#last point on choice has a perfect counter against august | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

spiltscribbles · 3 years

Note

Miss you and your marvelous writing!!!! Just a prompt if you’re up to it 😊 exes wolfstar staying friends but sirius gets into a new relationship and he brings his new boo to somewhere he took remus and remus gets sad 😭 but they get back together eventually

Notes: OMFG BABEY! this is so SO beyond precious of you! i adore you to bits! thank you for the sweetness and for this scrumptious angst🥺🥺 i really hope you like it😭😘😘💜

SEND ME A PROMPT | A Reblog means SO SO much! I ADORE YOU💜💜

“He can just be so… So” James pauses right then, takes off his cap with the hand that’s still clutching his baseball bat, and ruffles his hair with the other.

“Un-opinionated,” Remus offers half heartedly as they turn the block to the small coffee shop nearest school, both of them freshly showered after the required morning workouts for Tuesday and Thursdays. It’s the first semester in which Remus has actually joined in on the seven minute track, considering the fact that even despite their crazy contradictory schedules with all the sports and extra curriculars they each had, Sirius always made it a point to buy their ice coffees and drop it off to Remus, sometimes leaving them a quarter of an hour late for first period, or as just a quick drop and dash if one of them had an exam.

It was sweet, considerate. It was Sirius showing how much he cared because he’s never been one for words, even if he would frequently print off the little texts Remus would send him about how Sirius made him feel, and hang it up on the wall besides his bed, along with photos of them and Remus by himself and a few of their other friends too.

But yeah… None of that is really a thing anymore, not the coffees or the texts or the promises of being one another’s always. Not after calling it quits in early January because they knew by August they’d be working with thousands of miles between them and a three hour difference on top of that. It just wouldn’t have been feasible in the long run, and sure— Remus was the one to broach the topic and he knows that Sirius was hesitant about the logical side of it, but sometimes Remus wishes Sirius had fought harder, had argued louder, had wanted Remus more. But that’s a ridiculous expectation, and he had only admitted as much to Lily. And at the end of the day, it was the right choice, because it’s only early May now, and Remus can’t imagine how sick he’ll feel once catching his flight to Berkeley, and they’re steadfastly back in the best friends category of things. He can’t fathom how it would’ve been if they spent all these months and the ones after being together in all those intimate ways, knowing that they’ll be so far apart soon enough.

It was the right decision for the both of them and their friendship.

“Yeah, sure. Let’s go with that,” James says, bringing Remus out of his gloomy contemplations while opening the glass door to Three Broomsticks, sporting a thin smile that he always has on when he’s trying to be kind even when he’s irritated as all get out.

Remus snorts at him, elbow checking his side as he walks past. “Well he’s sharing that dorm with you and Sirius in New Haven, so I guess you’ve got that to look forwards to.”

James’s face pulls into a grimace and their typical barista nods their way, already receiving their orders through the app and sparing them having to wait in the queue. “Maybe Pete’ll grow his own personality in university, yeah?”

“Sure Prongsie,” Remus says, noncommittal as he checks his phone and lies against the windowpane, already exhausted by the morning. “And if he doesn’t, I’m sure Sirius is about to blow his lid any day now.”

“It’s going to be funny as fuck, and you won’t even be there to see the debris,” James counters, sounding pleasant enough even though Remus knows that he’s nearly as pissed off as Sirius is about the decision for him to go back to his home state for undergrad.

“You’ll send pictures though.”

“Of course Moony my old friend,” James jokes, tossing him a wink as they straighten once spotting their coffees being rung up. But as Remus takes a step forwards, he notices that a familiarly tan pair of hands are reaching for them, and when Remus looks up he feels like an idiot for not noticing him sooner. Because there Sirius is, dashing as ever in their school’s maroon blazer and tan pants, and his hair is windblown and shining as it falls midway of the nape of his neck. But Remus doesn’t really have the chance to appreciate just how damn good looking his ex-boyfriend is, rather, he’s more distracted by how Sirius doesn’t even notice him or James as he pivots around and hands over the second cup to a beaming Gideon Prewett. Their heads incline while they exchange a few words that are absolutely impossible to pick up in the crowded cafe before they bump their shoulders together and walk out the opposite door.

And it feels like nothing else watching that exchange— like their was a hammer and pick chipping away at his stupid, weeping heart.

“I think they’re just doing a project together,” James says lowly in Remus’s ear, clapping him on the back in reassurance, and Remus loves him, but he’s not in the mood for false platitudes, feels like there is a ugly, burning fire festering deep in his stomach and making Remus want to hurl all over the wooden floors.

“Yeah, I’m sure,” he replies instead, mild as he discretely picks up his phone again and opens up to the last conversation he had this morning.

R: need intel

L: Say more sexy things to me, lover

R: sirius and Gideon

R: what’s going on there

L: I’ll take a look, dw

Buoyed by Lily’s scary levels of detective skills, Remus returns his phone to his satchel and signals James to follow him to pick up their actual drinks. “C’mon, Flitwick hates it when we’re late.”

“Do you want the good news first, or the bad.” Lily asks Remus later that morning during their shared free period, dropping her bag on the tabletop that they typically commandeer towards the back of Hogwarts’s library, nearest the windows and tucked away by the shelves.

“Is there actually any good news? Or are you just saying that to make me feel better.” Remus asks, single brow cocked as he shuts his history book and tosses it to the side.

“Well your hair looks especially nice today,” she offers with a small smile, sitting besides him and ruffling his curls.

“Thanks, I suppose. But I’d rather just get to it. And don’t sigh at me like that! All long suffering and all.”

Rolling her eyes, Lily gathers her hair into a high pony before turning to Remus fully. “You’re my best friend, I love you more than just about anyone. You know that, right?” Lily asks him, stiff stance relaxing when he nods in turn. “Then understand that I’m saying this from a place of love, but you don’t get to be mad at him, okay. You’re the one who called it off Re, you’re the one who wanted you guys to go back to being friends to avoid that messiness in August. And you know I respect the decision, but also it wasn’t the only one to be had. I mean look at James and I—“

“You’re going to Columbia Lils,” Remus bristles, hates how defensive he’s getting all of a sudden. “That train ride is like two hours and some change at the very most. It’s not the same.”

“You guys could’ve made it work,” she insists, green eyes blazing in the dim light. “He’s crazy about you, and you’re in love with him— Like ass backwards in love. You can’t just cut that off like it’s nothing, damn it, Remus.”

He can feel his own ears reddening and Remus hates it, hates how today had started off so innocuous and now it’s an absolute shit show. Remus hates that Lily is always correct about everything, and hates how Sirius probably is regretting telling Remus he still fully intends to ask him out to prom, and hates how much he loves him— how whenever he looks at Sirius it’s just a deluge of wanting and adoring and regretting and needing to feel his lips against Sirius’s own again like a drug, how he’ll never forget how he tasted like coffee beans and cigarette smoke and the strawberries he ate every morning besides his breakfast. Remus hates it all and he can’t figure out how not to feel like suddenly everything is slipping out of his hands like sand drifting through his fingers.

“He’s probably not that crazy over me anymore considering he’s getting Gideon Prewett coffees now, so maybe it’s the right decision after all.” Is what Remus decides to tell Lily instead of that whirlwind of clashing feelings.

“Oh Christ,” Lily huffs, dropping her head back like she’s asking for strength from the heavens above. “Look, Dorcas tells me that they’ve only been out twice. And Marlene says that it’s nothing intense. Just a movie and then he went to go watch his nephew’s little league game.”

“Oh,” Remus intones, because, no. No he will not start crying like this is some fucking Nicholas Sparks novel, and he’s the wayward lead making all the worst decisions. He’s not going to cry damn it!

He is not a bird, and this is suppose to be happening, and none of this has any real consequence at the end of the day. He and Sirius broke up, and Sirius can go out with whoever he pleases— even if it’s good looking, ginger athletes.

Remus is fine.

“Remus,” Lily gently consoles, lacing her fingers into his own that’s resting on his lap, and squeezing for good measure. “Benjy told Mary, who told me during Calc that Gideon doesn’t expect anything. Sirius told him he’s not looking for anything long term.”

“That’s dumb,” Remus retorts, trying to hold everything in so that Lily doesn’t give him that concerned, doe eyed face of hers, like when he’s spent a week living off of protein bars and double shot espressos preparing for finals. “Gideon’s great, and there on the soccer team together, they would be perfect.”

“Remus, stop.”

“And he’s going to Dartmouth, so he’ll be super close for like weekend excursions and all of that.”

“Remus!”

“The more I think about it, Lils, the more it makes sense. They just fit.”

“Sure, those are all nice attributes,” Lily says, peering up at him disappointedly. “But he’s not you.”

Like a legion of angels singing in the distance, the bell begins to shrill for next period and Remus is spared from giving that statement any mind.

He spends the rest of the week acting as if he hadn’t even seen Sirius that morning whenever around him, and internally analyzing each and every exchange between them, and comparing to them to when he sees Sirius chatting with Gideon. And it’s not fun to say the least. It’s like a flashback to when he was trying to hide his crush on Sirius back in Freshman and most of sophomore year, but somehow worse. It’s worse because Remus had him, had Sirius in all the ways someone could ever want an other. He had Sirius’s languid morning kisses, and Sirius’s bark like laughter. Remus had Sirius being nervous the first time Lyall came for his typical Christmas visit, and Sirius had to try and impress him along with Remus’s mom as more than just the friend he hung around with at school. Remus had Sirius’s gruff voice when they were in bed and getting tangled into one another, and Sirius’s dopey looks in the middle of class when he’d be gazing over at Remus instead of the board. And if Remus is being honest, he knows he still has all those things, but it’s suddenly and searingly clear that some time— sooner rather than later— they’ll all leave, abruptly disappearing and shattering Remus’s world in their wake. Because eventually all of those different facets of Sirius’s won’t be Remus’s anymore— they’ll be Gideon’s or some other boy he meets in New Haven. And Remus can’t even be upset at it, he doesn’t have a claim to any of Sirius anymore, doesn’t get to call any part of him his.

And it’s probably the worst Remus has felt since that first night after their break up, because he’s eating every moment he has with Sirius like he’s famished and Sirius is the last meal he’ll ever know. He wants to memorize every part of him before he can’t have any of it. He wants to unravel every layer of Sirius, and kiss it for the final time, and it’s like saying goodbye a thousand times over, strangling his heart and splintering something desperate deep inside of him.

Like now.

It’s edging on midnight, and they drove up to the lake front near their suburb, with Sirius lying with his head on Remus’s lap and his long, muscled body lying against the tattered blanket beneath them. And his eyes are fluttered shut while the speaker they brought croons out the indie playlist they like most from Spotify.

And Remus can’t help but feel like this is one of their last nights like this, alone and quiet and together without any other specter of some other partner. So he watches him, watches the moonlight pacing over his nose and the high bones of his cheeks and across Sirius’s eyelids too. Remus watches his ink like lashes kissing his skin, and wants to touch the divot of his cupids bow like so many times before while his other hand cards through Sirius’s hair.

And Remus lets himself want Sirius and wonders if he’ll ever stop wanting, craving, loving him.

“I can hear you thinking Moons,” Sirius says, fluttering his eyes open and crunching up before Remus can even respond. “What’s going on?”

“Huh? What do you mean? I’m fine.” Remus all but sputters, folding his knees against his chest and wrapping his arms around them, feeling somehow vulnerable in blistering ways. “Nothing is going on.”

“Pff,” Sirius gives him a pointed look, settles down so that they’re side by side and tries to get Remus to look at him head on. “You’ve been strange all week, Moony.”

“That’s not—“

“And then tonight, you didn’t even tease your ma when she was telling us about that patient who puked all over her shoes.”

“Just tired is all.”

“But had enough energy to smoke half the joint I brought.” Sirius says with a snort, looking frustrated again when Remus didn’t even flinch a smile at the counter. “Remus, talk to me.”

“It’s fine Sirius,” Remus sighs, suddenly remembers how exhausting all their arguments were in the past. How Sirius tries getting him to speak everything in his mind, as if Remus could even put them into words.

“Okay, then tell me why you rejected my offer to go to that Frank Ocean concert. You’re obsessed with him.”

“’S in July,” Remus reminds him lightly, focusses on the way they can see the North star glimmering against the horizon instead.

“And, so?” Sirius asks, sounding more than a bit scathing. “You’re not leaving for another month after that, you trying to cut me off completely by the summer or something?”

“Don’t be an idiot.”

“Don’t be condescending.”

“Sirius, just leave well enough alone. Holy shit.”

“I can leave it alone if you can actually tell me what the fuck is going on with you,” Sirius snaps, standing up now, probably because he always likes using his height advantage on most people whenever he gets all pissy.

“You can be such a prick sometimes, you know that?” Remus snarls at him, following suit and dipping his head back just slightly so that they’re eye to eye. “Not everything is on your schedule, you know that.”

“My schedule!” Sirius’s brows jump to his hairline, and he breaks into that manic laughter that springs up only when he’s so angry he can’t put his thoughts together. “I’m trying to do as much shit with you as possible before you leave, because for some stupid fucking reason I’m going to miss you when your across the fucking country! But yeah, whatever. If you’re actually just sick of me and my presence or what the fuck else, you can just—“

“I would’ve assumed you wanted to go with Gideon,” Remus blurts out, simply unable to hold it back any more, unable to pretend like he’s not suffering a thousand fresh paper cuts every time he even glances Sirius’s way these days. He can’t do this, can’t pretend to just be friends when they were— when they are— so much more than that. “To the concert I mean. I just assumed—“

“No,” Sirius says, seething as he storms up to Remus— close enough that the tips of their noses brush up against each other.

“No? Excuse me?”

“No Remus you don’t get to do this!” Sirius repeats, voice going frayed at the edges as their glances level. “You don’t get to pretend as if I want anyone more than I want— than I’ve always wanted you. And you don’t get to float around for the rest of your life pretending as if this’ll ever change for me. As if you can’t hit me up in fifteen years when I’m married with kids, and ask to get back together, and think that I wouldn’t drop it all for you.”

Remus’s heart begins to thud, loud and painful against his ribcage, and his lungs feel like they might collapse the instant Remus let’s the tears swimming in his eyes sprinkle out. “Sirius, I ca—“

“I’ve been in love with you since before we were suppose to mean what that meant, damn it, Remus! And you’re the one who called it off!”

“It was the right decision.” Remus croaks out, plunging his hands into his hoodie’s pockets, doesn’t want Sirius to see the way they’re shaking.

“”For you. The right decision for you.” Sirius presses, his gray eyes dark underneath the stars. “And you know I’d do anything you wanted of me, but you don’t get to be mad at the ways I cope. And you sure as fuck don’t get to be jealous of fucking Gideon Prewett, as if he can hold a match to you.”

“Oh.” Is all Remus can gather to say, peering back down at his shoes and pressing together his lips, feels the most lost he ever has while around Sirius. “I love you too, you know that. You know I love you so much that it hurts sometimes— That was never the problem.”

Sirius makes a strangled sound deep in his throat, and the next second, Remus can’t feel the warmth of his body besides him because Sirius is darting over to the cusp of the lake and kicking at a rock. “Fuck, Remus. You can’t just say that, all right! You can’t because none of this is fair, or okay. And I fucking hate it and I hate this and—“

“Maybe we can try,” Remus says, quiet but unshaken. And he watches as Sirius slowly turns back around, face scrunched up in utter confusion, but eyes glittering with something like hope. “I love you Sirius, and you love me. And Lily’s right, fucking hell she’s so right. I can’t just turn it off, okay. I’ve tried and I’ve tried, but I can’t. I can’t be around you and not want every part of you. But I also can’t let myself stay away from you. So let’s try, and it’s probably a stupid difficult decision, and we’re going to be frustrated and we’re going to miss one another but I know there’s going to be no one I want more and I think you migh— Oof.”

Remus can’t continue rattling off any of the reasons why they should get back together, because Sirius is somehow magically popping up in front of him— his large hands cupping against Remus’s jawline and his thin lips crashing against him, and Remus can only wrap his arms around Sirius’s torso and give him back all he’s pushing forwards.

And it might’ve been a minute or an hour that past, but Sirius is pulling back with a face that looks lighter in ways Remus hasn’t seen on him since the breakup all those months ago. “I’d literally agree to anything if it means we can stay together, Moony. Absolutely anything.”

Remus feels the strain against the apples of his cheeks as he beams at him at the sound of the oath. “Yeah, me too Padfoot. Always and forever, it’s you.”

My Other Wolfstar FIC💜

#WOLFSTAR #REMUS LUPIN #SIRIUS BLACK #SIRIUSXREMUS #REMUSXSIRIUS #WOLFSTAR ANGST #WOLFSTAR FLUFF #THE HARRY POTTER SERIES #HARRY POTTER SERIES #MARAUDERS #SPILT INK #I AM A MESS #I HATE ME LMFAO

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dropsofletters · 4 years

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tales of a perfect rhyme

title: tales of a perfect rhyme pairing: son hyunwoo/reader genre: poet!au/painter!au/forbidden love!au/friends!au summary: Sometimes, you’re bad at exactly what you desire to become the most. That’s her case and it also is Hyunwoo’s when they realize that they are not exactly good at the arts they desire. Yet, their youthful personalities and their blossoming love seems enough to stay happy throughout their toughest times, until it is not enough. type: angst/fluff/romance/humor word count: 12,540 disclaimer: this is part of my august special called ‘the anti-love club’. each story can be read individually, however, you’d be getting a little bit more of backstory along with some easter eggs if you read each of them, as well as helping me with support. the masterlist can be found here.

Without the chirping tone of birds outside her window, what would be of her? Without the sunshine that gleams through it, the smell of fruits lingering in the air—too dulcet, yet too necessary, what would her life be like?

The question does not go through her head often, for her mind remains too busied by the beauty of the winery around her. Her house, on its own, is surrounded by fields and fields of fruits, green and blooming, the peak of existence. The oxygen in her lungs has always been easier to breathe, more lightweight, the reason as to why mischief is the first thing she thinks about when the ashes of sleep are dusted away from her face.

This room has seen her grow up into the woman she is today. With old paintings from her youthful days, running up to her uncle with paint-stained fingertips creating images of the rainbows she’d get to see after every ounce of rain. Some of them are newer—a portrait that said uncle, the owner of the winery, had gifted her for her seventeenth birthday, and clearly…some of her newest pieces of art. Nothing too excellent, mixes of colors a la Pollock, not quite looking for a shape or an imagery, but a feeling instead. One that she always dares to call normality—it may be happiness, just like it may be a routine, but in her thoughts, she knows that whichever way she decides to go, the winery will always be her home.

The paint on her walls is a contrast to her colorful sundress, yellow with daisies on top of it, but the length is not exactly what she is looking for. To anyone that has seen her walk through the streets, or simply riding on her bicycle, they’ve captured a glimpse of her style. The painted sneakers, the fixed dresses, the shirts that end up bleached or died or cut. The itch starts from her soul and ends up on the tips of her fingers, desiring to make a change in her life that can translate through her. She thinks that happiness shall be shown as long as it’s had, and it shall be prided on.

Perhaps, the reason of her happiness may be having breakfast right now and her gloss-coated lips press together while she looks at her reflection in the mirror. A pair of scissors is already going through the edge of the sundress—making it a tad bit shorter, a lesson that she learned when she had her second boyfriend and she felt more confident on her choices of clothing. The thing is…there are days in which she wants to exude the mentality that art is in herself, in a way, that as long as she can create something, her mind may never be dulled.

The fabric is shorter by the time she steps out of her room, not perfect, but sufficiently flowy for her to walk down the set of stairs and approach the cream-colored kitchen. The microwave is buzzing, her uncle’s shaggy head of hair covering the majority of the surface while he leans down to look at the coffee cup that is being heated inside the machine. The old man has done nothing but support her dream, that one memory of her youth that told her to be an artist…even when everyone else had told her that she’s not good at it.

Art is not about being good, she tries to tell herself. It’s about enjoying life in a different way. About feeling and letting others feel.

It will never pay the bills for her, but that’s why the winery exists.

Her attention is caught on someone else, sipping on a colder drink of coffee, then slurping from the spoon hovering over his rice bowl, so heated that a cloud forms on top of the breakfast. One of the winery workers, with golden skin and matted black hair, more often than not faintly moved away from his eyes, to show those small senses of gravity in their chocolate hues. His lips are plumped up, as if he’s always blowing on his meals to eat them—and that may be the case, for one of the few times in which she gets to see Hyunwoo open his mouth is when he is relishing on the taste of her Uncle’s infamous cooking.

Or that’s what the other workers at the winery say; that Hyunwoo is sweet, but too quiet. So eerily quiet that he seems to blend into any wall, any floor, any seat…though, she cannot see it that way. The moment Hyunwoo stepped into that winery, she was very well out of a relationship and promising to the world that love does not exist. She’d said she would never take any other man seriously, and he came in like a gentle breeze. Not a tornado. Not a tsunami, like the soft reminder of his laughter early in the morning, or the looks spared throughout a few months until a friendship started in between the two of them.

Her weight leans forward, staring at Hyunwoo’s eyes when he captures her gaze before jotting her chin forward. “Give me some of that,” She says, making sure that she crosses her arms under her chest, legs extending as a way of capturing his attention. And she has it, shredded glimpses of his interest in his eyes, in the way those lips quirk up and give her a foretaste of that soul that hides underneath his quiet nature. To some, he ruins the mood. For her, he creates it.

“Your uncle made you a plate.” He tells her, though his spoon is already balancing itself on the expanse of his hand, nearing her lips until they part and take a bite of the meal, paired with eggs. When the spoon is once again nearing his plate to scrape some contents off, her eyes trail to the notebook by his side, some words scribbled, others hidden under the blurred lines of a word he may not have liked…and still, Hyunwoo opts to use a pen.

“You got some writing done during the weekend?” And perhaps, a poet-to-be like Hyunwoo should really go for a laptop, and a Word Document at that, but his style is to keep it simple. Hyunwoo may not be the most profound, romantic of men—heck, he may not be one of those rooted poets that grow up to be stars every few years, creating a new wave to be remembered by textbooks, but the relaxed expressions on his features when finally having somewhere in which he can voice out his thoughts and concerns is more than she could ever ask for.

Hyunwoo nods, ready to spurt some knowledge of his endeavors back at home when her Uncle clears his throat, resting the expanse of her plate on the counter, the seat that she would be taking place in right beside her Uncle’s favorite worker. His strength has helped her Uncle endlessly, with carrying the wines, organizing them, making sure that his poor, old bones don’t struggle at the mere weight of his bent knees. “Pull your skirt down and stop fluttering your eyelashes like that.” Her Uncle says, giving her a pointed look when she simply shrugs her shoulders.

“Can’t pull it down, I already cut it.”

“One would think that once you became an adult, you wouldn’t be so…stubborn, but the older…the worse it becomes.” Though, the tiredness in his voice doesn’t dismiss the nostalgia on his tone. Days that were difficult, yet part of her growing-up process. The leather of the seat digs on the back of her thighs when she takes her spoon in between her fingers, her other hand already sneaking to reach for Hyunwoo’s notebook and read over his poems.

Something about him will always be tranquil. Just like wine, he makes her feel—sleepy, a bit heated, ready to embark in her biggest adventure but take it slow while in the process. He swirls on her tongue, intoxicates her, leaves a flutter on the pit of her stomach, a heartbeat against the other to race and see who wins, it brings her to the sky and puts her down on her feet in such a gentle, caring way. “Ah…I’ve heard that before. I’ll settle down eventually.”

Though, while munching on her meal and hearing the utensils on both men’s hands moving with precision to eat as fast as possible before getting to work, her fingers hook on the small, yellow, somewhat bitten pencil that rests in between the pages, scribbling down a note that only Hyunwoo could read.

“When will you write me a poem?” She writes first, on the last line of the one poem she read before drawing an arrow towards the piece of art itself. “Also, you’re improving.”

The pencil glides from her fingertips for him to take, and she swears she sees his expression lighten up, cheeks filled with food when he writes some words of his own. “What do you want me to write about?”

The action repeats itself, sparing one glance at her Uncle, too lost in the news displayed on the television to pay attention to her. “Whatever I make you feel.”

His response reads: “I can’t.”

She voices her thoughts out, speaking in a hushed voice while looking at him. Hyunwoo’s trembling expression turns towards her Uncle, but she knows that the old man is not what is stopping him—if anything, her Uncle would be over the moon if she got to date Hyunwoo, more seriously past this flirty relationship they hold. Instead, she basks on his presence, his manly scent, the way his white t-shirt hugs his body, jeans cladding his thick legs. “Why? Do I make you that speechless?” She counterparts, quirking an eyebrow when Hyunwoo chuckles and shakes his head.

“I just need time to think about it.” He whispers. “I’m not that good of a poet, yet.”

“You write about the winery, though. The trees, the fruits, the people here. Why not me?”

Why not her? Why not the woman that has promised herself that she’d capture his gaze and practically make it impossible to tear it away from her? To have Hyunwoo has always seemed holy, in a way, almost like getting an angel sent directly to her…all memories of the past few years merging into one single thought: that it has never happened. Without a lot of trying, and with a lot of work to do on the winery and on their preferred choices of art…it never happened. “It will happen someday.”

Though, she can only pucker her lips up, taking another bite of her meal before leaning back on her seat, arms crossed over her chest as a way to release the stress that is pent-up inside of her. Maybe, Hyunwoo would not see her a muse—that one person that takes every single breath away from his lungs, even in a place filled with trees. Or that one person who clouds his mind, even in his dreams, creating images of what-could-have-been’s that he can only fantasize about. “I won’t get younger at the pace you’re going.” The only sound she receives is his chuckle, shaking his head at her antics. This counts another day of a failed try of getting to be his muse, or simply to see more of a glimpse of interest from him. Not surprising, though somehow digging on her chest, she stands up from her seat after a few quick bites of her meal, doing her best to finish the rice before she continues on with her day.

Not without wrapping her fingers around his shoulder to speak into his ear:

“You’re lucky wine gets better with the passage of time.”

###

The trees wave against each other, dancing with the wind, singing their lonesome blues with every movement of their leaves. Instead, she finds the happiness in them—in the hope that the Sun glares down onto their existences, in the way animals seem to be happy around the winery and in the workers, too, not only Hyunwoo but everyone else, as well. Though, if she’s honest with herself, she wishes she could be a good artist, for painting Hyunwoo should be the best benefit for a person of artistic desire.

He’s far away, like he always is. So close, yet so far away when the day is welcomed into their lives. Another day in which she has to smile to hide the absolute adoration behind her eyes and another shrug of her shoulders when her uncle asks anything about Hyunwoo and herself. There’s nothing, she says, and it may be like that—if it was not for the way he smiles at her when he looks up from his position at picking up the sweetened violet grapes, because those eyes scream for her to finally settle down.

For him.

With him.

To have him.

The concept had always been foreign to her—settling down. There are too many beautiful people in this world; too many lips to taste; too many nights to remember. Plenty of times had she heard the words whore or slut used to describe her around the city, small in comparison to the ones in other countries…and she’d say that the concept is so…antique. Perhaps, she could image the word escaping the lips of a sexist man trying to sound remotely attractive while also demolishing the amount of things a woman can do…or, something easier, it’s the word that people use when they can’t understand the complexity of dating. Or maybe, she just sees it from the other end of the spectrum.

But Hyunwoo did not see her like some cheap woman who would much rather have her legs opened than her mind, because that’s not the case…and it will never be for him. The beige hat to shelter him from the sun moves a bit with the wind when his fingers stretch to wave at her, a gentle smile on his features—one that reads have a nice day, instead of the usual this is just a pleasantry before we have sex and have to pretend we don’t know each other after. And surely, with any other man she would have gotten tired…she would have simply said that not a lot of people are made for kissing and telling.

But this is Hyunwoo, the one man that saw her as an artist, as the glide of her brush against a canvas that reads…nonsensical matters. No one sees her art as worthy. No one but Hyunwoo.

When she stares back at the canvas, right after sending a wave back, she realizes that what she does is not art. If she had to conceptualize it, she’d go past Van Gogh or Pollock, past whatever The Louvre could show—that’s the history of art, but it happened way before all those people that crafted the popular side of art. Why is it that people had forgotten that they are art themselves? Art that when described, when coming to life, could be beautiful just like how it could be utterly disgusting. In her eyes, there will never be enough museums and art history books that would ever be able to help her become the artist that would showcase something to the world that matches what Hyunwoo makes her feel.

Her fingers hook around her sketchbook, moving away from the living room of the house while the flapping of wings dulls after two seconds of its initiation, her parrot resting on her shoulder. It may be a bit movie-esque, and Hyunwoo has compared her to a pirate countless times, but nature exists within her…and Hyunwoo is the tranquility that matches her softened heart. A heart that has prickled edges, too much intelligence for its own good, but that can become warm at the mere sight of him.

Art goes past colors—past the damned lines that she does in the name of showing what it is that goes through her head, past what she could ever comprehend, perhaps more understood by an expert…but she can give a name to what Hyunwoo makes her feel.

The caress of fingertips over someone’s back. Traced over lines, bumps, love handles, marks, reddened spots, moles—softly, gently, chilling, relaxing, yet so intimate. It can be done wrongly, when asking for a massage after a long day to someone who is not interested, for example; just like it can be the most miniscule of gestures that breathe out an ‘I love you’. Hyunwoo, with his voice alone, makes her feel like a teenager that has gotten her waist grabbed for the first time—not with a pull to make her feel uncomfortable, but with gentleness, the steps in between them taken far too slowly, too meticulously.

But…she’s not the type to get scared about what her uncle may think if Hyunwoo ends up dating her.

So, what is it that stops her?

Hyunwoo is kneeling down, the fabric of his pants dirtied by mud, his white tank top showing his glowing sweaty skin in the faintest golden color. With a raise of his eyebrow and a stare from the corner of his eye, he says: “Isn’t that my favorite pirate?”

Her fingers move at their own accord with her little pencil, too worn out that it creates the faintest of lines. She starts with the shape of his face—oval, with small eyes that glisten immensely, one more closed than the other as if deep in thought; his lips, plump, asking for a kiss, making her beg mentally to have him speak more. He doesn’t speak enough for how delicious his voice is to hear. “Depends. Jack Sparrow is not on your list?”

“Not when you exist.”

“Smooth.” She replies, looking at her sketch and furrowing her eyebrows. Realism is not her forte—but what is, really? Deep in this whole nonsensical heartbreaker stance that she has created for her, lost in a never-ending summer, she has tried to cover that insecure part of herself. The one woman that never grew up as a talented individual—that loved art, but was never good at it. Hyunwoo is the same with poetry, though he’s far more talented at other stuff around the winery, and an exquisite wine preparator. “I tried to draw you, but it looks like the lovechild of…a goblin and yourself, actually.”

“I wanna see.” He says, knees creaking when he stands up, nearing her body and making her pet parrot fly away. Sunny, an odd name for a parrot…but it just happened to stick around in between the staff at the winery.

Pressing the sketchbook to her chest, she looks into his eyes. “No. I’m shy.”

“You read my poems all the time—” Hyunwoo starts before squinting his eyes, smiling at her when tilting his head to the side to inspect her features. “Wait, did you just say that you are shy?”

For a woman who claims to love sex, casual dating and never getting too attached to anyone—for people are just that, equals, individuals supposed to coexist with each other to get to the end-line, she has definitely gotten attached to Hyunwoo. She’d say, even, he’s the cause of her abrupt stop in dating around. “I mean, I can be shy about things.” She starts, a shrug given by her shoulders. “Much more when those things look like shit.”

“Is it the first time that you’ve tried drawing me?” He asks, and she finds herself speechless.

“Depends.”

“Stop saying depends—”

“Would you think it’s silly of me if I had tried drawing you before?”

Twirling around after his response, a smile crept up on her features when she hears him say: “I’d think it’s sweet.” He tells her, the creaking of grass under his boots sounding behind her, holding her sketchbook to her chest, her dress moving with every movement she gives.

“I never do you justice, though.” She answers, trying to get away from him simply to tease—to have him chasing, following, at the edge of his seat for every word she says. Hyunwoo is a man that has, at least, a vast majority of the people in the city head over heels for him, and to see his quiet persona crumble into a bashful beam at her presence boosts her ego, truthfully—and gives her hope, if anything. For what? Only God would know.

“Don’t look down on your art.”

“We both know it’s not art.”

At that moment, he takes her by the wrist, turning her around until the expanse of his wide and toned chest connects with hers. Eyes to eyes, lips to lips, and when he breathes out an answer, she swears the air has sent her a kiss from him her way. “I’ll give you something and you give me your sketchbook to see how you drew me.”

Her eyes roam his features before scoffing. “Money?”

“I don’t have money, you know that.”

“Ah, a kiss?” Trying her luck, Hyunwoo raises an eyebrow, chuckling at her words.

“Not when all the workers are looking at us.”

“I’ve done worse—”

“I know,” Hyunwoo indicates. “But I’m not one of your worse moments.”

“Right, you’re the best.” She mumbles, knowing that losing him would probably hurt her as much as a blade digging into her sternum, towards her heart, dissipating to the rest of her body—electrifying her with one last breath. His fingers slip into the pocket of his baggy jeans, getting a small notepad out before putting it on her hold, snatching her sketchbook away from her hands just in time to open it.

Her eyes flicker towards the opened notepad, reading pages and pages of a supposed ‘her’. The poems are short, far too small for them to be thought-out pieces, but…they exude the kind of love that is simplistic, softened, all around a bit immature. “You know?” Hyunwoo answers, ripping the page away from her sketchbook before giving it back to her. “I’m going to keep this.”

“I’ll only keep this if the ‘her’ in the poems is me.”

Hyunwoo gives a few steps away from her, walking backwards as he speaks. “…Wouldn’t you want to know.”

The world shines brighter for a second, in the way it falls over his body and clads him in the shape of her daydreams. Where they stand will always be the reason of her reminiscing, something that shall never be taken away from her. “I do,” She adds, arms crossed, rushing towards where he is. “Because I’m the perfect rhyme for anything you think about.” She teases, knowing fully well that Hyunwoo’s mind will always be a mystery to her—but she knows there is attraction, this magnetism in between them that keeps them close, much more when he halters his steps, hands ending up on top of her uncovered arms.

A rhyme is more than tunes that sound the same. A rhyme needs profoundness, meaning, history after history behind syllables that match. “…You’re not wrong.” Hyunwoo breathes out, the wind blowing a bit on his hat, his hand reaching up to keep it in place. “Just, read the poems, don’t overthink it.”

“I won’t.”

And he leaves, blocking the noise of the birds with his steps, with the hum on his voice as he relishes on the sound of his favorite song of the week. For some reason, she feels like dancing when seeing his back depart from her and when her fingers feel the glide of the sheets of paper against her fingertips.

Her.

She’s ‘her’.

Unnamed, she shall remain—like a song that he heard on the radio, learned from one listen, and will never be able to find. But she’s there. Oh God, she’s there, settled, waiting for a smile from him, a rhyme to fit her, a moment that is not fleeting. For a chance to make Son Hyunwoo fall in love with her, and have a future with him.

But she’s not a woman to call a ‘forever’.

###

“Is this the apple wine you guys prepared this week?”

Hyunwoo has his hands crossed over his body, the light of the storage room of the winery barely powerful enough to cast down on his softened features. He quirks one of his eyebrows, a habit of his, and turns to look at her after humming. He has listened to her, she knows, but maybe he needs some confirmation, smiling at her before turning to the pristine shelves that showcase years and years of wines, all of different tastes. “Ah, yes,” He initiates. “It’s not fermented completely, well, not yet. I had to go over the recipe time and time again with your uncle—been a long time since he last prepared one of those.”

They’re not tipsy, but they’re alone. The sound of music is in the background, soft, steady, some jazz that relaxes them into—probably—sharing a drink or two. The door is locked, everyone is back at home and her uncle is certain that they’re adding the labelled stickers to the bottles to send them off to a store tomorrow. That, however, is only halfway done by the time she started to inspect the shelves. “Do you think it’s good?”

“It may taste a bit like cider, I believe.” But he doesn’t give much of an answer, instead taking another sticker and a bottle, lining it up perfectly before sighing. “Why?”

“Ooh, why must you think there is a reason behind me asking?”

“Because you’re you.”

“I’m the company’s publicist.” She defends herself—even when the title is not paired with a degree, it damn right fits her. She has done everything and anything to take the company to social media, exploiting it to getting more clients, more stores to buy their products—and of course, a few pictures that entice anyone to try their wines. “I need to know if what I’m selling is good.”

Hyunwoo chuckles, dragging a seat until he is seated in front of the spacious, glassed table where the newest bottles were placed, fresh out of fermentation. “So, you want to try the apple wine?”

“I want to try it with you.” She corrects, already looking for a switch to clear the room with more lights, smiling to herself at the sight of the city from the small windows. “It’s Friday night, Hyunwoo. And even on Friday nights, you’re always stuck here.”

Though, he can only give a soft answer. “I know.”

But why?

Why?

Why is someone like him just so given to the winery?

Her hand touches his shoulder, softly, gently, dragging her fingernails over the expanse of his t-shirt to ask: “Why?” Because she’s not one to stay with her curiousness, the questions that overtake her even at the peak of the night.

“Just because.”

“I don’t get it.” She skips the conversation, moving around until she is in front of him on the chair. His legs are extended, parted, fingers wrapped around a bottle of wine and she actually takes it from him and places it on the desk, getting lost in his eyes the more she speaks. He’d never see the poetry of him. “You’re a dancer, Hyunwoo. You’re meant to be in some club, dancing the night away with some girl—”

“I have you,” Hyunwoo replies, though they’re not a serious matter—much less have they voiced out their clear ministrations, what unites them. Their start had been simple, for Hyunwoo is a dancer, took years of classes just like her, artists that found love in some other shape of art…and ended up not being good at it. Their only choice was to get better together. “…And that wine really is calling for me.”

Slipping her fingertips on the bottle that had captured their attention, she uses a utensil to open it, grabbing two glasses with quickened movements. “I knew you’d end up trying it!”

“You always make me try new things.”

“Because you’re a boring grandpa, sometimes.” She answers, passing the glass down to him, surprised when his arm wraps around her waist, bringing her down to settle her weight down on his thigh, her knees pressed to his, his eyes staring directly into her soul after taking a sip of the wine. She follows his actions, sighing in delight. “This is good.”

“It is.” He answers, smiling at her with that glint behind his eyes. “At least, I’m good at something. Wines, you know.”

She blinks at that, letting her hands roam his face, learning every aspect of him—of the lips she has gotten to kiss a handful of times, never too profound, as if afraid of falling. But Hyunwoo is a ticking bomb, he’s waiting to grab her by the hand and drag her into the depths of bliss that is…being around him. “You’re good at everything, Hyunwoo.” She replies, leaning closer until her shoulder is against his chest, her head resting on his shoulder. “Just because you weren’t good at poetry from the beginning doesn’t mean you’re bad at it.”

“I just don’t get it,” Hyunwoo mumbles. “Poetry? Someone like me shouldn’t even be rhyming stuff.”

“Oh yeah, sure, let yourself get carried away by the supposed stigma of society that says that buff men can’t be sensitive or have a braincell sometimes.” She huffs out her answer, looking into his eyes and seeing the adoration in them, his silent stance speaking more than his words ever could. “We’re dancers—of course you’d end up liking poetry. You’ve danced to poetry, without knowing,” And her smile expands in a grin when she remembers that one night in which they did go out to dance, the night of their first kiss, the reason as to why Hyunwoo never disappeared from her brain. Hips snug together, arms slotted in fitted ways; two souls conjoining. “It’s music. Hyunwoo, if there’s anyone that does music justice in this world it’s you.” She takes a sip of her drink just at the same time that he does, the dulcet taste sticking to her tongue, begging to be taken away by him. By his kiss. “The difference is that music sticks to our brains—the lyricism of it is meant to be remembered, but poetry sticks to the soul. Let your soul speak, if it’s about the winery or about me, just let it have a voice. It’s getting better, I promise.”

His arm tightens around her waist, leaning forward until his lips press to hers softly, carefully, as if he’s afraid he’ll be caught, and he may. When Hyunwoo pulls away, his legs parting even more in the process. “You’re a doll, you know that?”

“I try to be for gods on legs just like yourself.” She replies, leaning her weight back before closing her eyes at the warmth of him. “Hyunwoo…”

“Yes?”

“We’ll make it someday.” She says, trying to sway into his heart, surprised to feel his breathing stopping for a moment, as if taken off guard. “You, as a poet. Me, as an artist.”

“I don’t think so—”

“That’s what dreams are for, aren’t they?” She replies. “It’s not for thinking, it’s for imagining, dummy.”

And she may imagine that, someday, her fingers may hook around a brush just at the same time that he reads over a book. Just at the same time that they grow away from that winery and turn into the exact persona that no one would have ever imagined them to be. And more than that, together, to be exact.

But that’s what dreams are for.

###

“Do you like Hyunwoo?”

Taking care of children may probably be one of the things she likes the least—but someone at the winery had brought their daughter to work today, and having children close to alcoholic drinks may not be the best of ideas. Hence, while seated in front of her canvas, in front of the window that sometimes shows the figure of Son Hyunwoo—just like now—, she wonders why the child that could not even braid her hair a few minutes ago now is intelligent enough to guess that she likes Hyunwoo.

Seojin swings her legs back and forth, seated on a chair right beside her, and she turns to look at her briefly, a smile on her features. “Maybe,” She answers, earning a big beam from the seven-year-old child. Once returning to her painting, a mess of colors and emotions that she cannot explain—too much green and yellow, currently, perhaps inspired by Sunny, hanging around the living room, she voices more of her thoughts out. “Why do you think I like him?”

“Because you look at him like how my mom looks at my dada.” Seojin replies smartly, moving the little baby hairs away from her face to look at the man that is kneeling down in front of the greeneries to pick up some fruits. “Hyunwoo looks like a prince.”

“He does.”

Curiousness overtakes her. “Then, why isn’t he your prince?”

Simple, she believes, the answer slips her tongue just when she stares away from her canvas, twirling her brush in between her fingers when Hyunwoo becomes a clear shadow that passes through the window, embarking a trip towards her heart. She had been touched by too many people, in love plenty of those, she had gotten drunk far more than a princess could ever tell, made mistakes that were horrendous, tainted her soul in distrust. That’s not something a princess does, or a doll, like Hyunwoo calls her sometimes. “Because I’m not a princess.” She answers, shrugging her shoulders just when she creates another line of the canvas, quickened and interrupted by Seojin voicing out her concerns.

“But you like him…if you like the prince, that makes you a princess.” Seojin speaks quickly, standing up from her spot and getting in the way with her canvas, the tips of her messy hair—still in a braid—getting scattered with a bit of paint. She does her best to take the small towel that hangs from her shoulder to clear the brown strands, but Seojin is not paying attention. “Why don’t you make him your boyfriend?”

Because it may be a bit crazy—a bit too out of what she normally does, simply date around and wait until it is over. It may mean love and part of her just fears what that could mean, or if Hyunwoo would even want something like that, for he had not voiced it out either. “I’m afraid he’d say no.”

“You’re pretty, though.”

“It takes more than being pretty to get a man like him.” She tells her, only to widen her eyes when Seojin rushes towards the entrance of the house.

“Of course not, you’re nice and cute, what else does he want?!” Seojin fires back, too overexcited when she opens the door with swinging motions, not helped by the strong wind that almost closes it again. “I’m going to tell him—”

“Seojin, no!” But Seojin moves too fast, already running to the left to go to the field in which Hyunwoo is working at. Without knowing, she stands up quickly, letting her brush fall on the floor just as she feels her heart racing at the mere words that Seojin had brought to life innocently. Someone’s half, a story to tell, a tale to finish—a fairytale, one that she has never lived, never got the chance to have with the people that she liked.

The wind moves her hair, her dress, crazy just as she wonders through the fields, hearing the giggles that escape Seojin’s lips. Just when she picks up her steps, the heels of her boots digging deeper into the grass, she watches Hyunwoo kneel down in front of Seojin, putting his ear closer to her lips just when she mumbles something to him. Slowing down her steps as she nears them, she’s met by Hyunwoo’s stare that trails up her legs and towards her features, giving her a piece of his heart in a smile.

She has never been this nervous—not when seated on his lap, not when kissing him, not when she promises herself that Hyunwoo is the reason behind her solitude these past few months, afraid of getting her heart broken, but also needing more of him. Her fingers slot with each other, trying to look for leverage, just when Seojin lifts her hands in the air, happiness overflowing. “She likes you!”

“Seojin, I asked you not to go out running like that.” She scolds softly, letting out a sigh at her last word, only to watch Hyunwoo nearing her.

“She came here to tell me a secret.” He says.

“We both know it’s not a secret.” She replies, wary of the small eyes that are staring at them as they speak. Hyunwoo is having the time of his life with this, his broad chest shaking with laughter. “You’re not even good with children, stop pretending you are now—”

“I’m not.”

“Hyunwoo—”

His fingers go through his hair, the strands curving to cup his face softly, caressing it with the twirl of his bags. Parted, showcasing his forehead that creases a bit when he speaks. “But, I like you, too.” He tells her, speaking nonchalantly, albeit laughing a bit to himself. Perhaps, the people around—ahem, Seojin—may be the reason behind his nervousness. “What if we settle this with a date? Friday?”

“…As if you were not going to spend your Friday night with me already.” She answers, her voice cut short when a set of plucked, small flowers flies in the air and falls on top of them. The extended hands and the huff that came from Seojin is enough of a reason to showcase that she must have plucked some flowers, thrown it at them as some sort of celebration.

“You’re so cute together!”

“Ah, Seojin, don’t pluck the flowers like that. That hurts them.” Scolding, she starts, only to hear Hyunwoo muffling his laughter when she kneels down and picks Seojin up on her hands, the weight making her puff her cheeks out. “I’ll take her inside before she starts telling people that I like you.”

“No one knows?!” Seojin voices out, only to have her hand pressing down on her small mouth.

“And no one will know, Seojin.”

Turning around, she feels Hyunwoo’s eyes on her form and she swears she hears his laughter, the promise of an endless love and a date that may be the start of her doom.

###

Living in the moment, that had always been her mantra. And what a way to live in the moment, it is, to be held in Hyunwoo’s arms.

Never had anyone taken her breath away, in a way that her chest constricts and still, she can’t have enough oxygen inside of her. But he does. Of course, it is the man that is dancing the night away with her that is doing so—the only person in this entire town that could have her thinking of a house in a hill, with not so immaculate decorations but homely ones instead, of walking barefoot on the tiles to reach him, wrap her arms around him as he downs his first cup of coffee of the day. But he does. Son Hyunwoo does, absentmindedly perhaps, simply by smiling at her, by holding her closer and dipping her into the dance floor, as if she’s a feather and he’s a bird—meant to coexist together.

Because, once every few moons, someone like her falls in love…and it is so slow and calculated in its process that she is surprised by her patience, by her abstinence in having him, but Hyunwoo is worth it. He’s worth waiting a million years, the slow music around them in the romance themed Friday night, paired with lighted up hearts in pink shapes is everything she could have never imagined happening. But here’s Hyunwoo, a predicament, the one stone in her road that had her falling and she’d go back and do it again if she had to.

…She had never been one to learn from her mistakes, after all, and if Hyunwoo is one…

This is the greatest fucking mistake of her life.

Her fingers wrap around the edge of his collar, opened buttons welcoming his taut chest that she traces with the tip of her index finger. “Showing some cleavage here, I see.” She says, sending a toothy grin that she can’t imagine herself giving to anyone but him—one of those that show her gums, make her seem a bit childish, and yet speak of nothing but excitement. “We’re twinning, then.”

Hyunwoo’s smile falters, his eyes flickering down to the neckline of her dress before laughing at his own antics. His cheeks are tainted pink, or maybe the lights are deceiving her, but it’s a nice color to match his beige button down and that rosiness of his lips that she will probably dare test later on the night. Probably meaning…certainly, as long as he’s into it. “You talk a lot.”

“And you talk too little.”

“I’m not a man of words.”

“You’re an action man?”

“I don’t know, I’d have to show you.” And with that, he presses her body closer to his, her hands stopping her ministrations to expand on top of his chest, catching her footing quickly, learned from years of dancing. Her feet move with expertise, along with his, the lingering smell in between them of fruity drinks and dinner. His hand moves on her waist, rest along her hips and sighs heavily, as if nearing their bodies will end of suffocating them but also filling them up with attraction. Past attraction, even, whatever it is that flutters on her chest and has her thinking about the beauty of being held by him instead of simply voicing it out is some magic that she can’t quite explain.

“Ooh, Hyunwoo is talking big.” She wiggles her eyebrows, trying to regain some power and speaking because—damn, it’s what he does. He gets her tongue going, her mind railing, her heart aching simply to have a piece of him. Hyunwoo seems like her future, and she’d be disappointed if this is not some sign from life that the only man that she feels like falling in love for is anything but trouble. “Let me tell you something. I’ll recite a poem to you, Shownu.” The way she spits out the poet name he had come up with has him smiling, nodding along to her words. “Roses are red, violets are blue—”

“Aren’t violets supposed to be, well, violet?”

“Don’t go smart on me now.” She replies, resting her head against his shoulder and looking towards the other couples dancing; some older, some younger, some definitely together for a long time, some learning to fall in love. Where do they fall? Where do an artist and a poet fall more than together? “You know what? I forgot. Thank you. Now, I can’t tell you anything.”

Hyunwoo closes his eyes when he laughs, rubbing his thumbs against her hips before he lowers his head slightly, bending his body in a way in which he can capture her lips in a kiss, though fleeting and soft. “My pleasure to make you speechless, doll.”

She squints at him, taking him by the face with both hands to stare into his eyes. Well, he’s not wrong, for the tip of her tongue is trying to look for words to tell him, for flirtations to whisper in his ears, for more than simple actions to clarify her interest in him, one that is already as clear as water, as the sky, as a glassed window itself. Because…she has talked enough, to other people, to people who did not want her to speak but still pretended to listen, and who would think that someone like her could find love in something as silent as art, and Hyunwoo, himself?

“You’re something else.”

“Good thing?”

“Very good thing.” She complies, leaning forward to press her lips to his, relishing on the taste of him before humming, eyes still closed. “I wish I could tell everyone just how head over heels you have me.”

But she can’t. She can’t turn this relationship serious, because it would not benefit them in the work place—Hyunwoo has more to lose than she ever could, but also because the timing of them will never seem to be right. She has to hold back, not because Hyunwoo is slow in his movements to her heart, but because he’s so skilled in his way there that she’s afraid something else could happen. What if it doesn’t work out? What if he’s indeed a prince, and she ends up running away in fear of the constricting seriousness of the situation?

“I have you head over heels?” He asks, as if he likes to hear her saying such things…and damn, he probably does.

She gasps, contrary to what one would believe. “Of course. Hyunwoo, I’ve been practically into you for the past few months and you still think I’m not head over heels?”

“Why?”

“What?” She asks, watching the way he lowers his lips and kisses her softly, delicately running his tongue on top of her upper lip, her hands trailing down to his neck, grasping softly to feel the pulse in there, Hyunwoo’s arms wrapped around her body entirely by the time he speaks again.

Rare. Of course, it had to be something important if Hyunwoo dares voice it out. “Why don’t you just show me how head over heels you are?”

This is exactly how she finds herself in Hyunwoo’s apartment, how suddenly being friends flashes in the back of her eyelids and reminds her that it has not been months, but years since Hyunwoo has taken up the vast majority of her heart. In the couch that he lays her on to take off his shirt, lips latching to her pulse points, sucking the soul away from her with each flutter of the plumpness of his skin, she had told him about the eleven years she spent in ballet classes and in between chuckles, she had admitted to being kicked out for flirting with the instructor’s son too much. The shirt that is thrown on the floor by the time he leads her to his room, hands expanded on her thighs, reminds her of the night three years ago—New Years’ Eve, when Hyunwoo couldn’t go back home to his parents and his frown was evident. At the time, she had done her best to prepare a meal for everyone at the winery to enjoy, and it was called a coincidence when Hyunwoo’s favorite meals were served on the table.

Or that bed, the background noise of the sheets the one she listens to whenever he calls her, saying how much he misses her—listening to her and sometimes, telling stories of his own. The timing with him will always be off, because she’ll forever be scared of waiting for too long, even when his legs are parting her own, strong muscles resting on each side of her head, his heart pressed to hers, skin to skin. Everyone says that waiting…fuck, waiting is the key to love.

Like waiting for someone to wake up.

Or waiting for someone to come home.

Or waiting for the day in which she believes she’ll have earned his love.

Because Hyunwoo cannot be a love affair—she wouldn’t forgive herself if she gets to taste him once or fifty times, but never forever. It’d be tragic, just like the sighs that leave her lips, the way her nails cling to him, the smile on his face that reads adoration—that sees her as more than a line in his body count, more than a friend: he sees her as art, and that’s all she has ever wanted to be.

Art is complicated, and she finds herself being egotistic, like she has always been. Selfish, in a way. Her hands cling to him, her lips press to his skin, to his neck, wants him to be more of her own, wants for every crevice of his soul to belong to her. When her eyes connect to his, his hair is done a mess, ruffled and ruined just by her, the skin of his neck bathed in sin, Hyunwoo can only reciprocate the kiss that lands on his lips, fervent, needing to have the moment last for an eternity, the one eternity that she has never wished for.

In one kiss, she expects to have her confession be read. She expects Hyunwoo to listen to the silence, like she does with him, but maybe, he doesn’t understand…that one simplistic kiss is screaming at him that she’s falling in love—

No, that she is in love. And it feels like she is floating on the shore of a beach, the tingling sensation matching with the rays of sunshine making her forget that there is a world around her, that there will be repercussions like a broken heart or worse…a fired man.

With one last breath of his name, she hopes the confession fell into his ears, one that reads a single sentence:

I love you.

###

“Where is my book of poems?!”

“What?”

Pulling her gaze away from the break-up app showcased on her phone in between her fingertips, she looks at Hyunwoo practically turning the house upside down in his repertoire to find his notebook. When entering the kitchen, well overdue the time in which he goes back home, the trails of the night seek after him when he lifts whatever surface he can to find that notebook, that damned notebook that she knows means the world to him.

“My notebook. Did you take it?” Hyunwoo asks, eyes shaking, for she knows better than anyone else that, just like her sketchbook, his notebook includes motions of his being that no one should read, or have gotten to read other than herself. His hands are already resting on her arms, as if keeping her in place will resolve the predicament, they’re in, but she simply shakes her head. “Fuck, I swear I left it on this counter earlier—”

Scratching the back of her head, she watches as Hyunwoo moves with anxiousness, for the first time showing a sign on his face that screams…hopelessness. Perhaps, he’s afraid of losing what he had worked so hard for, or he’s afraid that tomorrow morning he’ll wake up to the sound of his poems being read to the daylight, to be showcased as a comedy, when all he has done is try to find a sense to that inner voice of his. “Let me help you.” She tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear, looking around the couches in the living room, under the mat, whichever bump in it inspected by her.

“This is it. I’ve lost it.” The hopelessness in his voice comes soon enough, throwing himself over one of the seats, slumping immediately with his hands softly bounded in front of him.

“You have not, Hyunwoo. I’m here to help you out—”

“It’s not here, and it’s definitely not in my car.” He answers, not even sparing her a glance when she nears him, arms outstretched to hold him in her arms. “Goodbye poetry, goodbye that stupid dream of mine—”

“Your poetry is not hidden in that notebook, it’s in you, Hyunwoo. Stop it.” She replies, taking his face in between her hands before letting her faded lipstick create a shadow on his lips with a gentle kiss. “Don’t say those things.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. I’ll shatter this earth if that means getting that notebook back.” After months of this relationship, unknown to the world, three months of absolute joy, she’d do everything to give him the world if she could. “Make that a promise. I won’t ever give up when it comes to you.”

And what’s with this…feeling that tells her that letting go of Hyunwoo will be impossible to her? That she has found it, that thing that her friends had always talked about. That love that goes past summer nights and the heat that comes with forgetfulness, or with winter and its need for warmth—a love that stands even when a train is nearing it, when saying goodbye could be easier than staying. But, she decided to stay—to stay for a long while, as long as he lets her, and so far…it has not been so bad.

If hiding in the storage room every Friday night as a date is excellence, then so be it. If hiding their romance to the eyes of everyone at the winery is what it takes to have Son Hyunwoo, so be it.

“Don’t be scared,” She tells him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and nearing his face to her face, rubbing soothing circles on his shoulders. “I’ll find it, I promise. I’ll find it.”

“No—”

“I said I’ll find it, and I will.”

Because she’d drop a star from the sky itself if it meant seeing him at peace, like he always is.

Which is why she almost turns the entire house upside down the next day, as if looking under the sofa will get her the precious notebook that her boyfriend is looking for. Sunny is somewhere, flapping its wings and resting on her shoulder as if to help her, and she even skips breakfast to favor finding a part of Hyunwoo’s soul. It’s only when she opens the door to her uncle’s office that she finally gets to see a glimpse of a notebook, seated on top of the mahogany desk her uncle is by, and it’s opened, shown to the world to bare Hyunwoo’s soul.

The weight of the flooring creaks under her, though it is not as loud as the thumping inside her chest when her eyebrows crease, moving with precision to reach for the notebook and plater her hand on top of the pages to cover the peeping eyes of her uncle.

“What do you think you’re doing?” She says in between a whisper, hearing how her uncle stops his typing away on the keyboard before continuing, fingertips ushering her hand away so he can look at one of the poetic pieces written by Hyunwoo.

“I’m doing Hyunwoo a favor.”

“He’s been seeking for this notebook since yesterday, Uncle. That’s not helping him—” She tries to grab the fabric away, only to be stopped by a hand that wraps itself around her wrist. The glisten of happiness behind her Uncle’s eyes is clear, the document in front of him bleeding the words of Hyunwoo’s soul—sweet, caring, silent. “Explain.”

Her uncle lowers his glasses, plopping some of the blueberries on a white plate inside his mouth, munching slowly, with precision, patiently like he lives his life when he speaks: “I happened to come across it yesterday afternoon and took the time to read it. My boy has talent.” Her uncle replies, but her mind can only worry about the poems there—the little notes that they had shared in their written conversations when her uncle is in the room, perhaps dusted over with some lines on top of it caused by Hyunwoo’s precaution or if they are easily shown for the world to read. “So, I looked for some poetry contests online and I am mass sending my favorite poems—or a variety of such. The only way I can pay Hyunwoo for the support he has given me the past few years is by letting him go to something bigger than what he has right now.”

Letting him go, why is it that he is the only man that she has never thought of letting go of? His fingers always spread when around them, trapping her hand as if meant to be together forever. Sometimes, she likes to believe she’ll reach older years by his side—that one day she’ll get to see Hyunwoo with gray hairs, and he’d let his fingertips trace her wrinkly cheeks, pinching them with his usual smile on his face. Letting him go to another place, a place in which he’d become a true poet, could mean that he is simply leaving the winery, just like it could mean that he’d have to go anywhere else. Around the world, probably. Somewhere where opportunities for writers are far more fruitful.

She tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear, speechless, watching as her uncle continues to type and he asks a question, one that she can’t give an answer to because she can’t listen to him. Her ears beep intensely at the mere reminder that Hyunwoo is not a forever, because the title doesn’t exist or perhaps, because it has never been meant for her. His arms will not always wrap around her waist, his sighs won’t always end up on her nape, leaving her with a trail of goosebumps that can only be intensified by a kiss.

Another muse could exist in the far future for him.

And her canvas may consist of darker colors once he is gone.

“I see,” She breathes softly, only to earn a pointed side-eye from her uncle.

“You alright?”

“Kind of.”

“I’m doing this for him. He’s always said how he wants to go somewhere else, travel the world, you know? It would be nice if he got accepted.”

That’s a promise that she has heard in their late-night conversations, a reminder that the tapping of water on the vase will sometime overflow and leave them with the taste of memories. Her fingers try to wrap around the notebook again, but she ponders on the options of badness and wellness, of destroying his future or keeping him to herself. Instead biting down on her tongue, she nods at whatever her uncle said.

“Don’t tell Hyunwoo.”

About what? About the opportunities that will surely start to appear like clouds on his days?

“I won’t.”

And with that, she slips away from the room with a saddened sigh leaving her lips. Positivism lingers with nostalgia, it seems as though there is a goodbye—a piece of her mind that reads with certainty the words:

One day, you will have to let go of him.

Because, if you love him, you let him go, huh?

###

“It’d be cute.”

“What would be?”

“If one day, when we live together, we could hold one of your paintings up as decoration.”

His arm is extended on top of his bed, knees digging onto the mattress, his hand interlocked with hers on top of her abdomen. His body is resting by her side, black sweater riding up his tanned skin, looking at her with a messy hairstyle right after the small nap he had taken the moment they had arrived to his apartment. Hyunwoo is staring at her, she realizes, cheek pressed to his taut muscles, eyes inspecting her reaction when she finally pulls her gaze away from that one movie they had been wanting to watch—the initiation of a good actor, that had both written the script with his best friend, just as he had starred in it. She can remember the name of the actor right now, but it’s not like she cares.

Weeks after Hyunwoo’s stolen notebook issue, she had been the one to deliver it back to him after her uncle had stopped signing up the poems for every contest that he could find online. The life had been returned to Hyunwoo’s gaze, and he seemed to be more tranquil, breathing normally after days of silence that meant no one had read his poetry book. Instead, she’d take up on more working around the winery, trying to distract herself from her muse and on the long run, stopping herself from thinking of the end of something she feels like has just started, even after years of mutual attraction.

She rubs her free hand against her face, a few bumpy stops that she had not tried to conceal with makeup the first thing she touches, and still Hyunwoo looks at her as if she’s the world itself. Her worries may be spurts of non-knowledgeable insecurities, maybe Hyunwoo is the one person that won’t leave her.

“You would want to live with me?” Her voice doesn’t drop flirtatiously, instead she brings their joined hands up to her lips, kissing his knuckles in hopes of one day seeing his finger glisten with a band that calls him her husband. It’s stupid to think in a long run, to imagine Hyunwoo as the man to settle down with her, but he’s the one talking about it.

“Of course.” He says, eyes twinkling when he smiles, his fingers expanding to caress her bottom lip.

“I don’t think my art would be beautiful enough to be in our future home, though.” She replies, voice going through the depths of what their home would like. Tranquil, homely, perhaps with woodened decorations and too many memories—pictures of the people they love, of themselves, perhaps with a pet going around, or some old wines decorating the shelves.

Still playing with her lips, he answers. “Stop it.”

“I mean it.”

“Your art is fine.”

“Ah, I’m not good at it. We both know.” She says, shaking her head before straightening her back, sitting up on the bed and letting her asleep legs crack at her extension. “But what is it that you see in me that has you wanting to live together? That’s a big step.”

Her boyfriend turns around until he is facing the ceiling, their hands pulled away when he crosses his own over his chest. He breathes in softly, a smile plastered on his features, almost dumbly, too many thoughts that he can only voice out in a few words. “Because I love you.”

Oh, that would make sense. For time has taken its sweet years for her to feel as though he’s the only man that will ever love her for who she truly is, past the summery dresses and the faux smiles. “What do you love about me?” She asks, in a mere whisper that has her coming closer to him, as if nearing him will make her remember every part of Hyunwoo, in case she ever dares to forget about him in any day of her life.

“Can I say everything?”

“Yes,” She laughs, trailing her fingers up and down his arm, pecking his shoulder through the fabric of his shirt before resting her nose against the material. “I love you, too.”

“I know.” Hyunwoo answers, sparing a glance at the movie before she captures his attention again.

“Your phone has gotten a few notifications. Aren’t you going to check them out?”

With his phone in vibration, he may have not noticed. “Oh yes, I hadn’t noticed.”

Hyunwoo stands up, his physique in clear view for her when he moves towards the bedside table, picking up his phone and squinting at the screen. For a moment, she inspects his room—the one piece of art that is hers and he had hung up there, in belief for her passion, and the little bits of him that rest in memories on every spot, even on the pillows that are now too uncomfortable in comparison to his body. She studies his expression, how a white light washes over his face and he reads, reads until his smile is permanently plastered on his face, until he checks his messages and whatever notification he had gotten before he wraps her up in the biggest of hugs.

Those that take her breath away, that has her chuckling at his strength, pressed down by the weight of his body, feeling every movement of his lips while they press down incessantly on different spots of her face. Her cheeks. Her neck. Up until when he decides that speaking is a necessity, that whatever has overjoyed his chest shall be shared with her.

She’ll never forget that smile—that smile that had warmed her, just like how it had turned her blood cold. Hyunwoo shows her the screen, but it is too close to her eyes for her to inspect more than the big letters. Not necessary to read more, because Hyunwoo speaks with excitement. “You didn’t tell me your uncle had sent my poetry out. I just got an offer of representation and a call to sell my book and get a contract!”

She wishes she could keep him, that she could trap him in her arms and simply tell him to stay there, to let the silence in between them fall into normality, into a sweetened lake that will take them to endless romantic bliss. Instead, she clasps her hands together, because his happiness is hers—and love is about that, giving more than receiving. “Fuck yes, I’m so proud of you! Is it for real?”

“Yes, your uncle just confirmed it!” And his lips slot with hers, in a way that tells her that he really does love her and maybe…he will stay. She will be the culprit of his poems, he will be the outline of the shadows in her paintings and their love shall remain like that. Two rhyming words, they are, joined together by a verse—and not another word could ever compare to the magic the two of them work.

“Let’s celebrate!” She cheers, wrapping her arms around his neck and squealing when he lifts her up from the bed, moving towards the kitchen to what is clearly a night filled with take-out and cheerful conversation.

Waiting for this, for Son Hyunwoo, is the best decision she has ever taken in her life. There is no regretting that.

###

That one hat that she had seen on Hyunwoo’s head plentiful of times is now on top of her hair, caging the memories to her brain the more she paints. Realism is not her forte, she will always say it, but a sigh leaves her lips when she finds herself painting the outline of him—past the muscles, the lips she dares to kiss, the eyes that look for her everywhere and anywhere, but in his soul. Hyunwoo will always be a soul in green—like the greeneries around the winery, where she met him, and the calmness of him is a representation of nature.

Love affairs are supposed to be red, passionate, they are supposed to feel like sex and carnality, they are supposed to be plenty of things…but Hyunwoo is not a love affair. If anything, he is the only man she has ever loved. The brush dimly moves against the canvas, her hair framing her face uncomfortably, but she doesn’t dare move the strands, because there is this vacant voice in the back of her head that is telling her something will happen. The twist of her gut, the taste on the back of her tongue, everything reads fear, like in any occasion she will be moved by her feet, dragged through the ground, given a piece of reality for falling in love.

Hyunwoo is somewhere around the winery, God knows where, speaking to the representative on the phone to state the conditions of the contract he will be signing with the company for the publication of his poems. This makes her nervous, but more so angry at herself.

What a fucking egotistic bitch, she can only tell herself, not because she is envious of what Hyunwoo will surely approach with his talent, but because she is afraid of losing him. Scared that one day Hyunwoo will look at his success and think of her as a loss more than a win. At some point, she lets the brush rest against the canvas for a second longer. A dot. A dot on the figure that is supposed to be her boyfriend…an ending, because dots can mean the finalization of an idea, just like how it can mean the end of a story.

She doesn’t hear footsteps, not even Sunny dares make a noise, tranquil on the windowsill when Hyunwoo lets out a sigh that speaks wonders. It has all the meaning of her world in one single breath that falls deafly, as if he knows there is something deep in her mind bothering her. His lips press to her temple, his eyes dare close to flutter his eyelashes against her skin and when he finally gives her an answer, there are undertones of happiness in his voice:

“They want me to move to New York for the publishing of three poetry books.”

And this is excellent—it’s the best of the best. It’s the opportunity Hyunwoo always wanted and the one that he deserves, but long distance is something that she doesn’t know if she could bear. She could always leave with him, live alongside him like they had always planned—but she’s tied to her uncle’s waist. The poor man, only getting older, needs to be thought about from time to time and the winery cannot be kept together without someone helping him.

So, this means that her dreams are crushed.

This means that leaving is not a choice.

“That’s good, Hyunwoo. Congratulations.” She tells him, putting the brush down and twirling around on her chair, not as excitedly as she used to whenever she wore a flowery dress. Instead, he inspects her features, a small smile grazing his features. The whiteness of the room contrasts his beam, the twinkle in his dark irises when he says:

“We could always leave together. You’d have huge opportunities as an artist there—”

“No, love. I can’t leave.”

“Why not?” His fingers stop playing with hers, trying to look for the certainty of a possibility that has been broken. That, once again, leaves her with the lack of a bound that will never be broken.

“My uncle is not getting older, and you know his health is not the best nowadays. I can’t—I’ve been selfish my own life, I can’t leave him like that.” The affection in her voice must have softened something within him, and Hyunwoo is about to drop the subject, leave the talk for later like he always does, but instead, she continues. “D—Do you think we should break up?”

“What?” Hyunwoo asks, his voice rushed, waiting for her to correct herself.

“You will go live to New York. I will stay here. I don’t know if—” She cuts herself off, looking up to the ceiling and biting down her bottom lip. She has always been the one to break relationships up, but with this one, she can’t do it. Her eyes flicker, her tongue twists and she has to grab his hands stronger for her to gain some power. “I don’t know if it will work, truthfully.”

“Is that what you think?” His eyes flutter with endless blinking, trying to process exactly what she is saying and she feels her heart being ripped when she realizes what is happening—

She is finally speechless.

And in the worst of ways.

“Tell me why.”

“I can’t…I can’t leave, you can’t stay.” She tells him, shaking her head. “And I will never forgive myself if I stop you from being the poet that you always wanted to be.”

And even then, when anger overtakes his features along with disappointment, Hyunwoo is the most beautiful man she has ever met—inside and out. Her fingers trail through his hair, her lips leaning forward to seek a kiss out of him but when they join in the sweet gesture, his lips capture her strongly, as if needing more of her, as if letting go hurts him as much as it hurts her. His soul is trying to engulf hers, to down her in the most gorgeous of memories that started with poems about her, spoken insecurities, healed hearts, too much time to waste and of course, an ending.

His arms wrap around her tightly, her lips unwrapping from his to breathe out against his shoulder, her eyes closing tightly when she repeats: “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Love isn’t enough in most situations. This is one of them.

###

Her uncle would have probably loved to see the scenery in front of her.

The bustling city, the flickering lights, the people that join and walk alongside each other, the cars passing by and the extreme comparison to the winery. Perhaps, he would have not liked it as much—but who is she to know. Instead, she tries to make her way towards the café near her hotel room, desperate for her caffeine intake before her visits to the endless museums that she had looked up online. It’s difficult to move, much more when people press to her side, but she manages.

What catches her attention is the old looking library that passes her by as she walks on the sidewalk. The windows are huge, perhaps more than one floor in the place, showcasing the newest of releases or the most classic of pieces. Her feet retract the slightest, smiling at the sign that reads poetry and looking for a certain pen-name that she knows better than her own. The simplistic cover is enough to have her eyes widening, looking around as if caught by destiny—because Hyunwoo is there, by his penname, of course, but he’s there.

With persistence, she moves inside the library, grabbing one of the copies of the book that had caught her attention—the first one, one that she had been too fearful to ever look for, but now blinks at her almost mockingly. Or proudly, really, this would not have happened if only she had been selfish and snatched the notebook away from her uncle’s hands.

Some decisions are good on the long run.

Her fingers flick through the pages, recognizing some of the poems, even tutting at the fact that some of them are edited but his being still is exuded in his art. A little bit after, however, she is surprised to see an outline that she recognizes immensely—that one drawing that she done of Hyunwoo, more of a sketch, that he had kept with him, now plastered on the edge of the first book he released. Years later, and she had never noticed this.

The poem surprises her, the words ‘her’ its title, reminiscent of how she had always wondered if it was her that he was referencing. The more she reads, the more her smile widens…because nothing has been edited, not even a single syllable, and that is enough to press the book to her chest, closing her eyes to match the tightness of her chest.

He will always be the best rhyme for her poems, but it’s time for her to start a new one.

It’s time to let go.

That doesn’t mean she lets go of the memories, buying the book and pressing it to the depths of her purse, pushing the door open to go have her caffeine intake.

#shownu scenarios #shownu #monsta x scenarios #monsta x #kpop scenarios #writing #monsta x au #monsta x angst #monsta x fluff #shownu au #shownu angst #shownu fluff #the anti-love club #heeeey one more to go #thoughts on this one?#poet!shownu

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ourplaceinthecosmosphff · 4 years

Text

Chapter 5. Truth or Dare

‘TRUE BEAUTY is not of the body or of the face, no, it is a thing of the soul - of fire and air, breath and spirit, something brave and unafraid.’ Segovia Amil

The door opened without a knock; I saw through the reflection in the mirror Cadie stop herself from walking straight in, instead fixing her posture and looking solemnly at us.

“Excuse me, Ma’am.” She said, formally.

“Don’t bother with formalities on my account, Cade.” Louis told her, grinning. “We’re all friends here. I won’t tell Auguste you usually call my sister by her name.”

The secretary grinned, but didn’t move. “There’s a delivery for you.”

“For me?” She replied with a nod.

“I think it’s a dress.”

“Oh!” Louis exclaimed, jumping up from his seat in the two-seat sofa in front of my bed.

I raised a hand in pause to Cass, who was just about finished doing my hair, and turned around to eye my brother suspiciously.

“What is it? And why is it in my name?”

“It’s for you.” He said, walking to the door and speaking to someone outside. “In here, please!”

The Prince of Wales’ butler walked in, solemnly carrying a garment bag over both his arms, which he laid over the couch where Louis had been sitting, before turning around to bow to the both of us, and leave as swiftly as he had come.

“If it’s for me how come I don’t know anything about it?!”

“It’s a surprise.” He shrugged, smiley. “Cass, are you done over there?”

Cass, who had been discreetly spraying my hair as we talked, pulled another couple of strands leading into my bun and took a step back.

“Look at me, please, ma’am? Oh, yes, I’m done. Beautiful!”

I looked in the mirror. My hair was pulled loosely to the back in a bun, with strands falling artfully to the sides of my face. Atop my head, sat Empress Eugénie's 1853 pearl and diamonds tiara, commissioned by Napoleon III to celebrate their marriage. It was adorned with 212 pearls and 1998 diamonds. After Napoleon III’s 1870 defeat, the tiara was surrendered to the Savoyen Royal Family and now it laid on my hair. It was one of my favorites from the Savoyen Crown jewels vault, and Maman had sent me with Georgian pearl earrings to match, which I picked up as Louis rushed Cass and Cadie out of the room.

“I already have a dress, Lou.” I told him, approaching the garment bag.

“How would you know it’s a dress?” He asked, teasingly, to which I only gave him a suspicious look with one raised brow. “Okay, fine, it’s a dress…”

He pat a chair next to the bag and I sat down, just as he sat in the coffee table in front and held both my hands in his.

He cleared his throat. “As I have expressed, I am sorry for the things I said when we were fighting.”

I watched him, silently, then nodded slowly. “Okay?”

“However, there is something I have been meaning to talk to you about, which may have transpired during our, uhm, bagarre.”

“...yes?”

“Maggie, you have to stop letting mom and dad walk all over you.”

“I do not-”

“You have worn at least three outfits this tour I know for a fact that you wouldn't even have purchased if it weren’t to make sure Maman wouldn’t have something to criticize.”

“Excuse you, I think my outfits were very cute!”

“I didn’t say they weren’t!” He clarified, pointing a finger at me. “All I said was… they weren’t you.”

I sighed, resting my back against the chair.

I couldn’t say I hadn’t noticed before that every time I had to do something regal there was a tiny voice in the back of my head wondering, what will mom approve of? before I chose an outfit. Her style had more of a conservative, 50s debutant vibe, while I tended to be more romantic yet modern. It was a fine line that separated both styles, and the advantage usually fell to my mother.

“She’s a very stylish woman.” I countered, and he nodded enthusiastically.

“She sure is. And you are twenty-five years-old! You should be allowed to wear things that are… out there, daring, iconic!”

I laughed. “I’m not exactly a fashion icon!”

“My point exactly. You could be.”

“Louis-”

“I know you have style! I have seen it! You just hold it back because you think you have to!”

“I do have to.”

“It’s the twenty-first century! The Swede Princesses show a lot more skin than you do!”

“They don’t have our mom breathing down their necks.”

“Maggie, fashion is supposed to be fun! But you need a little bit of courage to really shine in it.”

I sighed. “What exactly are you suggesting?”

He leaned back and crossed his legs, confidently. “Let me guess, the dress maman chose for you for tonight's of a light shade, probably blue to match your angelic eyes, with a simple silhouette that covers everything God gave you, am I right?”

I didn’t have to answer; he knew he was right, so instead he merely walked over to his delivery as he spoke.

“I have made some very good contacts since I moved to Britain, in part thanks to religiously attending London Fashion Week. So I made a call.”

He dramatically opened the bag, to reveal a strong, smooth red fabric.

“Red?!”

“I looked it up, the Duchess of Cambridge herself has worn red to a previous state dinner.”

I bit my lip. It did look quite pretty. And much more interesting than the very conservative choice my mother had made.

“Okay, I’ll try it on.” He squealed as I got to my feet. “But just because I’m curious! If I feel it’s too much cleavage, or too out there, I’m putting on the blue dress.”

“Yes!” He threw the garment bag at me and ran to the door. “I’ll go get dressed as you do that, and send Cadie in to help you.”

As I rummaged through the bag, I saw another thing inside.

“Spanx, Louis?!”

He closed the door with a thud.

I needed Cadie’s help to get everything on without damaging my makeup, hair or losing the tiara in the mess, but at last, I was ready.

Cadie approved it. “It’s perfect!” She breathed, amazed.

I walked out of the bathroom to the full body mirror in the room, finding Louis sitting in the sofa again. His eyes widened as he saw me. “Woah.”

“Strapless?!” I asked him, unfazed. “Lou, you know I can’t show cleavage on a state dinner!”

“Oh, no, mustn't let the British know you have arms!” He rolled his eyes, getting to his feet. “What will they tell the church?!”

“Lou!”

“Relax, look, it’s an upper neckline, you’ll be fine! Again, the Swedes wear strapless all the time”

“We’re not Swedish!”

“To be fair, the draping does cover much of your chest.” Cadie added, to Louis’ joy.

“Thank you, Cadie. Why don’t you go wait outside?” I told her, with an eye roll. She left, grinning.

The shape of the dress was almost a mermaid-cut, but the draping made it a lot loser in the lower-body, and added a very interesting detail to the hips; in my case, making it look like I had some.

I sighed. “It’s… beautiful.”

“But?”

“There’s a lot that goes into choosing a dress for an event like this, I can’t just change it last minute.”

“Your tiara matches, I made sure of it. The dress is tighter on your body, but not that much that Maman will have any right to criticize, the dress is red, which is new for you but not against the rules, and most importantly, out of your comfort zone! With the added bonus of the sexy factor!”

“This is the gayest you’ve sounded in your life.”

He put a hand to his heart. “Thank you!”

“I shouldn’t be looking sexy in a state dinner, anyway.”

Through the mirror, I watched him give the windows a look he seemed to be hoping I would see.

“What?!”

“Well, you know, that is true… unless there’s a very handsome man in the state dinner who’s been shamelessly flirting with you for three days straight.”

I rolled my eyes, but smiled despite myself. “I was wondering if that had any influence over this intervention.”

“No!” He replied, quickly. “I’ve been thinking about this for a while. Although you gotta admit, it’s perfect timing!”

“Harry’s just being…”

“Nice?” He asked, sarcastically, before walking over to adjust the drape. “What’s wrong with nice? You deserve nice.”

He placed a hand over my arm and looked at me in the mirror.

“Chris didn’t deserve you. You know that, right?”

I wanted to roll my eyes at him for bringing him up again, but instead I just nodded, trying to allow the words to take root in my heart.

“But Harry might.” He shrugged. “He seems to at least know you’re way out of his league, that is more than Chris already.” We chuckled. “So wear the dress. Feel as powerful as I know you are and let him know it too.”

So I held his hand, took a deep breath, and said, “Okay.”

---- ---- ---- ----

Once you’ve seen one palace, you’ve seen them all: high ceilings, golden fixtures, red carpets. The one thing that changes is the art in the walls, the people in the paintings, the era of the vases. Buckingham Palace was not different, which is why I wasn't taking too much notice of it as we walked in that night; I had spent our first day in the country admiring Buckingham, tonight was about more.

Tonight was the ultimate opportunity we had to show the world how friendly our countries' relation was, so that the people might pressure their politicians into putting work into fixing the immigrant crisis. In a more direct way, the star of the night were the speeches by the Queen and King. In an indirect way, I had been informed by Cadie on the way over that the pictures of Louis and me with the Cambridges and Harry had become very popular online, and that it wouldn't hurt to look as friendly as possible.

That would be harder, though, because on state dinners the seating chart was made very carefully so that the main visiting royals can mingle with the hosts, and the spare royals can give their attention to the other guests, so they feel heard.

As we walked in, I suddenly felt absolutely wrong in the dress. Though there was limited photographers in State Dinners, they were definitely there. Particularly at our arrival. The flashes were so blinding I could only focus on walking without tripping over my train, but in the back of my mind I couldn’t help but wish I was wearing my comfortable, old blue. Louis had prepared me for it, though.

Back in Clarence House, as we descended the staircase, the last ones to be ready, he reminded me that everything new felt wrong until it didn’t. That was easier to say when all he had to wear was a boring tuxedo he had worn at least twenty times prior.

When we walked into the living room, the conversation stopped. My father and our five person staff stared at me, head to toe, mouths opened, as my brother offered them a cocky look.

“Well,” I said, “I’m ready. Shall we go?”

Though Auguste said nothing, he looked as though he wanted to, but reconsidered when my father merely smiled, offering me his arm, and we made our way out.

Now, walking into the palace, I was reconsidering the choice myself. The dress was beautiful, my hair and makeup were perfectly in place thanks to Arnie’s flawless work, the tiara was a dream come alive; it was me. I was a pile of nerves.

As Louis offered me his hand to climb up the steps, he looked at me, confused.

“Why are you shaking?”

I shrugged, and he grinned.

“Just you wait.” He replied when I questioned this.

Dad led the way, greeting Her Majesty with a kiss on each cheek, before taking one step to say hello to the Prince of Wales and his wife, just down the line. As the heir, Louis was next, so he stepped forward and bowed his head before kissing her as well.

“Your Majesty, is it 1956? Because you look barely a day over 30.”

The Queen let out a naughty giggle, caressing the diamonds in her bracelet shyly.

He was going to make a fantastic King.

“Your Majesty.” I said, bowing down in a curtsey when it was my turn.

“Princess Margueritte.” She greeted as I, too, kissed her cheeks. “You’ve been making quite a ruckus these last couple of days.”

I looked at her, feeling my head tilt sideways. “Have I?”

“I hope my grandson hasn’t bothered you too much.”

“Oh. No! Harry? No. He is… No!” I assured her, feeling my myself blush. “Uhm. He, he is-”

“He's always been a bit like a shark like that. If they stop swimming, they die. Well, he does if he stops flirting.”

I laughed, aware we were being filmed, hoping the press wasn't close enough to pick audio, trying to look as unbothered as possible.

"He's been very friendly and... Welcoming."

"I'm sure."

"What is it?" asked the Prince of Wales, drawing the attention of my father, brother and the Duchess. I shook my head, but the Queen told him merely, "Harry".

It seemed to be enough, though, as the whole group nodded, grinning.

"Oh, yes. It seems my son is a bit taken with your daughter." The prince told my father.

Though his mouth said "oh" in an amused way, I could tell it wasn't the first time he heard of this.

“It doesn’t help she’s exactly his type.“ The duchess commented, making the group laugh again, so I‌ attempted to hold a steady, polite smile on my face.

We moved on to mingle and get in our positions to enter the dining hall; as the guest of honor, since Dad was here, there wasn’t anyone else to wait for. The rest of the guests were already in the dining hall, probably being told to find their seats now. The royal families - hosts and guests - were to enter later, so for now we could be ourselves and enjoy some privacy.

“Breathe.” Louis told me again, as we followed dad around the room. “You look about to pass out.”

“What did she mean by ‘his type’, you think?” I asked him, in a whisper.

“He’s probably dated someone who looks like you.” He replied, grinning.

“More than one... but ‘his type’, though. You think he just likes me because I’m blonde? He just likes my looks?”

“Great relationships have started with looks.” He said, turning around to face me, stopping me in my tracks. “How do you know he’s dated more than one person who looks like you? Have you stalked him online?”

I rolled my eyes, turning to look around the room. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“You have a tell, Maggie. When you’re lying you look away so people can’t see your eyes.”

Instead of dignifying his - smart - insight with an answer, I merely hooked my arm in his and walked off, having just identified the people I’d been looking for, and trying to ignore the smile on Louis’ face when he realized where we were going.

“Good evening.”

Though Harry had his back to me, I could watch the reaction of his brother and sister-in-law. They looked at me as I approached, unsurprised I was coming; almost as though they had seen me already. When I got to them, instead of greeting us, their eyes went to Harry.

His shoulders squared back in a long breath, and then he turned around and looked at me. I watched his mouth open and his eyes widen, both so slightly it made me question if I’d imagined it, but also so obvious I wanted to turn around and go back to Clarence House to get changed immediately. It didn’t help he looked me up and down quickly and then gulped, before averting his eyes.

“You both look very dapper tonight.” Catherine said, smiling awkwardly between her brother-in-law and us. She was wearing a dark blue gown and a diamond tiara, hair half up, half down.

“Thank you!” Louis said, returning her smile with none of the awkwardness, and a lot of amusement.

“Yes, we’re very happy to have you.” William said, looking equally as amused. “I’m afraid you’re at the boring table today, Louis.”

Catherine gently edged her elbow to her husband’s arm. “Don’t say boring.” She whispered, making Louis laugh.

“Trust me, I understand what you mean.” He replied; I tried to smile, as it felt like that was the tone the conversation required. But it was hard when Harry still hadn’t looked back at me. “What is the party table, though? Does Harry get a round of Bubbly Pong going?”

They laughed, I mimicked. Harry looked around the room very still. There was an uncomfortable silence as the laughter died down, and suddenly there was a British aide telling us it was time to get to our places in line to enter the dining room.

I gladly took the excuse to move away, feeling sick to my stomach. Had I been excited before? I hardly remembered it anymore.

“I’m in the boring table, too.” Catherine told me, walking quickly to catch up to me as we moved to the middle of the line as the heirs went forward. “It was terrifying on my first time at one of these, but I’ve come to find you can have some interesting conversations, don’t you think?”

I smiled, remembering her nerves from the car the day before. “No, you’re right, it’s not that bad, actually. Though, it’s not as interesting as it seems to outsiders, either, I suppose. My sister is convinced there’s dancing, like in a ball in a Disney movie.”

She laughed, looked back, and then added, whispery, “You make him nervous.”

“What?”

“I’m over there, I’ll talk to you later, I hope.”

We exchanged a smile, even if mine was a bit confused, and she moved to stand next to the Prime Minister.

“You know, in Britain only the married women attend these,” Harry started, standing next to me in line. “And you wouldn’t be allowed to wear one of those until married, either.” He said, staring at the tiara in my head with - I was happy to see - some reverence.

“In Savoy, unmarried women can wear tiaras as long as they’re over twenty-one. Good thing I’m not British.” I said, on a low tone, glad Auguste couldn’t hear such an undiplomatic sentiment.

He grinned. “Yes. I’m very glad about that.”

I looked around, seeing the line basically done. “Are you not going to find your place?”

“I think I’m right where I belong.”

“With me?” I asked, surprised; he returned a flirty smile.

“Yes, Mary, with you.” I rolled my eyes, grinning.

“Do you get all your pickup lines from Taylor Swift songs?” He laughed a bit louder than the current volume level in the room, and more than one pair of eyes turned to look at us.

Usually they wouldn’t pair the ‘lower royals’ together like this. The high ranking ones, yes; queen and king, heir with heir. My father and Louis were both ahead, and would be sitting at the head of the table, with William and Catherine, I supposed. But Harry and I should have been paired with diplomats or dignitaries.

As we walked into the room, to the sound of their national anthem, I noticed two important things. One, Harry looked very handsome in white tie and tails, with his military medals pinned to his chest. Two, as we walked, he gave a grateful smile to a nearby aide, and I wondered if he had arranged to be seated with me. I felt… strangely flattered.

As we got to the table, and the anthem finished, a staffer pulled the chair for me, and we were all seated in silence as, at the center part of the table, they prepared for the speeches.

“I don’t think I can stress this enough, Mary.” He said, whispery, leaning closer to me than it was necessary.

“Marie.” I corrected, now more teasingly than anything else, making him smile as he looked into my eyes.

“You’re the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”

I didn’t have a teasing answer for that; I could barely think straight as he kept staring into my eyes from so close.

Suddenly, however, his grandmother’s voice startled us both out of it and we stared ahead as she began to speak.

It felt as though the Queen and my father spoke for hours; I‌ kept my eyes focused ahead hoping to steady my breath and sweaty palms enough to be able to look back at Harry at some point in the night.

Luckily, by the time they started serving the entrees, I‌ had remembered that due to the dinner etiquette I was supposed to make conversation to the man by my other side before Harry. So I took in a deep breath, smiled politely, and asked him about his work.

By the time it was our turn to talk, he gave me a friendly smile and said,

“Dare.”

I sighed a short giggle. We had, now that I‌ thought about, left the truth and dare game unfinished the day before. I‌ had answered last, so I supposed it was his turn. I cracked my brain to think of something that was good, but not scandalous.

“I dare you to,”‌ I‌ started, slowly, staring into his water glass, “tap you fork to your glass loudly to call the attention of the room to yourself, get up, and improvise a speech in honor of my father.”

He barked out a laughter that started louder than any of us thought was appropriate, and we quickly ducked our heads down to hide our playful grins and blushing cheeks; Harry was still laughing. Taking a deep breath, he looked around the room.

“I can’t!”‌‌‌ He replied. “It’s not protocol, it’ll be too weird. It will make the news!”

I sighed, smiling. ‌“Alright, then. I‌ suppose you could… start coughing when the staffer comes back for our plates and then dramatically grab his sleeve and pretend to have an allergic reaction.”

This time his eyes widened as he laughed, leaning closer to me. “Are you trying to get me disowned?!”

I‌ laughed.‌ “Too much? Okay. I dare you to…”‌ I looked around the room, thinking.

The table was shaped like an upside-down U. The Queen and her guests were at the top, horizontal edge; Harry and I were at the start of one of the legs, close to the curve of the table, which was narrow and had no one sitting there. The person closest to the other gentleman on my side, was Catherine, and by her side, ‌my brother.

“I dare you to throw a pea on my brother’s wine glass.”

He leaned closer to me in order to see around the tall centerpiece arrangement in the middle of the table. He smelled of… lime, possibly? And I‌ felt myself leaning back towards him to smell it better.

“Hm, how about Cath? She’s more in my line of vision.”

“No!” I‌ whispered, making one of his eyebrows raise slightly above the other. “She’s nice, I‌ don’t want to mess with her.”

“And your brother isn’t nice?”

I rolled my eyes. “My brother has been a royal since birth and is used to me. Your sister-in-law seems to still be trying very hard to… behave the way people expect her to. I‌ don’t want to make that harder.”

He smiled.‌ “How do you know that?”

I‌ shrugged.‌ “I’m observant. Stop stalling. If you won’t do that, then…”‌ I looked back, seeing the staffers come back around to collect our plates. “When they’re removing your plate, I‌ dare you to burp your thank you.”

“For such a pretty girl, you are… disgusting.”

“Ouch.”‌ I said, on a bored monotone, making him fight a smile.

I‌ kept my eyes ahead as the poor staffer approached by his side to remove the plate, and then I‌ heard a loud and disgusting “thank you”, making me laugh.

We waited until they had left and broke down in a fit of giggles that made me feel very hot; I‌ took a long sip of my water, deciding I had had enough wine for the night.

Throughout the night, the game went on through each course; because I‌ didn’t want him to get any ideas about revenge, I‌ kept choosing truth, and as the first one traumatized him so much, so did he, and we ended up just having a regular conversation. Well, kind of.

He asked how many people I had ever kissed; I did the quick math in my head and told him nine (Chris was my first everything, as he was a childhood friend, and other than one 7 minutes in heaven incident at 16, the rest were all casual dates during the one time when we broke up during University, and since the last break up). So I asked him the same, and he very quietly, blushing, justified his double digit as he stuttered through a lot of excuses, which I thought was cute.

He asked what my pet peeve was, and I talked about wanting to scratch my eyes out when people chewed gum open-mouthed. I asked who was his favorite out of all the famous people he had ever met, and he told me about meeting Paul McCartney, which lead me to volunteer my experience in a Paul McCartney concert in New York a few years before, and soon we were exchanging our favorite Beatles songs, and what were our favorite bands as teenagers, which was particularly cringey for both of us (I had an insanely embarrassing obsession with Britney Spears, he had a gangster rap phase).

He asked how old I was when I stopped playing dolls (13), I asked how old he was the last time he peed himself (20, drunk). He asked what was the last text I sent, and I told him about confirming lunch plans with my coworker for the day after tomorrow. I asked him what was the last thing he searched on his phone, and he told me about googling how to tie a bow tie, which earned him a confused look.

“I know, I know. I ought to know it by now. But I told you about my terrible memory. I can never remember.”

“Okay, okay. Tell me one thing on your internet history you wouldn’t want me to know about.”

He stared at his plate, thoughtfully.

“Well, in the name of our blossoming friendship, I feel I should come clean. After your brother mentioned it at polo, I did google you.”

I nodded. “Yeah, so did I.”

“You did?”‌ I‌ nodded. “Well, may I just say those pictures are low quality, and everything is actually much bigger-”

“I‌ meant I googled myself, you narcissistic piece of work.” I‌ laughed.

“Oh, you googled yourself and‌ I’m narcissistic?!”

I‌ shrugged.‌ “I guess I wanted to see what you would see if you googled me.”‌

“Well, I‌ saw some adorable childhood pictures.‌ Bangs look cute on you.” I rolled my eyes.‌

“Shut up.”

“Found out you have three dogs, amazing. And Christopher looks like trash. You can do better.”

I laughed again, drinking more water just to have an excuse not to have to comment on it.

As we moved to the next course, we took some time to talk to the people on our other sides, so I did my best to focus on the questions the gentleman to my right was asking me.

In the back of my mind, however, something bugged me. I couldn’t stop thinking that he still didn’t know about the first time we met, and the longer I‌ took to tell him, the more uncomfortable it would be when I finally did.

“Truth or dare?”‌ He asked, without preamble, as soon as I turned to him again.

“Truth.”‌ I‌ smiled, hoping he would ask how we met so I could get it over with.

“Which of your siblings is your favorite?”

I‌ sighed; mostly because he had a very irritant, smug grin on his lips.

“I can’t answer that. Also, it’s so unfair that you only have one so I can’t return this horrible question.”

“Yes, that’s why I asked. Go on, you can do it.”

“Fine. Louis. But I‌ have-”

“Oh, wow, Mary!” He said, mock-shock all over his face.

“You asked!” I‌ said, whispery.

“That is cold!”

“I have reasons!”

“Fine, what are the reasons?”

“I was eleven years-old when Lourdes was born! I love her, of course. But I‌ only had a couple years with her before going to boarding school. Louis is just a few years younger than me, we grew up together! We’re just… closer.”

He nodded. “You went to school abroad, right?”

“Well, I‌ had a year in Savoy, then I‌ transferred to Belgium.”

“One year?”

“Yes, and it was easier to see them then, I came home every weekend, spent as much time with them as I‌ possibly could. Even when I was living in Belgium, actually. I still did my best.”

“You came home often?”

“As often as I could.” I said. “Lourdes was three when our grandfather abdicated due to his age. She will never remember a time when she wasn’t the daughter of a king. I was already off at Belgium by then. I wanted to be… I don’t know, to be…”

“There.”

I sighed. “Well, yes.”

“You felt guilty you were away.”

I looked at him, but didn’t say anything for a while.

“I don’t- I don’t know. It’s stupid. I know there was nothing I could do, I just… They were so busy, our parents. Busier than ever. And I just... ”

“You didn’t want them to feel alone.” I looked at him, surprised. He shrugged. “Will did the same for me.”

He reached over and took a sip of his wine. “When… everything happened. Not just the divorce, but everything that came after, I think he felt guilty leaving me.”

I didn’t need to ask what was the ‘all’ that had happened. The entire world knew. For this reason, I think, I wanted to offer something vulnerable in return.

“I came over to Savoy every weekend.” I confessed. “I left school every Friday on a private plane, and went home to see my family as if I still was studying in Savoy. My father shielded me from it, but the press found out and he was under attack for the expense. They called me spoilt, and said my mother insisted I was educated in Belgium out of an unpatriotic whim.”

He gave me a sad look, but I shrugged.

“I just wanted to make sure Louis and Lourdes were alright. I didn’t want them to forget about me, or think I might have forgotten them.”

He nodded. “You want to know what I think?”

I smiled. “I know you’ll tell me.”

He chuckled, silently. “I think you sound like a girl who really liked her country, and her home, and her family, and really wanted to be there, but could not, for some reason, stay in school near them. I wonder why?”

I leaned back, sighing, a grin on my lips. “And what is your theory?”

“Don’t lawyer me, Mary.”

We laughed.

“Marie.”

“It must have been tough.” He added, seriously.

He didn’t know; he seemed to just… understand.

The staff arrived to remove our plates, and we took some time to ourselves. When they left, I turned to him again.

“The girls didn’t like me.” I confessed, softly. “I see now where they were coming from. I was too… too much. Quiet, but I overcompensated a lot. I had… a lot of opinions, which I mostly shared with the teachers, in class, when forced. I was always called on and, of course, everyone knew, or thought they did, every detail about me, and my family. And they all seemed to think I needed to be… more.”

“More what?”

I shrugged. “Everything. Or maybe less of everything... I don’t know, I just wasn’t enough. I just wanted… for no one to know who I was.”

“So you moved to Belgium.”

I smiled, sadly. “No one cared who my father was there. They found out, eventually. But I already had a couple of nice friends by then. It was all I needed.”

He smiled. “I hated school.”

I rolled my eyes. “Everyone did-”

“No, I… I really did. I’ve never been smart.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m serious. I don’t mean it in self-pity, either. It’s just… I’ve never been good at it. I don’t have an affinity for academics. I never had… an affection for any subjects, at all. I always just liked… the outdoors. The conversations, the connections with others. The adventure. I hated being inside.”

I smiled. “People are different. The only problem is the system that convinces us there’s only one way to be.”

After dessert, as soon as the Queen and King stood up, we were allowed to, as well. We were then ushered to another saloon where drinks were going to be served, and guests could mingle with other guests other than the ones they had been seated with at dinner, and soon after say their official goodbyes to the Queen.

The gentleman that had sat to my right introduced me to his wife, and we talked about their children for a while before I felt the conversation die out and gave a secret signal (adjusting my earrings) for Cadie to rescue me.

“Hello…” Louis grinned when I‌ joined him, where he was observing our father from a distance.‌ His tone alone got me to blush.

“Shut up.”

“Why? I was just going to say you and Prince Harry sure seemed to be having fun.”

I sighed, “We did.”

“That’s nice.”‌ The tone was different this time, more… honest. Less mocking. So I smiled in return.

“And I deserve nice.” I repeated his line back to him, making his smile grow.

“Auguste noticed it, too.”

I sighed again.‌‌ “Let me guess. Have I‌ behaved promiscuously?”

“He is not sure if anyone will have noticed, but he thinks it’s a bad match.”

“Ugh, what is this, the eighteenth century?”

He shrugged.‌ “He said something about both of you being spares, and none having a throne to inherit, it’s just not good politics.”

I gave him a flabbergasted look. “What?!”

“I’m obviously kidding!”‌ He laughed, but I‌ rolled my eyes. “Look, just don’t let him talk you out of it, okay? Harry is great. He’s funny, and polite, and according to Kate, seems to really like you.”

“What? What did she say?”

He grinned again. “She told me in confidence, I‌ can’t repeat it.”

“Louis!”

“He’s nice!‌ And you deserve nice!”

“I know…”

“…he’s also super hot, which doesn’t hurt.”

“Shut up.”‌ I replied, but with a grin of my own this time.

“What, you’re telling me you don’t think he’s super hot?”

“That’s not- I‌ don’t- Shut up!”

I‌’d seen Harry approaching out of the corner of my eye, and was desperate for him to stop talking.

“Hello.”‌ He greeted.

“Hi, Harry…”‌ Louis greeted him with the same teasing tone he had used to greet me.

“…Hi.”‌ Harry’s smile grew a bit more, and he blushed looking at the floor, uncomfortably.

“Stop.” I‌ whispered to my brother.

“Oh, look. I’m getting a call.” He returned, dead-faced. showing us his dark, silent phone, which was most definitely not receiving a call. “Talk to you later.”

Harry laughed as I‌ sighed. “Sorry, he’s…”

“Hey, do you want get out of here?” I stared, intrigued. His smile dropped as regret took over his face. “No!‌ I‌ just mean… To walk around, in the palace. See some cool closed wings and stuff.”

I‌ laughed. “Sure.”

“Really?”‌ He seemed genuinely surprised, and my heart ached.

I looked around at the room, enough people looking at us just because we were who we were. Our brothers looking away from us in a way that made me sure they were very aware of our movements. Auguste was standing by my father, but keeping an eye on me from the corner of his eyes. Cadie gave me a discreet thumbs up from the corner.

I remembered we were meant to be leaving the country tomorrow morning, and thought of how he still didn’t realize when we met. I remembered just how much he annoyed me only three days ago, and realized I didn’t know when I might see him next. Sure, it was almost time to leave, but I wasn’t ready to say goodbye. I wanted to see this through.

And I deserved nice.

So as he watched me with expectant eyes, I felt my heart jump in my throat and smiled as I said, “…yes.‌ Lead the way.”

--- ---- ---

Margueritte’s State Dinner Outfit

[A//N: Thank you so much for reading!!!!!!! I’d love to know your thoughts, please drop me a message here or like this page? Again, it’s a privilege, thank you for reading! Next week: Harry and Margueritte go on a secret Buckingham palace adventure!]

#prince harry fanfiction #prince harry fanfic #princeharryfanfic #princeharryfanfiction #princeharryff #Prince Harry #brf #fanfiction #fanfic #Modern Royalty AU #modern royalty fanfic #modern royalty fanfiction #chapters #OPITCphff

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thejollyroger-writer · 4 years

Text

To Serve and Protect - Chapter 5

SUMMARY: Detective Killian Jones has been investigating a stalker-turned-murderer for months by the time he goes home from the bar with Emma Swan. But when he thinks he sees the very man in question outside her apartment, can he separate his feelings for her and his need to keep her safe?

TRIGGERS: well, this is a fic about a serial killer. mentions of violence and death, with some physical violence/whump. as always, if you need me to discuss this further for you to be comfortable, message me. – rated teen

Prologue // Ch. 1 // Ch. 2 // Ch. 3 // Ch. 4 // Ch. 5 on AO3

a/n: another Monday, another chapter, another cliffhanger?, still no baby.

-- -- -- --

Graham shows up first, quickly clearing the two flights of stairs that lead to Killian’s walkup apartment. The first thing he notices is the open door.

The second is the emptiness in the space at the top of the steps. Emma’s not there, only a few bags of groceries and a bottle of wine.

Jesus, what’s he going to tell David — but he pushes the thought down with a gulp, not even allowing his brain to go there.

“Jones!” he calls out, turning his attention towards the half-open door. “I’m coming in!” And for a moment, the whole world stills, only silence greeting him on the other side. And then:

“Oh, Graham, thank god.” Emma’s voice comes from across the room, half-shrouded by the couch. He catches his breath closing his eyes for half a second. “Did you — are you —” He doesn’t even know what questions he’s trying to ask, but they’re not coming out either way, so he snaps his mouth shut before crossing the room to where Emma is kneeling on the floor.

There’s blood. There’s a lot of blood, actually, something which has long since stopped bothering Graham. But seeing Killian Jones passed out on the floor, a blood-soaked light blue towel pressed against his shoulder, makes his stomach churn. Sure, Killian can be a pompous asshole, he sometimes doesn’t know when to keep his mouth shut, and he’s been known to defy an order or two, but Graham would still place him on the short list of his friends.

“The stalker’s dead in the kitchen,” Emma says, her eyes never once leaving where she’s putting as much pressure on Killian’s gunshot wound as she can. “At least, I’m assuming it’s the stalker. And I’m assuming he’s dead, given that there’s been no movement or sound from over there since I came in.”

Graham nods, changing his course to check on that, first. Sure enough, behind the counter that separates the kitchen from the living room, there’s a dead body, a bullet in his chest and one just below his neck. Of course Killian would manage two almost-perfect shots while he’s getting shot himself.

“Yeah,” Graham confirms, pressing his fingers against the man’s neck even though there’s no way he could still be alive after those two shots. “He’s dead alright. How’s Jones?”

Emma sighs, but before she can answer, Henry calls to them from the hallway: “Jones! Miss Swan! I’m coming in!”

“We’re clear, Mills,” Graham says, meeting the young man at the door, and they share a nod before both holstering their weapons. “One DB in the kitchen, and Jones is unconscious with a shoulder injury but still alive.”

“And the ambulance?”

“On its way,” Emma says. “A few minutes passed between when I called you and them, so they should be here any minute.”

As if on cue, the two paramedics push their way into the apartment.

“Sheriff,” one of them says gruffly, sharing a nod with Graham.

“Booth. Officer Jones is behind the couch. And there’s a DB in the kitchen.”

“DB’s are your jurisdiction,” he half-jokes, but rushes to where Killian is lying on the floor. “Emma,” he says, kneeling next to her on the floor, and Graham notices the way a soft blush rises to her cheeks.

“Hey, August.”

“You did a great job with the towel. Probably saved his life.”

“Thanks,” she mumbles, letting August take her place at his shoulder, and she reaches out to sweep Killian’s hair off his forehead.

“I’ll take it from here,” he says, but Emma is already pushing herself off the floor and wiping her hands on her already-bloodstained dress.

“I’m… gonna change,” she says, her voice still soft, and she doesn’t meet anyone’s eye before she turns back towards the bedroom.

“You can take all the time you need, Miss Swan,” Graham says, and she stops but doesn’t turn towards them. “I’ll wait for you and you can ride to the hospital with me.”

But she’s already shaking her head. “No, I’m going with him.”

It’s not a question, but Graham still turns to August who confirms. After finishing his current task, the paramedic meets his eyes, nods with a shrug, and goes back to what he’s doing.

She told herself she didn’t need to know. She even told Killian that, if given the choice, she didn’t want to know. But now that the choice is here, literally, dead in Killian’s kitchen, she can’t stop thinking about him.

Because what if he is someone from her past, as improbable as it is? What if all of this was because of her?

She takes a deep breath in and holds it, pausing from trying to wash Killian’s blood off her hands to look at herself in the mirror for a moment before releasing it. From what she can tell, though her dress is ruined, none of it soaked through to her bra, which she only thinks about since she doesn’t know if she has another here to change into.

Anything to keep her mind off of what happened in the last ten minutes.

It doesn’t all come off, the blood staining her hands and her arms, but she does her best. It’s a warm day, but she has no idea what the temperature in the hospital is going to be like, so she opts for leggings and a plain white v-neck, but before she leaves the bedroom she pulls a blue and white flannel shirt from Killian’s closet overtop.

She is silent as she crosses the apartment, her arms crossed over her chest to make her as small as she can, but she’s made up her mind.

“Emma, are you—” Graham starts, turning away from where they’re moving Killian to a stretcher, but when she doesn’t stop, her path clear, he crosses the living room and tries to stop her. “I don’t think you want to do that.”

“No, Graham,” she says, shaking her head as she pushes past him and into the kitchen. “I’ve made up my mind, I need —” She swallows, stepping around the counter, but her attention is still on Graham. “I need to see him, I need to know.”

When she does turn her eyes down towards the body on the floor, though, everything stops: her words, her mind, her heart. Her breath catches in her throat. She might throw up — hell, she might faint. She needs—

Air.

Deep breaths. Slow movements. The balcony. Fresh air.

Holy shit.

“We’re ready to go here, Miss Swan, if you still want to come with us.”

But she knows she can’t. She can barely breathe, nonetheless make it down a flight of steps, so she shakes her head. “No, I — I’ll go with Graham. We need to talk to David.”

Though Graham offered to pick him up at the tavern, David insists on meeting her at the hospital. Between the slow night and the fear in Emma’s voice, he leaves almost immediately, much closer to the hospital than Killian’s apartment, but Graham and Emma still beat him there in the sheriff’s cruiser.

She’s a mess. An absolute mess, pacing in the waiting room, unable to stop moving — her feet, her hands, her mind, everything moving a mile a minute. Graham tried to get her to talk on the way there, but she couldn’t do it, wasn’t able to explain anything with David there. (Odd, he thought, but she’s certainly in a state of shock, so he doesn’t question it.)

It only takes David a few minutes longer than them to get there, but she spends them trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together, trying to figure everything out.

It doesn’t help, though. If anything, it just makes her head spin faster, dizzying her to the point where she needs to sit down for a moment — a moment that finds a quick end when David finally walks through the doors. It’s obvious by both his crazed expression and the amount of his hair sticking up in different directions that he’s been worrying about her since she hung up the phone, which doesn’t surprise her, but there wasn’t much she could do about it, since she couldn’t fill him in over the phone.

He greets Graham first, sharing a handshake with him before wrapping his arms around Emma. She’s always thought that was part of the reason she got along with him much better than James, even though she’s much similar to his gruff, silent personality. But David always seemed to understand her, was there for her emotionally the way no one else ever tried to be, and he truly has been pretty much her only best friend until Ruby came home to Storybrooke a few years’ past.

“Emma, please, tell me what’s going on,” he says after a moment, the silence of it all finally getting to him.

So she does. She fills him in, letting Graham give a little background on the stalker case after she talks about going home with Killian that first night. She doesn’t share anything that doesn’t need to — he is still her brother, and she would be okay if both he and Graham just assumed that she and Killian’s relationship had never gotten physical. She sums up the past few weeks quickly, seeing him throughout the day, spending nights between their apartments, everything he needs to know, until she gets to earlier that night, to standing in the hallway helpless as she hears the gunshots, to hoping that it’s safe for her to go in even though all that greets her on the other side of the door is silence — and how she found Killian on the floor behind the couch with a bullet in the shoulder and the stalker in the kitchen, how she called 9-1-1 and they talked her through finding a towel and putting pressure on the wound until the paramedics got there.

At the end of it all, David sighs from the seat he decided to take next to Graham, even with Emma still pacing between them and Henry, now seated on the other side of the small aisle. “So everything’s okay, the stalker is taken care of and now we just have to wait for Killian to get out of surgery.”

Emma shakes her head as she whips to face him, movement enough to make her vision go blurry for a moment. “Everything is not okay, David,” she says, which grabs the attention of both men. “It all comes back to Neal.”

“What?”

“The stalker. It was Felix.”

Graham stands up, running his fingers through his hair. This is beginning to be too much for him. “Wait, you— you know the stalker?”

At this, Emma nods, sitting in the seat he just stood from. “After I graduated from high school, I needed to get out of Storybrooke, but you already know that. So I went to Boston, and that’s where I met Neal. I got into the wrong crowd almost immediately, and he was — well, he was in charge of it. I knew he was older than me, but I never cared about how much older. I was seventeen and stupid and I though he was the answer to the thrilling life that I thought I needed. And I thought I loved him, which blinded me to what he was really doing, which was serious crime on top of all the gaslighting and manipulation towards me in particular. He would be out all night, come home all bloodied up but happy, and told me I was insane when I tried to ask him about it. Plus he had all this money, which he said came from his dad, who was apparently the ambassador of something, some kind of Boston big shot, so I shrugged off the fact that he had so much money.

“His best friend was this guy named Felix, who was even more terrifying than he was, covered in scars and tattoos and he had a violent past, though Neal convinced me it was all in the past even though he was apparently wanted for murder or something near the end, which was when I found out what they were doing, what they had been doing the whole time we were together. But I was young and stupid and I thought I was in love, so I shrugged it off, especially when he talked about running away from it all, leaving behind his life in Boston that required so much from him to somewhere quiet, where we could live in peace after one more big grab. That’s what he called it. And I believed him.

“We were supposed to leave that night, so I met him at his father’s mansion, everything packed in my car. I just needed him to come home. But it was a set up, and they called the cops and claimed to have me under citizen’s arrest, though I wouldn’t have even had anywhere to run had I tried. I was seventeen, an orphan, technically family-less since Ruth had never finalized her adoption, so I went to prison until my eighteenth birthday and then came home. I’ve been trying to forget about Neal and his cronies for ten years, and since Ruth passed a few years ago, David is the only person that knows what happened in the year and a half I was gone, except that little bit I’ve told Killian over the past few weeks but seeing Felix’s face tonight, even seeing him dead in Killian’s kitchen, brought it all back.”

David, who wrapped his arm around her shoulder near the beginning of her story, pulls her in closer, an awkward hug at an awkward angle, especially with the arms of their chairs between them, but it calms Emma nonetheless.

“I don’t think it’s over, though,” she says after a moment, voicing the fear that has chilled her since she recognized the body in Killian’s kitchen.

Graham is still trying to wrap his head around it all, and this certainly doesn’t help. Both he and Henry look back up at her. “Why? What?”

“Everything Felix did, he either did because Neal told him to, or because he was trying to impress him. So if Felix really is behind all this, as you seem to believe he is—”

“He matches the sketches that some of his victims have given us, he’s definitely the stalker,” Graham cuts in, needing to have some semblance of control over the situation.

Emma nods, but continues. “He either did it because Neal told him to, or he did it for him. Either way, I can’t help but think that wherever Felix is, Neal can’t be too far behind.”

“Fuck.” The word slips through David’s teeth, sounding foreign to Emma in his voice, but it’s fitting.

“So you think this Neal guy might be here in Storybrooke?” Henry asks.

Hearing the words spoken out loud makes Emma want to scream, or cry, or curl up in a ball on the floor. Or all three. But that doesn't change the fact that: “Yes. Or he will be soon. He may even be listed as Felix’s next of kin.”

She doesn’t like making plans without Killian, since he has been so integral to her and her safety for weeks now, but hearing Graham and Henry trying to piece a plan together, one that involves police escorts and uniforms stationed outside David’s house — the only safe place for her to stay, obviously — begins to calm her still-pounding heart.

They sit in silence for a while, each of them still trying to fit all the pieces together in a puzzle that seems totally impossible, but it’s not long before Dr. Whale comes out through the doors, a smile on his face that clashes with the tension in the waiting room.

If he senses something is off, he ignores it, spreading his arms wide in what can only be described as a welcoming gesture. Understandably,all four of them in the waiting room ignore it.

“I have good news, and I have good news!”

He’s much too happy for them. Graham rolls his eyes, as he does multiple times every time he has to deal with the doctor.

When only Emma and Henry physically turn their attention towards him, he tones the theatrics down a bit, which might be all that he’s capable of. “Since it was a low-caliber bullet, it didn’t pass all the way through, stopped by his shoulder blade and the muscles around it. Normally we’d worry about irreversible nerve damage to his hand and arm, but since he already has a prosthetic, that's no concern to us and he should heal just fine, with some minor physical therapy to fully regain use of his shoulder.”

“Can we see him?” Emma asks, her voice noticeably quieter than normal, making her seem smaller. Weaker.

Dr. Whale purses his lips, his eyes turned to the floor — avoiding meeting any of their gazes. “He’s not awake yet from the anesthesia, and probably won’t be until morning.”

“Besides,” Graham starts, practically cutting him off. “You should get some rest tonight. Tomorrow I’m going to need to take formal statements from both of you, a lot of paperwork and a lot of formalities. It’ll probably take most of the day.”

Emma sighs. “We’re supposed to meet with Mayor Mills tomorrow to go over a few cases.”

Everyone in the waiting room, including the doctor, watches in awe as Graham blushes, a soft smile gracing his face. “I’ll take care of Mayor Mills for you, don’t worry.”

A shocked silence takes over the waiting room. David laughs.

Dr. Whale clicks his tongue. “Well. Mr. Jones will be ready for visitors in the morning,” he says, then turns away from them and pushes back through the double doors he came through.

David barks out another laugh, breaking the silence that has built around them, slipping his arm around Emma’s shoulder. “It appears our boy here has developed himself a little crush.”

Graham rolls his eyes, but his blush deepens nonetheless. “For your information, Nolan — not that it’s any of your business anyway — it appears that she returns my ‘crush,’” he says, putting his own air-quotes around the word. “And she and I have been on a few dates as our busy schedules have allowed.”

Henry covers his face with his hands. David, apparently, can’t stop laughing. Emma’s not even sure how to feel, but can’t keep the smile off her face.

Graham shakes his head. “Let’s get out of here, alright? The smell of antiseptic is upsetting my stomach.”

She was worried about not being able to sleep. It was much easier to convince herself that she was safe when she could feel Killian beside her, when she knew that if anything did go wrong, he would be right there to protect her, either from the ghosts in her mind or the ones that had recently manifested in the real world. But she can’t get rid of them, the memories of Neal from ten years ago and the nightmares that have plagued her since, not to mention the memory of Felix dead in Killian’s apartment. Sure, Graham told her not to, and he was probably right, but she had to, had to know. Did it make anything better? Questionable. In some ways, it definitely made it worse, the shadow of Neal hanging over her more than ever before.

She can’t do this, though. Every time she closes her eyes, she’s met with Felix, or Neal, or one of his other cronies, or something from those long few months she spent in jail. Sighing, she pushes herself out of the bed, making her way to the guest bathroom as quietly as she can.

She turns on the faucet, needing some sort of sound to stop the ringing in her ears, the screaming in her head, and it almost works. Splashing the water on her face helps a little, too, helps calm the pounding of her heart. She runs her fingers through her hair, fisting some of the strands. For a moment, she thinks about showering again, even though she stood under the spray for far too long when they got home from the hospital, but she fears that nothing will make the nightmarish pictures on the other side of her eyelids disappear.

But she has to try. So she shuts off the water, turning away from the mirror before she can meet her own eyes, and leaves the bathroom, deciding instead to try sleeping.

And it almost works. She drifts off quickly, somehow, but it doesn’t last for too long before the piercing ring of her cell phone cuts through the silence of the house.

Graham Humbert, the screen reads.

Well, fuck. Her mind begins to race immediately, but it’s racing in circles around one main point: Neal Gold.

“What? What happened?”

“Emma, relax, please,” he breathes, though his own inability to do so is prevalent in his voice, even over the phone. “Killian is fine, he wasn’t hurt, but there’s been — there was an attempted attack at the hospital, and we got him. But Killian wants you here, just in case there’s someone else here. Henry’s waiting for you outside David’s.”

“Okay.”

“See you soon.”

But then it hits her: “Wait!” she says, hoping it’s not too late, and Graham hums. “You said you got him, but who was it?”

“Oh,” he says cooly, as if his next words aren’t going to rip her world apart. “It was Neal. Neal Gold.”

-- -- -- --

tagging: @shireness-says @kmomof4 @thisonesatellite @let-it-raines @wellhellotragic @darkcolinodonorgasm @profdanglaisstuff @stahlop @teamhook @snowbellewells @carpedzem @pepperspotts @imlaxdris71 @gingerchangeling @lfh1226-linda @kday426 @scientificapricot @resident-of-storybrooke @ultraluckycatnd @itsfabianadocarmo @galadriel26 @jennjenn615 @therealstartraveller776 @nightskylover @xarandomdreamx @kristi555 @nikkiemms @vvbooklady1256 @withheartfulloflove – if you want to be added or removed, please let me know

#my writing #wordsbymeganmichael #cs fics #my fics #captain swan #the detective fic #killian jones #emma swan #answers? you want answers? WELL #you get this instead

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stark-tony · 4 years

Note

If you’re doing fic rec requests, I’d love to see one with future peter! College, adulthood, future relationships, avengers leader, anything!

here you go!

* = incomplete

Sweet Stories and Gentle Goodnights series* by frostysunflowers

summary:

pairings: michelle/peter

tags: fluff, humor, angst

warnings: character death

I Never Lived ‘Til I Lived In Your Light series* by losingmymindtonight

summary:

pairings: none

tags: fluff, angst

warnings: character death

Easy Come, Easy Go by losingmymindtonight

summary: Tony Stark spends a lifetime waiting for Peter Parker to leave.But the kid stays. He always stays.

pairings: none

tags: angst

warnings: character death

built from scraps by peterstank

summary: “Everybody needs someone. That’s what you said, right?” Pepper meets his eyes and he’s struck by the way she’s almost pleading. “We both lost. We can help each other.”

Her hand, palm up and open, stretches into the space between them.

Peter hesitates.

Then he takes it.

or: the one where tony was dusted instead of peter, so he and pepper try to figure out the whole ‘family’ thing together.

(oh, and it turns out that the man who died in peter’s arms on an alien planet is his biological father. who knew, right?)

pairings: pepperony, michelle/peter

tags: angst, fluff

warnings: abuse

Allston Christmas by Gruoch

summary: “You guys didn’t have to do this,” Peter says from where he sits squeezed into the middle seat of the U-Haul, sweat running down his back. The air-conditioning in the truck they’ve rented is broken, and even with the windows rolled down it’s hellishly hot inside. “Really. I could have handled it myself.”

“We wanted to,” Tony replies as he blasts the horn at a minivan with a “Harvard Mom” bumper sticker that is attempting to cut into his lane. “It’s like a little trip down memory lane. It’s nostalgic—it’s gonna be fun. Right, Rhodey?”

“Absolutely,” Rhodey agrees, with all the enthusiasm of a man being lead to the gallows.

pairings: none

tags: fluff, humor

warnings: none

failure’s a stranger we all dream about by searchingforstars

summary: Peter’s professors all seem to know Tony. Instead of calling Peter out for turning in the odd piece of homework late or getting distracted in class like they might do for anyone else, they give him pats on the back in hallways and tell him fondly that, “Tony must be so proud of you, following in his footsteps.”

Tony wouldn’t be, though. Not if he knew how much effort Peter was having to put in to keep his head above the water.

He just wants Tony to be proud of him.

He has to work harder - that’s the only way.

–

or, Peter’s college workload and anxiety makes him worry that maybe he’s not good enough for Tony.

pairings: none

tags: hurt/comfort

warnings: none

Only Time* by losingmymindtonight

summary: On Titan, Peter Parker survives the Stone’s twisted lottery. Back on Earth, Pepper Potts and May Parker do not.Tony is still left with a shattered world, trying desperately to build something in the wreckage.And the universe is still mourning. It is still seeking revenge.In the end, we will always end up here.

pairings: pepperony

tags: hurt/comfort

warnings: none

Irreconcilable by sahiya

summary: “We’ll still be friends, right?” she said, frowning at him over slightly grainy video on his phone. “We said we’d always be friends.”

It sounded unexpectedly plaintive, coming from her. Peter swallowed. We’ll always be friends had seemed easy to promise back in August. It was harder now, with the sting of rejection so fresh. She’d tried to tell him that it was about her, about how she had changed, but he knew it was about him, too. He wasn’t what she wanted.

“Yeah,” he said dully. “Yeah, of course.”

pairings: michelle/peter

tags: hurt/comfort

warnings: none

The Hoodie™ by coconutknightshade

summary: The one in which Tony overhears Peter telling his roommate that the MIT hoodie he’s wearing is his dads.The one in which Peter never plans to call Tony ‘dad’ to his face but the universe has other plans.

pairings: pepperony, happy/may

tags: fluff

warnings: none

You’ll Be Here (in My Heart) by seekrest

summary: The morning that Tony’s life changed forever began as his days usually began now — shuffling into the kitchen half asleep, going through the motions as he searched for Pepper’s favorite coffee mug.

Tony stifled a yawn, grabbing the Black Panther novelty mug she adored while he grabbed one that Morgan had made them years ago - one that made her now cringe with embarrassment anytime she saw him use it, the childish scribbles that made him laugh.

He sets Morgan’s creation down on the countertop as he reaches for the Black Panther mug, it being just barely out of reach for when Pepper has put it last.

“Damn thing.” Tony mutters to himself, fingers barely brushing against it before he grabs it - going to set it down on the counter only to be surprised when Pepper walks in from the bedroom, an unreadable expression on her face.

“Morning. You know, you and I need to have a talk about about your choice of mugs. I know T’Challa somehow perfected the cup warmer thing here but you could at least show a little—“

“Michelle’s in labor.”

pairings: none

tags: angst

warnings: none

An MIT Halloween by bethy_277

summary: Coming to MIT had been difficult, having almost lost his mentor when he had snapped to save the entire universe, and Peter had really struggled. If it hadn’t been for Ned and Harley- who he had met shortly after he came back and become good friends with- he didn’t think he would have made it past the first few weeks at school. He had called both May and Tony that first week, hysterical and begging to come back to New York. May had been patient, Tony had been ready to get in his car to drive to him to help him through it, and Harley and Ned had been there and talked him down both times.

**Peter is a college student at MIT and Tony brings Morgan up for some trick-or-treating.

pairings: none

tags: fluff

warnings: none

287 Miles by imgoingtocrash

summary: There’s a long list of things that Tony would rather be doing at six in the morning that don’t involve carrying his seven year old daughter across MIT’s campus in his pajamas and a hoodie from the university that’s older than the student he’s visiting.

However, when Peter calls in the middle of a Wednesday night, Tony answers. That’s the gig, the only one left that matters now that he’s out of the superhero game.

The Great Tony Stark: father/father-figure of two, cares about working for SI when the mood strikes or his wife asks, savior of the universe, otherwise retired at the ripe old age of fifty-four.

Peter calls from MIT in a state of panic. Tony shows up with Morgan in tow, and only kind of makes a big deal out of the whole situation.

pairings: none

tags: fluff

warnings: none

The beauty that she brings by Gruoch

summary: Peter puts a hand on Tony’s shoulder and leans in close, his expression wide-eyed and solemn. “Can you keep a secret?”

“Honestly?” Tony makes a face. “No, I can’t. I really struggle with impulse control and running my mouth when I shouldn’t.”

***

or, old man builds family, lives happily ever after

pairings: michelle/peter, pepperony

tags: fluff, humor

warnings: non-consensual drug use

The Gift by Gruoch

summary: “Dad!” Morgan says, bursting into the room. “Dad—the baby’s on the ceiling.”

“The baby’s on the what now?” Tony asks, getting up to follow her into the living room.

Morgan points up at the ceiling, where baby June is happily crouched upside-down above their heads, offering them a gummy grin.

Tony looks up at her, hands on his hips. June looks back down at him and babbles nonsensically, clearly delighted with her fresh perspective on the world.

“Hm,” Tony says, rubbing a finger over his mustache as he assesses the situation. “Alright, no problem. I’ll get her down—go grab me a broom.”

“Dad!” Morgan says, scandalized. “You can’t just whack the baby off the ceiling with a broom.”

Or, Peter stresses, Tony schemes, and baby Jones-Parker keeps everyone on their toes.

pairings: none

tags: fluff, humor

warnings: none

And You’re Miles Away by losingmymindtonight

summary: College is scary, even for teenage superheros.

pairings: none

tags: hurt/comfort

warnings: none

This B.S. Better Be Worth It* by losingmymindtonight

summary: Originally, Tony’s plan had been to just surprise Peter with the fact that he would be on campus for a semester.He’d never actually expected Peter to sign up for his class.

pairings: none

tags: fluff, humor

warnings: none

Magic Tree House: Spiders at Sunrise by ciaconnaa

summary: "Trust me, you’ll have so much more fun here,“ Peter tells his daughter. “You get to play with Gerald, swim with Morgan, garden with Pepper -”

“- build a toy airplane with me,” Tony adds.

Peter’s eyes grow comically wide. He lets out a loud, dramatic, shout of anguish before he takes a few steps over and collapses onto the rug, AJ still pressed close to his chest. She starts shrieking with laughter at his theatrics. “No way! A toy airplane?! Tony builds the best stuff! I’m so jealous.”

or;

When MJ needs to study for school and Peter needs to do Official Spidery Things, their daughter gets to stay at Tony’s for a week, much to his delight. They do fun things like eating ice cream and watching movies. They also fall out of a tree house, but that part isn’t so fun.

pairings: none

tags: fluff

warnings: none

Candle in the Window by madasthesea

summary: Finals are over and Peter just wants to go home. The weather has other ideas.

pairings: none

tags: hurt/comfort

warnings: none

snapshot by ciaconnaa

summary: When Tony gets a call at 4am from Peter, he assumes it’s an emergency.

This thought is reinforced when, upon picking up the call, Peter announces, “Hi, I have an emergency.”

or;

Tony suffers a major blood pressure drop, Peter bakes a birthday cake that looked like it was bitten by a radioactive spider, and the two of them look at photos from a time capsule.

pairings: michelle/peter

tags: fluff

warnings: none

a sticky situation by ciaconnaa

summary: “Hey, Tony, look what I can do!”

Of all the things he expected in the grand adventure that is babysitting Peter’s daughter, Tony did not expect to turn his head to find the kid stuck to the ceiling.

Like father, like daughter, it would seem.

pairings: none

tags: fluff, humor

warnings: none

christmas eve car-rides by transpeterp

summary: tony picks peter up from college to get him home in time for christmas;fluff ensues

pairings: none

tags: fluff

warnings: none

#irondad #irondad and spiderson #tony stark #peter parker #my fic recs #yeah i know built from scraps is part of a series but I've only read the first two stories so i didn't want to rec the entire series #tw abuse

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submissivedjberry · 4 years

Text

Back to You || Jolia

Tagging: DJ Berry & Jo Fabray ( @jofabray )

Date: August 8, 2020

Location: Jo’s Suite

Summary: DJ goes to Jo after her scene with Nate & Mateo.

Jo was worried. There was no hiding it, no getting away from it, and no distracting herself from it. The sort of scene that DJ had volunteered herself for was intense, and it would require proper aftercare and a lot of attention. She trusted Nate - but knew less about Mateo. Presumably, since he had two claims, he was a capable Dominant, but DJ was hers, dammit, and Jo had spent the night obsessing over all that could go wrong. The blanket in her hand was wrung until it was a knotted mess, and whatever she'd been watching on TV all night was a complete mystery to her. She needed her girl in her arms, and the chance to look her over and be sure that she was safe. Then would come kisses, and cuddles, and all the attention the submissive could stand. As she waited for DJ to slip in the door of her suite, Jo shut her eyes in an effort to clear her head. It wouldn't do any good to be rolling with jealousy and worry when her girl arrived, and so that needed to go.

The scene with Nate and Mateo had been amazing. She had enjoyed being pushed in completely new ways. She was aching, but she was so happy. She had done well, as far as she could tell, and felt like she had grown through that scene. Returning to Jo's room took no time at all and she was there in the blink of an eye. She stepped inside and closed the door behind her, locking it as well. She moved further into the suite, smiling softly at the sight of her Domme resting on the couch. She dropped to her knees and then rested her chin on the Dominant's lap. She hoped that she didn't scare her.

Jo had half heard the door open, but she was comfortable and a bit lazy - so she simply waited for DJ to make herself known. Only when she felt a chin in her lap did she smile, hazy eyes slowly blinking open. "Hey, darlin' girl. Sorry, I just thought I'd shut my eyes for a few minutes. How was your scene?" Even though she was barely awake, Jo's attention was laser focused on DJ's face. She needed to be sure that everything was okay, and that the aftercare DJ might have needed had been on offer.

"Hi, my Miss. That's alright. You should rest if that's what you want." DJ mused softly, dark eyes focused on the Domme's face. She was so enamored with the blonde and she was so glad that Jo wanted her too. She didn't understand how Jo wanted her but she was so very happy and so grateful. "My scene was good. I'm a little sore, but they took good care of me." DJ assured the other with a soft smile.

"Not just yet," Jo shook her head. "We can rest afterwards, my girl, but first we give you a good once-over." She was glad to hear, though, that the scene had gone well and DJ had been looked after. "C'mon with me to the bedroom, and y'all can tell me more about it. You had fun?" She tried to keep her voice light, but it was hard to hide the little twinge of jealousy in her words. "Think it's somethin' you'd want to do again?"

"If you're sure." She wasn't going to push it or try to stop the Domme from looking her over. She may not officially be Jo's sub, but they were moving towards it. That, in DJ's mind gave Jo every right to want to look her over. "Yes, Miss. I had fun. I think it was a really good start to something that I could do more often." DJ said honestly, not wanting to lie at all. "I would like to do it with you at some point if you find someone you might want to do it with, my Miss." When they reached the bedroom, she eased off her clothes.

"Positive. There's no way I'd sleep now if I didn't at least give y'all a quick check. Need to make sure my girl's in good shape." She smiled as DJ described how much she'd enjoyed it, and that she'd like to do it again. "If I ever find anyone I'd trust with us both in that sort of scene, darlin' girl, I'll be sure and make it happen for ya." Once DJ was stripped, Jo kissed her gently on the top of her head. "Lie down for me, please. Anywhere you're feeling sore, or that I should look at first?"

"Keep me updated on that please, Miss?" DJ questioned, even though she knew there was a chance that she wouldn't get a chance to do it with Jo. She flushed slightly. "I'm mostly just a bit sore down below. They used a plug on me anally after Mateo opened me up with his fingers. But I really think it's okay, just not something my body has been used to in the past." DJ expressed honestly. "Other than that though, I'm feeling good."

"Of course, Dalia. I'd never consider bringin' someone else in to scene with us without a good long talk first. Our time is our time, and we'll keep that to ourselves unless there's someone I really think is worth lettin' be part of it with us." She nodded, taking that information in and wincing a little at the use of an anal plug. "Good girl. I'll just keep this quick, then, and you can tell me what you need - we can eat, if y'all would like, or rest first. Your choice."

"Our time." DJ agreed with a smile. She knew that there was a chance that Jo would connect with someone else and want to claim them, but it was nice to know that Jo would be open if that happened. She had had dinner before the scene, knowing that she wouldn't be let go until eleven, but having some fruit might not be a bad idea. "Do you still have some fruit, my Miss?" The submissive questioned, stretching out to let the Domme look her over wherever she would like.

Jo smiled in response. "I do, in fact. There's some grapes and some oranges, so we can help ourselves after." She didn't make too big a show out of examining DJ, but her careful gaze went from head to toe before giving her a gentle nudge so that the Dominant could check her other side. There were no visible marks, at least nothing that looked fresh, and Jo let out a soft sigh between her teeth. Part of her had been sure that Nate or Mateo might have done something that she'd have to take them to task for, but apparently that hadn't happened. "Looks all good, darlin'. If y'all want to slip a robe on, yours is just behind the door there. We can get some fruit and sit up for a little - thinkin' in here, or out on the couch?"

"That sounds perfect. I really like that idea." DJ agreed with a hum. She could already taste the sweetness and she was excited for the before bedtime snack. As she was tapped, she giggled softly and rolled over so that the Domme could look over the other half of her. Once she was finished, she eased herself onto her feet. "I think in here if that's okay with you?" She suggested and then moved to grab her robe, pulling it on and tying it closed before moving to the Domme and slipping her arms around her waist, nuzzling into her neck. "I had fun, but I'm glad you wanted me to come back tonight. I like falling asleep with you."

"That's just fine with me, darlin' - I'm very comfy in here with y'all, so it sounds like a really great plan to me." When DJ nuzzled into her, Jo's hands gently rubbed her back through the soft fabric of the robe. "I'm glad that you could - come back, I mean. I would have hated to have to wait until morning to see y'all after a scene like that. And I know just what you mean, because I very much like fallin' asleep with you too. I sleep better that way."

She was so glad that Jo felt the same way and that she wanted her here as much DJ wanted to be here. It caused a warmth to fill her up. "Did you do anything while I was gone? Have any company or anything?" DJ questioned, wondering if Jo kept herself busy at all over the last few hours. The feeling of the blonde's hands against her back was amazing, she felt so safe and so cared for.

Jo smiled, shaking her head. "Nah. I just curled up on the couch and had some tea, and that was about the extent of my excitin' evening until you got back." There wasn't a long list of people knocking down her door to spend time with her, and she didn't go out of her way to look for any either. "One intense scene between the two of us'll have to do for today."

“Sounds very relaxing, my Miss." DJ uttered gently, pulling back so that they could go get the fruit. "You don't have to scene with everyone you hang out with though, my Miss. Do you have anyone coming over tomorrow? Do I have to rush out at all?"

"It was, darlin' girl, thank you. A really nice evening, and the tea kept my mind off worryin' about y'all." Leading her out to the kitchen, Jo smiled an acknowledgement of DJ's words. "That's a fair enough point, my girl. But no, there's no one coming over - y'all can stay just as long as you'd like, we can get some extra sleep and take things easy." Opening the fridge, she found the fruit and set it out on the counter. "As much as you'd like, darlin'."

"You were worried about little ole' me?" Hearing that she didn't need to leave, she smiled softly. "Okay, Miss. But if that changes and you want to invite someone over, that's okay. I can leave so you can have someone other than me around." She teased, leaning over to kiss Jo's cheek. She reached in to grab some grapes as they were placed on the counter and she hummed. "So very good. Thank you."

Jo quirked an eyebrow. "I worry about you every time you're not here with me, Dalia. And that's not sayin' I don't want you to go other places or be with other people, but I will always worry until I see y'all again." She smiled as lips pressed to her cheek, reaching out to gently tousle dark hair. "I know you're teasin', but I'd never do that. Our time is our time." Jo put the grapes in a bowl along with a couple of oranges, reaching for DJ's hand. "You're welcome. I know how much a scene can take out of you, so fruit is a good idea."

"I'll always come back to you." DJ promised, meaning the words with every fibre of her being. She was Jo's. They may not have been at the point of a trial claim, but not that they were trying out the rules, it felt like it was becoming more and more real. And she loved that. "I know. But I also know that I just seem to claim your weekends and I can give you Sunday if you want to see someone else...like Tina." The Domme had been texting her earlier so she didn't know if she wanted time with her. "So delicious."

Her heart swelled a little in her chest, and she couldn't resist stealing a kiss. "And I will always be here waitin' for you," she promised. "Every single time." She led DJ to the bed and settled in, propping up the bowl between them. "If you claim my weekends, darlin', it's because that's what I want." She hesitated, considering her next words carefully. "I don't think Tina would have much fun over here. I know how much she struggles with the little things about the system, and there are things I can't let her get away with not doin'. Like kneelin' at the door." She popped a slice of orange into her mouth, chewing slowly. "I think she could use the company, but I'm still workin' on the best way to let her have it." Swallowing, she shook her head. "But this weekend, I'm all yours. Until classes Monday, if y'all want to stay that long."

The kiss was so welcomed, just like any other kiss she had ever received from the blonde. They were always perfect. She followed her to the bed, getting very comfortable. "I understand, Miss. Sorry." She breathed out, not wanting it to seem like she thought she could get Jo to do something she didn't want to. She hummed softly when she said that she wasn't sure if Tina would have fun over at Jo's, thinking over the dilemma that her Domme seemed to be facing. "I think she may be more willing if you ask her to do so nicely. You guys have been talking a bit right? So it's not like you're just hopping into asking something of her? Is there a lot more than that that you think she might be against?" She paused, biting on her bottom lip. "Sorry, I don't mean to overstep or anything."

"No apologies necessary, sweet girl. I knew what y'all meant, I just wanted to remind you that I always want you here with me. As many days of the week as we can. And it's not like y'all just show up and expect to walk in, we always talk first if I want you over, or if it's your request. So I just don't want ya to have to have to worry about it," she promised. Jo quickly shook her head. "You're not. I appreciate the advice, darlin'." She thought over DJ's words for a moment, considering what she had to say. "You've got a point there. I don't think it'd be out of the blue if I asked her to kneel." She considered the question. "Titles. She doesn't like those at all. But other than that, I don't think there's anythin' that would come up if we had some time in private."

"You could always just talk to her first and see if they were things she could get behind to spend time together. It's not like you don't have the right to ask for those things, my Miss." DJ expressed gently, resting her head on her shoulder. "You are amazing and I don't know why anyone wouldn't agree to things that would let them hang out with you." She realize she was essentially pushing Jo to hang out with another submissive and part of her was a little uneasy about that but she needed to trust in what she and Jo were building, otherwise she would go insane. Plus, she wanted Jo to make connections.

Jo nodded. "I do, you're right, but I try to be careful about pushin' people who have no interest in the system. It's not my place to change their minds, after all, or to try and...I don't know, fix them." Jo gently rubbed her back. "I don't think there'd be a lot of people out there who'd share that opinion, darlin' girl, but it means the world to me that y'all think of me that way." Her opinion of herself wasn't low, but her time in Lima had shown that she didn't seem to be very compatible with a lot of her fellow students.

"I get that, Miss. But just expecting a few things as a means of respect isn't really pushing is it? You're just setting up your expectations and if Tina doesn't like it...she doesn't have to come over, right?" The rubbing of her back caused a content sigh to fall from her lips. She cared about the Domme so much and felt so very comfortable in the Domme's arms. "If they looked around properly, my Miss...there's no way they wouldn't think the same." DJ argued lightly.

"No, darlin', that's true. I don't think that I ask for a lot, or that I'm a particularly demanding Domme. I guess what I worry about more is pushin' her away, because I really don't know how many people would be willin' to spend time with her if she can't do the basics. But in the end I guess all I can do is try." DJ's words pulled a little smile from her. "You're very kind to me, my girl. Thank you."

"All you can do is try. And I don't think you'll push her away, Miss." DJ said, though she did feel a little bit of something churn within her that Jo seemed preoccupied with not wanting to push Tina away. She swallowed, keeping herself nuzzled against Jo so that she couldn't see her face. "Just the truth, Miss."

Jo nodded. "We'll just have to see." She rubbed DJ's back in small circles again. "My darlin' girl." She pressed a kiss to DJ's head. "Still feelin' good about having a new rule? I mean I know it didn't change anythin' in your scene, but is it working for you to know that you have one.”

The kiss to her head had a bright smile forming on her lips. Jo always seemed to know what she needed, even if she didn't know why the submissive needed it. "Mmm, yes, Miss. I feel very good about having this rule. It's making things...what we are aiming for...feel more real."

"I'm glad to hear that. I feel very much the same - it's tough sometimes, I think, to remind ourselves while we're in separate rooms taking separate classes, or having nights apart, that we're still makin' progress toward the same goal. We're going to get there, and by the time we do we'll have some rules that we're both comfortable with." Jo thought for a moment. "For our next one, I'd like to propose something. A rule that would make you feel more grounded in a claim. Think y'all can do that for me?"

"I agree." She was glad that the blonde felt similarly to her. When Jo brought up having an idea for the next rule, she pulled back from the Domme and turned to rest on her back so she could look up at Jo, head now resting in her lap like it had been before she had gone for her scene. This time though, instead of on the long couch, her legs were hanging off of the bed. "Yes, my Miss. What do you have in mind?" Her eyes were wide, eager to find out what Jo might have planned next for them both.

Jo loved just how domestic, how loving and relaxed it felt as DJ laid in her lap. Brushing some fine hair away from her face, her smile at her submissive was soft and bright. "How would you feel about changing the way you address me? I think once you're mine officially, even in a trial, I'd like something more than Miss. That said," she hesitated. "I'm not sure that I like Mistress. So I was hoping you might have a better idea."

"Something more than Miss but not Mistress." She mused, biting down on her bottom lip thoughtfully. "I think I'll have to think about it, my Miss. I can slip a new one in every once in a while and then see how we both feel?" She didn't want to just choose, she wanted it to be perfect.

Jo nodded and smiled. "I think that's a very smart way to go, darlin' girl. We'll try them out and find somethin' that feels right to us both. My girl's so brilliant." Resting a hand on her forehead, Jo just took the sight of her in. "Also, I was going to ask: did you want to come up with some rules as well? I won't necessarily agree to them, but if you have ideas of what would make you more comfortable in a claim I think we should talk about those. No hurry, of course, but if anything comes to you."

When Jo asked the next thing, she hummed softly. How did she feel about coming up with some rules that she might feel comfortable with? It wasn't a bad idea, because she knew that at the end of the day, Jo would still be in charge of what rules she actually ended up having. "I think I like that idea too, Miss Jo." DJ agreed, reaching out to grab Jo's other hand and like their fingers as their hands rest over her stomach.

"Wonderful," Jo nodded. "I'll look forward to hearin' what y'all think of, darlin'." She gave their joined fingers a little squeeze. "How are you feelin'? Did you get enough fruit?" They'd likely sleep before too long, once the adrenaline of the scene had left DJ's body, but Jo wanted to be sure that she had eaten and got some fluids in her before that happened. It would help prevent any drop and hopefully allow DJ to rest.

"I'll definitely do some thinking. Promise." She would take this seriously. "Yes, Miss. I feel good. Just content. I'm with you, I'm very happy." DJ assured her, smiling up at the Domme. "I just want to make sure you are happy too." The submissive expressed, biting down on her bottom lip with a shrug of her shoulder.

"I never doubted you'd do otherwise, my girl." Jo tilted her head curiously. "Darlin', as long as y'all are here with me I'll be happy. I'm so proud to be lookin' to the future with you, and I know we're going to have a great trial claim. Then I can keep y'all here with me all the time, and that's going to make me happier still. I don't need more than you."

Her heart beat wildly in her chest and she felt tears well up in her eyes, turning her head to nuzzle into Jo's stomach and take a breath. She wasn't sure why she was so emotional, bur she felt it deeply.

Jo worried at the tears, but she trusted that if she'd said something wrong then DJ would tell her so. Instead she scratched gently at her scalp, giving their still-joined hands a little squeeze. "I've got you, darlin' girl. You're right here with me. And you're not goin' anywhere."

She took a few moments and then pulled back to look up at her. "I'm so happy you want me." She breathed out. She never would have imagined that she would have someone who wanted her this much so soon, or ever.

Nearly overcome with the wave of emotion that DJ's words caused, Jo had to blink a few times to clear her eyes. "Darlin' girl, I'm the lucky one. You're going to be so wanted, by so many people, and for some reason I can't fathom y'all want me."

When Jo sent the words back in her direction, she smiled widely. Jo was just so perfect. She breathed out slowly and leaned up to press their lips together, unable to stop herself in that moment. She didn't need anything more than that, just wanted the intimate touch.

Jo took her hand from DJ to cradle the back of her head, leaning down to make sure that the other woman didn't need to bend too far. She let the kiss linger for as long as DJ wanted it to, ceding control in the moment so that they could both get what they needed.

#post: para #para: jo fabray #para: jo fabray 10

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thesportssoundoff · 5 years

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“A tremendous title fight, a buncha old dudes and moral dilemmas” UFC 237 preview

Joey

May 8th, 2019

In many ways, UFC 237 is a unique card and yet it is, in many ways, a throwback card. This is the sort of show the UFC tries to pull off when it knows what the main event is and it knows that it needs some serious protection. In the old PPV era, this would be the kind of card where your mileage would vary depending upon how hooked up to a nostalgia drip you are. Nowadays with them getting a guaranteed payout before a PPV even sees the air, this kind of card feels retro. It's got a competent title fight with a bevy of names you'd recognize who fall on the spoiled side of their MMA expiration dates. It's like a Mighty Mouse card (albeit with a far more compelling main event) in a market that still has pings and feels for a show like this. Brazilians want to see their heroes and so the company is trotting out the likes of Anderson Silva, Jose Aldo, Lil Nog, Thiago Alves and a whole host of familiar names and faces potentially for the last time. It's Brazil vs the world (for the most part) with just enough good vibes and fair matchmaking to give the fans potentially one big feel good moment. I just also know that this card is for a very niche audience which you might not be in there.

Fights: 13

Debuts: Viviane Araujo, Carlos QuirLoz, Luana Carolina

Fight Changes/Injury Cancellations: 4 (Wu Yanan OUT, Priscila Cachoeira IN vs Luana Carolina/Jessica Rose Clark OUT, Melissa Gatto IN vs Talita Bernado/Said Nurmagomedov OUT, Carlos Quiroz IN vs Raoni Barcelos/Melissa Gattoo OUT, Viviane Araujo IN vs Talita Bernardo)

Headliners (fighters who have either main evented or co-main evented shows in the UFC): 11 (Anderson Silva, Jose Aldo, Rose Namajunas, Jessica Andrade, Thiago Alves, Francisco Trinaldo, BJ Penn, Clay Guida, Big Nog, Bethe Correia,Priscila Cachoeira )

Fighters On Losing Streaks in the UFC: 2 (BJ Penn, Priscila Cachoeira)

Fighters On Winning Streaks in the UFC: 7 (Jessica Andrade, Rose Namajunas, Alexander Volkanovski, Jose Aldo, Carlos Diego Ferreira, Irene Aldana, Raoni Barcelos)

Main Card Record Since Jan 1st 2017 (in the UFC): 25-11

Rose Namajunas- 3-0 Jessica Andrade- 4-1 Anderson Silva- 1-1 Jared Cannonier- 2-3 Jose Aldo- 2-2 Alexander Volkanovski- 5-0 Thiago Alves- 2-2 Laureano Staropoli- 1-0 Francisco Trinaldo- 2-2 Diego Ferreira- 3-0

Fights By Weight Class (yearly number here):

Lightweight- 3 (30) Women’s Bantamweight- 2 (5) Welterweight- 2 (29) Women’s Strawweight- 1 (12) Women’s Flyweight- 1 (14) Light Heavyweight- 1 (17) Featherweight- 1( 21) Middleweight- 1 (15) Bantamweight- 1 (24)

Heavyweight- (15) Flyweight- (7)

2019’s Records We Keepin’ Track Of:

Debuting Fighters (11-30): Carlos Quiroz, Melissa Gatto, Luana Carolina

Short Notice Fighters (13-15): Melissa Gatto, Carlos Quiroz, Priscila Cachoeira

Second Fight (30-7): Ryan Spann, Laureano Staropoli, Thiago Moises

Cage Corrosion (Fighters who have not fought within a year of the date of the fight) (10-18): Bethe Correia, Rose Namajunas

Undefeated Fighters (16-22): Melissa Gatto

Fighters with at least four fights in the UFC with 0 wins over competition still in the organization (6-6): BJ Penn

Weight Class Jumpers (Fighters competing outside of the weight class of their last fight even if they’re returning BACK to their “normal weight class”) (14-9): Kurt Holobaugh

Twelve Precarious Ponderings

1- If this show was on traditional PPV, how many buys would it get? Is 125K satisfactory given the conditions?

2- Rose Namajunas vs Jessica Andrade IS in all honesty a compelling title fight. It pits pretty much the division's top finisher (Rose Namajunas) against the division's top pressure fighter (Andrade) with the champion opting to face the champion on HER home turf, creating for a pretty compelling narrative to be told. They have more similarities offensively than people give them credit for; both Rose Namajunas and Andrade do their best work coming forward, pressuring albeit in different ways. They're cardio machines, cutting a pace early and dictating both the range and the tempo of the fight. For Rose, she's long enough and creative enough that its a pick your poison type affair. You can fight her at range, get picked apart from a distance with kicks and her really good straight shots OR you can blitz her, clinch with her and hope you're strong enough to win inside consistently. Andrade offers you no choice but to fight her fight for however long it goes. She cuts a relentless pace, has Mr. X level pursuit and while I think her power shouting vs Karolina was more of a perfect shot, she hits hard enough to break just about anybody. Even against Joanna, she still did her thing (pressure, come forward, blitz like a mad woman) which Joanna having the ability to win behind a tremendous jab and superior footwork. Rose CAN follow Joanna's gameplan of kicks + jab + circling for twenty five minutes, flustering Andrade from a distance but I'm not sure if she can do that while dealing with the pressure of Jessica Andrade for 25 minutes. Even against the likes of Tecia Torres and Joanna, Rose had those lapses in concentration where it felt like she stopped fighting her fight and needed to be reminded by her corner to mentally check back in. You have to be there every single second of an Andrade fight because she is a momentum creature.

3- Given how hard Andrade pressures and how long Rose is, I wonder if takedowns are going to be apart of the gameplan for Namajunas. Andrade's build and her wrestling normally prevent attempts but Rose is the better grappler by far who can probably score a finish in a variety of spots on the ground. Being underneath Andrade's ground and pound is a miserable endeavor BUT she's also reckless enough that limbs and necks get left out there for experienced enough submission artists. Could/Would Rose pull guard?

4- If Max Holloway is going to fight in Anaheim as he's suggested (Late August for those curious), you have to assume that Volkanovski vs Aldo is a pseudo #1 contender fight. So what happens if Aldo wins? Is that where the UFC blows the dust off of Frankie Edgar?

5- Does anyone truly believe Anderson retires after this fight with Jared Cannonier?

6- Looking at this card on paper with its host of "legends" bound to generate some buzz in Brazil, it's a bummer they couldn't of found a way to get Johnny Walker on the card. Would've been a great rub for him with guys like Aldo and Silva on the show.

7- At some point Francisco Trinaldo is going to buck the conventional wisdom and fight like his age, right?

8- I don't know if it's the fact that they're both elder statesmen who fight younger than they are but look older than their birth certificates claim or the fact that both basically cut their teeth carving up mid tier dudes in their respective divisions but Francisco Trinaldo and Cowboy Oliveira sure seem to have a lot in common. Both are really aggressive somewhat limited guys whose limitations show up when they attempt to make the long march to the top of their division. Both Oliveira and Trinaldo rely on brute force strength with so-so fight IQ but a surprising wealth of ways to be violent if they so choose them. Trinaldo faces Carlos Diego Ferreira who burst onto the scene with the UFC and then just kinda stalled out in no small part due to injuries and one of those supplement suspensions. Carlos is coming into his own based off back to back wins vs top competition and while I don't know if he'll ever be a consistent top 10-15 lightweight, there's light at the end of the tunnel for him. This fight should be insanely violent in spurts.

9- Worth noting that if she beats Bethe Correia, Irene Aldana will be on a three fight winning streak which should put her on the short list for women to potentially challenge Amanda Nunes. Especially since beating Bethe seems to be one of those secret passageways to a title shot.

10- I've never seen a more desperate attempt to milk out a win for a guy than Lil Nog vs Ryan Spann. Even in his faded borderline decrepit form, Lil Nog should have very little issue taking a W here.

11- Thiago Alves vs Laureano Staropoli has some sneaky FOTN potential. Laureano is an all action pressure forward fighter who like most guys out of non-Brazil South America has no idea what he's not supposed to do. As such, anything is on the table and AS such he fights like a guy who has a penchant disregard for his well being. Thiago Alves is no longer the kind of guy who can casually eat up the Staropoli types of the world and his last few fights have basically been him trying to be a sharpshooting counter striker who throws power shots at will. It should be a fun fight at the very least.

12- And I guess we gotta end negatively with BJ Penn. There's no reason for this fight to be happening from a pure actual fighting standpoint. I read someone elsewhere mention how "frail" BJ Penn looks as a fighter and I truly lack an actual better description for it besides that. He looks weathered. He looks old. He looks like a guy who knows how to only do one thing and he can physically no longer do it at any rate of success. Whatever you think of the legacy of BJ Penn or however you feel about his right to compete, it shouldn't be happening anymore and at the very least not at this level. This doesn't even account for the fact that he has so much turmoil in his life and while allegations can sometimes be just that, we've got a whole forrest fire worth of smoke telling us something is wrong. We all just recently read Babalu discuss the problems he's facing currently in his life after a long career of fighting. It should make us all stop and reconsider whether there needs to be such arbitrary lines of when enough is enough and how we can find the bridge for these guys when the time has come. BJ Penn isn't fighting because the UFC thinks he can do it; he's fighting because if not here then somewhere else and because there's always going to be a market for seeing your "heroes" compete. There are BJ Penn fans who watched the third Edgar fight thinking he could pull it off, there are BJ Penn fans who watched thinking he'd turn back the clock vs Dennis Siver. The UFC gave him the SAFEST possible match up in a guy they didn't think would hurt him and it still ended in disaster.

And yet on the same card, we have Anderson Silva who is 44 years old coming ooff of multiple surgeries, a career that includes some truly violent spectacle fights in his earlier days who has been rocked or KO'd in four of his last six fights. He was apart of one of the more violent gym cultures in the history of MMA. His family apparently asks him to retire after every fight, now running on what feels like four years worth of it. So if Penn's gotta go then shouldn't Anderson go? Even if my eyes tell me that he's got more in the tank, we're still comparing two guys who are clearly either firmly out of gas or running on E. Is it the fact that Anderson Silva by all accounts is a well adjusted guy who isn't in trouble? I mean wouldn't that make you more likely to want him to hang it up so he can preserve the way he is? I don't have all of the answers and so much of this is just emotion. All I know is I hope that this card is very much the last of its kind; a farewell to a lot of guys who made a special time in MMA with also a promise to do better by them in the future.

#MMA #UFC #UFC 237 #Rose namajunas #Jessica Andrade #BJ Penn #Anderson Silva

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welllpthisishappening · 5 years

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The Gift Receipt (5/5)

It genuinely makes sense in her head.

After all, Mary Margaret is being Mary Margaret and Emma just needs five seconds to herself and for her friends to get off her back and saying she can’t talk to Killian Jones because she and Killian Jones once went on a very bad date is the perfect excuse. It’s also not true, but whatever. It works.

Until Emma needs to bring someone home for Christmas. To get the entire town off her back. So, she comes up with another plan and another lie and pretending to get back together with a guy she was never actually with will make their inevitable break-up incredibly easy. It makes sense. Seriously.

That is, of course, until Killian agrees and there’s far too much pie and radio hits of the 70s and opinions on animated Christmas classics. It gets a little more complicated after that.

Rating: Mature Word Count: 9K+ Reunions deserve adjectives AN: If there is one thing you guys can always count on from me, it is a happy ending and kissing and the good guys winning. I don’t know that there’s winning here, but there’s definitely the other things and while stories sometimes have some angst, it’s always my goal to make sure that angst makes sense in character and, like, the real world. And there’s payoff. Here’s hoping you also think the payoff is worth it. As always I can’t thank you guys enough for letting me constantly throw words at you. It’s nice.

Also on Ao3 and FF.net if that’s how you roll.

She doesn’t call him.

She thinks about it. She considers it. She does...not much else for the next few days.

Emma stares at her phone and stares at the number in her phone and the text message conversation that sparked this whole goddamn, stupid thing because that’s exactly what it is. It’s stupid. It’s ridiculous and a little juvenile and decidedly immature because she knows she’s running away, but she’s also very good at running away and it’s not like he’s called her.

She rationalizes that particular point at four in the morning three days after Christmas, while she’s parked in her car in Astoria and, at that point, it feels like the most important thing in the world. It becomes less important forty-five minutes later when Emma’s heat is starting to sputter and her fingers are starting to take on a distinct blue-type hue and she’s typed and deleted the same message sixteen times.

On the fifth day she actually uses the system at work to try to track down Will Scarlet’s personal contact information because some absolutely insane part of her brain thinks that’s the best approach, but August walks in on her and--

“What the hell are you doing in here?”

“I work here,” Emma replies cooly, not looking up from the computer screen and that computer must be nearly thirty years old.

“What time did you get home last night?” “I don’t see how that’s your problem.” “Emma.” “Booth.” August shakes his head, the floor creaking under his feet when he moves further into the office and that should probably be a sign to both of them that they should be looking for another office. Emma is only a little worried the computer in front of her is going to explode.

“Emma,” August repeats, covering the screen with his palm. She groans.

“You’re going to get handprints all over there.” “We’ve got Windex somewhere.” “Can you use Windex on a computer?” August shrugs. “It’s like a TV right? God, I don’t care. That’s not important. What the hell are you doing here? If you’re going to try and get that Heller guy, you cannot be here today. It’s against the rules.” “Since when are you one for the rules?” “Ok, well, that’s rude. What’s going on with you?” “Nothing,” Emma lies, and the word feels heavy on her tongue. It feels like it’s settled into her soul too, a constant source of cold and disappointment and she should have just called him. They shouldn’t have left Storybrooke.

She’s considered driving to Boston more than once.

“You going to make a New Year’s resolution to become a better liar?” August asks, finally moving his hand and he’s not even remotely intimidated by Emma’s glare. “I’m serious about the overtime. If you’re clocking this, I’m not paying.” “You’re a benevolent leader, Booth.” “I’m being honest with you. See how that works?”

“And about as subtle as a pound of bricks.” “Occasionally that’s what it takes to get through to you,” August grins. Emma makes an incredibly unprofessional noise, widening her eyes and opening her arms like that will make her boss contradict himself. It only makes him laugh.

And she couldn’t find anything about Will Scarlet except the fact that he graduated from UMass Amherst and was part of the same frat she’s, like, seventy-two percent certain Robin was in.

That’s not really a lead though and Emma is usually better at this.

She refuses to acknowledge all the reasons she’s currently not.

“Wait, did you say that Heller guy?” Emma asks suddenly, like her brain has finally caught up to the conversation that will, actually, pay her. August nods. “Reportedly spotted in Mott Haven.” “Ah, the Bronx? C’mon, that traffic is going to suck.” “‘Tis the season for bums to try and run out on their bail and their families.” “God, that’s the most depressing thing I’ve ever heard.” August shrugs again, undeterred by depressing or anything that doesn’t immediately lead to a paycheck. “Someone I know up there saw him over by the St. Mary’s Dog Run.” “The Dog Run?” If August shrugs again, Emma is going to throw the computer at him. Then they’ll have to get a new one. August will make her pay for a new one. “What do you want me to tell you, Emma? This Heller guy is a dick. He’s hanging out in Mott Haven, apparently, I guess his girl’s got a thing for dogs.” “Did you swallow a 1940s gangster?” “You want to go up there tonight or you want to keep making quips that only you think are funny?” “Is that honestly a choice?” Emma asks, clicking a few more buttons and there’s seriously nothing about Will Scarlet on the internet. Her phone is still frustratingly silent.

And maybe she’s a little upset about that too – because Mary Margaret and David got back to the city two days ago and Ruby is supposed to be back tonight and they’ve all apologized and checked on her and double checked for good measure, but that’s as much contact as Emma’s had and the whole thing has left her feeling decidedly empty and even more lonely and she can’t seem to get warm.

The sentiment of it all feels far too heavy handed. Even in her own head.

“No,” August answers. “Unless you want me to find someone else to do your job for you.” Emma groans, rolling her eyes and clicking again – shutting down the computer and grabbing her phone and her keys and she’s fairly positive the heat in her car is getting worse.

And she hadn’t been wrong about traffic. It takes her forever to get up the FDR and the Willis Avenue Bridge is inexplicably closed, so she has to drive up to Third Avenue and that’s an extra forty minutes she wasn’t planning on. Because those extra forty minutes are just enough time to come up with all the reasons she should not want to date Killian Jones.

Still.

Or start. Whatever tense is appropriate.

Emma parks outside the dog run, tilting her seat back and doing her best to get comfortable, but that’s a losing battle from the get-go. She left her gloves in the office.

“Damn,” she mumbles, scrolling through her phone and wondering if she can find somewhere to get coffee without possibly missing this guy. She doesn’t get out of her car.

She types sixteen text messages instead.

She deletes them all.

And the hours continue to creep by, voices on the street because it’s not New Year’s Eve yet, but that’s tomorrow and Emma assumes there are still people out there who feel festive. Not her, but she’s sure they exist.

Her eyes are starting to flutter around two in the morning, a blanket she forgot was in the backseat wrapped around her shoulders, when she spots him. Or, at least, thinks she spots him. He’s not more than a shadow, a flash of a face that just looks like an asshole and Emma’s barely able to get out of the car without tripping over her own feet.

Eventually she will assume that was also some kind of sign.

It’s an absolute miracle she’s missed all of the signs.

“Hey,” she shouts, and the guy doesn’t slow down. He glances over his shoulder, just enough light at the end of the block to see his eyes widen, and then breaks out a dead sprint, nearly knocking over three different people in the process. “Aw, goodman, shit, fu--” Emma grumbles, and she doesn’t actually lock her car before she starts running after him.

She needs to get a better car.

She needs to get...better, but that’s neither here nor there and Emma can’t ponder life’s great meanings when she’s trying to chase down one of life’s great dicks. It doesn’t take long to get within lunging distance, but that’s kind of a last resort thing and Emma’s side is already aching.

Heller runs over another person on the sidewalk.

“Oh my God, you know you can go around them,” Emma calls. That’s a mistake. It hurts to yell and the air is cold and it feels like it may snow again and--

“--Or you could just stop chasing after me,” Heller counters. He jerks to his left, darting down an alley and something in the back of Emma’s brain starts at that. He’s backing himself into a corner. Maybe she’ll do something to her car with her inevitable paycheck.

Maybe she’ll use it to drive to Boston. Probably not.

She’s an absolute disaster.

That will also, eventually, be her downfall – quite literally.

Emma chases him into the alley, barely keeping her balance as she rounds the corner and Heller chuckles when he clears the fence at the back. “What the hell do you think you’re doing here?” he asks.

“Is that not obvious? What kind of ass blows his bail the day before New Year’s Eve?” “Am I messing up your plans?” “You’re helping, actually.” “Yeah? Big ideas for the holiday?” “Are we bantering when I’m honestly getting ready to bring you back to the cops?” Emma asks, and Heller grins at her. It makes her nauseous. That may just be the running.

“That seems to suggest I’m going anywhere with you. Or that you’re going anywhere.” “Excuse me?” “You got a look about you, don’t you?” Emma gags, complete with a stuck-out-tongue, but that only makes Heller laugh and his confidence is unnerving. “What exactly is it you did?” she asks, jogging towards the chain-link fence and trying, rather fruitlessly, to find a foothold. It hasn’t snowed yet, but it had been raining before and cold and everything feels like it’s covered in a thin sheet of ice.

Emma included.

“Forgery,” Heller answers, as if that’s not a crime. “Pretty much anything I could get some ink on. Books, money, important documents.” “You’re a busy guy.” He hums, that same, infuriating smile plastered on his face. “Sometimes. Which is why, unfortunately, I won’t be able to go downtown with you tonight or whatever overused cliché you’d like to pick. I’ve got a previous engagement. And plans for the New Year. I’m sorry to disappoint.” “I’m not sure that you have, actually.”

Emma jumps at the same time Heller laughs, twisting her fingers around the fence and maybe Killian was right – maybe she does have fairly good upper body strength. That, however, only serves to make her think about Killian and her distinct lack of New Year’s Eve plans because there’d been no engagement in Storybrooke and Emma’s got some pretty strong suspicions about David and Mary Margaret and--

Her right foot slips.

She scrambles for purchase, trying to find to find, something, anything to hold onto and the irony of that is not lost on Emma. She hates it, but she’s willing to acknowledge it, even as she’s crashing a few feet onto the incredibly unforgiving ground underneath her.

Emma doesn’t quite scream when her ankle turns underneath her, the actual crack of it echoing in her ears and her soul, but she might whimper and that is, somehow, ten-thousand times worse.

The tears burn her eyes immediately, a biological reaction that feels particularly weak in the situation, and she grits her teeth to stop herself from making any other noise. The blood rushes from her head, trying to get to the ankle that she’s only a little worried is actually broken and everything feels cold and spins and it’s as if her stomach has leapt into the back of her throat.

Emma gags again, bringing her hand to her mouth like that’ll help. It only proves how goddamn cold her hand is.

She really needs gloves.

“Holy shit,” Emma breathes, tears landing on her cheeks despite her explicit refusal to cry over this and she doesn’t know what to do next. Her whole body is shaking and she hopes she’s not going into shock. That would suck. “Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit, God, that hurts.”

She keeps talking, muttering curses to herself. No one comes. And Emma isn’t sure how long she sits there, but it’s got to be at least half an hour and she can’t stand up. She tries several times.

“Ok, ok,” Emma chants, twisting to try and grab her phone out of her back pocket. The screen is cracked now, which seems to make more sense than just about anything, but Emma can still make a phone call and her thumb hovers above her contacts list for a moment.

She calls Mary Margaret.

Mary Margaret answers on the second ring.

And, somehow, doesn’t hit traffic on the FDR.

Or let Emma go home alone. Because she broke her goddamn ankle. And it might actually be the first time she’s let a guy get away, but some vaguely petty part of Emma’s brain is quick to also point out she let Killian get away several days before and her phone dies before she gets back to her apartment.

Mary Margaret goes home with her and stays with her and Emma knows it’s only a matter of time before she hears the not-so-soft knock on the door at six forty-five on New Year’s Eve.

Mary Margaret is cooking.

“Is your door locked?” Mary Margaret asks, not bothering to stop stirring whatever it is she’s stirring.

Emma shakes her head, trying, and failing to get the remote off her coffee table. “I live in the middle of Manhattan. Also, what exactly is it we’re watching?” “Do you not want to be watching the New Year’s Rockin’ Eve preshow?” “Why is this still on? Why is there a preshow? Why do we as a society allow Ryan Seacrest to keep hosting things? He’s so awkward. It’s painful to watch.”

The person at the door knocks again. It doesn’t sound like one person. Emma is going to seriously mess up her throat if she keeps groaning. “That was certainly a lot of questions for someone who claims to not care about New Year’s Rockin’ Eve,” Mary Margaret says, moving towards the door with a bowl on her hip and Emma is only too aware that they’re not talking about New Year’s Rockin’ Eve.

The lock clicks and there’s a few mumbled words spoken in the doorway, quiet promises to behave and we went over the rules in the car over here and Emma can’t help but grown again. She slides further into the corner of the couch, bringing a blanket down with her in the process and Ruby is holding a plate of baked goods she absolutely, positively did not bake when she stalks into the living room.

“Why didn’t you call me?”

“Where’d you get those cookies?” Emma challenges, and Ruby practically growls in response.

“Is it bad?” “You’re the one who brought the cookies, not me.” “Are you on morphine or something? If you’re on morphine, then I can almost rationalize this.” “This?”

Ruby nods, and Mary Margaret mutters something that sounds a hell of a lot this is not what we agreed on. “This,” Ruby repeats. “Making ridiculous decisions and going after some creep in Mott Haven. You know how sketchy Mott Haven is?” “I’m perfectly aware of how sketchy Mott Haven is. I’d imagine that’s why the lowlife I was trying to get back to jail was hanging out in Mott Haven.” “You’re avoiding my question.” “There have just been so many, it’s been difficult to keep track.” Ruby deflates at that, some of the fight almost visibly falling out of her and Emma resists the urge to make a quip about fangs retracting. “Have I apologized for...everything in the last twenty-four hours?” “My phone is broken.” “Ah that sucks.” “Yeah, it’s almost as bad as the broken ankle.” “It’s broken?” Ruby shouts, and Emma winces when it sounds like the words reverberate off her walls. David clicks his tongue in reproach. “What? You didn’t mention that. I just knew you were hurt and...well, you called M’s and--”

“--You are a newlywed,” Emma reasons. “You should not be driving me to the ER two days before New Year’s.”

“You don’t have to keep using that as an excuse.”

“It’s not an excuse.” “Eh,” Mary Margaret contradicts, and Emma doesn’t entirely expect that. She’s kind of forgotten Mary Margaret is standing there.

Emma tilts her head. The ice on her ankle is leaving a small puddle on her coffee table. “Was that an unvoiced opinion, Mary Margaret?” she asks. “Or just a rather sweeping judgment?” “A little bit of both.” “We’ve all got a little bit of both,” David adds. “Some of us more than others.” “Ok, well, there’s no need to be a jerk about it,” Ruby grumbles, moving to perch on the edge of the table and she hisses when she notices the condensation. “When’s the last time you changed your ice? Should you be alternating with heat?”

“The doctor said ice until some of the swelling went down,” Mary Margaret says before Emma can answer.

“How long is that going to take?” “Well, he said it was a clean break, so that’s a good thing and--” “--Is it?” “Yeah, he said athletes come back quicker from clean breaks than like...I don’t know shards of bone or something.” “Emma’s not an athlete.” “Hey,” Emma snaps, but no one is paying attention to her and Ruby keeps jerking back and forth. It makes grabbing a cookie very difficult.

Mary Margaret makes a dismissive noise in the back of her throat. “True, but she does do physical things regularly and the doctor was pretty adamant she’d be up sooner rather than later, but then he also kept talking about the ice and, well, her ankle is kind of...purple.” “What?” Ruby screeches, Emma squeezing her eyes closed like that will make the noise less abrasive. She’s fairly certain she’s had the same headache for the last six days now.

“This is why we’re constantly icing,” Mary Margaret says. “There’s a whole plan and--”

“--And I didn’t know the plan.” “Well, you were just getting home and--” “--If Emma’s dying, then I want to know and Belle wants to know and she’s not totally alone and--” “And we’d all really like to make sure you’re ok,” David says, quietly but with enough something that everyone in the apartment seems to freeze. Emma wouldn’t be surprised if Ryan Seacrest froze in Times Square too. “You know...maybe more than just your ankle.” “My ankle and my overall state of being are not intrinsically related,” Emma mutters. David doesn’t try to hide his scoff. Ruby rolls her eyes.

“Ok, well, that was just incredibly bad,” Mary Margaret says. “You’ve got to practice that if you want us to believe you.” “We’ve known you way too long, that’s why,” Ruby mumbles conspiratorially. That time she winks. “Almost as if we can tell when you’re really feeling something.”

“God, you should practice that too.” “I wasn’t actually trying to lie. Emma was.”

“The judgments just keep on coming, don’t they?” Emma asks, and they’ve apologized to each other more in the last week than they have in the entire time they’ve known each other.

“And you keep dodging the question,” David points out.

She sighs, shoulders slumping with the force of it, but he’s right about that too and Mary Margaret might actually be baking something and if the scent is anything to go by, she’s definitely making cinnamon rolls. Emma’s heart thuds painfully in her chest.

It makes her ankle hurt.

Being awake makes her ankle hurt.

“We didn’t want…” Mary Margaret starts, moving back into the living room and letting David slings his arm around her shoulders. Emma’s probably ruined his proposal plans. Again. Maybe. She’ll feel bad if she wins that fifty bucks. “We’re sorry that we made you feel as if you had to bring someone home. As if you coming home with us wouldn’t just be enough.” It would probably be more comfortable if Emma’s ankle just fell off her body at this point.

“I know that,” she mutters, met almost immediately with three matching sounds of disbelief. “You know, in theory.” “We’re not playing a game here, Em,” David says.

“And I don’t think Jones was either,” Ruby adds. Emma snaps her head up so quickly, her neck cracks and her spine shifts and she nearly knocks her ice on the table. It’s mostly a plastic bag of slightly tepid water now. “It doesn’t make any sense for him to come back with you.” David swats at her shoulder. “What? I know, I know, and I agree with M’s, obviously, we shouldn't always be constantly trying to set Emma up with someone, but you know, love conquers all and she could probably use an emergency contact and--” “--Rubes,” three voices shout and she throws a piece of cookie at David.

“But,” Ruby repeats pointedly. “I’m just saying. Killian Jones was staring at Emma the entire wedding. They were both gone for awhile and then they came back and they were dancing and laughing and…” She shrugs when no one cuts her off. “A guy who’s not actually feeling something wouldn’t go to Storybrooke, follow the schedule and then look like he did when me and Belle showed up.” “Well, you were kind of yelling at him,” David mutters. She throws another cookie.

“If you keep getting crumbs all over my apartment, I’m going to strangle you,” Emma warns.

Ruby does not look threatened. “Can you even stand up?” “Not really.” “Then let’s get you some new ice and you can explain something to me.” Emma doesn’t argue – because she genuinely can’t stand up and she’s fairly positive her ankle is actually getting bigger and that can’t possibly be healthy – but the nerves in the pit of her stomach churn uncomfortably. David hands her a cookie.

“Figured you could use it,” he says with a smile.

“Thanks.” “You ok?” “If you start the inquisition before Rubes and Mary Margaret get back out here, they’re both going to be really annoyed with you.” “It’s not an inquisition, Em,” he says, resting a quiet hand on her slightly bent knee. “It’s how much you smiled while we were home and how easily you laughed and--” “--You’re getting sentimental on me, Nolan,” she accuses. He nods almost immediately. Probably when he notices the tears in her eyes.

Emma seriously cannot stop crying.

“I’m getting observant,” he corrects. “Did you call him?”

Emma shakes her head. And she’s almost ready for Ruby’s groan and Mary Margaret’s sigh, but she doesn’t look away from David and he doesn’t move his hand off her leg. “That’s stupid,” he says, serious enough that she can’t help but laugh.

“Yeah, I know it is.” “Ok, can we backtrack for two seconds?” Ruby asks, handing Emma hot chocolate no one asked if she wanted. “Because I’m still incredibly confused how you thought this was going to work. And like...why you haven’t called him.” “I don’t know that I ever really thought it was going to work,” Emma admits. “That was part of the appeal at first. We kind of knew each other, M’s thought we’d had a bad date, but the spirit of Christmas would do something and then we’d just get through the weekend.” The looks on their faces feel as if they cut their way through Emma – a mix of disappointment and sadness and being there since the very beginning. She grits her teeth, staring at her knees, but that only leads to staring at David’s hand as well and...damn.

She shouldn’t have called Killian to begin with.

She shouldn’t have done any of this to begin with.

She should call Killian now.

“That’s not really what I meant,” Emma whispers.

Mary Margaret drops next to her, an understanding look on her face that only makes Emma feel like more of a complete and utter dick. “I get it,” she says. “We are...overbearing.” “That’s one word for it,” Ruby laughs.

“Rubes, you literally tried to destroy Killian as soon as you got out of the car.” “Ok, no I did not. I just...wasn’t expecting it.” “Expecting what?” Emma asks, and it feels like an incredibly important question.

“For the two of you to be staring at each other like you had only recently discovered the sun.” “Or that the other one was the sun,” David amends.

“Either or, really.”

“It was very clearly and obviously romantic.” “And you only saw the end,” Mary Margaret mumbles, working a knowing laugh out of Ruby. “They disappeared at one point on Christmas Eve.” “Oh, can we not talk about that?’ David groans. Emma’s eyes widen to a size that cannot possibly be healthy, head snapping between a close-to-gloating Mary Margaret and an actually blushing David and Ruby’s laugh is going to make the neighbors complain.

“Before or after the pie?” “After. Emma didn’t buy pie.” “What?” “We made pie,” Emma whispers, not sure why she’s adding fuel to this particular fire, but it seems important and she’s still not one-hundred percent certain it was his mom’s recipe. She’s, like, ninety-nine point nine percent certain.

Once she can stand up on her own, she’s totally going to drive to Boston.

Probably.

Maybe.

She’s not sure what she can say to fix this.

“You made pie?” Ruby repeats skeptically. “Like...whoopie pie?” David’s head actually falls into his hands, the noise he makes not entirely human, and Mary Margaret nearly chokes on the cookie she’s eating. Ruby just arches an eyebrow.

“I’m not answering that question,” Emma says.

“Sounds like an answer.” “It’s not.” “You like him?” “Yes.” Ruby’s other eyebrow nearly flies off her face. “Wow, I wasn’t expecting that so quickly. Are you sure you’re not on Morphine?” “I’m capable of having real, human emotions without artificial stimulants.” “New year, new you, huh?” Emma’s laugh is a little strained, but it’s a laugh all the same and it feels kind of nice. “Yeah, something like that,” she mumbles. “It was...ok, so I totally played myself.” “Yeah, I think you might have and I wasn’t even there.” “He gave her a ten-out-of-ten at karaoke,” Mary Margaret says. “And my dad told me about the mistletoe incident.” “There was a mistletoe incident?” “Do we really have to talk about this?” David begs, but both Mary Margaret and Ruby brush him off and Emma’s smile feels almost natural.

“No one is keeping you here, Nolan,” Ruby hisses. “There was a mistletoe incident?”

Emma nods. “And some other incidents. But--” “--No, no, Emma, you cannot do that,” Mary Margaret snaps, an out-of-character edged to her voice. “That’s...ok, so it may have started strange. And you may have gone into it thinking that it was going to end or had to end or we wouldn’t want you there if it was just you there which, again, is ridiculous.” “So you’ve mentioned,” Emma says.

“Because I want you to believe it. We thought it when you were twelve and we think it now and we will think it whenever and we’ll...I don’t know, you can use our pie as your pie and--” “--We’ve got to find a different way to say that,” Ruby mutters, David barely keeping his laugh contained.

“The specifics of it aren’t important. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is how much we love you, Emma Swan. All year, but especially at Christmas because no one does Christmas better than us and you are part of that us. On an indefinite basis. No matter who you bring home.” She’s crying. She’s not sure if she actually stopped, but the specifics of that don’t matter either and David squeezes her knee when Emma actually sniffles.

“But,” he adds. “If you get to bring home a guy who stares at you like every constellation in the sky, then that’s kind of a bonus for us. We’re team Emma happiness.” “Every constellation, huh?” Ruby asks, twisting to glance at David. He nods.

“Take my exaggerated point for what it’s worth.” “No, he may know that,” Emma objects, and Mary Margaret looks triumphant. “He, uh...he was in the Navy. That’s like a sailor thing, right? Knowing the stars or something?” There are several nods and a few passably interested hums – a valiant attempt not to ask more questions that Emma will eventually appreciate. She twists her fingers together when the next few words seem to spill out of her mouth.

“I told him about Neal,” she says, ignoring whatever sounds her friends make at that particular revelation. “And that Christmas. And coming to Storybrooke. And there was a lot more than the mistletoe incident. But, I...ok, M’s you can’t interrupt.” Emma glances up at her own pitiful joke, Mary Margaret staring slack jawed at her. “The plan was not this. It was the opposite of this. It was supposed to be easy and it’d be some guy who came home and then was never heard from again, but…”

“You like him,” Mary Margaret finishes.

Emma nods. “And I’m being the world’s biggest idiot about it.” “Ah, that’s patented Emma,” Ruby muses, fingers flashing over her phone when she, presumably, updates Belle on what’s going on. “You really didn’t call him?” “I really didn’t call him. I told him that he went above and beyond what I asked him to do and then I drove out of Boston.” “Oh my God, Em.” “Please don’t. Anything you’ve said, I’ve already rationalized and unrationalzied and, that’s not a word either, so don’t bother mentioning that either.” Ruby laughs lightly, a quick salute that’s only a little patronizing. “There had to be a reason he agreed to go with you.”

“And,” David says softly, leaning towards Emma like he’s talking to Roland or Henry. It’s even more patronizing than the salute. “You don’t have to immediately assume everything is going to blow up in your face by default. He drank the wine.” “He drank the wine,” Ruby shouts. She jumps up, nearly knocking Emma’s leg off the table in the process and they’re a mess of explanations and more shouted questions and where’s your phone charger, just plug it in and call him and it’s so loud that, at first, none of them hear the knock on the door.

The second knock is a little more intent.

Like the knocker is determined. Or impatient. Or impatiently determined.

Ruby glances around – like she’s checking to make sure they’re all present and accounted for, and her brows pull low when she can’t answer the question she hasn’t actually voiced yet.

The third knock is more a rap of knuckles and a hint of frustration and all four of them turn towards the sound.

“Probably the Chinese,” Mary Margaret reasons. “I ordered just...way too much food.” “She knew we were coming,” Ruby whispers to Emma with a smile. She never actually had sat down, so it’s not much of a surprise when she jogs towards the door, the fourth knock sounding a little resigned to being ignored and Emma can barely hear her when she mumbles whoa on the other side of the apartment.

It’s difficult over the sound of the music.

The song itself is muffled – likely coming from headphones that had only recently been in ears – but it’s suddenly all Emma can hear and all she can think about and she inhales sharply when she hears the chorus, words imprinted on her recent memory and possibly her heart and--

“Yeah, it’s not the Chinese,” Ruby announces, moving back into the living room with footsteps following her and Killian’s eyes widen as soon as they land on Emma.

And her decidedly broken ankle.

“Shit,” he mutters, and Emma’s laugh is totally out of place considering the sound of his voice and the look on his face and she can’t figure out how he got here.

Her gaze snaps towards Ruby. Who immediately shakes his head. “Wasn’t me. No one told me until this morning.” “Ariel told me,” Killian says, not taking his eyes away from Emma. He looks exhausted, like the feelings she’s been feeling for the last six days have been transferred directly to his face. “Belle told her, I guess. And she said you, shit, Swan, did you break your ankle?” There’s a tremor to his voice, a shake that rattles its way down Emma’s spine and finds a spot next to the guilt in the center of her soul and the frustration between every one of her ribs and those seemingly always-there nerves in the pit of her stomach. She nods. “The fence was super icy. My foot slipped.” He exhales, body moving forward and arm darting towards her before he can stop himself. She wishes he wouldn’t stop himself.

She’s kind of made sure that happens.

“That happened at work?” “Yeah,” Emma mumbles. “The guy was a dick. Forgery and he made a bunch of jokes and there was some very unnatural banter and the whole thing hurt like hell.” “I’d imagine that happens when you break actual bones.”

“We went to the doctor.” “Yeah?” “The doctor said it was a clean break,” Mary Margaret reports, and Killian hums like he’s also a medical professional.

Emma can’t settle on what to look at. Her eyes keep flitting across his face, taking in every shift in expression – the quirk of his eyebrows and the twitch of his lips, patchy color on his cheeks as if he ran up the three flights of stairs it would take to get to her front door. There are bags under his eyes and it probably isn’t, but it looks like his hair is longer, curling slightly under his right ear and Emma bites her lip when Killian reaches up to tug on it.

“Where did you park?” Emma asks, a sudden question that’s not entirely rational. None of this has been entirely rational though and she likes him. And he’s standing in her apartment. Belle must have given Ariel the address.

Or he asked Belle.

All of their friends need a lesson in boundaries.

And, like, thank you cards or something.

“Somewhere illegally, I think,” Killian says. He takes a cautious step closer to Emma’s outstretched leg, eyes darting across her body and lingering on her foot. “That looks incredibly purple.” “It’s broken. Aren’t you worried about getting a ticket?” “Not particularly.” She’s not sure what sound she makes. It’s ridiculous though, she knows that, a scoff and guffaw and the audible version of visibly swooning and Ruby is already trying to tug Mary Margaret and David towards the door. “Well,” Ruby says. “I feel like this is our cue or something. Jones, if you get a ticket, let Nolan know and he can probably get you off or something.” “I can’t do that,” David argues. “Also Emma can’t actually stand up, so you’re going to have to change her ice.” “I am not an invalid,” Emma growls.

“Eh. I’m serious, are you going to change her ice?” It feels like a challenge and an expectation and Emma doesn’t hold her breath, but she also doesn’t exhale and that is absolutely the definition of holding her breath. Killian nods. “Of course.”

“Ok, good. Also, Em, you’re not going to win tonight, so, FYI.” Emma gapes at him. “Wait, what?” Mary Margaret asks, but Ruby is doing her best to dislocate her shoulder at this point and Killian’s still staring at Emma and she shouldn't be surprised they’ve delved into farce this quickly.

“Nothing, babe, nothing. New ice soon, Jones. We’ll see you later, Em.” “Sure,” Emma mumbles, and that requires her to exhale. The door slams behind them when they leave, a jolt of something working through the air that may just be expectation and hope and Emma’s not usually good at either one of them, but her eyes dart towards Killian again like those goddamn magnets are back and his almost-there smile does far too many things to every single inch of her.

“I’m sorry if you get a ticket,” she whispers. She’s an idiot.

Killian laughs, nodding towards the coffee table and it takes Emma a moment to realize he’s asking permission to sit down. She nods. And waves her hand. Seriously, the world’s biggest idiot.

“That’s still not your fault, Swan,” Killian says. “Your ankle is really broken? Ariel wasn’t sure.”

“I don’t...I don’t totally understand what’s happening here.” “You hurt your ankle.” “But you’re here.” His tongue flashes between his lips as soon as the words are out of her mouth, and Emma’s not sure if she should regret them. Probably. That’s been her mindset for most of the week. “Yeah,” Killian wavers. “I, uh...I’m not sure I’ve really had one coherent thought in the last six hours or so, if I’m being honest.” “It took you six hours to get here?” “It’s New Year’s Eve, love, there’s a considerable amount of traffic in Manhattan.” It feels as if her heart flies out of her chest, and it threatens to burst into confetti and rainbows and fireworks are kind of appropriate considering the holiday, as soon as he calls her love. Emma mumbles right, right under her breath and Killian’s laugh is distinctly lacking in any kind of humor when he leans forward to stop her from jerking her leg forward.

“You’re going to hurt yourself even more.” “I’m fine.” “Well, that’s good because I am absolutely losing my mind.” Emma blinks. “What?” “I’ve gotten some increasingly scathing reviews of my entire mindset in the last week or so, from both Ariel and Scarlet who seem to think I misplaced my brain at some point because I’ve been walking around in some kind of fog since Christmas.” “What?” “I can’t...Emma, I can’t get you out of my head and I genuinely think it may be driving me insane.” “That sounds kind of aggressive, actually.” He scoffs, a flash to his gaze that makes Emma smile and the tension in her shoulders nearly evaporates. She almost forgets about her ankle. “Yeah, it kind of is,” Killian agrees. “But...Belle told Ariel you’d gotten hurt and it might have been bad and I...shit, every single thing I came up with was worse than the last thing and A didn’t know what had actually happened, but she said Ruby was going to see you and I didn’t really think. I got in my car and I started driving and Belle’s probably researching ways to commit your friends without them realizing what you're doing because I think I mostly just screamed at her to give me your address once I got over the bridge.” The words get more manic the longer he keeps talking, and Emma’s breathing through her mouth. It can’t be very attractive, but her body feels as if it’s systematically shutting down and he came to New York. Because he thought she was hurt. Because he was worried.

Because he was worried about her.

“I can’t get you out of my head, either,” Emma whispers. Killian’s jaw drops.

“What?” “I feel like we’re going in circles.” “It’s entirely possible.” She laughs softly, letting her eyes fall closed and her head fall forward and she’s almost not surprised when his fingers graze over the side of her jaw. “It was an insane plan,” she mutters. “Absolutely insane. But I thought it’d give me some breathing room from my friends and my family and…” Emma lifts her head to find Killian staring at her, that same bit of wanting she’d been almost certain of in Storybrooke back on her face. “You told Aurora we didn’t want her key lime pie.” “It’s not even remotely festive, Swan.” “I know it’s not. But...no one had ever really done that. For me, I mean. I would have bought the pie and laughed about its lack of festivity and you wouldn’t let that happen. Like you cared and that...I can’t wrap my head around that.” “That’s decidedly depressing, love.” “It’s totally depressing. And I was ready for that all weekend. I was ready to just go through the motions and fake the whole thing.” “I didn’t fake anything.” “Neither did I.”

There’s no joke, no twisted eyebrows or vaguely attractive smirk. There’s just honest and certainty and Killian’s fingers lace through Emma’s as soon as he finds her hand.

“If I tell you that you were the gift I wasn’t entirely expecting because I was too afraid to actually ask for it, are you going to make fun of me?” Killian grins, tongue pressed to the corner of his mouth and Emma shivers when his lips brush over her knuckles. “On an indefinite basis, love.”

“Then I’m not going to say that.” “Probably a good idea.” “It’s more like Miracle on 34th Street anyway.” “That so?” Emma hums. “Yeah, you know without the kid. Maureen O’Hara doesn’t believe in much and doesn’t believe in romance or Santa Claus and then Santa Claus shows up and Fred? Is his name Fred?” “This is your reference, Swan, not mine.” “I think it’s Fred. Anyway. He shows up and he believes in Santa and there are letters and the US Postal service and then Natalie Wood gets her house on Long Island.” “Are you suggesting you want a house on Long Island?” “I mean, not yet. But you know, I don’t know. I’m open to the idea of Santa Claus and dating Fred. For real this time.” It’s easily the single most convoluted explanation of feelings in the history of romance, but it gets Killian to smile and Emma doesn’t expect the kiss. She hopes and that feels kind of in the spirit of things. The couch creaks when Killian leans against it.

And Emma feels as if she’s just waking up or only recently rediscovering oxygen, Killian’s fingers in her hair and her arms around his neck. They’re cautious with each other, both almost painfully aware of Emma’s decidedly purple ankle, and that’s only kind of frustrating, but she really doesn’t want to fuck up her ankle and she really, really missed kissing Killian.

He rests his forehead against hers when they break apart, smile still there. “Why’d you run, Swan?” “Why’d you agree to come home with me?” “I asked you first.” “I told you I wanted to date you.” “I drove to New York after convincing myself you were dead.” “I’m not dead.” Killian sighs, another quick kiss to her lips. “I know, love. And eventually my pulse will realize that’s a real thing.” “I’m sorry. For the pulse thing and the running thing, but that’s also kind of my thing and everything was so good. It was so easy to...just let everyone think we were whatever we were because--” “--It kind of felt like that’s exactly what we were?” “Exactly. And then it all blew up and I wasn’t sure I could deal with hearing that it was actually fake because I didn’t want it to be and I’ve never...I’ve never brought anyone home, and it was so easy for you to be home. It was so easy for you to feel like home. That shouldn’t happen.” She doesn’t mean to whisper the last few words, but her voice clearly does not care and Killian tucks his thumb under her chin when she tries to avoid his gaze. “It makes for a pretty good Hallmark movie, don’t you think?” “It’s way too angsty for a Hallmark movie.”

“Ah, yeah, that may be true,” Killian agrees, and he can’t seem to stop kissing her. He presses one to her cheek and the bridge of her nose, another just under her left eye and three across her forehead. Emma wonders if he’s following a path only he can see, but realizes almost immediately that she absolutely does not care one way or another as long as he doesn’t stop.

He doesn’t.

That seems important.

“But the Hallmark movies admittedly probably don’t start with a good amount of lecherous staring and selfish decisions, so…”

Emma hums distractedly at that particular string of words, moving away from the reach of his lips to blink blearily at him. “Selfish? How?” “You weren’t concerned with the lecherous staring?” “Killian!” He practically growls when she shouts her name, tilting his head and catching her lips and that’s a little more aggressive. Emma nips at his lower lip, solely to get him to make that sound, and she nearly fist pumps when she does.

That would probably ruin the moment.

“God, I was so worried about you,” he says, and it sounds like the words fly out of him. Emma’s heart grows more than three sizes. Thirty-three sizes and then some.

“You’re bouncing around the conversation quite a bit.” “I know, I know, but…” They dissolve into more kissing and more roaming hands, only stopping when Emma manages to kick her ice on the ground. “Swan.” “Ok, you do not get to chastise me for that. This making out is entirely your fault.” “Eh…”

“Explain your lecherous ways then.” Killian smirks. It’s stupid. “Well, I did kind of admit to it before. I knew who you were even before you gave that rather memorable speech and then you did give the rather memorable speech and I was...intrigued.” “That sounds kind of clinical.” “Not in that dress. Stupid attractive.” Emma burrows her head into his chest, Killian’s arm working its way around her waist to keep her pinned against him. He kisses the top of her hair. “Anyway,” Killian continues. “You were so certain about love and its ability to change people and that was fascinating and then you had that look on your face the entire time Mary Margaret and David were talking to you and--oh, was there an engagement yet?” “Nothing.” “Really?” “I think they were a little preoccupied parenting me.” “I doubt they regret that, Swan.” She hums noncommittally, letting her fingers card through the back of her hair. “Keep telling your story, please and thank you.” “Well, you had that look and then you left and Mary Margaret tried to turn me to stone. And then...I don’t know, I was walking before I’d even considered it. It was strangely like tonight, there were just more miles this time, but I barely said a word to Ariel and it was like something flipped as soon as I started talking to you.” “A good flip?” “The best flip,” Killian promises. “And then you call me and come up with this ridiculous plan and it’s...I normally go to Ariel’s, but she was going to be at Eric’s and I was going to be by myself. I wasn’t really upset about that until you called.” “God, this is the worst story,” Emma groans.

“It’s not, I promise, love. You explained the schedule and the system and the plans and it was, well, it sounded like every Christmas I wanted when I was a kid and that one Christmas I had when I was a kid and I found myself saying yes on the idea that maybe I could be part of that.”

Emma’s mouth hangs open. She’s breathing far too loudly. “So I said yes and it was greedy and selfish and probably the most childish thing I’d ever done, but you asked and I wanted and so I took my opportunity as it were. But then we got there and something changed.”

“Did it?” Emma asks.

“Rather quickly, actually. Almost as soon as we were informed there was only key lime pie available.” “The pie?” “The pie,” Killian repeats, thumb brushing under her eye. There’s a tear there. “Because I suddenly wasn’t there to maybe reminisce about something I had once, I was there...for you. And I wanted to be there for you. It was very easy to be there for you.” “Seems to be a trend.” “I’d like it to be.”

Emma takes a deep breath, and she hates that she closes her eyes, wants to spend several eternities memorizing the look on Killian’s face, but her body doesn’t seem to care about that either and one person can only deal with so many emotions at once.

She can only deal with so many emotions at once.

“Would you?” Emma asks, and his answering smile is a little nervous. She’s a little nervous.

She’s incredibly excited.

It feels like she’s radiating with hope.

“I think we’re pretty good at dating, don’t you think?” “Did we actually go on a date?” “I’m not sure if we did, technically. But plans were made, weren’t they? And, uh…” He reaches in his back pocket, twisting and balancing and he makes a face when Emma laughs at it, but she feels lighter than she has all week and that’s almost strange considering her distinct inability to stand up on her own. “Merry Christmas, love.” It’s a keychain – cold when it falls into her palm and Emma rubs the pad of her thumb over it, touching every crevice and makeshift crater and that’s exactly what it is because it’s the goddamn moon.

He got her the moon.

“You want the moon? Just say the word and I’ll throw a lasso and pull it down.”

“I’ll take it,” Emma mutters. “Then what?” “I always thought the next part was kind of weird.” “You’re not going to tell me I should eat the moon?” Killian shakes his head. “I’m not. But I’d settle for agreeing to that date. I’d like to continue to be your boyfriend for the foreseeable future.” “I’m not sure George ever told Mary that.” “Maybe in White Christmas.” “I don’t think I’m Rosemary Clooney though.” “Better singer anyway.” Emma laughs, another kiss and more smiles and she can’t bring herself to let go of the keychain. “Returning stuff is a lot of effort anyway.” “That’s the spirit.” “You really drove here from Boston?” “I did,” Killian nods. “And, uh...well, it’s not entirely certain yet, but Scarlet’s finally started seeing sense and he thinks it might be a good idea to maybe talk about the Long Island aspects of piracy. So I can’t promise a house yet, but maybe an apartment. Some space on the sink. At least some of the bed.” “Some?” “You’re a bed pirate, love.” She shouldn’t be charmed by it, but it’s too easy and too normal and Killian’s eyes are far too blue when Emma makes a face at him. “Do you think it’s against the rules to watch A Charlie Brown Christmas a week after Christmas?”

“If it is, I absolutely do not care.” “Rebel.” “Of the festive variety. Are you telling me you have A Charlie Brown Christmas readily available to watch, Swan?” “On DVD. But if you tell anyone that, I’ll deny it. Loudly.” He kisses her. And smiles. And kisses her again. “It’ll be our secret, love.”

And she cries at the end, because she always cries at the end of A Charlie Brown Christmas and Killian kisses her cheeks until there aren’t any tears left. He switches her ice because he absolutely set an alarm and they fall asleep well before midnight, a tangle of limbs on her couch.

David doesn’t ask Mary Margaret to marry him until Valentine’s Day – a pointed it’s romantic, Emma, shot her direction as soon as he drops to one knee in their apartment, but she just hums and nods and Killian kisses the top of her hair.

It goes from there.

There are more holidays, regularly recognized or not, and Killian doesn’t ever get an apartment on Long Island. He moves into Emma’s. On Flag Day.

And she gets her exam results back on Slurpee Day. They get free Slurpees from 7-11.

There’s Halloween and Thanksgiving and another Christmas in Storybrooke and Ruth doesn’t ever buy Killian his own stocking. The thought regularly makes Emma bite her lip.

And there’s New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day, a future and a life and more worries and they say I love you every day and Emma takes a cab to the Barnes and Noble on Fifth Avenue on what she later learns is National Walk to Work Day to buy Killian’s book.

She makes him sign it.

And eventually there’s another trip to Storybrooke and new members of the family with new stockings and Killian’s hand finds the small of Emma’s back. “You want to take a walk, love?”

She nods, moving towards the harbor and the docks before she realizes he’s directing her there and she’s not really surprised when he asks, because she’d kind of been hoping, but that felt a little selfish and she practically screams yes in his face.

There’s shouts from the other end of the street, a small crowd that had followed them because none of them had ever learned boundaries or collective control and Emma ignores all of them.

She jumps forward, arms around Killian’s neck and a smile on her face and she says yes again, like she’s trying to make sure he knows and believes and he tastes like Millionaire’s pie and mulled wine when she kisses him.

“Merry Christmas,” she whispers when she pulls back, his answering smile somewhere close to blinding.

“Merry Christmas, love.”

#cs ff #captain swan #captain swan ff #captain swan fic #cs fic #festive fic #i hope you guys all get what you want for the holidays #and there's just enough snow to be decorative but not make driving difficult

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gadgetsrevv · 5 years

Text

Ronaldo, Dybala ensure Juventus back in the ascendancy in Serie A

Gab Marcotti praises Maurizio Sarri for his tactics in Juventus’ 2-1 win over Inter.

Gonzalo Higuain scores the winner for Juventus, handing Inter their first loss. Watch Serie A on ESPN+.

A fast and furious Derby d’Italia ended with a late Gonzalo Higuain goal as Juventus beat Inter 2-1 (Stream a replay in full on ESPN+) to retake their usual spot at the top of the table. The result, thoroughly deserved on the balance of play, will come as great satisfaction to Maurizio Sarri. The performance greater still.

Juventus continue to get better and better and after beating Napoli 4-3 in August they reminded another title rival of the scale of the task facing them if another team is to stitch the Scudetto on their shirts come May. Inter’s perfect record in Serie A is no more and the team that shone in defeat in Barcelona on Wednesday night did not hit the same heights.

Antonio Conte made two changes from the team that looked sharp in Spain with Romelu Lukaku coming in for the suspended Alexis Sanchez and Danilo D’Ambrosio taking the place of Antonio Candreva on the right. How much gas the Antonio Pintus-drilled Inter had left in the tank after their efforts in the Camp Nou was one of the talking points before kickoff. Juventus’ extra day of preparation and no travel — they had a regulation home win over Bayer Leverkusen in Europe — promised to be an advantage and they started sharp with Miralem Pjanic catching Inter’s iron defence out with a ball over the top. Paulo Dybala then produced a rasping shot through Milan Skriniar‘s legs and past Samir Handanovic in the Inter goal.

– Champions League group stage: All you need to know – ESPN Champions League fantasy: Sign up now!

Sarri’s choice to go with Dybala instead of Higuain from kickoff found immediate vindication. Dybala has been in fine form since the last international break, setting up goals for Cristiano Ronaldo against SPAL and Leverkusen. Through September and into October, Juventus have got closer and closer to what we expect from a Sarri team, a turning point coming when the system shifted from 4-3-3 to a diamond with Dybala playing as a second striker.

The difference between the Napoli win and this one is pronounced, with Juventus transitioning from a Douglas Costa-led threat on the counter to a team able to dominate in possession with more and more sophisticated passing patterns. Sarri’s decision to go with Federico Bernardeschi as the nominal No. 10 instead of Aaron Ramsey following the Italian’s first goal of the season against Leverkusen did not pay the same dividends. But it didn’t have to, such was the level of interplay between Dybala and Ronaldo, who struck the crossbar shortly after Juventus’ first goal, skipping past Diego Godin and Stefan de Vrij before letting rip. The Portuguese would later force a save from Handanovic with Dybala plucking a Blaise Matuidi cross out of the air and teeing him up for a shot. He’d also have a goal chalked off after Dybala strayed an inch offside following another wonderful move.

Inter, trailing for the first time in Serie A this season, made this a fierce and entertaining contest. Lautaro Martinez, who had put his side in front in Catalonia, got them back level early with just the 10 minutes coming between his goal and Dybala’s. The Argentine beat Wojciech Szczesny from the spot after Matthijs de Ligt, who has come on leaps and bounds since his Napoli nightmare, handled a Nicolo Barella cross while seeking to stay with Martinez.

On a night that must have left Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni with a big smile on his face, Martinez kept taking the battle to Juventus. Szczesny prevented another of his shots from billowing in the top corner after Lukaku beat Pjanic and then De Ligt to start a fast break. The Belgian then lost the ball, but Martinez picked up the baton and had a go, taking on and getting the better of Bonucci.

In some respects the game turned not as Inter faded physically but when Stefano Sensi, the revelation of this season, went off injured with a adductor problem after half an hour. Matias Vecino came on and swapped positions with Barella and while the danger was far from over for Juventus, the fluidity to Inter’s game suffered. Vecino and Lukaku, flattened by a Ronaldo free kick in the first half, both made poor decisions in the final third and those misunderstandings were met with loud sighs ringing around San Siro.

Only two of Inter’s players ended the first half half with more than 20 passes completed and the foul count [11-2 against Juventus] spoke to the aggression of Conte’s crew, the pressure they were under and the antics of Ronaldo and Dybala which had the home fans up on their feet. A brawl almost broke out as the teams went in for the interval with Inter’s back up goalkeeper Daniele Padelli confronting Dybala on the way to his half-time oranges.

Unlike in those early weeks of the season when Juventus dipped in the second half of games, here they were able to sustain and build on what the team promised before the break. In fact Sarri was so encouraged by what he saw he decided to replace Bernardeschi with Higuain and play him with Ronaldo and Dybala. It was a show of strength, perhaps a moment of hubris too, as all of a sudden Inter came back to life.

Conte should be pleased with how his team kept fighting right until the end. Vecino twice went close with Szczesny making another vital stop. The Pole must have held his breath when another attempt from the Uruguayan struck De Ligt’s back and left him flat-footed. Unfortunately for Inter, the ball hit the outside of the post.

In the meantime, Sarri sought to re-balance his team with Emre Can entering for the superb Dybala. It was now left to Ronaldo and Higuain to finish Inter off and they delivered. A 24-pass move ended with Ronaldo and Rodrigo Bentancur, preferred to Ramsey as the in-game alternative to Bernardeschi in the No. 10 role, combining to release Higuain behind the Inter defence. “Pipita” had one chance and he took it, scoring in yet another big game to follow his brilliant goal against Napoli.

As a sub, this one worked in a way that none of Conte’s changes did. Godin joined Sensi in leaving the field with a knock and heads were scratched as Matteo Politano came on for Martinez not Lukaku. Perhaps it was in this exact moment that Sanchez’s ban was most keenly felt.

Barcelona and, particularly, Juventus have given Inter a reality check. But the overwhelming sense remains that this is a competitive team that won’t be going away. The problem for Inter though is not insignificant; Sarri is beginning to unlock the remaining potential the club felt Max Allegri failed to tap.

The irony is that Juve’s matchwinners were up for sale until the final week of the transfer window. Higuain and Dybala are playing with a point to prove and look hungrier and better than ever. Pair that with Sarri’s re-imagining of this Juventus team and maybe this isn’t the end of their dominance after all. Quite the opposite.

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#Uncategorized #Cristiano Ronaldo #Internazionale #Italian Serie A #Juventus #Paulo Dybala Ronaldo #D

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lolcat76 · 7 years

Note

Six Senses prompt: Regina meets Roland

Catching up on prompts. Six Senses is now on AO3.

“I was thinking about this weekend,” Robin says. He pushesher mug toward her, topped off with the last of the coffee and just a splash ofmilk. Just the way she likes it.

She hums as she takes a sip. God, the man makes good coffee.In the three months they’ve been dating, her favorite barista at Starbucks hasbeen completely abandoned. Why pay a stranger to make her coffee, when she canjust roll over in the morning and nudge Robin instead? “What about thisweekend?”

“It’s my weekend with Roland,” he says, “and I thought…maybeit’s time he meets you?”

She stiffens and drops the mug on the counter with enoughforce that a few drops splash over the lip. Where’s the damn napkin? Shescrabbles her fingertips along the counter, only to come into contact withRobin’s hand.

“Relax, Regina. It’s a four-year-old, not the SpanishInquisition.”

She remembers Henry well enough at four years old to knowthat the two are really not thatdifferent.

Deep breaths, deepbreaths, and count to ten. She waits for the sound of her heartbeat to slowin her eardrums. “Are you sure we’re ready for that? Meeting Roland is a bigstep, and it’s not one that we can undo.”

“I thought we were both on the same page about movingforward? Meeting Roland is the next logical step.” She can hear a quick intakeof breath. “Or maybe I’m wrong?”

She laces her fingers through his and gives his hand asqueeze. “No, no, this isn’t about us. Please don’t think this is about us.”

“Then what is it?”

“It’s about you, and your son. And your ex-wife. He’s your priority, andshe’s always going to be in your life. She’s always going to want to know thepeople that you introduce to your son. Are you ready for that to be me?”

Am I ready for that tobe me? It’s not about her, not really, but a little part of her is willingto admit that it is. Still, the adult, responsible Regina remembers Emma beingheartbroken over the end of her first serious post-Henry relationship, andHenry asking over and over again what happened to August. Being a sidelinespectator in that drama was hard enough; she doesn’t particularly want to takeon a starring role if it’s going to end badly for another little boy.

Still, she’s heard enough stories about Roland to want tomeet the little boy. She’s heard enough about Marian too, these last fewmonths, that she can’t help but be curious about Roland’s mother. What was itthat drove them apart? How can she not make the same mistakes?

“Yes,” he says, and he’s using his Dr. Locksley voice, calmand reassuring. “Yes, I’m ready for it to be you, and yes, Marian is ready tomeet you and vet you before you even so much as say hello to my son. Regina,this isn’t our first time around the block. Marian is living with someone; doyou think she would have taken that step without involving me as well?”

Given what she knows of Robin’s ex-wife, Regina would guessno, but given what she knows of parents in general (and shitty parents inparticular), she’s not going to volunteer an answer. “I just don’t want this tobe something you’ll regret,” she says.

He tugs her to her feet andwraps his arms around her waist, pulling her so close she can hardly breatheagainst the scent of him, warm and soft and slightly smoky. “Never going tohappen,” he growls, before his lips find hers.

***

In the few months they’d been dating, they’d had more than afew chances to talk about past relationships. She didn’t like to talk aboutDaniel; the pain of losing him in a car accident was still something thatweighed heavily on her chest. Robin, though, had no problems talking about thestart – and end – of his relationship with Marian.

Tell me what made youfall in love with her, she’d asked, and he was only too happy to answer.

“Her voice. She always sounded so decisive, so sure. When Imet her, I had no idea what I was doing with my life, and she always seemed tohave the right answer.”

I can relate, she’dthought.

Now, as she sits in the diner down the block from Robin’sapartment, she can only hope to find some small measure of that tranquility.She has no doubt that if Marian doesn’t like her, her relationship is over.Never mind the fact that the people of Watertown seem to like her just fine,fine enough to keep electing her to office – her entire self-worth rests on herboyfriend’s ex-wife’s opinion of her, and she hates knowing that no speech orcleverly argued union agreement is going to save her now.

Robin is running late, not an unusual occurrence given hiscareer choice, but she could really use a little pep talk right now, or evenjust the familiar weight of his hand on her back. Instead, she’s picking atwhat’s supposed to be a Caesar salad. Whoorders a Caesar salad at a diner, Emma’s voice echoes in her head, andRegina can’t help but acknowledge that Emma might have had a point all these yearsthat they’ve been having this argument.

“Who orders a Caesar salad at a diner,” comes a voice overher shoulder, and Regina can feel the slight shift in the air kicked up by apair of gloves and a purse slapped on the counter. “I’m Marian, by the way. I’mguessing you’re Regina? Robin said to look for someone in a suit eating asalad.”

Great, just great. Robin’s ex-wife is Emma. She holds out her hand in the general direction of the seatnext to her. “Regina Mills.”

The hand that shakes hers is firm and confident. “Marian. I’mordering a burger and fries. You’re welcome to some of the fries.”

They make small talk as Marian waits for her food, and it’snot exactly uncomfortable. Boston traffic, irritating coworkers, and schedulechanges that interfere with lunch. In another life, one where she didn’t feelthat every tiny tic of her muscles was being evaluated and graded, Regina wouldlike Marian. Makes sense, since she likes Emma just fine, and Marian seems tohave the same knack for saying whatever enters her brain at any given time,whether or not it’s appropriate. When her food arrives, Marian shoves half herfries onto Regina’s half-eaten salad, then takes Regina’s hand and guides themto the nice little pile of fries. “Ketchup or ranch?” Marian asks.

“Ketchup,” Regina answers automatically, and she can hearthe telltale squirt of a plastic bottle.

“On your right,” Marian says, and Regina is grateful thatMarian didn’t try to guide her to the plate of ketchup. If Robin’s ex-wife didn’tthink she was capable of finding a plate of ketchup for her fries, how wouldshe ever trust her to spend time with her son?

The fries are good, crispy and salty on the outside, andfluffy on the inside. She digs into them, mirroring Marian’s contented hum asshe works her way through a lunch that would surely send her mother into astroke if she could see it. Nothing unusual about two women having lunchtogether, except that Regina can practically feel the weight of Marian’s starewith every bite she takes, but she squares her shoulders and stabs her friesinto the last remaining bits of ketchup on the plate.

Is she supposed to speak first? Should she tell Marian herintentions? She has no idea what the proper protocol is here.

“You know, Robin and I were friends long before we starteddating,” Marian says, interrupting her train of thought, “and we were friendslong after we split up. It’s not easy, breaking up a marriage when you have ason, but it could be a lot worse.”

“I suppose,” Regina agrees, careful in her tone. Mariancould be giving her an opening or warning her to be on her guard, but since shecan’t read Marian’s expression, she has absolutely no defense here.

“He hates Thai food,” Marian says. “He hates football andHemingway.”

Well, who doesn’t hateHemingway, Regina thinks, but keeps her mouth shut.

“He can’t stand superhero movies because he thinks the plotsare completely implausible,” Marian continues. “I’m not saying that any ofthese things are a deal-breaker, but put together….he drove me nuts. Also, youshould hear him go off if the laundry stays in the dryer for a few days.”

Who leaves theirlaundry in the dryer for a few days?

“Let me guess,” Marian says, “you take the clothes out ofthe dryer and put them away immediately?”

“They get wrinkled,” she protests weakly.

“I guess they do. Well, if your laundry night isn’t Friday,maybe you could spare some time to play host to my son?”

“Maybe I could. And I can promise you, the sheets won’t bewrinkled.”

Marian laughs. “No. No, I don’tthink they will.”

***

It wasn’t much of a fight over the bill; Regina promisedthat Marian’s son would be perfectly safe in her home, wrinkle-free sheets andall, as long as Marian would let her pay for lunch. She’s just tucking her creditcard back into its slot in her wallet when Robin curls his arm around herwaist.

“Sorry I’m late,” he says. “No blood on the walls, so I’mguessing it went well?”

Well enough. “So,this weekend? Maybe we camp out in the living room and roast some marshmallowsover the fire?”

“He’ll love it,” Robin agrees. “His little feet are as coldas yours. A gas fireplace and some roasted marshmallows will be exactly what heneeds.”

A night in her living room with Robin, his son and a plateof chocolate bars, graham crackers and marshmallows. Maybe it’s exactly whatthey all need. If her white furniture gets smeared with little handprints, shehas a cleaner that can handle it.

She’s got experience with littleboys, after all. Tiny handprints are the least of her worries.

***

She worried about having a toddler in her house. Her furniture was all sharp corners and clean lines, just perfect to send a small boy running through the living room to the ER with a busted skull.

He’s a kid, not theMona Lisa, Emma said, perfectly content to let Henry loose in her livingroom and damn the consequences.

Henry managed to send her favorite pair of shoes down thedisposal – what kid does that – and ripher carefully chosen curtains right off the walls before Emma wrangled him intohis pack-and-play. She loved Henry, but she never let him out of her sightagain, not until the day he looked at his mother over Regina’s coffee table andasked her if she was raised in a barn, because only an animal would put herfeet on a table like that.

Roland, bless his heart, seemed much happier to curl intoher side. They’ve just finished Wreck-It Ralph, and she can feel him shiftagainst her as he lets loose a yawn. “Are you tired, sweetie?” she asks,reaching out to run her fingers through his hair. It’s thick and curly – he musthave his mother’s hair. She tugs at a tangle or two with a smile.

“Can I have a bedtime story?”

“Did you mum pack you some books? I’ll read one of them toyou,” his father promises.

“No, Daddy, I want Regina to read to me.” He keeps pleading,his voice trailing away as Regina listens to the stairs creak as Robin carrieshis son upstairs.

She used to love reading to Henry. Back when he was a littleyounger than Roland, reading to him was the way that she finally figured outhow to bond with the little boy, and every time Emma dropped him off at herhouse, he had a bag full of books. Emma was never much of a reader, and Henryused to complain that she didn’t read right. Too many arms being thrown aroundand way too many silly voices, especially right before bed. Somewhere in herguest room, she’s pretty sure she still has a stack of books that Henry hascollected over the years. It’s a damn shame that even the large print meant forlittle eyes is too small for her to read now.

Still, she’s not helpless, she reminds herself. She canstill read, even if it’s just a few words at a time on her iPad. She asks Sirito download one of Henry’s favorites and makes her way up the stairs, one handcradling her iPad and the other guiding her steps along the banister.Ferdinand, the sweet bull who only wants to smell the flowers – the perfectbedtime story for a little boy.

He’s out before she even gets halfway through the book, shecan tell, his breathing even against her skin. She eases him under the coversand tugs them up, then reaches out for Robin’s hand. He helps her off the bedand pulls her close. “See, easy as pie,” he whispers into her ear.

“I wouldn’t go that far,” she chuckles, “but it’s nice toknow I can still do this.”

Robin presses a kiss to her forehead. “I never had anydoubt.” With that, he snaps off the light and leads Regina by the hand down toher bedroom. Not because she needs him to, but because he wants to keep hold ofher as long as possible.

It’s nice to know that she can still do that, too.

#lolcatfic #six senses #outlaw queen au #Anonymous

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news-mashable-yahoopartner-blog · 5 years

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Lessons from 'Chopped' with Ted Allen: The 15 most rage-inducing mistakes in the TV kitchen

Food Network's Chopped invokes a certain kind of screaming-at-your-TV-screen carnal energy — the baskets! the knife injuries! the leaving an ingredient off the plate when it's sitting RIGHT THERE!

After 10 years and 40 seasons on the air, Chopped still delivers some of the most whiplash-inducing twists on television. Like say when host Ted Allen reads out a seemingly cohesive basket, only to have the last ingredient be something like pickle-flavored cupcakes.

SEE ALSO: Why the '15-minute recipe' sets you up to fail

me yelling at the tv when i watch chopped pic.twitter.com/pW37XlkEej

— nicole ♡ (@suckernasa) March 1, 2018

In Chopped's world of televised culinary surprises, there are still a number of things that always go predictably wrong. As the host of Chopped, Ted Allen has stood front and center for just about every kitchen disaster you can imagine, so we asked him to dish on the most common mistakes made by chefs tackling the unforgiving beast that is a Chopped basket.

"It’s a whole bunch of traps." Allen says. "It's nothing but traps."

1. Whenever anyone attempts to make risotto in under 20 minutes.

me whenever a Chopped contestant assures the viewer that they can and will make risotto in 30 minutes pic.twitter.com/pUYOTrS1QK

— elexus jionde. (@Lexual__) January 24, 2019

"Planning comes into play," Allen says. "Let’s say you’re in the appetizer round. It takes about 20 minutes to cook arborio rice. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but that’s probably not the best choice in round one."

Not only does the chef have to constantly stir the arborio rice to cook it to the right consistency, but then they have zero time to do anything else creative. Risotto is a labor of love — ask any Italian nona!

Lesson: The judges won't be happy with your undercooked rice.

2. Trying to save face when the plates come out looking less than desirable.

*watching chopped* "My plating is sloppy but I know my flavors are there" Me: pic.twitter.com/kJyl9XNvhv

— jojo (@BROCKSQUADD) August 2, 2017

Don't say it. Please don't say it. We know you're going to, and no one wants this, and yet here we are. You used the dreaded 'D' work. There it is...deconstructed.

There are absolutely other words to describe the way the a dish looks. Maybe it's Rushed. Sloppy. Mismatched. But the word you're looking for is not the 'D' one, and it's certainly not the 'R' word either (Rustic).

Time management is key here, or as Allen calls it, rational innovation. "We want you to do something creative, but you have to recognize the incredible limitations you’re up against."

Lesson: Take the time when plating (it's one-third of the judging criteria, after all) and be honest when the presentation isn't its best.

3. Forgetting a basket ingredient.

Okay, so...you know that feeling during the Big Game when the quarterback throws a perfect spiral, and the receiver is wide open, but he drops the ball anyway? Doesn't that make you tear your hair out?

No? You know when a chef forgets a basket ingredient? The camera zooms in, and it's sitting right there on the table? Same range of emotion.

"We’ve almost never had a chef that didn’t get 4 plates made that are reasonably plausible," Allen says. "But we did have one guy who did plenty of cooking, but he just judged his time so poorly that he got nothing at all on except for three edamame on one plate. Yeah, that was a rough one."

Lesson: It's not the end of the world. Someone else's dish could have literal raw bones and trash in it.

4. Trying to make ice cream during the dessert round.

When the Chopped contestant goes to the ice cream machine pic.twitter.com/pVVJRoHoEb

— Lindsey Adler (@lindseyadler) June 1, 2018

Why would this go wrong? Everyone loves ice cream, right? But the other chef is inevitably going to be making an ice cream too — it's the easiest way to hide a funky ingredient, or showcase an ingredient with a milder flavor profile. But you can't ALL use the ice cream machine, people, it's just not possible.

It's also a documented fact that there is purposefully only one ice cream machine, just for the chaos of it all. That's very Cutthroat Kitchen of you, Ted.

Lesson: Make cookies or something. NOT ice cream.

5. Leaving bones, seeds, or otherwise hazardous material in the dish.

One of the first rules new chefs learn is to taste their food as they go along.

The hustle of the Chopped kitchen can cause even the most experienced of chefs to forget this tried and true rule.

If the judges have to spend their precious time picking fish bones or seeds out of the dish, they will not be happy campers. For chefs that are unfamiliar with an ingredient, it's even more paramount to check and check again. Because something inedible might be left over. Or something possibly deadly (Fugu fish, anyone?)

Lesson: Taste it now. Taste it again. When in doubt, taste it.

6. Trying to make bread pudding during the dessert round.

me when the chopped contestant makes it all the way to the dessert round and then starts making a bread pudding pic.twitter.com/E7c9e6X99D

— generation loss (@shoegays) May 12, 2017

Bread pudding is such a popular dish during the dessert round, it might as well be made a requirement to win (please, no).

The dish became so popular, Allen reveals that "we did have a ban on bread pudding for a while. But it seems to have been allowed to creep back in. It’s just that you don’t want a show where everybody always goes to that, so we kinda had to push people to be more creative and think of other approaches to things."

The Chopped kitchen god himself has spoken.

Lesson: Get creative, even if you're not a pastry chef. Make something no-bake! Elbow your opponent for the ice cream machine! Make some candy, anything!

7. Not cleaning off the counter space.

My feelings exactly.

Image: GIPHY

One thing Allen says that viewers rarely consider when thinking about the difficulty of the kitchen is the small counter space. Most of which, he says, is taken up by the 7 knives chefs are allowed to bring.

"One pitfall that is often a giveaway [of who will be chopped] is people that don’t clean off their stations after they’ve done something, because of that lack of space. It’s always a good sign if somebody chops the onion, they put the chopped onion in a bowl, and then they clear off everything, and move on the next [task]."

Lesson: A clean station denotes an organized chef. And if you don't believe Allen, Ratatouille makes a pretty great point.

8. Calling anything with chocolate and chili a "mole."

Every time a Chopped chef introduces a "mole," the judging table reacts with grace, but you can see it in their eyes: Your mole sits on a throne of lies.

There's a wide variety of traditional mole sauces from different parts of Mexico, but the most ubiquitous kind typically includes roasted red chilis, nuts, spices such as coriander, cloves, and anise, and of course, chocolate. But very little chocolate is actually used, and it's added more like a spice.

Lesson: Of course no one's going to be judging on complete culinary purity when the basket ingredients are a wild mix. But if you melt a Hershey's bar and put some cayenne in it, don't call it a mole. You will be in the wrong.

9. Not planning out a dish before jumping into the cooking.

This one is hard. According to Allen, chefs get, at most, a minute or two to think after they open the basket, and they certainly don't know what's in the basket beforehand. The four ingredients are often so wildly different (such as Korean short ribs, canned spaghetti, purple artichokes, and baby pineapple) that there's no obvious connection.

"What often indicates that someone might do well is, instead of just jumping right in, taking a moment to plan. If you pointed to an 8-pound Peruvian leg of lamb, I mean I’ve literally seen people salt it and pepper it, then throw it in the oven whole before it occurred to them that, wait a minute, that’s never gonna work."

Lesson: It's all about taking a second to think about what is doable before it's 5 minutes left and you have an inedible raw lamb.

10. The goddamn siphon (aka the whipped cream canister).

Why does this one piece of kitchen equipment never seem to work? It might just be that chefs don't typically come into contact with a siphon on a daily basis, now that we've moved beyond non-dessert 'foams' and 'whips' that dominated the trend of molecular gastronomy. Or it could just be cursed.

Lesson: Shake it like a polaroid picture, or prepare to just see a spittle of sad sauce drip out.

11. Throwing any of the basket ingredients on the plate at the last minute, or as a garnish.

http://crayola-colored-skeletons.tumblr.com/post/161837244904/if-you-use-a-basket-ingredient-as-a-garnish-on

Part of the beauty (and the challenge) of Chopped is to take four disparate ingredients and transform them into one cohesive unit. But the keyword here is transform.

The chefs are under immense pressure, so it's easy to get all knees weak, arms spaghetti and forget a basket ingredient. But sometimes chefs will knowingly leave an ingredient to use at the last minute as a garnish.

Where's the showmanship? The pizzaz? You are not dripping in any culinary finesse if you don't figure out a way to incorporate all the ingredients.

Lesson: "Have the judgement to fit those mismatched pieces into a puzzle without masking them with too [sic] much with items from the pantry," Allen says.

12. Relying too heavily on the pantry ingredients.

Leaning heavily into the basket ingredients tends to score bigger points with the judges, however strange they might seem at first glance. You might not want to touch that black chicken, but at this point, what choice do you have?

Depending on what's given to the chefs, though, they might actually do worse the "better" the basket might seem.

"When you’ve been given a basic basket — with a T-bone steak, and a sweet potato, and butter, and a carton of heavy cream — it seems like such a layup, but it almost seems like [the chefs] do the worst job when they don’t have enough of a challenge."

Allen says that while something like pickled giblets might not be "the first thing you'd ask for," it might force chefs to get more creative.

Lesson: You don't always get what you want, but you might just get what you need.

13. Using rookie culinary techniques, such as adding truffle oil or a mint leaf.

Why do we dislike truffle oil on #Chopped? Most is synthetic & contains no truffle. It’s strong, & tends to overwhelm a dish. It was trendy (a long time ago), & we don’t like trendiness. It feels pretentious, now—a cheap way to try to make a dish seem fancy.

— Ted Allen (@TheTedAllen) June 5, 2018

If a Chopped judge utters the words "why are they going to the pantry, oh god, there's only 30 seconds left," you know this isn't going to be good.

Most of the time these last-minute additions are at best, superfluous, and at worse, ruin the integrity of the dish as a whole. The perfectionist anxiety to add ingredient upon ingredient in search of making your dish stand out is understandable.

"I mean this in a positive way, a chef is generally a control freak," says Allen. "Someone who has a strong point of view, something that they want to say with food. On Chopped, we take away all of that control, all of it."

Lesson: At a certain point, the dish is going to be what it is. And tossing something like truffle oil or saffron on top with five seconds left won't make your dish any fancier.

14. Trying to hide your basket ingredient through the magic of blending.

http://luvkurai.tumblr.com/post/165382319715/i-didnt-used-to-understand-why-people-got-so

Blending is the one technique that shows you're either the smartest person in the Chopped kitchen, or you have no idea what the hell is going on.

Okay, sometimes there's really nothing left to do when there's a basket that's mostly normal, but has one giant curveball. In that case, feel free to hit the judges with some foot-long oversized gummy worm gastrique.

Lesson: If the Chopped judges have to ask where you a put an ingredient, and the answer is "...it's in the sauce", perhaps the blender was not your best friend.

15. Starting to cook ANYTHING, or plating, with less than a minute left.

http://projectcatzo.tumblr.com/post/159772284409/ted-allen-one-minute-left-chopped-contestant

Hmm, I think my dish is missing something. Let me just whip up a little salad dressing real quick...oh, I should probably get my stuff on the plate too. How much time do I have left? 45 seconds? I got time!

Then, shockingly, they did not have time. And there is never really enough time. But as we've established, the secret ingredient to winning Chopped isn't necessarily killer cooking skills, it's killer time management.

Listen to Ted Allen on this one, kids: "If it’s going to take 20 minutes to make something, I might be able to pull off a ham sandwich. 20 minutes is nothing. It’s just nothing. Take a second to plan and realize that you’re gonna have to slice something smaller or make something that’s doable."

Lesson: Don't do the culinary crime if you can't manage your kitchen time.

me, with no professional experience, yelling @ chopped competitors when they burn anything or forget an ingredient pic.twitter.com/zMKbBk4gJT

— meg 🐉 (@n_agem) April 25, 2017

Sure, we'd love to think we know everything about goes down during Chopped's intense 20-30 minute rounds, but we're just Average Joes yelling about coulis and beurre blanc to a screen. The Chopped competition turns us all into pseudo-culinary experts, while perched on the sofa eating half-frozen chicken nuggets.

Allen says that if you ever find yourself getting frustrated at the chefs, "set the clock to 20 minutes, and ask your wife or husband to take out four weird ingredients, and see how you do. 'Cause it could be an eye-opener for you."

But that's the fun part! Chopped manages to show us a life lesson best expressed in Ratatouille: Anyone can cook. And, just as important, anyone can think they can whip up a risotto in 20 minutes and fail miserably.

"In this business, you’re only as good as the last plate you cooked. So the stakes are pretty high."

Ted Allen is right — the chopping block is a great, delicious equalizer.

WATCH: A study of 'ultraprocessed foods' had some bleak results

#_category:yct:001000002 #_author:Sage Anderson #_uuid:6fcc73ec-ec6f-306a-9799-d7331ff7345f #_lmsid:a0Vd000000DTrEpEAL #_revsp:news.mashable

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elsanna-shenanigans · 3 years

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August Contest Submission #19: Budding Romance

Words: ca. 3,000 Setting: mAU Lemon: No CW: None

Elsa doesn't even look up as the door to her little shop opens; not because she's rude, or disinterested, or ignorant, but rather because she's spent the last fifteen minutes counting the petals on every flower in a daisy bouquet for a very pedantic customer, and she knows she won't survive if she has to restart. Again.

The newcomer doesn't immediately approach the counter, instead moving to have a look at a few of Elsa's pre-made bouquets. She's eternally grateful, and within thirty seconds, Elsa manages to finish counting the last flower with a sigh of relief. It's perfect – just what they want.

Moving the bouquet to the side, she greets, "Welcome to Nip It!" a warm smile on her face as she finally looks up. "Oh, Anna! Hello." The smile, still warm, relaxes and becomes softer. "That time of the week already?"

Anna offers a shy chuckle. "You know it," she says. She's standing near the aromatic bouquets today – lavenders, gardenias, and hyacinths, among others. They provide a lovely frame, a backdrop to her own energy and beauty, and Elsa wishes she could capture the moment on film. "These are new," Anna continues, unaware of the thoughts running through Elsa's head. "Your design?"

Now, the smile is proud. "They are! Freshly cut only yesterday, too. Are you interested in one?" The question is only a little insincere; after three months of weekly visits, Anna has yet to buy a single bouquet. Though she's probably bought almost every flower at this point, Elsa muses.

Anna approaches the counter before answering. She seems to be giving it serious thought, biting her bottom lip. "Nah. Not today, I think. When I get a bouquet, I think I want it to be a little more... specific."

"Specific flowers, or for a specific someone?" Elsa smirks, chest light, glad for reasons she cannot name that Anna's refused. Anna remains silent. She's blushing red, and Elsa shouldn't enjoy teasing her this much, shouldn't enjoy this friendly banter that isn't quite "professional-and-client" anymore. She can't honestly say she has many "regulars", though, and a shocking number of clients buy flowers from her as apologies for infidelities or tragic circumstances. Anna's a breath of fresh air in that regard. "Well, we did get some new stock in yesterday, too. Fancy ones." Anna's eyes light up, and she leans in a little closer. She doesn't have to say anything for Elsa to know what she wants.

Shooting her a wink – an overtly brave gesture Elsa immediately regrets – she heads out the back of her little shop. There's another workbench out here, and messy shelving full of pots and ribbons and other decorations. Elsa soundly ignores it all in favour of pausing to put her head in her hands. Just for a moment to address her own burning embarrassment before neatly compartmentalising.

Once she's had her moment, Elsa returns to the actual reason she'd come back here: a huge selection of flowers, ready for her to work her magic and build outstanding bouquets. She doesn't bother – that's not her goal – and instead plucks a single flower from amongst the mix before heading back out to the front room.

It takes her a second to find Anna; she's standing amongst the sunflowers. Elsa doesn't interrupt yet, spending a few seconds committing the image to memory; camera or no, she wants to remember this.

Anna jumps when Elsa does finally approach, clearly not having heard her return, and Elsa holds out the flower with a proud, "Ta-da!". Anna's eyes widen as she takes the purple flower gently from Elsa's hands. "Oh, Elsa. This is beautiful. Is it for me?"

With an easy smile and a small shrug, Elsa nods. "You, or whoever the mystery person you always only ever buy one flower for," she says. Then, because she doesn't want to linger on that last thought, she adds, "That's a crocus – I had to put in a special order for it, so take care of it."

"It's very pretty," Anna says softly. Her eyes are glued to the delicate purple petals, ranging from a deep regal shade at the base to a simple pastel at the tip. It's a glorious design, and to see the pretty blush on Anna's face makes it well worth the additional cost in getting them here. Anna brings it up to her nose, inhaling lightly. "Oh, this is wonderful!"

Elsa steps back, a little bubble of pride expanding in her chest. "It's my favourite flower. Especially the purple ones."

"I'm not surprised." Anna smiles. There's a comfortable silence that perhaps lingers a little too long, but it doesn't seem as though Anna minds. She's the one to break it, though. "You know, Elsa," she says, holding up the crocus. "I actually... think I'm ready for that bouquet today. Do you have any more of these?"

Against Elsa's expectations, Anna seems to have a pretty good idea for what she'd like in the bouquet. Usually, Elsa has to poke and prod and piece together the perfect arrangement because people have no idea what they want. Given that Anna's spent weeks here with no clear intention to purchase an one, Elsa had thought she'd be the same. Not so: it's clear she's been planning it for a while.

Anna's going for something really special.

She keeps looking at the flower in her hand, smiling. It makes sense that she wants the croci to be the centrepiece, and Elsa's glad that they could be used in such a heartfelt display. She is! She's glad Anna has chosen them, that she's asked Elsa to make a special, specific bouquet; the perfect bouquet for the perfect person. And yet, even with that truth – for it is, most certainly, true – Elsa still has a niggling sensation in the back of her head. Doubt, perhaps, or regret, or some other unnamed emotion. She tries her best to ignore it, and instead just bathe vicariously in Anna's good cheer.

"The magnolias, obviously," Anna says when Elsa asks what other flowers she'd like. Of course it isn't obvious to Elsa, but she won't complain. Magnolias are lovely, one of her favourites to work with. "And I know you mentioned the calla lilies not that long ago, said you were getting green ones in? I think she— I think that would be nice."

She. Elsa bites the inside of her lip. "So, purple and green theme?" A strange choice, but intriguing. "Sounds fun – and you know how I feel about fun." She makes a note on her pad, and says almost absent-mindedly, "I'm glad you're not going for the traditional roses."

Anna tilts her head and gives an odd smile. "Oh? Why's that?"

Elsa looks up. "Why's what?"

"Why are you glad I'm not going for roses?"

For a very long moment, Elsa doesn't have an answer for her. "Oh. Just. This is more fun for me." She looks away, back at her notepad. "Anything else? Something aromatic?"

At that, Anna shrugs, biting her bottom lip in thought. "I'd like to, but I don't know what she'd like. Recommendations?"

Elsa looks at the list. She'll probably use Lady's Mantle and Baby's Breath as a filler, so... “Heliotropes? They go with the colour scheme and smell divine."

"Sounds like a plan. Oh, this is so exciting!"

Letting out a little chuckle, Elsa finds she can't quite look at Anna. "It shouldn't take me long to do this up," she says. "If you'd like to wait? Or come back after lunch?"

"I think I'll wait, if that's okay? I just." She sighs, and for once, doesn't seem very excited. "If this," she says softly, nodding at the crocus still in her hand, "doesn't go well, I may not be back for a while."

Elsa nods in understanding, looking down at the list in her hand. She wants to say something encouraging, but her chest has become unexpectedly tight, and she doesn't know how to cheer Anna up when she herself is feeling so unexpectedly low.

"I'm sure it will go well," she says eventually. "I can't imagine anyone turning you down."

And then, before either have a chance to dwell on those words, she turns around and heads out the back.

By the time she returns, Anna's moved again. She's still standing by the counter, but now she's off to the side, looking at a display of cards. They're all handmade by a local artist, so they're a little pricier than grocery-store cards. Elsa could bulk-order from Hallmark fairly cheap, but she likes supporting a good cause.

They are really gorgeous cards.

"Hey, do I have to pay for this first before I write in it?" Anna asks. She's got a selection of cards, trying to narrow down the perfect one, and a thoughtful frown on her face.

"For you? Nah," Elsa says. And maybe that'll come back to bite her, but she trusts Anna. The grateful smile she receives in return is well worth it. Might be the last time she sees it.

The thought is sufficiently depressing, so she sits on her stool and gets to work. There's enough furniture-as-shelves for Anna to find a space to sit down, too, once she moves a few flower pots. Usually Elsa would head out the back to do this – it requires more concentration than people think, and customers are distracting – but Anna's perfectly polite and considerate. Still distracting, but for completely different reasons that Elsa refuses to dwell on. She only interrupts twice; the first is to get Elsa to choose the card because she can't make up her mind, and the second is to get an approximate price so she can move some money around.

"The card is ten. The bouquet... forty?"

Anna frowns at her. "The bouquet is definitely more than forty," she says. She points at one of the pre-arranged displays. "That one is forty."

"Fine, forty-five."

"Els..."

Anna actually looks angry with her, which is the last thing Elsa wants. She's just doing a good turn for a... customer. Anna's just a customer.

"It's fine, Anna. I'm not losing out, and you gave me a chance to work with all my favourites."

Anna still doesn't look happy, but she says nothing. She turns back to the card, planning whatever she wants to write on a spare piece of paper Elsa had given her. Elsa had offered to write the message herself – part of the service – but Anna declined. She thinks it'll be more special, more personal, if she does it herself, and Elsa tries not to think about it very much at all.

Instead, she focuses on the flowers in front of her. Anna's chosen the perfect amount – not so many that it's too busy, nor so few that it's bland and boring. The fresh heliotropes and magnolias add to the dusky scent in the small shop, and the new buds cover her fingertips in pinheads of soft pollen, a warm, familiar cocoon around Elsa's senses. It's almost enough. Almost.

Why did she have to show Anna the crocus? If she hadn't, Anna wouldn't get a bouquet today and Elsa could still look forward to seeing her next week. Her eyes flicker up, and then away again when she makes eye contact.

"Almost done," she calls out, as though that were an excuse for having looked. "Got your message ready?"

Anna stands up and makes her way over. "I think so," she says. "I mean, I was just gonna write 'please date me', but I don't think that would fit with the aesthetic."

Elsa lets out a snort, adjusting the position of the magnolias around the lilies. It looks rather good. She doesn’t look at Anna. "No, probably not. Still, there's something to be said for forthrightness. Certainly seems your style."

"Yeah, well," Anna says. "I don't think it's hers, and I'm trying something new, I guess."

Nodding, Elsa maintains her focus on the bouquet and not, at least outwardly, on the woman in front of her. There are only a few finishing touches left; ribbons, mostly, but she also has this special glitter dusting that's biodegradable and makes all the petals shimmer. It's normally an extra cost, but for Anna... well, Elsa wants to do it. Delicately, she applies it, and though the urge is there to paint every petal, she knows that in this instance, less is more.

"Ta-da," she says gently, much more muted than earlier. Anna's eyes light up when Elsa lifts the bouquet from her workstation and onto the counter-top.

"Oh, Elsa..." she says, voice bordering on reverential. "It's stunning."

Elsa smiles weakly. "I think it's the best one I've ever done," she says. It's true. She almost wishes it weren't. "So, card?"

"Oh! Um, gimme a sec," Anna says. She's blushing now, bright red, and it manages to drag a smile to Elsa's lips. Only for a moment, and Anna doesn't see it anyway because she's turned back to her previous seat, hurriedly scribbling out her message onto the card before stuffing it into the envelope. When she returns, she keeps her gaze down, focused squarely on the little envelope in her hands. It sounds like she really likes this person – must do, if she's going to all this effort. Elsa finds her chest to be suddenly heavy, and she can't quite hide the melancholia before Anna looks up.

She notices straight away.

"Hey. Everything okay?"

Swallowing, Elsa finds it takes a little too long to find her voice, so she nods first. "Y-yeah. Just... thinking. About what you said earlier, about your visits. I hope whoever this is for appreciates it, Anna."

"I'm fairly sure you're the only one able to truly appreciate what you've made today, Els," Anna says seriously. "And I... I don't know. I think it'll go well. She seems interested in me, which means I'll have to keep coming here." Anna's beaming. Elsa offers a pathetic imitation in return.

"You better get this to her quick, then. No more wasted time, eh?" She pops a little plastic card-stand into the bouquet, holding out her hand for the envelope. Anna doesn't pass it over – she slots the envelope into place herself. There's no name on it. Elsa distracts herself with the till.

"No name?" she comments mildly.

"Nah. She'll know it's for her," Anna says, pulling out her debit card. The pay-wave flatlines, the beep a death sentence, and Elsa's throat tightens. She offers a smile, because it seems appropriate, even if it doesn't reach her eyes.

"Good luck, Anna." The words are heartfelt and sincere, despite the heavy thudding in her chest. Anna smiles that beautiful smile before looking away.

"Thanks, Els," she says, "But... I don't think I need it."

And then she turns around and walks out of the shop.

It's so sudden and unexpected that Elsa's momentarily at a loss, knocked off kilter by surprise and disappointment. She knew Anna had to leave, but she'd expected at least a "see ya!" or a "catch you later!". Not... this.

Blinking rapidly, she looks away.

The bouquet is still on the counter.

Elsa's breath catches in her throat as she stares. Looks up at the door, shut behind Anna and seemingly with no intent to reopen. Looks down again at the bouquet. It seems to be mocking, and if this had been any other customer, Elsa would have chased after them, trying to minimise their embarrassment at their own forgetfulness. This time, she finds she can't. She can't even bring herself to look away.

A Mexican standoff that she was always destined to lose, she finally, shakingly, reaches out a hand towards the envelope Anna had only just positioned. Her brain seems to be working double-time, never staying on one thought long enough for her to acknowledge it, let alone dwell.

No. No, this has to be some kind of– no. Anna's just forgetful. She'll be back soon, laughing at herself.

There's no way she planned this.

And yet, Elsa knows she's wrong. Those affirmations don't stop her from plucking the envelope from the display, as gentle as she'd pick a flower from her own garden. It isn't sealed.

I've waited three months to find out your favourite flower. It's been worth every second. I almost wish it had taken longer. If you're willing to share, Elsa, I'd love to learn even more. Anna xx

Elsa chokes. Anna planned this?

Holding the card tight, Elsa darts around the counter. She heads for the door, wishing she had chased after Anna because there's no number, no address, no nothing to find her now. Such a bald declaration and yet Elsa can do absolutely nothing with it. Wrenching the door open, she finds herself coming to an immediate, hard stop.

Anna's standing on the footpath, facing the shop. She holds the crocus Elsa had given her earlier in one hand. She's bright red.

"So..."

Elsa inhales sharply. She doesn't want Anna to speak yet. "Are- are those… for me?" she asks, staring with wide eyes. There's no doubt as to what she's referring. She hardly dares to believe it, but there's no other possibility – at least, not one she can see. "You got me… to make a bouquet... for myself?" Her voice is, despite the earlier inhalation, breathless.

Anna lets out a short chuckle, hand coming up to rub the back of her neck. "It um. It seemed like a good idea in my head," she says.

Elsa lets out a sniffle and a bark of laughter. "You didn't have to go to all this trouble," she says, and now she's started, she can't stop smiling. It's for her. Anna had been doing exactly what she does; poking and prodding and figuring out, all so she could make the perfect bouquet. All she'd needed was one last ingredient: Elsa's favourite flower.

"Like I said," Anna began, moving towards her. "Forthrightness isn't her style, and I'm trying something new."

Nodding, Elsa looks back down at the flower in Anna's hand, and thinks back to the bouquet still on her counter. "I've never received flowers before," she says softly. Then, setting her jaw, she looks back up. "Let me try something new, too," she says. "Because there's a girl I like, and she's usually very direct. Anna," she pauses to swallow, to stall for the courage to be blunt. "Anna, please date me."

The grin Anna gives her, full of affection and mirth, is as beautiful as the sunrise after a devastating storm.

"I don't think I've ever wanted anything more."

#elsanna #submission #august 2021 contest #prompt: flowers

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