her cute propeller sprout.

#femslash #zinniashipping #yugioh vrains #vrains #yugioh #aoi zaizen #zaizen aoi #sugisaki miyu #writing tag #propeller sprout #is.... is this first time this year i've posted a fic for no reason like no bingo no challenge no prompt meme no nothing??? #for my own?? satisfaction??? #sugoi. but also. concerning. if so.

[the-cat-and-the-birdie]

I vibe with hyperfixating w/ characters. To varying degrees I’ve fixated on: Armin from AOT for a while, 1D had a DEATH GRIP on me for a few years, (SEVEAL book characters through my teen years)I had an Alucard from castlevania fixation for maybe 3 ish years (‘ending’ only recently) and now Hobes lives in my head rent free ngl.

I get the “being sad cuz you can’t meet them” part, I’ve felt it. I try to not daydream TOO much cuz otherwise it takes over my life and I’m doing a considerable effort to live OUT of my own head, but BOI do I LOVE just daydreaming about my blorbos of choice.

I don’t speak too much about it (mostly the daydreaming) cuz to an extent it feels like a “me thing” (like something I don’t wanna share with anyone cuz it’s special to me), but if given the chance I DO info dump on my fixations.

I don’t think it’s cringe, not at all. These things are stuff that helps us process the world and our experiences with it. I believe everyone has sensitive weird shit that they don’t talk about, but if there’s something Ive learned is that we hardly ever have completely unique experiences. Most people just hide their oddness. Fandom being a prime example of how much our blorbos can mean to us. I think it’s okay and normal. (Until it goes overboard and people send idk violent messages to others because they headcanon something differently idk, the unreasonable stuff imo)

Can’t believe our of everything people would dare to make JOY and INTEREST the things with negative connotations. Being mean should be cringe, being a bully should be embarrassing. But unashamedly enjoying stuff?? That’s wonderful.

Anyone too embarrassed of their own vulnerability that they deal with it by making others feel bad about their interests are the most immature out if all of us.

Joy is everything that’s good with the world.

Even just seeing the letter 1D makes me wanna scream (in a good way!!) cause it takes me back to high school lol 1D was a bit older than me so my grade had Mindless Behaviour (does anyone remember them, where they even popular) but I remember the days where 1D was like the definition of summer songs

And I can totally understand the 'me thing'. Like I never really spoke about it but I felt like I knew my daydreams were more substantial or vivid than the 'average person' so to say.

Or when I spoke about characters to other people, I understood that neurotypicals likes characters, but they often didn't see them as fully formed 'persons' in the way I do - as to say, they didn't speculate or see emotional backstory, connections, or their behavior the way I did.

I never really shared any of my daydreams because like - I can't even get into it that's like asking someone to explain Star Wars to someone who doesn't even know space travel exists.

I grew up in a time on the internet where self-inserts and OC were seen as cringe, and someone would be very quick to call out 'Mary-Sue's (or flawless OCs) whenever they could.

It's not like that now - but in juxtaposition to canon x canon shipping, that bias is still there I feel like. Like it, as a work of fandom art has less 'value' that art or fics of canon only characters

It kinda bums me out still.

I think OC and daydreams and self-indulgent inserts are all the best part of fandom because it's the purest way of fans connecting with content on a personal level.

I'm happy that I see more people pushing back on that lately. Like after years of seeing people viciously hate furries when most of them seem like very nice, fun people, it's refreshing for people to be like 'nah, actually this thing is cool. and im gonna spend of time and/or money on this thing cause i makes me happy;

like you remember when the new Star Wars movie trailers came out and that dude reacted to it and he was moved to tears and people made fun of him??

yeah fuck everyone else that dude knows whats up.

Like yes, openly cry to your faves. Fantasize deep meaningful daydreams that help you process your feelings. Draw your OC with them, or learn every single thing their is to know about them.

That's why I wanted to talk about this. Because I've never heard it spoken about before. Maladaptive daydreaming, yes - and that can be harmful. But I hardly ever hear people talk about the basic mundane experience of it - or even how it can enrich our lives and help us emotionally develop of neurodivergent people.

When I think of it that way, it's something that makes me happy. I don't think I'll ever be able to describe it fully, and that's the point. Our stories are private to us, not because theyre embarrassing, but because they're so us that to even describe it would like describing a new world top to bottom

I love it. It's what makes humans humans.

#Thank you for this!!! Reading this is like living on planet Earth for once like yess!!! You get it!! #neurodivergency #neurodivergent #actuallyautistic #actuallyaudhd #actuallyadhd #adhd #autism #audhd #character fixations #hyperfixations #cringe culture

[splinteredmercies]

SPRING CLEANING ‘24 ␥ Phoebe Huynh (2/?)

fandom: stranger things

pairing: eventual and implied chrissy cunningham/phoebe huynh (oc)

author's note: originally written during the summer of '22, this hasn't seen the light of say other than a friend or two i've sent it to. it was also the time when i challenged myself to write in present tense. i planned it to be a one-shot like almost everything else i've written in the last two years. phoebe and chrissy are the definition of those middle school female friendships you never truly recover from, lol.

word count: 598

It’s the September of 1979. The Huynhs have moved from sunny California to dreary Indiana to open a nail salon in the heart of Hawkins, and Phoebe is entering sixth grade at the local middle school.

Phoebe’s schedule shows her first class is U.S. History with Mrs. Cassandra Callahan. Phoebe makes her way to the class—trying and failing to ignore how she’s the only Asian person in the building and how all the students stare and whisper.

The stares and whispers are worse when she’s one of the first students in the classroom. Her peers make a lousy attempt at sneaking glances at her while she is busy observing the classroom and Mrs. Callahan.

Mrs. Callahan is younger than the cluster of teachers hanging around their doorways in the Social Studies hallway. She’s newlywed, going off how she fiddles with the simple but shiny gold band on her left ring finger and stares at it with a sparkling gaze. Wispy strands of blonde hair fall around her face, and Phoebe can tell she has bright and eager blue eyes.

The bell rings, and Mrs. Callahan walks to her desk with a sunny smile. “Good morning, everyone! Since it’s the first day of school, we’ll do some ice-breakers before going over the syllabus and the class rules and expectations.”

Everyone is quiet except for the occasional shuffle as the kids move around in their seats. Mrs. Callahan brightens at the lack of groans and complaints. She picks up a clipboard with a pencil. “I’m going to call roll.”

Mrs. Callahan makes her way quickly through the list, but her confidence wavers through the H section.

“H-U-Y-N-H? I’m so sorry I can’t pronounce this—” Mrs. Callahan’s voice is high-pitched and hesitant when her eyes fall upon Phoebe. “How do you pronounce your last name, sweetie?”

Something about how Mrs. Callahan says “sweetie” aggravates Phoebe, but she swallows her pride, plasters on a saccharine smile, and gives her the correct pronunciation.

“Oh, I’m never gonna get that correct,” Mrs. Callahan mumbles, scribbling something down on the page.

In front of her, a girl turns around. The sudden motion makes the straw-colored hair in a ponytail whip around her face. “Hi, I’m Chrissy! I like your nail polish color!”

Phoebe looks down at her hands. The polish—a soft pink by the name of “Pink Almond”—had been applied by her mother during their mother-daughter bonding time she insisted on every Saturday night. Her mother had chosen the color, saying that neutrals and soft polishes on her natural nails suited Phoebe for the upcoming school year, and she promised they’d go back to experimenting with the bolder set of trendy colors during the summer.

“Thank you,” Phoebe replies with a clipped, polite tone. She looks back at Chrissy with the hopes the other girl understands she’s hesitant to talk to her and cools down the cheerfulness. It’s simply too early for this.

“Can I see your schedule? I want to see how many classes we have together.”

Phoebe feels like Chrissy is staking her claim on her. And, strangely, finds she doesn’t mind at all. She passes Chrissy her schedule and watches as the girl skims it.

“Sweet! We have basically all our classes together.” Chrissy seems excited at the thought but hesitates at Phoebe’s stony silence. “I was going to ask if you wanted to stick together, but if you—I mean, you don’t have to say yes—”

“No,” Phoebe interrupts. A smile tugs at her lips, one more sincere than the one aimed at Mrs. Callahan earlier. “We can stick together.”

#karla’s spring cleaning ‘24 #oc: phoebe huynh #karla’s plot bunnies #tv: stranger things #stranger things #chrissy cunningham #drabble