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wh0re43van · 5 months

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Just friends- (Peter Maximoff X Reader)

Summary: While staying with the Maximoff family, you admit your feelings to your best friend, and he doesn’t seem to feel the same until you inform him that you’re going on a date with another guy

Word count: 4K

Warnings: angst, sad Peter, a brief mention of Unsolicited groping

I’m so thankful for the Maximoffs. They’re allowing to stay with them for a couple months after getting kicked out of my parents’ home. I’m rooming with my best friend of four years, and I’ve never been happier. As soon as he heard about my situation, he welcomed me into his home- into his bedroom- with open arms.

“Honey, I’m home,” The goofball announces as he walks into our temporally shared room holding two pizzas, a 2 liter of dr. pepper, a bag of breadsticks with all the fixings, and a rented copy of The Exorcist.

“Wow, what’s the occasion?” I giggle, sitting up in our his bed, setting down the book I had been reading.

With a fwp, he’s turned down the lights, popped the movie in and arranged the food at the foot of the bed before sitting beside me, now in his pajamas.

“It’s a party!” he gives me a cheesy grin, popping open the pizza box and pulling out two slices, handing one to me.

“Oh god, Peter are we really so lame that this is what we consider a party?” I laugh before taking a bite of the greasy pizza, still hot since Peter was able to get it here in less than three seconds.

“This is the best kind of party! Hanging with your best friend, piggin’ out on junk food, and watching a bitchin’ horror movie? What else could a dude ask for?” He says as he stuffs his face, licking his greasy fingers. I cant help but laugh at the man child sitting beside me, even though it hurts my heart a bit knowing that he only considers me his friend. Don’t get me wrong, I’m more than grateful for Peter (and his mother) being in my life, but I just always hoped for more. It’s been four years and nothing’s escalated despite my many attempts, so I guess it’s time to accept that. I mean, we’re out of high school now, were adults. If he hasn’t shown interest by now then I guess it’s a lost cause. “Besides,” he smacks his lips, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. “The main thing that makes this a party is the fact that you’re here,” he gives a goofy wink, making my cheeks tint pink- but he doesn’t seem to notice.

“How flattering,” I nudge him playfully before opening the 2 liter, taking a sip out of the bottle then handing it to Peter. He mimics my action, then lets out a loud belch.

‘how in the hell does this man have me absolutely smitten over him,’ think to myself as he shoves an entire breadstick into his mouth.

“Whatever,” he chuckles looking away for a second.

“God damn Peter,” my eyes go wide when I see that he’s already eaten half a large pizza.

“What?” he asks as he holds his head up, his arm extended as he lets the cheese slide off the crust into his mouth. “Gotta fuel my metabolism, these rock hard abs don’t just appear overnight,” he snickers before lifting up his shirt, revealing his toned stomach, then takes another gulp out of the soda bottle.

“I guess your body does look pretty good for someone whose diet is 50% carbs and 50% sugar,” I tease, thanking whatever deity it is above us that the lights are too dim for him to see the blush rushing over my face as I stare at his bare stomach.

“You’d think the chicks would be all over this,” he wiggles his eyebrows before deepthroating another breadstick. “They wouldn’t know charm if it bit ‘em in the ass,” he mumbles through a mouth full of bread as marinara sauce drips down his face. “I mean come on, how do I not get girls?” He snickers as he wipes his grubby hands on his pants. I roll my eyes at the messy boy.

“Peter, I know you very well,” I reach for my second slice of pizza. “The reason you don’t get girls is because you can never tell when they’re flirting with you,” I tease, but meaning every word. He’s the dullest guy ever when it comes to picking up on social cues.

“I know,” he chuckles as he turns to look at me. “Real shame too. Sometimes I realize it after they’ve already walked away. Sucks cause I probably coulda’ lost my V-card by now if I understood the first thing about gals. I really can’t pick up on flirting” he says matter-o-factly as he takes a sip of soda.

“Oh, I know all too well, Peter,” I laugh out, my eyes focused on the tv screen. He gives a soft, almost confused laugh, then he’s silent for a minute before speaking up.

“Wait a minute,” he sits up straight in the bed. “Are you implying that even you’ve flirted with me?” he asks with wide eyes full of skepticism. I take a deep breath, sitting up to be eye level with him.

“Peter,” I start, he’s staring intently at me with his brows threaded in confusion. “The only reason I talked to you for the first time was because I thought you were cute,” I laugh out. How can he be so dense?! He stares at me in bewilderment in silence. I can see the gears turning in his head as he thinks back to our first encounter all those years ago.

“Oh my god!” he comes to the realization. “You were flirting with me that summer day in the arcade?” he asks still shocked. It makes my heart happy that he remembers the first time we met. “How did I not realize. God I’m stupid,” he slaps his palm to his forehead.

“Only took ya four years, Quickie,” I tease before taking a sip of Dr. Pepper. “Wasn’t the very first thing that I ever said to you: ‘You’re really good at that, handsome’?” I say and he repeats the quote with me, smiling and nodding. He remembers it word for word. “Come on man, how did you not know?” I chuckle. His eyes are still full of disbelief.

“I was really focused on the game!” his face turns red as he has another epiphany: “That probably wasn’t the only time, was it?” he asks, rubbing his hand on the back of neck, letting out a small laugh.

“God no,” I chuckle, a bit embarrassed but enjoying reminiscing on our friendship none the less. “Remember, two weeks after that, I invited you out to go roller skating?” I ask.

“Yeah of course, you were wearing that limited edition ‘Eagles’ shirt that you still to this day won’t let me touch,” he laughs. I thought that having this conversation would help me get over him, but hearing how well he remembers all our fondest memories together makes me swoon.

“Well, when I asked you, I meant it as a date,” I admit, watching his face once again fill with bewilderment. “But the whole time you were calling me dude and roughhousing me, I just assumed you either didn’t like me that way or you were to dumb to realize it was a date. Lucky for you, I had a lot of fun and chose to ignore it,” I nudge him playfully. He face palms himself again.

“Y/n, I had no idea. I never in a million years thought a girl as rad as you would be interested in me in that way, so the idea of a date never even crossed my mind,” he flops back on the bed, processing all of this new information. “Wait do you still flirt with me? How oblivious have I been? Oh my god am I still missing stuff?” he shoots back up in the bed once again..

“Peter,” I say flatly. “Just last week I changed right Infront of you. I literally stripped into just my bra and panties right next to the tv when you were playing Space Invaders,” I can’t believe this guy. He blushes thinking back to that moment.

“I thought we were just really comfortable with each other! We change infront of each other all the time,” he chuckles nervously. “I still tried not to look out of respect, but I’d be lying if I say I didn’t sneak a glance or two though,” he admits but looks away, avoiding eye contact.

“It’s alright Peter,” I sigh as I close up the pizza box before laying back to watch the movie. “Once a girl comes along that you’re actually interested in, I’m sure you’ll pick up on her signals,” I say not looking at him, accepting my defeat. He’s quiet for a moment.

“Well, how do I know?” he asks genuinely. I look at him, raising my eyebrow, waiting for him to elaborate. “Like, obviously I know a hot chick when I see one, but how do I know when I’m actually interested. I’m clueless y/n,” he lets out a light laugh after the last part, seeming a bit embarrassed as he intently awaits my answer.

“Well,” I prop myself up on my arm to look at him. “I guess it would have to be more than physical attraction. If you’re genuinely interested, then you’ll want more than her body, but also want more than just her friendship. You’ll want to talk to her, to just be in her presence. You’ll care about what she thinks about you. Stuff like that,” I shrug, not sure how to explain what attraction feels like to someone who claims to have never felt it before. He nods silently, absorbing my words. The fact that he hasn’t laughed in my face yet for admitting to liking him is giving me false hope that he could possibly feel the same way. I need this conversation to end soon.

“So it would have to be someone I can see a future with? Someone that I want to impress? Someone that I genuinely care about? But also someone who’s super smokin’?” he asks, wanting a genuine answer. I smile downwardly.

“You’re getting it now,” I sigh. “I’ll be jealous of whatever girl wins your heart over,” I laugh, holding my breath in anticipation for how he’s going to respond to that, preparing to have my hopes crushed so I can move on.

“Oh don’t worry,” he smirks. Here we go. “I’ll make room for the both of you,” he winks. And there it is. My stomach drops, but it’s out now. Now I know that he’s not interested, I know for sure that I’m going on this date tonight. Part of me hoped that Peter would admit his feelings and I could cancel this stupid date, but I have to get out there. “Oh! No, y/n I didn’t mean-” Peters smile drops, and he reaches for my arm.

“No, I get it. It’s cool, man,” I force a smile, standing from his bed, checking my wristwatch. “I gotta get ready for my date anyway. I didn’t even realize what time it was,” I say honestly as I walk over to my suitcase.

“Woah, what?” he zooms in front of me, blocking my bag. “Date?” he asks, a bit of panic in his voice. I scoff, pushing him to the side.

“Yeah, I went to the arcade yesterday while you were out with your mom, now I have a date,” I smile weakly as I strip, then slip into my dress before I walk over to my mirror that I hung on his wall to fix my makeup.

“No- y/n- i- that’s- who… whos your date with?” his words fall out a stumbled mess as if he can’t sort his thoughts from one another.

“Steve. Ya know, the one from the arcade that’s always trying to beat your high scores,” I explain as I brush my hair.

“Steve!?” He shouts in disbelief. “That asshole? Y/n come on, man!,” he almost sounds angry.

“Yeah?” I shrug as I apply some lip gloss. I see Peter pacing behind me in the reflection of the mirror.

“Steve? Really?” he throws his hands up.

“He’s cute. Plus, you know I have a thing for nerds,” I remind him. His face turns red. Why is he acting like this? He just crushed my dream of being with him and now he wants to act jealous?

“Cute?! You mean you’re not just going to be nice?” He sounds so shocked and almost hurt. I turn around to face him.

“I- of course Peter why would I-,” I’m completely flustered. “No.” I say sternly. “No Peter. You don’t get to do this. You had four years man, and just 15 minutes ago I admitted my feelings for you and you said that you didn’t feel the same,” I’m getting frustrated with him, I can feel my blood pressure raising out of anger and embarrassment.

“But that’s not- I didn’t- no you misunderstood!” he starts to raise his voice, laced with panic. “What if I do have feelings for you?” he asks with pleading eyes.

“Do not do this. Peter please don’t do this to me! You can’t suddenly have feelings for me just because I have a date with you nerd enemy!” I shout as my ears burn red with anger. “Don’t be immature,” I poke my finger to his chest, completely irate. He looks like his mind is running a thousand miles a minute. It takes him a couple seconds to rebuttal.

“No! I never said I don’t have feelings! Y/n I didn’t say that!” he shouts, but his voice isn’t angry, it’s worried as he places a hand on my heated cheek.

“No Peter,” I say calmly even though I’m beyond frustrated as I pull away from his touch. “You’re really hurting me right now. You’re the last guy I ever expected to fuck with my emotions like this,” tears well up in my eyes. I can’t believe what he’s doing. My ego was already bruised when he didn’t respond to my confession and now he’s trying to keep me from a date just because the dude plays video games just as well as him. Peter stares at me, his hand still outstretched in the air where he tried to console me. He doesn’t say anything.

Honk! Honk!

Steves car horn sounds from outside the Maximoff home, beckoning me.

“Please don’t go,” his voice is feeble. “Please just give me some time to think. Just five minutes to figure this out,” he pleads with desperate eyes. I almost give in, but I stay strong.

“Peter, there’s a guy outside this house that already has his feelings sorted. You stay here and figure it out. I’m leaving,” I seethe as I stare at his confused and hurt expression, almost making me apologize, but I’m too hurt and embarrassed. He doesn’t say anything, he just grips his fists so tight that his knuckles turn white, his jaw clenches, and I see that he’s holding back tears. I immediately turn to run up the steps because if I look at him for one more second, I would be holding him in my arms, telling him I’m sorry and letting him cry it out. Not today.

•

After Steve picked me up, we went to dinner, then to the drive-in theatre. I’m having… a decent time. He’s a little boring compared to Peter, no one can make me laugh like he can. I’m also a bit distracted at how I left my best friend. I think I may have been too hard on him. Now that I’ve calmed down, I think he really was just trying to sort things out. I know that Peter isn’t the most emotionally mature and definitely doesn’t have a way with words.

‘oh god, what have I done?’ I think to myself in horror.

“What do you say, huh?” Steves deep voice shakes me out of my thoughts.

“I’m sorry,” I smile sweetly. “What was that?” I bat my lashes at him, hoping he doesn’t notice that I’ve been thinking about another guy the whole time he’s been speaking to me.

“I said: Why don’t we move to back?” he smirks motioning towards his back seat.

“Uh,” I know exactly what he’s alluding to. Do I really want to go down that road? “Yeah, okay,” I smile. I guess I do. We get out of the vehicle and hop into the back. He immediately pulls me into his lap. I’m a bit taken back by his sudden grip on my body.

“You ever been touched by a real man?” he asks as he peppers kisses all over my neck as his cold hands slip under my dress without even asking. I’m shocked, disgusted, and confused.

“I-uh- can you stop please?” I pull arm out of his grip and crawl out of his lap.

“Hey, I paid for your food and your ticket. You owe me!” he shouts, grabbing my arm again. I have so much pent up rage from earlier, I didn’t even realize it when my hand shot out to slap him across the face full force. He looked at me stunned before getting out of his car, opening the door and literally throwing me out. He picks me up by shoulders and tosses me onto the dusty, bare, dirt. He drives away without a single word.

“What the fuck,” I mutter to myself as I stand up, brushing the dirt off myself. A young man from the next car over rushes to the scene, asking if I’m okay. I simply thank him for his concern, then take the walk of shame back to Peters house.

Now I remember why I waited for Peter for so long; He’s the only decent guy I’ve ever met. As if the silent, cold, horrifying walk back to the Maximoff house at midnight wasn’t punishment enough, once I arrive and enter his bedroom, the sight I see makes my heart break completely in two. I feel physical pain when I see Peter.

His room is dark as he’s laid on his couch, curled up In a blanket, staring at the starter screen on his Tank video game on the box Television. The flashing light reflects on his blank face, allowing me to see his bloodshot eyes, red nose, and puffy lips from crying. He hasn’t seemed to notice me enter the room. My own eyes immediately fill up with the tears I was trying so hard to hold back.

“Peter,” I let out a somber whisper. He jumps up, looking at me with wide, puffy eyes.

“Are you crying?” he zooms up to me, grabbing my arm. “Did he hurt you?” he asks, putting a hand on my cheek. How can he still care about my feelings after how I left things?

“I’m okay Peter,” I lean into his touch. “I should have listened to you, though. You were right about him,” my tear stained eyes meet his. His face flushes in anger.

“What did he do to you? Is he still here? I swear I’ll kill the guy!” He raises his voice with every sentence, balling his hands into fists.

“It’s- I, uhm, would rather not talk about it,” I look down avoiding his gaze.

“Y/n, did he hurt you, yes or no? That’s all I need to know,” He gently lifts my chin to meet his gaze again but I close my eyes. I can’t look at him with out the guilt from making him cry making me feel sick.

“…Yes,” I Whisper, not wanting to elaborate. With a fwp Peter’s gone. I hear the front door open, I rush out to the sidewalk.

“Where the fuck is he?” Peter screams in a tone that I rarely hear from him. He turns to look at me, his once sad expression now pure unfiltered anger: A look I’ve never seen on him before. I’m almost scared.

“He’s not here Peter, I had to walk home from the drive in,” I sigh. Peter looks at me as if he doesn’t believe what I’m saying. He kicks the neighbor’s trash can in anger. With a loud clang, the metal bin is sent flying down the street, his foot mark now permanently indented in the can.

‘Steve’s lucky he isn’t here right now. Jesus Christ’ I think to myself.

“Let’s just go inside, please. I need to talk to you,” I say softly as I grab his tensed arm. He looks at me, his expression softening before he allows me to lead him inside.

I bring him in and sit him down on the couch, it’s silent for a few beats, neither one of us want to look at the other one.

“I’m sorry,” we both blurt out at the same time, snapping our heads to look at each other. The awkwardness subsides as we smile at each other. We both try to start our apology at the same time, then erupt into giggles.

“Let me go first,” I put a light hand on Peters knee. He shakes his head ‘no’.

“No. I’m going first. I finally got everything sorted out,” he takes a deep breath. “Y/n, I do have feelings for you and I’m sorry. I’m just a stupid boy that never learned how to process emotions. You’re amazing! You’re my best friend and I feel so horrible that I hurt you. When you were explaining what it felt like to be attracted to someone, you just explained word for word how I feel about you. I was just confused, everything happened so fast, and I honestly thought you were joking with me at first. I’ve always kind of had the hots for you, but I never in a million years thought that you could ever be attracted to me, so I locked those thoughts away. I’m sorry that I couldn’t express this sooner. I’m so so sorry,” he says in a rush of words, I almost have trouble keeping up with the words coming out of his mouth. His big brown puppy eyes scan my face for my reaction. I just smile at him, tears once again swelling in my eyes for about the third time tonight.

“Peter, you’re such a sweet guy,” I grin and his face beams with joy. “I was such an asshole to you earlier… I’m sorry. My ego and my heart were hurt and I should not have taken that out on you. The way that you still cared about me when I got back from that awful date even though I had upset you right before I left just shows how amazing of a person you are. You are the best thing in my life,” a tear rolls down my cheek, Peter quickly wipes it away.

“Hey, come here,” he says softly before pulling me into his chest. As he pulls me into his strong arms, the scent of his cologne and the warmth of his body makes me forget about every problem I’ve ever had. The steady rise and fall of his chest and his fingers running though my hair could put me to sleep in an instant. “I don’t blame you for anything. That situion just unfolded really poorly and we both said some things we shouldn’t have, but that’s over now,” he kisses my forehead as I snuggle further into him.

“Thank you, Peter,” I yawn as I wrap my arms around his torso. He continues brushing his fingers through my hair and tracing mindless designs on my back, I feel myself drifting off to sleep, all the stress I had been feeling now completely subsided. I lay in his arms, wrapped in comfort as if he’s a warm towel straight out of the dryer. I hear him whisper,

“Goodnight, beautiful,” as he clicks off the tv with the remote. A small smile creeps onto my lips as I slip off to sleep.

#evan peters #evan peters smut #ahs cult #ahs hotel #jimmy darling smut #kai anderson #kit walker smut #ahs asylum #ahs fandom #ahs murder house #evan peters x reader #peter maximoff smut #peter maximoff #warren lipka smut #warren lipka #tate langdon smut #tate langdon

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sunshine-theseus · 5 months

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I’ve Got You | Charlie Grant x reader

Word Count: 2.4k Summary: Having someone like Charlie by your side makes pregnancy a whole lot easier. i don't think this is my best i'm sorry Warnings: none? Request for - @charligrantismygirlfriend

Being friends with Katrina basically guaranteed being friends with Kyra and Charlie.

I met Kat in 2022, toward the end of her time at Brisbane, as she was beginning to get back in with the Matildas. I found myself crying in the baby aisle of a rather desolate IGA in Clayfield when she crouched next to me and asked me if I was alright. I didn’t look up as I struggled to calm my sobbing to explain my situation.

“He- he left me. I’m 21 and pregnant without a partner. How am I supposed to have a baby without a partner?” I stared up at her with red-rimmed eyes and tears that stream down my cheeks. It’s then that I notice she has a young baby resting on her hip, eyes gently closed as her head rests on the shoulder of this woman.

“Do… do you have anyone that will help?” I vigorously shook my head, then told her how I’d been living alone for 4 years, my parents running off to whatever dingy town they decided would bring them the most drugs without police caring.

“A- and he kicked me out. Oh fuck I don’t have anywhere to live what the fuck am I doing?!” my eyes frantically flickered around the store as my situation settled in. There was no way I could survive this.

“I know this is a weird offer but… you could live with me? I have a spare bedroom and rent is getting kind of wild. And Harper would love you.” She looked down at the girl who clung to her with such adoration.

“I’m Katrina.” She reached out her hand and I took it.

“Y/n” I smiled gently at her.

“I mean it. You living with me. I had Harper 8 months ago and I have bunch of pregnancy books and clothes and all that stuff.”

“W- what about your partner? Won’t he mind?”

“She lives in Sweden, so probably not.” Katrina then told me her story of wanting to be a mum and going through IVF, and how Harper brought her back to football.

~~~~~

About 2 months later, I was flying over to Sweden, following shortly after Kat and Harper left. I attended pretty much every game Kat played, taking care of Harper when her mum couldn’t make it, and researching a lot.

I was lucky my job was remote, so I was able to move around with Kat without an issue. My boss had sent a small gift basket of baby books and clothes when I told her I would be living overseas for 6 or so months. She also gave me less work, insisting that I meet people and do fun things instead of worrying about how much I had to do. She was probably the person who pushed me the most to meet someone new.

It was 2 weeks after I moved in with Kat, and met Clara, that I met Charlotte and Kyra. Despite Kyra’s club being 5 – 6 hours away, she’d somehow managed to make it down for a few days on a short break between matches. We all went for coffee and brunch, me limiting my food to hashbrowns and toast because most other things made me nauseas.

Charlie and Kyra asked how Kat and I met and why I was living with them. I gave them a rather short version of the day in the IGA, and Charlie reached over and put an empathetic hand on my shoulder. I give a tight-lipped smile in return.

It doesn’t take long for me to grow close to the two younger players Kat had also taken under her wing. Some days they had off, I’d take Harper off Kat and Clara’s hands and take her somewhere with Charlie, like the park or a pool. Other days we’d all go together and when Kyra could, she’d come down and spend a couple days.

It’s nice to have friends my age to hang out and talk with, Katrina having been the only person I had for the most part of 3 or so months.

Both girls insisted I need to meet the other Matildas, but I struggled to find time when they have camp, or I’m too nauseas to travel.

This creates a new problem when Kat and Clara both decide to head back to Brisbane in mid-November now that the Swedish season is done, so Kat can play with the Roar again during the A-League season.

My bump is relatively big, and most forms of travel make me sick, so I know I won’t really be able to travel with them back home, and in a few more weeks I won’t be allowed to fly. So I’m stuck by myself again. Until Charlie makes a rather compelling offer.

They don’t have any matches in the up-coming international break, so she offers me to live with her for the time being so I’m not as alone. The one fault to present itself, is she only has 1 bed. I insist I sleep on the couch, but she waves the idea away as I hold my stomach, trying to relieve some pressure.

“Oh! Can I try something? It might help give you some relief for a moment. I saw it on TikTok.” I simply nod my head; I’ll try anything at this point.

I’m slightly shocked when she circled around behind me and reached around my front, but I can’t question anything before she placed her hands beneath my belly and lifts. I groan in relief and my hand rolls back onto her shoulder.

“Holy shit that feels so nice.” She holds my belly for a minute or so before gently removing her hands and pressing a kiss to my cheek.

I flush red as she goes back to making lunch. I’ve found myself doing that a lot around her recently. Any nice gesture or any touch and I’m blushing and butterflies flutter around my stomach. Sometimes I wonder if the same thing happens to her.

Later in the day, I'm desperate to take a nap, so I slowly lay down on Charlie’s couch. It takes her all of 5 seconds to realise and start pulling me up, dragging me to her bedroom.

“If you’re so adamant that I don’t sleep on the couch, and you definitely shouldn’t be sleeping on the couch, we can share the bed. It’s big enough for us both.” I don’t have the energy to refuse as I fall back against the pillows, eyes fluttering shut as Charlie plays with my hair.

~~~~~

I spend the next 2 months spending time with Charlie and Kyra, who also decided not to travel home until their Cup of Nations games in February. Kyra stays on a blow-up mattress she lugged with her from Stockholm while Charlie and I continue to share the bed.

I’m a week away from my due date when I feel something wet drip down my legs. Kyra and Charlie freak out, but I let them know my contractions haven’t started. And I nearly think that maybe it was somehow a false alarm.

Nearly a day later, I feel severe pressure on my pelvis. I groan in pain and clutch my stomach as I move positions, assuming it’s just a Braxton Hicks contraction. The pain doesn’t subside for a minute or so, and Kyra doesn’t take notice of my groans from the other room, on a call with Charlie who had forgotten the grocery list and now had to have Kyra recite it to her so she could rewrite it on her phone.

I don’t think much of the contraction until I feel another one 20 minutes later, and another 20 minutes after that. They progressively get closer together and I call out to Kyra to help me up from the bed before calling for an ambulance, and I frantically scroll my contacts for Charlie’s number. It takes 10 minutes for her keys to rattle against the door and she rushes in, followed closely by the paramedics.

~~~~~

I suffer through 13 hours of labour before I’m holding a small bundle in my arms, Charlie holding another, as Kyra takes photos to send Kat later.

“I can’t believe that fucking piece of shit left you, but at least he gave you two little cuties.” Charlie passes the baby off to Kyra and turns to me.

“I wouldn’t have been able to do any of this without you, Kat and Kyra.”

“I’m so proud of you.” I don’t stop to think before I lean over and gently place my lips on hers, her strawberry chapstick is all I can taste.

I see a flash go off in the corner of my eye and whip my head to look at Kyra, who giggles sheepishly before looking back down at the baby in her arms.

“I know this is probably rushed and wild, but do you want to move in with me? Officially? We can find a bigger place to house the girls. But I’ve been holding in my feelings for you for like 6 months now. I promise to take care and love you and the twins with my whole heart.” A tear falls down my cheek as I nod my head, and she kisses me again.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“Oh! Mini’s calling! She doesn’t know! What do I do? Do I answer?” Kyra interrupts us, frantically looking for whether she should answer or not.

“Facetime her.” Kyra hands the baby back to Charlie and quickly facetimes Katrina, who doesn’t take a moment to answer.

“None of you have answered any of my calls for the past 14 hours what the fuck is going on? Why does it look like you’re in a hospital” is the first thing she says as Kyra’s phone faces away from me.

“Well… we have a surprise.” The phone slowly pans over to Charlie and I and we both grin.

“WHAT THE FUCK? You had the baby?!”

“Babies” Charlie corrects her.

“Twins?!”

“Kat, I’d like you to meet Ashley Jade and Maysilee Hazel Gorry.” Everyone’s heads snap to look at me as I smile.

“What, what do you mean ‘Gorry’?”

“You literally changed my life, took me in when I had no one, introduced me to my best friend… and girlfriend,” I pause and give Charlie a look, she smiles in return.

“I also changed my name like a month ago, to Y/n Gorry. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Of course I don’t mind what the fuck!?” I glance back at Katrina; tears prick at her eyes and my own mirror her’s.

“I’m going to fucking fly over and meet those little cuties.”

“Well, I was thinking… if they’re healthy enough to travel, we’d fly over with Kyra and Charlie for your Cup of Nations matches in February? And I’d meet the team.” Another wave of shock ripples through out the room

“Fuck yes!”

We talk to Kat for a while after that. Harper tumbles into screen and coos at the babies but soon looses interest, and Clara comes in to congratulate me. We eventually have to say goodbye.

“Is it ok if I head back to the apartment? I think if I fall asleep on these chairs, I’ll never be able to play again.” Kyra dramatically complains, but I just smile and nod, sending her on her way.

“I know I already said it, but I am so proud of you and I love you so much. You could’ve given up on these babies, but you pushed through.”

“I couldn’t have done it without you Char, these little guys are going to adore their mumma so much.”

“Of course they will, you’re so amazing.”

“I mean you…”

“R-really?”

“I wouldn’t want anyone else by my side.” She kisses me passionately, well as passionately as you can kiss someone who’s lying in a hospital bed while you’re both holding a baby.

~~~~~

“Are you excited to see your aunties?” Ashley and Maysilee’s giggles fill the car ass Charlie tickles their feet.

“Yay yay yay!” they both chant as we help them out of the car and onto their feet.

They’re running down the corridor as soon as the elevator doors part open, giggling and screaming without knowing where they’re supposed to be going. They only stop when they run into two pairs of legs, and they sheepishly look up as they go to apologise, only to be picked up.

“Aunty MinMin! Aunty Anna!” Maysilee screams as Alanna gives her a sloppy kiss on the cheek, Ashley much quieter as she returns Kat’s hug.

“We’ll look after them while you settle in. I missed my favourite twins.” Kat says as she also gives Maysilee a gentle kiss on the forehead.

Charlie and I take each other’s hand as we walk to our room, kissing our daughters goodbye and thanking the pair of teammates. When we reach the room, I waste no time in fall on the bed, Charlie following swiftly behind. I lean into her as she wraps her arms around me before I kiss her.

We spend another hour or so cuddling and kissing, basking in the childless quiet. I admire Charlie like I do every moment we get together, her crystal blue eyes, the shape of her nose, her dull pink lips, the small scar above her right eyebrow. And I wonder the same thing I always do; how did I get so lucky.

“I can’t believe we brought our kids to the Olympics. Who does that? We should have left them with someone back in London.” I joke before kissing her.

“I’d take my babies anywhere; I hate being apart from you all.” Charlie pouts and kisses me again, and again.

~~~~~

Charlie brings Ashley, Maysilee and I to all the events and training sessions Tony allows her to, the girls always with one of their Mumma’s jerseys on or something that showcases a blatant support for the Matildas.

After a particularly difficult game, the team silently heads back to their rooms, Charlie curling up under the blanket as I get the twins ready for bed. When they notice she hasn’t come to kiss them goodnight, they clamber up onto the bed and start to tickle and poke her. She doesn’t respond and they seem to understand she’s upset.

“What’s wrong mumma?”

“Mumma’s just sad and hurt about today babies.” Charlie whispers through shaky breath.

I watch as they calm down and instead wrap their arms around her and kiss her gently, like she kisses them when they’re hurt. I slowly slide in behind Ashley, wrapping my arm around all 3 of them.

“We’ve got you baby.” I give them all a kiss and we fall asleep like that, the sun slowly allowing the blanket of stars to fill the sky.

#woso x reader #woso #womens soccer #the matildas x reader #the matildas #charlie grant x reader

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feybeasts · 4 months

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Okay see now the notion of "big ol' werewolf who is a Uncontrollable Pet" actually has me thinking on the notion of a werewolf who doesn't turn someone traditionally- no, they show up as a "pet" and then eventually by virtue of their lifestyle being such a constant for their "owner," eventually turns them too.

Sorry, pal, I imprinted on you, we're gonna have junk food and cuddle, eventually you start to notice that it isn't just my loose fur on everything, that you've sprouted a tail, that your hands look more like paws- oh sure, there's initial panic, but the truth is, ever since I've showed up, you've been finding yourself able to relax more, to not sweat the small stuff, to relish in a little chaos- by the time you're more lupine than human, you're fully on board with my way of things- which is great! I've got a pack of folks who were like you once, and you- and your house (our house now)- are gonna fit right in!

I mean, it's also how I avoid paying for rent, but y'know.

#werewolf #transformation #freeloading is cool and awesome

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painted-bees · 6 months

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part i

Hitting a cafe during rush hour wasn’t Raf’s definition of a fun idea, and he was well practised in the art of saying ‘no’. Yet, for some reason or another, that skill failed to find him when the wide-eyed little Portasound busker insisted on treating him to a coffee.

The streets outside Granville Station were abuzz with traffic of all kinds. The wide sidewalks were, at least, accommodating to the amount of pedestrians that relied on them during the city’s busiest times of day. The same could not be said for the roads as cars rolled slowly forward, bumper to bumper. Still, the ambience was manageable despite all the bustle. Only the hissing, honking noises of transit bus breaks would coax the occasional wince out of him in their random, unpredictable intervals.

The little Portasound busker, ‘Magritte’, kept up beside him in lock step. She hadn’t stopped talking since they began their walk together and, in honesty, he preferred it that way. She was a disheveled little thing, more than a head shorter than he was. Her manner of dress was as sloppy as the thick bundle of curly, dark red hair that flopped loosely atop her head. Her grey sweater was several sizes too large, covering her to the knees. With sleeves that hung far past her hands if she didn’t scrunch them in her palms. Black leggings were tucked into knock-off ugg boots whose soles had eroded so severely on the outer edge, Raf was concerned she’d roll an ankle if he made her walk too briskly. She smiled so vehemently as she spoke, that her lips rarely closed around consonants, making it difficult to understand her at times.

“–so when my dad was like, ‘you can stay here and work, or you can move out and do your music stuff’, I moved out. That was like…oh–almost three years! I was eighteen. I just turned twenty-one today!” She accompanied that last sentence with a joyful little skip that caused Raf to turn his head and watch her.

“Well, happy birthday.” He exhaled a small laugh. “Vancouver’s an expensive place to live, but house hunting here probably already gave you the full story on that.”

“Rent’s insane,” Magritte echoed his small chuckle. “But the weather’s way more agreeable in the winter, which is what I’m after. And the music scene! I heard there were tons of musicians in Van, and look–I’ve already met two in the first few hours of being here!”

“Oh, you’ll meet more.” The way he said it made it sound more cautioning than he intended and he diffused it with a snort. “Guess the music stuff must have paid off after all, if you can afford a place in the city.”

There was silence between them and Magritte chewed the nail of her forefinger for a moment. “It actually hasn’t, I’m not a professional musician by any means. I’m just really good at finding a lot of short term work and stuff. Sometimes it’s music related, but not often enough to call it a living.”

“Mmh.” Raf glanced down at her. The bounce in her step had vanished and he watched her chew on her lip beneath a knitted brow. With a shrug he said, “You sounded good in the station, all things considered. You stopped, you listened, you came in at appropriate moments, you improvised really well. The pieces I played weren’t really…great for busking…and demanded a lot more than what your little keyboard could reasonably provide, but even your rests were composed and natural. You didn’t drop off abruptly any time the melody brought you past the range of your keys, you played into it.” He smirked. “I’m not gonna lie and say we did a great justice to Paganini today or anything, but I was very surprised by what you were able to pull off. I dunno, seemed like the chops of a professional to me.”

That brought the bounce back into her step, though she continued to chew on her lower lip. Raf was content to see her spirits buoyed at least somewhat by his sentiments. He hadn’t embedded a single white lie into his assessment.

They arrived at the cafe of his choosing; a popular spot, very near to the station, named Caffe Artigiano. The outside seating was full up with patrons, but Raf hoped the inside would be a quieter space to sit anyways. Opening the door, he followed Magritte in. It was busier than he would have liked, but he couldn’t have expected differently, considering the hour. Still, one thing he appreciated about the place was that it did not play music. Only the sound of numerous quiet conversations filled the air. Raf gravitated towards a freshly vacated table in a far corner, and Magritte followed him to it. Her gaze hung on the coffee menu that loomed above the counter.

He waited for Magritte to pick her seat before gently offloading his violin case onto the seat across from her. “I’ll go order. Was it a latte you said you wanted?”

“Actually…” She let out an indecisive little sigh. “A mocha, I think. I want…choco. Oh, but–!” She dropped her duffel bag onto the ground before unzipping a side pouch and pulling out the twenty dollar bill that had found its way into her upturned ball cap at the station. She held it out to him. “With this! Please?”

He hesitated before taking the bill from her. “Yes, ma’am.” There was no point in telling her that the twenty had been his before it became hers. The thought was what mattered.

The line at the counter wasn’t long, despite the busy patronage, and Raf soon returned to their table and evicted his violin case out of the seat across from Magritte. Finding an unused chair from a nearby table, he pulled it up next to him and sat his carrying case on it.

He reached over the table to hand Magritte the change, and she stared at it blankly for a moment before saying, “–Oh!” with a bit of a start. She turned her palm up to receive it.

Magritte stuffed the money back into the pocket of her duffel bag. “So, Question.” She sat back up and looked to Raf. “You say you’re not a professional, but you sound like...you know…Properly trained, or whatever.”

“Mmh.” It was a predictable topic, but not one he wanted to stay on. “Or whatever.” He laughed. “Yeah. Parents pushed it onto me a little too hard. I’ve got the training, but playing it is a chore and I kinda hate it.”

Magritte’s eyes grew wide and rueful and she shrank against the backrest of her chair. “Wait, really?” She covered her face with the sleeves of her sweater and threw her head back with a guilty little groan. “I’m sorry, I made you play so many songs!”

Raf patted the air in front of him in a placating gesture, “No, no. You didn’t make me do anything, relax.” He sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I did that to myself. I meant it, though, when I said it was fun. It was the first time in a long while where I actually enjoyed myself once things got going.”

Magritte drew in a deep breath, recollecting herself before tentatively asking, “Enough that you’d wanna do it again sometime?”

A beleaguered laugh escaped him, “No.” He had given her much of his time and energy already, and being asked for more put a bitter taste in his mouth. The arrival of his iced americano and her hot mocha couldn’t have been better timed. As soon as it was placed in front of him, he brought the drink to his lips and took a long sip.

Magritte sheepishly turned her gaze down to admire the little white hearts in the foam of her coffee before she started to drink it. She placed the cup back down but kept both hands curled around it. “Did you enjoy it when you were younger?”

“Music?” Raf shrugged. “I don’t remember. It doesn’t really matter.” His gaze turned down towards her duffel bag as he grasped for a better topic. “Is your main instrument the piano?”

“Yeah! It’s what I had access to, growing up.”

“Who taught you?”

“Oh, I, uh…mostly just the internet and stuff. My parents didn’t wanna waste money on it, and my highschool didn’t have like…a music class or anything. Just choir. None of my friends played music.”

“...You learned online?”

“Well, like…on Myspace and LiveJournal. Lots of people share what they know there, and I made some really good online friends who tried to teach me things. We’d share music with each other and do weekly challenges and stuff. It was fun.”

“So, self-taught, more or less.”

“Mostly. Oh, except–!” Magritte ducked down to unzip the main pocket of her duffel bag and dove her hands into it. She rummaged around until she produced a small mp3 player and earbuds attached by a chord. “There was a year when I was living in Montreal, my girlfriend was a jazz pianist. And then we met other, um…friends who taught me more in that one year than I think I ever learned in my entire life. It was her and a whole lotta horns. They all let me use their instruments and taught me proper technique and stuff. I think they liked watching me stubbornly struggle with it. In the end, I was only able to record one song before I had to, um, move on. But I’m still kinda proud of it. I dunno if you wanna–it’s instrumental and kinda eclectic, but I loved making it.”

In response, Raf extended his hand, and Magritte spent a second scrolling through her library of mp3s before stuffing the little music device and earbuds into his open palm.

She performed an excited little wiggle in her seat as Raf wordlessly placed an earbud into his ear. “Just hit play, and it should be the right song.”

Raf wasn’t sure what he had expected to hear. He was, at least, perfectly comfortable with listening and offering his honest input. He didn’t believe in ‘bad’ music. There was skilled and unskilled music, there was music that fit his tastes and music that really didn’t. But none of it was bad. All music created deserved to be created and allowed to exist–if only for the satisfaction of the musician who produced it. He was prepared to tell her that the best music she could make is the music she enjoyed making, even if it didn’t resonate with his personal tastes. He pressed ‘play’.

What hit his ear was an uptempo half-time funk sound carried on a unison horn line; crystal clear, well mixed, high quality audio. Right from the jump, the sound had a quirky, catching character. He fitted the other earbud into his ear as a sustained note leapt into an energetic, off-beat ska groove. His brow furrowed deeply as he tried to discern the instrumentation. The drum fill might have been digital, but the winds sounded far too dynamic to be synthetic. And there were…three of them; the two horns he couldn’t quite specify, and then a baritone sax. The horns took centre stage, confident and playful, supported by a jaunty walking bassline and synthetic, bubbly organ accompaniment. Despite its G minor key signature, the character of the piece was lively and a little goofy, smart but playful; it was simply–fun. A smile lit across his face as the melody modulated G minor into G Phrygian for the bridge section. The effect was a jesting ooh gonna getcha vibe.

He listened to the end of the song before he began to comment on it. “Very cool. Your jazz friends weren’t sleeping on their music theory classes. I assume the organ is you?”

Magritte shifted nervously in her seat as her thumb smoothed over the handle of her coffee cup in small, repeated strokes. “I borrowed instruments for this one and recorded it in…um, my girlfriend’s parents' house. They had a music room where I was allowed to record things.”

“You borrowed–right. But the horns..?”

“Yeah.”

Raf levelled a measuring stare at her.

“I recorded each instrument separately,” she began explaining, “It’s uh, piano, trumpet, trombone, and–oh! The baritone sax was played by Sadie, one of my, um…jazz friends.” She let out a weak laugh. “And then, like…a bass, I also played. And a synthetic drum fill ‘cus…none of us knew how to actually play drums.”

“You played each instrument? Learned them and recorded this song within the span…of a year?”

“No, just the trumpet and trombone! I already knew piano and bass.” Confusion must have been apparent on Raf’s face, and she tried to address it by saying, “It’s all digitally processed, so it sounds a little more–”

“No, I–I know that.” Raf massaged an eyebrow with one hand. “You’re the songwriter too, I assume?” His tone was a little more sharp than he’d have liked it to be. It betrayed his incredulity.

Magritte picked up her cup and eyed him nervously over the rim as she sipped from it.

“No, I don’t know how.” She sounded embarrassed. “I can’t read or write music. I just sketched a bunch of it out digitally first, and then–”

“Fresh compositions? By ear?”

“Yeah. And then I recreated it with the correct instrumentation.” She chewed on the nail of her thumb. “It works, I think.”

“That’s still songwriting. It counts.” Raf sniffed and leaned back in his seat. “I gotta be honest, and don’t take this the wrong way but…it’s a little hard to believe.”

Magritte’s nervousness dissolved into a flattered grin. “Yeah?”

Raf’s brow twitched downward as he tried to read past her demeanour. He had expected a more sheepish response, if not a more defensive one. His doubt wasn’t intended as a compliment, but if she were being wholly honest with him, perhaps it made sense that she’d take it as one.

He drained the last of his americano. “So, you’re not pursuing this professionally, because..?”

“Oh, I am!” Magritte shrugged and turned her eyes to the upper right corner of the room. “It’s just been kinda…difficult.”

“Yeah? Why’s that?” It was a stupid question he already knew the answer to. Music was more easy to find nowadays than ever before, but discoverability still relied on knowing how to promote the work and get the right ears onto it. And, across the entire spectrum of skill, this is what everyone tended to blame for the inability to live off their–

“Money.”

“M–!” The response was so sudden and matter-of-fact in tone, Raf couldn’t stop a bark of surprised laughter from escaping him. He’d have laughed the same way if someone had just dumped a bucket of ice water over his head.

Magritte slapped her palms down on the table and leaned forward with wide eyes to state her defence. “Instruments are expensive, lessons are expensive, computers are expensive, software and sound libraries are expensive! Everything’s so expensive!” She slumped back in her seat, turning her palms over in an exasperated gesture. “If I could afford to go to school and actually like–learn music, and if I could afford to rent instruments and recording equipment and stuff, I could make more songs! I could upload like…whole albums! I’ve got all these doodles with my shitty midi libraries and they might sound actually good if I could just record them properly! But it’s been like…four years since I left home, and the only properly produced track I have to show for it is that one.” She flopped her hand towards the mp3 player on the table. “So, I just make my little digital doodles, and I come up with tunes that suit the sounds I have access to. I like it. I’m happy I get to make any music at all, but it’s a bit niche, you know? And I have all these other ideas in my head that need like…better, less…synthetic sounds. There are libraries that sound pretty convincing, but all the best ones are…expensive. And vocals are hard to record with the stuff I’ve got.”

Raf held up his hands in effort to placate her. “No, I know, you’re right–money. I just–” It wasn’t a struggle he had ever faced, and he couldn’t help but feel like a bit of a heel over the fact that he hadn’t even considered it as an obstacle to the extent that she was describing it.

“On the other hand,” Magritte’s voice took on a capitulating tone, “With the right skill, I should be able to produce bangers with whatever I’ve got, yeah? And,” she took up her coffee cup in one hand, staring into its contents, “if I was better at saving money, I’d be able to afford those really good sample libraries just fine, probably. I just like my sweet foamy lattes too much.” She sighed a little laugh at herself.

Raf let out a low groan of disagreement, but didn’t elaborate on it. “I kinda…want to listen to those ‘digital doodles’ you mentioned.” If nothing else, it’d give him an idea of how much input her jazz friends had over the composition of the song he heard. If the obvious compositional prowess flexed in that fun-loving jazzy ska piece were completely absent in her little sketches, he wouldn’t chalk it up to being just a fluke.

Drawing in a deep breath and holding it, Margritte reached for the mp3 player and scrolled through its contents before handing it to Raf. “You can just skip through these as you like. It’s all a little–” She wrinkled her nose and let out a grunt in place of any real adjective.

With an affirming little snort of his own, Raf took the little music player and put the earbuds into his ears once more. He pressed play, and immediately understood what she meant. The synthetic instrumentation was wholly lacking in dynamics, and the musical ideas present in the melodies begged for more colourful phrasing. As he skipped from one song to the next, he grew more frustrated. The compositional writing was good. Consistent with the first song he had heard, Magritte seemed to really love playing with eccentric progressions and modulations that were unconventional for the mood or emotion that the song was attempting to capture. And ever present in each little composition was this boundless sense of joy. But god, the instrumentation (or rather, the lack thereof) really, really held it all back.

As he listened, his lips pressed into a thin line. Finally, with a low groan that betrayed his thoughts, he took out the earbuds and handed the music player back. “Yeah, that sucks.” The end of that statement stuck in his throat as he sputtered to clarify, “Not the music–”

“Yes, the music.” Magritte’s giggle was one of genuine affirmation as she tucked the mp3 player away into her duffle bag.

“No,” Raf argued, “your toolset. There’s a lot of skill here, but the cheap synthy sounds aren’t doing it any favours. You went absolutely ham on those horns in the first song, and I don’t hear any of that in these sketches because it’s just not possible. There’s a lot of energy that is just…missing. Even watching you play at the station, yeah your keyboard suffers the same limitations, but at least in person I noticed you’ll even make use of like…the percussion of your fingers hitting the keys, which, you know…is dynamic.”

As he spoke, Magritte retained a smile and provided small nods before asking, “You like it, then?”

Raf leaned back, folded his arms and chewed on the question for a second before replying, “Yeah. I do. A lot.”

A lot.

There was a corner of his mind that begged him to get back home to his apartment and try out the melodies with an instrument that could do it proper justice. Jesus Christ, this actually makes me want to play the violin.

The realisation made his lip curl with a feeling in his gut that he couldn’t quite identify. “You know…”

Magritte, taking the last remaining sips of her latte, turned her eyes up at him with a little “Hm?”

There was a pause while Raf wrestled with himself. “I, uh…work at a recording studio not too far from here. Just down on uh…Powell Street.” He felt his jaw clench. There was no good reason for him to tell strangers about where he worked. There was no possible good outcome in doing so. Mentioning it felt too much like an open invitation for her to pop in at any time, for no good reason at all except to make things uncomfortable. “It’s called Hi-Note, and it’s got like…a pretty standard assortment of instruments to rent out and such. It closes early.” He wasn’t looking at her. Brow furrowed, he stared at the ice melting in his otherwise empty glass. “Swing by tomorrow night, after eight, and maybe we can jam for like..half an hour or something before I head home.”

He didn’t glance up to see her expression, but her voice was slow to rise to his ears. “..Wait, really?”

No. “Yeah.” What the fuck? “Really.” Unable to unfurrow his brow, he managed to at least turn his gaze towards her. Her eyes were so large on that petite face of hers, and her lips parted slightly, muscles tense with the anticipation of some kind of catch or condition. Or, perhaps she had picked up on his apprehension and was waiting for him to revoke the offer. For some reason, the idea of doing so suddenly felt…unconscionable to him.

In a small voice, she said, “I’d really like that.” The restraint of her response was belied by the way she wiggled in her chair. Beneath the table, her leg wagged restlessly like an excited dog’s tail. “Eight o’clock?”

“Mmhm.” Raf felt some of the tension in his browline relax as a slight smile passed his lips. “Let's see if we can revisit some of those tunes you have. Just–for fun. No recording, nothing serious.”

It seemed that Magritte could never keep a smile off her face for long, and once again, that broad, delighted grin of hers painted her features. “Yeah, yeah! I’d like that a lot!”

“Alright then.” Raf knocked his knuckles twice on the table like a gavel, before standing up.

As he reached to retrieve his violin case off the chair next to him, Magritte pressed her fingertips to her temples. “Hi-Note, eight o’clock.”

Raf favoured her with a lopsided smirk. “Don’t forget.”

“I won’t. I’ll see you there!”

He provided her with an affirmative little wave, but by the time she had realised he was taking his leave, Raf was already halfway to the door.

He heard her call out to him, “Thank you for the–um–everything!”

Looking back to her, Raf returned the sentiment with an appreciative nod before pushing through the cafe doors; exiting onto the busy sidewalk outside.

He wanted to get home before sundown…

To play his violin.

#Hi-Note #I'm not a very good writer I don't paint very well with words haha but this is at least one way to get the scenes outta my head!#rafael #magritte

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ros3ybabe · 24 days

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Daily Check-in: April 5, 2024 🎀

Friday was a decently good day! I managed to get some stuff done despite extremely fatigue (thank you womanhood), a 6.5 hour class, and crying my eyes out on zoom with my boyfriend (again, thank you womanhood). I hate having a functional female body, but I love being a woman? ughh, the confliction

🩷 What I Accomplished:

completed Chapter 9 of Spanish on Busuu

Created an excel spreadsheet to track scholarship applications that I am going to begin working on soon

watched a short YouTube interview in Spanish for some passive/active-ish learning

took a peak at the pdf Spanish textbook I'm going to begin using

read the first chapter of Essentialism (not sure if I'm going to keep reading that for now)

caught up on hand written psyc notes from the last two lectures

created a list of things for my excel spreadsheet for hosting rent options near my campus (I am moving out of my current place soon)

made my brain dump list for the week

planned out my upcoming week loosely

contacted a financial peer mentor from my university for help learning about budgeting and saving better

🩷 Good Things That Happened:

my position in my restaurant class barely changed, so I'm happy

met most of my prioritized goals

decorated one of my tracking journals with cute stickers

got confirmation that my friend is taking me to work on Saturday

had a really good day overall

got to zoom call my boyfriend twice

talked to my dad on the phone twice

my grade in one of my classes went up from a 79 to an 83

🩷 What Could've Been Better:

my friend and I accidently swapped chem lab notebooks on Thursday so I wasn't able to do my report with the extension

got told I was talking to loud during my restaurant class :(

found that I'm working with a girl I'm not too fond of (due to her controlling and "authoritative" tendencies) for my restaurant class

cried on zoom with my boyfriend because this time of year is hard for me

lots of back pain and low stomach cramping

drank a soda after having a coffee and had waayyy too much energy

didn't drink enough water or eat enough protein/vitamin-richs foods

🩷 Stuff To Do Tomorrow:

work shift 8am to 3pm

complete small Spanish study tasks

read a chapter of a book

update my brain dump list

create excel spreadsheet for renting options near the campus

look into savings template for my goals

find out how many hours I've worked to guesstimate my pay for this upcoming paycheck

complete assignment for chemistry

Saturday is going to be a good day! I am going to make sure I have a good day on Saturday because even if bad things happen, it doesn't mean my day itself was inherently bad. Gotta stay optimistic

til next time lovelies 🩷

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flashbastardsramblings · 7 months

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Our Flag Means Death is literally the series of the decade. I'm not even kidding. It has changed my life. It has altered my brain chemistry and it has made me happier than any piece of media in the past five years. It has been living rent-free (huh, get it?) in my mind ever since it aired and I can't stop thinking about it. I make playlists about it. I buy every single piece of artwork I can find at cons. I save every fan art, every meme every gif. I know this may sound too much, but I've never in my life been able to like and enjoy something 'normally', or more accurately, in moderation. I fixate very intensely and the object of my obsession consumes me entirety. Ofmd came into my life, cupped my face and kissed me gently on the forehead. It's undoubtedly the best queer show we've gotten and I'm so grateful. Watching it has changed me. It has changed the way I feel about myself, my queerness, my gender identity, my body, about everything really. It has changed the way I look at things. It has unlocked something deep within me. It has cracked my heart open. It fucking scares me how much the show has affected me, and I know most some people won't get it, but this post is for those who do. And for myself I suppose, because honestly I'm so fucking grateful to everyone involved in ofmd. It feels so fucking good to have a show that celebrates queerness and queer love in such an open way. It's stuff like this that makes being alive more bearable. It makes you feel that it's all worth it.

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cheesus-doodles · 1 year

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Since I rarely saw (y/n) being an executive alongside Hanma and Kisaki, here I go with platonic Hanma, (y/n), Kisaki trio. Those two spoil you when you are very much capable of buying your own things, probably teased you for being single when those two ARE THE REASON WHY YOU'RE SINGLE, won't date you but won't allow anyone to touch you either. You're probably hated by the girls Hanma and Kisaki surrounded themselves with tho.

IM FEELING SOME HCs SO HAVE SOME ANON - these takes place in the future between the Bloody Halloween arc and the Black Dragon arc

Masterlist

‎

Toman Executive Reader + Yan BFF Hanma & Kisaki HCs

Yandere Platonic Hanma & Kisaki

how you managed to befriend these two delinquents of all people is a different matter, but needless to say once they were fixed on you, they don't ever leave again

if you already had another job, too bad, you don't anymore - Hanma and Kisaki would have pulled out all stops to get you out from there, even if it meant burning the entire company down

these two (mostly Kisaki) definitely only agreed to you being a Toman executive alongside them because it would be so much easier to keep an eye on you

none of the other Toman executives understand why you are even an executive to begin with, as you’ve never been a formal part of Toman before - you only pulled in much later on once Kisaki became Mikey's right hand man

and neither were you able to stomach the mere mention of murder, let alone any of the more more awful and gritty crimes that Toman gets up to

you're barely even present at the regular earning meetings, since your job is a very surface level job, in charge of running of their smaller shell companies, and you don't exactly bring in the big bucks for the gang

but of course no one is going to question Kisaki about it, especially not if Mikey has already agreed to it

you're still given a hefty salary despite contributing almost nothing though, courtesy of your two friends

but that doesn't matter, since they would buy everything for you

house? nope, you stay with them in their Toman penthouse for "safety reasons", and no one seems to be be willing to rent or sell to you for some reason

clothes and bags? oh whaddya know, they mistakenly bought the wrong size/fit/style/gendered clothes again and its perfectly in your size and suits you - you don't want to these extremely expensive items to go to waste do you?

food? why do you want to go out and eat when they have their own personal, vetted team of chefs who can whip anything you can think of up?

you're spoiled and pampered whether you want to be or not, because Kisaki and Hanma are incapable of seeing you as anything but that small fragile friend that they made all those years ago

and you would always be that small friend to them who couldn't even take a fall without crying, let alone throw a punch to save your life

you weren't built for this world, certainly not their dark, messed-up world, and therefore it's up to them to shelter and protect you

you brighten their bloody lives, so its no wonder that these two love to spend every minute they can with you

anything that the two don't like, such as clothes that were too skimpy for their taste or that they didn't look good on you, gifts given to you by people they didn't approve of, would evaporate the moment you turn away

and you can't get a straight answer out of them what happened - they wouldn't lie to you, but that didn't mean they wouldn't run circles around your head with what they did with your stuff

no way would you be ever able to beat either men in their game of words

if not one or both of them being at your side constantly, they have an excuse to have a full team of their most trusted security forces accompany you absolutely everywhere

cameras and microphones absolutely everywhere in your home, at your office, in your car, hidden trackers on you and your stuff

these boys can't function without knowing everything about you and what you were doing - they just simply have to know that you were still alive, you were okay, and you weren't doing anything they wouldn't approve of behind their backs

like meeting strangers, getting into trouble with other gangs, or worst of all, finding a partner

even during meetings they have updates on your whereabouts and actions constantly pinging their phone

starts getting visibly fidgety when the updates go quiet for five minutes, to the point one or both of them would stand up and leave the room to call and get a hold of you

despite being part of the literal yakuza, you still have a set of rules that you have to follow, laid down by your two friends, which included not allowing you to get your hands dirty with actual yakuza work (the irony)

good cop, bad cop kind of system I would image, though the boundaries between good and bad are kinda blurred when it comes to Hanma and Kisaki

Hanma is more often than not the good cop; a lot more relaxed when it comes to you and your rules - more than happy to turn a blind eye to anything less than serious if it met you would come running to him to hide from Kisaki

would also be the one to spoil you rotten, taking you out for shopping and partying (at private Toman clubs with selected people only of course)

whereas Kisaki would be more the bad cop more often than not, being the one that has to remind you and hold you to their rules, and dish out the punishments whenever you break them

be it smacking you on your hands to the more severe locking you in a room for a week with no contact

but Kisaki does have his soft moments and Hanma does have his tougher moments - each of them have their boundaries when it comes to you and your antiques

they don't want to have to break bones or cut flesh to get you to listen to them, but push them to far and you probably wouldn't like what they become when their need to protect you and their jealousy get out of hand

no dating is an unspoken rule for you laid down by Kisaki, especially so among the other executives, though not that you know about it

doesn't matter if its a boy, girl, or anything in between, the only people in your life should just be Hanma and Kisaki

but you're still a sight for sore eyes when you do get invited to their manager meetings, with the rest of the executives being able to breathe a bit easier and relax even in the presence of Kisaki

they know that your presence means that none of the two would be pulling any funny business

neither like to have to beat the living shit or execute someone in front of you, so that is usually kept behind close doors

they keep an eye on the few executives who they think might be more of an issue to handle if they get to you, or they think you're one charming smile away from falling for

you have tried making small talk with a few of them, only for the reaction you get being for them to simply look away and pretend you haven't said anything, to whoever it is scrambling to get away from you

friendly, smiling face at you; dirty, warning side eye when facing away at everyone else

neither Hanma nor Kisaki would touch you either - no no, they can never see you in that kind of light

and neither did you see them as potential romantic partners

so single you remain, even if its against your will - none of your dates ever seem to go right, if they even turn up

Hanma lives for excitement, so drugs and girls seem to be up his alley whenever he ventures out into the night, whereas Kisaki doesn't seem to be the sort to go out of his way to get girls, but no doubt with his position of power there will be those who want to be seen with him and maybe even catch his eyes

so no doubt you would always be crowded around by jealous girls who can't believe that of all people you're the one that seems to always have Kisaki's and Hanma's attention

they won't tolerate any sort of actual malice or slander tossed your way though, and especially not any sort of advance on you though Toman should know better

a general increase in crime can be noted on those nights that they allow you out

p.s. if you read this, thanks for reading to the end! do consider coming to join us on Discord! i'm always there and I love TR

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skyward-floored · 4 months

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Warriors gets his nickname

Hi I’m not updating long fics even though I want to, I’m instead writing more short Incredibles au stuff *collapses*. I’ll update other things eventually I promise ;-;

This is the furthest back fic I’ve written I think— Time is only a teenager, and Warriors is very smol. Time goes by Time because he got sick of them both being Link, but Warriors doesn’t have a nickname yet. I think that’s all the background you really need though, so I’ll stop and just let you read already.

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Link held tight to Time’s hand as they walked down the sidewalk, headed towards the corner stand where Time knew they could get lunch for cheap. He usually skipped lunch himself, or just nibbled something small, but since it was the weekend, Link wasn’t in school and he had to get him something.

Time looked down at his little brother, Link trotting along beside him. He was nearly drowning in his too-big scarf, and Time flipped it around his neck one more time so he wouldn’t trip on it, Link giving him a little smile.

Time sighed to himself.

He was still figuring out how to deal with having a kid as his responsibility, but... he was making it work. He’d managed to get Link in a preschool on weekdays, and was working on a more permanent place for them to stay besides “in this nice tree” or “in the backseat of the car”. Nobody believed him when he said he was old enough to rent an apartment when he tried though, so it was usually still the backseat of the car for them.

But in general, Time didn’t usually feel like screaming, and was able to keep Link happy, so he was counting the whole thing as at least a partial success.

He seriously needed to find a nickname for the kid though— two Links was two too many.

Why did you name him after me, Mom? he thought as he watched Link jump over a slushy puddle. Why did you leave him with me? Surely you knew someone who who would do a better job? Someone who’s an adult? I’m his brother, but that doesn’t mean I know how to raise him.

A crashing sound made Time’s ears prick, and the thoughts he’d been repeatedly having ever since he’d met Link fled as he turned towards a tiny side street, one that ran behind several shops.

He tugged Link over towards the alley, suspicion in every step. That hadn’t just sounded like a normal dropping-something crash to him. And sure enough, he found a newly shattered window that led into a pawn shop, a shadow disappearing into the shelves inside.

“...bad guy?” Link asked, and Time nodded, already looking for a spot to switch into his super suit.

“Bad guy. A crazy one too, breaking and entering in broad daylight. Looks like somebody doesn’t know that stealing is wrong,” he said with a tsk, and Link let out a small giggle.

Time quickly ducked behind a dumpster to change, and emerged moments later, flexing his hands in his gloves. Link gave him an interested look, and Time suddenly remembered that he couldn’t very well bring his four-year-old brother inside with him.

“...Right,” Time sighed, then scooped Link up and quickly deposited him behind the same dumpster he’d changed behind. “Stay here, don’t let him or anyone see you. I’ll take care of him but don’t come out until I come get you.”

Link frowned, worry pinching at his eyebrows, and Time tucked his scarf a little more tightly around him.

“I’ll be fine, don’t worry,” Time assured, but Link kept frowning.

“Hurt?”

“I won’t get hurt. And even if I do I can handle it, but I need to not worry about you while I fight. Stay here,” Time said firmly, then turned and jumped into the shattered window before his brother could argue.

He spotted the robber within seconds, the man breaking open a glass case with all sorts of valuables stored inside. Time put his little brother out of his mind for now, and crept closer, then abruptly cleared his throat. The man jumped at the noise and whipped around, brandishing a crowbar and staring at him.

“I don’t think those belong to you,” Time said with a smirk, and the man swung, Time nimbly jumping out of the way.

“Fierce Deity,” the man spat, and Time gave him a mocking bow.

“At your service. Put the fancy gold watches back.”

The man laughed, then his eyes narrowed behind the reptilian mask he wore. “Dinolfos of the Lizal gang doesn’t take orders from you.”

“Fine,” Time sighed, rolling his eyes. “I guess we’re doing this the hard way.”

He threw a punch towards Dinolfos, which the robber neatly avoided, and the two began to fight, weaving around each other and dodging attacks.

Dinolfos was surprisingly skilled at avoiding Time’s punches, and Time had barely landed any hits after several minutes. Dinolfos on the other hand, had grazed him at least twice now, and annoyance began to swell in Time’s chest. He wasn’t incapacitated from the hits, but he didn’t like where this was going.

He fought faster, managing to knock the crowbar from Dinolfos’s hand, and the battle sped up without the weapon in the mix, kicks and punches just barely grazing both of them.

This guy is fast, Time thought, lunging out of the way of a punch that likely would have given him a bloody nose. How is he so fast?! Argh.

Time managed a swing that connected with Dinalfos’s shoulder, and he reeled back, shouting in anger as he lunged for Time. Time once again dodged out of the way, and noticed with a smirk that his opponent’s swings were getting more wild.

He backed up to give himself some space, easily dodging the angry punches thrown at him. Time stuck his tongue out as Dinolfos missed again, and his opponent let out a roar of frustration as Time continued to easily avoid his angered strikes.

Until Time stumbled on the dropped crowbar.

His foot slipped and Dinolfos lunged, kicking Time right in the chest and knocking the breath out of him as he was thrown straight through the broken window. He went flying into some trash cans at the end of the alley, and heard Link gasp from his hiding spot, but his chest was tight, too tight for him to sit up or even move, just lie there and gasp for breath.

Dinolfos’s foot had caught him at exactly the wrong angle, and knocked every bit of air from his lungs.

Footsteps ran over, and Time opened his eyes with a cough, expecting to see Dinolfos with his weapon raised above his head, ready to strike.

Instead he saw Link standing protectively in front of him, arms held out as if to shield Time despite his tiny size.

Dinolfos laughed.

“Is this your sidekick, Deity?” he guffawed, looking down at Link as he stalked forward. “He is tiny! Were you so desperate for help that you thought even a baby would be better than nothing?”

He continued to laugh, and Link glared up at him, his hands clenching into fists. Time tried his best to catch his breath and get to his feet, but his lungs refused to work, no matter how he gasped. Stupid lungs, come on!

The very air temperature seemed to drop all of a sudden, and a flare of panic hit Time as the robber stepped towards Link. No no no no no—

Dinolfos lunged for him, but Link blasted a spurt of ice from his hands, hitting Dinolfos in the legs. He yelped in surprise, and before he could recover, Link sprayed more ice at him, trailing up his legs and hitting his arms as well.

The shots were clumsy, and it was obvious Link didn’t have much practice, but Dinolfos was completely stuck by the time he finished, and unable to grab his weapon.

Or move, for that matter.

“You brat!” Dinolfos hissed, glaring at where Link stood. “How dare you? I am of the Lizalfos pack, son of Dinal, leader of the Lower Lizards, Master of—!”

Link shot a bit of ice over his mouth, making his face flush with anger.

Time finally managed to get some air into his lungs, and he rolled over, looking up at Dinolfos and Link with an impressed expression.

“Huh,” Time wheezed, still trying to fully catch his breath. Partially from the kick, but mostly from the remaining panic of seeing his little brother nearly be attacked while he just gasped for breath on the pavement.

Sloppy, too sloppy, you should have put him further away, he barely knows how to use his powers he could’ve been hurt he could have been ki—

Time sighed, and winced as he put a hand to his chest and lightly rubbed. He was definitely going to have a bruise tomorrow. “We’ll have to talk about your listening skills kiddo, but... nice work. You’re quite the little warrior, huh?”

His brother’s face positively lit up at his words, and he pointed to himself, some snowflakes settling in his hair.

“Warriors,” he said proudly, and Time snorted, slowly getting to his knees.

“Warrior, kid. No S.”

“Warriors!”

“There’s only one of you, there’s no S,” Time argued back as he stood, but the kid just kept chattering ‘Warriors’ to himself, over and over. A vein bulged in Dinalfos’ forehead, and Time snorted, shaking his head.

He had been thinking about finding a nickname earlier... I suppose there are worse ones out there.

“Well come on, ‘Warriors’, let’s go get lunch. Frosty here can just hang around until the police show up,” he said, ruffling Link’s hair.

Link beamed, and took the hand Time offered him as they stepped out of the alleyway and walked down the street, leaving Dinolfos behind in the alley.

Dinolfos yelled a curse behind them that was entirely unintelligible.

#Incredibles au #linkeduniverse #linked universe fanfic #lu warriors #lu time #linked universe au #minor injury #Incredibles au fic #writing from the floor #teeny tiny Warriors #itty bitty #he doesn’t talk much #and Time’s a snarky teenager #who’s resigned himself to caring for this kid because nobody ELSE is gonna do it

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strawberriemarswrites · 5 months

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CHAPTER ONE

Chapter Summary: Bartolomeo is your neighbor and has it really bad for you. The kind of bad where your stuff is out of place and going missing. Pairing: Bartolomeo x F!Reader Rating: Mature, SFW chapter TW: Stalking, breaking and entering, obsessive behavior Ao3 Link: Chapter One (3,510 words)

You moved to the city about four months ago. Life had become stagnant and suffocating, especially after finishing college. You needed to get away; from overbearing parents, from your snobbish peers, from everyone. The only good connection you made in college was able to get you an archivist job in the heart of the city, and you snapped it right up. You applied for whatever apartments were in the area that you could afford, and went for the first one that became available.

That might’ve been your first mistake, really. For one thing, it was in a grittier part of town. It was also small, barely the size of two dorm rooms put together, and the neighbors below you were always yelling at each other or loudly fucking each other. But the building was clean, the rent was cheap, and the neighbor across the hall was friendly enough. A bit crass and blunt, but friendly.

His name was Bartolomeo. He was a mean-looking motherfucker by all accounts: wild green hair, septum piercing, tattoos — he was exactly the kind of person people from your hometown would have hated on appearance alone. He had an odd sort of overbite that showed his long canines like a vampire, except that all his teeth were equally sharp, and at first you’d been intimidated by both that and his impressive height. (After a few trips on the train to and from work, you noticed much stranger and much taller folks, and figured it must have just been a quirk of diverse city life).

Despite all appearances, however, Bartolomeo was nice. He held the elevator if he saw you running up, even if it was nearly shut. Some days you’d see him in the hall and he’d stop to chat for a while. One day you realized you two had been talking for almost thirty minutes, and only stopped because he’d gotten a call from his coworker asking him where the hell he was. Even running late, he still moved and talked with an aloof sort of air about him, like nothing could get to him.

Early on, maybe a few weeks after moving in, you admitted to him that you’d never lived fully alone before, and wondered if maybe you made the right choice to live in such a rough part of town. Bartolomeo had laughed, like finding the neighborhood rough was something he’d never considered. You still remembered what he’d told you:

“People around here aren’t too big on hospitality, but they mind their own business. Don’t mess with them, they won’t mess with you.” He then smiled wide, showing off the rest of his uniquely sharp teeth. “Tell you what — since you’re so nervous about it, if anyone does mess with you, let me know. I’ll take care of ‘em for ya.”

Just the memory of how he had smiled that day brought a faint blush to your cheeks. Fine, you’d admit it: aside from being nice, Bartolomeo was also frustratingly attractive. His devil-may-care charm was hard not to be lured in by, and you couldn’t help but feel some of it rubbing off on you the more you got to chatting. He was loud and so were his friends, and the landlord rarely stuck around long if he stepped into the hallway. You definitely felt a little safer knowing he was around.

Two months ago, the troubles began.

It had been a day like any other. Average shift, average commute, about the only exciting part of the work day had been your coworker, Robin, inviting you for drinks on Friday. You came home and went to your bedroom to change into comfier clothes, but something was off. You couldn’t tell at first, but when you reached for the top drawer of your dresser to pull out some pajama pants —

It was already open.

Just slightly, with the edge of your pajama pants stuck in the drawer’s track.

Now, you weren’t necessarily a meticulous person, but in general you kept your dresser pretty tidy, so it seemed odd to find it this way. Puzzled, you pulled out the pants and a loose t-shirt, frowning as you put them on. Had you been in a hurry that morning? It was possible, since you were struggling to remember what you had for breakfast. Hustling through your routine and being a bit careless with the drawer as a result wasn’t totally out of the question. You pushed down the knot in your stomach and moved on with your evening, the incident forgotten.

Or at least, it would have been forgotten, had there not been further incidents.

Another day, you had been unexpectedly called off. There had been a power outage on the block your workplace was on, and they hadn’t been able to get the emergency lights working. You spent the morning getting your laundry done and putting fresh bed sheets on the bed, and left to run extra errands. When you came back, exhausted but satisfied with your personal productivity, you went to jump into your bed for a quick nap before dinner.

You stopped just short literally jumping in when you found the comforter was already disheveled somehow. As if someone had been laying on top of it.

The frequency of problems seemed to only increase from there. You came home to find your door was unlocked, when you were nigh-obsessive on double-checking it before leaving. Your favorite t-shirt to sleep in had gone missing, and you had just put it in the hamper the night before. You had a journal in your nightstand that you didn’t write in terribly often, but with the strange things happening you felt it’d be nice to get it all documented — you opened it and found creases in a couple of the pages, like it had been clumsily closed and tossed back into the drawer.

You had convinced yourself that everything was fine. Maybe you lost your t-shirt at the laundromat. Maybe you thought you double-checked the door but you hadn’t. Maybe you were nodding off the last time you handled your journal. Maybe, maybe, maybe. At this point, the only thing you were sure of was that you were in denial that any of this was fine.

In hindsight, you really should have brought it up to Bartolomeo sooner than you did.

Drinks with Robin and a few other coworkers became a biweekly affair, lining up with payday. The weather was finally warming up after a particularly cold April, so you put on one of your frillier blouses that you were saving for such an occasion and a pair of jeans. Then you spent way too long looking for your favorite perfume.

“Motherfucker!”

You slammed your palm against the wall in frustration. Of course. Why the fuck not? With all the other weird happenings, why wouldn’t that fall victim to the bullshit, too? Shaking the sting out of your hand, you got up from the bathroom floor and stormed off, snatching up your purse. You’d just have to hope no one noticed the blouse was a little stuffy-smelling from being put away for so long. Frustrated, you slammed the apartment door on your way out, triple-checking the lock and muttering curses the whole way.

“You good?”

Bartolomeo’s voice behind you made you jump and fumble your keys. With a deep sigh you crouched down and scooped them up, running a hand through your hair. “I’ll be fine. Just running late for payday drinks.”

“Oh yeah,” he said, and you saw him lean to one side in your peripherals. “That’s tonight. When are you guys gonna come out to my bar, huh?”

“When I’m more confident that they won’t mind the heavy metal music,” you said and stood upright, smiling and adding, “Which might be sooner than you think.”

As usual, Bartolomeo was the picture of nonchalance, leaning against his doorframe in a Cannibal Corpse t-shirt that had seen better days. He gave you a sort of half-smirk then nodded to your door. “You sure you’re okay? Sounded like you might’ve hurt yourself in there.”

“Yeah, just...” you sighed and shook your head, “kinda frustrated. I can’t find my good perfume.” You paused, remembering your conversation with him when you first moved in. “Hey, uh, Barto?”

He stood up slightly straighter at the nickname. “Yeah?”

“Can you, uh...” you paused again, twisting the strap on your purse. His suddenly intense stare made you blush and avert your eyes. “Would you mind keeping an eye on my apartment when I’m gone? Like, if you’re around, let me know if you hear or see anything?”

“Yeah, sure!” he answered with surprising eagerness, before he cleared his throat and quickly reverted to the casual tone. “I mean — can I ask why?”

You would have laughed at the outburst, had you not been trying to find the words to explain you thought someone was breaking into your apartment. “It’s just... I don’t know. Some of my stuff’s gone missing. Random things. And sometimes I come home and there’ll be something out of place, or a little off. Like... someone else has been there.”

“Oh, shit.” Bartolomeo pushed off the doorframe, the chain hanging from his belt clinking as he took a step closer. “How long’s this been goin’ on for?”

You continued avoiding his gaze. “Two months, maybe?”

“What?”

“I figured I was just forgetting things,” you said quickly. “It happens, I can be a little spacey. But... not like this. It feels different.” You finally looked at him again with a sheepish smile, your heart melting a bit at the worried look he had. “I probably should have mentioned something sooner. I’m sorry to freak you out like this.”

He shrugged, now suddenly avoiding your gaze. “At least you said somethin’ before it got any worse.”

A chill went down your spine. You didn’t want to think about what “worse” entailed.

“Hey, don’t worry about it. I told ya you could come to me if anyone was messin’ with you.” He smiled, his fully-bared teeth all the more imposing as he punched one fist into the opposite palm. “I’ll keep an eye out for ya. If I catch anyone hangin’ around where they don’t belong, they’ll be shittin’ sideways for the rest of their life.”

Despite yourself, you laughed. All things considered, you felt lucky that you had such a cool neighbor.

Relief gave way to panic when your phone pinged; a reminder that you had somewhere to be. You cussed under your breath and started rushing toward the elevator, but not before turning and waving to Bartolomeo, shouting as you ran, “Thank you! I owe you one!”

“Don’t mention it!” he called and waved back, watching you turn the corner for the elevator. He leaned against the wall next to his door, shoving his hands in his pockets and listening for the soft ding of the elevator’s arrival. Once he was sure you were out of earshot, he stepped back into his apartment and shut the door, taking a deep breath.

“FUCK!”

Bartolomeo put both his hands over his face, yelling every curse word he knew. How could he have gotten so careless?! He knew he’d gotten way too comfortable with sneaking into your apartment, but two months? You’d been onto him for two months?! He groaned and dragged his hands down, wincing when one of his fingers tugged on his nose ring. No, that wasn’t right; you weren’t onto him, specifically. You only noticed the missing stuff, and whatever it was you meant by “something out of place”.

(He knew exactly what you meant by that, considering his favorite thing to do in your apartment was lie down on your bed and cuddle your pillows.)

Admittedly, part of him was relieved. You asked him for help! Sure, from the time you noticed to the time you said something had him a little concerned, and sure, it was his doing to begin with — but you weren’t aware of the second part! And, if you hadn’t said something, it would only have been a matter of time before he got caught in the act. He had time to correct that now. With you asking for help, it meant he’d be seeing you more, so he wouldn’t have to break into your apartment anymore, and he could act like it never happened!

(He was aware, on some level, that it wouldn’t be that simple. It wouldn’t be enough just to see you more. He had to be with you.)

Bartolomeo groaned again and sat down on the couch, head still in his hands. His heart had finally calmed down, having been racing just from talking to you. You were so cute, from how you fidgeted when you were nervous, to how your laugh sounded, to how you looked in that outfit (well, he thought you always looked nice in any outfit, but that was beside the point). And your eyes — what he wouldn’t give to be able to look into your eyes for more than a handful of seconds. He’d started a habit of looking at your nose when you two chatted, just to keep from turning his head away when your eyes were too much, but it only led to him fighting the insatiable urge to kiss it. He wanted to kiss your whole face, really, but if he started thinking about that, his heart rate was bound to pick up again.

All this to say, Bartolomeo had it bad for you. Real bad.

It started out innocently enough when you moved in across the hall. He thought you were cute from the start, and wanted to be nicer than usual; holding the door if he saw you coming, taking time to chat with you. But then the more he saw you, the more you two talked, the more he found himself looking forward to it. Before he knew it, he was listening for the elevator every time he could, just so he had a chance to talk to you again.

Even though it wasn’t hard to tell you lived alone, you admitting out loud that it was the first time about sent him into shock. Seriously? And in the shittiest neighborhoods you could have possibly ended up in? Something in his brain cranked up to eleven, and he was determined you needed someone looking out for you. Someone close by, who knew the area well, and had more than enough street smarts under his belt. Of course, that someone would be him. Why wouldn’t it be? And so, he came up with something to ease your worries (it was mostly true, in that at the very least the people in the building and running businesses around the neighborhood minded their own), and offered help. The relief on your face was well worth it.

Bartolomeo hadn’t intended for things to get this... intense, though.

The first time he’d broken in had been on impulse. See, the apartment building had older fire escapes, where the ladder wasn’t as compact as it really should be and about half of it hung down below the bottom landing. Most people still couldn’t reach it without significant effort, either by dragging over something to climb on or risking their neck by trying to parkour that shit.

Bartolomeo, however, was not most people. Standing at seven-foot-three, he just had to reach up and haul his own weight for a few rungs. He only did it to prove to himself that he could, in case you were ever in trouble and he needed to get in quickly without fighting with the front door.

Then, he wondered if it would take very long to get to the fourth floor, where both of you lived. He knew he wouldn’t have to worry about the tenants on the way up making a fuss; the unit on the second floor was used by the landlord for storage, and the people directly below you were always too busy arguing or fucking to notice anything.

And then it just. Happened. You weren’t home, and the window was so easy to open, and he had to know everything. How you lived, what you showered with, what sort of stuff did you keep. He had a general idea from talking to you, but he wanted, needed more.

The first time, Bartolomeo just sat on the windowsill, looking around and taking in the bedroom. You kept the floor clear, so if he felt brave enough to venture further in the room he wouldn’t have to worry about tripping and breaking something. You had a desk with a bookshelf built around it that was full of books and video games and figurines, and one of those desktop computers with the rainbow lights on the tower. Your bed was neatly made, adorned with overstuffed pillows, with a storage bench at the foot that was currently being commandeered by a collection of plushies dressed like pirates. The bed itself looked wide enough for two, though he might have to get a little creative to make it work with his taller height.

Not that. He was thinking about laying next to you. Or holding you close. Or watching you fall asleep.

(He absolutely was thinking those things. But in his bed, not yours. What could he say? He needed his California King. It wasn’t perfect, but he couldn’t afford one of the fancy custom beds that other city dwellers somehow got their hands on.)

Bartolomeo resolved that breaking in was fine, so long as he always took off his boots (couldn’t rightfully wear shoes into your apartment now, could he?) and didn’t touch anything. That way you’d never know. He stuck to that for the first handful of trips. Then one time he couldn’t resist picking up and fawning over your monkey plushie at the foot of the bed, so he decided it was okay to touch things, but he had to put them back exactly as he found them. Before he knew it, one day he was poking around the jewelry trays on your dresser, and...

He only had the top drawer open for a minute. Two, tops. Any longer and he would have gotten dizzy from how much blood was rushing downwards. He slammed it shut and made a beeline for the fire escape, nearly forgetting his boots in the process. He told himself he wouldn’t be looking in there without your permission, otherwise the temptation would be too great and he'd steal something he really shouldn’t.

(Which is why he eventually stole your shirt instead.)

Okay. So Bartolomeo let his little guilty pleasure get out of control. He just hadn’t realized how easily that happened. Now that you said something to him, he was going to ease off. He pushed up off the couch and sauntered to his room, putting his hands back in his pockets, flinching when one hand touched something he forgot he’d still had on his person. Frowning, he pulled the perfume bottle out, a slight twist in his stomach at the thought he’d frustrated you with his antics. He really hadn’t intended to keep it — honest. He only swiped it because the shirt under his pillow was starting to smell like the rest of his stuff. Not necessarily a bad thing, as it wasn’t like he was unclean (he was unkempt and dirty minded, even peed in the shower sometimes, but not unclean), but. The whole reason he took the shirt was because it smelled like you.

He turned the bottle over in his hands and sat on the edge of his bed. The label on it just said “Elegia” — why couldn’t the names of these things be simple? Fucking vanilla, or flowers, or whatever, so that he could put it back and get something similar. He supposed at least this way he could try to find another bottle online, so he could get it exact, but still... what a pain. Point being, if it had been easier to remember the name, he wouldn’t have had to take it.

...Okay, fine, Bartolomeo stole it thinking you wouldn’t notice. You had a few others, he figured it’d be fine.

With a sigh he reached under his pillows for your shirt, unable to keep from smiling when he saw it. It was light purple, with the words “Bite Me” on it in a black, drippy font. He saw you wear it on laundry day once; it took an immeasurable amount of self control not to take it as an invitation. He then uncapped the perfume and sighed again, his eyes rolling back just a bit. At least he guessed right; this was definitely the one you wore the most often. It smelled like vanilla and strawberries.

Like you.

Shaking out of his reverie, he sprayed the shirt and folded it back up under his pillows. It had been in his possession for too long for him to give it up without arousing suspicion, so he’d settle for returning the perfume.

While you were gone, of course.

#bartolomeo #bartolomeo one piece #bartolomeo the cannibal #bartolomeo x reader #bartolomeo x you #one piece x reader #reader insert #yandere!bartolomeo #yandere #i'll fucking digest you one kiss at a time #ifdyokaat #hehehehehe i'm posting this from work #the other three chapters are up on AO3 but i'll put them here too if there's interest

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am-i-the-asshole-official · 4 months

Note

Am I the AH for refusing to be friends with someone who flat out hated me?

From ages 22-26 I was friends with R 29-33. R had only worked once in her life which was mcdonalds for 3 months to buy anime merchandise her grandma didn't want to buy her. R's grandma is in her late 80's now just for reference. R's granny had married a rich military dude who was on his 3rd marriage or so then died, so she got all his assets which included like 5 houses, 3 were being rented out which is how she'd get her income. So R never worked and just sat at home getting into internet fights. My friend had invited her into our discord and I'd be civil with her despite knowing how shes been with others. I was working full time for shit pay and going to school full time too. R was very, idk how else to say it, but she always demanded our attention. The other people in the server were 5 from ages from 16-22, we never used how much older she was against her, but she really didn't acknowledge or respect alot of us were in school. Many times we'd had to tell her to step back and set boundaries with us. It did result in people leaving the server. So, in summer of 2019 R decided to go to college. She got alot of financial aid and said her goal was to become a therapist cause she was everyone's "mom". That stuff wasn't even remotely true, she was always a total bitch to everyone. R unfortunately didn't understand that going to school means having to put the work in. She was more interested in spending the financial aid on gacha, anime merch, and other stuff. She lost her financial aid after the spring semester of 2020, and refused to talk to her school about the pandemic stress and other shit. During this time, she tried making me do her assignments and I kept saying no or only helped a little. I had my own assignments, school, and I was stressed. Well, when she lost her financial aid due to academic probation, she blamed me. When the pandemic hit my school did this thing where you'd get partially refunded your semester depending on how you did. I was so thankful for that since I barely scraped by to pay for school. R was so fucking nasty about it. I didn't tell my friends that to gloat, I actually said that before she lost her financial aid. She said I didn't deserve it, cause people like her struggled more. Which is fucking weird since I'm a first gen POC and made a few bucks above minimum wage where I live. I didn't even enjoy my time at school cause of the stress and never having money. So she kept harassing me for getting government aid. I wasn't eligible for financial aid! My parents weren't even eligible for food stamps and we always fucking struggled. But I didn't deserve help, who cares if R is a cis white woman in her 30's that only worked once for a few months, she has it harder. Then R left our server when the pandemic started getting nastier, alot of us struggled but we stayed close in the discord. Then one day I reached out to R in late 2021 to say happy birthday and she said "whose this? New phone." I was hurt she didn't keep my number, but whatever. In 2022 she reached out to me for gossip cause I broke up with someone. Then now in 2023 she reached out cause she wants resources to be a vtuber. I'm sorry, she was shitty to me, I've been struggling, and she reaches out for that? Idk even know how I'd be able to help her with that. I told a friend from our old server and she told me how she had been doing R's assignments for school, but stopped cause she was getting stressed cause she had her capstone class that semester. So wow. R basically didn't do shit for school and gets pissy i get some financial relief. I then had another mutual friend tell me how R had told them she sent me a gift and I didn't send her one, one year. Uh? I tried. I ordered something online for her, and the company sold out, but kept my shit on back order. So R got it like a month late, it was a Christmas gift and I explained it to her, sent her screenshot of when i placed the order and sent her an Amazon gift card as an apology. So she bad mouths me for something out of my control?

I've been getting "hey" messages from R lately, and idk. I'm so done with her.

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

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applejuicefruit · 1 year

Note

( trigger warning ).. could you make a headcanon of how kylian would react if he knew that before him, the reader suffered in an abusive relationship? where her boyfriend beat her, verbally abused her and stuff like that... only if you can and feel comfortable...

kylian mbappe x reader

Tw : verbal abuse, domestic abuse, mention of depression and panic attack

What is love?

you were in a bad relationship before meeting kylian

your ex boyfriend was very manipulative

jealous

possessive

and he turned out to be violent too sometimes

you couldn’t handle it anymore

it became too much for you

to the point you left your home, most of your belongings there and ran away

with nothing but just a few money

you went to another city to start a new life

and you found yourself in paris

you thought that maybe the city could give you a second chance, a new start

and so it was

you began working at some shops in the city, trying to save more money and being able to rent a place

it was small but it was your place

where you could feel safe and protected

without living in the fear of him getting mad or violent with you

those were the worst two years of your life and you had no idea why you waited so much to run away

now you’re safe

but your life changed completely the moment a certain kylian mbappè came into the shop you were working because he ran out of batteries

you helped him choosing the best one and he thanked you

but the day after he came back hoping too see you

and you were there

this thing went on for a bit before he asked you out

and now after five months you are still living a happy life as a newly couple

he loved you

and he really showed you

with words

gestures

affection and care

he really cared about you and you were completely scared because you had no idea on how to act

you never felt loved in your life and this was terrifying you

kylian didn’t know about your past relationship but you decided to tell him because you felt like he needed to know

he suspected something

by the way you acted when he was showing you his love

but he never expected for you to tell him about your past like that

it was a very harsh reality you had to live and he was mad

mad at your ex for treating you so badly

for laying his hands on you

for touching you and hurting you

kylian completely broke down when you told him the whole story

you cried and he cried too

he held you in his arms

held you close because he was afraid something might happen again

telling you that you were brave for running away

“you’re so brave baby, i’m so sorry this happened to you, you didn’t deserve it”

“i would never hurt you, i promise you”

“i love you too much”

“you mean the world to me, i love you”

he comforted you

he wiped your tears away

he kissed you with so much love you thought you could melt

you told him about how that situation brought you to panic attacks in the middle of the night

signs of early depression

how you panic every time someone touches you without your consent

it doesn’t matter if it’s a friend

you just freeze

so he showed you how he wanted to respect your boundaries

he showed you what real love is

and what real love do

he was scared your ex could find you

so he wanted you to live with him

but you told him that you weren’t ready to live with someone again

kylian understood it

but he was still scared

so he convinced you to move out from your first apartment and rent something closer to his home

you did it

because he made you feel safe and protected

he made you happy

and you never felt this happy in your life

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callmewrinkles3 · 11 months

Text

Peace - DR3 x Fem!OC

Summary: After their whistle stop trip to Perth it’s time for the next race in Baku. A photo causes issues, and Em sees something she shouldn’t have spotted.

Word Count: 9.6k

Warnings: Zak Brown, mentions of food issues (lack of appetite, not eating, what could be considered picky eating), media being assholes, panic attacks, mentions of mental health issues.

A/N: We’re baaaaaaccccckkkk! Sorry for the delay, we’ve been ridiculously busy. But in our defence, this is a monster chapter. We’re sticking with 2022 for the next while.

June 2022

“I have a couple of apartments.”

Em half woke to Dan’s words. She hadn’t really been asleep on the shorter flight from Dubai to Baku. Instead she’d been half dozing with her Beats playing music. London was clutched in her hand while she curled against Dan’s side. There’d been a plane swap and something else but their fancy seats were swapped into a row of three economy ones. Honestly if she was asked she preferred being able to curl up like this on a plane. His arm was around her and she got to chill out with him beside her.

“What do you mean?”

“For London. The city, not the bear I mean. If you still want to move in together?” He turned the tablet towards her to show an option. Three bedrooms, a view, in one of the parts of London they’d shortlisted. It looked nearly too good to be true.

“Talk when we get to the hotel? But yeah. I want to move in with you properly.”

They were two of the first into Baku for the race which meant that instead of going immediately into a bright orange race world Em got to unwind for a night. Dan brought her to an Italian restaurant for dinner and they held hands in public. They went back to the hotel room and curled up in bed before Dan asked her a question.

“So with the apartment thing. I’m looking at places for us to buy, not rent.”

“Danny…” She trailed off and looked at him, at the way he smiled at her.

“I didn’t tell you this. It was supposed to be a surprise. But I got the email the day before you arrived in Melbourne and it didn’t feel right to say it then. I dunno if you remember but do you remember when we were in Austin in 2019? We were in bed and you were talking about how much you like the city and you just trailed off and said it’d be a nice place to show kids.”

The vague memory hit her, the night after the race. When Dan had been jealous of her talking to Charles and Pierre and they went to the hotel. It had been emotional and she was still luxuriating that they’d said I love you a few weeks before.

“Yeah. Kind of?”

“I found a place. I was looking on and off since then but it had to be in delivery radius of that barbecue place we like. Your name’s on it too. I didn’t know if you were coming back or not but it’s our place. Bought, not rented. And if we don’t spend loads of time in Austin but we’ve got a place then we should buy somewhere in London. You don’t like Monaco that much. We just need to be there a bit for taxes and stuff. But we should buy somewhere. A home. Our home.”

“You bought us a place?” She couldn’t get over it. She couldn’t stop thinking about it. He bought them a home when she wasn’t even around.

“Yeah. It’s ours.”

“I love you so much. So, so much. And yeah. I want our home. A real home.”

“I’m getting you your lavender office. I promised you that I was going to get you a lavender office. It’s happening.”

She couldn’t stop grinning, holding onto Dan and sleeping well for the first time in weeks. It was restful at last.

Wednesday meant most people were arriving into the city and that included Blake and Michael. They hugged her tightly as soon as they saw her, both checking in through the day. There was still a divide between them and Dan. She could see the way they were with him. But that needed to wait, she couldn’t deal with all of it. Not now.

Most of the day was spent sitting with Blake and coming up with how she was coming back to work. She wanted to get back as quickly as she could, but Blake didn’t want to risk it for her. Which she understood. But she wanted to feel normal even when she felt like she was barely holding together. The other part of the day with Blake was having a conversation she never thought she’d need to have.

She had to make a plan about how her relationship was going to be made public.

Somehow she hadn’t been spotted much in Monaco, just a few gossip blogs which made life easier and harder. It was easier because at least it wasn’t a complete surprise that she was around. But it was harder because she hated having to do this. The fact that her and Dan were finally admitting that they love each other meant a PR response had to happen felt stupid. They were just two people in love. Why did the world care?

But it was clear that the world did care, the blog posts and TikToks and instagram posts about her were proof of that. The #WheresEm posts on TikTok from fans analysing photos of Dan, Michael, and Blake to see if she was in the background. The slideshows of her and other women who worked in F1. It was kind of surreal now that Blake was showing her.

“You’re in the paddock every week. You work in the sport. Netflix interviews you and every February people wonder if DTS is going to call you “Daniel’s girlfriend”. It happens.” Blake was apologetic as he opened a folder on his laptop called Tax Files.

“You told me that was taxes and that’s why it’s password protected.”

“Yeah, sorry. If you knew you’d have killed me.” She looked at the four PDFs held in the file. Dan_Em_dating, Dan_Em_engaged, Dan_Em_married, Dan_Em_baby. The last one cut like a knife.

“Seriously? Engaged and married? Statements for all of it?”

“It’s the two of you. I wrote them after you were in Vegas, there were rumours online for two months after that the two of you got secretly married. I thought it was better to be safe than sorry. For both of you. But this is the reactive ones in case someone posted photos or something. Right now I think you doing an insta post is enough, it’ll confirm but you don’t need to do details. Do you have any PG photos?”

Twenty minutes later a photo of her in Dan’s lap as he held her and gave her a kiss that was chosen to be the photo. Dan used his grid mostly for work related stuff so it was her account that would post it. The caption at least was her own decision. Thirty seconds of thought and she tapped it out. I know you know, but I love you to the moon and to Saturn. Once the draft was saved the schedule was set. Post it during FP1. It would be fine.

The plan mostly worked for Thursday. Her makeup was thick and Blake refused to let her work for longer than an hour of checking emails, but she walked into the paddock with her head held high. Friends nodded and gave her a smile, Carmen’s eyes widening slightly when she saw her and Em forced a grin. She was part of a team. She belonged her. She knew what she was doing. It would be fine and it was worth it.

Sitting in hospitality for the day Em refreshed one of the gossip instagram accounts she still followed, a photo of her talking to Blake appearing at the top of the grid. The caption made her huff.

She’s baaaaaaccccckkkkkk! Daniel Ricciardo’s assistant Em was seen back in the paddock. The rumour was that she was in Monaco but hiding in hospitality. She hasn’t been seen at a race since the Australian GP at the beginning of April, where she was seen with his parents and extended family. The duo were spotted in Perth for the weekend off last week, but they’ve never confirmed a relationship. Reminder: Em falls under our WAG rules because we don’t have confirmation if they are or aren’t in a relationship. No criticism of how she looks or what she’s wearing.

“What’s so funny?” Blake asked and she turned the screen to him.

“I’m kind of surprised how quickly people started sharing photos of me again. Am I really that impressive?”

“I think it’s more that you’ve been around for so long. Tomorrows probably going to be chaos with the post. You know that, right? You’ll get through it but there will definitely be questions.”

“I know. If we did this years ago it’d have been easier.”

Instead of a third iced latte that she’d asked for, Michael handed her an orange juice as lunch was brought over. He received a glare in its place.

“I thought I asked for a coffee?”

“And you’re vibrating in place. Eat something, Wriggle.”

The chopped salad in front of her was pretty but the idea of even touching it made her feel awful. Encouraging looks made her spear a couple of pieces of chicken that she could just about separate and eat them. At least playing with her food meant that it wasn’t noticed that she wasn’t really eating.

Dan was able to run in and grab food before going back to more team meetings. He pushed a kiss to the top of her head before raising an eyebrow at her bowl, but Em shook her head before he could speak. It was two or three minutes before he had to leave with Michael. Before he did he ran across to the coffee bar and plucked a lemon muffin from the stand to place in front of her. It was a smile and a squeeze of her hand before he had to go again.

She picked at the muffin and at her dinner that night before they were back in the hotel room together. Dan kept giving her looks to eat more but she was too worn out to eat. It was like her body was constantly waiting for the next crisis, coiled and ready to release adrenaline while she was begging it to relax. She needed to curl up with her boyfriend and be held by him. The day went well. People could tell they were truly in a relationship. Everything was public tomorrow. She could do it.

For the first time in years Em stressed about what to wear to the paddock the next morning. None of her clothes fit right and her usual style felt awkward. Normally she tried to blend in but this was the one day she shouldn’t have to. She wasn’t just Dan’s assistant anymore. People would keep caring about what she wore, working out what labels she had on and how much her outfit cost. It was so much stress that she didn’t want to deal with but Dan put his arms around her waist and kissed her neck.

“Wear what makes you smile. You’ll be beautiful no matter what.”

“You’re a charmer.”

“And you need to eat something. I know it’s not your favourite but I got you a bacon sandwich with my breakfast. Try to eat some of it?”

“Just for you.”

The nerves thrummed through her body as she pulled on straight leg jeans and tightened her belt. Her outfit was finished with a Paramore tee that was at least a size too big and one of the merch hats Dan always had around, but she was clothed and felt good. She could do this. She could do it. Em even ate half of the sandwich Dan gave her despite the butterflies in her stomach trying to rebel.

Their plan for getting to the race was simple. The four of them were driving to the track together, Blake taking her usual role as driver. Dan and Michael were walking in five minutes before she and Blake did so they could take most of the attention away. Once he was in the car for FP1 she’d post the Instagram draft and hopefully someone would fuck up in practice so the “Daniel Ricciardo has a girlfriend” story would die down. It was a good plan that they could do.

When they arrived at the drivers car park they all stepped out of the car before Dan pulled her into a giant hug. It was nearly deserted in the early morning and she fell into him before sharing a kiss and a smile.

“That’s the last secret kiss we ever have to do. How does that feel?” Dan asked to make her grin.

“So no more hidden corners in dive bars?”

“I mean that’s a tradition so we have to have some more there, right? I love you. I’ll see you after practice.”

“I love you too. I think Blake is actually letting me work today so I’ll see you then.” They had one final kiss before Dan and Michael walked away while she and Blake stayed behind

“Just for the record, if you and Dan split up again I’m choosing you. You’re my little sister. I don’t want you to go anywhere else.”

“I learned my lesson, Blakey. I’ve no intention of going anywhere. I promise.”

Five minutes later they were walking through the paddock and Em ignored the eyes that were on her. It was a statement to be publicly there in the paddock, to be beside Blake while she wore a 3 hat. She wasn’t ashamed of herself or her love for Dan. She couldn’t be. They were in love and that was what mattered to her.

They sat in Dan’s driver room while Em went through yet more emails that she’d missed while she was gone. The practice stayed on tv and she let the familiar voices roll over her. With ten minutes left on the clock Blake gave her a nudge to post the photo with a smile.

“Ready to be a WAG?”

“Will I ever be? But I’ve basically been one for the last four years without the benefits.”

When she opened Instagram her notifications were already going insane. There were people mentioning her in comments and tagging her and she had to scroll back to see where it all stemmed from. But when she found one of the paddock photographers accounts and started to read the caption her blood ran cold.

Arriving into the paddock this morning ahead of Day One of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix I got to see possibly the rarest sight in Formula One - Daniel Ricciardo and his presumed girlfriend @callmewrinkles3 canoodling and revealing their romance. We don’t know a lot about Emma except that she’s English and has worked with Ricciardo since at least the summer break in 2019. Her first appearance at a race was Barcelona in 2018 where she hid in the back of the Red Bull garage. Most people have assumed that they’re together but they’ve never publicised anything. It’s clear from the photos how in love they are, but why have they never admitted anything before? She’s missed every race since the Australian GP and the rumour around the paddock was that they had split up. I think that can be safely ignored now.

“Blake. Fuck.” She held her phone out to Blake so he could see the post and watched as his face changed while reading. “One hour. One fucking hour.”

The comments began to fill her screen and she couldn’t help but read them.

They’re actually together? I thought that was a joke.

Why did she just disappear like that?

Dan deserves better than an assistant.

Who is she? Just appeared one day like she was always there.

Friends with bennies. There’s no way they’re dating. They’d have admitted it by now. Has to be some PR thing.

“Timmy? Em? Can you hear me?” The panic was rising through her chest as all her deepest fears were on screen. Dan deserved better. He deserved more than her. She’d ruined everything when she left she never should have come back. Why did she come back when she’d ruined things for him?

Strong arms wrapped around her and pulled her tight, Em’s desperation filling her as Blake held on.

“I’ve got you. I’ve got you. Deep breaths in and out.” Tears streamed down her face as she tried to copy his breathing. They were just one hour late to do it. One hour. But the one thing that they’d protected for so long and had been so careful with had been revealed to the world before either of them had the chance to do it. Outside the paddock they were supposed to be private citizens. That area was off limits, it wasn’t supposed to be where they could be photographed. Especially not by accredited ones.

“Why us? Why the fuck does this always happen to us?” It was all she could get out as she kept crying, Blake holding onto her tightly and rubbing her back. It wasn’t the same as when Dan or Grace did it but it helped as she tried to stop herself from spiralling. But Dan had his stupid briefing and then had to get ready for FP2 and she was barely going to see him. All she wanted was for him to tell her it was going to be ok. It wasn’t much to ask. Em lost track of time as she tried to pull all of her broken pieces together. She needed to get it together.

“I can get him out of his meeting. Want me to grab him now?”

“Please?” She felt pitiful with the tiny sound coming out of her mouth, but Blake left a kiss on her forehead before sitting her on the massage table and leaving the room.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can, ok? Just remember. You and him love each other so much somehow. A photo and internet trolls are never going to change what the two of you have. I promise you that TimTam.”

She didn’t know how long it took until Blake returned with Dan but she could feel the fragile parts of herself begin to move and crack again. Why would Dan want her to be there with him? She’d left once before and she should just leave again. Let everyone else be happy. She could make herself be happy without them eventually she thought. The world was acting like loving Dan was some awful thing, that she didn’t deserve to love him and she didn’t know how she could keep going with it. It wasn’t fair.

Her sobs started again and Em’s arms went around her knees to hold them against her chest. It was going to be ok. It was going to be fine. It had to be fine. She couldn’t be too loud or people would hear and that would be worse for Dan if his girlfriend was having a breakdown in his room. She shoved her hand against her mouth to muffle her sobs. She could be quiet. She had to be quiet.

“Emmy? I’m right here Wrinkles.”

“Danny.”

It felt so stupid. So fucking stupid. It was a photo that revealed news that they were about to share anyway, but they wanted to get to do it. It wasn’t up to anyone else to share it. Why did they think they could?

“I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry Baby. You don’t deserve that and you never deserved have comments made about you like that. If you want to go home just tell me and you can, I’ll book the flights for you.”

The words hit her gut and she wanted to get sick. He wanted her to leave. Wanted her to go home.

She didn’t have a home anymore.

She destroyed their home and she was homeless and she had nothing left. It was all gone.

“I…I…We…We don’t have one. I don’t. I’m homeless. I got rid of it and Danny it’s gone and it’s my fault please don’t make me leave.” Her sobs began again as the reality of what she’d done hit her. She’d destroyed their home in a weekend. She was homeless. Michael had offered his spare room but she couldn’t. What had she done?

“No. Oh no, Emmy, no, I promise. I promise you’re not going anywhere if you don’t want to. I want you to stay here. I want to be here with you all the time. I’m right here and you’re staying with me I promise. I promise.”

She didn’t know how long he held onto her for but as her sobs subsided the embarrassment at how she acted filled her. It was all over a photo. This shouldn’t have happened because of a photo. But Dan held onto her and wiped her eyes while she stopped crying, emotionally and physically exhausted with red and puffy eyes. Her foundation was entirely gone but Dan smiled at her like she lit up the universe.

“For the record I hate saying this but we have thirty minutes until Dan needs to be in the car. And I might have a solution. Maybe.” Em twisted in Dan’s lap to look at Blake as he began to explain. Nat from Sky was willing to be outside to ‘run into’ Dan and do a softball interview for him to explain everything.

“Do it.” He hadn’t even finished speaking when Em cut across, making herself stand up on shaky legs and stretching while still holding his hand.

“Emmy…”

“Danny, do it. You get to get ahead of it and say something about how everyone knew. Act like it’s just stupid gossip. And then you can drive and ignore it, yeah?”

“If you’re sure.”

“I am.”

She wiped her face on one of the towels that was supposed to be for after Dan’s practice before nodding at him. Dan stood up and pulled her close, holding his lips against her forehead in silence. They were desperate to stay as close as possible for as long as they could until Blake tapped her shoulder.

“She’ll be downstairs in thirty seconds, it’s live.”

“Go.” It was a kiss to make Dan leave and Em sat down to get her makeup out of her bag.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m watching from the garage. So I’m making myself look vaguely presentable.”

Her fingers were shaking as she started pulling concealer and foundation out. The tv was already tuned to the Sky feed and when she heard Natalie’s voice her attention went straight to it.

“And look who we have here! Daniel Ricciardo was heading over to his garage but agreed to talk to me for a moment. You’ve had all of the attention on you thanks to that Instagram post everyone’s seen about your relationship.” It was open and warm and Em bit her lip while she watched.

“Yeah. It’s funny, we never thought we needed to announce that we were together because everyone knew. You were talking to Em at the AusGP opening yourself. It didn’t make sense to do some big thing when everyone already knew. But now here we are, I guess. At least that’s better news than my driving in that practice. We’ve got a couple of upgrades that we’re trying to learn how they work with this car, so we’ll see how they perform in this practice.”

The way he was so casual about it made Em smile while she finished her concealer and patted it down. It wasn’t anywhere near good but it’d do, and her sunglasses would hide the worst of it.

“Ready?” She asked Blake. He nodded once and followed her across. It was the first time she’d stood in the garage to watch him drive since she and Dan had their fight in Jeddah and he sent her away, but she walked out with her head held high. Dan was standing at the bottom of the stairs to wait for her and held out his hand, Em smiling at him.

“You look beautiful. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

He did better in that practice than the morning one but Em stood there silently. Blake had a hand at her back to keep her steady on her feet, orange headphones glued to her head. She hated the colour. Hated this garage. She wished it felt like home the way Renault had by the end. But she could do this. It was just an hour, and she could see when the cameras caught her and she waved. A small smile stayed on her face as she stared at Dan’s little orange dot on the screen.

She waited for him to get out and they held hands walking to hospitality for food before Dan had to go to more meetings. It was a luxury to hold his and and get to see him as her boyfriend. People stopped to ask for his autograph and take photos and she stepped back to let the photo be taken. One of the girls came up to her after getting the photo.

“I’m sorry about that photo for you. You deserved better than that for how your relationship was made public.”

“Thanks a lot.” It meant more than she could say that a stranger was being nice to her.

That night after yet more picking at food and trying to decide what she could stomach she curled up in Dan’s arms while he pressed kisses to her head. She didn’t know what to do or how exactly she was feeling, but that background anxiety was still there.

“Can I ask you something?” Dan whispered in the dark. It wasn’t too late so she nodded against his chest. “I know you probably don’t want to. But maybe we should find you someone to talk to? You’re not ok, Baby. It’s ok to need some help for a little while.”

“My dad always said that it was weak to need it. That if I couldn’t get through things then I needed to try harder.” The words slipped out before she meant to say it.

“You know I talked to someone last year after Monaco. I think it’s strong to admit that you need some help. It’s such a brave thing to do. It’s up to you but I think it could help.”

It was silent between them for a few minutes before Em could speak. “I think I need some help. Can you help me find someone who does it online?”

“I’ll be right beside you for all of it. I promise.”

“I know.”

Even admitting that she needed to talk to someone took some of the weight off her shoulders. There was something deep inside her that just felt broken and unable to put itself back together. She was freaking out about tiny things. That photo shouldn’t have made her feel this way. The entire Monaco weekend shouldn’t have affected her like that. She’d seen Dan crash before - she’d been in the garage when he crashed in Austria two years before - and the Monaco one wasn’t a big one. But it hurt her in ways she didn’t realise.

Em had never put herself first in her life. It was always everyone else. But this time she needed to put herself at the top of the list or she’d lose herself forever.

The trip to the track was quiet before practice and qualifying. Blake had made the decision that she wasn’t working until at least Austria. And it felt right if she was really honest. The fact that she didn’t want to fight about working proved to her just how necessary it was. Instead she sat in hospitality trading between cups of coffee and juices or water. Michael kept putting big bowls of food in front of her and she couldn’t bear to eat any of it. It was all mixed together and weird textures and the fish curry he tried to get her to eat made her feel disgusting. It was sweet that he tried but no. She could pick out bites when she needed to.

Over what was officially the lunch break but everyone was spending working she flicked through a crappy romance novel on her kindle when movement caught her eye. The teams had all come in and grabbed food before going back to the garage to get the cars ready for setup or do whatever they had to do. Blake was with Dan and Michael before Dan went to a fanzine event. She promised she’d be ok sitting there by herself. Em was convinced that they’d gotten people to keep an eye on her too, but she’d be fine. She could do this.

It was the two men walking through the barely quarter full room that caught her eye but the accent was what really hit her. Zak Brown talking to an Australian wasn’t unusual. What was unusual was that it was Mark Webber and not her boyfriend. Webber. Who managed last years F2 champion who didn’t have a seat. And Brown had been making comments about Dan’s performances needing to improve.

Oh no.

She always trusted her gut. Always. Her gut had yelled at her to not walk away in Melbourne, that it felt wrong, but she ignored it and look how things ended up? Her gut is what made her talk to Dan at Blake’s party nearly five years before. It made her kiss him and fall for him. Helped him make the decision to go to Renault. It was the right thing to do.

And she didn’t trust Brown. Not after the rumours and innuendo and the way her reputation took coordinated hit after hit last year. He had no reason to talk to Webber. Mark had never been in McLaren before, it was just wrong. She knew. Her gut was screaming at her, she knew. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Before she could start freaking out and worrying she saw Dan arrive in with the boys, a girl in her late teens with them. Em smiled as they came over, Dan kissing her cheek.

“Em, this is Rebecca. She flew out here for the race from England. I met her at the fanzone. She wanted me to give you something but I thought she could do it herself.”

“Hey, it’s nice to meet you.” Em looked at the girl who had a sheepish smile on her face before holding out a small bracelet.

“Hi, it’s really nice to meet you too. I saw all the media stuff yesterday and it was awful. I’m sorry people made such a big deal about your relationship like that. I don’t get it. But I make bracelets when I’m anxious and I had beads with me so I made this for you. I hope you like it.”

Em stared at the multicoloured beads and grinned. It said FEA in the middle, patterns of blue, purple, and pink beats surrounding it. It was perfect.

“This is gorgeous. Thank you so much. And thanks for being so kind. Do you want me to take a photo of you and Dan in here?”

“Actually could I get one with you? Feel free to say no. I know it might be weird. But you and Britta and Angela make me think that maybe I could work in motorsport? I’m not good at engineering or anything like that. But maybe I could do something else.” She blushed but Em just smiled, moving her bag with London sticking out of the top so she could sit in.

“Sit in here and we can take one. Just don’t put it online? I haven’t been well, I don’t want people seeing it.”

“Oh no! No way. I just want proof this happened, you know? Thank you so much for this.”

Em watched her leave with Blake, a grin on her face and her new Paddock Club lanyard was wrapped around her neck so she could watch qualifying and the race tomorrow in style. Em slipped her FEA bracelet onto her wrist beside her enchante one, the two comforting on her wrist.

“Sorry for springing this on you. She went to give it to me, said “This is for Em, could you give it to her? There’s loads of people supporting her and she should know that.” I thought you’d want to know.”

“She’s lovely. And that means so much. But what do you mean supporting me?”

Dan opened twitter and she went to groan but instead he showed her a hashtag. #Demma4ever was trending under motorsport. She wanted to groan when she first saw it but the one thing she realised was everyone was so sweet. People unsurprised they were together. People defending them from trolls. People defending her specifically from trolls. A twitter thread from someone calling themselves @cowboydan3 who had traced their relationship since 2018 by pointing out all the times they seemed to be together. It warmed her heart.

“All these people? But they’ve never even met me.”

“Not all of them. But there’s people who did at different events and talked about how you were nice to them. Fans who you pointed out to me so I could say hi and take a photo. People who say I’m in a better mood when you’re around. Yeah there’s trolls and bullshit, but most people have gotten to know the real you. They like you, Baby.”

“Yeah. They do. When’s qualifying?” She needed to not talk about it or she’d cry in public again. She couldn’t cry again.

“Thirty minutes. You gonna watch from here or the garage?”

“The garage?”

She stood beside Blake and watched as Dan was knocked out in Q2. The only piece of justice was Lando also got eliminated, so it wasn’t a “Daniel isn’t performing” kind of day. He had two overtakes to make to get into the points. He could do that. That was definitely something that could happen.

Standing in the paddock she spotted Lance and knew she had an opportunity to get some information. When she waved he made a beeline for her, offering a hug that she gave lightly thanks to the sweaty nomex.

“Sorry about your quali, I know it’s not what you wanted. How are you?”

“We’ll get there. I’m doing ok, how’re you? Especially after everything.”

“I’ll be ok. Unexpected, but I’ll be fine. I had a question for you actually!” She kept her smile fixed and hoped her nerves weren’t showing. “Has Esteban said anything to you about what Oscar is doing while he’s looking for a seat? I know he’s Alpine’s reserve this year.”

“No, nothing. We don’t tend to talk about much work stuff. Unless Alonso’s annoyed him. Then he’ll go on a rant but I ignore it. Dan was the only teammate that Esteban really got on with. But no. Why?”

“You know Dan. Young Australian who came to Europe alone too young, plus we got to know Oscar as a Renault junior in 2020. He wanted to check in but Rossi won’t let him anywhere near Alpine so it’s hard to do it.” He laughed before Lance’s osteo, Henry, came to get him for something.

“If I hear anything I’ll tell you. The latest rumour I heard is possibly a Williams seat. Nicky doesn’t think he’ll keep his seat which sucks.”

“Yeah it does, he’s a good one. Thanks Lance, good luck for tomorrow.”

Everyone knew the rumours about the Williams seat being available. The main rumour Em had heard was that it was a Williams junior who’d get it, there were a couple of prospects in F2 depending on how the season went. Fuck. This was real. It was real and all Em wanted to do was curl up and sob but she couldn’t. She had to walk through the paddock and find Blake to talk to him, and then talk to Dan about it.

As she began to walk back to the meeting rooms Em spotted Ted Kravitz, giving him a wave and a nod as she walked past.

“And of course that’s Daniel Ricciardo’s girlfriend walking past. It’s so nice to get to call her his girlfriend, you know that? Everyone’s known for a long time, back when he was at Renault, which of course is now Alpine, she was known for getting a card for everyone for their birthday. It was probably the worst kept secret in this paddock.”

Getting Blake into Dan’s driver room was easy and she put Fearless on through speakers to muffle their voices. This wasn’t a conversation she wanted to have anywhere near the rest of McLaren but she didn’t have a choice.

“What’s going on, Timmy? Please tell me you’re not leaving again.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” She fixed him with a glare. “But we need to talk and it needs to be private. Nobody can overhear. What do you know about Mark Webber and how his career ended?”

“He was fed up of F1. I was barely in Red Bull when he was leaving, but he was done and everyone knew about it. Dan was nearly pulled up mid season. Why?”

“He had a meeting with Brown today. I watched them leave Brown’s office just beside the cafeteria. Neither of them realised I was there, the cafeteria was basically empty. But they were there for a long time and we’ve both heard him talk about Dan’s performance.”

“Ems, no. No way. Dan has eighteen months left.” She shook her head and watched Blake’s face carefully as she spoke.

“Dan has a twenty five million dollar contract break clause. He’s working himself to the bone for this team and I’m pretty sure that Piastri is going to be in his car next year. I just…maybe I’m wrong. But when has my gut ever been wrong on this? I know this Blakey. I know it.”

“You’re sure?”

“I mean I wasn’t in the room but what other reason is there for the two of them to have a closed door meeting in between practice and qualifying on a Grand Prix weekend?”

“None. Fuck. But are you really, really sure? Seriously.”

“If my mental health wasn’t in the toilet you’d believe me immediately, right?” A sheepish nod. “I know you probably don’t trust me. I don’t trust me about me sometimes right now. I’m hanging on by a thread. But this is Dan’s career, and the one thing I have always done is put his career before anything else. You know that’s what I do. I wouldn’t say this based on anything else. You know that.”

“I know. I know.” I didn’t think they’d fucking do this. I didn’t think they’d do more to hurt him after last year.”

They agreed to keep it to themselves for now, that Em would tell Dan that night. She didn’t want to mention it before the race but he deserved to know. Part of her brain was blaming herself for it. If she hadn’t left then maybe Imola would have been better and the races wouldn’t have been a mess. But she couldn’t think like that. It wasn’t worth it. She couldn’t change the past.

There was a sponsor gala on that she hadn’t realised was even happening, but she was his official plus one to everything. At least she’d learned to always bring a dress to wear to any fancy event with her. It was the same one she’d worn in Melbourne to the race weekend opening but she didn’t care. The dress was looser than the last time she’d worn it, the corset top hanging rather than snug against her chest and waist. Instead of heels she put on ballet flats and did her makeup perfectly. She could get through this. For Dan.

Being on his arm as his girlfriend was a completely different experience to being there with him as his assistant. She smiled and made small talk with people who actually listened to her because of that title change instead of ignoring her. But finally they were face to face with Brown and his wife. Em kept the smile on her face and shook his hand.

“It’s good to see you back, Emma. We were worried about you. Dan didn’t tell us what was happening.”

“That’s because I asked him not to tell anyone. I was ill for a while, we wanted to make sure that I’d be ok before we let anyone know.” It was the same story they’d told everyone in the paddock who’d asked and he paled slightly at it. Worth every minute of not telling the full truth.

Finally they sat down for the dinner and Em stared at the plate placed in front of her. It was all traditional Azerbaijani food, but the worst part was that it was all baked together. There was nothing separate and she could tell from moving her fork through it that the textures were going to be impossible for her. Her stupid food thing and she was going to embarrass Dan if she didn’t eat anything and she couldn’t. She got some meat on her fork and lifted it to her lips, nibbling. It was tasty. But trying to swallow more than the tiniest bite felt impossible.

“You ok?” Dan whispered and Em nodded.

“I didn’t know this was the food.”

“Blake and Michael both checked there’d be food for you. We can just go back to the hotel. You need to eat something.”

“We can’t leave.”

“I’m not letting my girlfriend starve. Not with everything happening Em. You need food.”

“We can’t.” She took a breath and a sip of water, squeezing his thigh. “I’m not that hungry and I can get food when we’re back at the hotel. I’ll drink water. But listen to me. There’s something weird going on right now at McLaren and you can’t leave. You just can’t. I promise I’ll tell you everything when we get back. Just trust me?”

“I always trust you, Emmy. Promise you’ll tell me?” She could hear the worry in his voice but she just nodded, keeping her face smiling like he’d said something hilarious.

“I promise. Pinkie swear.”

A waiter came by about her full plate but Dan stepped in.

“She’s on a medical diet at the moment. We were told there’d be a special plate put aside.”

“Oh, we’re sorry. There’s none.”

She stayed by his side while they did the rounds to talk to people and sit through speeches. Dan’s hand stayed in the small of her back as she nodded and smiled and kept her mouth shut unless it was something she was confident about. Food was the last thing she wanted to deal with when they got back to the hotel. She wanted to go to bed and forget about the day, but that wasn’t going to happen. Instead they got in the same car as Lando to get back to the hotel.

“I mean I get why they didn’t give options but do they not realise picky eaters exist? It was kinda alright but I’d have liked a heads up! What about you, Em? Did you like the food?”

“Didn’t have much, medical diet.”

“Oh. I’m glad you’re back now. He was a mopey git while you weren’t travelling.”

Em knew it was just the younger man’s turn of phrase but she kept a tight hold of Dan’s hand to make sure he knew she was there. Thankfully it was a quiet drive back to the hotel. All the Hiltons in the world felt the same after a year of being sponsored by them. Walk in, hotel reception on the left, lifts around the corner and beside a vending machine. They shared the lift with Lando who waved as he stepped off on his floor. Em kept a hold of Dan’s arm until they were inside his room and he pulled her into a hug.

It wasn’t until she’d ordered room service and it was delivered that she was willing to speak. Once she had this conversation she knew she wouldn’t eat for the rest of the night. Then Dan would get annoyed and it would hurt more than it could ever help and that was the last thing she wanted to happen. So instead Em took a couple of bites of chicken teriyaki while mulling over how to say the words that she knew would devastate her boyfriend.

“When I was in hospitality between practice and qualifying I sat in the corner so nobody spotted me. I didn’t realise that I could see Zak’s office. Mark Webber came out of a long meeting in there shaking Zak’s hand and they left together about five minutes before you came in.”

It was silent in the room until Dan let out a long sigh. He slowly lay back on the bed, his head hitting the mattress. Em watched as he took deep breaths before undoing his bow tie and the top button of his shirt.

“On Saturday night in Monaco, just before I got you from Aston Martin, Andreas called me into his office. He told me that my seat is at risk if I don’t perform better. Fuck. Fuck!” He whisper yelled the last word and sat up while rubbing his face. “I didn’t want to worry you, that’s why I didn’t tell you what he said. You were so fucking fragile Baby. I couldn’t. You still are. I thought it was just a warning.”

“Is it because I left?” The words hung in the air for a moment and she wanted to get sick. Fuck. Fuck all of it. She left and Dan struggled and now he was going to lose his seat and it was all her fault how could she have done that to him?”

“No, no. No Baby. I promise you it’s not because you left.” He pulled his suit jacket off while coming over to pull her into his arms and push a kiss to her head. “I just can’t make the car work. It steers weird and the braking doesn’t work the same was as any other car I’ve ever driven. You being here makes it easier to clear my head when I’m not stuck in the car. But you made me promise in Spa that day to have a clear head before I get in the car. I swear, I clear my mind every single time.”

“Why didn’t you tell me then?”

“Because I couldn’t. You just came back and I was so scared you’d leave again. If I told you you’d blame yourself and leave. I couldn’t. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for not telling you.”

“Don’t be sorry.” She held his face with her fingers and looked up at him. “You were right not to say anything then. I was barely thinking then. I still barely am. I couldn’t hear it.”

“I’m still sorry.”

“And I still forgive you. I love you, you did the right thing, Danny. What do you want to do?”

“I don’t know. If he said that on Wednesday I might have walked away. But I’m not finished. I think I have more left in me.”

She lay on the bed and pulled Dan into her. Getting changed out of her dress was too much work, he needed to be loved and held and cared for. Tears began rolling down his face as she clung to him, her fingers carding through his curls.

“Remember when we were in lockdown on the farm? I promised you when you were deciding if you were going to leave Renault then that I wasn’t going anywhere. The colour you wear on race week isn’t going to change my mind about that. I said it then and I’m saying it now and I mean every word of it. I love you so much and not being together nearly killed both of us. You can learn to be a mechanic and a househusband with our unicorns.” A wet laugh bubbled out of his chest as her words settled into him and she kept talking.

“We can have our barn with our horses and our kids like we talked about. I don’t care about going and working in some office. We can have breakfast for dinner and lunch and breakfast. Pancakes three times a day, yeah?”

“I thought you hate my cooking?”

“I like your breakfasts. And I love you. I don’t love the Honey Badger. I don’t love DannyRic. I love my Danny. You’re the man who taught me that love can be a good thing. Yeah it hurts sometimes but it’s worth it. I want my life with you, whether that’s F1 or endurance or Indycar or anything else. I want you, Baby. I’m going to follow you to the end of the world. Do you hear me? Whatever you want to do next. I’m going to be holding your hand and right there by your side. Wherever you want to go. I promise.” Her voice was low as he sobbed into her dress. He’d held her as she sobbed the week before and it was her turn now. He was her boy and she wasn’t leaving him.

“I love you, I love you, I love you.”

“I love you so much, Baby.” She stayed there holding him as he cried himself to sleep and then just stared at him for hours. Dan needed to get it all out. He’d been holding it in since she left and he needed to cry. Em held him and ran her fingers through his hair and watched as he finally fell into some kind of a restful sleep.

It was another disturbed night for her but she woke to banging on the hotel room door, Dan turning his head into her to get away from it.

“One minute, Baby. Lemme get it.” She squeezed his shoulder before answering the door. Michael was on the other side, his face changing when he saw her attire.

“Dan’s meant to be at breakfast, what’s going on? Why are you…?” He trailed off and indicated to her outfit.

“It was a bad night. Order something for Dan for breakfast, we’ll be down in fifteen. Order me some toast please? Just toast, and if they’ve got smooth peanut butter some of that too. Otherwise plain toast.”

“Can you make it ten?” If she was honest she didn’t think she could make it in fifteen, but ten was definitely out of the question.”

“Fifteen. We’ll be down.”

Getting Dan up and changed was hard but she did it, putting on yet another merch tee and carrying a bag he gave her. Everything screamed “I’m Daniel Ricciardo’s girlfriend” and she didn’t care that it did. She needed to be his to the world. Em was broken and battered and in pain, but her Danny needed her. So she was standing beside him and staring down the world while holding his hand and supporting him because that was what he needed. She could do this.

Walking into breakfast the mood at the table was quiet. They all ate something, Dan swapping the bowl of yogurt and granola at her place for his egg white omelette.

“Mate that was-“

“Em doesn’t eat mixed up food. And she doesn’t eat granola because of the texture. At least this way she’s eating something. When have you ever seen her eat granola?” Michael shushed at Dan’s words, at the clear tension in both of their shoulders. She picked at the omelette before passing more than half of it back to Dan. He was the one racing. He needed to eat. The fucking race.

Arriving to the paddock had her heart in her throat. This was race day. The big event. There were cameras about to be on her and as little as she wanted to see them she knew it had to happen. Sitting in the back of the car Dan looked across at her.

“You can wait for me to go through. I don’t mind.”

“I’m going inside holding your hand. I’m a wag now, i have to act the part. Right?” He grinned at her but the smile didn’t reach his eyes this time.

“Love you.”

“I love you too.”

Her pass scanned easily and let her through the turnstiles as the photographers at the entrance got a picture of Dan waiting for her while holding his hand out. She ignored the loud shouts and just focused on moving forward one step at a time. Dan’s hand was a comforting weight in hers as she kept one foot going in front of the other.

“Emma! Dan! Over here!” The calls were coming from each side but her sunglasses hid her worry. Instead they made it to the FIA building before someone else arrived and attention was taken away from them. It was a relief and she was able to relax a little bit. Race mornings were always hectic and she kissed Dan goodbye before sitting in front of McLaren with a coffee to watch the paddock go by.

“Is this seat taken?” She turned and saw Carmen asking, smiling and gesturing for the younger woman to sit down. They’d texted once or twice, given each other cafe recommendations for London and chatted when they saw each other in the paddock. “Welcome to the official ‘I’m dating a Formula One driver’ group. How’re you doing with the media attention?”

“It’s a lot.” Carmen knew what it was like, Em was able to be as honest as possible with her. “I mean I had it anyway because of work and all the speculation. But this is different. Plus I haven’t been around so yeah, it’s a lot. Hopefully it’ll die down.”

“It will. It’s bad the first couple of races but then it’ll relax because you’re there most weekends. You’ll be fine. I just wanted to check in because I know you were sick. Are you feeling better?”

The nerves and worry and fear from the night before were coming back in full force but she bit her tongue and nodded until she was ready to speak. “It’s gonna take time. But I’m getting there.”

“If you want to talk about it I’m here. I get the going from being in the normal world and then diving in here. Or if you want to get food or a coffee. Lily will be in Silverstone for Alex’s home race. We’re both going to get food the Thursday before. You’re welcome to come for dinner with us as just the girls.”

“Maybe? Dan’s parents are in Europe, they’ll be in England then. Plus we’re trying to find somewhere to live. It’s a whole thing.”

“The offer is there. Especially race weeks if you have time away from work. If I don’t see you later I’ll see you in Montreal? Susie asked if I knew if you were going. She said to say thanks about that restaurant in Melbourne, Jack loved it.”

“Tell her she’s welcome. And yeah, I’ll be in Montreal but it depends how I feel? I’m still doing a slow return to work so we’ll see how it goes.”

She watched Carmen walk away as her hair shone in the sun, effortlessly walking around the paddock like a model. Would she ever get to that stage? She could do it when Dan was at Renault, but most of that was because she blended into everyone when she wore the Renault shirts. It was different now.

Her spot outside hospitality meant that she could people watch while she did some googling. Searches for online therapy turned to hybrid therapy and finding someone she could see in person when she was in London. One therapist had open slots so she booked an initial appointment online. The time difference would suck while she was in Montreal but it was worth it. She needed this. She needed to work through the pain and the grief and the heartbreak she felt over the last few months because Dan needed her and she needed to keep him together.

She went to lunch with the boys and Dan before standing in the back of the garage and kissing the side of his helmet before he got into the car to bring it out to the grid.

“Go fast and be safe, ok?” She looked into his eyes, visor still up. “I love you no matter what happens. I promise.”

A squeeze of her hands was everything Dan needed to do to show his love and she stood in her spot in the garage just waiting. Her pass gave her grid access but she never went up there. Going on the grid felt like she’d be a distraction.

Watching Dan cross the line in P6 made her grin, hugging Blake close. She knew it wasn’t enough. Something in her knew that anything short of a race win wouldn’t be enough. But he beat Lando and that was what she really cared about. She would get to walk out of the paddock holding Dan’s hand, and the next morning they were flying straight to Montreal to have a couple of days together before the chaos of the next race began.

She could do this. She could do it. She wasn’t going to break. She was going to make sure that she kept going forward. For her, and for Dan.

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