#amazin blue

[whyisstarkidfollowingmeshoo]

Jeff has mentioned twice during his livestreams that he and Justin Paul (of Pasek and Paul) were fellow acapella members. They were part of UMich's Amazin' Blue.

Jeff started out as a background singer and was singing his way (and butting heads against music directors) to become music director of the organization (i would have loved to see a MLB merch wearing music director, directing his choir. Did he use baseball terms in music? hhehehe)

In the second photo, Paul is located sitting down on the far left side, meanwhile Jeff is on the far right side, wearing a blue MLB hat.

Oh yeah, I remember that Pasek and Paul were this close to making (or maybe they still are, but there's nothing of it mentioned on their imbd pages) their own musical version about The Trail to Oregon Game. hahha. Jeff has not talked about that. I remember the ruckus it made online and most of the replies were from StarKid fans hahaha.

Paul, you can't do that to your former college music director. But as long as they don't make it identical then it's cool. Unless they copy it Jumanji style and Jeff already wrote and made that back in UMich and even sent scripts of it to a New York festival, however it was panned for being too off-colored.

#jeff blim #starkid #team starkid #jeff blim livestream #young jeff blim #young justin paul #justin paul #pasek and paul #amazin blue #university of michigan #umich #acapella #choir #college photos #jeff blim before starkid #justin paul before pasek and paul

[simonrileysfavteacup]

Simon From The Wiggles

Pairing: Simon "Ghost" Riley x wife!reader

Word Count: 632

Warnings: dad!simon, mom!reader, simon's first born son being named tommy after his brother, fluff

Summary: Coming home after a mission to his favourite people in the world, Simon experiences one of the best moments of his life.

(this is the guy being spoken about)

Simon had been off on a mission for a month or so, practically crawling to get back to you and your son, Tommy. The little bugger had just surpassed 10 months and he had began babbling. He was the most adorable thing and you both loved him to death. He was the light in the dark for Simon, much like you were the sun to his rain. 

When he finally did step back into your home, he immediately heard giggles coming from the living room. Tommy’s sweet little giggles. His babbling too, echoing throughout your house. He stripped off his gear, leaving everything by the door, including his mask. Simon stepped into the living room in just his compression shirt and tactical pants, smiling at the sight of you sitting on the ground, holding Tommy on your lap. 

The little boy’s eyes light up at the sight of his father, kicking his legs to get to him. Poor guy still doesn’t understand how walking works. Simon smiles, bending down to take the boy into his arms, tossing him up into the air and catching him again like a ball, just how he likes. 

You stand up, pressing a kiss to Simon’s cheek, smiling. “Hi honey, welcome home.”

He grins, “Hi lovie. You both have fun withou’ me?”

“Lots,” you nod at Tommy, nudging him with your nose. “Ain’t that right, bubba?”

The little boy giggles and fills the house with his little babbles. The sight makes Simon’s heart flutter. 

“Why don’t you two sit down, huh? I’m gonna go get started on dinner,” you kiss Tommy’s temple and Simon’s cheek. 

You head into the kitchen, preparing dinner. 

Simon sits down with Tommy, placing the little boy on his lap as he turns the tv volume back up. 

There’s these 3 guys, in different coloured shirts–blue, purple, and red–singing, with a girl in a yellow dress, bow in her hair. They look Simon’s age. He chuckles. Tommy’s face lights up, squealing.

“Mi-mom!” The boy babbles. 

Simon blinks. He does a double take. “What you sayin’, bubby?”

The boy giggles, still staring at the screen. He claps his hands, “Mi-mon!” 

It’s more audible this time too. But Simon still hears what he heard before.

“Lovie! He said i’! He said his firs’ word! My name! Lovie!” he shouts. 

You poke your head back into the living room. “Really?”

“Yeah! Say it agai’, bubby! Come on!” Simon’s voice is filled with excitement.

“Mi-mon! Mi-mon! Mi-mon!” Tommy claps and giggles at the top of his lungs. 

“Damn it, bubby. You ruined the surprise,” you shake your head. 

Simon furrows his brows in confusion. Why aren’t you excited like he is? Your first child just said his first word!

“Whadya mean, lovie? ‘his is amazin’!” Simon tosses his baby boy into the air. “My name!” 

“He wasn’t referring to you, Si,” you bite your lip to hold back a giggle. “One of his favourite characters in that show is called Simon…he said his name 2 days ago…I was going to surprise you.”

“What? What show?” Simon remains confused. 

“Simon…from…the wiggles…”

“‘M sorry, lovie, what the fuck did you jus’ say?” 

“The red guy on the tv, that’s him…” 

“The old guy? Tommy loves ‘im?” 

“Mhm.” 

The little boy in question is kicking to get back to the tv. 

“I’m sorry, honey…I know you were super excited and you should still be! His first word was Simon! We can tell people it was for you!” 

“Lil bugger,” Simon nudges his son. “Say it again.”

The boy giggles, not yet understanding his father. 

“Si, it’s a good thing, right?” you smile. 

“‘Course, lovie, he’s gonna be talkin’ soon, and he’ll be able to say daddy,” Simon tickles the boy. “Ain’t that right, Mi-mon?” 

Tommy’s eyes light up. “Mi-mon!” 

#ghost call of duty #ghost simon riley #simon ghost riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley cod #simon riley #ghost x reader #ghost imagine #simon riley fluff #ghost cod #ghost #cod #simon #the wiggles #simon ghost riley fanfiction #simon riley imagine #simon riley x reader #simon riley x you #simon ghost x reader #simon from the wiggles #simon the wiggles #the wiggles simon #the wiggles red

[redheadspark]

Barry with #10 please! 🖤

A/N - This is great for Barry! Thanks for the request, anon!

Give Them Hell

Summary - Barry knows just what to say to make the doubt go away

Warning - A mixture of fluff and Angst

“What do you think, luv?”

“I think I wanna jump out the window,”

Barry snorted as he sat next to you on the bed, seeing you shift a bit with your eyes glued to the floor and biting your lower lip.  He reached over, lacing your fingers together to press your palm against your calloused one, your perfectly manicured fingers for the premiere glistening in the hotel suite light. Of course, Barry would be calm about this, he’s done this dozens upon dozens of times with both independent flicks and massive blockbusters.

But this was your first one on his arm, and you felt like throwing up.

Barry was never one to be out in the public eye with his personal life, he was private compared to any other actor his age.  Rightfully so, needing to build up his own reputation from the ground up without the aid of anyone else in his corner.  He kept his nose to his craft, even with the paparazzi hounding him on how his personal life was like.  So when you came into the picture, going on a few group outings with mutual friends and then Barry finally asking you out on a date, you should have known that dating an actor meant your own life would be on gossip pages everything once in a while.

And it finally happened, but not in the best light.

It was bad enough to see your face plastered on the mega gossip magazine, a picture of you and Barry out on a private date.  But the column that wrote about the “Mystery Girl” and how she must have cozied up to be with Barry for his fame and fortune, hit you hard.  It was hard to react to those words when you were working a stressful job 40 plus hours a week when you were trying to repair the relationship in your own family that was severed years ago.

But to be called all of those horrible things…that did hurt and was a low blow.

Barry consoled you when he saw you holding the magazine in your hands, tears in your eyes and the magazine nearly crumpled in your fingers.  He took the magazine from your fingers, smoothing it out to see what was printed with his icy blue eyes looking it over the letters.  You didn’t have to see the look on his face to know that he was just as mad from what he saw.  

“I shouldn’t let it get to me,” You mumbled, Barry still looking at the gossip magazine as you sniffled and pushed the tears away abruptly, “But I just…I hate what they’re saying about me,”

It was worst letting those words get to you, to make your mind wander on that deep part of your brain and always put yourself down.  The relationship you had with Barry was amazing, one of the best relationships you’ve ever been in.  It was the best you’ve ever had, and Barry with his tough guy persona in front of the camera melted away with you.  He was sweet with you, his words of flirtation and affirmation would bring out the best in you, along with his simple gestures of love.  He treated you like a queen, more than.  

So simple words from a faceless gossip writer should have made you doubt yourself with what you had with one of the best people in the world.

Barry finally crumbled up the paper in his hands, tossing it away from the pair of you as he held you close in his arms.  He said nothing, but the way he embraced you was enough for you to know what he wanted to tell you.  With an arm around your waist, another around your shoulders to keep you close as you clung onto him, there was more that was said in silence. He told you that he loved you, he told you that he never cared about what others thought about you two being together.  

“Those words are nothin’ but lies,” he said against your hair as you were holding him tightly, rubbing your back with his knuckles, “They have nothing else to do but make up lies.  I know you, and you are far more amazin’.”

You said nothing, letting all that he was telling you to drink in under your skin.  Barry was never afraid to say what was on his mind, whether it was light or sacred.  He was brash in nature, but he was genuine at heart.  He would never lie to you when it came to his feelings towards you, and to hear him say those words to bring you comfort and move you.

“I love ya,” he hummed to you, still having you tucked in his arms, “You mean more to me than anything, ‘kay?  I don’t think I’d be the man I am today if it wasn’t for ya,”

“Barry…” you said his name, but he shook his head to have you look up at him and see how he looked beyond sincere.

“I mean it.  You have made me better, and there is nothing or no one, not even a stupid magazine, that will change what I think or how I feel.  ‘Kay?” He asked, hope in his tone as you finally smiled for the first time that night.  Barry grinned, seeing that small flick of light back in your orbs again as he leaned in to kiss you and let the negativity float away.  

The magazine stayed on the floor, curled up in a ball with no more power in the words as Barry kissed you over and over.

“You know you can do this, right?” Barry asked as he leaned his shoulder against yours, “Premiers are a walk in the park,”

“They are to you,” You reminded him as he grinned and shrugged.

“Eh, I don’t take them seriously.  Some journalists and photographers are pushovers anyways, plus it’s about the afterparty anyways.”  Barry reasoned, you chuckling as he leaned his head over to touch yours.  Such a simple gesture, something Barry liked to do to ground himself with you.  The butterflies you had from the upcoming event were still evident, but not as bad now that you had Barry by your side and comforting you.  You could only think about those gossip magazines, the paparazzi that would hound you every once in a while when you would go to work, and even some of the comments from your co-workers and family members about dating a bold actor like Barry.  

However, none of that mattered when it came to Barry and how he adored you.

“Don’t worry, I’ll protect you,” He said to you calmly, though he saw him crack a grin as you giggled and smiled at him, “Aye, see?  That’s the smile I wanna see when you’re on that carpet with me.  That smile will tell those naysayers who fuck off,”

“Barry!” You lightly scolded him as you smacked his arm, hearing him laugh as he stood up from the bed and pulled your hand along.

“Come on then, let’s give them hell!” He encouraged you, sounding so confident in himself.  And that night was one of the best nights of your life with Barry on your arm.

The End

Hurt and Comfort Prompt Session

#barry keoghan #barry keoghan x reader #fanfiction #writing #my love #barry Keoghan x female reader #barry keoghan fanfiction

[daryl-dixon-daydreams]

"Are we ready?" you asked, stepping down the stairs and into the front entryway.

"Wow," Daryl drawled. "Hold up. Lemme pick my jaw up off the floor," he added with a smile, looking you up and down.

Your cheeks flushed with heat. "Shush."

"Nah, I can't. S'gotta be said." He stepped toward you and his hands landed lightly on your lower back, sending goosebumps straight up your spine. "Really. Ya look... way too damn good for me."

"Are you kidding?" you asked, cocking your head at him and leaning in against his strong body. You ran your fingers down a wavy tendril of his clean and shiny hair and then clasped his face along his strong jaw. "You're way out of my league."

He let out a small laugh and ducked his eyes, but the smile on his lips quickly faded, despite you still being under his hands, where he most loved you to be.

"Hmm?" you prompted him, easily picking up on the sudden southward shift in his mood. "What is it?"

"S'nothin'..." His index finger tapped absently on your back.

"It's not nothing," you insisted gently. "Talk to me. What is it?"

"I just—I ain't gonna feel right at this thing. I never quite fit in here, in all these damn big houses with doctors and surgeons and lawyers. S'just—ain't a good feelin'."

"Mm," you nodded. "Okay. So... fuck this dinner then," you said seriously. Daryl's blue eyes shot up to your face again and you smiled at the disbelief there.

"What?"

You leaned in and said it in a conspiratorial whisper this time. "I said, Fuck. This. Dinner. You fit in best right here, with me."

Daryl's brow furrowed. "But... ya got all dressed up and—everybody's expectin' us to be there..."

You rolled your eyes. "I got dressed up for you and for me. Not for them. And luckily, you and I are both still here. As for them expecting us... who gives a shit? The only person that matters is right in front of me," you said with a smile. "Rick and our people will understand. Your comfort and happiness is more important to me than some stupid dinner. Like I need to listen to Pete tell us that story about his hole in one for the fifteenth time..."

"Ya really mean it? Ya dun mind if we just skip the whole thing and stay home?"

You could already sense the tension leaving him. "I don't mind at all, babe. And if you carry me down to your bed right now, I can promise you that I doubly won't mind."

Daryl shook his head at you a little vaguely, his blue eyes slightly wide. "Yer amazin'." The next moment he scooped you up and headed toward the stairs down to his room. You let out a peal of laughter and draped your arms around his neck. "Fuck the dinner," he drawled, finally smiling again.

Prompt: "Your comfort and happiness is more important to me than some stupid dinner."

#daryl dixon fanfiction #daryl dixon x reader #daryl dixon twd #the walking dead #twd fanfics #daryl dixon drabbles #daryl imagines #daryl x y/n #fanfics #writers of tumblr #twd drabbles

[jarofstyles]

Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy- Patreon

Hello! We’ve been getting asks about what our series are about, and we wanted to show you guys a little piece of what we have on there 🫶 this is a series about rancher and cowboy h, and Y/N is very happy to be getting a job out on the infamous ranch with her passion for the horses and the beauty of the land.

WC- 1.6k

Here is our sneak peek! You can join us on Patreon for multiple exclusive series (100+ pieces) and early access to our writing.

——-

The place was fucking gorgeous… but that didn’t seem to compare to the cowboy showing her around. Jesus Christ, the man was something of a movie star quality man.

He was polite and charming. Holding his hand out to take hers when they’d have to move over a bit of rougher terrain, his calloused fingers gently caressing hers with a sly smile. The hat on his head shaded his eyes so he could look properly, giving her eye contact the entire time. Chillingly hot eye contact that had her feeling a bit weak in the knees. Soft green, greener than the grass in the fields that sprawled the ranch.

“I think you’d like workin’ here. It’s a family for sure.” He hummed, moving his hat off to brush his longer locks out of his face and adjusting the hat back on. He was bronzed and golden skinned from working outside, a light dusting of freckles just barely visible from her distance. Carved cheekbones and sharp jawline but dimples deeper than the valley, he was a god like being standing in front of her with a sweet disposition he probably hid a bit from others.

“I think so, yes. It’s my dream. You know? It’s a bit cheesy to some at the school… everyone’s always dreaming to run off to the city. But I love the place. The animals. The air.” She murmured, looking around the ranch. Y/N was hyper aware of the warm form of the man next to her, and the fact he was looking at her. Never had she experienced such an attentive man in terms of talking to her. No checking of his phone, no looking away.

She also was unaware of how Harry was genuinely a bit in awe of her. The starry eyed cowboy drinking in her essence and watching carefully as she spoke. Observing the details he hadn’t managed before. Beating himself up over not having known her before. Because, how? A girl in their area who wanted to stay? Who genuinely loved his land? That was a rarity. It wasn’t going to take much to have him be taken with her.

“I think that’s Amazin’.” He smiled, placing his hand on the small of her back and leading her towards the barn where their personal horses were kept. “You’re like me then. Content with home. Everyone says… they want wild adventures. Don’t even bother lookin’ in their own backyard. And that’s a damn shame, cause there’s plenty.” He spoke as they walked. Her eyes trailed his petal pink lips, the slight stubble left on the skin on his face, the radiance in his entire being. Harry was truly one of a kind. Even with dirt smudged on his jeans, clunky cowboy boots and the occasional scratch on his hand he managed to be graceful and smooth.

“Exactly.” She chirped, excited that he got it. “To me… there’s nothing like the festivals downtown. Learning to make new things. Finding a new watering hole or mapping out the land. I love the bonfires and cookouts. I don’t know. I find there’s a beauty in simplicity.” She turned to look at him, eyes squinted for a moment before they adjusted to the sun. It was beautiful outside despite the heat. The blue skies elevated her mood, but she did think that it was mostly attributed to the man guiding her around.

Harry felt his heart swell and a round of hopeful caterpillar‘s making their cocoons inside of his stomach. So many times he’s been hoping to find someone of a similar mindset. Someone he could get close to and not worry about them wanting to run off later down the line. It just felt… nice. Comforting. Knowing someone else felt the same as he did.

“You get me, Sweets.” He lightly flexed his hand on her back as his smile widened. Harry was a skeptic romantic. Meaning he held his cards close before he let them show. He’s flirt and tease but playfully. It wasn’t real unless he felt secure. Something he felt more and more of each time this pretty girl opened her mouth. A dangerous combination for him.

His approval made her giddy, having to stop herself from skipping as he opened the barn door up with a creaky slide. “We’re getting new doors on the barn so it doesn’t cause such a ruckus. But this barn is for our personal horses. I’ve got a few, but my soul partner is right over here.” He led her over to a large black stallion. A white star shaped mark right between his eyes. “His name is Perseus. Or Percy, for short.” He grinned widely at the giggle that left her mouth, his hand stroking over his nose with gentle affection.

“Percy, hm?” She looked at Harry for approval before stroking the side of the horse’s strong neck. “What a beautiful big boy.” A gentle coo had the hose sighing. A sign of relaxation, making her beam. “Yes, you are a strong, Handsome one. I can tell.” Her hands worked over the front of the horse with a cooed affection that had Harry- in simpler terms- about to act up.

He was far closer to his horses than people realized. He loved his animals and had a special connection to them, but especially Percy. His best friend. He’d gotten him for his 21st, and ever since they’d been attached at the hip. “Oh, he likes you.” His deep voice rumbled through her stomach and almost made her jump. “He doesn’t usually take to stranger so fast. Got ‘im begging for attention. He will eat it up when he like ‘ya.”

So would Harry. He felt a little pathetic being jealous for wanting the girl to be stroking at his face like that. She had smooth hands.

“Does he get that from his Daddy?”

The giggled tease had Harry caught of guard but sent him into a laugh, head thrown back at the gall. This woman was something else… and it was calling right to him. A bit of banter was sexy. Especially teasing.

“Maybe so. But it takes a special woman to get men like us to behave like mere pups.” He hummed, leaning his hip against the stall door.

“Mhm. I bet that’s true.” She looked at him from under her lashes with a coy smile before returning her attention to the stallion.

I’ll be damned. He thought. This was the fastest a woman had managed to tangle Harry up in a lasso, but it seemed like he was pulling it tighter than she had even meant to.

“How many personal horses are then?” Her question snapped him out of his fantasy in his mind. Not an appropriate one to be having about a staff member but Harry knew that in his gut, she would be far more than that.

“I have 3. Percy, here.” He nudged his chin towards him. “Then we’ve got Athena. And Cash.” He pointed towards a paint mare and a chestnut… what seemed to be thoroughbred stallion. “Those are mine. Over there are my fathers two, and my mothers one though she doesn’t ride often. Hers is used more for riding lessons and all that. Sister got some too. So… 8. We got room for two more personal. Staff and ranch hands, if they got ‘Em, keep them in the commercial barns. There’s a lot of ‘em here.” Though she knew that. “I’m assuming you’ll like to spend time with all of them.”

“Well… Percy is a favorite so far.” She grinned towards the horse. “But you’d be right. I adore all animals but horses.. they’re a soft spot for me. I want to have a few of my own one day.” She said it shyly. It was stupid to be shy and Y/N knew that. Harry got it more than anymore but there was still that residual shame she felt from peers when she said she was happy where she was and wanted to keep going. She didn’t have the same wanderlust as everyone else.

“Hey.” He took a risk, gently lifting her chin up with his thumb. “Nothin’ wrong with that. Don’t know why you’re embarrassed when m’the one who just gushed over lovin’ my horses.” He teased lightly, keeping those pretty eyes of hers locked with his. “I’m glad… I’ve met someone who’s like me. Everyone in a rush to leave and fail to see how much fun and how beautiful life can be when you enjoy what you’ve got. The horses, the nature, everything. Everyone at school has those big city dreams. That’s fine n’dandy for them, but you n’me? We get it. We like how we were raised and we are comfortable being here. Don’t let ‘em haunt you. You can be open here. In fact… I’d love to see more of you like that. It’s not every day you come across a pretty little thing with a good head on her shoulders. My momma will eat you up and be happy you’re around. Some sense, she’ll say.” He gently stroked her chin before letting his hand drop. It was pathetic for her to miss the rough pad of the finger on her smooth skin, but she did.

“Yeah?” She asked shyly, looking up at him while shifting back and forth from heel to toe. A childlike comfort that Harry found to be fucking adorable.

“Yeah, Darlin’. Don’t worry about any of ‘em here. You’ve got me… and a whole load of other folks who have pride in loving where they’re from. “ he paused, taking in the sparkly flint in her eyes though she was a bit shy. It made him feel all the more eager to protect her, to make her see she was one of them. “I think you’ll fit in here just fine.”

#sneak peek #cowboy!harry #harry styles cowboy #COWBOYRRY #save a horse ride a cowboy #jarofstyles #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles one shot #harry styles fanfic #harry styles smut #harry writing #harry styles imagine #harry drabble #harry styles blurb #harry styles writing #harry styles fluff #harry styles angst #harry smut #harry angst #harry fluff #harry styles au #harry fanfic #harry styles fanfics #harry styles fic

[espiepuffs]

Can I request a Nemona X Galarian gn reader who’s also been to every region?

All around the world!

Pairing: Nemona x GN!Reader, Kieran x GN!Reader, Penny x GN! Reader (Can be interpreted as platonic/romantic, hinting at romantic at the end of Kieran’s!)

Notes: Hello anon, I really like this request idea! I hope you don’t mind, but I added Kieran and Penny due to them also being good characters to write for this specific prompt! I hope you enjoy reading it, and thank you so much for requesting!

Nemona

Nemona would find you so cool.

When she first met you, her thought process would definitely be ‘woah, they’ve been all around the world!’ to ‘imagine all the types of Pokémon they’ve caught and seen!’ which leads to a “Let’s battle, right now!”

(It’s non-negotiable.)

When she does battle you, she enjoys doing so because of all the different Pokémon you use!

Whenever you guys have rematches, she definitely encourages you to use different Pokémon, she loves a challenge >:)

Hope you’ve caught a lot, because if you know her she’ll want a lot of battles! It doesn’t matter if that Pokémon is in Paldea’s dex; she’ll be prepared for it!

She also likes to see all your different Pokémon outside of battle!

Before she met you, she’d only seen the Paldean variant of Wooper. She had no idea that that they were blue everywhere else?? That’s so cool!

As well as that, your Galarian Meowth is so cool? She’s in awe of how different it looks compared to normal ones!

She loves your Alolan Raichu. She could spend hours observing it, it’s so cute??? She’s so fascinated at how it practically ‘surfs’ on its tail.

You’ve also got a lot of questions coming your way about your Pokémon.

As well as a lot of questions about the different regions you’ve gone to!

She’s been to Unova, Kitakami and obviously Paldea, so she’s curious about the different cultures and people around them!

You’re going to spend hours talking about the different sights, people, and culture, and she’ll be listening closely to every minute, asking about things every now and then.

She’s most interested in Galar, (unsurprisingly) due to the way battles are run there.

You’re happy to indulge her, telling her about your time battling there, and of how you made your way to the semifinals of the Galarian Champion cup, of how you were beaten by a boy similar to your age named Hop.

And since it’s all broadcasted for the world to see, you invite her to watch it with you, to which she happily obliges.

Kieran

“You’ve been all over the world?! Wowzers!”

He’s so amazed. Kieran hasn’t really gone anywhere apart from Kitakami, Unova and briefly to Paldea.

He finds it so interesting, he wants to know tons about all your different adventures around the world!

He himself actually knows quite a bit about Kanto, Johto, Hoenn and Sinnoh due to them having similar cultures to Kitakami, but enjoys your recounts nevertheless.

He’s more into places more different to his, like Unova, Kalos, Alola, Galar and Paldea however. Not to say he doesn’t like listening to your journeys in the first four! He enjoys cultural difference and variety. As said before, he’d still be enthralled to hear about them!

He enjoys hearing about the Pokémon most, especially tales about legendary creatures, and mythicals that have practically no sightings, only having been written down in history books.

Tell him about your trips to Kalos, the food you had there and the grand Lumiose Tower that would stand tall and bright. Maybe the two of you should go there together?

Or entertain him with the story of the mythical Meloetta, how its beautiful music and dance inspired many works of art, music and song.

Kieran would want to know about your hometown the most, so tell him about Galar, and what’s happened there.

He’d definitely be interested in its history and the darkest day, as well as the battling culture there.

Wait, there are videos of you battling in the Champion Cup?! He wants to see that!

“Wowzers, you’re so amazin’ , s/o!” Is all he can respond with after he sees the way you lead your Pokémon in battle.

He’s flabbergasted, simply staring at your rotom phone once he sees that the battle’s over and done with.

Expect him to ask for battle tips from you, since you placed in the semifinals!

Have you told him about Galarian culture and traditions yet?

If not, just maybe you should be bold and tell him about the tradition of handling applins to people that you like, and hope that he isn’t too flustered after finding out to reciprocate your feelings!

Penny

Penny would know instantly that you’re a Galarian. You all stick out like sore thumbs, your accents easy to recognise and your fashion as bold as a highlighter.

Maybe it was the fact she was Galarian as well, but it was really easy to tell.

You two would spend a lot of time talking about the different brands you’d shopped at, giving recommendations to each other for the next time you’d head there.

The conversations goes from Galarian brands, to Galar itself, to all sorts of regions.

“Wait, you’ve been to other regions?!”

Penny had only been to two. Her homeland, great old Galar, and Paldea!

So you having been to every one? She’s intrigued.

She might have no intention of going to other regions at the moment, but her interest was piqued when she heard that you had.

She’s most interested about the sort of adven-tours (see what I did there?) you had and the sort of Pokémon you met.

“In Sinnoh, there were these guys that went under the name Team Galactic. They had horrid hair and outfits Penny, I think they’d need Atticus to go over there and give them new clothes for them to ever be taken seriously.”

When she hears that you’ve been to Kanto, she gets so excited and proceeds to info dump about the Sailor Sun manga because that’s where the author lives, and how it has an anime!

(Watch it with her pretty please c: )

She also likes seeing the sights there too. Show her photos of the ferris wheel you went to in Unova, or the Subway trains that you’d battle the train conductors on.

And although she’s not too big a fan of going outside herself, she enjoys looking at the Alolan beaches and how gorgeous they look at sunset. Show her Lumiose city!

She’ll be satisfied looking at anything with you!

Give her recommendations of places to go to. She probably wouldn’t consider going to them anytime soon, but she knows she’s in reliable hands when it comes to picking a place to go on holiday to.

Even after she hangs out with you and talks about all the different regions, there’s still one more thing she’s got on her mind.

She got to watch your Galar Champion Cup battles, of course!

She uses them as background noise while she’s drawing, or chilling with her veevees!

#pokémon #pokemon sword and shield #pokemon scarlet and violet #pokemon scarvi #pokemon swsh #nemona pokemon #penny pokemon #kieran pokemon #nemona x reader #penny x reader #kieran x reader

[darlingsfandom]

can i request a dark older actor cillian where he works on set with younger actress who is new to the industry and cillian thinks shes like naive and pretty so he manipulates into being his

you got it friend ✨

TW: dark! Cillian, he’s a creep! P in V, unprotected sex!

It had been a long day, your body ached, eyes burned and brain turned to mush. This was your first big break at a real Hollywood movie! You were going beyond your limits to prove yourself (even though you had the part) because you had the feeling swallowing you whole that if you didn’t you’d be fired.

Your trailer has been your new home over the last four months so you made it cozy for you! You were laying on your back closing your eyes and listening to your white noise machine with your fan blowing high to get your self calmed down and it was working until someone decided to knock on the door. A sigh left your lips.

“Come in!” You yelled and the door swung open. Cillian had waltzed right in. You loved Cillian and playing his leading lady made your head spin!

“‘Ello dsrlin.” He sat down next to you before pulling you in closer. “Wanted ta check on ya. I know tis was a big scene for ya! Had ya show everyone your young body.” Today was a first for you since you had just filmed a nude scene and it did make you feel seen in an unwanted way. “Ya did amazin darlin!” Cillians fingers brushed up and down your arm as he leaned in to kiss the top of head, but it wasn’t just a kiss he had also sniffed your hair which made you furrow your eyebrow. It wasn’t the first time Cillian had sniffed your hair or rubbed your back or he’d happen to catch you when you tripped and his hands cupped your body just right .

“Thank you Cillian.” You squeaked when you felt his hand sneak its way down to your ass and give it a feel. His lips curved into a smile.

“Such a pretty young thing you are.” His lips brushed against your ear sending shivers over your body. You shrunk a little before he grabbed you by your chin and made you look him in the eyes. His baby blues suddenly seemed dark and it made your throat dry. “And all mine.” His grip tightened making you whimper. His free hand made its way back to your hair and tangled his fingers into it. You gave him pleading eyes which turned him on even more. Cillian had been obsessed with you since he met you at casting. It was because of him that you had the role. You OWED him! You just didn’t realize it.

“Give me a kiss doll.” He puckered his lips to you. You shook your head which landed a smack across your cheek. “I said! Give! ME A KISS!” He sputtered at you making your thighs clench which he did notice . He squeezed your cheeks hard to pucker your soft lips before pressing his into yours. It was a rough kiss which you couldn’t deny actually felt good .

“If yer gonna be a brat, gonna treat ya like one.” Cillian bit your bottom lip before yanking on your hai to make your head go back so he could suck on your neck. A small whimper escaped your lips which made Cillian suck harder on your collar bone while his free hand groped your tits. He squeezed them hard before shoving his hand under your shirt and playing with your nipples. He smiled against your lips for not wearing a bra and giving him easy access. Cillian pulled away from you with a smirk before he pulled you up to you feet.

“Get naked.. now!” His fingers snapped at you as he sat there rubbing his bulge through his pants. Your hands grabbed the bottom of your shirt and yanked it off before getting your pants off. “Panties gotta go to doll.” You pulled off your panties and stood there fully nude as he licked his lips.

“See! Such a pretty young body doll! Show me yer pussy.” Your jaw dropped at his words.

“I won’t repeat meself! Do it!” He barked at you. You leaned back on the edge of the couch and spread open your legs. Cillian watched in amazement at how easily you listened . He also loved how wet you looked. He leaned forward and dragged his finger through your folds before bringing it to his lips and looked into your eyes while cleaning his fingers. “Such a pretty pussy too!”

Cillian stood up in front of you and unzipped his pants. He dropped his boxers and your jaw dropped when he pulled out his fat cock. It was average length but the girth made you gulp. He stood over you and slowly rubbed his cock.

“Bet ya want me cock don’t ya ?”

“Yes Cillian!” You gave him doe eyes and that’s all it took. Cillian pulled you up before he sat down and pulled you onto his lap. He helped you steady yourself onto his cock. “Oh!!” Your mouth hung open as the girth of his cock stretched you open.

“Dats it doll, make yerself cock drunk!” His words struck your core making it easier for you to slide all the way down his cock until you felt his balls against your ass. “Good girl, ride me!”

You held onto his shoulders as you started bouncing up and down on his thick cock. Cillian watched how your pussy sucked his cock making him even more aroused. You were his personal porn star. “Fuck! Such a tight pussy gripping me cock! Fuck doll!” He gritted his teeth and tossed his head back as you bounced yourself dumb on his cock.

Cillian gripped your hips and took over. He fucked his cock hard up into you. You were crying from the pleasure building up inside. Your nails were digging into his arms as the sound of his balls slapping against you filled your ears and it was such an exciting sound to hear how your wetness squelched on his fat cock.

“Cillian! I need to cum! Please please!” You pleased as your eyes rolled back.

“Be good for me and cum on me cock! Be a good girl!” He grunted hard as his own orgasm was building. His moans were enough to send you over the edge and your orgasm hit hard.

“FUCK!” You cried out as your thighs shook hard, your mouth hung open and your pussy clenched his cock hard!

“I’m cumming doll!” Cillian held you tight on his cock as his large load of cum shot into your wet pussy and already started to seep down your legs.

“Cillian!” You yelped and tried to pull yourself off.

“No no! Stay still doll! Allow your body to take me cum!” He smiled at you as you gulped.

“Always going to take care of me pretty doll because you are mine!” Cillian held you in his arms as the two of you came down from your highs. This was more than you had accepted as your first role.

#Cillian Murphy #au cillian murphy #cillian murphy drabble #cillian murphy masterlist #cillian murphy smut #cillian murphy x reader #cillian murphy au #cillian murphy x fem!reader #cillian murphy x you #cillian murphy x y/n #dark!cillian #emsblurbs

[okkalo]

ditched

karasu x reader

genre(s): angst? to comfort, exes to lovers?

warnings: reader gets canceled on before a party

this is after blue lock

part 2 is here

guess who’s prom date cancelled on them 😋😋 so yeah this will be self indulgent (can u guess who my comfort character is)

it was six in the evening when karasu came across your slumped figure sitting in front of your front door. it didn’t take a genius to notice you all dressed up, yet your face was a red mess from the crying you had done. it came as a surprise to you both, neither of you expecting to see the other at the moment.

“what are you doing here?” you asked, voice rough as you lazily wiped your tears away, shying away from his gaze. his heart stopped when he saw you, broken in front of him.

“what happened?” he asked as the breath that had caught in his throat escaped. his softened eyes scanning you while cautiously approaching you. it didn’t take long for him to plop down next to you, his hand reluctantly coming up to rub your back. and it sure didn’t take long for you to break down, once again.

your frown deepened at the overwhelm of emotion, eyes immediately filling with tears. he saw, urging you with a push of his other hand to fall onto his chest. you followed, your hands bunching up his lazy t-shirt.

here you were, sobbing into your ex’s chest, wailing about a guy who had ditched you for another date. by the end of your breakdown he had figured out the whole story, saving you from a groggy explanation.

your sniffles marked the end of your crying session. you slowly tore yourself away from your ex’s embrace, keeping your head down to avoid him seeing your puffed face. you knew full well it didn’t work when he moved your hair out of your face.

“so, what are you doing here?” you awkwardly tried to change the topic, finally looking up to meet his eyes. he could only chuckle.

“i came to drop off some of yer stuff,” he pointed the laundry basket he dropped on the ground when he rushed towards you. it was evident he didn’t care how it fell, the newly washed clothes all sprawled over the ground.

“ah,” you nodded, awkwardly looking back over at him. your eyes caught onto the wet stain on his shirt, very obviously from you. “sorry,” you muttered, giving a lazy point when he gave a questioning gaze.

“it’s fine,” he answered. it didn’t take long for a moment of silence to wash over the two of you. both wanting to talk but not knowing what to say. “y’know that guy is a douchebag.” you giggled at his attempt to clear the air.

“yeah,” you could only agree, eyes falling to your hands sitting in your lap.

“you look amazin’,” he continued, eyes never leaving you and you’re embarrassed reactions.

“thanks,” you sighed, keeping your head down, “…just wish i had somewhere to go.”

“we could go somewhere,” he quickly answered, your head jerking up in surprise. maybe it was the way he said we? or maybe it was the fire in his eyes as he said it. or simply just that your ex—of all people—suggested taking you out somewhere.

you and karasu didn’t exactly end on bad terms. your reasoning for every time someone asked about you two was always “bad timing”, which was true. a year after you two had started dating he was sent to blue lock where you had to live with not seeing him for months. it was when he was granted a two-week break that you guys cut it off, him broken but understanding.

either way, it was weird. not weird enough to fully decline though. “where would we even go?” you questioned after a moment of thinking.

“wherever ya want,” he shrugged, eyes falling to somewhere in the distance, giving you a view of his side profile.

there was another minute of silence as you thought, your stomach rumbling in the process. he turned his face back to get a view of your embarrassed face. “hungry? we can go eat,” he suggested.

“i want mcdonald’s,” you shyly admitted, a smile making its way onto his lips at the confession.

“mcdonald’s it is. ‘m payin’,” he got up, offering you his hand in aid, which you took.

“wait, but i can’t be looking nice while you look like that,” you stated as he pulled you up with a gentle tug up.

“ouch,” he gave a hurt look, to which you just rolled your eyes at.

“y’know what i mean,” you sighed, trying your best to ignore his signature smirk. “i still have that suit from my aunt’s wedding, come on.” he could only smile at the memories as he rushed back to collect the dropped laundry basket before running into your house.

five months of dating is when you forced him to attend your aunt’s wedding with you. you stated, “if i have to suffer, so do you.” he didn’t mind though, he thought it was fun to meet your family and hear your whispered gossip throughout the venue. your family welcomed him too, asking when you two were going to get married, to which you always blushed, trying to avoid his gaze.

he would never admit it but that was his favorite day. the memory soon dissipated as he walked out of the bathroom, now dressed in the suit you had kept in your closet. he didn’t miss the way your mouth opened in awe or the way your eyes sparkled. he looked the same as he did that day, maybe even better.

“am i that good lookin’?” he chuckled, cheeks heating under your gaze. you rolled your eyes and muttered a small “shut up”. you guys had the same conversation on the wedding day too.

“i bet you still can’t tie a tie,” you mumbled, walking up to finish his outfit with the blue tie he had once worn.

“i could do it back then, yer just picky,” he fought back, eyes falling onto your focused face that wasn’t far from his. he’s missed this, he realizes in the moment. the way his heart ached told him exactly that. and you did too.

with a sigh you finished the tie, smacking him lightly on the chest twice to signal you had been done. “okay, let’s go then.” neither of you spoke up about missing each other’s warmth at that moment. instead, you went to mcdonald’s as friends, acting like nothing more.

will most likely part 2 this

unedited thanks for reading

#bllk x reader #blue lock #blue lock x reader #bllk imagines #bllk #blue lock imagines #bllk fluff #blue lock fluff #blue lock drabbles #bllk drabbles #blue lock angst #bllk angst #blue lock karasu #bllk karasu #karasu tabito x reader #karasu tabito #tabito karasu x reader #tabito karasu #karasu x reader

[probssomethingorother]

Next of Kin: A TLOU fanfic

This is really long and hopefully kinda sad. Don't look too close cause I got tired of editing and didn't get a beta.

Pre-Tlou, Sarah's birth story, big sad, canon compliant-ish

Sarah, Joel, Claire (OC)

Rating: Teen

“This is on you, boy. So you march back in there, you take the reins, and you do right by that child. You hear?” He only manages to nod his head, but Mr. Johnson finds it’s enough, and he is released with a final shove. In the silence that follows, a lifetime passes. He stops being a kid, walks back in, and tends to his child. ------- The day Joel becomes a dad and how he deals. Slight canon divergence where his wife dies instead of leaving.

ONE SHOT - Words: 15,929

Live laugh love, comment subscribe reblog - that's how it goes right??

Read on AO3 here or down below ⤵️

He becomes a dad on one of the worst days of his life.

July 20, 1989.

*** ʚїɞ ***

It’s a slow morning until it isn’t.

Soft light pours into their tiny bedroom through sheer polyester pom-pom studded blue curtains, relentlessly shining onto his face until finally, Joel cracks open his eyes. He inhales deeply, sucking in air against his pillow as he withdraws his arms from underneath and stretches until he takes up the entirety of the bed. It’s just a full - it’s not hard to fill the space, but usually, there is someone else keeping both his arms from hitting the sides.

Claire.

Head popping up as he blinks away the fuzziness of sleep, he catches the time on their bedside clock, and then promptly flops back down.

8:47 AM, Thursday - class.

She is halfway through some advanced design course right now, stuck in an architecture studio with a bunch of kids who don’t know how to hold a hammer.

“You’re voluntarily going to summer school?” he had teased, a mock frown puckering his forehead.

“You’re not going to be able to build ‘em, if I can’t design ‘em, buddy,” she shot back with a grin.

They don’t have many concrete plans, but they do have a little dream to start up their own building company - her designs with his construction, in-house everything from start to finish.

Several months ago, it looked like that dream was gone. He came home to her sobbing on the floor of his bathroom, clutching three positive pregnancy tests, blubbering about how it wasn’t supposed to happen, how her parents would be so upset, how her life was over, and how she didn’t think she could be a mom.

After the shock abated—the overwhelming drumming in his ears subsiding to a disconcerting tapping and his heart slowing to a crawl—he descended to the bathroom floor to be beside her. With a deep breath, he slid down the putrid yellow wall, intertwined his hand in hers, and exhaled every ounce of air in his lungs. Then, with a sweet peck to the top of her hand, breathlessly he told her, “I don’t know nothin’ ‘bout kids….but I do know… if one’s gettin’ you for a mom - they’re goin’ to be pretty amazin’.”

Much to his chagrin, his words only brought on a fresh wave of tears and sobs. He didn’t know what part of what he just said was wrong, but he couldn’t handle seeing her cry. As he frantically scurried on the tile floor to sit in front of her, he missed the subtle shift in the way her shoulders shook, angst turning to something lighter.

Tenderly, he nestled her head in his hands, and hastily sputtered:

“No no no, please don’t - I didn’t mean - we can do this is all. Ain’t the end of the world. You’ll be a good mom - and I think maybe... I’ll be a good dad - teach him all sorts of stuff about buildin’, and football, and my abuela’s tamales...And he’ll... and I know we don’t got much right now, but that’s just right now - we can have ‘em -“

And then Claire let out a snot-soaked chuckle, mouth twitching up at the sides as she wiped her wet face against his arm, leaving a shiny residue.

“Him? What makes you so sure were havin’ a boy?”

With a sigh of relief, he sat back as her tears came to a trickle; and with a curt nod and a smile, he dropped his hands away from her face.

“Well yeah,” he drawled, “Miller’s only have boys - me, Tommy, all the primos- not a girl in the bunch.”

Two days later Claire met with her counselor, rearranged her course schedule, and made a plan to enroll in the summer semester, freeing up her fall for the arrival of the baby. At the start of term, she crossed her fingers and prayed to God that the little nugget would stay inside long enough for her to make it through to finals.

It’s her last week. So far the plan has worked.

Normally, he’s navigating the morning rush to drop her off at UT Austin before he heads to the relentless buzz of the construction site, but this morning he’s on the late crew. He has nowhere to be til noon, and the extra hours of sleep are nice, but he also would rather be working.

He had asked for more shifts to make extra money before the baby comes, but Asshole Andy didn’t take too kindly to the request and did the exact opposite - slashed his hours by six each week, snarkily advising him he could “probably use more time at home prepping from the arrival of the rugrat.”

He had brooded over the whole ordeal for a couple of weeks, but now it irks him less, especially since Claire has given him a laundry list of things to complete before the little man comes home - assembling the crib, buying a bottle warmer, installing his car seat, cleaning the kitchen, and the bathroom, and the floors, and the couch, and pretty much every surface in their dinky 700 square foot apartment.

The list starts its relentless nag on his mind right as the last dredges of sleep scurry away, and the morning light, now too bright for any more excuses, floods their matchbox of a bedroom. It leaves Joel with no choice but to begrudgingly abandon the comforts of their bed, and rolling to its edge, with a small groan he begins his day.

Shuffling out of their room, his feet catch and peel away from the warped parquet floor with a faint, sticky noise that echoes in the quiet morning. It's one of the many quirks of their aging apartment that they've come to accept- its "charm," as Claire loves to say. Their living space is a hodgepodge of second-hand furniture, DIY fixes, and cheap decor. They have tried to make it look better, but even with all of Claire’s design knowledge only so much can be done to distract from the place's age and size.

He flicks on the TV - an old set, the screen slightly too blue- and flips to Sport’s Center to catch the Astros’ game highlights.

Taking a few moments to himself, he plops down at the tiny table wedged in the corner of their kitchenette with a hefty bowl of frosted flakes before the day's duties demand his attention.

His spoon pauses mid-air, startled, as the front door swings open and bounces against the wall. He’s halfway through breakfast, but wasn’t keeping track of the time.

Claire comes barreling through, her presence like a sudden storm, backpack haphazardly dropping with a thud as she crosses the threshold. She’s always been a bit of a tornado, bouncy brown curls trailing her like a dust cloud as she whips up small messes in her wake.

“Need to pee!” She announces as she hurries past Joel, her movement more of a rapid wattle, one hand cradling her swollen belly. She’s three weeks out from her due date and feeling and looking like “Veruca J, Veruca!” - as she likes to lament to him at least once a week.

Despite the urgency, she tosses him a small smile as she slips inside the bathroom and shuts the door. With a small smile of his own, he gives his head a little shake and returns to his cereal.

“You eat?” He calls with a full mouth, attention on the screen in the far opposite corner, a little too enthralled watching the Astros get smashed by the Mets. The question is thrown casually over his shoulder, a formality really because he knows the answer. She never eats before class, opting to take the extra few minutes of sleep over fixing up something, but still, he has to go through the routine: he asks, she grumbles, he says the baby needs food, and then there is a slight pause before she crosses her arms and says he’s right.

But when its usual pattern unfolds with no reply, he lobs another question towards the bathroom, “Wan’me to pour you a bowl of this?”

And that’s when everything speeds up.

She emerges from the bathroom with stark panic etched across her face, its complexion losing color by the second. Her deep brown eyes, wide and unblinking, lock onto Joel's like a silent scream.

Her shorts are off, her underwear is red, and blood spreads down the tops of her inner thighs.

He’s on his feet in a fraction of a second. As he darts up, the table jostles violently, sending his breakfast airborne in a chaotic slew of cereal and milk, and the bowl slips off, splintering against the tile of the kitchen floor. The high-pitched clatter of it all is nothing compared to the sudden ringing now filling his head.

Tears begin to pucker her waterline as he rushes to Claire, his footsteps quick, his hands hovering before they gently, firmly, grasp her shoulders.

A thousand words are interchanged between them, but none break from either of their lips.

With a shared nod, they split—Joel to the chaos of their bedroom for clothes, Claire to the phone.

“Mom?… Momma? Can you n’Pop meet us at the hospital?” Her voice is shallow and cracky, but Joel can hear it as clear as day as he rushes to throw on a t-shirt and wriggle into a pair of jeans.

“No St. David’s ..” she chokes out, as he stumbles over his own feet as they enter his pant legs, leaving him to careen into the closet door. As he pops back up, he catches her trembling voice ending the call: “Okay, love you, see you soon.”

The phone crashes to the laminate countertop with a sharp clatter, clearly not rehooked, as he snatches his wallet from the dresser and scrambles to find his keys.

If he wasn’t fighting to suppress the panic quickly growing inside him, frustration over the search for the pesky things would have been all-consuming. He rummaged through three pairs of pants, and checked under the bed, in the couch cushion, in the kitchen, the bathroom, and pretty much every other inch of their apartment, before finally lifting Claire’s backpack strewn in the entry to see the car keys discarded beneath.

Within seconds of his eyes landing on them, they are out the door, and the worst and best day of Joel’s life begins.

*** ʚїɞ ***

“Joel?”

“Right here, baby, right here.”

“I - I- please, don’t let - we need to - now-”

“I know, I gotcha.”

Her fragmented pleas, broken by sharp intakes of breath and muffled by cascades of tears, repeat incessantly in his head—louder and more urgent with each echo. Joel can’t get it to stop - much like his leg moving in an equally incessant rhythm, bouncing up and down as he sits in the rigid chair. The compulsive movement is matched by his hand - right anxiously twisting his watch band back and forth, rubbing it deeper and deeper into the rawing skin of his left.

“There’s so much blood.”

“Just focus on breathe’n now, we’ll be there soon, alright?”

Dried remnants of it cling stubbornly to the crevices of his knuckles and dirty the spaces in between his fingers, staining them a brownish crimson. He could clean it off, but it’s a piece of her - and if he can’t see her, at least he can still look at this bit, no matter how gruesome.

Almost an hour has passed since he’s last seen her.

By the time they reached the ER, she was too dizzy to walk. She’s not much smaller than him, but Joel had scooped her up with urgency anyway and charged through the sliding doors. The muted blue walls of the hospital corridor blurred in his periphery as he zeroed in on the signs leading them there. As he burst through the doors, they rebounded off the walls with a loud slap, and the collective gaze of the waiting room pivoted toward them.

His arms burned from her weight, but he dug his grip in more, fingertips pushing into her thigh hard enough to bruise.

"Something’s wrong with her," he blurted out to the quiet room, his blown-wide eyes locking onto the woman’s at the admittance desk.

It took no time for the nurses to descend on them, ushering Joel out of the waiting room and back toward a bed he could finally let her down on.

Claire was barely coherent, face ashy, breathing labored.

“What’s her name, son?” A sweet older woman with box-dyed red hair asked, gently moving him aside to better attend to Claire.

“Claire,” She took his name officially a few months back, but he’s known her longer as - “Claire Johnson,” - it just flows right.

“Okay Claire, we’re going to take good care of you. How many weeks are you, hun?”

When her head lolled to the side, lips moving but no words coming out, he felt like someone was squeezing the air out of his lungs while simultaneously filling his head with cement.

He couldn’t think straight, couldn’t focus. His eyes bounced from her to the monitors, from the nurses to doctors, from the needle being pushed into her arm to the cross on the wall, from the strap being secured around her belly to her beautiful curls getting crunched beneath the oxygen mask, and then finally, to a calendar hanging crookedly above the corner sink -

His gaze had lingered there for a long moment.

Claire had put a magnet on the fridge to track the weeks, a little pink and blue calendar. He thought watching the time tick by was a little silly at first, but this week, when she flipped it to “3 weeks from baby!” he got a little flutter of something in his chest.

“37,” he muttered, brain distantly doing the mental math as a nurse dispensed a healthy glob of ultrasound jelly onto Claire, bottle squelching with the brute force of the squeeze.

Only 37 seconds later, a decision was made: she needed surgery immediately. Her bed rails snapped up, she was disconnected from the machines that beeped and blinked with a detached urgency, and wheeled away swiftly. Someone tried to explain something about the placenta and an “abruption” and that she was losing more blood than her body could handle, but all Joel could focus on was keeping pace with the gurney so her hand wouldn’t slip from his.

But eventually, it did - had to.

She was pushed behind a set of doors he was not allowed to go, held back by a physician’s firm hand. “Take a seat, someone will come talk to you,” they said.

That was 37 minutes ago, and nobody has come to talk to him.

The flickering of the fluorescent light overhead is now the only thing keeping him sane. It mixes with some sun strips crossing the blue tile floor, and when everything hits right, it looks like beams of light dancing at the bottom of a swimming pool. He finds himself fixating on it, forcing himself to take a breath every time a glowy strip appears. Everything else around him just fades into the background, the ring of the hustle and bustle of the hospital becoming muted as if caught beneath the waterline.

Claire once told him blue is used to evoke calm, but surrounded by the hospital’s blue walls and blue floors, it only makes him feel more and more like he’s drowning underwater.

Claire loves the water.

She’s lived in a landlocked city her entire life, but give the girl a chance and she will talk about the ocean. She’s only been a handful of times to the coast- just Padre Island, yet, you would think she’s dipped her toe in each of the seven seas. Sand and sunshine, blue skies and blue sea - she could never get enough.

They had almost escaped there for the Fourth.

“Come on, J, one last hurrah,” she had pleaded, her eyes alight with the prospect, her voice threaded with excitement as she bounced around their small living room. “It’s called a babymoon - everyone’s doing it now,” she had tried to explain, doing her best to convince him to sit in the sand and watch fireworks explode in dazzling arrays over the Gulf.

But he had to say no. There was no time, no money, and his old car, which creaked and groaned even on short drives, would probably not survive a four-hour trek in the boiling Texas heat.

It’s a little silly - especially now - but all he can think about is her and him, and how they really should have just taken the goddam trip.

*** ʚїɞ ***

There is little to say to her parents when they arrive and find him waiting, his hands slick with sweat as they approach. He gulps hard and clears his throat, scrambling for words that refuse to form. But before he can try to speak, Mrs. Johnson pulls him in for a hug.

Her hand gently brushes the back of his head, and the precipice of any words dissolves into a shaky exhale into the crook of her neck. She smells like a blend of lavender and vanilla—just like his mom used to. When she breathes, "Oh honey," her voice cracks with maternal warmth, and for a moment, Claire’s mom is his mom, and he doesn’t want to let go. Arms, heavy and trembling, slowly rise around her, his body deflates, and for a flash of a second, he doesn’t feel like he’s stuck underwater.

But he only gets in one breath before he slips back under.

Claire’s father, a big burly man - an old-fashioned Texas rancher- interrupts the moment, hand going firmly to his wife’s shoulder. He tugs her back, guiding her to a nearby chair with a look of the eye and a twitch of the head.

Mrs. Johnson’s eyes, already weary and tinted red, spare Joel one final sympathetic look before taking her seat and turning to the ground.

Mr. Johnson takes his wife’s spot, leaning in close. His breath is hot and has the stench of musky cigars as it puffs into his face. “Nurse at the front told us what’s goin’ on,” he gruffs with a dagger-like glare, a look that Joel has only seen once before when he caught them one late night junior year fooling around in the back of his Tio’s truck.

If it hadn’t been for Claire coming between them—literally—Joel’s pretty sure Mr. Johnson would have killed him on the spot.

Unfortunately, he’s lacking her protection now.

On shaky knees, he sinks back down in his seat as Mr. Johnson takes his own next to his wife, who has already brought out her Rosary and begun the Litany.

For a long while, he watches her fingers glide across the beads. Her umber tone makes the milky cream of the tiny glass orbs and the gold-plated cross shine in her grip. Head bowed, her voice is hushed, a whispered prayer—delicate, but intentional.

He’s never taken much to religion, but it was important to his mother, so he never missed a Sunday. It was just a hollow obligation then, but in this moment, he can see why people are drawn to it.

There is a comfort in knowing what to do, what to pray, who to ask for help.

He follows along in his own head, punctuating her efforts with his own hard “Amens”. He pushes his anxiety into each prayer, hoping the Mary up there will take pity on them, see herself in Claire, and protect their son.

They only make it three decades deep.

Perhaps if they had finished it, things would be different.

He barely registers the doctor’s approach. When he slowly looks up, he can’t miss the hollow defeat that hangs heavily in the woman’s eyes as she comes into focus behind the Johnsons.

Time stops.

He goes rigid, fidgety anxiousness leaving his body as dread pushes in.

Seeing the change in Joel's expression, the Johnsons twist to face the doctor, their bodies stiffening as they stand. He tries to rise, but his legs betray him, and he remains half-seated, peering through the narrow gap between their shoulders. The doctor, flanked by the nurse from before with the coppery hair - “Judy” he remembers off a name tag - looks exhausted, face drawn tight, almost like a different person then who she was in the ER.

"I'm sorry," the physician offers, each word measured but heavy, carrying a weight that squeezes out all the little remaining air from the waiting area. "We did everything we could, but..."

The words that follow blend into the sterile air. Something about complications, a clot to the brain, a loss too great, a life gone as a new one gasped its first breath.

His knees buckle and he’s back in the uncomfortable seat once more. His fingers find the sides and wrap around, knuckles going white as he holds onto the plastic like it’s a preserver in rough waters. Every hair on his body stands to attention as a wave of goosebumps runs from his head to his toes. Saliva pools in his mouth and his throat constricts tight and his lungs feel like they are vacuumed sealed shut.

They say when you die, your life flashes before your eyes. What they don’t tell you is that it happens just the same when they die.

Claire.

She’s eleven years old, escorted into their church camp room, and placed in a seat next to him. He was dared by Freddy Bower to yank her ponytail so he gave the new girl a gentle tug. In return, she picked her nose and wiped it on his arm. Everyone teased him the rest of summer that she had given him her cooties.

She’s in his homeroom when school starts in the fall and the rivalry is instantaneous, competition whittling down to their days of birth - and of course, she’s three days ahead.

And then she’s thirteen and leaning across the circle, the tip of the soda bottle pointing towards him. Even though she unabashedly wiped him off her lips, he didn’t mind the way her strawberry chapstick lingered on his. He wanted to remember his first kiss with a girl, even if it was with her. At the same party the following year, they are stuffed in a closet for seven minutes in heaven, but they stay several inches apart - “Miller if you think I’m goi-” - “Oh, like I would even want you to.”

And then they are freshmen, and she’s not in any of his classes or clubs and he kind of misses her, but convinces himself it's just the competition that he craves, and has nothing to do with how she’s bubbly, and witty, and pretty, and fun.

And then it’s the summer and they are stuck in the back of a hardware store together, wearing neon green vests, racing to stock shelves, tallying who knows the most paint codes, and the competition is back and now he doesn’t want to let it go. So he doesn’t.

He makes her start to hate him less, and they get paired together in home-ec, and when they both get dragged to church by their parents they go to the pew in the back and fold all the hymnal pages into geometric patterns. They get close enough for his mom to start packing her a tamale in his lunch, teasing “para su amiga,” with a wiggle of her brow, and for Claire’s older brother to start snagging him packs of Marlboro Reds from the corner store on Park before away games, because “since you she fights with our Pops less.”

And even though she laughs in his face when he asks her to Junior year homecoming, it’s official - they are together - and they stay together.

She cries with him when his mom dies and he holds her tight when her brother meets the same fate five months later. She gets accepted to NYU, but decides to stay in Austin for school - “I’m not doing this for you - me and Tommy are buds now, can’t leave him.”

And although she lives in the dorms freshman year and he takes the couch at his Tio’s, they still make it work. When he saves enough to rent a place of his own, one night a week becomes several, and then she’s with him full-time. And she decorates the place with seashells and butterflies and they laugh and dance in the living room, and burn things on the stove, and watch marathons of shitty movies, and flood the bathroom trying to fix the sink. And he pops the question one silly night under the sheets, and puts a peach ring on her finger, and he’s in love, and they are making plans, and having dreams, and having a -

"Hun?" The gentle intrusion startles him as it slices through his life with her. Judy’s auburn hair flashes infront of his eyes before her kind gaze takes its place. He nods mechanically.

“Why don’t you go see your baby girl?” She chirps soft and smooth, as one of her wrinkly hands comes to his elbow while the other wiggles her fingers under his and unlocks his grip from the edge of the seat.

With another shaky nod, he forces himself to his feet, each step hesitant as he follows the Johnsons out of the waiting area.

Only once he’s at their backs do her words hit his brain, but by then he’s not sure he’s hearing anything right - hoping he’s not hearing anything right.

*** ʚїɞ ***

Things go a little hazy for a while, like wandering through a dream that both makes absolute sense and none at all.

Despite being behind the doctor, her parents set the pace- a quick stride, nipping at the physician’s heels, pushing her to lead them down the winding corridor at a speed Joel finds wholly unmanageable. He can’t quite put his finger on the feeling, but his brain is telling him that it’s strange to be rushing - inappropriate- to be speeding this along.

With every five tiles, he falls a step behind, his pace slowing incrementally until the echoes of their footsteps fade and he’s alone with nothing but the empty stretch of corridor to navigate.

Distance.

Minutes ago, he had wanted the space between them to disappear; now, he wishes the hallway would stretch a little longer, the doorway be a bit further - hell, if he could move her room to the other end of the hospital, that would be best.

Space is time, and he needs time before this moment finally catches up with the next. The next that’s tainted by a cruel reality waiting on the other side of that door.

When he finally steps in and sees her, color already gone from her face, he feels small, like a little kid - he is a kid - and she was a kid - and now they have -

He doesn’t remember walking over to the clear plastic bassinet, but then he is there looking down at the thing that took his first love from him.

Her tiny fists wave in the air - clearly a fighter from her first breath- and then her teeny nose wrinkles up as she lets out a piercing cry.

The shriek, is timed perfectly with a deep wail from Claire’s mother.

The sounds are like the gun at the start of a race, his feet moving before he thinks.

He has no control over his body as he rushes back into the hallway, his heart pounding, breaths shallow and quick. His chest feels like it’s on fire as he slides his body down the wall, sinking into the floor, much like he did several months back when Claire broke the news - although this is light years more jarring.

“Why don’t you go see your baby girl?” Plays back in his head like a cruel joke.

It’s a girl.

He should be happy that at least one of them made it out, but all is brain can grab a hold of is the fact that the one that did, is not his girl - not Claire.

The commingled cries leak under the door and waft into the hallway, giving him no reprieve. His hands slide over his ears as he tucks his knees into his chest and digs his forehead into the denim of his jeans.

He thought he knew what grief felt like. When his mom died, years ago now, it was like someone rearranged his insides and forgot to put his heart back into the right place, stuck somewhere near his stomach, perpetually sunk. And back then, he knew it was coming - a monster in the closet that would eventually come so he left the door ajar. He slowly grieved the loss of her for months and months before the cancer finally took her, and it hurt, but not like this.

This was different.

He wasn’t prepared for a monster to come and take everything, and certainly not on today of all days.

He thought they would rush to the hospital and get settled in a room and figured the worst thing that could go wrong was Claire squeezing his hand maybe a bit too hard - maybe even enough to break it, he had heard that could happen - and then after a few grueling hours, they would leave with arms cradling a boy, a strong little fella with Claire's bright eyes and his big’ole nose.

They would go home as three.

He knows there’s two of them now, but he feels like he’s just one.

He can’t do this.

With a clack on the tile, feet halt in front of him. Raising his head slightly off his knees, dark brown cowboy boots come to fill his view as they grind into the ground. With a firm hand - an angry clench that squeezes his bicep- Claire’s father hoists him up roughly, feet slipping on the smooth tile as he’s forced to stand and face him.

His eyes are all fire when they meet Joel’s and his grip intensifies as they bear into him. He’s heard stories about Mr. Johnson’s anger - never would touch a woman, but Claire’s told him about how he wouldn’t hold back on her brother Mike. For a moment, he’s sure he’s about to experience what he can do, but instead, he’s slammed against the wall.

“Stand up. Act like a damn man,” he growls, his voice a strident whisper.

It’s harsh, but expected. Her dad never liked him, thought he was derailing his daughter's future, and that was before getting her pregnant. Five years of pent-up anger and disdain are channeled into the vice grip on his arm. He winces, but he also knows he's fortunate it's only his arm taking the brunt of it.

“This is on you, boy. So you march back in there, you take the reins, and you do right by that child. You hear?”

He only manages to nod his head, but Mr. Johnson finds it’s enough, and he is released with a final shove.

In the silence that follows, a lifetime passes.

He stops being a kid, walks back in, and tends to his child.

His child: Sarah.

That’s the name they had picked after thumbing through a far too large book rented from the college library. Claire had wanted something with meaning, “classic, but strong,” and landed on Alexander and Sarah - a warrior and a princess.

He didn’t think they would be needing the girl's name - “Miller’s make men” he had begun to chime every time Claire’s eyes veered toward something pink or purple for the baby. But perhaps it was mother’s intuition because here she is.

Sarah

Sarah

Sarah

She was supposed to be their princess. Now, she’s just his, and that fact weighs his body down like an anchor, planting his feet next to her bassinet, forcing him to stare into her big brown eyes that go as deep as the ocean.

Claire would have loved her baby’s eyes.

A warm hand settles between his shoulder blades, and he pushes his gaze away from her, blinks rapidly to clear away the tears pooling in his waterline, and turns toward the source. A nurse with a yellow scrub cap that matches a tweedy bird pin clipped on her pink scrubs offers him a quaint but sullen smile and drops her hand away.

“You picked a name out for her yet, sugar?” She asks bending over the bassinet clipped to retrieve the name placard at the top of the small crib.

The powder pink card boasts “It’s a Girl!” in a cursive font with flowers and a cheery teddy bear with a bow. Beneath it, are all the important things, like “Mother: Johnson”, “Weight: 6lb 1oz,” “Length: 17 ⅛. In.” and “Time: 10:27am.”

The spot for the name is glaringly empty.

Joel nods with a sniffle.

“And what’s the winner then?” The clipboard in her grip swings around to her front, and she balances it in a crevice of her stomach as she uncaps a black felt tip marker with her teeth.

Mouth dry, he swallows hard. The last time his throat pushed out words was when he whispered “you’ll be okay” into Claire’s ear as she was pushed away from him through those doors off the ER bay. He hates that his last words to her were a lie, but that’s neither here nor there now.

“Sarah,” he says slowly, listening how it floats through the air.

“Middle?”

He knows what Claire wanted - what they had planned - but his eyes flick across the room and find her blanched face obscured by a tube and surrounded by monitors, and he just can’t go with it.

“I think it should-,” he pauses, pondering it again for a fraction of a second, “-Claire.” He nods, “Sarah. Claire. Miller.”

He hopes she doesn’t mind.

*** ʚїɞ ***

The hours begin to bleed together.

The mechanical whispers of the hospital - the soft beeps, the muted shuffles of footsteps, the low voices of doctors, and nurses, and administrators weaving in and out the dimly lit room - it all becomes one giant mush after a while.

Someone had offered to wheel Sarah away, and put her in the nursery with all the other newborns - “are you sure? fathers ain’t normally the ones watchin’ them like this” - but despite being utterly terrified, he shook his head at the offer. He planted himself in the corner of the room on a small maroon plastic couch, rolled her bassinet firmly in front of him, and kept her small form at his eye level.

People come in to evaluate Claire, but when nobody veers toward their own little space to check on them, he wonders if it’s the wrong decision. She seems perfectly fine, but his leg bounces nervously with the possibility that she isn’t - silently slipping away because he doesn’t know anything about babies.

His gaze rarely leaves her even as conversations swell around them, constant low-murmured discussions about what comes next.

They frame their words carefully, tiptoeing around the inevitable, trying to present things as if there are options to be made, but there aren’t options - there is just one option :

When to let her go.

She’s already gone in all the ways that matter. Her body is there, but her brain is not. She’s never going to wake up. She’s not going to go home and dance in their apartment, or wiggle her toes in the sand, or blow bubbles in her drink, or call him “Joel Michael Miller” when he tickles her too much.

And she is not going to hold her baby, or hear her giggle, or see her take her first steps cause Claire is not going to be stepping out of this hospital.

He knows it, but the Johnsons haven’t quite gotten there yet. So he just watches from the corner of the room as her parents ask all the same questions over and over again, yet hope for different answers.

Earlier, someone had tried to explain what happened was rare. That when the placenta detached her body kicked into overdrive, blood clotting excessively. As little Sarah was being pulled into the land of the living, Claire slipped the opposite way, a clot traveling up to her brain and cutting off blood supply for too long.

A one in a million chance.

“Exceedingly rare,” they had said repeatedly, and, “no way to know this would happen,” as though those two things could somehow soften the blow.

Soft enough to knead it into something it isn’t.

For her parents, “rare” became synonymous with special, and “no way to know” mutated into defying the odds, and both together turned into a false hope of an impossible reality.

“She just need’s some time - we’ll wait- our Claire - she’s a strong one - patience is a virtue.” her mother told the room, aiming the words at nobody in particular.

And waiting is what they have been doing. They hover by her bedside, chairs drawn close, bodies hunched over and slipping out, practically on their knees as they tightly grasp Claire’s hands and pray.

Their words to God fill the space between beeps and breaths, and he doesn’t really believe in Him like how they do, but part of him also want’s to get down on his knees and ask Him why.

When the hours tick by, they start to beg for a miracle.

And Joel doesn’t believe in that sort of stuff either, but the longer he spends with Sarah the more he thinks that God has already delivered. He could have taken them both, but he left one behind.

Wrapped snuggly in a hospital blanket, she stirs slightly, her tiny hands balling into fists against the underside of the blue and pink striped fabric. He holds his breath until she settles.

He’s been doing that a lot.

The door groans softly on its hinges, inching open just wide enough for someone to slide through. The Johnsons pivot toward the sound, and they nod in recognition, gesture returned politely by the nurse slipping through. She then shifts focus, surprisingly shuffling back toward Joel tucked away in the corner.

It’s Judy again - that nurse from the ER who seems to be trailing them throughout the hospital. She pauses beside him, her gaze softening as she looks down at Sarah, and then back to him.

“May I?” Her voice is a hushed whisper as she gestures to the cramped couch that has become his home for the last several hours.

Anxiously his hands had been wedged beneath his thighs, but he slides them out, and scoots an inch to the right, making room for Judy to settle in beside him.

“I know I’m not one of the gals in pink, but I thought I would come and check on ya’ll.” She adjusts her sea foam green scrub top, smoothing out some wrinkles, and untangling her hanging ID badge that’s gotten caught in the chain of her glasses draped around her neck.

She’s so nonchalant about it all, it's a little strange, but also a little comforting hearing someone talk to him like normal.

"How are we holdin’ up?" she asks her voice a gentle coo. Joel pauses, caught off-guard, unsure if her words are meant for him or the baby nestled in front of them. He goes with the former, but manages only a shrug, expression a bit hollow.

“Well, that’s expected,” she murmurs back.

“I don’t know what to do,” he confesses, his whisper barely audible as he brushes his palms back and forth against his thighs.

He’s been thinking it for hours, hasn’t dared to utter it outloud, but something about Judy has him spilling his secrets.

“Do?” She angles toward him, her brow bunched together in a soft frown.

“With her. I don’t know what I am supposed to be doin’.”

A reassuring touch lands on his knee. “Oh hun, nobody really does at first. But you’ll get there,” she encourages. With a hopeful tilt of her head she suggests, “Why don’t you start by holding her?”

Joel balks, his voice stuttering. “No I don’t - I don’t -,”

He’s thought about it, but she’s a tiny little thing - swears he’s seen potatoes at the county fair bigger - and he’s petrified of someone how smushing her. He’s fairly certain his hands will cause more harm than good the second he reaches for her.

He hasn’t, so he won’t.

“ - I can’t,” he begins, but Judy halts his efforts with a raised hand.

“Nonsense,” she dismisses as she stands, couch squawking with the change in pressure. Her hands are cool as they touch his arms, sending goosebumps up his skin the moment she bends and positions them. The reaction has nothing to do with the iciness of her touch though; his heart bounces into his throat before settling back into his chest and hammering against his ribs.

“Yep there ya’go,” she softly assures as they become a cradle. Silently, he shakes his head - every part of his body telling him he shouldn’t do it, but Judy pays no mind.

"It’ll feel more natural than you think.”

Staying petrifyingly still, his eyes acutely track her as she turns towards the bassinet and slips her hands under Sarah’s small form. “Hand under her head now, like where mine’s at,” she instructs, catching Joel’s nervous eyes and waiting for him to return a nod before proceeding.

He’s not ready, but he doesn’t think Judy would let him stop even if he asked; he suspects her bright red hair matches her personality in that regard.

He bites down on the inside of his cheek and gives her a curt confirmation.

He’s going to have to be ready.

Sarah's tiny head fits into the crook of his elbow, and for a moment, he's too afraid to breathe. Her weight settles against his chest, and although a rush of warmth floods through his heart, physically he can’t seem to meet the feeling halfway, body clenched up tight.

Filled with apprehension his eyes flick up to Judy. She’s giving him a hearty smile, the crow's feet at the corner of her eyes turning into deep valleys as they crinkle up.

When Sarah begins to squirm and fuss, it has his heart starting to beat nervously fast. He didn’t realize he could be any more tense, but his body constricts even more, shoulders darting to his ears, spine curling, feet pushing hard into the ground; it's all in a futile hope that if he stops moving, she will too.

He holds his breath.

“Relax, she’s a baby, not a brick,” Judy whispers, careful not to aggravate Sarah anymore as she bends in close. “She feels what you’re feelin’ honey just -” Her hand settles on his upper arm and brushes down it.

He forces himself to take a breath, urging his body to comply with Judy’s coaching. Slowly, his shoulders come away from his ears and his chest sinks back against Sarah, and he lets out a shaky, but unburdening breath.

Sarah settles too.

When he looks up to show Judy, he discovers she has retreated several feet, busying herself with something on the back countertop. His heart catapults into his throat again as he realizes he’s holding her alone. His eyes widen with concern as they snap down to Sarah. He gulps hard, adam’s apple pushing down to the bottom of his neck and then climbing back up. His muscles are threatening to constrict again, but he tries to keep all that at bay.

Relax, relax, relax

The anxious flutter only settles when he sees Judy returning.

“Chart says she’s fit as a fiddle, and due for another feed soon. Did the nurse show you how to give her a bottle?” she inquires, peering at him over her purple glasses.

Joel shakes his head.

“They show you anything?” she presses, her tone gentle as she moves her readers and sticks them into her bushy hair.

Again, he shakes his head, and then at the same time both their attention moves toward the Johnsons, still ensconced in their silent prayer at Claire’s bedside. A mutual understanding passes between them then, both knowing that other things have taken precedence in this room besides teaching a new dad how to be just that.

“Well, I ain’t no labor and delivery nurse, but I’ve had five of my own. Reckon I can get you sorted,” she declares, settling back onto the couch. With practiced ease, she adjusts Joel’s hold on Sarah, her hands confident and caring. Unprompted, she continues, “You remind me of my youngest - and I’m not going to ask you where your mama’s at - but if my little one was havin’ his own little one, and I wasn’t there for some reason, I’d hope that somebody would have some mercy on that clueless kid and step’n for me.”

It’s true, he is a clueless kid.

He doesn’t know how to hold her, or feed her, or change a diaper, and he’s not sure what cry is fine and what sound should have him racing to find a nurse.

Not to mention any of the parts about her being a girl and what to do with that. He might have been able to push through if life with this child was going to be mud and dinosaurs and football and little boy things, but he has no idea about pink and princesses and dance class and being a girl.

And part of him knows he still wouldn’t know any of this stuff if Claire was sitting next to him, but at least she’s made for this.

Was made for this.

He’s not.

Yet, as if reading his mind, Judy offers: “You’ll figure it out.”

Sarah’s small lips pucker and then croak out the faintest yawn, before flattening into a little smile.

“See, she like’s when you hold’er,” Judy chimes while playfully bumping her shoulder into his.

Goosebumps cascade down his body again, but this time they are warm—soft and bright, like Sarah's smile. The fear still lingers, rattling in his chest, but he can’t help but mirror her expression. His mouth twitches, the corners lifting into a smile of his own.

The longer he looks, the more he realizes he’s seen that grin before.

Lost in the moment, he looks up to show Claire.

*** ʚїɞ ***

“No reason to keep her here, you’re all set to leave,” the pediatrician tells him as he unhooks his stethoscope from his ears and gently places Sarah’s blanket back in place.

His tone is light and optimistic, but his volume is hushed, matching the somber ambiance of the room. Everyone’s been quite cognizant to keep quiet with the Johnsons holding vigil at the other end.

“Leave? To another room?” Joel whispers, swaying on the balls of his feet, hands crossed tightly over his chest.

With a small snort and shake of his head, the doctor tries again, “No no, your baby is being discharged, you can go home.” There is a beat of silence and then he adds, “get out of ..here.. for a bit, get a break from this, son.”

Joel’s eyes drift over to Claire’s parents, and a weight that’s been looming in the background suddenly settles on his shoulders. He rakes his hands down his face and they settle in front of his mouth, palms touching like prayer hands.

He knew this would come, but he hadn’t let himself consider how it would play out. A shiver slips down his spine and he drags in a long breath.

He’s not sure he can do this part, but then again, he didn’t think he could do any other parts of the day either.

“Talk with ‘em, but I think it’d be best if she goes home tonight,” the physician encourages as he departs, giving his shoulder a small squeeze before smiling back at Sarah and taking his exit.

The talk is a mess.

It’s a charged volley of raised voices and differing views.

They can’t believe he is considering leaving, but the doctor is right, there is no reason to stay lingering by and waiting in a place seeped in gloom and dread when Sarah’s life should start with something much brighter.

They tell him a mother and child aren’t supposed to be separated.

They aren’t wrong, but they aren’t right. He holds his tongue to what he could say, and the conversation pivots, anyway.

He asks them to revisit what the doctors said, that she will not be waking up. Gently, he tries to convince them that Claire wouldn’t want to live as a shell hooked to monitors and breathing by way of an air tank -that this isn’t what she would want - that this isn’t her.

But they don’t get it. They tell him God can work in mysterious ways, that He will choose if she goes.

He tells them that God made his choice, and now it’s their choice - his choice, he corrects. He has let them take charge this entire time, but their ceremony at the courthouse in March makes this his responsibility.

It was just a little thing with a borrowed suit and a white dress from the thrift store, and a Clerk named Alvin as their witness, but he wants to uphold the vows he swore to her that day.

With a scoff, they tell him that it wasn’t before God, that it wasn’t in a church, that it might have well have been two kids playing dress up.

They say she’s still their responsibility. And he knows “responsibility” for them is really “she’s our baby,” - and he now has a glimpse of what that means - but still, he can face what they can’t.

He tells them they are making her suffer.

They tell him he’s going to hell.

He doesn’t necessarily disagree with them.

*** ʚїɞ ***

When he shakily thumbs through some paperwork - meaningless words on a page that don’t stick in his brain - and then signs his name at the bottom, he somehow feels too young and too old at the same time.

His signature is a janky mess that anyone would be hard-pressed to decipher if it came from the trembling hand of an eighty-year-old or a fourth-grader learning cursive for the first time.

Her dad had told him to be a man.

It hurts, but that’s what he’s trying to do.

*** ʚїɞ ***

When the nighttime air hits his face, he takes a breath, dragging it in slowly through his nose and holding it until his lungs beg for mercy. He thought a few moments away would feel good, but it just seems to have highlighted a new type of anxiety that’s prodding at his insides.

A tiny voice in the back of his mind tells him he’s forgotten something, but he knows it isn’t true.

Sarah, Sarah, Sarah, it whispers.

He tries to picture exactly where she is, tucked safely in the hospital minded by nurses, but the nagging feeling stubbornly remains.

Anxiously, he twirls a pair of borrowed scissors in his fingers as he walks across the parking lot toward his car. Every step further elicits one more repetition of her name, louder and louder.

Sarah, Sarah, Sarah, Sarah.

He pauses halfway across the parking lot, the urge to go back stopping his stride. As he drums the blade of the scissors against his palm, he considers it for a moment. He wants to have her where he can see her, but shaking his head, he dismisses the idea and continues on.

It’s strange how they’ve only been together for a few hours, and already he can’t seem to let her go—not even when he tries. He hopes that’s normal.

His keys twist into the back lock and the trunk pops open with a loud click, catapulting open and up as soon as it's unlatched. Having seen far better days, the ‘78 Wagoneer is chronically temperamental. He’s normally fluent in its weird behaviors, but he’s not on the ball today.

A second too slow at catching it, the edge nails him in the face as it comes up. It doesn’t hurt all that much, but it’s embarrassing, and he quickly turns his head around the parking lot to check if anyone’s noticed. But the only thing staring back at him is the washed-out face of a smiling baby plastering the side of the car seat box in his trunk.

It was bought over the weekend from Walmart, but hasn’t been touched since. Getting it sorted before the baby was born was supposed to be on the list of things for him to do.

Obviously that didn’t happen.

With a hefty sigh, he drags it closer and flicks open the scissors to slice at the packaging tape. Every inch of the orange handles and silver blades are heavily plastered in sharpie with “Nurse Stat. 7” to an absurd degree.

Asking for them wasn’t easy.

His request was simple at first: “Ma’am, do y’all have a pair of scissors or somethin’ I could borrow?” The woman at the large, curved desk glanced up, giving him her full attention. He probably didn’t need to say more, but her direct gaze made him nervous, and he found himself rambling.

And that’s when things got hard.

“We just had - I just had -” he stuttered before stopping in his tracks, trying to find the words that felt right to explain what had happened that day.

They did just have a baby, but they weren’t a “we” anymore, yet saying “I” felt dishonest—he hadn’t done anything. She had done everything. Gave everything.

And he knew the other half of his “we” was gone. He knew it, but verbalizing that reality outside the confines of her hospital room felt like he was spreading a lie, leaving a bitter, acidic taste in his mouth. So he decided to omit it—“if you have nothin’ nice to say, don’t say nothin’ at all,” he reminded himself, as though he was a kid back on the schoolyard, stopping a pesky rumor from spreading.

He wished it was just that.

With his hands buried in his pockets to hide their shaking, he instead managed, “My baby came a bit early and were gettin’ ready to go, but they say she needs a car seat, and her’s is still packed up in the back of my trunk.” The words came out awkward and uneven, voice cracking as if he was just a kid.

She was light on the sympathy when she handed the scissors over, slapping them into his palm with clear directions not to run off with them as if she’d heard his story several times before.

Maybe she has.

He dumps the pieces out haphazardly and arranges the array of lightweight muted grey awkwardly shaped plastic parts across the flatbed. The only bits he can definitively identify are a curved handle, a lightly padded fabric liner in blue, and two thin woven nylon straps for her seatbelt. Frustration comes on quickly as he fails to snap together two parts that look like they should fit, finds nothing that seems to anchor another, and every time he looks at the pieces scattered about, it feels like the pile has doubled in size. The minutes start to tick by quickly, and he’s no further in the process than when he started.

The little voice in his head is getting louder and louder screaming Sarah, Sarah Sarah!

He’s not really an impatient person but he can’t take it.

With an exasperated breath, an unlucky piece flies from his hand, arcs through the air, and crashes against the interior of the trunk, ultimately landing back among the sea of discarded parts.

Leaning heavily against the back bumper, his clenched fists dig into the rusty metal, knuckles going white. His chin hits his chest, defeated. Of all the things to make him unravel today, he can’t believe the goddamn car seat is somehow a fighting contender.

He thought he would be good at this - capable of building something - it’s what he does day in and day out, but this is a puzzle, not a construction project. He can build a house, but he has no idea what fits where in a seat that doesn’t even look like it would hold a toy doll, much less a living breathing child.

His gaze lifts reluctantly to the box, and with a deep sigh, he straightens. Dragging one hand through his hair the other plunges back into the box and retrieves a small white instruction booklet that mocks his competence. He slams the trunk shut with a dissatisfied breath.

Coming around front, the window slips down a healthy inch as he forces his car door open with the usual two hearty tugs. The leather of the seats are cracked and chipped, and whenever he slides into the driver’s side, his jeans always snag as he gets settled. Today is no different.

The car smells like her - sweet and floral with a hint of salt from that spray she likes to put in her hair. Claire always said it was to help with her curls but knowing her, Joel thinks it was just to smell a little like her favorite place.

He leaves the door open, allowing the nighttime air to cycle through the cabin and chisel away at one of the last remnants of her.

Lingering in any memory of her for longer than a heartbeat hurts far too much.

He cranes and contorts his body to catch a sliver of light, but it helps little. Even the big bold letters on the front - “Joy Ride Infant Seat Manual” - fade into the darkness and when he flips to the first page, squinting does nothing to help decipher the instructions.

With a sigh, he tosses the booklet into the passenger seat and moves his keys from the cup holder to the ignition. The clunker sputters to life, and Joel slams his door shut, the window pane sneaking down another half inch as the metal frame rocks with force. He drives it up two spaces, putting it under the white light of the parking lot pole lamp, and then gets out, and tries again.

The instructions do wonders for making progress.

The seat begins to take shape, but its frame is lighter and more fragile than he wants it to be. Each piece snaps and clicks into place with an unsettling ease that doesn't inspire confidence in the slightest. His hands grow clammy as he flips back and forth through the instruction booklet, doubting each step.

"Right?” he asks with skepticism to the air, picturing how it should look, glancing at the flimsy thing, and then back to the box and booklet. Truthfully, he had been worried about the quality even before putting it together:

“It’ll be fine, we didn’t even have them when we were kids, and look - we made it through,” she had tried to assuage his fears as they waited in line with it by the register on Saturday. Doubt about their choice started settling in when he picked up the suspiciously light box and it rattled with the sounds of several small pieces.

Several pieces that are now somehow a car seat.

“Right,” he mutters reluctantly, shaking his head at the final product. It hardly looks like it will keep her safe, but he’s pretty sure that is the result of choosing the cheaper option - of being two kids on a shoestring budget - and not his poor assembly skills.

He was always the worrier, Claire was always the one to talk him down.

“Go with the motion of the ocean, dude” she would always kid, dropping her voice low and slow, pretending to be some surfer boy Kyle from San Diego.

He wonders if she would stay as cool about 'the motion of the ocean' if she saw the seat's concerning sway, despite being securely fastened into the backseat during the short drive through the hospital parking lot. His ears can’t help but to zero in on the sound of its rocking as he maneuvers the Wagoneer from the dimly lit lot to the harsh fluorescent light under the hospital’s awning.

Coming to a stop, the engine idles with a rhythmic purr that mixes with the steady blink of his hazards, and for a moment, it feels nice - just him alone.

But it doesn’t last long. Alone makes him feel guilty.

Sarah! The voice in his head screams again.

As he reaches to turn off the car, his fingers brush against his keychain, causing the baubles to jingle. He pauses, the sound drawing his attention to the beaded orange and black monarch and a tiny bleached conch that knocks softly against the other keys.

Claire had "spruced them up" one afternoon, hoping to get a funny rise out of his coworkers at the construction site. After the teasing, he took off most of the other girly keychains and pink ribbon, but he kept around the butterfly and small sea shell.

He wishes he kept all of it now.

With a deep breath, he retrieves the scissors from the dash and goes to collect his daughter.

She is fussy and more squirmy than he thought a baby should be when he eases her down into it. Her tiny limbs flail against the stiff plastic sides and each time he tries to snug her in, she wriggles, face scrunching in displeasure. The straps are working against him too, twisting up as he fumbles with the buckles.

His hands tremble as he attempts to adjust the plastic chest piece, sliding it up, then down, never quite finding the right spot. He knows he’s doing something wrong, but he’s not exactly sure what - other than maybe being too gentle, but he’s not sure how to change that either because he’s determined to keep his touch feather light with her; keep it all soft and gentle so he doesn’t scare her more than she already looks to be.

He glances back at the assembly booklet, but the part about actually putting your child inside is light on details - just one page out of a hundred.

Sarah’s cries escalate, echoing in the backseat and slipping out to fill the air in the hospital entry.

His heart races as he imagines the eyes of every passerby on them, judging his clumsy attempts. A car honks loudly, startling him, and he pops his head up just in time to catch the driver shaking their head in disapproval as he swerves past.

“Work with me Sarah, come’on baby girl.”

He holds his breath as he hears the sound of the sliding doors behind him, and his hands still as he bears down and waits for someone to yell at him to get a move on.

He steals a quick glance over his shoulder, catches the eye of the woman coming through, gives her a pleasant but curt nod and then turns back toward Sarah in the car. He hopes the gesture will stave off the inevitable complaint heading his way.

“Excuse me.”

He sucks in a breath but doesn’t reply, unsure of what to say. He knows he’s been at this too long, he doesn’t need a stranger reminding him of it too.

A gentle hand lands on his shoulder.

"Need some help with that?" she asks.

His face must convey his answer, cause she doesn’t wait for his reply, pushing in next to him. Part of him wants to resist the help, too proud to need it, but the better part of him lets his hands back away and hers take his place.

“First time’s always hard with these things,” she tells him as her hands untangle and unclip the twisted straps. Her nails are painted purple like Claire’s before - like Sarah’s mom’s that morning - and that’s all his brain can seem to focus on as she moves things around. He almost misses her undoing the straps completely and resetting them- apparently he anchored those upside down when he put the thing together.

With a final click of a buckle, she’s gone as quickly as she came, giving him a pat on the back before climbing into the car that honked at him just moments ago.

He didn’t get the chance to say thank you.

*** ʚїɞ ***

It’s a short drive home, but it's a spotty blur of lights in the dark - some greens and reds, but mostly whites - bright headlights that burn into his retinas from the rearview as he takes far too many long and hard glances toward Sarah in the back seat.

With every mile, his grip on the wheel tightens and his arms stiffen, and by the time he’s pulling into the apartment complex he might as well be a statue in the front seat. And even though it prolongs the stiffness even more, he takes the curve into the apartment complex at a crawl and keeps the speedometer unreadable as he glides gently into his parking space.

His foot moves slowly as it eases off the break, car bobbing back ever so slightly. His hands release the steering wheel, knuckles aching as they straighten and flood back to color. His right-hand drifts stiffly down, fingers curling around the ignition key. With a deep breath, he pauses, gaze going to the top of Sarah’s car seat just visible in the corner rearview, and then with a decisive twist, the rickety engine that had been her lullaby shudders to a halt.

Mercifully, she doesn’t wake.

He exhales a long breath as the car settles into the stillness - quiet, yet far from peaceful.

Drawing another breath in feels like inhaling sludge, oxygen to thick to gulp. Suddenly his body is feeling again, bringing out every worry and fear that he pushed down in their drive home. They are trying to crawl out of his stomach, digging into the sides of his throat as they climb their way up and out.

He can’t breathe.

The car is totally stopped, but he feels like any move he makes now will somehow send them into a tailspin, he won’t be able to steer them out of it, and they will crash, and Sarah will end up in the same place as Claire.

She’s home safe and sound - “home safe”, he repeats over and over in his head - but he can’t get his brain and body to sync up.

He knows it's all irrational, but he feels lightyears away from safe.

His fingers grip the top of his thighs, pressing down hard and deep as his breaths come in choppy and labored through his nose, jaw clenched up tight.

He knows what’s happening, but it makes little difference in stopping it. His mother used to call it "emociones fuertes" when he was a child, but he hasn’t had a true one in years - really not since living with Claire.

“Stop it Miller, Stop it.” He grates, trying to find something to focus on to push away the feelings of overwhelm. His eyes land on the only thing in view, the parking sign at the head of his spot, and he traces the number 12 over and over again with his eyes.

Down, around, across, over. Down, around, across, over.

Failing to find relief, he takes a long breath in and collapses forward, forehead pushing into the top of the wheel as he closes his eyes hoping the sparkly specks and blurry colors behind them will be a better distraction. Instead, his mom’s voice comes drifting through his head, a brief vision of her flashing behind his eyelids: "Mira, mira, mijo, mira a mí. Inspira - uno, dos. Suelta - uno, dos."

He does what she says.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

He repeats over and over again.

When he peels himself up and away after an undeterminable amount of minutes, his eyes first go to his rearview mirror and catch Sarah’s car seat, and then go to his dashboard and land on the green numbers of the clock. It reads 10:27, just like the placard on her bassinet at the hospital - a strange coincidence that has his anxiety twitching, threatening to come back in full for no apparent reason.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

He cracks open his car door, but almost slams it shut - a roaring sound of buzzing cicadas wafting into the car. He holds his breath and pauses, hand not even off the door handle. He waits and waits for her to start fussing and crying -bugs should make babies cry right?- but Sarah stays quiet, blissfully asleep.

And she remains that way by some small miracle as he detaches her car seat and locks the car with a loud resonant chirp.

The flight of stairs up to the apartment is taken at a sloth's pace, anchoring both of his feet into each concrete step and pausing before moving on to the next, all while holding the car seat fiercely level with two hands as if the slightest dip will have her slipping out.

When he reaches his front door, he does everything in his power to minimize the sway of her seat as he shifts to hold her with one hand and muffle the jingle of the keys as he unlocks it, petrified of waking her.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

With a creak, it falls open and an unexpected, staticky voice from a distance halts him on the threshold. His eyes track the sound to a very faint blue glow in the far corner and the realization hits harder than it should - TV’s still on, left unattended in the rush this morning.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

Shaking his head, Joel sighs heavily and steps inside. His gaze flits to the light switch but then back to his hands glued firmly to the car seat, and decides not to engage with it, forgoing the juggle it would take to get them turned on. The door closes with a push of his heel, and the apartment entry plunges into darkness.

A jolt of panic rips up through him as he stumbles, feet tripping up on something on the floor. He catches himself in a rush of awkward steps, and looks back to see the culprit. Squinting against the dark the outline of Claire’s backpack comes into view.

Swallowing hard, he tears his gaze away, focusing on getting Sarah settled.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

Embarrassingly, his arms are already aching, and that makes his heart pound with worry, fearing somehow they will just give out without his permission. It’s maybe only ten steps, but it feels like he is crossing the entire length of the small apartment as he rushes to put her down.

But then she’s on the coffee table and he finally lets out a real breath.

Fumbling in the dark, he attempts to flip down the car seat handle, hands blindly feeling out the button, but he can’t get it to budge. “Okay, baby girl, okay,” he coos in a whisper as Sarah begins to let out the tiniest mewls as her resting place is disturbed. Promptly, he removes his hands holding them up until she settles.

He steps back, pauses, then scrambles to find the remote control and flips off the TV, pushing the space into stark silence.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

With a deep sigh, he sinks into the couch in front of her. A sliver from a street light outside slips through a small opening in a window curtain, hitting her car seat at just the right angle. The orange hue brightens up the darkness just enough for Joel to see her small little face as she settles back into sleep.

It should make him feel better, being able to see her, but the more he stares, the more anxiety fills his body.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

He isn’t supposed to be doing this alone.

Twisting his watch band back and forth, his mind races with all the things he doesn’t know, all the things he’s going to have to learn, and everything he has to do. He grates his molars together as the list grows and grows.

He’s going to fail at this.

He is going to fail her.

His chest is feeling tight again, and his breaths are coming in choppy no matter how many times he tries to coach himself into breathing. Desperate for relief, his hand leaves his watch and goes to rub it against his sternum. It’s an unseasonably cool day by Austin standards for July, but the apartment is starting to feel unbearably hot and all too small. His shirt is growing wet, sweat making it uncomfortably cling to his body, and he wants to just rip off the constricting material and get out of this too-small space, and run away.

But that idea hurts his heart more than helps. An image of her alone in the dark stabs at his insides and aggravates all the dread swirling inside him.

He stands abruptly and crosses to the window, bats at the curtain to push it aside, and cracks it open to let in some of the night's cooler air.

The sounds of the city at night drift in - a car alarm in the distance, the low hum of traffic, and of course, the buzz of the summertime cicadas. He leans against the wall next to the window, allowing the slight breeze to cool his face as he listens.

He didn’t realize how suffocating the silence was until his heart rate slowed and his lungs grew lighter as he basked in the distant rumble of Austin. Back in the hospital, there had always been a constant backdrop of sounds—machines beeping, footsteps, conversations - all a distraction for his brain to digest instead. When it’s too quiet there is nothing to keep his anxious thoughts at bay.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

He could stay standing in the spot all night long- fall asleep upright - but his heart is tugging him in a different direction after just a couple of minutes. Feeling more steady, he pushes off the wall and goes back over to Sarah, already worried he’s done something wrong by taking his eyes off her for just a few moments.

When he settles in next to her this time, it's on the floor beside the coffee table, wanting to be as close as possible. He leans his head on the wood table top as he gently reaches inside her car seat and lays his hand atop her stomach.

Feeling every one of her tiny inhales and exhales calms some of his nerves, but doesn’t wash away all his fears. He pushes himself to match her breathing.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

*** ʚїɞ ***

He doesn’t remember falling asleep. And he certainly doesn’t remember moving off the scratchy rug on the floor to the old green tweed couch, but he has.

His eyes snap open as the sound of her wails jolt him awake, body jerking and almost tumbling off the side, back to the floor where he thought he had been.

Still dark, his eyes take a long moment to adjust, only seeing the outline of her car seat and her squirmy body, while his brain also races to catch up with his sudden awakening.

But then her small little body emerges from the dark, pushing against the confines of her seat, and he’s dropping to his knees infront of the coffee table in an instant. His hands make quick work of unclipping her buckles, but come to a slow as they reach inside for her - making sure his big clumsy hands are delicate and careful with her as they slip under her tiny arms and around her back, pointer fingers nestling at the base of her head as Judy had aptly shown him.

The moment she is free, her body curls into a tight ball, knees drawn to her chest. Her face mirrors, scrunched tightly as she cries, eyes squeezed shut and mouth wide open, her tiny chin trembling with each wail.

"Shh, baby girl, I got ya," he murmurs, his voice thick with sleep and laden with worry. Carefully, he draws her close against his chest, rocking gently as he kneels on the floor. His hand sweeps down her back in a soft caress, followed by a tender pat, repeating the process in a rhythmic lull. But it does nothing to soothe her.

Her cries continue to pierce through the silence of the apartment, and each sob compounding the worry and anxiousness filling up his gut.

One of them is shaking - he’s really not sure which one - but as her cries persist and stab into his ears, he thinks it might be him more than her.

“C’mon, Sarah, tell me what’s wrong,” he pleads softly as he slowly rises to stand with her.

Pacing the room, he rocks her gently, his lips pressed to her forehead in a silent plea for calm. "Shhh, it's alright, nothing to cry about," he murmurs, the words meant as much for himself as for her.

It’s a little startling how easily her tears have triggered his own. They slip down his face in one hot wet line, and he feels horrible for allowing them to drip onto the crown of her head, but he can’t move his hands away from holding her to brush them out of his eyes and off his face.

“Please stop cryin’.”

The cries only swell.

The ring and echo in his ears, muddling his thoughts into a desperate slurry of “please stop.” He hates himself for it, but he places her back in the car seat, digs the heels of his hands against his eyes the moment they are unburdened, and groans hard in frustration.

“Wet, hungry, tired. That’s all you got to figure out, capiche?” Judy had told him.

He repeats it now, despite his doubts about the simplicity: “Wet, hungry, tired.”

Gritting his teeth, he wipes the back of his hand to his eyes, clearing away the tears, and carries her to the kitchen - not exactly sure why, it just feels right.

The tiles are cool under his bare feet and the overhead sconce flickers before coming alive and bathing the space in a soft yellow light.

He pauses with her in the carrier, looking at the mess of spilled breakfast still on the table, and the minuscule space of countertop that barely can fit a pan on a good day. He taps his hand against his thigh as he thinks about his options, but her cries are like a timer pushing him to make a decision.

They hadn’t gotten around to setting up her crib yet or a changing station of some sort, and the space seems the only feasible option for them right now.

So the floor it is.

He drops to the ground with her, tugging down two dish towels looped over the oven handle as he descends. A faint odor of rancid milk and soggy cereal wafts up from the tiles, leading his gaze to the shards of a broken bowl scattered beneath the table, remnants of this morning's chaos. He contemplates moving, but her cries are growing louder. Wincing, he pushes the stench to the back of his mind, and then with an exacerbated exhale that puffs out his cheeks, he wipes his forearm across the floor, checking for bits of bowl. When he feels none, he lays out the two towels atop each other like a little mat, hoping to provide her some comfort.

“Please stop cryin’, please Sarah I'm tryin’,” he whispers as he finds the snaps on her onesie - a powder pink and thin cotton thing given from the hospital, plain as can be. “Please baby girl I'm tryin’,” he begs softly against her hard cries that echo and bounce off the tiny kitchen, growing in strength each time they ricochet into his ears.

But his quick work is all for nothing, cause he straightens up on his knees and realizes he has forgotten the most crucial bit - a diaper.

His heart sinks and he lets out a dejected rumble at the realization of where it’s at. The hospital had handed him a 'goody bag for dad,' as one nurse had cheerfully put it, filled with enough supplies to last until he could make a proper store run. Grateful, he had nonetheless tossed it onto the floor of the passenger seat, his mind too preoccupied with other things to pay it any attention, until now.

Sitting back on his haunches, he contemplates a quick dash to retrieve it, but the thought of leaving her alone, even for a minute, claws at him.

With a resigned sigh, he bundles her back into the car seat - forgoing her onesie - it’s warm, it will just be a minute. Cursing under his breath, he heads to the car with her in tow.

The journey downstairs and back is torturous, each step deliberate, trying not to jostle her too much and worsen her cries. The thud of his heart pounds in his ears, synchronizing with each of her sobs.

He’s not sure if it's just the contrast of sounds, but it seems quieter out than before, and he wonders how late into the night or how early into the morning it actually is. He bites his lip with a grimace as they pass the neighbor’s door, Sarah of course letting out a particularly loud wail right in front, certainly disturbing their sleep. If he wasn’t already feeling guilty, that surely sealed it. He makes a mental note to send them an apology, as he come back inside to the apartment and drop the bag onto the kitchen floor.

With a deep breath, he resets, and begins the process again.

It’s his second time ever changing a diaper and it’s no better than the first horrid attempt at the hospital. Somehow the sticky side wings bunch up together and pulling them apart ruins the whole thing, tearing at the materials and making it wholly unusable. He shakes his head and rolls his eyes at the mistake, chucking the collateral damage of his inexperience far across the kitchen as she continues to cry and cry.

Things bode better with the second diaper, satisfaction flicking across Joel’s face as he fastens up the last snap of her onesie and her cries recede.

But the quiet is short-lived, gone before he can even sigh in relief. She starts to whimper and then they escalate into another bout of full-on cries, face scrunching up in discomfort.

She really does have a set of lungs on her.

"Alright, not wet, then. Hungry, huh?" He asks scooping her up into his arms as he debates what to do. He eyes the carrier and then settles Sarah back into it, standing with her in the middle of the kitchen for a long moment. It seems like the only safe place to have her when he’s up and moving.

“Hungry, we can fix that, just we gotta -,” he narrates as he takes a long stride forward to the counter. He attempts to place her on it, but the top of her carrier hits the underside and cabinet, preventing him from doing so.

Shit.

He fumbles momentarily, trying to figure out where to put her, to finally deciding on the sink. The stainless steel double bowled sink was something they used to make fun of, size out of place in the rest of the tiny apartment, but he’s never been more thankful for it now. Her carrier balances perfectly on one of the sides, resting atop like a colander would.

He lets his hands go from it hesitantly, murmuring, “Okay, just stay there,” as he slowly backs away to retrieve the brown bag of supplies from the floor.

“We’ll get you a bottle then,” he tells her, throwing the words over his shoulder as if she can understand. Her reply is only more piercing sobs.

His hands are shaky as he pulls out the formula and a bottle and he can’t help but stare at them with wide eyes as they linger in the palms of his hands. The transfixion breaks at the sound of a particularly rattled shriek that claws up from her throat.

He carries the supplies back to the counter and instinctively reaches into his pocket. Relief washes over him as he finds the small piece of paper he stashed there hours ago still safe. Carefully, he pulls it out and smooths the crinkled paper against the countertop edge.

“Can I write this down?”

“Sure thing, let’s um - here,” Judy offered, ripping out a blank form from a chart, flipping it over to a blank white back, and passing it to him with a click of a pen.

It’s his writing, but it’s barely recognizable chicken scratch.

Reading the instructions aloud to himself, his voice is hesitant and shaky, but he tries to ground himself in the steps, eyes casting over to Sarah every other second.

Her face is red and glistens, soaked in tears.

He can’t help but tell her, “workin’ as fast as I can baby,” as he lowers his head down to the bottle and makes sure he is pouring the exact amount of water into the measuring line. The formula tin opens with a scratchy metallic sound as he tears away the top. His fingers dig inside for the scoop - he made a note that Judy said it likes to hide - and when they find reach it he quickly uses the plastic shovel to ladle the powder into the tiny bottle.

It’s not a particularly clean process - rushing, excess powder spills onto the counter every time he taps the scoop to the lid of the bottle to get the formula in. He probably should be more careful with it, but Sarah’s screaming for him to hurry.

He slides infront of her as he shakes the bottle, using his free hand to wipe away the tears drenching her cheeks.

“Almost there, almost there,” he coos half to Sarah, half to himself, as he clings to small talk as if the words could bridge the gap between panic and calm while gently rocking her seat.

Raising the bottle toward the ceiling, he uses the light to check the formula is all dispersed and seeing it is, he turns quickly to offer it to her, and the nipple grazes her mouth her pulls it back quickly.

He forgot to warm it.

Quickly, he flips the faucet handle up and over, hot as it can go, and holds the bottle under the stream. The heat begins to sting his hand, but he holds it steady and waits for the warmth to seep into the milk.

Sarah’s cries lull to a sputter, and her tense expression eases into a prolonged frown.

There is only one thing that’s changed:

“You like the water huh?” he asks glancing back and forth between the tap and her face.

As he holds it under, the redness in her face fades begins to fade, and a tentative smile begins to form on Joel's lips. "You know, your momma loved the water," he distantly murmurs, watching her visibly relax.

With the rush of the faucet filling her ears, Sarah stops crying abates, and he slips the bottle out from under it.

“You get that from her.”

It’s a melancholy whisper that he knows she can’t understand, but he hopes it somehow it roots in her heart like his. Catching a glimpse of Claire in her - getting a reminder that she still is her daughter too, and not just his, has a certain type of flutter kicking in his heart.

He tests the temperature on his wrist like Judy showed and, then hesitantly takes a sip himself just to double check—it’s lukewarm at best, but it will have to do. He keeps the soothing rush of the tap on for her as he gently slips the bottle into her mouth. When she takes it without protest, his shoulders droop, relief washing over him. He watches her drink, the soft rhythmic sounds of her sucking mixing in with the white noise of the water beside her.

"There you go, baby girl. That’s it," he murmurs, a smile blooming full into his cheeks.

He’s not sure what does, but suddenly he’s feeling like nothing can go wrong.

As she takes the bottle at a chug, her plump cheeks rise and fall, appearing even fuller and irresistibly adorable. Her long eyelashes, mirroring the rich brown mop of hair atop her head, flutter gently as she settles more comfortably. And even after crying her little head off, remnants of her screams and tears still clearly on her face, he can’t help but think that she is one of the most beautiful babies out there.

Which isn’t a surprise cause she looks like Claire and she was one of the most beautiful people out there.

"We can do this," he whispers.

*** ʚїɞ ***

“3 weeks from baby!”

The small little calendar magnet stares him down. His eyes are glassy and bloodshot from a night gone without sleep, but he holds its gaze harshly. Gently swaying, Sarah rest against his chest, her tiny form curled securely in his grasp.

He’s not sure what to do with it.

Never once has he changed it - it was Claire’s thing - and it still feels like her thing- but the morning light peaking through the crusty blinds in the kitchen is hitting it perfectly, spotlighting it in a warm glow, and it just feels like the world is telling him to fix it.

He stops his sway, coming to a slow as he heaves a sigh. With one hand, he carefully removes the magnet, flips it to the last page, jostles it in the air as the thin pages catch on the cheap spiral binding, and slaps it back onto the fridge.

“Baby is here!”

It’s up for all of three seconds before it flies across the kitchen.

It clangs against the metal sink, sliding down with a scrape, and settling ominously at the bottom drain.

Fixed somehow feels infinitely worse than wrong.

Sarah stirs, a soft whimper breaking through as she senses his tension. He exhales slowly, relaxing his clenched jaw, and resumes his gentle sway, hoping to soothe both her and himself.

Now, the black fridge door hosts only a lone neon butterfly magnet, its wings pinning a small card beneath them - a phone number, an address, and an army insignia.

His heart moves from somewhere beneath Sarah to the floor.

Tommy.

He had been gone most of the summer at basic training, and at the start of his ten weeks, Claire had put up the address to make sure she knew where to send his letters. They were two kindred spirits, the same type of recklessness and bubble - her little brother just as much as his.

He never asked what was in the letters she sent, but he’s certain Claire was keeping Tommy up to date with her pregnancy, especially because in his own letters from Tommy, he would be nagged about not buying Claire enough chocolate-covered pretzels and salt n’ vinegar chips- her two favorite snack cravings.

He deserves to know.

Plucking the card from the fridge, Joel shuffles over to the wall-mounted phone, the cord stretching and coiling like a reluctant snake. He sinks into a kitchen chair, cradling Sarah more snugly as he dials the number, each press of the button sharper than necessary. Calling during training isn’t really a thing - “only write me” Tommy had explained once, but this isn’t something that could wait. After an agonizing series of redirects and brief conversations with faceless operators, his brother’s familiar voice finally crackles through the speaker.

“Joel? Everythin’ alright?” He asks immediately.

His eyes are on Sarah, balanced in his arm supported up by a bent leg in a figure four. His foot is wiggling anxiously, but she seems to like the motion as it vibrates up his leg. “She’s here” is what is at the tip of his tongue, fighting to come out, but that’s barely half the truth.

The feeling like he is about to spread a lie is back, guilt settling heavily in his chest. He can’t find the words to say Claire is gone.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

“Joel? You there brother?” Tommy presses again.

His eyes drift up to the butterfly on the fridge and suddenly the truth is tumbling out in a hurried stream, details of the past day pouring out so quickly he barely catches his breath. He’s not even sure he says it all in the right order, and he knows the sprinkles of things the doctor said, and mentions of Claire’s parents, as well as his laments about not having anything ready, probably don’t help with clarity either. By the time he finishes, the phone is pressed hard against his ear, digging into the cartilage to an uncomfortable extent and the acidic taste from yesterday is peaking into his mouth from the top of his throat.

For a long moment there is only the echo of Joel’s winded breath.

In - one, two. Out - one, two.

“Hermano,” Tommy sighs, breathy air pushing into the phone and transmitting as a loud crackle in Joel’s ear. The static subsides back into silence, and both are unsure of what to say.

“Brother I’m s -,” he begins, only to stop to shush some ruckus in the background of his line, “I’m goin’ to request some leave - come home, be there by day after next.”

“That ain’t -“ Joel begins to protest, but Tommy cuts him off.

“-don’t start with that, I’m comin’, this is family.”

His eyes wander down to the bundle in his arms, and immediately they well up with tears. He sniffs them away - no time for that, he chastises himself - and nods his head before letting it fall back, gaze turning up toward the blotchy ceiling, letting gravity take care of the rest of the water pooling in his eyes.

“Joel?” Tommy asks against the prolonged quiet, voice tugging him back from the brink of tears. He comes back to attention, clearing away the tightness growing in his throat with a closed-mouth cough.

“Yeah sorry.. I’ll see ya’ day after tomorrow then.”

“Day after tomorrow,” Tommy parrots, almost absently, trailing off with another despondent sigh. “Howaw is he?”

“He?” Joel pauses, confusion wrinkling his brow.

“Your son.”

“Oh,” Joel says with a small snort, a hint of a smile forming. He wedges the phone into the space between his ear and shoulder, and holds it firm in place as he readjusts Sarah. She’s starting to wake, lips twitching up and little eyes fluttering. He gently brushes his pinky down her soft cheek.

“Well you ain’t goin’ to believe this, but he’s a she.”

“A girl?”

“Yeah, a girl…Sarah.”

Sarah who looks like Claire with beautiful brown eyes and thick hair, and loves the water like her mama. Sarah who has a sweet little gurgle but cries like a coyote cause she’s strong and knows what she wants. Sarah who has been with him topside less then a day, but has already made his heart grow two sizes bigger.

“Well I’ll be dammed..baby girl Miller...ain’t that somethin’.”

She is. She really is.

#tlou #the last of us #tlou fic #tipsy bison #ao3 fanfic #joel miller #joel and sarah #sarah miller #oc #Claire Miller #tommy miller #Joel becomes a dad #Dad Joel #my fic #my writing #Next of Kin #sad stories #sad shit #single parent Joel

[jungle-angel]

May Your Days Be Warm And Bright And Your Wedding Day Be White (Calvin Evans x Reader)

Summary: The big day for you and Cal is finally here

Tagging: @floydsmuse @lewmagoo I hope you guys are ok with me including Father McDowell in this. Meggy, you've finally convinced me to write for Calvin and Leah, I can't thank you enough for including me on that taglist for the Rhett fic you posted. You guys are awesome.

Warnings: SMUT! 18+, religious references, etc.

Cal took a deep breath as he straightened his bowtie in the mirror. He had never really been one for black and white, but he was determined to make an impression, seeing as you had both been waiting for this day for a long time.

He thought back to that glorious fall day when you had been walking around campus, both of you newly hired at the college, him in the chemistry department and you, the new nursing professor. Cal had taken you and Six-Thirty down to a favorite spot of his near the river, a beautiful little spot near the river on a path that he had used on his daily run with your canine companion. When he had pulled out his grandmother's ring, you truly realized what you meant to each other.

"Hell's Bells boyo," chuckled the old Irish priest. "Sweatin through yer dress suit are ye?"

"Any more and I'll be a puddle on the floor, Padre," Cal joked.

Father McDowell laughed. "Well, if the worst I have to do is have Helen clean you up with a rag, then I s'pose it's a good day eh?"

Cal smiled and shook his head. He quickly noticed the odd, laughing expression on the priest's face. "What?" he asked.

"Thinkin back to the day when you and John ended up on our doorstep," he chuckled. "Now look at ye, a fine young man, smarter'n a whip and who can command a chemistry lab as though it be a U.S Cavalry regiment. I'm proud of ye Calvin. And I'm proud of (y/n) too."

"She's amazing isn't she?" Calvin said.

"Amazin ain't even the half of it," Father McDowell chuckled. "Brigid's fire burns bright in that one I tell ye and if any o' the pretentious little bootlicks at the university wish to go after'er, I'll break both their legs and their balls all at once."

Calvin burst into a full fit of laughter until his older brother, James, poked his head in the door. "Cal, you ready?" he asked.

"Ready as I'll ever be," Cal answered.

Father McDowell clapped a hand onto his shoulder. "Go git'er me boyo," he told him.

The smile that crawled across Cal's face, at that very moment, would have made you scream.

**************

"Oh God I'm so nervous.....ow!"

"Sorry, sorry," Mei apologized. "There's just alot to work with."

You smiled at her, along with the rest of the girls. Cal's sisters, Barbara and Kathleen, were busy looking after Lucy, Barbara's daughter, while Georgina and Betty, were helping with each other's makeup.

Mei had done serious wonders along with her twin sister, Betty. You looked so natural and so beautiful with your hair all done up and the lightest little touches of makeup here and there.

You and the girls had all risen at some ungodly hour of the morning to get ready to do each other's hair and makeup with Lucy barely sitting still long enough for Barbara to run a brush through her unruly curls. Your wedding dress had been kept in the closet at Mei's house, the something old that your mother had given to you when she had heard you and Calvin were engaged.

"So we have a something old," Mei mused as she combed back the last bits of hair out of your face. "And a something new?"

"My shoes," you chuckled.

"A something borrowed?"

"Momma's wedding veil," Barbara piped in. "Which Tony brought down from the attic this morning."

You breathed a sigh of relief, thankful that Barbara's husband had brought Patricia's newly repaired wedding veil down from the attic. The veil desperately needed repairing after having been in the attic for so long with you, your mother-in-law and the girls all pitching in to help.

"Something blue?" Mei asked.

"Not yet I'm afraid," you answered.

"Ah, I'll take care of that," she said excitedly. "From me, Betty, Mama, Baba and Nai-Nai."

You opened the little black velvet box, a hand flying to cover your mouth. It was a small blue and gold hair pin that took the shape of a brilliant phoenix, the bird hardly bigger than the tip of your middle finger.

"Mei where did you.....?"

"That was Nai-Nai's when she got married in China," Mei explained. "When they left Guangzhou during the war, it was one of the only family treasures she could carry with her. She gave it to me when I got married and now, I want you to borrow it."

You could've cried right then and there. You gave her and Betty the biggest hug you could possibly give, when Patrica, Calvin's mother, poked her head in.

"Oh (y/n) you look so beautiful!" she gasped, trying not to be loud and give anything away.

"Thank you Pat," you said, trying to control the emotions as you hugged your soon to be mother-in-law.

"We're ready when you are," she said, her voice barely a whisper.

You took a shaky deep breath as you and your bridesmaids readied themselves. Six-Thirty made his way up to you, sitting up as straight as he could on his haunches, the small basked clamped between his teeth. It wouldn't be long before you were officially Mrs. (Y/N) Evans and though you were nervous, you wouldn't have it any other way.

*****************

Cal stood nervously near the church altar, the pews already full of family and friends and people at the college you were close with. He bit his lip with anticipation as your mother walked in with Dr. Powers and then his parents. His father, Henry Evans Jr., stood tall and proud in his Marine Corps. dress blues, his cap tucked under one arm and his mother, Patricia on the other. His aunt began to sing from the choir loft as your bridesmaids and their husbands and boyfriends all walked in, each one looking like a queen in their lilac colored dresses. Lucy and Six-Thirty trailed in front of them, the tiny little girl hanging onto his collar to keep her balance.

Calvin's jaw dropped the minute he saw you enter, his hand flying to his mouth to keep from breaking down right then and there. He couldn't believe it. Here you were in front of him, in your momma's wedding dress, ready to take a vow to be his wife.

Your father gave you away, a few tears in his eyes as Cal took you on his arm. Father McDowell kept his sermon short and to the point before you and Cal read your vows to each other, trying to hold back the tidal wave of emotions that threatened to pull you both under.

"........My love, I could never imagine where I'd be without you," Calvin spoke. "Where I once felt lost, I found you, so unexpectedly and completely out of the blue, that it felt like a dream. From the moment I met you, I wanted to give you the whole world. You are my how and you are my why.......I love you (y/n).....so, so much."

There wasn't a dry eye in the house when you read yours either. Even Cal's father, the saltiest Marine you had ever met, was biting his lip, trying not to cry and claiming it was just allergies.

Before long, Six-Thirty brought you and Cal the tiny little wicker basket with the rings inside, returning to Cal's side and sitting a little straighter than before. When Father McDowell announced that you were now Mr. and Mrs. Calvin Evans, the whole church roared with applause, especially when you and Calvin shared your first kiss.

******************

The reception had all been one hell of a blur, you and Calvin having an absolute blast with your friends and family at the hotel downtown. You shared your first dance with family and friends joining you soon after, but not long into the night, the shenanigans had begun to ensue. You didn't really remember any of the family members with little home video cameras running around filming it, but once the film was developed, perhaps it would jog your foggy memory.

You and Calvin stumbled upstairs, laughing a little bit after having had a little too much to drink that evening. Knowing his family, they would still be downstairs in the reception hall at five in the morning, singing every drinking song they could remember off the top of their heads.

"Ready for bed Mr. Evans?" you purred.

"My head's a little achy, so I'd say yes," he answered, his voice a little slurred and sleepy.

He gently took your face in his hands and kissed you deeply. Even after all that, Calvin still couldn't believe you were his at last.

"Need some help Mrs. Evans?" he asked you.

The way the words rolled off his tongue made your legs clench a little. "Just with the back," you told him.

Calvin quickly undid the back of your dress, before you hung it up in the closet. You slipped into the bathroom to change into a little something that Barbara had picked out for you and when you emerged, fresh and clean from a bath, you couldn't help but blush when you saw the naughty look on your husband's face.

"C'mere," he beckoned, his voice low like the first roll of thunder before the storm.

You crawled right into bed with him, the sheets and soft comforters falling over the both of you. Calvin pulled you right on top of him, pulling one leg up over his hip as he kissed you deeply, softly rubbing your thigh and trailing to the swell of your ass.

"So gorgeous," he mumbled. "My pretty little wife."

Your own hand trailed from his chest, down the soft little indents in his belly, the marks of hard exercise and days spent rowing out on the lake near the campus grounds. Your hand dipped a little into his shorts, hoping that his cock would grow swell in your hand.

"Like what you feel there sweetheart?" he chuckled.

You hummed as you kissed him deeply, his hands roaming as they played with the hem of your white satin slip. "Wanna take this off," Calvin whispered under his breath. "Wanna feel every little bit of you."

You pawed a little longer at his cock until you felt it growing, eliciting a moan from your husband. "Sweetheart?"

"Hmm?"

"Help me," he mumbled. "Wanna let my cock out."

You giggled a little as you helped him off with his shorts, his breath growing rapid and the heat from his body radiating onto you. When you saw his now freed cock, straight at attention and red with heat, you couldn't resist. You desperately wanted it inside you and Cal could see the look in your eyes.

"Shhh, sweetheart, it's alright," he said softly. "I'm here to help......easy now.....good.....good girl.....oh sweetheart, you're taking me so well....."

You whimpered a little bit as Cal guided you down onto his rock solid cock, caught completely off guard at how big he actually was.

"Now, now it's alright," he cooed, reaching up and spreading his finger across your stomach. "It's alright......"

You rocked back and forth on his cock to get comfortable. You loved how deep he could go, just deep enough to rub all the right places so that your core tingled. You gently moved his hands to your hips to keep you steady, fearing that when your orgasm finally hit, you would fall over.

"There we go......" Cal murmured. "Back and forth.....back and forth.....oh......good......good sweetheart, there we go......feel better now?"

You nodded.

A moan fell from your lips as you felt his cock twitching inside you, the wetness between your legs obscene as it married with the noises you both made. Calvin sat right up as he kissed you, pulling the bedcovers around you as your legs wrapped around his waist and his deft hands lifted your satin slip over your head and tossed it to the corner with his shorts. He held you so gently in those strong arms of his, letting your head rest against his shoulder as he slowly drew your orgasm out of you.

"Cal...?" you moaned. "Cal....?"

"Shhhh.....sweetheart....." he purred. "Gently.....gently my love.....not so rough now."

You calmed right back down as soon as he kissed you again, his hands roaming over your back and shoulders. You had no idea that this position could feel so fucking good. You and Cal had experimented a little here and there, but now you were so close together, that the space between you both had become nonexistent. You felt your orgasm intensify when you felt each other's tits pressing against each other and before long, you felt a sudden burst and a gush erupting between your legs.

Maybe it was the booze, maybe it was the intense sex, but you and Calvin could barely keep your eyes open as you lay side by side in the comfy bed of the hotel room. You were more than content to sleep in the arms of your husband that night, knowing there would be plenty of time to do other things in the morning.

You and Calvin slept all through the night and for the better part of the morning as the sun came streaming through the hotel room windows. You didn't even hear the jangling of Six-Thirty's collar as he entered the room nor did you see him climb to Cal's side of the bed and begin licking his face.

"Oh, OH GOD!" Cal exclaimed suddenly. "Aw Six-Thirty, that's gross!"

Six-Thirty gave a sheepish little *WOOF!* before settling on the floor.

"Are you ok dear?" you laughed.

"No I've got dog drool all over my mouth," Calvin chuckled.

His disgust was soon broken when he saw a note attached to Six-Thirty's collar. He pulled it out and unrolled it, the message scrawled in black ink.

Your flight leaves for Key West tomorrow morning, don't be late---Dad

"What is it?" you asked, pressing a soft kiss to Cal's shoulder.

"Just a note from Dad," he answered. "Flight to Key West is tomorrow and you know what that means."

You were both filled with wild excitement, knowing that it would be your honeymoon trip......two whole weeks in a little cottage in Key West, Florida and no troubles whatsoever.

"I love you Mrs. Evans," Calvin mumbled, pressing a few soft pecks to your cheek and the side of your head.

"And I love you too Mr. Evans," you purred softly.

#calvin evans #calvin evans x reader #lessons in chemistry

[lavendertheys]

my favorite thing (Sugar, You)

for @thewhalelord <3

To each one’s own, but as far as Laudna is concerned, it’s not a lie if you genuinely believe that what you’re saying is true. 

When Imogen asks her about the obvious stiffness in her right hand as they work on an after-dinner puzzle, Laudna tells her not to worry, because Laudna isn’t worried, because there’s no swelling yet, and they needn’t waste precious energy on false alarms. Later, when Laudna tries to pick Cǎté up off the bed and can’t, she elects to shove him with her forearm instead, and Imogen isn’t looking anyway, so Laudna simply continues with her nighttime routine.

By morning the weakness hasn’t faded at all, but it hasn’t gotten worse either, so she calls that a win and parks herself on the couch and resumes her work on the scarf she’s been working on for weeks to give to Eshteross for his birthday. Laudna found the most beautiful blue yarn at her favorite craft store and is trying to do a cable stitch for the very first time—not so advanced that it’s beyond her understanding, but today she’s pausing every few minutes to stretch her hands and having the damndest time keeping her fingers steady—

“Laudna, that looks amazin’.”

Imogen’s voice is nothing but soft and sweet—one of the things Laudna loves most about her—but she startles at the sudden comment and tries to hide a wince as her knuckles flex sharply around her tools.

“I’m not even halfway done yet,” she says with a sigh, “but if I really lean into it I think I can finish by his birthday.” Laudna goes right into another hand stretch without thinking, isn’t quite as ginger with her left wrist as she should be, and her whole arm recoils at the subsequent pulse of heat.

She feels the couch cushion sink under the weight of Imogen perching beside her.

“Laudna…”

“I’m fine,” she cuts Imogen off. “I’ll be fine. I’ve crocheted through much worse before,” Laudna says in somewhat of a rush.

Imogen leans forward with an elbow propped on her thigh, head resting in her palm, and gives Laudna that look that means she’s about to see right through her in the gentlest way possible. “What color?” she asks quietly.

Neither of them can talk their way around the color system, and Imogen seems to be very aware of that in this moment.

“I… Yellow,” Laudna admits with a sigh.

“You know you’re not supposed to be pushin’ yourself when you’re yellow,” Imogen reminds her, still patient as ever.

Laudna’s shoulders sag even as her hands itch—metaphorically—to get back to the scarf. “I do, but—but this is important, and I’ve been having so much fun with this new stitch, and…” She forces herself to meet Imogen’s eyes. “Just this one time. Just long enough to finish, and then I’ll take a nice, long break. I promise.”

But Imogen only shrugs. “You don’t need my permission, Laudna. This is between you and your body. Won’t stop me from worryin’ about you,” she admits as her expression conveys as much, “but it’s still your choice.”

Imogen leans forward, kisses her on the cheek, and leaves her to it.

Laudna sighs again and splays all ten fingers out and back, looking away when they start to shake.

She spends the rest of the day taking as much ibuprofen as she can safely get away with, trying to work quickly (as if that will give her joints less time to process their irritation), and Laudna is definitely sore by the time they settle into bed, but still hopeful that this flare-up will hold off just a little longer. Imogen hasn’t asked her any more questions about it, but takes extra care with Laudna’s hands, and chooses to hold one flat in her palm and delicately caress the knuckles rather than lace their fingers together.

But, even with all of their caution, Laudna wakes up far too early the next morning to swelling and hot throbs of pain. The sun is only just starting to peek through their window shades and there’s not quite enough light yet to see her joints, but she can feel how bad it is, and tears of frustration come pouring out before Laudna can even consider trying to hold them back.

Imogen stirs beside her and she braces herself for disappointment and “I told you so”s, but instead she feels a warm, grounding touch at her arm and a feather-light thumb brushing back and forth.

“Ice or heat?” Imogen whispers.

Laudna’s chest stutters and she swallows at the lump in her throat. “Heat,” she chokes out, “please.”

A small kiss to her temple, then fingertips easing Laudna’s hair behind her ear, then Imogen slips out of bed.

She comes back several minutes later with heating pads and Laudna’s laptop and some extra pillows from the living room, and Imogen helps Laudna get comfortable before opening her laptop and scrolling to see where Laudna left off on her favorite show.

“I hate it,” Laudna mutters as she waits for the worst of the pain to subside. “I hate not being able to do my favorite thing. I hate having something wrong with the part of my body that I need the most. What—f-fucking rotten luck is that?”

Imogen sets the laptop aside, tucks in close to Laudna, and ghosts her knuckles along Laudna’s wet cheeks. “I know,” she soothes, soft and quiet and steady. “It’s not fair.”

Laudna sniffs a few times and takes a deep, shaky breath. “What am I supposed to do now? His birthday is—I don’t have time.”

“Well, personally,” Imogen replies, “I’m willin’ to bet that he won’t give a shit if you’re a few days late. He’d want you to take care of yourself first,” she points out, “because we both love you a whole lot, birthday scarf or no birthday scarf.”

A cozy silence settles between them as Laudna focuses on calming down, and when she’s confident her voice will be steadier, she clears her throat a little.

“Ibuprofen?”

“Comin’ right up,” Imogen promises, and opens the drawer to the bedside table to retrieve Laudna’s meds.

“Also, Laudna adds, voice still slightly wobbly from her tears, “I finished season four last week when you were sick and slept all day. I’m halfway through five, I think.”

Imogen pauses in the middle of shaking two tablets into her palm to shoot Laudna a teasing look, and all Laudna can do is shrug.

“The blonde one got abducted and the brunette one was freaking out about it and they dragged out the rescue for like twenty episodes and I hoped they would admit their feelings once she found her and they didn’t say anything but they did hug each other for an extra long time so I have to assume they’ll kiss in the season finale.”

She watches Imogen process her recap, looking almost like she’s trying to do complicated math in her head, but eventually she just blinks in confusion and hands Laudna the ibuprofen.

“Who?”

Laudna nods her head toward the computer. “Just start the episode and I’ll catch you up as we go.”

Imogen kisses her and then barely remembers to switch seasons in the drop-down menu, and Laudna smiles for the first time since her hands started to hurt.

Read on AO3

Sugar, You (Complete)

#critical role #imodna #imogen x laudna #cr imogen #cr laudna #imogen temult #cr fanfic #ao3 fanfic #arthritis #chronic pain #hurt/comfort #sugar you #bake off au

[whyisstarkidfollowingmeshoo]

Hey guys, I invented a new word.

Blump: a noun that means when a Jeff Blim fan or any person on the internet or in real life will dump facts or anything about Jeff Blim (a well known composer and actor famously connected with StarKid) all at once.

Plural: Blumps

Verb: Blumping.

Also means when Jeff Blim takes a dump (I'm so sorry)

Oh, since a couple of accounts asked about that anon confession in @starcanwrecked-confessions that inquired if there are other tumblr accounts (some even shared that a few SK members follow them on IG) that are followed by the offiical StarKid account or a SK member.

Hi, it's me, Anon.

If you fancy some blumps like @the-real-team-starkid (as of now they still follow me unless I start posting "wallets coz Jeff" posts then they'll probably get sick of me) do, consider following me.

I swear, they followed me after I posted the Amazin' Blue post hahha. I wonder which post made them decide or they thought this blog is just a whole encyclopedia of Jeff facts and history, especially his past theater career and his livestreams.

Like to thank everyone before me who collected and documented a lot of Jeff media for me to enjoy which most of them I've included in Jeff's main wikia fandom page. U know who u peips are.

Oh, Plan B means Plan Blim hahhahahaha

#jeff blim #starkid #team starkid #jeff blim livestream #tumblr milestone #jeff blim facts #blumps #blump #im gonna make blump happen #gretchen stop making blump happen it's never gonna happen #blump means a jeff blim dump #get it? #blimmed #let gets blimmed #uncle jeff #uncle jeff blim #jeff blim dump #hatchetfield #professor henry hidgens #professor hidgens #anon confession #starkid confessions #starcanwrecked confessions

[gimmethosedaddymilkers]

Firsts with (Modern) Arthur Morgan!

These are for you @cantchoosejust1​ and @photo1030​

We’re gonna do firsts with Arthur Morgan, but modern, and this is thinking of Arthur from my previous modern takes on him! 

Which can be found here!

More of a Female reader here! 

Warnings!: NSFW THEMES, Female reader, maybe a little angst

Nothing too bad to worry about

but 

18+ under the cut!

Modern Arthur collection!

Ok

So

To kick things off

Arthur says that if you take him on a date he’ll feel repaid for fixing your car, this is on the FIRST day you met this man

He is incredibly charismatic, so of course you said yes.

So, he tells you that he’ll pick you up at your house around 8, be ready and wear something that you can move in

You’re confused at first but of course you listen.

He watches you pull out in that beautiful 1971 Dodge Charger and he thinks that he’s never seen anything hotter. 

of course you are TERRIFIED for this date

a hot man? A hot MECHANIC? 

who asked you out???

I mean what are you supposed to do? 

NOT panic?

You take in consideration what he said 

“Wear somethin’ you can move in, no fancy dresses, though I’m sure I’d be weak in the knees at that-” 

Obviously you blushed so hard at that

But 

You took that in consideration and decided to wear something that made you look fantastic but it was something you could move in

he said make sure it was nice though, not fancy, but nice

So, you settled on a very loose, flowy kind of skirt, black, and pleated, as well as a low cut v shirt, your favorite color (Olive/sage green for me if you’re curious :)) 

You do a little makeup, not too much and you do your best to rid your nerves

When 8 rolls around there’s a knock at your door and you open it with a smile

Surprisingly your nerves practically deleted themselves the moment you saw him

Though he looked fantastic

I mean

you thought he was HOT in that garage earlier, a tanktop on and oil smears all over him, but now

seeing him there at your doorway

Wearing a blue stripped button down with his sleeves fully rolled down and a nice pair of brown slack pants

he was so 

so

attractive

he was even wearing a dark brown tie

Fancy, but casual

“You look amazin’ darlin’!” 

Blushing immediately

He hands you flowers kind of sheepishly, and you smile widely at him before putting them in a vase and returning to him

He takes your hand without hesitation and leads you out to his truck, an older one, but looking at it, it was obviously taken care of and you weren’t worried about it in the slightest.

He opens the truck door for you, and helps you up into the car before getting in himself

He refuses to tell you where the two of you are going, the only reason you aren’t worried about him ya know

murdering you

is because of his charm, and you know, you warned him you knew how to use a gun, and he was perfectly gentlemenly about it.

(It turned him on)

When you get to where you’re going, a little charming bar just on the outskirts of the small town you lived in, you smile and realize why he told you not to wear something you couldn’t move in as you come into it

The bar is run by one of his family members 

Karen is the Bar owner, and he introduces you with a smile

The bar is small, but it’s popular, there’s plenty there, but still room to dance

and thats exactly what he took you there for

There’s square dancing! 

And as much as Arthur claims he hates dancing he’s fantastic at it! 

He takes you dancing, after the two of you have had a few drinks, and you smile at each other, your faces red as you dance as a pair with the others

(Cotten Eye Joe comes on and Arthur is literally like on fire he’s so good at it lmao)

By the end of the night you’re exhausted, but in a fantastic way

He leads you out to the truck and he’s been smiling the whole night

Obviously the two of you had taken some time to sit and get to talk a little more, but most of the night had been spent dancing away

On the way home you looked over at him, that smile on his face as he watched the road and right there you knew you’d never be able to handle not being with him.

You almost ask him right there to be your boyfriend, but you refuse to come off as desperate and don’t say anything, but the butterflies in your stomach are just 

OBNOXIOUS

He takes you home and leads you to your front door, spinning you once as you reach your destination

He kisses your hand, and takes off that cowboy hat of his and gives you a little bow.

“I had a great time with you Miss L/N.” 

“And I you Mr. Morgan.” 

He gives a timid smile to you, and then you grab his hand

“Can we go out again? Soon? I’d love to get to know you better Mr. Morgan. It’d be a real shame if you walked out of my life.” 

He nearly bursts right there. Like I said in the first headcannons he was in love at first sight, hearing you say those words made his entire heart move so fast he’s afraid he’d have a heart attack.

“I’d love that very much.” 

He leaves you his phone number in your phone, and you in his, and with that he leaves you, waving as he gets into his truck and drives away.

That was your first date

Your first kiss?

Oh, it was perfect, I mean, he’s so shy when it comes to that stuff so it was SO sweet

So, it’s on your third date, you’re wondering why he hasn’t kissed you, if you have bad breath, or maybe there’s always been something in your teeth

Then you remember that he tends to have shy tendencies

so at the end of the date, when he brings you to your house again you stand on your tiptoes and kiss his cheek, not his lips, but his cheek and he just goes beet red.

I mean

RED

and you can’t help but smile at him

“Oh..I...Oh...Thank...thank you...I” 

He blinks a couple times and then takes the hint to kiss you back.

He’s very gentle, very kind, and he cups your face in his hands before kissing you.

It’s so soft, and despite him having chapped lips, the kiss is absolutely wonderful.

It doesn’t feel rushed, it doesn’t feel too slow.

You almost feel as though you’d like to go further, but taking it slow is just as good.

When he pulls away he apologizes for not doing that the first date, and you just take his hand and smile

You tell him that you know it’s early but you’d love to be his girlfriend, if he’d like that.

He nearly DIES

and he says he’d love nothing more than to go steady with you.

From there two of you introduce yourselves as Boyfriend and Girlfriend.

The next few months go swimmingly

I mean

It’s almost like you’ve known each other from the beginning

He makes you laugh with all his little things

the way he talks, the way he walks

I mean

those things turn you on too, but like

sometimes they’re funny

When you hang out with him at your house and he tries to figure out how to work your microwave

He says its fancy

He’s muttering to himself turning dials

“What the hell...what the....how the fuck do you....Jesus christ when did this shit get so complicated just press the damn button you moron.” 

Or when the two of you went on a fishing trip and he couldn’t get a hook out of the bass’s mouth

“You sonofabitch, get outta there..”

It was just hilarious to you

But sometimes he was just so hot too, and you didn’t want to rush into anything with him

Granted

You wanted to

but you didn’t at the same time, it wasn’t worth messing up what a wonderful relationship you had with him.

Soon, three months of dating has gone by and he finally gets up the courage to ask you to stay at his place.

You brought him lunch at his shop, smiling at his oil covered forehead when he leans around the car’s hood that he’s working on.

You drop it off and before you leave he nearly begs.

“Sweetheart, I know I’m gonna be home late, but....I miss ya, we’ve been busy this week...can...can we please...Will ya stay at my place tonight? I’ll pick ya up on the way home and you can have my bed.”

You say yes of course.

I mean

How could you say no to a face like that?

Plus I mean

you wanted to stay with him too, it wasn’t just him.

So you go home and you get all the things you need and then wait for him to get you. 

You have a bag packed, I mean, clothes for the night, for the next day, tooth brush, toothpaste, hair brush, everything you could think of that you'd need.

He picks you up around 8:30 and drives you to his house a hand on your thigh the whole way

As you two come into his house he takes your bag for you and even runs you a bath, telling you that he wants you to feel as relaxed as physically possible.

After your bath he tells you to wait in the bedroom and he'll be in as soon as he's cleaned himself

So now that you're in your pjs and in his comfy bed you take the time to look around, looking at the pictures of him in high school, wearing his football uniform and hugging Dutch to his side

Things like that

Trophies hanging around

A picture of him at the fair after winning a bull riding competition 

You are literally so nervous, sitting there on his bed. I mean

He sleeps there! 

You can just imagine a shirtless Arthur, laying on his stomach with his arms under the pillow, his hair disheveled and groggy grumbles coming from him.

It’s a comforting, and very attractive thought

but you’re still worried

I mean

it’s not your bed

it’s not your house

but it’s your Arthur.

When he comes out of the shower he comes into the bedroom without much thought, wearing a towel around his waist and you can’t help but stare at him.

He simply smirks at you and grabs a pair of boxers out of his dresser.

He literally just stares back at you and slips them on under the towel before dropping the towel on the ground.

“Arthur, why do you hate me?”

“Hate you? Darlin’ I don’t hate you, I just like teasin’.” 

He asks you if you want him to sleep on the couch instead of sleeping on the bed with you and you just roll your eyes and pat the bed next to you.

He crawls in and you lean over and kiss him, telling him there wouldn’t be much of a point of you staying the night if he was just gonna sleep on the couch rather than with you.

So he smiles and turns the light out and the two of you cuddle up together, him wrapping an arm around your waist and pulling you close. 

You’ve never slept better.

The next morning the two of you have to figure out your morning schedules and how they work with each other.

He makes you breakfast, he’s AMAZING in the kitchen

I mean

he claims he can’t cook but like

i MEAN

try his pancakes, they’re better than anything you’ve ever eaten, and his omelets?

to die for

After that the two of you go to brush your teeth and you keep pushing each other out of the way.

“Move your fatass, I can’t see!”

“My fatass? Darlin’ have you seen your ass?”

“Are you calling me fat?” 

“You just called me fat!” 

“Oh, you have a point.” 

“’Sides, I said your ass was fat, not you.” 

When it comes time to go to work he drops you off and gives you a kiss, and from then on you didn’t really want to go home. 

You wanted to go to Arthur’s

So, from month three

you’ve practically lived at Arthur’s. That was home. He cleared out half his dresser for you, bought your favorite shampoos, he literally started to change his home, told you bring whatever you wanted to decorate.

Thats how all the plants got there lmao.

It just felt right to you.

As for the first time you tell each other that you love one another?

Arthur says it accidentally.

Not that he doesn’t mean it

but he was afraid of telling you, he wanted to let you say it first, at least that way he would know it was reciprocated

But it just slipped out

He woke up, rolled over in bed and wrapped an arm around your waist, and groggily mumbled “Good Mornin’ love.” which wasn’t really a confession of his love

but then immediately after

he muttered, still half asleep.

“I love you so much...you smell good.” 

Which was just so 

I mean

so cute and so wholesome that you do nothing but smile but something registered in Arthur’s head that he’d said it and he starts freaking out.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean...well I mean I meant it but.. I didn’t mean to say it just yet...I...shit I’m sorry-”

“Arthur, I love you too.” 

He is silent, but then kisses your shoulder and then manually flips you to face him so he can kiss you properly. 

“You are the best thing that’s ever happened to me, and I mean that.” 

“And you me, Arthur.” 

From there your love just BLOSSOMS

I mean, he says it all the time, overuses it almost, but it doesn’t bother you in the slightest, it boosts your confidence, makes you feel special, I mean you just feel so fulfilled each time he sneaks behind you and snakes an arm around you muttering that he loves you to the ends of the earth.

You say it to each other before you go to sleep, when he drops you off at work, in the morning after you wake up.

Any time that you just feel so full of love that you can’t not say it.

the first time that the two of you finally...ya know

Do it

It’s been six months of you two being together, and it isn’t planned at all

not thought out

it just happened in the moment

You’d been in the shop with him on one of your days off.

it was late, he was working on a personal project, an old bike he’d found that had been abandoned, but needed only just a little bit of work.

Well

a lotta bit but he refused to admit that

He wanted to fix it, it gave him something fun to work on that wasn’t a client’s car.

He was just so attractive, watching him work on something with such focus in his eyes, and his muscles flexing with each twist of a wrench.

You simply come up behind him, brushing your fingers over his shoulders as you walk around to face him.

You crouch down to meet his level, and he looks at you with a red face.

“Has anyone ever told you just how hot you are Arthur?”

And he just

Melts

he doesn’t know what to do

You just kiss him, and he literally can’t keep his hands off you, I mean

He puts his greasy hands all over you, and eventually carries you to the workbench, and as the two of you start stripping each other he feels bad that the first time the two of you will do this it’s in a dirty shop rather than some nice place, or at least his house, but you 

you are excited as HELL

because this is just hot

He gets less worried about it when you just whine his name and palm his jeans 

He’s thought about doing this with you for a while. Not in a creepy way, but just like

god he thinks you’re so attractive

and he’ll admit, taking you in his garage on his workbench

It does wonders for him.

Luck for him you’d been wearing a skirt, mainly cause you had been too lazy to put jeans on, and he just had to move your undergarments to the side.

When you get to the nitty gritty, you just feel

amazing

its right

i mean

it’s meant to be

by the time you’re finished you’re putting a sweaty forehead against his chest, and you know you need a shower, there’s grease all over your thighs, and ya know....

him on your legs

and he cleans you with one of the work rags (A clean never been used one obviously) and then helps you down from the work bench

and he enjoyed himself

a lot

but he still apologizes profusely for letting his desires take over, and for not taking you to a better place to have this special moment happen

but you simply tell him you’d never trade it.

After that your sex life with him is just fantastic. I mean

you both have a high sex drive and he literally almost always wants you

you did it in the shop again, but you did it ontop of a clients car

YOU CLEANED IT PROFUSELY AFTERWARDS FEELING HORRIBLE

(Arthur just watched smirking and smoking a cigarette from the workbench.) 

Flash forwards, after a year of dating he asks you to marry him

we know where that goes

so we cut even further

to the first night of being married to this man

He’s so giddy

the whole reception of the wedding he’s nothing but smiles, he has a hand on you the entire night

he’s calling you Mrs. Morgan at every chance

Its like watching a kid in a candy shop

The first night of you being married and in your house together

its no longer his house

its both of yours

its been that way for a while now but its official now

He is nothing but sweet, and loving, and just absolutely in awe that you were married to him

He was the luckiest man on earth to have such a beautiful woman to call his wife.

The two of you def made love that night

it was different 

not different bad

different good

making love and knowing that you were married now

that you guys were really “one” 

it was slow paced, sweet and intimiate.

Just

absolutely perfect. 

He told you repeatedly

that he loves you

and he couldn’t be happier to be with you, he couldn’t be happier with the way things turned out. 

#rdr2 #rdr2 community #Rdr2 Headcannons #arthur morgan #arthur morgan x reader #Arthur Morgan headcannons #Red Dead Redemption 2 #red dead redemption 2 drabble #Arthur Morgan drabble

[sevikasangel]

𝐛𝐞 𝐦𝐲 𝐯𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐞 ๑⁠˙⁠❥⁠˙- what would it be like to be asked to be their valentine?

including: vi, caitlyn, jinx, sevika.

— 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐬: fluff, f!reader, legal age gap, lowercase intended.

— 𝐚/𝐧: gotta love sweetheart aesthetic!

𝐯𝐢 ♡

you were a very close friend of vi's. you'd stuck around when she needed somebody the most. you were the only person she knew she could rely on ever since vander passed. no matter how many fights you had, how life treated you both, how many opposites against your friendship there seemed to be in the way. vi's feelings turned into something deeper a while ago. she realised she loved you after she had an awful day at work, and the only person she needed to see was you.

despite a recent fight you had over vi letting her stress get the best of her, she bought you your favorite fast food and a heart pin for your bag, you loved those accessories, she noted. you were surprised to see her sitting at your doorstep with some paperbags after you came back from work.

"cupcake, you're finally here...happy to see me? i...got you those fries and sandwich you like...with a cupcake! just like you... listen, i know i was bad to you and i said mean things. you can punch me in the face! go on! what you mean no? ok...then, forget the punching. (y/n)...(y/n). i don't know how to be lovey dovey and stuff but i am trying here. i like you. i really do. can i come in? we can eat this...and maybe i talk you into being my valentine."

𝐜𝐚𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐲𝐧 ♡

caitlyn slipped a lock of her long hair behind her ear as she anxiously tapped her foot against the wooden tiles of the hallway of your building. the enforcer sucked in a breath, glancing between the bouquet of white and red roses she'd ordered at the local flower shop. you both met at a local piltover festival while caitlyn was on duty. she helped you retrieve your stolen wallet and she'd been awestruck with you ever since. she knew you worked at a local cafe and she would always order her morning breakfast with you, sharing small conversations that meant a lot to her.

Caitlyn gathered enough courage to knock gently on your door. There is no turning back now, she thought to herself, as the monotonous sound of your footsteps began getting closer and closer until the knob turned, followed by the low creak of the door. And then your face emerged, your full body following. She couldn't help but smile. You were the most beautiful girl she'd ever seen.

"hello, (y/n). good afternoon! how are you? i am quite fine, too. better now, actually, after seeing you. oh, this bouquet? no, no, no, it isn't for me. i ordered it for you. i remember you told me you are fond of roses. they did remind me of you. so...would you like to go to the movies with me? amazing! and lastly...be my valentine, please."

𝐣𝐢𝐧𝐱 ♡

jinx spent the whole morning and afternoon preparing a surprise for you. she was your best friend, but the blue haired girl wanted to be so much more than that. she'd loved you for such a long time, but never felt courageous enough to ask you out. the voices would convince her that you would never feel the same for such a loser like her. but this time, after two years, she wouldn't waste another valentine away from the girl she loved.

she broke into your house while you were visiting your family and went straight into your bedroom to give you her gift and proposal: with her colour sprays and inventions, she painted your walls and drew on them with little doodles of hearts, adorable animals, you both in a beautiful garden...she also spread handmade gifts all over your room. your bed was covered in red dye with hearts and a monkey robot on top of it held a banner: "(y/n), i love you! be my valentine!"

"toots, ya finally came home! ya like your surprise!? don't look so dumbfounded, it's amazin'! it took me hoooours to finish. look at that lil spinning ballerina i made for ya! and the bed, so soft! aaaand...will you be my valentine!? i love ya, toots! i want you to be my girl and we will kaboom boom blah togetha'! wait...ya love me back! aaaaah, i told y'all, she is mine! now come lay on ya nice bed and we will cuddle, valentine!"

𝐬𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐤𝐚 ♡

you were one of the girls who worked at babette's. though not as a stripper or a prostitute, you were a waitress, trying to make some money in order to survive in zaun. if you were lucky enough, you'd get some tips here and there from drunks who were hopeful to get under your pants. however, sevika was different. you felt no malice coming from her. silco's right hand woman was different from the men who could only see you as a piece of meat. she actually treated you with respect. the bare minimum, yes. but in zaun, the minimum was a lot.

sevika was fond of you. you were a woman who she felt something she couldn't quite get a grasp on towards. it was a weird sensation on her chest, seeing you. her heart would pump faster and she'd feel thrilled whenever you demonstrated to be impressed by a story she told. it wasn't that she didn't feel physically attracted to you. she did. oh, how she did...though it was more than that. and that persistent, unknown feeling annoyed her.

you were dead concerned when sevika showed up bruised and bloodied from a street fight with vi. she definitely didn't expect to have you on your stupid cupid costume at valentine's day to be patching her up and gently cleaning her wounds, inside a small spare room of the bar. the sounds of the muffled loud music and you humming to yourself were swirling around her head as she glanced at you, releasing a strained breath.

"listen, (y/n). i don't know how to do this shit and i think it's stupid, but be my valentine. that cupid costume would give me second hand embarrassment had it been in anyone else, but you look like an actual angel in that. what you laughing at? that isn't corny! i wanna take you on a date, but i am fucked up right now, doll. tomorrow i will pick you up at your place by seven o'clock, be ready. gonna take you somewhere nice, not this dump of drunks. you're special to me, really...i mean it. thanks for being here. you can always count on me too, sweetheart."

#arcane #arcane women #arcane x reader #lesbian #wlw #arcane x you #caitlyn kiramman x reader #arcane caitlyn #vi x reader #arcane headcanons #sevika #arcane sevika #sevika x reader #jinx x reader #arcane jinx

[sealisstupid]

there was this huge collab for the everhood anniversary that you should all see (rubik gave permission to post it here)

also i drew the midnight town door

links to artists that i could find under cut

https://youtube.com/@SugaMot?si=bekpm-jZNgwfGBm0

https://twitter.com/LuneLaguna

https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561199245435035

https://youtube.com/@Leditore?si=_hCYTHLMnqcAn5US

https://twitter.com/TheMaskedInkyz

https://marxmatter.tumblr.com/

#everhood #notareblog

[stargazer-balladeer]

“The Sound of Music” [Ensemble Stars]

Imagine catching you humming their unit’s song. 

Characters Included: Mika Kagehira, Hiiro Amagi & Rei Sakuma + GN! Reader

Notes: aha sorry if some of these are OOC qwq i still havent grasped their characters much yet. Hope ya’ll still like this tho! 

Warnings: None

Mika Kagehira

Ecstatic about the fact that when he hears a familiar humming of one of his Unit’s song and it led straight to you, his beloved s/o. His mismatched eyes sparkled with delight as he goes to approach you, cheeks covered in a pink hue as he lightly taps your shoulder. “That- No words can match what ‘m feeling! Yer amazing as always!” compliments poured out of his mouth as he flashes you a rather why smile. Maybe you two should have a duet!

Mika perked up from his gaze to the doll he was making, a present he wanted to give you as a way to express his love to you. He thought he heard a familiar tune emitting from behind him, akin to one of his unit’s - Valkyrie’s - song, one he did with Teach. He turned to look at you looking at your screen while typing peacefully. At first he thought he was imagining it, but the tune continued to hum through the air which made Mika knew for sure you were humming his tune. 

Unable to prevent a giant smile from creeping up his face, he can literally feel his face warming up. Ahh, the things you do for his poor heart. Setting down the doll gently, he stood up and made his way to you. You haven’t looked up from your gaze on the monitor’s screen so Mika tapped your shoulder, not wanting to frighten you. When you looked up to meet him and flashed him your smile, he couldn’t help but put his hands on your cheeks while rubbing the tip of his nose against yours. “That was amazin’! Ya made the song ten times better than it was originally! Oh but uhh don’t tell that to Oshii-san, okay?” Giggling alongside you at his last comment.

“I think we should have a duet soon! I’ll try to come up with a song for us hehe. It’ll be fun, promise~” You don’t have a heart to say no to him when he looks excited like a kid finally having his candy after being deprived of it. 

Hiiro Amagi

Initially confused when he heard the humming, didn’t immediately recognize the tune of his Unit’s song but immediately went to investigate. He didn’t even knew it was you until you told him, maybe getting a bit embarrassed when he makes a noise of surprise. Compliments you overload, saying whatever compliments he remembered. It’ll maybe take a while before he realized you were humming his unit’s song though. 

“Ah, it’s only you, love.” You jumped a bit when you suddenly heard the door being banged open, leaving a loud thump as it hits against the poor wall. You turned around to meet the eyes of your boyfriend, who was as surprised as you are. He made his way to you, not minding the deed he did to the poor door at all. “I heard a familiar tune from here so I followed it and it lead me here! I couldn’t place where I heard the tune before though.” Hiiro explained while taking one of your hands to rub his thumbs across your knuckles. 

His blue eyes quickly leaving yours to scan the room, only for his brows to furrow and his mouth turning into a frown. You tilt your head when he looks back at you. “I don’t see anyone here besides you though… hmm maybe I went inside the wrong room?” Hiiro frowned while shaking his head. “But it couldn’t be. I was so sure-“ “Uhmm… I think it was me you heard humming.” His eyes quickly opened after closing them for a moment to meet yours, but your gaze wasn’t on him. He could tell you were embarrassed but he couldn’t wrack his brain why you would feel this way. He thought the humming was special, it was soothing to the ear that was why he was attracted to it in the first place. And now knowing it came from his significant other makes it better!

“Why are you embarrassed? You have an amazing voice though! I thought you were a deity that came down from the heavens a while ago!” Letting go of one of your hands to slightly slap your cheeks two times, his disappointed face akin to a master scolding his dog (which is kinda insulting since he was supposed to be the dog but shh). “Shoo shoo bad thoughts. Let the good thoughts shine.” Aaaaa the urge to not squeal in front of him- 

(Extra: You were surprised when you heard thundering footsteps making its way to you the next day only to reveal your boyfriend who was screaming at you for not telling him that you were humming his unit’s song.) 

Rei Sakuma

Probably caught you humming to his unit’s song one too many times to count. Never really confronted you about it though, but he did drop some hints that he knew your secret habit using his old vampire antics. Even though he would’ve preferred you singing it to him face-to-face, he respects you, he wouldn’t dare invade your personal space. But you see, even this old man needs his needs. 

“Sing me a song, my beloved.” Rei’s sudden request made you jumped a bit as you made yourself comfortable inside his coffin, making you hit your head against the walls. Wincing at the pain, Rei clicked his tongue as he sets his hand on your head to soothe the pain. “Tsk tsk be careful, wouldn’t want you harming yourself now.” Taking advantage of your lowered guard, he brings you closer to him. Letting out a sigh when he takes the sniff out of your scent, he waits for a moment before speaking again. “Hum me a tune, a lullaby, or any song.” He said softly and quietly. 

“You don’t need a lullaby. You’re an old man.” You retorted as his chest rumbles slightly from his chuckles. “But you see, this old man needs a lullaby to sleep. I can’t seem to sleep properly.” You huffed at his excuse, knowing fully well he’s making everything up. “That’s just an excuse to hear me sing.” He smiles, lightly kissing the top of your head. “Just indulge me~” You gave up trying to argue your way out of this. Not much choice when this old vampire is clinging to you while still whining. When you start to hum, he stays silent taking in your humming. He immediately recognizes it to be one of their more ‘tame’ songs. 

He closes his eyes as he basks in your presence. No words are needed in this world you and he created for yourselves. He wishes you would sing openly in front of him next time, but he’ll just have to remain patient until then.

[x] Main Page || [x] Valkyrie Page || [x] Alkaloid Page || [x] UNDEAD Page 

#ensemble stars #ensemble stars x reader #enstars #enstars x reader #ensemble stars headcanons #enstars headcanons #mika kagehira #mika kagehira x reader #hiiro amagi #hiiro amagi x reader #rei sakuma #rei sakuma x reader