#Wonder if band camp over the summer will give us time to catch up..

[passivenovember]

West.

(For my darling @cuepickle , ILYSM!)

--

Washed in fire-cracker light from a pit in Steve Harrington’s backyard, Billy swallows an entire topaz ocean from a can and stops wishing for California.

Because he’s piss-drunk, crinkling aluminum in his fist to keep from reaching out, into the flame, to prove that it’s all a dream. A feeling that will pass. And Steve’s smoking through Billy’s pack of Marlboro reds, one right after the other, the little train that could.

It doesn’t make Billy angry. It used to. Because he wanted to be the lighter in Steve’s hand and the smoke in Steve’s lungs and the blood rushing, confident, through his veins, and he never knew it.

That’s the thing about Billy. If it’s not coming from a textbook, he’s slow on the uptake and eager to swing out of misplaced anger. But once he figured out what this was, catching butterflies in his hands, he settled for friendship and he’s happy about it. Thrilled and content to share his cigarettes until the stars stop spinning like they’re caught in a washing machine, and he hopes against hope, that. Steve’ll stay put.

That they’ll sit close enough to touch all night long.

That even though people keep trying to drag Harrington back into the house, where they’ve got a game of beer-pong going and the stereo thumping so loud Billy thinks the Earth might crack open–he hopes that Steve will stop searching for tomorrow’s bright spring rays, too.

So, Billy stops dreaming of California.

“This is nice,” Steve says. The wind tousles his hair, kicking up notes of leather, coffee grounds, and vanilla ice cream. Billy wants to bottle it and make a fortune.

“Yeah,” He determines, instead. There’ll be time for masterplans and grand crimes later when Harrington’s the first to fall asleep.

Steve leans to scratch his leg, staring out at his empty swimming pool. “You’re having a nice time?” He asks, and Billy thinks all the color is gone from his face. But maybe it’s just the shadow of the new year closing in. Maybe it’s the moon.

Billy wants to make him smile. “Yeah.”

“That all you can say, Hargrove?” Steve glances over, cheeks red from the cold.

And he's gorgeous.

Billy's never seen anything like him in all the world, so he keeps a textbook full of moments exactly like this one. He never loses track of them, leafing through their worn and well-loved pages whenever he's lost in seas of brown.

A smile plays at the corners of Steve's lips, "Me too," he says, soft and secret and so like an eclipsing planet even though beyond a scraggly line of ferns and balding oak trees, tripping all the way along a path of bronze sandstone, all of Hawkins is getting trashed on the sloppy seconds from the Harrington’s Christmas party.

Steve doesn’t mind it. He’s got the world in his hand, a wristwatch that’s stopped working, and all of Billy’s attention focused as a searchlight, on his pretty, pretty face.

The whole cheerleading team is probably wondering where they are.

Billy can’t get his legs to work, they’ve turned to vanilla pudding. “What’d you get for Christmas, richie-rich?”

Steve shrugs and turns back to the pool. “Pair of Nike’s, that new Queen record, a pack of cool-ranch sunflower seeds, some kettle corn-–”

“Wow, Momsie and Papa couldn’t roll the savings account for you? Aren’t you an only child?”

“I got a Playboy desk calendar, too,” Steve passes his-their-Billy’s cigarette without a second thought. “It’s the gift that keeps on giving.”

Suddenly the backdoor opens, and a pinpoint of yellow flashes in a sea of dark, dark winter.

Billy uses his free hand to shield his eyes.

Steve clicks his teeth, annoyed when he shouts, “I’m busy,” to the short, pissed-off figure that calls his name into the night.

“It’s fine,” Billy tells him, swinging his legs over the side of the pool chair so he can get his feet under him, “They’re probably lost in there without you.”

“No,” Steve snaps. The thick gold band he stole from Billy’s gym bag after training camp this summer taps a frantic tune on the metal chair beneath him.

And Billy gets the sense that this isn’t a casual conversation.

That Steve’s got speeches and roadmaps snaking like candy-land fields in his mind, a clear goal trapping them in this moment on the last Friday of winter break, two hours past midnight on the first day of a brand new year.

Steve looks at him. Studies him.

Says, after a long, weightless moment, “There’s something I want to talk to you about,” and Billy’s mind goes a hundred and one places. None of them good, all of them baring teeth and claws and spikey bones from years of rotting decay.

"Feeling brave, Harrington,"

Steve grins in spite of himself, "Maybe,"

And somewhere behind them, the pinpoint of light goes out.

Steve takes a deep, uneasy breath. “I’ve been thinking about graduation.” He starts, and the world tilts sideways.

Frosted blades of grass crunch underfoot of someone drawing closer and closer to whatever grenade Steve’s about to throw on their perfect, carefree night. A stranger, or friend, or–-

Neil, for all Billy knows, is set to get a front-row seat to Steve’s admission.

I know what you are, Billy imagines him saying, kind eyes finally slicing Billy open after so many months of liquid care, I know how you feel about me and what happens in your gym shorts when you see my ass in the showers. I’ve seen how you fuck yourself open on your fingers imagining that I’m pressing myself inside you because we’re in love with each other–-

Steve gulps down the rest of his beer and turns, so their knees knock.

It hurts, and it doesn’t. He swallows panic, anyway.

Billy gets like that at the first sign of trouble. Sensitive as an overripe peach. All those times they put their hands on each other and Billy doubts Harrington knows that he bruises easily. That he carried Steve’s fingerprints on his skin for weeks after--

“It’s just,” Steve says, eyes cast to the ground. To the crust of the Earth, knocking politely on the lid of Billy’s sneakers, “When I think about my future, it gets fuzzy.”

“Yeah, that’s normal, I think.” Billy turns, eyes straining through the darkness to find the owner of those clandestine footsteps. The yard is empty. He passes the unlit cigarette back to Steve and wonders, through a cloud of haze and terrifying anxiety, if he imagined the whole thing.

Maybe they’re alone, after all. Maybe Steve will go easy on him. Maybe—

Steve lets the cigarette fall to the ground.

“Wasteful,” Billy says, trying to cast light on the mood.

“I don’t care, I’ll buy more."

On the tip of Billy’s tongue, he feels red-hot jealousy inflate like blown glass. Typical, he wants to say, you rich bitches don’t give two shits about the resources you deplete or the mouths you take them from, and still–-

Call it a habit.

Billy’s trying to file his own edges down. Doesn’t want to be that guy to Steve anymore, the one who says those things and means it, because–-

Billy bites down until he tastes blood to stop from saying something stupid. But the thought comes an hour and four beers too late.

Steve won’t look at him and Billy’s trying to find the hole in their lifeboat before their friendship sinks. There’ve been a lot of parties this break. A lot of weed smoke, a lot of tequila shots, and stolen six packs exchanged for frozen pizza, and Billy thinks for an endless moment that maybe he said something, once.

Got shitfaced and lost in the pink feeling when Steve carried him home and put Billy to bed and crawled under the sheets with him, so close but not touching, until they both fell to dreams.

Maybe Billy got too comfortable in their safe, easy friendship, and ruined everything.

Maybe Steve knows.

“My future,” Steve tries again, eyebrows pinched in a way that’ll give him wrinkles before he turns thirty-five, “It only makes sense if I imagine–-”

“Jesus Christ, It's fucking freezing out here."

Billy cranes his neck and Robin appears, windswept and higher than a kite, balancing along the abandoned edge of the pool. Her cheeks are red from the cold despite the insulated overalls that still hold last month's mustard stains, and the leather jacket she stole from Billy’s room and never gave back is slung around her shoulders.

They stare at her for a long, breathless moment.

“Y’all scared me,” She says, rubbing her hands together, "Am I interrupting something?"

Billy turns back around, "Not really," He says, at the same time, Harrington snaps, "Kinda," All teeth and none of that sappy best-friends-who-can-read-each other's-minds bullshit that he keeps on tap.

“You knew we were out here,” Steve clarifies. He flicks a cluster of ash from his sun lounger. “You were standing at the door, calling my name.”

“I was calling both your names.”

“Bullshit,” Billy tells her, chuckling.

“Not shit,” Robin says, plopping down on the pool lounger next to him, “I called both your names and when I heard Steve’s voice I thought maybe you went into the woods together.”

“How much dope have you had tonight?” When Robin waggles her eyebrows, Steve frowns, “We wouldn't go into the woods. Don’t go into the woods, Bucks.”

“Too late, I already did,” Robin snatches their cigarette off the ground and takes the lighter that’s offered, pinching the filter between her front teeth, “It’s fucking freezing out here–-”

Billy grins. "You already said that."

“We were talking,” Steve bristles. His eyes are narrowed, pools of honey covered in bees and wasps and he doesn’t say what Billy so clearly sees between the lines. We were talking–-

And you interrupted us.

Robin frowns. “What could you possibly be doing out here that couldn’t happen inside?”

“You mean the very same inside that’s caught under the mind-numbing cadence of Wham! and the watchful eye of half the school?” Billy shrugs, “Wasn’t my bag.” Billy takes robins-his-Steve’s cigarette and tells the truth. “Harrington’s waxing poetic about the future.”

“My future,” Steve says.

“His future,” Billy clarifies.

“Jesus Christ. It’s the last Friday of winter break, can we please not do the college thing?”

“Quick, check her head for bumps,” Billy deadpans, stealing his cigarette back. It’s comical, coming from Mrs. SAT herself.

Robin knocks her shoulder into Billy. Hard. “I’m serious. You guys put too much pressure on yourselves.”

“I got into UC Berkeley and it was my first choice,” Billy teases, “Don’t worry about little Hargrove, he’ll be shouldering summer road trips and bags of dope in four years' time.”

“Four and a half years, let’s not jump the gun,” Steve says, He fiddles with the sanded edge of his beer can, a thousand and one thoughts racing by like taxi cabs behind the curtain of hair on his forehead. “I can do that, now,” He says like it means something.

“Steve,” Robin begins softly, “What’s wrong?”

“God, nothing,”

And Billy’s smart enough to know when a bomb’s set to explode. Harrington’s got fire in him, it burns on a simmer like the focused light from an oil lamp, high in a tower overlooking the sea. He’s good at steering conversations and batting his spindly shutters to get what he wants.

It’s what makes him the King.

And Billy has to physically swallow his own tongue to stop from saying that Robin’s efforts are pointless.

Steve’ll talk when he’s ready if he ever gets there at all, and to be honest, Billy hopes the train doesn’t arrive tonight.

Billy’s feeling selfish.

Wants so desperately to skip the big, emotional conversations and for the light to return to the sky. For the last Friday before the spring semester to lose twenty pounds so it can fit, cookie-cutter and all, into the mold of Billy’s senior year. He doesn’t want to think about the future, there’s plenty of time for that.

Mostly, he wants to go inside and get drunk.

“C’mon,” Robin tries, kicking the toe of her boot and Steve’s sneaker together until he grinds his molars, “You can talk to us,”

Billy groans.

“Just because Hargrove and I are going to the same school-–”

“Buckley, leave the kid alone.”

Steve is silent for so long that Billy grows a headful of gray.

"I don't care about Berkely, I just care about California," He says. He looks at Billy, peers right through him and Steve’s eyes are glittering like a million wayward stars. Like he might cry. “I wanted to-–”

Billy springs to his feet.

“Jesus, can we just go inside?” Billy’s fingers itch for the comforting cylinder of aluminum. He wants to dance, and he’d take Cher or Madonna. George Michael–-

He pats the seat of his pants, instead, so it looks like he’s searching for something to smoke.

He doesn’t miss the hurt that flashes, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it, across Steve’s face.

“Alright,” Harrington crumples his beer can and tosses it, sharply, into the dark hollow of his swimming pool.

“C’mon, Steve, Bills is just being an asshole,” Robin’s nose wrinkles. She’s trying really hard to look serious and interested and sober. “What were you going to say?”

“It wasn’t important.”

“It was important enough for you to hold Billy hostage for the last hour and a half,” She takes the last puff from her cigarette, losing steam in this conversation, “You know Heather Duke was playing twenty questions, trying to figure out where Billy ran off to?”

“I don’t care about Heather Duke,” Steve says bluntly, “What makes you think I would ever give a shit about–-”

Robin is unphased, “Seems kinda like you give a shit about Heather Duke.”

And all at once, Steve snaps.

It’s like watching a tree fall in the woods. Silent, and then all hell breaks loose and the world ends.

“You didn’t have to come out here,” Steve says, about as even and gentle as the aftershocks of a hurricane, “You could’ve stayed inside with everyone else.”

“God, you’re such an asshole when you drink brown beer, it makes you delusional-–”

Billy sits back down.

“--Shoot me for wanting to make sure my best friends are okay,” Robin tells him, dry as an old desert bone.

“We were fine,” Steve snaps.

“You drank a bunch of beer and then fucking vanished.”

“If you think I’d ever let anything happen to him–-”

“--Harrington-–”

“--You’re out of your mind, Buckley.”

“Fuck you,” Robin throws her cigarette at Steve’s face. “Come find me when you’re done acting like you’re the only one who’s got feelings,” She says, and then she’s off. Stomping across the frosted lawn until the french doors slam shut behind her, harsh and final.

Steve kicks his sun lounger.

“Hey, easy, pretty boy.”

“We were having a private conversation,” Steve snaps. When he looks at Billy his eyes are glossed over, wet, huge, and afraid. “We were talking, and then–-”

“What the fuck has gotten into you?”

Steve frowns, spine going taught like the string of a bow, poised to kill.

Billy shrugs, confused to the very core of him. “In all the months I’ve known you and crashed on your couch and gotten piss-drunk in your shitty fucking car I’ve never seen you act like this. Robs mentions Heather Duke and-–”

“What, you care about Heather Duke, all of a sudden?” Steve scoffs like Billy’s the most irrational, irritating, piece-of-shit guy on the planet. “You know her dad bought her a nose job, like, two weeks before you moved here?”

“Oh my god, who gives a shit? I’m here with you. Right? I’m right here,” Billy shouts, uncaring for how his voice echoes against the bark of a million barren, dying trees, “Can we try and have a good night? It’s the–-”

“If you say it’s the last Friday of break one more fucking time–-”

Billy wonders what crashed Steve’s yacht into the rocks. What’s got his panties bunched up, and why Steve feels like he’s got any authority to stop Billy from getting a few good orgasms in before sunrise.

He doesn’t get the chance to ask.

Steve rubs the wet from his cheeks. “Forget it,” He says, “Let’s just. Let’s go back to the party, alright?”

“Steve-–”

But he’s gone.

Before Billy even has a chance to say that everything will be alright, Steve’s gone.

It’s another hour before Billy has the courage to chase after him.

—

In a room full of piss-drunk kids and aluminum barrels and honey-comb ashtrays that look like they’ve spit up all over Mrs. Harrington’s nice coffee table, Billy drinks the edge away.

Steve said he was going back to the party but he’s nowhere in sight. Robin’s missing, too, and Billy has no doubt they’ve hugged and made up. They’ve got a Care Bear cut to them, you know, can never go to bed angry.

Billy imagines that they’re in the mast bathroom right now. Swimming in Ma Harrington’s jet tub, or painting their toenails in the guest bedroom that overlooks the west-facing tree line. He wonders if they’re drunk enough to talk, hushed and trepid, about their fears.

Billy wonders if he’ll ever fully fit in with them. If he could ever belong anywhere else.

Eventually, the house starts to empty. Tommy H. says some dumb shit about being hung out to dry, all, if Harrington wanted to fuck the weird girl in a quiet house all he had to do was say something, but everyone else is too drunk to fake a laugh.

Billy tells him he should move the party to his. “Your parents are in Aspen, right?” Billy wonders, swallowing the last sip of his last beer for the ‘85 season.

“Yeah,” Tommy H. slurs, so he uses Billy’s head as a push lever to stand on the coffee table and knocks Mr. Harrington’s ashtray onto the carpet. Says, “Hey guys, afterparty at my house,”

No one in their right mind wants to go home plastered.

So the house clears.

Billy sinks into silence about as easily as a rock in the ocean. It swallows him, the distant drone of the heater is his only companion as he vacuums drifts of cigarette and marijuana ash from the carpet.

He runs the loud machine about the whole room to tidy up, imagining that with this invention Billy is cleaning up the last, terrible dregs of a very long year.

It’s freeing.

Billy’s weightless, so on cloud nine that when someone thumps on the floor upstairs he wonders who could be so high above him. Higher than his crown of mussy curls, taller than God himself.

Billy takes the stairs leisurely, focusing every free inch of brainpower on putting one foot in front of the other.

And the thing about Steve’s house is that there are a million long, winding corridors that Billy can’t navigate even when he’s operating at peak performance, you know. Drinking lots of water and eating root vegetables and laying off the cigarettes and following the thread of gold that trails after Steve like toilet paper stuck to his shoe.

Billy’s shitfaced and out of breath by the time he’s run out of guest rooms to investigate.

There’s no one here, Billy thinks.

No one but me, and the pipes–-

“Billy?”

Steve’s in his pajamas. He looks a little bit like Winnie the Pooh, in red flannel, rubbing at his eyes like maybe something woke him from a deep, dreamless sleep but Steve isn’t angry about it. Because he sat up all night waiting.

“Thought you left,” Steve mumbles, eyes squinted as if every bulb in the house is burning at once.

“Why would I leave?”

“I thought maybe I pissed you off and you went home with someone else,” Steve pads forward, voice soft and warm with curling tendrils of exhaustion.

Billy wants to touch him. Billy aches to run his fingers through Steve’s hair and pull and tug until the guilt is smoothed from his face.

Most of all, Billy wants to kiss him.

And he’s so used to that feeling sitting like a hot coal in the very center of him, heating words and emotions to boiling until they bubble up and spill over in ways Billy could never stifle, even with a lid to the flame.

Billy’s so used to it that he shrugs, instead. “I’m wasted,” He admits, because it takes the sting away from the thought that Harrington’s suspicious of him. That once the alcohol burned everything away, Billy whored himself out. Chose someone else. Abandoned ship even though–-

“I know,” Steve smiles softly, “Me too.”

“Where’s Robin?”

“Asleep,” Steve confesses. They stare at each other for a moment and Steve’s expression melts. His smile is washed away, happiness swallowed by grief. “Listen, Billy–-”

Billy pads toward the bedroom. “We can talk about it tomorrow.”

“But I–-”

Billy takes his shirt off, slipping out of his boots and trousers on autopilot. There have been so many nights exactly like this one, so many beer-filled memories of slipping under the covers and feeling Steve, warm and soft, curl up behind him.

But it’s almost like a switch has flipped and after their friendly spat by the pool, they’ve been sucked into an alternate dimension where the awkwardness that stuck like wet paint to their friendship and never really dried.

Steve stands next to the bed, now, teeth rattling from the cold.

Everything’s quiet.

“I was an asshole,” Steve tells him.

Billy’s exhausted. “Stevie, get in bed.”

“Things are changing so fast and I just-–”

Billy’s already half asleep. “I don’t give a shit about that, Steve, it’s alright,” Billy settles in with Robin. She snuffles, rolling over until she’s settled enough to begin drooling slick over Billy’s left nipple.

He lets his eyes slip closed, breath calm even as the mattress feels like it’s lost at sea.

Billy cracks open one eye, glaring up at Steve where he’s watching Robin and Billy with a small, sweet curl to his lips. “Come cuddle, you shithead,” Billy mutters, knowing he’ll be embarrassed about that tomorrow.

Steve looks afraid. Young and frightened and so uncertain.

It’s a strange, unusual look to see on Steve’s face.

Billy’s heart pinches, shuddering painfully in his chest. “C’mon, Harrington, I’m cold,” Billy tries again. He knows he won’t be able to fall asleep without Steve. It’s a dorky, pathetic development as ancient as the stars.

Even when he’s home, lounging in his own bed on Cherry lane; even when the days are decent with no fights and swinging fists because Billy did his chores and minded his tongue, when there’s nothing to cry about and nothing be up early for, Billy doesn’t dream as easy as he does here.

With Steve.

So Billy shuffles toward the edge of the bed, smirking when Robin flips over onto her stomach. “If you get in here with me you can tell me all about it, alright?”

“And you’ll listen?”

“And I’ll listen,” Billy swears.

Steve bites his lip. He shuffles for another few seconds and then gives in, laying on the other side of Billy.

And Billy is too drunk to notice the way their bodies naturally curl around each other. Like clinging vines and stone houses, soft greenery seeking warmth. Billy puts his face in the crook of Steve’s neck, pushing into the calloused fingertips that trace the curve of his spine.

He’s warm.

He’s already asleep, dreams lapping like warm ocean water against his toes.

“I was thinking,” Steve says, “About the future?”

Billy makes a noise, floating on Steve’s mattress.

“I just. I want you–” Someone’s snoring. “Goddammit, Robin.”

Billy curls away from the sound, slinging one leg over the waist of that soft, murmuring voice to stop it from disappearing. It blends in with the texture of the night. It slips away but that doesn’t matter.

“Billy?”

Billy dreams of the boy it’s attached to, and he falls asleep, succumbing to the mystery of the future.

–-

“This is your fault,” Robin says. She dips a green bean in tarter sauce and licks all of it off before chewing, “Well. Mostly it’s your fault.”

It’s fish-fry day. Reminds Billy, like a spot of paint on a big bright canvas, just the tiniest bit of home. He’s in a good mood, taking his time with his mashed potatoes, hasn’t even cracked open his Pepsi, and it’s like the afternoon catches on a low-hanging branch and pops open. Ripped at the seams.

Billy’s slow on the draw, mouth smeared with lazy ease. “What now?”

“Steve,” She says. Like duh. Like, “It’s your fault.”

Billy stabs his last fish stick. Imagines blood and guts, little water-logged voices screaming in pain, “You’re full of shit.”

“I’m full of astute observations,” Robin tells him, looking around and leaning forward like anyone in first lunch gives a damn about Steve or either of them, for that matter.

Billy’s cool died, right along with his heart, the first time Steve smiled at him.

“You really need to pay more attention to the people around you.” Robin continues loudly, “Just because we don’t have 20-pack abs-–”

“What the fuck are you talking about, Buckley?”

“You were there. You saw how Steve blew a fuse.”

“Wasn’t like he was running in tip-top shape anyhow,” Billy spots Heather Duke across the room, batting her lashes so hard it looks like she’s got something in her eye. "Are we really talking about this?"

She waves.

Billy doesn’t wave back.

“Stop making fuck-me eyes at your girlfriend,”

“Buckley,” Billy warns, eyes snapping, poised to kill, on Robin’s face, “You’re on thin ice.”

“I’m always on thin ice,”

“More than usual,” Billy clarifies. He leans forward, close enough that he hopes his tarter-sauce breath kills Robin on the spot. “I’m not taking the blame for the Princess’ shitty New Years' mood.”

Robin doesn’t plug her nose. “Well, you should.”

“Why, because I’m a reformed asshole and that makes me a scapegoat for everyone else’s neurosis?”

“No,” Robin says dryly, “You’re probably the only person on the entire planet who can let him know everything’s going to be okay.”

Billy flops back in his seat, scrubbing at his face and tugging at his hair like maybe if he buffs hard enough, he can be a new person. Shiny and clean. The type that does shit like this, who can open like a spring flower and not care about the bees.

Eventually, Billy inflates again. “Steve hasn’t said anything to me about anything.”

“He’s probably embarrassed.”

“--The guy who brags about being best friends with a Middle Schooler–-”

“Okay, then he’s worried you’ll reject him,” Robin says.

And.

The first boy who ever had a crush on Billy pulled his chair out from under him. Billy cracked his head on the desk and had to get four stitches. Billy’s mom drove him to Urgent Care and said boys only do that when they’re in love with you.

Because they can’t find the words, she’d told him.

In retrospect, it makes sense to Billy that his mother would say that. All she ever knew was love the color of fresh bruises.

But the thing about Steve is, he’s full of words.

He drips honeyed dad jokes and terrible made-up song lyrics about the cowlick that floats in Billy’s hair when he’s had too much to drink. Steve spins stories about the future and says things like when we’re at college together and when we’re roommates and I get to trap you forever by my side–-

He’s stuffed to bursting with sunlight and easy promises.

And the thing about Billy is, his whole life has been about death. Rebirth, too. Over and over and over again. He’s had to rework what love looks like from all sides, proving to himself time after time that nice boys don’t leave bruises when they hold you in their arms. They don’t crack skulls and split lips with anything but their teeth.

And when blood spills, it’s all by accident.

They clean it up with their mouth. They spit it out again, and it's golden healing.

Billy’s pretty sure he falls through the chair.

Or maybe, the legs break out from under him. And the Earth crawls away, nursing split crust and shattered plates. And the cosmos burns up, like. In one fell swoop.

That first crush times a million and Steve isn’t even here.

“What,” Billy rasps. He clears his throat. Chokes and tries again, climbing up a mountain of truth. “What does that mean?”

Robin won’t look at him.

Billy leans forward. “He’s worried that I’ll stop hanging out if he’s vulnerable with me?”

Robin’s cheeks are red. So pink Billy would chew a roll of HubbaBubba to color match with the fuzzy damp of her skin.

“Did Steve say Friday was my fault?”

She picks at her food.

“Robin,” Billy says.

Robin shakes her head. She won’t look at him.

Billy grinds his teeth, “Robin.”

“No, Billy.”

“You’re such an asshole.”

“I’m not getting involved–-"

“You’re getting a head full of mashed potato if you don’t tell me what you’re talking about,” Billy scoops what’s left off his tray, gripping the handle of his spoon so hard he’s sure his palm starts bleeding.

“Billy,” Robin starts.

Billy raises his eyebrows in a venomous threat, leveraging the spoonful of mashed potatoes he’s got locked and loaded.

He’ll do it. He’ll fire the first shot and every blow that comes after and Robin knows he will.

She shifts in her chair, “I wasn’t supposed to say anything.”

“It’s a little late for that.”

Robin shakes her head. “I was supposed to keep quiet.”

“Dammit Robin, why the fuck are you speaking in riddles? Why are you acting like you can point fingers and pin blame all from the comfort of your fucking high horse and not get your shit rocked for it?”

“I’m not on my high horse–-”

“Bullshit,” Billy slams his spoon on the table. “You can’t tell me that everything is my fault and not speak the fuck up.”

Billy won’t stand for it.

Robin frowns. “Maybe ‘everything,’ was a bit dramatic.”

“Ugh, Robin.”

“Maybe I should’ve chosen my words a little more carefully,” She dodges the mound of potatoes that goes flying, cheeks red as the sun. “I would’ve. If I could do it over again, I would.”

“Spare me.”

“You know I can’t control my mouth once it gets going, I get, like. Verbal diarrhea.”

Billy jerks into motion and starts gathering his lunch scraps.

Because he’s got a thing about blame, at the root of him. Being saddled with the weight of everything. Everyone’s shit mood and shit decisions and shit consequences, all smeared down the front of his heart just because he’s strong enough to hold it.

Robin stares at him as he slings his backpack over one shoulder. The calculus textbook he’s read twice cover to cover, sits like a familiar childhood blanket against his shoulder blades. His heart rate slows, everything grinds to a halt, and that’s when he realizes that Robin’s about three seconds away from crying.

At lunch.

In the lunchroom.

“Steve’s been such a good friend to me,” Robins says quietly. “He’s never aired my shit, you know? Or put himself in the middle of something that didn’t concern him.”

“Steve’s a good person, he wouldn’t do that.”

“But he could’ve,” Robin scrubs at her face just to make sure it stays dry. “I guess I'm still a little pissed off about Friday.”

Billy slides out of his backpack. “I don’t really blame you. Something’s bothering him, I’ve never seen him flip his lid like that.”

“I’m really worried about him, Bills.”

“And you think I’m not?”

“No, I know you are, it’s just,” Robin bites her lip again, so hard Billy worries that blood will trickle onto the Formica table top. “Have you talked to him about his acceptance letters?”

“His college acceptance letters?”

“Yes,”

Billy blinks, more confused than he’s ever been in his life.

He’s embarrassed to admit that it’s been the farthest thing from his mind. After Billy got into Berkeley and Robin followed close behind, like a toppling domino hellbent on majoring in Forestry, Billy just sort of assumed, that–

“Steve didn’t get in.”

Robin studies her picked-over lunch tray and the table beneath that, like maybe the wood grain will hold the key to the universe if she stares hard enough.

Billy slips into his backpack.

Robin jerks up at him, frowning, “Where are you–”

“Steve’s got free period next, right?”

“Yeah–”

“I’ll be back in time for Calc.” Billy kisses Robin’s cheek, immediately wiping the taste of nosey lesbian from his lips.

Chapter Management

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Chapter 2

: as long as you followChapter Text

Whatever Steve’s supposed to do with his life is a distant cloud on the horizon until it’s not.

And as his father would say, hardly glancing from the dotted line splayed on the desk in front of him, that Steve’s wrapped in a Molotov of distraction.

He’s never had to work a day in his life, really work, because Steve’s mother wanted him to have a bright and easy childhood. And because of the angelic grace given to him as the result of a long line of lovers who wanted better for their love, Steve won’t make anything of his life.

He digs his heels into that truth, ever his father’s son, making sure to take chunks out of it.

He wants to gather that harshness into a pile and create something else. Build a home or a treehouse or a getaway car.

So he drinks and smokes and fucks his way down the river. Past roiling clouds of semester finals and homecoming games , never really clocking that behemoth milestone in the distance.

Until Billy, who makes Steve so crazy he feels radioactive.

Billy talks about the future all the time. With a curl to his lips and a beer in his hand, ribs and knuckles bruised. When I’m finally out of here and I’m back home, standing in the summer waves—

He makes grand statements. He could sell Steve a plot of land at the edge of the world, his bare feet dangling in the cosmos because anywhere is a step up from here.

And at first, college is a welcome ticket out of Hawkins and away from Billy and all the confusing, fucked up things he makes Steve feel. But then, just as quickly, it becomes about doing everything in his power to stop the wedge of the future from coming between them.

It becomes about giving Billy something to hold onto. It becomes about all those gnarled things his father told him about failure and family names.

Steve’s future starts to look less and less like what he’d never fully imagined. It  doesn’t belong to himself, or to his father, but to Billy.

Just like everything else, it.

It becomes about mortaring a foundation and building a thatched roof to come home to when the stars grow cold.

But love doesn’t change his transcript.

And all the money Steve would rather die than take from his father to make every problem swallow itself doesn’t chip away at reality. For Billy, doors, and windows have opened into bright, golden pastures flanked by possibility as deep as the Pacific ocean, and Steve.

Steve will only hold him back.

–-

He chews on that for a while.

It grows thick and gummy from unsheathed worries and unshed tears and Steve wishes, into the empty well of his endless swimming pool on New Year's Eve, that things were different. That all the money he’s sitting on like a lucky dragon with a pocketful of coins could change the fork in the road.

Steve tries to ignore it.

Billy’s leaving in four months and he’s taking Robin with him and Steve wants that. Wind in Billy’s hair, you know.

Life.

It’s killing him. Robin knows, but only because Steve was wasting away.

She thinks he’s being a dumbass. “Just talk to him,” She says, “You never know what he might say, right? He could–”

What? Steve doesn’t tell her. Billy could give up his dream and stay here in Hawkins and rot and rot and hate me forever.

Billy asks him, “What the fuck has gotten into you,” That night and so many times before. Astute and scholarly and beautiful like an open flame when Steve can’t fake any more smiles.

Billy’s got to fly away. And Steve, regardless of whether he’s earned his wings, wants to jump after him.

–-

He’s parked at the quarry and the sun’s playing peek-a-boo.

On the hood of his car, Steve digs at his jean pockets and tires to imagine that the future could be like this. That maybe, without Robin’s big mouth and Billy’s fierce protection, Steve could find spots of sunlight to bask in so he won’t freeze to death.

But, really, every day is overcast.

He’s tired of pretending otherwise.

So it’s fitting that right as Steve considers walking ten extra feet to the lip of the rocky ground, Billy’s car pulls to a thundering halt and almost skids past the rope barrier, careening off the cliff and into the raging waters below. Steve imagines jumping after him. He would. He–

“You didn’t get into Berk,”

There are countless clouds on the horizon. “Nope,” Steve says, and he pop’s the P because it feels right. New Year New Steve–

Billy shoves him off the car hood. “You’re an asshole.”

Steve can’t fight anymore, “I know,”

“Why the fuck didn’t you say anything?”

There’s so much he could’ve said then. And now. And always.

I love you, he tries, staring out at a distant line of trees, I want to give you the world.

Steve shrugs his shoulders. “Nothing will change it.”

“Your parents have money, Steve,” Billy tries, and that’s just like him. Steve’s biggest cheerleader.

But Steve lost, alright? The game. The guy.

“It’s not any kind of money I want.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Billy shoves him again. His eyes get caught on Steve’s collarbone, tracing the line of his sweater. “Why aren’t you wearing a jacket?”

“‘M not cold,”

“Your lips are almost blue.”

“So I’ll freeze to death,” Steve admits, like. Big whoop.

But then Billy’s shrugging out of his jacket, “Here,” He says. Pissed and venomous like it’s going against his personal code of ethics to keep Steve alive when all he’s ever been is a dumbass with a hazard sign taped to his ass.

When Steve doesn’t take the warmth that’s offered to him, Billy steps close–

So close Steve gets wind of the ylang-ylang oil Max got him for Christmas

–and drapes the jacket over Steve’s shoulders.

It’s sweet.

It’s exactly the kind of thing Steve would’ve done for Nancy, back when he thought he knew what love was supposed to taste like. It chokes him up, gets those huge, impossible words lodged in the back of his throat so when Billy lights a cigarette and hands it over, Steve nearly chokes to death.

He lives.

Billy sits on the hood of the Beemer. “What are you gonna do now?” He asks.

Steve puffs on the Marlboro, “Maybe I’ll work at my dad’s office.”

“You’re not doing that, Steve.”

“Okay, then I’ll go missing,” He passes the cigarette back over, trying to brush Billy’s skin with his fingertips one last time, “Maybe I’ll die if I’m–”

“What happened to Marine Biology?” Billy shifts on the hood of the car so his knees press, sharp as knives, into Steve’s hip bone.

He looks so open. Earnest and dead-set on solving all of Steve’s problems for him, making a way, and forging a path in fire when the road won’t yield its secrets. It’s so Billy, so exactly the reason Steve loves him, that. He can’t hold onto it anymore.

“That was a lie,” Steve admits, “I don’t know shit about biology or the ocean beyond what I’ve seen on the History channel, I just. Wanted to be with you.”

The truth lands like cold water on Billy’s lap.

Steve flicks ash from the end of the last cigarette he’ll ever share with Billy, and. Thinks this is what love tastes like. Truth and smoke and clear, bright wintery air.

“My whole life, nothing and no one ever really made sense. For so long I was avoiding every turn that brought the future because I didn’t know what it was supposed to look like, but then–”

“But then?” Billy asks, so quiet Steve almost misses it.

He takes a deep breath. “I met you,” He admits.

And it feels good.

It’s almost as good as flying, so Steve takes a deep breath and says, “I met you and everything made sense. You talk about the ocean so much that I really did want to learn more. I thought, if he loves it then I could, too. Because I love him and I would do anything, be anyone, if it would make him smile. I wanted to study its ways and become fluent in its language so when you spoke, I could talk back. I wanted to be good enough to make you love me, good enough to take you away from here, But I’m not.”

Steve scrubs a hand across his face.

“You don’t need me to take you away from here, though. I think I always knew that. You’re strong enough to do that yourself. I’m sorry I’m not good enough, Bill.”

The sun disappears behind a bank of thick, gray clouds, and Steve imagines freezing solid.

It’s fitting. A neon sign that proves Steve was right.

Billy takes the cigarette when it’s offered to him. He doesn’t say anything for so long that Steve starts the grieving process, truly dawning a black veil for the death of what was and what never will be.

Steve slides off the hood of the car.

“Do you want to see the West with me?”

He looks over his shoulder. The wind kicks Billy’s curls into his face, hiding his eyes so he looks like a mysterious figure, an ancient God, offering the world on a silver tray.

“I,” Steve mutters, “I don’t understand–”

“You can’t stay here.”

Steve stands his ground. “I can. I have to.”

“I’m not letting you go,” Billy determines. Because he’s beautiful and stubborn and when the wind flows into the east, his eyes bore holes into the cosmos.

Billy slips off the hood of the Beemer, heels cracking so even though they’re standing on even ground all of a sudden, Steve imagines toppling through the crater left behind and voyaging to the center of the Earth.

Billy must pick up on Steve’s master plan.

He sets his jaw in a cut line that has always and will always mean business. “You can’t offer me the world and then take it away because you’re scared,” Billy tells him. He steps close, fingers toying with the hair at the base of Steve’s skull. “I want to get out of this fucking town, Harrington,”

“You should,” Steve blubbers. He’s crying, when did he start– “You should run away and never look back, you know?”

“I plan to,” Billy says bluntly, “And you’re coming with me.”

“Billy–”

“Here’s the plan,” Billy wipes at Steve’s tears, his own eyes dry and resolute. “Over spring break, we’ll take that trip to California just like we said we would. We’ll smoke a lot of dope and I’ll teach you to surf and Robin and I will look around campus–”

“--That sounds great-–”

“--And we’ll find an apartment,” Billy insists, somehow eclipsing the sun and the entire vast, endless spread of the Earth behind him. “We’ll find an apartment, and you’ll go to community college and even if you decide to write terrible poetry and do nothing else for the rest of your fucking life, it won’t matter. Because we’re gonna grow old together, okay?”

He grips the ends of Steve’s hair and tugs, yanking until Steve finally cracks a smile.

“Okay,” Steve says.

When Billy kisses him, it’s like falling apart and fusing together, over and over again until Steve is made new.

Somewhere between the past and the future, the sun escapes the bank of clouds

They hardly notice.

#harringrove #gift fic #angst and humor #fluff #angst with a happy ending

[stitchdfox]

Eddie is on tour pt 2

“I haven’t even thought about him once this week,” Eddie lies as he stacks their home designed shirts on the table.

Jeff rolls his eyes. “I know you, Munson. Let’s recap. You’ve talked to this guy once, haven’t even text him because you’re in your head, and you’ve been agonizing over calling him again since the second you hung up the phone nights ago.”

Eddie lets out a low snarl.

“That means I’m right.” A smug grin peeks at the corner of Jeff’s lips. “You’ve not stopped thinking about him.”

Whatever. Maybe Jeff was right. Eddie didn’t know the rules with something like this. Should he text? Should he call? If he calls, what time would be okay to call? It’s not like he could guess when he’d be free. Plus, time lost all meaning on tour. It had been 5 days and almost 500 miles on the road between shows.

Tonight Eddie was on merch duty. He is the most engaging one out of the guys. They usually put him there because he brought in the most profit. It was easy for him to talk. He chats with a girl who was terribly interested in how the band started.

“We did a talent show together in middle school. We didn’t win but we did a blood bond ritual that night so we are stuck together forever.” He shoots her a devilish grin and she gives a nervous chuckle. “Only kidding. These guys—“ his phone lights up. It’s Steve.

“Excuse me,” he nods at his phone as he picks it up. He takes a deep breath before he answers. “Hello?”

“Hey Eddie!” Steve sounds excited he picked up. “I am so sorry I didn’t call sooner. “

Eddie smiles “it’s okay.”

“I swear I wanted to call—“

“Steve, it’s okay!” Eddie takes the cash from the girl as she walks off with a copy of their EP.

“Okay.” He gives a soft chuckle.

“Hope it wasn’t a beautiful girl who kept you away.” Eddie teases, causing his heart to drop into his stomach. Sure it had been on his mind since they first talked but—

“Nah, man. I was at camp this week with the kids and we had negative amounts of service. I wanted to call. I did!”

“Steve.”

“And Robin kept giving me shit about it and—“

“Steve.”

“Maybe she was right—“

“Sweetheart.”

Steve goes quiet. “Yeah?”

“I’m glad you called.”

“Cool. Alright. Yeah.”

Steve sighs.

“Couple questions though.” Eddie grins.

“Shoot.”

“You have kids?” His voice catches in his throat.

“Ah. No. It’s kind of complicated.” Steve sounds more relaxed so Eddie urges him on.

“Do tell.”

“I used to babysit them. I know, weird. They are all wonderful little brats, as much as I’d like to strangle them. They’re growing up too fast and this is our last summer together before they head off to college.”

“That’s… not what I expected.” Eddie says more to himself than anyone else. He’s startled as the next band starts up, loudly presenting their set.

“Shit. You’re still at the show!” Steve hollers through the phone.

“Time zones, man. I can call you back—“ Eddie is cut off as Jeff joins him at the table. He makes a lewd gesture at Eddie, knowing full well he’s on a call with Steve.

Eddie waves him off as Steve’s call drops. He sighs, a bit defeated. Jeff pokes at his shoulder making kissy noises. He ignores him and pushes him away as his phone vibrates in his hand.

Steve: call me tonight if you want. I’ll be up late. :)

Jeff peers over Eddie’s shoulder and reads the text. “Eddie and Steve, sitting in a treeee.”

Eddie elbows him in the stomach.

“Shut it, man. I don’t even know if he’s into guys! He mentioned a girl named Robin. Could be his girlfriend.”

“I’m not convinced.” Jeff shrugs. “He called you tonight. That text has a smiley face on it. He doesn’t have a girlfriend. And if he does, and he’s doing that,” he points to Eddie’s phone. “Then you don’t want any part of it.”

Eddie has to agree with him there. Before his thoughts run away from him he spots another patron eyeing their table and waves to her.

Jeff leans in, “guess that’s for future Eddie to worry about, huh?”

Eddie rolls his eyes and readies for his performance.

“Fair maiden. Can I interest you in our wares?” Eddie sweeps his hands in front of him to present their small selection of merch. She steps forward and smiles as she points to a hand designed shirt.

He makes mental notes of the things he wanted to ask Steve. Need to figure out who this guy was and how did he have such a hold over him already? All Eddie knew was that he was completely taken with him.

Cross posting from my Twitter fandom account.

Part 1 here.

Part 3 soon. You can catch up on Twitter if you don’t wanna wait!

#Steddie #Eddie Munson #Steve Harrington #Modern AU #eddie is on tour #cross posting from my twitter

[ebaeschnbliah]

A log with eyes ...

There was little speech and no laughter in any of the boats. Each member of the Company was busy with his own thoughts.

The heart of Legolas was running under the stars of a summer night in some northern glade amid the beech-woods; Gimli was fingering gold in his mind, and wondering if it were fit to be wrought into the housing of the Lady's gift. Merry and Pippin in the middle boat were ill at ease, for Boromir sat muttering to himself, sometimes biting his nails, as if some restlessness or doubt consumed him, sometimes seizing a paddle and driving the boat close behind Aragorn's. Then Pippin, who sat in the bow looking back, caught a queer gleam in his eye, as he peered forward gazing at Frodo. Sam had long ago made up his mind that, though boats were maybe not as dangerous as he had been brought up to believe, they were far more uncomfortable than even he had imagined. He was cramped and miserable, having nothing to do but stare at the winter-lands crawling by and the grey water on either side of him. Even when the paddles were in use they did not trust Sam with one.

As dusk drew down on the fourth day, he was looking back over the bowed heads of Frodo and Aragorn and the following boats; he was drowsy and longed for camp and the feel of earth under his toes. Suddenly something caught his sight: at first he stared at it listlessly, then he sat up and rubbed his eyes; but when he looked again he could not see it any more.

That night they camped on a small eyot close to the western bank. Sam lay rolled in blankets beside Frodo. `I had a funny dream an hour or two before we stopped, Mr. Frodo,' he said. `Or maybe it wasn't a dream. Funny it was anyway.'

`Well, what was it? ' said Frodo, knowing that Sam would not settle down until he had told his tale, whatever it was. 'I haven't seen or thought of anything to make me smile since we left Lothlórien.'

`It wasn't funny that way, Mr. Frodo. It was queer. All wrong, if it wasn't a dream. And you had best hear it. It was like this: I saw a log with eyes! '

`The log's all right,' said Frodo. `There are many in the River. But leave out the eyes! '

`That I won't,' said Sam. ` 'Twas the eyes as made me sit up, so to speak. I saw what I took to be a log floating along in the half-light behind Gimli's boat; but I didn't give much heed to it. Then it seemed as if the log was slowly catching us up. And that was peculiar, as you might say, seeing as we were all floating on the stream together. Just then I saw the eyes: two pale sort of points, shiny-like, on a hump at the near end of the log. What's more, it wasn't a log, for it had paddle-feet, like a swan's almost, only they seemed bigger, and kept dipping in and out of the water.

'That's when I sat right up and rubbed my eyes, meaning to give a shout, if it was still there when I had rubbed the drowse out of my head. For the whatever-it-was was coming along fast now and getting close behind Gimli. But whether those two lamps spotted me moving and staring, or whether I came to my senses, I don't know. When I looked again, it wasn't there. Yet I think I caught a glimpse with the tail of-my eye, as the saying is, of something dark shooting under the shadow of the bank. I couldn't see no more eyes though.

`I said to myself: "dreaming again, Sam Gamgee," I said: and I said no more just then. But I've been thinking since. and now I'm not so sure. What do you make of it, Mr. Frodo? '

'I should make nothing of it but a log and the dusk and sleep in your eyes Sam, said Frodo, if this was the first time that those eyes had been seen. But it isn't. I saw them away back north before we reached Lórien. And I saw a strange creature with eyes climbing to the flet that night. Haldir saw it too. And do you remember the report of the Elves that went after the orc-band? '

`Ah,' said Sam. `I do; and I remember more too. I don't like my thoughts; but thinking of one thing and another, and Mr. Bilbo's stories and all, I fancy I could put a name on the creature, at a guess. A nasty name. Gollum, maybe? '

`Yes, that is what I have feared for some time,' said Frodo. `Ever since the night on the flet. I suppose he was lurking in Moria, and picked up our trail then; but I hoped that our stay in Lórien would throw him off the scent again. The miserable creature must have been hiding in the woods by the Silverlode, watching us start off! '

`That's about it,' said Sam. `And we'd better be a bit more watchful ourselves, or we'll feel some nasty fingers round our necks one of these nights, if we ever wake up to feel anything. And that's what I was leading up to. No need to trouble Strider or the others tonight. I'll keep watch. I can sleep tomorrow, being no more than luggage in a boat, as you might say.'

`I might,' said Frodo, `and I might say "luggage with eyes". You shall watch; but only if you promise to wake me halfway towards morning, if nothing happens before then.'

In the dead hours Frodo came out of a deep dark sleep to find Sam shaking him. `It's a shame to wake you,' whispered Sam, `but that's what you said. There's nothing to tell, or not much. I thought I heard some soft plashing and a sniffing noise, a while back; but you hear a lot of such queer sounds by a river at night.'

He lay down, and Frodo sat up, huddled in his blankets, and fought off his sleep. Minutes or hours passed slowly, and nothing happened. Frodo was just yielding to the temptation to lie down again when a dark shape, hardly visible, floated close to one of the moored boats. A long whitish hand could be dimly seen as it shot out and grabbed the gunwale; two pale lamplike eyes shone coldly as they peered inside, and then they lifted and gazed up at Frodo on the eyot. They were not more than a yard or two away, and Frodo heard the soft hiss of intaken breath. He stood up, drawing Sting from its sheath, and faced the eyes. Immediately their light was shut off. There was another hiss and a splash, and the dark log-shape shot away downstream into the night. Aragorn stirred in his sleep, turned over, and sat up`

'What is it? ' he whispered, springing up and coming to Frodo. `I felt something in my sleep. Why have you drawn your sword? '

`Gollum,' answered Frodo. 'Or at least, so I guess.'

`Ah! ' said Aragorn. `So you know about our little footpad, do you? He padded after us all through Moria and right down to Nimrodel. Since we took to boats, he has been lying on a log and paddling with hands and feet. I have tried to catch him once or twice at night; but he is slier than a fox, and as slippery as a fish. I hoped the river-voyage would beat him, but he is too clever a waterman.

`We shall have to try going faster tomorrow. You lie down now, and I will keep watch for what is left of the night. I wish I could lay my hands on the wretch. We might make him useful. But if I cannot, we shall have to try and lose him. He is very dangerous. Quite apart from murder by night on his own account, he may put any enemy that is about on our track.'

The night passed without Gollum showing so much as a shadow again. After that the Company kept a sharp look-out, but they saw no more of Gollum while the voyage lasted.

JRR Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring, The Great River

#the lord of the rings #the fellowship of the ring #the great river #jrr tolkien #anduin #frodo #sam #aragorn #boromir #gollum #movie pics #peter jackson

[vintage-brass-tc]

I’ve seen you talking with other students, sort of like you’ve known them for years. Laughing, smiling, and joking as normal pals do. Some have even felt comfortable enough to use your first name in your absence, without any second thoughts. 

I hope it isn’t too late to at least become friends with you in that regard. 

I truly do want to spend time with you and get to know you better. It would be pretty saddening if I missed out on the opportunity to hang around the very person I look up to the most.  If I could prevent the things I’ve done in the past that potentially worsened my self-image in your eyes, I would. Unfortunately, things happen and you have to keep moving forward in spite of them. 

It must have been rough having to deal with me back then....but at least I think I’ve grown to improve as a person over the years. The R from the past shouldn’t be the R you see me as now, right? 

Maybe there’s still a chance to better myself—if not for you, then for me. 

#Wonder if band camp over the summer will give us time to catch up.. #only a week away #Until then I’ll focus on making a good last impression on W before my leave this year #M #personal #vent? #teacher crush #teacher crush community #tc community #tc #tcc #tc post #tcc post #teacher crush post #tc thoughts #tc ramblings #teacher love #wishing for the the best

[troped-fanfic-challenge]

TROPED: JATP MASTER LIST

And for our encore, the Master List of all 53 (fifty-three!?) fanfics written for our FIRST Julie and the Phantoms TROPED event!! It was such a treat for us to see how a new fandom took on our prompts! We, here at TROPED, love it when our authors push the limits of what a trope can be, and this fandom kept us on our toes, and we loved every word! We hope you enjoy these trope bending, phantastic fics as much as we did!

New rockstar writers joined us for the first time for this event, which is the coolest thing for us! We love getting to see how different fandoms interpret our prompts and how you see these stories through the lens of different characters. We learned a lot about how to run an event this round, with new voices helping us to make TROPED better, which was so exciting. We came out of this event with new ideas, and we’re pumped for what’s next! We hope you’ll join us again soon ;)!

*Some summaries have been edited for length. Tumblr has a max post length. Who knew!

ROUND 1: ANGST FICS

The Tropes:

Character discovers they’re not human

Coffee Shop AU

Poorly Timed Confession

Character A catches Character B crying

————

the sky was gray and white and (cloudy) (Rated T) [Alex x Willie] by @screamin-amuseum

Summary: “I’ve got you,” Willie’s whispering over and over, panic creeping into his voice. “Alex, I’ve got you, okay? Come on, baby, come on, it’s okay, I’ve got you, you’re gonna be okay, I love you–”

Alex spits out what feels like a clot of blood and gives Willie a tired grin, probably looking completely insane.

“That’s pretty gay of you,” he says, just as his vision clouds over and he passes out.

Honey, You’re Familiar (Like My Mirror Years Ago) (Rated T) [Julie x Luke] by nik_knows_nothing

Summary: Luke works at a coffee shop, which is normal, quietly pines after his coworker, which is normal, and also occasionally steals people’s faces without really meaning to.

It’s probably that last part that moves him pretty solidly out of the “normal” territory.

But that’s fine, that’s totally cool.

He’s handling it super well.

You Can’t Value People Less Than a Good, Hot Cup of Bean Juice (It Just Seems Rude) (Rated T) [Julie x Luke] by nik_knows_nothing

Summary: Julie gets a job at a coffee stand in the middle of nowhere.

It’ll help to pass the time, if nothing else.

And if there’s a cute guy who works the shift after her and sometimes leaves her ridiculously endearing messages on an ancient tape recorder?

Well, that’s just a bonus.

honest to god I’ll break your heart, tear you to pieces and rip you apart (Rated T) [Julie x Luke] by @tonightthestarsalign

Summary: the siren!Julie AU no one asked for

new instincts (Rated T) [Luke x Reggie] by @comeonpeters

Summary: Reggie is fine with being the only human member of his band, Julie and the Phantoms (tell your friends!), just like he’s fine with being the only single member. It doesn’t make him feel lonely, and he’s only picking up more shifts at the coffee shop because he needs more money, not because he’s avoiding being alone. And picking up more shifts at the coffee shop is making the work easier! He’s only a little confused by the fact that he can now touch the espresso machine mid shift without burning himself… must be all of the experience.

you look like you’ve just seen a monster (is that what i look like to you?) (Rated T) [Bobby x Alex x Luke x Reggie] by @aroacethetic-shitpost

Summary: it’s angsty tiefling bobby time, folks!

We Are Monsters, We Are Proud (Rated G) [Flynn x Carrie, Julie x Luke] by @americanhoney913

Summary: Carrie finds herself at a college like no other in search of her dad and some answers. Julie’s not feeling good and maybe staring at roses wasn’t the best idea.

Monster College/Coffeeshop AU

sending forth their beautiful voice, and my heart was fain to listen (Rated G) [Julie x Carrie] by @madeline-kahn

Summary: Months after the death of her mom, Julie prepares to sing again and makes an upsetting discovery.

rise from the ashes (Rated M) [Alex x Willie] by @willexxmercer

Summary: At a time when everything was going wrong for Alex, the one bright spot in his life was the charming barista at the coffee shop he frequented. At least, it was the bright spot until everything went up in flames. All he could do was hope that they could rise from the ashes and figure things out together.

Siren’s Song (Rated T) [Ray x Rose] by hufflebibin

Summary: The Scopuli was never meant to be a permanent arrangement. Rose had taken the job straight out of school just looking to make a little extra money before the tour kicked off.

That was four years ago.

After a string of bad luck befalls Rose and the Petal Pushers, she can’t help but wonder if she is the problem. Or is there something more sinister at play?

Yellow (Rated T) [Julie & Reggie] by @tmp-jatp

Summary: Reggie just wanted to get some new guitar strings. A shapeshifter!Reggie au

Angels Like You (Rated T) [Luke x Reggie] by @sunsetcurveofficial

Summary: Reggie is having a bit of a weird day. It gets worse when he figures out that it’s because he died in his sleep and has somehow been walking around as a ghost without realising it. Meeting Luke helps. Luke says he’s a fellow ghost, and there is something about him that Reggie just feels drawn to. Falling for him is the easiest thing Reggie has ever done, but Luke is a little more than he lets on, and it turns out that their story actually started long before Reggie thought it did.

look into my eyes (it’s where my demons hide) (Rated T) [Flynn x Carrie] by @fanfics-she-wrote

Summary: Hiding out from demons was never a desirable nightmare. Of course, Carrie would much prefer a run-for-my-life nightmare than actually running for her life. Having Flynn around is a very welcome soothing balm, though.

Bring All The Monsters Out To Play, Let All The Red Erase The Grey (Rated T) [Bobby & Reggie] by @kennysbirthday

Summary: Mythologicals, Reggie realised, were kind of like queer people. Sometimes your Token Human friend turns around one day and admits that actually, there was something they were suppressing all along, and they hadn’t realised.

–

Reggie’s final exam has been pushed forward at the most inconvenient time. Bobby is sick, Alex is missing, and now he needs to help a selkie get their ‘Happily-Ever-After’ in order to scrape a passing grade. Oh, and if his boss catches him handing out more free coffee, he’s gonna get fired.

————

ROUND 2: FLUFF FICS

The Tropes:

Exes

Time Loop AU

Camp Counselors

Prank Wars

————

Okay, Campers, Rise and Shine! (Rated T) [Julie x Luke] by nik_knows_nothing

Summary: The Groundhog Day meets Gravity Falls meets Summer Camp meets The Author’s Own Distaste For Prank Wars AU that no one asked for. Ever. At all.

Starting To Forget (Just What Summer Ever Meant To You) (Not Rated) [Flynn x Carrie] by bi_magic

Summary: Last summer didn’t end on a positive note for Carrie Wilson - she and her girlfriend broke up on the last night of camp, and she’s been miserable since. But it seems that the universe is intent on having her fix that this summer. Even if that means she has to live through the same day over and over and over again until she does.

Creative B.S. Was No More, Was No Less (Look Around, You’re Gonna Miss What You Found) (Rated T) [Alex x Luke, Flynn x Reggie] by @americanhoney913

Summary: Alex and Luke go undercover on a mission to a summer camp in order to find a talisman that could endanger the camp and all the kids. While there, they bond with the kids and make peace with the fact that they broke up.

While Alex and Luke are away, Flynn accidentally fucks with time.

bitch but like romantically (Rated T) [Flynn x Carrie] by @screamin-amuseum

Summary: or: flynn gets stuck in a time loop. {for troped jatp round 2}

down by the bay (Rated T) [Alex x Willie] by @sunsetcurbed

Summary: Over time, Camp Phantom has simply become known as a selective summer camp: one that took only the kids that Caleb saw promise in. And Caleb wasn’t exactly lying. He really did take only the ones he saw promise in, he simply looked for different traits than others might.

For example, say, hypothetically, a boy who could see the future. Or, hypothetically, a girl who could interact with ghosts. Or, hypothetically, a boy who could summon objects to him with a simple thought. Or, and this is completely hypothetical mind you, a boy who could manipulate time.

Those might be some traits that Caleb saw promise in. Just, like, as examples.

Time will tell (But only if you do it right) (Rated T) [Flynn x Carrie] by @malecacidd

Summary: Carrie had been acting a little off for a week or so, but Flynn was pretty much known for seeing something in nothing, and that was probably what they were doing then. If something was going on, Carrie would tell her eventually.

OR

Who knew all it took was a little bit of miscommunication to mess up time itself?

and so it begins (Rated T) [Bobby x Reggie] by @comeonpeters

Summary: It’s the first day of their second week at Camp Carolling (they’re spending an entire month, and they’re getting paid to be there!) when Reggie gets a little lost in the woods. During this misadventure into the woods, he finds an egg shaped rock, an inhabited cabin that may or may not be riddled with signs, and something that might be magic. He probably doesn’t get paid enough to discover magic.

or, when they were thirteen years old, four boys met at camp carolling and eventually became a band that almost became something legendary. now, all four boys are coming back as counselors, three boys in one band and one boy in his own solo act.

so begins the reunion, though it doesn’t go how any of them imagine.

Porcupine Day (Rated T) [Bobby x Ray x Rose] by @wr0temyway0ut

Summary: It’s been fifteen years since Trevor broke up with Ray and Rose and they’re… not fine, but managing. But when Trevor to adds insult to injury and buys the camp across the lake from the one they once owned together, the two camps become locked in a bitter rivalry. With neither side willing to set aside their pride and work out their issues, the universe decides to settle their fates itself.

Day After Day (After Day After Day) (Rated T) [Alex x Willie] by hufflebibin

Summary: When Alex met Willie just after their senior year of high school, they spent a wonderful three months dating before their relationship ended in a blaze of glory. Now, four years later, they meet again as counselors at a summer camp. The only problem? Alex keeps reliving their first day together. The day that Luke had declared “Prank Day.”

This is not how Alex pictured his summer going.

clocks move faster (it’s all we’re after) (Rated G) [Julie x Luke] by @willexxmercer

Summary: Julie likes it when her friends are happy, so when she realizes she’s stuck in a time loop, she uses her knowledge to make sure everything works out for everyone… except she conveniently forgets to factor herself (and Luke) into the mix.

Touch of Magic (Not Rated) [Alex x Luke] by @williexmercer

Summary: When everything stands in Luke and Alex’s way of getting to be with the people they love, they have to repeat the day over and over until they can get the happily ever after that they want.

the play’s the thing (that goes wrong) (Rated T) [Alex x Willie] by @madeline-kahn

Summary: Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day for Macbeth, but not so for Alex and the production of Hamlet that he is directing and starring in. And while he’s stuck repeating the day of the performance over and over, mishaps of all kinds befall the cast.

anything, anything (for another run with you) (Rated T) [Alex x Willie] by @aroacethetic-shitpost

Summary: the camp counselor/exes/prank war/time loop fic of your dreams (unless you read all of the other troped round 2 fics lmao)

there’s a glorious sunrise, dappled with the flickers of light (Rated T) [Julie x Luke] by @tonightthestarsalign

Summary: ex-best friends Luke and Julie, working as camp counselors at rivaling camps, find themselves stuck in a time loop

the daughter of apollo (Rated T) [Julie x Luke] by @the-most-beautiful-broom

Summary: the JATP x Camp Half Blood AU that nobody asked for

maybe the world isn’t ending (maybe it’s been postponed) (Rated G) [Julie x Luke] by @tmp-jatp

Summary: It’s the last day of camp and Julie has one more prank planned for Luke. He just doesn’t know what it is.

Here We Go Again (Rated T) [Julie x Luke] by @kybee1497

Summary: Julie blinked as she stared at the place Euterpe had disappeared. What did that even mean? What journey? Old places and lost faces? What was she talking about? But before she could dwell on the questions swirling around in her mind, the sky full of stars began to move, shifting in place and descending until they were all around her. Julie felt her feet leave the ground as she rose up and up. One star in particular was burning brighter than the others, growing bigger in front of her.

It grew and grew, until the light was blinding and Julie had to throw a hand up against the harsh light. She closed her eyes as the light surrounded her and then she was falling. Falling down, down, down.

————

ROUND 3: CANONVERSE FICS

The Tropes:

Secret Places

Neighbors

First Kiss

Time Jump

————

Just say you won’t let go (Rated G) [Julie/Luke] by @fanfics-she-wrote

Summary: Hey, Julie

You're the heart and soul 'round here, it's plain to see

in which Julie has a second chance with her boys, and then a third

we will fight to shine together (bright forever) (Rated G) [Bright Lighting Guy/Rob from the Orpheum] by @screamin-amuseum

Summary: the rob/bright lighting guy fic literally nobody asked for but i wrote anyways. enjoy gays, bring ur tissues

what happened when (Rated G) [Alex/Luke] by @janaikam

Summary: Before Julie and the Phantoms, before the guys became ghosts, before Sunset Curve – they were Luke and Alex. Not 5 feet apart cause they’re totally gay.

who cares if one more light goes out? (in a sky of a million stars) (Rated T) [Ray/Rose] by @tonightthestarsalign

Summary: The first and the last time Ray ever kissed Rose.

we can forget the world (just you and me) (Rated T) [Alex/Willie] by @sunsetcurbed

Summary: “This was the first place I ever came out to someone,” Alex says, spinning around and taking in the tree house.

together we can take on the world (Rated G) [Alex/Reggie] by @comeonpeters

Summary: Alex Mercer meets Reggie Peters on October 8, 1983, which means that two days have passed since Reggie’s sixth birthday, because Reggie is a Libra according to the magazines that his mom reads when she gets Reggie to paint her toenails. He’s also just moved to Los Angeles, California from his hometown of Gatlinburg, Tennessee, a small town in the mountains, and he’s told Alex Mercer about all of this in the three minutes that they’ve known each other, and he might be the loudest, most obnoxious boy that Alex has ever met, and he absolutely has to be Alex’s new best friend.

The Peters family moves in down the street from the Mercers in 1983, and so begins the rest of their lives.

Long Live (Can I start another life with you?) (Rated T) [Julie/Luke] by @smolfangirl

Summary: It’s all too much for one day: first a muffin, then more heartbeats. Julie just needs some time to think. If Luke runs after her to sit by her side so she doesn’t lose it, she won’t complain.

Except afterwards, he starts acting weird. Very weird. And months later, she’s tired of letting him keep his distance.

She can’t do this. Not right now. Not today.

She jumps back on her feet.

The excited grin falls from Luke’s face. She doesn’t try to catch it.

“I – I think this is too much. I need some time. Alone. Sorry.”

Then she runs. She runs past the calloused fingers reaching out to her. Past Reggie and the door, past carved pumpkins on porches and Cornelia Street.

She just runs.

Roses (Rated G) [Emily & Luke, Alex/Luke] by @americanhoney913

Summary: It becomes a sacred place she shares with her son. Mitch is usually off at work from dawn until six o’clock, but Emily’s working from home for now. She works as a florist’s shop right outside the neighborhood. So she brings home seeds and little flowers and other cuts from the store; she and Luke will spend hours out in the dirt, planting seeds and making mud pies and Luke will babble about whatever happened in daycare and make up stories about the different flowers.

Somewhere Only We Know (Rated T) [Nick/Carrie] by hufflebibin

Summary: A journey through Nick Danforth-Evan’s life as experienced in the safety of his backyard hide away.

The Itty Bitty Details (Rated T) [Alex/Willie] by @williexmercer & @futurearchaeologyprof

Summary: 5 times Willie knew Alex and one where Alex knew Willie

you’re the only one who makes me (my wildflower) (Rated T) [Bobby/Reggie] by @willexxmercer

Summary: The tree was Reggie’s safe space, and Bobby was his safe person. He could escape all his troubles there, except for one nagging thought - did he have feelings for his best friend?

Dying complicated things.

because i’ve known you so long, i know every cadence and what they mean (Rated G) [Alex & Julie, Julie/Luke] by @tmp-jatp

Summary: the Juke 5+1 fic from Alex’s POV.

Someday (I’ll See You Again) (Rated T) [Alex/Willie] by @kybee1497

Summary: They’re wrong. Alex, you are not a failure. You’re incredible. You’re smart. You’re funny, and the best friend I could ask for. You’re a wicked talented drummer and you have a beautiful voice. And more important than all of that, is that you’re you, Alex. And the you you are is wonderful, and lovable and perfect. If your parents can’t see that, that’s their own fault. But I swear, Alex. If you’re afraid of them, I need you to tell me. You have to be safe.” Willie’s voice had gone desperate by the end. Alex deserved to know how freaking amazing he was and the fact that his parents didn’t bother to tell him, and actively worked to tear him down instead, was infuriating.

But Willie also worried about him. He’d worried about Alex since the first time he heard Mr. Mercer shouting through the window, a worry that never really went away. Not with the way Alex automatically straightened up when his parents were mentioned, as if he could hear his dad lecturing him about appearances from miles away. Not with the way Alex looked when he was with them, perfectly pieced together and falling apart at the seams, eyes distant and shoulders tense. Willie was pretty sure he had worrying about Alex etched in his bones by this point.

The Energy Never Dies (Rated T) [Gen Fic] by @americanhoney913

Summary: Four moments across time in the loft of the Molina’s garage.

————

ROUND 4: FINAL!

Theme: Author’s Choice

Tropes:

Royalty AU

Soulmate AU

“Long Story Short…”

Author’s Choice

———

Look, Steal From the Rich. Do It. (Rated T) [Julie/Luke] by nik_knows_nothing

Summary: A Julie and the Phantoms Star Wars AU that kind of looks into the ramifications of soul marks in a turbulent society, but mostly just focuses on the gang infiltrating a fancy Core World party.

take my heart (and take my hand) (Rated T) [Alex/Willie] by @sunsetcurbed

Summary: The stranger smiles. “I’m Willie,” he greets.

“Alex,” Alex nods back.

“Sir,” Willie says pointedly, and smirks up at him as he bows exaggeratedly.

“The word sir is coming out of your mouth directed at me, but I don’t feel like you just addressed me as a sir at all. And please, call me Alex.”

“My apologies,” Willie hums, straightening back up. And then, pointedly, he lowers himself back into the same bow and makes deliberate eye contact with Alex. “Sir.”

Alex blinks. “You’re not going to call me Alex, are you?”

“Absolutely not, Sir.”

the princess and the lord (Rated T) [Julie/Luke] by @the-most-beautiful-broom

Summary: a JATP x Princess Diaries 2 AU

Diamond in the Rough (Rated G) [Julie/Luke] by @tmp-jatp

Summary: The JATP Aladdin AU

Okay, So You’re Interrupting the Political Guy Again, So Think About That (Rated T) [Julie/Luke] by nik_knows_nothing

Summary: Julie and the Phantoms meets The Goblin Emperor meets a soulmate AU meets the author’s stunning lack of what I assume is basic knowledge on how monarchies work.

i had the time of my life, fighting dragons with you (Rated T) [Julie/Luke] by @tonightthestarsalign

Summary: luke gets hired by some noble to bring back the princess that was kidnapped by a dragon

born to be yours (Rated G) [Alex/Willie] by @willexxmercer

Summary: “Hello. It feels strange, resorting to notes like this, but I couldn’t think of any other way. I know you’re here, somewhere. At the ball. I’ve tried to find you for the past few nights. My parents always told me never to believe in looped days and soulmates, but I think this just proves that they were wrong.

My name is Willie. I don’t know how to find you, but sometimes I feel like I’m drawn to you. Like I can just sense you nearby. I don’t know if you’ll find this, but if you do, I’ll try to wait for you on the balcony.

Until we meet.”

our best days are yet unknown (Rated T) [Alex/Reggie/Willie] by @aroacethetic-shitpost

Summary: When Prince Alexander of Sacuria meets his fiance, Prince William of Coterra, he’s astonished to discover that he recognizes his daemon. He recognizes it as one of the other shapes that his own daemon is able to take… as his soulmate. The only problem? Alex already has a soulmate: Reggie Peters, his childhood best friend. What should he do about finally meeting his second soulmate?

Panic and run away? Yeah, sure.

Little does he know he’s about to have a bigger problem than that…

————

Please take the time to read of all these incredible fics! Leave the authors some kudos/comments! They worked so hard this whole event. Thanks so much!

Just as a reminder, our non-anon collection is always open and we are always so excited to receive any submissions! The TROPED: JATP official collection has been CLOSED but if any of our prompts inspire you, please share your fics with us in our non-anon collection! Simple put ‘TROPED_Non_Anonymous’ where it asks for the collection name, and be sure to put what round you are writing for in your notes so we can be sure to tag it appropriately when we share! Also, just as a note, fics submitted to the non-anon collection do not have to follow the word limit and do not require the same strict adherence to the tropes, though we do ask that you comply with our other rules regarding no rape, incest, negativity, and things like that! Happy writing!

TROPED JATP AO3 Collection: https://archiveofourown.org/collections/TROPED_JATP_1

TROPED Non-Anon AO3 Collection: https://archiveofourown.org/collections/TROPED_Non_Anonymous

#troped: jatp #jatp fanfiction #troped: masterlist #julie and the phantoms #long post

[isoscele]

Lumberjanes Week Day 1 - First Day of Summer

(This is longer, weirder, and later than I wanted it to be, but isn’t that the spirit of the week?)

                                                        --------- Jo’s last exam is electrical engineering, and she finishes twenty minutes early. Dr. Quispe winks at her as she turns it in, and Jo tries to smile. The constant fog of formulae and diagrams dissipates from her head, replaced by a more all-consuming calculation.

One hour, six minutes to go.

She drops by her room, picks up the single backpack sitting on the bare mattress. On her way out, Gabi pops out of the lounge. “All done?”

Jo’s smile softens, takes on something real. “Yup. You?”

“I still have an essay, but I’ll probably do it at home. Got any big summer plans?”

“Kind of.” She shifts her backpack higher on her shoulders, silently debating how much to say. “I’m going camping with some friends.”

“Oh, cool,” Gabi says. “I wouldn’t’ve pegged you as an outdoorsy type, Jo.”

“Oh, you know.” Something under her skin humming, some outdated circuitry splitting into life. Forty-nine minutes. “In certain circumstances.”

Gabi giggles. As is the case with every one of their sporadic interactions, Jo wonders if they’re flirting. “Have fun! Don’t get eaten by a bear!”

She swans back toward her laptop and empty M&M packet. If she’d looked back for just a moment, she might have wondered what she had said to make Jo look so devastated. 

                                                       ---------

Mal has a pickup truck. It’s disgusting, with a windshield wiper that sounds like a dying macaw and a clutch that, for two heart-stopping seconds at the beginning of each gear shift, refuses to move at all. Mal has always defended it with a vigor previously only saved for her best friends and favorite bands.

Jo slides into the passenger seat. The radio is blasting heavy metal and the interior smells shockingly of mayonnaise; she has to blink hard to hold back her tears. There are some things that are so beautiful, so precious that it’s impossible to look at them head-on. Jo always forgets, when she’s away.

“You’re in the bus lane,” she tells Mal.

Mal obligingly starts the very long process of getting her car to move. “I thought the idea behind going to fancy science school with adults was that bus lanes were no longer necessary. Also, it’s fucking amazing to see you.”

“The buses shuttle students around campus. Also, I’m delighted that you’re here and I want to give you a hug.”

“Motion passed,” Mal says, and they squeeze awkwardly over the two melted Frosties in the cupholders.

The car jolts into first gear hard enough to throw Jo into the seatbelt, and then suddenly she’s laughing so hard she has to hold her sides to keep herself from spilling over. 

“Sorry!” Mal says, “sorry, she’s jumpy around strangers,” which is what she says every summer. It’s a terrible joke laced with an irrefutable affection, and it’s so Mal that it makes Jo laugh even harder.

“We’re not strangers,” Jo says. She pats the center console, feels a little of the polyester flake off on her hand. “Me and this truck go way back.”

“Well, let’s hope you and this truck go way forward, too,” Mal says, “because I’m really not sure the engine’s going to last us to California.”

                                                     ---------

They pull into the trailhead at around six the next morning, and make silent work of the luggage in the back. The sun’s just starting to come up, blinking warily between the table pines. Mal waves her on, and Jo sets off along the winding path.

The first year or two, they mostly stuck to campgrounds and RV parks, warming hot chocolate on the camp stove despite persistent, obnoxious heat. Jo didn’t think much of it at the time, but now she knows that Molly was trying not to inconvenience them, trying to keep them to the shallows of the forests. Trying to keep anyone from going too far, getting too stuck. 

The fact that they were instructed to bring backpacking gear this year doesn’t do much to assuage the constant thread of worry in the back of her mind. This isn’t something they can dip their toes in anymore; the world is always a more dire place than they left it last summer.

The hike is long and treacherous. They go off the trail almost immediately, but neither of them need a map. It sounds cliche to say that they’re following something else, but they are. The anxious chitter of the birds and the sun balking at the edges of the trees and the distant hush of a river form a clear topography in their minds. They walk without discussion, taking each turn as naturally as if they had always lived here. 

Around mile seven, they start to hear voices. Mal breaks into a run, and Jo comes crashing after her. 

They knock straight into April, who catches both of them with practiced ease. For a moment, the air splits with three different calls of incomprehensible joy, and then they’re lowering themselves to the moss as a single, complex organism.

“Holy Felicia Flames, you guys look great!” April hollers.

“I have so much to tell you,” Mal says.

“Are you trying to set the forest on fire?” Jo asks, wandering over to where April has piled an impressive set of branches and old newspaper. She must have packed most of it in herself; the trees around here don’t look like that.

“Might make our job easier,” April says, and then a grim silence falls over the clearing. 

I’m going camping with some friends, Jo had said, as if it was just camping, as if they were just friends. As if Jo’s relationship with these people, the things they had to do together, could be described in such a mundane and immaterial way. As if Jo won’t sit at the fire with them tonight, watching the way the sparks clear the shadows around their eyes, and love them with everything she has in her. As if she won’t hate them, too, for making her come here.

Here they are, in the annual half-second when they don’t know what to say to each other. The moment when the summer teeters, still soft and blameless, on the edge of something sharper. 

But then April asks Mal how the band’s doing, and the moment passes.

“I wish I’d thought to bring pictures,” Mal says. “We played at this amazing venue last January--there was this skylight, and it was pouring rain, and people just kept coming in because it was so miserable outside.”

“Aw, that’s great,” April says. “I’d love to come someday, but y’all sell out so fast!”

Mal scratches the back of her neck, looking embarrassed. “Yeah, sometimes.”

“What are we talking about?” Ripley half-shouts. Jo yelps, and then that turns into more laughter, which turns into an incredible group hug. For someone who carries no fewer than three kazoos on her person at all times, Ripley can be surprisingly stealthy when she wants to. Jo never hears her approaching anymore; first, there’s nothing, and then there’s Ripley.

April hugs Ripley so hard she lifts her off the ground. Ripley immediately starts listing all the weird birds she’s seen this year and asking April to cross-reference them with her encyclopedia of creatures.

And then, of course, there are four.

Jo drifts half a step closer to Mal and extends her hand. Without tearing her gaze from the blot of trees, Mal takes it.

Last year, Molly had been sort of--sick. They’d been camping on a bauld where eagles circled high overhead and the flowers were all this terrible saffron yellow, bent under the shadow of the rocks. Molly had walked with a stick, like the Bear Woman--like Nellie used to use, thick and gnarled. But she said that was temporary, just because of a bad fall, and no one talked about how her freckles had almost overtaken the white of her hands, how her eyes were spotted with yellow and seemed to constantly rove towards the sky.

No one had mentioned much of anything, because the year before that they had buried Nellie in the soft earth beside the lake and they had all tacitly agreed not to talk about it. Maybe that’s what growing up is like--finding more and more things that no one is willing to say. Holding a grief in you that sometimes feels so bright and all-consuming that it can’t possibly be real.

“She’ll be okay,” Jo says, quiet so as not to kill April and Ripley’s buzz. “The forest loves her.”

But that’s a cold comfort, because they have all spent the same six summers learning that the forest’s love can be the most terrifying force in the world.

                                                   ---------

It doesn’t take long at all before a familiar sound comes rolling in from the mountain. It’s a sound like dinosaurs, like goliaths, like the world collapsing in on itself.

It’s a sound that heralds the approach of Bubbles, who these days is about the size of a house. 

I don’t know! Molly had said, laughing, the first time they had seen him again. I guess he was just a baby when we met him. I’ve been feeding him a lot of peanut butter lately, maybe that’s it. 

Bubbles crashes through the trees, chittering so loud that it sounds like the laughter of a god. On his back, perched awkwardly against the scruff of his neck, sits Molly.

She does look okay. Their home hasn’t killed her yet.

There’s a little more white in her hair, a little more curl to her fingernails. But she’s smiling so wide it’s almost like they’re just here to catch up, like just for today they can afford to be a group of friends and nothing else.

Later, of course, will come the campfire, and the birds falling silent, and even the cicadas forgetting to cry, and they will map out another fraction of the world. They’ll find another dozen stone men, sleeping still enough to be dead. They’ll find perhaps hundreds of potential apocalypses, and they’ll spend the month eating little and sleeping less, preventing the end of the world again and again and again until they can’t even remember what they’re saving. 

But right now, Molly slides down Bubbles’ side and yells “Guys!” and the summer bursts into being. 

#lumberjanes week #lumberjanes #my writing #sorry about the weird formatting this website is a genuinely terrible place to publish writing

[wincore]

campfire + first kiss + renjun pleeease

theme: enemies to lovers!au, side college!au

You smack your head against the bark of a tree and immediately regret it. 

That was obviously not one of your best decisions. It’s late at night and you seem to be the only one awake in your suffering. You dust off the remnants of the upper layer of the bark and hiss at the scratch you find. Now, if only Jaemin didn’t rush this camping trip, you’d be having a much better time under a pale moon like this. You sigh, twisting your head to look at the sky. It’s almost miserable.

Ah yes, summer. The best time to find insects and other interesting creatures while struggling to sleep through the hot, humid night. When else could you have this wonderful a trip?

Right! When you’re not forced to live in agonizing turmoil with the one guy you cannot stand. You groan. You can put on repellent for the bugs. You can rely on the night to get cooler with time. But how on earth are you supposed to look him in the eye anymore? You refuse to the spend the night in the same small cramped tent as Renjun. 

Where does all the hatred come from? Good question, you don’t remember either. It’s been so long since you first saw him, in kindergarten, a shy boy offering you a red crayon. It’s different now, vastly—you barely exchange words without engaging in a heated debate and prolonged glares. There’s a lack of warmth in his eyes, uninviting and annoyed. 

You pause for a second at the sudden memory that interrupts. A dorm party bordering on too wild and an extremely drunk you after a tough week of assignments and projects—that’s the summary of it. But there’s more. Renjun was kind in that moment when he took care of you and you feel particularly embarrassed to admit it. He didn’t have to help you. Your friends were there. Jaemin was there. He didn’t have to make you overthink like this. He was so gentle that night—holding you firm all the way to your apartment, rubbing circles on your back when you threw up, medicine and a glass of water ready on your table by the morning without him. You remember all of that, although you’re sure neither you nor Renjun want to remember. You blush at the memory of your lips so close to his as he grasped your waist to get you to stand straight. You shake your head. Whatever, at least you didn’t end up kissing him.

The truth is, you don’t know why you seem to hate Renjun so much. It wasn’t always like this. You were almost friends once, many years ago. You just know the burning in your cheeks and a boiling pool of words stuck in your throat whenever he’s there in front of you, with that god awful confidence in himself. It’s not real. You know he puts up a front. 

But there’s something more, isn’t there? a voice speaks up in your head, sounding scarily like Renjun himself. You want to yell, just to get rid of it.

You stay there for a while, trying to catch a break from all the stress Renjun’s been giving you, especially after the party. Your cheeks feel warm again, and you pray to the night breeze to get cooler soon. 

Someone calls out your name. 

You spin around, the perpetrator of your thoughts standing in his classic striped sweatshirt, somehow resistant to the summer heat. Renjun raises an eyebrow as you look up at him, your heartbeat freezing up with all the heat run away to your cheeks. 

Just how long will you keep up this denial? an annoying voice pops up—no, it’s his voice again.

“Don’t hang around the edge like this,“ Renjun scolds. “It’s not safe.“

You think for a moment, a sly grin working up its way. “Ah yes, did you hear about the girl who died in these woods? I heard her spirit still haunts this place.”

“Th-There’s nothing like that!” Renjun says, but he straightens up visibly. “Don’t joke around!”

You giggle at his flustering, a sudden relief from your previous thoughts.

“What happened?” He clears his throat and points. “To your forehead, I mean.”

You tilt your head at his concern. You always do stupid things to get on his nerves. Hasn’t it always been this way?

“Never mind.“ Renjun sighs. “It’s something stupid, I know.”

Before you can refute it, he interjects, “I have some band-aids, I think. If not, I’m sure Jaemin has them. Come on.”

Was he always nice like this? You follow him nonetheless to the dwindling campfire and sit on the soft grass, waiting. The blood pumps through your veins softly, a sound calming yet terrifying. You half expect the forest spirits and the fireflies to pay you a visit when it’s so quiet like this.

There’s a moment when you lock eyes with Renjun as he gets the ointment and band-aids. You quickly look back down at your feet, flustered yet not knowing why. You’re so stupid, Renjun’s voice says in your head. I know, you think. 

You purse your lips, hesitant to let him dress the small cuts and scratches.

“It won’t hurt,” Renjun coaxes, “I promise.“

And so you let him take care of you a second time since adulthood.

Your hands are balled up at the sides as Renjun dabs wet cotton over your forehead, an inevitable pounding of your heart at the dawning realization. The band-aid Renjun uses is white and square, with moomin mamma over it. It’s undoubtedly his, a smile almost breaking out on your face if it weren’t for his eyes focused on you. His eyelashes are unfair, long and pretty, and his lightly colored lips are a little too close for your liking.

“You’re stupid,” Renjun says softly, finally pressing the band-aid over your forehead.

“I’m always stupid to you, Renjun,” you say airily.

“Oh, don’t pick a fight now.“ Renjun clicks his tongue.

“I’m not,” you whisper, looking away.

You both offer silence for the cicadas and the flames to fill up. There’s something unspoken that always stays in between, something tying you close. The wind is starting to pick up its pace, colder than it had been in the evening, when your thoughts were louder. It’s your problem to solve now. 

You’ve never hated Renjun. You’ve been jealous of him, sure, sometimes annoyed and angry, sometimes even blamed him for several things—but you’ve never hated him. You couldn’t bring yourself to do that to the only person who understood you.

There’s something unique about wanting Renjun; you long for him the same way you long for the stars, your distance between you making you long for them all the more.

Renjun breaks the silence with the same question as yours. “Can I ask you something?”

He leans back, letting you go first. His eyes look almost honey-like, by the flickering flames, more so distracting.

“Why did you take care of me after the party? You didn’t have to, you know.”

Renjun scoffs. “Of course I did. Do you know how many people you kiss when you’re drunk? And regret it later? It’s so annoying to see you wail around Jaemin and the rest.”

You feel the heat shoot to your cheeks, unable to answer. “Well, you didn’t have to be the one being oh so kind. Besides, you’re sort of ruining the thing we have that way.”

Renjun raises an eyebrow. 

“You know,” you explain, pointing your fingers at him and yourself, “The thing. We’re barely nice to each other.”

Renjun smiles at first, a ghost of a laugh escaping his lips. He’s so pretty like this, when there’s laughter in his eyes. He falls silent thereafter, eyes a little changed under the firelight. 

“Do you hate me? Like really hate me?” Renjun’s voice is low, the shadows of the flames dancing across his face to a patient symphony. He questions, but you don’t know how to answer. You’ve always played around your feelings, too comfortable in the relation, your hiding place, you’ve built with him.

There’s a dash of something foreign in his voice, an undertone daring enough to show hurt.

You shake your head. If anything, he makes you feel lighter. Every day at university would be so much more stressful without him. 

“I wouldn’t trade you for all the stars and planets,“ you whisper.

It happens in a fraction of a moment. A fraction of a moment is all you need. You lean in, your breath hot as it leaves your mouth, hovering a few inches from his as you wait for permission. 

His eyes flutter to your lips and back to your eyes, coming closer when you close the distance, your lips melting in soft mush against his. Did you ever think Huang Renjun’s lips would feel this way? No, you thought they’d be rougher, like his tongue and words. But they’re soft, warm, inviting—all the things you refused to believed Renjun was for a long time, for a thing as worthless as pride. 

When you pull apart, Renjun flushes a bright red, the campfire caressing the hue all the more as his fingers reach up to his lips.

“I’ve never- I’ve never…done that before.”

You pause, blushing all the same. “Wait. You mean you’ve never kissed anyone before?”

Renjun scoffs, looking away. You catch on to his smile, your heart fluttering at the sight the same way it does every time. 

“How could I? I’ve been in love with you this whole time.”

#nct blurb #renjun blurb #nct dream blurb #nct au #nct scenarios #nct dream scenario #nct dream au #nct dream fluff #renjun fluff #nct renjun scenarios #moonwrites #am i too obsessed with enemies to lovers renjun or do you guys like it too #this was so cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesy #kiss prompts

[bazwillendinflames]

Gravity Falls/LIS2 AU

The last place Sean wants to spend his Summer is in a weird town in the middle of no where, Oregon, reconnecting with a Mother who hadn’t wanted to see them in years in her weird tourist trap. But Daniel is determined to go and his Dad gives Sean little choice but to babysit him.

But soon it becomes clear there is more to Beaver Creek than meets the eye and the strangeness of the town soon unlocks some family secrets and strange abilities. Maybe their Summer won’t be so boring after all.

AO3 

“Lyla, I will die of boredom.” 

“It can’t be that bad,” she replied, her voice a little tinny still. The bad reception was just one of many reasons that Sean was having an awful time. (In the week and a half since they had arrived, he’d already made a list.) 

“Nope, it is exactly as bad as I’m saying.” 

“I mean, come on, you’re Mom’s there. What’s that like that?” 

Sean scowled. “Number one on reasons this place sucks. All she talks to us about is all this weird mystic stuff she likes. Her store is so weird, it’s all crystals and bad poetry.” 

Lyla snorted. “Really?” 

“Yep. Not to mention this is the whitest town ever.” He glanced out the window, where Karen was smoking, notebook in hand and ducked his head before she could spot him. “There are no cool people.” 

“Come on, you have Danny.” 

“I get enough babysitting at home thanks.” He glanced outside again, wondering exactly how long he could bitch on the phone for and call it a break. “Anyway, this place is just making Daniel weirder. He’s convinced this place is magic or something.” 

“That’s sweet. Hey, we used to play witches when we were kids, remember?”

“Hey, you were the witch, I was a manly wizard.” 

That time Lyla actually laughed. “Sure dude. I’ll believe it when I see it.” 

“Anyway, we were into the Harry Potter books, you know before terf-face ruined them. Daniel is into the ancient runes and fake spell cards Mo- Karen sells.” 

“That’s adorable.” 

“Ugh, only you could find him adorable. That’s only because Daniel doesn’t kick you in your sleep-” 

“Did Lyla call me adorable?” 

Sean sighed as Daniel barged in. Not much had changed since home tehre at least, apart from the fact they now shared Karen’s attic room. (Bunk beds, making the being kicked in the shin at night thing even more annoying.) 

“Hey, I’m kinda on the-” 

Daniel yanked the phone and rolled on the bed. “Hiiiiii Lyla. Do you miss us?” 

“Give me that back.” 

He wiggled out of his grap. “Did you know Sean talks in his sleep, it’s so weird-” 

“You would know about weird,” he grumbled, snatching his phone back, only to find the shitty signal had finally cut out on Lyla. “Dude.” 

“Sorry.” Daniel grinned at him. “Hey, I’m helping Mom restock, can you help me reach the top shelves?” 

He checked the time on his phone. He had almost managed a whole brother-free hour. 

“Guess I should I get back to work.” 

“Cool.” Daniel followed him downstairs, bouncing with energy. “Hey, Sean what does terf-face mean?” 

  Sean was stuck behind the register, although the store was still empty. He wasn’t sure why Karen insisted on such early opening hours when no one else showed up. 

He rubbed his eyes, the early start not helped by the fact Daniel had been reading with a torch all night. He had picked up a weird book from the store or something. Of course he would pick up a late night reading habit once they were sharing a room. 

“I brought you guys some toast.” Karen balanced the plate on the top of some unsold art books. (Her organization was as great as her parenting.) 

“Thanks Mom!” 

Sean poked at a black spot under a thick layer of peanut butter. “Yeah, thanks.” 

“I gotta do some inventory but I’ll be back up for lunch.” 

“Can we go to the cool diner? Chris says the milkshakes are great.” 

Karen smiled. “Yeah. Does that sound good Sean?” 

He grunted in response and her grin flickered. 

“Right, work. You boys got this.” 

“We’re not your boys,” Sean muttered, although she didn’t hear. 

“Why are you so mean to Mom?” Daniel asked, his mouth full of toast. “She’s always nice.” 

“Right, she’s been real nice the first nine years of your life.” 

Daniel looked up at him with big eyes. “Sean…” 

“Fine, I’ll try. Put those eyes away Bambi.” 

He smiled. “So, I was thinking the strawberry milkshakes are Chris’ favourite but I like chocolate more so you could get one and we could share?” 

“Huh, yeah, sure.” Sean had only been half listening, distracted by the newest customer. Waking up early suddenly had its appeal. The girl had matted purple hair, an arm full of tattoos and a guitar strapped to her back. She caught him looking and winked. 

“Are you okay Sean? You just went really red and-” 

“What? No. Shut up.” Sean moved into a more casual position, his eyes still fixed on the pretty girl. His elbow knocked the tip jar and it fell off the edge. “Shit-” 

“Here.” Daniel put it back. “Woah…” 

“Good catch Enano.” 

“Yeah. Catch! I totally caught it.” Daniel smiled a little suspiciously. “Hey, you said a swear, you owe me a dollar.” 

“A dollar? It’s only a quarter at home.” 

“Now we’re away from Dad, you’re supposed to be a good influence.” 

“You get a quarter.” Sean dropped the coin in his hand. “Be cool.” 

“What?” 

“Hey boys.” The purple-haired girl leaned against the other end of the counter, an easy smile on her face. Her voice had a faint Southern tang. “So, I come to this town every Summer and I don’t recognise either of you cuties.” 

“I- we- um-” 

His brother beat him to it. “I’m Daniel.” 

Cursing his stammering, he finally managed to introduce himself. “I’m Sean.” 

“Why hello. I’m Cassidy.” 

“Hi. Um, cool guitar. You play?” (Internally, Sean cringed: You play? Why else would she have a guitar?) 

“Yeah, funnily enough. I’m actually here to hand out flyers for my band’s show. Could you hang it up?” 

“Yeah.” Sean took the flyer. “Your show is this Friday?” 

“And every other Friday. You wanna come?” 

“I’m invited?” 

Cassidy laughed. “Yeah sure. It is a concert. You’re lucky you’re cute, City Boy.” 

“City boy?” 

“It’s on your sweatshirt idiot,” Daniel whispered. Seattle Track Meet, 2015. He was frowning in the general direction of Cassidy. “We’re busy Friday so-” 

“No. Nope, I’m not busy. Ignore him.” Sean flattened his hair. “I’ll be there Friday.” 

“I’ll look out for you City Boy. Nice to meet you.” 

Sean waited until Cassidy had left before pumping his fist. “Yes! She called me cute Dan!” 

“You’re the worst.” 

“What?” 

Daniel pouted. “You promised you’d take me camping in the woods Friday. I already brought us marshmallows and walkie-talkies.” 

“Hey, there is plenty of time to camp in those freaky woods. But I only have one chance with a girl like Cassidy.” 

“Wrong, you have zero chances with any girl.” Daniel stomped off to the corner of the store. “You’re the worst.” 

“Dan- come on.” His brother went back to ignoring him. Sean crossed his arms. “Fine. Be like that!” 

There was the only sound of a raspberry in response. 

  “Nope, I’m totally with Danny. That was a jerk move.” 

“What? Lyla, you’re supposed to be my hype man- er woman. You’re always trying to set me up on dates.” 

“Dude, three weeks ago you were so into Jenn.” 

He sighed. “And Jenn was into Derek Anderson. We had ice cream and everything.” 

“Dude, don’t fuck up your relationship with Danny over a dumb Summer romance.” 

Sean buried his head in his pillow. “You sound like my Dad.” 

“Go to this hippy girl’s show next time. You Danny will do the face.” 

“The Bambi face?” Sean groaned. “I have been facing the Bambi face all week.” 

Lyla scoffed. “Is there anything else to add?” 

“Fine. I’ll go camping. But only for the s’mores.” 

“Okay, brother of the year.” 

“Thanks jerk.” 

Lyla blew him an exaggerated kiss. “Aw, love you too.”

Sean grabbed his backpack, moving to shove in his hoodie and torch. Daniel had already shoved one of the walkie-talkies inside. 

“Calling little wolf, we are back on for camping.” 

There was nothing but static on the other end. Sean pocketed the walkie-talkie and headed downstairs, calling his brother’s name. There was no one in the kitchen and only Karen sitting in the living room, chewing on the edge of a pen. 

“Hey, have you seen Daniel?” 

Karen looked up. “Oh, I thought you already left? Daniel passed by twenty minutes ago with the sleeping bags.” 

“That little-” Sean wasn’t panicking, but he was maybe sweating a little more than he had been before. “Um, right. I just forget a…” he scanned the room and grabbed Daniel’s weird book, “scary story. Classic camping right?” 

“Oh. Have a nice time then.” Karen hesitated. “I know you’re not thrilled to be here. But I hope by the end of the Summer we can understand each other better. 

“Me too.” Sean tried to look as un-guilty as possible. “See you tomorrow Karen.” 

  “Daniel!” He yelled, running head first into the spooky mass of woodlands beyond their store. “Dan, I’m sorry okay. Quit hiding!” 

No answer. Sean went digging for the walkie-talkie, now glowing an eerie blue. 

“Dan?” 

The walkie-talkie crackled again- “Sean?” 

“Dan.” He let out a shaky breath. “Hey, I’m sorry I ditched you-” 

“Sean, help!” 

He was clutching the walkie-talkie so hard his knuckles went white. “What’s wrong? I’m coming okay. What’s happening?” 

“Creature- help- monster- ahh!” 

Sean scanned the trees around him, suddenly aware he was lost too. Daniel had been the one eager to explore the woods but he had said it was too creepy and now it seemed he was being proven right. 

“Sean- book- monster-” 

He dug around to find the weird book Daniel had been carrying around all week. He had assumed it was from one of Karen’s displays but now he was looking at it, the journal seemed too real to go with the modern witchcraft bullshit she was trying to sell. The cover was dark blue and the pages thick with drawings and polaroids. 

“Dan, I have the book, what do I need to look for? What is this thing?” 

“Page- tree- monster-” Daniel was breathing heavily. “Hear?” 

“I can hear you,” he said comfortingly, “I’m coming.” 

He held the torch in his teeth, flicking through pages until he came across a few marked with Daniel’s doodles and writing. He seemed to be studying telekinetic powers, complete with a superhero sketch: SUPER /DUDE DAN/ WOLF? ask Sean for name ideas

He finally came across the page that looked like a bush drawn with yellow eyes. 

Dangerous 

camouflage shape shifters 

Hard to photograph shush ma-

Likes dark 

Under the original writing Daniel had added his own note: babies in woods. 

“Hey,” Sean held up the walkie-talkie, “is it these moss creatures? What well?” 

“Sean!” This time Daniel’s voice was clearer, his voice steadier. 

“Dan. What happened? Please tell me you had a good reason to go into the woods alone without telling me or Karen.” 

“Come on, that’s it? Can you yell at me when I’m not being chased?” 

“Okay. I’m coming, where are you?” 

“Where are you?” 

“By some trees. There’s a sign for a lake?” 

“Go to the lake, I’ll meet you there.” Daniel was cut off by some more static. “Hey, stop chewing that Mushroom!” 

Sean followed the signs, hoping Daniel at least would know a way out. How did he know the woods so well already? Was Sean that much of a shitty brother he hadn’t noticed him running off into these haunted-ass woods? 

The lake slowly came into the view but it was empty. 

“Daniel? Dan?” 

The lake was weirdly normal, just muddy water and a few droopy looking frogs. Still, Sean was still on edge, swinging the heavy torch from hand to hand. The faster they got home, the better. 

His relative peace was interrupted by the rustling of tree branches and heavy footsteps. Daniel came barging through the trees, a small bundle of something wrapped in his checked shirt. Something was chasing him and fast- Sean barely had time to move out the way as Daniel crashed into him. Something big and fast ran past. 

“Sean!” Daniel threw himself into his arms. “I’m sorry, don’t yell at me.” 

“I’m not mad. But you did scare the shit out of me.” 

“Sean-” 

“Fine, you get a dollar, let’s just go-” 

“No, look.” 

Sean turned slowly, met with amber eyes and a large face of bark and weeds. The creature sniffed at him curiously. 

“Um-” 

Daniel hid behind him. “Any ideas?” 

“You have the stupid haunted book!” The creature snorted, blowing hot air in his face. “Wait, the book said-” Sean slowly moved for his pocket, finding Dad’s lighter. 

“Dan, on three, we run.” 

“One-” he reached for a branch, “two-” he flicked the lighter on, “three!” Sean held the flaming branch up the creature’s face, dragging Daniel out the way as it squirmed. “What, the light should have scared it off.” 

“Remember when you said you weren’t going to get mad?” 

Sean turned to him, as Daniel revealed the squirming mass of moss in his arms. 

“You stole it’s kid?” 

“I always wanted a puppy! She’s called Mushroom-” 

Seeing it’s child, the larger creature started inching slowly towards Daniel. 

“Put it down! We can’t keep this weird monster-baby!” 

“We bonded!” The larger creature nudged its nose towards the smaller one, poking his chest with a spikey horn. “Okay, I’ll give her back.” 

Daniel held out his arms, placing the small creature on the floor. It wiggled a loose vine that could almost be a tail and followed its parents into the woods. 

Sean punched him in the arm. “That’s for trying to adopt an actual monster.” 

Daniel rubbed his arm. “Ouch.” 

Sean pulled him into a hug. “And that’s for scaring the shit out of me. I’m glad you’re okay though.” 

“Me too.” Daniel smiled. “Hey, now you owe me two dollars!” 

  After all the excitement, the brothers’ settled on camping in Karen’s yard. 

“So, you found that spooky book in a tree and didn’t think to tell me?” 

“You were being the worst!” 

Sean laughed. “Okay, I deserve that. But, next time you find a weird monster thing, tell me. We’re in this together.” 

“Okay promise.” Daniel threw another marshmallow at him. “Sorry I made you miss your concert. I guess Cassidy wasn’t that bad.” 

“Hey, I saved your butt, that’s more important.” Sean took a bite out a s’more. “Hey, there isn’t anything else you’re not telling me right?” 

“Actually,” Daniel held out his hand, a marshmallow hoovering a few inches above his palm. “Surprise?” 

(A boring Summer suddenly looked so much more appealing.)

#Life is Strange 2 #Daniel Diaz #Sean Diaz #gravity falls #lis2

[sloven5905115]

Summer Time Chp. 2  Here Cums the Girls

Well as I was checking out the bank lines and waiting for Mark to return I reflected on just what had happened.I would have never imagined the feelings I had at that moment.I didnt know if I was gay or what but I couldnt deny that what me and Mark had done was probably the greatest thing I have ever done in my short life.As I sat there nursing my beer I relived the feeling of Marks cock in my mouth, hard yet velvety at the same time.And then the way Mark took me in the ass for the first time of my life.What ever happened next I knew that this would always be a time that I would remember for the rest of my life.Just as I was about to drift off to sleep I heard the unmistakable sound of Marks pickup, I got up to climb up the side of the river bank to help him carry the stuff down to the camp site.When I realized that Mark wasnt alone.He had brought his sister, Becky and her friend Karen.Now a little bit about the girls, both were 15 at this time and were basically glued at the hip, there was a lot of rumors going around about if the girls were lesbians.While both were about 52 , 53 with Karen being the taller by just the slightest amount.And since they were on the school track team they were about 115 lbs and rock solid physiques.Becky had a set of abs that most guys would love to have.Karen was black shoulder length hair with about large B cups with legs to die for, and Becky had strawberry hair that she kept fairly short and her breast were just a little bit larger than Karens.

Becky bounced out of the pickup and waved her arms at me shouting hi Jimmy,hows the fishing.I dont know why but I just hated being called Jimmy and Becky knew it but would say it all the time just to rub it in.So I gave her a hurt scowl look and she came up to me with that puppy dog look and kissed me on the cheek.Usually this is as far as it goes, it was becoming a private game between the two of us, but this time instead of saying there, there Jim it will be alrightshe surprised me by reaching around and grabbing my ass and whispering in my ear Mark told me everything.

I must have looked like I had be hit by a cattle prod at that news.I couldnt believe that Mark would have told anyone at all about what had happened earlier.For a minute I felt betrayed and hurt but, Becky leaned to my ear and said ‘not to worry stud Mark and I share every thing.At this she stepped back with a serious shit eating grin and I stood there looking like a dork, I was completely confused.She had never acted that way toward me, I used to be the neighbor hood geek now she was calling me stud.And what the hell was this share every thing shit.But before I could say anything Mark and Karen came up to us carrying some ice and more beer.

Well Jim did you catch any fish. asked Mark

I dont know about fish but if Jim doesnt close that mouth of his, hell sure as hell catch some flies. laughed Karen as they walked by.

Oh, by the way there is some food in the truck Jim why dont you get it for us. Mark said over his shoulder.

So, after I got the food and came down to the camp site I say Mark sitting next to Karen and Becky was on the other side of the fire and patted the ground next to her.Not being one to disappoint a lady I sat down next to Becky and she leaned on my shoulders.Now I know what most of you will think that the first thing I noticed was her tits or something like that, but, I just couldnt get passed how good this girl smelled.It wasnt overly perfumed or anything like that just a good clean smell.Well after a minute Becky looked up to me and said that this was the point when I was supposed to put my arm around her and hold her.I smiled down at her and held her.Even though me and Mark had just fucked holding Becky was just something that I knew I could get used to.Where Mark was hard teenage muscle Becky was firm but not too hard and her skin was so much softer.Well we sat there talking about school, summer and about anything else we could think of, and of course drinking beer.After a while Karen got up and grabbed Mark by the hand and led him off.

Now I wonder where those two are off to.I asked Becky.

She grabbed hold of my face and said to give us some privacy silly.At which she leaned forward and kissed me.I was a little shocked at first but, that lasted about a second and then I figured after what I had already done that to just go with the flow.So I reached around and held her and started to kiss her back.I guess in my eagerness I was to hard because the next thing I knew she pushed me back.whoa stud, when your kissing a girl you need to take your time.Just remember that ladies like to make love, guys like to fuck.So stud just take your time because we have all night.

I do have a question for you though.I said as I laid down next to her.

Whats that Jim

What did you mean when you said that you and Mark shared everything.

Well, lets just say that I havent been a very good girl.She said looking off into the distance.Im not sure why but all of a sudden Im kind of embarrassed by this.As she said that I sat up and looked at her with a confused look on my face and she reached up and grabbed my arm and said.Oh now Jim I dont mean you or this, its not you, its just , , , you see, , , well.Oh hell there isnt any easy way to say this so here it goes.Me and Mark have had sex together, it started one night we were kidding each other and he dared me to show him my pussy and I dared him to show me his cock.Well the next thing I know Im on my knees sucking him off and then he eats my pussy.Dont get me wrong he didnt rape me or anything it just kind of happened, but we have been doing it off and on since then.I even let him fuck me in the ass, good thing I was drunk that night or there is no way I would have done that, and I havent let him do it since.But there is one place he hasnt fucked me.

You mean your pussy is still cherry.I looked at her with disbelief, especially with everything that she had told me.

Yes it is, I know that this is going to sound silly but Ive had a crush on you for a long time.And I just knew that I wanted you to take my virginity.And when Mark fucked my ass that time I cried for a whole week knowing that I hadnt given you the chance.But you would hardly talk to me, so I thought that you didnt like me.After saying this she looked down and I knew she was about to start crying.

I lifted up her chin and gave her a pick on her forehead and told her Dont cry its partly my fault too.She looked at me with doubt and tears starting to form in the corner of her eyes.I thought that you didnt care for me and I was scared to ask you out. For fear that you would turn me down and make fun of me.

OH GOD, no Jim I wouldnt do that.I know that I have teased you in the past but that was child stuff and it will never happen again, I promise.Saying that she wrapped her arms around me and held on tight.After a moment I could hear her starting to quietly sob.I was so stupid to treat you that way, its all my fault.

As I was holding her close to me I said softly to her ear No its nobodies fault were just two young kids that didnt know what we were doing, but that is changed and now that we know how we feel toward each other things will be different.

Just hold me for now ok.

Sure anything that you want.So there we were two kids just holding each other after opening our hearts to each other.Now I know what your thinking what about what I had said to Mark, loving him and all that.At that time I wasnt really thinking of that, I figured that I would just have to sort that out later.After all Mark was probably fucking Karen right then at that moment.Then I felt Becky start to stir and rubbing her hand up and down my chest, I just laid back and enjoy the feeling then I felt her hand go for my waist band of my shorts.Reaching down I grabbed her hand and told her you dont have to do this to prove your feelings toward me.I dont want you to ever regret this moment.

She looked at me and it looked like she was about to cry again and I thought oh shit what did I say this time.Becky just looked at me and said that was the most beautiful thing you could say to me.I want to fuck you so much now you just dont know.She reached in my shorts and started to stroke my cock and said you know for being the cutest dork around you can say the smartest things.Smiling down at me she started to pull on my shorts so I help her out and took them off.Damn, not bad size and your young, I think with some care on my part it will grow some more.with that comment she leaned down and took my cock in her mouth.While Mark was able to take my cock completely in his mouth Becky was only able to take half before she started to gag and back off.But, what her mouth couldnt handle she stroked with her hand.So this is what making love feels like, I realized that what I thought was love with Mark was in reality just great sex between two guys.I looked down and watched her bob her head up and down on my cock and for a moment I could see a small tear running down her cheek but she wouldnt stop.I started to feel the sensation that told me I was about to cum so I put my hand on her head and told her, but she backed off and said no Jim I want this, I want all of it I never let Mark cum in my mouth but I want you everywhere.With that she returned to my cock and started to suck with more vigor.Then it hit me and I couldnt hold back anymore I arched my back and dug into the ground with my hands as I started to cum in Beckys mouth it must have been six or seven squirts and she tried to swallow it all but some came out of the corners of her mouth.I must have blacked out because the next thing I knew Becky was next to me with a look of contentment on her face.Welcome back to the living stud, you know Ive heard the other girls say how they like their boyfriends cum and now I know what they were talking about.

I gave her a big hug and told her well I guess its time for this gentleman to do his duty.with that I started to kiss my way down her neck and kissed her left nipple while I messaged her right breast.I kept nursing, for want of a better word, while stroking her body making a special effort to avoid her pussy area.I had read a story from Penthouse how that was supposed to drive a girl crazy and now I was going to find out if the guy knew what he was talking about. And so far it seemed like he did, because the more I suckled her breast and rubbed her body the more Becky started to squirm and beg me to touch her pussy.So finally I gave in and started to rub her pussy, at first I thought that she peed herself she was so wet.I kept working my way down kissing her everywhere, when I got to her belly button I put my tongue in and sucked.She jerked hard screaming how that wasnt fair to be making her feel like cumming and tickling her at the same time.But, I just smiled and kept on going, finally I got to her pussy.There was a muskiness to the smell but not bad I could get used to this, I thought.I ran my tongue up and down her slit and every once in awhile I would give her clit a suck.Then with outwarning my sweet petite Becky grabbed my hair on my head with the strength of a bull rider and clamped her legs around my head.For a minute I was wondering if she was going to let go but, then what a way to die LOL.Then all of a sudden she started to squirt her own juices in my mouth I tried to swallow but there was just too damn much fluid.

Finally she relaxed and I moved up and kissed her on her lips.Damn Jim where did you learn to do that, you been practicing on other girls.

NoI chuckled just a healthy dose of Penthouse Letters.

She cradled my head and stroked my hair and jokingly said Well thank God for pornography and maybe well have to write out own letter someday.But, first are you ready for the main event.

Are you sure.I mean I would love to but…..

Jimmy stop talking and get ready to make me your girlfriend, lover and best of all your woman.

You keep calling me that and Im going to have to spank you.

Promises, promises.she said laughing now lets get this done before I start thinking about it

Yes maam. with that I got between her legs and looked at her laying there.I moved up and placed my cock at her opening and started to move in when all of a sudden I hit something and she arched her back and put her hands on my chest.She was actually panting, I asked her if she was alright and if she wanted me stop.But she shock her head and said wait so I stayed in the same position and she said now.So I leaned into her.I could tell by her face that it was hurting her and was about to stop when all of a sudden I broke through.

Becky arched her back and screamed, OOOOOHHH GOD THAT HURTS.I was scared that I had done something wrong and started to pull out when she grabbed me and shouted for me to stop moving and just let her get used to it.So that is what we did and after a while I started to move in and out of her and she said that it was ok, and that it was actually starting to feel better by the minute.So I started to work myself in and out of her, her pussy felt so good around my cock that I never wanted out.I was thinking then that what I did with was Mark was nice but this was even better.So I kept up and I even started to pick up speed.Becky started to grind her pussy on my cock and telling me how good my cock felt in her pussy.Then all to soon that feeling came over me and I knew I was about to cum when I said I should pull out and not cum inside her, Becky wrapped her legs around me and said No you dont I want your cum inside me, dont you dare pull out Jim, if you do Ill never forgive you.So stop thinking and just fuck the shit out of me. Ooh God that feels better and better.Dont stop fucking me Im going to cu……with that she stiffened and I felt her juices on my cock and that sent me over the edge and I shot my load in her pussy.There we were two teenagers whose bodies were locked in a missionary position our bodies spasmingwith the pleasure of youth.Finally the feelings subsided and we parted and laid side be side and just sat there enjoying the afterglow of great sex.

It was only a couple of minutes when I heard noises and looked up and I saw Mark and Karen walking toward us.The first thing I noticed was that they were both naked and I could see cum running down Karens leg look Mark I think theyre finally doneKaren said with a smile on her face.

Yea they sure did take their time, for a minute I thought I was going to have to fuck you again.Mark joked while he had a finger in Karens ass.

Now stud that wouldnt be so bad would it.Besides the way she was screaming I wont be surprised if the sheriff doesnt show up.Hey Becky how about you let me have a go at Jim and see how he is. Karen asked Becky.

I dont think so Karen, at least not for awhile but right now I want to keep him all to myself and that means you big brother.You keep your hands off of him.Becky said while we were still laying on the ground with me on my back and her with her right arm and right leg draped over me.I do know one thing and that is I need to cool off.So Jim get your but up and lets jump into the river and cool off for awhile.

With that she stood up and grabbed my hand and led me off to the river.While heading to the water I heard Mark tell Karen What did I tell you

Youre right Mark they do look like a cute couple.But, you know what Im going to miss most.

Whats that Karen.

That sweet pussy of your sisters.

I looked at Becky and she just gave me that impish smile of hers and said Ill tell you laterI cant wait for that story

https://curvage.org/forum/index.php?/forums/topic/55079-new-fan-of-curvy/

https://forum.codeigniter.com/thread-79016.html

https://www.immihelp.com/forum/usa-visitors-visa/758499-reenter-after-extended-stay

http://forum.canardpc.com/threads/130465-%D1%81hoix-carte-mere?p=13356373

https://www.planete-citroen.com/forum/showthread.php?208758-Leve-vitre

https://forum.primefaces.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=66424

https://community.apachefriends.org/f/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=80685

https://www.ramforumz.com/threads/4wd-serv-light.282132

https://forum.outerspace.com.br/index.php?threads/recomenda%C3%A7%C3%B5es-de-hardware.240712/page-812#post-18831521

https://www.nissanclub.com/threads/2015-altima-acceleration.521820/

[chalantness]

fic: When the Lights Come Up

Rating: M Word Count: ~3200 Characters: Steve/Natasha Summary: I’ve been waiting for you all along, Steve had told her, down on his knee. Because that life you wanted me to get? It starts with you. I think it always has.

A/N: HAPPY (belated) ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY TO AVENGERS: ENDGAME!

I don't really know what this is, I just know that I saw this fanart on my dash and went a little crazy! This is also loosely inspired by a prompt sent in by an anon about Steve secretly knowing Russian. The way I ended up using it is different from the actual prompt, but I hope that anon still enjoys this anyway if they read it!

With that being said, I completely relied on this post and this article for the translations, so I apologize in advance if anything isn't accurate. I did not take a lot of time to cross-reference since I hadn't planned on writing this so quickly, so please feel free to correct me if you feel comfortable doing so.

Read On: [ ao3 ]

It’s strange how something can feel familiar and new all at once.

Natasha wonders if she should feel some small, lingering sense of wariness as her gaze drifts across the room, taking in all of the chatter and laughter as it floats through the air. The last time she’d stood behind this same bar at a party almost exactly like this one, it had ended in a fight, just as it always seems to. Every single thing on this floor may look as it always has, but Natasha knows that it’s been ripped and shattered and repaired. Natasha knows the fallout that happened that night, in this very room, had led to a lot of lives lost and almost the fall of an entire country in a blink—and yet, here they are again, gathered like they’ve done dozens of times before, and there’s nothing melancholic at all about a room full of people laughing and drinking and celebrating despite the fallout that had once happened here. Just as there’s nothing melancholic about walking through the streets of neighborhoods that’d been rebuilt and breathed back to life, even though, just a year ago, they’d sat vacant and haunted by the ghosts of everyone that was lost.

There’s only light, and warmth, and something that feels suspiciously like hope.

“Well, doesn’t this scene look familiar,” a voice muses, and Natasha turns to find Tony sitting himself on one of the barstools on the other side of the counter. “You know, if you’re looking for some extra cash, I can always hire you back on as my assistant. No need to get all my guests drunk just to squeeze a bigger tip out of them.”

Natasha smirks. “I was more Pepper’s assistant than yours,” she points out, “considering you were a little too preoccupied with your downward spiral.”

“In my defense, I was dying,” he reminds, and she really, really shouldn’t want to laugh at that, of all things. But she catches his gaze, sees her own amusement reflected in his eyes as his grin widens, and she can’t quite help the giggle that spills from her lips over the absurdity of this, of them and the two of them joking about death when, a year ago, that had been exactly their fate. “I’m surprised that Steve’s even let you out of his sight in a dress like that,” Tony adds, scrunching his face as he continues, almost in the same breath, “and I promise that sounded classier in my head than it did out loud.” Tony holds both hands up as if in surrender, and Natasha smirks as she shakes her head at him.

“The only reason I’m still in this dress is because I’ve been out of Steve’s sight,” she says, feeling her smirk widen as Tony groans loudly.

“Okay, okay, enough.” He squints his eyes at her in a playful. “You know, when I said Steve should surprise you by picking out a dress, I knew it was going to backfire on me but I went and opened my big mouth, anyway. I guess self-sabotaging is a hard habit to shake. Then again,” he pauses, pointedly shifting his gaze to her hand, “maybe not.”

Natasha follows his stare, flexing her fingers out as the diamond on her ring glitters under the glow of the lights. “Maybe not,” she agrees.

“It’s nice, huh? The quiet life.” Tony’s gaze shifts from up from her engagement ring to meet her stare, his grin fading into something softer. “You know, I was a little worried at first. That you wouldn’t know how to put the suit away for good.”

“I don’t think any of us puts them away for good,” she points out gently. “It’s just not how we’re wired. You came back, didn’t you?”

“I did.” His smile hitches at the corner. “The difference is that I walked away to begin with. So did Steve, a little bit. We may not have been talking, but I knew Cap gave his suit a chance to collect dust for five years while you handled operations on your own.” He hesitates, holding her stare, but she gives him a small smile and a nod and he nods back as he goes on. “Of course, I can’t give Steve all the credit. He wasn’t exactly trying to move on, even if that’s what he preached once a week during all those meetings he ran. But that part wasn’t too surprising.” Something somber flashes in Tony’s eyes, but it’s gone with a blink, his smile widening. “There was no way Steve was moving on without you.”

Natasha smiles, a warmth fluttering in her chest as she glances back down at her ring.

I’ve been waiting for you all along, Steve had told her, down on his knee. Because that life you wanted me to get? It starts with you. I think it always has.

“He’s always been a stubborn man,” Natasha quips, and if Tony notices her voice quivering ever so slightly, he doesn’t point it out.

“He has to be if he wants to have any hope of keeping up with you,” Tony retorts, and Natasha breathes out a laugh, shaking her head. There’s a small pause, and then, softly, Tony adds, “You know you two are welcome to stay as long as you want. Stay forever. Morgan will become a nightmare if you ever leave our guest bedroom.”

Natasha laughs again, her chest squeezing as she glances across the room at where Morgan is running around with Lila and Nathaniel. It’s ridiculous, really, the pang of reluctance that hits her whenever she thinks about not seeing that little girl at the table for breakfast every morning. The feeling is made even more ridiculous when you consider that she and Steve are building their home on the same lake as Tony and Pepper, only a few dozen meters away from their cabin. They’ll practically still live together, anyway—and no, that hadn’t even been in the plan. They knew staying in the guest bedroom was only temporary, but, after only a couple of weeks, she and Steve simply couldn’t picture living anywhere else. Briefly, she and Steve had considered renting a place to stay during construction, but Tony and Pepper shot down that idea without a second of hesitation.

“Morgan will adapt,” Natasha points out, one eyebrow arched at Tony as she grins. “And you will, too, even if you’re nearly as stubborn as me when it comes to change.”

“Okay, you got me,” he chuckles, holding his hands up for a moment before tapping his knuckles on the bar, grinning at her. “It’s been tolerable, though, right? Camping out in our guest bedroom?”

Natasha smiles. “It’s been great, Tony,” she tells him. “We may be moving out eventually, but you can’t get rid of us that easily.”

Tony smirks, but rather than a quip in response, he simply nods. “Good.” He taps the bar again, sliding off of the barstool and onto his feet, and now there’s a playful sort of glint in his eyes as he leans in and adds, his voice low, “By the way, you might have everyone else fooled by being back here, but don’t think I didn’t notice that congratulations are in order.” Natasha narrows her eyes at him ever so slightly as he draws away, but she doesn’t quite fight her own smirk as his widens back at her. “I’m surprised Steve kept quiet.”

Natasha rubs her lips together, but Tony just winks and turns to walk away before she can respond, heading over to where Pepper is sitting with Laura and Maria.

Somehow, she’s not surprised.

Natasha feels herself smiling as she shakes her head, her gaze drifting over the crowd, and she hopes she never, ever stops getting that little burst of warmth that rolls down her spine when she catches Steve’s gaze. He’s across the room, almost facing away from her where he, Wanda, and Scott are at the pool tables, but he glances over his shoulder the moment she finds, his lips hitching up into that crooked, boyish smile she loves. He leans off of the pool table, turning to Wanda and Scott to excuse himself, and Natasha feels a flutter in her chest as he crosses the room and stops in front of her. He holds his hand out, and his thumb brushes over the band of her ring when she slips her palm against his.

“What did Tony want to talk about?” Steve asks as he brings her hand up to his lips, brushing a kiss to her knuckles.

“He wanted to congratulate us,” she answers, one eyebrow raised. Steve blinks, surprise flitting across his expression only for a second before it shifts into a grin.

“Of course,” he breathes out with a laugh, rubbing his thumb in a circle over the back of her hand. He doesn’t seem even a little bit bothered by this revelation. Instead, his grin softens into a smile as he gestures with a nod of his head toward one of the doors leading to the balcony. “Let’s get some air?”

She nods, letting him guide her out from behind the bar, and he pulls her against the warmth of his chest when they step outside. It’s definitely still cold out, but with summer only a few weeks away, it’s already starting to feel warmer outside. Natasha doesn’t doubt that they’ll spend most evenings in their new house, out on the patio just like this. It’ll be a matter of days before they’ll officially be done with construction, and by the time they get moved in and settled down, it’ll be warm enough to enjoy the lake behind them.

She feels him press his lips against the top of her head, his hand drifting across her shoulder and down her neckline, her skin almost entirely bared from the thin straps and tastefully low neckline of her dress. She shivers lightly against the touch, tipping her head up to meet his gaze as his hand splays against her stomach. She’s only barely starting to feel the tiny bump of her stomach, and she’s definitely not close enough for anyone other than Steve to see, but the high waist of her dress would’ve hidden it well, anyway.

“How are you feeling?”

She covers his hand with hers. “I’m good, I promise.”

“Yeah?” He starts stepping back, gently tugging her with him as he pulls her further onto the balcony. “You don’t need anything from me?” he asks, one eyebrow arched as they round the corner. Natasha breathes out a laugh as he guides her back against the wall, tucking them out of sight from the door as he steps into her space.

He pushes a hand into her hair, tangling his fingers into the curls as she bites on her lower lip. “No,” she answers.

“No?” His other hand curves around her waist as he breathes out a chuckle, hovering his mouth over hers. She slips her hands under his blazer, splays her hands against his chest through the thin material of his dress shirt as she stretches on her toes, ghosting her lips against his. “Nothing at all?”

“Nope.” She nips at his lower lip. “What about you, soldier?” She leans away, just a little, and blinks up at him from under her eyelashes. “Do you need anything from me?”

His eyes seem even darker, somehow, and the hand at her hip squeezes her gently. “Mozhno ya tebya poceluyu?”

Can I kiss you?

Natasha’s heart skips in her chest, her breath hitching as can practically feel the cadenced syllables brushing across her skin, sending a tingle down her spine.

She blinks, swaying back ever so slightly, but Steve steps closer, practically pressing her between him and the wall. “Steve?” she asks with a whisper.

“This may be one of the only times I’ll ever be able to surprise you,” he says, his eyes glinting, practically twinkling like the city lights glowing somewhere over his shoulder. He ducks his head, presses his face against her cheek, and each word is almost a kiss against her skin as he says, “Ya obozhaju tebya.” She feels him smile. “Ya tebya lyublyu.”

I adore you. I love you.

She exhales a sharp breath, reaching up to cup his face with her hands. “Steve.”

“I just started learning,” he tells her, brushing his knuckles against her cheek, no doubt feeling the warmth of the blush just under her skin. “I don’t know if you want to teach them the language, but if you do, I want to be a little prepared. I want our child to adore every part of you, because it’ll be part of them, too.”

She strokes her thumbs over his jaw, her vision blurring ever so slightly at the edges as she breathes out a shaky laugh. She can feel her heart thrumming against her ribcage, feel her skin tingling where his thumb is smoothing in circles over the pulse in her neck, and she stretches up and brushes her lips against his. “Poceluy menya,” she murmurs—kiss me—practically pleading it against his mouth, and he does, slanting his lips over hers and making a low noise from the back of his throat as his tongue sweeps past her lips. His hand slides down from her neck, fingers splaying over the bared skin of her back as he pulls her off of the wall and presses her against his chest, kissing her even deeper.

He may say that she’s the hard one to surprise, but Steve is always the one that surprises her, the one that always sends a thrill down her spine.

He kisses her right there on the balcony until she’s breathless, until she’s hazy and heady with the want, feeling flushed against the cold air of the night – and she doesn’t care that there’s a party on the other side of this wall, and she definitely doesn’t care someone may notice that they’re gone.

And she knows that Steve doesn’t care about any of that, either, when he pulls away from their kiss with a sharp inhale and murmurs, right into her ear: “Ya tebya hochu.”

I want you.

She feels a little frantic when she nods, her hands coming between them, reaching for his belt, but he gently bats them away, kissing the side of her jaw, the pulse in her neck, the dip between her breasts just above the neckline of her dress as he lowers himself onto his knees in front of her. He pauses for a moment, pressing a softer, sweeter kiss to the flat of her stomach through the silky fabric of her dress, and she pushes on of her hands into his hair, twisting her fingers into it as he glances up at her with a smile. It’s soft at first, but only for a moment, and then he’s smirking, his eyes glinting as he gathers the skirt of her dress in his hands and pushes it up her thighs. She twists her fingers into the fabric, holding it up for him as his head dips underneath, and she feels the heat of his mouth right before it’s against her, his tongue licking at her through her lace panties.

She lets out a shaky breath, her head falling back against the wall.

He pulls one of her legs over his shoulder, presses one hand to brace her against the wall as the other tugs aside the front of her panties, and then his tongue is lapping at her again, his lips finding her clit and sucking gently, and she feels her body quiver as she curls forward.

She can’t quite roll her hips against him like this, can’t tug on his hair with her hands holding her dress up, and she wonders if that’s why he’s done this to her a few dozen times before and yet, this feels a little bit more—more intense and more consuming and just more, oh god, it’s so much more.

She bites down on her lower lip as he rubs the tip of his tongue against her clit, circling, just as he always does when he knows she’s close, and she thinks she nearly draws blood in her effort to stifle her cry as she tips over that dizzying edge. He continues lapping at her, soothing her nerves as her orgasm bursts through her, until she’s mewling and breathing out his name. He kisses the inside of her thigh, keeping her trembling body braced against the wall for balance as he pulls himself back up, and she tightens her hold on her dress with one hand as the other grasps at his tie and pulls him forward for a kiss. “Lyubimiy,” she murmurs against his mouth, earning a low groan in response.

My beloved.

“Rodnaya,” he whispers, making her chest tighten as he presses his body against hers. My dear. “I’ll be gentle, love,” he promises, hooking an arm around her, and she breathes out a laugh as he lifts her up, her legs going around his waist as he hitches her higher against the wall.

She can feel him pressing at her entrance, can feel her bundle of nerves ache with want as she winds her arms around his neck. “Maybe not too gentle,” she says, feeling him chuckle as she slants her mouth against his, and she nearly bites down on his lower lip as he pulls her body against his, slipping into her and filling her as best as she can from this angle, in this position. It’s not the first or even fifteenth time they’ve done something like this, but each time is just as thrilling as the first as he starts moving against her.

She’s not quite sure how it’s possible to know exactly how her body fits against his, to know that they’ll always move in sync, no matter what—and yet, it still sends a shiver of surprise through her when she can feel him against her, inside of her, touching every part of her.

“Ya tebya lyublyu,” she breathes, kissing him and whispering it again, and again, and again, her body trembling and tightening around his as he moves faster, harder.

I love you.

She gasps as he hits that spot inside of her that sends a white-hot burst of heat through her veins, and she whimpers against his mouth as he stifles her cry with another kiss as she falls over the edge again. This time, she can feel him inside of her, throbbing against her as he chases his own high, and it drags out her pleasure as it bursts through her. He groans lowly, kissing her harder, deeper, his hips stuttering, and then he’s following her over that edge, her lungs starting to burn from how deep and hard he’s kissing her.

It’s a long moment until Steve hums softly, breaking their kiss and letting her catch her breath as he presses his lips against the corner of her mouth.

“Nat.” He kisses her cheek, the bridge of her nose, and then he pulls back, smiling down at her as her eyelashes flutter open. He reaches up with one hand, tucking a few errant strands of her hair behind her ear before dipping it down between them, pressing his palm to her stomach. “You still okay?” he asks softly.

“We’re perfect,” she tells him, curving her hand over his, brushing her thumb against his ring like he loves to do to hers, and Steve is smiling as he brushes his lips against hers in another kiss.

#romanogers #steve rogers #natasha romanoff #chanty writes #chanty's smut #let me just................. drop this here and run #i'm sorry i'm such a liar because i just said i was taking a break and then THIS HAPPENED

[one-spidey-boii]

BUMMER SUMMER || peter parker; ch three

read ch two here

masterlist

an; heya, happy friday. :)

**italics indicates flashback**

warnings; mentions of battle wounds (i.e. blood/scars/etc), future smut, mature language, fluff, angst, both peter and oc are 18+!!

word count; 2.6k+

edie's pov

pulling up to the compound is nerve-wracking, to say the least. this place is the home of so many valuable items and pieces of technology. to be put in charge of those things is something i don't take lightly. i just hope to make tony proud.

we pull into the underground garage and he helps me take my bags out of the backseat. he goes to pick up my weapons bag and stumbles when he lifts it.

"oh- damn. this thing is heavy. what do you have in here? rocks?" he questions with a chuckle to throw me off the obvious fact he’s struggling. i grab the bag from him and sling it around my shoulder with ease.

"it's just all of my knives, a few throwing stars, my suit, some-" i begin to say but he cuts me off.

"okay okay, stop that. it was rhetorical. get in the building." he leads me to the fingerprint password protected door. "give me your thumb." he demands.

i stretch my hand out to him as he grabs my thumb and presses it against the touchscreen pad that was next to the door. after touching a few buttons and scanning my thumb, he continues, "there ya go. you now have access to almost every room in the compound. don't be stupid with it." he pointes a finger at me playfully.

with that i nod and follow him into the compound and up the stairs that take us to the main level. he gives me a quick tour of the place and makes a point to remind me of all the things i'm not allowed to touch.

finally, we stop in front of a cream-colored door and he turns around to face me.

"here's your room. do with it what you want," he says with a smile and steps out of my way. i open the door to a completely white room with white walls and bedspread and curtains and-

"i figured i'd leave you a blank slate so that you could...i don't know, be creative?" he explains, "okay, see ya. i'll give you a holler when the kid gets here."

peter's pov

aunt may had just finished hugging me to death when i hear a honk from the street below us. i squirm away from her arms and grab her hands.

"may, i gotta go now. i'll see you soon." i say with a sad smile, knowing she’ll be miserable wondering if i’m okay every second of the day. she nods at me and mouthes 'i love you' as i slip out the apartment door.

happy sits in the car, anxious to get going as i scramble to get everything in the trunk. i slam it shut and make my way to the passenger seat. as soon as i grab the handle, the door locks and happy gave me a stern look as he rolls the window down to speak.

"no way, in the back," he says as he nods to the back seat with his head. i try to argue but he’s already rolling the window back up. i groan while hopping into the back seat and put my headphones in before resting my head against the window.

-

once we reach the compound, happy parks the car and begins to make his way to the door, leaving me to get all my bags. he tells me to hurry up with a small smile on his face, which tells me he’s just messing with me.

he still makes me carry it all myself though.

i practically trip in the doorway and all my things fall to the ground. mr. stark appears in front of me with a smug look and his arms behind his back.

"glad you could make it, parker. don't worry about the bags, happy will get them," he says as he turns and begins walking away. i notice happy out of the corner of my eye and stick my tongue out at him teasingly. he gives me a dirty look.

mr. stark pulls me out of my antics as he clears his throat. i whirl around to look at him and offer a sheepish smile.

"okay, kid. let's get down to business," he says but before he can continue, i rush to speak, unable to contain myself anymore.

"where should i sleep? do you even want me to sleep? considering i have to be alert to take out the bad guys? hey, can i bring my friend ned over some time? or could i get a dog? it's probably gonna get a little lonely here." i spew out with one big breath.

mr. stark gives me a weird stare before a look of realization crosses his face. "oh. oh. i didn't tell you, did i?" he asks as if he's surprised he let this information slip his mind. i cock my head at him as a sign to continue.

"you're not doing this alone. i recruited someone else to stay here too," he says with a serious face. my own face falls at his words. of course he didn't trust me enough to leave me here alone. he probably got some old person friend to keep an eye on me and tell me what to do. i have to admit though, the idea of not having to be here for three months all by myself is kinda nice.

"hey now, don't jump to conclusions. it's not some old person." he continues on with a smirk. i swear he can read minds. i walk over to the couch and throw myself onto it face first. "in fact, i think you might like her. wolfie, come on in." he calls through the room.

my ears perk at the sound of my best friend's nickname, but immediately push it aside when i remember she left for that summer camp this morning. and she also isn't the type of person tony stark would ask to protect his compound. i don't even think he knows who she is.

soft footsteps make their way into the living room, along with an off-key voice singing the spiderman theme song. i raise my head off the couch to catch a glance at the owner of the poor singing voice.

"spiderman, spiderman, does what ever a spid- peter?"

oh shit.

-

edie's pov.

hell no. no part of my body is willing to accept what i am witnessing in front of me. not only am i pissed off that i've never been told about this not-so-little secret—the one that means my best friend is the spiderman- but this bitch decided to lie to me about this whole entire summer, thinking he could just 'go on vacation.'

"what the heck, edie?" peter yells as he flings himself up from the couch. "this isn't summer camp! what are you doing here?" he asks while flailing his arms in the air.

his angry face is a shock to me. i’ve never seen my best friend get so worked up about anything before. it takes me a second before i can regain my composure. and then i just get mad.

"me? what are you doing here, parker?" i shout back at him with the same amount of energy and annoyance. i take a few steps into the room and towards him before a hand is placed on my shoulder.

"okay, yeah, i know that look. why don't you stop right there, kid." tony says as he steps in between peter and i.

"sorry, mr. stark." i say in complete unison with another voice. my head snaps back to peter and my mouth falls open in disbelief.

"hey, hey, hey, he was talking to me." i say with a pointed finger at peter's chest.

"no. no, no. he calls me kid." he replies with a pout.

tony rolls his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose, "you're both children, especially at this very moment. there, are you happy?"

peter and i look at each other with fire in our eyes. his expression falters for a second before he regains his anger. i try to search for what the other emotion was, but can't find anything behind his stern gaze.

"let's just take a seat, okay? how about that?" tony continues and leads us to the couch.

i plop myself onto the couch with a huff and cross my arms over my chest. peter sits down on the complete opposite end, mirroring my expression. tony takes a seat on the coffee table in front of us.

"i really thought you guys would be more excited, seeing as you are best friends." tony says with a smirk.

peter looks at me and back at tony, "wait you knew that we know each other?" he says and straightens his posture a little bit.

"clearly you guys don't know each other as well as you thought." tony snickers, "listen, you're both here for a reason. hash it out and come find me later."

with that he stands up, gives us each a pat on the head and strolls off to who knows where.

peter and i both watch him walk away, focusing on mr. stark's retreating frame for as long as we can before it turns weird. i slowly shift my head to face forward, too stubborn to make the first move. and of course, peter being the good guy he is, begins to talk.

"what's going on, e?" he asks softly. i keep my gaze forward and fiddle with my fingers. he turns his body to face mine and waits for an answer.

this was all just a big clusterfuck. i'm furious with peter. for lying and for feeling like he can't tell me something so important to him. but i'm one to talk, i guess. how can i be mad when i've done the exact same thing to him?

i'm pulled out of my thoughts when peter's finger pokes me on the side of my face. i swat his hand away and force myself to look at him.

"i'm sorry." i whisper.

peter softens at that and returns my gesture, "me too."

after a few seconds, i continue, "who knew my best friend was the amazing spiderman?" i say with a small chuckle. he gives me a smile and shrugs his shoulders.

"i guess i am pretty amazing." he gloats. we both laugh and then return to silence.

i know he's going to ask about me and what capabilities i have that make me worthy of being here. to be honest, i’ve always been confident in my abilities, until now. we all know why peter is here. he has heightened reflexes and healing. he can shoot actual webs from his fancy wrist bands and scale buildings and swing from place to place.

i, however, can do none of those superhuman things. i'm just good at throwing sharp objects. but if that's enough for tony stark to take me under his wing then i guess i have nothing to worry about. right?

i decide to answer the question looming over his head and stand up from the couch. i stick out my hand for him to take and gesture for him to get up.

"wanna see some of my tricks?" i chirp. he smiles and takes my hand.

but before we can go anywhere, i grab his arm and flip his body over my head, making him slap the ground hard with his back. he lands with a grunt and looks up at me with shock. i double over with laughter and poke fun at the flustered boy.

"i'm sorry, i'm sorry. let me help you up." i choke out between laughs and grab his outstretched hand. with one heave i pull him up onto his feet with ease, which seemed to surprise him more.

"you're...weirdly strong," he comments with an uneasy look on his face. i just shrug and turn to go grab my goodie bag from my room.

-

peter's pov.

i find myself standing in the training room, practicing my dodges and agility as i wait for edie to come back with her things. i'm trying to keep my head clear and thoughts open.

i have to admit, all of this is just a tad overwhelming. figuring out i'm not going to be here alone, and the person i'm going to be spending my summer with is my best friend— who is badass enough to flip me over her shoulder? i mean, i knew she was great, but this is, well, unexpected.

as far as the lies go, there's nothing i can do about that. i’m calling it all even at this point.

footsteps enter the room and stop abruptly. "why are you wearing your suit?" a voice sounds off behind me.

i flip around and stare at edie, who is dressed in workout clothes. i glance down at myself and shrug playfully.

"it's the first time you get to see spiderman and know who's underneath the mask." i say as i do a princess twirl in front of her. "where's your fancy getup?"

she huffs and drops a bag onto the ground with a loud thud. with curiosity taking over my thoughts, i walk over to her and poke around at her bag.

"hey, what's in here-? ow!" i exclaim as i rub the back of my head. "why'd you do that?"

"i'll put my suit on if you stop trying to touch my stuff." edie responds as she tries to hide a smile.

i flop onto my back and nod, albeit a little defeated. she rustles around in her bag before leaving the room.

i stare at the ceiling, sprawled out across the floor. i can't help but smile to myself at the thought of this summer. staying in the avengers compound with edie is something i could have never thought up myself. yet here we are, feeling all happy and cheesy like a bad movie.

"okay, parker. let's do this."

i push myself to my feet and almost choke when i see edie standing in front of me. the suit she has on is completely black and slim-fitting and she looks good. i can only dream that that's how i look in my suit. like that, but yanno, manly.

then it dawns on me. i've seen a girl in this suit before. the other night, with those three guys. and she kicked their assess. i have to admit, i'm even more proud to call her my best friend after seeing that.

"so you're the knife girl, huh?" i tease. she mocks me with a laugh and in an instant, she's pulling two knives out of her waistband and chucks one at me with no hesitation.

i shoot a web up to the rafters in the ceiling and swing out of the way of her attack.

"ha ha. missed me, missed me, now you gotta ki- woah!" i try to tease her but she's already flinging her second knife at me. with a last-minute dodge, i turn around to see the knife an inch from my head.

"if i wanted to hit you, i would have." edie taunts with a smirk.

i smile at the girl on the ground below me, thankful she can't see my giddy face underneath the mask. i hop down to her level and cross my arms, "so you obviously don't like 'knife girl'. do you even have a cool superhero name, wolfie?"

she seems to be stuck in thought for a moment before answering me with a shrug, "i'm sure i can come up with something better than spiderman."

|| wanna be on the taglist? drop a comment y’all

taglist; @my-patronus-is-mabel-pines

#marvel #peter parker #tom holland fanfiction #peter parker imagine #the devil all the time #spiderman far from home #spiderman #peter parker x oc #peter parker fluff #tom holland smut #peter parker smut #peter parker angst #tom holland #tom holland angst #tom holland fluff #iron man #tony stark #avengers #spiderman homecoming #cherry #tom holland cherry #tom holland chaos walking #bummer summer #original character #peter parker fanfiction #happy hogan #avengers endgame #tommo hollandy #fanfic #shoutout to tom holland

[londonspirit]

Occasionally, Dan Levy will pick up his phone and send a text: “Can you believe it?” These messages are sent to Annie Murphy or Noah Reid or Emily Hampshire or Karen Robinson, former inhabitants of Schitt’s Creek, titular town of the series Levy co-created with his identically-browed father, Eugene. What Levy can’t quite believe is that a CBC and Pop network show that aired in the U.S. after reruns of The Young and the Restless became a no-shit international phenomenon and won every major 2020 comedy Emmy from Outstanding Series to Outstanding Contemporary Costumes, plus awards for the show’s four main cast members: Levy, Levy the elder, Murphy, and Catherine O’Hara.

Not that Levy has any qualms about the best thing that’s ever happened to him. Or, more accurately, the best thing he’s ever made happen: In addition to creating, writing, and starring as skeptical scion David Rose on Schitt's Creek, Levy occasionally directed episodes and sourced many of the award-winning costumes. But the endless wretchedness of 2020 is perhaps an inopportune time to publicly garner good fortune.

“What this year has done has opened so many people's eyes to so much of the social unrest that is happening in America and really forced people to learn more,” Levy says, sitting in the bland Toronto apartment the 37-year-old is temporarily renting until he can head back to LA. “Read more. Educate themselves more. Check their privilege more. And yet…” Levy’s magnificent eyebrows unfold from a furrow of probity to an arch of delight, and his mouth into a crooked tilde of a smile. “There are moments when I think it is important for your sense of self to also be OK to say, ‘Something good happened to me this year, and I worked really hard for it.’ And so did a group of really talented people that I love. You're kind of caught in this place where only you can talk about it amongst yourselves.” Levy’s conversations with his co-stars are couched in language familiar to anyone who doesn’t want to give off the vibe of an Instagram caption on a pandemic birthday trip to a private island: "Well, obviously, you know, this is not of much significance" compared to everything else that’s going on. Still, Levy has to acknowledge that, yes, a good thing did happen; after all, he says, “You're talking about breaking records at the Emmys!”

Since he began social distancing, Levy has engaged in something like a fame-offset program, matching his good fortune by taking, publicizing, and raising money for University of Alberta’s online Indigenous Canada course. Levy’s queasiness about his success happening with a 2020 backdrop seems to stem from goodness so pervasive he’s caught himself thinking, Am I going to seem too, like, sincere? (When I ask if he believes he’s a good person, Levy frets, “Is being a good person something you can proclaim? Or is being a good person something that someone has to observe about you?”)

And Schitt’s Creek itself is an oasis of kindness — it doesn’t seem coincidental that after a slow five-season ascent, the show’s viewership exploded in its final year as we quarantined with our own bad thoughts. Levy has said that the arc of the Rose family — a “Balenciaga” to “consignment Balenciaga” to “back to current season Balenciaga” story — is based on the question, “Would the Kardashians still be the Kardashians without their money?” To Levy, the answer is obvious: Yes, and they would be better for it because, he says, “There is a love to that family.” So of course when the Roses lose the fortune amassed from a video rental empire and are forced to move to a Canadian town purchased as a novelty gift, they learn what truly matters.

Levy’s father and collaborator, Eugene, who co-wrote Christopher Guest films Best In Show and A Mighty Wind, says, “There are people who work in the world of comedy where they like to push envelopes in terms of what they can get away with, but that may come at the expense of other people. If it's at all important to you to avoid then you, you know, avoid it.” With the notable exception of programs like The Great British Bake Off — Levy, naturally, used to host the Canadian iteration — it is quite a bit more difficult to be entertaining and kind than entertaining and cruel. But Dan Levy attributes some of Schitt’s Creek’s success to what he calls “a purity to the storytelling and the show that caught people off guard because it was so unexpectedly sincere.” “There was something badass about the fact that it didn't have the kind of edge that people had often equated with cable comedies,” he says.

Making Schitt’s Creek a source of goodness and light was an unrelenting crush for Levy. “How much anger and rage do I have to repress in order to get the light out?” he says, laughing and stroking his elderly dog, Redmond, so vigorously I worry about ginger fur getting on Levy’s David Rose-appropriate black and white JW Anderson T-shirt. “Um, at times a lot.”

When Levy was working on Schitt’s Creek, he was picked up every morning at 5 a.m. and driven to set, where he would rehearse and rewrite scenes. Next was making decisions about sets and wardrobe fittings for cast members like O’Hara. Moira Rose, the actor mother of Levy’s character with a grandeur as flamboyant as her choice of syllable emphasis, might have to go to meet someone who makes her feel exposed. Levy would supervise an outfit selection that functioned as a billboard for her emotional state. “How do you express vulnerability?” Levy asks. “Well, you put more clothes on, and more aggressive clothes on, so as to armor yourself.” Levy needed to approve budgets, which didn’t increase even as the show gained more attention. He would act and sometimes direct, and then be back in wardrobe picking out the right statement necklaces for O’Hara to wear to buy a used car.

After filming ended, Levy went to the writers’ room to work for a couple more hours. He’d get home at 8 p.m., quickly eat dinner, and write until 2 a.m. on some nights. Then he’d sleep for two hours and get in the car to go back to work at 5 a.m. When shooting wrapped for the year, Levy went into post-production, spending months in windowless rooms. Once a season was finally completed, preparation would begin for the next one. Levy charged himself with making sure every detail connected to each other and tracked with the personal histories he and Eugene had written for each character before the series began. Eugene can remember only one deviation from those bios during the entire run of the show. Originally, the father of motel employee Stevie had been a roadie for Fleetwood Mac before receiving a restraining order from the band; the detail was later transferred to the father of diner waitress Twyla, who was played by Levy’s sister, Sarah. Several times during the run of the series, Levy developed anxiety so literally paralyzing that his neck would seize up, forcing him to wear a brace and receive chiropractic treatments between scenes.

“Through every phase of Schitt's Creek,” Eugene says, “Dan had a very strong sense as to what it was he wanted the show to look like and what he wanted it to sound like and what the tone of the show was going to be and what the message of the show would be. He certainly makes himself responsible to make these things happen. He doesn't go with the flow at all.”

Total control let Levy create a perfectly realized world, from the menu size in the Café Tropical to the caws in Moira’s comeback film The Crows Have Eyes III: The Crowening. But it’s perhaps not the healthiest arrangement when the confines of quarantine feel normal to you. “Over the past six years,” Levy says, “I really haven't been outside that much.”

When he was a boy, Levy became so anxious that he did not want to attend birthday parties. He did not want to go to summer camp. He did not, in fact, want to engage in any social situations. Levy’s anxiety physically manifested as iritis, an inflammation of the eye which doctors feared would eventually take his vision. It was as if the anxiety that drove Levy indoors had then decided to draw all the curtains.

“I think that came from a deep-rooted fear of knowing that I was gay and not being able to be free,” Levy says now. “By the time I got to high school, when your brain is starting to catch up to your physical impulses, it led to a very confusing time. Because on the one hand, you are now being introduced to things like self-awareness and anxiety. At the same time, you’re becoming more and more savvy when it comes to hiding it.”

The escape was theater. Levy began writing, directing, and performing in school plays, including a student-run stage adaptation of Clue produced during a teacher’s strike. “I was starting to develop a sense of confidence by way of being able to entertain people,” Levy says. “It was like a decoy version of myself that I was putting out there to not have to live with the reality that when the bullying was happening — if someone was calling me a f----t or whatever it was — they were speaking the truth.” What a cursed blessing to discover you have a gift but to understand it as a distraction from who you really are and not as a true part of yourself. No wonder that Levy says of creating a persona — naturally, in the self-distancing second person — “Your sense of self gets chipped away. You lose sight of your own value.”

Levy had a ticker of fears scrolling through his mind broadcasting what might happen if people knew who he really was: “Fear of being ridiculed. Fear of being othered. Fear of exposing something that I think a lot of high school students at the time didn't have the tools to process properly, to make it comfortable for me.”

Then, when he was 18, Levy came out. Actually, his mother, Deborah Divine, invited Levy to come out, over lunch. Levy accepted, and was accepted in return. It was one version of an inflection point that Levy has explored in some of his most impactful work. In Happiest Season, Hulu’s lesbian Christmas rom-com, Levy delivers the film’s high point in a monologue; filmmaker Clea DuVall tells me, “I cried during every take.”

“Everybody’s story is different,” Levy’s John says to Kristen Stewart’s Abby, who is planning to propose to a woman whose family doesn’t know she’s queer. “But the one thing that all of those stories have in common is that moment right before you say those words, when your heart is racing and you don’t know what’s coming next,” John goes on. “That moment’s really terrifying. And then once you say those words, you can’t unsay them. A chapter has ended and a new one’s begun, and you have to be ready for that.”

On the Schitt’s Creek episode “Meet the Parents,” David’s future in-laws discover their son Patrick is gay before he can come out to them. “Did we do something wrong, David?” Patrick’s father asks, inadvertently head-faking homophobia before saying, “The thought that Patrick was feeling like he couldn't come and talk to us about this…”

Obviously not everyone who comes out gets the response they’re hoping for. But like Patrick, Levy had a happy ending sitting in front of him: accepting and caring parents wondering when their son was going to tell them he was gay and trying to respect his timeline for doing so. When I ask Eugene if it’s painful knowing that he could have potentially alleviated the anxiety Levy was feeling by approaching him sooner, he concurs. “I would have done things so much differently, you know?” Eugene says slowly. “I would have gotten more involved in talking about what was going on.” But he doesn’t know that it would have changed anything — after all, the flow goes with Levy. “Not necessarily that we would have gotten any direct answers,” Eugene says. “You can only get back what you get back.” (Levy confirms he was not ready to discuss his sexuality before he was; despite his parents’ openness and love, he had created Schrödinger’s Eugene and Deb in his head, simultaneously welcoming him and rejecting him at the news.)

Newly out, Levy went to college and began dating. However, he says, “I was not in any place to be of great value in a relationship.” Like David Rose, Levy’s pitch tends to ascend on the back half of sentences, making him sound like he’s interrogating his own thought process. “You then get into these habits where you're dating people who are totally wrong for you because they're seeking out people who are a bit damaged,” Levy says, “and you're seeking out people who have one foot out the door so that you don't actually give yourself over in any kind of way.” (After I mention that while watching Happiest Season, I wanted Stewart’s character to dump her semi-emotionally damaging girlfriend and leave with Levy, he says, “In this conversation, I'm brought back to many a relationship [where] ‘RUN’ was just, like, the subtitle flashing for about a year and a half of my life.”)

Dating, then, became another way to keep people out. “I really got to a point where I felt like if I didn't make an active choice to pull myself out of this shell that was becoming such a comfort,” Levy says, “I would not be the adult that I want to be.” He spent a summer in England, answering phones at the ICM talent agency as exposure therapy for speaking, unscripted, to strangers. A month and a half later, he auditioned to be a host on MTV Canada. Levy says it was “the ultimate exercise in pushing myself and getting myself out there. If I could get a job on television asking other people questions — which had previously been on the top five things that I would never want to do — this could be the final kind of exercise in changing myself for the better.”

Like Levy’s high school theater work, his success as a host was a gnarled little monkey’s paw of unfortunate wish fulfillment. He was charismatic on screen and became famous enough to travel to New York on the weekends and get into the clubs he wanted to get into. Levy also pioneered the now-prevalent televised after-show with his The Hills discussion series, which exists in the same tonal universe as Schitt’s Creek: sharp enough to make you feel smart for laughing at it, but warm enough that Lauren Conrad herself was a guest.

But much of the work felt limiting. The questions he had to ask celebrities were pre-negotiated with publicists and written by producers — as Levy notes, “No one wants to sit down with someone from MTV Canada and have a revelatory chat about life.” One of his last appearances before quitting was the MTV Movie Awards red carpet. “You could see a kind of judgment in the people you're interviewing,” he says. “They're not rolling their eyes, but you can feel them thinking about rolling their eyes. And I know that a lot of the times they were questions I didn't necessarily want to be asked if I were in that situation.” Pretending to be the version of himself he thought people would accept, Levy says, “kind of just didn't feel worth it anymore.”

You know the next part. Levy realized he could keep the traits people had responded to when he performed — his charisma, his humor — add sincerity, and still be compelling. He spent half a decade grinding out something that was truly of himself. And through Schitt’s Creek Levy became, his father points out, “one of the top showrunners in the entertainment business right now.” Eugene says, “After the [Emmys] broadcast I think there were probably some executives who — if they even remember us going in to pitch the show — are probably kicking themselves.”

Based on what he does next, Levy is now in the unique position of being able to calibrate how famous he becomes. It’s evening in Toronto, and Levy mulls the question over what simply cannot be good wine; when I ask what kind it is, he says, “Red?” Levy knows he could choose to stay behind the scenes and work on the ABC Studios projects he has in development. But Levy is also in the early stages of a romantic comedy he would star in. He worries that he wouldn’t be able to handle uber-fame with the aplomb his co-star Kristen Stewart does. When they went out to a dive bar while filming in Pittsburgh, he says, “I was just so kind of in awe of her confidence and comfort in herself. She's so at ease — [I say that] as someone who I think will always be on their journey to have that for myself.”

“Dan’s assessment is actually incorrect,” Stewart says later. “But what I have done is try to keep that experience [of fame] fairly insular, not make other people I’m with take on the weight of my own self-consciousness — or, God forbid, have someone think I’m up my own ass and loving the attention. It’s easier for me to pretend [people noticing me] is not happening, even though on the inside I still feel like the world is a big school yard of giggling onlookers. Are they laughing at me? Yes, no… Who cares.”

If Levy ever does find himself in the position of being Stewart-famous, she thinks he’ll be fine. “What I did notice was how absolutely wonderful Dan is with everyone,” she says. “He is so loving and gracious towards people that recognize him. The positive force he puts out into the world is clearly reflected in how people come back at him.”

What Levy is putting out into the world next: “I would like to date more,” he says, shoulders bashfully rising ceilingward. “Circumstance plays such a huge part in what we accept for ourselves. When you're doing something that you love it’s like, ‘I have a full plate.’ Even though [Schitt’s Creek was] super intense and even though at times I need a neck brace, it was never not inspiring, and it was never not thrilling and exciting and totally satisfying. So to [want to] make space for someone else…in a way, it is the ultimate filter. You’re basically saying, do I want to carve out the space in an already full and fulfilled life for this person? And a lot of the time, the answer is no. But it only makes it that much better when the right person comes along.”

For now, Levy’s plate is full of his multiple simultaneous projects. (He says there are more than three but few enough that you could count them on both hands, though he doesn’t want to talk about them in detail until there’s actually something to talk about — if Levy follows the Schitt’s Creek model, he jokes, he’ll “get five seasons on television before anybody sees them.”) Before he begins writing, Levy must make sure his entire house is immaculate. Even today, months after the series finale of Schitt’s Creek aired, Levy is negotiating the length of the “fuck”-blocking bleeps of syndication. But as we have all learned this year, not everything is under our control, even if we are Dan Levy. Stewart remembers him panicking as he tried to decorate a new home and realized none of the furniture he bought made any sense together. “The idea of him left and right showrunning and developing and acting and writing — and then his sweater closet confounding him — was very cute,” she says.

A certain amount of acceptance will be useful as Levy figures out how to follow up a beloved hit show. “The goal was to make sure that the first season was exactly what we wanted it to be,” Levy says of his Schitt’s Creek thought process. “To use the resources that we have as best as we can to get that season out there, so that we can go to sleep at night knowing that if people don't respond to it and it gets pulled off the air, there was nothing more we could have done.” Levy leans forward with a sincerity he’d surely second-guess if he were writing this scene and explains the daunting task of living up to yourself. “That’s the goal of anything I'm gonna do from here on out. It's just, try and do the best job you can. Try to make sure that you're loving it.”

#dan levy #daniel levy #bustle interview #such a beautiful interview #thoughtful and passionate and lovely #and just another of the many many reasons why I've fallen REALLY REALLY hard for this man #not only fucking gorgous #but also kind and GOOD and smart #long post #as in #really long post #SOWWY #but I wanted the whole thing on here #tw: anxiety #just in case

[corymulpepper]

Cory Mulpepper Intro

☆ CORY MULPEPPER —

BASICS

★ BIRTH DATE / 13 August, 1960  ★ BLOOD STATUS / Half-blood ★ PRONOUNS & IDENTITY / she/her; cis female ★ FACECLAIM / Sophie Simnett

ACADEMICS & ROOMING

★ PRIMARY SCHOOL / Cork Wizarding School, class of 1978 ★ ACADEMIC PURSUITS / Natural sciences degree, Potions cohort ★ HOUSE & YEAR / Hufflepuff, second year

POINTS OF INTEREST

★ It had been established in 1106 and not much had changed in ways of Mr Mulpepper’s Apothecary except for its staff throughout the years. It stayed within the family and eventually reached the hands of Nikolas Mulpepper, an English botanist and potioneer, in the year of 1949. Outraged by the fellow apothecaries that littered the wizarding world, Nikolas condemned them all for their greed and their use of harmful practices. Since then, Mr Mulpepper’s Apothecary has been the most affordable apothecary to shop, with constant deals on cleaning solutions and performative draughts. And it’s no secret Nikolas is one to barter if a patron cannot afford the remedies they so dearly need. The shop has almost gone bankrupt multiple times and while Nikolas may pay the ultimate price by having to shut down his family’s century old shop, he would never go back on his ways. He’s always been loyal to the customer and have taught his two daughters the very same. It should come as no surprise that they’ve made a formal announcement -- that they do not approve of Selwyn’s squib vaccine.

★ Lydia, Nikolas’ wife, was born a squib. It positively broke his heart when the love of his life was unable to see her twin daughters start showing signs of magic themselves. But as Lydia had had a difficult upbringing because of her status in the wizarding world, Nikolas was just happy she’d finally found her peace. He told nothing but wonderful tales of his beautiful wife as bedtime stories to their daughters, who looked more and more like Lydia as the days passed by.

★ Born only minutes apart, it was safe to say the girls were inseparable from day one. This never, not once, got in the way of their individuality. Where one was brushing their teeth, the other one was using her toothbrush on the family dog’s teeth. Where one was doing arts and crafts, the other was using their scissors to give herself a new haircut. Two different sides of the same coin, essentially. They really became individuals upon attending Cork Wizardy College. They still shared a room, which wasn’t so different, until they began meeting friends of their own and attending different social gatherings. One would go to group palm readings, while the other went for live music shows. Even as time passed and distance began leaving its toll, the girls would still get together once a week with their favorite sweets and catch up on what boys or girls they were kissing.

★ Cory, the loud mouth she could be, was not placed into Gryffindor upon arriving at Hogwarts. But her quieter sister, Colleen, was, while she was sorted into Hufflepuff. Cory carried a chip on her shoulder about that one for a long time coming, wanting to be sorted where their father had gone. Where she’d idolized half her life. But no, Colleen got in where Cory hadn’t. Their weekly meetings were soon diminished, Cory saying she was too busy with the workload to catch up on any gossip. The most they spoke now were holidays back at home, where they put on a show for their father. To be perfectly clear, this wasn’t something Colleen had ever wanted, but for most of her life just like in birth, she followed Cory, Cory’s wants, Cory’s needs. They came first.

★ Cory usually spends her time half-assing a dozen things; painting, riding her skateboard, her school work in potions. But when it came to quidditch, she put in 110%. But as much as she put into the game, Cory rarely saw positive results coming back. In Primary, she’d gotten ejected from two games in row, which ultimately got her kicked off the team. She’d been too aggressive (and broken more bones than anyone) and needed to turn a new leaf, but when she had, upon joining Hufflepuff’s team, her efforts once again went unnoticed. This time she was denied from a summer quidditch camp. It seemed no matter what route she rode, she never chose the right one at the right time. It didn’t help that she was playing with and against peers that simply outshined her on the field. Dawn Withey was going to be the talk of Hogwarts when she landed herself on a fancy, popular, professional quidditch team, while Cory just barely scratched the surface. Her cynicism didn’t stop her from trying, though. With her third year coming up and a possible captainship, more is on the line than ever.

★ Thankfully, growing up, the girls never had to rely on looking for summer jobs. Their pops let them open and close the store on weekends for extra money. Cory was sure she could’ve gotten extra school credit towards her potions work for working in an apothecary. She’d have to pull that card if her grades ever dropped, she decided. One afternoon, the shop was buzzing with Christmas crowds, and the next second everybody was fleeing the scene. The Menagerie next door had apparently caught fire, smoke now billowing over into Mr Mulpepper’s Apothecary. Now, Cory couldn’t see much of what was happening once smoke grew thicker, but she knew a man had entered the shop. The man turned his wand on Cory, throwing Cory aside and knocking her right out until black was all she saw. When she awoke, alone in the shop, she knew that he had escaped with something in the commotion of it all. Cory had planned on going through inventory herself, but an item as rare as this, Mr. Mulpepper knew it was gone the second he returned to his shop. He immediately owled the DMLE. Cory’s yet to come forward with her statement of that afternoon, hardly believing anything truly happened as it all happened so quickly. The nightmares about it haven’t stopped.

TRAITS

✓ challenging; individualistic; responsive  ✗ critical; self-conscious; reactive

extra shit

cory is on hufflepuff’s quidditch team, as a seeker! this is the one thing she never slacks off with and is always on time for. and im sure gives people a hard time if they’re not picking up the slack dlsfjasjf and it’s like SHUT UP CORY, YOU’RE NOT THE CAPTAIN. so any hufflepuff team connects hmu.

has a twiiin name colleen. cory is the “older” one. colleen’s gonna be an open bio if anyone has an itch 2 get silly wit me 

is Dramatic af

is not totally full of hufflepuff pride and maybe gets points taken away every so often? oops. 19 years old and still actin’ up.

her about page is here 

listens to a LOT of music. a lot of underground bands that people havent heard of allll the waaay to the huge names like rolling stones and the who. she’s never been to an actual, huge concert venue with a big band headlining. she’s only seen smaller shows here and there. despite that, doesnt own a whole lot of vinyl. cuz she really prefers the live experience better.

she would love a skateboard riding buddy for when the weather’s nicer!! and she paints only landscapes and oceans cuz she sucks at pretty much everything besides that. and always knows where the best party is happening. probably cant wait to have a low street house next year to throw her own parties.

opinionated for the fact that she just loves to hear herself talking

hmu for any relationships!! friendships, she is prone to enemies with her big mouth, she is bisexual AF so anything there, just anythaaaang <3

hmu for threads! it’s kinda a busy time so i get that <3 if not let’s plan stuff for when they get back to school :’ ) ty xoxo

#sleepingdintro

[smartguyreviewed]

2x2 - Working Guy

Originial air date: September 17, 1997

Did anyone have an actual job when they were teens? I remember how embarassing it was for me, a high schooler in the mid-aughts, to tote around resumes in my little manila folder and then be told to either apply online or have some snooty white asshole at Eddie Bauer all but dismiss me because he was clearly racist. The only jobs I really “held” included being an election judge twice, once during that totally insignificant 2008 presidential race and the other being a summer camp counselor at the church I went to. 

Those little jobs sucked but I chose them. The students of Piedemont High were not that lucky. 

The setting for this episode is the work experience program that shows students what it’s like to have a job. I have a lot of questions. I’m sure some of these students fared better than me back then and already have jobs, so wouldn’t this make no sense? Would they have two jobs? Are all of these jobs suitable for minors? Why does Piedmont fund such strange things?

Mo, as usual, (or depending on the plot of the episode) only cares about the perks of whatever he’s doing. With the band, it’s the girls. With this program, it’s being able to leave school after lunch. Wait, what? They’re having the students skip multiple classes for this? Is this part of a class or an elective? I wonder because this seems like it takes up a lot of time.

TJ is more excited about working in the industry of his choice, but if that was the case, he’d already have a job assigned to him as opposed to having to pick what’s on the board, making it first come, first serve. This is dumb and I can’t believe I have this many questions about a fictional high school. Anyways, TJ is short so he can only grab what he can reach and it’s not what he wants at all because he has a menial blue collar job.

Meanwhile, at the crib, Floyd is pissed because his basketball buddy who is a doctor apparently has cancelled their game because he has to do surgery. Floyd is only petty every once in a while so I’ll let him have this one. Then Marcus comes in wearing a suit and even though we’ve definitely seen him dressed up before, the audience goes wild. I hate canned audience reactions! He says not to hate him because he’s wearing Armani. 

I first thought Marcus was joking because it looks like a Sears original to me, but apparently he took Floyd’s credit card and had a ball buying clothes for his fancy schmancy job. Okay, I have more questions. Marcus had to buy a whole suit and shoes to enter his predominately white workspace. Is Piedmont paying for things the students need to even work at their job? What if you’re a natural black woman and you have to get your hair straightened if you have Marcus’s job? This is all for a part time job during school hours, so will these hours count towards credit since you’re not in class? I am so confused. 

Floyd is surprisingly okay with Marcus running up his card because his next question is asking if he can help Floyd get ready for his game. Marcus jokes that he’s going to be drinking with the guys after work. Floyd doesn’t press further and says he’ll practice alone until Yvette offers. Marcus and Floyd have a nice kii at this because duh, Yvette’s a girl and girls don’t play basketball. I love how all the Henderson men (including Mo) are sexist in their own ways. This isn’t the first time Floyd disregards his daughter when it comes to doing “manly” things and Marcus and TJ bond over their hatred of Yvette when her feminine ways don’t align with their default male ways. 

TJ comes in and doesn’t want to talk because he’s embarassed to have this job that was forced on him. Marcus adds insult to injury by informing him that he’s working at Marcus’s job.

Speaking of Marcus, this dude just doesn’t quit. He begins sexually harassing one of the women who works there, inquiring about what she does. She has to explain to him what a DVD is, immediately dating this show. Luckily, she has sense and shoots down his attempts. Sis can’t even do her job without some horny little high school boy bothering her. This program is stupid, by the way.

TJ enters, wearing his blue collar work uniform and ringing a bell. After fending off the usual “aww he’s so cute” remarks, he’s led into the office that needs the grub. The buffoons working there can’t seem to figure out whatever physics equation makes the DVDs run and of course, TJ is effortlessly able to offer a suggestion. He gets poached from this stupid temp position to help them out.

Floyd and Yvette are practicing in the garage when Marcus and Mo show up to gloat about their temporary yet important positions. Marcus has his own office. I would hate to be the person who worked there for years, sacrificed weekends, holidays and their sanity to get a promotion and their name on a door, only to watch a punk ass intern from high school get it instead. Mo is somehow working for a judge but I’m not sure for how long because this briefcase that was foolishly given to him contains a document that should have already been mailed off to William Renquist. Mo quickly dashes from that scene to deliver the mailpiece. Marcus makes an extremely dark joke that i didn’t even catch at first about someone getting the electric chair due to Mo’s carelessness. I’m sorry but I bellowed at that. However, I question how many lawsuits will be filed against Piedmont after this program is over.

TJ comes home and announces that he quit his blue collar job and is now working as a special consultant for research and development at DVD Electronic. That’s the name of the company? It’s so bland and generic that i sounds like an Amazon seller of used books and shit. Floyd is confused but TJ gets hired by a large company every other week so it’s whatever.

At work, we see TJ has his own office. Remember that person I would hate to be? They have to watch a fucking 10 year old get it instead. Maybe they did a mass firing or something because they seem to have plenty of rooms to just give to people. Of course, TJ likes the new digs. After his friendly secretary introduces him to his space, the resident hater shows up. I guess the person I was describing earlier is this white man, because man is he salty about having to share a cubicle when he started. White man is now attempting to get into TJ’s head and asks that he pitch all ideas to him first. How TJ, who is probably a psycho or sociopath didn’t see through this as a ruse for him to profit off his black ass ideas is beyond me. Or maybe TJ is faking dumb so that when he does reveal white man’s treachery, it’s more believeable? 

Marcus barges in and the white man is two seconds away from calling the cops before Marcus lets him know they’re related. But white man thinks him calling TJ his brother is a “black” thing until TJ says they are related albeit with similar genetic coding. I assume this is an obvious reference to Marcus being darker than him? Funny because I just wonder if Floyd’s wife was dark or if they both have a dark skinned parents and it just so happened to manifest in Marcus and no one else? Or maybe Marcus is actually his half-son? Let me stop. 

After the white man leaves, Marcus correctly assumes he is a piece of shit but TJ disagrees. He then gets a call to join a meeting. The head boss who is stationed in Zurich makes it a point to consider that TJ’s work study day ends at 5--wait, so they’re away from school for that long?--but quickly ignores that tidbit when some meeting gets pushed to 6. Of course, TJ shouldn’t be here unsupervised and out this late but we’re gonna ignore that even if the logistics of the Piedmont Work Study Program still boggle my mind.

So yeah, TJ is stuck at work and being asked about one of his ideas, the big boss says that the white man told him to filter all ideas through him. The white man is clearly displeased with TJ snitching but the boss man ends up making TJ the new head of the project. That’s how you use your privilege, even if it is child endangerment! The hating white man (whose name is Dick Ferrett by the way) comments to another coworker that TJ is toast. How dare this little black bastard be better than him?

Meanwhile, at home, Floyd is nursing an Yvette inflicted wound from when they were practicing basketball. TJ comes home acting like a middle aged adult, complaining about work and how bad traffic was. When Floyd notices how TJ is being affected by this job, he suggests that he quit. TJ whines for a little bit and Floyd relents. What the fuck Floyd, drag him by his collar and make him sit down! TJ promises to make Floyd’s game which means he won’t be able to make it because of work.

The next day, TJ is at work and discussing things with his secretary. The hating white man is just itching to fuck up TJ’s day and it shows. You might not be wondering who replaced TJ as the chow wagon boy but it turns out that it was Mo. Yes, instead of being fired from this program that he had no business being in to begin with, he was demoted to TJ’s job.

TJ is about to leave for the day when hating ass white man comes and dumps a bunch of work on TJ’s desk. See? Told you he wouldn’t be able to make Floyd’s game! Luckily, his secretary is going to film it for him.

Back at work, TJ is falling asleep trying to carry these stooges to a victory and the hating ass white man is actually calling TJ names. They even go back and forth for a moment. Floyd finally decides that enough is enough and he’s bogarted his way through security to get TJ because I’m sure it’s midnight at this point. TJ tells Floyd he must be mad that the game was missed. Floyd says he isn’t mad although the other guys’ kids showed up. Aww Flody. Parents have feelings, too.

The head white boss offers Floyd to hire TJ permanently but Floyd declines. TJ is able to get the hating ass white man fired before he leaves, in a move that is definitely petty but deserved. Fuck that guy, exploiting a gifted black child like that.

TJ is mad at Floyd according to a conversation between Yvette and himself. He thinks TJ is going to be mad at him forever but he comes downstairs and asks to play dominos with him. Aww. This is quickly ruined as per the usual. We all know TJ only abruptly forgives and forgets when he has an ulterior motive. This time, he’s going behind Floyd’s back to keep working with DVD Electronics. Floyd comes in during a session. I’m assuming he got his ass whooped after this but we just fade to black before an arms-folded Floyd can dole out any punishment. Eh, guess we’ll find out in the next episode. Ha. No we won’t.

Stuff I noticed:

- DVD Electronics video chat has a pretty stellar, crisp quality for 90s internet.

- Mo rewore this shirt from a prior episode. I really like when characters rewear clothes. It’s much more realistic than characters who seem to always have money for new outfits no matter how broke they claim to be.

- When TJ is bringing in the food, there’s an audience member who yells “You go, girl!” I have heard this woman in the audience of a Boy Meets World episode and another show that I can’t recall, but further proves that canned laughter is creepy and needs to be banned everywhere.

#tahj mowry #smart guy #marcus henderson #tj henderson #mo tibbs #omar gooding #90s #nineties #john marshall jones #floyd henderson #essence atkins #yvette henderson

[lazyxlazer]

Shit Church Experiences Pt. 1

As the pandemic continues, I’ve been thinking more and more about shit that I never had time to think about before. It weighs on my mind as I try to sleep every night, and since I process by writing things out, I decided this would probably be a good first step at getting it the fuck out of my head. Nothing has affected me quite as much as my church experience. None of my current friends went regularly as a child, so I’ve become the go to for Bible related questions. Unfortunately for them, I’ve blocked a lot out from my memory as far as Bible memorization goes. A lot of the other shit persists.

I had never heard of church until I was probably 8 or 9. My aunt, uncle, and cousins lived in an apartment complex in my hometown, so I was over there frequently being watched by my aunt and uncle. I remember one day being asked if I would like to go on the “church bus” and go to Sunday School with my cousin. She was probably around 5 and my aunt was putting her on this “church bus” alone to go to some unknown church. Mind you, this wasn’t a traditional bus but a large 14-seater van. Don’t worry, it had windows! I’m not sure if I was supposed to keep my cousin company or if my cousin was just encouraged to bring me along.

The church was about five or so miles away from the apartment complex and sat on a mostly empty highway. It was surrounded by lots of trees and the road with the entrance to the church was kind of treacherous. Since there was not much else around, people driving on the highway weren’t very good at paying attention to cars slowing down to turn into the church. When I first started going, it was large but pretty modest inside. It had red brick walls and a tall white steeple. The inside had a cafe and an area for kids. Sunday school rooms were upstairs. The sanctuary was covered in thick maroon carpet. I should have taken it as a subdued warning; everything in that place was a shade of red. A few years later they would build a brand new, extremely massive sanctuary and a school onto the side of the old church building. The adults had church in the new sanctuary and the kids used the old building.

I don’t remember what that first time was like, but after that, I was in love with going to church. We sang songs and danced around, they gave us SNACKS, we played fun games, and the best part was that I was being told how good of a child I was for going to church. 

The church bus started coming to pick me up at my own home every Sunday. I took my mom with me one time. Then the next time my dad came. After that, we went to church every Sunday without fail. This comes back to haunt me to this day. If I hadn’t gotten on that stupid bus, I never would have gone through all of the pain and suffering that it caused later down the line.

Even though my parents were church regulars, I still rode the church bus. I got to hang out with kids, sing songs, and goof around without my friends. Also, if we brought friends, then we were rewarded. Whoever brought the most friends on the church bus at the end of the month got to go out to lunch with the bus driver, Jake. What a reward, huh? He took us to Wendy’s for burgers, fries, and a frosty. I won that prize SEVERAL times.

The thing about me is that I’m very motivated by praise from authority figures. I’m also very motivated by food. Naturally, church was a dangerous environment for a person like me. There’s always food, and there are plenty of people that have authority and use it to the fullest extent. It wasn’t even hard to look up to them because everyone was always so kind, or pretended to be. 

In Sunday school and in kid’s church, which they called “Adventure Land,” I was very subservient. I memorized all of my Bible verses, I did my daily devotional, I prayed. I wanted to be the best, and I wanted God to love me the most. I thought that if I showed them and God how good I was then I wouldn’t end up in the scary, fiery place called Hell. I had to prove I was good enough to be in heaven. I also wanted to prove to everyone else that I had worth and was meant to be there.

I was quickly pulled into the church “family” and my parents were too now that I spent every Sunday and Wednesday at the church. My dad joined the church choir and band. He played the saxophone, and he loves nothing more than to sing his heart out. My mom cleaned the church every Tuesday. I would usually go with her then, too, to help clean. When I got a little older, I got roped into doing puppet shows and teaching kids how to do the dance moves for the songs. The adults trusted me to help teach others what to do, so I felt the worth I wanted so badly. I knew all of the words and motions to all of the songs! I raised my hands and swayed to the music. I closed my eyes and pretended to feel the Lord’s presence. I knew how to do this stuff. Therefore, I was perfect for indoctrinating younger children!

I don’t recall a lot of the time I spent “witnessing” to other children, but I have a strong memory of something I did for Vacation Bible School (VBS). In the summer, there was a weeklong camp that parents sent their kids to so we could learn all about Jesus and be entertained so parents could have a break from their kids. I went up on stage with two adults in front of the entire congregation and sang a song and danced as a preview for that year’s VBS called Amazon Outfitters. I still remember the song. Now, I see how racist and fucked up it is. It went:

Amazon Outfitters,

We’re on a mission for the one true God.

We cannot be quitters, 

We’re on a mission and we will not stop.

Amazon Outfitters, 

We’re giving everything that we’ve got 

To help others discover

The wonders of the one true God.

And at the end of that verse you made a guttural “HUH!” noise like Edwin Starr in his song “War” because that’s exactly what that song needed. The song is poorly written, but at least it has the imperialistic undertones! Colonization, anyone?

So yeah, a person who is now painfully introverted went up on stage to advertise to parents and their children how they could be cool, just like me, if they went to VBS. Where was my shame? I desperately needed it then, but I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought I was important.

I was also a perfect candidate for indoctrinating others because of  how “inspiring” my story was to others, at least according to the adults. I came to church for the first time WITHOUT MY PARENTS and CHOSE to keep coming back. Heck, I BROUGHT THEM WITH ME!! I was the pride and joy of several Sunday School teachers and youth pastors. I was also “saved” before my parents were, so it was because of me that they got saved too.

It’s an absolutely riveting story, let me tell you. One of the church members was an actual cowboy. He had a farm, he owned horses, he had a cowboy hat, he had a handlebar mustache, the dude had it all. On a very special day of church, he brought one of his horses with him to show all of the children. While he talked to us about Jesus, I was enraptured by that horse. I’m not really into horses, although maybe I could have been in another life, but at that moment, nothing was more important to me than touching that horse. He had rich brown hair and a diamond shaped white spot on his nose. Luckily, if we decided that we wanted to ask God to forgive our sins and to follow him no matter what on that very day, we were allowed to come and TOUCH THE HORSE!!!! Like fuck was I passing up that opportunity! I was the first kid to stomp my happy ass up to that horse. I touched it and asked God to forgive me of my sins without a second thought.

I was informed soon after that I would have to get baptized, you know, because we have to wash away our sins in a chlorinated pool before it’s official. I did that without question. It was on a day in April in the old church building. It was still cold outside, enough to wear a jacket. I’m pretty sure I wore a dress that was white and lacy. You wouldn’t catch my gay ass in something like that now-a-days, which is why I bring it up. Upon arrival at the church, we were told that the heater in the baptismal wasn’t working, but it would be okay to go ahead with the baptisms. 

It was not okay.

That water was so cold, that everyone that got baptised that day was a shivering mess for the rest of the service. My legs turned purple. I will NEVER forget how cold I was and how foreign my legs looked on my body. I also recall keeping my eyes open when the pastor dunked me into that water.The pastor laughed at me and told me I was weird. Then, later in the day, my parents threw a little party for me where everyone brought me gifts for being baptized. It made me feel proud and WORTHY.

I give myself a lot of shit for following so blindly, for not questioning, for believing every adult I encountered had good intentions, but there was absolutely no hope for me then. I’m a people-pleaser, I’ll admit it. I know how to listen, pay attention, be quiet, obey. I was taught to always respect adults no matter what. I never questioned them or talked back. I once asked my parents what I was like when I was younger, beyond my memory. My dad said to me, “You were always such a good little girl. You were so...meek. If another kid was throwing a fit because you had a toy they wanted, you would just give it to them and do something else.”

He’s not wrong. That behavior persists to this day. I find it interesting that my parents weren’t more concerned about it. I was such an anxious child. I identified with cartoon characters like Piglet from Winnie the Pooh and Chuckie from Rugrats. Miss Frizzle from The Magic School Bus, too, but that’s just because I’m a weirdo nerd. Maybe they found it endearing and sweet. Maybe they liked how cautious I was because they never had to worry about me doing something dangerous. Honestly, I don’t blame them. I’m sure I was an easy child to handle. However, at a time when I needed more than ever to have ideas and opinions, I was indoctrinated into an extremely toxic church environment. Something that was supposed to give me meaning, purpose, and worth actually left me with nothing when I no longer followed without question.

I still have plenty floating around in my head and MANY STORIES that I believe need to be told. Later I’ll be talking about:

The Youth Barn - are you ready teens?! AYE AYE, JESUS!

The Baptist Church Break-up

The Truth About Bob (spoiler: it’s not good)

The Pizza Church

Noah and The Wonderful World of Technology

Ken Ham and Creationism

Youth Group

Church Band

“Dude, your pastor is a little creepy…”

HOW I ESCAPED

#church #bad experience #quarantine thoughts #childhood #indoctrination #war huh #what is this good for? #absolutely nothing