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whenimaunicorn · 5 years

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The Pussy Willows Mission - Part One

Fandom: Wynonna Earp Pairing: Bobo Del Rey x OFC Warnings: Explicit, dubcon: undercover stripper gets coerced into things she didn’t expect

Timeline divergence note for canon sticklers: let's just assume that the Earp gang realized that Pussy Willows was owned by revenants some time before Bobo Del Rey was out of the picture...

The plan had started off perfect. Once we realized Pussy Willows was the center of some shady revenant shit, the next step seemed obvious: infiltrate the joint and see what the demons were up to. Wynonna couldn’t do it; she’d have been recognized. Haught had said “hell no,” and no one would let Waverly volunteer, so it was on me to initiate phase one and go get a job at the infamous strip club just outside Purgatory.

How hard could it be? Pose as a dancer for a few nights, long enough to get close to the revenants at their next meet-up, and learn exactly what they were doing. I had just enough confidence, and just the right lack of hang-ups or personal boundaries, to nail the audition and get myself assigned to the right nights.

My first shift wasn’t crucial. I just had to manage to not get fired before the weekend, when the real stake-out would happen. My plan was to be exceptionally mediocre at this job; take my turns on stage, make a few bucks, and just kind of blend into the background of the staff. You know, not work too hard.

The boss didn’t like it. Jonas had me pegged for a slacker within the first hour, scowling at me for hanging by the back bar and flushing me out to go try harder at drumming up business with the three customers making an early night of it at the beginning of my shift. I discovered lapdances were kind of fun, anyway, since these guys were following the rules and keeping their hands to themselves. It was nice to feel appreciated, if I didn’t think about it too hard.

I was enjoying myself on stage, shimmying into the mood and out of my clothes, when the trouble started with a flash of fur in the seats at the right-hand corner. Most of the demons in Purgatory had no idea I had an association with the Earp family. That’s why we had considered this plan foolproof; but there was exactly one fucker who did, and at the sight of his trademark coat I felt my heart sink lower than that panties I had just dropped to the stage floor.

Bobo Del Rey shouldn’t be here. Our informant swore up and down that the trailer park boss was not involved, that this gang of revenants was cooking up something completely separate from whatever his bullshit was. And yet, there at the end of the stage was that greasy black mohawk, the two-toned beard surrounding a lazy smile full of sharp teeth.

Somehow I managed not to trip in my 6-inch platform heels. I turned away from him and took a deep breath, trying to think fast without betraying the notion that anything was wrong. There was a decent chance he hadn’t recognized me yet. I was wearing a long, full, pink wig that was definitely not my natural hair color, and maybe he wouldn’t look very hard at my face. With luck, I could finish out my set without him paying any more attention to me.

I rolled my shoulders and snuck a peek past my curtain of fake hair in Bobo’s direction. A crisp dollar bill now lay on the stage in front of him.

Fuck. The place was so dead that he had no competition; there would be no way for me to pretend I hadn’t noticed him there, or that there was no time left to get to him for a little one-on-one tease before my song was over. Especially with the boss already suspicious of my ass… I was going to have to go over there.

Standard procedure is to get down on your knees in front of the customer, make some kind of friendly or sultry eye contact, depending on the kind of stage persona you’re going for, and then do a few seconds of body rolls or contortion-y dance moves that show off your assets, up close and personal to them. Overachievers might lean in and touch the guest, rub her tits on their face or whatever, but I was definitely going to try and get away with the bare minimum with Mr. Del Rey. Then you hold up your garter strap and wait for them to slide the money in, and you’re done.

Even the eye contact part of that formula was too risky for me; the cotton-candy-pink of the wig was probably only going to be disguise enough if he never got a good look at my face. So I chose the bored-and-sultry persona, dancing my way over to his side of the stage with a slow sashay, ending with my heels on either side of his dollar bill and my backside facing out.

My inner monologue had one shining, screaming moment of what-the-fuck-are-you-doing-with-yourself-right-now. Bobo had sat down at the stage after all my clothes were already off, and now one of our greatest enemies was about twelves inches away from my ankles and staring up at the bare cleft of my ass. But what else was a girl to do? I rolled it, popped it, and dropped it with as much skill as I could muster, then bounced on my heels with my ass sticking right into his face.

I dared a glance over my shoulder. I just had to; my skin was tingling under even the idea of his gaze. Bobo’s face had gone slack, eyes fixed on the bounce of my buttocks and whatever glimpse of my pussy he was able to get in between. The simple pleasure I saw in his eyes tempted me to bend forward, spread myself a little further for him as I felt goosebumps rise along the back of my thighs.

Because the other problem was… did I mention I totally had the hots for Bobo already? I knew it was wrong, but there was no denying the way that he made me feel the last time that Wynonna and I had a run-in with him. So there was a little part of me, a little part that was getting bigger and needier by the second here, that wanted to relish this chance for incognito flirting. To think that Bobo liked my body, even though he didn’t know who he was looking at… I undulated my hips and indulged the temptation just a little bit longer.

Bobo leaned in, closed his eyes, and took a deep sniff of me. It should have been gross but it really, really wasn’t. Pure, animal appreciation was in his gaze when he opened those eyes and locked them onto mine.

Watching his reaction from over my shoulder, I returned his gaze for probably a second too long. He snapped his teeth together with an audible click and I realized myself, flipping my hair to hide my face again. I spread my knees wide and dropped almost to my belly in my haste to distract him with other body parts. I writhed with an arched back before him for a few beats, then closed my legs and switched to a catlike sort of body roll on hands and knees, getting ready to transition out of there. That was fun, but now I was just about to lose my nerve.

I finished by sitting in front of him, one bent knee braced on the stage while I swirled the other thigh open and held up the elastic of the g-string just a few inches away from my exposed cunt.

Bobo wasn’t letting me off that easy. He picked the dollar bill up off the stage between us and traced it along the wrong leg, knee to hip. His fingertips brushed my skin too, when he ran it along my lower belly, and then finally backtracked toward the required destination. I thought I could hear a pleased little growling noise emanating from his chest as his eyes followed his fingers. He tickled me a little as he slid the bill into position, and grasped my leg in a light squeeze for just a second when I moved to pull away.

“You,” he said, eyelids narrowing as he inspected my face. “Come talk to me when you’re done on stage.”

I tried not to betray the chill that ran through me after that, smiling and nodding like the compliant girl eager to make a buck that I was pretending to be. I gathered myself up enough for a few turns around the pole before the D.J. started speaking over the final notes of the song. “Everybody give it up for Angel. It’s her first night tonight, guys. Give her a try, let her show you some love.” The music shifted, and I tried to match its quicker beat as I swiped my outfit off the floor and strode down the stairs opposite Bobo’s end of the club. “Desert Rose to the stage next, Desert Rose.”

‘Come talk to me,’ he had said. I turned the words, and the inscrutable smoothness of his face when he had said them, over and over in my mind as I pulled my strappy thong and mostly-sheer pastel babydoll back over my body, quick as I could. For the first time that night, I wished I had chosen an outfit with just a touch more coverage. Had he recognized me? It could have been innocent, he could have just liked me and been asking for a private dance, but I was afraid I had seen something else behind his eyes.

So, I stalled. Another patron waved me over with a cry of “Hey, new girl!” and I plopped into his lap and chatted him up – at an angle where I could still keep an eye on Bobo. My hope that Desert Rose might catch his interest failed, as every time I looked up I found Mr. Del Rey continuing to stare at me. Every minute of delay made me more sure I was in deep shit; I highly doubted he would scowl this hard at any old girl that just wasn’t giving him the first turn.

He probably knew who I was. So why hadn’t he raised hell and had my ass thrown out as soon as he realized? What game was he trying to play, here?

There was only one way to find out.

With a polite little “let me know if you wanna get a dance later” for my new friend, I extricated myself from his lap and sauntered straight across the room to meet my fate.

Bobo looked peeved to be kept waiting. He sat at one of the high-top tables off to the side, one long leg splayed off the edge of his stool as leaned into his elbow and watched me come.

I’m sure my face looked guarded. Threat stiffens my back, makes me puff up to my full height and try to convey that I am not one to easily be fucked with. “Hey,” I said, bumping the back of my arm against Bobo’s table as I came to a stop before him, but making no move to initiate contact.

“Hey,” Bobo echoed, extending an arm to beckon me into his personal space. “Having a good time tonight?”

I ducked under his arm because it was expected, and his warm palm came to rest on the bare skin of my lower back. “Sure,” I shrugged, looking around the room because I figured I still ought not to let him get a good look at my face. I let the music take me, shimmying with my back against his front, and trying not to memorize his tobacco-and-campfire scent.

I felt his nose brush against my ear, his hands coming around to cover my stomach and hold me close against him. “You don’t belong here,” he murmured low, drawing out the words like they were something delicious to savor.

My heart skipped a beat but I still found a way to reply. “That obvious it’s my first day, huh? I’m trying to learn as fast as I can –”

Bobo cut through my excuses. “I know you. You work with the Earps.” One hand traveled up to the side of my face, pulling the hair off my cheek. “And now you’re here, of all the places a girl could get a job. This can’t just be a coincidence.”

I forced a breath out of my ballooning lungs. “Times are tough, man, and I heard strippers make great—"

“We could talk to Jonas, see if he thinks it’s a coincidence.”

I cut the shit. “Don’t.” My muscles locked, ceasing any pretense of dancing. “He’ll kill me.”

“Yeah, he probably will,” Bobo agreed. His hand wrapped around my hip. “But don’t worry yourself, Angel. Just keep dancing.”

I turned inside his arms, now that we were past disguises. “Why shouldn’t I worry? You keeping my secret, Bobo?” On to Plan B: keep the problem contained.

One notched eyebrow lifted. “Depends on what you’re here for, darlin’.”

“Nothing that involves you.”

Bobo took a long sip from his straw, chewing that over. “Can you guarantee that?”

I tossed my head. “You trying to be a part of this thing Jonas is cooking up?” I held his gaze as levelly as I could, pretending we already knew more about the revenants’ plans than we really did.

Bobo scoffed. “Hell no. I’ve got more important things to do.”

I shifted my weight, just a little bit distracted by the way the line of my body was brushing against his. “Then we’re good. No conflicts of interest here.”

Bobo tucked his arm around my waist more firmly, smiling down on me. “Then I can keep a secret, darlin’. So long as you can play nice.” He ran his palm down over my ass, but I was too nerve-wracked to enjoy it.

“Watch your hands,” I said, pulling away. “The guests don’t get to touch around here.”

Bobo’s face was smug. “Is that what you think.”

I reached for his near-empty glass, grasping at any excuse to walk away and clear my head. “Let me go refill your drink.”

My body slumped as I waited for the bartender. What exactly did Bobo mean by ‘play nice,’ and how far was I willing to go to keep this operation from tanking? This was getting way more complicated than we’d anticipated. Tonight was supposed to be the quiet night, the warm-up to establish my cover, that’s all. I didn’t need Bobo fucking with me on top of everything else.

And then Jonas came striding down from the other end of the bar at me, his scowl apparent even in the dim mood lighting. “What the fuck was that, Angel?”

I creased my brows in what I hoped was a cute pout. “What do you mean, boss?”

He motioned in Bobo’s direction. “He doesn’t look happy.”

I glanced over my shoulder. Bobo Del Rey was indeed glowering at me again. In a flash, I reviewed what our conversation must have looked like from the outside. My body language had not been very inviting. And Jonas already thought I wasn’t working hard enough. I tried going for the sympathy plea. “I had to walk away, he got handsy. I think you need to send Rodrick over there to remind him of the rules.”

Jonas didn’t even glance toward the bouncer. “Oh really.”

“Yeah,” I continued, though it didn’t look like I was swaying him. “Dude was being a real creep.”

He shook his head, face twisting. “Where do you think you are, princess?”

Damn. I had only pissed him off more. Bobo’s fresh drink landed at my elbow, and Jonas scooped it up with one hand while grabbing my upper arm with the other. “Come on.”

He practically towed me over to Bobo’s table, though I tried to walk with a little more dignity than that. Bobo’s eyebrows climbed, like he expected something really interesting to happen next.

I didn’t get a look at what Jonas’ face was doing, though there was an edge of tension in his voice when he spoke. “So you’ve met my newest girl, Angel.” He wiggled my arm for emphasis, and did not let it go. “Pretty, right? Nice set of tits on her. She doesn’t know how things work around here yet.” Jonas turned to me, eyes deadly serious. “This guy right here, he’s a very special customer. He gets anything he wants.” My stomach started to drop. “VIP.” He used his grip on my arm to thrust me closer to Bobo before releasing me. I stumbled a little, extra graceless because I turned to grab the table for balance rather than Bobo’s thigh. “You’re gonna treat him right tonight, aren’t you Angel?”

I swallowed the hot words that were already thick on my tongue. If I didn’t come off as compliant, a team player, then I doubted Jonas would let me near the important guys when the real shit started going down. If there was one thing I had to make him think I was tonight, it was revenant-friendly.

I settled into a silky smile, letting my spine sway. “Of course. Anything you say, boss.” And then, because Jonas was watching, I gave Bobo my brightest, most inviting grin as I pushed his spread knees out a little wider and settled myself between them.

“Good,” Jonas said, “show him what you can do.”

I rolled my ass against Bobo’s crotch. Table dances were a little tough in these tall pub chairs, but there were a few moves I could think of. I bent at the waist and put my hands on my knees, grinding my ass up, down, and side to side against Bobo’s jeans while I arched my back and tossed my hair. Jonas retreated back to the bar, but he watched me like a hawk. This performance was for more than just one.

I worked it good, in time to the heavy beat, but I kept the contact against Bobo’s body light. I wasn’t ready to know if I was making him hard. I felt his hand land on my lower back, felt it ooze up my spine, sliding under the sheer fabric of my halter top. Customers don’t get to touch, except Bobo does.

The song changed. I straightened and swiveled around between Bobo’s knees, daring to meet his eyes. Smug satisfaction and lust met me there in equal measure. The new song was slower; I rolled my body in half time as I stared down the enemy from just inches away.

Bobo raised his hand as if to touch my face, rings glittering in the flashing lights from the stage. I flinched, and he frowned, and I remembered Jonas was watching closely. I straightened up and let Bobo caress my cheek.

The boss was too far away to hear us talk, though. And speaking to Bobo like I wasn’t afraid of him helped me keep my nerve up. “I thought you said you weren’t working with him.”

Bobo smiled at me like I was cute. “I don’t have any deals with him, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want a deal with me.” His fingertips traced down my jaw, heading along the side of my neck. “The perks of being the baddest thing out of hell around these parts. He kisses my ass.” He leaned in closer, curling those long fingers behind my ear. “And that means you have to, too, if you want to keep this job in time for whatever fool plan you all are cooking up here.”

My breath slipped out of me, with a quiet little noise that Bobo’s ear may or may not have been close enough to hear. Being presented up just about on a literal platter here for Mr. Del Rey, it had my unfortunate crush bubbling up full force, making my legs weak as they struggled to balance around the tingling between them.

I could handle this. And I could even enjoy doing it, and show Jonas just how good I can treat his VIPs. Earn myself a place right on the lap of one of tomorrow’s revenants, or maybe even Jonas himself, as they had their little meet-up and spilled all the beans about their plan. All I had to do was live out one of my wilder fantasies, and give Bobo a really fuckin’ good dance right here.

Bobo’s fingers left the back of my neck, coming to idly play with his beard as he looked down the line of my body. Taking the hint, I thrust out my chest and undulated more widely to the beat. I let my hands run up my ribcage, tossing my head and arching my back so that Jonas had a good angle too, so he could see what a good sport I was being.

Bobo bit his lip as my hands covered my tits. I played with myself a little for him, made sure my nipples poked hard and strong through the thin fabric that barely covered them. His hands came to my hips, grasping like he was trying to keep control and inching me closer to him. “Jonas was right,” he rasped, “you’ve got some of the nicest tits I’ve ever seen.”

I mimicked what I had seen some of the other girls doing out at the tables, pulling the fabric of my top to the sides and letting my nipples pop out the top of my costume. I didn’t think we were supposed to be taking things off out on the floor, but technically all my clothes were still on.

Bobo groaned and leaned closer, and I ran my cheek against the shaved side of his skull. “You make a man wanna lose all control,” he growled, “and do some unseemly things to you.”

The lust was spiraling fast. I would have been much more afraid if we weren’t in the middle of the slowly-filling club, if my boss weren’t right there watching us. Because my desire was answering Bobo’s and I wasn’t sure how much control I was going to be maintaining either.

Bobo pulled back with a noticeable swallow, lidded eyes still fixed on the rhythmic motion of my body as I continued to follow the song. “What’s the plan here, anyway?” he asked. I got the notion that he was trying to clear his head too. “You a spy, 'Angel,’ just keeping an eye on Jonas and his gang?” A smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth as he met my eyes. “Or is this the beginning of some kind of undercover sting operation. Maybe you’ve got some guns stashed somewhere,” he tried to look down my back, “so you can cover Wynonna in a hail of bullets from the stage later? Now that would be something to see.”

I dropped and rolled my body low for a beat, then came back up with a teasing little grin. “I’m not one to kiss and tell,” I quipped.

“Oh, you wanna give me a kiss?” Bobo let his lips part, gazing down at mine.

I put both hands on his shoulders, leaning in slowly. I ghosted my lips just above his cheekbone, close enough for him to feel my breath. “Against the rules,” I whispered in his ear.

“But whose rules are you following,” he whispered back, tempting me with a grip stretched wide around my ribs, both thumbs sliding up to tickle the bottoms of my breasts.

Fuck. I could pretend my panting breaths were solely the fault of the physical exertion of dancing, but that would be a bold-faced lie. The adrenaline and lust were mixing together in a cocktail more intoxicating than any alcohol, and I found myself wishing that we were somewhere more private, where Bobo and I could do more than just tease each other.

I failed to notice Jonas walking over, hypnotized as I was by the sensation of Bobo’s fingertips swirling over my nipples. “What do you think, Bobo, you like her?” the boss asked, smirking at the adorned hands that had just started palming both my breasts.

“She’s all right,” Bobo said. He dropped his hands to my hips and looked over at Jonas like he was interrupting.

Jonas wasn’t stupid. Reading the situation, he knew what play it was to his advantage to make next. He ran his hand over my shoulders, possessively. “I’ve got a good feeling about Angel, here. She’s gonna make me a lot of money. Once she learns how to work a little harder.” His hand came to the back of my neck and he turned my face up to meet his. “Why don’t you take Mr. Del Rey here back to the Champagne Room. Thirty minutes.” He turned back to Bobo. “On the house, of course.” They exchanged smiles. “Then come talk to me, we’ll see how you feel about my business after that.”

So now I was a bargaining chip. Bobo nodded to Jonas, not giving him much to read in his face after that final comment.

Jonas drew me back and pointed me toward the hallway leading to the “private” booths. Here at Pussy Willows, the Champagne Room was past all those, a truly private area with a door that closed and its own wet bar and tiny stage.

I guess I was getting my wish. I tried not to shiver as I put on a bright smile for Jonas’ benefit and reached out for Bobo’s hand. “Right this way, darlin’.”

Jonas grabbed my arm before I passed him up, leaning down to growl into my ear. “And since you seem so concerned about the rules, Angel: you let him touch you everywhere. And you do whatever he asks you to. He ain’t no cop. And I need you to make him feel like a king.”

Part Two Here

Taglist: @allsharingonebreath, @demoncrypt1066, @writingfromasgard, @that-was-not-supposed-to-happen, @peachieowl @savismith @ceridwenofwales @equalstrashflavoredtrash @ivarinleatherpants @fandomfic-galore

#bobo del rey #bobo del rey imagine #bobo smut #wynonna earp fanfiction #wynonna earp fic

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loudsuitlover · 5 years

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Ohana

A/N: New series. I’m super excited about this! It’s a new format to the one I’m used to post in here but I got a few asks about writing in a different person- like not on second person and I decided I would share this with all of you. I hope you guys like it!

Preview:

“Okay what’s with you and normal food? There are vegan burgers too if you’re one of those people.”

“Vegan you mean?” She chuckles. “No, I eat meat is just I wouldn’t eat it at this time of the night.” She says but something tells me there’s more to that than the time.

“Well what would you have at this time of the night?” I grin because in my head I had pictured her eating something entirely different at this time of the night.

I don’t really know why- I don’t even know this girl- but I’ve been thinking about her like that since I saw her earlier tonight. She was walking next to Gemma and even though she was nodding her head at my sister’s incesant talking, I knew she wasn’t listening. I don’t blame her though, Gemma can be a pain in the ass, and I bet she was telling her about that stupid dolphins show she made us watch in LA anyway so who couldn’t blame her for not being interested? But there was something about her that got my attention. She wasn’t paying attention at anyone at all. Moreover, I had been looking at her for most of the night and she hadn’t realized until her eyes accidentally bumped into me and the moment I looked at her she looked away and never looked back at me.

I don’t want to sound like a self-centered guy, but I’m not used to having girls look at me once and not make eye contact. I don’t think she’s noticed either how Noah looks at her but I wonder if they have already slept together or he was just doing her on his mind. She just doesn’t seem to notice things. I bet she doesn’t know she frowns a lot when she’s thinking too, but I like her attitude.

Jamie

Leaving Mateo alone is the hardest thing I have done in months. Well, technically he isn’t alone; he isn’t even with just any nanny, he’s with my mum and I can’t think of better hands to leave my son than with the woman who rised me but ever since he was born five months ago, we haven’t been apart for more than an hour. I have decided on breastfeeding him and so far that has given me the perfect excuse not to stay away from him for too long but Charlie is getting impatient- she keeps repeating I can have a baby and still be 21 years old- and because after fifteen years I know better than to fight her, I agreed on going out tonight.

Jack and Charlie said they would pick me up and give me a ride to a little get together at somebody else’s house where I don’t know anybody other than them. How exciting. I stare at myself in the mirror at my parent’s hall thinking back to when I used to check myself out here every day right after school and I would wonder how many hours I had been with that strand of hair looking like a radio antenna on the top of my head. It almost takes me a while to recognize myself, I haven’t worn any makeup since I got pregnant and it’s like I had almost forgotten how I looked like with it on, but Mum insisted on taking care of that for me while Dad “bonded with his grandson” and looking at myself in the mirror now I almost look like the person I was before I gave birth. I grin, like testing it out, but it also makes me somewhat happy that just some light bangs and some eyeliner can make me look as some random uni girl again. I turn to my side, having a look at my flat stomach. It seems unreal to me that I carried a baby in my belly for 39 weeks.

“You look absolutely gorgeous, right Will?” Mum asks dad as they both stare at me from the kitchen door.

I roll my eyes. I could be 41 and they would still act as if I was going out for the night for the first time in my life.

“Guys, I’m just going out with Charlie and Jack. Stop acting as if this was my senior year prom all over again.” I chuckle.

“We’re not.” My mum defends them both. “We’re just happy you get out of the house. You know your dad and I are always free to babysit our lovely grandson, isn’t that right Will?”

I share a knowing look with dad. After 21 years of living together, we both know there’s no way one can contradict Alice Johnson so he just nods at her and we both chuckle, making my mum smile excitedly.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be back soon anyway.”

“I mean you don’t have to.” She smiles, encouraging me to get out and be social and all that shit like she had been doing since I got pregnant. “We were thinking you could even go back to your apartment and we’ll drive Mateo there in the morning.”

“And leave Mateo here all night? No way. What if he wakes up crying and I’m not here? He’ll feel abandoned and he’s so little, he’s used to sleeping next to me and I breastfeed him every night, he’ll probably cry so hard.”

“Baby, your mum and I have raised two children. I think we’ll know what to do.”

My dad smiles at me and I regonize that smile. It’s the same he used to give me when I would ask him why to every single thing on Earth when I was seven years old and only then I realize I am getting paranoid. Again. I take a deep breath. If I can’t leave my child with my own parents then how am I ever going to get a job? I start to feel a tinge of anxiety running down the back of my neck when, as if on cue, I hear a car parking on my parents’ driveway and my phone vibrates on my purse.

“Okay, they’re here.” I say, more to myself than to my parents and then I give them an awkward smile. “Just... Please call me if he doesn’t go down okay?”

“We will.” My mum smiles. “Now relax, have fun and” she puts her fingers up in the air as if she wanted to point at the sky and starts moving her hips, I suppose trying to dance, but really she looks as if she’s trying to get a spider off her jeans “blame it on the boogie!”

I don’t know what she wants to say with that, but quite frankly I’m afraid to know, so instead of asking I try to supress my laughter and walk outside the house while Dad asks her what she’s doing. As soon as I make it outside the house, Jack turns on the main beam lights of his car and almost blinds me as I try to walk towards them. I flip him the bird and get on the back seat as Charlie swats his arm playfully but he keeps on laughing. She turns around from the passenger seat and gave me a beaming grin.

“Hi, love! You look absolutely gorgeous! We might have to go out after all so guys can see you! Doesn’t she look lovely, Jack?”

“She does look lovely, yeah.” He smiles.

“And almost blind, thank to you.” I retort but he just chuckles, not even pretending to be sorry the little shit. “And I thought we were going out?”

“Well we are going to Chloe’s.” Charlie says as she does her lipstick using the mirror on the gray flap over the passeger seat of her boyfriend’s car. “But don’t worry, babe, there’s gonna be lots of guys.” She moves the flap so her hazel eyes meet with mine through the tiny mirror and then she wiggles her eyebrows making me roll my eyes. “Single and fancy.”

“I see you’re really up to date on the single guys department, Charles.” Jack jokes making Charlie adorably giggle.

I smile at their interaction, those two are made for one another. I remember when Jack was head over heels for Charlie and she wouldn’t even pay attention to him. He was the sweetest guy in the whole school but of course Charlie couldn’t see that because that was the time when she was obsessed with Zac- I’m pretty sure it was because his name was Zac like Zac Efron- who was the football captain and a total dick, and it wasn’t until they both got into college that she fell for him too; but ever since then they have been inseparable and if there is such a thing as a soulmate then they are that for one another.

“You promised you were not going to set me up with anybody tonight. That’s the only reason I even agreed to come out.” I remind her, hoping she wouldn’t lie to me, even though I know she wouldn’t.

“I know. Relax! I don’t even know who’s going.” She grins. “Entirely.” She adds.

I laugh on the back of their car all the way to her friend’s house and swallow the lump in my throat as soon as we arrive to one of the richest parts in London. I look down at my little black dress and all of a sudden it doesn’t seem to me like something appropriate for this part of town. Anyway I have nothing to fake- I am going to go out tonight with Charlie and her friends and then crawl back to Mateo for another year.

The three of us stand on the door waiting for someone to open it as Jack keeps messing with my newly cut very-light-barely-there bangs and saying I look just like I did in eleventh grade. God I hope he’s lying. I try to decipher the music they’re playing inside, thinkin it can give me a little clue about what sort of people are going to be sitting past the door. I imagine they might be a bunch of snobs who only listen to Alicia Keys or Adele, but instead this music sounds like one of those bands from the 70s my dad would play as he fixed stuff around the house on the weekends when I was little.

A brunette girl with thick bangs and a face full of freckles opens the door. Her eyes strick me for I can’t quite tell which colour they are. One moment they seem green and the next I’d swear they are completely brown and then she looks up at Jack and they seem gray to me. She is gorgeous, that’s for sure, and she has one of those smiles that takes a while to forget. I try to smile back as best as I can but I am already afraid all of the girls in this house are going to be this pretty.

“Hi Gemma!” Charlie greets her, giving her a cuddle as if they had known ech other forever before the girl smiles at Jack.

“Hi, guys! Long time no see! I have to tell you both about my trip to LA!” She sings. “Oh, hi!” Her smile only brightens when she notices me. “I’m Gemma.”

“Hi, I’m Jamie.”

It’s funny how our names sound kind of alike, even though it won’t be funny is I spend the whole night thinking they’re calling my name every time they talk to her. I remember in fifth grade there was a girl in my class called Amy and I always looked when the teacher scolded her- cause she also wouldn’t shut up- and I hated it. The three of them chat among them as we make our way towards the living room where I suppose the rest of the guests are hanging out and I appreciate Gemma’s attempts at including me in their conversation. If she’s going to be this nice, I won’t even mind if I get confused when they call her name. She keeps looking at me as she talks about LA and how she has seen stars at Griffith Observatory and whatnot and I silently feel embarrassed to think the only things I know about LA are that most celebrities go there all the time and that they have long, wide roads with palm trees on either side. It even seems funny to me, that one would go to see starts precisely to LA where I would think the light pollution is so high you can barely even see the sky but it seems like I am wrong about that too.

As soon as we get to the living room I am surprised to see it’s not as big as I thought it’d be. All the way to the living room- and that’s already saying a lot for in my parents’ house it literally takes a minute to walk into the living room from the door; not to mention my apartment, where the door literally opens to the living room, no space in between- but at this Chloe’s house, it all seems to be fancy and expensive- even the paint on the walls seems expensive. But when we get to the living room it seems normal, with gray colour walls, a chimney with no fire on and a tobacco colour couch which seems rather comfy.

Gemma asks me what I want to drink and I politely ask her for a glass of water, apparently making her frown in amusement before she says she would have to pop to the kitchen for that. I stay there glancing through one of the walls which is made out of glass catching a glimpse of the swimming pool and the balcony right before the London city lights. Okay, maybe thinking this house was normal was a little silly.

Gemma comes back carrying a small plastic bottle of water and she gently touches it against my elbow until I face her and she giggles. I thank her and smile.

“Oh, there you are!”

This time a blond girl with long straight hair walk towards us. She has blue eyes and one of the sexiest bodies I have ever seen. I swear she has flesh everywhere you’re supposed to have flesh and she is slender everywhere you’re supposed not to have any. I think about my thighs touching each other under my dress.

Charlie hugs her and I notice that compared to this girl’s hair, Charlie’s hair doesn’t even seem blond but rather hazel and she looks so thin. The beautiful blonde gives her a warm smile before she turns to Jack and greets him with the same enthusiasm.

“Hey Chloe, this is my friend Jamie.” Charlie grins, wrapping her thin arm around my shoulders and pulling me to her side.

“Oh, hi, Jamie! I love your dress!”

Despite looking like a blow-up doll, I like her already.

“Thanks for having me.”

I catch her having a sip of her champagne flute so she just frowns and shakes her head dismissing my comment as she hums with one finger up as if asking me for a moment while she swallows.

“No, no!” She says. “Thanks for coming. There’s food on those tables and drinks...” She looks around the room “Everywhere.” She grins excitedly as if she has just realized that, despite it being her house and that make us all laugh. “I guess you don’t know anybody.” She tells me to which I bite my bottom lip.

She must have noticed my anxious expression because she just chuckles and drops it even though I am afraid her real intentions had been introducing me to everyone. She looks like the kind of girl who would just get up in a table and attract everybody’s attention and say hey y’all, this is Jamie. Well, probably she wouldn’t have said y’all, but in my head she did. She invites me to sit on one of the couches with some of her friends and I just smile at them as they talk to me.

I am not an anxious person, not even socially awkward- hell, I am a waitress and I recommend plates to strangers all the time; but being the only strange person in a room full of people that know each other wouldn’t be easy for anyone, especially when all those people seem to have so much more money than my entire family combined.

Chloe asks me if I do yoga, which quite frankly seems like a rather weird question to me, but judging by the way they all expect to hear my answer, it seems to be something these rich people would talk about. I consider lying, a bit of fitting in won’t hurt anybody, but then I realize I can easily get caught if they start talking about those stretches like the lying dog or the fighter frog I have no idea about and to save myself from the embarrassment I go with the truth.

“She probably said it because your arms look strong.”

Charlie tries to save me and I end up laughing out loud, not only because she can’t not be awkward for the life of her but because for a second I consider telling all these young people my arms aren’t strong because of yoga but after carrying 15 pounds worth of baby- 15,5 if I haven’t changed his nappy after the night sleep.

Realizing I just laughed at something that wasn’t even funny for anyone else, I look away from the people in my new chat group as if trying to get away for a second and then I notice Harry Styles himself is laughing and talking to some random guys. I recognize him straight away, I have seen him before in his own concert. I went with Charlie over a year ago when I had just found out I was expecting a baby, whom I would raise on my own. Apparently, Harry Styles was giving a concert in London that weekend and she thought it would cheer me up. It’s not like I was a fan or anything- I hadn’t even listened to his last album other than that song they always played on the radio, Sign of the times- but she was right, I did have a good time. Especially when both Charlie and I jumped and danced as he reapeated “I’m having your baby, it’s none of your business” over and over again because for the first time since I had gotten that positive result, I was happy Mateo’s father was out of the picture.

I try not to look at him for too long, the last thing I need is for him to catch me staring and think I’m some crazy fan who’s planning how to secretly steal one curl of his head but there’s something quite magnetic about him. I can understand how he sells arenas all around the world. There’s something about the way he just stands there, joking and laughing, as if he owned the room but not being fully aware of it. I won’t deny he is really handsome too, especially when he laughs and those dimples dig holes on his cheeks. Without my consent, my eyes travell down his lean figure. His shirt is black but very thin and is barely buttoned up to where his sternum ends so I can see some of his tattoos an my greedy mind immediately imagines how they would look without the soft cover. I swiftly look away the moment his green eyes fall on me, probably aware of my intrusive stare, but even though I don’t look back at him, I can feel him staring at me.

One of Chloe’s male friends asks if he can sit down next to me and I immediately remove my purse as if I am desperate for somebody to take that place even though I’m not. I know I give him a weird grimace because he laughs but he doesn’t mention it which I appreciate. We all chat in a group for a while and I learn that the girl who’s sitting in front of me is called Olivia and the guy next to her, who I think is Gemma’s boyfriend’s name is Michal. My mind might be playing tricks on me, but I would swear Harry keeps glancing my way from the corner where he’s standing. I’m not big-headed. I mean I think I’m pretty, but not even half as pretty as any of these girls are and anyway he’s a rockstar- he would never set his eyes on me- but damn it if he’s not looking at me. I try to ignore him anyway. Maybe there’s something between my teeth and these people are just too nice to tell me. Or maybe I’ve got a booger. Man that would be embarrassing.

Charlie places a daiquiri on the table right in front of me and I give her a questioning look. I haven’t drank since the night I got pregnant and she knows this but looking at her smile I know what she’s thinking. I smile back, the truth is I’m having fun like I haven’t in a long time and I have bumped enough milk for Mateo for another day so I return her teasing smirk and bring the black straw to my lips. She clapps her hands together and does a little dance which makes me roll my eyes but I smile nonetheless.

Right as I finish my second daiquiri, I accidentally wet the knee of the guy who sat next to me about a half hour ago and that gets us talking. His name is Noah and after some light chatting I learn that he’s American- his accent gives him away- and that we actually have some things in common. We soon discover we went to the same uni- even though I dropped out last year but I don’t tell him why- and there’s no shutting us up after that. From the corner of my eye I can see Charlie wiggling her eyebrows like a fifteen years old teasing a friend who’s talking with a crush and I almost roll my eyes at her but instead I chuckle and blush- Gosh, I’m tipsier than I thought- and then I glance back at Noah and bite my bottom lip, as if apologizing for my weird antics.

“Man” he stifles a laugh “you’re really pretty.”

I grin like the Cheshire cat in seconds. The way he has said that- and the daiquiris- have me grinning like a teen girl. I hoped Charlie was listening so she cuts the bullshit about my flirting skills; or maybe she would expect me to go home with Noah, and even though he seems nice and he is very attractive- with that olive skin and that wavy brown hair and that childish smile, I am not sure I want to go home with him- or anyone for that matter.

“Thank you.” I smile and next thing I know I have got hiccup and my eyes widen as I look at him. he threw his head back and started laughing hard.

I haven’t gotten hiccup in forever, in fact it has been so long I didn’t remember it was so annoying- feeling my chest going up and down on its own. I hold my breath, I heard somewhere it took the hiccup away, because it is too late to lift my arms over my head, you can only go through three hiccups before you do that and my stupid, drunken overwhelm about hiccup has distracted me. As I take a mouthful of air, hoping it would take me through the 30 seconds I had to hold my breath, Noah laughs harder.

“So cute!” He chuckles.

I give him a drunken grin, boycotting my own attempt at land-base scuba diving in the process, before I stand up and prepare myself to find the kitchen. As soon as I get up, I realize I have managed to spend some time without thinking about Harry Styles and I realize too that it hasn’t felt as if he was staring at me. Definitely, it has been my mind playing tricks on me. For some reason, I search for him, maybe to enjoy some of the eye candy he’s displaying but I can’t find him. For all I know he's gone. It’s like I feel a little disappointed, for some reason I thought I might have the chance to talk to him, but of course guys like Harry Styles don’t really talk to girls like Jamie Johnson.

I jump and bring my hand to my chest the minute I get to the kitchen fot there he is, as silent as a house cat, pouring some gin on a glass. He gives me an amused smile and the air in my lungs is nearly gone. He really is handsome and I’m talking, the overwhelming kind of hansome. His face is just perfect, his got a perfect straight nose and I almost bring my hand to mine because there’s just no way someone has a nose like that, and his jaw is perfectly shaped. I can feel thousands upon thousands of girls screaming for me to do something or say something but I’m afraid even though I’m not I might look like one of those crazy fangirls who would give everything they had just to have him signing their boob. I shake my head to clear my thoughts and rest my glass on the table. I decide I don’t have to talk to him.

“Hopefully that scare took your hiccup away.” He smirks and I chuckle, for some reason somewhat embarrass.

“Yeah” I still have my hand against my heart and I can feel it beating. “You made me jump.”

“Sorry about that.” He smiles. His green eyes set on my glass for just a moment and noting it was empty he raises his eyebrows at me and asks “What are you drinking?”

“Uuhh, I think a daiquiri or a caipirinha or something like that. I’m not really sure what it was.”

He smiles again and makes me smile too- his smile is kind of contagious. I didn’t know he was so smiley, he didn’t appeared to me like the kind of person who would smile all the time, but rather like some sort of dark, interseting indie artis who had too many things on his mind to walk around smiling to people. I’m really bad at assumptions. I notice his eyes are glossy and his skin is a little flushed so I know he is at least as tipsy as I am and I think that might be the reason for his smiling nature. His green eyes linger on my face before he looks at my glass again and stretches his hand towards it, silently asking me to hand it to him.

“Oh, no, don’t worry! I can make it on my own!” I lie. I have no idea how to make a daiquiri whatsoever but at this point I’m drunk enough to drink any other thing. “Thank you.”

“Can you please hand me your glass and stop acting as if you knew how to make a daiquiri?” He grins smugly. How the hell did he know that?

“Like you know how to make one?” I tease instead.

He stare deep into my eyes and I know he’s just pretending to be highly offended by my apparent doubts at his ability to make Cuban cocktails. I can feel my lips curl up into a smile before he answers.

“‘F course I know how to make a daiquiri, angel face.”

I don’t know why I’m blushing. I guess the fact that some attractive guy calls me angel face apparently can make me blush. Then I remember even though I know his he doesn’t know my name and I think that’s the reason he called me that.

“So” he starts, having a sip of his drink before he starts reading the label of the rest of the bottles “first we need white rum.” He finally choose a bottle and looks at me with a warm smile. “You see? There’s no cachaza, that’s how I know you were not drinking a caipirinha” he smiles smugly, obviously enjoying leaving me looking like an idiot by proving he indeed knows how to make cocktails. I should have known better. “Where’s the cocktail shaker? Please don’t tell me your friend has been giving you cocktails without having the decency to use the shaker...” He shakes his head, smiling playfully as he searches for a cocktail shaker across somebody else’s kitchen and I start to think he’s just putting on a show “Oh angel face... You’ve been drinking shit all night!”

I throw my head back and laugh out loud as he grins triumphantly. He’s definitely putting on a show. I take it he’s a bit eccentric, not that it surprises me judging by the clothes he chose to wear tonight.

“But we’re going to fix that right now” he wiggles his eyebrows as he softly shakes the cocktail shaker he just found in one of the cupboards “so then, pay attention angel face,” it even sounds natural now, the way he says my new nickname “then you can tell these guys you did it yourself, you squeeze half a lime. It has to be half, yeah? Not more, not less. Then you add sugar and you mix them together and then you add the rum.”

He starts literally giggling as he pours as much rum as he wants to and I laugh, surprised at his showman skills, no wonder he makes a living out of this.

“What?” He asks, faking ignorance.

“How much rum are you supposed to use? You get all scientific with the half lime and then there’s no exact amount of rum? Which I reckon it’s the most important part?”

He chuckles.

“The most important part? Somebody drinks like a pirate here...” He grins. “No, there is, there is. But, angel face, when you’re a pro at making cocktails like me, you’ll be able to measure alcohol with just your very eyes.” He purses his lips and raises his eyebrows as if that would make him right and he makes me laugh. “Now, you shake it with the ice for 13 seconds” He smiles and I start to wonder if he isn’t making the whole thing up and he has never made a daiquiri before. Maybe this is not how you make a daiquiri at all. “Wanna do it?”

“Oh, no, please. I’ll let the expert do the honours.”

“Smart girl.”

He grins and I giggle during the 13 seconds as he counts them out loud, his defined arms shaking the metal glass over his shoulders, his green eyes set on me. I notice they are greener at this close up distance than they had looked at the concert.

“There you go...” He hands me the cocktail perfectly poured on my glass and looks into my eyes questioningly “I don’t think I got your name.”

I knew it. The angel face times are about to end.

“Jamie.” I give him a smile.

He grins, offering me his hand to shake and I take it, once again feeling all his fans roaring through my veins. I think it’s funny that out of all the women in London he has come to shake my hand. I almost tell him I know nothing about him, just to make things clear.

“Harry.” He says. Well that I knew. “It’s nice to meet you.”

I hear Charlie calling my name from the living room so I turn my head towards the door and raise my voice asking her what she wants. If I wasn’t drunk, I would have probably noticed I am being rude, raising my voice at somebody else’s house as if it was my own, but I am drunk enough not to care about it. Harry is smirking when I turn to face him.

Harry

Gee, she’s pretty even with her hair all over her face. She turned her head towards the door so fast that I was afraid she had given herself whiplash but she’s smiling back at me now so I reckon that means she’s okay. I chuckle at how excited she seems to be, even though her friend hasn’t heard her yelling.

“She didn’t hear me.” She points out to me as if I hadn’t been in the room too.

“Yeah I don’t know how she didn’t.” I tease her, but only because I like to see her blushing.

I don’t have to turn my head to know the meat pie I popped in the oven is not ready yet but I’m fearing she’s going to say she has to go check on her friend because I don’t think I’m going to get the chance to just walk back towards her without looking like a creep if she goes to the living room before I do. She looks like she’s waiting for me to say something else and the thought that maybe she just doesn’t want to go either for some reason speeds up my heartbeat. We are just smiling at each other.

“I’m... I’m gonna have to go check on her” she starts and I nod, pretending her words didn’t bother me. “Uh, are you coming?”

I grin. So she doesn’t want to stop talking to me either. I look back at the oven- 12 minutes left and then my eyes met her hazel ones once again.

“I am waiting for a meat pie.” I tell her and she scrunches her nose and gives me a weird look. “I am hungry, aren’t you?”

“Yes but I wouldn’t have a meat pie now.” She says seemingly disgusted at my appetite.

There was pizza on Chloe’s fridge too and vegan burgers but I’m not into that kind of shit. She had lots of vegetables too but I wasn’t about to cook a wok at 9 am so I decided on one of the many meat pies she had on the freezer. I tell Jamie there’s pizza too in case she’s hungry but she scrunches up her nose once again.

“Okay what’s with you and normal food? There are vegan burgers too if you’re one of those people.”

“Vegan you mean?” She chuckles. “No, I eat meat is just I wouldn’t eat it at this time of the night.” She says but something tells me there’s more to that than the time.

“Well what would you have at this time of the night?” I grin because in my head I had pictured her eating something entirely different at this time of the night.

“I’d have ice cream.” She smiles.

Okay, she’s cute.

“Ice cream? What are you? 5?”

She giggles before she rolls her eyes at me. I really like her attitude and then I catch her trying to see how much time left we need to wait for the oven to beep. I realize I actually don’t know how old she is. I look at the timer myself.

“There’s seven minutes left now.”

“That’s barely any time at all.”

She takes a seat on one of the stools in front of her. I’m glad she decided to stay, mostly because seven minutes more with me means seven minutes less with Noah so I smile at her. I’m so hungry seven minutes seem like a year.

“Yeah well say that to all those poor people who had to spend seven minutes of heaven with someone with a bad breath.”

She laughs and I can’t help but grin at my achievement.

“Has that ever happened to you?” She asks.

I shake my head. I have never played that game but I know it exists because Kaia has told me. I wonder if Jamie has ever played and for some reason the thought of someone spending seven minutes of heaven with her brings some sense of protectiong in me. I have no idea what’s going on with me.

“How old are you?” I ask her.

I know it’s a rather personal question and maybe it’s a little strange to ask such a thing at 12 am in Chloe’s kitchen to a girl I don’t know but I’ve been trying to figure it out myself and I have only gotten to the conclusion that she can’t be older than twenty-something but those are ten years of possibilities and I made her a cocktail so I think I’m entitled to know if I did something illegal or not. She looks at me as if she was weighing whether to tell me the truth or not.

“Twenty-one.”

I think she’s being honest and relief washes over me the minute she tells me so I catch myself on the lie I just gave myself about wanting to know her age because I gave her alcohol. I can’t believe I’m considering having something with her but I have to admit I wanted her to be legal for different reasons than alcohol consumption.

“And you?”

“Twenty-five.”

She almost frowns and I have to fight the grin that wants to stretch my lips. I might not know her but I know she’s considering whether I told her the truth or not. Why would I lie? She could google it anyway.

“Do you live here?”

I’m gladly surprised by her question and I know she’s surprised she asked that too. I would give her a hard time about it for frowning so much if I wasn’t afraid she might think she crossed a line and close off but for now it seems that she doesn’t mind personal and I could use that to my advantage. For a second I don’t know what she means by here because to be fair I am indeed cooking Chloe’s food and making cocktails in her kitchen so she might think I actually live in this house, but maybe she’s just asking whether I live in London and I like that’s something she has wondered because it might mean she’d want to see me again.

“In London?” She nods. Good. “Uh, yeah. Well I mean, sometimes it’s hard to know where I live” I chuckle “I travel around a lot but... I guess if I think of home, right after Holmes Chapel I would think of London.”

“So you’re from Holmes Chapel?” She seems interested.

“Yes” I have a sip from my drink “I was born there but then I started singing when I was sixteen and moved to London.”

“You moved on your own when you were sixteen years old?”

She seems horrified by that and that makes me think she is close to her family. She might even still live with them and I find that endearing. I’m close to my family too. I moved away out of need really and I didn’t know how nice it was to live with my mum and sister until I went away. I nod.

“I like London but there’s nothing like going back home and feel how old I am when I walk down the river where I used to go as a teenager.”

She laughs and nods her head.

“What about you? You’re from London?”

I can tell by her accent she is, but she might as well just have been living here long enough for the accent to stick. I know a bunch of people who do that. It’s like Jeffrey, he starts aspiring the ts and the rs if we spend enough time in Machester. Jamie seems to ponder whether to lie again.

“Yes.”

“You don’t look like it.” I say, just to see her reaction.

She frowns a lot and looks at me as if I had lost all common sense. It’s priceless. She’s so expressive.

“And how is a London girl supposed to look like according to you?” She inquires, almost accusatorily.

I’m afraid she might give me a lecture about prejudice and stereotypes and how bad is to be biased but I grin and shrug.

“Like Chloe.” I tell her.

I love it when she frowns.

“You mean rich and blonde and pretty? ‘Cause I’m just one of all three.” She jokes cheerfully and I can tell she’s waiting to see if I find it funny.

I don’t cause it’s true. She is pretty and it kind of bothers me that she would think she could joke about that. I hate it when beautiful girls don’t know they’re beautiful. It’s not about being self-absorbed but rather not pulling themselves down. I’m not saying she’s perfect. Hell, I’m sure she’s got hundreds of flaws but being ugly is not one of them. I choose to tease her instead.

“Oh, so you’re rich?”

She rolls her eyes and I chuckle at her reaction but I’m afraid she might go to the living room if she takes it the wrong way. She doesn’t stand from her stool though, not even when the oven beeps and I turn around to open it. She looks at my meat pie with a disgusted expression and I wait for her to sass me after my teasing.

“You’re not funny.” She shrugs and that only makes me laugh.

“You’re right, I’m not. I’m just very honest.” I keep it up because I know she’s not taking it to heart.

I’ve been flirting with her long enough for her to know I think she’s attractive anyway and the fact that she has chosen to stay in the kitchen with me instead of going back to the party with everyone else kind of tells me she might find me attractive too. She hums and nods as if she was waiting for me to elaborate.

“Really?” She asks when I don’t.

“Really.” I smile, cutting the meat pie in half just in case she wants some after all. “It’s like” I grab my half and blow on it hoping it would cool it down sooner. I’m really fucking hungry. “If you ask anyone out there” I’m thinking about Noah “if that dress makes your ass look fat they wouldn’t even think about it, they’d just say no so as not to hurt your feelings but if you asked me, I’d tell you the truth.”

She is smirking at me and I don’t think she’s aware of what that’s doing to me. I don’t know why but I can’t help but smile too, her expressions are contagious. This time I can’t figure out what she’s thinking and man, I would give a finger away to know. I feel a little giddy, almost like a teenage boy, and I bite the meat pie so as to occupy my mouth on something. She just smiles.

“You’re weird.” She blurts out and I laugh despite the fucking boiling bite of meat in my mouth. Maybe it wasn’t very smart to sunk my teeth that far away on the pie.

“You’re really not going to ask me?” I laugh.

“What?” She frowns.

“If I think that dress makes your ass look fat.”

She frowns again but this time her lips betrayed her and curled into a smile.

“Mmhmm.... No.” She shakes her head. “I know it doesn’t and you’re just looking for an excuse to check my ass out.”

I already checked her ass out. Multiple times. But I just grin at her comeback. I guess I underestimated her when she joked about her beauty, she did because she knows she’s pretty and I like that she’s confident. I also like that she’s not afraid of calling me out or give me weird looks and that despite all that she’s staying here with me anyway. I offer her the rest of the meat pie but she just gives me a disgusted grimace.

“Ew, no” She frowns again making me laugh “Plus I know you’re burning your throat like hell with that.” She mentions making me laugh.

She is smiling at me. She’s engaging without being too nice and I like that. I know she wouldn’t let me walk all over her or impose my interests over hers- she didn’t want meat pie and she said it and she even said she would have ice cream instead. I like that she’s not afraid to speak her mind when she disagrees with me and I know for a fact that she would kick me if I touched her inappropiately, which I would never do; hell, no; but it’s nice to know she’s that kind of girl. Shit, I like her.

Her phone vibrates against the table and only then I notice it’s been there the whole time. I eat the other half of the pie after making sure she really doesn’t want any and nod at her to attend her phone. She texts whoever it is that texted her and I frown when I check the time. It’s almost one am so the thought of her boyfriend texting her is the most plausible one.

“Hey” She looks up at me and I notice that amused spark on her brown eyes she just had a minute ago is gone. Damn it, she’s beautiful even when she’s concerned. “I have to go.” She smiles.

No! I nod.

“I...” It’s like she doesn’t know how to say goodbye to me. “I’m gonna go tell Charlie.”

“Do you need a ride?” I offer.

“No” She shakes her head. “I’ll get an Uber.”

Yeah, at 1 am, alone. No way.

“No, you won’t.” I smile trying to ease this weird protective instinct that’s taking over me. “I’m leaving too. I’ll give you a ride.”

“No, really, it’s 1 am, you... You don’t have to.”

“Precisely because it’s 1 am” I insist “I’m not about to let you take an Uber alone.” She doesn’t say anything but I know she’s thinking of a way to decline my offer. “You can either let me drive you or make me follow your Uber until your house and then drive home.” I shrug.

She rolls her eyes but I know I’ve won this one.

“Let me tell Charlie you’re giving me a ride then.”

I nod and wait for her by the door while I text Gemma I’m going home. God knows I don’t want to go back to that living room and pretend I like any of her friends other than Chloe who I can at least tolerate. I keep my hands on my pocket and rest my head against the wall.

She tilts her head to the door silently telling me to move when she gets back and I even like that too. I seem to like everything she does. She walks next to me but somewhat far away as we make our way towards my car and I try to hide a smile as I see her looking around the different cars parked out here trying to figure out which one is mine.

“So” she tells me “where’s your Porsche?”

I laugh.

“Lamborghini then?” She raises her eyebrows. “Ferrari?”

I can’t take it. She’s funny. I stop next to my black Range Rover and smirk at her and she smiles. I can tell she likes that I drive this car instead of a Porsche. Don’t get me wrong, I have a Porsche too, I just don’t drive it around London; but I won’t tell her that.

“Safety over speed.” She appreciates. “I like it.”

I chuckle as I open the door for her and she purses her lips and tilts her head to the side before she gets on the passenger seat.

“So” I tell her as I sit on the drivers’ seat and start the car “where are we going?”

“I’ll give you the indications.”

I smile. She doesn’t want to give me her address just yet and I respect that. After all, she doesn’t really know me. I’m actually kind of proud that she would take these many precautions. It relaxes me to think she can keep herself safe.

“Alright.”

I turn on the radio and let Stevie’s voice fill the car as I take my eyes off the road for a second to glance at her and watch her reaction. None. I like watching her as Edge of Seventeen is playing. I lower down the volume and ask her.

“Do you know who that is?”

She looks at me.

“You mean the singer?”

I nod.

“I’m not an idiot.”

I smile. I like that she’s mouthy and I think her answer makes her all the more sexy.

“Now turn left.” She tells me.

I do as she says and keep bothering her. For some reason I want to hear her say her name,

“So” I query “what’s her name?”

“You think I don’t know who she is.” She throws her head back and laughs. “It’s not even like I need to know anything about music to know who she is. She’s fucking famous.” She chuckles.

“You still haven’t said her name.” I grin. I know she knows who she is.

“She’s Stevie Nicks and you’re an idiot.”

I laugh at her reply again. I don’t get tired at listening to what she has to say.

“So you like Stevie?” I ask her.

If she says yes I’ll ask her to marry me before we get to her apartment.

“Take the second exit at the roundabout and at the traffic lights turn left.” She indicates and I nod, hoping we’re still far away from her house. “And yes I do.”

“Who’s your favourite singer?” I can’t stop smiling.

“It’s not you.” She jokes which makes me laugh.

I didn’t expect her to say it was me anyway even though I would admit I would have loved it.

“Alright.” I grin at her. “Then who is it?”

It only takes her a second to answer and that surprises me. Most people always think about it long and hard as if they would ever give a right answer. I think she just said the first singer that crossed her mind.

“Steve Perry.”

But Gosh I really like this girl.

“Uuuuh.” I nod my head. “Fair enough.”

“Turn left on this next street and then at the gas station turn right. Then it’s all straight until you have to turn left.”

I don’t recognize this part of town. It’s a residential area for families and I start to doubt whether she has taken me to a fake direction and now she’s just going to knock on some random family’s door so long as I don’t know where she lives. Something tells me she has made me take some wrong turns so I wouldn’t remember how to get to her house, wary angel face.

“This is my street.” She says. “You can stop whenever you want now.”

I see her eyes set on one of the house to our right so I drive up there and stop the car. She gives me a smile but I can tell she’s a little freaked out I got her house right. I smile.

“Well” she starts “thanks for the ride, Harry.” She takes her seatbelt off. I smile and nod. “And for the daiquiri.”

I laugh.

“You’re welcome, Jamie.” I grin. “Can I ask you something?”

“Yes.” She smiles.

I weigh whether to ask her why she had said I wasn’t his favourite singer or the real question I want to ask her. I go with the second.

“Do you have a boyfriend?”

She smirks. I can tell she’s flattered and pleased I asked. I feel my heartbeat speeding up as I wait for her answer. She rolls her eyes and opens the door, getting out of the car.

“If I had a boyfriend I wouldn’t have spent most of the night in the kitchen watching you eat a meat pie.” She smiles through the rolled down window.

I grin. I want to ask for her phone number but something tells me she won’t give it to me so instead I just wink at her and she rolls her eyes again.

“Bye, Harry.”

“Bye, angel face.”

I can faintly hear her laugh as she walks to the door and I wait for her to get inside before I drive away. Something tells me I’m going to see her again. And if not, now I know where I can have a coffee and wait for her to appear.

Part 2

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connywrites · 5 years

Text

of flesh and blood

parts [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14]

“Weakness is a physical state calculated by a decrease in energy and-slash-or motor function ability. Your reaction to it as a negative psychological status and thus wanting to dismiss it in favor of your own aggression is what seems strange to me. It makes working with you difficult. Do you think all partners go through this process, or do you enjoy making it tedious and time-consuming for myself?”

Gavin stopped in place as he stared at the RK900, unsure of how to respond before his eyebrows lowered and he huffed. It wasn’t supposed to know he felt weak, especially not caught in action, but it seemed that was nothing got past a perfect computer.

“This isn’t about you and you shouldn’t give a shit what it takes to get something done or not.” RK900 considered the statement, LED blinking as its eyes scanned across the scene, looking for any other clues it might find to help them. The whole thing was messy and scattered—a pile of money, various splatters of blood but no bodies to be found, muddled with questionable involvement in a setting far out from the city. It would have considered it an event worthless of pursuing, but naturally, Gavin was insistent, and it couldn’t refuse.

“Androids don’t trust. Why do you think I should?” Acknowledging his bloodshot eyes and the way his fingertips twitched, it did a reading for the caffeine content in his blood, quickly identifying it as at least part of the cause for his temperament and behavior.

“I never asked you to trust me, detective.” Gavin fumed, feeling dismayed at his own skip over the conversation. Did he make that part up in his head? 34 hours of insomnia had the tendency to blur the lines between reality, dreams, and useless brain fuzz. Sometimes there were still shadows that would flicker in the corners of his vision, and the 900 reminded itself that Gavin was a bit more difficult than most to earn civil interaction from. Lieutenant Anderson seemed like a walk in the park in comparison, but maybe that was only because it’d mostly seen him and Connor on friendly terms in its short existence. Gavin treated it something like an annoyance, a threat to be his downfall as well as useful tool, and not much else, only being talked to respectively when he needed or wanted something, whether it was actively important in the android’s favor or not.

“Then what do you want, smartass?” The android stared at him in that way that they all tended to do, a little too long with an expressionless face that did no favors for his irrational fears. It was awkward. It was unnerving.

“I was simply stating that our objectives would go easier if you were more compliant.” Gavin laughed, but he wasn’t smiling.

“You’re funny. What’ve you found out, anyway?”

The android took note of his subject change, pulling up a photo on its hand to display to him.

“The only person that’s been here in the past 90 days was a young Native American woman. The blood matches up with hers, but there’s no trail and not a body to be found.” Gavin’s eyes narrowed as frustration dug in over the fact there was seemingly nothing else to work with, rather than accepting the hint as a step forward; another response that made the 900 shoot him a likewise glare – mirroring him had nearly become habitual in their days together, to the point that sometimes it didn’t even notice.

“So? You just gonna stand around?” It was the android’s turn to offer him a sarcastic smile, before turning around to walk down the hall in search for more immediate clues.

“Are you?” It called back to Gavin as he checked something on his phone, glaring up at the android with no verbal response, silently walking up to follow behind it.

“There’s no fingerprints…or footprints. The murderer was wearing gloves and probably something over his shoes, assuming it was a human,” it stated, considering how advanced some deviants seemed to be becoming. Gavin grumbled something under his breath, nodding towards the darkness under the bed.

“There. What’s that?” Turning its head, the RK900 pointedly looked to zoom in, finding something strange on the carpet. Dipping its fingers into it, it gave the substance a sniff, immediately identifying the source.

“Blue blood. JB400. It’s such a small amount, barely noticeable…good eye,” it offered. Gavin smirked as he was temporarily satisfied by the congratulation.

“So, what’s that mean, anyway?”

“I assume the android was slightly wounded in the process. Now, I at least have a lead. If we can find any more traces, we might be able to figure out where it came from.”

At first, Gavin hated hearing we at the beginning of its sentences, as he never liked the idea of working with teammates or partners, even humans; he considered himself working better alone, as considering his short-fuse personality, it was easy for him to get into conflicts with other people, even if they were on his side, and this was an android no less. But over time, it settled calmer on his ears, and he got used to sharing with the robot, from the passenger seat of the cruiser to his personal technology devices. He claimed the excuse of it being easier since androids could sync up with them, even though he’d never let another person lay a finger on his things if he could help it.

Somehow, the 900 had proven itself worthy.

Somehow, it had slowly, but surely, managed to gain his trust; but he didn’t want to admit it, let alone believe it.

The RK900 was gone in a flash, one foot in front of the other as it disappeared before Gavin could register what was going on.

“Hey! Where the hell d’you think you’re going?!” He ran a few paces forward while he tried to watch the route the android followed, only to stop as he realized he wasn’t really in the shape to go chasing inexhaustible beings.

“I have no time to explain,” it said simply, before disappearing behind the nearest building. Gavin grit his teeth, surprised to find himself annoyed at the lack of the android’s presence as much as he didn’t seem to want to hear from it. It worked hard, it did well, then it did shit like this and he didn’t appreciate not knowing what was going on, or what it was doing. That was the thing; working with a partner meant the situation wasn’t entirely under his control, a discomfort in itself. Aside from the lieutenant, he was signified as one of the best in the Precinct, and with Hank’s misbehavior, tardiness and disciplinary warnings, he’d made a strong image of himself in the influence of the DPD, even with his constant hostility. Androids were slowly marching their way up into jobs and careers, seeming to pull them from under humanity’s feet, and he’d hate nothing more than to be upstaged by a robot. Fired. The image of his father’s angry, disappointed face flashed into his mind and he walked back to his cruiser, deciding he’d drive down the road while ‘looking around’ for the android, ultimately using it as an excuse to find the next coffee shop whether it was with him or not to order something through the drive-through.

“Coffee isn’t going to solve your problems, and high amounts of caffeine are known contributors to agitation.” The RK900 somehow appeared as he didn’t catch sight of it approaching, surprised to see it leaning into his opened driver-side window while he’d been parked, arms folded against the door while it leaned forward with a casual look on its face--he spit out half a mouthful of coffee as he realized the damn thing was covered in blue blood. He wasn’t concerned, of course, just surprised.

“Ech, don’t get that shit on my car,” he hissed, prompting the android to lift an eyebrow.

“You’ve drenched it in milky, sugared coffee already.”

“That blue crap stains way worse and I don’t want android juice on my nice seats.” The 900 was amused at the fact he avoided the commonly used term for blue blood, and then seemed confused that Gavin didn’t question its appearance, but simply told it to keep away from the nice car. Leaning away from the vehicle, it pulled off its jacket, wiping off some of the excess that was smeared across its face.

“The job is done. We can go home now.” The corner of Gavin’s lip twitched as the word home rung strangely in his ears, but he assumed it meant nothing by it.

“What, did the damn thing explode? You look like you fell in a puddle of the stuff.” RK900 offered a small, but knowing smile.

“Something like that. Do you want me to walk?” For a moment, Gavin almost felt guilty, before remembering that it didn’t matter, and that he was giving this android more humanity than it frankly deserved in a moment of forgetfulness over the fact they didn’t grow tired, like he would.

“Yeah. Go uh, update Fowler, or something. I didn’t wanna see his face today anyway.”

“He’s your boss, but fair enough.” Gavin ignored it, rolling up his window with relief that the workday was finally over.

He didn’t expect it to be in his living room before he was, urging a sense of panic to crawl up his spine even though he’d already unlocked and re-locked all the latches on the front door. The android didn’t have a key, so how had it gotten in?

“The fuck?” Despite his typical outburst, the RK900 gave him a usual, polite greeting, now standing clean in fresh clothes.

“You’ll be unhappy to know one of your windows is susceptible to breaking in. I would have waited in your driveway, but frankly, the alternative entry was more enticing.” Gavin massaged his forehead with a tight blink, before looking above his living room couch.

“That window?”

“No.” Gavin narrowed his eyes. There was only the kitchen, the hallway, the back door, and…

“Your bedroom. The inside handle was open. I don’t imagine you forgot, did you?”

Gavin felt like he was losing his mind in a rather literal sense as he had no recollection of doing such a thing. He never touched that window—never needed to, as his room was his most private space and thus, the window remained shut and the blinds remained closed. Often, he locked the bedroom door as well, even if he was the only one home, an old habit that had long since carried on from when he shared a house with others.

“No one’s been here,” he said out loud, mostly to reassure himself. His eyes darted down the hall, but he was suddenly uncomfortable making the trek to his room. Acknowledging there was a spike in his anxiety, the RK900 simply walked past him and towards the bedroom, itself.

Gavin felt foolish as old nightmares threatened to seep into his sleep-deprived mind again. He glanced at the clock. It wasn’t that late; definitely not late enough to go to bed.

“Detective…” Snapping out of a disassociation spell, he looked down the hallway and followed the voice.

“Stay the fuck outta my room, and you don’t come into this house without me ever again,” he snapped, nearly colliding shoulders with the android as he walked briskly past it. Turning on the bedroom light, he looked around, checking to see if anything was out of place that supposedly hadn’t been touched in the last 9 work hours.

Certainly, he was overreacting, and he’d forgotten to lock the window in a moment of distraction. Was it this morning? Every day was becoming more unclear as he felt the shift in his mind, like concentrating was becoming harder, and he couldn’t think as well. When did that start? How long had it been going on?

“I know you haven’t taken them today.” Upon hearing those words, anger abruptly boiled under his skin, knowing what it was referencing to.

“The ones you’re supposed to, I mean.” The condescending tone of its voice made him seethe.

“Shut the fuck up!” The RK900 stared at him while he raised his voice, and that was part of what he hated about androids. They didn’t do anything; no emotion, no life, they just stood there and stared with no reaction. He wasn’t sure if the RK series was particular with this, or if all androids were eerily statuesque, but either way, he didn’t like it.

“Fuckin’ snooping in my stuff like you own the place? Fuck, you’re supposed to help me on my cases, not keep personal tabs on me like a damn nanny.” The RK900 stood behind the doorway, a short distance from the bright red virtual wall that stated DON’T ENTER now hovering between them.

“You’re right,” it retorted simply. Confused, Gavin glanced back at it.

“Becoming personally involved was mostly my choice, but not one you haven’t encouraged.” Bemused, Gavin folded his arms, lifting his chin and shoulders as he practically took the phrase as an insult; the same way he often did.

“I haven’t been parked at the precinct since our second week together. You bring me with you to lunch, and to your house, even when there’s no need to.” The realization made Gavin turn around on his feet as he no longer wanted to face the thing.

“Get outta here,” he demanded urgently. An uncomfortable sensation dawned on him, one that made the 900 stop in place to scan his vitals again, sensing the imbalance, but it accepted there was nothing it could do as it turned around to walk away.

Waking up to the smell of coffee was an oddity, one Gavin didn’t immediately recognize until he heard the familiar sound of his alarm go off. It seemed too early, and it was too cold, cuing him to pull the comforter further up with a grumble as he hit the snooze button and closed his eyes.

By the second ring, he squinted his eyes open, glaring at the window to try and gauge the weather outside. The foggy white lighting through the blinds was dim, suggesting the sun wasn’t out, and by the temperature drop, it might be snowing outside. Great.

The coffee was still hot, but cooled down enough he took a sip, closing his eyes once more as he sat up in the bed, thoughts halted while he was still too tired to make sense out of anything.

The morning was slow, and his shirt and jeans were stiff and cold against his skin, chilled from the frosty air overnight. Teeth chattering, he shivered, downing the rest of the coffee, eager to feel it warm his body as he got up to stretch with a yawn and walked to the living room.

With the android nowhere in sight, he was content to find some peace, pouring another cup from the almost-full pot, finally making the connection that it was probably here to make the coffee, anyway. Wasn’t that against its instructions from last night?

Oh well.

“Yesterday’s case was interesting,” the RK900 brought up once it was sure Gavin was coherent enough to initiate interaction.

“The android had painted it as though it was the murderer, but it seems the woman isn’t actually dead and had sought out her own revenge.” Gavin squinted with a lethargic gaze, lacking understanding without more context.

“Her blood was a ploy, left from an expired hospital bag. She must have had a recent transfusion.” Gavin sipped away the rest of his umpteenth cup of coffee, handing the android his empty cup expectantly.

“Why go so far to paint a murder scene? And for her to be the victim?” he finally asked.

“No idea. Whatever personal relationship she had with the android must have had immense strain. The android itself was in bad shape, as well.” Walking over to the coffee machine, it filled another cup while they interacted.

“Well, where’s the woman? What’s her name again?”

“Julien Asher. I didn’t find her. The android tried to flee but I called backup in time, it’ll be taken back for analysis.” Gavin’s brows narrowed and twitched, but he nodded, seeming to finally understand its explanation, at the very least.

“So you think she’s a murderer or just really hated that android?”

“Violent outbursts weren’t uncommon in her history.” Two sugars, two creams, and stir. It handed him the fresh cup with a lid, tapping it twice in a reminder that it’s hot and not to take a drink right away. Gavin set the cup down for the moment without thinking about it.

“She lived on the native american reservation, which was why the location was so far from Detroit, and had grown up defending herself from a life physical harassment. That house wasn’t even hers. She might have had a vendetta against someone else, android or otherwise. Domestic abuse isn’t out of the question.” Gavin raised an eyebrow, leaning against the break room table.

“So, we don’t know where she is, and she might have enemies. Might have friends, too. That could be bad news for us.”

“Doubtful. The situation seems too personal to land in our hands. However, we might want to patrol around the area and see if we can’t catch another lead.”

The RK900 disappeared again. That time, it didn’t come back.

It didn’t arrive at work the next day, either.

“You know Cyberlife will send another one,” Fowler groused, staring Gavin down over his desk with the familiar look of you’re wasting my time again.

“Then why haven’t they?” Confused, his boss gave him another ugly look.

“What are you so worried about, huh? I thought you couldn’t stand the fuckin’ things,” he responded, feeling like he’d just gotten whiplash from the deja vous of repeating a similar conversation with Hank in the past. Anderson had calmed down with Connor by the look of it and maybe he could say the same for Gavin, but ultimately, he didn’t really care. He had work to do.

“Call them yourself and find out, I don’t care. Now get out of my office.” Gavin remembered the news reports about androids and how they always ended with ‘Cyberlife was unavailable for comment,’ making him feel skeptical over the whole ordeal. Spying, hacking, physical violence among various other assumed aggressions were barely the start for a list of what those machines were capable of, and the idea of a government-issued one missing without any detail as to why made Reed feel uneasy. Part of him thought of betrayal, but his logical mind couldn’t figure out why. He blamed it on the unlocked window, the blue blood, the missing murderer, reassuring himself with the fact the RK900 was never secretive. It and its predecessor, Connor, weren’t entirely subtle about what they did and didn’t do, often speaking the obvious. But did that stop them from downloading and recording information? Having it in his house was one thing, having it missing after the fact was another. Part of his life was now implanted in that hyper-intelligent tape recorder, but he remembered it didn’t know anything it shouldn’t, nothing it could have shared that would put him in danger.

The medication. The behavior. The lecturing, the nagging. Where had it gone? What was it going to do? If another one came back, would it know the same things? Leaving Fowler’s office through the glass doors, he started to pace around his desk, finding it hard to keep his attention on his terminal even as he flipped through his own files. Their most recent one was still open, without updates, pessimism creeping up on him while he realized how bothered he was over the whole ordeal. Now that he had the self-awareness, he could nudge it away and put it behind him to focus on his work, knowing he didn’t have to rely on it for everything.

Still, it was strange to make his own coffee again, and the air around his desk seemed strangely empty without it hovering over him and skimming over the records faster than he could blink. The cruiser was bare without anyone in the passenger seat. The evening felt absent without its presence, and the night seemed harder to sleep through. All in all, he pretended not to notice.

“The co-dependence was an unconscious habit built around your instinctual desire for safety. Those that spend time alone tend to grow lonely, you know.”

The sting in his eyes weren’t real, not any more than the fast, heavy beating of his heart, or the way he’d nearly feared for his life without the damn thing.

“I was fine without your help, thanks.” They both knew the words were hollow, but the RK900 respected his notion. Gavin felt stuck, as if his feet were suddenly too heavy to move even though he had all the freedom in the world to leave. It was time to go.

“Your work declined drastically. You clocked in late. You—”

“Stop fucking telling me about my own life,” he steamed, and finally had the energy to walk out, tossing his empty cup towards the trash; it hit the rim and bounced back out. As if it were expected to, the 900 leaned over to pick it up and throw it away properly. Standing up straight again, it waited – pursuing the problem wouldn’t solve anything or make it easier on either of them. Gavin would return the next day, if nothing else.

Gavin was there, but he ignored the android, leaving the 900 without a partner. Searching for an empty desk, it sat down at a terminal across the room, shifting its hands to its original white plastic form while it swiped across the screen to dig for the most recent files.

Gavin could see the updates from his own terminal, looking unamused as he clicked on a different one. The exchange was indirect, but nonetheless entertaining on both their behalves—mostly for the android as it added text to one of the reports, updating what it had seen in recent days. Once the time came, Gavin was quick to take his lunch break, dismissing the idea of spending money on food so he could buy another espresso-fueled latte in the break room and having a quick chat with Tina to take his mind off of everything.

The whole ordeal was affecting him more than he expected it to, worse than he was comfortable with. Sucking down half of the cup, he eyed the 900 from the distance, trying to figure out his own feelings on the ordeal with no avail; it didn’t make sense. He couldn’t force it to make sense. The pieces weren’t only scattered but they didn’t match, and even in his attempts to avoid the thing, it still followed him in his thoughts.

#vaaaaaguely hinting @#900reed #if u squint #:)#dbh: gavin reed #dbh: rk900 #detroit: become human

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rabiesram · 7 years

Text

anxiety (fanfic) (freeform)

ech I don't like posting my writing much but I have to come out of my shell eventually I really only do this as a hobby so everything is freeformed and nothing is really ever planned out lmao but getting to the point here; jay in the movie looks so nervous all the time so I thought,,,what if anxiety attacks???? contains massive amounts of brotherly fluff (no shipping)! ///

Jay was doing his regular nightly routine on a Tuesday...scowling around for criminals out in the alleyways of Ninjago City. It wasn't fun at all. Well, at least to Jay. Jay didn't bode well with crowds...especially during the night hours. And there were a lot of crowds at night. He didn't know how to explain why he felt this nervous hatred for it. Just whenever he was stuck in a crowd with no real way out, he couldn't just push his way out or ask people to get out of the way. He had to deal with it because nothing would come out of his throat and his muscles would never act. And dealing with it led to him panicking. Jay didn't know why his heart would jump even at the thought of a large mass of people around him! It just did! Jay huffed and shook his head, trying to get his train of thought on the tracks to something else. He had to focus on his duty as a ninja right now, it was incredibly important to the city that he did this efficiently. Jay took off in a sprint down one of the many alleyways, his eyes darting wall to wall. He needed something to keep his attention on. Before he could actually find anything of interest so he could let his mind wander on other topics, he slid to a stop, finding himself at the entrance of the alleyway. Right in front of him was a parade. It seemed like festival kind of parade with people dressed up with the most incredibly flashy outfits he has seen all year. He was admiring the outfits before something seemed to stab him right in the stomach. He remembered what parades basically were. A huge group of people in one area tightly fitted together to stay on the road. His brown eyes widened and he stepped back. The lights from the festival themed parade grew brighter after he realized this fact, and every voice around him became louder. The cheering of people on the side of the streets, the people walking in the parade singing, everything was so loud. It was getting so intense for Jay. The brunette boy shook his head and grabbed at his hood. "Focus Jay! Focus! You just need to get to the other side of town. It'll be calmer there!" Jay thought back to his mother's words one time he had a similar problem like the one he was currently facing. She always told him to breathe. A long breath in, holding it, and then letting it go through his mouth, as if he was blowing out candles on a birthday cake. Jay attempted to do exactly that; breathing in and out. It took him a few breaths with tightly shut eyes to get his composure back. "Ok...You can scale the building and go over the power lines..." He told himself. He gently opened his eyes, immediately looking at the brick wall across from him to avoid looking at the screaming crowds on the street. Jay knew he could do this. He wasn't going to be a kid and run from his problems. He was going to work through this, even if it killed him. Jay huffed and jumped onto the brick wall with his hands touching the wall first, then his foot. He then leapt to the other wall side using his other foot and still keeping his arms at the ready. He repeated this until he reached the top of the building he was originally looking at. Jay crouched down in the shadows of the rooftop. He needed to make sure that nobody could see him. After he was sure the coast was clear, he stood back up and started a stroll on the top of the building. "Hey, how's the city doing?" A voice yelled out. Jay jumped, his heart skipping a beat. It didn't take him long to realize it was just his communicator that he kept on his wrist. He rolled up his sleeve a bit and brought his wrist up near his face. "It's...busy for sure." Jay answered. "Need any 'backup'?" Jay sighed. "No, no that's not necessary...I-I'll be ok." "Your voice crack says otherwise." "Cole...I can do this!" The communicator went silent for a minute, giving the thought to Jay that Cole must've hung up. "Ok, fine. But the minute something wrong happens, you better call." Jay smirked. "Got it, bro." With his conversation at a end, he tucked his sleeve back into it's original position and stretched his arms out with a heavy sigh. Could he really do this? He shook his head, his brown locks bouncing. He could do this! He almost even slapped himself for being so negative. The teen let his arms fall back to his side as he jogged over to the edge of the building. He crouched at very edge and viewed over the streets. The parade still went on, everyone cheering and screaming in delight of the festivities. Jay frowned and then spotted the power lines over the city. "What a jump! It looks like plain child's play." Jay smiled with a new found confidence blossomed in him. He leapt onto the pole that kept the lines in the air and scurried up it without a second thought. The ninja reached the top and cautiously stood up on it for a second, taking in the jump from line he was about to get onto. It...looked smaller from below. With the mix of his nervousness from earlier, a new fright sprung up into his chest. He was used to falling, yeah, that didn't scare him as much...but falling into a crowd. All of the attention would be on him. Everyone would stop. The entire planet Earth would stop and just stare at him for failing such a easy task. Jay's heart beat sped up. He knew this wasn't good. The teenager attempted to breathe once again, remembering his mother's words that always stuck with him. "Just breathe in..." A long pause. "Hold...!" Another pause. "Andddd out!" His mother's voice kept replaying and replaying in his head. It seemed to grow faster and faster like a movie going at twice the speed it should. His breathing began to get faster as well. The whole world from up high started to twitch to the right, and then to the left. Instantly, he pulled his sleeve back. "Cole. I need to get out of here. It's happening." "On it. Be there in a minute. Sit down until we get there." Beads of sweat trailed down from his forehead as he slowly made his way back down the pole. His whole body began to shiver like he went out into the snow with nothing on but boxers. Jay tried to breathe while he slowly climbed down enough to make it over to the rooftop he previously scouted around. He mis-stepped when he got off the pole and tumbled onto the rooftop. Nothing much came out of his mouth when he tumbled because his throat felt like it was swelling up. The only thing he could manage were a few strained coughs as he put his hands around his neck. He felt like he was about to faint. He couldn't breathe. Tears started pouring out of his eyes in the masses and hit the ground. Even the plip-plop's of his tears sounded like drums in his brain as he cried on the ground. Everything was just...terrible. His muscles tightened as he hugged himself, clenching his teeth. Boy, did we want to go home. --- "We there, Nya?" Kai asked his sister who was piloting the Destiny's Bounty. Nya's focused look turned to Kai. "Just about. Location says he's right over some café in town." Nya replied, eyeing down at the city below. Kai followed her gaze down to Ninjago City. They were closing in near a...parade? Kai sighed with a pinch of anger, stomping his foot on the wood below them. "I shouldn't have sent him out there! This is like...the worse possible place he could've been in!" Kai exclaimed, motioning to the festival below them. Nya frowned. "You didn't know that there's was a parade tonight. Don't beat yourself up. These things happen." She sighed, trying to comfort her older brother. Kai still looked furious with himself. He let his own teammate, no,brother, out in what was probably a nightmare for the electric ninja. Kai groaned and ran his hands through his hair. He hoped that Jay didn't keep this as a grudge against him. "We're here! Everyone set?!" Nya yelled behind her, directing her call to the residents of the ship. Kai and Nya waited for a answer for a solid five seconds before a answer was blurted back out to them. "All ready to go!" --- Jay looked up, his vision still incredibly cloudy from the buckets of tears he was crying. He made out the crimson red dragon head of the Destiny's Bounty. A part of him was incredibly relieved...but another part of him was incredibly worried about showing his face around his team. He didn't like being seen like this. He was weak. Jay sniffled and looked back down at what seemed like a puddle on the ground as the ship stopped in the air and hovered. He heard something being thrown off the ship and a few voices, but he wasn't focusing on them enough to hear what they were actually talking about. Then he heard someone land. "Jay! Jay!" Not a minute later, he felt his shoulders being grabbed by someone. He yipped at this and shut his eyes tight, his shaking increasing. "It's ok, Jay. It's me, Lloyd." With his eyes still tightly closed, he clamped his hands together and debated on if he should open them or not. Maybe it wasn't Lloyd. Maybe it was a snake person with a voice changer hooked up to him to make him sound like Lloyd. The thought of this made Jay give out another cough, forcing his eyes to flutter open anyway. His chocolate brown eyes locked with the blonde's ivy green ones. Yep. It was Lloyd. The real deal. Jay wanted to leap up and tackle Lloyd with a big hug. He was so touched that he came out to get him like this. Jay opened his mouth in a attempt to shout a 'thank you' but his mouth clamped back shut and he fell into another crying fit. "Alright. It's ok tough guy." Lloyd spoke softly. The leader crouched down and put his arm around the fellow ninja. He held him fight and helped Jay step over to the rope. It took a minute, but Lloyd soon got a grip on the rope, as did Jay. Lloyd tugged at the rope, signaling that he was ready to get pulled back up onto the flying ship. The rope, almost instantly, started to slowly work its way off the ground and up into the air. Lloyd kept his attention on Jay and his shaky grip on the rope. "We're almost up. Just hang in there." He spoke, using one of his hands to keep Jay's hand steady. Jay nodded with a sniffle. --- Just about everyone was on the training docks. Everyone except Sensei Wu, who was busy but he had come out earlier to help calm Jay's nerves with some special tea. Lloyd, Kai, Cole, Nya, Zane, and Jay sat around on blankets in a circle. Most of them were talking about stories and the such. Jay and Zane, however, were sitting together. Jay was too shook up to even sit alone, he needed to just be by someone to assure himself that he was safe. It was about a half an hour after Lloyd and Jay had boarded back on the ship, and Jay had calmed down quite a bit. His hands were still shaky as he took small sips of his Sensei's tea. Zane sat by right next to him, as if he was guarding him, with a arm always behind Jay's back. His glowing blue eyes had a certain comfort to them. Probably the fact that they looked like headlights at night and kept out any weird creatures creeping in the darkness really gave Jay a sense of comfort. Well...that's what he thought anyway. "And then bang! Gone! Totally outta the park!" Kai yelled out, throwing his arms into the air. Everyone in the small circle laughed at the ending of Kai's small story about a time he beat a huge skeleton and won. Jay smiled, a few more thoughts beginning to plague his minds. "I take these guys for granted sometimes..." He looked around at everyone. Everyone was so happy and full of life. This was his team. This was his family. This was his true home. The freckled teen gently let his head rest on Zane's shoulder, earning the robot's attention. He closed his eyes and let the sound of Zane's gears run throughout his ears. It was soothing to say the least. It reminded him of the junkyard. "Thank you, brother." He muttered. Zane grinned and patted his brown curls, letting the electric ninja doze off on his shoulder. "Anytime, brother."

#my literature #I'm not rlly expecting criticism on this tbh #just for fun #angsty lego pieces

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sebstanimagines001 · 7 years

Text

Evanescent (Bucky Barnes X Reader)

Okay, so this is gonna have 40s!Bucky flashbacks so enjoyyy

GUYS I HAVE SO MANY THINGS I WANNA WRITE AND NOT ENOUGH TIME IN THE DAY AND IM EATING AN ITALIAN ICE RIGHT NOW AND CAN’T TYPE QUICKLY ECH

Bucky laid in his bed, staring at his ceiling. Hours on end, night after night, he did this. Sleep was not something that occurred regularly for the man. He sighed, rubbing his eyes which were itchy with sleep. But, he couldn’t give into sleep because as soon as he did, he saw her. Nobody else knew that there was something that kept him up at night besides the nightmares. That’s because she was a memory reserved just for him, and nobody else.

She was his whole life,it’s as simple as that. He met her when they were fourteen; she was new to their school. It was lunch and Bucky had been messing around with a couple kids in the hallway, late to the cafeteria. When he got there, he saw a scene he had grown all too accustomed to; his best friend Steve getting bullied by the bigger guys. He was about to step in, when an unfamiliar component of this scene began to play out.

There, in front of him, an angry looking girl marched up to the group messing with Steve. She planted her feet down firmly, defiance hidden in the sparkle in her eyes.

“Hey, you big losers! Why don’t you go pick on someone your own size,” She yelled, yanking back on one of their shoulders. They looked at her bewildered, but she only stepped closer.

“I swear, if I see any of you lay a finger on this guy again the last thing you’ll see will be my fist in your face!” She threatened, holding up her fist for effect. They nodded, and slowly backed away from her. After, I saw her turn to Steve and help him up, before politely shaking his hand.

From that moment on, she had become an irreplaceable part of our little group. Not only did she stand up for Steve, but she taught him how to stand up for himself. She also had a sense of humor to match Bucky’s, always being able to banter back and forth with the boy without missing a beat.

She was so different from anyone else Bucky had ever met, and he couldn’t help himself from falling helplessly in love with her. In fact, she had that effect on most of the boys and men around her.

Bucky smiled at the thought of her, but he could feel the tears gathering in his eyes. It physically pained him to think about her, the overwhelming feeling of emptiness, of missing her, followed even after the happiest of memories- scratch that, especially after the happiest of memories.

It was a normal Friday night for Steve, Bucky, and (y/n). Every single Friday without fail, the trio would go to (Y/n)’s house for a sleepover. Except, instead of sleeping, they often talked through the night, straight into the morning light. On this particular night, the three were sprawled out across (Y/n)’s room. Bucky was lounging in the girl’s comfy chair, Steve was lying on his back on the floor, and (y/n) was lying on her stomach on her bed.

“You know guys, I think about how different our lives would be if we never met each other a lot,” Steve admitted, looking at his two best friends. (Y/n) looked over at him thoughtfully.

“Well, I’d probably have no friends,” she said finally.

“I’d probably be a bad kid, running with the wrong crowd,” Bucky admits, a sad sort of look passing through his features.

“I’d probably be dead,” Steve laughed, though you could hear the underlying fear in his voice.

“Well, then I guess it’s good we all got each other, then,” Bucky smiled cheekily, (y/n) and Steve nodding along.

---

It was school picture day, and everyone was dressed their best in hopes of a good picture. That included (y/n), who was wearing her favorite red dress, accompanied by her hair flowing like a halo around her head. When Bucky picked her up to walk to school, she took his breath away. She looked so perfect, he knew right then and there that he wanted her to be his.

“Morning, Barnes,” she grinned, meeting him on the sidewalk. He looped his arms with hers, grinning widely down at her.

“Well you look simply breathtaking, doll,” he greeted, an underlying tone of awe masked in his voice. She looked up to meet his eyes, the sparkle in hers mesmerizing.

“You look rather dashing yourself, James,”she replied, grinning like an idiot at one of her best friends. She looked so flawless to him in that moment, Bucky decided to just screw it and throw everything out the window.

“H-hey, (y/n)?” he started off, cursing his voice for sounding so timid and nervous She looked at him, one eyebrow quirked, a small, amused smile on her lips.

“Um, do you, I-I mean, would you like to maybe go on a date with me?” he flickered his eyes to the ground, preparing for rejection.

“Of course I would, James! Pick me up at seven,” she grinned, leaning her head on the taller boy’s shoulder.

He hadn’t realized it, but he was crying. Salty, cold, tears rolled down his face, and he didn’t even bother to wipe them away. He was smiling at the fond memory, though an excruciating ache had taken hold of his heart. He tried to stop- to stop thinking about her, to let her go, but he couldn’t.

Bucky watched his girlfriend run ahead of him, to the school doors. She turned around, excitement and innocence glimmering in her eyes.

“Oh, Buck, look! It’s raining!” she shouted gleefully. He chuckled, leaning against the wall and watching as she ran out, spinning around in the raindrops. She stopped momentarily, looking over at him, before beckoning him to join her. He shook his head, rolling his eyes, before running out to her.

“Dance with me, Bucky!” she smiled, and they started slow dancing in the rain, talking and laughing about nothing.

“You look beautiful, doll,” Bucky smiled; a genuine smile, not his signature smirk, making his heart ache as he watched her cheeks dust red.

“Kiss me, you dork,” she giggled, before reaching up on her tiptoes. His lips met hers, and he could taste her signature vanilla chapstick. He smiled into the kiss, pulling her as close as humanly possible. He thought only for a moment about how this moment was so absolutely cliche, but then decided he didn’t care at all.

“James, do you ever think of our future?” she asked one day as they laid side by side on his bed. He turned to look at her, though she was still looked at the ceiling. He took a moment to admire her long, dark eyelashes, cute nose, and perfect lips.

“’Course I do, doll,”he answered truthfully. On more than one occasion he thought about how he hoped to marry her one day, and even past that.

“And what do you think about, exactly?” she asked, turning to cuddle her head into his side.

“Well, I think about how I want to marry you one day. Maybe have a couple ‘a cute kids, grow old and bitter together,” he told her, both of them chuckling at the last part.

“I’d like that to,” she said, smiling. He leaned down, connecting his lips with hers.

By now, he couldn’t stop the tears from coming down his face. Thinking about someone like her could only result in a slew of emotions. He loved her-no, loves her- with every single cell in his body. He fell hard and fast for her, and he still was under her trance, even though he knew he would never see her again.

That was the worst part. He would never see her sparkling eyes, bright smile, and sassy attitude ever again. It physically hurt him that he wasn’t lying in bed with her at his side, cuddling her, protecting her.

The thunder clapped yet again, making her whimper and burrow deeper into his side.

“Shh, doll, everything’s okay. I’ve got you, I’ll protect you,” he murmured into her hair, wrapping his arms tightly around her torso. She looked up at him, and her tear stained face and fear-filled eyes broke his heart. There weren’t many things that she was afraid of, and thunderstorms happened to be one of them.

“I don’t know what i’d do without you, Buck,” she mumbled, closing her eyes.

He remembered that night very clearly still. That night, when he promised to protect her. He remembered that, maybe, because he broke that promise.

She stared in shock at him, tears welling in her eyes and his. He gulped down the lump in his throat. He’d practiced telling her so many times over the last day, and he never expected it to be so hard.

“Y-you’re shipping out in two days?” she asked, her lip quivering. The tears in her eyes finally spilled over as he nodded solemnly. She came forward and buried her face in his chest. He wrapped his arms protectively around her, resting his chin on top of her head.

“I’m gonna miss you like crazy, doll, but don’t worry, i’ll be back. And when I get back, i’m gonna marry you. And we’re going to get our own little house in Brooklyn, and we’re gonna live there until we’re old and bitter,” he promised, which only made her cry harder.

“I love you, James, so so much, much more than you even know,” she said to him, wiping furiously at her eyes.

“And I love you, way more than I could ever tell you,” he replied, kissing her with enough passion to last until he got back.

He never saw her again. Not because of his experimentation, not because he couldn’t make it back, but because when he did get back, the only thing he could visit was a grave.

“Where’s (y/n)?” Bucky asked as he got settled back in at home. (y/n)’s sister, Luisa, frowned, her eyes saddening. His grin faltered, and he repeated his question.

“I-i’m sorry, James, truly I am. Shortly after you left, she felt useless. she wanted to do her part in the war, so she took up a job at the bomb factory. T-there was a mishap, an explosion, and s-she didn’t m-make it out alive,” Luisa sobbed, covering her face with her hands.

“You can’t be serious! This has to be a joke. Where is she, really?” he asked, not being able to believe it. But Luisa just shook her head, tears leaking from her eyes. He fell to the floor, sobs racking his body. That was it, there was nothing he wanted to live for anymore. He was alone, nothing mattered anymore.

Many times he laid there in his bed, right into the early hours of the morning, thinking of what life would have been like if he never enlisted. How he would have married the love of his life, settled down in Brooklyn, and lived out a happy, fulfilling, and hopefully long life.

But he couldn’t that. Not without her.

Nothing could ever be good without her.

#bucky barnes x reader #Bucky Barnes #james buchanan barnes #james barnes #Sebastian Stan #sebastian stan imagines #sebastian stan imagine #marvel imagine #marvel imagines #marvel #bucky barnes imagine

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thesunglassesgamer · 7 years

Text

The Talk, (Pt 3)

Part three of my current project. This is around the part where I started to have problems thinking of where the story should naturally go. Problems need to be answered, and I probably forgot some important details. The end of this part is ech, but it sets up better stuff later and fixes a story problems, so yeah. Anyways, comments, reviews, suggestions. Enjoy.

"That dumbass…" Jackie muttered to herself, now alone in the Diaz household's living room. She stood looking at the tiny note Marco had scrawled out for her in his hurry to leave. He'd left to go fight Ludo and try to get the book and the little glossary guy back. Alone. Despite the fact that Jackie had said that she'd go with him. And he'd taken the only working pair of Dimensional Scissors on Earth, so there was no way to go after him. Fucking wonderful.

Jackie sighed. She knew exactly why he'd gone alone. For months, Marco and Star had been tighter friends than anyone else. They walked together, talked together, ate together, fought monsters together, everything. There were several people who thought they were dating, and, at first, Jackie had been one of them. It was an incredibly personal "friendship" that the two kept. If Marco had felt that he'd hurt Star in any way, he'd hate himself until he, and only he, had fixed it. Jackie had almost straight out told him that Star didn't feel loved. She was kicking herself in the ass for not realizing what she'd done until too late.

It also didn't help that Marco's self-esteem was almost non-existent. The majority of their first date had been him freaking out and worrying that he'd somehow not be worthy of her. He'd outright said that he'd expected her to dump him. It had taken almost an hour for him to stop freaking out and just enjoy the moment. He'd gotten better since then, but not by much. He wasn't tense when they went out, and he smiled more. But after two weeks, it had become clear to Jackie that it was going to take a long time to help Marco overcome his self-loathing. He'd probably ran off to help himself feel worthy of Star's love as he'd done it to show her his own. Dumbass.

Jackie shook herself out of her examination of Marco's mental and emotional problems. She wasn't Doctor Jackie, PhD. She was Jackie Lynn Thomas, the girl who was going to save her boyfriend from what amounted to heroic suicide. Spending three whole paragraphs of standing around wasn't going to save him.

So, how was she going to get to another dimension without any special scissors, track down Marco, and help him defeat a magical evil bird? Simple. Ask Star.

A few seconds and three knocks later, Jackie was staring at Star's door. She hadn't gotten any response. She knocked again. The muffled voice of the (usually) lively princess said, "Go away." She sounded like a mess.

"It's me, Star!" Jackie yelled, banging on the door again. "I need to talk to you!"

Star didn't respond. Jackie let out a huff and opened the door, saying, "Come on, Star, it isn't that ba-" The sight before her made her speechless.

It was hard to take in the entire spectacle due to how low the lighting was. Only a few candles lit the room, but they allowed Jackie to see the atrocity of room design Star had committed. The entire room was painted with only two colors: Red and Black. Small poems with names like "Pain", "Desire", and "Bitter Love" lay around the bedroom floor. Posters with teenagers posed with enough angst to start crappy bands in their basements littered the walls. The phrase "Love is Pain" was painted across the wall, overlapping some posters. Star herself was buried beneath a pile of pillows, apparently lying limp on the bed. The drama of it all almost made Jackie hurl.

"Uh, Star?" Jackie asked, awestruck. "What the hell?"

Star didn't look up. She simply deadpanned, "I am become death."

"Wrong phrase, but close enough," Jackie replied, still confused. "But that's not what I meant. I mean you usually don't act this… emo. Even when you're normally upset."

Star shrugged. "I'm a magical princess alien from another dimension who's been spending almost every waking second with Marco. And I STILL got fucking beat out by the popular girl." She glared up at Jackie. "I think I've got a pretty good reason to mope."

"Star, I haven't replaced you, Marco himself sa-"

"Jackie, stop," Star interrupted. She looked venomously at Jackie. "I can live with you being his girlfriend, I really can. But I can't stand being treated like a five-year-old. People have done that to me for years, and I'm sick of it. You won, don't try to pity me."

Jackie let out a huff of irritation. "Who are you right now? Marco is about to get himself killed just to prove that he wasn't full of shit when he told you that he loved you. And here you are, wallowing with enough self-pity to make a whole new Twilight series."

Star's emotional rollercoaster hit the decline into anger and she pushed herself up to look Jackie right in the eyes. "You don't know the-" Then her face went blank. "Wait, what did you say about Marco?"

Jackie's anger, born from irritation, came out in her voice as she scolded, "He ran off to try and get your stupid book and glossa-whatever. He's probably going to die unless you get up off your sorry ass and HELP ME SAVE HIM!"

Star looked at Jackie with big eyes. "You're really mad right now. Like, really weirdly mad."

Jackie wanted to scream at Star. She covered her face with her hands and muffled a scream instead. It was just so frustrating to deal with Star that she, she… realized that Star was right. Jackie never got angry. Never. Upset, sometimes, but not screaming in outrage. She took a few seconds to stare at her hands before looking up with almost the same expression that Star had: dumbfounded revelation.

"Uh, I, um, yes, you are correct. I, um, yes." Jackie coughed awkwardly. "Sorry. Just…"

"Yeah, no, I, uh, get it." Star looked around the room, taking it all in as though it was the first time she'd seen it. "I really, really get it."

"Well, it looks like Marco brings out the best in all of us," a smooth, sarcastic voice echoed from the doorway. Both girls jumped up, yelling profane language. They turned around to see the demon-prince Tom, dressed in clothes that looked like they came straight out of Hot Topic. He grinned mischievously at both of them. "Hi, Starship," he said gallantly, "and Hi, J… ackie? Is that it?"

Both girls stared at the demon for a full five seconds. Then Star's face went flat. "Tom, what the hell are you doing here?"

Tom's smile turned coy, but then relaxed casually. "Well, originally, I was going to ask Marco if I could borrow his computer for a few days. Mine broke during a game of Karate Kickers 5 after I lost 12 matches in a row." Tom clenched his hand and closed his eyes. "Patience is a virtue when it comes to owning expensive material goods, apparently." Then he clapped his hands, opened his eyes, and continued, announcing, "But then I come here, overhear that my best enemy has gone MIA, and that you two have no way of getting him back. Correct?"

Jackie blinked at the thing in front of her. With nothing else to say, she nodded and said, "Uh, yeah, sure."

Star was much more conservative than her human counterpart. Experience with Tom had made her wary. "Maybe. Why do you care?"

Tom blinked. "He's the closest thing to a friend I have. I need that asshole back to hang out and fight with."

Jackie looked at Tom. He seemed genuine, despite him being a demon. And after all, she didn't want to judge some being just on its species. That'd be racist. Or something similar. Probably. She nudged Star and gave her a reaffirming nod.

Star was still hesitant. "You aren't going to ask for anything else?"

Tom looked hurt. "Ouch. I've gotten over you, Starship. I've got someone else in mind now. Don't worry, I just want Marco back."

Star wasn't sure, but Jackie was. With everything that'd happened over the past two weeks, Star had come to realize that her opinion was probably better than her own. "Alright, let's go."

#starco #jarco #star vs the forces of evil #eeeeeehhhhhh #rushing these out on Sundays has taken its toll on the story

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voyagerafod · 7 years

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Star Trek Voyager: A Fire of Devotion: Part 3 of 4: Sweeter Than Heaven: Chapter Three

Chapter Three

“You seem a little tense, Seven,” the Doctor said as he ran his medical tricorder scanner over her. “This isn’t any different from any of your other routine check-ups.” “I’m aware of that, Doctor,” Seven said. “It’s... I must admit I feel a certain trepidation about the next few days.” “Why’s that?” the Doctor said, curious what his patient and friend meant.

“The last several occasions I have been given what the Captain calls ‘time off,’” Seven said, “invariably something objectively bad happens within a week. It has happened on too many occasions to be mere coincidence.” “Oh come now,” the Doctor said, surprised at Seven’s sudden superstition and paranoia. Seven raised an eyebrow, and proceeded to list off a number of stardates. The Doctor recognized the dates.

“Okay, I see your point,” he said. “Still, it has been almost a week and we have not run into anymore Borg attacking viruses, nor has Samantha been involved in any shuttle crashes, and you haven’t been kidnapped even once this past month.” “Most sentient beings are never kidnapped their entire lives. I’ve had it happen to me three times within the past year.” “Look, if something bad happens to you in the next 48 hours I’ll confess to there being some sort of curse, if that’s what you want to call it,” the Doctor said. “That said, if there is one, Commander Chakotay is the one you’d want to talk to about that. Spiritual matters are well outside my expertise.”

“I will take that into consideration,” Seven said. “Anyway,” the Doctor said, “you are in perfect health. This keeps up I may decide to lengthen the period of time between checkups on you and your Borg implants.” “I’m curious why you have not done so already,” Seven said.

The Doctor felt a little uncomfortable at that comment, for one reason. She’s got a point. Why haven’t I? he thought.

“Fair enough,” the Doctor said. “Let’s make it every three weeks instead of every two. Oh, before I go I forgot to mention some exciting personal news on my end.” Seven nodded. The Doctor sighed “Your enthusiasm is overwhelming,” he said. “Your news, Doctor?” “I have developed an addition to my program that will allow me to take part in the time-honored sentient tradition of daydreaming.” The Doctor smiled, proud of his accomplishment, and the expansion of his own sentience; another step on the journey from mere hologram to a full-blown photonic lifeform. Seven of Nine’s facial expression did not change. “Why?” she said.

---

“I suppose I owe you an apology, Seven,” the Doctor said. Seven of Nine raised an eyebrow, ignoring the looks the rest of the senior staff sitting down in the briefing room were giving her. “Had this occurred approximately one day earlier, you would,” she said, actually feeling sorry for how badly the Doctor’s new daydreaming protocols had started going. “However, we are outside of one full week after my return from my honeymoon. As such, this does not count as evidence towards any sort of ‘curse.’” “Gee,” the Doctor said with that mock smile that Seven found so obnoxious. “Glad to know that you can keep your priorities straight.”

Seven sighed, and looked to the captain to say something, anything, to move this conversation along. The Captain, head in her hands, finally spoke up.

“So, just for my own sake, so I know I’m not losing my mind,” Janeway said, “could you repeat what you just told me? ‘Cause it sounded to me like you just said a bunch of aliens want to destroy us based on what they saw in your ‘daydreams.’” “Well, when you put it that way Captain,” the Doctor said, “I know it sounds rather-” “Insane?” B’Elanna said.

“Ridiculous?” Harry said. “A typical Thursday for us?” Tom said. The Doctor huffed. “I was going to say ‘implausible.’ But at least it explains my unusual behavior over the past 24 hours.”

“Like climbing over the railing around the warp core?” B’Elanna said. “In my defense,” the Doctor said, “I did believe that a warp core breach was imminent.” “Go back to the beginning Doctor,” Janeway said. “And no more interruptions from the rest of you,” she added, glaring at the rest of the senior staff. “Right, sorry,” the Doctor said. “In short, I added new subroutines to my program that allowed me to daydream, an activity I’ve long wanted to be able to do. But, as the incident in engineering demonstrated, the subroutines began malfunctioning. I was daydreaming whether I wanted to or not. At first, I assumed the problem was a result of a failure on my end; that I’d somehow botched the coding to put it simply. But then an alien named Phlox, no relation to the Denobulan we met during the NX-01 incident-” “That’s the part that throws me,” Janeway said. “That seems an awfully big coincidence Doctor. How can we be sure this Hierarchy you’re trying to warn us about isn't another hallucination?” A valid question, Seven thought. “Captain, aren’t you breaking your own order about no interruptions?” the Doctor said.

Janeway gave the Doctor a look that both Samantha and Naomi often referred to as the “death glare,” and Seven actually felt sorry for the Doctor in that moment.

“Um, yes, well, moving on,” the Doctor said, shifting in his seat. “According to this other Phlox, we’re being observed from the nebula we passed by an alien race that calls themselves the Hierarchy. They perceive us as a threat, because in one of my daydreams, my ECH program was activated, and I used a weapon called a photonic cannon to destroy a Borg sphere in one shot.”

“Was this before or after you started with the nude paintings of certain female crewmembers?” Janeway said. This was news to Seven. She certainly hoped that neither herself nor Samantha were among them. While logically it was not fair to punish someone for fantasies at all, let alone fantasies that were being influenced from the outside by alien technology, she also couldn’t deny that things would be awkward between them for an indeterminate amount of time if that were the case. “You said you wouldn’t mention that!” the Doctor said to B’Elanna. “I didn’t,” B’Elanna said. “The Captain was with me when we used the holodeck to find out was going on in your head when the odd behavior started.”

“I believe we are getting off track,” Tuvok said. “Agreed,” Chakotay added. Seven couldn’t help but notice that the latter looked as uncomfortable as the Doctor. Janeway sighed. “Okay, yes,” she said. “Maybe I’m being a bit unfair here. Daydreaming can be a good thing, as it lets one imagine other possibilities in life. However, you should’ve consulted with someone, and waited until you were absolutely certain that you could add this ability to your program without damaging it.” The Doctor nodded.

“You are absolutely correct, Captain,” he said.

“Now,” Janeway said, “back to this other Phlox and the Hierarchy.”

“At first,” the Doctor continued, “I thought that what Lieutenant Torres had done to stabilize my matrix had failed, and that I was imagining again. But what he said made too much sense, especially compared to things like the photonic cannon or, um, well. What he said was that he had put me back into the fiction so he could communicate with me. He said he was an observer on an assault ship that scans passing vessels for technology or raw materials they, the Hierarchy, can steal. For several days, he was using a long-range tunneling sensor to tap into my program.” “That could explain how your algorithms got all jumbled,” Harry said. “You might not have done anything wrong when you added the daydreaming function. What happened could’ve been a side effect of the tap.” “Plausible,” Tuvok said, “assuming this is not another daydream.” “Continue, Doctor,” Janeway said. Seven glanced in her direction. While she wasn’t entirely certain, the tonal shift suggested that the Captain was starting to believe the Doctor. Seven was sure she did too, but decided to wait for more information.

“He told me that he had mistaken my daydreams for reality, that he had tapped into my perceptions as opposed to my fantasies. Seeing that Borg sphere vaporized with one volley of the fantasy weapon I invented convinced the Hierarchy that Voyager was a threat that needed to be destroyed and that they are planning a sneak attack as we speak.

“He said that if I did as he asked, we could avoid the attack.” “Why would he want to help us?” Janeway asked. “His motives weren’t entirely selfless,” the Doctor said. “He said that the Hierarchy does not tolerate mistakes like the one he made. He claims he would face a loss of employment at best, execution at worst, if we were attacked and his superiors found our ship to be less powerful than he reported. I imagine that I had, well, imagined the whole thing my fantasy would’ve involved him simply seeing the error of his ways and joining the path of the righteous.”

“Well, at least he was honest,” B’Elanna said.

“You believe him?” Tom said. B’Elanna shrugged. “Maybe,” she said. “Speaking for myself,” Harry said, “I do.” “As do I,” Seven said.

Janeway held up a PADD that the Doctor had handed to her on the bridge. “And this is the information you say he gave you,” she said, “about how to reconfigure our sensors so we could find their ships, which would be cloaked.” It wasn’t a question. “As I said, Captain,” the Doctor said. “And the sooner we do it-” “Harry, make the adjustments. I don’t see how doing so would harm us in any way if this turns out to be another fantasy.” “Aye, Captain,” Harry said, standing up and taking the PADD. “Everyone else, back to your stations,” Janeway said. The crew all nodded before standing up and filing back out on the bridge. Seven stopped to put a hand on the Doctor’s shoulder, and wondered why he flinched when she did so. “Doctor,” she said, “I assure you, if this turn out to be the result of another hallucination, we will do our best to fix you.” “I know,” the Doctor said. “I’m just sorry for how uncomfortable I’ve made everyone. Thank you for being so forgiving.”

Seven had to work to keep her facial features from betraying her initial reaction when she realized what he meant. After a moment, she spoke again. “You are not the first individual on this ship to have feelings for me that I cannot reciprocate,” she said. “I’m glad that things aren’t going to be awkward between us,” the Doctor said. “I’m afraid they will be,” Seven admitted. “but only until I’ve had a chance to process this new information.” The Doctor looked down, and Seven felt empathy for him, but she couldn’t let that distract her. She was needed on the bridge at her post.

“I won’t ask you not to tell Samantha about this,” the Doctor said, “I have no right. But, would you be so kind as to leave out the nude painting part of the daydreams?” “Trust me,” Seven said, “I had no intention of including that information. Now, if you could be so kind as to delete those images from your memory…” “Seven, I’m the ship’s physician. I’ve seen everyone’s body.” Seven gave the Doctor her best approximation of the Captain’s “death glare.”

“I’ll delete the paintings,” the Doctor said.

---

“The Doctor was right,” Harry said. “I’m detecting three ships out there. Distance, six-hundred thousand kilometers.”

“Well I’ll be damned,” Tom said.

“That’s closer than I’d thought they be,” the Doctor said. “That’s not good.”

“On screen,” Janeway said. Even though she had believed the Doctor, a part of her was still shocked to actually see three vessels on the screen. The image wasn’t crystal clear, but that was likely a side effect of their cloaking devices.

“Okay,” Chakotay said. “Now what?” “Hang on,” Tom said, “what if this is all part of their attack? What if this Phlox guy fed you false information as part of a ruse?” “I doubt it,” Janeway said. “Giving us the ability to spot them through their cloaks would be an incredibly stupid plan. No one would… well, okay the Pakleds maybe. But no one else would deliberately put themselves at such a disadvantage.”

“According to Phlox, and no, that will never not be weird to say, the Hierarchy is running what’s known as a type-3 assault. They won’t de-cloak until they’re right on top of us, at which point they’ll fire a warning shot across our bow.”

“At which point,” Janeway said, “they start making demands?” “Correct,” the Doctor said. “For technology and the like. If we don’t comply, they destroy us. Fortunately, Phlox promised to transmit the frequencies of their phasers. He gave the ones for his ship already, he just needed time to get the information on the other two.” “I’ve already put that information into the computer,” Harry said. “Confirmed,” Tuvok said. “What did this Mister Phlox want in return?” The Doctor winced, and Janeway knew that she wasn’t going to like what she heard next.

“In return. Yeah. He mistakenly informed his superiors that I was in command of Voyager. He wants to maintain that fiction. When they open that channel, I’m sorry, but I have to be sitting in the captain's chair.” Janeway rubbed her eyes. “You know,” she said, “if I couldn’t see those ships with my own eyes…” “He insisted, Captain,” the Doctor said. “This should be fun,” Tom said. “Well, good luck with that,” Janeway said. “Harry, help get the Emergency Command Hologram set up.”

---

Harry Kim had to keep himself from laughing as he helped make the necessary alterations to the Doctor’s program. “I am in over my head,” the Doctor said. “I am going to screw this up, I know it.” “Too late to back out now, Doctor,” Harry said. “If we want to keep the Hierarchy from being a problem down the road, we can’t just run away.” “I never should’ve created the program alteration in the first place,” the Doctor said. Harry simply shrugged and tapped out the last few controls. Suddenly, the Doctor’s visage changed; his uniform became command red, and four pips appeared on his collar, one at a time. The Doctor glanced at them, then back at Harry with a frown. “Was the dramatic flourish really necessary, Lieutenant?” he said. “Nope,” Harry admitted.

“Captain on the bridge,” Tom said, smirking. Harry watched as the Doctor nervously sat in the captain’s chair, Chakotay at his side offering quiet reassurances. Let’s hope this works, Harry thought.

“Captain,” Chakotay said, “we’re ready to proceed.” “Acknowledged,” Janeway said over the ship’s comm from astrometrics. “Seven and I can hear everything that happens up there, but no one will be able to hear me but the Doctor once the internal comm link is active.

“Doctor, are you ready?” “No, but do I have a choice?” Harry did not hear anything. “Understood,” the Doctor said. The link’s already on then, Harry thought. I hope hearing only one side of the conversation doesn’t get too confusing.

“I’m receiving a transmission on a secure channel, audio only,” Tuvok said. “Must be the Doctor’s new friend,” Chakotay said. “Let’s hear what he has to say.” “Doctor,” the voice said, “something terrible has happened. They’ve ordered a type-four assault. Our phaser frequencies will be rotated continuously. I won’t be able to help you.” “Oh shit,” the Doctor said, “oh that’s bad. That’s very bad.” “Calm down, Doctor,” Chakotay said. “Mister Phlox, this is Commander Chakotay. What else can you tell us about type-four?”

“Three vessels are decloaking off the port bow,” Tuvok said. “I’m too late,” Phlox said. “I’m so sorry,”

The deck lurched violently underneath Harry, the whole bridge shuddering. “That didn’t feel like a warning shot,” Tom said. “Direct hit, shields are holding,” Tuvok said. Harry heard a beep from his own console. “They’re hailing us,” he said. “On screen,” Chakotay said. The visage of an alien bridge filled the viewscreen. Three large headed aliens were within frame, the tallest one at center, presumably the ships’ commander. The alien to his left was looking at something off screen, while the one to his right looked forward, fidgeting. That must be Phlox, Harry thought. He even looks friendlier than that Denobulan we met.

“The Hierarchy controls this region of space,” the tall one said. “Your ship has supplies and technology that we require.” “We’ll defend ourselves,” the Doctor said. “You won’t get what you’re after.”

“An exchange of fire would damage both of our ships,” the Hierarchy commander said. “but we have support nearby. You are alone. Take your weapons off-line and prepare to board-” the viewscreen suddenly went back to a view of the now de-cloaked Hierarchy ships. “Excuse the interruption, Commander,” Tuvok said, “I’ve found a potential weakness in their shields, but I’ll need time to reconfigure our phasers.”

“Keep him occupied, Doctor,” Chakotay said. “On screen.” Chakotay stood up and walked past the Doctor to the tactical console. “This is your final warning,” the Hierarchy commander said, as though he hadn’t been interrupted. “Don’t rush me,” the Doctor said.

“Take your weapons off-line, immediately. I won’t ask again.” “You,” the Doctor said, wagging his finger at the screen, “appear to be suffering from a physio-emotive disorder.”

What? Harry thought. Where is this going? “You’re impatient, quick to anger,” the Doctor continued, “you may want to see a physician. Me for instance. That was my first job after all. I kinda miss it since I had to take command.” The viewscreen showed the bridge of the Hierarchy shudder slightly. Harry looked down. Tuvok had opened fire. “Direct hit,” Tuvok said. “Ha!” The Doctor said. “How do you like that huh? A taste of your own medicine!” That definitely didn’t come from the Captain, Harry thought. The Hierarchy commander slammed down on something off-screen, and Voyager shook violently, panels sparking all over the bridge, “Phasers are off-line,” Tuvok reported. “Prepare to be boarded!” the Hierarchy commander said.

“Tuvok!” the Doctor said, standing up to full attention, looking confident for the first time since this fiasco had started. Harry bit his lip to keep himself from asking the Doctor what he was planning. “Activate the photonic cannon,” the Doctor added, striding casually closer to the viewscreen. We’re dead, Harry thought. “Tuvok, that was an order,” the Doctor bellowed, as Tom looked back at him as if the Doctor had just given an order to perform scenes from a 20th century melodrama.

Harry glanced at Tuvok, who was looking at Chakotay. The latter nodded. “Activating the photonic cannon, sir,” Tuvok said. “I’d rather not give the order to fire,” the Doctor said. The Hierarchy commander looked up at something. “My sensors show no activation sequence,” he said. “Of course not,” the Doctor said authoritatively. “The photonic cannon is impervious to sensors. “The Borg couldn’t detect it either,” the one Harry was sure was Phlox said, “that’s why they were destroyed.”

“The Borg, the Hierarchy,” the Doctor said, “it’s all the same to me. Just another bully who didn’t know when to back off.” “We’ll be vaporized,” Phlox said. The Hierarchy commander pushed a button, and the communications link was severed, the viewscreen returning to the view of the Hierarchy ships. “I’m choosing to take it as a good sign they haven’t just opened fire already,” Tom said.

“Right there with you Mister Paris,” the Doctor said. It was only then that Harry noticed that the Doctor’s hands had been behind his back the whole time, hidden from view of the Hierarchy commander. They were shaking. Harry smiled, impressed at how well the Doctor had hidden his nervousness from the Hierarchy. Nearly a minute later, the viewscreen showed the Hierarchy ships turning around. “They’re moving away at full impulse,” Harry said. The Doctor, despite being a hologram who didn’t need to breathe, sighed as if he’d been holding the breath the entire time since the comm link had been cut. He walked back towards the captain’s chair, but didn’t sit in it, instead just looking at it. Chakotay moved away from the tactical console and stood behind the Captain's chair, and motioned to it. “Go ahead, Doctor,” he said, smiling. ”You earned it.” The Doctor sat down, slowly, but eventually began looking around the bridge, allowing Harry to see him smiling now as well. “So, Doc, did it hurt?” Tom said. “Did what hurt, Ensign?” “When you pulled that bluff out of your-” “Tom,” Chakotay said, “resume our standard course.”

---

The Doctor sat in his office in sickbay, going over the daily reports. The daydream program, despite being fixed by Harry and B’Elanna, was off-line. He’d been tempted to delete it altogether and might have had he not mentioned the plan to the Captain, who had proceeded to talk him out of it. She’d convinced him to take more time to consider it before just deleting it rashly, stating that he might regret it later if he did so now. The chirp of an open comm link filled the quiet room. “Torres to the Doctor,” B’Elanna’s voice said. “Could you come to the mess hall please?” What’s this all about? the Doctor thought. It didn’t sound like an emergency, there was no sense of urgency in B’Elanna’s voice. He wondered if maybe one of Neelix’s cheeses was threatening the bio-neural circuits again.

“On my way,” he said, affixing his mobile emitter to his arm.

He wondered what could possibly be important enough to summon him that wasn’t a medical emergency. He reached the entrance to the mess hall and stepped inside, only to be shocked to see most of the senior staff and several other officers standing there in dress uniforms, as well as Neelix, and Naomi. “Surprise!” they all yelled. “Don’t worry Doc,” Harry Kim said, “this is all real.” The Doctor looked around,

“I don’t understand,” he said. “What’s this all about?” Janeway held her hand up, and Harry put something in it. She walked up to him and affixed a pin to his uniform.

“For your imaginative defense of this ship and her crew,” she said, “I am awarding you with the Starfleet Medal of Commendation. Congratulations.” “I… Thank you,” the Doctor said, feeling overwhelmed. “I’ve also reconsidered your request from a few days ago. I’m going to authorize a research project to explore your command abilities. The Emergency Command Hologram won’t just be in your fantasies anymore.” Janeway began clapping, and soon the rest of the crewmembers in the mess hall joined in.

The Doctor looked around, taking it all in when a realization hit him. Obviously, they couldn’t fit every Voyager crew member in this relatively tiny mess hall, and none of the Equinox survivors were allowed to attend ship functions yet, but two particular absences stood out to him. Seven of Nine and Samantha Wildman weren’t here.

I guess I can’t blame her, the Doctor thought.

---

Seven of Nine sat on the couch in Samantha’s quarters, reading a PADD. Samantha looked at her, concerned, but didn’t say anything. “If you wish to attend the party for the Doctor, Sam, I won’t be offended,” Seven said.

“Offending you isn’t what I’m worried about,” Samantha said. “I get why you’re upset, but I doubt the Doctor has done anything at any point untoward with you.” “Perhaps,” Seven said, “but at the same time the revelation of his feelings for me complicates matters. I can’t help but wonder how many of our friendly interactions over the past year, or possibly more, were done with the purpose of spending time with me as opposed to his stated reasons.” “If it were just about any other sentient on this ship I’d say that was possible,” Sam said, moving from her chair to sit next to Seven. “But the Doctor? I think his only crime here, if you could call it even that much, was not just getting it out in the open, like Harry did back when he had a thing for you. If the Doctor hadn’t kept it to himself you both could’ve dealt with this like adults.” “Am I not handling it like an adult now, Sam?” Seven said. Samantha rested her hands on Seven’s shoulder and sighed. “I suppose you are,” Samantha said. “If you weren’t I imagine you’d be doing far worse things than skipping his award ceremony.” “That is accurate,” Seven said, putting the PADD down and leaning back. “It is best that I avoid being alone with him for a day or so, allow myself time to process my feelings on the matter.” Seven turned her head to look Samantha in the eyes, and smiled. Samantha smiled back. “Would you be willing to help me?” Seven whispered.

“What kind of wife would I be if I wasn’t?” Samantha whispered back.

#a fire of devotion #Part 3 #chapter three #sam7 #fan fiction #star trek voyager

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readbookywooks · 7 years

Text

The Schoolboy

BUT Kolya did not hear her. At last he could go out. As he went out at the gate he looked round him, shrugged up his shoulders, and saying "It is freezing," went straight along the street and turned off to the right towards the market-place. When he reached the last house but one before the market-place he stopped at the gate, pulled a whistle out of his pocket, and whistled with all his might as though giving a signal. He had not to wait more than a minute before a rosy-cheeked boy of about eleven, wearing a warm, neat and even stylish coat, darted out to meet him. This was Smurov, a boy in the preparatory class (two classes below Kolya Krassotkin), son of a well-to-do official. Apparently he was forbidden by his parents to associate with Krassotkin, who was well known to be a desperately naughty boy, so Smurov was obviously slipping out on the sly. He was - if the reader has not forgotten one of the group of boys who two months before had thrown stones at Ilusha. He was the one who told Alyosha about Ilusha. "I've been waiting for you for the last hour, Krassotkin," said Smurov stolidly, and the boys strode towards the market-place. "I am late," answered Krassotkin. "I was detained by circumstances. You won't be thrashed for coming with me?" "Come, I say, I'm never thrashed! And you've got Perezvon with you?" "Yes." "You're taking him, too?" "Yes." "Ah! if it were only Zhutchka!" "That's impossible. Zhutchka's non-existent. Zhutchka is lost in the mists of obscurity." "Ah! couldn't we do this?" Smurov suddenly stood still. "You see Ilusha says that Zhutchka was a shaggy, greyish, smoky-looking dog like Perezvon. Couldn't you tell him this is Zhutchka, and he might believe you?" "Boy, shun a lie, that's one thing; even with a good object- that's another. Above all, I hope you've not told them anything about my coming." "Heaven forbid! I know what I am about. But you won't comfort him with Perezvon," said Smurov, with a sigh. "You know his father, the captain, 'the wisp of tow,' told us that he was going to bring him a real mastiff pup, with a black nose, to-day. He thinks that would comfort Ilusha; but I doubt it." "And how is Ilusha?" "Ah, he is bad, very bad! I believe he's in consumption: he is quite conscious, but his breathing! His breathing's gone wrong. The other day he asked to have his boots on to be led round the room. He tried to walk, but he couldn't stand. 'Ah, I told you before, father,' he said, 'that those boots were no good. I could never walk properly in them.' He fancied it was his boots that made him stagger, but it was simply weakness, really. He won't live another week. Herzenstube is looking after him. Now they are rich again - they've got heaps of money. "They are rogues." "Who are rogues?" "Doctors and the whole crew of quacks collectively, and also, of course, individually. I don't believe in medicine. It's a useless institution. I mean to go into all that. But what's that sentimentality you've got up there? The whole class seems to be there every day." "Not the whole class: it's only ten of our fellows who go to see him every day. There's nothing in that." "What I don't understand in all this is the part that Alexey Karamazov is taking in it. His brother's going to be tried to-morrow or next day for such a crime, and yet he has so much time to spend on sentimentality with boys." "There's no sentimentality about it. You are going yourself now to make it up with Ilusha." "Make it up with him? What an absurd expression! But I allow no one to analyse my actions." "And how pleased Ilusha will be to see you! He has no idea that you are coming. Why was it, why was it you wouldn't come all this time?" Smurov cried with sudden warmth. "My dear boy, that's my business, not yours. I am going of myself because I choose to, but you've all been hauled there by Alexey Karamazov - there's a difference, you know. And how do you know? I may not be going to make it up at all. It's a stupid expression." "It's not Karamazov at all; it's not his doing. Our fellows began going there of themselves. Of course, they went with Karamazov at first. And there's been nothing of that sort of silliness. First one went, and then another. His father was awfully pleased to see us. You know he will simply go out of his mind if Ilusha dies. He sees that Ilusha's dying. And he seems so glad we've made it up with Ilusha. Ilusha asked after you, that was all. He just asks and says no more. His father will go out of his mind or hang himself. He behaved like a madman before. You know he is a very decent man. We made a mistake then. It's all the fault of that murderer who beat him then." "Karamazov's a riddle to me all the same. I might have made his acquaintance long ago, but I like to have a proper pride in some cases. Besides, I have a theory about him which I must work out and verify." Kolya subsided into dignified silence. Smurov, too, was silent. Smurov, of course, worshipped Krassotkin and never dreamed of putting himself on a level with him. Now he was tremendously interested at Kolya's saying that he was "going of himself" to see Ilusha. He felt that there must be some mystery in Kolya's suddenly taking it into his head to go to him that day. They crossed the market-place, in which at that hour were many loaded wagons from the country and a great number of live fowls. The market women were selling rolls, cottons and threads, etc., in their booths. These Sunday markets were naively called "fairs" in the town, and there were many such fairs in the year. Perezvon ran about in the wildest spirits, sniffing about first one side, then the other. When he met other dogs they zealously smelt each other over according to the rules of canine etiquette. "I like to watch such realistic scenes, Smurov," said Kolya suddenly. "Have you noticed how dogs sniff at one another when they meet? It seems to be a law of their nature." "Yes; it's a funny habit." "No, it's not funny; you are wrong there. There's nothing funny in nature, however funny it may seem to man with his prejudices. If dogs could reason and criticise us they'd be sure to find just as much that would be funny to them, if not far more, in the social relations of men, their masters - far more, indeed. I repeat that, because I am convinced that there is far more foolishness among us. That's Rakitin's idea - a remarkable idea. I am a Socialist, Smurov." "And what is a Socialist?" asked Smurov. "That's when all are equal and all have property in common, there are no marriages, and everyone has any religion and laws he likes best, and all the rest of it. You are not old enough to understand that yet. It's cold, though." "Yes, twelve degrees of frost. Father looked at the thermometer just now." "Have you noticed, Smurov, that in the middle of winter we don't feel so cold even when there are fifteen or eighteen degrees of frost as we do now, in the beginning of winter, when there is a sudden frost of twelve degrees, especially when there is not much snow. It's because people are not used to it. Everything is habit with men, everything even in their social and political relations. Habit is the great motive-power. What a funny-looking peasant!" Kolya pointed to a tall peasant, with a good-natured countenance in a long sheepskin coat, who was standing by his wagon, clapping together his hands, in their shapeless leather gloves, to warm them. His long fair beard was all white with frost. "That peasant's beard's frozen," Kolya cried in a loud provocative voice as he passed him. "Lots of people's beards are frozen," the peasant replied, calmly and sententiously. "Don't provoke him," observed Smurov. "It's all right; he won't be cross; he's a nice fellow. Good-bye, Matvey." "Good-bye." "Is your name Matvey?" "Yes. Didn't you know?" "No, I didn't. It was a guess." "You don't say so! You are a schoolboy, I suppose?" "Yes." "You get whipped, I expect?" "Nothing to speak of - sometimes." "Does it hurt?" "Well, yes, it does." "Ech, what a life!" The peasant heaved a sigh from the bottom of his heart. "Good-bye, Matvey." "Good-bye. You are a nice chap, that you are." The boys went on. "That was a nice peasant," Kolya observed to Smurov. "I like talking to the peasants, and am always glad to do them justice." "Why did you tell a lie, pretending we are thrashed?" asked Smurov. "I had to say that to please him." "How do you mean?" "You know, Smurov, I don't like being asked the same thing twice. I like people to understand at the first word. Some things can't be explained. According to a peasant's notions, schoolboys are whipped, and must be whipped. What would a schoolboy be if he were not whipped? And if I were to tell him we are not, he'd be disappointed. But you don't understand that. One has to know how to talk to the peasants." "Only don't tease them, please, or you'll get into another scrape as you did about that goose." "So you're afraid?" "Don't laugh, Kolya. Of course I'm afraid. My father would be awfully cross. I am strictly forbidden to go out with you." "Don't be uneasy, nothing will happen this time. Hallo, Natasha!" he shouted to a market woman in one of the booths. "Call me Natasha! What next! My name is Marya," the middle-aged marketwoman shouted at him. "I am so glad it's Marya. Good-bye!" "Ah, you young rascal! A brat like you to carry on so!" "I'm in a hurry. I can't stay now. You shall tell me next Sunday." Kolya waved his hand at her, as though she had attacked him and not he her. "I've nothing to tell you next Sunday. You set upon me, you impudent young monkey. I didn't say anything," bawled Marya. "You want a whipping, that's what you want, you saucy jackanapes!" There was a roar of laughter among the other market women round her. Suddenly a man in a violent rage darted out from the arcade of shops close by. He was a young man, not a native of the town, with dark, curly hair and a long, pale face, marked with smallpox. He wore a long blue coat and a peaked cap, and looked like a merchant's clerk. He was in a state of stupid excitement and brandished his fist at Kolya. "I know you!" he cried angrily, "I know you!" Kolya stared at him. He could not recall when he could have had a row with the man. But he had been in so many rows in the street that he could hardly remember them all. "Do you?" he asked sarcastically. "I know you! I know you!" the man repeated idiotically. So much the better for you. Well, it's time I was going. Good-bye!" "You are at your saucy pranks again?" cried the man. "You are at your saucy pranks again? I know, you are at it again!" "It's not your business, brother, if I am at my saucy pranks again," said Kolya, standing still and scanning him. "Not my business?" "No; it's not your business." "Whose then? Whose then? Whose then?" "It's Trifon Nikititch's business, not yours." "What Trifon Nikititch?" asked the youth, staring with loutish amazement at Kolya, but still as angry as ever. Kolya scanned him gravely. "Have you been to the Church of the Ascension?" he suddenly asked him, with stern emphasis. "What Church of Ascension? What for? No, I haven't," said the young man, somewhat taken aback. "Do you know Sabaneyev?" Kolya went on even more emphatically and even more severely. "What Sabaneyev? No, I don't know him." "Well then you can go to the devil," said Kolya, cutting short the conversation; and turning sharply to the right he strode quickly on his way as though he disdained further conversation with a dolt who did not even know Sabaneyev. "Stop, heigh! What Sabaneyev?" the young man recovered from his momentary stupefaction and was as excited as before. "What did he say?" He turned to the market women with a silly stare. The women laughed. "You can never tell what he's after," said one of them. "What Sabaneyev is it he's talking about?" the young man repeated, still furious and brandishing his right arm. "It must be a Sabaneyev who worked for the Kuzmitchovs, that's who it must be," one of the women suggested. The young man stared at her wildly. "For the Kuzmitchovs?" repeated another woman. "But his name wasn't Trifon. His name's Kuzma, not Trifon; but the boy said Trifon Nikititch, so it can't be the same." "His name is not Trifon and not Sabaneyev, it's Tchizhov," put in suddenly a third woman, who had hitherto been silent, listening gravely. "Alexey Ivanitch is his name. Tchizhov, Alexey Ivanitch." "Not a doubt about it, it's Tchizhov," a fourth woman emphatically confirmed the statement. The bewildered youth gazed from one to another. "But what did he ask for, what did he ask for, good people?" he cried almost in desperation." 'Do you know Sabaneyev?' says he. And who the devil's to know who is Sabaneyev?" "You're a senseless fellow. I tell you it's not Sabaneyev, but Tchizhov, Alexey Ivanitch Tchizhov, that's who it is!" one of the women shouted at him impressively. "What Tchizhov? Who is he? Tell me, if you know." "That tall, snivelling fellow who used to sit in the market in the summer." "And what's your Tchizhov to do with me, good people, eh?" "How can I tell what he's to do with you?" put in another. "You ought to know yourself what you want with him, if you make such a clamour about him. He spoke to you, he did not speak to us, you stupid. Don't you really know him?" "Know whom?" "Tchizhov." "The devil take Tchizhov and you with him. I'll give him a hiding, that I will. He was laughing at me!" "Will give Tchizhov a hiding! More likely he will give you one. You are a fool, that's what you are!" "Not Tchizhov, not Tchizhov, you spiteful, mischievous woman. I'll give the boy a hiding. Catch him, catch him, he was laughing at me The woman guffawed. But Kolya was by now a long way off, marching along with a triumphant air. Smurov walked beside him, looking round at the shouting group far behind. He too was in high spirits, though he was still afraid of getting into some scrape in Kolya's company. "What Sabaneyev did you mean?" he asked Kolya, foreseeing what his answer would be. "How do I know? Now there'll be a hubbub among them all day. I like to stir up fools in every class of society. There's another blockhead, that peasant there. You know, they say 'there's no one stupider than a stupid Frenchman,' but a stupid Russian shows it in his face just as much. Can't you see it all over his face that he is a fool, that peasant, eh?" "Let him alone, Kolya. Let's go on." "Nothing could stop me, now I am once off. Hey, good morning, peasant!" A sturdy-looking peasant, with a round, simple face and grizzled beard, who was walking by, raised his head and looked at the boy. He seemed not quite sober. "Good morning, if you are not laughing at me," he said deliberately in reply. "And if I am?" laughed Kolya. "Well, a joke's a joke. Laugh away. I don't mind. There's no harm in a joke." "I beg your pardon, brother, it was a joke." "Well, God forgive you!" "Do you forgive me, too?" "I quite forgive you. Go along." "I say, you seem a clever peasant." "Cleverer than you," the peasant answered unexpectedly, with the same gravity. "I doubt it," said Kolya, somewhat taken aback. "It's true, though." "Perhaps it is." "It is, brother." "Good-bye, peasant!" "Good-bye!" "There are all sorts of peasants," Kolya observed to Smurov after a brief silence. "How could I tell I had hit on a clever one? I am always ready to recognise intelligence in the peasantry." In the distance the cathedral clock struck half-past eleven. The boys made haste and they walked as far as Captain Snegiryov's lodging, a considerable distance, quickly and almost in silence. Twenty paces from the house Kolya stopped and told Smurov to go on ahead and ask Karamazov to come out to him. "One must sniff round a bit first," he observed to Smurov. "Why ask him to come out?" Smurov protested. "You go in; they will be awfully glad to see you. What's the sense of making friends in the frost out here?" "I know why I want to see him out here in the frost," Kolya cut him short in the despotic tone he was fond of adopting with "small boys," and Smurov ran to do his bidding.

#BrothersKaramazov

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