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eluxcastar · 1 year

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Fatui Harbingers with a child they don't own

── ୨୧：fatui harbingers & reader

୨୧﹑synopsis :: a child that doesn't seem to belong to any one of them is known to wander around headquarters, though it's not exactly clear whose it is or how it even got there. well, it's cute enough, isn't it?

୨୧﹑genre :: fluff

୨୧﹑content :: gn reader, child reader, child endangerment 💀, scaramouche is soft because baby, pantalone is trying to teach a kid stocks, pulcinella is such a grandpa

୨୧﹑words :: 2k

this was a little thought that came to mind, mostly because of the fact I was like "Capitano forced to carry around some lil baby would be cute" and I'm fuckin speed running writing this before sports tryouts I've got less than one hour 😭

nvm I didn't finish in time and it got cancelled anyway so we can work slowly now (I didn't even finish this until the next day anyway LMAO) the mild implication each of them handles the same child on different days and this kid is just experiencing all of these things is funny to me for no reason

you have a horrible habit of wandering off while waiting for your parent, somehow managing to find yourself in the stranger possible places. how you end up there, nobody who has to look for you ever really knows, but you usually end up finding at least one person who will—if nothing else—tolerate you.

the youngest of the Harbingers is the easiest to survive and get along with. Childe likes you, and knows how to keep you entertained while he somewhat awkwardly waits to see if anyone will arrive to look for you. admittedly, he likes it whenever you pop up, finding you a good little distraction, and you think his bow is cool to watch when he uses it. you think it's just the fact that he's so good with it that makes it so interesting, and he's very supportive when you tell him all of the stuff you don't get to tell anyone. it's not that Childe is constantly waiting to feed his interest nor does he always care a lot but he certainly makes it sounds like he does and it sounds very much like he's proud of you for even your minor achievements. are you hungry? he can get you food if you need and makes sure you're shockingly well taken care of and there's not a scratch on you when you leave. he even has you calling him big bro at some point though where that came from nobody is really sure.

on a very different note, Arlecchino is at first very confused by you, then quite soft. she does not coddle you, but she is never particularly aggressive towards you, initially believing that you were looking specifically for her for some reason. after all, what else would make a small child pull at her overcoat? she does begin to wonder where you came from, and was very impressive to you, though she warns you not to grab at her clothes too much. by her own words "Something might bite you" thought that really refers to whatever weapon she keeps, referring to it in a way a child would easily understand. she lets you sit with her while you wait, but warns you once more this time not to wander, sometimes letting you take her hand and guide her to pat your head and play with your hair.

admittedly, you are not what one might call the the most popular with the banker, though he gives you little trinkets and more frequently gives you mora to look at. he gifts you loose mora so much that you run off to him when there's something you want but can't afford, and of course he notices though you think you're so slick. Pantalone starts to give you more money, as long as you keep showing up, looking and learning all the things he wants to show you. he wouldn't indulge your greed so much if it didn't give him what was an opportunity. he finds fostering your curiosity is much easier than squandering it and when you want to see the many things you simply cannot afford while living on the salary of a lowly fatuu you've picked the best option for who to go to. someday you're going to need the knowledge he happily provides, and who better to learn from than the richest man in Teyvat? wait, what do you mean you barely understood a word of it?!

above all else you think La Signora is very beautiful, and really you just want to follow the pretty lady around even if she tries to pretend she doesn't notice you at first. your persistence got so annoying she was forced to turn around and try to figure out what you want, touching your face and observing your features to see if she recognises them. of course she doesn't. she has no idea who the hell you are, or where you came from or what you want. strangely there's this endearment to you, like she can't quite bring herself to get rid of you even if she's not over the moon about you insisting on holding her hand and going wherever she goes.

easily one of the most fun to bother is Sandrone, who may have been a little on the eager side to have someone who could act as a test user for at least a few of her automatons for her. if even a child could understand the instructions, surely grown adults would have no problem right? you make a great play tester, often finding several of them piled up just for you to play with. she knows you can't stop your wandering, you'll continue to come back to see her--her inadvertent bribery that she'll have cool toys to play with ready for you to seek her out. admittedly not all of your critiques make it in, mostly the ones that don't actually apply to their purpose as she has you believing they're just harmless toys with coincidental abilities. she is generally quite benevolent towards you however, always acting as if she really will accept them in a heartbeat. she always keeps you well taken care of too.

perhaps the most shocking reaction of all is Scaramouche who is…unexpectedly nice to you. for someone supposed to be bold and generally disliked, he sure is nice in letting you crawl all over him and ask your thousand questions. he fusses over you in that odd caring way, though never what you'd call particularly sweet about it. he buttons your coat for you when he doesn't want you to get cold and lets you hide under his hat from the snow. Scaramouche often sits you in his lap as he finds something to talk to you about whether it be school or home, all a ploy to keep you still perhaps, but if for some reason he doesn't enjoy your conversations-- well, you certainly don't notice. he does greatly enjoy it in fact, a little more than he cares to admit even to you.

talking at all to Pulcinella is like talking to your Grandfather as he comes to recognise you well, greeting you with a ruffle of your hair as he asks if you've gotten bigger. you haven't gotten bigger, and he's really not all that good at picking you up, but he certainly tries and you try to pretend your feet are more than an inch off the ground. perhaps manhandling simply isn't his strong suit. still you enjoy all the candy he has laying around, and the little gadgets you find around his office which haven't had a use in twenty years. a bit of interest to them doesn't exactly make them useful, and the things you really like are always the ones you can't touch like the little tin of rolled up papers secured with a rubber band and some suspicious stuff you can't discern, but he has many stories to tell of these things all to keep you distracted from the fact you got your hands on a tobacco tin and specifically cannot use it.

strangely the least opposed but most confused by you being around is Capitano, who cannot seem to simply scare you off at a glance and therefore has to wonder why you're here at all, where are your parents? you definitely don't work here. you must be cold, hungry? did you drink enough water today? he finds himself starkly confused as to why you just wander around him, can't seem to find an ounce of sense in you as you don't turn tail and run, and while he lets you sit on his lap when you get too tired he does not appreciate having to pull your hands away from his helmet all the time. maybe he should let you just to deter you after you almost get your hand bitten off. something about the way you still hug him tightly before you leave, or how you'll just dangle off your arm, even the way that you will appear in the most inconvenient situations and he'll just hook you under his arm and cart you off somewhere with him he knows is safe. of course you think this is the most fun you've ever had but on the other hand he really wishes you would show up at a time when he's not occupied.

to Columbina you are just the cutest little thing, drawn to the sound of her voice, though that is only what first leads you to find her by chance. she does not specifically take care of you so much as pamper you, playing with your hair and sitting you by her side to keep you company. you like to turn her hair and the ornaments in her hair, all which make you say she's like a pretty dove. she knows someone will come to find you, but in the meantime she is focused on settling you down to stop your wandering. she lets you cuddle up to her, lulling you to sleep with a pretty song that calms you down. you're much easier to watch that way. it keeps you from wandering, something she notices you must have a habit of considering you found her in the first place. it doesn't matter how full of energy you were when you walked in, always finding yourself curled up, head resting on her shoulder as you drift off to sleep rather quickly.

you are not exactly granted the warmest welcome by the Doctor, in fact you become terrified of Dottore the second he notices you've found your way inside and accidentally mistakes you for one of his test subjects. of course that makes you turning tail and running off seem quite suspicious, though you're also not very hard to catch. all of your squirming is expected, barely even stopping him very much at all. thankfully Dottore wasn't born yesterday, and the large stuffed animal you carry around and the clothes you wear are fairly indicative of the fact that you're probably not one of his subjects after all once he gets a better look at you. though it's hard to ease your shaking and wipe your tears when you're not eager to listen. he's not exactly the best with children either, though you do eventually come around once he figures out what to do, letting you cuddle up to him while he stroke your back to soothe you just in case you happen to be well liked by anyone he's not keen to annoy--rare chance but never impossible. you're not exactly eager to spend time loitering around there once he sets you back on your feet and watches you run off, but rare is not impossible.

how you even managed to find your way to Pierro is beyond even him, as the sudden opening of his door is usually met with a glare, though the sight of an empty space where a person would usually be prompts him to look down just to be sure. suffice it to say he's not exactly happy to have some little ankle biter running around headquarters, but he doesn't really have time to drop everything and scoop you up to march you back wherever you came from. you have to sit still and wait. Pierro should've foreseen you crawling around his feet to get under his desk and treating it like a hidey hole--being there in the first place should've indicated to some degree that you're not particularly into the idea of patience. his numerous attempts to catch you by your arm and hold you still don't work either, just resulting in you giggling and running off to some other corner where you get into something you shouldn't. he knows damn well all of his attempts are only encouraging you, and he's a glad to finally watch you give up, possibly just because you got bored-- but whatever the reason, watching you crawl back under his feet to fit between the little space in between him and his desk lets him breathe a sigh of relief and go back to working for a little white longer while you wait for him to go find whoever you belong to.

suffice it to say whoever was looking for you is sufficiently horrified by the time they find you, but that doesn't seem to be too unusual to you.

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the-moon-files · 4 months

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Linked Universe / GN!Reader - Random Headcanons abt the Chain! :)

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 (ur here!)

Sun: Gender Neutral Reader (you/they/them), Guide Reader!

Orbit: Headcanons-ish, Scenarios?

Stars: Wind, Wild, Sage, C*urage, K*ridai

Comets & Meteors: Content Warnings: i included the link from K*oridai (faces of evil), and the brunette Link from that old cartoon tv show,

& Trigger Warnings: none known.

☆

Wind (Wind Waker):

Misses being a big brother

LMAOOO I CAME FOR UR THROAT HAHAAA

ok chill chill he's doing okay

He's just not used to being the youngest in any given group, he used to be the oldest kid in charge of the younger ones and his little sister too

But dont get him wrong! He rlly does love the advantages that come with it,

and when he's feeling down abt not being older u usually cheer him up by reminding him he can be the biggest little shit he wants and every single Link will forgive him once he pulls out his baby seal eyes lmao

Ur the easiest to rope into horse playing/goofing off and he's very happy abt that

The others can be too serious for too long so he appreciates how u and him lighten them up by trying to give each other noogies (he loses most of the time)

As soon as Wind found out the others could play instruments, he immediately demanded they do campfire songs every night lol

(Most of the time one person caves, even just to idly play smth)

Likes inventing weird new games to play that'll convince as many other people to particpate, he used to do it back home too, like finding the prettiest rock on the island, that way his grandma and even adults could play too :)

Needs to sleep beside someone at night, bc he secretly likes it, back on his adventure going to sleep all by himself (unlike living with his grandma/sister) always was a little hard for him

Very hard to wake up in the morning, sleeps in the latest out of all the Links

("I'm a growing boy? Ofc i need my sleep, whats ur excuse??" @ the other Links who sleep in late lol)

Likes to sew! He's still learning, but his grandma used to teach him how so he could help her keep up with his growth spurts/recklessness tearing his clothes up

Idolizes u forever if you embroider, and will watch u like those videos of someone's cat who's fascinated by watching owner craft smth lol (like this ⚫️v⚫️)

Enjoys making stoic people crack their persona and laugh

Also has the wheeziest laugh youve ever heard, it makes u laugh every time, even when he started laughing over a dumb pun

Oh yeah, makes a foul amount of dad jokes for someone whos only like 14 💀

(He once managed to break Time and Legend, which then broke Wars and Twi, and it just continued down the Chain until everyone was crying or on the ground, he wears that shit like a badge and it literally made his confidence go 📈 puffed his chest out and everything lol)

Wild (Breath of the Wild):

U already know everything there is to know abt him??

I dont even have to say it, and it shows when ur around him lol

Like he'll go to do smth stupid like shield surf down death mountain in a unknown Hyrule, and before anyone can even realize thats what he's planning to do you've caught and stopped him and made a compromise to shield surf down some snow bluffs later instead

Or when u know he's gotten new ingredients in some other Link's Hyrule and is going to try and cook with them tonight, so u help him make a regular meal of smth else along with so the boys dont suffer stomaches

Like u can absolutely predict his bullshit all the time, just imagine the most adrenaline junkie thing he could do in that moment with the combination of things around him and you always know what tf he's up to, ur always right lol

Ur the only one who can get him to stop the chaos (besides maybe Time, weirdly enough Sky/Hyrule/Four bc they are the least likely to tell him to stop, so when they do, its usually a very, very bad idea)

Likes hair ornaments, he's got long hair for a reason after all

Likes u to style his hair, and esp if u teach him how to braid or do diff styles <333

He loves that u help cook/at least prep, and u make sure another Link helps too, bc thats a lot of ppl to make food for with little to no help 💀

(Makes u ur fav foods at even the slightest mention of them, like u wont even have to say ur craving Link's already whipped the pan out best housewife fr)

One of the few Links who's adventurous with his clothing, and trying new stuff

Wild was worried abt his Champion tunic getting messed up but was sad he couldn't wear it as much anymore

So u handmade him a new shirt that imitates the old one but with some new designs to represent the Chain! :)

He started crying.

He either hugs so lightly he seems like he's not enjoying it (no true, he's just trying to be polite)

Or he squeezes so hard be pops ur back and nearly breaks a rib

U got the latter for that shirt lol

Any new thing he doesnt remember how to deal with, like how to sew (he knows 1 stitch help), how to wash clothes (dont mix whites and blacks, and colors), how to soothe headaches/muscle aches etc.

He just wanders pitifully over to ur side and looks pitiful lol

Like he's a confused and saddened puppy

And just holds up whatever mess he's made like, "im so sorry, i dont know how to do this pls"

Bc he trusts u to know (the other Links may be hit or miss too tbh lmao)

And ur the least likely to clown him for it too, at least nothing he doesnt also find funny

Sage (Tears of the Kingdom):

So sue me, i enjoy this stupid-definitely-not-canon-unhinged-Link thats done with everyones bullshit and wants to be a hermit

SUEEE MEE ABT ITTTTT✨️

The first time u saw his hair nest and immediately clapped ur hand over u mouth in shock and tried to take a brush to it on sight

He fucking hissed at you.

Feral bitch.

Sage isnt like that all the time, but he was certainly the most distrustful and prickly out of all the Links

(U could smell it was like a defense mechanism from his adventure/past from a mile away, and knew with time that it'd fade away into his true self... like how u just knew Wild that well too)

U are the only person allowed to casually touch him, he shys away from the other Links, let alone strangers,and the first he allowed to help him with his hair

Tbh after u washed it out and got tangles and mats out and cut split ends off etc.

He almost teared up, and was extremely confused why

Def the type to not have realized he felt insecure lowkey abt it until it was fixed (he also was embarrassed to say he didnt rlly know how to take care of it)

Energy of a stray feral cat that leaves dead birds on ur doorstep without fail every morning and u leave a food bowl out in hopes he'll actually be your cat 💀

Extremely protective of you, and eventually the Chain, to the point where he might set someone's hair on fire or use runes on them

Like not enough to seriously injure but enough to scare tf out of ppl and have them running for their lives

(Did he literally growl at someone when they tried to flirt with you?? ... why is Twi encouraging him.)

Was unnerved by Wild at first but slowly got used to him and often butts into whatever private convo u two are having

Like just casually struts up and plops his head on ur shoulder and waits for attention, may complain loudly depending on how grumpy he is that day

(Wild's not getting jealous and constantly hogging u for cooking to get even more time with you what-)

Okay but unfortunately

Once those 2 got comfy with each other, they started tag teaming everyone

Like u can now bet that if an explosion happens in the distance, Sage definitely caused it, and if he's there, then Wild's there making him the explosives

(Same for if Wild's there, then Sage's there)

Def the Link that likes showing the most skin, he "gets overheated easily" - local half naked man justifies his nakedness

(coughtotallynototherreasonslikebeingshirtlessaroundyouallthetimecough)

Absolutely grievous clowning on the other Links, like its getting into bullyinggg 😭

His words are E rated for Everyone, no ones safe not even you

Sage: "wait, all those rings and nobody's ever put one on you? And you've never put on one someone else??🤔🤔"

Legend: ...😦

The rest of the Chain: 💀😭😶

Time, trying to hide he's choking on laughter so hard he's abt to fall into the firepit

Will occasionally team up with Wild to make a protective little border on either side of you while in towns/new Hyrules

U once offered to sing/hum for him after a nightmare while it was ur turn on watch (he sleeps up trees btw) and after u switched off w/other Link, u both went to edge of camp to sleep next to each other and he had the best sleep of his life like that

Now demands begs u to sing him to sleep every night, wont take "i dont sound that good tho" for an answer

Courage (The Legend of Zelda, 1989 Cartoon TV show):

Yeah... he's here too.

Just dont read this tbh

Enjoys being ✨️special✨️ by being the only hero twink out here with brunette hair

Was insecure abt it being curly/wavy until u slowly built his confidence

Bc he's got the most confidence in his strength, but not in much else tbh 😭

Actually will randomly have moments of responsibility or capability you didnt expect out of him bc he can be so silly and jokey all the time

Youll be lost as hell and he just "hey its ok the stars look like this so we go this way" and it works

Like the type of person u sort of avoid relying on bc he's like a playful jock type and then they randomly show theyre the captain of the team for a reason

Dont ask why, but hes good at knitting, shhhh no, no, no explanation he just secretly is he wont even tell u why or how or when he learned this he just "hehe, wouldnt u like to know princeyyy/princesssss/your majestyyyy"

Hyrule, and rest of Chain standing by, went to talk to one of the Great Fairies in a Hyrule once to try and get some info abt where to camp tonight or where nearest town was and before he could get close enough to ask,

Courage was already yelling like "YOOOO BIGGEST FAIRY WHATS UP?! u mind giving some poor lost fellas like us somewhere to go with ourselves tonight??"

They kept talking super casually and she laughed so hard that she let u guys stay near her that night to camp and be under fairy protection like no fairy boy Link needed 💀

Everyone was shocked, and thats how u all found out Courage is rlly good with fairies/their best friend no matter the Hyrule

Every time u guys learn smth new abt him it feels so unexpected, like out of left field or smth

It just never seems to fit his usual persona, or at least not what youd expect from him

So needless to say the first time u guys learned he could talk to magical objects that were powerful enough (like the fucking triforce)-

(this was apparently so normal he literally lived with a piece of it just in his room all the time????)

Has weird mixture of country boy vs. royal prince sensibilities?

It alarmed several Links. 💀

He can talk to Fi.

(Sky and you nearly cried)

Like he lived in the castle alongside Zelda so he inherited some spoiled/etiquette stuff, but he still would absolutely go splash in mud puddles in the rain

Would literally do fucking anything if it meant youd give him a kiss on the cheek

Likes to hug you a lot too, with his huge ass arms lifting u up (no he does not care how much u weigh ur going UP) and spinning u around

Its his favorite, almost as much as kisses

No but he's slay fucking Majora to get a kiss, like it's actually unbelievable and kinda endearing how excited he gets if u promise him one lmao

Koridai (Link: The Faces of Evil):

Omg not them putting Link's name in the title of the gameee i didnt know that 😭😭

Geezzz,, i dont know what im on

But ig heres that other silly ass Link if anyone feels like reading it

Will also fight any god, including Hylia, for a kiss

Actually astoundingly good at strategizing

Like after a few times in heat of battle him organizing Links, Time and Wars practically jumped him to include him in planning shit

He was similar to Courage to in that he just was cracking jokes all the time u didnt expect it, also he's significantly more sarcastic than Courage

U introduced him to dark humor and the laugh he laughed practically burst out of him, he looked shocked by his own laugh lmao

So he also now has a streak of dark humor he shows when u talk for while/sees someone also enjoys it

Its like his not-so-guilty-pleasure

Really good at baking? He apparently learned a lot of miscellaneous skills to better court someone and he now uses them fully to seduce you,

thru gift giving mostly, its is love language besides acts of service :)

(All Links do some amount of acts of service tho <3)

Rlly good at styling hair surprisingly, and at shield surfing??? What

Actually down to try Wild's experimental dishes...

And by that i mean he pranks the rest of you by sneaking the inedible bits into ur food

U may or may not have nearly choked him out for it and now he doesnt do it to you, and even was trying to act all pitiful abt it like "sorry lovely, but i just wanted to tease u bc ur so cute!! 🥺👉👈"

Like,, stfu u little shit 💀

He has the energy of a male orange cat, dont ask why he just is, and specifically the orange cat getting on top of the fridge or stuck between the the screen door and glasss door comically or smth 😭

Hes also loud as hell

One of the worst at stealth unless he just keeps his mouth shut completely, like his whispering is loud

He proclaims his affections very loudly too, like gettin u flowers and chatting ur ear off with what he likes abt u lol

No, like he can go for 20 minutes or more if u let him, u better stop him before he gets into the personality based compliments

Bc those sound wayyy too personal to be aired out in public ngl, like its so soft and domestic itll kill u lol

And he means every word too 👀

☆

I HATE THIS NEW FEATURE OR FUNCTION I SWEAR THIS DIDNT HAPPEN BEFOREEE!!!

😭😭 U ABSOLUTELY KNOW WHAT IT IS BY NOW, IT FUCKING POSTED MY DRAFT BEFORE IT WAS READY TO GO

God fuck this hellsite stop doing this meee

Thats it im just do what i do for the other blog and write it smwhere else and then copy paste onto the post this is ridiculoussss 😒😒

Well anyway, i hope if u read this before i updated and actually FINISHED THIS u come back and read it again!! :(

Sorry guys, but blame tumblr pls before u blame me 😔

(Yeah theres a lot of emojis leave me alone i feel strongly abt this)

Peace out,

🐤 Peep

I think ill start signing off my name ig, unless u guys wanna call me Moon that works too

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jamiesfootball · 5 months

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2 & 14

2. How did you get the idea to write this?

oh god, you're gonna get it (you have not been given love) - Dissatisfaction with the Jamie's dad thing between Mom City and the finale started it, but then Roy going to therapy and becoming the new manager sealed it. There was just so much to explore. Plus, they gave my boy canonical depression in the second to last episode. How am I supposed to not do something with that?

From there it turned into a fun tetris puzzle of 'hmm, here's EVERYTHING THEY DIDN'T USE. FAIR GAME NOW.'

I still feel like the same person I’ve been - aside from really really wanting to dig into the between moments of certain episodes, I've always liked the concept of a character who goes through tons of emotional development but when they look back at it they're like 'so why am I still me? why don't I feel like I've changed?' By tying this together with the pavlov thing, I thought it added an interesting echo. You are the same, but you've changed. You are still the habits you've learned, and they'll happen to you over and over again. Things will repeat, but that doesn't mean they have to stay the same. (I like themes)

the vacant house behind our home - I got a prompt from an ask game: “I have an idea, but you’re not going to like it.” I liked the peril of it, the lingering threat out of eyeshot bracketed by the pretense of a buy-in. But I had nowhere to put it. The easiest idea was to give it to one of the players, but that felt too easy and didn't spark any good brain juice. Then I was re-listening to some of the first episodes of Welcome to Night Vale and the idea came to me of Ted, the talker that he is, having to walk someone through this horrible nightmare of a place. From there the investigator, the journalist (scientist) Trent fell into place as the one who would remain calm enough to ask the right questions, and a dialogue was born

you're gonna go far kid - an old idea that I got from someone else who suggested that what with his stunt as an Amsterdam tour guide, Jamie would make a fun travel host. At the time I read that, I had just cracked on this backstory for Isaac that he's actually really into archeology. From there it was easy to slot into place - Jamie, Isaac, and Colin doing a mini travel show. Isaac with the old history and the archeology and Jamie with the culture and the latest things to do. Colin there, basically just hanging out. Occasionally Isaac and Jamie will disagree and he'll be the tie breaker. He really is the deadpan third wheel who has people going 'why the hell is that guy there?'

Mostly Colin is just grateful that he gets to go on holiday and didn't have to do any of the planning. He's living the dream.

Then someone popped up in my ask box and was all 'oh what about a fic where Jamie wins an award and everyone is proud of him?' and my brain for some reason went 'you have the travel thing loaded. give him a webby.' 'but that would have to be after he retired.' 'yep' 'so wouldn't that also be a really sad time?' 'yep'

Oh. Oh.

So now i have a fic where jamie copes with the death of his career by starting a tiktok recipe channel and becoming a mini Anthony Bourdain, and many people are proud of him. Comedy!

14. Is there any unwritten/unpublished fics you planned on doing, but now you're feeling like you're gonna scrap those ideas?

I don't think I've scrapped anything ever in my life. Either they'll get written, or they'll sit around in my drafts taunting me, or they'll slowly morph into something I can use somewhere else. Ideas are made for keeping, I think

#ask game #ask box is always open #thank you for asking friend!#writing stuff

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crowkip · 11 months

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hi there!! i came across your art recently and love how you simplify forms for your style!! Do you have any tips on what you did to learn art and develop your current style? Did you take figure drawing lessons or just hyperfixate on an anime?? Any materials/exercises that were particularly helpful for learning how to draw humans? Thanks for your time!

thank u so much!!! i do have some handy info but im gonna put it under the cut so it doesnt clog up ppl's feeds bc it's gonna get a little long, hope this helps out!! ꉂ(ˊᗜˋ*)

ok so!! my top tip is to try out some life drawing classes! you'll often be expected to capture a full body gesture in 5-15 minutes which really helps you learn break the body down into its simplest forms since you wont have time to work on all the details. i only ever did a few sessions since they were part of a design course i was taking but even that alone definitely helped me streamline my process when it comes to planning out poses and making sure things arent looking too stiff

as for developing a style i honestly dont have a super clear answer bc i still find that i feel like my art is vERY very inconsistent, but even with that being said i do still have a few things that've helped personally!! easiest place to start is finding the tools you enjoy working with, for me i have a handful of brushes in csp that i tend to default to which helps form a little bit of consistency across my drawings (ofc dont be scared to branch out!! it's just handy to know what brushes work best for you). the other thing that's influenced my style is reading lots of comics and spending a lot of time looking at other artists' sketches, if you see a specific feature you like in their work try giving it a go yourself!! i remember noticing the contrast of soft and hard shadows in old oil paintings a few years ago n thinking 'ooh ive gotta try that' and ive been using it on my own art ever since. in the end your own style is greatly just a reflection of little things you've loved seeing in other peoples art and once you combine all those you end up with smth uniquely yours which i just think is awesome tbh

and as for shows n stuff that got me drawing, i dont have the coolest answer but as a kid i got super into drawing my friends as my little pony characters lmao i would spend every minute between classes drawing these stupid little rainbow horses and it actually really got me into picking out colour palettes and helped me build up that muscle memory which was what led into me drawing things that were a little more challenging. even if whatever motivates you to draw is considered kind childish or 'cringy' or whatever, dont stop drawing what you enjoy!! i wouldnt be drawing now without the years of pony doodles on homework as a kid and im glad i embraced it. i hope this can be helpful to you, so sorry for the long read but thanks for getting through it all!! good luck as dont be scared to dm me if you ever have any questions, i'll always do my best to help out :D

#omg this got so long but i did my best to keep it concise #rlly great question!!#ask crow

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nokingsonlyfooles · 11 months

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Art Week Hangover! And Here's Milo!

More tarot card designs/illustrations for my various characters. These folks are in a story, which is free to read, and everything is licensed under Creative Commons, BY-NC-SA, so it's yours to play with as long as you share. More description and various notes under the cut.

Poor Milo. Feeling sorry for him is kinda like feeling sorry for myself, but I just can't help it. It's not his fault I didn't know how to define my deal when I gave him my trauma and anxiety, but now he's all complicated and problematic and shit. At the moment (because the language does tend to drift a bit) Milo is autistic, trans, nonbinary (he doesn't know that part yet), and he either exists as two people or is sharing his body with a friend - depends on what "Ann" is and what he did to his brain when he made her. He does have access to magic, so that may or may not be involved. (Sorry to any systems who may trip over this, I know you don't need magic to exist as a multiple, but the ambiguity is necessary to Ann's character and I really thought they two of them would be a lot simpler when I made them.)

Among my few fans, he seems to be a favourite. We're not quite at sexyman levels of moral ambiguity (yet) but he certainly is willing to maim and kill to protect his loved ones and he could use someone willing to take him home and fix him. (He has a girlfriend and a kid and a big family by the end of it, but not at the point of this illustration!)

I screwed up his original card and I'd merged some layers I needed to have separate, so I could only kinda fix it.

...It's easiest to see in the glow on the lightning. I'm happier with the redraw, but it's a little harder to tell you're seeing his scars where his sleeve's pushed up. It's not super important you realize at first glance, anyway. You know he's messed up, that's all you need to know.

Milo and Ann's cards have a nonstandard design, because they're both reversed and upright at the same time. Here's Ann again, for reference.

Ann's got a triangular cutout at her feet (representing a red carpet) and Milo's got one coming from the top down (a lightning bolt), so you can sorta pretend you really did flip the card.

Milo really swung for the fences when he learned to mask his weird brain! An advantage of this method is the ease with which you can turn it off when you're tired and you just want to be you. Also, if your mask is a discreet individual, you can negotiate with it and make friends.

Ann and Milo are very good friends, but a little codependent and overprotective at times. They have occasional fights, but it's usually when one of them wants to do something scary, or stupid, and the other one doesn't.

If I ever develop a fandom, I foresee Ann and Calliope dying a lot of silly deaths so people can box Milo up and take him home like a lost kitten. I'm cool with that! I've got the original version and he's got his own things going on, but you can torment your version to your heart's content. I know he's adorable when he's suffering.

And, finally, here's the first, crummy version of Milo's introductory illustration, because you've been a good listener and read to the end!

#original characters #lgbtq characters #nonbinary character #tarot cards #tin soldier and soldier on

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dine-on-nervine · 9 months

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Is there a gang problem in your area? I'm told there's one.

Do you make your Starbucks order more complicated if it isn't busy? I don't drink Starbucks. As for a coffee order at other places, I have a select few things that I like and they're not too hard.

Do you consider airports to be emotional places? They are when you've got a loved one leaving. The last time I had a moment like that, she was saying goodbye in more ways than one.

Where do you need to be? Bed.

Would you date an already attached person? I have done that. It's fun for one night or a few rolls in the hay, but the realities of someone else being there to plan around set in.

When you marry, will you wear white? As the groom, I'm not expected to wear white.

What vaccine that you've received hurt the most? I don't have an answer to that question. None really hurt.

Do you ever feel like you're being watched? My landlady has 5-6 cameras around the house, so I am when I'm outside of my room.

What will it take to make or break this day for you? Coming twice. My body says that's not going to happen.

Would you give up a dream for someone you loved? I probably have done that. I know I caused someone else to give up one of their dreams, but that was genetically for the best.

Could you date someone who's only been your friend for a long time? I may have done that. I know of one couple where that was the case, he was her boyfriend's best friend, boyfriend died, they worked through it together, they lived together for awhile platonically, and then stuff happened. I lost touch with them so I have no idea how long that lasted but it didn't, the question is whether the friendship survived.

Do you prefer to date various people or do you pretty much fall into monogamous relationships quickly? Monogamous. Me getting one date is hard enough.

Are you afraid to ask people out on dates? I have been. The older I got, the better I was at gauging whether this was something they'd even want me to do... but not without at least one instance of misread signals.

Do you think it's better to look for love or let it find you? I don't know. A lot people say they found love when they weren't actively looking, so *shrug* >> "True love is easiest found with eyes closed", but take that statement one of two ways. If you don't open yourself up to find it, it can't find you.

Have you ever found yourself worrying about commitment? Me wondering if I can do it? Yes. Me wondering if someone else can do it? Absolutely, since the last 2-3 girlfriends I had had no sense of fidelity. Commitment beyond fidelity? Not really, it's been a matter of whether I'm ready for the altar.

Would you get involved with someone if they had a child already? At my age, they have grandchildren.

Have you ever learned an important lesson as a result of a break up? Yes. It's best to have a new plan when the old one falls apart.

Have you ever gotten back in touch with an old flame after a time of more than three months of no communication? Yes.

Do you or would you ever wear fake eyelashes? Nope.

Do you think that smaller breeds of dogs are cuter than big ones? No. They're way more annoying.

When was the last time you slept in a tent? 2005 I think. Backyard of a friend's house, Sunnyside WA. Woman in the next tent talked until her boyfriend passed out, then she went inside and fucked the host. After she was done and back in her tent, I was tired enough to finally fall asleep in mine.

What brand of make-up do you prefer to use? I don't.

Do you have any siblings and if so, what're they like? I have three. My sister is a bitch with three kids, my brother is an asshole with two kids, and my dickhead baby brother has two kids.

What was the last television show that you sat and watched multiple episodes of? Holmes Family Rescue.

Is there anything significant happening this month? Going to Renfaire in two weeks.

When was the last time you plucked your eyebrows? You couldn't pay me to pluck my eyebrows. I have shaved them before but plucking is a no-go.

Do you have any chronic pain? Not in the expected sense, just occasional aches.

When was the last time you had a Poptart? I ate my last one (the cranberry ones from Trader Joe's) a few days ago because I ran out of milk for cereal.

Do you like hot chocolate? I am a regular guy, yes.

Who is your best guy friend? Wayne.

What’s your favorite Michael Jackson song? I suppose "Man In The Mirror".

Where did you buy your favorite pair of jeans from? I don't have a favorite pair of jeans. I haven't even worn jeans in so long. >> I haven't bought jeans since 1986.

When was the last time you got your hair done professionally? Last haircut was a month ago I assume.

Do you like TGI Fridays? I may have been in one that is long gone now but (shrug) I can't remember anything about it. I have had the bagged potato skin chips.

Have you ever gotten your legs waxed? Another thing you couldn't pay me to do.

Have you ever read anything by Edgar Allen Poe? English minor here so yeah, plenty of his work.

When was the last time it rained where you live? 2-3 days ago?

Do you like horses? Platonically.

What is your opinion on air pollution? I thought we had this question settled in the 1970s but people still can't see past the ends of their noses.

What are your grandfathers’ names? Maternal was Barney, paternal was Hal.

Have you ever seen a snake in real life? A few.

Do you know anyone that has been held hostage before? Only by situations.

#100 ?'s

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itsclydebitches · 3 years

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I kinda wonder, what could bakugou do (hori write bakugou to do) to make him less popular with the "anti" crowd. Like He was a horrid child no doubt and people who try to put blame on Deku or lessen the terrible shit bakugou did aren't great. But as we don't rly see it, we have to assume bakugous behaviour wasn't stopped, we only ever saw his mum "punishing" him when he was being rude after getting kiddnapped. Nothing will excuse what bakugou did, but he has stopped? He's overall a harsh person but he's not harrassing and bullying people anymore, specifically not deku, he's trying to attone for what he did to deku and has now apologised for it. His behaviour was never viewed as justified or good in the series, he's a scary figure in middle school, we're not meant to like his behaviour, so the series itself hasn't justified his actions.

As someone who relate to both bakugou and deku more than I'd like to admit (never told someone to jump tho, that's fucked lol) so I can 100% understand not liking or even hating bakugou but as someone who's not 15 anymore, looking back I also made a lot of really shitty decisions and like bakugou have tried to make up for it, and like deku I was 'friends' with people who hurt me.

Is there anything he can do for the "antis" to just dislike him rather that be "anti"?

(I'm very sorry if you've talked about this somewhere, you can just tell me to look for it if you have, I'll continue to look for your posts on the subject)

Hey there, anon! I think I’ve spoken about this only tangentially and/or in my main Bakugo meta, which is too big for anyone sane to read. So yeah, let’s chat here!

For me personally—and that’s all I can ever do: speak personally. I think it’s important to keep in mind that there is no single solution to please the “anti” crowd. Each fan will be looking for something slightly different in Bakugo’s character, much of which might contradict what a “stan” is currently enjoying. Given how charged a character he is, I'm not sure it's possible to get the entire fandom to like him—what I’m looking for hinges on having a different reading of the story than you seem to. Meaning, I think the series does justify his behavior. Not in any overt, super obvious way like having all the characters go, “Wow, Bakugo! I sure do love how you threaten people all the time. That’s super cool and heroic!” Things are rarely that straightforward. Rather, it’s in a more subtle, but consistent manner that paints a rather conclusive picture across hundreds of chapters.

Simply put, Bakugo is continually rewarded for his actions. Or, if not outright rewarded, his actions are ignored in a way that implies silent acceptance. Characters may not always like what he does... but they're willing to let it slide because Bakugo's heroism was always treated as a given, not something he had to earn and prove.

With the ever necessary disclaimer that I’m not fully caught up yet, here’s a list of some of the things that stood out to me in the first half of the series:

Bakugo’s bullying made him the most popular kid in school.

Bakugo’s bullying was ignored by/outright supported by the teachers.

Bakugo’s bullying did not hinder him from getting into U.A., one of the most prestigious hero schools around.

Despite acting horribly throughout his time at U.A. too, this behavior was continually ignored by the teachers and other authority figures around him.

Bakugo’s struggle to realize that other people aren’t “trash” doesn’t hurt his achievements in any way. He still gets top scores, still wins the tournament, etc.

Bakugo’s behavior gets him special attention from All Might, the greatest hero and Bakugo’s personal idol.

His behavior doesn’t make others dislike him in any manner that’s taken seriously. Everybody is still willing to not just put up with Bakugo, but—in time—start treating his behavior as a quirk (no pun intended lol) that they’re secretly fond of, rather than something he should legitimately be striving to change. Kirishima is the most overt example of this.

This is compounded by his behavior constantly being framed as humorous. Much like with Mineta’s perverted actions, characters might superficially go, “No, that’s bad!” but the story never demands any significant development because then we’d lose the “joke” of Bakugo screaming in rage at the slightest inconvenience, threatening to murder someone over nothing, constantly belittling everyone around him in a “funny” manner, etc. When fans talk about development of a manga character as archetypal and extreme as Bakugo, most don’t really want to see significant change to his base personality. Because then that would result in someone who doesn’t look like the “real” Bakugo: someone nicer, more even-tempered, more mature, etc. But for those of us who were never drawn to that personality in the first place, the continued acceptance of his rude, egotistical, and violent behavior is discomforting. The easiest comparison I can draw is between this and Bakugo’s mother slapping him. That slap is meant to be another “joke”—we see it constantly in shonen anime, something "humorous" you shouldn’t take too seriously because haha, it's just an overprotective mother—but many fans do take it seriously, using it as the basis for a whole “Bakugo was abused and this explains his behavior” reading. Well, I take the “joke” of Bakugo’s threats and insults seriously, especially in a story that starts with something like telling Izuku to jump off the roof. In the same way that many fans want others to treat Bakugo’s mother as a serious topic that has had a negative influence on his development, I want the series to take Bakugo’s everyday actions seriously as a negative influence on… well, everyone around him. But it doesn’t. His base personality is grudgingly adored.

The above two points are seen most overtly in Izuku, who never wavers in his respect for Bakugo despite how Bakugo treats him. Not just prior to U.A., but during their training too. Izuku, as the protagonist, is the emotional heart of this tale, so when he talks about how inspiring Bakugo is, it encourages the reader to see his behavior as inspiring too. Rather than, as said, something that needs to change. Izuku's continued friendship with Bakugo, his adoration of him, and his acceptance of the way he's treated has severely warped how the entire story sees Bakugo's actions. After all, if #pure Izuku can see the good in Bakugo, why can't everyone else? He must not be that bad after all.

I could get into detailed analyses of all the above—like how Bakugo was the one comforted after attacking Izuku outside the dorms at night and how the messed up relationship he has with Izuku is upheld as something to nurture; how the remedial courses he had to take were made to be rather silly, thereby undermining their supposed importance to his development; how Bakugo’s kidnapping had nothing to do with his flaws, but much of the fandom uses it as a way to dismiss any appropriate consequences because, “Hasn’t he suffered enough?” etc.—but in the interest of keeping this within a readable length, I’ll leave it at that. The point is that Bakugo has always been privileged when it comes to his behavior, resulting in others either outright praising it, ignoring it, or demanding that he change a miniscule bit, which always keeps him far below the standards of both his peers and the expectations of a hero. Everyone in 1-A must learn to be even better than the good people they already are... Bakugo needs to learn that other people aren't dirt at the bottom of his shoes. It's never been a particularly impressive development when pit against the rest of the class. All of which can make something like an apology feel pretty hollow. Yes, he’s apologized and I say with all seriousness that that’s great! But how does that apology stack up against 300+ chapters of content? As Bakugo’s words highlight, he's been a really awful person up "until now": he was consumed by Izuku being “miles ahead of [him],” he “looked down on [him]” because he didn’t have a quirk, he “didn’t want to recognize that,” he “hated that,” “grew distant,” “tried to beat you down,” “opposed you and tried to show my superiority over you,” and ends it all with, “it probably doesn’t mean anything telling you all this” before finally getting to the “I’m sorry.” This is basically a laundry list of how horrible a person Bakugo has been for the entire series, with an acknowledgement that this apology is coming really, really late. This is the moment where I could START to like Bakugo, depending on how he acts form here on out, but that pivotal moment arrived after six years of content and in the final arc of the story. It’s too late. Bakugo needed this kind of self-reflection and positive action 250+ chapters ago so he could (hopefully) grow into a better person across the story, not at the story's end. What we got instead is 322 chapters of him being a really horrible person, but the story going out of its way to excuse or even praise that behavior the majority of the time.

As a quick comparison to end on, I think what Bakugo needed was what Soo Jin got in True Beauty. You don’t need to have seen the drama to follow along. The tl;dr is that she has a lot of the core qualities of Bakugo: an all-consuming drive to win that was created due to abusive parents with high expectations, resulting in her bullying a peer to a pretty horrific extent. The difference between them is how the story frames their actions. When Soo Jin becomes the bully she loses everything. Rather than succeeding academically, her grades plummet, making it clear that this anxiety and self-doubt (things the fandom keeps insisting Bakugo is struggling with, but that rarely ever show up in the text) is actually impacting her day-to-day life. Her best friend drops her because she’s not going to support her choices. The boy she likes rejects her. She’s eventually forced to start over somewhere new - which importantly separates her from the girl she was bullying - and get some distance from her parents, resulting in the growth needed to become a healthier, happier, good person again. So when Soo Jin apologizes to the girl she hurt, it feels earned. The story continually recognized how horrific her actions were and put her into a place where she either had to change, or continue losing at everything else that was important to her. Bakugo? Bakugo doesn’t lose. Oh, he claims he does because he’s comparing himself to Izuku constantly, but that’s just him thinking in extremes. He still wins academically. Still wins many battles. Still wins at having friends. Still wins by maintaining the prestige of being a U.A. student. Still wins by getting All Might’s attention. Still wins by receiving Izuku’s respect and an agreement to maintain this rivalry that Bakugo is so obsessed with. Bakugo comes out well 99% of the time, he just thinks he's "lost" because he can't stand not being the absolute best.

For me, the story needed to have Bakugo face consequences for his behavior, not receive rewards and/or have others ignore it, and that revelation/apology needed to come way, way sooner. For me the issue is not a specific action that Horikoshi can have Bakugo do in the next chapter and them bam, I like him now. The problem is Bakugo’s entire concept, how he’s received by the entire cast, and his run across this entire series. "Entire" is the key word there. Which is why the “But he’s apologized. What more do you antis want?” reactions don’t sit well. What we wanted is a better written redemption arc across those 300+ chapters, not a single scene that’s meant to have us forget all the other problems inherent in the story. At this point it’s a far more complicated situation than, “Bakugo just needs to do X, Y, and Z and then we’re golden.” At the end of the day, Horikoshi failed to make me like him as a person and I’m pretty sure he isn’t going to change Bakugo enough to make him likable to me. Bakugo was never the sort of character I’d be inclined towards without a serious, nuanced redemption arc, but sadly, a core, crucial part of that redemption arc took six years to arrive. At this point there’s no way to change the problems in Bakugo’s writing for that huge chunk of the series and not enough time left in the series, it seems, to do the work we should have seen across the entire run. Honestly, idk if the Bakugo we'll get going forward is someone I can just dislike as opposed to being really uncomfortable with, but my money is on there being too little story left and too much investment in upholding Bakugo's base personality for that to happen. I could absolutely be proven wrong! But I think the problems are structural and needed to be better dealt with from page one, not hastily patched over in the final hour.

#BNHA #My Hero Academia #anti bakugo

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buckyjamess-archive · 3 years

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𝓻𝓸𝓼𝓲𝓮 𝓪𝓷𝓭 𝓲 ❁ 𝓫𝓾𝓬𝓴𝔂 𝓫𝓪𝓻𝓷𝓮𝓼

chapter thirteen • a/n: lmfao really be pulling plot twists outta my ass cause I love it, I love the suffering, like my moodswings from one to the other, also not proofread so do with that what you want :') • wordcount: 1.7k+ • warnings: cutesy fluff ending ending in angst. They both assholes. Kids, babies, parenthood. Talks about depression (blink and you'll miss it.) Probably dropped sex a couple of times.

summary

going through rough years after losing your husband, you try to raise your daughter the best you can. With the help from the wilson's you make the best of it but the road is bumpy when sam introduces you to his friend.

masterlist - chapter twelve - chapter fourteen

It's a sight to behold, a picture so perfect to be put in the most expensive frame; a scene pulled right out of a sappy romance movie, every novel, every one of his daydreams and yet he's here, you're here– this isn't a movie or a book, it's real.

The soft glow of the two bedside lamps and the flashing of the TV screen illuminating the bedroom, a soft breeze wafting through the small cracks of the window – bucky sits on top the fluffy blanket, his back is pressed against the soft headboard of the bed, legs crossed at the ankles, book laid on his legs. He's admiring the sight next to him.

He doesn't know when you lost the battle with sleep, you had been fighting it for the last hour, after JJ his last bottle– you were tired, Bucky didn't even blame you for it; JJ being the easiest baby one could imagine having a particularly rough day and only wanting to be with you. Mama's boy in the making.

Laying on top of the blankets just like bucky, he's got perfect few of the soft features of your face and the steady breathing; chest heaving and a hand laid upon the back of his son– bucky could hear your heartbeat in his head, memorised, he has laid his own head multiple times before where his son has taken his place tonight. Cheeks squished against the flesh of your chest, bawled fists raised in the air. Your other arm stretches out beside you, a mop of messy hair resting on your bicep, arm wrapped around the toddler who made home in your arms the moment her little brother laid down.

This is his life now; spending nights in bed, sleeping early, waking up every few hours to feed JJ, get through the day and repeat it all over, he wouldn't have it any other way if this is the sight he gets to see every minute of the day.

A full month with all four of you.

A full month's where bucky got to learn a lot about himself. This was all he ever needed, all he ever wanted‐ he wasted years of his life, picking up one girl after another. Spend nights getting drunk, always out; ignoring all bad things that happened in the army, back in the field. Bucky remembered the bad, talked about the bad with you during late night pillow talks. Talked about his feelings more than before, showed the real him you barely had seen before, only had glances of once in a while. A whole new bucky who changed his life for the better, for you, Rosie and JJ.

You are his world, you gave him the new world– you're everything and he isn't afraid to show it and yet the outside world seemed to doubt every little thing. Friends slowly leaving, claiming the two of you as insane, too fast; turning tables with Sam who tried to get his own family to Brooklyn as a surprise for you. But Bucky doesn't care, the black box buried deep inside the pockets of one of his jeans stuffed into the back of the drawer, carrying an engagement ring, a subtle hint for those friends to leave.

When or how was still the question that haunted his mind everyday. Bucky's sure he's going to pop that question he used to dread– the least thing on his mind for years. You're the one and he's sure of it. Die a lucky man if you want to wear his last name after everything you've given him so far. Spoil you to death if he needs to, woo you off your feet until the day he can't. He just needs to find the right moment. Not something cliché and normal, you guys were anything but that.

Grabbing the book out of his lap, Bucky sets it in his nightstand, turns off the tv with the remote nearby and swings his legs over the edge of the bed, soft carpet brushing against his feet. He stands up straight and walks his way over to your side of the bed and without effort hooks his hands underneath Rosie's arms and picks her up. Arms lazily swung over her shoulders, legs dangling and face pressed against his chest– a heavy sleeper.

Padding his way through the dark hall, Bucky walks the path he's walked a million times before and softly kicks the door open with his foot. Welcomed by the pink and grey bedroom, floor littered with toys– bucky steps through the mess, reminding himself to ask the girl to clean her room. With a soft groan from himself, Bucky puts Rosie in her own bed, tucks her in, pressing a light kiss on her forehead before making his way back through the war zone of dolls, crayons, teacups and stuffed animals. Leaving the door ajar, he steps back in the hall.

He's quick to get back to your bedroom and carefully picks his son off your chest, as to not wake both of you up and it surprises him when neither of you move a muscle– knocked out. Bucky chuckles to himself and makes his way back into the hall again, padding his way to JJ's nursery this time. A moment just for himself and his son, he sits down on the comfortable armchair and places his feet on the matching footstool. The bunny shaped lamp does little to brighten the room, his own eyelids become heavy and with one thing repeating in his mind, Bucky falls asleep himself.

How did i become so lucky

But as the weeks pass by, how did I become so lucky, changed to where did it go wrong.

The words that leave without a second thought, causing a chain reaction of arguments, fights, to days going without saying a word– communication through Rosie, through JJ. Days ending in fights, nights slept on couches or miles apart in bed.

Little annoyances made into big problems; disagreements about the smaller things– truly not knowing each other well enough to make such big steps but too naive to see what could go wrong.

Maybe Sam was right, maybe you two weren't meant to be a thing. Maybe your friends were right, did the two of you go too fast.

Bucky doesn't even know what set it all off; the lack of intimacy– at least he tries and tries, hold you, touch you, kiss you, all being waved off with an excuse; too tired, not in the mood. Maybe it's the constant arguing over the stupid little things, whose turn it is to do the laundry, who feeds JJ, who picks up Rosie or maybe it's the pure jealousy running through Bucky's veins when you talk about your new job or your new colleagues..steve and maybe it's all of it together.

A ticking time bomb.

But Bucky's seen you like this before, the dark place you were in just a couple of months into your relationship– pushing away everything and everybody, isolated and yet it was different, you're fighting against it and it's making you a different person

But bucky can only take so much.

"You're sleeping with this Steve guy, aren't you?"

It's a low blow and something he regrets the moment the words spill from his lips. He knows the answer; of course not, he knows that. It sets off the bomb, explodes with a loud thud of utensils meeting the metal sink.

"Good to know you think of me that low-" you scoff and the softness of your voice surprises bucky and sends a shiver down his spine "to awnser your fucking question; no, I do not. Steve's my colleague, Steve and I work the same shifts, Steve and I share an office-" you drop you plate in the sink aggressively and wipe your hands off on your jeans "Steve's married to Natasha and unlike me– according to you ofcourse, Steve doesn't sleep around with dozens of others."

"I didn't-"

Cutting Bucky's sentence short, you scoff again "that's exactly what you wanted to say, it's been on your mind for weeks now."

"Doll, I didn't know," Bucky tries "I shouldn't have said that."

You chuckle low, looking up from your dishes to finally lock eyes with the man standing a few feet away from you "look, I'm sorry I can't be the person you want me to be– I work from 8 to 9, I barely see my own kids and when I do get home, you're passed out on the couch," You hiss between your teeth "So I'm sorry Mr. Barnes for not wanting to be your sex doll every damm night."

Taken aback, offended and hurt, Bucky shifts his weight in his feet and crosses his arms in front of his chest. Biting the inside of his cheek, Bucky tries to find the right words- words that won't piss you off more but you're a step ahead of him already.

"Isn't that why we're here in the first place, the whole reason for this thing were having– sex, right?" You snort "one week my ass."

"So you're telling me you regret all of this, us, JJ?" Bucky huffs, the silence is defeated as he waits for an answer "Do you?"

It's an endless game of back and forth, accusations based on nothing thrown at each other. A game of who's done it, who's the victim and who's not.

You're thankful for the thick walls in-between houses and the heavy sleepers upstairs. It's tiring, going through the same riddle everyday and it asks the most of you. Shines light onto the darkest parts of your brain– you thought you were doing alright.

"You blame everything on me bucky– maybe you don't mean it that way but you do. I'm sorry I can't live up to this version of me in your mind but I gave up on my friends and left my home to be with you. I gave you what you wanted, I gave you a child but if that's not good enough, I take that as my queue to leave." You state and your voice breaks but Bucky doesn't seem to care, keeps his stance in the opening of the kitchen, now dark blue eyes burning in your soul.

"So you do regret JJ?"

Taglist: @farfromshawn @Nicollettemarie @wooya1224 @felicityofbakerstreet @agentmstark @sierrax023 @lilyevanswhore @qhbr2013 @buckybarnesobsessed @themaddies-obx @aloserwithoutacause @aanngie @sebby-staan @sweetth1ng @starrystarkey93 @libidinexx @dontputyourfckingdrinkonmytable @gasly-kvyat @brown-bi-beautiful @peter-laufeyson @im-squished @meshlababy @lindseyrae20 @cb97skies @qwccrr @ssprayberrythings @yougottalovefandoms @jbcalway @realgaytrash @natyvwe @poetryazenth @winterberryfox @ahahafudge

#bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x female reader #bucky barnes fanic #bucky barnes imagine #bucky barnes #james bucky barnes #james buchanan barnes #rosie and i

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hwiyoungies · 2 years

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Tbh I dont really know anything about colombian accents but now im curious!! I grew up hearing mexican Spanish frequently, even before I started formally learning it in school, so that's always what's most familiar and easiest to understand for me. That's really funny that so much shade is thrown at Chilean Spanish though LOL but also do you have a video you could link as an example? Quechua got mentioned in every single Spanish class but I don't think they ever showed us Chilean Spanish...maybe on purpose

Yza what are these notes!!! Please share with the class 👀👀 don't just tease me

Awwww yay! Can i ask what your costume was? That's.... bizarre that your body did that but I guess it's good that it worked out?? You've been okay since?

Thank you for saying such nice things :') I didnt really do anything for Halloween since im still pretty anxious about covid but my roommate and I went on a nice hike and painted pumpkins while I tipsily showed her kpop videos (mostly svt) LOL the hike included crossing a creek several times and I definitely slipped and fell in a couple times and my roommate got a picture of one of them 😭

i don't remember who was it, but a dude that learned spanish in colombia and then came here thinking cool i can properly communicate! only to be faced with the sad reality of how we speak LMAO and oh man i'm trying to think of any videos, but the ones that come to my mind are memes and most of them are from people in the, oh man i hate saying it like this, but the lower class and they tend to speak worse too because ~classism~. but the podcast that my brother listens to, tomás va a morir, it's a pretty good example tbh

hey hey yza babe @woozi you're getting a free pass here to clown me LMAO

i was belle from the beauty and the beast LMAO but with the blue dress not the yellow one, i've always wanted to dress up as her and well now i was like why not! so i just, made the dress LMAOO

on a hikeee!!! that's so fun, and paiting pumpkins too! i've never done that since besides dressing up and now kids going trick or treating halloween has never been a huge thing here. also mood about showing friends kpop videos while tipsy have done it more times than i'm proud. and lmaooooo would they be a good friend if they don't take at least one pic of you tripping tbh, you're gonna look at it and remember it fondly hopefully :')

#asks #spanish learning anon

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cherryeol04 · 4 years

Text

Stray Kids Playing Minecraft~

A/n: I hope you all enjoy, and if you liked, please leave a like! 💖💖💖💖

Tags: @straysrachaa @lordseochangbin @channiesmixtape @starryseung @felixsanxchatbot @jisungsjheekies @mrbangchannie

Chan

- doesn't know almost anything about Minecraft the first time around but he plays with you to make you happy

- you have to baby him for a while

- BUT THEN!

- He goes and learns about the game in his free time

- and then he pleasantly surprises you now that you he doesn't suck anymore

- and most peculiar of all

- he got really interested in redstone

- boi can make some INVENTIONS

- His house is like, fully automated - farm and all

- it makes you jealous but also very proud

- a pretty big pacifist

- shears, veggies and bread is all he needs

- he still big soft baby but he smart baby now

- also, would totally run around with a pumpkin on his head if you could still wear them in the latest version

Lee Know

- would kill everything that moves

- would hoard all the meat and refuse to give you any

- deforestation at its finest

- king of surplus

- playing with him is actually playing by yourself cuz he goes off on his own

- builds himself a goddamn empire!

- and no one knows where it is

- if he catches you inside his house without permission: shoot first, ask questions never

- mobs fear him, not the other way around

- will give you items cuz you're a charity cause

- actually shares when you both go mining though

- but let's face it, he's just OP

- would try to get all the cats

- totally to chase away creepers

- not because he wants an army of them or anything

- gets annoyed that he has to constantly fish because the cats keep taking them but won't be tamed by him

- he totally did not search for mine shafts just for name tags to name his cats

- DO NOT HURT HIS CATS

- or he'd cancel you in-game and irl too

Changbin

- would be super excited to play Minecraft with his friends

- he would be the first on the server to scout out the land and get resources

- however, no one warned him about night fall

- and all the creepy, scary things that spawned

- changbin lives in the ground now

- he dug a hole at the base of the mountain to take refuge during the night and never looked back

- normal person? No way! He was a mole now!

- the best at mining and interior rock design

- he would only resurface to seek out food and animals

- it was Changbin who stole all the cows and sheep, so you couldn't find them for felix

- he would have three large pins just next to his mountain

- lots of cows, rainbow sheep and pigs with saddles

- " uh...so I found these pins of animals and like...no house?"

- "What?"

- "I think the magical Minecraft fairy spawned it into the world?"

- "It's super weird. But I'm gonna kill some cows for their leather"

- "DON'T YOU TOUCH MY COWS!"

- and to your shock, a secret door in the mountain opens and Changbin comes running out

- the door made courtesy of Chan

- "He's got a diamond sword already?!?"

- it's the last thing you scream as he kills you for being near his cows

- and after a round of feeding and breeding, he disappears back into his hole

Hyunjin

- would only be about building

- he would be the first one to have a diamond pickaxe just so he could mine cobblestone faster

- would also get efficiency V just so he could speed run through the mines

- would wander through different biomes for days to collect clay so he could make concrete

- and while you're busy actually playing the game, he would beg for you to pick flowers on your trip so he can dye the concrete different colors

- his first house would be a mansion

- but he would give up half way because he kept falling off the roof and dying

- would forget he is actually playing the game and would get scared when night falls and mobs start spawning in his unlit house

- not like you didn't tell him countless times to put down torches

- but he kept saying they ruined his aesthetic

- but now he keeps dying because mobs are literally waiting at his spawn point, killing him over and over and over again

- and he begs you to set the time to day and kill the mobs for him

- but you just laugh uncontrollably at him because karma really is a bitch

- but in the end, he ends up making an entire city, and invites the others to come and play on the server.

Jisung

- would be just like Chan

- a pure ass baby when it comes to playing minecraft, but super eager to play the game

- his first spawn would be in the middle of the night (because of server)

- and you would try to tell him to not leave the safety of spawn, but he just wouldn't listen

- "Listen, Y/n, I know what I'm doing! I'm a pro at this!"

- and he would run confidently into the night, like the actual idiot that he is

- he wouldn't get too far before he was attacked by all the mobs and got killed

- "Well that was just rude!"

- "Oh my god Jisung, I told you not to do it."

- "Well how was I supposed to know they were going to kill me?!"

- and you can only shake your head at his stupidity

- he would eventually wait until daytime, but unfortunately all of his items would be lost due to despawning

- it's not like either one of you were equipped to go and retrieve his items

- zombies sucked man! And skeletons are the worst!

- but with a new day comes a new adventure and you both head out to find a place to call home

- Jisung would run the entire way, even though he had no food to keep his hunger up

- he also wouldn't be paying attention to where he was going and would fall into a hole

- a very BIG hole

- 'J.One fell from a high place'

- "Really Jisung?"

- "I couldn't see it!"

- playing with Jisung would be a very challenging task, because he would never learn

- because by the time he had diamond armor and ready to fight the wither, he would have fallen from fifteen cliffs, twenty holes in caves and three ravines

- "Jisung if you die one more time I swear to god!"

- 'J.One fell from a high place'

- "That's it! I quit!"

Felix

- You would be so hyped to play with Felix

- You've seen him play other games, so you knew he'd be great at minecraft

- Getting the server had been his idea, the easiest way everyone could play together

- First day of spawn, Felix would already be listing off the things that you would need to accomplish

- wood, cobblestone, iron, seeds, sheep

- it was all just so overwhelming

- by the time you make your first complete set of wooden tools, felix would have iron tools already

- he'd been ten feet underground, digging for more resources while tasking you to find the animals for food, wool and feathers

- easier said then done

- and when he resurfaces and you don't have animals, he would simply sigh and go do it himself

- which would upset you because you would spend hours looking for just one god damn cow

- meanwhile, Felix would take five steps in one direction and come across hundreds of cows!!!

- WHERE DID ALL THESE COWS COME FROM?!?!?

- he'd travel the whole map just to find a jungle to get coco beans

- seriously though, how did he find the fucking jungle?

- it like doesn't exist

- except it does and Minho most likely lives there with all his cats

- Also, there's pandas!!!!!

- Felix would try and tame a panda, even though it's not possible

- When not trying to show off, Felix would be in his crappy little hut (cause hyunjin was still making the city), making cookies and cakes because why wouldn't he?

- at least he shares, unlike someone.....

- Felix would be absolutely unstoppable at the game, while you struggle to get to iron level armor (while trying to keep Jisung alive)

- Felix would have just a big ego

- it's okay though. One strike from Seungmin's sword and he'd be put back into his place

- Revenge is a dish best served Seungmin.

Seungmin

- the worst of the worst

- he would be the one to pretend to not know the game

- but really, he would be a minecraft expert

- read: troll

- every chance he would get, Seungmin would try to do something to ruin your day

- don't ever go mining with him. EVER!

- he would be the one to lead over a creeper to you in a ravine while you're trying to mine diamonds, right next to a lava pool

- the first one to explode wouldn't do any damage, thankfully

- "Don't you dare bring a creeper over here!"

- "I wouldn't."

- somehow, you wouldn't be convinced

- but you decided to trust him

- y/n clown

- you're just mining away at the diamond when a big explosion happens

- and you notice two things

- 1. the diamonds and the surrounding area were blown up

- 2. you were now in the pool of lava, dying

- meanwhile, Seungmin was running away, cackling like the evil little shit that he was

- the holy terror, that's what they would call him

- he would purposefully go out and fight creepers just to gather their gunpowder so he could make dynamite

- no one was safe from him

- except Minho

- because no one knew where he was

I.N.

- Jeongin would spend at least two days researching things for the game before actually playing

- he would want to have some knowledge before walking into hell that was the Stray Kids server

- it's okay though, because everyone loves Jeongin

- really, he wouldn't need to do a thing

- diamond armor, enchanted? check

- enchanted weapons? check

- his own cat and dog? double check

- everyone would do anything for this baby

- but Jeongin isn't one to mooch *coughJisungcough*

- even with all his presents, he would still start with the basics of punching a tree

- while others have found this skills in cooking, mining, falling into holes, redstone and building

- jeongin would be more interested in potions and enchanting

- YOU'RE A WIZARD INNIE!

- Jeongin would quickly master potion brewing

- even if it meant battling the scary blazes in the nether

- huh, so that's why Changbin was screaming so much

- he would be hired by Minho to make him potions of breathing so he could go claim an ocean monument

- Jeongin would only do it if he could help

- surprisingly Minho agrees and for the first time in 84 years, everyone gets to see Minho's character

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kiaraspeaks · 3 years

Text

Anansi x Female!Reader: In a flash we'll meet again.

You hope that he understands one day, his father is a complicated man. Man? That's a stretch of the imagination right there. You loved Anansi, loved him more than anything and anyone else in the world, besides Charlie, but, you couldn't stay with him. Children only are able to see what you put in front of them, and Anansi painted just enough of a vision of himself to hide his world from your child. Children. What a fucking mess that is. There are days that you wished that you hadn't met him but that's a pointless line of thought, Anansi desired you, to know you, to have Charlie, long before any war. He may have driven you up a wall at one point but he was family, and you knew that despite any differences when you called he would always come.

After all that's how you met, you weren't trying to summon a God. But praying for somebody, anybody, to stop this man chatting you up in the bar. You came for a quick drink at Randy's Divebar, Anansi materialized nearby (or perhaps he was waiting in the wings the whole time, just waiting, as he had done your entire life) what might be a hideous green and yellow floral pattern worked for him, long lean lines that might make someone else seem imposing made him even more inviting despite the man yammering on and on about himself.

"Bothering you?" He said, he inhaled on the cigarette and blew smoke into the face of the man hassling you. Whichever meathead that was hassling you didn't take kindly to it, but Anansi didn't care, had never cared, didn't care that he was thinner and obviously more breakable. He out maneuvered everyone before ever setting foot in any room, that included you too. "Move."

"Or what?" They said, he'd been hunched over you for the better part of the night but he was standing up rod straight and cutting an imposing figure. First, Anansi smiled, something you learned much later masks more pain and irritation than any human body could tolerate. Next, he picked up his glass and drained it and turned it over in his hands a few times. You heard it, the sound of the glass shattering, the crunching of the bones in his face, and finally saw the mess of the meathead's face. They ran out screaming, bleeding and crying. You should've been positively frightened but you weren't. Not even as Anansi plucked glass out of hands and tossed it into the drink of the man who had annoyed you.

"That wasn't necessary." You said and nursed your drink. The bartender didn't say anything, clearly they had some type of understanding. They moved further down to tend to other customers.

"Maybe so," He said, the cigarette perched perfectly in the corner of his mouth. He pulled out the splintered shards of glass like it didn't hurt, the blood didn't bother him. He raised his bloody hand and signaled for two drinks. "But it was fun."

"For you."

"Well maybe I'll have to work harder to impress you next time." He said.

"What makes you think there will be a next time, and why would you try?" You said, he smirked, didn't smile. His smirks were harmless, adorable, thoughtful. It's dangerous to know a God so closely. You would call it fate, but Anansi hated such words. After all he thought the only stories that were written in stone were penned by him.

"You're Mr. Nancy's girl, why not try?"

"And who is Mr. Nancy?" You asked, two drinks are placed between you both and then a small container of gauze. Anansi grabbed the gauze and one of the drinks, he poured the liquor over his wounded hand and allowed it to drip perfectly into the glass with the bloody shards. He doesn't wince, sigh or suck in deep breaths of air as the booze washes over his wounds.

"Someone important, snappy dresser, charming, and I hear that he might even be single."

"If I'm his girl how is he single?" You asked,he wrapped his hand with an ease that told he got into these types of scuffles often. Again, you learn Anansi doesn't take on any war that isn't already won, that includes your heart.

"Well that sounds like a proposal if I ever heard one." He said.

"You're Mr. Nancy?"

"My friends call me Mr. Nancy, but you, you can call me whatever you want."

"What's your name?" You asked. Another charming smirk, no madness in the eyes, he tapped the growing mountain of ash into the glass with the shards and the blood and tainted alcohol, he killed the light on the cigarette and topped .

"Have dinner with me and I will tell you." He said.

"You don't even know me, Mr. Nancy."

"Well, I want to get to know you, otherwise we wouldn't still be having this conversation." He said, "Do you want to get to know me?"

"I think so." You said, he held out his undamaged hand to you and you shook it.

"My name is Anansi, and it's wonderful to finally meet you." He said and bowed his head and kissed your hand, and when he asks your name you tell him. You don't know it then but you love him, someone so in love with who you are, starting with your name and every other story that you're apart of. You expected dinner much later, perhaps in a couple days but it didn't take much prodding to get you out. Randy's food at the divebar wasn't very good and you didn't feel like fiddling with the oven tonight.

----

You wished that you could properly explain to your son that his father was a God and that made him half and if he chose have kids that would make them a fraction and yet with all the potential of full Gods. There just never is enough time and never a correct way. Even you struggle at times, Anansi appears to just be a man, impeccably dressed, always on time, and two steps ahead at any given time. You had time to walk away, if anyone could imagine doing such a thing, but you knew something was diffferent, something was wrong. Anansi warned you that he got mixed up with some bad people, that bad times might be coming eventually, gave you time to leave, time to ask questions. Maybe you didn't want to know, perhaps you thought you already knew, you suspected he was a criminal but never a God.

Sometimes he's in two places at once, some times things fall to the floor, teleport across the room, but there are times when he is so far removed from you, nothing can bring him back from that place. You were tired of being ignored, once upon a time being Nancy's girl meant something but now it meant going to bed alone and waking up alone, sometimes with Anansi having not moved from his spot in a chair at all. You came in, surprised he wasn't in a haze, he seemed to be waiting on you.

"You're late." He said. An observation and an accusation. You weren't cheating on him, you could, there were so many who wanted you and yet here you were...alone in your own relationship. The perks of being Nancy's girl.

"So." You said, he went days at a time in the same household and yet not saying a word. How dare he get up for going one night without seeing you. You'd met up with co-worker, Higgler, went out for drinks. No harm in that.

"I waited."

"I didn't ask you to do that."

"I must be confused," He said and stood up and walked into the the kitchen and came to stand beside you. "Is something wrong?"

"No, you tell me, Anansi."

"Are you drunk?" He asked, yes, you were but that wasn't why this was happening. This conversation was begging to be had for a while now.

"Does it matter? Would you even care?"

"I care. Of course I care." He said, then said your name softly and pulled you into his arms. You stay still for a moment but it's hard to resist him, always has been since the moment you met him.

"Why won't you just talk to me?" You asked softly into his chest.

"Would you believe me if I told you?"

"You've never struggled with being convincing before." You said and looked up at him. Then he smiled at you, looked through you and then pulled away.

"Take a seat."

"What's wrong?"

"I'm about to tell you who I am and you should probably sit down." He said, so you do and he does tell you. Your head doesn't split open and you don't die but initially you think he's lying. He can't be a God! He just can't be! It's your human nature to emphatically deny what you don't understand.

It takes more than him politely explaining who and what he was. He sighed heavily and walked away from you. He stood in the center of the kitchen and raised one hand and touched the ceiling and flattened it, then his other hand and used his weight to pivot and climb the ceiling. If that wasn't enough, his forehead was lined with eyes and large fangs extended from his mouth. A birth defect? A disability, possibly. He can see this is a lot and came to sit at his feet.

“This can be a lot for most people.” He said.

“I’m not most people.” You said.

“I know, that’s why I chose you.” You looked down at him and took the cigarette from his hand and he lit it for you.

“What type of God are you?” You ask after a long while, you go through two more cigarettes before you feel steady enough.

“Jack of all trades.” He said. “The people need to be safe and laugh.”

“You make them all laugh?”

“I can change the story but not completely remove it, important parts have to stick. Humans are sticky and linked to one another, I can only ease the journey.” He said. “Wisdom in the form of entertainment has been easiest, you know it’s hard to tell a stupid motherfucker they’re doing something wrong.”

“Are you apart of my story?”

‘Do you want me to be?” He asked, you stand up and he doesn’t look away. Perhaps, reflecting during these final moments you see what it is. Blind faith. He believed in you. Despite him hating fate, kismet, whatever you wanted to call it, he always knew you’d choose him. Like a good book, you’d always return, even if there was an entire ocean separating you. If you couldn’t then he’d come to you. He couldn’t unmake himself a God, much like your boy won’t be able to burn away that part that calls out and sings so sweetly. You held out your hands to him and he took them.

“How long can you stick to the roof?”

“It’s not a party trick.” He said and wrapped his arms around you, holding you tight and spinning around with you. When he placed you back down you were standing in the bedroom.

“Says who, spiderman?” You asked and you both laugh. It’s a period of adjustment like nearly everything in your life.

----

You ultmately wish for your boy to understand that everything has a sunrise and sunset. You loved Anansi inspite of every red flag you ever saw crop up, and there came a time where loving and being in love wasn't enough. He was your husband, your best friend and beacuse of that you came to a proper agreement. A moment would come when this world and this war was too dangerous. Your boy, charlie, loathed his father because they were too much alike, both parading around in facades, both busybodies in the worst ways, both too damned pigheaded to say what was on their mind truly at times.

"So you're going to leave?" He asked, it was one of the dumbest thing you'd heard him say. You were finally debased to obvious observations, he was always so well spoken and right now he was holding up a wall watching you in your living room. You'd moved from Chicago to Florida, created a life for one another, brought a child into the world, spoke truth into the world only to watch it crumble away partly due to an invisible war you never saw and the fact Anansi spent more times chasing stories than keeping you happy. Those stories always came in many faces, younger, healthier, livelier people who seemed so different from you.

"Bags are packed. This is where we should leave things."

"You're being very cordial about this."

"And you're smiling, are you happy about this too?" You said and pointed out, he ran his tongue over his teeth and tried to remove the smile but failed. He was angry, but so were you for so many reasons you'd never share. If he loved stories so much he could keep up with them without embarassing his son every forty five minutes and neglecting his wife, he'd always be a God and you'd always be a human who might have bit off more than she could chew. Charlie was a God too, no matter how shy and withdrawn he'd became.

"I know what you're thinking." He said and slid his hands into his pcokets.

"I assure you don't." You said, "Maybe in another time but I can't--"

"Can't what?"

"Can't play second fiddle forever to whatever story you're chasing." You said, "Not for you or for any man."

"Maybe not a man, but a God?" He asked. He pushed off the wall and walked over to you. After years together charm wears off, the butterflies die but familiarity never changes. Falling into step has become second nature, you are so far from the young woman impressed by the cool headed man with brute strength who won every battle before he ever picked an arena. "I know you think you're making the right choice."

"And what do you think?" You asked, "And I want you to really tell me, no cheating, no looking into the future."

"I think that no matter where you go, all you have to do is call and I'll come."

"You'll have three more people moved in before the end of the week." You said, you need to say it so that you know this is really over.

"Doesn't make it any less true." He said and you hold out your hand to him.

"When I'm gone, promise you'll be here for him, he'll need you." You said, he took your hand and dropped down onto one knee and kissed the back of it.

"I'll do my best."

"That's all I can ask for." You said and placed your hand on the top of his head and then pulled away and lifted up your last bag and started towards the door. "If I ever call...it will be to say goodbye."

"So this isn't goodbye." He said and teleported beside the door.

"No, this is just farewell for now." You said and walked out. You don't look back, you don't need to, you don't know exactly what binds him here but hopes he finds something to free himself.

----

You hope one day he understands that his father is not a man and will never behave like one. He doesn't have to, he's not even bound to this planet let alone it's rules, but you hope one day that Fat Charlie realizes he is so much more than just a man and to live the life he really wants to. You can feel when the life starts to leave you and you want all your affairs in order. You move across the country and then out of the country and Charlie followed. He grew bitter and irritated with his father seeing his flambouyant and exuberant personality as a flaw instead of something to carve out in himself. You don't expect cancer to take you, but you've lived a full life and hope Charlie does the same.

You don't expect Anansi to actually show, you don't expect the band, or the kiss that would knock you off your feet if you weren't already in bed plugged up to machines. The nurses enjoy the change in pace and so does Christine, your roommate. Anansi is lively and brings a bottle to celebrate your new change in life, or so he calls it that.

"I'm sick." You said, "I'm dying."

"You're all dying, but it's not a bad thing, and I'm right here, like I promised."

"Still a man of your word down to the parade." You said, you thought the times you got drunk and waxed poetic he hadn't paid attention. You were glad some things hadn't slipped through the cracks. "Talk to Charlie?"

"No, no, you know how he is. Always on about something."

"He's your son and when I'm gone he's all the family you got left."

"You consider yourself family?"

"You wouldn't cross an ocean for no reason." You said. He slid his chair closer, placing his hand over yours.

"You look good." He said, he's older now, or that's what he wants you to think. A little sag here, a bit more hunched over. You've watched him shift his entire body to fit his agenda, this is no different.

"I'm old and bald, Mr. Nancy." You said,

"Call me Anansi."

"Or whatever I want, right?"

"Right." He said and laughed. "But you look good regardless of what you've got. If you could do anything, what would you do?"

"Besides live?"

"Yes, besides that." He said and held your hand in his. His hands have grown harder, rougher. Less story telling, more fighting, much more hard work than he ever should've been used to.

"I want to travel, really see the world, you know I always talk about it but things got in the way, and then Charlie came and I couldn't just take off."

"Yeah, I think I'd lead that boy to an early grave." He said and you both laugh together. A hearty laugh that you didn't know you needed. "Well let me get some things in order first and you'll have it."

"Look, Anansi--"

"You're Nancy's girl, right? You'll have what you need." He said, and you believe him. A spinner of tales he might be but never a liar, at least when it came to you. "Say it."

"I'm too old for this shit."

"No, I'm too old for this. You're exactly where you're supposed to be." He said and you smile, it's been so long since you've done that, you've done more smiling now than you have in the last couple of years. "Say it."

"Say what?"

"You're Nancy's girl."

"I'm your girl." You said and smile again, you mean it, after all these damn years away from him, only an hour together and you've fell back into patterns.

"Kiss on it?" He asked, ever the slick and sly trickster. It has been many years since you've kissed him, it's not just flesh to flesh, he can pour something into you that you didn't know you needed.

"If that's why you came then sure."

"No not the only reason but you know you got what'll make a man sell his soul to the devil and cross the sea." He said, he stood up and leaned over you, not making you work too hard. He leaned on the button helping you lean back and pressed his lips to yours, tilting your head up. You feel it, a tingle, something that starts to brighten and jump to life inside you. You are not a spring chicken anymore, but he makes parts of you spring to life as if you were in the first bloom of your life. "Damn, girl."

"What are you on about?" You asked.

"Nothing, you called, I came, like I told you I would. I've got to get back before anyone knows I'm missing."

"Don't forget to say goodbye to your son."

"Oh, I won't." He said and raised your hand up one final time and kissed the back of it. You watch him go and know you'll see him again but you won't be among the living, this is your last time. You are unsurprised when your tests come back negative and you're discharged. The cancer is gone, dead within seconds, and when you return home you find plane tickets waiting on your counter. Anansi is more than a man and that's okay, you hope Fat Charlie sees that.

-----

You are dead. You know that. You hope Charlie can learn to forgive his father for being so boisterous, larger than life and embarassing, but he is his father's child and it is hard for them to see eye to eye on any damn thing. You rise from the hotel bed and walk over to the balcony and you wait for him because you know he's going to come, or you're going to find him. The land of the dead is silent, there are others, you can see them walking about, playing in the park, running with their dogs, kissing and holding hands, going on strolls. For a moment you think you won't see him, you leave, no need to gather your things, you won't need them.

Anansi once told you about the after life, about what may or may not await you depending on which road you walked. You knew he said he'd never be far behind and you believe that, you believe in him. You step out of the hotel, turn right and walk, going purely on intuition, the hotels and beach towns wash away, through the forests you continue, climb the necessary hills. As you come upon a different world you note your knees don't hurt, your feet don't ache and neither does your back. At the top of a hill is a cave, you pass through the mouth of it and felt something shake and shimmer over you as you enter the room.

It is a large single room, a grate pit in the center of the room surrounded by cushions. There are portraits on the orange walls and shadows dance about the room, you're sure exactly from where. He is laying back on the cushions, his head is pillowed on his arm and staring up at you. He is different, more himself, his true self. His hair is longer, and he has many eyes that line his forehead, and many arms that line his torso. He has a book hand, is weaving with another and waving from a completely different hand.

"You found me." He said.

"For now, I don't think I can stay here, can I?" You asked.

"Not the end of your journey, I'm afraid. Soul like yours comes around once in every few flashes."

"Flashes?"

"It's complicated. You'll learn. All afterlifes are the same in one way or another."

"How much time do we?"

"Oh, as much as you want." He said and dug between the cushions and held a bag of sand. "Sand of times, snatched it off some kid on the way home. Felt like we'd need some time together."

"For what?"

"Whatever you want."

"And Charlie?"

"He'll be fine, smart kid with a good head on his shoulders." He said, he pushed himself up and kept tossing the bag up in the air.

"Tell me what you did when I left." She said.

"Now that is a story..." He said, you walked over to him and the things he semed to be doing to keep himself busy disappeared. He welcomed you with open arms, when you wrap your arms around him the room changes with a snap. You are back in the bar you met in, you pull away and look up. Yes. This is Randy's. Same dumpy dive bar where he inserted himself in your life and you let him. He walked away and over to the bar and picked up the glass of bloodied glass shards, tainted alcohol and ash from his cigarette.

"WHat's is this about?" You asked. He picked up the second glass and poured it into the concoction.

"Drink it."

"You think I'm crazy?"

"You trust me, right?" He said and held it out to you, "Besides, you're already dead."

"There's so much worse you can do."

"Says who?"

"Says whoever you snatched that sand from." You said.

"Touche." He said, but you drink it anyway. A drink. A potion. Whatever it is it makes your head spin, you feel whatever entity you are shift and turn inside out and the sound from Randys came back but it was different. Not a dusty dive bar but the scent of it is still the same and so is the chipped bar. You and Anansi stood at the back of the crowded bar, someone at the front was tearing it up on a saxophone.

"I made arrangements." Anansi said.

"For?"

"Our boy." He said, and yes, why it is Charlie but he's different. Alive in a way you could never put your finger on as his mother. But you see it, at his core, what makes him a God and a man and they're not at war with one another.

"True to your word, why does that make me feel like we're coming to the end of our journey?"

"We'll meet again, a soul like yours, shines too bright." He said. You nod your head in agreement, you sip the drink again and feel yourself start to break and shift. Charlie climbs down from the makeshift stage and tries to part the crowd, but you are dust in the wind.

Blood.

Glass.

Liquor.

Ash.

----

You are flesh, bone and free will, but you do not have direction. Perhaps that's why you hover here at Mausoleum of the fallen. The entities that are sculpted here are beautiful some made of marble, others onyx, you walk by and sense that you are not alone. You know you are a flash, a shift in the cosmic energy and a rarity, you will continue to hide amongst of the morals, walk between the worlds of Gods and mortals....and then there they are far in the back of the Mausoleum.

"What are you?" You asked.

"Choice." They said, the God walked out, impeccably dressed, "Always on time, I see."

"I don't understand."

"You will."

"Gods have never come to meet me before."

"This is different and I'm not just any God," He said.

"How many flashes have we suffered one another?" You asked, you're not sure but instinct in not something you need to find. This multi-eyed creatures stares at you with fondness.

"Seventeen."

"That is not chance, that is planned." You said.

"Yes."

"Why is this different?" You asked, They held up a tumbler of alcohol with ash and glass shards floating in it. You look away back to the statues, there are handfuls of Gods that are necessary, some haven't been seen in eons, they play it fast and loose and are wild cards. You wonder which one he'll be.

"Just is." He said, you have no reason not to trust him despite being gifted with these instincts. You reach for the tumbler but he pulled it back away from you. "The past couple times I meddled but now you have a chance, a real chance."

"You don't think I'll choose you." You said and tilted your head to the side to study them. "Even though you chose me all these cycles."

"The last cycle was different, you walked away, for good, only called when you were about to die."

"And so you wanted to know that now I'd choose you."

"Yes."

"Fascinating."

"How so?" He sked.

"Even Gods, in all your wisdom and knowledge, have your insecurities."

"We invented them, mortals just inherit them."

"Now what will we do afterward?" You asked, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a bag full of sand.

"We have time to figure that out." He said and this time when you reach for the glass he allows you to take it. You drink it down down, swallowing the glass and ash and tainted alcohol, with each swallow you remember a different life, a different flash, eons of you doing this dance with him, each time you're different, the circumstances are different but the last time is by far the most daunting. Charlie. Oh, how many years has it been? Did your baby boy live well? "How do you feel?"

"Cold." You said and looked down and noticed you were naked. "I bet you think this is funny."

"Only in a cosmic way."

"Is Charlie--"

"He's fine, he's fine. Two wives, three kids, a bar. Living the dream." He said and shrugged out of his jacket and draped it over your shoulder. "We have time to catch up on him later, I've missed you."

"What do you want to do?"

"Lets go to a club, I need to stretch my legs."

"Which ones?" You said and then scoffed as you followed him out of the afterlife. You weren't sure where you were going but you trusted him enough, had trusted him after thousands of rebirths, what was so different this time? For so long you two had been together, maybe now you could stay together without the cruel hand of fate intervening. As you reached the portal you thought of one last thing. "Whatever happened to that war?"

"Oh. I ate the people that were pissing me off.. " He said.

"You're kidding."

"Only a little." He said. "No worries, no war this time, just you and me."

"The way it's supposed to be."

"The way it's always been."

#Mr. Nancy #Anansi #Anansi x Reader #Mr. Nancy x Reader #ag fic #ag

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thisstableground · 4 years

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I know you've done this before (and I loved it) but I would LOVE some "Abuela Claudia and the barrio kids" wholesome content ^^ Especially with characters like Benny or Vanessa, or Carla and the Rosarios - basically, Abuela Claudia being awesome and crazy big-hearted.

[Under a cut because as always, this got carried away. edit: now also on ao3, please leave a comment if you like it! Content warning for parental neglect.]

***

The only instructions Naomi Garcia gives, when she dropsVanessa off at Claudia’s is, “she’s got a coloring book, she can pretty muchjust look after herself. Do not takeher to the Rosarios. I’ll pick her up on Sunday.”

Vanessa stands there mutely, in her pink backpack andsmudgy-kneed overalls and, despite the mid-April warmth, a woolly winter hatwith a bobble on. She’s clutching her coloring book like she’s ready to beatsomeone to death with it. Claudia gives her an encouraging smile as her momleaves and says, “it’s good to have you here, Vanessa!”

“I ain’t see why I can’t go play with Nina just ‘cause ourmoms is fighting about dumb boring mom stuff,” Vanessa says, scowling. “I’mstill gonna be friends with her no matter what they say.”

She gives Claudia a challenging look, as if to say, and you aren’t going to stop me. Claudiajust says, “¡Bueno! So what do you want to do today?”

“I want to go to Nina’s.”

It’s going to be along weekend, Claudia thinks.

Much as Claudia agrees with Vanessa that a fight betweenparents shouldn’t get in the way of children’s friendship, she’s loathe to directlyignore one of the few direct instructions given by Vanessa’s mom. On realizingshe isn’t going to get her way, Vanessa slouches off to a corner of the livingroom floor and quietly colors in while Claudia goes about her usual morningcleaning, feeling faintly stumped.

This is so strange in comparison to Usnavi, who always thunders right in as though he owns the place, or Nina who always stays firmly by Claudia’s side the entire time she’s there.From the time she’s spent with both Nina and Vanessatogether, Claudia knows that Vanessa is a very headstrong young lady, usually farmore boisterous than this – bossy, even, always taking the lead while Ninafollows her around admiringly. But on her own, Vanessa is silent, hidden downbehind the side of the couch and only speaking up to say “no, I’m fine” whenever Claudiaoffers her a drink or asks if she wants to watch la television.

Her short, terse answers are bordering on what might becalled rude, but when Claudia asks if Vanessa’s hungry and Vanessa hesitates,looking hunted for a long moment before ducking her head back down very close to thepage, scribbling intensely without giving an answer, she realizes that perhapsVanessa is shy. It has, after all,been many years since Claudia looked after her alone without Nina there too,not since the girls were toddlers, and it is much easier to be brave and bossywith a good friend there.

“I haven’t had my breakfast today,” Claudia lies. “I wasgoing to get myself some food, if you wanted to share?”

“…I guess maybe I’m a littlebit hungry,” Vanessa concedes.

“We will make something together, then.” Claudia says, thenspots all the felt tip pen smudges on Vanessa’s hands, and the dirt under herbitten-short fingernails, and adds as they walk to the kitchen, “but first noslaveremos las manos.”

She pushes a chair up next to the kitchen sink so that Vanessacan reach. Vanessa sticks her hands quickly under the water then wipes them offon her overalls, still inkstained and dirty.

“No, no, con jabón.” Claudia rinses her own hands andlathers the bar of soap between them, more thoroughly than she usually would sothat Vanessa can see what she’s doing. “Like this, see?”

“I know!” Vanessasnaps, but she watches Claudia and copies carefully anyway, every movementmimicked exactly.

When she’s done, Claudia moves the chair over to the counterfor her, sets a cutting board and knife down ready, then rummages through thedisorganized cupboards looking past long-expired half-empty jars of pickles andsauces and preserves for the ingredients she needs. She really needs to tidy upin here but somehow it’s so hard to bring herself to throw anything away. “Ay, ¿dónde está?I’m sure I had una cebolla here somewhere…”

“What we makin’?” Vanessa asks, climbing up onto the chair.She picks up the knife and examines it, sharp end very close to herface. Claudia swiftly takes it out of her hands. “Hey!”

“We’re having arroz con pollo.” Claudia puts theknife safely out of Vanessa’s reach and finally locates an onion nestled inwith the bananas and mango in the fruit bowl.

“I usually have peanut butter jelly sandwiches,” Vanessa tellsher. “They’re easiest to make.”

“You make your own lunch?”

“Uh-huh! I do it all the time when Mommy isn’t home.”

“Oh, vaya, that’s very grown up.”

Vanessa beams proudly and Claudia smiles at her, but in herheart she didn’t mean that as a compliment: Vanessa has barely been six for amonth. She’s so young to be spending any time at home alone, never mind feedingherself while she’s there. Perhaps it would have been less surprising back in Claudia’sday when children were far more independent far younger, but Claudia thinks thatthere are many things in her day that she’s glad have gone out of fashion now.

But she says nothing of it, only shows Vanessa how tomeasure out enough rice and rinse it so that it doesn’t all stick together whenit cooking, lets her open the little glass jars of spices and sniff each ofthem individually. Vanessa follows along with an unexpected focus, likeshe’s trying to memorize every instruction for herself.

With the air conditioning barely functioning as ever,Claudia’s apartment is small and stuffy, especially on a day like this. By thetime the pot is full and bubbling away on the stove and it’s time to clean up,Vanessa’s cheeks are bright pink from the heat.

Claudia says, “aquí, why don’t you take that hat off,” andwith the unconscious familiarity she’d show for Usnavi or Nina, plucks thebobble hat off Vanessa’s head.

Vanessa shrieks, and Claudia sees instantly thatshe isn’t wearing it just out of one of those odd childish whims like she’dassumed: her hair is an absolute rat’s nest, not just messy fromplaying but hopelessly tangled and sweaty like it hasn’t been washed or brushedin weeks.

“No! Give it back!” Vanessa shouts. She stamps her foot onthe chair and leans over on tiptoes making a grab for the hat. Hurriedly, Claudiahands it back before she overbalances and lands right on the stove. In asplit-second Vanessa has jammed it back on her head, jumped to the ground and boltedout of the kitchen, the door to Claudia’s bedroom slamming shortly after. WhenClaudia follows and knocks on the door, she yells, “go away! Leave me alone!”

Claudia taps her fingers against the doorframe and pursesher lips. Dealing with Vanessa, she thinks, is very, very different fromdealing with the children she’s used to. If Nina has ever raised her voice inher life than Claudia wasn’t there to see it. Usnavi wouldn’t even think to beembarrassed about something like messy hair in the first place: the boy wouldbe a walking mud puddle if his parents didn’t intervene.

Hm. Maybe that’s a point. She leaves Vanessa to calm down onher own while she goes to call Camila and find out exactly why it is that Naomidoesn’t want Vanessa going to visit.

The second she mentions Naomi’s name, Camila makes asquawkingly aggravated noise down the phone and says, “ay, do not get me started on that woman. Shesends her daughter round here practically every day and we feed her and look after her forfree and what thanks do we get? She should learn to take good advice when she’sgiven it.”

“What kind of advice?” Claudia asks, and then because sheknows Camila very well, “and how did you give it?”

“Oh, I know what you’re thinking, Claudia, but it wasjustified. I see enough of what goes on there to know that she isn’t fit to be a mother. It’sno wonder the girl is growing up half-wild.”

“Camila!” Claudiascolds. “No es justo, Naomi is still very young herself, she is only trying herbest with what she’s got.”

“Ha! If that’s what you call trying I’d hate to see what happens when she stops. The amount of times Vanessa’s complained about having aheadache here because nobody ever taught her you need to drink water and eatduring the day? El otro díashe says she can’t pick Vanessa up from our place so ‘just let her walkhome by herself’! I ask you, at herage? In this neighborhood? And then I try to talk to Naomi about it and shecalls me interfering!”

Claudia makes a sympathetic tsk noise.

“She might have been young when she had her but she’s anadult now, she has responsibilities,” Camila says firmly. “If she’d rather haveher own pride than listen to me, well, I wash my hands of the whole thing.”

It’s all very well tosay that from the outside, Claudia thinks as she hangs up, as much toherself as to Camila. She’s always felt for Naomi, who moved here with nothingbut a teenage pregnancy and that waste of space she called a husband - what aman of his age was doing with a girl barely out of childhood herself,honestamente – and whose fierce pride and broken heart and sharp temper made it very, very hardto get along with her for very long. But as young as Naomi is, Vanessa’s even younger and wheredoes all of this leave her, this odd, stubborn half-wild half-adult child, whoalready makes her own lunch and walks herself home from school the days hermother forgets to pick her up but was never taught how to wash her hands orbrush her own hair properly?

The bedroom door is still closed when Claudia returns to it.She knocks but lets herself in without waiting for an answer. Vanessa issitting on the floor by the bed hugging her knees, looking furious and ashamed.With some difficulty because her knees aren’t what they used to be, Claudiasits on the floor beside her.

“Don’t want it brushed,” Vanessa mutters sullenly, andscuffs her fingertips against the floor, picking at the fake wood-effectlinoleum.

“¿Por qué no?”

“Mommy used to brush it and she always pulls too hard, and Isaid ow and she told me to stop beinga baby but then I told her it hurts and she got mad and said if I know so muchabout everything I can just do it by myself.” Vanessa gives a heavy, put-uponsigh. “And I tried but it’s too tangly.Anyhow, it’s just hair. Why’s it matter if it’s messy?

“Because if you leave it like that then eventually birdswill start living in it.”

Obstinately, Vanessa says, “maybe I want birds to live in it.”

“Perhaps you do,” Claudia says, “but then they will sing allday and wake you up so, so early en la mañana.”

She makes cheepy bird noises, her fingers tapping against her thumbs like little cawing beaks all around Vanessa’s ears until Vanessastarts laughing then immediately looks outraged about it.

“Can I try to help? I promise not to pull it,” Claudiaswears. Vanessa gives her a suspicious look but then relents and takes the hatoff. It looks even worse up close. Claudia does her best not to react but Vanessaseems to have picked up on it because she bunches her shoulders up so high theyalmost hit her ears and stays like until Claudia tries togently finger-comb it out. She barely touches her before Vanessa hisses andgoes “owww!” in a high-pitched whine.

“Lo siento,” Claudia says, though she knows it couldn’treally have hurt.

“I told you, it’s too tangly,” Vanessa says, with an edge toher voice that means I am on the verge ofhysteria. “I already tried to brush it but it won’t work!”

“What if we call the ladies at the salon and ask what theythink? Daniela will know how to fix it, I’m sure.”

“She’ll laugh at me.”

“I’ll tell her off if she does.”

That makes Vanessa pause. “You’d tell Dani off?”

“Believe it or not, it wouldn’t be the first time.”

Vanessa says, “don’t tell her it’s about me?”, something sopitiful and pleading about it that Claudia wants to hug her. She resists theurge and says, “our secret” and with Vanessa’s nod of permission, calls up thesalon.

“I have a very young friend here with very tangly hair,” sheinforms Dani. “Un cepillo will not work. ¿Qué hacemos?

Dani says, “I told Rosa that next time Usnavi gets gum stuckin it she should just bring him here straight away.”

“No, not Usnavi. And nothing is stuck, it is just…ah, descuidado.”

“Oh,” Dani says, suddenly serious and sighing. “It’s Vanessa,isn’t it?”

Claudia makes a noncommittal sound: Dani is closest of allof them to Naomi, and she suspects probably could give her more of an insightinto the Garcia family than anyone, but she did make a promise. There’s a mufflednoise of Dani covering the handset and talking to someone for a second and thenshe says, “Carla says to work a lot of conditioner into it and comb it through,starting at the bottom.”

“Will that work?”

“It’s worked before for some little problemas,” Dani says.“But if her hair’s that bad it might take more time than it’s worth. Sometimes the only thing to do really is to cutit all off and start again. Do you want to bring her in and we’ll have a lookand see how much we can salvage? Sin cargo.”

“No, no, we’ll try the conditioner first, gracias. Give Carlamy love.” Claudia isn’t going to make Vanessa go and have all her hair cut off ifshe can help it. And so they eat their arroz con pollo then afterwards, she gathers everything and has Vanessa sit on a kitchen chairwith a towel round her shoulders, and gets to work with a comb and a bottle ofconditioner. She does her best to keep up chatter to cheer up a morose-lookingVanessa, but with very little in the way of responses and such a long taskahead, Claudia eventually just concentrates on what she’s doing, making slow,slow progress.

After about ten minutes, there’s a quiet sniff from thelittle figure in the chair, and then another one. Claudia stops what she’sdoing and leans round to see that Vanessa looks seconds away from crying. “¿Esto duele?”

“No,” Vanessa mumbles.

“What’s wrong?

Vanessa just shakes her head, staring at the floor with acrumpled brow and tears in her eyes, and though it may be overfamiliar, Claudia’syears of instinct immediately demand that she pull Vanessa into a tight hug –how could she possibly do anything else? With no noise but one tiny, miserable whimper of breath, Vanessastarts crying silently but hard, face against Claudia’s shoulder.

“Ah, pobrecita, I know,” Claudia murmurs, strokes Vanessa’shair as best she can, her hand sliding over the gloss of conditioner. She mightnot know Vanessa quite as well as some of her other children but one thingshe’s certain is that she’s a proud, independent little thing. This must bemortifying for her. There seems no good way to say to her that it isn’t herfault, that there are many small but crucial things in life that she should be taught to do, not left alone to figure out, and that this is probably only one of many. Telling her that won’t fix anything. But it does remind Claudia of a far-off and absurd memory. Shemoves Vanessa off her shoulder, still holding her by the arms and says, “when Iwas una niñita, we used to curl our hair withstrips of newspaper.”

Vanessa frowns at her. She’s already stopped crying, wipingher face on the towel round her neck. “Huh?”

“You’d take un pedazo de periódico in your hand and put yourhair around it like this – “ she makes a wrapping motion in the air, “and leaveit to dry en la noche, and you wake up with beautiful curls. My mama used to doit for me, but one day when I was a little older than you, she was not feelingwell and so I tried to do it myself. I thought, it cannot be so hard, if shedoes it all the time, and so I wrapped all my hair in newspaper and I went tobed, and you know what?”

“What?”

“It looked terrible,”she says. “At the front, too many curls, like the wig of a clown! But at theback, where I could not reach properly, all the paper had come out and so itwas not curled at all. Can you imagine?” She gestures down her back as thoughlong straight locks are still there, then holds her hands up at the frontmimicking the explosion of badly-curled ringlets.

Vanessa giggles at the image. “That sounds silly.”

“It was,” Claudia confirms. “And in those days we did nothave a shower and so I couldn’t wash it out so easily. I tried to get it wetand make it lie flat but it only made it look worse, and because Mama was sick Ihad to go out and run all the errands with my hair so crazy.”

“Oh noooo,” Vanessa says, hands over her mouth, utterly invested in the story. “What didyou do?”

“Well, first I cried very, very hard,”Claudia says,remembering it with a smile because it seems like such a small thing to be so upset over now. “And I wore una bufanda around my head, because I thought everyonewould laugh at me. And even when I went in to see my Mama in bed I wore labufanda because I was so embarrassed that i did it so wrong. And she did laugh,when I told her what had happened, but then when she was better she showed mehow to do it right, and I still curl my hair that way to this day.” She patsher neat, pinned-back rolls of rapidly-greying curls.

“My mommy wouldn’t do that,” Vanessa says. “She’d just getmad at me for doing it wrong.”

“Maybe,” Claudia says, because it seems even harsher to lie about it, “but I neverwould, if you ever need somebody to tell you how to fix a problem. It’s okay if youget it wrong for a while. Many things take a lot of practice and a lot ofpatience.”

Vanessa mulls it over, then gives a very solemn nod and sniffs hard one lasttime. “Okay. We can carry on now.”

Daniela was right: the whole process takes well over anhour, and they have to move to the couch so that Claudia can sit down halfwaythrough, but what of it? Claudia’s got plenty of time to spare in herretirement and, she reflects a little sadly, it has probably been a long, longwhile since anyone paid Vanessa this much attention.

All worth it in the end, when she announces that they arefinished, and Vanessa touches her own hair with her eyes lighting up. “You didit!” she gasps, as though Claudia had performed a miracle. “You fixed it!”

“We still need to rinse all the conditioner out.” Claudiahesitates about that: if it were Usnavi or Nina she’d simply throw them in the tub. They’re both getting old enough to be left unsupervised for short moments when they’re in there, but thedoor is always open, and she always calls reminders to not forget to wash theirfaces and scrub under their nails. They still need help rinsing out shampoo andclimbing out of the bath. Both of them still let her rub one of her oldfaded-pink towels thoroughly over their hair to dry it, and they still play thegame where she covers their whole faces with it and puts her hand therepretending she is going to scrub away their face just as roughly while theyshriek in pretend-fear and yell “no, Abuela!”. They’re getting too old for suchthings, but what are abuelas for if not to baby the grandchildren? They allknow that these moments are not forever, and why not hold onto childhood justas long as possible?

But Vanessa probably won’t allow anything like that, alreadyso clearly ashamed of the things about her that speak to the age she really is,and she’s already had enough embarrassment for the day. Claudia spares her thediscomfort of asking, instead rinsing her hair tipped upside down over thekitchen sink the way Claudia’s mama used to do for her so many years ago: cleanit all off with warm water and then one last jugful of cold to finish. Vanessa hollersloudly at the shock of cool water, but she laughs about it right afterwards.

Later in the living room, when Claudia is reading thenewspaper and Vanessa is lying on her belly on the floor with her felt tips,there’s the sound of ripping paper, very slow and quiet like she’s trying notto be heard. Claudia looks up to see Vanessa with a strip torn out of hercoloring book, trying to tie it in a knot around her still-damp hair.

She looks sheepish when she sees Claudia watching. “I want it allcurly,” she explains. Her hair uncoils itself from around thebadly-wrapped strip of paper.

“Would you like me to teach you how?”

“You don’t gotta.”

“I would like to.”

Vanessa hmms, and says, “only if you don’t make it go allcrazy at the front, then.”

“I’m much better at it than I used to be.”

Claudia takes the pages of her newspaper she’s finished readingand tears them into strips, and this funny, prickly hedgehog of a girl sitsclose in front of her, allowing her carefully roll her hair up into twists. Vanessaisn’t silent or sulking now: she’s talking about how she wants her hair to looklike Nina’s because Nina has the most beautiful hair, and gives a high-pitchedbubbling giggle as she recounts Claudia’s story about her own failed papercurls. She sounds just like the six year old she is instead of a tiny, furiousadult. Claudia’s back and eyes already ache from bending over and concentratingfor so long earlier, but she doesn’t mind pushing through it for this. Some things justneed a little patience.

#in the heights #abuela claudia #vanessa garcia #fandom: in the heights #character: abuela #character: vanessa #i'm very much in my vanessa emotions rn #also got a teenage vanessa bonding with dani fic coming up #sophia writes fic #belphegor1982

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loseyoutoloveme · 4 years

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can you do a rundown/review of every song on folklore like you've done for selena? and what your current top 5 are??

considering this is officially one of my top 3 favourite albums ever i’m v happy to 😌! warning, absolutely every single song will be ranked 10/10

thank for wanting to know my thoughts :( i can’t believe anybody would volunteer to read this JDNSKSDJKDS

first of all, my top 5 is probbbbably gonna change (maybe not tho bc my lover top 5 hasn’t really changed a lot), but for now, i think it’s: august > seven > mad woman > illicit affairs > mirrorball

THE 1:

ngl my very first thought was that it reminded me of same love by macklemore skdjdskjdskjsd but not in a bad way!

literally some of the prettiest lyrics, i knew just from this song that this would top red as her best lyrically (best album in general)

honestly just rly sad and sweet and one of those songs that has such a universal sound i feel?

also the simplest song of the album lyrically (also not in a bad way, just like objectively this is the easiest subject matter on the album with the least opaque lyrics), so a really good opener

best lyrics: “we never painted by the numbers baby but we were making it count/you know the greatest loves of all time are over now” and “we were something don’t you think so/roaring twenties tossing pennies in the pool/and it my wishes came true it would’ve been you”

a cute girl, 10/10

CARDIGAN:

i was surprised by the darkish sound of this one

idk what that like clanking sound in the background is but i find it a lil distracting in the first half of the song - but if i ever find out what it is and it has some symbolic meaning/purpose for being there (i assume it does) i’ll accept it sdjknsd

i love the nostalgia that is so present in like almost every song on this album :(

also the music video is stunning and frames the entire album in the most interesting way, metaphor-wise

best lyrics: “i knew you’d linger like a tattoo kiss/knew you’d haunt all of my what-ifs/the smell of smoke would hang around this long/cause i knew everything when i was young/i knew i’d curse you for the longest time/chasin’ shadows in the grocery line/i knew you’d miss me when the thrill expired/and you’d be standing in my front porch light/and i knew you’d come back to me”

10/10

THE LAST GREAT AMERICAN DYNASTY:

love this one bc it’s like a nice lil exhale in an album filled with angst, like it’s cute and boppy without being aggressive

i’m suddenly absolutely obsessed with rebekah harkness, particularly the “bitch pack” thing and her dyeing someone’s dog green

i love taylor’s storytelling and i love how that’s always been a big part of her approach to songwriting. this is taylor at her best narration, like starlight but so much better. this is a type of songwriting that is so underused these days, esp by mainstream artists and i love so much that she has always used it and been so invested in it

the pronoun change made me screech. sooo goooood

taylor’s obv a deeply autobiographical artist which is why it’s so incredible to hear her tell OTHER people’s stories and somehow make them so her own. like i think it’s mostly the english major in me that just gets so emotional over that...... the way that other people’s stories became our own through the way we tell them......

this song is def the one that is most explicit about the album’s theme of telling stories but ones that tell something about her (and about her listeners too), by switching to personal pronouns at the end. it sets up a pattern for the rest of the album, where each song is about one thing (the actual story she’s telling) but also about a bunch of other things.

a good example of why she’s the greatest songwriter of this generation

best lyrics: “there goes the maddest woman this town has ever seen/she had a marvelous time ruining everything”

10/10

EXILE:

bon iver’s voice was a full shock to the system the first time i listened and idk why sdkjnds it is just so deep and i was not at all expecting it esp after the cuteness of tlgad

anyway these lyrics are GORGEOUS

i love a duet where the 2 singers’ lyrics are meant to be directed at each other. is there a word for that type of duet idk but it always makes a duet infinitely better

the miscommunication exemplified in the bridge...... chef’s kiss heartbreaking

out of all the songs this is the one that makes me feel the most like i am in the middle of a forest in winter. i can already picture myself listening to this song in december with the sound of a crackling fire in the background mmmmmmmm my exact vibe

best lyrics: “you’re not my homeland anymore/so who am i defending now?/you were my town, now i’m in exile seeing you out” and “i’m not your problem anymore/so who am i offending now?”

10/10

MY TEARS RICOCHET:

this chorus BRRROOOOKE ME

writing songs presumably about the masters situation and framing them as breakup songs was absolutely galaxy brain

i feel like the image of tears ricocheting has like a million layers to it and is just suuuuch a smart metaphor

also just such a visually rich song ? so is every song on the album but the metaphors of this song are all just so visual

best lyrics: “i didn’t have it in myself to go with grace/and you’re the hero flying around saving face/and if i’m dead to you why are you at the wake?” and “i can go anywhere i want/anywhere i want, just not home”

10/10

MIRRORBALL:

ok so i did like this one on first listen, i loved absolutely everything on first listen, but it didn’t hit my top 5 until like 8 listens later, so it’s def a big grower and i think could be a huge fan fav by next year

the self-awareness in her writing will never fail to amaze me

the way that life is just performing...... yeah

but it’s crazy to me that a person could be like “i’m a compulsive people pleaser and performer and i’ll do anything to get ppl to like me” and that leads to “i am a disco ball” like ???? her brain is so big. it’s such a gorgeous metaphor.... and the circus imagery AHHHHH

best lyrics: “i’m still on that tightrope/i’m still trying everything to get you laughing at me/i’m still a believer but i don’t know why/i’ve never been a natural, all i do is try try try/i’m still on that trapeze/i’m still trying everything to keep you looking at me” and “i can change everything about me to fit in”

10000/10

SEVEN:

this one simply rips my heart out

at first i was like oh this is so weird and then the chorus just would not leave my head

for me personally, nostalgia is literally 90% of my personality and just for so many personal reasons the thought of childhood ending and all of the growing pains that come along with that have been at the forefront of my psyche for the past year. so it just kills me whenever i find a song like this one and it kills me that taylor specifically has several songs about this topic and this is 100000% the best of them all. like it’s the most beautiful experience to have your thoughts and feelings and fears expressed so perfectly by a total stranger, and that’s rly what art is about and i love taylor for doing that for me and millions of other people

i just feel like this song brings up so many vivid beautiful memories of childhood for so many people, like being outside in the summer and screaming and being free. ugh

the pause after “i hit my peak at seven” before completing the phrase........ OOOOOOOOOF IT HITS TOO HARD

and sound-wise, just so off-beat and cool and unique

best lyrics: “i hit my peek at seven/feet in the swing across the creek” and “are there still beautiful things?” and “love you to the moon and to saturn/passed down like folk songs/the love lasts so long” and “before i learned civility/i used to scream ferociously/any time i wanted”

100000000000/10

AUGUST:

i knew immediately that this would be my favourite tbh like i could sense it the second it began

i wrote my first impression thoughts in my journal and you can tell the exact moment i got to the bridge bc i just started screaming sdnjksdkjsdn

i would 100% get a tattoo that said “to live for the hope of it all”

everything about this song is LITERALLY flawless like i have.......no notes......no thoughts.......it’s just an absolutely perfect song

best lyrics: “back when we were still changing for the better/wanting for was enough/for me it was enough/to live for the hope of it all" and “august sipped away like a bottle of wine/cause you were never mine”

100000000000000000000000000/10

THIS IS ME TRYING:

this song is rly good but i keep forgetting it exists omg :/ once i learn all of the lyrics i’ll appreciate her more

the strings are gorgeous

i was rly surprised that this one was done with jack instead of aaron just bc the bridge of this sounds SOOOO the national

these lyrics could be interpreted in so many different ways depending on the listener’s experiences and that’s beautiful

best lyrics: “i was so ahead of the curve/the curve became a sphere/fell behind all my classmates and i ended up here” and “it’s hard to be at a party when i feel like an open wound/it’s hard to be anywhere these days when all i want is you/you’re a flashback in a film reel on the one screen in my town”

10/10

ILLICIT AFFAIRS:

that soft high note on “down,” “stop,” etc is sooooo nice

i don’t have many thoughts on it, it’s just so soft, SOOOOOO gorgeous instrumentally and lyrically

best lyrics: “it’s born from just one single glance/but it dies and it dies and it dies/a million little times” and “don’t call me kid, don’t call me baby/look at this godforsaken mess that you made me/you showed me colours you know i can’t see with anyone else” and “you taught me a secret language i can’t speak with anyone else/and you know damn well/for you i would ruin myself/a million little times”

100000/10

INVISIBLE STRING:

like i said about tlgad, this is a nice little break from all the angst and pain and anger sdnjksdnskjsd just a sweet little break to remind u there are good things in the world too. so placed really well in the tracklist imo

super super super super cute chorus

so many pretty melodies

absolutely an autumn song btw

best lyrics: “time, mystical time/cutting me open, then healing me fine”

10/10

MAD WOMAN:

i literally lost my mind listening to this for the first time

i have such a thing for scorned women anthems like i will immediately love it whatever it is

the pure rage when she says “cause you took everything from me” gives me full body chills

it is just so eerie and haunting and perfect

best lyrics: “women like hunting witches too/doing your dirtiest work for you/it’s obvious that wanting me dead/has really brought you two together” and “every time you call me crazy i get more crazy/what about that?” and “good wives always know/she should be mad, should be scathing like me/but no one like a man woman”

1000000/10

EPIPHANY:

i find this one so hard to listen to but it’s absolutely beautiful and devastating and so heavily relevant for i think the whole world rn

the heart monitor and the trumpets tying both of the topics in together is so genius and so heartbreaking

i think will be the sygb of folklore where it makes everybody cry so much that it becomes a skip despite being a beautiful song

best lyrics: “something med school did not cover/someone’s daughter, someone’s mother” and “some things you just can’t speak about”

10/10

BETTY:

first of all THE HARMONICA

this made me so happy bc it’s just so debut and so fearless and it made me SOOOOO nostalgic on my first listen, because it really felt to me like i was getting to listen to a song from debut or fearless for the very first time again

it’s just so sweet and cute and simple and yet another very self-aware moment of looking back to her past material/subject matter

best lyrics: “would you have me? would you want me?/would you tell me to go fuck myself/or lead me to the garden?” and “i’m only seventeen, i don’t know anything/but i know i miss you”

10/10

PEACE:

the bass at the beginning is soooooo nice

this miiiiiight be the strongest song on the album lyrics-wise but idk yet

not much to say, it’s just so gorgeous

best lyrics: “i’m a fire and i’ll keep your brittle heart warm/if your cascade ocean wave blues come/all these people think love’s for show/but i would die for you in secret” and “would it be enough if i could never give you peace?” and “i talk shit with my friends, it’s like i’m wasting your honour”

10/10

HOAX:

i have a feeling this one will be underrated/underappreciated bc it’s just simple and dark and the last song, but this is....... a lyrical masterpiece

i feel like i need to be playing this on vinyl with all of the lights off and just a candle burning yknow, like there’s just something so dark and ancient about it

best lyrics: “my winless fight/this has frozen my ground” and “your faithless love’s the only hoax i believe in/don’t want no other shade of blue but you/no other sadness in the world would do” and “you knew it still hurt underneath my scars/from when they pulled me apart/but what you did was just as dark/darling this was just as hard”

10/10

OVERALL: 10000000000/10 literally one of the best albums i have ever heard and (while i wouldn’t put it past her to top it) absolutely the best work of her career. so complex and layered and emotional and painful and genuine and different. not to get ahead of myself but this is/should be considered her blue, her rumours, her abbey road....... god. can’t wait to listen to this album for the rest of my life and play it for my future children and just watch it live on as the greatest work of one of the most important artists of the 21st century

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yourfaveisyanderematic · 5 years

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2! 6! 10! 13-14; 24; 44-45; and 49!! Please do whatever amount you are comfortable with - but I'm glad you've decided to receive questions from this numbered post too!

Man you just went absolutely nuts with this one, huh Nice.

THIS GOT LONG; I’m gonna try to put it under a cut but you know how Tumblr.Hell has been to me, lately. Maybe it’s in protest about all the horny content I’ve been writing.

Things that motivate you.

I’m always super stoked when I read something really good, or see an interesting scene in a film or show! Whenever I see or hear an idea that goes “wow, that’s such a fresh and intense element of horror”, I get a really strong urge to work. Sometimes it’s enough to make me throw all priority out the window as I struggle to capture an idea before it gets away from me, which is why y’all still haven’t seen that god damn Narancia fic. I’m working on it, I swear.

It goes without saying, but knowing that people enjoyed something I wrote--especially if I’m insecure about it--also makes me really happy, and I get another burst of energy to write something for people. Comment on fics, guys! Tell authors you like their stuff! You’ll get more!

How did writing change you?

I consider things more analytically and find myself trying to work out how I’d describe a particular emotion, or sensation or experience. It’s also given me a better appreciation for the work of others! I tend to pick up on things I like or dislike about a work and better articulate why I feel that way, and then dissect the author’s approach and their strengths in conveying things. It’s like an English class, but far more fun!

How do you do your researches?

I get the idea for a fic, sit down and write it, and then as I start describing how a character’s thrown through a wall go “...wait a moment. Would drywall realistically be used in the construction of a house at this place and time?”, which turns into an hour-long rabbit hole where I learn all about Midwestern architecture instead of writing. Other times I’m dissatisfied with my own understanding of things and have to spend some time running several iterations of a medical (sometimes suspicious) question to get accounts from people who experienced the injury, or a doctor’s opinion on what’s likely to happen. FBI Agent-chan, I promise I’m not actually going to feed someone lye! I just want to know some things about what would happen, if I theoretically did. Theoretically.

Hardest character to write?

*Narancia materializes behind my shoulder like the ghost of a murdered Victorian child*

...good characters. I should say, it’s incredibly difficult for me to write heart-of-gold ultra goodboys like Okuyasu as the antagonist of a horror fic! There are characters who are generally good-aligned but are more than willing to get their hands dirty to get a job done, and there are characters I just really have a hard time seeing hurt people, so I avoid them if I can’t think of a good angle. I can’t--maybe won’t, it’s all the same thing with my Hell Fuck Brain--write something if it doesn’t feel in character, and I avoid doing pure/straight fluff on this blog.

Easiest character to write?

KIRA. I used to be pretty interested in true crime and serial killers (a fact that should surprise absolutely nobody), and of all JJBA’s villains he’s very...human, in the way that we have plenty of real-life people with his motivations and deeds, if not his exploding housecat. I really enjoy dissecting his psychology, because he exposes a lot about his worldview in only a few interactions with women. Anyway, writing him comes very easily to me, because I understand him.

Favorite scene you’ve ever written?

Why, Anon, I don’t know what you mean! I love all my scenes equally!

*later* ...I don’t care much for [you’ll never know]

I actually had to think about this one for a moment, because I actually don’t think about my scenes too much once I’m done with them. Always looking to the next thing to write, I guess lmao. If I had to pick a favorite, though, I’d definitely say it’s the Doppio scene. I’ve got a soft spot for that one because of the research that went into it (that ultimately ended up meaning VERY little lmao) and the muted horror and agony that I think really defined what I wanted to do with this blog. I think I tended to veer more towards psychological horror than body horror since then....until this month, anyway. Lmao.

Do you write linear or do you write future scenes if you feel like it?

It’s very difficult for me to start a fic ‘in the middle’. If I’ve got a good middle bit, I’ll sit on it and sit on it until I think of a good way to get there, and it’s not until I have the beginning that I actually start. Not because I want to, that’s just how my brain works lmao. I tend to keep most of my writing in my head (drafts WHO? Outlines WHAT? Don’t know her, bitch!), so the future scenes I have just stay there and keep developing until I’ve got the scope of the fic all set.

Share the synopsis of a story you work on that you haven’t published yet.

"Company Man”

Haha, what if I wrote a Modern/Office AU...just kidding...

unless...? Trouble-prone Reader-Chan is a new hire at Brando and Associates, where they discover a whole new definition of ‘cutthroat’ as they immediately get enmired in brutal office politics of unbelievable scope. The salary’s great, but the workload is...shall we say, murder.

Writing advice?

Play Dnd. Specifically, run DnD...or any tabletop storytelling game, really, there are plenty of systems that focus on storytelling and don’t really care about dice. I understand that this might require you to be a little more social than the advice you were expecting, but doing so is going to really help you with:

Flexibility. You must adapt to what your players unexpectedly do--there’s no way to prepare for every outcome--and still make a story that’s coherent and interesting. You have to learn that your characters--not your plot--is the king of your story, and sometimes they’re going to take things in a direction you didn’t plan on. ‘Yes, and’ or ‘Yes, but’ is going to become your best friends, and this strategy will be a big help when you feel like you’re in a writing roadblock because your characters won’t do this or that!

Feedback. A story has to be engaging first, deep and profound or whatever second. Players will be able to immediately tell you ‘hey, this is fun’ or ‘hey, this isn’t cool’, and by playing with different people you’ll be able to catch weaknesses in your storytelling style sooner, and also get a better feel for what you just enjoy doing.

Also, write. Even if it’s bad. There’s a post on tumblr with this example, but it’s better to make a hundred shitty pots and improve each time than it is to wait and make a really good pot that could have been way better with the time you spent waiting to perfect it.

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gomustanggirl16 · 5 years

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What's your favorite scene that you've written for With Love From The Hastings

I have no idea when you sent this or why I haven’t answered before, but so far my favorite is a scene is a tie between two I actually never used. And have been waiting and trying to integrate for over a year now, but unfortunately tbey just never fit. The first was supposed to take place a little bit after the first hospital visit and I ultimately decided not to use it because I took the chapter in a different route and the second takes place in Chapter 13 right before Sharon shows up. I didn’t end up using it because it was an early draft that took place in a happier setting and was before I decided to have Nat find out Steve was reporting back to Fury on her. I also thought I lost them due to the Great Deletion of 2018, but I didn’t! So that being said here they are:

“HeyNat?” Steve said getting Natasha’s attention.

“Yeah?”Natasha looked up giving him her attention.

“CanI ask you something?” Natasha smirked.

“Technicallyyou already have. Twice.” Steve rolled his eyes and she kicked his leg with herfoot playfully. “What is it?”

Stevehesitated a moment trying to find the right words, like he wasn’t sure heshould be asking what he was about to ask.

“Yousaid before the start of all this, before we agreed to take it on that younever really planned on having kids. Why? I mean I think I know why anyone inthis business wouldn’t want to, but still.”

Thatcaught her off guard. Why wasn’t she interested in having kids of her own? Wellbesides having that option taken from her? Her entire life is reason enough.

“I’msorry, I shouldn’t have asked, it’s just-and no I’m not being stereotypical,but the girls really take to you and I don’t know maybe I’m just trying tofigure it out for myself to.”

Natashasighed setting aside her tablet.

“Well,besides the job? I’ve got a ledger full of red and a long line of people who’dlove nothing more than to watch me suffer. It just seems selfish and cruel toput a child in their line of sight like that all because they came from me.Besides, I wouldn’t even know what to do with myself.” Simple, neat, andstraight to the point. Steve nodded.

“Yeah,you got a point there, but you seem to be finding plenty to do.” Natasha smiledshaking her head.

“Becauseit’s a mission directive. It’s an order. To actually want this on my own? Noone giving orders, creating this life myself?” She shook her head. “It’s awhole lot different.”

“Youknow for someone who calls themselves a spy, you talk a lot like a soldier.”

“GuessI’m a bit of both.” Natasha returned, “My turn, why don’t you ever go out onthose dates? I mean I know you had someone back then, but not even one just totry? So, what if it doesn’t turn out to be more at least you put yourself outthere and maybe gained a friend.”

Stevesighed taking a sip of his beer.

“Yes,that’s all true, but the thing you gotta understand Nat, is that for me? Iremember hitting the ice, I remember losing consciousness and it was just likeI blinked and suddenly I’m waking up at SHIELD. Two, maybe three minutes tops,was what it felt like for me. Not seventy years. It felt like I closed my eyes,I’m not fully asleep, but almost and what was meant to be a short half hour napturns into twelve hours. Some days I still have trouble comprehending it all.Afraid that I’ll wake up back there and learn this was the dream. Trust me,I’ve thought about it, but I feel like I should have it more together before tryingto start something like that.”

“That’sfair, I guess,” Natasha never realized how jarring waking up really must havebeen for him. How haunting it must be. It’s an honest to god miracle he’s asstable as he is.

“Howabout you?” Natasha raised an eyebrow.

“Whatabout me?” Natasha countered.

“Idon’t think I’ve ever heard about you going out on a date once. For someonewho’s constantly trying to set me up, you seem to be lacking in that areayourself. Ow!” Steve laughed as she punched him the shoulder.

“Youknow it’s rude to ask a lady about her love life.”

“Iknow, but I was referring to you-hey!” Steve blocked her next punch that was alittle off thanks to her laughter.

“You’resuch an ass!”

“Stilldoesn’t answer my question.” Natasha groaned sitting back again.

“Wellif you must know, I don’t really do the whole dating thing. When your codenames the Black Widow it tends to scare people off. I’ve had a few one nightstands here and there in the past, but it was usually a quickie in a clubbathroom. Goes along with my earlier statement.”

Shecould tell she’d caught him off guard with her honesty, but it was true. Whenyou’ve spent your entire life seducing people into bed only to off them afterthey’ve given you what you want, having a real relationship just doesn’t feelright.

“Holdup! Are you telling me you’ve never in your life been out on a real date?”Natasha frowned.

“Really?Out of everything I just told you that’s what you get stuck on?” He shrugged,and she rolled her eyes. “Of course, I’ve been out on a date! More times thanI’d like to admit.”

“Thosewere all for a mission. You just said you don’t date.” Natasha’s mask falteredas she realized her slip up. Steve seemed to realize it too.

“Natasha…whenwas the last time you actually kissed someone? As you not the Widow, or for SHIELD.” Steve was challenging her, shecould see it.

Natashashifted in her seat trying to come up with something, anything. Well the last guy she kissed as herself was also the lastguy she fucked, which if she recalls was Clint’s farmhand Paul at Lila’schristening three-oh god.

“Okayso it’s been a little while.” Natasha said into her drink and Steve put hishand up to his ear.

“I’msorry I didn’t catch that.” Natasha mumbled into her drink again before Stevepulled it away and she huffed.

“Fine!Three years happy.” Steve’s eyes went wide, and she nearly smacked him again.

“Andyou’re the one questioning me about the last time I kissed someone?” She glareddaggers at him.

“Isuggest you sleep with one eye open tonight Rogers. You might wake up with someundesired damage done.”

“Oh,come on Nat…seriously though, when’s the last date? You don’t really strike meas an on the first date every time person.”

Natashatried to recall if she’d ever actually dated, but she couldn’t. She was raisedto be a weapon to make a life for herself.

“Ihaven’t.” Natasha answered timidly making Steve’s brow furrow in confusion.

“Youhaven’t what?”

“Haven’tbeen on a date.” Natasha huffed.

“Ever?”

“Never.”Natasha said, lips in a taught line and Steve’s expression fell. Natasha sighedrunning a hand through her hair.

“Alright,come on let’s have it. I’m sure you’ve got plenty to say.” Steve shook hishead.

“So,your first date was with a mark?”

Natashanodded.

“Firstkiss?”

Anothernod.

“First…”He couldn’t finish that one, but she nodded knowing what he was asking, unableto hold his gaze any longer.

Momentspassed as he watched her, and she felt like she was in front of a firing squad.No one, not even Clint had asked her about that, well besides the SHIELD shrinkshe’d been forced to see, but everyone else just didn’t think about it ordidn’t ask. She doesn’t remember pulling her legs up to hug herself, but shealmost felt like she couldn’t breathe.

“How…”

“Twelve,maybe thirteen.” Natasha responded in a whisper.

“Iwas gonna ask how long you worked for them, but…” Steve let out a harsh breathand she looked at him out of the corner of her eye. He was mad, no he waspissed.

“Pleasesay something.” He opened and closed his mouth a few times and she began toworry what he would think of her now. Would he look down on her? Sure, hedidn’t before, but clearly, he never anticipated for her to have gotten such anearly start. Would he be disgusted by her?

“Whatthe hell did they do just kidnap you up off the street?” Natasha looked back upat him, nodded and watched as his face fell completely. She watched theemotions flash in his eyes, horror, disgust, anguish, fury…

“God…Nat-”

“Don’t.”Natasha said cutting him off before he had the chance to give her the usualsentiments. He nodded leaning his elbows on his knees. Neither spoke for quitesome time not knowing what to say. She was still shocked at how easy it was forher to tell him those things. Then again, it’s easiest to keep a secret when noone wants to know.

“Thankyou.” Natasha frowned looking over to Steve.

“Forwhat?”

“Fortrusting me.” That shouldn’t have been as much of a relief as it was, but stillit made her feel a little lighter and she gave him a hint of a smile.

“Youhave no idea…”

Lancaster was a little over an hour’s drive west of them, but the roads were open andtraffic minimal for a Saturday. All around them were tall oak and sycamoretrees with pine and maple mixed in painting a beautifully calm scenery. The airwas different, not stale like the city or stuffy, fresh and clean (besides theoccasional waft of manure). Everywhere you looked you could see for miles,large stretches of farm land and mountain ranges. Lexi would stretch pointingout the window at the many horse farms they passed excited by every single one.

She’d done some research last night looking at whatthey could do deciding to just spend the day. Steve was fine with it and whileyes, she could be mission focused, she loved just walking around the cities andstreets of the places she went when she could. You could tell a lot aboutpeople by the way they live. Either way she’d bought tickets for the StrasburgRail Road thinking maybe Lexi would like it and Steve though, she more or less wantedsomething to tease him about.

They arrived at the railroad and saw a few dozen otherfamilies walking around. She could feel Lexi bouncing in her car seat andlooked back to find her tugging at her seatbelt. They got out of the car andLexi looked around, jumping a bit at the sound of the trains whistle. Natashagrabbed Ellie from her seat and put her hat on before allowing Lexi to pull herforward because she absolutely knewwhere she was going or why.

“Open car?” Steve asked as they boarded the train andLexi hopped into the seat closest to the window. “You know that hats gonna flyright off, right?”

Natasha scowled.

“The hat stays on. It’s a steam train from themid-eighteen hundred, it’s barely moving faster than you drive.” Steve chuckledshaking his head as he sat down across from them.

At Natasha’s insistence, Lexi sat down as the trainstarted moving as she mimicked the sounds of the whistle laughing. Sure enough,Lexi stood up again and Natasha quickly grabbed her by the waist to keep herfrom falling out the window. Steve just raised an eyebrow and she knew he waswaiting for the damned hat to go flying.

“It’s not coming off.” Natasha repeated, and thebastard just smiled and returned to pointing at things for Ellie as she stoodup on his legs.

It was halfway through the trip that Lexi just sohappened to lean a little bit forward and the hat caught wind. Natasha snatchedit though quickly stuffing it next to her.

“Told you.” Steve smirked.

“It doesn’t count if you catch it.”

“It still came off her head.” Natasha glared sittingLexi on her lap to keep the girl from leaning more over the side.

“This was a good idea.”

Steve said later that day as they left the localfarmers market. It was hard to find good fruits and vegetables especiallyaround this time of year. Not to mention she found out that bargaining gets youeverywhere. A lot of the market consisting of Amish farmers who were more thanwilling to barter with you for a fair price.

So far, she’d found peaches, grapes, raspberries, mostgreens, eggplants she had plans to use tonight, gorgeous air loom tomatoes,along with ripe fresh ones she planned on canning with the peaches and pears,and a small basket of apples they’d gone and picked right off the treethemselves. Lexi had a lot of fun doing that as she sat on Steve’s shoulders toreach the best ones to put in the little basket the lady at the entrance handedher.

“Thank you.”

Steve chuckled.

“Your welcome, but I have to ask what on earth are youplanning on doing with all that?”

She considered her baskets and bags she’d brought tocarry everything.

“Canning, the late season finds and baby food for Ellie,maybe applesauce and were having Eggplant Parmesan for dinner.” Steve nodded inresponse and as they were about to leave, an older man stopped them.

“Might you guys like a photo before you go?”

“Yes.” Lexi answered for them and Steve looked up ather from where she still sat on his shoulders.

“Sure.” Natasha said pulling out her phone.

They stood against the backdrop of the farmers marketas she held Ellie and Steve slipped his arm around her waist. They all smiled,Lexi and Ellie’s cheeky.

“Such a beautiful family! One more, how ‘bout a kissfor your wife?” The man asked, and Natasha instinctively tilted her head up tomeet Steve’s lips.

He reacted almost instantly this time and her breath caught as he pulled her a littlecloser by the waist. It was slower this time and she was a little surprised tofind his lips moving with hers. It didn’t last long though as Natasha heardLexi giggle and parted from Steve’s lips as Lexi laughed for whatever reasontwo-year old’s laugh. She accepted her phone back from the man before theyheaded back to the car.

I have so many more, but these are the ones I remember the most XD I have fill in and all that, that I simply didn’t have time for or just didn’t fit in, and I hope to use some of it eventually, but most likely won’t. Anyways thanks for asking!

#the hastings #steve rogers #natasha romanoff #romanogers

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