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#and everything except bread and peanut butter in the fridge
jessilynallendilla · 6 months
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Dylan Hollis Baking Quotes Without Context Part 5
"Come to think of it I’ve never really thought about what’s in ranch, perhaps out of fear." 
"You know I once watched a friend of mine eat a whole bottle of ranch with his pizza." “Yeah he’s in prison now," 
"Forsaken by parsley," 
"I’m serious, don’t disrespect the Irish, they can be mean." 
"And half a cup of wheat germ, oh no." 
"The wheat germ just needs to swell up like an infection, soaks up the butter and everyone's happiness." 
"These taste like a damp park bench." 
"I’ve been told to keep this in the fridge so it stays disgusting for longer." 
"So these were a part of America’s K rations, think of them as dystopian lunch boxes." 
"Why would someone put bread crumbs in cookie dough? It could be because of like illicit substances, psychiatric disturbances, being held at gun point, these types of things." 
"So I’ve actually already taken a dump in this kitchen before." 
"Today 's dump requires the use of a can opener, rather painful condition." 
"Ow, ow! It’s got ranged attacks!" 
"What, you never put cereal into a blender before? Call yourself a chef?" 
"Now if you’ve never had a prune, good, best not to engage with the enemy." 
"Uncooked whips such as these were very popular in the twenties, alongside dysentery." 
"I’ll tell you cheese makes everything better, except car accidents. Trust me I’ve tried, the police got very mad." 
"I’m going to hemorrhage." 
"I don’t know what a firm ball is but they should probably see a doctor." 
"Last instruction is a simple one but a little bit barbaric." slams hammer on counter 
"So if you’re allergic to peanuts it’s hell of a way to go out." 
"Get some rolos," drops them "throw them on the floor." 
"Thank you, I would hate to have an uneven disaster" 
"Thank you dead lady," 
"Haven't a clue of what this is, it could be spoons made of bread or bread made of spoons." 
"What do we bake this in, I have no idea, it could be a shoe for all I know." 
"I’m baking soup." 
"Tastes like itchy milk." 
"I can feel my teeth falling out of my face right now." 
"This tastes like a scented candle," 
"I know people taste test these things, do taste testers eat candles?" 
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aggedyann · 2 years
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Black Out
Short little thing about Tim and Ethan in a middle of the night blackout.  
“Ow! Fuck!”
Tim awoke to Ethan’s cursing.   “Babe?  What’s wrong?”  He reached over to switch on the lamp next to the bed.
“Power’s out.”  Ethan sniffed as Tim discovered the lamp wouldn’t turn on.  “I guess I haven’t figured out the layout of your apartment yet.”  He carefully made his way to the bed and groped around for his phone.  Finding it, he switched on the flashlight.”
“Everything ok?”
Ethan shook his head, turning away to bury a harsh sneeze in his t-shirt.   “HatChoo!”  He turned back to Tim.   “NyQuil’s wearing off, for one thing.”  He sighed.  “And I can’t tell if I’m starting to run a fever or hypoglycemic.   I woke up and I’m sweating.   I went to check my temp and blood sugar, but I can’t do that in the dark.”
Tim frowned.  “Dizzy?”
“Yeah, but fevers do that to me, too.”
Tim swung his legs over the edge of the bed, grabbing his own phone, also turning it into a flashlight.   “I’m coming with you.” He coughed.   He glanced at the time.   “It is time for NyQuil anyway.”    He trailed Ethan to the bathroom, watched while he checked his temperature.    
“98.4.”
“Blood sugar.  You don’t eat enough when you’re sick.”  Tim fussed as Ethan pricked his finger.   He buried his face in the crook of his arm.  “AhhrShoo! HahhRrahhShoo!”  He exploded as Ethan waited for his machine to beep.
“64.”  Ethan reported as Tim straightened up.  
“Snack time.”  He led Ethan to the kitchen.   “Sit.   What do you want?   I mean, that can be made without electricity.”
“Preference is always peanut butter toast, so ummm…” he paused to cough.  “Half a peanut butter sandwich, please?”
“Coming up…after these sneheezes…heeYehhShoo!…EeckShoo!”  He crossed over to wash his hands.
“Bless you.”
In the dim light of their cell phones, Ethan watched Tim smear peanut butter on a slice of bread and fold it in half.   Placing it on a paper towel, he set it in front of Ethan.
After blowing his nose on a napkin, Ethan picked up the sandwich.   “Thank you.”
“You gotta eat more; you’ve been picking at your food since you got sick.”  Tim nagged.  “And I have to ask: what is it with peanut butter when you’re sick anyway?”
Ethan shrugged, swallowing.  “I can taste it.”   At Tim’s confused look, “colds dull my tastebuds.   Everything tastes blah.  Except peanut butter.  That tastes normal.”
Tim nodded in the dim cell phone light, handing over a glass of orange juice.   “So, to get you to eat, I should make peanut butter everything?”
Ethan shrugged.  “Besides, peanut butter is my go to for low blood sugars anyway.”  He laughed.   “When I was little, my dad used to just give me spoonfuls of it when I dropped.”  He pressed his napkin to his nose.  “AhShoo!”
“Bless you.  NyQuil after this.”  Tim promised, sipping his own orange juice.  
Ethan gave a small smile.  “I really am sorry I gave you this.”
Tim shook his head.  “My fault.   You did tell me to stop kissing you.”
“Not that I put up a fuss when you didn’t listen.”
“Can’t keep my hands off of you.”
Ethan laughed.  “Well, I hope this stage of our relationship never ends.”
“Mehhh HehhghSchoo!  HeyyEddgeSchehh!  Ugh…this snehhh…heyyyYyehhShoo!  YyyehhScheshhh!  This sneezing.”
“More?”  Ethan asked.
“No.”  Tim’s face relaxed for a brief second, then contorted again.  “Yehhes.   YehSshoo!  EhhChesshoo!”
“Bless you.”  Ethan swallowed the last bite of his sandwich and passed Tim a napkin.    “We gotta get you some NyQuil.   Once you start like this…”
Tim groaned.  “Don’t I know it.   I hope I won’t keep you awake.”
“Not if I’m taking NyQuil,” Ethan grinned, finishing his juice and encouraging Tim to do the same.
Tim finished his juice and blew his nose, squashed two sneezes, and blew his nose again.  “NyQuil?”
“Go lay down.   I’ll bring it.   You need more water?”   Ethan stood up to pull water bottles out of the fridge.  
Tim shook his head, pulling a new napkin to him.   “HehtShoo, Heyyyehhshoo!”  Gingerly wiping his nose, he stood up, trailing Ethan down the hall.     Crawling into bed as Ethan grabbed the pills from the bathroom, he blew his nose again as Cashew curled into his side.
“HatChoo!”   Sniffling, Ethan handed Tim his blister pack as he sat on the edge of the bed to take his.  
“Bless you.”
“Thanks.   You gonna be able to sleep?”
Tim nodded in the dim, grabbing a tissue.  “HehhEckkSheshh, EhhSheshh!  This’ll die down soon.  Guess I gotta make up for all the time I coulda been sneezing while I was sleeping.”  
Ethan laughed.   “Guess so.”   He pulled the covers up around his neck.   “Hope it’s not too long.”   He pressed down on the flashlight icon on his phone as Tim did the same so they lay there in pitch blackness.
“Haven’t been in a room this dark since camp when I was a kid.” Tim commented.  
“I don’t think I really have.”  Ethan noted.  
“You know the dark has its advahhn AhhhHatShoo!  AhhRShoo! Advantages.”
“You know, it’s a little more romantic when you can stop sneezing long enough to actually fool around right?  Speaking from experience.”
Tim’s response was a loud blow.  
“And one or both of us don’t need to constantly stop to do that.”   Ethan said gently, leaning over and kissing his cheek.    “I’m sure there will be other blackouts.   Or you can always find us a cabin in the woods.”
“HehhckChehh!  HehhyehhtSheshhh!  Ugh!  I’m not sexy?”
“Let’s just say you’ve been sexier.”
Reassured, Tim stopped talking so Ethan could fall asleep.  And in time, he was finally able to fall asleep as well.
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y0itsbri · 3 years
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it's pizza night at the gallagher-milkovich household!
word count: 2k
usually they order a couple pizzas from some local joint: thin crust chicago supreme for ian and deep dish meat lovers for mickey, though they steal pieces of each others' all the time (even if mickey has to pick off all the onions from ian's chicago supreme.)
but tonight ian wanted to do something different. the tomatoes and bell peppers from the garden were finally looking ripe. ian, with his green thumb, had spent most of spring and summer nurturing a row of plants in the community garden of their apartment complex. mickey had thought it was boring as fuck at first when nothing seemed to be changing, but eventually seeing the plants shoot up and seeing ian excited about all the new growth gave him a paternal kick somewhere from deep inside him. he even found himself wondering how the plants were holding up after a particularly bad thunderstorm one night. for fuck's sake -- was he a plant dad now? when the fuck did this happen?
and if they were going to make their own pizzas with ian's fresh vegetables, they sure as hell weren't going to cut any corners with the store-bought dough. though mickey would never admit it, he was getting pretty good at baking, which was something ian was both a little jealous and very proud of. at this point, mickey was basically a pro specifically at making orange cranberry bread (which ian had become immediately hooked on for a few weeks after jill brought over a loaf as a 'sorry-my-boyfriend-pissed-off-mickey' gift) and also at his favorite peanut butter chocolate chip cookies (mickey has such a sweet tooth, and ian has no idea how he hasn't had more cavities.) surely pizza dough couldn't be too much different than the rest of mickey's pretty impressive baking skills.
after work wednesday evening, mickey emerged from the shower with just a towel wrapped around his waist. he peeked out into the living room expecting to see ian zombified on the couch with the usual two boxes of pizza balanced across his legs. however, mickey was thrown off a bit as he spotted ian behind the kitchen counter rummaging through cabinets, occasionally opening the fridge, and proudly wearing his "i like to get high (quality ingredients)" apron, which had been a very appropriate birthday gift from lip.
"what's with all the ruckus in here, big bang," mickey teased. ian's wild eyes calmed a beat after they had finally noticed mickey standing in the doorframe. he checked out his husband up and down once over as a mischievous smile blossomed on his face.
"it's a surprise, but i'm gonna need you to put some clothes on," ian announced, even though his darkening eyes were saying quite the opposite.
mickey was rather hungry and curious about the shitstorm of a mess in the kitchen, so he decided not to push his luck with ian's lustful gaze and instead obediently turned around to pull on some sweatpants while mumbling something about "can't be too good of a surprise if i have to put on clothes." ian smirked from behind him.
mickey swaggered back to the kitchen wearing one of ian's old rotc t-shirts, hoping it would get enough of a rise out of ian for him to enthusiastically take it off late in the night. as if ian needed a reason.
"alright, alright, tough guy. what's the big surprise?"
ian slid his arm around mickey's waist and pulled them flush together as they stared at the array of ingredients sprawled out.
"Pizza," he stated as if it were a simple fact.
mickey's brow furrowed. there clearly wasn't any pizza on the counter. "where's the fuckin' pizza? or did you get too high," he teased, poking at ian's apron.
"ha. ha. very funny, babe. just high quality ingredients, remember?" ian winked and mickey smirked, musing at his dork. when mickey didn't counter him again ian cleared his throat and continued, "no, but for real. ya know how i've been growing vegetables in the garden here?"
mickey nodded. as if he could forget.
"well, for pizza night i was thinking that we could make our own with some of the vegetables and i was hoping," he dragged out the word and squeezed mickey's waist, "that you would make the dough, seeing that you're the star baker of the house."
mickey rolled his eyes. he didn't know where ian got the impression that he was the next best thing to a professional baker when he would usually just take the easy way out. especially when he was hungry and it came to pizza night. but he was secretly very excited to try the food that ian had spent so much time cultivating.
"yeah, man, let's get it." mickey leaned over the counter to turn the bluetooth speaker on and connect his phone, 'wait by the river' by lord huron playing. he grinned as he allowed ian to slide his hand down his arm and lace their fingers as they swayed together for a moment before pulling away and promptly getting to work on food prep.
ian hummed while he washed and chopped the vegetables, occasionally making comments about how he can't believe how colorful they are or how they had grown from nothing. mickey entertained his comments while he made the dough, "well not quite nothing. there was the seed and the sunlight and the shitty ass soil and you watered it a bunch and stuff. all that love ain't nothing." ian warmly smiled at how casually his husband talked about all forms of love now.
once everything was cleaned and diced and the dough was divided into two equal slabs, they got to shaping their crusts. mickey, being the little shit that he is, had extra flour on his hands and wiped some across ian's cheek. he took off behind the counter and into the living room before ian was able to even get out an agitated "what the fuck, mick!" ian was soon on his heels though and tackled him into the couch, wrestling and straddling him and pinning mickey's arms above his head with one hand and smearing flour from his own hand across mickey's cheek as he struggled.
"payback's a bitch," ian teased through his fits of laughter as mickey's face was twisted up in utter disgust, "oh c'mon, mick, can't take it?"
"you know exactly what i can take, asshole," mickey wiggled his eyebrow as he grumbled lowly. ian's face dropped in complete shock as he was taken off guard, and his grip loosened. mickey used that moment of weakness to flip ian off of him and straighten up his shirt as he stood, no mind to the floured handprints placed haphazardly all over himself, and definitely not entirely from his own hands.
"great, so pizza, then?" he smiled over his shoulder at a disheveled ian as he went to go shape the dough, innovatively using a can of beans as a rolling pin.
ian joined him behind the counter and smacked his ball of dough. "hmm"ed and paused. mickey turned to investigate the curious glint in ian's eye when he heard and felt a similar smack on his own ass.
"oh my fucking god, ian. we're never going to get anything done. i'm fucking starving," he groaned.
"as if you didn't start it!"
mickey paused for a moment. sure, fine, yeah. ian had a point with this one, "whatever." he poked ian in the side and then turned back to his pizza. after they were rolled out enough, ian picked up the spoon to put sauce on.
"nah, man! what the fuck are you doing?" mickey snapped, more with urgency than actual agitation, "we gotta cook them for a little bit first before putting all the shit on there, ya know?"
ian put his hands up in innocence and slowly backed away from both the pizzas and the oven, "my bad, chef, carry on."
mickey flipped him off before slipping the two crusts into the oven for a couple minutes. while they waited, ian picked up mickey's phone and pulled up a youtube compilation video of gordon ramsay 'critiquing' his chefs.
"hey mick, this is you in the kitchen."
they watched for a couple minutes as ian laughed his ass off.
"oh fuck off, you'd burn the place down without me," mickey retorted, carefully pulling the crusts out of the oven. ian just rolled his eyes and resumed playing the music from a spotify playlist that mickey totally did not have named 'date night🥀.'
they took turns spooning sauce with chunks of fresh tomato onto their half baked crusts and then sprinkled on some grated cheese and pepperoni, which they had picked up at the farmer's market on their last trip with a couple of the women in their complex they had accidentally befriended.
as much as mickey ate like a broke college kid when he was left to fend for himself most days, he really didn't mind vegetables (except for fucking onions -- those could rot in hell.) despite this, ian still looked on astonished as mickey piled on the veggies just as much as his pepperoni. that was really saying something.
mickey glanced up, "what, popeye? like you're the only one that gets to enjoy the shit from the garden? i gotta taste for myself all the hype that went into this!"
a look of pure adoration flashed across ian's face as he laid a smooch on mickey's forehead. mickey's felt fucking butterflies in his stomach. he thought that being married to the guy would make those feelings simmer down, but as if it was even possible, the flames burned even stronger.
as they waited for their pizzas to cook in the oven for the final time, they giggled like lovestruck teenagers as they wiped the flour off of each others' faces, making an even bigger mess than they started with, as mickey's hair was now dripping wet. they then cleaned off the countertops and packed the extra ingredients in some blue-lidded tupperware set that debbie had recommended.
ian got two beers out of the fridge, "special occasion," he reasoned. mickey scoffed. as if they needed a reason to get fucking smashed.
soon the pizzas were done, and only slightly burnt at the edges, "adds flavor," mickey reasoned. as if anything mickey actually put effort into cooking would be less than perfect.
ian sliced the warm pizzas as mickey grabbed a couple plates, pausing in his steps to not-so-subtly stare at his husband's biceps flex with the force of the pizza slicer.
they didn't even bother to put on a tv show in the background as they ate. mickey's phone was still playing some chill, lowkey romantic music, and they were just excited to dig in. at this point mickey was fucking starving. mickey quite literally moaned as he took his first bite. ian snapped his head to stare daggers at mickey, watching his throat intently.
"shiiiit. that good, huh?" ian murmured.
all mickey could manage to do was nod as he swallowed.
"might have to do this more often," ian suggested as he took a bite of his own slice. shit. this was good.
"good job growing this shit, man," mickey praised through a mouthful. he swallowed, then added on teasingly, but actually oh-so-serious, "might wanna try growing some mary jane next year if you keep it up with your green ass thumb."
"sure, mick." ian took a sip of his beer. ian would agree to anything mickey would ask of him right now, tipsy on both his beer and his fondness of his husband. as if he could read his mind, mickey reached his hand out to rest on ian's thigh, squeezing once before resting it there for the remainder of dinner.
they finished off the beers and pizzas in bliss, leaving the dishes near the sink to be tomorrow's problem. they didn't even make it out of the kitchen before ian started to tug on the hems of mickey's shirt.
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jimlingss · 4 years
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Sugar and Coffee [10]
Chapter 9 - Chapter 10 - Chapter 11
➜ Words: 5.2k
➜ Genres: 99.5% Fluff, 0.5% Angst, Pâtisserie school!AU
➜ Summary: It isn't hard to be a pâtisserie chef, but it's not a piece of cake either. It seems like for you in particular, life keeps throwing in one wrench after another. It always finds ways to make your sweets bitter. The cherry on top is Jeon Jungkook — a rival with a sensitive sweet tooth who always finds ways to complain about you.
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You love baking.
It’s what got you through the years of high school, through your grandparent’s passing and when home wasn’t the refuge you wanted it to be. For a long time, baking was the only real interest you had. And for great reasons too. It was magic and every time you stepped into the kitchen, you felt like a magician, pouring ingredients in, mixing to get an instant product.    It’s chemistry with a sweet result. Something you can share with others.   And that passion has only deepened over time. You love baking desserts, pastries, cakes, tarts, everything. Even things with chocolate, no matter how hard it is to master them.   But fuck. Lemon meringue pie is an absolute bitch.   “The pie filing is a bit watery.” The teacher places her tasting fork down. “Not too bad, but lots of room for improvement, you two. Watch that starch.”   You and Jungkook sigh. This was your second attempt too. You swear this dessert is a nightmare in disguise and here to ruin your career.   Taehyung notices the gloomy atmosphere bogging you and Jungkook down. He slides up to your counter after the teacher goes to judge the next pair that have finished. “Can I get a taste?”   “Knock yourself out.” The boy beside you pushes the sad pie over to him.   Taehyung eats, tasting it thoughtfully on his palate, and hums.   “The crust is a bit soggy, huh?”   “I don’t get what we did wrong,” you mutter.   At least this was just practice and not a time-constricted examination. But so much for picking Jungkook as your partner. You thought he was the most competent baker in this class and thus the most worthy to bake with you. But maybe you gave him too much credit.   “Well, there could be a number of things you did wrong. Maybe you boiled your cornstarch for too long or at too high of a temperature. When did you add in the lemon? The acidity might’ve destroyed your cornstarch’s ability to stay thick,” Taehyung points out, suddenly an expert on pies. “Also did you make sure the lemon filing was hot before you spread the meringue? That might be your issue as to why the filing is a watery mess. Try again, guys. Maybe you’ll succeed next time.”   “What the fuck.” Jungkook has his brows furrowed, eyes narrowed into slits. Like you, he’s baffled. He doesn’t even process it and is unable to think of a comeback to Taehyung’s condescending tone.    Taehyung is an idiot. Usually. Since when did he know better than the two best people in class?   “Want a taste of ours?” A huskier voice sounds behind Taehyung. The brunette moves aside and you find Yoongi at the counter beside yours, a smirk plastered on his face. He sets down his lemon meringue pie. It looks similar to yours.   “Sure.”   You wonder what their pie’s issue is. But as you dig into the slice they cut and put it on your tongue, there’s an explosion of flavour.   Their crust is buttery and crispy, meringue fluffy on your tongue and soft. The filling is sweet yet balanced with a citrus sharpness to the flavour. You almost cream your pants as you swallow. Your mouth is watering for another lick, but you have too much dignity and pride to do so.   Unfortunately, Jungkook can’t hide his expression as well as you can.   “Good, right?” Both Taehyung and Yoongi are wearing shit eating grins, obviously relishing in your reactions. “The teacher said it was the best she’s tasted in a long time. Asked us if we cheated and bought it at a bakery.”   “This’ll probably be our last attempt.” Yoongi hums, crossing his arms. “Probably don’t need to try again. She said she’d give it an A anyway, and you can’t really get any better than that.”   You take a deep breath and grab Jungkook by the shoulder to drag him back to the counter with as much dignity as you have left.   //   The scent of lemon is stuck to your skin permanently. Even with a change of clothes and your apron stuffed in your locker, you can still smell the damn thing when you’re miles away from the kitchen.   “Can you smell that or am I going crazy?”   “No.” Jungkook already knows what you’re talking about. “I can smell it too.”   “God.” You bang on the door and Jimin opens it. “Hey, Chim.”   “Hey, guys.” The two of you step inside where the others have already gotten started, playing Super Smash on the TV with Yoongi and Taehyung battling against one another. It’s not an unusual sight, but what makes you stop in your tracks is that—   “Aeri?”   Your friend is seated on the couch with Hoseok’s arm looped around her casually. “Hey.” She greets you with a shy smile.   You nod, rather impressed at this new development. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”   “I didn’t either,” she admits and Hoseok grins at you.   You throw your bag down while Jungkook flops beside Yoongi, taking a controller to join in.   “Gonna play?” Jimin asks, about to hand you a controller too but you shake your head.   “Nah. Not yet. I’m starving.” You pat your stomach and walk to the kitchen, ready to raid the fridge of whatever it has.   “Don’t eat the meringue pie!” Yoongi shouts after you.   “Fuck you,” you spit without looking back. “I wouldn’t even if you paid me to.”   Now that’s one huge lie. But you still have your pride to hold onto.   “Let me join you.” Aeri gets up and scrambles from Hoseok’s arm much to his dismay.    You hum, peeking into the fridge and purposely overlooking the beautiful, godly pie in the middle. Min Yoongi must’ve placed it there to mock you on purpose. That fucker would.   But you aren’t swayed and you grab the jars of peanut butter and strawberry jam as well as the stale bread. You place the ingredients on the counter to slap a sandwich together.   In the meanwhile, Aeri lingers on the other side of the island. “How was your day?” she asks.   “Good,” you answer and don’t beat around the bush— “So you’re dating Jung?”   She coughs, sputters, caught off guard by your question. “Well…..I-I don’t know.” You loll your head to the side, giving her a look, and the blush on her cheeks deepen in hue. “Maybe? I don’t know…..it’s...kind of my first time….”   “Being in a relationship? Yeah, I get it.” You smile reminiscently. Even if you’ve lost a comrade to the curse called love, you can’t feel bitter about it. You know what it’s like — the excitement, butterflies, nervousness, how every touch got your heart racing into what you thought would put you into cardiac arrest. The innocence of a first love can never be repeated. “Do you like him?”   “Y-Yeah. I think so.” Aeri struggles to explain how she feels and makes wild gestures without realizing. “Every time I see him and every time he’s gone….I...I….”   “You miss him.”   The girl in the sweater nods and tugs on her sleeves self-consciously. “Sometimes I get really anxious that I’m doing something wrong and other times I’m so happy.”   “Yeah, that’s how it goes. Love’s a crazy thing, huh?” You spread the peanut butter on one side of the bread. “Fucks with your brain real bad.”   “It does,” Aeri agrees sheepishly. “And I don’t like being out of control with my feelings, but I think….it’s worth it.”   “I’m jealous.” The words come out before you can stop it, but then you reel back and you laugh it off, slapping both halves of your sandwich together. “Not really. I’m kidding. Anyway, take it slow and you’ll be fine. Hoseok’s a good guy. You have nothing to worry about.”   “Yeah, I know.” She grins, rocking back from her heel to her toes, beaming with joy.   “And if he ever hurts you, tell me.” You slam the butter knife you have in hand onto the counter and it makes her jolt in surprise. “I’ll kill him.”   Giggles bubble out of Aeri's throat. They diminish as you finish making your sandwich, tossing your tools into the sink. But she doesn’t easily let go of the slight envy you had accidentally expressed. “You’re doing okay, right, Y/N?”   “Things couldn’t be better,” you assure with a grin.   Except that’s a lie too.   The both of you arrive back to the living room and your ears perk, catching wind of a husky voice, “—pie is good enough to win the competition, guaranteed, so that’s why we signed up.”   If there was one thing in your life that could be better, it would be Min Yoongi and Kim Taehyung’s humbleness or rather, lack thereof.    “Are you still talking about your pie, Yoongi?” You scoff, flopping down to the couch, and eyeing him with a cocked brow. Aeri slides back beside Hoseok in the meanwhile and the dark-haired man is visibly happy to have her return to his side, arm coming to drape the back of the couch again. “You have no other accomplishments to rave about?”   “At least I have one.”   “It wasn’t even that good,” you tell the rest of them just for the record.   But Yoongi audibly scoffs. “Really? Because it looked like Kook here was about to start crying.”   “Jungkook always looks like he’s about to cry when he’s put on the spot.”   Your kitchen partner turns his head away from the screen towards you. “Excuse me?”   “Just admit it,” Taehyung eggs you on to further irritate you. “Our lemon meringue pie was the best thing you’ve ever tasted and that we’re going to crush the other teams.”   “After we pick up that five hundred dollar prize, I might as well retire.” Yoongi stretches out his muscles with a small smirk. “I finally found the product I can sell for the rest of my life.”   “Gordon Ramsay would probably put it on his menu to serve,” Taehyung says to his partner who shrugs nonchalantly.    “I wouldn’t be surprised.”   You whirl your head to the other people in the room to see if they’re hearing this like you are.   Both Jimin and Aeri are sheepish and shrug at you, not knowing what to say. Hoseok grins, enjoying the back and forth. But you know that look on Jungkook’s face, the expression he exchanges with you. The two of you are pissed off at their cockiness.   Hoseok notices and decides to throw gasoline into the fire. “Was it really that good?”   “You can try it if you want. It’s still in the fridge.” The corner of Yoongi’s lips curl. “But it’s better than Y/N and Jungkook’s, that’s for sure.”   “A lot better than theirs,” Taehyung says in a matter of fact way. “Theirs was sad, the filing and crust soggy. The meringue was weeping too. What a shame.”   “Can’t blame them,” Yoongi adds as he leans back into the couch, spreading his thighs like he owns the damn place. Which he does. But that’s not the point. “Lemon meringue is hard to make. Only the best. Excellent. Competent. Most talented can bake it.”   “That’s right,” Taehyung agrees.   A muscle in your cheek twitches. Your jaw clamps.   That’s enough for you to snap. “Jungkook and I are competing too.”   Your partner looks away from the game and quirks a brow. “We are?”   “Yeah.” Your eyes flicker from him back to the grinning duo. “So we’ll see who the best really is.”   //   It hindsight, it was a bad, bad decision made on impulse.   The baking competition was taking place on a Sunday at school with four teams already signed up, including Taehyung and Yoongi. The competition itself isn’t too shabby, especially considering that the five hundred dollar prize is a great incentive.    The problem is you and Jungkook haven’t prepared anything whatsoever. And it’s a problem that explains why most students don’t do bake-offs — sometimes it’s more effort than it’s worth.   The pair of you haven’t decided anything. You both haven’t practiced.    “Are you sure this is a good idea?” Jungkook asks, standing in front of the bulletin board with all the details of said competition happening within the next few days.   “Come on, Jeon!” You try to ignore your own doubts by firing him up, plopping a hand on his shoulder. “We have our pride and our dignity on the line.”   “I’ve never had too much dignity to begin with,” he mutters.   “Are you really going to let Yoongi and Taehyung tell you that they’re more competent than you?”   Jeon Jungkook scoffs, his competitiveness being poked at. “Yoongi can’t pipe for shit and the only thing Taehyung can bake is bread.”   “Exactly.”   He nods and together, the two of you sign your names on the sheet, bracing for whatever is to come.
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The day of the competition arrives sooner than expected.   You’ve gathered at an open kitchen with all your friends watching on the risers at the sidelines, and two of those most annoying idiots are at the counter beside you. There are ninety minutes on the clock and three teachers you know seated at the front with bright smiles. Mrs. Pham is nodding her head, Mr. Chu looking around while Miss. Kang coming forward with a microphone.   Something that should be a friendly contest has you, Jungkook, Taehyung, and Yoongi oozing an intense competitiveness that has the other three teams scared.   “Alright folks, when the timer begins, you can begin and get whatever ingredients you need from the pantry. Remember, you will be judged on taste, presentation and creativity equally! Try your hardest and have good sportsmanship!”   “Ready?” You lean in to whisper to Jungkook, eyes meeting his and he nods sternly.   “Is everyone ready?” Miss Kang lifts her arm and on three counts, grins. “Go!”   The timer begins and Jungkook books it to the pantry with Taehyung is hot on his tail.   In the meanwhile, you preheat the oven to four hundred degrees fahrenheit and grease two baking sheets that are already at your counter. Jungkook ends up coming back sweaty but with a basket of things you need and doesn’t seem to be missing anything.   “Nice.”   “Course, I have it all up here.” He mischievously taps his temple, making you lightly scoff.   “Hand me the—”   Before you can finish your sentence, Jungkook slides the butter across the countertop and you catch it.    “I got you.” The boy in the white apron winks, making you roll your eyes.   You combine one cup of butter and two cups of water in a large saucepan, putting it over medium heat. At the same time, Jungkook works in sync with you and gets two cups of flour prepared with a half teaspoon of salt.   Right when the butter finishes melting, you remove it from the heat and whisk in the flour and salt. He puts the egg carton beside you and begins to chop the semi-sweet chocolate he had gotten from the pantry.   Beside you, Yoongi and Taehyung have fallen into a rhythm as well. They shout calmly at one another, as calm as shouting can be. You know they’re not to be underestimated, but it’s comforting to know that you don’t need to win — you just need to beat Yoongi and Taehyung.   Miss. Kang approaches the pair of them. “What are you two doing here? Ooh, Yoongi, looks like you’re making pie crust and Taehyung you’re making working on some filing?”   “It’s lemon meringue pie,” Taehyung says with a grin, flickering his eyes up.   The teacher is genuinely impressed. “A classic, but one with great difficulty to master. I’m excited to taste it. Are you nervous at all?”   “Not really,” he responds. “Our pie is the best.”   “I am loving that confidence, you two. Keep it up!”   She continues around and as you’re working, you hear the team behind you are making rhubarb cherry pie. Another team is working on mocha truffle cheesecake and the last, a duo diagonal to you, is baking blueberry bread pudding.   It seems like everyone has a solid plan, but you don’t dwell or pay too much mind. You focus on beating the eggs into the mixture one at a time until the batter is smooth.   “What a lovely sight to see, Jungkook and Y/N!” Miss. Kang is ecstatic to see the two of you working together. Especially when she was the one who paired you both to the internship happening in two months while being completely aware of the bitter feud that was going on back then. “And what are you two making today on this beautiful afternoon?”   “We’re making croquembouche,” Jungkook says with a smile as he finishes chopping his chocolate. His announcement seems to get the attention of the other contestants, Yoongi and Taehyung whipping up their heads to look as well.   The teacher is taken aback. “And you’re making that in an hour and a half?”   “That’s the plan.” Jungkook grins with that bunny smile of his, channeling that Jeon charm of that almost has you rolling your eyes yet again.   “It will be very impressive if you two can pull it off. Well, good luck!”   Miss. Kang walks another round before waltzing back to where Mrs. Pham and Mr. Chu are waiting. She must murmur something to them because their eyes suddenly widen and they look over at your station.   Jungkook works on spooning the choux dough into twenty four small rounds on each baking sheet and once it’s in the oven, the timer sets for half an hour.    “It’s in.”   “Good.”   Quickly, you wash the raspberries and leave them to dry before preparing the caramel mixture. You pour the sugar into a saucepan and then add two thirds cup of water, allowing sugar to boil and you move to prepare the ice water.    Jungkook, on the other hand, heats the one cup of heavy whipping cream until it shimmers and pours chocolate over it. He stirs until it’s all melted and lets it sit to return to room temperature after sprinkling in coarse sea salt.   Once the choux is golden brown, it’s out of the oven and both you and Jungkook work side by side to pipe the ganache into the choux.   “Twenty minutes left everyone!” Mrs. Pham announces.   “I’ll grab the caramel,” Jungkook says and you nod, going to get the serving plate.   The both of you work fast. You dip the choux into the caramel and leave it on the tray for Jungkook to begin assembly. But in the midst of working, he notices your hands beginning to shake.   “Hey, Y/N.” He calls you softly and your eyes flicker up. “It’s going to be okay. We’re doing well.”   You nod. It’s calming to have his reassurance and you finish dipping all forty eight in while Jungkook forms them into a cone shape, towering up to your eyes. You bring over the caramel, the consistency that of syrup, and you lightly drizzle around the choux pastry puffs. The thin threads of caramel wrap around the dessert, gold and glistening in the light.   Jungkook’s brows furrow, placing the raspberries between them in the last few remaining seconds.   “Here.” You help him.   “Ten….nine….eight….seven….six….” Mr. Chu is counting down, watching the timer go off. Then it rings. “Alright folks, step away from your plates, please!”   It looks like all the teams have finished on time, and the scent of baking surrounds your senses — breads, chocolates, and cooked sugar. The air is sweet.   You look over and Yoongi and Taehyung are grinning. Their perfect lemon meringue pie is on their counter, exactly replicated from last time. But your eyes move back at your own dish, and you find pride blooming in your chest. The french dessert stands tall, choux pastry puffs piled into a cone shape and bound with threads of caramel wrapped around it.    On the sidelines, Jimin, Aeri and Hoseok are cheering, and while you’re not sure if it’s for the other team or your own, you like to think both of you deserve it.   “I think we did pretty well, if I do say so myself.” Jungkook gives you a cheeky smile, getting you to high five him.   You giggle after your hands slap together. “I think so too. Ours has the best presentation that’s for sure. It’s only about taste now.”   “I’m sure we’ll be fine. Well...I don’t know about your pastry, but my ganache filling is…” He does a chef’s kiss, gathering his fingertips together to kiss against them and then opening up his hand.   You scoff. “Please, Jeon. If there’s any issue, it’s going to be the caramel or the ganache. My pastry is perfect. I would know. My specialty is going to be in pastries.”   Jungkook grins, expression all too playful. “Okay, we’ll see then.”   The three judges go around, giving a taste to all the dishes and giving compliments. As expected, their eyes bulge at Yoongi and Taehyung’s pie, and Taehyung seems to charm them too. All of them laugh, openly wondering if they somehow cheated and slipped in a pie from a gourmet bakery.   “Very fluffy and crisp. Absolutely delicious.”   Mr. Chu bobs his head in approval. “I’m not much of a pie person myself, but very well done.”   “Thank you.” Yoongi offers a modest smile.   They move on, having nice things to say about everyone with few criticisms. And when they come over to you two, they’re smiling and all the contestants pay close attention. “Now to the dessert of the hour.”   “It’s incredible that the pair of you managed to make croquembouche in an hour and a half. It can take some up to four hours, so I’m very impressed over your ambition,” Miss. Kang admits, “There was a point I thought you weren’t going to make it. But you worked hard and finished it off, so well done.”   “A very tedious and painstaking dessert to make,” Mrs. Pham notes. “But you both work well together if you can pull off something like this under such strict time conditions.”   “Exceptional teamwork,” Mr. Chu agrees.    They each take a choux from the top onto their plates with raspberries, and a bit of caramel. When they bite into the pastry, they quirk their brows in surprise. “It isn’t pastry cream?” Miss. Kang chews thoughtfully. “It’s salted ganache.”   “Jungkook works well with chocolate and I work well with pastries so we decided to combine both our skills and put a twist to the usual croquembouche,” you explain.   “Very creative!”   “The salted ganache is also bittersweet and the choux is very crisp,” Mr. Chu says as he swallows. “Typically the choux has to be chilled in the fridge, but in spite of skipping that step, I cannot taste the difference. The raspberry is a good touch as well and not just for presentation.”   Mrs. Pham nods at him. “It’s crunchy and has a good bitter note to lessen the sweetness of the caramel. It’s perfect.”   “Well done, you two!” Miss. Kang grabs for another. Once they finish up, they take a step back. “We’ll take ten minutes to decide the final results!”   After the announcement is made, they return to their places at the front as Yoongi and Taehyung slink over.   “I’ll admit…” Yoongi ganders at your tower of pastries. “This is pretty damn extra.”   “We take challenges seriously,” you chime with a grin and he smirks.   “Can I have one?” Taehyung asks, fingers itching, eyes glimmering. “They made it sound so good.”   “Sure.” But you stop him before he can grab one. “On one condition. I get a slice of your pie.”   “Deal.”   “So you admit it.” Yoongi cocks his brow, smiling. “Our pie is delicious.”    “I never said it tasted bad.” You mischievously shrug.   “I want a slice too,” Jungkook says as he leans over. “Or two.”   Yoongi takes a choux off of your tower and grins. “Fine by me.”   While Taehyung moans about how good your croquembouche tastes, the other contestants come swarming over, curious and wanting one as well. Jimin shouts from the sidelines to save him one and Jungkook hands them out. In the meanwhile, you go over with Yoongi to claim a slice of the meringue pie and get Jungkook’s before it’s all gone too.   “Think you’re gonna win?”   Yoongi shrugs, surprisingly not as arrogant as before. “Maybe. We’ll see.”   You lightly scoff at him. “Where did that confidence go?”   But the dark-haired man merely shrugs. He cuts you a piece and you don’t hesitate to dig in. Yoongi smiles when he sees you openly enjoying the pie without restraint and then his eyes travel across the room to where Jungkook is still happily handing out the pastries. “So this is what the dream team can cook up, huh?”   “Dream team?” You frown.   “Yeah. You and Kook,” he says it like it’s obvious. “You two are the ultimate pair. What? You’ve never heard people say that before?”   “People? Who?”   His shoulders bounce nonchalantly. “Classmates. Teachers. I’ve heard it a few times and it’s true. You make up for what the other person lacks and you work well together. It was easier to deal with when the two of you still hated one another, but now that the top two kids can work with each other, it sucks for the rest of us.”   You burst out laughing. “You just have a lot to catch up on, Min. Don’t fall behind on me and Jeon.”   “Kind of hard not to when you’re both maniacs.”   Jungkook comes barrelling over for his piece of pie before you can eat it.   You also try other contestants’ desserts before the judges return, making you all scramble back to your stations.   “The results are in!” Miss Kang announces with a bright smile. “Everyone did exceptionally well today and it was difficult to come to a decision, but there’s a team in here today that was just exceptional and demonstrated that it’s possible to push the limits on taste, creativity, and presentation!”   You look over to Jungkook and he grabs your hand, bracing for it. “Please give a round of applause to our winners—”   Suddenly you’re being picked up.   Jungkook has his arms wrapped around you and lifts you off your feet, swinging you around. After a second, he sets you down onto your feet again, but you’re bewildered. There are claps from the few in the audience, the contestants and teachers applauding and all staring at you and Jungkook.    Aeri, Hoseok, and Jimin are on the stands cheering loudly. Yoongi is smiling while nodding in approval. Taehyung is grinning. And Jungkook places his palms to your cheeks. Your mouth forms into fish lips, face squished together, and he makes you look at him. Your dazed eyes meet his.   “We won!”   “We….won?” You blink. His doe eyes are glimmering like there are stars captured in his dark irises. Jungkook’s pretty — you never really thought about that before. “We. won. We won?!”   You can’t believe it. But after some words of congratulations, it sinks in.   “We won, you freaking idiot!” You jump on your feet and hug Jungkook again. He smells like chocolate and sugar, his apron dirty against yours, but you don’t particularly care. Not in this moment. “You’re not such an idiot, after all!”   Jungkook laughs, boyish features scrunched up. You smile at him.   Maybe Yoongi’s right. No. You know he is — you and Jungkook are the ultimate duo. Like two socks that make a pair, like two magnets that attach, like dumb and dumber. And you wouldn’t have it any other way.
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“Hey, Jungkook!” Baekhyun approaches him in between their class break, and they fist bump each other. “I heard you won that competition with Y/N. Congrats, man.”   “Thanks.”   “How’s it going by the way? Haven’t seen you in a while.” The two of them are not necessarily close, but they became friends in last semester’s sanitation and safety class where they both died of boredom together.   “As great as it can be with exam season coming up.”   “Yeah, it’s tough.” Baekhyun sympathizes with a sigh. “Business communications is destroying me. Like I need to get at least a ninety on the finals to pass the course.”   Jungkook sharply inhales. “That’s rough, dude.”   “But hey, after this then it’s just our internships. That’s the only thing getting me through it. That and my girlfriend. Oh yeah, you were going to do wedding cakes, right? How do you feel about it?”   “I’m still not sure,” Jungkook admits and then without thinking much, says, “The only thing getting me through it is being able to hang with Y/N.”   He hasn't seen you since the competition which was two days ago, but it’s still a long time. Especially when he’s used to you plopping down beside him during breakfast, lunch or dinner — when he’s used to you banging your fist on his dorm room — when he gets texts with you whining about period cramps — when you come from nowhere and pester him till the end of the world.   Jungkook’s still buzzing over the victory, but it’s been tough days one after another. The only thing that gets him through it is finally being able to see you and spend some time with you.    These days Jungkook prefers being with you anyway as opposed to hanging out with Yoongi, Taehyung, Jimin, and Hoseok. They’re noisy and always worsen his headache. Sure you like to purposely egg him on and tease him, but your company is still peaceful and worthwhile. Most of the time.   “So you two are finally dating?”   “What? No. No, we aren’t.” Jungkook laughs it off. It’s an odd idea that still sends shivers down his spine.   “Oh, okay, my bad.” Baekhyun smiles. “It’s just that I see you both hanging around together a lot and I’ve heard you talk about her a lot too.”   “Yeah, we’re friends.”   “So you’d be okay with it if she dated someone else?” he suddenly asks.   “Uh…” Jungkook’s caught off guard, mouth opening before closing like a fish out of water. “I guess?”   “You guess?” He pauses. Jungkook flashes him an odd look and Baekhyun laughs loudly, lifting his hands and backing off. “Sorry, I don’t mean to intrude or be annoying. It just reminded me of before my girlfriend and I got together.”    “It was kind of hard to tell where the line of friendship and romance was and then one day I realized that friends don’t really miss each other in the way that partners do. Like when you miss them when it’s only been a short period of time, like a day or two. But anyway,” Baekhyun sing-songs, “I shouldn’t stick my nose into anywhere it belongs. I know I tend to do that and Jessica always yells at me for being rude. Oh shoot. I should get going now before I’m late. See you around?”   “Y-Yeah….See you.”   Baekhyun smiles and walks away, not knowing the bomb he just dropped.    Jungkook’s brows furrow and he begins to dangerously wonder.    He wonders if he’s supposed to miss you like this when it’s only been two full days. If he’s supposed to come to you every time something goes wrong. If he’s supposed to think of you every time there’s good news. If he’s supposed to think of you this much.   Friends aren’t supposed to think about each other like this.
585 notes · View notes
vegetalass · 4 years
Note
hcs of the gang being quarantined in one big house together maybe?? 🥺 lub ur writing
i lub u, anon!!🥺 sorry this took forever!
General 
Oh my godddddddddd
They had to stop doing movie nights because there was too much fighting 
They tried to set it up such that everyone got a turn to pick a movie but there were still complaints
Now, movies are viewed at random and the policy is that 
1. The TV is first come first serve
2. You have to announce when you’re using it
3. Anyone is allowed to join you 
This has stemmed into multiple people shouting “IM WATCHING _____” at random times
And yes, people will try to hide the remote (mostly Sean)
If they can find it, that is
The lines between public and private property have been blurred. Everything must be labeled or there is a chance someone will take it 
You can risk it, but it’s not recommended since they’re all dudes and will most likely eat anything 
And even with your name on a box of graham crackers, there’s still a chance someone will stick their hand it in and steal a few
All the dudes walk around in their Long Johns like it’s not awkward
They have to do their own laundry so everyone is missing socks
Or they have extras
And wet laundry is constantly being left on the ground if it’s unattended and someone needs the washer 
Arthur
This dude double dips 
He licks the spoon and puts it back in, too 
Gets yelled at a lot for this, but never remembers to stop
Everybody is afraid to touch all of the dips now because of this 
And Hosea has to start buying separate ones just for Arthur
He’s the one who takes 3 hour baths 
I imagine that there’s multiple bathrooms in the house but not enough for everyone so there are definitely times when people are like “WTF, Arthur you’re still in there?” or “Where’s Arthur?” 
Usually it’s Charles or John because they don’t mind sharing a bathroom with each other 
Cue Arthur having accidentally fallen asleep in the tub 
But yea he’s just chilling in there, otherwise
Started the quarantine off by trying to fix up the house… But immediately got lazy
There’s probably a number of things he keeps saying that he’ll “get to, eventually”
The only reason Dutch hasn’t called someone is because it’s a PANDEMIC
Technologically challenged 
Barely knows how to turn on the TV and still uses an iPhone 5 that has pretty much stopped working
John has given up trying to explain how to make things fullscreen on YouTube
Because of this, probably spends most of his time wandering around the yard and reading or journaling
Tilly even bought him some scrapbooking supplies, which he’s been trying to use 
Little washi tapes and highlighters because she knows it can’t get too complicated too fast 
She also makes him an Instagram account so he can take photos or post art
But figuring out how it works is a losing battle, and he never remembers to use it, anyway 
“I think we should get a pet” 
Everyone: “Arthur... Do we look like we take care of ourselves? 
If anyone tries to talk about how annoying the quarantine is, starts ranting about people who refuse to take it seriously
And the conversation ends up spiraling into him blaming capitalism for everything
John 
Every other meal he eats is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or Doritos
He does that thing where he wraps a bowl or plate in plastic wrap so he doesn’t have to wash it 
Doesn’t clean up after himself
Leaves used tissues, slimy butter knives with PB on them, and crusty socks laying around 
Unluckiest of them all 
His snacks get taken the most, the bathroom is always occupied when he needs it, never gets to use the TV, his laundry is always moved, etc. 
Always ends up using the bathroom when there’s no toilet paper
Texts Arthur for help and then makes an announcement in the group chat about “common courtesy” 
Nobody replies
His texts are full of messages to Abigail that all say the same thing
“Help.” + “Please come get me” + “I hate it here”
They’re all left on read except for the occasional response asking if he needs anything from Target
The list he sends back is like four paragraphs long and it’s all dumb stuff 
He’s like “FaceTime me when you get there, I wanna go shopping too”
Doesn’t even really want to leave the house for necessities, so he has to do stuff like water down his soaps or steal other people’s toiletries just to prolong how often he needs to go shopping for himself
He’s the one using Irish Spring from the dollar store mixed with water or a block of orange Dial soap that hasn’t been touched in five years 
Charles tries to throw away an empty hand soap and John is like “THERE’S STILL SOAP IN THERE LOOK” *mixes water with it* 
Steals razors and Shampoo 
Thinks conditioner is “unnecessary” and “doesn’t do anything” 
Complains about being bored but doesn’t bother to do the things people that people offer
Charles 
Voluntarily becomes a recluse 
Not because he wants to but because everyone else is too annoying to deal with 
He’s forced to start using the internet and when he’s not on the computer he’s trying to block out the noise of the 8 other men he lives with just living 
Going on walks is his other hobby
Also probably buys one of those adult coloring books to color
Like Athur, Charles hogs the bathroom 
It’s not as bad as Arthur since he’s not in the tub for the whole time but he really will spend an hour getting ready in the morning for absolutely no reason 
If anyone asks about it he just tells them that since they’re in quarantine there’s no reason to rush 
But he does get yelled at if there’s no other bathrooms available 
Becomes a self-care connoisseur 
Walks around in a bathrobe and face mask just to try and achieve some sort of zen 
Literally the only one who doesn’t walk around half naked
Besides Hosea, the one of the only guys who tries to wake up on time and eat three healthy meals a day 
The house is entirely dark and he’s eating toast while Hosea makes coffee 
It’s awkward, not because they’re weird about each other but because no one else is awake and it’s quiet for once 
Dutch is the third person up and Charles leaves the kitchen by the time he’s around 
Gave up trying to do the dishes and only cleans what he uses
Sometimes if he feels like being nice he’ll do Arthur’s dishes, too 
But only if he gets something back in return, like Arthur doing his laundry or something
The only one who changes his bedsheets on the regular
Him and Kieran are the only ones trusted by Hosea to leave the house safely 
Micah 
Everyone is surprised Micah isn’t dead yet
Everyone is constantly fed up with him for something or for just being irritating 
And try to ignore him for the most part, which is hard
Tries to defends himself with “Well, you don’t have to bother me if you don’t want to” 
Doesn’t clean up after himself, either
John leaves more mess, but Micah does worse stuff 
While John just leaves his dirty peanut butter knives around, Micah does stuff like forget to put the mayo back in the fridge, leave the bread bag out and open, forgets to bring his used dishes to the dishwasher, throws his trash in other people’s trash cans, leaves his wet laundry in the dryer, etc. 
If it’s annoying and gross, he does it 
And tries to eat food that other people have made for themselves or don’t want to share with him 
Dutch is the only one who shares with him willingly
Does not pick up his hair from the bottom of the shower
And doesn’t clean the sink after he shaves
Honestly, I doubt any of the drains in the house work properly because so much shaving goes on 
It’s honestly surprising to everyone that he takes the quarantine seriously 
Accuses people of being sick even though all of them have barely left the house… 
Wears a mask inside when he’s feeling salty 
He doesn’t even care about the mask, it’s just to make people feel gross and bad about themselves
Besides Sean, he’s always trying to hog the TV
And everything he watches is annoying, pretentious, or both
Complains about there being “nothing to watch” despite always having something on and refusing to stop
Tries to smoke inside and literally always get busted for it
Even if other people are doing it too, he’s the one who doesn’t even bother to be by a window when he does it
His room is always off limits 
If you need something from him you need to knock and wait in the doorway
Also does the “You’re too close… Step back, please” thing
And if anyone gets mad, says it’s a pandemic and he’s just trying to be SAFE
Mostly does this to feel powerful
Turns in to Uncle Jr. with all the complaining and berating he does
Uncle is honestly offended
Hosea
The only person allowed to do the shopping 
He gave up trying to give people lists because the groceries they came back with were never right 
Either too few, too many, not the right stuff... You name it 
See here for more
That’s why, despite being the oldest, he’s the one who goes grocery shopping for meals twice a week 
Refuses to buy alcohol because of incidents that they’ve had
Can’t stop people from sneaking it, though
Similar to Dutch in that he gets annoyed when people oversleep, but because its quarantine, he tries to not mention it, and at the worst, gets passive aggressive 
Tries to make a chore chart for people to follow but it gets ignored
He ends up having to force people to do things by reminding them constantly 
He’s the one who starts opening people’s doors in the morning and turning on the lights
Makes everybody start eating on paper plates with plastic silverware because he’s tired of trying to make people use the dishwasher 
Arthur doesn’t know how, John doesn’t put his plates in the right place, Charles refuses to since no one else contributes to keeping it neat, Micah doesn’t even know they have one, Kieran also can’t fill it correctly... 
Basically, it’s too much for Hosea to handle 
His dinners are all Costco pre-made meals that can be made quickly 
Frozen lasagna and prepackaged salad type stuff 
He’s the guy who falls asleep on the couch sitting up while watching TV and if you try to talk to him he says “I’m awake” without opening his eyes
And if he’s using it, don’t even think about suggesting to change the channel 
The answer is and always will be no
Even when he’s not really paying attention
And it’s either on the History Channel or Discovery Channel
Always complaining about how cold his feet are
Doesn’t let anyone touch the thermostat
He’s an in real life Elf on the Shelf
Dutch 
If anyone, and I mean anyone starts sleeping in, he gets in a really pissy mood 
“While I’m up, doing work for you, you’re sitting in bed being lazy!!!” and “What do you mean you don’t understand why! Why should I have to tell you why wasting the day is annoying to all those who are working!” 
Even despite this, he can’t actually change the fact that no one wakes up on time
And it’s not like the work he’s doing for them is very important
He’s the one who thinks that a pandemic is the perfect time to be or do something useful
Eat healthy, write a book, pump iron… Anything
And when people complain about being useless he’s like “You have all this free time!!!1! Stop complaining!!! You can do anything!!!” 
And if he’s doing something he considers useful, yells at people who try to bother him 
Arthur: “Hosea wanted to know-”
Dutch: *doing sit ups* “CAN’T YOU SEE I’M BUSY?” 
When it’s his turn to cook dinner, he’s making 8 boxes of Trader Joe’s mac and cheese in a huge pot and calling a meal
Literally the only meal no one complains about 
He won’t clean the pot when it’s finished, though
Literally just cooks and leaves it out for someone else to deal with
Another self-care aficionado 
Also walks around in a bathrobe and face mask 
He’s worse than Charles though, because while Charles wears pants... Dutch will be booty ass naked under his 
Also keeps trying to make homemade masks and scrubs and walks around in those, too 
He’s like “This is a good one, I can tell already” 
Everyone: “Dutch... is that... mayo... in your hair?”
Annoyingly good at monopoly
Does not invite Molly over and gets yelled at over FaceTime
Cue everyone eavesdropping on their arguments
Goes on power walks
Yells at people when they listen to loud music with swear words 
Honestly, always yelling at people
“Can somebody get me my slippers? Arthur? John? Hosea? AnYoNe!!!”
Kieran 
Spends the least time in the bathroom because he’s afraid of getting yelled at 
Does everything in five minute increments 
Except for showers, when he allows himself ten minutes
Barely 
Most of what he eats is just microwave popcorn and shredded cheese
He’s the one asking people if they want to go on “family walks” with him
Literally no one joins him 
Also tries to play board games with everyone
This goes a little better at least because Hosea will sometimes play and if he’s there, a few people will definitely join 
Very bad at monopoly
The most conscious about wearing a mask 
The others wear them but Kieran is the one who wears double masks, gloves, and carries around Febreeze 
Also will get mad if anyone forgets their “safety equipment” 
Or if they’re within six feet of him in public
Props to him though for staying healthy 
I’ve mentioned this before, but... Spends most of his time playing games on a big tablet wearing headphones
Candy Crush and FarmVille and Words with Friends and stuff like that
Though all of his internet friends are weird old ladies he doesn’t know 
Everyone is mad at him for sending non-stop game notifications, too
Hosea is the only one who responds to any of them 
He’ll never admit this, though
Also tries to start doing arts and crafts 
Mary-Beth started telling him about the various crafts she’s been doing, so he’s started trying to follow along, too 
Things like crocheting or popsicle stick art 
His stuff all looks bad, but he’s just happy to be doing it
And to be FaceTiming Mary-Beth
When he gets to choose a movie, he’s picking a “family-friendly” movie like Inside Out or Lilo and Stitch 
Everyone starts out being mad but they all end up watching the whole thing without complaining 
Heated debates ensue, too 
For example, like about whether Flynn should’ve cut Repunzel’s hair in Tangled 
“YOU’RE GONNA LOOK AT ME AND TELL ME THAT I’M WRONG?” 
Charles + Arthur vs. Dutch + Bill
Makes meatloaf or Hamburger Helper like once a week
They’re basically the only thing he knows how to make 
Sides with Arthur when he suggests getting a pet
Wears a Snuggie 
Doesn’t change his socks 
Javier
Plays his own music very loudly and won’t turn it off or down if you ask 
Either that or he’s practicing guitar 
It’s not really that bad but when you can’t escape it.... People get mad 
The only saving grace is that the singing is usually in Spanish so it’s not as bothersome
The door to his room is always closed
Refuses to open it
To talk to him, you have to knock and then he’ll exit
Dutch is the only one allowed in and he thinks Javier’s rules about entering are creepy so never does it
Javier cooks his own food and won’t share
Only makes enough for exactly one person so even if he wanted to, there’s not enough
Eats dinner in his room to prevent people from bothering him or asking for some
However, he has the biggest stash of quarantine snacks… 
No one knows where he gets them
And getting him to share is like trying to do a drug deal, but he’s not against it as long as he gets something in return 
He didn’t personally cook all these snacks so the rules are different 
His room is full of scented candles to make it smell better since the whole house kinda smells like Boy 
Buys a gamer chair at the start of quarantine 
Claims it’s more comfortable than the office chair that Dutch and Hosea chose for everyone
Everyone is jealous
Wears fuzzy pajama pants only 
Sean
Sean is the one sleeping in
Never sleeps in his bed and just falls asleep wherever, basically
Usually the couch
Because he’s always snoozing, he’s the one who watches the most TV
Micah claims this isn’t “fair,” despite doing the same thing
And even if he’s not watching TV, he’s just using the couch to watch Tik Toks full volume 
Tries to make his own Tik Toks, but they either stink or no one wants to participate
Constantly having people get mad at him for recording them 
Stopped wearing clothes the moment quarantine started
Always in a tank top and his underpants 
It’s kinda weird 
People cared at first but by now they can’t be bothered to complain since they’re 
1. Used to it 
2. Probably start doing the same thing
Leaves his laundry laying around
Also won’t share anything he’s eating 
Gets mad when people steal food
Doesn’t address anyone in particular though, just walks around yelling about how “nobody has the common decency not to steal” 
Has food delivered almost every other day 
No one knows where he’s getting the money from, either
Everyone think it’s a waste
Mostly because he doesn’t share, but also because all hell broke loose when Hosea found out about an expense called “delivery fees” 
Also has a stick up his ass about wasting food 
Started yelling about this randomly, too 
If he can’t force someone else to finish leftovers, he forces himself to finish them 
Probably gets caught watching a certain type of nasty video a lot
Lowkey it probably happens to everybody at least once
Yells at anti-maskers 
Tries to wrestle the other boys and gets his ass handed to him
Bill
Possessive of everything 
Usually he’s not this bad but being cooped up with a bunch of thieves and liars doesn’t make him confident that his Circus Animal cookies will last very long 
Doesn’t share anything and very adamant about making sure there’s labels on things so nothing gets mixed up
Also makes his own space in the fridge with tape 
BILL’S SPACE DO NOT TOUCH 
And will start yelling in anything is moved 
Not as bad as Sean though because he only cares about his own stuff
The whole thing is super hypocritical though, because he definitely steals other people’s stuff
If he gets caught, claims “it’s only fair” 
Hosea has to buy him soap because he won’t buy it himself
Definitely the one who learns how to make prison hooch with cranberry juice and yeast
And the one who eats all of the ice cream 
Even the nasty flavors 
Wears the same clothes everyday because since he’s not working, “they’re not dirty” 
They start getting holes in them, though
If anyone tries to suggest something for him to do, he gets mad and claims he “knows how to entertain himself”
Also constantly accusing people of being in his space or business 
Ends up starting a ton of fights over this and then complaining about how mean everyone is to him 
He’s not doing it on purpose, though 
Ends up buying some kind of gaming console to pass the time
If he buys an Xbox, he shares with the rest of the boys
If he buys a nintendo switch, he starts playing Animal Crossing and doesn’t put it down for weeks 
Out of everyone… He’s the one who takes the pandemic the least serious 
He follows the rules because he doesn’t want to be eaten alive by any of the boys, but he probably thought the virus was a hoax at first 
He learned his lesson the first time he tried to go out without a mask and got locked in the car, though
Forgets to flush the toilet 
His room is dirty
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What items did you get for your quarantine shopping list? I did re-supply my first aid kit, but am struggling with food ideas.
Oh, boy. I don’t want to alarm anyone, but I feel it never hurts to be prepared, so here’s my list.
For pantry food: rice, dried lentils, canned beans (pinto, red, garbanzo, black), canned vegetables (corn, green beans, mushrooms), canned tomatoes, canned chicken and salmon, canned corned beef hash, spaghetti, spaghetti sauce, peanut butter, jarred chipotle peppers, canned dulce de leche, microwave popcorn, plain and cinnamon sugar pita chips, tortilla chips, powdered milk, powdered mashed potatoes, Jell-O pudding in powdered form. Flour, sugar and yeast because my daughter likes making homemade bread. Graham crackers, Hershey chocolate bars, and marshmallows because the kids like making s’mores in the microwave. Rice Crispies because ditto rice crispy treats. Microwavable mac’n’cheese. Pop-Tarts, breakfast bars, instant oatmeal. Add-water pancake mix. Raisins. Peanuts.
For seasonings: Chili seasoning, Sazon seasoning, olives, capers, canned sardines, salt, pepper, hot pepper flakes, Soy Vey teriyaki sauce, hot sauce, powdered broth cubes, garlic, powdered Parmesan cheese (yes, we have this in the US and it’s an acquired taste), olive oil, vegetable oil, vegetable cooking spray.
For freezer (because electricity should not be a problem): ground meat, turkey kielbasa sausage, frozen soup vegetables for soup, frozen stir fry vegetables for fried rice.
For dehydration (some of the symptoms mimic stomach flu): Jello-O gelatin, Emergen-C, Crystal Light flavoring (also provides Vitamin C), Gatorade, 7up, lots of tea (chamomile, English Breakfast, Constant Comment, peppermint).
For illness: Advil, DayQuil, NyQuil, Immonium. Canned chicken noodle soup. As you can see, I am not really afraid of getting sick. My main concern is being told to stay home and having a hard time getting groceries either because I can’t get out or because the supermarkets are having trouble stocking food for any reason (hoarding, supply chain problems, etc…). [EDITED: thermometer, which I totally forgot about, chewable acerola tablets, and Vicks]
For pets [EDITED]: Kitty litter, cat food, dog food, pet meds.
Paper products [EDITED]: Paper towels, disinfecting wipes, toilet paper, kleenex tissue.
This is extremely individualized, so YMMV greatly. I also focus on foods that I will be able to use in the future (hence no Spam because we don’t eat it at home). I usually have most of this in my pantry (except for the powdered milk, and Jell-O, which I usually buy fresh), so it’s just a question of buying more than usual. That’s why I mostly buy stuff that keeps for a long time. I don’t want to have 50 lbs of cheese in my fridge for weeks or lots of moldy bread because I was paranoid.
With this I can make rice and beans, fried rice, rice with vegetables, lo mein, bolognese, puttanesca, arroz con pollo, rice with sausages, sausages and mash, picadillo and mash, sesame noodles, chicken soup, lentil and sausage soup, regular chili, taco soup, chicken tinga chili, salmon cakes, chocolate pudding, rice pudding, dulce de leche crepes, etc… I can also keep the kids entertained with bread and dessert-making, which is the biggest problem I tend to have during emergency situations. Luckily, electricity and wi-fi should be fine during this kind of emergency. If nothing happens (and it probably won’t) then I will use it up slowly over time.
I’ve lived through blizzards, hurricanes, and just plain blackouts, so this is pretty old hat for me. The one thing that’s different from my usual “something bad may happen, so let’s be prepared” list is that I added a frozen section since the power won’t go out. LOL, I even bought batteries because I may as well stock up on everything.
AGAIN, THIS IS NOT MEANT TO ALARM ANYONE. I don’t think anyone has to go out and buy cases of Spam and Velveeta. However, it doesn’t hurt to think ahead and try to figure out what you may need in case it’s recommended that people stay inside for a few days. Your list will probably be different than mine. Just think of what you would like to have around if you’re stuck inside for two weeks, and what you would do with it if this turns out to be over-prepping (as will likely be the case). 
And this is just what I do. Your list may be just Kraft mac’n’cheese and a couple of cans of Amy’s Soups, or you may have truffle oil as an essential pantry item you can’t live without. Everyone is different.
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scavengerbird · 3 years
Text
TJ & the Angel
The angel’s got a thousand eyes and they’re all looking at TJ.
He guesses it’s an angel. That’s what it said it was. Or that’s what it told him it was. It didn’t really say, TJ guesses, ‘cuz it didn’t make any sound. There were just words in his head, all a sudden, without any kinda sound or sight or shape except an understanding of their meaning. It sorta burned, but not in a bad way.
He figures it can’t really speak with sound ‘cuz it hasn’t got a mouth as far as he can tell, just all those wide brown eyes, movin’ and spinnin’ round each other and never blinkin’. It’s like a Ferris wheel got tangled up with a couple other Ferris wheels but the cars are eyes and the whole things on fire. Kinda.
TJ’s all soaked through and shivering still, ‘cuz apparently the angel can pull his body outta the river and pull the riverwater outta his lungs, but it can’t dry his clothes off. Or maybe it could, if he asks, but he can’t figure out if that would be rude or not.
He wants to get home before Dad, so he can sit by the radiator and have a cigarette in the house and not have to explain why he’s got half the water from the Missouri with him. But it’s bad manners to leave when someone’s in the middle of talkin’ to you, and he figures it’s probably double bad if that someone just saved your life, and triple bad if that someone is an angel of the Lord. He can’t even imagine what Ma would say, if he just up and walked off right now.
So he tries to pay attention.
Hearing the angel is hard, but in a way that feels good. Like the burn in his legs when he runs, except instead of just his legs, it’s his whole body, or, more than that even, his whole self. The angel’s sayin’ lots of grand sounding things, about destiny and purpose, a higher calling and his own free choice, watching over him and waiting for the right time and love and repeating history and hope.  
TJ’s brain is starting to go a little fuzzy trying to hold it all in. It’s like being drunk, on the good whiskey Cecily lifted from her grandad’s cabinet that one time, not the cheap shit beer they usually get Armani’s older brother to buy them. Everything feels far away and a little funny. An angel pulled him from a river. He was dying and then he wasn’t. The angel wants something from him. He wants to laugh, but he doesn’t have to think about if that’s rude or not, he knows it is.
Something warm is dripping from his nose, and he thinks it must be runny from the cold, except when he wipes at it with the back of his hand what comes away is red.
*
TJ wakes up in his own bed and tries to pretend to himself the angel and the river and the blood was a dream. He lies there for a moment, tellin’ that to himself over and over, but he’s never been much good at lying. Always gets caught, even by himself.
           When he finally gives in and opens his eyes, he just about shits himself. There’s a boy’s face hovering over his own, just a few inches away. The eyes are wide and brown and very familiar, but that doesn’t stop TJ from startling so bad he rolls back and off the side of his bed, knocking his head on the hardwood.
           “Jesus,” he mutters, once he’s got his breath back. The angel tilts its head at him. It looks like a boy now, instead of a burning storm cloud raining eyes. A boy about his age, scrawny and brown-skinned and with those same eyes, just set still in a face under thick eyebrows and a few pimples. It’s followed him, crawling onto his bed to keep peering at him by leaning over the side.
           “NO,” it says, “NOT QUITE. NOT EVEN CLOSE, REALLY.” TJ can’t tell if it’s serious or if that’s supposed to be a joke. He doesn’t know if angels make jokes, doesn’t know if they can. He wonders if it’ll smite him, for taking the lord’s name in vain. Ma’d say it’d serve him right.
It’s making actual sound now, but there’s still something about its voice that burns on the way down, makes him feel warm all over. “ARE YOU OKAY?” it asks, forehead wrinkling in concern.
“Yeah,” TJ sighs, “I’m alright. Just hit my head.” He tries to sit up, but the world spins a little and he has to catch himself on the bedframe to keep from flopping right back down.
“HERE,” the angel says. And then it reaches out to cup the goose egg growing on the back of his head, and before he can even finish wincing from being touched there a white-hot flash sears through his skull, and he gasps and his whole body jerks and he sorta notices that the angel has to reach out and grab his arm with its other hand to keep him mostly upright. And then the heat is gone. So is the dizziness, and the pain, and the goose egg.
TJ gently touches the back of his own head, where it felt like he got stabbed and then felt like nothing had happened at all. His fingers brush against the angel’s and he pulls back.
“What was that?” he asks, voice ragged.
“I HEALED YOU,” the angel says simply.
“Then why did it hurt?” TJ asks, trying to swallow something down, but his throat is dry.
The angel shrugs, looks sad for just a second, and says, “HEALING USUALLY DOES.”
           TJ hasn’t really got anything to say to that, so he just shrugs outta the angel’s arms and heaves himself to his feet.
           TJ’s starvin’, so he makes the angel follow him down to the kitchen. He musta slept for hours, ‘cuz it’s dark outside the window. He pokes his head outta his room real quick to make sure the coast is clear. The door to Dad’s room is firmly shut, and the house is quiet, so TJ gives the angel a thumbs up and waves it out after him.
           Downstairs, TJ doesn’t bother with the kitchen light switch. He likes the nighttime too much, feels safer in the dark. The soft yellow slice of light that comes out the fridge when he opens it is good enough. The angel wanders over to stare out the window above the kitchen sink while TJ digs out grape jelly and bread and peanut butter. He can tell it’s gettin’ antsy, that its just waitin’ to give him the speech it started at the edge of the river. He’s not sure what it’s waitin’ for. Maybe it feels bad about him passin’ out and thinks he’ll have a better chance with something in his stomach. Maybe its waitin’ for him to ask.
           He asks it, “Do you want one?”
           The angel turns to look at him and the sandwich he’s holdin’ out. Then it just keeps lookin’, so he repeats himself, and then he starts to feel like maybe he’s askin’ a dumb question, so he starts rambling. “I mean, uh, I guess I don’t know if you eat, really. But I thought’cha did, or, I mean, thought angels did, you know? In the bible. The Old Testament part. At Sodom, I think? Or Gomorrah. One of ‘em. Or maybe that was God. Or maybe I’m just remembrin’ the whole thing wrong,” he mutters, huffing a quiet laugh that he hopes doesn’t sound too nervous.
           The angel blinks, finally, real slow, and then holds it’s hand out. TJ puts the sandwich in it, relieved, then turns back ‘round to make one for himself. “YOU ARE NOT REMEMBERING WRONG,” the angel says, slow and quiet, the way you talk when you’re bein’ gentle. “IT HAS BEEN MANY CENTURIES SINCE A HUMAN LAST OFFERED ME FOOD.”
           “Oh,” TJ says, turnin’ back to the angel as he finishes spreading jelly and slaps his two pieces of bread together. The angel’s still holdin’ its sandwich, just starin’ at it like it’s made of gold or some other precious thing. TJ feels like maybe he did something wrong, except he’s pretty sure the opposite’s true, and he doesn’t know why anyone would look at PB&J he made on wonder bread the way the angel’s lookin’ at it. He kinda can’t stand it, so he shoves his own sandwich in his mouth so he’s talkin’ with his mouth full when he says, “Ya gotta bite it, ya know.”
           The angel laughs, just a small laugh, but TJ didn’t know angels could laugh at all. The sound makes his bones feel ‘bout as sturdy as the jelly in his sandwich. He leans against the counter. The angel finally takes a bite, and it closes its eyes again, the way you do when you’re eatin’ somethin’ real good and all you wanna focus on is tastin’ it. It’s ridiculous. It chews real slow, swallows, and says “THANK YOU” in that same quiet voice.
           “Don’t mention it, uh-” TJ says, and then realizes suddenly he doesn’t even know what to call it. Ma really would cuff his ear if she could see how bad his manners have slipped. He pushes that thought away.
           “You got a name?” he asks the angel. It sorta smirks at him, and he doesn’t get why ‘till the angel opens its mouth and makes a sound it shouldn’t be able to make with a human’s mouth, one that sounds the way honey tastes. “Right,” TJ says, noddin’. Angel will have to do.
           He watches the angel eat the rest of its sandwich in those same slow, savorin’ bites. Makes himself another and wolfs it down before the angel’s half done and hopes that’s not rude of him, but he really is hungry. It looks so happy eating that he makes himself wait ‘till its finished the whole thing and licked the stray smears of jelly off its fingers before he lets himself say, “I didn’t know you could do that, ya know, make yourself look different,” with a wave at its body.
           The angel looks down at itself. “YES,” it explains, “I SHOULD HAVE DONE THIS BEFORE I APPEARED TO YOU. I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN YOU WOULD NOT YET BE READY TO BEAR WITNESS TO A TRUE ANGELIC FORM. MY APOLOGIES.”
           TJ sniffs, remembers the copper tang of blood in his nose, says, “No harm done.” Then he thinks for a minute about the parts of what the angel just said that weren’t an apology and says, “Wait, what do you mean I’m not ready yet?”
           The angel snaps its head up and TJ’s heart sinks. This is the question the angel’s been waitin’ for him to ask. He’s not real sure he wants the answer.
           “AS YOU GROW INTO YOUR ROLE AS PROPHET,” it answers, “YOUR MIND WILL EXPAND. YOU WILL BECOME CAPABLE OF PERCIEVING MUCH MORE OF THE TRUE NATURE OF THINGS. AREADY YOU CAN SEE MORE THAN THE AVERAGE HUMAN. ONE LOOK AT MY ANGELIC FORM WOULD HAVE KILLED MOST OF THEM.”
           “Oh,” TJ says, ‘cuz he’s not real sure what else to say. And then, “Sorry, uh, my role as – did you say prophet?”
           “YES. CONGRATULATIONS.”
           TJ lets himself slide slowly down the kitchen cabinets behind him, sinkin’ to the floor. He puts his head between his knees and breathes. Tries his best to count sevens while he does.
           He feels the angel’s hand light on his back, its fingertips ghostin’ over him through his t-shirt. “ARE YOU HURT?” it asks, and all TJ can do is shake his head.
*
TJ doesn’t know how to turn down bein’ a prophet. He’s pretty sure he remembers at least one of ‘em tryin’, in the bible, but it didn’t do ‘em much good, in the end.
He thinks he mighta freaked Angel out, just a bit, ‘cuz it didn’t really say much else about the whole prophet thing, just kept a hand on his back ‘till he got his panicked breaths evened back out to a normal rhythm, then took his hand and guided him back upstairs to his room. It tucked him into bed like a kid, but he didn’t really mind. It was kinda nice, feelin’ like somebody was lookin’ after him again.
It’s less nice now, with the angel just hoverin’ over him while he’s tryin’ to fall asleep. He’s got as many questions for it as it has eyes in it’s true form. He thought it might have somethin’ better to do than watch him sleep, but it seems content to just stand next to his bed and keep those brown eyes fixed on him.
He sighs and cracks one of his own eyes open to look at it. It shoots him a small smile. He gives in. “Do you sleep?”
The angel looks surprised. “I DO NOT THINK SO. I HAVE NEVER TRIED.”
“Try now,” TJ suggests, scootin’ over to one edge of the bed. “It’s too weird, tryin’ to sleep with you standin’ there and starin’.”
“OH,” the angel says, and starts to reach for the bed before it hesitates, like it’s not sure TJ really meant what he said. He sighs and pulls the covers back, pats the mattress.
The angel gets into bed slowly and settles on its back, eyes still wide open, limbs stiff at its side. It’s kinda unsettlin’, like that. Looks like a corpse. TJ pokes it in the arm.
Touching its bare skin gives him a little static shock, but in a nice way. It turns its head to look at him, and TJ realizes that it’s very close to him again. He swallows. “C’mon then,” he says, “Get comfortable.”
The angel’s brow furrows as it studies him, like it’s not really sure what he means, and TJ feels kinda sad for it. Finally, it nods and rolls over so it’s lyin’ on its stomach, turnin’ its head again so it keeps lookin’ at TJ. And then it reaches out the arm closest to him and takes one of TJ’s hands in its own. His breath stutters.
“I FEEL COMFORTABLE KNOWING YOU ARE SAFE,” the angel says, and then it closes its eyes. TJ really thought he was gonna have to tell it to do that part, what with all the unbroken eye contact and refusing to blink. He gently rubs the back of the angel’s hand with his thumb and it does something he wants to call purring, even though it’s not a cat. TJ nestles down in his blankets and falls into an easier sleep than he’s had in months..
*
Dad’s already gone when he wakes up, and the angel’s still there, layin’ right where he left it like it hasn’t so much as twitched all night. TJ swears when he gets a look at his clock, manages to catch himself in time to switch from “Goddamnit” to “shit,” though. Then he hauls his ass outta bed and digs around his dresser for a t-shirt without anything too stupid written on it.
“I gotta go to work,” he tells the angel, as it watches him get dressed. He thinks about tellin’ it to turn around, but he’s pretty sure that just ‘cuz he can’t see any eyes in the back of its head don’t mean they’re not there, and he hasn’t got anything it hasn’t already seen a billion times before, if it’s been watching over humanity since the beginning of creation or whatever.
           “OK,” is all the angel says.
           TJ glances up at it as he ties his shoe. “So, are you just gonna hang out in my bedroom all day or…?”
The angel does another one of its quiet laughs and then says, “NO. I WILL GO WHERE YOU GO.”
*
Grover gives the angel a funny look when it shows up with TJ, but he doesn’t say anything. Grover’s never cared too much what TJ does while he minds the roadside stand the old man sells his vegetables out of, as long as he’s polite to everybody who comes by. He’s pretty sure Grover doesn’t even make a profit with the thing, or need to, just has it ‘cuz he doesn’t know what else to do with all the tomatoes and squash he grows. He’s also pretty sure Grover only offered to give him a few bucks an hour to keep an eye on it so he could keep an eye on TJ, at least a little bit. He always liked Ma a lot, definitely enough to try watchin’ out for her son after she couldn’t anymore, but TJ tries not to let himself think about that too much.
The angel wanders around for a while, pickin’ up all the tomatoes that have gone just past the right side of ripe, and when it sets them back down they look perfect again, so TJ doesn’t have to go around chuckin’ any of ‘em over the fence. Since he didn’t have time for breakfast, TJ picks out a watermelon and busts it open on the corner of one of the wooden tables.
“C’mere,” he calls to the angel, and it does, quick and curious. TJ scoops the heart outta the melon and offers it. “Try this.”
The angel does, and its eyes go even wider than they already are and it sucks the juice off its own fingers. It plops down in the dirt with him and they scoop the rest of the melon outta the rind with their hands.
TJ thinks he should feel weirder about watchin’ an angel dribble watermelon juice down its chin and onto its shirt, but he doesn’t. It just feels nice, to sit here with someone. Everyone looks at him different, since Ma, it’s like they can’t really see him, behind this big-awful thing that happened to him. He can’t say he doesn’t feel seen by the angel.
But he knows it can’t last. Grover’s out in the fields, ridin’ around on his tractor, and no one ever comes by this early, so TJ feels safe enough to pull out a cigarette and take a few drags, get himself steadied. He offers it to the angel, half ‘cuz not sharin’ feels rude and half just to see what it’ll say.
It just shakes its head, but TJ raises an eyebrow and says, “What, you gonna tell me angels can get cancer?”
The angel glares at him, but there’s no heat in it. “I DO NOT WANT TO SET A BAD EXAMPLE.”
TJ snorts. “A bad example for who? Me? Don’t’cha think it’s kinda late for that? I’m already smokin’ ‘em.” The angel still hesitates, but TJ can see the curiosity on its face. He grins, “I know you’re wonderin’ what they’re like.”
The angel shakes its head even as it’s reachin’ out to take the smoke from TJ’s hand. “WONDER CAN BE A DANGEROUS THING.”
TJ laughs. The angel puts the cigarette up to its mouth and breathes in. It hasn’t really got the hang of it, keeps its mouth too open, but it coughs anyway, and TJ laughs again and claps it on the back.
“I PREFER THE WATERMELON,” the angel says as it hands his cigarette back, so TJ reaches up and swipes a peach off the table they’re leanin’ against.
“Here,” he says. “You’ll like this better. ‘S lot closer to the watermelon. Promise.”
The angel takes the peach and TJ lets himself watch it enjoy the first few bites before he takes a deep breath and makes himself say “So, about this whole prophet thing.”
He can’t look at the angel straight on while he’s sayin’ it, ‘cuz he’s a coward, but he still sees it straighten up in the corner of his eye. Sittin’ at attention. Didn’t it say somethin’ yesterday, about bein’ a soldier of heaven?
He keeps his eyes fixed on the orange tip of his cigarette as he talks. “Thing is, my Ma made sure I knew my way ‘round a bible before she…” he swallows, gives his cigarette a bitter smile before he keeps talking. “Well, I’m sure you know, you said you been watchin’. ‘S what you do, right? Hang around prophets before they become prophets.”
The angel nods in his periphery. He wants to ask it how long it’s been watching him, how many others came before him, if it likes what it does, if it even has a choice in somethin’ like that. Instead he shakes his head, makes himself focus.
“Point is,” he forges on “I read ‘bout the prophets. And bein’ one? Well, it kinda sounds like a shit gig.”
The angel doesn’t say anything, so TJ keeps talking. “I mean, I can’t remember anythin’ good ever happenin’ to any of ‘em. They’re always watchin’ their city get burned down, and everybody they know get tortured, and gettin’ treated like a loon ‘cuz the Lord’s got ‘em runnin’ ‘rond lightin’ their own hair on fire and shit.”
His voice is shaking now, in fear or anger or both, and the angel still doesn’t seem like it’s got anything to say. He turns on it.
“And here’s the thing about all that. I don’t got a city for y’all to burn, and I already watched the person I loved best die, slow and awful with her lungs full o’ tar, so nobody here would be surprised if I went loony. Sometimes I think they’re all just waitin’ ‘round for it to happen, so none of ‘em would listen to single goddamned word I had to say, even if it was prophecy from on high.”
His face is warm and wet. He wonders if he’s bleedin’ again, but when the angel reaches out and brushes his cheek there’s no red on its fingers. It’s just tears. He flinches back from it. And it looks sad.
“What?” he asks it. “Aren’t’cha s’possed to be down here convincin’ me or somethin’? Where’s that grand speech o’ yours? You ain’t got anythin’ else to say to me ‘bout destiny and plans o’ higher powers and shit that’s more important than lil ol’ me?”
“YOU ARE IMPORTANT, TJ.”
He laughs, and it comes out wet-sounding. “Yeah? Well maybe I don’t wanna be. Why’re you here now? Why not six months ago? You could’a saved her. Don’t tell me you couldn’t’ve. Why wasn’t she important enough to save? She prayed for it. Hell, I prayed for it. Every night. And nobody answered. She fought right up ‘til the very end. ‘Til your stupid god let her die. Took her.”
His whole body’s shaking now and he has to stop talkin’ ‘cuz he’s chokin’ on sobs. The angel’s looking at him with those big eyes, sad and somethin’ else too. It’s not pity. He almost thinks it’s understanding.
“WHY DID YOU STOP SWIMMING, TJ?” it asks. And that brings him up short.
“What?” he manages through his tears.
“YOU FELL INTO THE RIVER YESTERDAY. YOU DID NOT JUMP. BUT UNDER THE WATER, YOU STOPPED SWIMMING AND LET THE CURRENT TAKE YOU. YOU STOPPED FIGHTING.”
TJ stares at it. He remembers the cold rush of the water all around him. The way his clothes pulled him down, like all the metaphorical weight around his neck suddenly made physical. He remembers the moment he wondered what would happen if he just gave up, let himself be too tired to keep trying to push his head above the surface. When he let go.
The angel’s the one who looks away for once, like whatever’s on his face is too much for even it. It turns its half-eaten peach over in its hands.
“IT IS IN THE MOMENT WHEN YOU STUMBLE, WHEN YOU CAN NO LONGER WALK, WHEN YOU LAY DOWN READY TO DIE, THAT THE LORD OFFERS TO CARRY YOU.”
TJ doesn’t even think he feels angry anymore. Just hollow, and tired, and bitter, and oh, he guesses, actually still a little bit angry. He spits in the dirt.
“Well, what happens if I decide I can walk just fine after all? You gonna toss me back in the river where you found me?”
“I DO NOT UNDERSTAND.”
“What happens if I say no? ‘Cuz I’m sayin’ no. D’you just fuck off back to heaven now?”
The angel frowns at him. “YOU WILL NOT SAY NO.”
TJ stiffens. “I know you said somethin’ yesterday about this bein’ a choice so-”
“IT IS A CHOICE,” the angel interrupts, “I WILL STAY ON EARTH WITH YOU AND WAIT UNTIL YOU CHOOSE TO ANSWER YOUR CALLING, BUT YOU WILL CHOOSE TO ANSWER IT.” It sounds almost sad, when it says, “THEY ALWAYS DO.”
TJ doesn’t have anythin’ to say to that, just spits in the dirt again.
*
TJ hates the idea of thinkin’ anything good coulda come outta what happened to Ma, but he has noticed that most o’ the kids who used to pick on him at school have slacked off. Nobody’s heartless enough to shove around the kid whose mom got lung cancer, even if he is queer and bad at pretending not to be. Well, almost nobody.
TJ lets himself swear good and hard when he sees David comin’ up the dirt road towards ‘em. It’s dusk and they’re halfway home, him and the angel, and he knows he’s faster than David, could probably go across the field and up Ms. Feldman’s fence and loop around the back way and make it, but he doesn’t know if the angel’s gonna slow him down. Its human body isn’t what he’d call athletic-lookin’.
David smiles at him, big and wide and mean, and TJ decides they’re just gonna have to take their chances runnin’, grabs the angel’s hand and starts to pull it outta the road, but it doesn’t budge. TJ looks back at it.
It’s standin’ there starin’ David down. “YOU FEAR THIS BOY,” the angel says.
It’s not a question but TJ answers anyway. “Well, yeah, he’ll do his best to beat the shit outta us if he catches us. So let’s not get caught.” He tugs on the angel’s hand again. “C’mon.”
The angel looks at him and then it lifts its free hand up to his face, brushes its fingertips gently along his cheek. He holds his breath.
“BE NOT AFRAID,” it tells him. Then it lets go and steps forward, towards David.
And then it explodes.
Maybe bursts is a better word. It comes outta its human skin in flash of heat and light. It’s a pillar of fire and TJ can taste ash. Its thousand eyes are back and each one is a million swirling shades of brown, like churning earth, and looking into them feels like falling. The air around the angel is electric and there’s lightning dancing over TJ’s skin. TJ thinks this is not just an angel, this is an avenging angel. And this is the most terrible thing I have ever seen. And also the most beautiful.
And then it’s over. Just as sudden as it expanded, the angel shrinks back into a boy’s shape at TJ’s side.
TJ’s brain doesn’t feel quite so liquefied this time. More like it’s turned the consistency of silly putty and its bein’ stretched out. It doesn’t hurt, though. And TJ realizes he could keep lookin’ at the angel. That his brain, or maybe its his soul, could keep stretchin’ to make this glimpse of the infinite fit. That this is what’s bein’ offered to him. That if he stops fightin’ it, stops tryin’ to live his life his own way, gives in to this calling, he gets to see this. He gets to see more. Not just a split second’s glimpse of one angel, but whole visions of Truths. Revelations. He can taste them on his tongue and his mouth is watering.
The angel’s lookin’ at him, it’s eyes just the one shade of brown again, and it looks sorta resigned, like it knows what hit’s comin’ and it’s just waitin’ for the blow to land.
TJ touches his own face, under his nose, checks for blood. There isn’t any.
“He still alive?” TJ asks, jerking his chin at David where he’s lying in the road, curled on his side like a baby in a womb.
The angel looks surprised. TJ knows this isn’t what it expected him to say.
“YES.”
“He gonna be okay?”
“THAT DEPENDS ON THE DEFINITION OF ‘OKAY.’”
TJ rolls his eyes. “Are you even allowed to do stuff like that?”
“NOT EXACTLY.”
TJ frowns. “Are you gonna get in trouble?”
“NOT RIGHT NOW.”
“Right. I guess we should drag him outta the road, at least.” He starts toward David, but the angel flaps its hand abruptly, and David vanishes. TJ makes a stuttering noise.
“I SENT HIM TO HIS HOME,” the angel explains.
TJ huffs. “Well, if you can teleport people then why the hell are we walkin’ home?”
The angel makes a noise somewhere between distress and desperation. It’s starin’ at TJ with its big eyes full of confusion and disbelief and maybe hope. He’s gone off script.
TJ understands now, why the angel was so certain he’d say yes to bein’ a prophet. He can feel a pull in the back of his brain, the tips of his fingers, the soles of his feet. He can feel how easy it would be. How enlightening. He could stop worryin’ ‘bout how late Dad gets home every night and how even though he doesn’t get pushed around much anymore he’s still only got the two friends and Armani can’t even look at him without pity on her face anymore and how he’s gonna get lung cancer and go in an awful way just like Ma but he can’t quit smokin’ ‘cuz the smell reminds him of her. He could stop missing her. He could let himself be emptied of all that, become a vessel for knowledge of things so bright they burn. Fulfilled. And it would be so easy. So much easier than living his own life.
TJ knows all that, and he also knows Ma never backed down from a challenge. Knows she said the right thing to do is almost always the harder thing to do.
He knows the angel said it could stick around ‘til he caves.
TJ smiles at the angel. It’s a tired smile, but it’s real.
The angel stares at him for a long moment. And then, slow and careful, it smiles back.
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completely-zucked · 3 years
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I've been homeless and immobile for a while, but I'm in danger of losing my accommodation and wheels (again).
Mentally and spiritually, I have been homeless for nearly two decades. I have once again been threatened with eviction because I don't have enough money in my bank account to pay my rent or meet my car repayment and other loans. Each time it happens, things get worse and there's no negotiating.
This time around, though, I might call their bluff, because I was already being driven mad (quite literally) by the restrictions, manipulating and gass-lighting (being called a cold, uncaring self-centred, irrational, illogical, lazy, stupid, narcissistic and paranoid sociopath — enough to make a guy with self-esteem and motivation issues suicidal). What's changed is that now I've been banned from using, cleaning and/or performing any maintenance on any room in the house except my bedroom (including bathrooms and toilets), which was previously one of my responsibilities. I have to use outdoor ones/the old servants' quarters, which doesn't have a door on the bathroom. )I live in the southern hemisphere; it's winter here.) I'm not allowed to hang a curtain or take material to make one, so I use an old chlorine bucket in the passageway/corridor outside as an indicator that I'm in there. I'm not allowed to be out there past 21:00 and am not allowed to move my stuff to the servants' quarters or garage because they are being used as storage space for tools and, occasionally, as a home gym by/for my landlord. I'm also not allowed to use any tools or appliances (including vacuum, cleaners, brushes, brooms, dustpans and cloths), because no maintenance. Everything of mine that I don't keep hidden and locked away has been confiscated. Of that, everything that I bought myself has been discarded or claimed as belonging to my landlord and landlady. (My soap, of all things, was the first casualty, which is what tipped me off and prompted my buying locks for those things I could lock away.) I am also not financially able nor permitted to buy more tools, containers or locks (and replacements for those) since my finances are being scrutinised and my choices, decisions and purchases criticised.
My broom is a paintbrush, my dustpan a plastic shopping bag and my duster a roll of paper towel. My vacuum cleaner is a cardboard tube glued to a Pringles can with a PC fan inside. ... And they wonder why I've taken to doing DIY projects that repurpose recyclable household items ; how irrational of me ... Le sigh.
That means no fridge, kettle, microwave or stove. I also don't get cooked meals. That would be fine on its own if I weren't subject to restrictions. I live off powdered milk, coffee, cereal, peanut butter, marmite, bread, orange squash concentrate, syrup, biscuits and bananas. Sometimes, I skim a couple of tablespoons of yoghurt out of the container when they're not around, or dilute fruit juice with water at a ratio of about 1:3, just to have some variety/luxury. I had some meal replacement shake powder too, just to keep me from starving, but that's gone and I can't afford to replace it. If I ask for more, I'll have to pay it back; they keep track of everything they buy for me (including a bottle of vitamins) that I'll have to pay back if/when I get a job again. I already owe about $220. It was, of course, a big deal when I bought myself twelve beers on special for $9 the day I got paid for the first lot of contract work I'd done in nearly six months since losing my job, despite the guy underpaying me by just over $100 because I hadn't insisted on a written agreement and was in no position to haggle/negotiate; the last time I do favours for friends, especially those who're religious. (The fact that I'm rationing out the beers at one a week and am only on my sixth one next weekend doesn't have any relevance to my landlady, who tried to confiscate a couple with intent to give them to my landlord and made an almighty fuss about how selfish I was being when I said I'd be fine with sacrificing them if either of them had just asked for one, how she'd noticed my ex always bought the wine despite our having agreed on certain divisions of costs when we were together, and a whole lot of other irrelevant bullshit.)
I need help getting out before the end of June, assuming I find a job and somewhere to go by then. Otherwise, I'm quite likely to end up on the street or attempting to off myself again. Currently, I have no job, nowhere to go and not even enough money to buy a cheap bicycle for $175. Even if I take my car to a dealer who'll settle the balance of my loan with the bank, I get nothing for it because it's an old model which I haven't been able to afford to take better care of and is pretty much a lemon four years after I drove it off the showroom floor. (I should have traded it in after two, before the new model came out). That's the best deal I've been offered. The alternative is to either trade it in for something else and extend my loan or take an amount that's less than it's worth and continue paying off a loan for a vehicle I no longer have. Hooray for death by a thousand cuts under Consumer capitalism.
Apparently, it's all my fault for not learning my life lessons, growing the fuck up, sorting my life out and GTFO of the family home a hell of a lot sooner (by at least a decade, nearly two), when the physical abuse by my peers first started in small and subtle ways. I thought that would all be behind me when I left high school, then varsity, then two corporate jobs. But no, I'm the kind of person who attracts bullies and toxic, abusive relationships.
The moral of the story
If I had known what I now know and the lessons I have learned when I was a padawan/young twenty-something, I would have taken my education seriously and applied myself to obtaining both CS and EE degrees instead of a crappy, near-worthless diploma, moved into my own two-room shoebox as a priority and bought a bicycle instead of a car. Anywhere I can't reach by bike probably isn't worth going and a car is an immovable liability/waste of money two years after purchase. At least I would have my own space (which I so desperately crave). At least then, I could be an allegedly horrible, reprehensible and repulsive degenerate of a person all by myself without anybody to hurt or hurt me. I'm fucking done with living with other people for a while. Fuck that noise; I want a thousand days of solitude, even if it's in a corrugated iron shack in an informal settlement. I'm prepared to cook my supper in a three-legged potjie over a wood fire and boil collected rainwater in a cast iron pot while I wait for my orchard and mielies to grow.
Honestly, at this stage, I'm prepared to live on a camp bed with a sleeping bag and a camp chair and folding table in somebody's garage, undercroft or old servants' quarters (as long as there's a plug point and running water) just to be able to get away from here. I just want some space of my own to be myself (horrible or otherwise) again and keep my interaction with people to a minimum while I figure out how to cope with/manage my shitty life situation, get back on my feet and out in the world again without being scrutinised, criticised, judged, condemned, restricted, rejected and ostracised. That shit is literally making me crazy and suicidal. It is not in any way conducive to me so much as thinking of an action plan/way forward, let alone pursuing it. Yet, somehow, I still manage to restrict the time I spend buggering around on social media (still too much), which I apparently need to succeed in the modern world, hunt for jobs, write, make music and try to flog my Patreon to disinterested parties. Oh, and I'm also writing a proposal for a social media site for someone who's attempting to gather funding.
Seeing my shrink for two hours a month (which costs me a month's wages from my part-time weekend job) and the afore-mentioned job is not enough, as much as I love animals.
So if you can spare between ten and twenty-seven dollars a month to help keep me afloat, please subscribe to my Patreon. Your support will be greatly appreciated.
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Mimic Chapter 4
TITLE: Mimic Chapter 4 PAIRING: Klaus/OC/Diego RATING: T CHAPTER: 4/? SUMMARY: Cassie is one of the 43 children born on the same day. Her parents hid her growing up, but her life changed when she met Klaus. Klaus gave her the nickname “Mimic’ because of her power to mimic other’s powers. When Reginald Hargreeves dies, what will the Umbrella Academy think of her secret?
Five disappeared.
“Where’d he go?” Luther asked.
“I think I know,” Vanya said.
They followed her and sure enough Five was in the kitchen. They all gathered around to watch Five make a peanut butter and marshmallow sandwich.
“What’s the date? The exact date.”
“The 24th,” Vanya told him as he walked over to the table with a loaf of bread.
“Of what?”
“March.”
“Good.”
“So, are we gonna talk about what just happened?” Luther asked.
Five said nothing.
Luther stood up and said, “It’s been 17 years.”
Five scoffed. “It’s been a lot longer than that.” He jumped through Luther to grab a bag of marshmallows.
“I haven’t missed that.”
“Where’d you go?” Diego asked.
“The future. Its shit, by the way,” Five answered.
“Called it!” Klaus exclaimed from his place on the table.
Five walked over to the fridge and pulled out a jar of peanut butter, before walking back over to the table. “I should’ve listen to the old man. You know, jumping through space is one thing, jumping through time is a toss of the dice.” Five looked at Klaus. “Nice dress.”
“Oh, well, danke!” Klaus said, fiddling with the hem.
“Wait, how did you get back?” Vanya asked.
“In the end, I had to project my consciousness forward into a suspended quantum state version of myself that exists across every possible instance of time,” Five explained.
“That makes no sense,” Diego told him.
“Well, it would if you were smarter.”
Diego stood up and started to charge at Five when Cassie darted in front of him and put her hands on his chest. She tapped into Luther’s power to hold him back.
“Ah, Cassie. So you’re still hanging around these two dumbasses are you?” Five asked.
Cassie and Five met shortly before he “disappeared”. It wasn’t until she was 15 that she started hanging around the Umbrella Academy more.
Cassie blushed, dropping her hands and stepping back from Diego.
“How long were you there?” Luther asked him.
“Forty-five years. Give or take.”
Both Luther and Diego sat back down.
Cassie stood behind Diego, rubbing his upper back.
“So what are you saying? That you’re 58?”
“No, my consciousness is 58. Apparently my body is 13 again.” Five finished making his sandwich and picked it up.
“Wait, how does that even work?” Vanya asked.
“Delores kept saying the equations were off.” Five shrugged and then took a bite of his sandwich. “Bet she’s laughing now.”
“Delores?”
Five picked up a newspaper, looking at the front page. “Guess I missed the funeral.”
“How’d you know about that?” Luther asked.
“What part of the future do you not understand? Heart failure, huh?”
“Yeah,” Diego said.
“No,” Luther corrected.
“Nice to see nothing’s changed,” Five said leaving the kitchen.
“That’s it? That’s all you have to say?” Allison asked him.
“What else is there to say? Circle of life.”
“Well…that was interesting,” Luther remarked.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
They all gathered in the courtyard later.
Cassie stood next to Klaus under his clear umbrella with pink trim.
Ben’s statue stood at the end of the courtyard.
It was always odd to see the statue when she could see Ben whenever she wanted to. Since Cassie was so close to Klaus, her power was almost intertwined with his. She didn’t even really have to try anymore, except when she was trying to summon a particular spirit.
Cassie was a comfort for Ben. Klaus’ inclination for getting drunk and high impaired his abilities, but Cassie was always sober. There were many nights when Klaus was passed out that she and Ben would stay up all hours of the night and talk about anything and everything.
“Did something happen?” Grace asked.
“Dad died. Remember?” Allison asked.
“Oh. Yes, of course.”
“Is mom okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, she’s fine,” Diego said as Klaus took out joint and lit it, “She just needs to rest. You know, recharge.”
Pogo joined them. “Whenever you’re ready, dear boy.”
Luther opened the urn and emptied it on the ground.
Klaus flinched when Luther looked at it oddly. Cassie wrapped an arm around Klaus’ waist, rubbing his side.
“Probably would’ve been better with some wind,” Luther said.
“Does anyone wish to speak?” Pogo asked.
No one said anything.
“Very well. In all regards, Sir Reginald Hargreeves made me what I am today. For that alone, I shall forever be in his debt. He was my master and my friend, and I shall miss him very much.”
Cassie hated Reginald Hargreeves for what he did to Klaus and Diego, but what Pogo said was very touching.
“He leaves behind a complicated legacy…”
“He was a monster,” Diego interjected.
Klaus laughed, causing Cassie to thump him on the back. Cassie glared at him as Klaus rolled his eyes.
“He was a bad person and a worse father. The world’s better off without him.”
“Diego,” Allison snapped.
“My name is Number Two. You know why? Because our father couldn’t be bothered to give us actual names. He had Mom do it.”
“Would anyone like something to eat?” Grace asked.
“No, it’s okay, Mom,” Vanya told her.
“Oh, okay.”
“Look, you wanna pay your respects? Go ahead. But at least be honest about the kind of man he was,” Diego said.
“You should stop talking now,” Luther told him.
“You know, you of all people should be on my side here, Number One.”
Cassie jumped in between the two of them. “Diego, stop it! Walk away!”
“Sweet little Cassandra. Always the peacemaker aren’t you?” Diego shoved Cassie aside, causing her to slip on the wet ground and fall.
Cassie waited for him to apologize or for Klaus to stand up for her, but neither of them did anything.
Vanya helped her up.
“Thanks,” Cassie muttered.
Diego continued to egg Luther on. “After everything he did to you? He had to ship you a million miles away.”
“Diego, stop talking.”
“That’s how much he couldn’t stand the sight of you!”
Luther threw the first punch.
Vanya pulled Grace and Cassie back.
“Boys, stop this at once!” Pogo yelled.
“I could rumor them,” Cassie said.
“No, I think it’s best to just let them fight it out,” Vanya told her.
“Come on, big boy!” Diego yelled at Luther. Diego started wailing on Luther.
“Stop it!” Vanya yelled.
“Hit him! Hit him!” Klaus cheered.
“Klaus! Diego! Stop it!” Cassie yelled.
Pogo shook his head and left the courtyard.
Luther finally grabbed Diego by the shirt and held him back.
“Get off me!” Diego yelled, punching Luther in the arm.
“We don’t have time for this,” Five said, going back inside.
“Come on, big boy!” Diego yelled.
Luther threw a punch and Diego dodged it, causing Luther to punch Ben’s statue.
The statue went crashing to the ground, knocking the head off.
Cassie’s heart stopped. “No!” She ran over to the statue. Her hands shook as she tried to pick it up and set it right.
“And there goes Ben’s statue,” Allison said, as Klaus walked over to his panicked girlfriend.
“Cass, Cass, its okay,” Klaus cooed to her. He put his hands on her shoulders.
The other Hargreeves’ were shocked by her outburst, especially Diego. He hadn’t realized she knew Ben that well.
“I’ll have it fixed,” Cassie said, “He’ll have a newer and better one.” Cassie was too in shock to see Ben watching them with a sad expression.
Klaus smiled. “I’m sure Ben would love that. C’mon. Let’s get you inside and dried off.” Klaus helped Cassie up and wrapped an arm around her shoulder.
“Cassie, I…” Diego said.
“Don’t Diego. Just don’t,” she told him.
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tk-writer · 4 years
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Another Time. [YTTD - platonic KeiSou]
Ever since the fourth incident, Sou’s life had not known peace. And it was all because of Keiji.
In hindsight, he should’ve known this was coming. Sou noticed how intently he was watching the three of them that day, how ardently he hid his gaze and cunning smirk behind his phone screen while Sara and Joe nearly wrecked him to the point of insanity. Silently taking notes, yet staying detached enough so as not to raise alarm. Sou knew better than to think he was safe from another attack.
Keiji just kept messing with him, in ways so subtle that he couldn’t say anything without calling unwanted attention to himself. Like how he took every opportunity to use a stupid pun, even when it was unwarranted.
“Thanks for making breakfast, Sara,” the blonde said one day when she brought him some hash browns. “These really tickle my fancy.” He glanced at Sou across the dining room table and winked. The loner felt like ice was being poured down his spine. He grabbed his own plate and practically ran out of the kitchen that morning.
“Sorry, had a tickle in my throat,” he said a few nights later while everyone was watching a movie together in the living room. He had just gotten over a coughing fit which sounded real to everyone but Sou. In fact, no one took note of his comment except for Sou, who visibly cringed as he sat in the armchair next to him. He felt Keiji’s eyes boring holes into him, but he didn’t dare turn his head to look back. Instead, he shoved another fistful of popcorn in his mouth and kept his gaze locked on the TV. His heart pumped loudly against the confines of his chest.
“For me?” he exclaimed the next day when Sou handed him an Amazon package that had been sitting on the front porch for hours. “Why, I’m tickled pink.” Sou rolled his eyes and mumbled something indecipherable into his scarf while he slithered away, further amusing the friendly policeman.
Things got progressively worse as time went on. Little things, like how Keiji always put both hands on his waist when he was trying to get past, sneaking a pinch or two on his lower sides before sauntering away like nothing happened. Or how he’d poke him in the ribs when he wanted to get his attention. Sou was pretty good at masking his reactions, but after a while it got harder and harder to hold it in. Against his better nature, every touch from Keiji made him jerk violently and let out a little shriek. Being caught off guard so many times had him on edge, and when he was tense, he was much weaker than usual.
After a few weeks of steady buildup, the tension came to a head one day when the two of them were alone in the house. Both Keiji and Sou were off on the same day while everyone else had classes or work, to Sou’s dismay. He was on high alert, making sure to keep his eyes in the back of his head in case Keiji decided to pull something.
He made it through most of the day unscathed. At least, until evening.
He was just trying to grab a snack from the kitchen. Sou tiptoed down the hallway, taking care not to make any noise when he passed Keiji’s room. However, the door opened right when he was passing by. He swore that man had superhuman hearing.
“Hey, Sou,” he crooned. He gave him a soft half smile, already looking amused.
“Oh. Hey.”
“You seem tense,” the detective commented. “Why dontcha put your feet up and relax a bit.”
“Ugh… enough already…”
“Hmm? Did something I say get under your skin?”
God, he was such an ass. Sou wondered how he got saddled with him as a roommate.
“...Nevermind. Just leave me alone.”
He turned his back towards the policeman and marched into the kitchen, grabbing two slices of bread and the peanut butter and jelly from the fridge. While he was busy preparing himself a sandwich, he felt Keiji’s presence behind him. Having him in such close proximity made his heart race, but he swallowed his nerves before they could show on his face.
“It’s kinda funny,” Keiji practically whispered in his ear.
“What is.”
“How embarrassed you get.”
Goosebumps rose on every inch of Sou’s skin.
“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Suddenly, Sou felt a pair of strong hands place themselves on his ribcage and froze up, dropping the butter knife onto the counter. Keiji’s fingers tapped, drummed, and plotted as they made themselves at home on his sides. Get off me, Sou tried to say, but his words quickly turned to giggles as Keiji began gently digging the tips of his fingers into his sides. There was no holding back; not only had the detective caught him completely unaware, but he was tickling one of his worst spots. His cover blown, the next thing he focused on doing was escaping. He writhed like a worm in place and tried pulling Keiji’s hands off, but his grip was much too firm for his weak muscles to handle. All he did was squirm backwards and further into his embrace.
“Must’ve tickled your funny bone,” Keiji said, getting one last pun in before absolutely destroying Sou. It was almost as if Keiji knew all of his weaknesses, like how soft strokes on his lower sides got him to squeal and how raking his underarms made him lose his ability to speak. The green-haired man couldn’t so much as think of a proper retort, let alone form words. With ten fingers wiggling all over his midsection, all he could do was laugh. His skin quivered and shook under Keiji’s hands.
“Fuck, stop!!” He managed to spit out in between bouts of giggles. He pounded his fists against the strong arms that held him still, but that did very little for his cause. He hated how he could practically feel Keiji smirking behind him. He tickled and tickled until Sou was pretty much scream-laughing and causing the house to shake from the noise. 
When his knees went weak and his body started to go limp, Keiji finally let go. The loner braced himself against the counter, taking in large breaths of air. It took everything in his power not to crumple up on the floor in defeat. As if to kick him while he was still down, Keiji bestowed on him yet another unwanted nickname.
“See you later, Giggles.”
Oh, how badly Sou wanted to kill him!
Looking immensely satisfied with his work, the detective turned around and headed back towards his room. Out of breath and energy, Sou decided against pursuing him. 
He’d have to get his revenge another time.
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inkytrinket-irii · 3 years
Text
PROMPT: I turned around to get some jam as my toast was ready, only to find when I turned back it was gone. I live alone and don’t have pets. @everblue22
[Recording Begins]
So, I just start talking into this thing? Okay. Oh! I see it writing everything down here, that is... HEY! Awesome! It even knows WHEN to capitalize! PORCUPINE! Okay, okay, I’m done messing around. What? I just think it’s neat! Uh... okay, here it goes. Huh, where do I even start? I guess just with whatever I want? 
Well, I want to say I could tell you I found my fridge, but I can’t. It’s gone. I don’t know where and I don’t know what the hell I’m gonna tell Jan. Maybe I should just not tell him. No, I have to, he’s gonna find out sooner or later. Why though? He checks in every now and then of course but why should I even care? Am I scared or something? I think so.
Yes. 
Jan the... leviathan, Jan fear lord, Jan the landlord. Jan, my landlord. He owns my house. (I have a house, right? I must... where else would I keep my fridge that I don’t have? Or... is it an apartment?) Anyway, Jan in charge of my home where my fridge has disappeared, possibly down some... some semi-indescribable thing. Something that my landlord with definitely notice. Ugh, that’s a conversation I am not looking forward to. I’m not sure how mad he’s going to be able to be, though. 
I mean, yeah, the fridge is gone and there’s The Trench pit-stairs-thing there now, but none of that is my fault! I’m usually a very good tenant; I’ve always paid my rent on time, I never have parties, everything is entirely as intact as when I first moved in, sometimes more so! Well, except for the fridge that is... 
I’m sorry, you probably don’t understand this. Let me start over. I’m a- I’m a... hmm, I- you know, I can’t remember. I had a... job at some point, didn’t I? Yes. I never got fired or anything, I would remember something like that. Probably. Anyway, I have a job where I usually am when I’m not home. 
I’m not quite sure what I did but we had ridiculously short lunch breaks. That combined with the fact everything nearby was expensive as balls meant I ended up skipping lunch a lot. I also had to be there early so forgot about breakfast most days too. By the time dinner came around I was too exhausted to cook anything big, plus groceries were expensive, so I’d just microwave a tin, force down a few bites, and go to bed. Some days I don’t think I stepped foot in the kitchen at all. Yeah... turns out those are all really bad habits to be in, especially at once. 
It kind of clicked one day while I was driving to work and feeling miserable that it is not normal to feel that way all the time. I thought down a checklist of reasons I might feel like crap (water, sleep, breathing, etc.) and nearly crashed when I got to food. I had a quiet “oh” moment realizing I hadn’t eaten that day. I also couldn’t remember if I’d eaten yesterday or the day before that. I knew I had eaten, just not when or how often or how much. Yeah. That was pretty crap. 
That night I sat down and decided I wanted to exist again and to do that I had to start eating again, regularly. I at least needed to get something in my body every day. Breakfast was still hard and dinner still felt complicated so I settled for focusing on lunch, starting small and all that. That way was I was trapped, at home I could just do something else but at work? There was nothing to do but work or eat and I was hoping the time limit would help me force down some food even if I didn’t feel like eating. 
I- oh damn, I’ve been rambling this whole time, haven’t I? I’ll skip to the important part, I made a lot of sandwiches. I’ve never cared for peanut butter, I didn’t hate it but I wouldn’t be able to eat it so continuously. In fact, I couldn’t stomach many things over and over again for too long. Stimulation is very important to me, I need routine but can’t stand stagnation. (That’s probably another reason I was so miserable.) Because of this, I opted to get an array of spreads and switch between toasted and plain slices of bread. t worked out pretty well, after a while wasn’t even an inconvenience to make and eat food at home. 
Now, here’s where my troubles really started. One day, I didn’t have work, I was making some toast. I think it was breakfast which was rare for me but again I didn’t have work. I had set the bread in the toaster and turned to pick out a jam from my fridge (which at this point was still there) but when I turned around the toaster was empty! I know I heard the sound of it popping up but there was no toast, there wasn’t even bread. 
I feel a little silly to admit this but I actually checked around to make sure the toast hadn’t been flung out of the toaster. Then I searched my whole home for some kind of animal. I don’t have any pets but the idea of one breaking in seemed a semi-plausible explanation. In some ways I guess I was right on the money. 
Obviously, I was perplexed by this disappearing act but I shrugged it off and made some more toast. I stayed watching the toaster the whole time and everything worked normally. That is until I turned to get the jam and found it wasn’t there. Expect, then it was. I know that makes no sense but that’s simply what happened. I just ate my toast with butter at that point. A few days later the same thing happened again, beat for beat, only this time the disappearing never stopped. My bread would keep disappearing if I turned my back on it even for a split second, at least, that’s what I thought.
At some point, I realized it had nothing to do with me watching. Bread would disappear right before my eyes and never come back unless I had a thing of jam out. If I had jam out then the jam would disappear for a moment and repaper. I got in the habit of leaving out a certain jar whenever I cooked. At first, that was it. That’s probably all it would have been, just another odd habit to add to my routine, if it weren’t for the fact I noticed the jar was beginning to empty. I could have just let it be, written it off as me forgetting I used it, and moved on, except it was grape. I despise grape flavored things, the only reason I had that one was it came in a pack with the rest of the flavors. I had not and would never use the grape jam.
That was too weird for me. I became curious. I don’t know how I jumped to the conclusion something was eating the jam, the disappearing could have been a million other things, but that’s what I immediately assumed. Since it didn’t matter if I was watching or not I decided a camera wouldn’t affect too much and set up my phone to record it. If it failed, I would have a video of me making toast. If it succeed... well, I’m here, aren’t I? 
I went through the process just fine, setting out the now half-empty decoy jam right in view of the camera. It happened like normal, normal as it was for me anyway. The jam disappeared for a second then returned right where it was. I calmly ate my snack, not wanting to do anything hastily lest I became suspicious, before casually reaching out to check my phone. The video was not as helpful as I liked. Even slowing it down and running it through some filters I couldn’t notice too much except for some faint, invisible, shape only there for a split second. That sounds impressive but already knew something was stealing my jam, I wanted to know what. 
The rest happened almost entirely by accident. I got up in the middle of the night, barely remember it, just stumbled to the kitchen for water. It took me a few minutes to notice I was hearing something and not dreaming. It was a soft, tinkly, pattering sound. Like a dog’s paws scrambling across a floor made of glass. Still half-dreaming, I opened up my phone to fumble for a flashlight. This, of course, blinded me as looking at your phone when used to the dark is never a good idea and I had mine on full brightness for some forsaken reason. I yelped, grabbing my eyes. The sound stopped. 
I opened my eyes, blinking away blind spots, or trying. Some just wouldn’t leave. It took me far too long to realize that they weren’t blind spots, they were creatures right in front of my face. I wish I could blame it on sleep but honestly, I think I’m just stupid. 
Anyway, these things were borderline indescribable at first but as my eyes readjusted to the dark I could understand them quite clearly, visually, anyway. They had bodies like... well, you know when you stare at the sun too long and you get that dark/light green-ish/blue-ish blob in your vision? They had bodies like an inverted form of that. Their forms were inside a bubble, as in a soapy blowing bubble sheen wrapped around their serpentine bodies. They sat hunched on their back legs. they’d clearly been scrabbling against the door of the fridge with their little paws but now sat frozen, staring at me with dopey faces. 
I, for some reason, did not freeze in return. Instead, I just stared at them, holding out my hand like I was giving treats. Two of them cowered while one tilted its head. Its head shape was odd, when I saw it from the side it appeared to have a snout but when it looked directly at me it just seemed perfectly round. It had what I could only assume was two reflective oblong eyes in the center of its face. They were the color of a blank tv screen and remained exactly where they were like a Hawk’s head in flight. The only reason I could tell its head was tilted at all was two (Three? One?) smoky wisps flowing down its top. We stared at each other for a moment until I tried to gently take a step forward and all three dived under my fridge. 
I was shocked, of course, but not for the reasons you’d think. More because they left than because they were there. I handled the situation fantastically all things considered but I wanted more. I couldn’t just them go like that! So, I did the only thing I could think of. I made some toast and jam. 
It didn’t work. 
I felt defeated, dejected, and sad. Mournful, even. I couldn’t help but feel like I’d missed something incredible. This is the part that was really on accident, I began tapping the glass jam jar. The tinkling little noise was the only sound throughout the entire bitch black of the night. I don’t know how long I sat tapping, maybe a few minutes, maybe an hour, but at some point, I noticed there was an echo. Then, of course, I realized it wasn’t an echo at all! It was the glass sounds the creatures made. I whipped around and saw- well, to be perfectly honest I saw nothing. Not at first. 
Then, under the fridge, I noticed some darkness was... different. It was flatter, shinier, there were two oblong blanks in the shade under the fridge. Eyes. My heart leaped and I desperately kept tapping the jar, holding it out for the creature to see. I assume it worked as in a millisecond the jar was gone from my hand and on the floor, opened, then closed again. I opened the fridge and got out all the jam jars I had, lining them around the fridge like some kind of summoning circle. It took hours, maybe even minutes, for them to come out again. They were just as fast as always, I didn’t see them and I barely saw the jars move. 
Now, I know this is going to sound stupid. It probably was a stupid idea but I was getting desperate, this whole thing was beginning to dishearten me. I raked over everything that had happened trying to figure out what let me see them and... listen, I did the only thing that made sense, at least at the time. I flashed my phone’s flashlight into my eyes a couple of times. It’s not that bad, okay! Stupid? Maybe, but it worked! I saw them! 
Oh, they were beautiful. There was more of them this time, completely crowding the space around my fridge. I could see them so clearly. I noticed they had six limbs, rabbit-like hind legs with two sets of arms. The way they used them to open the jars reminded me of a raccoon. The wisps on their heads were like antenna, varying from four to two on each one’s head and flowing down past their bodies like tails. The size seemed to vary drastically based on each one. Their bodies’ still impossible and gorgeous.
They paid me no mind, swiftly swiping snack after snack from the jars lighting fast. I feel like the night should have been well over by this point but it was still dark and quiet. I couldn’t even hear the wind outside, although, it’s not like I was trying. My focus was on these creatures. These beings with their gorgeous bodies and musical tinkling calls... I couldn’t look away. Soon, looking wasn’t enough. 
I wasn’t so enthralled as to try and touch one, not yet. No, I only grabbed a jar and opened it, holding it in my hand. It took a moment but it worked. One of the little guys came up to eat out of it. As it got close my senses, except sight, went all fizzy. Yes, I mean fizzy and not fuzzy. It wasn’t dull, quite the opposite, like eating pop rocks. I felt like I’d just been submerged in and inhaled some physical form of static. You’d think that would be unpleasant and let me tell you it was... wasn’t. No, of course not. I- I didn’t dislike it. I didn’t dislike a single moment of it. It- it was- it was all so... euphoric. All of it...
All of it. 
Um, what- oh! Oh yes, the fridge. Well... I- I’m not sure I can tell you what happened. One minute I was having the time of my life laughing, petting, and playing with all of my radiant little friends... oh, they’re just lovely. I haven’t named any of them yet because I can’t really tell them apart and I’m pretty sure they change form. Ugh, I just love them so much. Yes, I do! Yes, I do, my dizzy little... 
What? Hello? What was I... oh yeah, the fridge. So, I love these guys. So... just SO damn much.  Am I  tearing up? Ha! A funny thing about these guys is that static thing I was talking about earlier. Yeah. It’s constant but it usually very faint unless they’re right up close, then it just absolutely drowns you. I was hugging and petting them so I was completely lost in the static. It was fantastic but I don’t really remember much. I don’t even know how long I was there just that I was suddenly cut off. An- um... a car had driven by. I- I think that’s what happened at least, I don’t know. Something must have happened because suddenly they all dove back beneath the fridge. 
Oh, I can’t describe the emptiness I was left with. It was so dreadful it- I... oh, I can’t. I can’t. I was desperate. It was only for a moment but I was so desperate, I- I lost my mind! I must’ve! I don’t know how what happened next could have happened. I ripped my refrigerator off the wall. I’ve heard of people getting super strength in life-or-death situations for loved ones, maybe it was something like that. Whatever the reason I had the whole refrigerator tossed clean to the other side of the room. What did I even have to show for it? Nothing. It was just a dusty area where the wall met the floor and some outlet things were placed. 
I couldn’t stand for it. I know the precocious little beings had come from and gone somewhere. I was going to find it. I needed to find it. I reached out my hand so hard and fast I’m certain I would’ve snapped my wrist if the floor hadn’t given way. No, that’s not quite it. It didn’t “give way” it- 
Whoah! This thing can do those “line things?” That’s “dope.” How can “it” even tell- wait, no, I’m not going to get off track again. The floor didn’t break or crumble into a trench that was beneath it, nor did I punch a giant hole into the floor. I do not believe it even existed before I touched it but I also don’t believe I created it at all. 
I fell... ugh, how do I put this... I fell into it and out of it simultaneously. I can’t be any more clear than that, sorry. I was falling (Phasing?) down and up at the same time and then I landed on my kitchen floor. I- oh, yes, I know I said the fridge wasn’t my fault. It’s not. I have no idea where it is. If I did I could just put it back- well, I guess not because there’s the giant trench where it plugs in now, but I could have someone else do it! Actually... maybe it fell in somehow? I don’t know. I really don’t... 
About the pit itself, it’s really more like a ravine. I couldn’t see the bottom but not because it was dark, because of the opposite! It has this soft yellow glow at its bottom, or as far down as I could see anyway. The sides look like rocks, some gradient of turquoise and bismuth. It’s pretty thin, only about a meter across, but stretches out for an unreasonable length into the wall. I don’t know how, it looks like one of those optical illusions people paint onto the sides of buildings that make it seem like there’s a tunnel even though you can clearly see it’s a wall. It wasn’t an illusion though, oh no. I threw several things against my wall, or what used to be my wall, and they flew right past where it should have hit and down into the trench. Lost a lot of spoons... When I walked around to my bedroom (the room on the other side of the wall) there was nothing. It was completely normal, you’d never think there was some hole with impossible dimensions cutting through on the other side. 
Well... that’s all I have to say I guess. After a while, the sun came up and I marched over to the first place that looked like it could help. You... you can help, yes? I really don’t want to deal with Jan. Ugh, I’m gonna have to call him, aren’t I? Oh, I hate having to deal with bull like this. So you can... close... no no no, I don’t want you to CLOSE the hole. That’s where- it’s so nice and pretty. I just want... wait, why DID I come here? I don’t... no. NO. I do NOT want you to undo anything that has happened! I don’t care what I said when I came in here, nothing needs to change. I won’t let anything change. 
What’s what? What do you mean? Oh, I’m just getting out some jam. Yeah, I took all the jam with me. Well, all the ones that didn’t fall in anyway. Yes, I’m absolutely certain. You cannot quote-unquote “fix” anything. You know what? I won’t even let you onto my home. You’re too insistent. That pit... I- I don’t much about it but I know it’s where the creatures came from and I one hundred percent can’t risk losing my little friends here. Yes, here. Right here. Of course, they’re here! You just can’t see them. I can’t either, not right now at least. Oh, it’s no big deal, they just follow me everywhere. Calm down. Not much I could do about it and if I could why would I even want to? You have my statement, I’ll be on my way now. 
I said... I’ll be... on my way...
No. You can’t touch them, they don’t like you. No. NO! Get away from them! I WON’T LET Y- 
[Recording End] 
--- 
[Recording Begins]
Follow up: 
All digital follow up has been redacted. 
The reason is listed as confidential, however, that is only a routine precaution. There will be no reprimand for any violations. It is not recommended you try, though.
Anyone who has attempted to review digital information about this case has reported suffering migraines and difficulty recalling the information to the point of uselessness. Several attempts were made to make physical copies but the pages printed out incomplete or blank. Attempts at writing it by hand proved to have even more disastrous strain on the mind. With no idea how to prevent this, or how dangerous it could become, we were forced to simply stop the work. 
As for evidence that IS accessible, besides this recording, we have a few polaroids of the so called “Trench” as well as the attempts to un-digitalize the information. Within all attempts any personal information is absent. We have no name, no age, no phone number, no address, nothing. We DID manage to track down this “Jan” that was spoken of. 
Jan Preswer is indeed a landlord but had no information we weren’t already able to salvage from the records. In fact, he didn’t have a lot of information in general. He was rather standoffish on the matter in a way we later realized stemmed from fear. When we pressed he eventually relented and gave us access to an apartment he claimed was “dangerous to think about” which is where we were able to take the pictures. There was nothing in the place that could identify the speaker. There was nothing there at all, not even interior walls, except the hole. It was exactly as described except smaller, only about a fourth a meter wide.  When we returned the next day it was completely gone.
Because we have no real way to continue investing and because the issue seems to have resolved itself we are placing this entire case on hold. All we can do is wait and watch. I, personally, recommend keeping a close eye on the amount of stolen jam and bread. 
Wherever this person went they seem to have taken all of the creatures with them. We have had no reports or sightings of any kind despite the panic from having them in the buidling. 
They honestly didn’t seem so bad... the creatures, I mean. The way they were described they sounded... docile. Curious. Friendly, even. Granted, this is clearly not what anyone would call a “reliable source” but they must be coming from somewhere and this IS one of our most tame cases, possibly ever. They must be interesting to observe, at the very least. I wish I was able to see one of them if only to understand for a moment. 
Maybe I should start setting out some jam, haha. 
That... was a joke. Record it here, that was a joke. Don’t try that. It would be incredibly irresponsible to attempt to recreate a situation described in a statement no matter the possible discoveries, personal feelings, or… general lure… of the...
What… what was I doing? Uh… yeah this- this case is closed unless something else comes up. That’s not how I’m supposed to sign these things off but I’m… can’t… huh.
You know, I’m really hungry. That’s probably it. Goodness, I can’t remember that last time I ate. Gonna go get some… toast or something…
[Recording End]
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yourmandevine · 3 years
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Some stuff that made me happy in 2020, in no particular order
God send you no greater loss. It’s something my grandmother said a lot — a bit of highly Irish Catholic wisdom intended to remind you, warmly but sharply, that whatever you’re currently suffering through isn’t all that bad compared to what lots of other people are dealing with. That it probably isn’t too much to complain about, in the grand scheme of things. That you should, instead, be grateful for what you’ve got, big and small and everything in between.
God sent a great many people a great many unfathomable losses this year, and as hard as it felt at times, our family wasn’t among them; we’re lucky, in the big picture. In the past, people have recommended I try writing those reasons down, to give myself a list of stuff to be thankful for, for the times it’s tough to summon up the gratitude. I figured the end of the year was as good a time as any to make that list, to highlight the stuff that helped me get through this year — the reasons big, small, and in between.
So: here goes.
Peanut butter and jelly
I haven’t counted how many peanut butter and jelly sandwiches I’ve eaten since March 11, which is good, because that would be an absurd thing to do, and a sure sign that I have succumbed to a very specific kind of madness. It’s also good, though, because I would undoubtedly be ashamed by the number; the figure would be titanic, like the unsinkable ship of same name, or the iceberg that sunk it.
Or, at least, I would be ashamed under normal circumstances. This fuckin’ year required whatever flotation device you could find, and you know what I found in the fridge and cupboard? A couple of slices of bread, some strawberry jam, and some goddamn Skippy.
Need a weird mid-morning “brunch” after not having breakfast because you went right from waking up to remote school with the 6-year-old? Crank up a PB&J with that third cup of coffee. Need to pack something in the diaper bag to feed everyone while you’re out at the playground for the afternoon? Stack ‘em up, son. Need a late snack after working the overnight shift filing weird bubble playoff columns? Three letters, one ampersand, one love.
I need to eat better in 2021. But I kind of needed to eat sort of like shit to get through 2020, and time and again, when your man needed it most, PB&J was there.
Sunday night Zoom sessions with college friends
I know that most of us started something like this back in March; I’m not sure how many have stuck with it. I hope the answer is “a lot,” because honestly, knowing that I’m going to end the week by seeing a few friends — some here in Brooklyn but mostly beyond our reach for safety’s sake, some who’ve moved away — has felt like a stabilizing agent on more than a few occasions. It’s important, and no small blessing, to have people in your life who really know you, weird messy ugly bits and all, and in front of whom you can let everything go.
That gallery view’s provided a place to vent, to seethe, to laugh, to cry, and to try to find some semblance of center before heading back into another week. I’m grateful for it, and for the people in those little boxes. Except for the time they reminded me that, when I was 18, I was pretty sure I was a Pacey, and they were all extremely confident I was a Dawson. They were right, but still: a bitter pill to swallow, then and now.
Olivia calling herself “Dr. Bloody”
She took out her little toy doctor kit and just turned into a cackling villain.
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Deeply disconcerting, yes, but also adorable.
All Fantasy Everything
What got me in the door was the conceit: three very funny stand-up comedians (Ian Karmel, David Gborie, Sean Jordan), often with a very funny guest but sometimes without, pick some topic or another and engage in a fantasy draft of their favorite aspects or representations of that topic. (It is, crucially, a serpentine draft. Now what is that? That’s a great question.) Some favorite examples: Mikes; Words That You Think Make You Sound Smart, vols. 1 and 2; Things You Yell After You Dunk on Someone; Fictional Athletes; Crimes We’d Like to Commit. Yeah. It’s that kind of podcast.
What kept me around was the friendship. Listen to an episode and it becomes really clear really quickly just how much the three hosts love each other, how much fun they have being around each other and making one another laugh. The warmth radiates, just pours out of the speakers; in a year where I sorely needed some good vibes, I appreciated my regular check-ins with the Good Vibes Gang to just ... unclench for an hour and a half or so. 
Drinking beer
OK, I’ll admit: This doesn’t sound great for me. It’s true, though. I really like beer. (We brewed one in our kitchen, which I realize is something of a “bearded guy in Brooklyn” cliche, but here we are. It was exciting to complete a project, and it tasted OK-ish.) At some points this year, it didn’t feel like there wasn’t much to look forward to, and sometimes drinking some High Lifes or Narragansett tall boys — with my wife in our living room, with friends on the computer, whatever — helped take the edge off a shitty day/week/month/year. I look forward to being able to do that outside with people again.
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The Good Place
I am sure some very smart cultural critics and political thinkers and social revolutionaries have forwarded compelling arguments for why this show is Bad, Actually, because that seems to be more or less true about most things, whether because said thing is Actually Bad or because the economics of the attention economy on the internet functionally necessitate the composition and publication of pretty much every position on pretty much every issue, and especially ones that present a counterargument for why you shouldn’t like the thing you like, and might be kind of a piece of shit for liking it. But I liked this half-hour comedy about the way the universe might be put together, why we should try to take better care of each other, and how doing so might be a pretty great way to take better care of ourselves.
Andrew let me write about it a little bit for a big project we did before the series finale aired, which was really nice of him. I found myself thinking about this part a lot this year:
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I also thought a lot about Peeps Chili, but that happens every year.
Taking pictures of my dog
Check out this flumpy goddamn champion:
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“Lugar is a good boy” is the main takeaway here. They don’t all have to be complicated.
Schitt’s Creek
I know we’re not alone in this, but we inhaled this show this year. A half-hour comedy about people being laid low, learning how to deal with who they actually are, and finding some grace and community and opportunities for growth kind of hit the spot, I guess.
One of the most wholesale enjoyable ensemble comedy casts I can remember; Catherine O’Hara was already in Cooperstown, but what she made with Moira Rose only polishes her plaque. I’ll never be able to describe with any specificity the thing Chris Elliott does, but I know it has made me laugh since I was a child too young to understand the Letterman bits or see Cabin Boy in the theater, and it’s probably going to make me laugh until I am dead.
I love that people who, for years, never got to see themselves or people like them on screen got to see David Rose on screen and maybe recognize themselves a little bit. The idea that seeing the David/Patrick relationship might make them maybe feel a little more at home, a little safer and more whole, makes me happy. Sad, about the before, but happy, about the now and the what comes next.
Past that, I just love how what was ostensibly a family-and-friends production for a Canadian channel just got absolutely everything right—the tone, the look, the sound, the theme song, the cast, the jokes, my goodness, the jokes—and before long, the rest of the world just got it. Like catching a fastball square on the barrel. Something the show clearly knew a little bit about.
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Finding new outdoor places it was safe to go
Necessity is the mother of invention, and the need to give the kids a place to be that wasn’t unnecessarily dangerous but also wasn’t inside our two-bedroom apartment led us to do more exploring than we had before. Shirley Chisholm State Park is great. Canarsie Pier was a fun place to spend a Sunday morning; so’s Canarsie Playground. If we got there early enough or made our peace with some rain, the beaches at Jacob Riis Park and Fort Tilden were pretty rad this summer. I lived in Staten Island from ages 8 through 18, and during breaks throughout college, and don’t think I ever hiked in High Rock Park — that’s dumb, because it was nice!
Even if all those little excursions did was kill a little time and reduce the overall stress level of the four humans stuck in our four walls, that’s not nothing. Some days this year, it was everything.
Cobra Kai
I know I’m late here; I didn’t rush to seek it out because I don’t consider myself a huge fan of The Karate Kid, or at least not a big enough fan to sign up for YouTube’s premium service. I checked it out when it came to Netflix, though, and I honestly can’t believe how much I enjoyed this show. Give me “dumb, but with heart” every day of the week.
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I believe in Miguel Diaz; I believe in Johnny Lawrence; I believe I will be firing up Season 3 next month, and perhaps drinking some Coors Banquets in its honor. (I cannot, however, believe how the “get him a body bag” thing came back around, but that’s neither here nor there.)
Closing unread tabs
I’m a serial hoarder of links, and I am bad at finishing all of them. I’ve tried to get into Pocket and Instapaper, but I’ve never been able to turn that sort of workflow — open link, save to third-party service, go back to third-party service later to read, then delete from there — into something that felt instinctual, natural, or habitual. So: lots of tabs. Like, lots of tabs.
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This was a dicier proposition than usual in 2020, because cutting my work week in half to be able to more effectively coparent two kids who didn’t have school or day care for most of the year meant less time to read things.
I tried to do my best to keep up with the important stuff for work, and to read at least some stuff about how other parents were dealing with their anxiety/anger/depression/frustration at having to be on 24/7 and work, and to stay abreast of (at least some of) what was happening in the world. Sometimes, though, I would wake up and realize I’d been holding onto blog posts about Really Interesting Rotation Decisions on the 11th-Seeded Team in the East or whatever for literally nine months, and I would go against my nature and just hit the eject button on a 25-deep window, and something amazing would happen: I wouldn’t get fired for being shitty at my job. I would move on with my day, and I would feel about 10 pounds lighter.
I still keep too much stuff open. (As we speak, I’ve got three different Chrome windows open on two different laptops. I choose not to count the total tabs.) But I do so knowing that, if it gets too heavy, I can experience the momentary joy of surrendering to the inevitability that I can’t catch everything. In that moment, I feel OK with my decay.
Reading writers I wasn’t familiar with before
Two in particular stand out in my mind: Nekias Duncan, now of BasketballNews.com, who does excellent film breakdowns and statistical analysis, and Katie Heindl, who writes basketball stuff of all types all over the place, and strings sentences together in a way that scratches an itch inside my brain. I’m grateful I got more chances to read them this year, I look forward to bigger and better things for both of them, and I’m hopeful that, if things calm down and our schedules go back to something approximating normalcy, I’ll have more bandwidth to hunt out more new voices in the year ahead.
The time I ambushed my wife as she was trying to break down and put away the girls’ space tent
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Pretty good.
Siobhan learning to ride a bicycle (with training wheels, but still)
The moment passed pretty quickly; Not Exactly A Mechanic over here can’t get the training wheels to reliably work right without either loosening them too much or tightening them so much that she can’t pedal it. In that first moment, though, and for as long as it lasted, it was really great to see her get excited about doing something new, big kid shit, for the first time.
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She was proud. I was proud of her. And then we went to a playground for a few hours. Pretty good day.
Tyler Tynes roasting me
Tyler did some incredible work this year — The Cam Chronicles is getting deserved praise as one of 2020′s best podcasts, and his reporting on the Movement for Black Lives was exemplary. It’s hard to top this, though:
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You know what the messed up part is? I was excited to tell him what I was doing, just because I knew the reaction would be so violent. Like a body rejecting a transplant. So lucky to have such a dear, dear friend.
PUP
I’m late on everything, so I didn’t start listening to PUP until the spring of 2019, but I haven’t really stopped since. This year has been too sedentary too often; this band is too kinetic to allow me to stay there.
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“Bloody Mary Kate and Ashley Kate” is never more than about 20 minutes away from returning to the front of my mind. I would fucking love for it to be safe enough to watch these guys live at some point, and I am absolutely going to take Steve up on his offer.
Someone sending me a shirt based on a joke I tweeted
First:
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Then:
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Then:
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I’m not sure you should be rewarding my behavior, SnoCoPrintShop, but I appreciate it all the same.
Which reminds me:
Family dinner/family movie night
My wife works in Manhattan and commutes back on the train, and we've tried to prioritize getting the girls to bed early since they were little, so that doesn’t leave much of a window between when she gets home and they go in the tub for us all to connect; before everything shut down, we almost never really ate together. We’re still not great about it, but for a while now we’ve carved out Saturday as family dinner night, where we sit down to eat and talk about our “up” from the day — something that happened that made us feel good or happy, or something we’re looking forward to. (We used to talk about our “down,” too, but that kind of seemed like overkill. Why try to focus on more bad shit right now, you know?)
Then we settle in for a movie, with who gets to pick rotating each week. It’s mostly been Pixar, which has been great but also has its drawbacks; after she caught me crying during one of them (maybe the Bing-Bong scene in Inside Out? or Miguel singing to Grandma Coco?), Siobhan straight up told me, “You need to get yourself together, man.” We just watched My Neighbor Totoro, too, which they loved, so we’re probably going to try some more Miyazaki soon. It’s a really simple thing, but it’s one we rarely made time for before, and it’s been really nice to manufacture something positive that we can share and look forward to together.
Sometimes looking like a shiftless drifter
No shade to anyone who felt strongly about getting a lineup or whatever, but I haven’t really felt like going to the barbershop was worth the risk, and I continue to refuse to believe that my wife can actually pull off the fade she’s long wanted to give me. (It is also possible that she just means she’s intending to run my fade, and that I will before long wind up cold-cocked and slumped by my bride of nine years.) So I’ve just kind of been growing out my hair like it was when I was single, and sometimes been letting my beard get kind of out of control too, and, well, I sort of like looking a little bit like a Wildling, it turns out.
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I have since trimmed things up a little. It didn’t go over well with my youngest. Oh, well. I’ll try to do better next time.
My wife and daughter singing the Pixies
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We don’t know all the words to too many lullabies, so we sing the ones we do know the words to. This will probably come back to bite us in the years ahead. For now, though: Pretty good.
Doughboys’ Tournament of Chompions: Munch Madness: Mac Attack
I can’t believe how invested I became in Nick Wiger and Mike Mitchell’s quest to determine the best menu item at McDonald’s in a 64-seed tournament that spawned hours and hours of delightfully funny audio featuring all-time home-run guests like Jon Gabrus and Nicole Byer, who gleefully feed into the often warm, sometimes antagonistic, always entertaining chemistry between the two hosts. I have also never found myself wanting to go to McDonald’s more in my entire life. I have hit the drive-thru a couple of times since, and the boys are right: The McDonald’s fountain Coke does just hit different.
Sound Only
I’ve lost track of whether or not a 38-year-old is considered a millennial, but I’m quite confident that I’m not exactly plugged into “the millennial lifestyle” as my teammates Justin Charity and Micah Peters discuss it on their podcast, which relaunched this summer. Doesn’t matter, though, because I love hearing Charity and Micah talk to each other even if I don’t know what they’re talking about.
Their conversation about Dave Chappelle was great. After listening to their Travis Scott episode, I felt like I kind of understood who he is and why he occupies the space he does in pop culture now. I had no idea how they were going to get me to give a shit about set photos from The Batman, but this they not only got me there, but wended their way toward blaming 50 Cent for needing to know who Groot is to have a conversation on the internet, which is something for which Abraham Lincoln did not die. The show is good, it's getting better, it’s fun to hear them talk their shit, and Charity’s regular bellowing of “I, TOO, AM AMERICA” has made me smile for four straight months. 
Siobhan’s letters and notes
She’s in first grade now, and she’s taken to communicating her feelings through the written word. A lot.
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I won’t pretend that I loved all of these in the moment. I can only get so upset, though, when she’s already writing with such a clear voice. (And trying to use proper punctuation. (And drawing little cartoons to drive the point home.)
Palm Springs
I’m having a hard time remembering too many specifics about it right now, which probably means it’d be a good thing to rewatch over the holidays. But, as I’m sure many people noted many months before we got around to watching it, a comedy about living the same day over and over again, and about trying to figure out how to make your life mean something when everything seems meaningless, scratched a pretty particular, and particularly important, itch this year. It could’ve been twice as long, and I would’ve eaten up every second of Andy Samberg and Cristin Miloti together.
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I’m pretty sure I cried, although this year, that doesn’t necessarily mean much.  Also, put Conner O’Malley in more things.
Joining our union’s bargaining committee
I won’t say too much about this, but I will say that becoming an active participant in the process of a labor union negotiating its first contract with management has been an extremely educational experience. It’s pushed me to have conversations, sometimes difficult ones, about our priorities as a staff and a company. It's helped me get closer with the other past and present members of the BC, and has led me to start developing relationships with members of our staff that I otherwise might not have had much of an opportunity to get to know.
The organizing work takes time, effort, and energy, but trying to do what I can to help take better care of my colleagues has been well worth all of that. Here’s hoping that in 2021 we can reach a deal that helps make our workplace even better, stronger, and more equitable for all of us.
Publishing a story about Stevie Nicks’ Fajita Roundup
I swear this is true: After I accepted my offer to work at The Ringer, but before I started, I told a friend that one thing I was excited about was that you had the chance to work on offbeat stuff here, in both the “kind of weird” and “not about the NBA” senses. That, I thought, might maybe open the door to me getting to write a story about a Saturday Night Live sketch I saw when I was a teenager about Stevie Nicks from Fleetwod Mac running a cheap Tex-Mex restaurant in Sedona, Arizona — a sketch that I wasn’t sure anyone else remembered, but that was stuck in my head forever.
That story ran on May 26.
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A lot of people seemed to like it.
Accomplishing this goal was, as dumb as this might sound, a highlight of my year, and, honestly, a highlight of my career. I’d like to do some more stuff like this next year, time permitting; we’ll see. Whether or not I do, I got to do this. I’ll always have that.
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manorbagofsand · 4 years
Text
he takes mental inventory of everything he's eaten since yesterday morning.
coffee.
an english muffin.
a few handfuls of spicy peanuts.
the last few plantain chips.
a beer.
another beer.
kombucha, free from your housemate’s job.
another beer. 
a wash of shame comes over him. he shouldn't drink this much. but he knows he won't change. he at least shouldn't try to hide that he drinks this much, leaving the empty cans on the floor between his bedside table and the bed until he can covertly discard them. 
is he an alcoholic?
he takes inventory. he's not very functional while drunk, that's why he drinks, after all. alcohol gifting him a sense of complacency unavailable to him otherwise. he has, 1 or 2 drinks a day, and only most days. he's only been drunk at work twice, before, both after a night out with Esther, both miserable experiences, vomiting outside in the median between the sidewalk and the street where some bright-eyed city planner probably thought would have flowers, but actually just has bark mulch and the shiny glint of litter. he thinks of his ex's dad, asleep over a glass on the table. he thinks of the characters in lucia berlin stories, the desperate night errands to buy a fifth, how the other addicts told her she wasn't really one of them if she wasn't a wino. he only really drinks beer? he is fine when he doesn't drink? well, fine meaning miserable and desperately seeking escape. he feels another wash of guilt thinking about all the alcoholism screening assessments he's lied on. lately he's been putting down eight. that's one for four days a week, two for another two, and taking a day off. he tries to convince himself of this. he can’t remember the last time he took a day off. he buys two six-packs a week. he drank half a six-pack just yesterday. 
okay so what if he’s an alcoholic, he can’t manage otherwise. maybe he should have a drink before he leaves to see tony. is noon too early?
he takes inventory, he can only think of one time he started drinking alone that early in the day, and it was before a date. a first date, at that. he thinks that felt justified, but also is an incredible bad look. okay, no, he doesn’t need a drink now, doesn’t even want one. he thinks about Wendy in Little Fish, Jonny Appleseed, Jessa in Mostly Dead Things and it doesn’t make him feel better, but he is at least able to move back to what he was trying to think about –
this morning, coffee.
more coffee.
he decides, as usual, to forgo, breakfast, even though he still has more english muffins and even has the right brand of almond butter. in addition to all the wrong brands he's never going to touch. he thinks he probably won't get fucked until evening, so he doesn't want to give his digestive system any ammunition with that much time.
he takes inventory of all the things he needs to dispose of while his housemate is out of town this weekend.
the four empty beer cans under his bed.
the cake he made last week and never even cut.
the pie his friend gave him that he also never cut that is now starting to grow mold.
the remaining slices of bread that are too old.
the potatoes in the fridge he cooked and didn't like the texture of.
the soup he made on monday. but what if the soup is still good? probably, but he probably won't eat it so he should just let it go now. it makes him feel worse to consider how careful his housemate is about not wasting food, that thinking about what he might think washes him with yet another icy bucket of shame. if he discards it now, maybe his housemate won’t notice, or just think that he ate it. he feels bad, but not enough to actually make him eat it. 
he should go to the farm stand and buy produce tomorrow. or maybe he shouldn't because he's just going to compost most of it anyway.
the half a roasted sweet potato, that he weirdly had cut into circular discs rather than his usual wedges. actually, he will eat that still. sweet potatoes have become a go-to for him in the last few months. long-shelf life. they keep well after being cooked. and also, he pretty reliably still feels interested in eating them even after they’ve finished roasting. what kind of motherfucker can’t even be interested in eating food through the forty minutes it takes to prepare? they don’t do anything suspect to his shit, which is to say, he can’t see them again on that end. 
he takes inventory of all of the things he’s stopped eating because they come out identifiable in his shit. quinoa. corn. grapefruit. carrots. he thinks about the girl who lived with his ex-, who had her eating disorder diagnosed because her therapist noticed her hands had turned orange because she only ate sweet potatoes. how she had speculated Japanese sweet potatoes wouldn’t be as obvious. how it all came crashing together then for him how his hands had also been orange when he was in high school. for him, baby carrots. he tried to remember when he still ate bagged processed vegetables. 
he tried to remember what it was like before anyone had told him there was something wrong with him. before there was something wrong with him?
no, he remembers standing in the shower, circling around if he could be pregnant. he hadn’t had sex with anyone, but what if? he remembers having a doctor recommend he get tested for female athlete triad syndrome, how he still was new to interacting with doctors and didn’t realise they weren’t actually going to follow through at all on that. feeling like there was not anything wrong with him, that he was finally in control.
the dirty condom from a few nights, when he didn’t want to clean himself out, let alone clean the toy off afterwards. he laughs how he still doesn't have a trash can in his room. this seems the most reasonable of all on this list. yes, he’s an immature fag with no blinds and dirty condoms on his floor. this is a flaw he’s willing to lean into, to pretend he is loose and free and reckless. but he isn’t. he is so wound up in his head. he has practiced these worries too many times today already. the only kind of reckless he could actually claim is the four burn scars on his arms from cooking while drunk in the last year. which he worries people will ask if he did intentionally. 
what if he did do it intentionally? 
he doesn't want to be like this. the shame layers on, shame that he hates how he is, but doesn't change. no matter how rational he is, he cannot actually convince himself that no one cares. shame that he has no control over his shame. 
he has to leave in hour and half if he’s not going to be unacceptably late. he wonders if he can make it out of the house by then.
he heads for the bathroom. puts the fan on the 40 minute timer. worries his housemate will wonder what he is up to. tries to convince himself he already knows, that he does not care. he wants that, but he can’t convince himself. 
he’s also covered in sex-bruises all the time on his neck and shoulders and wrists and he does not hide them, and no one even says anything. does his housemate know that he is gay?
is he gay enough? 
he feels shame that he still uses the same beginner douche kit he bought years ago. he remembers the pang of jealously of learning about posh gays with a whole douche attachment for their shower head. what if he were that put together? 
he flips the toilet seat up, so it won’t get splashed, and tries to focus on relaxing his sphincter. 
he’s not actually ashamed of his body. except for the way his skin hangs loose on his abdomen, refusing to show his faint hard work of abs. except how his chest and legs are covered in red welts and scabs. except that he is covered with scars, most of them self-inflicted, which are visible enough that he feels constantly conscious of them, but not gnarly enough that people actually ever ask about them. except the way he has a bald spot right under his chin on his beard, how the whole thing is still pretty sparse, maybe he should just shave it but then he feels shame about looking pubescent. 
but he thinks he’s not ashamed of his bodily functions. he’s not afraid of his own shit. he thinks about the shame of the dirty condom on the floor of his room. he thinks about all the times he’s scraped his middle finger a circle around the inside of his rectum, feeling for any residual chunks to decide if he needs to douche another round. he thinks about the time after getting fucked that somehow he had shit all over his own feet, how his ex had gently gotten paper towels and wiped them off, gently, and wordlessly. 
and yet, it’s been years since he’s been on so much as a first date without cleaning himself in advance. it’s not that he’s afraid of someone being spooked when their cock comes out streaked, it’s just that it seems worth the relief to be able to avoid it. except that relief is fleeting. untrustworthy. whatever. he knows its what he needs to do in order to actually leave the house. he scrapes his finger around the inside, up through the second mouth, which yields to show it has nothing else to reveal, like Monty Hall opening the first door.
placated, he gets in the shower. he thinks about how freud would have had a heyday with him. 
he really doesn’t want to have to have that conversation. he thinks tony already seems to think he doesn’t eat. this isn’t quite true, but he is charmed by the simplicity of it. he feels some obligation to uphold that expectation, to be able to avoid eating in front of him. he wants to avoid the intimacy of having a conversation about his pre-sex routine, which seems only possible by keeping a very strict pre-sex routine. 
tony asked him recently to take a weekend trip with him. the travel. the prolonged company, sharing meals, the ruined veneer of being ready all the time. 
he could come up with five hundred reasons why he can’t go, but are any of them good enough to say to someone else? could he suffer through just a weekend? 
could he, 
maybe, 
even, 
have an okay time?
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ohblackdiamond · 4 years
Text
little t&a (paul/gene, nc-17) (part 2 of 29)
part 1   part 2   part 3   part 4   part 5   part 6   part 7   part 8   part 9   part 10   part 11   part 12   part 13   part 14   part 15   part 16   part 17   part 18   part 19   part 20   part 21  part 22   part 23   part 24    part 25   part 26   part 27   part 28   part 29 
Four weeks before KISS gets back on tour, Gene discovers that Paul's been cursed by a groupie. For the sake of KISS' finances, Paul's comfort levels, and Gene's libido, this crisis must be resolved. Sexswap fic. In this chapter:  "What do you mean, what else was I doing? I woke up with tits! Don't you think that's a little fucking traumatizing?" Gene and Paul try to pinpoint the root cause of Paul’s predicament.
          Gene carried the groceries in for Paul. It felt like the lousiest apology, but he didn’t know what else to do. Paul looked as if he were seconds from tears—pretty horrifying, for Gene to try to realign his whole thought process, to try and reconcile the Paul he’d known for the last eight years with the pretty brunette currently slumped over the kitchen island—and Gene didn’t know how to mitigate that, either. Paul wasn’t much of a crier. Under the circumstances, though, Gene couldn’t exactly blame him.
           “I shouldn’t have done that.”
           “Forget it.”
           “Look—I thought it might be you from the tattoo, but I had to make sure—”
           “You made sure, okay? You definitely did that much.” Paul’s elbows were resting on the counter. His mouth was pressed against his clasped hands, muffling his words. “Fuck it, Gene. You were supposed to just write me back.”
           Gene rolled his eyes.
           “Yeah, you cut off contact with everybody a month before we go back on tour, and then you send me a two-sentence postcard and expect me to act like a fucking pen-pal. C’mon, Paul.”
           “Well, obviously, I didn’t want you coming over! You think I wanted anyone to see me like this? I already had to run Peter off!”
           So that had been him earlier. Shit.
           “How did this even happen?” Medically, it was impossible. Paul probably hadn’t had this little hair on him since he was ten years old. To say nothing of the drop in height, or the total reconfiguration of his body shape. He still looked pretty similar in the face, same big brown eyes, same slightly crooked chin and full lips, but the features were a little softer. Really, he looked like a good bit like his older sister, although Gene knew better than to mention it. Paul hadn’t seen Julia in at least three years.
           The guys had always made fun of Gene for his lack of discernment, and he knew there were plenty of women that looked like dogs dotting his photo albums, but Paul was—actually kind of pretty. Or would be, if his eyes, always a little sad-looking, weren’t all watery and his mouth wasn’t glued in that firm line behind his hand. Even Peter, who, oddly enough, probably had better taste in women, looks-wise, than any of the four of them, had said Paul was cute. And the tits—shit, Gene was distracting himself. Paul had taken his time answering anyway.
           “How should I know how this happened? I woke up like this!”
           “When?”
           “Wednesday morning.”
           “That’s five days. You’ve been like this for five days?” Before Paul could answer, Gene added, bewildered, “Have you gone anywhere?”
           It wouldn’t have surprised him much if Paul had holed up in the house the entire time. He did that enough normally. Gene could understand that, to a point. Gene never knew what to do with himself off-tour, either, except get laid, but Paul usually added a healthy dose of self-pity on top of the lays. Given what had happened to him, he’d probably been feeling sorrier for himself than usual.
           Paul surprised him by bringing his hands down from in front of his mouth and nodding.
           “I drove to Peaches yesterday.”
           “You drove?”
          “You think I could’ve convinced my chauffeur I was Paul Stanley?”
           “Might have an easier time with him than you would a cop.”
           “A cop? I’m a great driver—”
           “You don’t have a license right now.”
           Paul’s lips pursed and he went quiet for a while. Like the full magnitude of his situation had only just dawned on him. Not that Gene wasn’t sympathetic. This was going to screw him over, too. The new tour a month away, and their frontman not only entirely unable to prove his identity, but—really, assuming he got the other guys and their management to believe him, what was he supposed to do? Strut onstage in that sequin-studded jumpsuit, singing about the dick he didn’t even have? Even Bill Aucoin couldn’t spin a story about Paul getting a sex change into anything close to palatable for the magazines and papers. If they didn’t get this shit fixed and turn Paul back into a guy, KISS was sunk.
           Gene let the silence hang in the air rather than try to fill it up with small talk or reassurances. He got up and started taking Paul’s groceries out of the paper bags, just to give his hands something to do. A wrapped package of deli meat, several cans of Tab, a bunch of celery, and a loaf of sandwich bread were all that was in the first bag. The groceries of a depressed catalog model, not a rockstar. He put it all up in the pantry and fridge unceremoniously. Paul didn’t have a breadbox, so Gene left the loaf on the counter next to the sink. The second bag of groceries was just as dismal, maybe worse—peanut butter, saltines, apples, and, horrifyingly, a box of Kotex. Shit. Had Paul already given up on going back to normal, or—
           “You’re not on the rag, are you?”
           “Fuck, no. Put that back.” Paul was going crimson. Gene felt sorry enough for him to drop the Kotex back into the bag and return to his seat across from him at the kitchen island.
           “Are you planning to just wait around for it? Haven’t you done anything yet?”
           “Gene, I don’t know what to do. I did get some books sent over.” Paul got up and went to the living room, returning with some paperbacks under his arm, which he dumped on the kitchen table. Usually, Paul’s reading material consisted of teenybopper magazines with his face on the cover, contracts, and his own unflattering comics of his bandmates. Now Gene found himself next to copies of The Lesser Key of Solomon, The Secret Lore of Magic, and LaVey’s The Satanic Rituals. He could’ve sworn the hairs on the back of his neck were standing up just from cracking the spines. Gene tried to swallow his nerves as best he could, tried to look at the whole deal clinically, never mind what years of yeshiva and the start of rabbinical school had taught him, but every sigil-covered page made him feel a bit ill.
           “You haven’t tried any of this, have you?”
           Paul snorted.
           “Fuck, no. I’m already going to hell, there’s no point in expediting the trip.” He blew his bangs out of his face with a breath. They settled back in front of his eyes almost immediately, and he shook his head. “I just wanted to read up. I thought if I could figure out how it happened, I could get someone else to reverse it for me.”
           “Like a witch.”
           Paul flinched slightly.
           “Well, yeah, since that’s probably who did it in the first place.” He was standing behind Gene, reaching over him and pointing at the book he’d opened. “Oh, it’s in this one. Hang on.”
           Gene shifted obediently, trying to ignore the feeling of Paul’s bare chest pressed against his back. He knew Paul wasn’t coming onto him, not consciously, at least, but—fuck, the last several years on the road had spoiled him. Every chick he got near wanted to get laid, if not by him, then by one of his bandmates. But Paul wasn’t actually a chick, a fact made all the more apparent by how utterly oblivious he was to the fact that his bathrobe was halfway open, again.
           He handed Paul the book. Paul was thumbing through it before long, in his usual way, licking his finger with every pageturn. Gene could see the remnants of black nail polish on his fingernails—still aggressively manicured—and a couple of marks beneath his knuckles.
           “What happened to your hands there?”
           “Huh? I bit them.”
           “Why?”
           Paul shrugged and cleared his throat.
           “Anyway, found it.” He pointed to a passage alongside a lithograph of a lion head. “‘Marbas, alias Barbas is a great president, and appeareth in the forme of a mightie lion—'”
           “Paul, the e on the end of ‘forme’ is silent.”
           “Shut up—‘he bringeth diseases and cureth them, promoteth wisdom’…. It’s in here, I swear—there! ‘He changes men into other shapes.’ So that’s probably the demon that whoever it was conjured up.”
           Paul looked more than vaguely pleased with himself. Gene almost felt bad for not being impressed. Almost.
           “That’s all you’ve come up with this whole time.”
           “It’s only been five days, Gene, I—”
           “What else were you doing?”
           “What do you mean, what else was I doing? I woke up with tits! Don’t you think that’s a little fucking traumatizing?”
           “You had—” Gene just shook his head.
           “I don’t have anything, Gene. You said so yourself. I don’t even have access to my own bank account. I’m done once the cash runs out.”
           Gene started to ask how much cash Paul had on hand, then thought better of it. Probably not a whole lot. Paul had the annoying habit of charging everything he could to either the label or the KISS Corporation proper while they were on tour, and not letting anyone know until the following board meeting. Off-tour probably wasn’t much different.
           “Did you make a list?” he asked finally.
           “A list?”
           “A list of anyone you think could’ve done this to you.”
           Paul shook his head.
           “That’s the thing. Nobody I know would’ve wanted to do this to me.”
           “Then maybe it’s someone you don’t know.”
           “Like who? Gene, what good does it do anybody if I’m stuck as a girl?”
           “Revenge. You have any exes into the occult?”
           “Not that I know of.” Paul cocked his head, considering. “Mostly they break up with me, not the other way around.”
           “Groupies, then?”
           “Gene, I don’t—take notes on every girl I fuck, it’s not that important to me.”
           “Did you get with anyone strange lately? Maybe, I don’t know, a cult member or something?”
           “I don’t think so—”
           “Anyone ask you anything weird? Or try and get a lock of your hair?” Gene’s knowledge of the occult was limited, but he did vaguely remember needing—what was it, the person’s clothes or hair before any magic could be done on them. At least, that was how it worked on Dark Shadows.
           “That happens every tour at least three times.”
           “I’m trying to figure this out for you.” God. Paul had had almost a week that he could’ve spent seriously researching his predicament, and all he’d done was buy a couple of books, send Gene a postcard, and sit around moping. “Did—”
           “There was this one girl who yanked out some of my chest hair a couple weeks ago,” Paul said slowly. “I didn’t really think much of it at the time. I thought it was, y’know, a kink thing. It was cool, right, kind of a you’re the boss deal—”
           Gene winced.
           “Did she say anything?”
           “She said she was going to make me feel like she did.”
           “And you didn’t think that was strange.”
           “No! It was while we were doing some S&M shit!” Paul’s face was going slightly pink. “It was fun! You go on tour and you end up with a lot of real desperate virgins and groupies with V.D. and none of them really—they just wanna do what you want, they don’t wanna ever take the lead, and this girl, she had me up against the—”
           “I get the idea,” Gene snapped, although he didn’t at all. He wasn’t picturing the encounter as it’d happened, just Paul as he was right now, up against the wall, breasts heaving, one long leg hooked around his waist. Fuck, was it hard to look at him. Gene had never been ashamed of his own lasciviousness until faced with the one person who noticed it and needed it least. “Okay. We’re going to get this taken care of.”
           “How?”
           “I’m calling Ace.”
           “Ace?” Paul was almost squeaking. “Don’t call Ace!”
           “Relax, I’m not gonna tell him what happened.”
           “Then what are you—”
           “Just trust me, Paul.”
           Gene got up and walked over to the kitchen phone. Paul looked as though he were about to argue, but then he just shook his head, watching carefully as Gene punched in Ace’s number.
           “Hey. Hey, Jeanette, this is Gene. Is Ace around? Let me talk to him for a second.” Gene rubbed the back of his head with his free hand while he waited. He could hear Jeanette calling Ace over, and a little shuffling, just before Ace picked up the phone.
           “Hey.”
           “Hey, Ace.”
           “You find Paulie?”
           “Yeah. Yeah, he’s fine. I’m at his house.”
           “What was he pulling that prima donna crap over, anyway?”
           “He’s…” It was hard to talk to Ace casually with Paul staring at him. “He’s fine. Just paranoid.”
           “Paranoid? Why?” Ace sounded a little disbelieving. Gene couldn’t blame him. “He didn’t start on some shit, did he? Thought all he took was white cross.”
           “He’s not on anything. He’s worried about the tour.” Gene paused. “You still go to that psychic, don’t you?”
           “Sometimes. Why?”
           “Do you have her number?”
           “Gene, you don’t believe in psychics or any of that—”
           “Yeah, but Paul does. I thought I’d make him an appointment, ease his mind some.” Gene watched Paul’s brow furrow, one corner of his mouth lifting up in a wary expression.
           “You’d make it for him?” Ace’s tone was dubious. “I’ve got her number somewhere. Let me find it.”
           Gene heard rustling in the background, and Ace asking Jeanette where the address book was. Jeanette said something in return, and then Gene was almost worried they’d both forgotten about the call until he heard Ace’s high voice back on the line.
           “Okay. Her name’s Suzie, she’s got a little office over in the Bronx if you wanna pop over in person. I dunno the address, though, you’ll have to call.” Ace rattled off the phone number as Gene scrambled for a pen and paper. He had to settle for a napkin. “Hey, could you tell Paul to call up Peter sometime? He’s getting kind of worried.”
           “Yeah, I will. It’s nothing personal.”
           Ace laughed.
           “Pete ain’t gonna believe that secondhand, you know that. See you, Geno.”
           “Bye.” Gene hung up the phone. Paul got up from his chair.
           “You’re getting me an appointment with Ace’s psychic.”
           “Yeah. Do you have to check your dance card first?”
           “Psychics can’t reverse curses,” Paul said flatly.
           “Do you have a better idea?”
           “No.”
           “Then you’re going.” Before Paul could protest, Gene snatched the phone off the hook again and started dialing. “Get dressed. I’m pretty sure she’ll be willing to pencil you in quick.”
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swellwriting · 5 years
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What do we do now? - Part 8
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Part 8 - Lavender Honey 
A/N: Remus never gets tired of the dragon egg jokes, everyone else may be but he’s not. A little bit of fluff, some stupid Bertram comments as per usual, some smut, and a cliff hanger ending all in one chapter! ALSO please like/ reblog/ comment if you read and feel free to send in drabble requests for this story (Fluff/ angst /smut whateva u feel like)
Warning: This chapter contains smut! It is clearly marked and easy to skip if its not ur cup of T.
Word Count: 4k   Series Masterlist  
The angry pounding at the door continued as Y/n and Remus came to their senses. Through all the banging and yelling Bertram's door remained closed, either he was sleeping through this whole thing or he was purposefully ignoring it.
Y/n got up and stretched as she made her way to Bertram's bedroom door, unaware that he had locked himself in there since she hadn't read the letter he left them last night.
She tapped loud enough for her knocking to sound separate from the stranger outside. “Bertram, there is someone, someone very angry, at the door.”
“I know!” Bertram whined, he was sat against the door listening and dreading having to face his problems, but at least he wasn't running away like Remus or Y/n probably would in this situation.
“Are you going to answer it? What do they want?”
“No! I won't answer it, can’t you tell he is angry?”
“Well, I don't think he is leaving anytime soon.”
“Just tell him I'm not here!” Bertram yelled in the same whiney voice, like a toddler.
Y/n got up and walked towards the door, she grabbed her wand from the floor beside the makeshift bed and yelled to the other side of the door.
“Bertrams not here!”
The person stopped pounding on the door and yelled back, still just as angry. “Bollocks he’s not there, a course he is! And he is going to answer to me! He is going to open this damn door!”
Y/n stepped away from the door and looked at Remus who was standing away from the window even though the curtains were pulled shut.
Remus walked over to Bertram's door and knocked. “Bertram, he isn’t going away. What did you do to piss him off so much anyway?”
“I don't know! Maybe I sold him the wrong potion, maybe I got the bottles mixed up, I do that sometimes.”
Y/n sighed and placed a hand on her forehead, stressed with this entire situation. She turned to the door again and just repeated herself. “Look, I'm very sorry I wish I could help you but Bertram isn't here, I don't know what else to tell you.”
“That’s it, I'm going to report this to the police! And if they think I'm crazy I’ll find the magic police, someone will make you accountable, there must be regulations for a business of this sort. You can’t sell me a love potion that is actually a fire breathing potion and expect to get away with it!”
Remus peaked out the window and watched as the angry man stormed down to the road and got in his car speeding away and disappearing into the distance.
Y/n placed her head against the door, relieved to at least have made the man go away.
“Good morning.” Remus joked as he fixed the blankets on the bed and flicked his wand transfiguring the bed back into a couch. “Fancy some breakfast?”
“Please.” She groaned and they went to the kitchen to find some sort of food. Y/n sat on the stool against the counter and propped her head up with her hands watching Remus try to sort through the fridge.
“Slim pickings I'm assuming?” She asked and Remus closed the fridge with a nod.
“I could always fry up some Dragon eggs?”
“Very funny. Is there any bread in the cupboard there?” Y/n asked and Remus opened the cupboard beside the fridge.
“Yes, there are seven, seven loaves of the same type of bread. And we have a toaster, all we need is,” Remus paused as he looked through the other cupboards, “Peanut butter?”
“Perfect.”
Remus made them both toast and sorted through the cupboards to find them some coffee and tea.
They sat silently, backs arched as they leaned their elbows on the counter in front of them, kitchen islands are really impractical for posture. Bertram opened his door and peeked out, hoping they wouldn't see him but they both turned their heads in sync, looking at Bertram when his door creaked and gave him away.
He was very clearly trying to sneak out.
“If you were trying to sneak past us you could have gone out the window, or even apparated away?” Y/n questioned as she munched down on her toast, she wasn't angry with him and Bertram was visibly relieved.
“I thought you might be sleeping, I was trying to be quiet.”
“We spoke to you less than five minutes ago.” Remus deadpanned from behind his coffee mug.
Bertram just nodded, accepting that he had been caught and was out of dumb excuses.
“You really fucked up.” Y/n said as she wiped some crumbs off the counter, “mixing up a love potion with one that makes you breathe fire? A big difference with those, a dangerous difference.”
“Honestly I think they are equally as dangerous, given the nature of some love potions and all,” Remus commented, humour dark like his coffee.
“I know.” Bertram pouted in the same whiney voice from earlier, falling onto the couch with a huff.
“Well next time he comes you should really talk to him, offer him a free dragon egg for his troubles or something.” Remus teased.
“We can just Obliviate him? If he comes back.” Y/n said giving Remus a questioning look as if to ask him for his input.
“You want us to obliviate him?” Remus asked.
“I mean it’s what we are supposed to do when we find out a muggle has seen magic of some sort.” She explained.
“You’re right, I guess it keeps our hands clean too. If he does find the ministry somehow and he gets here before them at least we can say we tried.” Remus offered but Bertram stood up walking across the room swiftly.
“He won't be able to contact the ministry he’s a muggle!” He argued.
“Well, he found a way to get his muggle hands on magic potions so if he’s determined I'm sure he will find a way to contact them somehow, we just have to hope he tries to come back here first.” Y/n placed a hand lightly on Bertram's shoulder, trying to comfort him as his wide bloodshot eyes gave away how stressed and tired he was.
Bertram just nodded slowly, squinting his eyes as he was in deep thought. He offered no explanation before grabbing his wand and a fist full of floo powder before disappearing in a flash of green fire.
“Okay, see you later Bertram!” Remus sarcastically said as he stood up and patted his palms against his legs looking around for what to do now. Y/n was just standing there leaning against the counter waiting for Remus to do or say something. It was nice being in one place after weeks of travelling, nowhere to go. The forest was nice in that sense but it was like camping, and you can only enjoy camping for so long. There comes a point where a real hot shower and a big warm bed are deeply missed.
“This cottage is really nice actually, needs a bit of cleaning though.”
“Are you suggested we clean it?” Y/n asked with a smile, cleaning wasn't nearly as much of a dreadful task when magic was involved.
“Sure.”
With no further words exchanged the two started cleaning, falling into a good rhythm, they really were a good team. Y/n opened the curtains and cracked the windows to let in some fresh air, Remus found a closet with cleaning supplies that flew out and started cleaning once he opened the door. 
They started grabbing books that had fallen off the moving bookshelves and arranged them neatly, Y/n ran her fingers across the spines as she skimmed through the titles, “there are some good books here.”
“I’d hate to say Bertram has good taste.” Remus teased.
“There's no way these are his, they are his grandmothers I'm sure, I think everything here is.”
“Except the illegal stuff.” Remus joked and they both laughed, Y/n placed a finger over the shiny book that would open the storage room but looked hesitantly at Remus before daring to move it.
“We should let the cleaning supplies get in here don't ya think?”
“Yeah, they will be gentle. Better than if we, or dare I say, Bertram, were to try and clean in there.”
With a giggle Y/n pulled the book out, stepping back as the bookshelf disappeared into the floor. She stepped aside and the cleaning supplies that had just finished cleaning the kitchen and living room went inside. She stood patiently, watching as the charmed cleaning supplies cleaned everything, dusting the shelves and mopping the floor, cleaning the burnt cauldron so it sparkled again. They flew out and Remus was waiting on the other side of the room to let them into the basement. After that, they dared to even let the supplies in Bertram's bedroom and the bathroom that they hadn't even noticed.
Y/n and Remus stood in the doorway of the bathroom, it was nice, arguably the nicest part of the house. Maybe that's just the opinion of Y/n and Remus, two people who have been living outdoors and on this wild runaway adventure with no nice bathrooms, and also the biggest introverts you could ever meet.
Maybe that’s why this cottage with its secluded location, wall-length bookshelves, large windows, comfy couches, isolated backyard and now a lavish bathroom with a huge bathtub and separate shower, was so appealing to them.
“We have cleaned the entire house, now it’s time for the house to clean us!” Y/n said excitedly as she ran across the room to the bathtub and kneeled in front of it placing her arms and hands over the side as she admired the smooth porcelain.
“Not sure that makes sense but I get the point.” Remus teased.
Y/n looked up at him with the biggest eyes of admiration, the kind she had always looked at him with, though he was unaware of it most times. “If you need me I’ll be in here for the next five years.”
“I think that’s ample time for relaxation, would you like me to grab you a book and your pyjamas from the car?”
Remus leaned down a bit as he spoke to her, grabbing her cheeks gently and squeezing them before he moved his hand to the side, she nuzzled her cheek into his palm as she smiled, shutting her eyes. It was a peaceful expression, Remus almost didn’t want to look away.
“It's not even noon, you think I should put my pyjamas on already?” She asked, eyes still shut and a smile still across her face.
“Well, why not, it's not like we are going anywhere.”
“You’re just full of brilliant ideas today aren't you.”
Remus chuckled as he placed a kiss on her forehead before standing back up and leaving the room. As he shut the door, not knowing when Bertram would be back, he heard the tap turn on and the sound of Y/n shuffling through the cabinet for bath products.
When he got back, with a good book that he picked out for her guessing what she would like based off how well he knew her, and a pair of pyjamas which were just plaid pyjama shorts and a very oversized t-shirt that he recognized as probably being one of James’, he knocked quietly before creaking the door open.
“I have your requested supplies, Mini.”
“You sound like my potions assistant again.” Y/n joked from inside the tub, she was fully submerged and hidden behind a mountain of purple bubbles, the room smelled like lavender and honey and the bathwater was so hot the mirror was already fogged up.
“No potion supplies here, just a book and some Pj’s.” Remus smiled as he tried to avoid looking in the soapy water, he placed the items on a dry part of the counter beside the sink.
“Come ‘ere” Y/n almost whispered and Remus instantly abided before she even finished her words.
He leaned against the side of the tub, knees against the floor and elbows resting on the edge, his sleeves already a bit damp. Y/n grabbed some bubbles on her fingertips and rubbed them across Remus’ face, leaving some to pile up on top of his nose. He scrunched his face up as if it bothered him but his smile and red cheeks gave him away.
“How can I ever thank you?” she asked quietly as she ran her fingers through the curls that fell in his face, getting them wet as she played with them.
“You can thank me by having a relaxing bath with me sometime.” He suggested.
“Some time? But there's one right here right now!” She said in a slow teasing tone that made Remus’ heart beat faster, he gripped the side of the tub, knuckles turning white as his mind raced.
“You want me to come in there? With you?” He asked timidly. 
They hadn’t done much since that night in the car, even that was mere foreplay, they hadn't even kissed that much since then, not having a moment alone without Bertram hovering around. Neither of them being big on PDA. 
Y/n just nodded, a wicked smile on her face.
Remus put his hand in the water swooshing it around, “If I get in there it will overflow and spill everywhere.”
“Oh no, too bad we don't have a magic mop in the other room.” 
*****Smut starts*****
She smiled as she got on her knees bringing her upper half out of the water, wet and sudsy skin making Remus blush more. She grabbed his shirt and pulled him close so his lips were on hers, she kissed him quickly, unsure of how much time they truly had. Remus moved his hands to her breasts, rubbing his fingers gently across the bubbles, brushing against her nipples with his fingertips and before he knew it he was being pulled in with a splash and a flood spilled on the floor.
The bathtub was big enough that they could both fit if they were careful but they were in such a heated hurry that they splashed about as they moved around, kissing intensely only pausing to smile on each other's lips. Y/n had her back against the porcelain tub as Remus hovered over her. His clothes were too wet and heavy to easily take off on his own so Y/n slowly peeled them off piece by piece as he slid his hand between her thighs. 
Her legs spread as far as they could since she was pinned beneath him, his knees on either side of her hips. His fingers pushed inside her with little rhythm, every time he moved his arm the water would spill over the side of the tub a little more. 
Her fingers fiddled with his pants, trying to get them off him but the effort proved useless. He smiled against her cheek as he moved to kiss down her neck before pulling his fingers away and moving his hands to grip her hips, carefully wrapping her legs around his waist and then lifting them both out of the tub. Taking careful steps around the bubbly puddles and then placing her on the bathroom counter. The cold smooth tile underneath her warm bare skin.
Remus was still wearing his pants, his shirt and sweater were successfully taken off by Y/n in the tub. He stood between Y/n’s legs as she wrapped them around his waist and pulled him closer to her. She continued her mission from before, if she was completely naked why shouldn’t he be. It took a bit of teamwork to get his soaked jeans off of him, building up the tension and impatience they were both feeling for one another. 
She wanted to see him completely naked for so long, the last time they did this it left too much to the imagination, and when they went swimming he was hidden under the water from her examining and detail searching eyes.
She didn’t get to spend too much time admiring his pale skin, covered in scars and odd freckles here and there before he grabbed her face, kissing her roughly before pushing inside of her. They both gasped, shocked at the new feeling. His hands moved from gently holding her cheeks to grabbing her hips, pulling her closer to him with each thrust.
She wrapped her hands around his shoulders, moving her hands over his wet back, digging her nails in to keep him close.
Remus placed a hand on the mirror to steady himself. This was not the smartest way for them to do this for the first time, it was clumsy and slippery and desperate and exploratory and not thoroughly planned out like everything they do together. His hand slides against the glass of the mirror as he thrusts faster and deeper, his forehead is pressed to hers because he can’t focus on this and kissing her at the same time.
She wants to say something but isn’t sure what’s right to say, her mind is clouded and all she can think of, all she can feel is him.
“Rem, Remus…” She muttered through scattered breaths as the tension-filled her stomach as she came undone. Remus thrust a few more times before coming, kissing her and pushing her against the mirror to her back.
He pulled away from the kiss, smiling sheepishly at her and she just smiled back at him.
“Now I feel like I need another bath.”
“That can be arranged,” he teased before he kissed her once more.
*****smut ends******
-
Bertram rushed around the small kitchen making some sort of food, Y/n was sat on the stool at the kitchen island and Remus was stood on the other side of it, trying not to be in Bertram's way. They were unfazed by the commotion Bertram was causing, he insisted he didn't need any help. 
Bertram had been gone almost all day and had only come back around 6 pm, with a few groceries in hand thankfully.
Y/n looked at Remus from behind her mug, her eyes travelled from the floor and then up to his face. He was already looking at her. They both stayed like that, silently examining each other, a smile broke across Y/n’s face, simply because he made her happy.
They looked at the faces in front of them, wondering how they went from strangers to classmates, to acquaintances and then to this, whatever this was. They went from existing in the same small world to being each other's whole lives, their points of view focused on each other. 
The background blurred when she stared at him, she took a sip from her tea and he raised a teasing brow. He was about to tease her, tell her to take a picture as it would last longer, but smoke passed in front of his face catching both their attention.
It was clear Bertram really did need help.
Remus chuckled and turned to help him as Y/n watched in amusement from her seat. After a few struggled minutes Y/n was presented with a plate with two burnt pancakes on it.
Before they could all sit down and enjoy the sweet moment and the hopefully sweet pancakes, there was a loud banging on the door again. All of their smiles faded.
“Bertram! Open the door. Answer me you lying bastard!”
Remus was the first to stand he walked over to the door and went to turn the nob to open it but Bertram ran up behind him.
“No.” He whispered but Remus shook his head. 
“You can’t hide forever. Just obliviate him.” Remus said before he forced the door open, his wand in his hand hidden behind his back.
The man started yelling but Bertram said nothing in response he stared blankly at the angry man in front of him.
“Bertram, do it!” Y/n yelled from her seat as she watched nervously.
Bertram shook his head, a clear look of fear on his face so Remus pushed him aside, silently casting obliviate on the angry muggle in front of him.
Suddenly three Auror’s appeared, wands drawn. The muggle man looked around confused as ever as to where he was and what was happening.
“You obliviated him?” One of the Aurors asked as she looked at the muggle.
Bertram shook his head, making them believe that Remus was who they were looking for.
“So you are Bertram Aubrey then?” The woman asked Remus and he shook his head. One of the Aurors stepped forward, Remus recognized him. 
Of the three Aurors in front of them, there was a woman he didn’t recognize but looked not much older than him, and two men who he recognized as Dirk Cresswell and Davey Gudgeon. 
“No, that's Remus Lupin,” Davey said.
“Uh yeah, that's Bertram, but I am the one who Obliviated the muggle, that's a law. I followed the law.” Remus said, he was panicked but he was trying to sound calm and sure of himself as he spoke slowly and clearly.
“We know the laws, and being apart of the black market for potions and creatures is against the law.” The woman snapped at him.
“I'm not,” Remus argued but he was interrupted by Dirk.
“Then why obliviate him?”
Remus didn't want to admit that he knew what Bertram was doing and he couldn't think of any excuses fast enough.
“That's what I thought,” Dirk said as they went behind Remus and used a spell to lock his arms behind his back, they did the same to Bertram.
Y/n ran to the door, not worried about being arrested herself.
“You can’t take him! He's innocent I swear.” She pleaded, tears filling her eyes at the sight of Remus being pulled away.
“Well, even if he is, he just obliviated our witness so I think he will prove useful. Stay safe out here all alone little lady, there are wolves in these woods I hear.” Dirk teased.
“Sorry about this Y/n, and I’m sorry about James too. Just stay here in case we need to come back for you, we have no reason to take you in now but please don't run.” Davey said before they all apparated away leaving Y/n standing in the doorway by herself, unable to do anything to help them. 
She was alone now, in a place that wasn’t home and only felt like it because of who she was with. The backseat of the car felt like home with Remus there, the forest felt like home and the shitty motels did too as long as Remus was there with her. But now he wasn't.
Loneliness consumed her and she fell to her knees as she whispered to herself.
“What do I do now?”
The emphasis on the I hurt, because the honesty of it all was that Remus wasn't there to ask her this. He wasn't there for her to focus on and guide, Bertram wasn’t there to be clueless and she had never felt so hopeless and powerless. How could Davey look at her, offer his empty apologies to her and then take them away anyways, leave her there? They weren't close friends at all but he knew James, how could he take Remus away like that?
She sat like that for an hour staring down the driveway, until a black shaggy dog ran down the road and stopped at the door, staring at her through the thin screen.
At first, she thought it was a wolf, but as it got closer she realized it wasn’t.
She didn't fear the dog, she welcomed anything to cease the loneliness, but its eyes seemed not those of a dog but of a human.
Where did this mysterious dog come from?
Part 9
85 notes · View notes
flyingblackhawk · 5 years
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Pasta Clintasha fic 1,977 words - After the debrief, Clint drives home. He troops into his apartment, strips off his clothes, and tries to shower off the last week. It’s been punishing, and he falls into his bed without much of a thought for anything but his soft pillow. When he wakes, he goes about his day as he normally does when he gets a day off. He eats, watches movies, and naps. He sends Natasha a checkin text. She’s fine. Good. It’s two days before he notices anything is off. The mission was bad - worse than a lot of their previous exploits, and he’s considering going to see the SHIELD shrink. Natasha seems okay, but when he sees her at a meeting at HQ, she looks pale and tired. Clint shakes it off. She’s probably not sleeping well. He knows the feeling. 
It’s not until he drops by her place to check on her that he realises something is actually wrong. Her kitchen is spotless, and there is no food to be found. He chalks it up to post-mission takeout, but there are no containers anywhere. Natasha is in the living room, curled up on the couch. She wakes from her doze when he enters.
“Hey,” she mumbles.
“Hey,” he returns. “You okay?”
Dumb question. She nods, like she always does, but he’s not convinced. She’s still pale, and his mind is starting to connect the dots between the lack of supplies in her kitchen and the way her fingers are trembling as she brushes her hair off her face.
“Nat,” he says, his voice gentle, “when did you last eat?”
“Earlier,” she says, waving him off. She knows he’s onto her, and gives him a sharp look that has no real edge to it.
“When? What did you have?”
“I had a coffee a couple of hours ago.”
“Coffee doesn’t count. When did you last eat a meal?”
She huffs. “I don’t know. Bosnia.”
“What?”
“Clint-”
“That was three days ago, Nat.”
She looks at him, as if thinking of something to say. She clearly draws a blank, and Clint sighs, his hand landing on her leg. “You’ve got to eat,” he says, lamely. It’s not convincing. Natasha curls up tighter, and rests her pale cheek on the cushions.
“I’m fine,” she says quietly. It’s an outrageous lie. Clint has been struggling too, but at least he had some goddam cheerios for breakfast.
“I’m going to bring you some groceries,” he says.
“Whatever.”
He leaves her to her wallowing, and makes a determined trip to the nearest bodega, where he stocks up on essentials and a few non-essential treats. Arms laden with bags, he makes his way back to her building, and up to her apartment. She is dozing on the couch again, so he unpacks the bags and slings some bread in the toaster, then shuffles around in the cupboard for the peanut butter he just put in there.
Natasha rolls off the couch and comes to watch him, arms folded, a bemused look on her face.
“Why do you care if I eat?” she asks.
“Because humans do this weird thing where if they don’t eat, they die.”
She rolls her eyes.
“Don’t give me that look,” he says, brandishing the peanut butter he’s just located at her. “Humans need to eat. That’s science.”
She watches him like someone at the zoo. He takes the toast when it’s done and spreads peanut butter on it. He bites into one slice, holding it between his teeth, and hands her the other slice. She looks at it with overt distaste, and sets it down beside her on the bench. Clint takes a measured bite of his own toast, and watches her in silence. She rolls her eyes again and Clint is surprised she’s not dizzy from the amount of times she’s done that. She picks up her toast slice, and takes a small bite. He watches her as she chews it, and swallows. She waits for him to leave her alone. She should definitely know by now that he won’t, not until she’s eaten the damn toast.
“You’re very irritating,” she says, through a mouthful of peanut butter.
“Takes one to know one,” he mutters, as he puts the peanut butter away.
-
She doesn’t eat anything for dinner, and Clint puts the leftover stir-fry in a container in the fridge, just in case she wants to wait until he’s gone. He doesn’t have high hopes though, so he leaves her in the late evening, still pale, still tired, curled up on the couch with a book.
Clint forms a plan, and sleeps. When he wakes, he goes straight back to Natasha’s place, via the bodega. He knows he’s the only one who has a key to her place, so hopefully she won’t shoot him in the head.
He enters her apartment, and all the lights are off. She’s still asleep, which is unusual for seven in the morning. Clint chalks it up to her eating almost nothing for four days, and gets to work on breakfast. By the time Natasha emerges from her room, he’s laid out a spread of waffles, bacon, syrup and various fruit all over the table.
“Do you like it?” he asks, gesturing to the feast. “The waffles are only heart shaped because the bodega only had heart shaped ones in the freezer.”
“You made me frozen waffles?” she asks. He passes her a coffee, which she takes with what nearly looks like a smile.
“Hey,” he protests. “I’m working with what the bodega has to offer. Besides, you don’t have a waffle iron.”
“Third cupboard from the left on the top.”
He huffs. “Okay, I didn’t think to check.”
She laughs, and it’s the best sound Clint’s heard all week. Natasha nibbles on the corner of a waffle, eats a strawberry, and spends the rest of the meal focused on her coffee. Clint jokes, keeping it light, but he is aching for the woman in front of him, and at the same time, he’s frustrated.
“Medical won’t clear you,” he says, when they have both reached the bottom of their coffees. “Not if you’re not eating.”
She sits back in her chair and looks at him. “You’ll tell them?”
He shrugs, a little helplessly. “What am I supposed to do? Stand by and let you go back into the field before you’re ready?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not.”
She rolls her eyes. As she gets up to leave, Clint wonders if they do eye-rolling in the Olympics. Natasha could eye-roll for America. Or Russia, he supposes.
Her bedroom door slams, and Clint clears away the breakfast. The leftovers go into the fridge beside the untouched stir-fry from the night before. He heads out, but not for long. Just after midday, he’s back in her kitchen.
“Seriously?” she asks. She comes into the kitchen, where Clint is pressing paninis. “You’re still doing this?”
“I’m doing this until you eat,” he says, sliding one sandwich onto a plate and cutting it diagonally. “This one’s prosciutto, provolone and pesto. It’s amazing.”
“No thanks.”
He clenches his teeth. “The other one is chicken, brie and rocket. Also good.”
“Clint.”
“What?” he asks. He swings around with two plates in hand to find her leaning against the door frame. She looks unsteady, and as he watches, she slips and grabs the frame. He sets the plates down and hurries over to her.
“Hey,” he murmurs. “It’s alright. Here, lean on me.”
She does, and he helps her over to her seat.
“You’re killing me, Romanoff,” he sighs, his hand still on her shoulder. “I know it was a bad mission. We’re both messed up. But starving yourself to death isn’t going to help you, and it certainly isn’t going to help me.”
She nods, and then shakes her head. Clint watches his partner struggle for words, something he’s only seen her do a handful of times.
“I just need…”
“Tell me,” he murmurs, after she trails off. “Tell me what you need, so I can help you.”
“I need to be in control,” she says. She looks up at him, and all traces of the Black Widow are gone. All Clint sees is a vulnerable, tired Natasha, looking at him with a pleading face he knows she never shows to anyone else.
“Okay,” he says. “I’ll figure it out. Come on.”
He helps her over to the couch, where she curls up under a blanket. She dozes off almost instantly, and Clint leaves for yet another trip to the bodega. The guy behind the counter gives him a welcoming, if puzzled smile. He collects everything he needs, pays, and goes back up to Natasha’s apartment. He sets it all up in the kitchen, then goes to wake Natasha.
“What’s this?” she asks, when he shows her his setup.
“Pasta,” he says. “Come on.”
He ushers her over to the bench.
“Remember the first time we made pasta?” he asks. She nods, and a little smile tugs at the corners of her lips.
“I’d never made it before,” she recalls. Her hands move to the stove dials and she lights the flame on the hob. Clint has already filled a pot with salted water, and she moves it onto the flame.
“You threw pasta at the wall.”
He chuckles at the memory. “That’s the best way to check if it’s ready.”
“You could just taste it.”
“Less fun.”
She laughs, and opens the packet of pasta. When the water boils, she slides the pasta into the pot.
“Remember the sauce we made that night?”
She nods again. “Carbonara.”
Clint gestures to island bench, where the ingredients are waiting for her. Natasha looks more relaxed now, so he takes her by the waist and steers her over to where he’s laid out a chopping board.
“Garlic,” he prompts her. She chops the cloves finely. Unprompted, she takes the pancetta and chops that too. When she pauses, Clint hands her a small frying pan.
As he watches, she fries the pancetta and the garlic. When it’s done, she moves on to the next step without instruction, mixing eggs, cream and cheese in a bowl.
“The pasta,” he reminds her. Natasha drains the pasta, and she gracefully folds the mixture through the steaming pasta. Clint watches, and she stirs it until it’s ready and then ladles it into two bowls.
“There’s cheese for topping,” he says, pointing. She grabs it, and sprinkles a little on each serve.
Natasha takes the two bowls to the table and sits. Clint grabs them each a beer from one of the bodega bags, and passes her one.
“Well cooked,” he says, leaning over to inhale the fragrance of the food. It brings back memories of that night in a dingy apartment, long before they had money or coworkers or anything much to worry about except keeping each other alive. He remembers a young woman, so proud of the simple meal she’d cooked, and eating that meal out of plastic takeout containers, sitting on a windowsill while rain fell outside.
Clint is so taken in by this vision of the past that he doesn’t notice Natasha eating her pasta. She is enjoying every mouthful, lost in the same memory he’s drifting in.
“Seconds?” she asks. He blinks. She’s already moving over to the pot to scoop more pasta onto her plate. He lets the warm, accomplished feeling roll through him until there’s nothing he can do but smile.
“Please,” he says, holding out his plate.
-
Later, when they’ve abandoned their plates and finished their drinks, Natasha reaches across the couch for his hand. Clint laces their fingers together, and brings her hand to his lips for a rare moment of closeness.
“Thanks,” she murmurs. He doesn’t have to say anything. He just squeezes her hand.
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