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magalidragon · 4 months

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❄️❄️dashing through the snow ❄️❄️| Jonerys Winter Wonderland | teaser

For prompt Sexy Sleigh Ride 🛷 | also I get my runaway bride fix too 🤭

Tulle flew over her face again; her legs went out from under her, and she was sure now she was showing off her undergarments to the world if anyone decided to take a peek. She cursed in Valyrian, struggling to upright herself, gathering skirts and tearing what she could, and now she was barefoot.

In the snow.

In the winter.

At Winterfell.

And she had no true escape plan.

"At least I'm out," she mumbled, looking up at the open window where she'd fallen from. She took a deep breath and turned, scanning around where she'd ended up.

She was on the north side of the castle, near the stables. The godswood was over to the west, a bit too close for comfort. The kitchens were on the far south side which was good because it was less likely for her to be caught by some cater waiter. All the guests should be seated, but she couldn't risk it.

"Daenerys Targaryen!"

Oh shit.

Dany whipped her head up, in time to see a flame red flash in the window she'd pushed herself out of. "Fuck," she mumbled. It was either Cat or Sansa, both of whom were the worst people in the world and now the hunt was on. She really had to get the fuck out of here.

Keep calm, keep calm.

The cold was starting to get to her, her arms bare in the floaty dress which looked like she'd been painted in feathers. It was beautiful. It was expensive. It was designed by her future sister-in-law.

And she hated it..

It was also not conducive to a winter outdoor wedding or escaping from the roof of a castle. The neck tied around her in a halter style, with rows and rows of floating feathery tulle and lace, fanning out into a train that was longer in the back than the front and was designed to show off the crystal studded heels she’d be wearing and also the matching coat. The coat, of course, she’s left upstairs. Damnit.

The ground was frozen solid, what little not covered in fluffy white snow feeling like cement beneath her bare feet. She gathered her skirts, her skin still flushed and warm from the adrenaline of the escape, and she ignored the beginnings of numbness in her toes, hurrying towards the stables.

There had been a plan, since they'd be going to the other side of the castle for the reception in the great hall, to have the "newlywed car" be a gilded sleigh pulled by reindeer. Yes, fucking reindeer. No horses for the Starks, no, they had to go find bloody reindeer. Like she was Mrs. Claus running off for a getaway weekend with Santa. She would have preferred a dragon.

Unfortunately there were no dragons to be had, so Dany had to settle for a reindeer.

Along the stables the reindeer were already hooked up to the newlywed sleigh, along with several others that would shepherd guests back and forth. Like Christmas Ubers or something. She could not believe the shit that Robb's family wanted to pull for this wedding. It was seriously the event of the decade, but she was going to throw a massive wrench into that plan.

Dany was surprised she wasn't hearing whistles and dogs barking-- wolves in the case of the Starks-- being set off to hunt her down and drag her bodily back to the godswood to continue the wedding. "What are you doing?" she hissed to herself, her head buzzing.

Running away from a miserable future.

Gods, she had to get out of here. She was freezing, she had no shoes, and honestly she just had to ride this psychosis to the end and figure it out later.

Missandei, her maid of honor, would undoubtedly know what happened when no wedding occurred and she’d hightail it to her hotel at the B&B in Wintertown, so Dany might as well head there. She glanced sideways.

At the reindeer.

“Bingpot,” she muttered, sprinting to the sleigh. She clambered up and into the monstrosity, silver and bedecked with bells and ribbon. The reindeer hitched up to it turned its head to curiously peer in her direction. She lifted reins and called out. “Mush!”

Nothing happened.

Hmm. “Go!” she shouted. She tugged on the reins. She knew how to ride horses and grew up with them. Reindeer were just fluffy horses with antlers right? Nothing again. The reindeer turned its head back around and carried on eating from the container attached to the hitching post. Dany closed her eyes, dripping her head. “What are you doing?” she repeated, rhis time a whisper.

“Yes, what are you doing?”

The voice, raspy and deep behind her, came from beneath the flannel blankets piled in the seat behind her. Dany screamed, throwing the reins in the air, startled and that did it. The reindeer pulled his head from the food and immediately began to run, making for the open gate.

Damn a sleigh moved fast.

Wind caught at her skirts, pulling them back around her and she flailed, caught off guard and not secure in her seat.

Owner of the voice cursed, tossed a cigarette she hadn’t even smelled or noticed over the side into the snow and jumped over from the back into the seat beside her, a blur of black leather and denim. He snatched the reins and pulled on them, bringing the reindeer to a manageable trot, and brought the sleigh over to the side of the main drive out of the castle grounds.

And the man she was in love with— who was definitely not her finance— whipped his head around, dark curls flying about his pale face and his gray eyes flashing.

“Daenerys Targaryen what the fuck are you doing?”

Dany didn’t even think— she hadn’t so far— blurting out: “I’m running away.”

There was a quiet beat, and then he smiled, long and slow, white teeth flashing canine like against his dark beard. “Well. We best get going then.”

And Jon snow turned away from her and snapped the reins, the reindeer running off and speeding the sleigh away from Winterfell.

#jonerys #jonerys au #my fics #my moodboards #fic teaser #snowxstormworld #joneryswinterwonderland2023

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totowlff · 1 year

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somewhere in the haze

➝ when your race for generational talent came to an end, you didn't expect to be so shaken. however, you also did not expect to be supported precisely by your great rival

➝ word count: 4,4k

➝ warnings: mentions of health problems

➝ author’s note: i don't even remember the last time i wrote a one-shot, but this one made me particularly happy. hope you like it.

Sitting at the dark marble-colored bar, you stared at the aperol spritz you'd ordered, the slice of orange floating amongst the slivers of ice that still lingered at the bottom of the glass. You typically didn’t make a habit of drinking, especially by yourself, the night before a Formula 2 feature race.

However, you felt like you deserved a drink or two, especially after the insanity of the last few months.

You downed what was left in your drink and signaled to the bartender for another. The man nodded, whisking your glass, with its lone orange slice, away. You stared at the veins of the marble bar top, losing your gaze in the faint white veins running through the stone as the image of a young boy’s face filled your mind. His dark eyes were filled with tears, and his lower lip was trembling.

“You said they would accept me,” he repeated in your head.

— Y/N? — a familiar voice asked behind you.

You sighed deeply. Of course he was here. Why would he be anywhere else in the damned city aside from this exact hotel bar?

You glanced to your side and found a tall man looking at you with a serious expression on his face. It was just like that afternoon a few months ago, in that cramped garage in the Italian countryside.

The sky was gray and depressing that day, but the environment at the track was electric.

You were in Lonato del Garda for two days already, following the ROK Cup International Final 2018, one of the main karting competitions in Italy. It brought together more than 420 drivers from 21 countries, all looking for a chance in the world of motorsport. Something you could offer them.

The prancing horse embroidered on your jacket was proof of that. You worked for Scuderia Ferrari, and your job with the team was scouting talented up-and-coming drivers for the Ferrari Driver Academy. Judging by the eight laps you’d just watched, you found one, and a good one.

As you walked through the garages, looking for the number 633 in the columns, you mentally reviewed the information you had gotten about the boy by talking to other people who were there.

His name was Andrea, but everyone called him by his middle name, Kimi. His father, Marco, was a driver as well, and was extremely passionate about the sport, to the point of having founded a team with the family surname. Kimi had been racing around Europe for three years, winning championships and drawing attention for his impressive results, as well as his mature and extremely intelligent racing style.

“He’s exactly what I want”, you thought, as you strolled into the garage marked with his number. You expected to find the boy with his father and his mechanics, but to your surprise - and not a pleasant surprise - there was a tall man standing next to Kimi’s cart, his hands resting on the equipment.

— Your overtake on the third lap was fantastic — you heard that familiar voice say, with its deep and distinct accent. “Damn you”, you said mentally, as you approached the three.

— Indeed it was — you said, forcing your face into a pleasant smile.

The three of them looked up at you, each with a different expression. While Kimi and his dad looked excited to see you, the man clearly looked annoyed.

— Y/N, what a surprise to see you here — Toto Wolff said, dryly.

— Don't act like you don't expect me to be here, Wolff. You know I'm always on the lookout at these competitions — you replied in the same tone, while approaching the boy — Besides, I was told there was a boy with the name of a champion running around here. You must be Kimi, right?

The boy smiled.

— Yes, that’s me.

— I'm Y/N Y/L/N, nice to meet you — you replied, holding out your hand to shake his.

— Are you from Ferrari? — he asked, his brown eyes glued to the prancing horse on your jacket.

— Yes, I'm with the Ferrari Driver Academy. As you may know, I’m always looking for drivers that can be developed within our program, as we did with Jules Bianchi, Sergio Perez, Lance Stroll and, more recently, Charles Leclerc.

— Never mind that none of them drive for Ferrari at the moment — Toto said from behind you, his voice dry and detached

— We are not looking for talent just to feed our team, Toto, but the whole category and the sport as a whole. Better than some teams that claim to have a driver academy and haven't actually recruited any drivers yet — you spat, glancing back over your shoulder. You could see his jaw clench — But Ferrari has already nurtured the careers of several drivers in all steps of the feeder series, through Formula 1. And I would love to have someone like you, Kimi.

— Good evening, Wolff.

— Didn't expect to find you here — Toto said, sitting in the stool next to yours.

— You know I always come to watch the feeder series races, Toto.

— I was talking about this hotel, Y/N. You always stay where the rest of Ferrari stays, don’t you?

— They ran out of rooms — you muttered, nodding to the bartender as he placed your second Aperol spritz in front of you. You took a sip, and squeezed the orange slice into the drink.

— So you decided to stay here?

— Yes, Toto. Does that bother you? — you sneered.

— Not at all, Y/N — he replied — If I’m being honest, I actually prefer your presence to that of most other people’s.

His words had you looking at him with pursed lips. He was wearing a denim shirt and cream-colored dress pants. His hair was a bit mussed. He had a playful smile on his face that somehow never failed to make you feel strangely lighter.

— If Christian saw us talking like this, he’d be jealous. You know that, right?

— I hope so — Toto murmured, before waving to the bartender and ordering a beer — But I don’t care. If I could get away with it, I'd run him over with my car at the first opportunity.

— Wouldn’t we all — you muttered, before taking another sip of your drink. When the bartender set his beer in front of him, he took a generous gulp, and an uncomfortable silence stretched between you, as both of you were undoubtedly thinking about the month before.

Especially after everything that had happened.

Sitting in the Antonelli family’s living room, you knew you had won. Kimi was sitting next to you on the sofa, showing some newspaper clippings and photos, while Marco told more about his son's participation in karting competitions around Italy.

— His first real competition was the Easykart International Grand Final in 2015, at the Circuito de Lignano. Kimi won almost two seconds ahead of second place, it was fantastic.

— That was the day I knew for sure that I didn't want to stop racing — the boy said, smiling.

— And I hope you don't, Kimi — you replied, putting a hand on the boy's shoulder — You're very talented, one of the most talented boys I've ever seen.

— Toto said the same thing the last time we met — the boy said, smiling — He said that I have the potential to drive in Formula 1 someday.

The mention of Toto made you tense up, a wan smile tugging at your lips.

— I usually say that Toto doesn't know what he's talking about, but this time I'll have to agree with him. You really do.

A gleam of hope appeared in Kimi’s eyes.

— Kimi, dear, can you put these things away? — Marco asked. However, when you looked at Kimi’s father, you realized what his intention was.

— Yes, dad — he replied as he got up to take the photos back to where the family kept them. The silence lasted for a few seconds, the sound of some children's television program drifting into the room, making the silence even more tense.

— My son is very excited — Kimi's father finally said — He only knows how to talk about your interest, how he might be on the verge of becoming a Ferrari driver…

— That's excellent, Marco — you replied, smiling.

— But I can’t help being a bit worried, Y/N.

You swallowed hard.

— Worried?

The man in the armchair took a deep breath.

— We are reaching a point in Kimi's career where he needs to step up into a higher category. He wants to go into single-seaters, like Formula Renault or Formula 4, and I fully support him, and want that for him, too.

He didn't have to say another word for you to know what the problem was. Despite having a privileged and much more comfortable condition than that of many other boys, the Antonelli family was not wealthy to the point of being able to fund Kimi’s racing career themselves, especially in a category much more expensive than karts.

It seemed strange, as Marco had a racing team, and Kimi already had some sponsor backing, but nothing of that was able to guarantee that he would be racing in the following years, especially in the category he wanted.

— I know, Marco.

— I want to offer a sure thing to my son, so that he can dedicate himself to his racing career without having to worry about running out of money and having to drop out of a series mid-season. To have the backing of Ferrari would be amazing…

You smiled.

— Will be amazing, you mean. It will be.

Toto took another sip of his beer.

— I guess you heard the news, huh? — he said softly.

— What news?

He was silent for a few seconds.

— We reached an agreement with Kimi.

You raised the glass to your lips, taking a generous sip of your drink.

— Congratulations — you muttered, trying to disguise your frustration.

— For what?

— You won.

He put the beer bottle down and turned to you, one eyebrow raised.

— Won what?

You huffed in frustration.

— Won the battle. Our fight for Kimi.

— Y/N…

— It's fine to celebrate your victory, Toto. You’ve signed a generational talent, the future of motorsport. If it were me, I wouldn’t be able to stop bragging about having managed to sign him. I probably would have spent the rest of my career reminding you of it.

— Y/N, you know I was already resigned to the idea of not having him in our program.

— Were you?

— Yes. I thought it was a long shot, truly.

You sneered.

— You've got to be kidding.

— I’m serious — he said, his face set in a serious expression — I knew I was going to lose. I could have offered to fully fund his entire career myself, but I knew it wouldn't matter if you made him an offer.

— I…

— Having your attention means having Ferrari's attention, and what Italian kid wouldn't want to drive for Ferrari?

You looked back at your glass, the squeezed-out sliver of orange bobbing along the top of your drink. He wasn't wrong.

— I had already started talking to the family of another boy who was in the same championship with Kimi that weekend — Toto continued — Until you called me, Y/N. You begged me to sign with him, to take him. I… Thought it was strange, but I’m not ungrateful, but I’ve been meaning to ask… Why?

The question brought another memory back, something churning in your stomach.

Kimi's eyes sparkled as she stared at the screen that was just above the red reception desk. Looking at the images of the celebration of Sebastian Vettel's last victory, in Belgium, the previous year. Kimi was probably imagining himself in the German driver's shoes, winning trophies in those legendary red overalls. You were imagining the same thing as you went to greet him

— Good morning, Kimi! — you said happily — How are you?

— I’m fine, Y/N, looking forward to seeing everything — he replied, as his father smiled at you.

— We appreciate your invitation, Y/N, it was very generous of you to invite us to Maranello — Marco said, placing a hand on his son's shoulder.

— It was the least I could do for our future academy driver. Shall we start with a little tour?

You guided the boy and his father through the Gestione Sportiva, pleased with the absolute enchantment on Kimi’s face. He seemed interested in every aspect of the factory, asking questions and revealing a bit of his own familiarity with it all, considering he had grown up around racing cars.

However, you were most looking forward to showing him the simulator. All of the academy drivers used it, including the team’s Formula 1 drivers.Something told you he would love to try it himself, and after a few conversations with the simulation engineers, you got the go-ahead for him to do a few laps himself.

As you told him this, Kimi’s face broke into a broad smile.

— Are you serious? Like, really?

— Of course, do you think I would joke about such a thing?

— This is amazing! Thank you, Y/N — he exclaimed, giving you a hug. You reciprocated almost immediately. Your heart felt warm and full.

During your time negotiating with Kimi and his family, you couldn’t help but develop a fondness for him. It was something simple and sincere, similar to the affection you felt for the other drivers at the academy, who you were proud to call “my boys”. And you were sure that Kimi would be part of that little family that you had formed inside Ferrari.

With a generic overalls and a helmet provided by the simulation engineers, the boy sat in the cockpit in silence, while the virtual version of Monza was set up for him to do a few laps.

— Charles broke the record for this track — Ash muttered, as he typed something on the computer.

— What was his time?

— 1:20'05'' — he replied, starting the simulation.

Seeing Kimi’s speed in a kart was already impressive, but you were astonished seeing the ease with which he piloted the single-seater, even if it was just a simulacrum. It didn't take the boy long to adjust to the buttons and controls on the steering wheel and to do several quick laps, the surroundings of the circuit becoming a blur on the screen, as he accelerated through the curves.

— Fuck…

— What? — you asked, noticing Ash's surprise as he stared at his workstation.

— That’s not possible — he continued to type something into the computer, before looking at you, wide-eyed — He’s beaten Charles’ time.

You downed the rest of the drink in front of you. The memory of the boy's expression in front of you was too painful, even more so considering that you were the one who caused it.

— Well, he needed a place where he could develop— you answered, without looking at him — And Mercedes was the only place he could go.

— But…

— I took him to Maranello, back in February, with his father — you continued, your eyes fixed on your hands — He was so happy, Toto, so excited. I showed them everything I could, even the simulator. Did you know that he beat the lap time record at Monza?

— Who’s time did he break?

— Charles — you said, smiling wanly — Ash, the engineer who operates the simulator, was shocked, but I knew he could do it. It was fate. We had to get him for Ferrari, there was no other team, but… when it came time to put pen to paper, it all went wrong.

Toto remained silent, his fingers tracing the star on the beer bottle. Maybe he wasn't sure what to say at that moment, maybe it was a silent invitation to keep talking, so that’s what you did

— I had scheduled a meeting with Maurizio so we could finalize the last details of his academy contract. He already knew everything about Kimi, I had already spoken about him more than the other drivers in our program — you said, a pained smile on your face — He even told me that he was looking forward to meeting him and…

Suddenly, your eyes filled with tears of frustration, your lower lip trembling. It was as if all the feelings you had been building up inside you had found a way to escape, revealing all your anger and guilt for what had happened in the boardroom.

— We sat down with Maurizio and he started a whole speech about how he'd seen videos and numbers and had listened to me ramble on about him for hours and was really curious to meet him — you continued — After a few minutes of conversation, I asked if we had a proposal ready to present to them and Maurizio said no, because the academy would not sign Kimi.

— But you said…

— Maurizio said he was impressed, that his numbers were good and that he believed in his potential, but that Kimi was too young. He didn't want to invest in the development of a kid who wasn’t even in single-seaters yet, and the academy didn’t take on drivers that were still in karting. He just dumped Kimi, Toto — you said quietly, working up the courage to look at him.

Toto’s expression was soft, almost as if he was acknowledging that this was hurting you deeply. Then, in a move you weren’t expecting, Toto leaned over and wrapped his arms around you, in a tender and sincere hug. It made you cry even more, because he was approaching a facet of yourself that you didn’t show most people.

— You know that doesn't mean you're a bad professional, right? — you heard him say softly, close to your ear — Things don't always work out and that's okay.

Then you looked up at him.

— It’s not so much that they didn’t work out for me, Toto — you said, sniffling — It's that they didn’t work out for Kimi.

You felt dizzy as you accompanied Marco and Kimi to the reception area of the Gestione. Maurizio had never even hinted that he wouldn’t take Kimi into the academy, quite the contrary. He’d gotten your hopes up, which caused you to get Kimi’s hopes up in turn. Hearing Maurizio say he wasn't interested in signing Kimi was like being jolted from a sound sleep by being doused in a bucket of ice water. What made things even worse was that Kimi had ceased talks with other driver academies and other potential sponsors. Ferrari was what had mattered, and Ferrari simply let him go.

— Well, that wasn't the end I envisioned for our day — you started, only to be interrupted by Kimi.

— Why did you say that?

— Say what?

— Why did you say you wanted me, Y/N? — he asked. He sounded upset. The way he looked at you made something inside his chest sink.

— Because we wanted you, Kimi. I talked to Maurizio, he showed interest, he was willing, I don't know what happened — you started stuttering, your nerves getting the better of you.

— I thought you wanted to support me, that you wanted to be part of my future…

— I do, Kimi…

— Then why did you lie!? — he yelled. It made you shiver. You imagined this would look strange from the outside, a 12-year-old boy yelling at someone old enough to be his mother — You said they would accept me, I believed you!

— Son, please — Marco said, placing a hand on his son's shoulder.

— Kimi, I'm sorry, I didn't know what he was going to say — the look in his eyes made you stop talking. His eyes were full of tears, his jaw set. He didn't want to cry, but at the same time, it was like he was making every effort not to break down. Then, without saying a word, he turned and walked towards the revolving door that led to the street, without looking back.

— Sorry about that, Y/N — Marco said quickly, his eyes glued to the boy as he walked towards the parking lot — I understand your reasons, but at the same time, I can't help but feel sad to see my son like that. You know how it is for a parent, right?

The last sentence made you freeze. You didn't know how it was for a parent. You didn’t have kids. “It’s not like I’ll ever know”, you thought as the boy's father said goodbye and left you behind.

— So, you called me — Toto murmured, his eyes locked with yours.

— For some time now, I've seen these kids as more than just talent. A lot of them come to Europe alone in search of their own dreams and leave their families behind, and don’t have anyone they can count on, other than their academies and teams. When I say I see the academy drivers as my boys, it's because I mean it. I see them as my family, a part of me — you hesitated for a few seconds, wondering if you should finish your thought, but you did anyway — Like the children I'll never have.

— Don't you want to be a mother?

— It's not a question of wanting to. It's a matter of not being able to.

Another awkward silence followed, filled by the ambient conversations in the bar. Even still, it was like you’d lobbed a grenade and you were waiting for the explosion. However, Toto didn’t say anything. Instead, he reached out and brushed a lock of your hair that was falling over your eye with a strange tenderness. It was strange, considering your relationship was professional, but antagonistic, but you didn’t shy away.

— You can’t have kids?

— No.

— I'm sorry — he said softly — I'm really sorry.

Toto's expression was laden with sincerity. The way his brows were furrowed and his eyes locked with yours were ample proof that, in the midst of all your silly jockeying for talent in the motorsport world, he was a kind, caring man. And that scared you a little.

— I'll survive — you said, wiping your face and pulling away from him.

— But if it makes you suffer — he began.

— That's not what makes me suffer — you snapped.

— Y/N, you just told me that you see the academy drivers as your children because you can't have any, clearly this is a psychological response to your suffering…

You looked at him, with a serious expression.

— Are you my therapist now?

— I'm just stating the obvious here.

Your eyes went back to your empty glass. You traced the drops of condensation on the outside with your fingers as you considered his words. There was nothing to say, especially when you knew he was right. However, you didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of giving him another win, especially when he had already won so much from you these last few months.

You caught the bartender’s eye and ordered another Aperol spritz, neither you or Toto saying anything until another glass was placed in front of you. There was something depressing about crying to your professional rival in a bar, but then again, there wasn't much to do. These feelings had been inside of you so long that they flooded out as soon as someone asked.

— What now?

— What? — you asked, before taking a sip of your drink.

— What will you do?

— Honestly? I don't know. After what Maurizio did to me and Kimi, it just feels like I’ve been betrayed. I don’t even want to look Maurizio in the eye right now.

Toto looked at you, looking surprised.

— Is that why you’re not in the same hotel as the rest of your team? — he asked, earning a raised eyebrow in response — I should have known something was wrong.

— I’ve just gotten the feeling lately that my input isn’t… valued. But at the same time, I don't really know what to do.

— Why don't you get out of there?

— And where would I go, Toto? — you asked. In the end, that was the big question. It wouldn’t be easy to leave Ferrari, from a bureaucratic point of view. They might whine about your years of service to the team and try and guilt you into staying, or even offer you a big pay raise. But in the end, you could walk away. But then what?

— Well, Mercedes needs an academy director — he muttered. His voice was strangely casual as he picked up his beer and took another sip.

— Are you offering me a job?

— No — Toto said, a smile on his face — It’s just an observation. I’ve tried to get everything set up, but now that we have an academy in earnest, I can't dedicate myself to it the way I'd like to, because of my other obligations. I would need someone to do it and I would want someone with responsibility, intelligence, experience, and the love for what they do

— That sounds a lot like a job offer, you know that, right?

— Would you accept it if it were?

— Well — you said, but hesitated. There was one crucial detail: the first driver supported by the Mercedes driver academy was Kimi, and you doubted the boy would ever want to see you again — I don't know. I think your new driver wouldn't want to see me there…

— Kimi and his father know that you were the one who referred him to me — he said.

Your eyes widened.

— They know?

— Yes. And I believe they were very happy about it. You didn't fail him, Y/N, or destroy his dream. You gave him a chance, even if it meant he was going to a rival academy. And personally, I find that admirable.

— Is that something you would admire in an academy director?

— I appreciate the human aspect of people, Y/N. And you, despite usually being a moody thorn in my side, are a good person. That’s what I admire about you.

You felt a warmth growing in your chest. It was familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. You downed the rest of your drink in one go before getting up from the stool you were sitting on.

— Where are you going?

— To my room, I have a race to watch tomorrow — you replied, arranging your bag over your shoulder.

— You didn't answer me about my offer — he said, leaning an elbow on the bar.

— You said it wasn't a job offer, Wolff.

— What if it is, Y/L/N?

— I'm going to need to think about this — you said, trying not to smile.

— Want to have dinner with me tomorrow to talk about it?

You raised an eyebrow.

— Is that you asking me on a date?

— Maybe.

— Christian will be jealous.

He gave you a smirk.

— I hope so — Toto replied — So, do you accept?

You squeezed the handle of your bag.

— At seven, here?

— Perfect.

#toto wolff #toto wolff x reader #toto wolff x you #toto wolff fluff #formula 1 x reader #formula 1 x you #f1 x reader #f1 one shot #formula 1 one shot #wlffog #oneshotwlff

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pinkheart22 · 2 months

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The Albatross HOTEL & TTPD

Ok so we examined the albatross as a bird and a poem, but now we find The Albatross a hotel that went up in flames in Coney Island.

Tonight (feb 23 2024) Taylor sang White Horse x Coney Island AFTER announcing The Albatross. ( I think Taylor must have been writing, like she said 2 years in the making, near when she was making evermore because CONEY island seems to directly link to The Albatross Hotel) * NOTE SHE SANG YOU'RE LOSING ME AFTER ANNOUNCING THE BOLTER which would tie in that someone is leaving, eg. you're losing me. SOO I think Taylor is going to sing a song that she's already written that somewhat directly links it to the TTPD album variants before she announces the next one.

Ok So back to The Albatross

On November 1, 1903, just a couple of months after nearby Luna Park had wrapped up its inaugural season, one of the worst fires in Coney Island's history consumed over 260 buildings. It began in the Albatross Hotel, at the west end of the Bowery,

Lots of stuff here, Coney Island had one of the worst fires in THE ALBATROSS hotel - I think this is a direct link to her lover house burning and BOWERY is YB's pseudonym

The fire is said to have been set by a former employee of the Albatross Hotel because of unrequited love for a female employee who preferred the attentions of the hotel's owner.

If we are going off of the Lover house being burned to the ground then, The former employee here would probably be referred to as Taylor who burned The Albatross down because she loved YB and he preferred that of someone else.

The reform element at Coney Island, which still hated the Bowery because of its less-than-Puritan venues, was predictably not overly disappointed to see the whole area burn down.

Coney Island ( TAYLOR) HATED the Bowery (YB) because of the less the Puritan venues (or values in this case) Puritan a person who adheres to strict moral or religious principles, YB wasn't faithful.....---And Coney Island (TAYLOR) was not that disappointed to see the whole area (HER RELATIONSHIP) burn down because I think there had been signs (eg her song Exile so many signs)

So what if'a thousand women and children [were] rendered homeless, and many could be seen wandering around the streets of Coney Island. [having] lost their all, not saving anything in the way of clothing except what they wore'? Only Satan's emissaries would inhabit a place like the Bowery in any case.

After the fire of it all Taylor was left wandering Coney Island having lost everything. But she would rather be left wandering alone that go back to a place like the Bowery (YB) ** I'm on a bench in Coney Island wondering where did my baby go? The fast times, the bright lights, the merry go Sorry for not making you my centerfold Over and over**

As Brooklyn Borough's President Swanstrom commented, 'The fire at Coney Island, while a great hardship to the unfortunate people who lost their property, will be a blessing in the long run... [flire is one of the best purifiers'.

'The fire at Coney Island, while a great hardship to the unfortunate people who lost their property, will be a blessing in the long run... [flire is one of the best purifiers'. - THISSS - Although what Taylor went through, her relationship essentially going up in flames and she lost everything, it is a BLESSING in the long run. As FIRE IS ONE OF THE BEST PURIFIERS! Which is why she burned the LOVER HOSUE!

Both city officials and business owners agreed that the Bowery street itself had to be widened by sixty feet. This would hamper the ability of a fire to spread from one side to the other as easily, but also made the area much more inviting and increased visitor capacity.

The Bowery street had to widened - THE DISTANCE BETWEEN HER AND YB - And stop the fire spreading - She wants to stop the hate, and just move on. The Albatross is gone ( The Lover house is gone) making her life freeing than before.

This is my analysis of The Albatross Hotel from the connection to Taylors variant of TTPD : The Albatross and Taylor and YB's relationship. I am no way saying this is at all true, and i do not personally know about their relationship. i do not mean to put anyone down. its just a theory based on rumours

feb 24 2024

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kvetchlandia · 1 year

Photo

Harold Chapman Allen Ginsberg in the Beat Hotel, Rue Git-Le Coeur Paris, 1956

In the depths of the Greyhound Terminal sitting dumbly on a baggage truck looking at the sky waiting for the Los Angeles Express to depart worrying about eternity over the Post Office roof in the night-time red downtown heaven staring through my eyeglasses I realized shuddering these thoughts were not eternity, nor the poverty of our lives, irritable baggage clerks, nor the millions of weeping relatives surrounding the buses waving goodbye, nor other millions of the poor rushing around from city to city to see their loved ones, nor an indian dead with fright talking to a huge cop by the Coke machine, nor this trembling old lady with a cane taking the last trip of her life, nor the red-capped cynical porter collecting his quar- ters and smiling over the smashed baggage, nor me looking around at the horrible dream, nor mustached negro Operating Clerk named Spade, dealing out with his marvelous long hand the fate of thousands of express packages, nor fairy Sam in the basement limping from leaden trunk to trunk, nor Joe at the counter with his nervous breakdown smiling cowardly at the customers, nor the grayish-green whale's stomach interior loft where we keep the baggage in hideous racks, hundreds of suitcases full of tragedy rocking back and forth waiting to be opened, nor the baggage that's lost, nor damaged handles, nameplates vanished, busted wires & broken ropes, whole trunks exploding on the concrete floor, nor seabags emptied into the night in the final warehouse.

Yet Spade reminded me of Angel, unloading a bus, dressed in blue overalls black face official Angel's work- man cap, pushing with his belly a huge tin horse piled high with black baggage, looking up as he passed the yellow light bulb of the loft and holding high on his arm an iron shepherd's crook.

III

It was the racks, I realized, sitting myself on top of them now as is my wont at lunchtime to rest my tired foot, it was the racks, great wooden shelves and stanchions posts and beams assembled floor to roof jumbled with baggage, --the Japanese white metal postwar trunk gaudily flowered & headed for Fort Bragg, one Mexican green paper package in purple rope adorned with names for Nogales, hundreds of radiators all at once for Eureka, crates of Hawaiian underwear, rolls of posters scattered over the Peninsula, nuts to Sacramento, one human eye for Napa, an aluminum box of human blood for Stockton and a little red package of teeth for Calistoga- it was the racks and these on the racks I saw naked in electric light the night before I quit, the racks were created to hang our possessions, to keep us together, a temporary shift in space, God's only way of building the rickety structure of Time, to hold the bags to send on the roads, to carry our luggage from place to place looking for a bus to ride us back home to Eternity where the heart was left and farewell tears began.

A swarm of baggage sitting by the counter as the trans- continental bus pulls in. The clock registering 12:15 A.M., May 9, 1956, the second hand moving forward, red. Getting ready to load my last bus.-Farewell, Walnut Creek Richmond Vallejo Portland Pacific Highway Fleet-footed Quicksilver, God of transience. One last package sits lone at midnight sticking up out of the Coast rack high as the dusty fluorescent light.

The wage they pay us is too low to live on. Tragedy reduced to numbers. This for the poor shepherds. I am a communist. Farewell ye Greyhound where I suffered so much, hurt my knee and scraped my hand and built my pectoral muscles big as a vagina.

-- Allen Ginsberg, “In The Baggage Room At Greyhound” 1956

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gatheringbones · 9 months

Text

[“William Quantrill was born in Ohio, made his living as a cattle rustler and slave catcher in Missouri-Kansas and Texas, and was living in Lawrence in 1859, although not yet politicized. Quantrill’s pro-slavery terrorism in Missouri coincided with the onset of the Civil War, when he and fifteen men set out to torture, kill, and destroy the properties and livestock of abolitionists and their supporters. In August 1862, Quantrill received a field commission as a captain in the Confederate Army.

By the time of the attack on Lawrence a year later, Quantrill was able to muster a force of hundreds of Bushwhacker guerrillas, nearly all armed with multiple six-shot revolvers. The group staged its attack at daybreak, when everyone in the town was still sleeping. Although the men of Lawrence had drilled and practiced for defending themselves and the town, they stored their firearms and ammunition in the city’s armory, so the sleeping population was defenseless when the lightning attack began. Over a span of hours, the guerrillas secured the main hotel as a command center, slaughtering 150 unarmed men and boys, most of the adult males of the town. They burned about a quarter of the town’s buildings, including all the businesses except two.

For the city of Lawrence today, the trauma of the massacre still resonates, especially for the descendants of the dead and survivors. “‘It was utterly catastrophic,’ said Pat Kehde, a retired Lawrence bookstore owner and great-granddaughter of Ralph and Jetta Dix,” reads a Wichita Journal account 150 years after the fact. “On the morning of the raid, Jetta tried to protect Ralph by standing between William Quantrill’s men and her husband. When Jetta stumbled as one of Quantrill’s men rode his horse into her, Ralph was momentarily unguarded and in that instant was shot and killed.”

“We are in an age where we have a war on terrorism, and we talk about terrorism all the time,” said Lawrence historian Paul Stuewe, “but we don’t think about the 19th-century terrorism.”“It is a calamity of the most heartrending kind,” said the New York Times following the attacks, “an atrocity of unspeakable character.”

Following the Civil War, John Newman Edwards, who had fought for the Confederacy, wrote Noted Guerrillas, extolling the Missouri guerrillas as great patriots of the Confederate cause, romanticizing the taking of life up close, claiming the guerrillas were almost superhuman specimens, trying to place them alongside the valiant Confederate Army to be commemorated. He was fascinated by the guerrillas’ deft use of the pistol, often attacking with one in each hand, rather than a rifle, which was the standard weapon used by professional soldiers. He wrote that before a battle, “a Guerrilla takes every portion of his revolver apart and lays it upon a white shirt, if he has one, as carefully as a surgeon places his instruments on a white towel. . . . He touches each piece as a man might touch the thing that he loves.”

Edwards also portrayed Quantrill and his guerrillas as expert horsemen, shooting while riding fast. In fetishizing the guerrilla revolver and the horse, Edwards heralded the beginning of the “cowboy” and “outlaw” hero of the post−Civil War decades, even though these figures had nothing to do with cattle or ranching or even the “West.”

Some of the most enduringly famous, or infamous, of the Missouri guerrillas—Jesse James, Cole Younger, Myra Maybelle Shirley (Belle Starr), and their brothers—came from land-owning slavers; some, like the Shirleys, ran successful business operations and were well connected politically. Their elevation to post−Civil War social bandit heroes would eclipse their former pro-Confederate deeds. In the two decades after the Civil War, the Winchester rifle was fetishized for killing Indians, and the Colt revolver for outlawry. In the process, gun violence and civilian massacres were not just normalized, but commercially glorified, packaged, promoted, and mass marketed.”]

roxanne dunbar-ortiz, from loaded: a disarming history of the second amendment, 2018

#roxanne dunbar-ortiz #history stuff #currently reading #cw racism #cw genocide

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bcacstuff · 1 year

Note

Any idea who C.M is that Purv has been posting about?

And I have great number similar asks in my inbox about this subject. 🙄🤐

Well, let me tell you. CM is Cinderella Manderson. She's the daughter of Peter Pan Manderson and Thumbelina Andersen. One of her ancestors is, you guessed it, Hans Christian Andersen.

Do you like fairytales? I know I did like them when I was a child, and liked them again when I read them to the children in my family when they were young. They enjoyed them too. They asked me if dwarves really exist, and they loved how Sleeping Beauty got kissed awake by a prince on his white horse. But they grew up and learned that they're there to enjoy and nobody in their right mind does research on the Sandman to see if he really exists.

Ergo, I do research when there's a fact like a fan posts a picture from Miami. I don't waste my time when there's someone 'saying as an anon' he was in Paris in a weekend he clearly was in Antwerp with all of the crew and cast. P had better spend her time as well to research the Miami location on IG and could have found the footage herself, as I did. You know the footage that clearly showed he was with his friends, AN, MN, PD. And none of them brought their SO's. Don't tell me they were at the SPA of the hotel when the guys were enjoying diner and a fire dancer. But of course using his 'they were all there as a surprise' is easily used as an excuse they must have ruined his plans with Cinderella.... 🧚‍♀️

Seriously, let's get real. It's a nice thought that there's a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but truth is, there isn't an end to the rainbow and there most certainly has never been found a pot of gold. P's spinning stories about any woman endlessly, connecting them with the most thin evidence (which is no evidence at all), up to the point that she makes herself ridiculous. Blowing soap bubbles that burst as soon as reality comes in.

So please, enjoy the fairytale if you like to do so, take a big bag of salt with you when you do, laugh at all the shenanigans, but stop flooding my inbox with these nonsensical stories about a woman. The man is working, I said it so many times, but one more time: He doesn't have time for these things when he's working!

I leave you with this Anon 👇

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itsdappleagain · 1 year

Text

ALRIGHT EVERYBODY LETS GET GUSSIED UP FOR THE LUCKY CAT CAPER!!!!

this is SUCH a solid episode. i love this one as well- the outfits, the slapstick, the action. all really good!! alrighty

today's post title pictures are some of my own, from my trip to san fran a few years back!! I'll share some of my favs- I visited or photographed every major caper location on the trip!!

there's me in chinatown, the golden gate bridge, alcatrez, fisherman's wharf and the pier, and good old karl himself!

alrighty- enough pictures. sorry for the long intro! notes under the cut as always :)

YEAHHH THE FLASHBACK TO CARMEN'S FINAL,,, YEAH. i forgot the episode opened like this tbh. i know everyone and their mother has ALSO pointed out that this scene is bathed in red light so i will AGAIN not beat a dead horse but just yes. color theory <3

i love the tiny little oh shit moment on shadowsan's face. like he hadnt quite realized how good she was

GOD THIS GETS SO BRUTAL he's pawing her around like a cat with a pompom

YEAH THE WAY SHE JUST GETS. DESPERATE AS THE FIGHT GOES

her waking up from the nightmare with that culmination of stress. the timer going off correlating with the phone. still being half in the dream when she talks to player and then realizing when he starts talking to her...

this is such a human moment for carmen i love it so so much. she's failed. she is tired, having nightmares, maybe has a headache. she's making mistakes and she's a little bit out of it, she's stiff from sleeping....she's a PERSON and i LOVE IT SO MUCH

or in much less eloquent terms SLEEBY CARMEN <3333

i love the setup for next episode here. its not overbearing; it doesnt feel like a setup episode but it IS and it hints at shadowsan's true motives almost right off the bat

the sigh and "i don't know" is weirdly smooth animation i love it

that pickpocket is soo smooottthh

also i have to know what carmen was doing in san francisco the night before that a. gave her a headache when she woke up and b. made her so tired that she just dropped her pants on the floor and passed out. because it seems to me like carmen sandiego got drunk and had a great time last night.

also. she has just woken up and is picking an outfit for a NIGHTTIME CHARITY GALA. SHE SLEPT IN SO LATE HEHHSHAHJ their sleep schedules are all so bad

carmen looks great in that shot where she opens the curtains sorry not sorry

carmen's hotel is just outside the transamerica pyramid!

in fact it is quite reasonable to assume that she was staying at the hilton. i have solved the mystery that no one asked me to solve

karl <333

cable cars weren't running when i visited sf </3 i was heartbroken

FREE KARL

i dont know look at her reflection

carmens feet are shaped like shoes and i dont know how to feel about that. why is her heel a heel

this dress was the most spectacular thing they ever put her in and the amount of time she wore it was criminally short

they also should have put her in a white dress shirt more often??? hello??? i see it in the closet??? put her in a fucking suit once in a while....that waitress getup in tsonts was THE SHIT

SHE LOOKS STUNNIIINGGGGGGG IN THAT DRESS

i also love that she's thinking about zack for the car, then player for the stamp. her writing is so good this episode...at the start at least

ten million cents, she chuckles, as if the stamp wouldn't still be worth a hundred thousand dollars

i love how casually she is willing to spend 10 million VILEBucks

i love how they call her the generous lady in red too- like they arent expecting this room to be able to afford a ten million dollar stamp and BID on it

L O O K AT THAT DRESS GOD ITS SO GOOD. THE STRAPLESS THE CHOKER THE ELBOW GLOVES THE CLUTCH PURSE AUGHHH ITS SO GOOD I NEED TO SEE IT MORE

THE CONNECTOR IN THE BACK? THE FANCY COMM EARRINGS? CHEFS KISS

chase and carmen had the exact same smirk when they saw the other in the fog i know it

i love their dynamic actually they are so funny together. egypt in season 4 highlights it so well but also. like here. the teasing the banter chase taking everything way too seriously in comparison to carmen treating him like a joke

its close to the cigarette aesthetic, to be honest, and it does not cause lung cancer. so this tiny flashlight i salute you for being hot

CHASE AND JUST TRYING TO GRAB HER DSJHKJWGD

THE SHOE IS SO FUCKING FUNNY AJHKJDFH IT NEVER FAILS TO MAKE ME LAUGH

poor carmen running around barefoot in the fog now

juliump scare

they stick those where in the world/where on earth references in there every opportunity they can with chase <3

julia is so short wheeze

MIP MIP MIP

that is for sure a bun i am not sure how mime bomb's beret made that shape

this episode is just chase getting jumpscared

he shoes mb away like a stray cat wheeze

the signed/mimed description of carmen is so on point i love mime bomb

go shadowsan go. send tigress <333 i love that he knows carmen so well even now that he knows she would enjoy one-upping tigress on this again

the "betrayed us and took a new name" thing from brunt is. carmen is transgender and brunt is the phobic about it i dont know it reads heavily okay

maelstrom and his democracy

FINE FINE SEND WHOMEVER

brunt has the cleaners on telepathic speed dial damn

the absolute muscles of steel mime bomb must have to sit in midair like that holy fuck

vile's lucky cat. meow. cat girl hand

carmen trying to watch subtly and stay hidden. girlie those are your opposite of strongsuits. weaksuits

mime bomb moves so cartoonishly and i love that. yes this is a cartoon. but. he is more of a cartoon

the music timing with carmen's face as she realizes its a shop FULL of lucky cats is so good

ILL TAKE THE TCHOTCHKE

carmen needs to stop saying "or what? you'll (insert bad thing here)" because the person she's saying that too ALWAYS says "yes exactly that"

luck cat store owner voiced by julia's va beloved. deserved better. glad she got cash in the end even if carmen was an aloof little prick about it and didn't even apologize

WE HAVE OTHERS YOU KNOW im so sorry lucky cat shop lady you deserved better

bait and switch

"keep the change" okay you still destroyed a shitload of her beautiful statues and didn't even help her clean it up. didn't apologize or. look at her. but fine

mime bomb. thats it thats the post

see the comical shifty look around is so fucking funnyyy

MIME BOMB COULD NOT BE MORE SUSPICIOUS IF HE TRIED HE'S SO FUNNY

the running in place gag never gets old

HFDJSFGDS

carmen just being half surprised and half impressed that they arrested mime bomb. yeah

also her just standing blatantly on the rooftop and NO ONE notices her wheeze

JULIA LISTING OFF ALL OF HIS MISHAPS IS SO FUNNY

the graffiti just being giant x's and o's dhfjdasg

mime bomb. is skrunkly

chase thats how you get sued you have to list the miranda rights in murica

julia <333 yes. yes yes yes

i gotta know what mime bomb was signing that made chase interpret "an elephant giving you a pedicure while spreading cheese on a baguette on Bastille day"

julia immediately giving a perfect translation. they are so funny

the expressiveness of chase and mime bomb combined makes for some GOLDEN freeze frames

julia shielding her mouth the wrong way. good job girlie. you tried. he can still see everything youre saying though

chase's neck disconnects from his head!

considering chase and julia never showed any form of identification mime bomb could hypothetically press charges for kidnapping

MIME BOMB OFFERING THE FLOWER AND THEN CHUCKING IT WHEN TIGRESS GETS ANNOYED WITH HIM IS JUST. HIS ANIMATION AND CHARACTER ACTING ARE SO GOOD

all of 26 cents buys mime bomb out

i like julia's little lean on the wharf railing. she's usually just sitting or standing up straight its cool to see her do something

this chase scene is so goood

btw unrelated but this girl is my favorite background extra?? they use her in a TON of bg scenes so. pointing her out to you so that you will notice her forever in other scenes

poor chase. his poor coat. his voice is screaming I LOVED THAT COAT from the future

hehheshgdh carmen is so frustrated that it happened AGAIN with tigress and the stupid thing in the pocket wheeze

HES SO HEARTBROKENKDJSDGFDSG

THE LAMP POST TRANSITIONS BETWEEN EVERYONE RUNNING ARE MY FAAAVORITE I LOVE THOSE

SHE JUST DUMPS THAT GUY OUT OF THE CAR LMAOO

zack using a lil racing metaphor!!! because!! yeah!!!!

this chase scene is so fucking good with all the cars GOD the music and driving through san francisco and everything AUGH

what if the car had just hit chase and he went flying

THIS IS EXACTLY WHY I AM NOT INVITING YOU ALONG! I CANNOT BE SLOWED DOWN BY "CAUTION WORDS"

chase is so funny he really sets himself up to fail

i feel bad for julia in this one though. you can see the buildup to next episode when she finally yells at him. shes fucking tired of this shit and yes she should be

carmen is your mom when you go 5 miles above the speed limit

she's one to talk, obviously, seeing as one of the first things she ever did in zack and ivy's presence was run a red light, almost cause an accident, and then fly into an open construction pit, ruining the car she stole from them

the concern in carmen's voice as she attempts to get zack to not crash into a building in an attempt to go up the wall

PLS CARMEN JUST GOES FLYING WHEN THEY GO OVER THOSE HILLS

the little sideyes the other two faculty give when shadowsan and brunt are squabbling shdshgfsdgh

i got to bike across the golden gate bridge it was super cool

THE WOMAN BEAMS HERSELF FROM A FOUNTAIN PEN, SHE CAN DO ANYTHING. well its some kind of respect women juice. maybe not the right kind though

the terror in julia's tone after watching chase not look at the road for a solid minute

annnnd there he goes

julia being done with his shit is so funny i love her

go sheena. scaling the whole ass bridge with her fingertips alone

carmen again sacrificing politeness and basic human decency for a quip </3 oh well

i love that cs color theory post thats like. the golden gate bridge is the epicenter of carmen's power and tigress was a fool for challenging her there

wow look its carmen becoming distracted and disadvantaged by valuable objects people throw at her again

not sheena showing carmen where she put the stamp too. nice job tigress

this showdown is pretty cool

carmen is SO efficient about it she just slides and boom its over. AND she steals the phone

she does look pretty awesome holding the stamp with two fingers though. god

STEALING THE PHONE WAS SUCH A POWER MOVE I LOVE THAT

plus she outed him in front off the whole faculty which is only funny if you dont know what happens next lmaoo

stamp of approval. laugh

tigress just sadly sitting there is also very funny

AND JULIA DRAGGING CHASE OUT OF THE WATERNDSDV

HERE WE GO TRANSITION SENTENCEEE

GO GET HIM!!!!!

WOW i can't believe this Saturday is already going to be the season finale. I LOVE the french connections caper so I am VERY excited for the next episode!! hopefully I won't get so far behind this time. to be fair I was doing state testing and presentations and shit but hopefully the worst of that is over.

alrighty- until next time for the chase dies and then carmen dies caper!!

#csweekly #cs weekly #carmen sandiego

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justforbooks · 9 months

Text

If anybody deserved the title of “Renaissance man” it would be Carl Davis, who has died aged 86 following a brain haemorrhage. A formidably gifted composer and conductor, in a career spanning seven decades he wrote scores for a string of successful films and a long list of some of the best remembered programmes on British television, including the 1995 BBC production of Pride and Prejudice.

Davis won a Bafta and an Ivor Novello award for his score for Karel Reisz’s The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1981), scripted by Harold Pinter and starring the Oscar-nominated Meryl Streep, and worked on many other prominent films, including Scandal (1989), starring Ian McKellen and Joanne Whalley, Ken Russell’s The Rainbow (1989) and The Great Gatsby (2000). His theme music for the 1984 horse-racing drama Champions, starring John Hurt as the Grand National winner Bob Champion, was subsequently used by the BBC for its Grand National coverage.

A fascination for the era of silent movies prompted Davis to create new scores to accompany numerous classics from cinema’s early years, including his composition for Abel Gance’s sprawling 1927 epic, Napoleon. His work helped trigger an international revival of presentations of silent films with a live orchestra.

He achieved another career highlight when he collaborated with Sir Paul McCartney on his Liverpool Oratorio, an eight-movement piece based on McCartney’s experiences of growing up in Liverpool. The piece was recorded in Liverpool Cathedral in 1991, featuring the classical soloists Kiri Te Kanawa and Willard White.

Despite his relentless schedule and prolific output, Davis enjoyed a reputation as an expansive and witty conversationalist who could always make time for friends or interviewers. When conducting at occasions such as the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic’s Summer Pops concerts or the BBC’s Proms in the Park, he would gently subvert notions of classical seriousness by conducting in a union jack outfit or a gold lamé coat.

Born in Brooklyn, New York, Carl was the son of Sara (nee Perlmutter), a teacher, and Isadore Davis, a post office worker. His Jewish family had ancestry in Poland and Russia. Encouraged by his mother, he displayed precocious musical ability. He started playing piano at the age of two, and soon became an adept sight-reader. He recalled how from an early age he would listen to the Metropolitan Opera’s live radio broadcasts on Saturday afternoons, and he would obsessively study musical scores of operas and orchestral pieces obtained from Brooklyn’s public libraries.

He took lessons with the composers Hugo Kauder and Paul Nordoff (later the co-founder of the Nordoff-Robbins music therapy programme), then with the Danish modernist composer Per Nørgård in Copenhagen. He studied at Queens College, New York, and the New England Conservatory of Music, Boston, and as an 18-year-old served as an accompanist to the Robert Shaw Chorale. He then attended Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson in upstate New York, which has had a remarkable roll-call of actors, writers, film-makers and musicians pass through its portals. He graduated from Bard as a composer, having already begun to compose music for theatrical productions.

In 1958 he became an assistant conductor at the New York City Opera, and then won an off-Broadway Emmy award as co-composer of the 1959 revue Diversions. This was staged at the Edinburgh festival in 1961 and subsequently transferred to the Arts theatre in London, retitled Twists. It caught the eye of Ned Sherrin, then working in production at the BBC. He commissioned Davis, who had moved to London and was living in decrepit lodgings in Notting Hill, to write music for the satirical TV show That Was the Week That Was.

It was the start of his prolific and varied career in the UK. The Davis touch added lustre to the television movies The Snow Goose (BBC, 1971) and The Naked Civil Servant (Thames Television, 1975); the adaptation of the Anita Brookner novel Hotel Du Lac (BBC, 1986); and the miniseries A Year in Provence (BBC, 1993) and A Dance to the Music of Time (Channel 4, 1997) among many others.

A notable milestone was his ominous and unsettling score for Thames’s The World at War (1973), which was produced by Jeremy Isaacs. It was through Isaacs that Davis became involved in the Thames TV series Hollywood: A Celebration of the American Silent Film, based on the book The Parade’s Gone By … by the film historian Kevin Brownlow.

Davis was tasked with tracking down musicians who had worked on films during the silent era, and the series set him off on a decades-long crusade to revive silent films with newly created scores. He enjoyed the challenge of conducting the music live as the film played. “You have to keep going,” he told the Arts Desk’s Graham Rickson in 2021. “Some conductors use click tracks and headphones. I’m old-fashioned and don’t like being tied to machinery – I try to conduct these things with as little apparatus as possible.”

The most dramatic expression of this was his work on Napoleon, and in 1980 Davis conducted a performance of it with an orchestra and audience at the Empire, Leicester Square. “That first screening wasn’t flawless, but it was electrifying,” he recalled. He subsequently conducted performances around the world, and the score let to him being appointed chevalier of France’s Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1983.

He went on to compose music for more than 50 silent films featuring stars such as Greta Garbo and Rudolph Valentino, for comedies by Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and Buster Keaton, and for classics such as Ben-Hur (1925), the Douglas Fairbanks swashbuckler The Thief of Bagdad (1924) and DW Griffith’s Intolerance (1916).

Another genre which Davis excelled at composing for was dance. “The relationship between film and ballet is striking, and I find myself composing more and more ballet scores now, something which the film work has made me much better at,” he told Rickson. For Northern Ballet theatre, he worked with the choreographer Gillian Lynne on A Simple Man (1987) and Lipizzaner (1989). For Scottish Ballet, he collaborated with Robert Cohan, a fellow New Yorker, on A Christmas Carol (1992) and Aladdin (2000). And for English National Ballet’s Alice in Wonderland (1995), Davis (commissioned by ENB’s artistic director Derek Deane) drew on themes by Tchaikovsky.

It was also through Deane’s influence that Davis was commissioned by the National Ballet of Croatia to write Lady of the Camellias (2008), which gave him the opportunity to revisit Alexandre Dumas’s original novel and Verdi’s operatic version of it, La Traviata. The opera had been a favourite of Davis’s since his childhood days of listening to Met broadcasts, and he had also worked on a production of it for New York City Opera. The resulting piece gave the story a contemporary twist, so “the action could flow without pause and indeed the production did effectively utilise projections and film”, as Davis wrote in the recording’s sleeve notes.

He received a Bafta special lifetime achievement award in 2003, and in 2005 he was made CBE.

In 1970 he married the actor Jean Boht, who starred in Carla Lane’s sitcom Bread. She survives him, along with their daughters, Hannah and Jessie.

🔔 Carl Davis, composer and conductor, born 28 October 1936; died 3 August 2023

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

#JUST FOR BOOKS #Carl Davis #in memoriam

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psychologicalwardkins · 28 days

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Haiii I’m a kin and irl blog looking for mediamates ^_^ I’ll make some posts about my kins and you can ask me questions about my mems ^_^. I am a minor and I’m not looking to kindate at all. IRLS are welcome here ^_^. I do not want to do discourse. You can call me Canine or any of my kin names.

My kin and irl list:

⦻IRLS: Jane everlasting and Nina the killer,Clockwork

⦻ Media:Creepypasta

⦻ Doubles are okay!!

⦻ Kins: Simon Henriksson and Judge angels,Suicide Sadie,Dante Basilio,Eyeless jack,Jane the killer,Kate the chaser,Ghostface,Rachel Gardener,Rouge,Pomni, River (oc)

⦻ Coping links:Heather/cheryl Manson, Indoraptor,sirenhead,Sakura head

⦻ Fictionflick:violet evergarden. canine (oc),Alastor, korekiyo

⦻ Kinsiders: Puppet,Micheal afton

⦻ Media: cry of fear,Jurrasic

world,Creepypasta x6,Silent hill x2,8:11,violet evergarden,TrevorHenderson,Hazbin hotel,Scream,Angels of death,Tadc,slender the arrival,Fnaf,Daganropa

⦻ Doubles are okay!!

Therian:black wolf,those goats from the movie witch, whitetail deer,Red fox,Barn owl

Otherhearted:A black cat & the Irish cob horse,great white,Luna moth

Kintype: Angel,Fae,ghost,Werewolf,Vampire, Loch Ness monster,Ai,Abnormal psychology

Copinglink:Antique doll

#IRL #kin stuff #fictionkin #kin blog #IRL blog

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callmewrinkles3 · 7 months

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Also dying to know the details of this - White Horse - Em when she realises she has to leave Dan. We haven’t really talked about it, but she decides she’s leaving on a flight home after the Saudi Grand Prix. She didn’t even see Dan after it, she got Blake to get her a ride to the hotel and she went straight to London when she was supposed to be on a flight to Perth with the boys.

Alex will kill me if I give too much away, this is a oneshot!! But essentially at the Saudi GP in 2022 they had a really big fight. Things weren’t great between them anyway, the plan was the four of them would fly to Australia and spend time with their families. After the fight Em barely turns up to the track, and she doesn’t even tell Dan that she’s leaving to go back to London, just that there’s a family thing and she can’t go to Perth.

They’ve been struggling since they separated for Christmas, and it’s on the flight back to London that Em decides she can’t keep doing this. She can’t keep feeling like she’s alone, she can’t keep feeling like her entire life is wrapped up in loving a man that she’s not sure loves her too. That flight starts her plan to leave, and by the time she lands in London she’s decided everything she’s going to do. And it hurts. She’s grieving losing a family and knowing she’s still gonna have to see everyone and pretend nothing is wrong when she knows it’s all broken.

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niemernuet · 2 months

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also pls pls pls drunk (mutually/accidental) kisses fooooor atlas me thinks 🤩?

Only five weeks (on the day actually) too late for your last prompt but here it finally is. I wanted to finish it on Sunday but of course it got away again. 🙄 Thank you so so much, i loved all of your prompts. 🩷😘

The tinted glass covering one side of the gym turns the world outside into an old film. Modern cars and busses, bikes, scooters and pedestrians move through the sepia-toned air, a surprising amount of them in the rhythm of the hectic bass that is just a smidgen too loud to be comfortable. Technically, Atle's rest time between sets has ended but both Lucas and Charlie are still hovering over at the bar, and none of the other patrons look approachable enough to ask them to spot him. So, he waits. Charlie is filling his bottle with water but his face looks as if he was a general listening to bad news from the front. Lucas keeps talking, his face close to Charlie's ear, his hands drawing wide figures in the air. Charlie keeps listening until suddenly, he doesn't. He shuts off the faucet, screws the lid on top of the bottle, mutters something to Lucas in return, and hurries away while shaking the bottle furiously. Atle watches, unsure whether he should go over. Lucas takes the decision off him when he straightens his shoulders, grabs his own bottle from the counter, and hurries back.

"Everything okay?" he asks.

Lucas smiles. "Sure. He's coming right back in a second. Come on, you're not done with your set." He claps his hands together, and hovers them over the rack, ready to grab them should Atle's arms be too weak.

Atle does not lie down yet but stares at the door to the changing room where Charlie has vanished. "He looks angry? What's wrong?"

Lucas drops his arms, and rolls his eyes. "It's nothing, really. We were just discussing where we'd go out tonight and I may have worded my answer to his suggestion a bit…too direct."

Atle laughs. "So, do we have to look for a hotel, or…?"

Lucas snorts. "He'll be back in a minute. But I'm telling you, I'm not setting foot in a location that gets advertised in the leaflets at the tourist information. I need a real club, in the real London."

"You're such a snob." Atle is still laughing while he lays splayed out on the bench, and he takes a few deep breaths. "By the way, the next time we're coming here, we're taking Aleks with us. Some of these bros really need to be taken down a peg."

Lucas puts his hands in position again. He's brushing against Atle's arm, and a shiver runs down his spine.

"That's a plan," Lucas say. "Now get going!"

Charlie is back to his usual cheerful self when they leave the gym and step out into the bright sunlight again. Just around the corner, hordes of tourists shove each other down Baker Street but they set off in the other direction. They pass a small park with an iron fence looping around, and walk past a wild mix of old brownstones with white-framed windows and modern glass buildings that are glistening in the sun.

"And did you come to an agreement?"

Charlie eyes Atle quizzically. "About what?"

"Where we're going tonight."

"There's only one place where we're going tonight," Charlie snorts. "And I do not take criticism from some hicks who live in a yurt above the Arctic Circle."

Lucas grins, and winks at Atle. "You wished London's clubs were half a cool as Oslo's," he says as they turn into a small alley. It is a dead end with two rows of low two-storey houses facing each other. Here, the noise of the city is subdued, held back by the brick walls. Once upon a time the houses used to be stables for horses but nowadays they are posh apartments for people with deep pockets. Charlie fishes a key out of his sports bag.

"Before you think about throwing us out consider that I'm totally on board with whatever you have planned and I think your taste is great," Atle throws in.

"Traitor," Lucas says, and Charlie laughs.

They leave for dinner when the sun is slowly setting, and shining directly into their eyes as they make their way towards the closest station. The tube is full of commuters who do not have summer holidays and tourists who do, yet they still manage to snatch free seats. While the train is new, the tracks are old, and the waggons rattle as they rush across the city. Atle does not flinch when Lucas' hand settles on the nape of his neck, simply turns his head, and smiles at him. Lucas smiles back, and something heavy clenches around his heart.

"What?" he asks.

Lucas shrugs, his smile unchanged. Across the aisle, Charlie pretends to be deeply captivated by something in his phone, though he has the same frown from earlier in the gym. Lucas' fingertips comb through Atle's hair, and caress the skin around the seam of his shirt. It does not tickle in the least; Atle could sit like this forever, even though he knows something is…maybe not wrong, but also not right. Maybe this is why Lucas dragged him along on this trip. This here, the city with all its concrete and metal and noise is very much Lucas' turf. If it had been up to Atle, they could have gone on a hike around a fjord somewhere, and set up their tent under the stars.

The choice of restaurant at the top of the giant dildo feels like an accommodation to Atle and far too tourist-y, though at least Charlie is just as mesmerised with the view of the sprawling city and the river snaking through it. When their meal arrives, Atle automatically shoves his plate towards Lucas so he can arrange it for the photoshoot. They have ordered drinks, and when their glasses are empty, Lucas flags down their waiter for the next round.

"The season's about to start," Atle reminds him, and adds a little laugh so as not to sound too much like a nag.

"Come on, you're only here once," Charlie answers in Lucas' stead.

They eat, and when they are done they walk back to the tube and rush across the city once more. Their next stop is not just geographically on the opposite side of the city. The stench of warm piss hits them like a wave when they step onto the platform, and Atle pushes the turnstile standing between him and the exit with his shoulder. They follow the stream of people along the cracked pavement, the ground caked with litter, and the walls grey with all the graffiti sprayed over each other. Lucas puts his arm around Atle's shoulder when they get to the bouncer. His eyes take in Atle from head to toe, and when he steps aside he makes sure to convey that but for the grace of Lucas is he allowed to step over the threshold of the rundown warehouse. Here they drink more, wedged between a mass of people and buried under a wall of literally indescribable noise. Atle loses track of time, not in the least because he cannot hear where one song ends and another begins. All he can do is hold on to Lucas, and let him guide the way. Eventually they lose Charlie to a handsome blonde, and when they leave for the toilets, Lucas pulls Atle up to the first floor and onto a worn-out couch. Here, the bass and the music is as loud as it was earlier today in the gym, which in Atle's opinion says everything there is to know about that joint. He has no chance to tell this to Lucas though because he climbs into his lap, and kisses him. Atle lets it happen, his hands wandering under Lucas' loose shirt and moving over the hot, sweat-sheened skin. Ever so often Lucas pauses, his face hovering inches away, mustering Atle with his unreadable gaze, before he kisses him again and again. Atle expects that he will finally find out why they have come here, and why Lucas has been drowning the pre-season diet so thoroughly. The next time Lucas stops, he untangles one of his hands from under the shirt, and pushes his long curls back in soft strokes.

"We won't let things change between us?"

The curls wrap around Atle's fingers and snag on his sticky skin but Lucas does not flinch.

"What?"

Lucas' grip around Atle's head tightens, and this time the kiss feels more pressing, more urgent.

"Whatever happens, we'll always have us, right? No matter what."

Atle laughs. He stares up at Lucas, his mouth hanging open, his brain spinning in his head. Lucas knows they will. He knows Atle will always follow his pace, no matter how fast or how slow he wants to go. He knows Atle is nothing without him.

He pulls Lucas close; plants a kiss on his forehead. "What is going on?"

Lucas freezes, his head bent, his eyes averted. When he eventually moves, he moves with his whole body. Atle stays put, lets Lucas grind his hips against his unmoving groin, and his tongue dart in his mouth, and only comes back to life when Lucas' nails dig into his shoulder blade. Lucas is hard under his wide trousers when Atle's hips shoot up, and the too soft padding of the couch dips around them when he spreads his legs further, giving Atle space to reach underneath the waistband. Atle catches the first moan with his mouth, and the next, and the next.

He does not need to know more.

Epilogue:

It occurs to Atle that Sander is probably spending too much time with Henrik when his first reaction is to lash out straight away.

"What the fuck is wrong with you, asshole?" he yells, and even with his hands balled to fists, and his whole body shaking with anger he still looks like a middle schooler. "We have a race in two days and you come with this now?"

Lucas says something but Atle cannot discern whether it is to Sander or to Timon and Rasmus who are both babbling the same questions at once, or to Adrian who barked a simple "No!" and now glares at him far more menacing than Sander could ever manage, or to Aleks who stands before Lucas with raised palms and talks at him as if he just needs to calm down and think this over.

Whatever anyone says, Atle does not understand one word; the blood rushing in his ears, the pounding in his head drowns out everything. Sander storms off first, not after hurling another barrage of curses at Lucas that carry no edge because his eyes are just a tad too red. He is followed by Timon who tries to stop him, and Atle slinks out behind him, unseen by the rest of the people in the room. Aleks is still talking intently, urging Lucas to do the thing Atle knows would never happen. He ends up on the balcony of their room, in his sweatpants and his shirt, out in the cold night. Everything makes sense now, and when his eyes fall on the packed suitcase on Lucas’ untouched bed, the sadness rushes in. He is still crying when Lucas returns, and they both cry a little more, only an open door between them and yet so much more. There is only one thing Atle thinks about, something so unimportant it does not matter, but all the things that matter are unchangeable anyway.

“You told Charlie before me?”

Lucas shrugs. “I don’t love Charlie,” he rasps. “Made it easier.”

Atle laughs and sobs, pressing his palms into his eyes until red lightings are dancing in front of them. Of course this would be the moment one of them would say the big three words for the first time. If a bit in a roundabout way.

“Please,” Lucas begs.

Atle’s shoulders slump as he drops his arms. He only needs to take two steps to bridge the gap between Lucas and him. The tears still have not stopped but at least he has Lucas to cling to now, his head buried in his neck, and his arms wrapped so tightly around his body that he can barely breathe.

“We’ll always have us,” Lucas whispers.

Atle does not need to know more.

#thank you thank you thank you ♥️♥️♥️#ask #answered #atlas #text #mine

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