who's afraid of little old me?: nico x player!reader
tagging: @ivy-34, @francesfarhadi, @hzstry8, @cixrosie, @itsnotgray, @estapa94, @trevs-swiftie, @heartz4hischif you want to join the taglist let me know!!
you stalked the comments under your post, whilst you knew you shouldn't have paid any attention to what was being said, you couldn't help yourself as curiosity got the best of you.
negativity is something everyone would tell you not to pay attention to but it was hard to do so when it was everywhere. it was as if the fans were ready to attack you at any point.
they didn't understand the hard work you put in to make it to the NHL. the blood, sweat and tears that went into ensuring your place in a professional hockey league.
the comments made by fans who didn't appreciate your hiatus were something you expected but after years of enduring such unnecessary hate, their comments only fuelled your want to play better in the season to come.
after giving birth to your daughter, you readied yourself for world championship games and surprised everyone when your name appeared on the list.
your interview was like a record scratch at a party. the interviewers asked about the influx of negativity towards you and you replied "who's afraid of little old me?"
they laughed it off as a joke but in your mind, you knew they should be.
the news of yours and nico's relationship spread like wildfire amongst the hockey community. adding the birth of your child made people question whether you were on the team for your skill or convenience.
whilst both of you were happy to be open about your relationship, you couldn't help but wonder why your name was the only one being tarnished.
"schatz, i will tell all of them to stop what they are saying. they wouldn't be true fans if they think it is okay to bring one of us down," nico promised one night.
you turned to him and smiled, placing a kiss on his lips. "you don't have to worry. it's not anything new,"
not only was your relationship the talk of the summer, but once the season had started paul bisonette made it his life's mission to make snide remarks about you relationship.
the jokes piled up as you played game after game, until one day you couldn't take it anymore. you sat in your apartment, tears streaming down your face as another joke made its way around the internet.
the devils were playing the rangers and body's were being thrown throughout the whole game. whilst you were a person who wasn't afraid to lay a hit, you steered away from fights.
but as a player from the opposing team chirped in your ear every moment he could, you dropped the gloves landing punch after punch until the referees pulled you apart.
in your post-game interview, a reporter asked what prompted you to start the fight and you answered. "I was tame, I was gentle 'til the circus life made me mean. it was about time I reminded everyone why I'm here,"
yourusername
yourusername: who's afraid of little old me?
no matter what you did, it seemed that the media was out to get you. now people were questioning your abilities as a mother as you continued on with your career.
"nico you tell me everything is not about me, but what if it is? every article about the devils has mentioned me in some and you can stand here and tell me that they didn't do it to hurt me," you screamed.
you came back to the season, feistier than before. showing everyone just how disturbed they made you. starting fights whenever and raking up your penalty minutes.
the older guys in the league (sidney crosby, matt martin and brad marchand) had all expressed their concern for the way you were acting and staged an intervention.
during the all-star break, they cornered you in your home and interrogated you about your behaviour. "we know what it's like to have all this media attention so you don't have to fight this on your own," matt prompted
you shrugged his hands off your shoulder and stood up. "all of you can talk about your difficulties but you wouldn't last an hour in the asylum where they raised me. i'm always drunk on my own tears, isn't that what they all say?" you retorted, referring to your post-game interview where your frustrated tears were addressed by everyone.
as the season came to an end, the devils had clinched a playoff spot and you had been scratched the past five games. your behaviour had changed since your talk with sid, matt martin and brad but the three knew the media's words made a lasting impact on you.
so as the devils faced off against the penguins for the first round and reporters asked if you would play the way you have all season you replied, "I am the way I am because of the media. you all act afraid of me when this the a product of the belittling I received upon coming back,"
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MINORS DO NOT INTERACT
Simon "Ghost" Riley x Reader
Title: Morning Sex with Ghost
Tags: morning sex, size kink, overstimulation
Words: 700
Warning: English is not my first language. Not beta read. I do not own these characters, only the ones I create. Please, do not repost my work to other sites and don't add your own writing ideas to my post.
Notes: if you liked what you read, I'd very much appreciate a like or a reblog or even better: both. Thank you so much and I hope you enjoy the reading!
If you want to suggest ideas you think I should write about, prompt me one in the ask section. But remember to read my pinned post first: I always update it with new information regarding this blog.
Also, I tend to put myself down a lot regarding my writing, so, as desperate and/or pathetic as it may sound: any words of encouragement or actions (likes, reblogs, nice comments, etc...) would truly mean a lot to me... Thank you in advance! 🖤
You're a nervous sleeper. The type of nervous sleeper that tends to almost fall off the bed every single night you and Simon – on those rare occasions he manages to come back home to you – sleep in the same bed—his bulk occupying more than half of the space on the king sized bed.
So, it's only natural for Simon to lock his big and veiny forearm around your waist and bring your body closer to his until your back is practically plastered on his front. Then, satisfied with the new arrangement and knowing you're finally safe from accidental injuries, he leaves a kiss on your temple or your hair and goes back to sleep.
You never actually wake up during the night when he does this. You never wake up when you know he's right next to you, but, in the morning, when you finally notice what he did to keep you safe, you cutely roll yourself around his tight embrace. After a lot of sweet talk to convince him to loosen up his grip on you – he actually growled into your ear, disappointed – he probably takes pity on you and decides to let you free from his vice-like hold.
So, you start kissing him. Of course.
You kiss him on the cheek first—as if to thank him. And that alone gets you another growl, a pleased one this time, from the big man laying next to you. The sounds he's making are so throaty and primal, that you get surprised every single time you hear them. You can't help but keep kissing his warm and exposed skin; a need to devour him that's just as strong as the heat pooling in your center.
His neck, his huge pecs – you like to bite those, just around the areola – his relaxed but still bulky biceps, his torso. You keep going like this for a couple of minutes, taking your time with each kiss and bite—until you see the peak of a smile at the corner of his lips.
Like the apex predator that he is, in the blink of an eye, he grabs you by the back of your head and pulls you into a real kiss. Morning breath and all. His chipped lips clash with your softer ones. He's devouring you, not letting you catch your breath.
Next thing you know, you're naked, and he's on top of you, slapping his thick, hard cock on your puffy, hot lips and clit. He looks down, where your genitals are touching, and you can clearly hear his throat emit a guttural sound. He nudges his forehead into the space between your neck and shoulder, only to mumble with a low and drowsy voice:
"Already so wet for me in the morning… Sweet."
And then, without any other warning beside his slick tip rubbing into your entrace, he swiftly buries his large member inside of your heat. Your erratic breath is captured by his mouth, and he kisses and fucks you at the same time, keeping a steady and hard rhythm—just the one he knows you like best after not seeing each other for such a long time.
You come louder than usual, without even needing to touch your clit. Once, twice, three times—until you're so tired your eyelids start to lower and then snap open, only to go down a second time. At one point, your arms and tights aren't able to hold onto his back muscles anymore, and you just… let go: floating into the pleasure, like a free fall. That's how safe you feel with him. He could do anything he wanted to your body, because you know – just like you know that the sky is blue – that he will always take your pleasure into account first and foremost. Because, that's just how he is, how he has always been with you—from day one.
You fall asleep in his arms, again. He's keeping you in his possessive embrace while still fucking you, as if hearing your soft, tired moans and your walls tightening around his cock were his only reason to live another day. As if loving you and your body were his duty.
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The "Robin would never date Steve's ex who broke his heart" take is FUCKING stupid for a lot of reasons.
First of off, the autonomy you're taking out of Robin with this.
Like she's not Steve's sidekick, she's not his yes man, she's an indepent girl who should be free to date any girl she wants.
She would never let her friendship with him ostacolate her love life.
Why the fuck she should do that?!
No one would.
And also, Steve is actually the one who hurt Nancy the most (slut Nancy Wheeler).
And if you think for a second that Robin would ever take Steve's side, then you're wrong.
Just stop centering everything around Steve, and stop reducing Robin to be just his sidekick, 'cause she's FUCKING not.
Hi! So. Pretty sure you found the most recent post I made (on April 6th) tagged anti rnce (and ONLY anti rnce. Not even stranger things. Just anti rnce and my personal original text post tag and a quip about choosing violence. So clearly if that’s how you got here you chose to not just send a post you disagreed with to your friends to rant about but came into my inbox and tried to start shit)And if you didn’t I truly don’t get how you, clearly a rnce fan, found me.
I’m going to be honest. Neither of us are going to change each other’s minds. I don’t like rnce for a lot of reasons, from i just don’t see a romantic spark there to a lot of the shippers being kinda shitty. I don’t care what you ship, really, just that. Claiming it’s canon or should be canon endgame etc gets annoying. And that a lot of the times the way I’ve seen the relationship portrayed (because, contrary to possibly popular belief, I have actually tried to read some fics for them. It’s also such a commonly untagged side or background pairing that I am subjected to it like that often as well) there’s so often weird terf or radfem red flags and alarm bells going off. I’ve seen someone harassed by rnce shippers for calling them out and then those shippers loudly regurgitating terf talking points like it’s fucking funny. I know all fandoms and ships have bad eggs but holy shit.
There’s been a few posts about how for some reason rnce fans try to portray people who don’t like it as making Robin Steve’s sidekick, when really we are acknowledging the facets of her characterization other than her lesbianism. Just because she likes girls doesn’t mean that’s the only thing that matters to her!
Yes, Robin liking girls is part of who she is, it influences how she acts and what she talks about, but it’s not the ONLY thing about her. She likes old movies, she enjoys pop and new wave music, she does her make up in her best friend’s car, she forgot to mention she never learned to drive because he forgot to ask if she could, she thinks combining into a super being with said best friend would possibly solve most of their problems.
Robin is a character who makes her own choices! She chooses to butt in at scoops, chooses to stay with Steve in the bunker to hold off the Russians, chooses to tell him her deepest secret, chooses to apply for jobs with Steve once they heal from the mall, chooses to spend a lot of time with him! And that’s rad. It gives us insight on who she is!
Whenever I’ve written or talked about Robin choosing not to date Nancy, I’ve always made it perfectly clear that it is Robin’s choice. Because given what we see of her in two seasons, Robin is loyal, and greatly values her friendship with Steve. Like. Regardless of how Steve feels about it, and I do think of Robin was legitimately interested in Nancy and Steve thought she had a chance, he’d encourage her to go for it. (Steve isn’t blindly encouraging Robin to hit on Vickie. He has high suspicions that Vickie is queer in some way too! She likes boobies!) I think Robin would think twice about it just because how much she encouraged stancy to get back together in s4.
Honestly, it makes me sad seeing how many times “why would robin choose her best friend’s feelings over getting a gf” is said because like. I value my friends’ feelings all the time. If I thought something I was doing was or would hurt them, I would reevaluate. Why WOULDNT Robin consider her best friend’s feelings? The first person she ever came out to? Who made her feel safe and accepted? Who made her laugh when she felt most vulnerable? Who she encouraged to get back with his ex? Romance is not a level up from friendship, it is not the endgame of life, it is not superior to any other relationship type. Treating friendships as less important to romance is something to reconsider and reevaluate.
Your last point. Anon, who is centring Steve now? Sure. He fucked up in s1. Literally no one denies that. He fucked up and he worked to make things right. He cleaned up the graffiti, he went to apologize to Jonathan, and he presumably apologized to Nancy, because she decided to date him for eleven months after that. I highly doubt there wasn’t heavy gossip about the graffiti or their breakup/makeup. I do agree that before Tina’s party Steve wasn’t helping Nancy as much as he could have, but Nancy wasn’t communicating to him either. They weren’t in the right place for each other. If we consider the alley the breakup, how is that not still breaking his heart? Yes Nancy was on a noble crusade, but it still had collateral damage. It’s something interesting about her character!
Robin wouldn’t be on board with the graffiti. But like. Steve’s changed and apologized since then. And She wasn’t there? She’s just here for the aftermath of Steve’s reignited feelings for Nancy. Idk. Both Steve and Nancy hurt each other in s1/2. It’s not a Steve v Nancy thing? It’s just an acknowledgment that of the two, Robin is closer to Steve. She’s more likely to consider him. She’s not omniscient to everything that happened or the persons feelings and reasons for doing it.
I’m sorry you don’t think friendship has an equal or greater value than some romantic relationship, it must suck. I also hope you find better things to do than to come to someone’s inbox and try to start something over a ship you like that they don’t.
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Cruel Summer - Chapter 1
Pairing: Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader
Summary: The "Eddie Munson is a speedway racer" high school AU no one asked for, but you're getting it anyways. Enemies to friends to lovers | No-Upsidedown AU | Fast cars, fast times | Reader moved from "the city" to Hawkins
Tags [will be updated as things progress]: swearing, underage drinking, dangerous driving, Jason sucks as usual, mentions of weed, light angst, misunderstandings, reader is afab, not sure if I'll have smut yet or not
A/N: Chapter 1 is already on Ao3 but here's the Tumblr version! New chapters will always be posted on Ao3 first, with a week or so delay to here.
CH1: 3,780w
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“Hot summer streets and the pavements are burning, I sit around /
Trying to smile, but the air is so heavy and dry”
If anyone had asked, you wouldn’t have said car racing was something you’d be interested in. Watching hunks of metal speeding around in circles always seemed pretty pointless to you. When combined with the auditory chaos of engines and screaming crowds, and nauseating smell of gasoline and burning rubber, it had never been high on your bucket list.
Then again, neither had moving to Hawkins, Indiana. And yet, here you were: stuck in small-town nowhere for (just, you hoped) the summer. But a summer practically felt like forever to you.
And so you were at the speedway car races with your cousin, Robin. Because apparently, she said, it would “be fun” and “social” and “lots of people went.”
You supposed you should be lucky Robin was pretty chill about hanging out with you. After all, having your city-slicker cousin practically dumped on your doorstep without so much as a “by your leave” by your parents — who had gone off to “rediscover themselves” and hopefully salvage five years of impending divorce — probably wasn’t high on HER bucket list, either. She and her parents had been more than welcoming, sticking you and your five overstuffed suitcases in the spare room on the second floor, just next door to Robin, without hesitation and urging you to make yourself at home.
If you saw Robin and her parents exchange some pointed and pitying glances, well, you’d just try and ignore them. Because they were right. Your parents clearly didn’t care enough about you to take you with them on their wild second-honeymoon or whatever, so they’d abandoned you without looking back, saying they’d pick you up in a couple months before school started up again. They thought. Maybe homeschooling had been implied as a possibility if they happened to return a bit later than assumed from…Panama? Costa Rica? Whatever warm, probably tropical, place they’d gone to. Without their only daughter.
Honestly, sometimes you just felt the truth of it in your bones when, at the height of their marital Cold War, they’d each called the other some variant of “frigid bitch.” Only the coldest of the cold would up and abandon their offspring like that, without any evident desire to really take responsibility for them ever again. If you just wandered off at the end of the summer, got a job waiting tables in the nearest big city, didn’t bother to send a forwarding address, you didn’t think they’d be too fussed. Depressing.
The frozen atmosphere at home had gone on so long, you’d practically adopted aloofness yourself as a survival mode. What you didn’t feel, couldn’t hurt. Didn’t help you with making any friends once you’d entered high school, but it kept anyone from really bothering you for three years. The summer before your senior year was supposed to be this golden eternity of afternoons at the pool, perfecting your tan, or giggling at the local mall while licking ice creams and debating who-liked-who-liked-who.
Not wasting away in Hawkins, a town small enough you bet you could count all of the stoplights on one hand.
You missed the city so much it ached . Missed the dizzying heights of the buildings towering above you, missed the way the very air seemed to thrum with an energy, a beat that got into your pulse and made you feel alive. Missed the hole-in-the-wall restaurants on every street and the used bookstores piled high with more volumes than you could read in a lifetime. Hawkins was…quaint, but inside you worried if you stayed here long enough it would drain the life out of you until you couldn’t make it anywhere else.
Not that you’d say any of that to Robin, who was babbling cheerfully away at your side as you strolled up to the local speedway just out of town. She was wearing a loose striped men’s shirt with the cuffs rolled up and jeans, despite the lingering heat of the evening. Robin, you’d come to learn, was pretty much always babbling about something or another, a natural condition that tended to get even worse whenever she was flustered or nervous. Given your tendency to listen, rather than speak, you actually balanced each other out rather well. With her, surprisingly, you felt you could be…yourself…that little bit more. Felt a bit of that icy shell melt away.
You tuned back in to hear her say, “We’re going to meet up with Steve, he’s gotten there early to stake us out a spot. You wouldn’t think it but it can get really crowded and picking the right spot out of the sun and the dust and on the right side of the track is, like, crucial to the enjoyment factor. Steve’s a boy, by the way. He’s not my boyfriend – well, he’s a boy who’s a friend, but we’re not like that, actually he’s more like an annoying brother. But he’s not annoying, I promise!”
You smiled to yourself as Robin rambled on. Truly, you found it more endearing than not.
“I’m sure he’s nice,” you said, cutting in so Robin could actually take a full breath. She smiled back at you.
“Yeah, he’s great. But don’t tell him I said that, I swear his hair grows an inch every time someone says something nice about him.”
You smiled and promised that, of course, you wouldn’t breathe a word.
The two of you step up to the bored-looking teenager taking tickets, and you passed over your paper stub, slightly sweaty from being clutched in your hand. Stepping through the entrance gate, you’re immediately assaulted with the smell of deep-fried foods mixed with beer, the raucous laughter of crowds of families and teens here for an evening out. A fine dust permeated the air, making your eyes water. The track, a packed dirt oval that was both bigger and smaller than you imagined, spread out before you, bordered by some haphazardly stacked rectangle bales of hay you assumed were there for the “safety” of the crowd, though they looked anything but. You imagined any car crashing into those at serious speed would take them out easily…as well as the onlookers setting up their camp chairs frighteningly close to the barrier.
Across the track, a small elevated building rigged with wires and a mounted loudspeaker was clearly where the announcers were situated. Tinny commentary was blaring from the PA system, but it was almost impossible to hear above the general din.
There were mullets and wife-beaters on display everywhere. As you looked around, you noted that everyone – and you mean everyone – seemed to be dressed in nothing more formal than jeans and a shirt. You hadn’t batted an eye when Robin left the house like that, because that’s what your cousin always wore. And she’d told you to dress casual but…
“Robin,” you asked, “am I overdressed?”
She’d been herding you along the track toward one end, but at your question she glanced over at you and winced, which you supposed was answer enough.
“Robinnnnn,” you whined.
“What?” she protested. “I said ‘casual,’ that’s what you came out in, so I figured it was fine!”
Up until you saw the sea of daisy dukes before you, you’d thought what you were wearing was casual. It certainly was back in the city. The simple, white-and-red polkadot dress you were wearing, cinched at the waist with a plain wide belt you’d dug out the bottom of your suitcase, cute frilly sleeves sitting just below your tanned shoulders, wouldn’t have been anything your classmates back home blinked at. You hadn’t even done your makeup, besides a swipe of lip gloss! But you were rapidly getting the sense you’d have to redefine your expectations here in Hawkins. And with the swirls of rust-colored dust almost constantly permeating the air, you could already tell white was a particularly bad choice.
Oh well, you’d just have to make the best of it. And get the dress in the wash sooner rather than later.
“It’s alright, Robin,” you reassured your cousin, who’d been worrying at her lip while you thought. “It’s just a dress. Plus, it’s not like I’ll be in any of the cars,” you joked.
“Steve’ll probably have a blanket or something you can use anyways,” she said. “He’s a dad like that. Oh look, there he is. Steve! Steeeeve! Ugh, he isn’t listening. OI, DINGUS!”
Robin waved frantically at a boy a bit ahead of you, who’d staked out a pretty prime spot on the hillside around the middle of the straightaway, complete with camping chairs, picnic blanket and cooler of what you desperately hoped was something cold. Now this is what you’d imagined when Robin said “races.” And it was comfortingly far away from the hay barrier.
The boy – Steve – raked his hands through his already artfully disheveled mop of hair and rolled his eyes at Robin.
“Could you shout any louder?” he grumbled. “Jesus, I think the whole crowd heard you.”
“Oh don’t be such a wuss. Hey, this is my cousin. She’s cool. Cousin, meet Steve. He’s a dweeb.”
“A dweeb with charm, also known as the best kind,” Steve said with a smile, reaching out to shake your hand. “I heard you’re in town for the summer. Welcome to Hawkins – guessing it’s a pretty big change from where you’re from.”
“Um, yeah, wasn’t sure what to expect, but it’s better than I thought. Lots of nice people,” you offered him a small smile in return, a bit taken aback by the easy way he folded you into the dynamic.
“I’ll bet,” he agreed. “First time at a speedway?”
“First time at any kind of races,” you admitted. “I have no idea what’s going on.”
“Not much too it really,” Robin said around a mouthful of beer. Clearly, she’d helped herself to Steve’s stash, but by the way he just shook his head, you got the sense this was basically normal. He silently offered you a bottle, but you shook your head – maybe in a bit. Steve did seem nice, but you weren’t quite ready to be under the influence under someone new just yet. Robin kept talking: “Cars go zoom zoom, and the one that goes zoom zoom the fastest wins. We mostly just come here to support Eddie.”
You cocked your head. “Who’s Eddie?”
“Friend from school. He’s been working extra shifts all summer, which is why you haven’t met him yet. He works down at the local body shop, races on the side. We’ll point his car out when he’s up.”
You nodded, sure he’d be nice too, if Robin’s taste in friends so far was anything to go by.
The three of you sat, chatting amiably for a few minutes, and you felt yourself relaxing into Robin and Steve’s easy, familiar banter. They traded well-worn jabs back and forth, but there’s no heat behind them. You settled yourself on the blanket between them, tucking your skirt beneath your legs and mostly enjoying the vibe, only chiming in when you had something to say, like when Steve started to say “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” was supposedly underrated (he was wrong, and both you and Robin soundly told him so).
As the sun finally started to go down – days were still long and hot, and all three of you were peevishly slapping at overly familiar mosquitos – the track lights finally flickered into life and it seemed like things were about to start. Robin let out a squeal, wiggling her knees in excitement.
You were all ready for – you didn’t know, monster trucks or something? – when, to your surprise, the first line of cars that raced onto the track looked more like glorified go karts than anything else. Seeing your confusion, Steve leaned over and murmured, “They do the kiddie stuff first,” and you then saw that the drivers did seem awfully young. Fortunately they were wearing helmets.
The announcer counted down the start, and at the waving of the first green flag they tore around the track, kicking up immense clouds of gasoline-scented dust that settled over everything – your hair, your clothes, you could even see it coating the fine hairs on your arm. Gross.
And these little kids were vicious. Not crashing directly into each other, but drifting aggressively around the turns and cutting each other off within what looked like inches to spare between bumpers. Everyone was cheering on individual numbers, and you, Steve and Robin got into it by picking your favorite car and rooting for them at the top of your lungs. After a few heats you felt your throat dry up, and gratefully accepted one of the cooling bottles of beer Steve offered.
Beer with friends on a Friday night. Weirdly, this felt more like how you thought summer was supposed to go than you figured you’d get in Hawkins. Or anywhere.
As the night wore on, the races of the small and mid-sized cars started to blur into each other, and you started idly wondering when you’d be able to go home. Well. To Robin’s home.
“And nowwwww, the event you’ve all been waiting forrrrr!” shrilled the announcer.
From the back paddock where all the cars were parked, there came a grunty rumble. A vibration that made its way into your bones, your veins, the thump-thump of your heart. This was the rhythm you’d been missing, filling you up from the inside out.
And then, the first line of proper-sized cars ripped their way onto the track, to a massive cheer from the crowd. But you weren’t even sure you could call them “cars.” Dinged, dented, and beaten back into shape, these were machines reduced to the essence of speed. Any extra baggage had clearly been ripped out – seats, radio, even the entire bottom half of the trunk was gone. What was left was the engines, the driver’s seat, and anything essential to make them go.
They ran a few menacing laps around the track, jostling for position on the grid.
“Look, there’s Eddie!” Robin pointed.
“Which one is he?” you asked.
“The black one, with the red bat on the hood.”
“Eddie’s always had a flair for the dramatic,” Steve clarified.
Your eyes traced the black car as Eddie maneuvered it into the inside of the track, on the front row – “That’s a good position,” Steve clarified again. Unlike most of the other cars, which had paint jobs in varying states of peeling off, Eddie clearly kept his car freshly painted despite the risk of damage – it gleamed, pitch blank, with just the blood red of the bat leaping out of the design. From what you could see of Eddie, as he was mostly shielded by a helmet, he was also in all black.
“I’m sensing a theme,” you muttered dryly.
Like horses jostling for position, the cars – there must have been a dozen or so – revved their engines just behind the starting line. There was an agonizing moment of tension, where everyone stared at the red stoplight holding them in place.
Then it winked green, the flag was waved, and the race began.
You watched as Eddie’s car and the one on his right, painted a chipped red-white-and-blue roared to the front like bats of out hell. They gunned it down the straightaway before whipping into a drift around the curve that was so aggressive, their cars yawing onto two wheels so hard, your hands flew to your mouth to swallow a gasp despite yourself, sure they’d tip over or spin out. Magically Eddie’s car righted itself as he came out of the turn and he gunned it down the next straight, neck and neck with the other vehicle.
The laps went by in what felt to you like seconds, a frenetic dance conducted at speed. With the razor-thin margins the two cars took the turns, you knew that if Eddie lost concentration for a nanosecond, he’d be out of the race. You blinked dust out of your eyes furiously, loath to miss a single second. Next to you, Robin and Steve were yelling – you were pretty sure Robin was just repeating profanities at this point – but you could hardly make yourself breathe normally, let alone cheer.
There were only a few laps to go and the other car had stolen the lead from Eddie. Though Eddie was keeping the black monstrosity right on his tail, pushing himself right into the rear bumper to try and throw the other driver off.
They made another sharp drift around a corner and, as they came off the curve, Eddie made his move, pushing the throttle to take his car around the outside of the red-and-white leader. He took the turn, hard, trying to get his nose in front of the other car’s, and this time you did let out a whimper of concern. Your heart thumped in time with the roar of the crowd, and when Eddie made it, slipping in front of his rival to cross the finish line first, you couldn’t help but sigh in relief.
Steve and Robin were now jumping up and down and hugging each other, and you smiled at their infectious joy.
The other cars coasted to a stop in the middle of the track while Eddie took his victory lap, waving the checkered flag from out the driver’s window. He must have spotted the two maniacs next to you, because the car rolled to a stop on the track in front of you, and Eddie stepped out from the car.
You knew he drove like a devil, but you weren’t expecting him to look like a fallen angel.
A strange shiver ran through you as you watched him pull off his black helmet. Long, dark curls spilled out, framing his sharp, sculpted face. Even with his bangs sweat-soaked and disheveled, he was capital H-O-T. Dark hair, dark eyes, with a plush mouth you knew was made for sin. He was everything your parents would have warned you away from, and everything you – or your body, at least – immediately wanted.
“Be normal,” you thought to yourself. “This is Robin’s friend .”
Robin and Steve trotted down to the side of the track, and you trailed behind them, a little unsure. It was the last race of the evening, and with the entertainment over, the crowds were starting to melt away. It didn’t escape your notice that while all the other drivers were getting handshakes and back-slaps galore from their fellow racers and even some officials, no one had come over to congratulate the actual winner, Eddie, except for the three of you.
“Edieeeeee, you won!” Robin shrieked at her usual top-volume. “But also, ugh, you smell like fumes, ew no, don’t hug me.” She wiggled away from his playful attempt at a hug, wrinkling your nose.
“Comes with the territory, Robin, you’re just gonna have to get used to it. You certainly don’t mind when I’m fixing your car for free, again . Hey, Steve, nice of the King to make an appearance.” The two boys traded fist bumps, Steve rolling his eyes at his high school nickname. You broke into a wide smile at their antics.
Eddie’s eyes met yours, where you lingered behind, and he arched one eyebrow, his previously warm and open expression becoming more guarded, scanning you from the top of your windswept hair to the bottom of your now quite dusty flats. Your smile faded, and you resisted the urge to brush yourself off in the face of his gaze.
“Who’s this?” he asked. “Wasn’t aware we had a third cheerleader on the squad. Does little miss Dots like what she has to see so far?”
You find yourself bristling at his presumptuous tone. “I don’t quite take your meaning,” you respond stiffly.
Eddie laughed, an open, easy sound you could have loved – except for the sharp edge to his voice. He straddled the hay bale, spreading his hands open. You tried not to look at how his black racing uniform stretched tight over his thighs. Really, you tried.
“Come on, guys, this is a joke, right? Ha, ha, Eddie’s first race of the season, let’s get a cute little cupcake of a girl to come along, flirt a little, string lil ’ol Eddie along? Give the girl a ride to remember?”
He fixed his molten brown eyes on you. “Did someone put you up to it, Dots? Patrick? Jason? It’s the sort of shit thing Jason would do.”
By this point, both Steve and Robin were exchanging a confused glance that clearly conveyed their shared sense of, “uh, what?” But you knew exactly what.
Eddie had taken one look at you – at your too-much dress, too-much smile, maybe something else you didn’t even know in your demeanor – and concluded that the only possible explanation for your presence was that you were a…paid escort? Hooker? Someone bribed to come watch his race and flutter your eyelashes at him, spread her legs?
You felt the usual protection of your ice queen reputation from back home freezing off any earlier warmth from your expression.
“Someone clearly has a high opinion of himself. I’m not going to cream just because you’ve got half skills with half a car. Get over yourself. Robin,” you turn to your cousin, “I’m going back to the house.”
“It’s miles to the house,” Robin protested, nervous gaze flicking between you – fuming – and Eddie – nonchalantly picking at his cuticles, not sparing you another glance.
“I’ll walk.” It was only a mile or so to Robin’s, and you didn’t want to spend a single second more in his company, friends with your cousin or not. Eddie’d done a spectacular job of reminding you why you usually didn’t do things that were “fun” or “social” or that “lots of people” went to. You didn’t need another asshole man in your life, your father was doing a bang-up job of that by himself.
“I’d give you a ride, Dots, but as you can see,” Eddie gestured to the literally empty passenger seat in the stock car next to him, “I can’t.”
“Fuck you,” you hissed, whirling around and stomping off before reaching a hand up to swipe angrily at the tears pooling in the corners of your eyes.
You heard Robin run after you. “She’s my cousin you MORON,” she called back to Eddie. When she caught up to you, you gave her a watery smile in thanks, and she reached over to squeeze your shoulders.
New item for your summer bucket list: Never, ever see Eddie again.
-- -- --
NEXT TIME: You and Robin go to a party.
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Ok so I'm going to do a better, Tumblr-focused writeup soon and also track down those blogs to talk about them more specifically, but I fell for a misinformation scheme today and want to talk about how and why. Here's an email I sent my little cousin about it.
This morning, I encountered a Tumblr post talking about the TikTok ban and the government's attempt to severely curtail digital privacy rights as part of it.
I had heard that the TikTok ban was currently up for debate in the Senate, after passing the House with strong bipartisan support. I was not surprised by the information in the screenshots; it matched with things I knew the government had tried to do often in the past, and often under similar circumstances. I looked up the bill linked to verify, and yeah, it was an active bill that had been introduced in the Senate. (I should have realized then that there was an issue with what I was reading, but in my defense it was about 6:00 AM, and I was just glancing over things in the parking lot before going in to work.)
Concerned for the digital privacy and security of my family, and especially the ones I can't just drive to, I drafted the following message to you:
"I haven't had time to read all the way through the RESTRICT act that the Senate proposed, but summaries I've seen indicate that as written it's a massive overreach. It's better known as the TikTok ban; the news has been focusing on that part as it passes through Congress so far.
I always sign my emails to you with my public key. Both of you should look up how to use PGP to send me encrypted emails with that. It may become even more important soon to normalize secure encryption in Internet communications, and there may also be things that we wish to discuss that state or federal laws may frown on in the future.
I planned to introduce topics related to computer and information security more gradually, but making sure that talking about those is possible at all is an important part of that.
Congress.gov page on the bill
Tweet thread"
(As an aside, I do still think that normalizing encryption is a very worthwhile thing to do; it makes the web a safer place for activists and informants needing a way to communicate without surveillance, without being singled out as enemies of the surveillance state.)
I then checked through the notes of the Tumblr post to see if there was more context I wanted to share, and noticed people who called out a detail that I missed. That post was first posted in March of 2023, a little over a year ago. It refers to an entirely different bill than the TikTok ban which is currently going through the Senate, one which activists successfully stalled (and likely killed) last year. This year's bill is much more targeted (though, as implemented, I still have issues with it); its text can be found here.
This is a classic example of how misinformation spreads. I did not have bad intent when I went to share that commentary on last year's bill with you, and I did not find it from someone with bad intent (in fact, she subsequently shared a commentary I posted on the actual bill, in reply to her original incorrect post.) From what I can tell, on March 14, a number of mostly inactive politically-focused blogs all shared that post directly from the original poster (not from someone who had it in their feed, like a normal Tumblr interaction). Each of these was tagged with fairly popular political tags. None of these blogs has posted since, keeping it at the top of their page to get more eyes on it.
Misinformation is spread deliberately, and it takes caution and checking of your biases to combat it. I almost fell for this one because I expected it to be true. I should have checked on it before sharing anything at all. Looking at it now, I ask: who benefits from this?
Most directly, proponents of the current TikTok ban benefit from activist efforts being directed towards a functionally dead bill. This, apparently, includes the strong majority of the House, on both sides of the aisle; it may be assumed that it also includes the government's surveillance agencies (as it is easier to compel data from American companies than from foreign ones, particularly Chinese ones). It could also include other social media sites, especially those like YouTube and Instagram that compete directly with TikTok in the realm of algorithmically driven short videos.
More abstractly, though, this misinformation benefits the status quo, and conservatism as a whole. By causing people who are invested in the TikTok ban (mostly left-leaning people) to engage with more stringent and concerning bills, stress is increased on activists and burnout becomes more likely. Targeting the mental health of left-leaning activists is a tactic we've seen multiple times recently in misinformation campaigns; another example is the "the Guardian is doing a story on DIY HRT" hoax that recently circulated among my trans friends. This type of stressful lie misinformation serves the dual purpose of causing activists to burn out and decreasing trust among communities that share it.
This is a new specific strategy to me, but the solution is the same as ever. Check your sources when you speak publicly, check how your biases affect what ideas seem "clearly correct", and aim for your statements to maximize quality, rather than quantity. That's a discipline I still need to refine, but it's not hard. Just requires a bit of diligence.
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