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#did i cram this for two and a half days?? hell yes!
channnel · 4 months
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MDHM au where everything is the same, but mc stepped on an anthill before meeting Alan.
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aechii · 10 months
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₍⁠₍ OF LOVE AND FASHiON ₎⁠₎
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A/N ?! last fic for the day booooo 😥 i dont know if i will be able to post any tmrrw, but i hope i can. anyways enjoy my lovelies
p.s. there's a little written part in this but it's abt 500-600 words
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[y/n]'s heart's racing. every palpitation hammers against her chest with much force, so much so that her full-upon-entry water has decreased to less than half left in just 30 minutes. the heat still fused with the air, but as the sun begins to sleep, it loses its energy, leaving a cool undercurrent that presses into the skin of all the attendees. she's so glad about the cooler weather, finding it completely unfathomable how she would've coped if the heat joined tham at night as well.
but the man seated beside her crashes all of her composure, and her body begins to feel hot and strangled.
she hasn't seen such a visually blessed male specimen in all the years of her living, and the fact that his body was so close to hers because of the crammed seating made matters worse. she can't think, breathe or concentrate on the influx of dressed models that come and go non-stop.
"you look disgusted."
the voice comes from right beside her, and her head whips around, startled. the man that has enraptured her entire conscience smiles goofily at her, and her heart wavers.
"what? me?"
"yes," he chuckles softly, "you."
his eyes turn back to the show before them, yet he continues speaking before [y/n] can justify herself, "i don't blame you, though. some of the outfits are... questionable."
his facial expressions are priceless, and [y/n] falls into a bout of laughter, "you're sick!"
he looks on seriously, eyes flashing with extreme judgement, "i'm not lying! how does anyone find pairing a skirt and baggy trousers aesthetic?"
the combination, that [y/n] had, most likely, missed from being consumed by her thoughts, makes her grimace, "yeah, that wasn't a good look at all."
he turns back to face her and, god, he stares so intently that she has to look away.
"speaking of outfits, what brand you wearing? 'cause i know it's not lv for sure, i'm not seeing any," he thinks of the right words, "over exposure of the logo."
"that's one way to put it," [y/n] snickers, looking down at her outfit, "i made it all myself... apart from the shoes of course."
the boy is taken aback, mouth agape and eyes wide, "no way!"
she begins to feel flustered by his reaction and just smiles.
"that's so cool, honestly. i would take more pride in that than wearing a slutted out luxury brand."
"slutted out?" [y/n] can't believe her ears; he's going to kill her, she's sure.
"how the hell did you come up that?!"
the boy purses his lips, looking smug, "i'm just that amazing."
"you're delusional."
he pretends to think for a moment, "delusional enough to think i'd get your number?"
[y/n]'s eyebrows shot up, "you want... my number?"
he doesn't hesitate to nod, "i don't think i'll be leaving without it."
jobe, who had been painfully listening in on their conversation, decides to make himself apparent, "don't do it, you'll regret it."
she turns around, coming face to face with a younger boy who looks almost identical to the one she had been speaking with for the past 15 minutes.
"you two brothers?"
the older one responds, "yeah, he's a cockblock though, don't listen to him."
"cockblock? jude, i'm trying to save her life!"
ah, so that's his name.
"clear off, jobe," he rolls his eyes, turning back to the girl sitting beside him, "sorry about that- so, your number?"
"don't do it!"
and much to his dismay, she does.
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y/n_l/n
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liked by judebellingham and 23,899 others
y/n_l/n paris photo dump !! met some cool ass people there lowkey
view comments...
judebellingham was lovely meeting you, such a vibe 😆
y/n_l/n you too!! <3
yfn__ best time of my life honestly
y/n_l/n paris at night is a sight to see
user1 you look GORGEOUS
user2 i really missed pfw just a day after i left france </3
user3 JUDE????
user4 I'M ACTUALLY SO SHOCKED
user5 😮
user6 WE FOUND HERRRRR
user7 and jude beat me to it already 😐
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judebellingham
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liked by y/n_l/n and 899,231 others
judebellingham ❤🇫🇷
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y/n_l/n love the after party candid, send it to me plz xx + tell jobe i'm sorry but not sorry
judebellingham you look so pretty in it ofc + he'll see it anyways xx y/n_l/n @/judebellingham stop plz 😭🛑 jobebellingham @/y/n_l/n buy me croissaints and maybe i'll forgive you
jadonsancho freshh 🔥
user1 who's that girl in the last pic????
user2 someone who he met at the lv show, got her number and everthingggg 😭
user3 AND SHE KNOWS JOBE TOO? that's my chance stripped unrightfully away from me </3
user4 icel, she's gorgeous AAAAA
user5 this is my 13th reason
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dual1pa · 10 months
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prom
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warnings: using she/her pronouns, lanugage, all around fluff, heavy makeouts in car
not really proofread
18+ ONLY Y’ALL
enjoy :)
All she thought about was prom. She’s been looking forward to the very special night since she was a freshman at Hawkins High.
She was more than halfway through her senior year and she was ready to graduate and get the hell out of that place. However, the only thing keeping her going: PROM
She already cut out several potential prom dresses in the paper and taped them to her bedroom wall to create a large collage and has it narrowed down to two. They were both equally as perfect, but she just couldn’t decide. 
Of course, she had the perfect boy in mind to be her prom date: Eddie Munson. However, he cringed at every prom poster he walked past in the hallways. 
He wasn’t the type of guy to “dress up.” A simple jean jacket and black pants would suffice his forever wardrobe.
She, of course, fell for him in the 10th grade. He sat next to her in English class. It wasn’t right, of course, but she let him look at her tests to help him pass the class — which he did. The two were complete opposites but clicked instantly. 
One night, she invited him over for a study session since her parents were away on business. One thing lead to another and they ended up making out all night on the couch. 
They’ve been happy ever since. 
Returning back to the now, she tapped her pencil on her neatly written history notes, waiting for that slow clock to finally hit 11:33 so she could see her boyfriend. 
Sure, they weren’t the most popular guys in school, but she really loved hanging out with his group of friends and learning all about Dungeons & Dragons.
She drowned Mr. Smith’s voice discussing the Revolutionary War ages ago. The thought of cramming more information into her brain gave her a migraine.
As soon as the bell rang, she quickly put her notebook and folder into her backpack and went to her locker to switch her books around for the second half of the school day. 
She put her three-number combination into the lock and opened it, admiring the photos she had in her locker — most of her and Eddie, but others of her friends and family. 
It wasn’t long before she felt arms wrap around her waist only to quickly be turned around and lightly pressed up against the locker beside her. 
Her beautiful brown-eyed boy was wearing his famous Hellfire Club t-shirt and his favorite jean jacket and pants. 
“Hi, angel,” he said, giving you a sweet kiss. 
“Hi, how was math?” 
“Fucking boring, as usual,” he sighed, “But I’m with you now and that’s all that matters.” 
She chuckled, “You really need to pass that final, Eds, If you’re not walking down that aisle with me, it’ll be the end for you.” 
“Speaking of... could you come over tonight and help me prepare for this test? I know I would fucking fail without your genius mind.” 
“Of course,” she smiled.
— 
At the end of the day, she grabbed the books that she needed for the weekend and met Eddie at his van where she was greeted with a passionate kiss. 
“Well, isn’t someone happy to see me,” she kissed him once more before throwing her bag in the back. 
“Before we leave, I have a question to ask you.” 
Her eyebrows raised, “Is it bad?” 
“What? No! Of course, not,” he reassured her. 
He gave her a large envelope, which she opened quickly. 
“I was wondering... uh.. would you like to go to prom with me?”
She squealed when she saw the physical tickets for “Hawkins High School Prom 1986.” 
She instantly wrapped her arms around Eddie’s neck and jumped into his arms. 
“Yes, yes. Of course I’ll go to prom with you. Oh my God!!” 
She pressed kisses along his lips, then over his cheeks, and then all around his face. 
“I’m sorry it’s not a big ask like I’ve seen others do but,” 
She interrupted him, “Stop that. I love it and I love you. Thank you for doing this for me.” 
“I want to because I love seeing you so happy.” 
_
Prom night came so fast. 
Thank God Hawkins High canceled classes for the day. 
She was up and awake early in the morning to start getting ready. Eddie begged her to sleep over the night before but she didn’t want him to see her or her dress before the big night.  
Throughout the day, she was so busy: she had a hair and nail appointment as well as getting her makeup done by her best friend, Rachel. 
She saved the best for last, putting on her dress. 
After weeks of deciding between those two dresses - she finally found the perfect one. 
Her mother helped her into the baby blue dress and zipped up the back.
“The love of your life is downstairs,” her sister, Elizabeth, said, “And he looks incredible.” 
She put on her white heels and took her time to walk down the stairs - holding on to the railing for dear life so she didn’t fall. 
Eddie was facing away from her until he heard her movements.  
He took one look at her and fell in love with her all over again.
She felt the same, he looked so handsome wearing a suit. 
He raced to the bottom of the stairs to help her with the final few steps. 
“You look... wow. You look so beautiful,” he leaned in to give her a kiss on the cheek. 
Deep down, she knew that all he wanted to do was pick her up, twirl her around and kiss her all over. However, since they were in the company of her family, he kept it PG. 
After several pictures, Eddie finally got her out of the house and into his van.
While driving back to school, his hand intertwined with hers on her lap. He constantly told her how beautiful she was in her dress.
Sure, they’ve been going out for a while, but he’s never seen her so dressed up before — and vice versa. 
She couldn’t take her eyes off her man and how hot he looked while wearing something other than his normal attire.
As he abruptly parked the car as far away from the school as he could — can’t have those popular kids hitting his car. 
He ran over quickly to help her out of the car. 
As he was about to lead the way, she pulled his hand back to bring him up against her chest. She leaned up to quickly kiss his lips a few times. 
“I’m excited for tonight, and you really do look so handsome,” she kissed him once more before joining the other students making their way into the gym.
“I kinda only really wanna for a few songs tonight, then get outta here,” she said. 
“My God, you are the woman of my dreams,” he kissed her cheek and twirled her. 
Since none of Eddie’s friends “believed” in Prom, she saw her friends waving to her to go sit with him. 
“Wow, Eddie, nice to see you not in your typical uniform,” her friend, Rachel said — sort of joking. 
He turned around to give the table a full 360, “You all like?”
Hoots and hollers came from the table as she held her boyfriend close. 
“We’re gonna go dance.” 
“Behave, you two,” her other friend, Veronica stated. 
“Don’t we always?” she asked. 
“Never!” Veronica joked.
— 
What felt like forever, the band finally played a slow song. She was still out of breath from dancing. 
Eddie pulled her in by her waist and swayed back and forth. She wrapped her arms around his neck and rested her head on his shoulder. 
Deep down, Eddie didn’t find prom as bad as he thought it was going to be. He had the girl of his dreams in his grasp and never wanted the moment to end.
Every now and then, she felt him place gentle kisses on her temple as he held her close — like he was afraid someone was going to take her away from him. 
This was the moment she was looking forward to since her freshman year – before she even knew Eddie. She wanted to slow dance with her first love while feeling safe in his arms. 
She lifted her head to look into his eyes.
“What do you say we get out of here?” she asked. 
“Honey, I’d never thought you’d ask,” he grabbed your hand and swerved through the crowd of people. 
The cool Indiana air hit them as they walked back to Eddie’s van hand in hand.
Luckily, prom wasn’t close to being over so they had a chance to leave before everyone else. 
He opened the door for her and quickly ran over to his side. 
“What do you wanna do now?” he asked. 
As he was speaking, she pulled her dress up so she could leap over into the drivers seat. 
“Woah, what,” he said, hands instantly grabbed her waist to balance her. 
His hand reached down to pull the seat all the way back and down for more space. 
She spent the next few moments attacking his mouth with kisses. 
“What’s all this about?” he asked. 
“You did something very nice for me tonight. You knew how much prom meant to me so you sucked it up and went along with it. Thank you, Eds.” 
“I love seeing my girl happy,” he smiled, reaching to pull her dress up so he could feel her ass. 
“My uncle isn’t home tonight, wanna get outta here?” 
“I don’t have a change of clothes,” she pouted. 
“Oh babe, you won’t need any clothes,” he smirked.
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kiddbegins · 7 months
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Distraction - Matt Casey | 18+
requested: yes
word count: 2,204
warnings: smut [unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it), dirty talk, lowkey think some of it counts as a breeding kink? I don't actually know???]
a/n: ... jesus christ
Masterlist
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[“You’re the worst type of distraction, you know?” ]
Matt was probably the most supportive boyfriend you had ever had. He’s had your back since your first day at 51. He wasn’t a lieutenant yet but he still had enough pull at the house that he was able to get some asshole off your back in the first hour.
And since then he’s been at your side. You were a paramedic, so it wasn’t like the crush that had grown between you two was against the rules. And you didn’t even get together for… a while. For lack of a better word. But once you guys were, it was the strongest bond anyone had seen.
Nothing but loyalty, trust and support. Especially now. You’d had enough of being a paramedic. Not knowing what happened to patients after you brought them in. Not being able to use the copious amount of medical knowledge you had in the field. All of it was so frustrating.
So you decided to go to actual medical school. Which was going well. No you weren’t the top of your class but you were pretty high in the ranks. Half of the younger students ignored the embarrassment they put on themselves to ask for your help, knowing that as a paramedic you must have known a fair amount of stuff.
Which you did. But that wasn’t without the excessive cramming you did in between shifts. Like right now. Matt had been asleep for a few hours by now, expecting you to join him by the time it hit midnight.
It was 2:30 in the morning now.
And even though you knew you should go to bed, you couldn’t. Not when you still didn’t know what the hell to look for on an MRI. “Baby, why are you still awake?” Matt’s groggy voice was followed by the scuffle of his feet across the floor, making their way down the hallway.
You glanced over at him, a pen tucked behind your ear and hair tied up loosely. It was neat before but strands were slowly falling out of it the more you tilted and turned your head. His voice made you jump slightly, eyes too focused on some highlighted words in your textbook.
“Huh?” He sat on the couch behind you, gesturing to the skewed papers. “Oh, studying. Go back to sleep,” You gave him a soft smile, feeling his arms go around your shoulders, pulling you towards him.
Matt placed a kiss to the top of your head, “Come to bed with me,” He muttered, his hands sliding down your arms to push a different pen from your hand, grabbing it in his. You laughed softly, feeling him kiss from your cheek to your jaw.
Lightly you hummed, giving way to him, “You are the worst type of distraction you know that?” You muttered, twisting your hand to hold his. Matt nodded faintly, leaning more to kiss your shoulder.
“I know, so let me distract you more, in bed, and you can pick this back up tomorrow. When you’re more rested, and relaxed,” He slid his other hand over your shoulder, squeezing softly. It was damn near impossible to say no to him. Actually, completely impossible.
Matt was addicting. His touch, his words. Everything. He always has been. The first kiss you ever had sparked something deep inside you and since then it was like you were insatiable when it came to him.
Being at work was hard enough to control yourself, and his office only went uninterrupted for so long before someone knocked on his door so quickies were nearly off the table. Nearly. But at home, and when he was lazily kissing at your neck like he was now?
How could you even imagine declining his sweet offer?
You shifted onto your knees, turning to face him, pressing your lips to his. Matt’s hands abandoned yours, instead swooping around your waist, gently holding onto you. “That a yes?” He questioned smugly, already knowing the answer. He was well aware of the pull he had over you.
It was balanced perfectly, your presence having the same effect on the lieutenant as he on you. You hummed softly, pushing yourself up and off the floor, not without leaning forward to give him another firm kiss.
Moments like this made you thankful he was the type to only sleep in pajama pants, his chest bare for you to run your hands over. “Mhm,” Now impatient, you grabbed his hand, pulling him up, feeling him bump into your back as he followed you back into your bedroom, textbook and studies at the back of your mind.
You turned back to him the second you heard the door click behind you, hands finding the back of his neck to pull him into a kiss. Any sleepiness that was in his body when he woke up was now gone, completely replaced with you, your lips and your body.
“You can’t just,” You firmly kissed him, “Come out there,” Another kiss. “And distract me.” And another. Slipping words in between them. Matt’s hands on your hips pulling you closer.
He reciprocated each kiss, his tongue fighting to slip into your mouth each time, slowly he pulled away, not caring about the line of spit that connected your mouths. “Seems I can though, doesn’t it?” His cocky words driven by the horniness that was clouding his mind, the ever growing bulge in his pants pushing the sarcastic side out of him.
Usually you were able to wrangle him in, get things done but when he started talking back? That’s when you knew to just let him do his thing. Cause damn was he good at it. “Is that so Lieutenant Casey?” You ticked an eyebrow up, overly softly gazing up at the blonde man.
Matt nodded, your tone catching his breath, “Mhm,” He nudged you back, slowly getting you to the end of the bed. “Cause look where you are,” His lips pressed to the bottom of your neck, “With,” Matt nipped right below your ear, “Me.” His breath sent a chill down your spine.
You closed your eyes, tilting your head to the side, letting the man kiss back down your neck. His hands slid up your sides, under your shirt and pulled it off. Matt turned you, sitting on the edge of the bed and pulling you onto his lap.
Slowly your hands went over his shoulders, wrapping your legs around his waist. His arms wrapped around you, leaning up to catch your lips again, pulling you into a deep kiss. It was slow but heated, all of the lust and passion wrapped into each twist of your lips together.
Each brush of your tongue against his made him grow more and more, grinding his hips up into yours. “You can take my clothes off you know,” You muttered into the break he took to catch his breath. Matt’s eyes found yours, loosening the grip on you to lean back onto his palms.
“Or you can do it for me,” He mumbled, eyes dragging across your bare chest and the pajama pants you had put on hours ago. Your cheeks burned as you lifted from his lap, making a show of pushing them off, going to return to your spot when he held his hand out in expectancy.
You tilted your head slightly, Matt raising his eyebrows at the floral underwear you still wore. Oh. With a slight smirk you pulled them off, tossing them to the side, accepting Matt’s grasp as he brought you back towards him.
“That’s my baby girl,” He muttered, his hand going to your hair while his other gripped your hip, rocking up against you. Lightly you moaned, head leaning back as he did it again. His bulge rubbed right against your clit, making you pull your lip between your teeth.
Matt wanted you to beg. You knew that and you wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of it. So instead, you leaned forward, kissing along his collarbone. Aka his hot spot that always, always did the job in getting you what you want.
And it did. As you sucked a mark into the spot just above his collarbone he stood, his arms tightly around you before he gently placed you on the bed, standing back up to pull the rest of his clothes off. In seconds he was back over you, his hand on your cheek.
“You want me to get you ready or do you think you can handle it?” Matt asked softly, his other palm pressing over your chest sensibly, just lightly running his thumb over your nipple as he spoke. You couldn’t wait any longer than you already were so, even though you weren’t sure you could, you nodded.
“I can handle it,” You put a hand on the side of his neck, holding onto him as he nodded, slotting himself between your legs.
Even when you’d done this million times, the warmth of Matt’s skin always made you twist and turn, the anticipation of feeling him grew like a hot air balloon in your stomach. “Okay, tell me to stop if it hurts too much.” Even in his lust filled mindset his first thought was always you.
No matter what, Matt did what he could to make sure you were having as good of a time as he was. So his eyes trained on your face as he pushed in, soothingly running his thumb across your cheek as your face screwed up.
Matt wasn’t big by most means but he was big enough to stretch you out, sending a burning sensation through your thighs every time he entered you. The pain never lasted long, usually subsiding within the first few seconds. But that was also after he’d already fingered you.
This was probably the first time he went in without the foreplay and honestly, you might have regretted it a smidge but the second the pain subsided the doubt went out the window and a moan left your lips.
“You alright?” He asked softly, yet to move his hips.
“Mhm,” As soon as you nodded Matt pulled back, slowly rolling his hips back into you. Your eyes were still squeezed shut but as your body loosened, he continued to move. With Matt it was always, well, at least usually, sensual. He liked taking his time.
Liked moving that one way that had your toes curling as you tightened your legs around him. And this was no different. Strategically he thrust into you. His hands grabbed your hips, pulling them as close as he could get as he leaned down to kiss you.
His lips always felt amazing, even more so when he was deep in you and hitting every spot perfectly. It was like his kisses could coax an orgasm out of you the same way his tongue around your clit could.
Something about Matthew Casey was just so perfect that he molded perfectly to you every time, every night. Your hands grasping his face tightly pushed his movements to grow faster, losing himself in the heat of your body, wet skin slapping together roughly as each moan went right to where you two were connected.
“God I love you,” He muttered roughly into your ear before biting at your lobe, his eyes fluttering shut. Matt was trying his hardest not to cum yet, making sure you were first was also something he always did. Very gentlemanly, of course.
Your head went back as he spoke, your eyes darting across his blissed out face. “I love you,” All of your emotions managed to come out when you were together, and this was no different. The serotonin or dopamine or whatever it was that spilled into your brain was always met with Matt’s touch and love.
Matt’s hand slid between your legs, slowly rubbing at your clit the opposite of his thrusts, relishing in the way his name slid off your tongue at the newly added sensation. “I love you so much. My girl,” He spoke, knowing his loving words and tone always made your stomach pull into knots. “Gonna be with me forever, hm? Always with me. Gonna get married,” His fingers sped up slightly as you gazed up at him, eyes locking.
“Gonna have my babies. Have a family. Always going to be mine, huh princess?” His last couple of thrusts sent you overboard, eyes failing to stay on his as they squeezed shut, backing lifting off the bed as you saw stars.
Matt took the opportunity to wrap his other arm around you, fingers slowing until they stopped, allowing himself to focus on working you through your own high and finally releasing inside of you. His chest rose and fell quickly, gently pulling himself out and off of you as your hand trailed up his arm and to his face.
“You better make good on those promises.” You muttered, stroking a thumb across his face. Matt tilted his head slightly, mind clouded by his orgasm, all he could think about was you.
Softly he hummed and you smiled softly, keeping your eyes on him. “Marrying me.” He leaned down, catching your lips in his once more, slowly moving against them.
"I plan to."
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Wanna join Matt's tag list?
tags: @winchesterszvonecek
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jobey-wan-kenobi · 1 year
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Suited — the fugitive
👀👀👀👀👀👀👀????? 💛!!!
I cannot emphasize enough how not-good this is.
I mighta spoken of it once to you before, I think—Richard starts taking Walsh out for lunches and it might be that he likes her or it might be that he wants to drive Sam a little nuts with jealousy of whom is left ambiguous. Sam stews for a while before then taking the bull by the horns showing up to a fancy gig with Kathy Wahlund. Yes, at some point the boys should just make out. Or go to therapy! One or the other.
I was also considering bringing in another half-baked idea where Sam's team is guarding a morally-dubious witness until they can testify in high-profile case. When said witness gets shot, Richard attends to them in surgery because that definitely falls under his purview and perhaps also is able to suss out and take out a threat to the witness in the hospital.
Two half-baked ideas make one full fluffy loaf! In theory.
In practice, your Sam and Richard snippets were so breathtakingly perfect that I don't think I have dare written a word on this since around the time we became mutuals (💙). I cannot aspire to that level of realism.
But I couldn't bring myself to delete the file. Maybe one day, when I watch The Fugitive for the 145th time, the idea will catch fire again...
There is a snippet below. Sam is stuck (stag, this time) at one of those black-tie thingies and he's coping by being a little bit manic tbh. I was really leaning into the U.S. Marshals vibe when I was writing this.
--
Within minutes of arrival he had decided that tonight’s entertainment would be smiling as widely as possible at the mayor while making as many references to a leaking story about certain auto workers’ union bribes as one could humanly cram into a two minute gladhanding and then helpfully telling two screenwriters doing research for their new show one enormous lie about law enforcement after another. He was already starting to enjoy himself when he saw a familiar face and laughed aloud.
Renfro, who would have known that laugh if he came across it in the Sahara, groaned and turned.
“Oh wow, lookitchoo, Renfro, you’re almost looking like a person tonight! Are those platform shoes or did you get taller?”
“Very funny, Sam.”
They had fallen into their usual step. “It is funny, I thought I left you in charge?”
“Walsh told me I had to come. She said Poole would run things just fine.”
“Oh, she’s not wrong, in fact I’m sure Poole’s is doing twice as good a job as you would, but why the hell does she have you decked out in black and white?”
“Well, Sammy, I don’t know if you noticed, but I’m getting to be a very important person these days—”
“My ass.”
“Yeah? What about it?”
A bit belatedly, the men realized that Gerard was barreling them through the room and that Renfro was starting to shout. They exchanged a rueful look. “Sorry, ma’am,” Renfro muttered to the woman that Gerard had most recently pushed aside.
“No, that was me,” said Gerard, giving her a sunny smile over Renfro’s head as they departed.
“Jesus, they shouldn’t let us off the streets,” Renfro observed, in a subdued mutter. Gerard was giving a last lingering look to the woman’s backless dress. “Anyway, Walsh told me to schmooze.”
“And you said ‘How low?’”
“Nah, I’m not that witty.”
“That is true. You are not a witty guy.”
“Yeah, you and my wife should get together.”
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okay so. last night i scrolled past some random podcast video ad on my fb feed, where two women were talking about “i want to teach my kids to have a healthy relationship with money”; which of course is a great thing. but then one of them went on with the classic, tired tangent you see online about “oh so we learnt pythagoras’s theorem, but NOTHING about high interest bearing accounts and home loans etc at ALL in school!!! how dare they teach us about Pythagoras but absolutely NOTHING about life skills like saving for a home!!!???”
like effie or whatever your name is. we did learn about basic interest in school, specifically in year 9 & 10 maths and probs in senior general maths too- even though i dropped maths for years 11 & 12. we did learn about how to calculate double time & half pay in maths. we did learn about saving money and budgeting in maths. but lo and behold, you were 15. and so, like many 15 year olds (very esp myself back in 2010 for example) you ignored this stuff and didnt think that it was important. like what teenager goes to apply for a car loan with a low interest variable rate of 7.5%??? not one. what 15yo actually cares about interest and how to calculate it???? not many. but maths teachers, to the best of their ability, do try to teach these things to the stubborn kids who don’t want to listen or even do the work. but it’s because they’re abstract concepts, in many ways, to kids. they defs were to me. i didn’t want to know anything about them (or mind you i didn’t want to know anything maths based bc to quote 15yo me i “loathe, despise and detest maths. so therefore i don’t have to try at it!”). and i think many teenagers who struggle with maths think like that.
but then we latch onto the obvs memorable names like pythagoras or fibonacci or just the all-encompassing term of algebra, and totally dismiss it, when we’re older, as pointless. like yes. don’t get me wrong. algebra, even without my distinct lack of trying at it, did send me into deep confusion and to *sleep acting* sleep. but for fucks sake, you can’t expect teachers and the school curriculum to cram EVERYTHING into a school day like life management skills.
i think this is one reason why teachers are so burnt out. because people like this (and generally the internet at large now) keep spitting out these stupid as fuck lines about “WE DONT NEED ALGEBRA AND PYTHAGORAS!! we need life skills classes!!! why don’t schools and teachers totally disrupt core maths skills learning and teach life skills like how high interest accounts work?!” like no. that’s a parent’s job. or even an extension project for more engaged kids thing. or even, if a kid is interested in this stuff, they’ll research it themselves. high schools don’t need to jam “life skills” into their curriculum. especially when globally, it seems, teachers are burnt the fuck out bc of low pay, bad behaviour from both kids & parents and already overloaded class planning and admin etc etc etc that goes with being a teacher.
because although i still see maths as a complete mystery tbh, i can now appreciate that it’s there in school curriculums to try to teach logic and order and systems… in a way much different to english and other artsy subjects like drama and history, that i was good at, do. but this is always ignored, bc the underlying logic of maths is also devalued as being “unnecessary and impractical” all bc no one particularly enjoys or likes algebra…. and just also conveniently forgets that you are taught money skills in maths; albeit if it is annoying…. because why the hell would you buy 70 pineapples and then split the dividends of selling those 70 pineapples amongst you and 3 of your friends??? did you buy them with a 10% discount??? what is the profit and loss of those 70 pineapples??? how do you budget and save up to buy 70 pineapples???? who knows. no one knows. except if you show your working and reasoning- which no one (and not definitely not me both now at 27 and back then) wants to do at 15 years old- let alone at 30 or 40 or whatever other age.
just yeah. i am so sick and tired of people whinging and bitching about the “we should replace pythagoras with life skills in maths!! teach me about high interest bearing accounts and how to apply for a home loan when im 15!!” when teachers are already over-burdened enough already… and if you’d just bother to find your old year 9 maths textbook from whatever year, you’d find that you did learn basic money management skills, then and there. but it went over your head, like it should have when you were 15. and like. applying for a home loan is almost null and void at this point, with how real estate and interest rates are globally (or domestically here in aus) rn. shut the fuck up and let kids be kids, vicki. and let teachers be teachers, when they’ve already got enough on their plates as is, vicki.
and also. the above doesn’t really factor in how kids would feel about so-called “life skills” classes being forced into their already jam-packed class schedules. maybe some kids would thrive in a class that gives them assessments on how to set up a bank loan for anything- a house, a car, a boat idek. or do a report how insurance premiums are set up. or what the process is for working out your superannuation (here in australia) accounts and paying your taxes.
but on the other hand, i think many kids (like 15yo me for example) would resent and hate to have another class that’s scheduled between maths and geography- or maybe gives them an extra period at school some days (eg like the catholic school i was at from years 7 to 10 did on fridays until i was halfway through year 7, i think, in 2008). no kid wants a 7 period friday. no kid wants to have a mandatory life skills class on a friday afternoon about how to file taxes and how to apply for a bank loan. when they’re already up to their eyeballs in english, history, geography, PE, religion (since i was at a religious school) and whatever other subjects they’ve got in junior years assessments and/or exams. 
and if it’s in senior years: how would it be assessed??? would they try to stuff it into a year 12 end of year exam and cause kids to have mental breakdowns all because they can’t remember the difference between CTP car insurance and regular car insurance in a HSC exam in new south wales?? or remember the correct definition of variable rate home loan??? like if i had to sit through that as a COMPULSORY exam at the end of year 12 back in 2013 i would’ve had even more of a mental breakdown than i already had back then. and it would’ve sent me into a further panic attack mode around my ATAR (uni entrance mark).
just. i think all these comments people always throw around about “they need life skills classes in schools so you learn about home loans and taxes and wages and everything Adulting™️ at school… which is FAR MORE important than pythagoras in maths or shakespeare in english and/or drama class” is really not factoring in both the capacity of teacher workloads and also kids workloads at school when EVERYTHING has to be assessed, examined AND reported on these days. it would be a nightmare.
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nizar-dreams · 3 months
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If Only You Believe In Miracles So Would I
Chapter 2: And I Am The Living Sign (Teaser
"It was the official first day of classes. Because of the additional staff, the schedule was very different than most of the original staff were used to. Like being able to have classes more often, rather than once every two days. For example: Astronomy classes could now be doubled scheduled so that, while Professor Sinistra was in the tower with her students, Professor Alvyan could be on the grounds or in another tower with roof access, and vice versa. Another being like Professor Snape’s and Camargo’s schedules where some teachers got a specific year or two and then shared the others. But, now everyone would see their students every other day, rather than once or twice a week since they now only had seven classes each between them with combined houses. Not that they had set schedules, as it was. Well, Camargo called it an ‘AB’ schedule where you had an ‘A’ schedule and a ‘B’ schedule. Then the week would look like one day was A, the next was B, and repeated — and if you started Monday with A, then the following Monday would start with B. It was definitely not familiar to Severus’s experience, as Hogwarts — or, really, Dumbledore — was all about chaotic schedules and awkward time periods, but he recond he’d get used to the time switches after a month.
Severus, amongst others, were just glad that they didn’t have to cram each lesson or frustrate themselves with having ‘doubles’. Those were absolute hell in Severus' pessimistic opinion. Don’t even get him started on a double class with Gryffindors and Slytherins! Even Minerva felt her patience fray each time, and even worse when they had O.W.Ls and N.E.W.Ts to prepare for. Now they actually might have time to grade homework and grade tests without wanting to strangle coworkers on what should be relaxful evenings and Saturdays. 
Damn those who have always had ten to five classes to teach anyway. They didn’t have to deal with cramming twelve to fourteen different classes five days a week, somehow get each lesson to stick until the following week, completely switch gears to start teaching another class, and pray to whatever god would listen that nothing dared interrupt that lesson plan or so help me— No, they didn’t have to worry about that, or deal with being a head of house either. They could take care of their lessons and gradings efficiently and relax. 
Yes, Severus was very spiteful about the whole thing, even if most of them were kind enough to help out where they could. He was, in fact, a petty man and well aware of it. Did he appreciate when his colleagues offered assistance? Yes, but it still left a bitter frustration he had only barely begun to let go.
But now... Now they did have the extra staff. Now, after years of pain, the workload was finally being shared.
Severus nearly prayed in thanks out of relief when the first day didn’t leave him hating every child walking through his door. Whose bright idea was it to cut staff down? A thousand children and teenagers, to only a handful adults? 
Fucking. Ridiculous.
It was a wonder no one snapped under the pressure, and no wonder Minerva always came back frustrated with every attempt to encourage hiring more teachers.
Ten years of frustration, Severus pondered. Ten years of him nearly having panic attacks from being so new to teaching children who nearly killed themselves for being careless and forgetful (damn you Slughorn!), and ten years of having to go through mountains of homework and tests like a teacher’s personal Hell of — and truly — their own creation, and ten years of wondering why he didn’t give up after a particularly frustrating, hair-pulling week.
Ten years. Ten years ago he was barely an adult. Little more than a child who realised too late that he had made a grave mistake. He didn’t even know, back then, if he would even live half of those ten years, with Azkaban breathing down his neck and only saved by Albus Dumbledore. Ten years of his life were spent just trying to keep going because he promised Her.
Damn whoever cut staff down. Damn them."
~~~~~~~~~
UGH ALMOST THE FIRST OF FEBUARY AND I CAN FINALLY POST THE NEXT CHAPTER!! (Bruh life drama caught up to me and I nearly forgot that i have to make sure the 2nd chapter was cleaned up and ready to go lmao rippp) ANYWAYS! Here’s a teaser, and exploring more of how I want to write Severus Snape. Considering I’m currently catching up to him in age, which is crazy, it’s making me reflect on how this stress would effect me at such an age and choosing the path he went through.
I would be a mess, frankly. I’m almost positive his skills in occlumency are what’s keeping him together 75% of the time throughout the entire Harry Potter stories and the other 25% because he’s a stubborn man who grew up fast because he had to.
Anyway. I hope you enjoy and give my story a look on AO3!
AO3 fic: If Only You Believe In Miracles So Would I
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riko0youth · 4 months
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Rollercoaster New year
Did I tale about how I had a Quiz on the 31th? no? thought so, let's go,
So i had an online quiz, i was carelssly studying for cuz they said its only 9 points and i was somehow sure i could wing it (bad, bad me), or just cram it, the quiz was sunday 9am (and we hated that with passion), but when i was starting my exam night cramming they Sent a message at 10 pm that it was moved to 9PM, i did a victory dance allover the house until my stomach and associated organs started to hurt, However, as a paranoid person i was scared half to death i would wake up to find the exam link sent for morning, i had to get reassure from people and get people to get reassure from people, before i could force myself to sleep, woke up, day went fine, i totally forgot it was the last day of the year until i was reminded, all my thoughts are on the quiz and the paper i had to turn in next day, so skip to an hour before quiz, i finished my half assed cramming and was doing questions, and still sus,the link wasn't sent yet, i did the mistake of following the group CHAT, someone had the mind to ask how many questions was the quiz and the usual answer got out, nine, nothing grand about it, but the all hell broke loose, The admin (Students Rep.) was like, Who says, and we all paused in panic and bomberes him with freaked out questions,
First arrow hit, He sent a crying emoji saying the doctor said its 20 questions.
Now imagine, you're carelessly prepared for a tiny quiz, already planning on sacrificing some subjects, since they prolly only had a one or two points in, and then you're hit was the fact that there's enough room for all subjects to whoope your unprepared ass and only less than an hour away from said whooping for you to prepare ANYthing.
Second arrow, he then said that he is trying to negotiate with the doctor, trying to convice her to prolong the exam time to half an hour, and we were like, Wait, then how much is it? and there were scrambled replies of 10 or 20 minutes and we didn't know who to trust, the fact of what we were about to face not really sinking in for me,
We tried to remedy the situation, finding any logic in that farce we reasoned that it must be half a point for each question, 10 points, not so bad, more room to think, all is good,
Now third, K. O., arrow hit, he sent another plethora of crying emojis,saying its 20 points.
(at that point someone angrily asked why he doesn't say all that in one go, i wholeheartedly agree) Half an hour, before said 20 questions quiz.
At that point, i acted when i do in really highly stressful situations, and kept calm and cool and chill about, i was like, okay this is happening now, let's end this, get it over with, and go cry about it to every single person i know later,(yes my uncles included, i've always found comfort in crying to them about hard academic stuff, like my trauma against physics, i somehow, by a strange twist of fate always got to sit with them right before any major physics test i had, including the final, and i found great comfort in that), 15 minutes, I locked my phone and continued to finish the questions i had in hand before running out of time just to Scream about in with fellow suffers, I looked again, couldn't help myself, five minutes later to find the admin sending on the Announcement group, "Okay guys, the doctor was just doing a Happy New Year Prank on us, the quiz is 9 questions"
You can guess what happened next.
It is note worthy, that there were people calling the bluff, people calculating with great logic why i could only be 9 questions, People saying that the doctor was probably joking, i was one of those people, say that the module was only 90 points, EOME, Practical, Final,Activites, how will they get enough points for those if the gave a whole 20 to a tiny quiz.
However, when one is dealing with our college, we learnt the hard way not to rely on logic and not to be too optimistic, yes, we suspected, but we knew better than to let our guard down while dealing with a college that tells you the number of exam questions and the exam time right before the thing itself.
So, instead of seeing my fellow Suffers in arm's reaction, i finished the questions first and tries to follow up.
Two minutes before the quiz someone said to start the count down
Exactly a minute before the quiz I sent lamenting that we're counting down to the beginning of the quiz instead of the beginning of the year.
Right after, they closed the group Chat, and I started my mental prep, Closed all the books and moved from the bed where they lay, cuz its not an openbook quiz. it took a few tries before the quiz opened.
All in all, the quiz itself was anticlimatic (for me at least, and I'm very much thankful for it) I lost a point because i didn't revise a subject as well as i should've, i avoided losing another point thanks to dear, dear, Spongbob squarepants (don't ask how, i make weird connections and refernces while studying, It very decidingly, very provenly (?), Works, so imma keep it that way) after successfully submitting (another thing i was greately thankful for) I Stood up, previously supressed Dizziness and Fatigue crawling back in with the speed of lightening, I went to the dining room, very obviously didn't eat, Drank a huge cup of tea (its a soup cup, Stolen/Gifted from my uncle, he was horrified when he saw me drink black tea from it,I have a bigger one now,almost 1/2 a litre I usually drink from twice a day,I always gleefuly smile when i see someone stares in horrified amazement/worry)
New year came and went, just happened, one moment i was still scrolling through food videos to get myself motivated to eat(I do suspect i have ARFID, but like my other mental and psychological suspected disorders, it remain undiagnosed) the next it was 12:02, i missed the ritual count down I am used to doing alone as the only person sentimental enough in the house to stay awake for it on a school night, I was kinda in a weird mood, but i woke up from it soon, My lil bro was surprisingly awake, not for the sake of welcome the first second of the year of course, I Told him happy new years, Shooting a text to each of my two enstraged from each other bestfrieds (Im like a child with divorced parents, the irony of it, what with my family circumstances, is not lost to me, in dark amusement i joke to myself that I get to experience both a failed ongoing marriage and a divorce, that was one of the reasons I was in a freaky mood), one replied one slept early, I aimlessly went to the kitchen, mood lost while watch a mundane Old Comedic Play on the TV, I Made something up on the spot in the kitchen, as you do.
Watching an eating, my brother joined me halfway for a while, we talked about that iconic actor we love, talking about Animation movies trilogy and Rewatching said movies and anime series and old,golden age cartoon we just pity the younger generations for missing out on.
it was honestly chill. still the weirdest Newyears eve i can remember. I was still Dizzy from the stress rush I had thanks to the quiz when i went to sleep.
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chipper-smol · 3 years
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Hollow Knight Telephone Round Two: Babysitter SL
Prompt: Shade (lord) is in the midst of final exams and they’re more stressed and tired than usual while babysitting. They accidentally fall asleep in the middle of a calm spell and the god babies become worried. The next time Shade comes over, all of the god babies present a gift they all made together!
By @minnesotamidian-blog​
Shade barely noticed their surroundings as they entered the nursery playroom. Plastic clattered and they sighed as Radiance yelled at the top of her lungs. At least she wasn't screaming. Yet. The scene was set: Unn was still in a crib and chewing on a bar, Root was climbing slowly onto a chair. Radiance was knocking over plastic blocks as Grimm cackled away. For once, Wyrm was playing peacefully with a kick toy, batting at it with his tail. Root got onto the chair and squealed, raising her arms. "Big Root now!" The little blue-eyed godling squeaked out.
Shade picked her up, hugged her to their chest before holding her out. "Now you're a flying Root."
She screamed laughter as Shade tiredly walked her around the room before setting her down near some of her favorite toys. They made sure nobody else had claimed the chair and took a seat, bending over to pick up the fussy moth. "Ancient enemy!" Of course she bit their hand.
Shade winced and just ran a hand over her fluff. "Are you hungry for something that isn't void?" They spoke tiredly.
"Oranges!" She yelled out.
The teen sighed as he went to the mini-fridge with snacks and found some miracle of miracles! pre-peeled oranges. Shade pulled them out and put her in a high chair with one at a time so she wouldn't be tempted to throw the extras at them.
Finals were here and they were really taking it out of the gangly god. Why did they have to know stuff about inorganic chemistry? Why did they have to know about history nobody cared about? There were some fun subjects, but the finals seemed to even suck the fun out of those classes, going over notes and studying everything just in case. They'd been pulling long nights and the night before had been an all-night cram session-and they still had to come to work, they couldn't afford not to. They'd underlined all the stuff the teacher had said was important to remember and had written down stuff from the last finals about each teacher's usual tests.
It made narrowing down what to study from impossible to I'm totally toast. They groaned as they set down a calmer Radiance the opposite side of the room from Wyrm. She found toys that interested her, at least. Root wandered over to Wyrm, who was really into knocking at the kick toy and purring. Root settled nearby and burbled as she hugged and gnawed a plushie.
The teen couldn't help it. The kids were calm for once; their head started to tilt forward, eyes heavy. They were exhausted. Shade's eyes closed and their breathing deepened. At first, their toys were too interesting to notice their babysitter's state; but it didn't take long for Grimm to get bored enough to fly over and notice. "...Shade? Shade's eyes are closed." They landed and the four children not in a crib headed for the batlike godling.
"Is Shade dead?" Wyrm sounded worried.
"Don't be stupid, they're having a nap!" Radiance huffed.
Root looked up and swayed before patting Shade's leg. "Grown-ups don't have nap times." She was tearing up.
"Nuh-uh, they're having bad dreams and it's tasty!" Grimm clamored onto their lap.
The others joined, Radiance grabbing Unn to join them on the sleeping teen. Grimm rested between Shade's horns, Unn was on one shoulder, Radiance on the other, with Root and Wyrm curled up together on Shade's lap, Wyrm purring for once.
When Shade woke up, they were surprised by the weight on their body and forced themself to look down and around before moving. "Uh oh, I fell asleep… sheesh, I'm glad this place isn't a fiery disaster." They picked the godlings up. "You're not dead!" Wyrm exclaimed.
Root burst into tears and even Grimm joined in on the crying spat. Shade sighed and spent the rest of the time comforting them until meal time and settled them down. Time to go home for them all!
But the worry didn't leave the heads of the little godlings. "We should make something for Shade. If they're having nightmares, they might be sad." Radiance sighed. "But that doesn't mean I feel bad for my ancient enemy!" "What do we make?" Root twirled around, slowly turning in place until she fell onto pillows in her dizziness.
"Something of clay! I can burn it dry!" Grimm hopped around.
"But there's no clay." Unn spoke slowly, thoughtfully. "But there's crayons and paper."
"Oooh. We can make a pretty picture for Shade!" Wyrm waved his head happily. The group went for papers and each started to draw on the paper. "You're taking up too much paper!" Wyrm whined.
Radiance complained in turn, pointing at the color he was using. "I want that color!"
Wyrm growled and argued back. "I had it first!"
They started rolling around over their drawings, biting and clawing. Grimm gave a solid scream that startled the two. "You ruined Shade's pretty pictures!" He yelled.
The two looked at each other and hung their heads. "...sorry." Radiance muttered.
"-'m sorry." Wyrm looked away from the moth, skulking. "Start again? You can have the crayon, Radiance…"
Radiance took the crayon and they all picked up the last piece of paper. "I think this is better." Root spoke cheerfully.
It was three days later, once Shade had a solid night's sleep and finals completed that they'd returned to work. A large construction sheet of paper in grey covered in scribbles and rough names and messages was waiting for them.
Feel better soon Shade
Love you
Best babysitter
Tastiest nightmare!
Not the worst anciant ancient enemy.Shade could only feel warmth and laugh, hugging the drawing to themself. There were some days the job felt like the best thing in the world.  ------------------------------- By @tomatotimes
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By @loud-whistling-yes
"No."
The kids protested louder. Shade lifted the TV remote higher up, now above their head.
"Screentime's over, I said no."
Wyrm attempted to crawl up their leg in what was a rather pathetic attempt at stealing the remote, but was promptly shaken off. Grimm tried next, flying overhead to snatch the controller. Shade ducked and grabbed him by the tail before he could send himself flying straight towards the ceiling fan for the third time that day.
"Find something else to do," Shade said as they stuffed the remote deep into their pocket, much to everyone else's dismay. "Look, as much as I'd love to shut you guys up for the whole day, you've all been staring at the TV for hours now and I don't want to get in trouble with your parents."
Louder complaints.
"No, no, no. I am not cracking this time." Shade announced as they pulled Radi, who was hissing like an angry cat, off their jeans and pulled their phone out. "You guys got me last week, never again. No more TV for you, we're doing something else before I lose my money for tonight. Google almighty, what is your suggestion."
activities to do with children
fun activities to do with children
activities to do with toddlers
what can I do with kids that isn't a major headache to deal with goddamnit
Go to the park? Shade took about half a second to consider the thought before wondering why they even thought it was possible anyways. Five kids from the deepest depths of hell, outdoors? No. No park.
Finger painting? A pain to clean up, but better than outdoors. Then they looked up from their phone and considered the idea with greater thought. Grimm's wings, Radi's legs, Unn and Wyrm's… er…. Body?.... Nevermind.
Play pretend? …. If they hear the name Hallownest one more time they might just go insane.
Hide and seek? No. No no no no no. No more hide and seek. Shade was utterly sick of hide and seek. If they had to spend another second stuffed inside the closet or trying to get Radi off the roof they'll probably quit the job right there and then.
Baking?
… That might work. Sure, cleaning up is gonna be absolute hell but it's the only thing Google suggested that they haven't tried yet without horrible results.
Shade stuffed their phone back into their pocket and made a getaway to the kitchen, everyone else following, probably still trying to get the remote back. Butter, eggs, flour, sugar, oh, even some chocolate chips…
"Well then," They declared, pulling every ingredient out of the cabinet and fridge. "We're making cookies! And no, no one is allowed to touch the oven when it's hot. If you guys behave we'll have cookies in like, an hour or something like that."
The kids watched in confusion as Shade ran around the kitchen, pulling out bowls and spoons and a bunch of other utensils while typing furiously on their phone.
Cookies recipe
Cookies recipe easy
Cookies recipe for beginners
Cookies recipe for kids
"What do you guys think about chocolate chip cookies?"
Multiple chitters of approval. "Chocolate chip cookies it is then."
Step one: sieve the flour. Oh wyrm, first step and it's already gonna go to shit.
"Okay, you guys can watch this but for the love of the holy wyrm, do not touch it." Shade measured the correct amount of flour before scooping Wrym and Unn off the floor onto the table so they could see while Radi pulled herself onto the chair. The Lady had already clinged herself onto their sweater and Grimm was doing just fine flying nearby.
“You guys get one chocolate chip each if you guys behave and don’t get flour everywhere.” Shade added. “Now, Lady, hold still and don’t move, I gotta keep my hands steady for this…”
************
"Okay, chocolate chip time." Shade popped open the jar of chocolate as the kids cheered. "Actually, we’re not supposed to be eating this plain, cause it's going into the cookies. But no one actually does that so you guys get five chips each for not setting the kitchen on fire so far."
"The recipe says a cup of chocolate chips but we all know that's a lie." They added while shoving their phone back in their pocket and grabbing a handful of chips before mixing the batter together. "I'm probably not someone you should take life lessons from, but here's one thing I can guarantee you should take to heart: never follow the recipe when it comes to chocolate chips, you count that with your soul."
Final step: oven time. The oven was preheated earlier, and the only thing left was to get the cookies into the tray and into the oven. "Now, who wants to make heart-shaped cookies?"
****************
Three deformed stars, five mutated trees, two malformed cats, several irregular hearts, a couple handfuls of chocolate eaten straight from the jar, and one (1) perfectly round cookie later, the cookies were on the tray, in the oven, and in a surprising turn of events, no one burned themselves… yet. Shade grabbed everyone and made sure no one was in a five-meter radius within the oven before picking up all the dirty bowls and utensils. “Cookies will have to sit in there for about 15 minutes, we’ll be cleaning up in the meantime.”
“Don’t look at me like that, and no whining, if you want cookies you gotta deal with the mess afterwards. That's the payoff, unless you're a wizard who has a passion for baking. Then that's fair, I guess." They dumped all the used utensils they could find and turned on the sink. The sief, three bowls, tablespoons and teaspoons.. Oh wait.
"Radi, the big wooden spoon, please?" Shade called, sponge in their hand and bowls being thoroughly rinsed.
Radi, of course, was not willing to help, because she's basically a feral house cat that just so happened to grow more legs than the average feline. Shade sighed and moved on to finding the next helper they could find.
"Grimm, I know you're touching the oven, stop it. I'm pretty sure you're immune to fire but not everyone else and you're setting a bad example for them. Get me the spoon please."
“Lady, here’s a cloth, help me dry the bowls up. Wyrm, … i have no idea how you can help, no limbs and all but uh, could you go get Unn? I have no idea where she went. Thanks.” The last sentence was to Grimm, who flew over with the mixing spoon and dropped it into the sink while Wyrm scurried away to find Unn, wherever she’s napping at.
"Radi? Radi, I know you're right behind me, stop pretending that you can't hear me. Lady has an extra cloth with her, you're on table wiping duty."
*********
“See? That wasn't so bad,” Shade sent the last of the bowls back into the cupboards and closed it shut. “And the cookies are pretty much done.”
“Also, no. You may not eat the cookies the moment I pull them out of the oven. These rules also apply to Grimm because it's unfair to everyone else.. Don’t look at me like that Grimm, I know you’ll eat them all before they cool and leave us nothing.”
The cookies smelt delicious, and were left on the dining table to cool. “Now that it's cooling down, it's naptime.”
A chorus of groans and wailing.
“It’ll be ready when you guys get up. Up up up, sleep time.”
**********
If you’ve been anywhere near toddlers before, you’d know that getting them to nap in their bedrooms is a near-impossible situation. And Shade was not a person who deals with near-impossible situations well. So following the months old custom, Shade turned on the tv, remote miraculously not pickpocketed, collapsed onto the couch, and waited for everyone piling on them to fall asleep before moving them into their bedroom and pretending they managed to wrangle them all into bed.
And it all goes to plan, the Lady and Wyrm were sound asleep on their lap, Radi and Unn were dozing off on their shoulders, and they're pretty sure the snoring from the top of their head was coming from Grmm. Now, step 2: get everyone off them and onto the beds.
… Or maybe later. It's been a long day, and the couch is pretty comfy. Yeah, just five more minutes, nothing wrong with that…
And if the parents came home to see a cleaner-than-expected kitchen, a tray of chocolate chip cookies, and five kids snoring on top of their babysitter, also sound asleep, then that’s nobody’s business.
And if the originally completely full jar of chocolate chips was pretty much empty, then that’s no one’s business as well.
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By @astronomicartz​
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By @hollow-kin​
Shade lord wanted to take a nap. They are sooo tired, but they are babysitting 5 baby gods for 5$/H. Grimm is a brat, Radiance his sister is also a brat. Unn was ether eating or seeping, same with grub1. Lady was, well sweet and cuddly. they needed to find a distraction for the kids, what would work?
Would tv work, would cartoons work? They had dinner already. Tv had to work or grub and radiance would destroy the house. They needed to take a nap. Now what to watch was a different question, they would have to ask the kids. “so, what do guys want to watch? “Movie!” well they were all in agreement, what was good. “What kind of movie do you guys want to watch?” “Fire!” “dath” “animal” “tree” “ok. No, we are NOT watching fire.” “awww” “i do not know what dath means so no. So nature show it is then.” they go over to the tv and turn it on, then select the world around us. Lady was quick to fall asleep, on their lap. Shade lord slowly fell asleep, and grub nested between grub and shade lord. Grimm climed up to shade lord's head. 
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By @hawaiianbabidoll
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By @neoliberalsatan
A gentle darkness surrounded the shade lord. He finally felt at ease. "finally", he thought, "rest." it didn't take long after that before the darkness started to take shape and a whole new world created out of shadows sheathed him.
But the happiness of the shadows didn't last long. A new and a new sound drowned out their world and all the animals and plants took to hiding back in his head. The shade lord felt the distressed creations stir inside his mind and woke up to the sound of his phone ringing. He rubbed his lowest eyes and accepted the call
"Hello, with shade lord. How can i help you?" "Oh sorry dear, i know it's terribly late but we got an unexpected call and need to leave. Since you've babysat Unn multiple times we assumed she would like to stay with you. Is it okay for you? Can we bring her to your place?" The shade lord thought for a moment and decided he could use the money. "Yea it's fine, she's always such a pleasure to babysit." The voice on the other side sounded relieved. "Thank you. You're a life saver. We will make sure you're compensated accordingly."
Feeling a bit more awake after the phone call he started to prepare for having baby Unn over. After a while her parents arrived and after some greetings he was home alone with the baby. He walked with her in his arms towards the living room and placed her gently inside the crib. She opened her eyes for a moment after losing the feeling of someone holding her, but then closed them again and fell back asleep.
The shade lord decided he couldn't sleep anymore and made some popcorn and decided to put on a movie. It didn't even take 20 minutes before he got called again.
"Hello, with shade lord. How can i help you?" "Oh yes finally someone who answers. Sorry but you're our last hope. We were going somewhere tonight but our babysitter called off. Do you think you could babysit our lovely Radiance? She's very good behaved and won't cause you trouble." "yea, no problem. You'll just need to bring her to my place if it's no trouble"
Not even 5 minutes later the parents showed up and dropped of their larva. Shade lord looked at it a bit confused but didn't get the time to say anything because the parents left as soon as they handed her over. He closed his front door and gave the larva a good look. She was white and had a fluffy appearance. She had 5 pairs of legs and yellow-orange eyes. She started to writhe a little bit and shade lord made sure to hurry to the living room. He took a pillow and placed it on the couch and softly laid her on it. She seemed at ease and rested on the pillow all stretched out
Shade lord continued his movie, which was finally starting to get interesting, but as usual the commercial break hit. He was in the kitchen making more popcorn when he got another call.
"Hello, with shade lord. How can i help you?" "Hello, is this the babysitter?" "Yes, that's the one you're speaking with." "Great, a family member had an accident and i need to be there for them so do you think you could babysit for me?" "Yep, totally." "Thank you, can we bring him to you?" "Oh yea, no problem."
A few minutes later his doorbell rang and he hurried towards it. The father carried his toddler in what could only be described as wing-esque appendages. The shade lord extended his arms for the man to put his toddler in and felt a gentle brush of the leathery membrane. He shivered lightly before feeling a sudden warmth light up in his face, like someone has started a fire. When he looked back up the man was gone and he closed the door. The creature he was holding in his arms was unlike anything he had ever seen. 2 horns sprouted from its black head. The face was as bleak as white linen on a summer day. It seems she likes make-up because she had already 2 black lines running from her cheeks towards her eyes, eventually fading into the darkness of her head. She had the same membranes as her father and no limbs besides it.
He wasn’t even in the living room before he heard his front door being was under siege. He put the weird creature down and opened the front door. Immediately he was assaulted by Hollow, a very energetic child. He was wearing a green cloak today and it finally seemed he was starting to grow bigger than a hand. His horns has also branched into the inside. Immediately after Hollow jumped on his he could hear Pale complain about his unprofessional work attitude. Although he was bigger than most it seems he wouldn’t grow much anymore. His tiny stature didn’t discourage him from being bossy. Finally White entered. By far the biggest of the bunch, she was also the most introverted. Her roots slid elegantly over towards him and even managed to stop Pale from talking for a moment.
He took them inside the living room only to find that somehow the larva and the winged creature had somehow gotten into a fight and now both were in hiding in opposite sides of the room. Normally he wouldn’t make such a big deal out of this if somehow his couch wasn’t full of tiny needles and a chair was on fire. He rushed to the tap to fill a bowl of water to extinguish the little fire. With the attention being diverted Hollow managed to slip from the watch of Pale and could now be found in the corner Radiance was hiding. The larva figured out quickly he liked to play games and had soon enough set up a plan to make him betray Pale.
In the meantime White had climbed the couch and started pulling out the needles while Shade lord had figured out what the membrane between the appendages from the weird creature were for. Namely, for flight. And now she was attacking his horns and he couldn’t reach her. As if her flying was not good enough alone, whenever he raised his arms she would back off and launch a little fireball  All this commotion woke up baby Unn who slowly started to slither away from her crib to find food.
The shade lord finally had enough of the little fire hazard and rushed towards the pantry to get a kettle. Once he had found it he peeked around the corner only to find that fire hazard eating his popcorn! All caution was thrown aside and he grabbed her by the guts and put her inside the kettle. She tried to heat it but he added some water to it. While it evaporated quickly it was apparently enough to bring over the message. Now he could focus his attention back on the larva again, only she could’ve produced those needles, which White was making great progress with removing them as a quick glance told him.
Now back to Pale and Radiance who were apparently having a fight (Darkness, that larva really has a talent to provoke others). They were arguing near the coffee table, because apparently they wanted a fight so bad they just ran to each other and met in the middle. Hollow was climbing one of the legs of the table, but wasn’t noticed by the shade lord because he was too occupied with the other 2. He tried to separate the arguing pair but they were at each other’s throats. They even had summoned a needle and a tiny dagger to fight each other. The shade lord obviously didn’t count on this tiny factor and had soon enough one in each hand. He screamed, trying not to curse, barely not failing miserably, and Pale managed to escape. In any other situation this wouldn’t pose a problem, but Hollow, after eating some popcorn, found himself at the right edge of the coffee table and pulled out his tiny wooden sword he got from Pale. The larva, Darkness curse her, used this to her advantage and made the sign to Hollow to betray Pale. The act of betraying Pale involved jumping off of the coffee table and hitting Pale as hard on the head as possible. Naturally, all of this went according to plan and even brought some extra spectacle. After Hollow had hit Pale on the head he wasn’t prepared for the recoil of the wood and ended up hitting himself in the face.
All of this lead to 3 crying children (1 of them from laughing, the others from pain) and 1 very angry young adult. He put the larva on the couch and took care of the others while White held a close eye on the damned 10 legged thing. After Pale and Hollow weren’t crying anymore he took the little fire hazard out of the kettle and continued his movie, which was getting to an end.
After the film ended a documentary started and had all the kids hooked. He went to check on Unn only to find an empty crib. He could however see a slimy trail lead up his wall and onto the ceiling. It went through the door into the pantry where he kept his food and toys for the toddlers. He looked up on the ceiling only to find a sleepy Unn with a letter block in her mouth. Suddenly Unn started to make a very weird noise and fell from the ceiling onto his face. He swiped her off of his face onto his shoulder and then washed it.
He returned back to the tv to watch the documentary that was still playing and plopped down on the couch. Not long after he was asleep with White on his left shoulder, Unn on his right shoulder, the little fire hazard on the same arm and Pale curled up in his lap. Radiance and hollow were still awake but occupied with the documentary instead of causing trouble. After the documentary ended they crawled up against his sides and fell asleep.
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By @constantlost 
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By @bugbeee
Exhaustion seeped into Shadelord’s body, limbs weighed down by a heaviness they hadn’t experienced in a while. The smatter of godlings that lay around them on the couch, or on them in Radi’s case, was enough to convince them that they had died and that this was the Eternal Void that was created to punish them for cheating on that test in the 8th grade. In their defence, it had been on rock sedimentation.
Wyrm continued his grumbling from the corner of the couch, still infuriated by the attack on his person only moments before. Root, the aggressor, looked remarkably pleased with herself. Shade knew they should probably punish her further in some way but... well, to be perfectly honest, they simply were not paid enough to do so.
They really should have charged more. Fifteen dollars at least per tiny demon they had to look after rather than the whole bunch. Fifteen dollars was not enough to encourage discipline. It was enough for them to make sure none of the godlings killed the other. And they had thought they had come up with an ingenious plan to secure some peace and quiet.
After much wrangling, they had finally managed to set up two separate playpens, each far enough away that the godlings wouldn’t start screaming if one of them saw their rival. Wyrm and Root in one pen, Grimm, Radi and Unn in another. It was a gamble, but one that thankfully seemed to have paid off. Radi was still exhausted from the tussle she had just had with Wyrm, and Grimm seemed content to chew off the heads of the plastic Garbies they had found. Unn continued to watch, and occasionally helped Grimm execute a Garbie in a spectacular manner. It was both reassuring, and beyond disturbing. Root and Wyrm meanwhile were cheerfully ignoring each other as they both played with their own toys.
It should have been foolproof.
Unfortunately for Shade however, they were dealing with infants instead of fools.
For some damned reason, Root had decided that now was the perfect time to act up, instead of being the sweet little darling she had been so far. Her target, much to their dismay, had been Wyrm. In all fairness, the godling had probably deserved it in some way; most likely he had tried to worm too close in order to steal some of the grubpaste and mushroom sticks Shade had left out as a snack. Root had seen this theft as a cardinal sin, and had subsequently decided that Wyrm deserved nothing less than absolute annihilation.
The momentary doze Shade had managed to fall into was abruptly interrupted by loud shrieking and wailing, resulting in them vaulting over the couch to hurriedly find out which one of the godlings was being tortured.
The scene that greeted them was... well, it wasn’t any less ridiculous than some of the other stuff the little goblins had pulled before.
Using her flexible tendrils, Root had seen fit to wrap them around Wyrm, and aggressively dunk him into the bowl of grubpaste he had attempted to steal from. His shrieks and hisses had woken up Radi and drawn the attention of the other children, who were now cheering on Root’s attack on Wyrm’s person.
“Enough,” Shade declared, shooting a glare behind them, “Root, let him go.” Root looked up innocently.
No, she seemed to say with her eyes, justice must prevail.
“Justice won’t get me my fifteen dollars,” they hissed out in return, and they could have sworn that Root shrugged, turning away from them to dunk Wyrm into the bowl yet again.
“No!” they cried out, quickly whipping down to grab the poor child before he could be further humiliated. After finally being saved from his vicious tormentor, Wyrm decided it was time to go into hysterics, lashing out with a sharp tail to fully show his displeasure. Root simply watched impassively as the rest of the children cheered.
Shade wondered if fifteen dollars was even worth it at this point.
“Alright, alright, enough! Root, you go in time out. We do not waterboard our fellow godlings in grubpaste. Wyrm, calm down, it’s just grubpaste- Settle down!” they yelped out, flinching as something heavy settled onto their head. The soft fluff revealed that Radi had decided to fly out of her pen and taunt Wyrm in person. Shade wanted to sob with frustration.
The door cracked open, and Ghost peered in, head tilted curiously.
Need help? they signed, and Shade wanted to collapse in relief.
“Please,” they begged, and their sibling nodded grimly, even as amusement danced in their eyes. Shucking off their school backpack, they quickly headed over to the other pen and signed to them, bobbing their head up and down in a soothing motion. Grimm and Unn were entranced. Radi less so. She remained seated on their head, but at least seemed to have finally stopped provoking Wyrm.
“I’m just going to clean him up,” Shade explained uselessly, watching as Ghost simply nodded and waved them off. 
With a tired gait, Shade wandered into the kitchen and turned on the tap, listening as Wyrm’s panicked yelps grew louder at the realisation of what was going to happen next. Radi snickered softly, before leaping off and gliding back into the living room.
Bath time, according to the godlings, was a fate worse than death, and something to be avoided at all cost.
Unfortunately for both Wyrm and Shade, it was a necessary evil. Wyrm disagreed. Loudly. And with claws.
He howled furiously as Shade slowly lowered him into the warm water, softly scrubbing at the now-dried grubpaste sticking to his skin. Despite his attempts, Wyrm failed to prevent them from continuing his bath. He turned to pathetic pleading instead, making soft mewling sounds as though he was nothing more than a poor innocent child who had done nothing wrong, ever.
Shade, who remembered the little bastard knocking a glass ornament onto their head, was not convinced. Ultimately there was no escape, and Wyrm reluctantly gave in to the soft scrubbing, though he made sure his rumbling complaints were known.
“Yes, yes,” Shade said quietly, “I truly am the worst. Close your eyes so I can rinse you.”
Wyrm, in a dumb act of defiance, did not close his eyes. The hysterics started again, and Shade contemplated drowning themself in the half-filled sink. Fifteen dollars, they repeated. Fifteen dollars.
Grabbing a tea towel, they quickly dried the godling off, carefully teasing out water droplets from soft scales. He child gnawed on their fingers in revenge. “I’m done,” they announced, wandering back into the living room with a now clean, and furious, Wyrm.
Ghost looked up from their position on the floor, back leaning against the couch as they played with Grimm. Radi immediately perked up at the sound of Shade’s voice, and quickly flew over, making herself at home on top of their head. Unn seemed to have decided to undertake the momentous task of scaling up the back of the couch, leaving a thick trail of slime behind. Root, still stuck in her pen as punishment, let out a wail, demanding to be let out.
Shade was all out of energy to fight back or deal with a tantrum.
“Alright, alright, out you go,” they muttered, depositing Wyrm on the couch before reaching down to lift out the petulant child from her terrible prison. She clung to them desperately until they finally collapsed on the sofa. She quickly wriggled out of their hold and instead plonked down beside them. Wyrm had hissed at the sight of her, and slunk to the other side of the couch to sulk.
Grimm let out a raspy cackle at the sight, before diving down to nip at Ghost’s fingers.
Unn finally made her way to the top of the couch and waved her eyestalks victoriously. All Shade could do was give her a tired pat.
They sank into the couch, the exhaustion creeping back in. It should have been foolproof.
Fifteen dollars.
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By @arandoskeleartist​
youtube
157 notes · View notes
mizunetzu · 3 years
Note
wait okay i have so many ideas you have no clue- okay so basically y/n is too scared to confess to either ushijima or shinsou (you decide lol) so he just puts love notes in his locker :)) but ushijima/shinsou catches him one day so he teases him about it but he liked y/n too so he lowkey confesses and its super fluffy i- 🥺🥺 i've had this idea for so long but i have no clue where to start writing it myself lolll
Guess who...took 4 months...to do Mr. Shinsoussimps request...not me...ahahaha...what are you talking about...BUT ANYWAYS IM SO SORRY MR SHINSOU PLS TAKE THIS FIC AS MY APOLOGIES
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Ushijima x reader - Secret Admirer Love Letter-kun!
⚠️warnings - none
Pronouns- male, he/him
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(Y/n’s) hands shook as he traced the linings of his love letter.
It had a red, heart-shaped sticker on the seal flap, with the words ‘To Ushijima-san’ written in royal purple across the back. The letter had slight crinkles from the shaky grip (Y/n) held it with.
His heart raced purely thinking about how Ushijima would react. Would he even react? Or would he just look at him with that blank stare and walk past him? Would he be ridiculed for being a man giving a love letter to another man?
Every single intrusive thought made (Y/n) want to tear up the letter and flush it down a toilet. Nonetheless, he stood next to Ushijima’s locker, waiting for him to appear.
His legs shook. His heart felt like it was going to explode out of his chest. He could physically feel the sweat running down his forehead. He was probably gaining stares from other students for standing near Ushijima’s locker and panicking silently.
All these ‘what-if’s’ was beginning to make (Y/n) second-guess his decision. Maybe he couldn’t do this after all...
No! He had to! He’s been harboring his feelings for Ushijima for years now, and he was getting nowhere! Even if it was rejection, and he certainly hoped it was not, he needed an answer!
Just as if right on cue, (Y/n) heard the familiar deep voice of Ushijima coming down the hall. He wasn’t saying much, but the accompanied grunts of acknowledgement to Tendou’s ramblings was enough proof it was him. Without thinking, (Y/n’s) panic took over him, shoving his love letter into Ushijima’s locker and dashing out of the way.
He blended himself in with the gaggle of students near their lockers, watching Ushijima as he opened his own locker.
“Ara?” Tendou cocked his head when the letter (Y/n) slipped in fluttered out. It landed on the floor gracefully. Ushijima bent over and plucked it off the ground.
“Our Wakatoshi~kun has a secwet admiwer?” Tendou squashed his face together and boared curious eyes into the heart-shaped sticker on the note. Ushijima grunted.
“It seems to be a love letter.” Ushijima’s low voice sent even more panic through (Y/n). He didn’t want to be there while he opened the letter. But here he was, 10 feet away from him as he carefully peeled off the heart sticker from the envelope.
Ushijima’s eyes silently scanned the letter, it’s meticulous, thought-out writing filling Ushijima’s eyes. The silence rang so, so loud to (Y/n), as he watched Ushijima read his love letter with his emotionless face.
After what seemed like forever, Ushijima lifted his head up from the note. (Y/n’s) heart stopped.
“It is a love letter.” (Y/n), and Tendou, deadpanned.
Tendou reached for the letter. “Fiiiiine, then let me see-!”
Ushijima pulled the letter away, raising it above his head and out of Tendou’s easy reach. He lowered the letter and cradled it to his chest.
“No. It’s mine.”
(Y/n’s) heart fluttered. Could this mean-?
“But it does, however, have no name.”
“Awh. Poor Wakatoshi-kun’s admirer must be rewwy shy~”
(Y/n) internally facepalmed. Of course he forgot to sign the note! Why wouldn’t he?! (Y/n) crinkled up his nose. He was still determined to get his feelings to Ushijima.
He turned around, and walked to class. The next day, for sure, he was going to give him a love letter with his signature on it this time.
——
(Y/n) stared down at his paper, then shifted his eyes to the alarm clock sitting tauntingly at his dorm room’s desk, with the bright red numbers 10:35 pm glaring so menacingly at him. Like it was telling him to hurry up and sign the new love letter he just wrote. (Y/n) re-read the letter on his desk for the 6th time that night.
Everything was perfect. It explained his feelings perfectly, explained how long he’d been smitten for him for, hell, he even doodled a small picture of Ushijima himself with a heart next to it in the corner of the page.
Everything was there, except his name.
Did he really want to put his name, though? I mean, (Y/n) saw how...endearing Ushiwaka’s face looked reading his original letter. What if he ruined that when he finds out it was him who wrote it? And not some cute girl?
(Y/n) stared at the empty space on the page where his name was supposed to go. His hand gripped his pencil tighter than he should’ve, and began to write.
‘(L/n) (Y/...’
He stopped. (Y/n) thought about it for awhile, then grabbed his eraser and scrubbed at the name until it was pristine white again.
‘Your secret admirer’
Was all he wrote.
He packaged up the note in another small envelope, pressed a cute little heart sticker to the flap, and went to bed.
——
The next day, (Y/n) made sure to rush to school early to slip the note in his locker. He wanted to see his reaction to his new note. It made him feel sorta high. What kind of face would he make? Would he be delighted? He hoped he would.
(Y/n) crammed the note into Ushiwaka’s locker. No one was around. Good. No one saw him shove the letter through, therefore no one could tell Ushijima it was him. (Y/n) sighed contently, and timpered off somewhere secluded, but somewhere he could still see Ushijima and his locker.
After scrolling on his phone for what seemed like an hour, he heard Tendou’s familiar voice, humming a strange song and trailing next to Ushijima. It was his daily indicator that Ushijima was near. If he could hear Tendou coming, almost 100% Ushijima would be there too. (Y/n) pocketed his phone quickly and peeked behind a row of lockers.
Ushijima silently unhinged his locker, listening to Tendou talk. However, they fell silent when another letter fluttered out from his locker, this time landing so perfectly in his hands.
“Ara ara? Another note from Admirer-chan?”
“Yes. But I know it’s a boy, Tendou.”
(Y/n’s) heart dropped. He watched as Ushiwaka peeled off the heart sticker once more, while continuing his conversation with Tendou.
“Oh yeah? How so?”
Ushijima stopped, and reached into his locker once more. He pulled out (Y/n’s) previous note, and pointed to a line of text scribbled on there so neatly. Tendou raised his eyebrow, and leaned down to inspect the note.
‘-Besides, there’s no way someone as amazing as you can like a guy like me. It’s weird right? I hope you don’t think it’s weird. But I wouldn’t blame you.’
“Ahhhh~ makes sense...” Tendou hooked his arms dramatically over the back of his head. “But do you? Does Wakatoshi-kun think Secret Admirer-kun is weird?”
Ushijima traced the two love letters with his eyes. “I think he’s brave.”
(Y/n) clutched his tightening chest. It suddenly became really hard to breathe. How was Ushijima being so unintentionally sweet?
Tendou cooed. “Awwww, Is our Wakatoshi-kun catching feelings for his Admirer-kun?”
Ushijima folded the two notes back into their envelopes silently. He said nothing to Tendou’s remarks, while gently placing the two love letters back into a safe spot in his locker.
(Y/n) brisk-walked away, flustered, before he could hear his answer.
——
Writing notes and hiding them in Ushijima’s locker became a sort of habit for (Y/n) in the past few weeks.
Every now and then, he’d write a short love letter signed “Your Secret Admirer” or “Admirer-kun” and slip it under Ushijima’s dorm room door or the cracks between his locker. It became an addiction of watching him unravel the note with the tenderness of an angel. For such a big dude, he held each love letter (Y/n) wrote him with such delicacy.
(Y/n) walked with a pep in his step as he arrived to the school building early, like he’d usually been doing. He’d recently been writing small letters, playground compliments like “I think you look nice today!” or “the way you play volleyball gets me all fired up!” but this was the first time in a while he wrote a good chunk of his feelings out.
At first he thought he would make Ushijima uncomfortable, but after many of his personal notes filled with the most wonderful explanations of his feelings, or rambling about dates he’d like to take him on, he’s grown more comfortable with it. Especially after seeing the teeny tiny, barely noticeable blush tinting his cheeks as he read them.
(Y/n) stopped in front of Ushiwaka’s locker. It was a familiar stop, after cramming in letter after letter inside for about a month or two now. It’s been so long that (Y/n) couldn’t even remember himself.
Just as his hand met with the cold metal locker to slip the note in, two hands slammed down on (Y/n’s) shoulders, effectively scaring him shitless.
“I’ve caught you! Secret admirer-kun!”
“Uwaaaah!”
Tendou made a show of flamboyantly pointing his lanky fingers at (Y/n), bending his back father then (Y/n) knew was possible in the process. (Y/n) jittered, swinging his hands in front of him while stuttering incoherently.
“I-it-its not-! It’s not wh-what it-! T-the letter-I was just-I-!”
“There’s no use for it now, Secret-Admirer (L/n)-kun! You’ve been caught red handed!” Tendou stuck his tongue out heartily while (Y/n) broke into a cold sweat. If Tendou kept yelling the whole damn school would hear him.
“I-I’m not the one leaving notes in Ushijima-kun’s locker! I was just-!”
“Oya? Then how did you know Wakatoshi-kun was gettin’ notes in his locker in the first place?” Tendou eyed him down half jokingly. (Y/n) sputtered.
“More importantly...” Tendou dramatically pointed to the envelope half-sticking out from the slits of Ushijima’s locker. “Whaaaaats that!?”
“That’s-!”
There was no use fighting Tendou on this. (Y/n) deflated, defeated and grasping on to the wall of lockers for support. “Uuuuu...”
“So, Secret Admirer-“
“S-stop calling me that! Just (L/n) is fine-!”
“-Secret Admirer-kun, what made you fancy our lovely Wakatoshi-kun?”
(Y/n) turned around, facing the locker as Tendou smiled his usual, Tendou-grin. (Y/n) didn’t wanna look at Tendou and his stupid knowing smirk.
“He’s just...I dunno, he’s just so-cool...and stuff...and he’s so nice...looking...”
“Ah, such sophisticated words-tell me, do you write all of this down in the letters you give him?”
“Hey!” (Y/n) whipped his head around.
Tendou chuckled, and part of (Y/n) wanted to smack him upside the head. Tendous laughter eventually died down, as he pretended to wipe a tear from his cheek. He looked back at (Y/n), who was blushing profusely and had his arms crossed.
“Phew...haha...” Tendou cleared his throat. He pointed straight at (Y/n). “Now, here’s some ultra wise words from Satori-sama!” He mimicked a fake drum roll on his lap, before pointing at (Y/n) again.
“Ja-jun~! You should Wakatoshi-kun how you feel about him!”
(Y/n’s) heart got stuck in his throat. “A-are you crazy! I could never! I-I’m not...I’m not...I’m scared..”
“Hm? But you’re not scared to write about how much you wanna kiss him alllllllll oveeeeeer-?”
“That’s different!” (Y/n) yelled, more quietly this time. He turned back to the locker, and tipped the rest of the note in sticking out inside the slit. The note disappeared through the gap, just like all of its predecessors. “Like this, I can tell him how much I love him without him knowing it was from me! What if he’s disappointed it’s me and not some other dude?”
“I’m veeeeeery sure he won’t be. But suit yourself, I guess.” Tendou shrugged. He turned around and left, but not before saying,
“But you’d better tell him yourself before he finds out from someone else.”
“Wait-what does that mea-“
(Y/n) looked back, only to find Tendou gone. (Y/n) stood there, perplexed, before dashing off to his own locker, so he wouldn’t be spotted near Ushijima’s.
——
Everyday when (Y/n) went to slip another note into Ushiwaka’s locker, Tendou’s words would ring in his mind.
‘You’d better tell him yourself before he finds out from someone else.’
He knew that. He knew that but he couldn’t stop himself from cowardly slipping notes into Ushijima’s locker, just to run and take cover as he opened them up. And one time he could swear Tendou was looking right at him in his hiding spot when Ushijima was reading one of his letter.
(Y/n) shook the thoughts from his head. That happened 3 days ago, and nothing happened. Tendou was probably just trying to scare him into telling him. Yeah. There’s no way anyone could’ve found out about him being Ushijima’s secret admirer.
He huffed and strode up to Ushijima’s locker, just like he did every time before that. No one was in the hallway. There was no footsteps, at least to (Y/n’s) knowledge, and Tendou wasn’t around with his booming voice. If (Y/n) could hear Tendou coming, chances are Ushijima was not too far behind.
Tendou wasn’t there. (Y/n) was safe. He smiled and rose the letter up to the slot in Ushijima’s locker. He slowly crammed the note in, slowly, slowly until-
Slam!
A large, calloused hand slammed against the locker, making (Y/n) jolt up in surprise. (Y/n’s) heart stopped beating. He felt someone lean against his ear, and then they whispered:
“So Tendou was right. You were the one leaving the letters in my locker.”
“Ushijima-kun-!”
(Y/n) whipped his head around by the speed of lightning, pressing himself against the locker wall as if he’d disappear into it. Stupid fucking Tendou! Of course he’d tell Ushijima!
Ushiwaka didn’t move from his spot in front of (Y/n). His arm outstretched on the wall beside (Y/n) didn’t falter either, making him blush even more. God, he wanted to disappear.
The letter, now hidden crudely behind (Y/n) sweaty back, was being smushed as he tried shrinking in on himself.
“I-I-“ (Y/n’s) mouth ran dry. “It’s not what it looks like-!”
“Hm.” Ushijima’s deep voice manage to startle (Y/n), despite being right infront of him. God, he was close. So close. He’s too close. Oh god, why is he so close?
Ushijima suddenly grabbed (Y/n’s) hand, making him sputter in surprise as Ushijima pulled it out gently. A letter with a red heart sticker on the flap was wedged in between (Y/n’s) shaky, sweaty fingers. Ushijima looked at the envelope, while (Y/n) averted his embarrassed eyes.
“...But it’s exactly what it looks like.”
Words perished in (Y/n’s) throat. If the locker would just open up and swallow him whole, now was the time.
Ushiwaka plucked the note out of (Y/n’s) hands, ignoring the small protests of (Y/n) himself. He tried to grab for the letter, but Ushijima held the envelope high above his head and grabbed at (Y/n’s) shivering wrists. (Y/n) squeaked.
“...why are you trying to grab it back if this letter was meant for me in the first place?” Ushijima looked oblivious to (Y/n’s) embarrassment. (Y/n) croaked. He didn’t even register what Ushiwaka said with how strong and warm his grip on his wrists were.
He didn’t realize Ushijima managed to peel off the heart sticker and fish out the note with his hand until he started reading the letter. His eyes scanned the words, even when (Y/n) quietly squirmed protestingly in his grasp.
“Mm.” Ushijima hummed. (Y/n’s) eyes widened when he realized what he wrote in today’s note.
‘Y’know, I think you’re really cool with how you’re so dedicated to your club. But maybe...one day we could grab a bite to eat after your club activities? Just you and me? And maybe if I’m lucky enough I just might get a kiss from the amazing Ushijima Wakatoshi-kun~’
(Y/n) wanted no more but to die then and there. Ushijima looked at (Y/n) with an unreadable gaze.
“Ah. So it seems in today’s letter, you would like to go out for food and kiss. I am free after club activities today at 6. Are you free at that time or must we reschedule?”
(Y/n) met Ushijima’s state with a confused face. He said nothing-he couldn’t say anything. All he could do was muster up a weak “w-wha..?”
“So...you are not free today...?” Ushijima’s face was normal, but he gave off the same vibe a sad, kicked puppy would. It was sorta cute. (Y/n) waved his hands around frantically in Ushijima’s grasp.
“N-no! That’s not it! I-I’m free! I’m totally free! I just-“
“You just what?” Ushijima cocked his head to the side bluntly. (Y/n) opened his mouth to say something, but let it clamp shut quietly.
(Y/n) averted his gaze. “Well...you don’t think it’s...weird that I was the one leaving you love letters?”
“But I already knew you were a man in the first place.”
“Still!” Ushijima was genuinely confused. (Y/n’s) voice died down a bit.
“Aren’t you...y’know...disappointed?”
Ushijima’s gaze never left (Y/n’s) eyes. “Why would I be disappointed?”
“I’m...w-well...it’s just...”
Ushiwaka placed his free hand on the other side of (Y/n’s) face, effectively trapping him in between his arms. Ushijima’s heavy gaze was too much to bear. (Y/n) instinctively averted his gaze away.
“You still haven’t given me a valid reason to be disappointed.”
“I-“
“You’re lovely, I believe you are very attractive, and you leave nice letters of encouragement in my locker everyday.”
“Wait-“
“I believe we both have feelings for each other. Therefore, I do not see why you are so hesitant on just doing what today’s lovely note said.”
“Ushi-“
“Is this just an excuse to turn me down? Were the letters not your true feelings? Because if so you just have to say so-“
“Ushijima-kun!”
(Y/n) rasped out between his fingers. He was covering his blushing face, and Ushijima didn’t know why until he realized his face was centimeters away from (Y/n’s). If it weren’t for (Y/n’s) hands cupping his face, they’d probably be able to kiss with one push closer.
“P-ple-please s-step back...”
“Oh. Sorry.”
Ushijima moved back, but didn’t quite move his arms from their positions on either side of (Y/n). He blinked. Silence engulfed them both, Ushijima bluntly staring at (Y/n) as he blushed and blushed into his hands.
Ushijima figured he should say something, and even open his mouth to speak when (Y/n) suddenly piped up, bringing his hands down from his face.
“I-I’m free...at 6...”
Ushijima blinked again.
“Ah. Today?”
“Yeah..!”
“Lovely. It is decided then. Will you wait for me at the gym after practice? If not I can pick you up from your dorm room.”
(Y/n) fought the urge to pinch his arm to see if he was dreaming or not. “I-I can meet you at the gym!”
Ushijima smiled gently, and that’s probably the first time (Y/n’s) seen him smile ever. It was so coaxing, relaxed and warm, (Y/n) wanted to take of picture of it and just stare at it for days. Ushijima let his hands fall to his sides. Not before giving a pat to (Y/n’s) head.
“It is decided then. It’s a date.”
(Y/n) had to remind himself to thank Tendou later.
——————
Lowkey this was so fun to write~ why don’t y’all leave some love in the comments because of that~~?
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write-like-wright · 3 years
Note
u asked for requests so im here to comply😳could you maybe do a ”should you date them” with the defense attorneys in the series?? or just generally some other characters?? bc the prosecutor one added like 20 years to my lifespan lmao. hope u have a great day!!
I'm so glad you liked it!!! Here's the sequel, just for you <33
Original post here
Should you date them: Ace Attorney defense lawyers edition
Phoenix Wright
yes, you really should
probably one of the best, if not the best, boyfriends in the series
wanna get married? husband material
wanna have kids? father material
has a tendency to casually adopt children actually, could be an issue at some point
worships you
you know how some guys brag about how they'd die for you?
Nick would unironically die for you
may even come close a few times but I'm pretty sure he's canonically invincible (eating poisoned glass and falling off a burning bridge, who?? tis' but a scratch!)
massive gossip
gets home after an investigation and immediately starts like "you won't believe what I found out about Gumshoe today"
somehow surprisingly mature and good at keeping secrets in spite of everything
has a lot of really cool friends!!! and larry
have you seen those shoulders tho?? mans built like a dorito, smashing through massive wooden doors n stuff
biggest monthly expense is hair gel
claims his hair is natural but you know better
don't be the big spoon, he will poke your eyes out
can somewhat read your mind tho? a bit off-putting but ok
marry him before Edgeworth someone else does
Mia Fey
hell yeah, dude
cool, calm, collected
has literal superpowers
successful business owner at 27!!! unironical #girlboss
went from being a lame rookie to a literal legend with her own practice and an apprentice in, like, three years
she's so smart, I fear her
has the fashion sense of a female character drawn by a cis man... oh, wait
god help whoever tries to hurt you
will literally kick their ass to hell
family-oriented
believes in second chances
took phoenix under her wing after everything, mia has the patience of a saint honestly
drops cool oneliners in everyday speech like a marvel character
curve lovers rejoice
doesn't mind being called dorky nicknames
major wife material
Diego Armando/Godot
I already covered him in my prosecutors list,, literally did not occur to me to split Diego and Godot into two lists
but to sum up, if I had to choose between the two, I'd go for Diego
i like my men like i like my coffee - tall, dark and bitter
^^ eats up pickup lines like those
Apollo Justice
Polly is such a sweet babey boy, please be nice to him
short king
low on confidence, makes up for it by being loud
*voice cracking* HE'S FINE!!!!!!!!!!!!
your neighbours will hate him
such a pushover, will do anything you ask of him
sensitive boy, not afraid to cry
pretends not to be dorky - is very dorky
consumes nerdy media almost exclusively (canonically a Whovian! but Capcom can't say that)
bikes everywhere and is apparently good with a hula hoop
Polly got cake is what I'm saying
have you seen his cool street style clothes?? sk8er boi
very grounded, literally
might play around and hold your hand for comfort
won't come to visit you if you live on a high floor, sorry
cat dad!!! cat pics!!! yes!!!
about 7 different tragic backstories
new secret family member drops every week
stares at you when you speak sometimes
is he jealous of Klavier?? does he have a crush on him??? who knows but it's funny watching them interact
bicon
spends way too much time on his hair
someone please date him, he deserves some love
Athena Cykes
holy childhood trauma batman
been through a lot
total empath
if you're sad, she's sad
can kinda read your mind... why is this such a common thing in AA games?? I like my privacy
super energetic
will drag you to the gym, take you on hikes, practice wrestling moves on you...
you will always be sore but also in the best shape of your life
has minus 25 chill
incapable of keeping secrets from you
her weird goth convict uncle threatens you every once in a while
she promises he means it in a friendly way
loves europop
way too accomplished for her age, everyone in this game is so smart, help
i feel like she'd enjoy theme parks idk
date her, she's baby and she needs some TLC
Kristoph Gavin
no
he's scary
thinks he's better than you
thinks he's better than everyone
has the audacity to wear white shoes with a blue suit??? are you going to prom????? sir????
obsessed with phoenix wright to an alarming degree
perfectly manicured nails!
the kind of guy who warns you never to go into his basement
nice on the outside but it's all fake
deeply rooted issues even he's unaware of
if you like drillbit hair consider Klavier instead
Ryunosuke Naruhodo
world's biggest baby
secretly a bitch
loves to clown on people
fake it till you make it
has no clue what he's doing most of the time
very determined in spite of that
everyone loves him
so many cool friends
cries at the thought of your bare ankles
physically incapable of walking by a shop and not buying something he doesn't need
"look, i got you a gift!!" "awh, how sweet! ...what is it?" "i don't know, i'll ask Mr Sholmes when he gets home!"
good with his tongue
may be somewhat trapped in the closet
has literally zero chill
remember when he just casually chased armed robbers??
must be a family trait
Iris interrogates you about your intentions with her brother
she has a gun
you have no privacy at his place
Sholmes crashes your dates
his bromance with Kazuma sometimes drops the "b"
becomes ultra cool eventually
hop into that time machine and date Ryu's ass, but be prepared to deal with period-appropriate homoeroticism and misogyny lol
Extra little shout out to Kazuma Asogi for that one time where he was a defense lawyer for, like, an hour and a half and somehow managed to cram 50 of the horniest one-liners in the game in that very limited time. Date him.
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expectingtofly · 3 years
Text
When Peaches Fly
established dean/cas, toddler jack, fluff :)
written for day 5 of @one-more-offbeat-anthem's follower celebration || prompt: farmer's market
“Hi Krista.” Cas transferred his cloth bags to his other hand—tomatoes, mason jars, bell peppers, and corn on the cob bumping against his leg—and reached for Jack’s hand. The five-year old poked at the peaches, plums, and apricots lined up at a precarious angle on Krista’s stand. “Jack, careful.”
Straightening up from behind the stand with a crate of fruit, Krista beamed at them. “Hey, Cas, hi, Jack! How’s it going?”
“I got a donut!” Jack told her. Remains of the powdered pastry on his face proved this fact true, and Cas licked his thumb, then wiped at Jack’s cheek. Jack squirmed away. “And we’re having burgers tonight!”
“Sounds like fun. Claire come with you today?”
“She’s coming later,” Jack said. “She has a…” He peered up at Cas, squinting a little. “Prior obligation.” He stumbled over the words a little, but Cas nodded at him. In truth, Claire and Kaia were on a hunt, but after too many concerned calls from teachers, they’d managed to explain to Jack why that information couldn’t be shared with everyone.
“She’ll be staying with us—Jack, no.” Cas tugged a little at Jack’s hand as Jack tried to grab a plum. “She’ll be staying with us for a few days.”
“Aww, I’m glad she could come visit.” Krista gestured to her stand. “Looking for anything in particular? Or just browsing?”
“Just browsing,” Cas said. “I believe Dean wanted fruit to make a pie for tonight.” Looking for Dean, he scanned the center town square where the weekly farmer’s market took place, small tents and wide tables quickly becoming obscured by the growing crowds. They always had plans to arrive early to avoid the worst of the crowds, but unfortunately, mornings did not always agree with him. And this morning Dean had been particularly persuasive to stay in bed longer.
“Well, I’m assuming that’s what he wants to make,” he said, turning back to Krista after failing to spot Dean in the crowds. “Today’s been a bit chaotic.”
First Claire texting late last night that she and Kaia were coming over—which prompted a scrambling to make sure the guest room was clean—then Jack spilling his orange juice at breakfast—dammit, he still had a stain on his shirt—now Dean disappearing and leaving him to carry ten thousand bags—Cas’ fault for buying two jars of honey plus a box of honeycomb, plus various vegetables and baked goods, but still.
“Well, I got some really ripe peaches today,” Krista told him.
Cas started to respond, but movement drew his eyes to Jack just in time to watch him poke at a peach and shift the entire infrastructure of perfectly balanced fruit. Though he leapt forward to stop the avalanche, he couldn’t get there in time to save ten or more peaches from launching themselves into the air and rolling away.
Krista started laughing and, face burning, Castiel crouched to collect the fallen peaches, bags banging against his knees. “Sorry, I’m so sorry, I’ll pay for these. Jack, say sorry.”
“Sorry,” Jack said, toeing at the dirt and looking chastened. “Didn’t mean to.”
“It’s alright.” Krista came around the front to help pick up the peaches. “A little dirt never hurt anyone.” Straightening with two in each hand, she asked Jack, “You wanna try a piece?”
“Yes!” Jack said with a clap of his hands.
“You don’t have to—” Cas started, but Krista was already pulling out a cutting board and knife from behind the stand and cutting into the peach.
“The best part of coming to a farmer’s market is the free samples,” she said. Juices seeped onto the board as she divided the peach into thick slices. “Here.” She offered a slice to Jack first, who crammed it eagerly in his mouth, then one to Cas.
Juggling the runaway peaches in his arms, he took the pale yellow slice and bit into it. Sweet with just enough tartness, soft skin and buttery smooth flesh.
“Mmm,” he said, catching juice dripping down the side of his hand. “Those are very good.”
“Told you so,” Krista smiled. She held out a box and Cas placed the peaches that had tried to make their escape inside. Sixteen in total. Much more than they needed for a pie. Well, at least they were delicious.
“Why you buying so many peaches, man?”
Hefting the box of peaches into the crook of his arm, Cas turned to see Dean walking over, a brown bag in one hand, an open container in the other displaying a half-eaten slice of pie. “There you are.”
“Yeah, sorry, got distracted talking to Liam.” He gestured in the direction of the meat vendor with a plastic fork, then back at the pie slice. “Dude, you have to try this, it’s so good.”
“You want a peach sample, Dean?” Krista asked.
“Oh, hell yeah.” He took the slice from her. “Best part of coming to these markets.” Krista gave Cas an amused I told you so look.
“Anyway,” Dean said around a mouthful. “I’m thinking about rigging up a sheet in the backyard with the projector. Ya know, to watch movies tonight? Thinking Sam and Eileen can come over too, make a whole get-together out of it.”
How quickly plans for a quiet Saturday night could turn into a boisterous Winchester and Co. event. Dean’s eyes were bright, though, and Jack’s eyes were wide in amazement at this idea.
“Sounds good to me,” Cas agreed, and Jack cheered. Dean held out a forkful of pie, and, leaning forward, Cas let Dean feed it to him. He nodded thoughtfully, appreciating the spices and crunch of sugar. “Your pies are better.”
“You’re lying,” Dean said, though he looked appropriately pleased. Jack clambered at his legs, so he gave him a forkful too, then tossed the empty carton in a nearby trashcan. Cas paid for the peaches—and a few plums and apricots too because he’d never been good at self-control in a farmer’s market.
Jack bounced eagerly, babbling about Claire and donuts and Finding Nemo and Toy Story, "... and the peaches went flying." He swung his arms wildly to demonstrate, and Dean scooped him up. When Jack tried to get away, he turned him upside down, and Jack’s protests turned into screaming laughter which caused more than a few glances their way. Cas smiled despite himself and fixed Jack’s shirt, which was sliding to his head.
“I got everything I need,” he told Dean, holding up his bags and boxes.
“Well, I got the sack of potatoes,” Dean said, shaking Jack a little.
“No!” Jack said, his face turning red. “Not potatoes. Jack!”
“What?” Dean turned him right-side up and stared at him like he was seeing him for the first time. Jack giggled. “Sorry, dude, my bad.” He set him on his feet and took some of the bags from Cas. “See ya, Krista.”
“Have a good rest of your day,” Krista told them. Cas waved to her as they walked off. Jack squeezed himself in between him and Dean, taking their free hands.
“I wanna make peach pie,” he told Dean.
“Sure, Cas has enough for three of them.”
“And ice cream,” Jack said. “And donuts and burgers and hot dogs.” He jumped and Dean and Cas took the cue, lifting him to swing him between them. Jack whooped, and Cas started laughing.
“What?” Dean asked, grinning as he swung Jack again.
“Nothing.” He smiled at them. “Just enjoying the day.”
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suddenlysackler · 3 years
Text
Keep Up
Henry McHenry x Reader
TW: tad bit of angst, mention of divorce, reader feels a bit insecure, henry is an ass but we’re working on him, brief mention of addiction/sobriety
A/N: Writing is hard but I’ve been working really hard on this so I wanted to share it even though there was really no point to the plot I just wanted to write for Henry. I have literally no posting schedule/writing schedule anymore. This takes place post Waltz in the Storm, only we’re gonna say Ann survived and took Annette and divorced Henry okay bye ily all so much.
...
“Are you sure it’s safe?” Your eyes are round and full of mixed emotions — trust, fear, maybe some excitement — as you grip the helmet shoved into your hands with a vice grip.
Henry watches you from the seat of the Harley he had bought with the money from the sale of his and Ann’s estate after the divorce. It’s ridiculous, really. Completely over the top, particularly for someone who was just making a comeback in their career and trying to get back to some sort of financial stability. “Just get the fuck on the bike and try to keep up with me, will you?” His tone leaves no room for argument, his face is playfully skeptical.
The red Harley Davidson motorcycle is “fully loaded” as the sales person had told the two of you as you made your way across the show room floor just a few days ago. It’s completely with heated grips and a backrest in the passenger’s seat and a full scale infotainment system for Henry to blast his favorite music between gps directions as he sees fit. He’d passed on the built in defensive driving mechanism and balked at the Milwaukee-Eight 114 engine and even sprung for the most expensive of saddlebags. Hell, he’d even told you he was planning on getting the leather embroidered with his initials. 
Did this surprise you? No, not in the slightest.
Henry is eccentric. 
It’s your default response to the questions and comments and concerns expressed by each member of your social circle from the moment you’d mentioned that you’d been seeing someone. Questions of who, what, when, where, why, and how and worries about whether or not someone who shined so bright would be good for you and whether it would even work.
Honestly, you ask yourself the same thing almost every day. If you didn’t love him, you wouldn’t be able to see it.
He asks himself how you can see it every time he wakes up to your hair spread across his pillows.
Back to the matter at hand. You. Him. Big scary motorcycle. 
You turn your feet inward almost absentmindedly, standing pigeon toed and letting your shoulders tense up as he kicks off the bike with an exaggerated groan and comes to stand in front of you. “I’ve never done this before.” 
Henry pulls off his own helmet, tosses it to rest on the seat, and smiles knowingly at you. “That’s never stopped you before.”
“Shut up.” 
“Ann never —”
Your eyebrows furrowed and your lips parted just a bit. It was the one thing he continuously did even a year and a half into your relationship that made you lose your mind. He stops mid sentence when he sees the disappointment on your face. 
“I’m not Ann.” You say, trying so, so hard to not ruin the night. He’d been waiting for a break in the much needed rain falling over LA county for the past week to take you out and show you a good time. Try as you might, your lips start to tremble ever so slightly and you let the helmet clatter to the ground, beyond frustrated with him. With yourself even?
He rushes forward, hands all over you and your face before you can even bend at the waist to pick up the discarded the mixture of plastic and fiberglass at your feet. “I didn’t mean it.”
“You did it again.”
“But I didn’t mean it.” Henry says, pleads with you. His brown eyes convey the honest to goodness truth of it all and you know he’s good for his word. He really didn’t mean to. 
The past year was tumultuous, everyone knew that. Finding Ann stranded at sea on the coast just ten miles away from where Annette slept safely on board the yacht with her father. The accusations, the words thrown like daggers. The bliss and fervor and passion of their early days slipping away faster than vinegar leaves the bottle when you pour it, the whole ordeal just as sharp and bitter to taste. 
You’d been introduced to it just as the papers had been served to Henry’s modest home that had been inhabited for six months before Ann had made her final decision. 
He’s grateful for your loyalty and tells you that much just about every day. There isn’t a day where you doubt his love for you — how could you when you watch him work on himself in therapy and in the gym and with the way he tosses his cigarettes to the side and limits himself to a carton a week somehow? 
However, the one thing you had zero tolerance for was being compared to Ann.
Henry bites his tongue as he looks at you. He represses the urge to yell and ask why it always has to be about you, why you always have to nit pick when he does something you don’t care for. He takes a deep breath and focuses on the feel of your skin and how it’s almost as if it’s a balm for all of the negative emotions and thoughts crammed into his head. He reminds himself that you aren’t doing anything wrong by calling him out on this, that it’s appropriate to. Rather than lash out, he takes a deep breath and says the words he had been working so, so hard to work into his vocabulary in sincerity over the past year. “I’m sorry.”
The apology rings through your ears and settles in your mind. You sit with it for a moment and think about the Henry you had heard of prior to meeting him — the violent outbursts, the juxtaposition of his drinking and smoking habits in conjunction with his almost militant like work out routine. The selfishness and the narcissism and the screaming.
Your brow knits together as you process his words. “You’re sorry?” The words felt foreign on your own tongue, you couldn’t imagine how he must feel.
He nods slowly, giving you a once over as his cheeks begin to heat up. “I’m really, really sorry.” Henry promises, swears it. “It’s force of habit and that doesn’t make it right. I’m sorry. I’m working on that.”
You nod after the last word leaves his lips and you’re reminded of the fact that, yes, he is working on it. He’s working on a lot of things and you remind yourself that the whole reason he bought the bike was to celebrate one year of sobriety. With bated breath, you stand on your toes and kiss his cheek bone gingerly, an acknowledgement in it of itself. You know Henry doesn’t need your words.
Henry leans down and kisses your forehead, then crouches and grabs your helmet. He stays close to the ground for a long moment and falls to his knees. He buries his face in the fabric of your shirt and rests his arms just around the small of your back, memorizing the feel of holding you and relishing in the way your hands almost automatically move to thread through his hair, no longer matted from neglect and back to its usual thickness and shine. 
After a few moments of silence, you pull back just a bit to look at him. “I’m proud of you.” You whisper, eyes shining with a mixture of emotion.
His own eyes bore into your face, always working on committing whatever it was he was currently feeling to memory. “Thank you for helping me.”
A smile breaks out on your face and you shrug before leaning down and kissing his temple. “Always.” You murmur. “Now, will you please get me on the bike? Show me what I’ve been missing all these years.”
Henry smiles, the expression of satisfaction much wider than your own flash of your teeth. “You sure?” He asked, repeating your words from just a few minutes prior back to you.
“I’m sure.” You respond while trying to suppress the giggle that threatened to bubble past your lips at his teasing. You can’t help but cackle as he all but drags you to the bike and helps you put on the helmet, letting you inspect the bike before hopping on. When you finally straddle the seat, his left hand comes to rest over your arms, now looped around his waist and hanging on for dear life, before he hits the ignition and punches it, riding off in pure bliss and leaving the events of the past year behind, as it should be.
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carminite-wyrm · 3 years
Text
A Kingsglaive Time Loop AU, Part 1
Nyx Ulric wakes up, the memories of a burning city, of betrayal and loss, fresh in his mind. It is not the first time that he wakes this way, and it won't be the last.
Or: Nyx has a very, very bad time.
Now with a Part 2!
Nyx gasped awake, the scent of ash and burning flesh, and the sound of war and ruin still fresh in his mind, a burning ember of phantom pain deep in his chest. He lay there, eyes quickly taking stock of the room he was in, a room that was so familiar to his senses, a room that he could have sworn should have been reduced to so much broken rubble, like the rest of Insomnia. He could see the fading curtains, the walls that were slightly cracked, the photos of his family and friends. By all appearances, this was the same damn apartment he’d lived in for nearly the past decade, down to even that one corner where it would always leak when it rained. Off to the side, he could see his phone, the date and day clearly marked upon it. The day that the ceasefire, and the peace treaty, had been declared.
He slowly ran his fingers over the worn fabric beneath him, the soft texture slowly easing the rapid pace of his heartbeat. He finally managed to drag himself into a sitting position, and lifted his left arm into the thin strip of sunlight that managed to peek through the curtains. There was no sign of the magical scarring that had crawled up his arm like wildfire, when he had put on that damn ring. His arm moved freely, none of the pain he still remembered slowing him down.
With a groan, he stumbled to his feet, shaking his head as he tried to dispel the…dream, it had to have been a dream, one born from that crippling loss that had nearly seen him lose Libertus, alongside the other fellow brothers and sisters in the Kingsglaive. There was no way everything had been real, even if there were elements of reality to it, such as that damnable giant daemon that had nearly been the cause of Libertus’ death. Now that he thought about it, really thought about it, away from the panic and adrenaline of oh shit everything is going to hell and the King is dead and so was-
Yeah, there was no fucking way any of that was real. It had felt real, sure, but Nyx was pretty damn sure that rationally, there was no way the King would have deigned to give him of all people the all-powerful ancestral ring that held together the shield over the city, and much more to boot. After all, didn’t the King still have people like Marshal Leonis, who definitely had the proper skills and strengths to guard something as important as that? Not some random Glaive who was in the process of serving out yet another punishment for insubordination.
Feeling almost like he was a ghost in his own body, Nyx decided the logical thing to do was to find Libertus and Crowe, his two best friends. Not just because he wanted to make sure they were fine, of course, but also-
Oh, who was he kidding, the dream – and yes, it was absolutely a dream, Nyx affirmed to himself – had in fact rattled him enough that he wanted to hug those two for at least an hour.
As he stumbled out of his apartment, blinking at the sunlight above him, he tried to remember where he was meant to be going, where he would be able to find Libertus and Crowe at…around midday, now that he checked his phone. His phone buzzed then, from where he had haphazardly crammed it into his uniform pocket. Taking it out, he smiled slightly at the message, which turned out to be from Libertus, and handily reminded him that they were meeting up in one of the training grounds.
Nyx tucked the phone away, and decidedly pushed aside the little part of himself that quietly reminded him that this was exactly how things had played out, in the dream. He still had to hold himself back from desperately clinging to Crowe and Libertus like his life depended on it, when he finally met up with them, though he did still give them both a slightly calmer hug, to their surprise.
That dream was just a combination of recent trauma, his own over-active imagination, and also probably more trauma.
Right?
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thirty minutes later, he was watching the news report about the coming Peace Treaty with Niflheim, the other Kingsglaive around him murmuring in discontent. As Commander Drautos -and how could he be a traitor, how could any of them be traitors- debriefed them, Nyx found himself having to hide his hands in the pockets of his uniform, the phantom urge to reach out and just end the man keeping him on edge the whole time, to the point that he almost missed Crowe being called away for a separate assignment.
Two days after he had woken up from that terrible dream, he watched as Libertus stormed away, the death-glazed eyes of Crowe staring up at him from inside the bodybag.
And on the 16th of May, four days after that dream, everything fell apart.
Nyx screamed wordlessly as he watched King Regis die at Glauca’s hands, the scene identical to the one he had dreamt, as Lunafreya spoke words that almost fell on horror-deaf ears, that only registered because he could almost speak them word for word himself.
He stumbled as the King’s magic disappeared, only kept upright by the fact that he already knew, somehow, what it felt like to lose that connection, the steel-spark buzz of power fleeing from where it had lain within him.
He received Drautos’ call almost in a fugue, his words echoing those from his dream. And it was only the memory of that dream that meant that the bullet from that traitorous bastard Lazarus only went through his arm, instead of through his shoulder, though the shock of it still had him on the ground. He mouthed the words Lazarus spoke, as he gloated, as he was goaded by Lunafreya into putting on that ring.
Libertus ramming into Drautos- no, Glauca, with the car, nearly made Nyx laugh out loud, it was so ridiculously accurate it felt like it was scripted. And when he faced the old Kings of Lucis, in that otherworldly time, it was only the faintest sense that he needed to save Libertus and Lunafreya, no matter what, that stopped him from cackling hysterically in the face of those reticent ghosts.
Nyx died with burning scars tracing up his left arm, with the rising sun in his eyes and the ruins of a dead city behind him.
And then he gasped awake, the scent of ash and burning flesh, and the sound of war and ruin still fresh in his mind, a burning ember of phantom pain deep in his chest.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
All in all, Nyx thought it was perfectly justified that he missed the treaty announcement, and the subsequent debriefing, curled up in bed for the past hour as he realised, truly, that this wasn’t all just a horrible dream. That he was indeed reliving the same five days, the five days that would culminate in the fall of Insomnia, the deaths of almost everyone he’d cared for, and his own death at the very end of it all.
The ringing of his phone had eventually stopped, if only because he’d thrown it haphazardly off to another end of the room, and probably broken it in the process. With that in mind, he absently gave himself another twenty or so minutes before Libertus or Crowe, or both of them, broke into his room demanding if he was alright.
Oh shit, Crowe.
He dragged himself off his bed, and stumbled over to his sink, as the image of Crowe’s corpse rose unbidden at the thought. He stood there, hunched over the sink, as he desperately tried to bring some semblance of rational thought back.
He just. Needed to make sure Crowe wouldn’t go on that damned set-up of a mission, the one that would have Luche -that fucking traitorous bastard- killing her for- For what, exactly? Luche had only talked about what Niflheim had promised him and the other traitors, after he had revealed what he had done.
Alright, then. Nyx nodded to himself, taking a moment to wash away the acrid taste of bile. Crowe first, everything else can wait.
He had four days, or three, if he discounted this one, before Niflheim would attack during that farce of a treaty ceremony. Four days to figure out how to avert disaster.
Nyx briefly entertained the thought of just, grabbing Crowe and Libertus, and heading for literally anywhere other than Insomnia, before roughly brushing it aside. No, he had a second, well, third chance, somehow. A chance to make things better, to make it so that no one (except those who really, really deserved it) had to die, so that the Empire wouldn’t be able to run rampant with their magitek armies and tamed daemons. And what sort of hero would he be, if he just ran away from that chance?
A sharp knock on his door, and the sound of it being flung open, had him spinning around in surprise, stumbling back into the counter in barely-concealed panic, before he registered that 1) it wasn’t a magitek trooper or some other sort of attacker 2) it was Libertus and 3) Crowe wasn’t with him.
Somehow, he had forgotten that Libertus had his apartment’s spare key.
“Oh shit, Nyx!” Libertus crossed the room with surprising speed for someone on crutches, eyeing how Nyx was practically trying to meld with the countertop. “When you didn’t pick up the phone-“
Libertus broke off with a yelp as Nyx grabbed him, half in a hug, half so that he could drag him in closer.
“Lib. Where is Crowe?”
“She’s off at some confidential briefing with the Commander, Nyx, are you alright?” Libertus managed to extract himself from Nyx’s grasp, giving him a once-over with a critical gaze. “You look- you look like shit, Nyx. And you weren’t at training. Do I need to get you to a doctor?”
“N-no. I’m…fine.” Nyx slowly inhaled, then exhaled, before trying to make himself look a little less like he’d just had a breakdown for the past hour and then some. “I am definitely fine. But I need to see Crowe.”
“Nyx, I’m sure it can wait.” Libertus sighed, filling a glass with water and passing it to Nyx, gesturing for him to drink it. “Me and Crowe covered for you during the briefing you missed saying you came down with something, though Commander does want a confirm on that. Though, man, you actually look terrible.”
“Just…had a bad dream, that’s all.” Nyx admitted.
Libertus raised an eyebrow, before shaking his head.
“You know that you can tell us anything, right? Anything that’s troubling you.”
“I…”
Nyx considered telling Libertus everything. Telling him about Crowe’s death, about the Glaives turning traitor, of Commander Drautos being that hated General Glauca, of the city burning under an Imperial onslaught, of the Old Wall and the old Kings. Of how Nyx had died.
But would Libertus even believe him? Nyx barely could believe it himself, and he’d lived it. Twice.
Libertus was one of his best friends, his brother in all but blood. But even so, he was fairly certain that Lib was probably going to check him into a hospital, at least initially, and he couldn’t afford to spend time trying to assure him of his sanity when he only had four and a half days.
“I’m fine, Lib. Really. Just had a bad dream, about Galahd.” Nyx paused, before he added. “And that giant daemon.”
“Oh.”
“Now, please, I need to meet up with Crowe.”
“She should be out of that meeting by now, I told her to meet up with us here, after I checked on you.”
Almost as if on cue, Crowe burst into the unlocked room.
“Oh good, you’re alive.” Crowe said, looking at Nyx and Libertus. “Wow, you really do look out of it.”
“Crowe!” Nyx swept her up in a hug, trying not to tear up.
“Hey, hey, Nyx. You good?” Crowe asked.
“You’re alive.” Nyx breathed, clutching her harder. “You’re alive.”
“I…am?” Crowe looked over at Libertus in confusion. Libertus shrugged, mouthing ‘Bad dream’ at her. Nyx instinctively lifted his middle finger at him, having caught the action even as he swallowed back his tears. “Look, Nyx, I’m fine, alright? Now, sit down, and let us catch you up to speed. Some shit’s gone down.”
“Yeah. Yeah, you are.” Nyx nodded, slowly moving to sit down. Libertus and Crowe both perched themselves nearby, Libertus taking the other seat, whilst Crowe leaned against the counter, wrinkling her nose at the mess in his sink.
“So…what’s happened?” Nyx asked, though he knew what it was they were going to tell him. But…well, he couldn’t just tell them how he knew that anyways, might as well give himself plausible deniability for some of his foreknowledge.
“Niflheim wants a peace treaty, at the cost of all other regions of Lucis besides Insomnia. And the King accepted it.” Libertus spat.
“There’s…not many in the Kingsglaive are happy about things at all. The general sentiment is that the King’s throwing away our homes.” Crowe continued. “On that note, the Commander’s given me a mission to recover the Princess Lunafreya from Tenebrae, I’m leaving first thing tomorrow.”
“No.”
Libertus and Crowe both turned to stare at Nyx, who was clutching the glass of water in his hands like a lifeline as he spoke.
“What-“
“You can’t. Crowe, please,” Nyx looked up at her, trying to convey the importance of his words, the desperation behind them. “Don’t go on that mission.”
“Nyx, I have to-“
“I don’t want to lose you, Crowe.” I don’t want to lose you again.
“Look, Nyx, you know I can handle myself.” Crowe patted his shoulder comfortingly. “Don’t let some bad dream get you all worked up, what did you dream of, me dying?”
Nyx dropped the glass, sending shards scattering across his floor. Distantly, he heard Libertus cursing, and Crowe…saying something, something that he probably imagined was supposed to be soothing, but couldn’t hear over the rising static as he remembered Crowe’s death, Libertus’ fury, Luche’s smug shitty face, Drautos half covered in that cursed armour-
Eventually, things slowly came back into focus, and he blinked as he looked up at Crowe and Libertus’ slightly relieved expressions. His neck ached, and it was only then that he realised that somehow, he’d gone from sitting in one of the terrible bargain chairs he had in his flat, to being on the floor, back pressed to one of the walls.
“You back with us, hero?” Libertus asked softly.
“Y-yeah.” Nyx croaked out, tilting his neck back and forth for a bit in an attempt to ease the soreness. “Sorry.”
“No, no, don’t be. Guess I must’ve accidentally hit the nail right on its head, then.” Crowe said, crouching down and slowly extending her hand. “Now, let me help you up.”
Nyx nodded, getting his breathing under some semblance of control, and he briefly closed his eyes, waiting until he felt calm enough to actually move.
He let Crowe hoist him to his feet, and went in for another hug, this time getting both her and Libertus in it. They gradually relocated to sit on his bed, Nyx practically wrapped around his two siblings-in-all-but-blood.
“You died, Crowe. You died and there was nothing I could do to stop it.” Nyx sobbed; the words slightly garbled considering his face was mashed into Libertus’ shoulder. “A-and Libertus left, and then everything just, went to hell and then some, the city was attacked-“
He broke off, unable to put the rest of what he’d seen and lived into words.
“Look, hero, you know what I’m capable of, right?” Crowe said reassuringly, after a silent minute, slowly carding her fingers through his hair. “Whatever it was that your subconsciousness cooked up, it won’t happen, alright?”
“It-“ Nyx choked up, the words he desperately wanted to say lodged in his throat.
“I’ve called you in as sick, so the Commander won’t be all up our collective asses when you don’t show up for duty for the rest of the day.” Libertus said, patting Nyx on the shoulder. Nyx felt like he should be flinching from that, even though he knew that there wasn’t any kingly power burning its way through his body. Yet. “Come on, you should get some rest. Proper rest, after I get you something to eat. I’ll be here, though Crowe needs to go prepare for that mission of hers. We can see her off in the morning.”
The meal that Libertus cooked up an hour later tasted like ash in his mouth, and as Nyx was herded to bed, he couldn’t help but think that he had failed, once again. But he couldn’t go after Crowe, not now, not when Libertus was already keeping a cautious eye on him, not when all they knew was that he just had a panic attack, and a dream terrible enough to spark it.
And on top of all that, he had no idea what to do now, not when he knew that Libertus and Crowe probably wouldn’t believe him at this point, not when he’d made everything out to be just a bad dream. He’d had some sort of grand plan, to convince Crowe to not go on that mission, in the hope that it’d derail at least part of the Empire’s plan, derail it enough to give him time to figure out how the hell else he’d be putting a spanner into the rest of their planned invasion.
That plan, at least for now, was in utter shambles.
Now that he thought about it, actually thought about it, there were so many things that would eventually lead to the fall of Insomnia.
Crowe’s death, which would fracture the Kingsglaive even further than what the initial ceasefire announcement had done.
Lunafreya’s arrival, and subsequent kidnapping, which would be the bait that would draw the loyal Kingsglaive to their doom at the hands of the traitors, and signal the initial attack on Insomnia.
The theft of the Crystal and the fall of the Wall, which, he still didn’t know exactly how that had even happened.
The whole mess with the – rebels? Faction? – that Libertus had joined the other two times, the ones who had bombed the signing ceremony.
The death of King Regis, which would inevitably ruin much of their chances to stop the invasion, because it would mean that no one would have their borrowed magic anymore to help them against the forces of Niflheim.
How to deal with those giant daemon weapons withoutbringing forth the Old Wall, an act that would cause a decent amount of destruction in itself.
And General Glauca, that traitorous Commander of the Kingsglaive who was, Nyx admitted, quite possibly the greatest threat to everything he held dear at this point.
He could deal with rescuing the Princess, having done it twice already. Could probably even deal with the traitorous Glaives, hell, he knew at least Luche and Tredd were in on it, and if he took those two out then the others would lose a good part of their leadership.
But how in hell was he going deal with everything else? Nyx wondered, not a little desperate, as exhaustion finally set in, and he fell unwillingly into a fitful sleep.
He woke again, sometime in the evening, eyes tracing the cracks along his ceiling as he tried to parse his racing thoughts. There was just so much to do, so much he had to stop or fix before the Empire burned the city to the ground.
Well, he eventually thought, a little sardonically, I could always just knock Luche out now, and maybe he won’t kill Crowe tomorrow.
He sat bolt upright at that thought, and tried not to fall out of the damn bed in his haste. He fumbled blindly for his boots, and looked around for something heavy enough to give someone a bad concussion. The frying pan hanging on the rack above the shitty little stove, still a bit damp after Libertus had washed it, looked like it would do nicely.
He couldn’t kill Luche yet, even if every bit of him really wanted to do so. It’d probably de-rail things to the point that his foreknowledge would be rendered completely useless, and he hadn’t yet come up with ideas on how to deal with the next few days to make that murder as feasible as he wanted.
But he could just. Make sure that Luche wouldn’t be able to kill Crowe, or at least he’d be able to give Crowe a better chance at surviving the ambush, if he couldn’t convince her not to go in the morning.
Nodding to himself, he opened his door, preparing to march down the hallway and bait Luche into sticking his head out so he could bash it in with roughly three kilograms of steel. Fortunately, no one appeared to be outside of their own flats, though considering it was late in the evening by now, that was unsurprising.
He knew Luche had a habit of sleeping early if he had the opportunity to do so, so Nyx was fairly certain that if he knocked on the man’s door now, Luche shouldn’t be aware enough to register it was Nyx holding the frying pan before it hit him.
Sure enough, Luche opened his door with bleary eyes, and Nyx had a moment of vicious satisfaction watching the man crumple to the ground with a single hit of the pan. Now that Luche was unconscious, and not dead (there was a pulse, Nyx had checked), all that was left to do was shove him somewhere in his own apartment and hopefully have him out of commission for the next day at least.
“Uh, Nyx?”
Nyx looked up from where he was dragging the surprisingly heavy Luche the rest of the way into the apartment. Libertus was standing there, one crutch held limply in his hand.
“This…isn’t what it looks like, Lib.” Nyx winced, as Libertus looked incredulously at where Nyx was holding onto Luche’s limp arm.
“Is it?!” Libertus’ voice somehow reached another octave, as he cautiously approached Nyx.
“Look, this is going to sound incredibly crazy, but would you believe me if I told you that Luche is a traitor and he’s going to try to kill us all, except for the fact that I just knocked him unconscious.”
Libertus’ expression told him that no, Libertus didn’t believe him, and also that Nyx was…probably in some deep shit now.
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Nyx awoke, for the fourth time, in his bed, in his flat, a burning ember of phantom pain deep in his chest, clutching at where the piece of the collapsing hospital ceiling had stabbed right through him.
Well, he thought, somewhat hysterically, that could’ve gone better. Much better.
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moonscarsandstars · 3 years
Text
happy birthday @sirrriusblack!! you’re an absolutely amazing person and deserve the worldd :)) i hope you have a super lovely day and a very very wonderful year ahead (or i mean just wonderful life in general you deserve it love), and hope you like this fic!
~~~
The bustle of the coffee shop may have been what Sirius loved most about it.
Something about the atmosphere seemed to be noisy yet all too calming at the same time. With the ecstatic chatter of people from Sirius’s classes coming in after school, the hum of the espresso machines at the counter, and the tinkling of the bell that was just above the door. 
In fact, it was that sudden tinkling of the bell that brought Sirius’s attention from whatever chaotic conversation he’d been having with James.
“Oh fuck.”
“What-” started James, before looking at the entrance and grinning. “I think I’ll let you take this shift.”
“Absolutely not,” muttered Sirius before ducking under the counter. There was absolutely no way he was going to tend to Remus Lupin- the exact same seventh year he’d been head over heels with for years now. Not if he didn’t want to embarrass himself by probably spilling coffee and forgetting his own name.
“Pads,” said James, trying to pull Sirius’s wrist. “Get up, you’re breaking at least fifteen rules here. It’s just going to be a few seconds of talking.”
“It’ll be the longest few seconds ever.”
“But it’ll be the best few seconds, won’t it?” Asked James with a smirk.
Sirius stuck his tongue out.
“I’m not wrong, am I?” 
Grabbing the counter, Sirius gave one last scowl at James before pulling himself up.
“Sorry about that,” he said, staring pointedly down at a pair of worn converse. “How may I help you?”
If the scraping of chairs in the background wasn’t so loud, the entire floor would probably be able to hear Sirius’s heart rapidly beating against his chest.
“As many double shot espressos as this can get, please,” said Remus flatly, slamming a crumpled ten pound note onto the counter.
Blinking, Sirius’s eyes widened.
“Exams.” Holding up a history textbook, Remus managed to drop at least a dozen loose papers.
“Ah, I see,” quipped Sirius with a grin. “On the house in that case. Name?”
“Moony,” replied Remus distractedly, trying to pick up all the papers and meet Sirius’s gaze.
God, his eyes were fucking beautiful.
“Moony?”
“Yes, M- oh, uh-”
“Moony it is.”
“I- okay, yes, okay.”
“Are you okay?”
Looking at the dark circles under his eyes and the constant yawning, Remus looked either like he hadn’t slept in days, or just woken up from sleeping for days. The irony was, Sirius couldn’t tell which.
“I’ll be good, thanks,” said Remus, wandering off after Sirius’s smile. But Sirius could here him vaguely mumble something along the lines of “even my textbooks aren’t okay” and couldn’t stop himself from chuckling out loud.
~~~
Maybe if Remus had any logic, he wouldn’t have deleted the exam timetable. 
Or had to cram in his ten hours of history content into two hours of revision. Or have stumbled into the exact coffee place he pointedly avoided everyday. Or be sitting here with five shots of strong coffee trying to read the same line over and over again.
Sipping on an extremely bitter glass, Remus glared at his illegible notes with an even more bitter look.
“Need any help?”
Remus’s heart skipped a beat.
“I think I’m good, thanks,” said Remus, proceeding to curse under his breath as he knocked over a glass.
“Oh, I should-” started Sirius, before running off and returning with a cloth and a spray as Remus quietly wished he could sink into the ground.
“Sorry about this. I- well- didn’t get the timetable,” he muttered sheepishly.
“You didn’t? Why not?”
“Well I did,” Remus looked away, before continuing. “But I deleted it.”
Sirius stopped what he was doing to look Remus dead in the eye. “You deleted it? The mocks timetable?”
“Accidentally! No- stop laughing!”
But Remus couldn’t stop himself from catching Sirius’s laugh, holding his aching stomach no matter how much he should’ve been worrying.
God, he had such a contagious fucking laugh.
“What’re you studying?” Managed Sirius, after an intense few seconds of holding his stomach and trying not to burst into laughter again.
“History.”
“I thought you loved it though, I mean, you’re always reading it in the-” Sirius stopped himself, as an almost invisible blush rushed up his cheeks.
“You noticed?”
“I- that was much creepier than it was meant to be.”
Remus chuckled, but there was no hint of discomfort, much to Sirius’s relief. “Love history. Hate history exams.”
“Makes sense I suppose.”
“As for being creepy, I suppose it makes up for me finishing your espresso stock,” said Remus, vaguely gesturing at his messy, half-finished collection of espresso shots.
“Oh please, don’t bother. We stock up for exam season.”
“You’re kidding.”
“And you’re not alone. I’ve a nice collection of coffee at my flat, actually. And history textbooks. Well, art history, but still.”
Raising his eyebrows, Remus quipped, “Careful, that might sound like an invitation.”
“Maybe it is,” said Sirius with what Remus could have sworn was a wink that sent the childish butterflies in his stomach crazy.
“Sirius? Where the hell are you?”
Jumping in surprise, Sirius yelled back “I’m coming!” before turning to Remus. “I’m very sorry, but I’m also very much in trouble.”
And with that, he rushed off leaving Remus flustered, confused and in realisation of just how much he’d put off. 
~~~
Reluctantly, after a few minutes of mindless doodling and giddy smiling, Remus came to the conclusion that he’d never finish anything in this particular coffee shop- not the studying, nor the coffee. Definitely not with all the distractions. 
Yet he couldn’t bring himself to leave, not with the memory of Sirius’s wide grin and sparkling eyes. That is, until a voice from behind managed to scared the living daylights out of him.
“This place does close unfortunately.”
Jumping out of his skin, Remus whipped his head around with a start. There Sirius was, grinning like an idiot, trademark apron folded on a shelf revealing his shirt- top two buttons undone, Remus noticed with a start- and black jeans. Suddenly, he felt a wave of consciousness in his overflowing jumper that rolled up at his wrists.
“That- really is tragic. I was planning to sleep here, you see.”
“Well,” started Sirius, a smile playing on his lips. “What if I offered you another place to sleep?” 
Remus silently cursed as his heartbeat raced. He thoroughly hoped that the heat travelling up his cheeks wasn’t as visible as Sirius’s knowing grin made it out to be. Sirius was going to be the death of him.
“But really,” started Sirius, giving a look at his watch. “It’s getting late.”
“Sorry,” said Remus, not at all sorry for every second he spent stalling and spending time with Sirius. “Just give me a second to pack up, yeah?”
“Of course. And my offer still stands.”
“Does it come with benefits?”
Now it was Sirius’s turn to blush, eyes widening and parting his lips in a split second of surprise that turned into that same, ear-to-ear grin. Pointing to the counter awkwardly, Sirius chuckled, “I’ll- I’ll meet you there.”
The way Sirius’s blushed seemed to travel to his neck brought a smile to Remus’s lips, filled partly with some sort of satisfaction and partly fluster in its own way. Heading up to the counter, he dragged his feet in a pathetic attempt to take as long as he could.
“I’ll be heading out now,” said Remus, slapping a pathetic two dollars onto the counter as some form of tip. But his tired expression turned into confusion as Sirius produced another order of coffee, fixing the lid on before handing it to Remus.
“I- I really appreciate this, but the ten pounds was all I had-”
“Oh please, this is complimentary. On me, if you will.”
“I couldn’t,” insisted Remus, finding it increasingly difficult to refuse something from Sirius.
“Well, I’m sure you’ll want it anyway. Really, consider it a gift?”
Sirius had that earnest look in his eyes- the one that reminded Remus almost of a puppy that you just couldn’t refuse. It was infuriating, he told himself as he accepted it. “Thank you so much, I owe you.”
“Don’t worry about it.” said Sirius, leaving the counter and twisting the “open” sign to display the word “closed”. “I’ll see you soon if I’m lucky.”
And with that, he disappeared, leaving Remus confused and heart hammering against his chest. 
But that grin returned to his face as Remus turned to the cup, recognising that familiar scrawl spelling out the words scrawled on the cup read “To moony,” with an address.
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