#lionel needs to shut up

[maneaterss]

Can you do a Neymar fic where he calls her clingy behind her back and she overhears and changes

i'm done doing the "pairing, summary, cw" thing cause it's kinda obvious by the req! also i changed this into more of an argument LOL.

angst!! insecurity. mentions of past relationships were reader was cheated on.

-

you and neymar had always been open about what you want out of your relationship, how you feel about certain things- etcetera.

you gave him your all- always making sure his jerseys were ready for whatever game he had next, making sure he had food to eat after practice, and letting your hearts beat together at night- him holding you close.

during practice season him, messi, and kylian would all carpool and switch off, this time in particular messi and kylian decided it best that they would come over after practice and play some fifa on the couch.

when neymar came in- you welcomed his friends and pressed a kiss to his cheek.

you were working on something on your laptop so you went straight back to the room and continued working on it.

after about half an hour you needed to use the bathroom which was directly across the hall from the living room, you sat your laptop on the bed and quietly made your way to the bathroom so as to not disrupt the guys.

once you'd done your business, you washed your hands and dried them.

"antonella wasn't able to be home last night so i woke up so late." you heard lionel's voice echo through the living room.

"i couldn't imagine having to go home to someone every single night and not be able to drop onto the bed and just fall asleep- i feel bad for you guys."

at this. neymar laughed loudly, "honestly, it becomes a lot- having to talk to them 24-7- especially y/n she's a little-"

"clingy?" lionel questioned. curious to where this was going.

you could've sworn your heart dropped- time seemed to slow down as you waited for his answer.

"extremely. she's just-" he also laughed and sighed at the same time. "not simple."

your heart dropped even further, your eyes brimming with tears. were you honestly that clingy? were you mistaking being caring with being a burden? were you really that bad? so bad that he had to talk about you like this while you were still in the house.

your ears were ringing, how many times had he spoken down on you like this without you knowing? so many questions and regrets.

your hand was still on the doorknob, if you left now he would know that you'd overheard and it would result in an awkward and insincere apology from him. but you couldn't just hideout in the bathroom.

you'd decided to leave the bathroom, trying to slip by as you did before- it went unnoticed by everyone in the room that you rushed past with your head down.

neymar was laughing for practically the rest of his friends visit before they'd decided to call it a night and head home.

you on the other hand were sat on the bed- laptop closed. your thoughts focused on only one thing.

the pressure in your throat builds as tears still stung at your eyes. every single betrayal came back crawling onto your shaken skin- every disloyal relationship, every time you'd been cheated on, thought of as lesser than, everytime you wanted to crawl out of your own skin, the skin that neymar had worshipped.

"she's just not simple."

you squeezed your eyes shut, you'd gotten too comfortable. you were torn back to those times where you were struck with someone elses dishonesty- poisoned by their greed. where those that you loved were too blind to see that your kindness was their stability. undermined, unworthy, and manipulated.

maybe you'd blown it out of proportion, he laughed when he said it- he must've not meant it. wether he was saying it to make his friends laugh or not- it had no other outcome than tears running down your cheeks, desperately trying to pull yourself together.

you looked at yourself in the mirror- you felt so stupid, so small, so insignificant like the life had been torn from you. didn't this go to show that you'd been to clingy? that you cared too much?

you heard his friends leave. you really had to get your shit together now.

you wiped your tears and walked to your armoire, folding the stray t-shirts that were spread over the inside.

in walked a straight faced neymar, who came up behind you to press a kiss to your cheek.

he grabbed a few of the shirts in the folding pile, trying to lessen the task for you- but in all honesty, what does he care? "i've got it, " you spoke without looking up at him.

he persisted, continuing to fold the shirts.

you hastily grabbed the shirts from his grasp, "i said i've got it."

he was caught off guard with the sudden attitude, he genuinely couldn't think of what he'd done to make you unhappy. "what's wrong meu amor?"

"nothing, just let me fold the clothes." you looked him in his eyes for the first time tonight and wondered how someone who looked at you so softly, like you were delicate pieces of china- could say belittling things about you knowing what you had gone through.

you wanted to blame him, you wanted to not internalize it and say it's his fault and not yours for the way that you let his words change your outlook on things, to change you.

"no tell me what's wrong." he began walking towards you, "i know somethings wrong."

you became angry, angry because you so badly wanted to breakdown into tears- curl into a ball and disappear, but his stupid, selfish, greedy words made you decide against it. "god neymar, drop it."

you prayed he would let you go to bed angry, and you'd wake up and act like nothing happened, but he couldn't think like that. "no." he furrowed his eyebrows, "what's gotten into you? is it because i didn't spend enough time with you? if it is then i'm s-"

you audibly laughed in his face, it was ironic. "no it's the opposite neymar, maybe i spend too much time with you."

he remained confused for a mere few seconds, before his mouth shut, he didn't know what to say. "y/n."

"i mean i guess i already got a head start to the clingy thing, i didn't make you dinner tonight was that better for you? did that make things easier?" you mockingly spoke. sure it was evil to shove this in his face but you were tired of being calm about this when you were so far from it.

"that's not what i meant. i didn't mean it like that." he stood on the other side of the bed from you, tears brimmed his eyes now. how could he have the capacity within himself to hurt the person who has saved him from darkness? why did he say things like that so spitefully when you were someone who had filled his lungs with air and left the kiss of the sun on his skin.

but you'd wonder what life would be like if you were an easy girl. if all those people from the past wouldn't have done those things to you, if neymar wouldn't feel sideways about you. this was rubbing away at a part of you, the giving part of you- you were running out of these kind gestures bit by bit, but what did it matter? he didnt care for them anyways right?

you didnt even realize you were crying nor did you realize he'd came up behind you and wiped your tears.

"no i'm sorry baby." he buried his head into your neck. "i'm so sorry."

your tears fell regardless. your heart rate still at an all time low. you didn't believe that he was truly sorry, he gave unsolicited backlash to your raw wounds and spoke so openly about it.

you freed yourself from his grasp, and began to pace around the room, "no." you wiped the tears with your hand that ran down your face. he refused to let you make these decisions blind with anger. he corned you, begging you to say something, to yell at him, to tell him that he's stupid. god anything. "i can't believe you embarrassed me like that."

"i know y/n. i know, i know, im sorry." he ran a hand through his hair.

"i have given you every part of me since i have loved you and for you to-" you spoke through sobs- sobs that tore the air from you, "god what were you thinking."

his heart broke with that last line, he knew what it meant. it meant something had changed for you, that something would never be the same and the scariest part was that he didn't know what it was.

"i wasnt thinking i don't know what i was saying, please forgive me baby please." he was breaking down now too.

"who's simple?" you asked, expressionless besides the tears that stained your cheeks.

"what?"

"was bruna simple?"

three words and his expression fell. now equally as hurt as you that you had to bring that up, you were both hurting so it resulted in hurting each other. his hand that was once reaching for your cheek now fell this his side as he ran a hand over his mouth. he was more speechless now than before.

you took heavy note of him taking more offense to the mention of his ex than his comments towards you. you knew you were in the wrong to bring it up, but didn't he deserve it?

"im going to stay with my sister tonight." you grabbed your car keys and left- nevermjnd the fact that you didn't have a spare change of clothes.

he stood, watching you leave- not preferring it but not objecting, just letting it happen.

#neymar jr #neymar #neymar angst #neymar fluff #neymar headcanon #neymar smut #neymar x you #neymar imagine #neymar x reader #neymar imagines #neymajr

[didishawn]

some Jules kounde smut plssss

This request surely made me see Koundé on a different light

No more Muchachos (Jules Koundé x Argentinian Reader) smut

Warnings: a bit of teasing because of the World Cup final, Koundé fucks you hard to shut you up, smut, some Spanish

Masterlist

If he has to hear the song one more time, Koundé will go mad.

En Argentina nací (I was born in Argentina)

Tierra del Diego y Lionel (land of Diego and Lionel)

De los pibes de Malvinas (of the guys frtom Malvinas)

Que jamás olvidaré (that I will never forget)

No te lo puedo explicar (I can't explain)

Porque no vas a entender (because you won't understand)

Las finales que perdimos (the finals that we lost)

Cuantos años la lloré (how many years I cried them)

Pero eso se terminó (but that finished)

Porque en el Maracaná (because in the Maracaná)

La final con los brazucas (the final with the Brazilians)

La volvió a ganar papá (Dad won it again)

He knows you are on heaven since the World Cup final, and doesn't matter how sad you felt for his loss, your happiness was greater at seeing Messi finally lifting up the Cup -even he was excited for that.

But he seriously cannot keep on going like this, everyday Muchachos sounds on repeat in your home, your low humming going with the music and always with a teasing look on your eye.

His teammates and the media find it so funny, how much you seem to love your dear Argentina over him -even he finds it funny, but can't help but dream of setting you straight as he finds himself singing the lyrics even when you are not around.

Dreams do become true.

Is what Koundé thinks as he pounds into you from the back, one hand pulling you back, the other on your hair pushing your face to be buried in between your comfortable pillows.

"Does that feel good, darling?"

He hears your muffled yes and smirks, hips still pistoning into yours.

"This is what needed to be done, isn't it? A good fuck so you can stop being an annoying little shit, love reminding me about that day, don't you?"

You lift your head, even with glossy eyes you still give him a teasing look, "No es mi culpa que perdieran, pa. Era para Sudamérica no para Europa" you hum, he groans, even if he loves how thick your accent gets on times like this. (not my fault you lost, dude. It was for South America not for Europa)

"You really are a little shit"

He spins you around, holding one of your legs up, kissing your ankle then placing it on his shoulder, reaching deeper inside you, his length and width have you closing your eyes and whining, it hurts so good -an expression you never understood until meeting Jules.

His lips are on yours, he wants to be the one thing you think about, his fingers playing with your bundle of nerves have you squirming around.

You are trembling, your moans are getting higher, nails leaving marks on his back, you bite into his neck, making him groan out and thrust harder.

He looks down at you, so much love in his eyes yet his thrusts are nothing but punishment, hard and fast, his lips are all over you, your breasts, neck, face, hair, one caressing your stomach, calming you down, a sweet kiss on your cheek. You are close, he can tell, he knows everything about you and can recognise the signs.

"Cum for me, darling. Let me feel you around me"

You moan as you reach your extasis, whines leaving your mouth as he continues on fucking you. You can feel him throb inside of you, you caress his back with you nails -something you know he loves, and have him trembling.

He suddenly leaves your insides, taking your hand and dragging you to the edge of the bed, he stands in front of you, your face inches away from his cock as he jerks himself off, a loud moan sounds as he cums on your face and he groans when he sees the look you give him while cleaning yourself off and moaning at his taste.

He cleans you up, and you lay side by side, you cuddling into his chest as he caresses you ans kisses your head.

He smiles down at you "Is that enough to get you to stop playing that goddamm song?"

"Sure, I suppose"

You will just have to start playing 3 estrellas en el conjunto, you guess.

#jules kounde #koundé #jules kounde smut #jules koundé #jules kounde x reader #jules kounde imagine #barca #fc barca #barcelona #france nt #france national team #argentina nt #messi #muchachos #world cup

[smilingformoney]

Sharing Part VII | Lionel/Reader

Summary: Lionel's in for a punishment of his own when you get wind of his fling with PJ Puznowski.

Read on Ao3 or below the cut:

“I thought I’d find you in here.”

Lionel tore his eyes from the remnants of the fake painting he’d almost parted with £12 million for, and his disappointment washed away when he laid eyes on something even more beautiful than any painting in his collection: you, in a slick black dress, crossing the threshold of the room that held Haystacks at Dawn.

”[Y/n]!” he grinned. “I’m so glad to see you. I was just considering packing in this droll party, but now you’re here, I’ll definitely pack it in. We’ll need the place to ourselves, after all.”

He slipped a hand around your waist and reached down to grab your ass as he kissed you. He tasted like expensive wine, and he smelt just as sensual as he always did. You almost gave in, basking in the feel of him, but then you remembered the woman you’d just passed on your way into the house.

Lionel had been fucking around. Now, he was about to find out.

You spotted the fake Haystacks at Dusk out of the corner of your eye as you parted for breath, and your curiosity got the better of you.

”Why is her maj watching us kiss?”

Lionel glanced back at the fake painting with a sigh. “I was almost fooled into buying a false Haystacks Dusk. Fortunately Deane realised the forgery… just moments after Zaidenweber declared it genuine. Needless to say, Zaidenweber won’t be my new curator after all.”

“I told you Harry was worth keeping around,” you said smugly. You had a soft spot for Harry Deane, finding his constant deference and bumbling endearing despite Lionel’s eternal annoyance at him - perhaps because he annoyed Lionel so much.

”Yes, well, too late for that. He quit on the spot. Now I’m left with no curator at all and Queen Elizabeth staring at me from within a fake Haystacks at Dusk.” He turned back to you with a smile. “But no matter. I still have Dawn, and more importantly, I have you. How was your flight?”

”Long. You really need to move to your office in California, Lionel, then there’d be none of this flying back and forth every six months business.”

Lionel smirked. “You’d have to drag me away from London kicking and screaming, love. Talking of screaming - it’s been a long night, and I sorely need a reprieve. I hope you don’t expect to walk away with that dress in one piece.”

”I know you better than that, sweetie. Come on.”

You took his hand and led him away from the gallery and up to one of the many bedrooms in his manor, letting him ramble on in his husky voice about all the things he was going to do to you - or all the things he thought he was going to do to you. You had a very different plan in mind, and Lionel wasn’t going to get any say in the matter.

As soon as the door was shut behind you, Lionel’s hands were on your body, grabbing hungrily at the fabric of your dress.

”This. Off. Now.”

You placed your hands over his to still his movements, and he raised an eyebrow at you.

”You first,” you insisted. “I flew all this way. I wanna see you strip for me.”

As if Lionel needed an excuse to get his clothes off. If he didn’t have to wear clothes to be seen in public, he’d never put them on in the first place. It had taken you by surprise the first time you’d come downstairs in the morning, he having woken and got up before you, and found him lying on the sofa stark naked. You certainly didn’t have reason to complain about his nudist habits - it just made him more accessible. You even began wearing less clothes around the house yourself, usually opting to just cover yourself with a robe until he inevitably threw it to the floor so he could worship your body.

Lionel was sat on the edge of the bed as he removed his final piece of clothing, tugging his trousers from his ankles, and before he could stand you quickly pushed his shoulders until he was laying on his back.

He chuckled, thinking he knew what was coming. He was sorely mistaken.

You hitched up your skirt and lifted a leg to straddle him. He felt your bare flesh press against his crotch, and he hummed in approval.

”No knickers? You filthy thing. I bet you’re not wearing a bra either, are you?”

He lifted his hands to pull your dress down, but you slapped them away. He frowned.

”Show Daddy your tits, [Y/n],” he said sternly.

You shrugged. “Nah, I don’t think you deserve them.”

”…Come again?”

You almost laughed at how genuinely confounded he was. Normally you were eager for him to paw at your chest, leaving bite marks and scratches behind, so your resistance at getting your tits out for him at all was certainly new.

”You heard me. Daddy’s been naughty. I don’t think he deserves to see my tits.”

Lionel pushed himself up with his elbows and snarled at you.

”Has six months with Michaelson made you forget who’s in charge here, little slut?”

You scoffed. “You’re calling me a slut? That’s rich.”

You and Lionel had fucked so many times in the rooms of his manor that most of them had some sort of toy lying around. This room, you had specifically led him to because you knew there was a pair of handcuffs in the bedside cabinet. You learned over now to reach into the drawer and, before Lionel could react, you had one of his wrists cuffed.

In his surprise, he fell back onto the pillows, and you took advantage of his temporary disorientation to grab his other wrist and lock both his wrists together above his head.

”What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Lionel hissed. “Those are for your wrists, not mine.”

”Oh, but they look so good on you, Daddy,” you pouted.

”Let me go this instant!” Lionel demanded, tugging at the handcuffs as if that would help, and you just laughed at him. “Don’t you laugh at me, slut. You’re going to have to let me out eventually, and when I do, you and your arse are in for a big punishment. You won’t be able to sit for weeks. You won’t even be able to stand up straight, you’ll be stuck with your arse in the air, just waiting for me - mmph!”

You stopped his threats with a kiss, and despite his indignant anger, your lips were as irresistible to him as ever, and he whined into the kiss with a desperate need, his hips bucking up into yours as if hoping he could slip inside you.

“Oh, is there something Daddy wants?”

Lionel frowned at you. “You know exactly what I want. You’d better give me your cunt, [Y/n], or you’ll sorely regret it.”

You grinned, adjusted your position on top of him slightly, and wrapped your hand around his cock.

“Tell me you’re sorry.”

You stroked him once, just enough to taunt him.

“Sorry for what?”

You pouted.

“Daddy doesn’t even know what he did wrong,” you said with disappointment. “And he thinks he can have my cunt?”

Lionel hissed with frustration. Your thumb was on his tip now, teasing at the precum that was beginning to leak from him.

“You know I don’t like these games, [Y/n]. What do you think I’ve done?”

“Hmm…” You continued to stroke him slowly, with featherlight touches, just enough to keep him frustrated. “Maybe you need your memory jogged.” You leant over him, bringing your lips close to his ear, and you could feel his frustrated heavy breathing tickling your ear.

“Would you remember if I rode you?”

“Yes,” he said quickly, thinking he was getting what he wanted. “Yes, ride me, [Y/n], then I’m sure I’ll remember…”

“And tell me, Daddy - what’s the position called when a woman rides a man?”

“Erm - cowgirl?” Lionel said with a frown, which deepened when he realised what you were getting at. “Wait - is that what this is about? The cowgirl?”

You gave him a couple of tugs as a reward, then went back to your languid movements.

“Got there eventually. You really are slow when you’re thirsty, aren’t you, Daddy?”

“I don’t — what are you talking about, [Y/n]? I thought she had Haystacks at Dusk. Clearly, it was a fake. That’s all.”

You tugged on his earlobe with your teeth. “Liar.”

You released your grip on him, causing him to groan in frustration, then reached out to grab your bag from where it had been discarded on the floor. You pulled out your phone, pulled up a screenshot and showed it to him.

It was a photo of Lionel kissing PJ outside the Savoy, and a tweet caption: Lionel Shabandar kissing a woman that is definitely not [Y/n] [L/n].

“So I kissed her!” Lionel said incredulously. “I have a free pass for when you’re not here, don’t I?”

“Not all over Twitter!” you hissed, tossing the phone aside. “Do you have any idea how embarrassing it is -“ You took his cock in your hand again and tugged it, causing his hips to buck and a whine to escape his throat. “- when Eli comes shoving this in my face -“ Another tug, another whine, another buck of his hips. “- and then my mother sends it to me! She’s in bits because she thinks you’re cheating on me. How can I tell this innocent old lady that we’re open, huh? That you’re allowed to fuck other women?”

“I didn’t - fuck - I didn’t fuck her —”

“Stop lying to me, Lionel!” You groaned with frustration, releasing him from your grip to lean over him, hands either side of his head, trapping him beneath you. “You led her into the hotel —”

“And left twenty minutes later! She turned me down.”

You scoffed. “So you only tried to fuck her. Well, that’s alright, then, isn’t it?”

Lionel tugged on the handcuffs in frustration, but they were far too high-quality to budge.

“[Y/n] — I’m sorry, alright? If I’d known it would upset you, I wouldn’t have even gone near her.”

You hesitated, looking at him carefully, watching for any sign that he was lying.

“…Really?”

“Of course,” he said, as if you’d asked him something as obvious as the colour of the sky. “I love you, [Y/n]. She might have been a good fuck, but that’s not worth upsetting you over. Nothing is.”

“Not even if fucking her got you Haystacks at Dusk?”

“Not even for Haystacks at Dusk.”

You sat up, looking down at him, all anger and frustration dissipating from you in mere moments. You knew he loved you, but just like Eli, he had other priorities. For Eli, it was his ego. For Lionel, it was his art. And yet, here he was, insisting you meant more to him than Haystacks Dusk, and despite everything you believed him.

You uncuffed his wrists and he sighed with relief as he lowered his arms, hissing as he rubbed his sore wrists.

“You need practice with these. They were far too tight.”

“You offering to let me practice on you?”

Lionel smirked. “In your dreams, love.”

He grabbed your hips and flipped you over, nestling his hips comfortably between your legs.

“Now, [Y/n], please may I see those tits? I’m just itching to get my hands on them.”

Was he seriously asking, not just taking? Wow. He must really be sorry.

You smiled and raised your arms above your head. Lionel grinned hungrily and grabbed the fabric of your dress to tug it over your head and discard it on the floor, leaving you naked as he was.

“Fucking perfection,” he growled, his large hands already cupping your breasts. “And you really thought I’d fuck other women when I’ve got you?”

He leant down and buried his face between your breasts, licking at every inch of skin he could reach, as if he could leave a trail of saliva to remind Eli where you’d been.

“You can fuck them, Lionel, you know that. I just don’t want it all over Twitter.”

“Hmm… I’d rather just have you, to be honest.”

He kissed one nipple, then the other, then your lips.

“I don’t recall the last time I fucked another woman… how can I, when I’ve already had the best? PJ was a means to an end, that’s all… you are the only woman for me, [Y/n].”

You whined, from need, from love, from frustration. You wrapped your arms around your lover’s shoulders, clinging onto him as he breathed in your scent, his nose tickling your cheek as he dropped slow, featherlight kisses to your face.

“Move to California, Lionel,” you begged. “I can’t stand being away from you. I love Eli, but I love you too. I need you both there.”

There was a long pause. Lionel stilled his movements, his face still pressed against yours, his hair tickling your skin slightly.

“…I’ll think about it,” he conceded.

You smiled as a warm feeling spread within your chest. You knew it was the best answer you could have hoped for in the moment. Lionel wasn’t one to make promises he couldn’t follow through on, and he didn’t want to let you down.

“Any other requests while I’m here? The moon, perhaps?”

He was smirking at you, but you had a feeling if you really wanted the moon, he’d find a way to buy it.

You wrapped your arms tighter around him, holding him close.

“Devour me, your Lordship.”

Lionel grinned, purring hungrily. His pupils were blown with lust, his breath heavy, and you could feel his cock twitching as it lay pressed up against your cunt.

“Ohh, [Y/n]… I may be a Lord, but you are my Queen. I won’t just devour you… I’ll worship you.”

He slid inside you so easily, you’d have almost not noticed if he weren’t so fucking big.

Lionel groaned with relief, his cock finally inside you, finally where he belonged.

“Mhmm… I’m so glad we stopped using condoms, darling. The walls of your tight cunt feel so fucking good. And you’re so wet… always so wet for me.”

“All for you, Daddy,” you whined, and Lionel hummed approvingly, rewarding you with a deep thrust.

“Yes… yes, all for me, my perfect little slut… I’ve missed you and I’ve had a hell of a day, I don’t know if I can control myself…”

“Then don’t,” you begged, your fingernails digging into his shoulders, hips wriggling desperately beneath his. “Fuck me, Lionel.”

He chuckled darkly. “As my lioness wishes.”

You cried out as he began thrusting into you, the squelching sound of his cock plunging into your soaking wet cunt filling the room, rivalled in volume only by your depraved groans.

“Mmm, yes, that’s it… fuck , you take me so well, darling.” Lionel sunk his teeth into your neck, aiming for a bruise Eli had left you last night. “As if I would ever have some - ah! - subpar other woman when I have you. I rub my cock every night thinking of you, darling, fucking my pillow and imagining it’s you beneath me… Do you think of me, darling, when you’re with him?”

“S - sometimes,” you gasped. “Wish you were there…”

“Only sometimes?”

“Always,” you admitted. “Always want you there… want him here… both daddies…”

Lionel grinned mischievously. “Greedy slut. Yes, you love it, don’t you? Not satisfied with just a billionaire - or just a Nobel Laureate - no, you have to have both.”

You buried your head in his neck and whined.

“D - don’t care about that,” you spluttered between groans. “Just want you - and Eli - don’t care about the rest. If - oh, fuck, Lionel!”

You cried out as he pushed your legs back slightly, opening them nice and wide for him, his cock pushing up against your sweet spot just right.

“What was that, darling? If what?”

“Lionel - Lionel, I - ahh! Just like that, Lionel, please…”

He laughed at you, relishing the sight of you rendered so helpless, so cockdrunk, gushing with desire for him, your eyes alight with pleasure and your mouth emitting the most sinful groans.

Lionel pulled out of you, grabbed your hips and turned you over, then swiftly re-entered you from behind, giving him the perfect angle to slap your arse as his cock slid in and out of you.

“I see Michaelson’s been keeping you in line,” Lionel chuckled, examining the bruises and bite marks on your ass cheeks. “Good man. Don’t want you forgetting your place, do we, love?”

“N - no,” you gasped.

“And where is your place, slut?”

“Wherever Daddy wants me,” you groaned into the pillow. “Anywhere - anything you want, Daddy…”

“Good girl.”

He reached around your waist and his expert fingers found your sensitive nub, and you were so close to the edge already that it took him only a few strokes to send you over the edge, screaming incoherently into the pillow, hands gripping tight around the bedpost as you came. Lionel followed soon after, painting your insides with his cum, body shuddering as he held your hips firmly against him, keeping himself buried deep inside you as he filled you up.

Your knees gave way and your hips fell unceremoniously onto the bed, sliding off of Lionel’s cock, and he quickly followed suit, lying on top of you on the messed-up sheets of a bed you’d never slept in.

He pressed lazy kisses wherever he could, across your shoulders and neck, and you giggled when he kissed behind your jaw and his hair tickled against your ear.

“You’re incredible,” he whispered in your ear, and you blushed. You wriggled around underneath him so you were face to face, and his lazy kisses became a deep, warm, loving kiss between the two of you, both savouring the intimacy of the moment.

“I love you, Lionel,” you whispered when your lips parted, as if the room were bugged and it was a secret nobody else could know.

“I love you too, [Y/n],” he replied with a smug smile, knowing he had your heart, body and soul, and that was worth more than any painting, no matter how rare.

You shivered. Lionel kissed you once more then rolled off you to let you go to the bathroom, and when you returned he was still stark naked, looking out the window, where he could see the gala was still in full swing without him.

You approached him from behind, still naked yourself, and wrapped an arm around his waist. He smiled and put an arm around your shoulder to hold you close. He kissed the top of your head, then muttered, “I do want to live with you all year, darling. I’d happily move to California to be with you, even with Michaelson there too. But… my work is here, for now.”

“I know,” you replied, looking out across the estate at the gathered revellers, far too interested in the free food and drink to notice their host’s absence. “It’ll all fall into place one day.”

You were both quiet for a few moments, enjoying each other’s presence, completely naked and vulnerable as you looked down at the party. Most people had taken their masks off by now, and down near the band, you saw a figure of similar build to Lionel, dancing energetically with a dark-skinned woman with unmistakable bushy hair.

“How long have Betty and Sinclair been together?” you wondered aloud.

“Hm? Oh, about… twenty years or so. Why?”

“They’re still so in love.”

“They, my love, are unique among married couples. Especially those in the upper classes. Most rich married couples are miserable, but those two… they almost make me believe in true love.”

“What’s their secret, do you think?”

“Well, either they’re on copious amounts of cocaine…”

You laughed.

“…or they genuinely enjoy one another’s company.” Lionel looked down at you. “You were going to say something earlier. Before I rendered you speechless.”

You smiled. “I was going to say that I don’t care about your money. It’s good to see you reap the rewards of all the effort you’ve put into Shabandar Media, and I definitely like the perks, but if you lost it all, I’d still love you.”

Lionel smirked. “Careful, [Y/n]. Talk like that and one might think you’ve gone soft. You’ll be talking about marriage next.”

“My title would be ‘Doctor Lady’, I’d marry you just for that.”

“Two titles, two lovers. You really are just a collector, aren’t you, [Y/n]?”

“You can talk, with your art collection!” you said teasingly.

“That’s true,” Lionel conceded. “Perhaps we’re both greedy.” He kissed you again, then sighed. “I suppose we should get back to the party. I closed on an important deal tonight, I don’t want them to change their minds because I disappeared at the party, even if it was to fuck you.”

He kissed you one last time, deeply this time, and there was something unusually sweet about it. Before you had chance to savour it, however, Lionel pulled away and began to gather his and your clothes from the floor.

You glanced back out the window and considered, for the first time in a long time, if moving back to England wouldn’t be so bad after all.

#alan rickman #lionel shabandar #lionel x reader #sharing

[alyszaen]

𝐑𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬

You were looking for my masterlist? Here you go.

Disclaimer: Nothing here is sorted in any particular order!

Cooperations

I take part in posts by @chiskz: check out the Masterlist, but my absolute favourites are the small Red Lights Series: Music Video, Reaction, Behind the Scenes Another fic of theirs I love: kawasaki once more

Things I requested

~Build Me Up Buttercup by @longingpurity~ I asked for a period comfort and JayJay DELIVERED ~Did you know? by @longingpurity~ Jay always makes me feel better whenever I ask for a fic ~Boyfriend texts with Han by @boydepartment~ Im so delulu i will cry :(

~Movie Night by @skz-jisoo~

~Changbin x bff!reader by @caseiloveu~ ~Felix x reader by @caseiloveu~

~Flower-ed Playlist for Han by @venusdailyblog~ ~Flower-ed Playlist for Changbin by @venusdailyblog~

~Stray Kids when they break your favourite mug by @minvho~

My absolute favourite reads ever

~Ignite | Lee Felix by @pettypuppy-jonghyun~ Y'all I don't like AUs and this shit made me tear up, read it rn ~Kiss me | Han by @pettypuppy-jonghyun~ KABEDON, HAND ON THROAT, BOYFRIEND ~Greaser Boy | Seo Changbin by @pettypuppy-jonghyun~ I literally love u so much for endulging in my thirst ~Cuddling with you | Hyunjin by @pettypuppy-jonghyun~ by now y'all can tell that her writing has a chokehold on me but this is SOFT ~Together Is Better | Jisung (skz) by @pettypuppy-jonghyun~ tysm for this, i am so soft for it nobody will ever understand ughhh ~Sweet Night Talks | Han Jisung by @pettypuppy-jonghyun~ just me being delulu for hanji and loving this bitches fics

~under the same sky by @almondespresso/@chiskz~ this made me feel so safe

~Pink Chamapgne - Lionel Newman by @longingpurity~ the fluffiest fluff

~Before We Go To Bed by @chachachannah~ this is about me and hanji obv ~last embrace by @chachachannah~ gut wrenching. i hate this. fucking painful

~Lee Know x reader by @lino-nyangi~ I am very soft for this Lee Know

~Han x reader by @bbyquokka~ Jisung soft hours best hours ~stay with me by @bbyquokka~ a realistic depiction of mental health, incredibly comforting ~my soul mate is my cat by @bbyquokka~ this one hurts so good

~boop, and there he glares by @byjeekies~ SOFT SOFT SOFT

~Lee know x reader by @rachalixie~ I need all of you to understand how obsessed with this I am ~sleepy seungmin. by @rachalixie~ I want to put him in my pocket

~Politely, Shut Up by @skzonthebrain~ soft lino >>>

~The moments.. by @taeminsung~ toothrottingly sweet

~dance practice (h.h) by @yxngbxkkie~ the concept alone already has my heart aching

~they call you clingy by @yangfleurs~ I come back to all four of these posts regularly for sad hours

~not recommended by @skzinka~ this broke my heart

~Better Than Ever by @thevampywolf~ this one actually made me cry, the emotions are portrayed perfectly ~Stars At Home by @thevampywolf~ this is just so soft in a way that it made me physically warm

~does she? ; lee felix by @loveliestfelix~ unrequieted love? or not?

~skz treating your skzoo plush by @strayedstars~ funny af

~anything for you by @binniecorre~ this is so damn good y'all it healed every heartbreak i ever felt

~the dating experiment by @caseiloveu~ i need everyone to read this, genuinely, this did things to my heart

~You like me too? (H.JS) by @mxnsxngie~ I am delulu

~purposely loved | hyunjin x reader by @svngcore~ comforting in a painful way

~What about us? by @skzhua~ a masterpiece

~Clean Teeth & Goodnight Kisses by @jae-bummer~ it's not a want it's a need

~Hand hug by @hwaightme~ an absolute masterpiece that feels like a hug you've needed for years

Favourite Series

~Pizza Parlor by @longingpurity~ My absolute favourite ongoing series ever, i need new chapters RN

~Heart Attack by @cupidsheqrts~ I get full on giggly when another chapter is out

#recommendations

[nightlifeseries]

Breaking the news to Lionel again... pt 1

Diamond wakes up the next day dreading life. She has to meet with Lionel to discuss her pregnancy and she is on the verge of an anxiety attack.

Lionel has a penthouse across town in San Myshuno next to the art district. Diamond makes it there in 15 minutes.

*knock on the door*

Lionel answers the door after a few moments , shirtless.

Lionel: Morning. Come on in. You look petrified. Are you alright?

Diamond: *snicker* You shouldn't answer the door like that.

Lionel: Like what? When you get like me and pay $10,000 a month for a place, you can do whatever you want.

Lionel: Can I get a hug?

Diamond: Sure.

Lionel: What did you need? Do you want some of this anaconda?

Diamond: Omg *eye roll* Look .....

Diamond reaches in her bra and pulls out the test.

Lionel: What? *chuckle* Why else would you - What is that?

Diamond: I have something to tell you. But I can't deal with you freaking out. I am under a lot of stress as it is. Can you promise you won't yell at me?

Lionel: I .... don't know. But I can try. Let me get a drink first....

Diamond: I swear if you yell at me I may just stab you!

Lionel: You need to shut that sh*t up. This is My house!

Diamond: Lionel come ON!

Lionel: Don't rush Me Diamond. I see you look bugged out and I'll think twice of my response. But don't come in here barking orders. I could be in a meeting right now. You could have told me this over the f**king phone, since you want to be so rude.

Diamond stands in the kitchen, visibly upset and stressed. Lionel pours himself a shot glass and continues to talk sh*t to Diamond with his back turned to her.

Youtube

#ts4 #nightlifeseriesdiamond #sims 4 #urban sims #ts4 story #sims 4 story #black simblr

[jimmys-zeppelin]

moonbeam

ch. v

table of contents

may 14, 1998

Sabrina entered Clarence’s with a food-full plastic bag in her hand. Lunch. And she was starving.

There were still a few finishing touches she had to put on the second of Jimmy’s three suits. She wouldn’t be done with the third until Sunday at the least. Luckily, she had peace of mind in knowing he would only need one of the suits for his trip. She debated giving him a call about the status of his garments…

Perhaps it would be too much.

But he said to call, her mind urged her.

“Fuck this,” Sabrina muttered to herself. Upon entering her office, the silence was serene. The tinny Lionel Richie playing inside the store was muffled behind the makeshift partition and she hummed along to All Night Long as she unpacked her Chinese takeaway. A few loud steps boomed up the creaky staircase—footsteps she knew well as Daniel’s—and soon his tall, lanky figure appeared into the office.

She muttered a ‘hello’ to him while taking her seat at her desk. Daniel did the same, waving to her with similar regard. He had propped open a book and smacked a piece of gum between his teeth. Fresh out of university, Daniel had a degree in Textiles; something Sabrina had no idea was a possible degree path.

The irony of the situation was that he was apprenticing under her. It gave Sabrina a silly boost to her ego.

She split her chopsticks and cracked open her Coke before she began to dig in. Not halfway into her first mouthful of chicken fried rice, Daniel slapped his book shut and an uncomfortable silence fell over them.

"I heard Jimmy Page was in for a fitting?" he asked.

Sabrina froze, slowly finishing her mouthful of food while the sound of her heart pounded throughout her entire body.

She gulped, "Yeah...last week."

"Fuck. Right when I catch a cold. How was he? What did he get?"

"Three suits. I've finished two of them."

"Seriously?" he exclaimed.

"Dunno why everyone's shitting themselves about this guy. He's just a normal bloke. Very nice." And kinda hot...

"Sab, I know you like the Spice Girls and that George Michael fruit but this guy was huge back in the day. I wonder why he'd even come to our store to be fitted."

"My dad and brother buzz off rock music so I know who he is, but he's a normal person. And he's a regular here, comes at least once every week or so. Guess he likes the savings," Sabrina shrugged.

Daniel's eyebrows furrowed, "How come I've never seen him?"

"Just unlucky, I guess," she teased, a grin spreading over her face. "I gave him your card, though. Mine hadn't come in yet so I put in a good word for you."

Excitement shone through his eyes, seemingly jumping for joy while stationed in his seat, "I could kiss you right now, Sab," then paused to think. "Did he leave his number?"

"Yeah, but I'd have to find the note I made with it."

A partial lie. Sabrina had written his number into her files for safekeeping, but she had left his receipt at her flat. She could practically see it laying beside her phone, the numbers begging to be dialed and given a chance.

"When you do, I wanna call to tell him the suits are ready," Daniel stood.

Sabrina guffawed, "Why would I let you call when I've done all the work?"

"Sab, what if he answers? It'd be an honor to tell him his suits are ready to be picked up."

"You sound like my brother right now," she chuckled. "He was practically on his knees asking for Jimmy's phone number after I told him."

"Please," he begged. He stepped closer to Sabrina's desk, picking one of the three fortune cookies she'd gotten with her meal.

“No,” she answered, “When you get your own famous client, then you can call them whenever you want.”

☽

The dial tone droned through the phone's receiver. Sabrina fought with herself over whether or not to press the final number to Jimmy's phone number. A sudden impulse decision made her press the number and soon the phone began to ring.

As her palms became increasingly sweatier, Sabrina could only imagine the conversation ahead. What would he say? How would he say it? What would she say? Suddenly, she felt transported back to her secondary school days when calling her crush's phone number. Then, she felt dumb.

She shook the anxiety from her mind and when the last ring was about to complete itself, the line clicked, "Hello?" his gentle voice said through the phone. Sabrina felt her heart melt just a little inside.

"Hi, this is Sabrina from Clarence's. Is this Jimmy?" Sabrina said the message as she normally would have to a normal customer. But she and Jimmy knew that he was anything but a normal customer and their interactions were anything but normal.

"Hi, Sabrina. This is Jimmy, yes. How are you?" Jimmy asked.

Sabrina smiled to herself, a step shy of giggling into the phone. "Good, thank you. And yourself?"

"Much better now," he paused to exhale amusedly. "Are you calling about the suits?"

"Yes, actually. The black and blue suits are ready for pickup, but the green one will have to wait until Sunday. I know you said you only needed one ready for today, but I tried my best to have all of them ready for you."

"That's quite alright, Sabrina. Shall I stop by this afternoon to pick them up?"

"That would be splendid, Jimmy."

Splendid?

"And will I have the honor of seeing you? I like to thank my tailors personally after I've seen their handiwork."

Sabrina felt her heart race in her chest when he spoke, "I'll be here until four as usual."

Jimmy paused for what seemed like a check of his watch. "I should get going then..." he chuckled. "I'll have someone come pick me up and I should be there soon."

"Sounds good," she paused for a beat, "People are buzzing about your appearance last week. I just spoke with Daniel over lunch and he was very upset to have missed you."

"Maybe he can alter some other piece of clothing I should buy and he can make my acquaintance. But I think I'm set on who I have altering my clothes now."

"Oh really? Who would that be, then?"

Jimmy laughed softly, "You, of course, darling."

"Oh—" Sabrina started, overcome with a short wave of shock at his response. "You haven't even seen my work yet and you're already praising it."

"You do a great job as a cashier. And you are head of alterations, aren't you?"

"That doesn't have anything to do with the work I do—"

"It has everything to do with it," Jimmy answered enthusiastically. "Listen, I'll be there in an hour. Can you wait for me?"

Daniel's footsteps came up the stairs once again. Sabrina was relieved the conversation had been coming to an end when he entered through the curtain. He furrowed his brow and signaled the phone with his fingers, silently asking who she was talking to.

"Of course I can wait, Jimmy," she said.

"Jimmy Page?” Daniel whispered loudly, nearly jumping for joy at the prospect. Sabrina nodded, turning away from him so as not to distract from her conversation.

"Beautiful...I'll see you, Sabrina."

Her heart fluttered, "Bye, Jimmy," she said. Upon placing the phone back onto the receiver, Sabrina let out a deep sigh, collapsing herself onto the desk.

“Not fair,” Daniel complained. He let out a distressed sigh before continuing, "I need your help with a customer. Are you busy?"

☽

Sabrina stood outside in the back alleyway of Clarence’s with Conner as he puffed on a cigarette. This was their usual ritual during the warmer months when she needed an additional moment away from the cash register or sewing machine. Conner didn’t mind, he enjoyed the extra bit of conversation while not being under the managerial watchful eye. She had had no qualms about the hobby itself, but the stench of the tobacco brought back nauseating memories.

Yet, despite this, she held an unlit cigarette between her fingers to further cast the illusion that she was on a “smoke break”.

"Why are you stood out here with me again?" Conner asked, not minding Sabrina as he flicked his bright green Bic.

The weather was too warm to be with a sweater, yet too cool to comfortably be without one. Sabrina rocked back and forth on her heels waiting to see if Jimmy's car would approach; an attempt at raising her body heat.

"Needed the fresh air,” she answered.

"You're second-hand smoking off me, Sab."

"Yeah, you should really kick that habit..." she said mindlessly, still stretching her neck to peer out into the quiet street. She rolled the cigarette between her fingers nervously.

"Why? So we can stand here and look like a couple of drug dealers?" Conner laughed, inhaling and blowing the air away from Sabrina's face, only for the wind to blow it back in her direction.

Sabrina rolled her eyes, "It's not good for you. Anyway, I'm headed back in; I'm starting to get cold out here."

"Is Jimmy coming back today?" Conner teased. "I heard Daniel talking shit earlier."

"About me?" Sabrina asked with a laugh. To his nod she said, "He's just jealous because he's the one who wants to be face deep in Jimmy's crotch."

"You say that like you weren't absolutely drooling all over him the other day."

"I wasn't!" Sabrina shot back. "If anything, Jimmy's the one flirting with me."

Conner hummed in disagreement, "I think you like the older ones and don't realize it, Sab. Just be careful. Men like him have whole mausoleums in their wardrobes. And those skeletons are dusty..." he said, taking another drag of his cigarette.

"How would you know?"

"You just know, Sabrina," he insisted. "What time is it?"

She checked the time on her watch, "Nearly four. Jimmy's probably here already. I'll catch you inside,” she said, passing Conner back his cigarette.

"Later," he replied, watching as Sabrina headed back out into the street to enter back into Clarence's through the front.

Sabrina was barely in the door when she heard someone call her name from the sidewalk. Jimmy, with his hands deep in his pockets, started on a light jog so as to approach her faster.

"Glad I caught you," he smiled, the corners of his eyes scrunching so all she could see were his pupils. He held the door for her as they entered back into the store; the regulated temperature bringing Sabrina some relief.

"I thought I had nearly missed you," Sabrina replied. "I was just in the back for a little bit. Taking in some outside air."

"Long day?"

"It's been alright. Nothing too bad," She began leading him back up into the fitting area. They bypassed her coworkers who seemed not to notice Jimmy—at least for the time being.

Jimmy's suits were hung in a changing booth where Sabrina had gone to retrieve them. She gave the zipped up bags a good pat before coming into the main area. "Do you want to take a look?"

He shook his head and reached out to Sabrina for the bags that nearly matched her height. They looked much smaller in his grasp. "I trust you."

"Do you?" She teased.

Jimmy took a deep breath, his exhale making it obvious he was holding back a laugh.

"Come on, Jimmy, I just want to see if you like them."

"I'm sure I will, Sabrina."

"Please," Sabrina countered. She batted her eyelids so as to draw a laugh from him. This time she broke through, once again getting the chance to see the delicate crow's feet bunch up by his eyes and to see the shake of his head as he couldn't believe she’d gotten him. It was only then that she noted his cologne again. The combination of it with the smell of the leather jacket he wore was sure to stir up any woman's interest.

He grimaced a bit at her begging, still sure (as he had said) that her work would have been to the quality that he had expected. But just to give her the satisfaction, Jimmy unzipped the bag and examined the navy colored suit coat and eyed it meticulously.

"Just as I thought. Wonderful work, Sabrina."

Sabrina nodded. "Thank you," she paused, "You can, uhm, you can call me Sab—if you want. All my friends call me Sab." she cringed as the words left her mouth, though, couldn't reverse them now.

"Sab," Jimmy replied, testing out how the name sounded on his lips. He played with the 'B' at the end for a moment, saying her name in full before fixing his gaze back onto her.

"You got it out of your system?" she smiled.

"I'm only teasing. I'll keep that in mind."

"Have you got any nicknames?" she asked.

"Just Jimmy. My full name's James."

"That rhymes," Sabrina chuckled. "Anyone call you Jim?"

"Not anyone that I like," he answered, his eyes firmly on hers the entire time, occasionally glancing away to map out the features of her face. She knew he had spotted not only the dark circles beneath her eyes, but also the smile lines that her mother nagged her about on a consistent basis. Jimmy held an amused look in his eyes, like he wanted to say something he couldn't.

Sabrina felt that she was unable to look away from him. His face seemed to have so much to offer her: dimpled cheeks further made charming by the combination of time and weight; Adam's apple bobbing as he took in steady breaths; the soft curl of his hair swiping his forehead like an older Superman trying hard to retain his image. All combined, she simply couldn't peel her eyes off him.

"Alright then," Sabrina said, "So you're happy with the suits? They'll serve you adequately for your time in America?"

"Absolutely. Thank you very much, Sab," he replied, nudging her with his elbow.

"You're very welcome. And since you've paid, you're free to go," she said, using her heels to begin rocking back and forth again.

"Alright, so I'll see you around then. I'll come get the last suit when I come back."

Sabrina nodded, "Safe travels, Jimmy."

He gave her a small smile and nodded. Jimmy's hand came out to touch her shoulder and it was as if all the cells in her body froze. Her breath hitched softly, then was a soft squeeze of his hand. Seconds later, he was gone again, and Sabrina watched as he trotted down the steps. She didn’t move a single muscle until well after she heard the jingling bells of the front door, signifying Jimmy’s exit.

☽

Later, Sabrina had come to find out that Jimmy had left her an extra hundred pounds as gratuity at the register. Much to her dismay, she pocketed it on her way out the door. A fleeting thought entered her mind that she should give him a call and reprimand him for his tip.

Then she debated if it was even worth it. She didn't want to make it seem as if she was too comfortable around him. After all, she barely knew him. That wasn’t to say she wasn't against getting to know him better.

The Northern line train rumbled along its tracks and Sabrina idly watched as people engaged in a myriad of activities. One woman sat with her nose in a book, her presumed son seated beside her, beating the living shit out of his Gameboy. Another man stoically read his Wembley Observer; the front page reading "Bid to Oust Tory Chief", something Sabrina would have to ask her father about later on.

She was nearly asleep on the train up to Brent Cross. Her mother had insisted she come for dinner as she had cooked extra and "wanted her daughter back home", if only for one night. Sabrina couldn't deny that a home cooked meal would do her some good. She could barely fry an egg without setting her flat ablaze so she was stuck with shoddy sandwiches and cheap takeout.

The train slowed to a stop at Brent Cross station, the tiled signs becoming clearer with each passing moment. Sabrina barely wasted a second following the opening of the doors before she was on the platform and weaving through the corridors she grew to know so well.

Her father's red Volkswagen flashed its lights at her upon her exiting the station. Sabrina made a quick approach to the car, entering the vehicle to see her father's outstretched arms.

Granting him the hug, Sabrina's father hummed contentedly. "Always great to receive a hug from your child. How are you Beanie?"

"No longer a child, that's for sure, Dad," Sabrina chuckled. "Where's Zach?" she asked as the car backed away from its spot.

"Home. Your mum needed help with something or other..." he trailed off, forgetting just why Zachary had stayed at home. He waved off the question. "You been alright, dear?"

Sabrina nodded, answering, "Everything's...going."

"Your mother worries about you being in that flat all alone. I tell her you'll be fine, but of course I worry about you, too, darling."

A pang of muted annoyance hit her, but she knew he had a good point. Nonetheless, she had to dispel their worries.

"I think I might get back into dating soon...maybe I'll have someone to keep me even more safe,” she lied.

"Oh, don't tell your mother," her father breathed a laugh, "She'll ask too many questions. Plus she's still holding out hope for Shaun..." he trailed off.

Sabrina scoffed. “What for?”

“Oh, come on, Beanie. You were together so long. Don’t tell me he’s dead to you already.”

That and more. “Shaun’s a prick,” she said, unable to hold back.

There was a tsk of his tongue, "Don't say that."

It was much quieter following the stunted conversation point about Shaun. Sabrina knew that what he had done didn't deserve her forgiveness; not for a very long time. There was no way her parents would understand his actions, either. This all left her in even more of a dilemma with her "beloved" ex-boyfriend.

"Heard any good music lately?" Sabrina tried. They were nearly home free, the familiar turns of the streets she had spent her childhood and teenage years on started to flood her mind with memories.

"Just my old eight-tracks. Stones, Clapton, this, that, the other. You?"

"I don't know," Sabrina trailed off, "Not much besides the radio playing at work. CD's, the like." She shrugged.

"Oh, I have a CD you may like. Remind me to get it for you before you leave," his fingers tapped at the steering wheel in time to the bass of the song playing quietly on the radio. They pulled into the driveway.

"Yeah? Who?"

"George Michael. I picked it up 'cause it looked interesting and it was quite good. Think you'll like it."

“What’s it called?” she asked, hoping the disc wouldn’t be one she already had in her collection.

“Something like Star Girl or what have you…it’s only got a few songs on it. But it has that song you like on it, Everything She Wants. An acoustic version of it.”

Excitement filled Sabrina’s chest. She had been putting off buying the Star People ‘97 single mostly because of her inability to justify the purchase. But she had also been unable to buy it because she could never find it in any shops near her. It was a wonder how her father had managed to encounter it in the tiny shops of Brent Cross. She would interrogate further once she had the disc in her hands.

As the two entered Sabrina's childhood home, the look and feel of the place always gave her an indescribable blast from the past. The wallpapered walls were the same as the ones that littered the backgrounds of hers and Zachary's childhood photos.

The shag carpet had been freshly hoovered—meaning shoes were forbidden until the carpet was trampled over again—the colors remained the very same, if not a bit faded from time. Sabrina gripped at the long carpet with her socks just as she had many-a-time in her teenage years when being lectured at dinner.

She could already tell this visit home wasn’t going to be the relaxing break from reality she was hoping. There was something in the air. And Sabrina didn’t like it one bit.

Everyone managed pleasantries as usual, but once around the table, the atmosphere made Sabrina more uneasy.

The clinking of silverware on ceramic put Sabrina’s nerves on edge and the usual delicious smell of Yorkshire pudding was rancid in her nostrils.

"David, did you get the radishes at the market like I asked you to?" Her mother, Georgia, asked.

The adult children very well knew the answer to the question. The two merely exchanged glances, hoping to god they would be spared from a passive aggressive discussion between their parents.

David looked up from his plate. He pretended a pondering look before looking regrettably at his wife, "Sorry George, I forgot," he swallowed, "Was so excited to see our Beanie that it slipped my mind."

Sabrina's mother fixed her gaze to her instead, "Sabrina, you'll never guess who I spoke to this week."

She broke off a piece of Yorkshire pudding and thought through all the people she could have possibly spoken to. She came up empty. "Hm?"

Zachary's foot nudged Sabrina's beneath the table. The knowing look he gave her made her heart sink into the pit of her stomach. Her expression turned in an instant.

"Shaun called this week," Georgia quipped excitedly, "Don't make that face! He said he wishes you both left off on a better note."

"Mum—" Sabrina started.

"Plus, he was so keen on proposing! And you went and clipped his wings, darling. He was so upset, the poor thing."

Finding that she couldn't possibly muster a response, Sabrina stared idly back at her mother.

"Say something, dear, don't just stare at me all bug-eyed."

"I haven't quite come to terms with him myself, Mum. I still need to do some personal reflection," Sabrina answered as calmly as she could manage.

"What does that even mean?" she threw her hands up. "I invited him for dinner on Sunday. I'd better hope you'll be in attendance."

Sabrina took another beat. "I'll have to politely decline. I'm busy this Sunday."

"Oh—" Georgia said. "You'll be missed, then."

"Sab, can you pass the mash, please?" Zachary mumbled. Without a word, she obliged, transferring the heavy bowl to her brother's hands.

The buzzing in her pocket diverted Sabrina's attention. She furrowed her brow, angling herself in her seat to better retrieve her phone from her jeans. "Sorry," she said.

Jimmy Page — mobile flashed on the screen back at her. Sabrina blinked once, then twice. The name didn't budge. Eventually she stared long enough that the call dropped. It was only then that she heard her heart pounding in her ears and felt the heat rising to her cheeks.

She wondered what Jimmy could have possibly wanted from her at this hour...

“Everything okay?” her father asked.

Sabrina couldn’t help a stammer. "Sorry, it was—uhm—a colleague."

"You're red as a tomato…quite some colleague," Zachary chuckled. Sabrina kicked him beneath the table and quickly put her cell phone back into her pocket. She reached for her glass of water, downing the rest of the liquid as the rest of the table sat in silence.

The feeling of her cell phone in her pocket was now an unwelcome intrusion. Conversation carried on between Sabrina’s family as she idly sat there. Stewing.

The assumption of Sabrina’s mother that she would be enthusiastic about dinner with Shaun followed by the unsolicited call from Jimmy was the one-two punch she didn’t know would be coming her way that evening. Perhaps this was the horrible sick-to-her-stomach feeling that had welcomed her into her parent’s home just half an hour earlier.

“Excuse me,” Sabrina said suddenly. Her feet carried her up the stairs, muscle memory guiding her back to her lilac and white striped bedroom. She swung the door closed, not quite slamming it, but pushing it hard enough that the door easily clicked into place.

“God,” she exhaled, letting her breath go as if she had been holding it in for much too long. Her face was hot and she pushed her thick, dark hair out away from her eyes. Her vision clouded over and she let herself go for long enough that her cheeks became streaked with tears. She wiped them away quickly, not fully allowing herself to have the moment she so desperately needed in light of her mother’s insensitivity.

Sabrina looked around her childhood bedroom, turning so she could reach for the sticker-laden light switch. The wallpaper that had been cut around it had been peeling for fifteen years, the yellowing beginning only recently. The warm glow of the yellow light placed Sabrina back into the mid-80s. The Raggedy Ann doll on her bed, the gargantuan Wham! poster on the wall above her headboard, and finally, her vanity. Looking at it now, she kind of wanted to take it back to her flat with her. The vanity that once held dozens of perfume bottles and all sorts of makeup products was now so empty it looked out of place in her old bedroom.

She sat on the pink suede-cushioned stool, crossing one leg over the other and holding her face in her hands. Her breath was the only sound she focused on for a long while. The steadiness brought her back to a better sense of calm. She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket; an attempt to better examine what had just happened.

MISSED CALL

Jimmy Page — mobile

CALL BACK | EXIT

“Why the fuck…?” Sabrina whispered to herself. Her fingers ghosted between the arrow keys of “Call Back” and “EXIT” and considered calling him back before nervousness got the better of her and she clicked away from the pop-up.

Footsteps became louder as they squeaked up the staircase, nearer and nearer to her bedroom. Silence. Then, “Sab?” Zachary’s muffled voice came through the door. “You alright?”

In a rush, Sabrina stood and shoved her phone back into her pocket. “Yeah!” she exclaimed all too loud, “I’m—I just needed a minute.”

The door opened without so much as a knock, “I told her not to say anything about Shaun, that you wouldn’t—”

“It’s okay, Zach. It’s my fault I haven’t told her what happened yet.”

“Well, yeah, but you shouldn't have to. It’s over, she shouldn’t keep pestering you about him.”

Sabrina sighed, “I know. I know…”

There was a lull, Zachary staring at the floor, not wanting to ask, but desperately wanting to know…

“So, who called you?” he asked, a smile growing on either side of his lips.

--

masterlist | playlist | ao3

taglist: @keepcalmandcarryfire @witchesdust @jonesyjonesyjonesy @paginate54 @hejustsatisfiess @salixfragilis @modernloverss @reincarnated70sbaby @rebel-without-a-zeppelin @kyunisixx @blackberryblossom @jimmypages @foreverandadaydarling @lzep @n0quart3r @verrbena-in-the-air if you want to be added to the list let me know!

#sab and jimmy are so silly !! *eye twitches* #I they're barely even romantic yet but I want to push their heads together and say 'now KISS' #zach I love u so much #probably one of my fave recurring characters #it's bc we have the same music taste #ANYWAY #HIIIII #I'm back 😈 #next chapter will most likely come much fast than this one #AS ALWAYSSSS THANK YOU ALL FOR WAITING #jimmy page #led zeppelin #fanfic #fan fiction #fanfiction #moonbeam #rock stars #classic rock #1990s #90s #1998

[mrhowells]

Smallville 5x04

LOISSS MY WIFE IS BACK!!!!

Shut up Clark no one was hoping she'd stay in Europe longer, you just can't deal with her greatness

"Actually, I just ran into Mrs. Kent at the Talon and right out of nowhere, she asked if I'd like to move back into the farm😇". "Yeah right." "...😇" "...Really?"

AHJKHSJS PLS THE FACE JOURNEY

Lois: 1 - Clark: 0

See that's why we need Lois, it immediately turns into a comedy and Clark gets more personality.

LOIS BIKINIJFKSFJAKJK

BRO. HOLD ON. Was the AC actor on b99 as young Scully?? PLS that would be so funny.

the prettiest girl I've ever seeeen🎶 from the cover of a magazineeee🎶

like????????

she's still insulting the guy who saved her I LOVE HER SO MUCH THAT'S THE LOVE OF MY LIFE OKAY

and the Lana/Lois scraps I liveeee (but also, why didn't we get more, where is the humanity?)

"He can swim faster than I can." HEHEHEHEEHEE😈

Professor Milton Fine? I don't think so

He really just compared Lex to Hitler, BRO💀💀

Same Clark, same

"I got a buck." "Yeah? You should use it to get some fashion sense."

lmaoooo

LOIS STAHP I'M NOT STRONG ENOUGH FOR THIS

It's actually beautiful, you can see her come up with her next burn in real time

"You know, this, uh, whole orange and green thing you got going? Looks like Flipper threw up."

Gooodd I'm in love with her

SHE CALLED HIM FISH STICK I'M-

"You were turning blue." "It's a good color on me."

LOIS STOPPPPPP I NEED TO BREATHE😭😭

THE WAY HE'S LOOKING AT HER? DUDE SAMEEEE

no because they actually have great chemistry

wdym German philosophy is easy DO YOU KNOW THE TORTURE I WENT THROUGH IN HIGH SCHOOL??? DO YOU??

stop why am I shipping Lois and AC they're so cute together😭

HELP

Lois if he falls into the water, shouldn't you jump in after him??💀

I really feel like they made the change in Lex too abrupt which is kind of a bummer because they had a great setup for it after Lionel tried to kill him at the end of season 3.

"You really don't listen, do you?" "No, I try not to, I find it distracting."

AGAIN, I LOVE LOIS AND THEY'RE CUTEEEEE

some of his pickup lines are really cringy though💀

not me getting invested when I know this isn't going anywhere😭

"LOIS??!?!?"

perfect timing Clark

Clark: 🧍😠

"Lois is all over this guy. And all we know him is that he can swim faster than I can."

jsdkdjHkas HE NEEDS TO GET A GRIP BECAUSE WHY DOES HE SOUND ANGRY AND NOT CONCERNED😭💀

I can't

Chloe: listing perfectly normal things about AC like him being on a swim team

Clark: Does he have a criminal record?😠

"I don't know what it is about this guy but I get a bad feeling."

Mmmhhhmmmm okay yeah...

CLARK DON'T EMBARRASS YOURSELF PLS

Even Lana is so done with his shit I'm crying

"Do you really believe that or is that just a pickup line for the girls?" "Clark!!!!"

RIGHT IN FRONT OF LANA LIKE-

you can't make this up😭

PLSSSSSS

Okay Lois he would totally attack AC because he's jealous (and he kinda did💀) but he wouldn't straight up invent lies about him, come on.

OOOOh is this actually the first time we hear the nickname boy scout? (I don't have the best memory so I'm not sure😅)

not AC calling Lex "bro"💀💀

"One day of college and he's already an activist."

PLSSSSS

Again, I think they could've set up this plot a bit better wrt Lex's reasons for selling that weapon despite the damage that it causes.

I'm sorry but this is kind of funny

OK NOW I'M FULL ON LAUGHING

WHAT IS THISSSS😭😭

"Are you okay?" "WET AND READY BRO."

SHDAJKFHDHGWAUIFGQM W H A T ???

WET

AND

READY

????????

I JUST FELL OUT OF MY BED WHO IS THE LEGEND RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS PIECE OF DIALOGUE I MUST KNOW😭

"Well, you didn't tell him about my pitchfork, did you?" "I defended you."

*brief pause from the comedy of it all to feel PAIN*

the way AC says "bro" takes me outttt

"Maybe we should start up a junior lifeguard association or something."

STOOP THAT'S WHAT BART SAID TOO (not the lifeguard part but you know what I mean)

This just in, JLA stands for Junior Lifeguard Association💀

STAY SUPER BRAH (I'll stop making fun of AC now I prommy)

noooooo Lois😭😭😭

welp, I shipped it while it lasted

(I'm still tagging this post as clois though because we all know who the OTP is😌😌)

"I was just trying to look out for you." If you say so👀

not to be repetitive but...

CAN WE TALK ABOUT HOW GOOD SHE LOOKS IN THIS LIGHTING????

"I've known a lot of guys who want to own the world. I haven't met very many who actually want to save it. How am I ever gonna meet someone like that again?"

SCREAMING CRYING THROWING UP FALLING TO MY KNEES DO YOU GUYS EVEN UNDERSTAND????

That, exactly that is the reason she loves Clark (or will eventually, whatever) I'M GOING INSANEEEE THEY WROTE HER SO WELL😭

"Lois, I promise, some day... you'll meet someone even more special."

this episode was everything I needed and more

#ellie's smallville thoughts #smallville #5x04 #clark kent #lois lane #arthur curry #clois #lex luthor

[ineffable-monster-romancer]

Glass Onion Things 3rd Rewatch

Blanc on the discord call: "The last thing I need is a vacation" Blanc to Miles when he offers him Jared Leto's Hard Kombucha: "Well I AM on vacation"

I'm sorry I know it's old news, but everyone falling about coughing and spluttering with the shot and Blanc's polite "ahem". I would say Whiskey is the most subdued next to Blanc?

"The question isn't why did he invite her, it's why did she show up?" Noooo, I really think the question is why was she sent an invite.

The joke "piceshite" about the docks I don't know if people picked up on it immediately and that was the joke that it went right over their heads but as a Scottish gal Piece eh shite had me absolutely in stitches

Also why would he assume it was a Banksy? Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't Banksy famously very anti-capatalist? Like didn't he have one of his most famous paintings shredded immediately after auction or something?

Someone find that tweet that talks about how rich people are more likely to pursue the arts because they have the liberty of time because they're fuckin rich, and apply that to Miles knowing how to play guitar (or at least a bit of it).

WHY IS THE GUITAR THE ONLY MOMENT WE SEE THE BIRDIE FACADE TRULY DROP? Is it an acting choice? Is it a gag? Also when he drops the guitar that Paul wrote blackbird onto the sand (scratches, bumps, dings omfg) nobody says anything, but when Helen takes that fuck off mace to the piano the first comment is "that belonged to Liberace". Shows they don't care about the origins really, just who does what with it

Watching Claire be soooo uncomfortable with that Miles hug, watching Miles be soooo uncomfortable with that Duke hug, watching Duke be soooo uncomfortable with that Whiskey hug, watching Miles and Lionel both be uncomfortable in their strange 4 millisecond greeting.

Someone said in the tags of one of my other posts that Derol represents Covid and I'm just OBSESSED with that. BUT more obsessed with the thought that Derol is the epitome of lockdown. He's what normal, everyday fuckers like you n me went through. Drinking, smoking, "going through some stuff", being alone. Sometimes we would comment on what the elite were up to, but mostly we were in the background to their extravagant parties. But in the end, when the Glass Onion is exploding, Blanc sits and smokes with him, because they're just two dudes who went through hell in lockdown, watching something funny.

Miles walking away from the bags, shoves between Duke and Whiskey, putting his arm over Dukes shoulders (hilarious because the size difference) and an arm round Whiskey's waist, but Birdie then jumps between Miles and Whiskey and bumps her out of the way

Why when Whiskey is walking along the slats is she purposely walking on the gravel between the wood? Why does she give Duke into trouble for also standing on the wood? Why does Duke then correct his feet to stand on the gravel?

The Chakra that we can see are absolutely wild, like holy shit

Birdie - Sacral - Sexuality and creativity

Whiskey - Heart - Love and healing

Andi - Root - Basic Trust - Survival

Blanc's bumbling Southern gentleman fool act is AMAZING. They all KNOW he's the world's greatest detective. But while he's bumbling up and down "oh my word it's full of stars!" He's being his own Glass Onion! He's hiding directly in plain sight

"Simple Children's Puzzles" MILES FACE babe he's the world's greatest detective

PREDEFINITE DETECTIVE. Prerequisite maybe? But even that doesn't make sense? Prominent?

BIRDIE GIVING IT THE SEXIEST CATWALK OF THE WORLD YES GIRL HOLY SHIT

Lionel and Claire 😏 you know? The fact that he's leaning right over her to see the laptop, and her dressing gown is off her shoulder but as soon as Birdie shows up they're leaving six feet for god

Benoit Blanc's little bathing suit with his little matching ascot and his little moccasins and it HAS POCKETS shut up he's the new Poirot shut up he's the new Sherlock that's fuckin Fred Jones.

PANCAKED. He's the only one to say pancaked, it intentionally sticks in your brain

DONG.

Claire and Lionel are the only "intellects" in the friend group. Like Claire is a politician and Lionel is a scientist, a lot more hangs on their words than Model and Twitch Streamer

Duke leaving his shit in the pool, firing his gun, wearing his speedos and throwing his macho man facade about. It's so gross it's amazing.

You never know when shits gonna go down is such a red herring in dukes relationship to the gun. It immediately made me think DUKE is going to shoot someone, or DUKE is going to be shot. Didn't realise that what Duke really needed was an Epipen

Peg why do you have a switchblade

Whiskey yawning while they talk about Birdie's accomplishments

"SOCCER MOM IN BEIGE" just kill her it's kinder holy shit

It's dangerous to mistake speaking without thought to speaking the truth, don't you think? TATTOO THIS ON MY BODY PLEASE

I'm assuming that Peg has been around for a while, seeing as Claire knows to say hello to her and that this meet up is an annual thing and what not, so the fact that Miles doesn't remember her name is hilarious. Also, THE RED SOLO CUP. Man took one look at Peg and thought "Freshman, beer pong"

SOCCER MOM IN BEIGE DRINKS ROOM TEMP WHITE HOLY SHIT MILES JUST KILL HER ITS KINDER

Benoit has some fucking incredible hand eye coordination, him catching the Klear was some spiderman shit

Blanc is the perfect POV to have the first half of Glass Onion play through. He doesn't have a clue. He's along for the ride, what he sees, we have seen. He asks questions and points out things that we would also want to know, like yeah, what is Klear and do we win a prize and why is the car on the roof?

I fully believe when Blanc left the room with the magazine of Birdie way way back in that scene, THATS when he solved Miles murder mystery.

Also his friends kinda seem to be having a great time watching Benoit fucking decimating Miles good time 😂

"I hired Gillian Flynn to write the whole thing -" "OooOoh she's quite gooood"

THE COIN! HE GOT THE COIN OUT

#glass onion: a knives out mystery #glass onion spoilers #glass onion

[aparticularbandit]

Lionel Makes A Time Machine

Summary: When Lionel creates a time machine and Claire can't figure out a way to save Andi on her own, they go to Helen for help.

Rating: T.

AO3

“Again”

Claire steps one foot out of the contraption, spins the thick steel and silver ring on her thumb, and meets Lionel’s eyes through a thick steel and silver visor.

“Claire—”

“Again.”  Claire cuts him off and steps back inside, shutting the door behind her.

Lionel can barely see her through the door’s foggy glass, but he takes stock of the firm, determined set of her shoulders met with the lowered bent of her neck.  There’s something held tight in her hand that he can’t make out; she stares down at it.  He sighs, sets the date, and starts the engine.

~

It’s only thirty minutes for him, but it must be longer for Claire, and this time, when she steps her single foot out of his contraption, she has the visor in one hand like sunglasses, dangling from her fingertips.  “Try a couple months earlier.  Right before the trial.”

“Claire,” Lionel says, giving a little shake of his head and moving forward to meet her, “this isn’t going to work—”

She doesn’t even look up.

“Just do it, Lionel.”

When Claire turns and goes back into his machine, shutting the door behind her, Lionel considers the exhaustion in her voice.  How many times had it taken him before he gave up?  (None.  The answer is none.  He couldn’t send himself back in time.  How would he have been able to get back?)  But he’d known the first time she returned; the machine isn’t built to do what they both want.  Not for them.  He’d known.

She’ll give him time to explain eventually.

Maybe.

For now, Lionel goes back to the controls, changes the date, and starts the engine once more.

~

Claire returns with her lips pursed together.  If the visor were a pair of sunglasses, she would have the tip of one end perched between her lips, brows furrowed, gaze staring off into nothingness.  In the heartbeat when Lionel opens his mouth to speak, she turns to him, deep blue eyes lit up from within.  “When she came up with the idea,” she states, one finger in the air, corner of her lips quirking up in a determined half of a smile.  “That’ll do it.  I can make sure that she—”

“Claire, the machine needs to charge.  You can’t just—”

“It has enough for one more trip, Lionel,” she says as though she knows his machine better than he does.

Lionel knows better, but when she meets his eyes with the same determination he’d had building the thing, he can’t deny her.  “Last time,” he says, holding her gaze, meeting it with as firm of a look as he can muster.  “Then you have to stop.”

Claire nods in agreement.  “I won’t need another trip.”

As she shuts the door, as he changes the date, as the glass grows even more foggy, hiding her behind it, Lionel gives a shake of his head.  In a way, she’s right.  She won’t need another trip.  But she still won’t save Andi.

Not for them, anyway.

~

Claire pulls open the glass door, eyes scanning the room around them, and when she finds that nothing is different and that no one is waiting for her other than Lionel, her hand tightens into a fist so tight that Lionel rushes to her, unclenches her fingers, and removes the steel and silver ring from her thumb, takes the visor out of her grasp so that they don’t break under that pressure.  Her teeth grit together, and she speaks through them when she says, “I have to go again, Lionel.”

“The machine needs to charge.”  Lionel turns from her and places the visor and accompanying ring next to the second set of them.

“I don’t care about the charge; I need to get back—”

“It won’t do any good.”  Lionel moves the control panel, making a few changes here and there before finally powering his machine down to rest.  “You’re not going to bring Andi back.”

Claire storms across the room to him.  “You made a time machine but we can’t use it to fix anything?”  She glares at him.  “Some shitty piece of crap—”

Lionel sighs and turns to her, meeting her eyes again.  They flash like lightning in a thunderstorm, dangerous, but only to the people they might hit.  He’s been fairly good at avoiding those strikes, or maybe they’ve simply never homed in on him.  Not that lightning can home in on anything.  “It fixes things for the Andi you see,” he says, glancing up at her with a half of a smile.  “Isn’t that enough?”

“No,” Claire responds immediately.  Then her eyes narrow, and she crosses her arms.  Gives him a once over.  “What do you mean for the Andi I see?  Are you saying I don’t see our Andi?”

“It’s a little more complicated than that.”  Lionel leans back against his table and mimics Claire, crossing his arms just as she has hers, and his gaze drops, not out of shame but because he’s thinking, and he always turns in on himself when he thinks.  “You’ve seen the Marvel movies, right?”  He hasn’t seen most of them, but he knows enough to make the reference.

Claire just rolls her eyes.  “Yeah.  Devon loves them.”  She stares blankly at him.  “What’s your point?”

Lionel glances up at the ceiling this time.  He takes a deep breath in.  “When you make a change in the past, you split the timeline.  You’re fixing things for Andi – and for us – but the timeline splits.  You always come back to your timeline.”  This time, he meets her eyes again.  “To our timeline.  Where there’s no Andi.”

Claire’s eyes narrow.  “Bullshit.”  But the lightning in her eyes soothes, flickers with confusion.  She turns, arms still crossed, and walks away, fingers tapping against her arm.  Thinking, always thinking.  She might not be the scientific mind that Lionel pretends to be, and she’s not as good with people as Andi once was (or as Miles had been), but sometimes…sometimes—

She’s not going to be able to think her way around this one, though.  He knows that much.

“Did you tell Helen?”

~

Helen doesn’t answer her phone when the shitheads call.

To be fair, she has most of their numbers blocked.  She deletes their voicemails whenever they try to use a different number.  She still isn’t sure how they got her number in the first place, because it isn’t like she gave it to any of them.  No one who knows her would have given it to—

That’s not true.  A lot of them would.  Despite how much she would specifically tell them not to do that, if she knew they were giving her number out in the first place.  Birdie would win them over by saying they were old friends.  Someone would pay them a lot of money.  Claire’s political career might be down the drain after everything that happened with that asshat Miles, but she still has connections.  And Lionel—

Had somehow gotten Alpha out of the mess that Miles got it into it, but only after Miles had been removed entirely.  That doesn’t make him better.

(Andi would have loved him for that, but then Andi had loved all of her shitheads.  She’d loved them more than Helen.  But Helen doesn’t like to think about that.)

The thing is that it’s harder to not answer the door when one of them shows up at her actual lived in house.

Helen slams the door in Claire’s face – or she tries to, but Claire wedges her foot in the crack between the door and its frame.  She feels no pity when Claire winces as the door digs into the side of her foot.  “Go away, you shithead—”

“It’s about Andi—”

“Andi is dead.”  Helen glares at Claire, forces the sharp edge of the door into her shoe, and feels a grim sense of pleasure when Claire cringes.  “You get her name out of your dirty ass mouth—”

“You can see her again—”

Helen kicks Claire’s foot out of the way and slams the door, locking it behind her.  She leans her back up against the door and takes a deep breath in.  There’s nothing to Claire’s words.  There’s no way to see Andi again.  Just like a shithead to bullshit her about something like that.  Andi’s dead.  She can’t—

She waits for Claire to leave.  Stays against the door until she sits up against it.  Glances out the window and doesn’t see her.

And yet….

Helen takes another deep breath in and opens the door, eyes narrowed.  The other woman is still standing there, arms at her sides, head lowered, lips pressed together.  “Why the fuck would you say that?” she hisses, eyes narrowed.  “Andi’s dead.  You can’t just—”

“Lionel made a time machine.”

Helen groans.  Covers her face with her hand.  No.  Just.  No.

“You have got to be shitting me.”

“No, Helen, I’m not shitting you.”  Claire should be cringing over the word, but she isn’t, which really says more about what politicians like her say behind closed doors than anything else.  “I’m not fucking with you either.  Lionel made a time machine.  It works—”

“And you expect me to use that thing after everything with Klear?”  Helen’s brows shoot up.

To her credit, Claire’s face grows ashen, and her gaze drops.  She doesn’t make any excuses – like that she and Lionel knew better and Miles just pushed it through against Lionel’s scientific advice – and even if she did, Helen wouldn’t care.  Maybe that’s why Claire doesn’t say it.  Instead, she says, “I don’t expect anything from you.  I just thought you’d want to know.  If you wanted to use it.  To see her again.”

Just like a shithead to lie to her, to use Andi like this.

…and just like Helen, unfortunately, to grasp at another chance to make things right.

~

Helen does not let Claire drive her anywhere, which is a good idea because the ex-governor drives her to what is definitely not one of the shadiest places she’s ever been but might be one of the shadiest places Claire’s ever been – all abandoned warehouses in the middle of nowhere, one right after another, tagged with all sorts of graffiti, two or three sets of train tracks crisscrossing every which way, broken windows in at least half of the warehouses (maybe more, if she could see them), gravel everywhere with a thin stretch of one-way dirt road, tagged train cars set here and there – even a tall white silo, less white from the age, standing straight into the sky, like it could pierce the growing dark rainclouds above it.  Not that it will actually rain here.  That’s the way it is, more often than not, all of the clouds darkening the sky overhead and making it a gloomy grey mess, but no actual raindrops, only the humidity and the ever present threat of rain.

Just like it had been the day she found out Andi died, just like it had been the day of Andi’s funeral.

(It should have rained during the funeral, should have poured down tears on all those people in their fancy clothes and ruined them the way they’d ruined her.  (Helen shouldn’t have been with one of them now, didn’t want to be one of them now, but if there’s actually a real time machine and she can see Andi again….  Well, it’s just as likely they’re going to try to murder her (again) as it is anything else, and she can take care of herself.  She thinks she’s well proven that point.))

Claire pulls up in front of the least sketchy of the sketchy warehouses – its windows are all gone at this point, replaced with thick wooden boards, but whether that’s from scavengers busting the windows in and Lionel theoretically replacing them later or from Lionel himself deciding he didn’t want anyone else looking on this magnificent machine he’s been creating is not a concern.  What is a concern is why he built this machine out here instead of in one of Alpha’s fancy, repurposed laboratories.  Probably just doesn’t want them to get their hands on his tech.  Imagine all those tech bros suddenly having the ability to go back in time.  (Imagine Miles—)

She doesn’t like to think of the king of the shitheads.

Helen slams the car door behind her and stalks over to Claire.  “What a great place.  You vacation here?”

“No, no, I—”  Claire takes a deep breath.  Then she levelly meets Helen’s eyes.  “You know where I vacation.  That’s not funny.”

Helen shrugs, arms crossed, and holds Claire’s gaze when she says “I’d’ve said this was a great place to take me if you wanted to kill me, but I figure if you really wanted to do that, you already missed your chance.”

“Helen—”

“Don’t.”  Helen’s gaze sweeps to the building, and she gives it a little nod.  “This where he’s keeping it?”

Claire nods once in reply.  “I know it looks bad out here, but—”

“I’ve seen worse.”

It’s easy to cut Claire off.  Very easy.  Mostly because Helen doesn’t want to hear anything Claire has to say, any excuses she might provide.  Even the sound of her voice sets her on edge, sets her teeth against each other.  That isn’t why she’d blocked the ex-governor’s number, not even remotely; that has more to do with how Andi used to call this woman her best friend – the closest of all her shitheads – and how Claire was the first to turn on her at the trial.

(Also the one who ran after her on the island when she was drunk.  Also the one who called her – Andi – out for being there in the first place.  Also the one who—)

((It doesn’t matter if they went to Andi’s house; it matters why they went.))

“Right,” Claire says, and her gaze follows Helen’s without dropping.  “Okay.  Lionel should be waiting on us.  He can explain his little pet project.”

~

The inside of the warehouse doesn’t live up to the tech bro image that Helen had for the king of the shitheads, but that should only be right, since it isn’t their king who had any tech prowess at all.  Everything is clean in a way that absolutely nothing outside is.  In fact, there isn’t even any dirt or pebbles or dust just inside the door, no footprints or bootprints tracking mud along the floor, which is highly improbable considering the dirt and gravel road outside.  No more improbable than a time machine, though, so maybe Helen shouldn’t be surprised – and on second thought, she isn’t.

Cables are everywhere like veins, drawing out from the walls, tied in bundles along the floor with a thin walkway through them (one that Claire leads her down), stuck here and there and everywhere with no end or beginning in sight.  There have to be outlets somewhere – or a generator – or both, but Helen can’t see either one.  Not that she’s really looking for a power source.  As long as it isn’t Klear—

Lionel stands hunched over a table but looks up as Claire and Helen approach.  His expression softens the slightest bit for Claire but firms once more when he sees who is with her.  “Helen,” he says with a nod of recognition and moves around the table, stuffing his hands into his pockets instead of reaching one out to her.  “I meant to call.”

“No, you didn’t,” Helen says, not quite looking at him so much as at the table – and the nearby console – where he’d been standing.  “Wouldn’t have got through anyway.”

Another little nod.  “Block our numbers?”

“Mmhm.”

This time, Lionel nods towards Claire.  “She storm your door down?”

Claire makes a startled sound.  “I do not—  I’m not Duke—”

“Pounded on the door and wouldn’t leave until I answered.”  Helen notes the quirk of a smile that Lionel forces down, hates it without thinking.  “Probably would’ve staked out until I drove off.  Would’ve followed me—”

“I would not—”

Helen doesn’t know if she, personally, is joking or if she’s just trying to make Claire uncomfortable.  They aren’t friends, so it can’t be a joke, but it has the same familiarity to it.  Like maybe, if she were her sister and not herself, it would have been a joke.  Maybe that’s why they keep calling.  She moves past the other two to the table, places her hands on the edge, and glances over everything.  “So what do you have here?  Claire says it’s a time machine?”

“It is.”  Lionel’s voice comes soft and gentle, and it rubs Helen precisely the wrong way.  He steps over to her and nods toward what looks to be a pair of visors and a pair of rings.  “You take one of each of those, put them on, and then climb into that chamber over there.”  His brows raise as he nods to what looks like a giant soda can with a foggy glass front.

As he does, Helen pockets both of the rings.  She doesn’t know why she does this; it’s a hunch, something she can’t quite explain.  “You tested this thing?”

“He sent me through a few times,” Claire says as she moves not-so-subtly between the two of them.  Her fingers run along one of the visors; Helen is certain that the ex-governor must have noticed that both rings are missing, but Claire doesn’t say anything about that, instead picking up the visor and letting it rest on her wrist like an overly large bracelet.  “It sends us back in time, and it brings us back to our time.”

Something in Claire’s tone suggests that this is different than what she’d expected, so Helen asks, “Meaning…?”

“Meaning that whatever you change there doesn’t stay here.”  Lionel sighs and glances back, wincing the slightest bit when he notices the visor around Claire’s wrist.  “You really shouldn’t be playing with that—”

“I’m not Birdie,” Claire interrupts, leaving the visor just where it is.  “It’ll be fine.”

Lionel’s expression doesn’t change.  “But—”

“What do you mean doesn’t stay here?” Helen echoes, eyes narrowing.  “You two been fucking around trying to change shit?”  She gestures to both of them with one hand, the other laid flat on the table next to the second visor.

Lionel’s gaze drops, but Claire gives a half-shrug, turning to meet her eyes.  “I thought we could keep her from dying…and I didn’t think you would call that a bad thing.”  Her gaze returns to Lionel.  “He said it saved her in other timelines, just not ours.  We can’t change ours.”

Bullshit, Helen thinks.  She’s not sure which part she disbelieves the most – that they couldn’t save Andi in their timeline or that that was the only thing Claire tried to change.  Something in her says that Claire wanted more than just to save her sister, but she doesn’t know what…and honestly doesn’t really care.  So instead of responding to any of that, she lifts the remaining visor and places it atop her head.  “So how does this thing work?”  Her lips press together, and she asks, a plan formulating in her mind, “And what happens if I don’t wear this thing?”

“You go blind.”  Lionel’s reply is frank and blunt and not what Helen was expecting.  He walks from the table over to what must be the control console, places one hand flat atop it, and then continues, “And depending on what you see before then, there’s a slight potential for insanity.”  Which is the sort of answer she was expecting.  “I’m not sure.  I haven’t risked it.”

No part of Helen wants to know the sort of experiments Lionel did to come to those assumptive conclusions, nor does she want to know how foolproof he’d made it before sending Claire through – or even if Claire was the first person he’d sent through at all.  The way the two of them act around each other, she finds it hard to believe that he would send her through first, to believe that he would risk that.  On the other hand, she can’t imagine anyone else he would send through.

But, again.  She doesn’t want to know, and she doesn’t particularly care.

Helen sets the visor down over her eyes; she can still see through them, but it’s dark, so much darker than sunglasses.  “Don’t tell me I have to wear this when I see my sister.”

Lionel shakes his head.  “Just on the trip there and the trip back.”  He glances over to her, over to Claire, who is still fiddling with the other visor.  “Claire can show you how everything works.”

That’s not comforting.

Then again, if tech bro over there hasn’t ever gone into the past himself, then Claire would be more knowledgeable about how all of this works than Lionel is.  At least from a traveler’s perspective.  And at Lionel’s words, Claire leads Helen over to the soda can-shaped container, stilling the visor around her wrist.  “Did you take the rings?” she asks, meeting Helen’s eyes, brows raising.

“Do I need both of them?”

“No.”  Claire shakes her head, glancing down to her visor.  “You only need one.  Whichever finger you want.  I wore mine on my thumb.”  She nearly smiles but doesn’t, an expression that fades as Helen fiddles with one of the rings until finding it fits best on her middle finger.  Then she takes Helen’s hand in hers, ignoring the way Helen flinches when she touches her skin.  “The whole trip takes roughly a half hour on our end—”

“Are you saying I only get thirty minutes with my sister?”

Claire gives her a look.  “Let me finish.”  She runs a finger along the ring Helen wears.  “It takes a half hour on our end, but on your end, in the past, you can stay for as long as you want.  Just press this button here,” she taps what looks like a little red Christmas tree light embedded in the center of the ring, “and you’ll come straight back.”

Helen stares down at the ring.  “Lionel sends me out.  I bring myself back.”

“Mmhm.”  Claire nods.  “All you need to do is give us a date.  Then you climb into that,” her gaze shifts to the soda can-shaped container, “and Lionel sends you out.”

“Alright.  I can do that.”  Helen barely notices when the visor around Claire’s wrist slips down across their hands onto her own wrist, and once she does notice, she doesn’t say anything.  Instead, she tucks it under her shirt as Claire turns away and hopes that Claire doesn’t notice as she mentally reaches for a date.  A good date.  When should she see her sister?

I should have seen her, Helen remembers telling Benoit, so long ago, trying to get him to agree to help her.  I should have been there.

Then she knows, whispers the date to Claire, pulls her own visor down over her eyes, and steps into the container, pulling the foggy glass door closed like a pocket door behind her.

~

Traveling through time sucks.

Claire didn’t tell her that.  Claire didn’t tell her a lot of things – like how the container around her doesn’t disappear all at once as Helen travels back through time, but that she stands still, frozen, as the world around her rewinds.  It’s slow at first, the door opening as she – or not her – walks backwards out of the door she’d just shut behind her, as the door shuts again and she can barely make out one (sometimes two) shadowy figures moving outside of the container.  Claire joins her in the container, too, but it’s a Claire from the past, a Claire who, in their own time, eventually goes to find Helen in the first place.

Helen can’t hear much outside of the container, but she can hear Claire each time the door closes behind her, each time it opens and she finds that Andi isn’t there to find her – hears Lionel’s comments.  It’s a glimpse of something that maybe she isn’t meant to see, and it’s at its truest the first time Claire steps into the container to go back, before she can know what the travel will even look like – when she stands in the same spot where Helen is frozen and says, “It’s okay.  I’ll do it right this time.  I’ll get there first, and then it will be fine.  Duke won’t die.  Andi won’t—”  That momentary pause that says more than finishing the sentence would, the swallow, the clench of her fist.

And then nothing.

Funny, how Helen can hear her words forwards when the rest of time moves backwards.  Lionel probably has a theory about that, or would if someone told him about it.  Helen doesn’t intend to ask, even if she remembers it once she gets through this shit show.

She…probably won’t remember it.

Then the container comes apart piece by piece in the reverse of Lionel building it – time moves faster backward now, as though the machine itself needed to charge before it whirled her backwards, so she misses whatever experiments he tries before Claire’s journeys, misses if Claire was the first or not – at least, she misses if there is anyone else other than Claire, which probably means there wasn’t.

There are moments in the whirring backwards that are easier for Helen to make out: Lionel, hunched over that same table as before, one hand over his head, the other with pencil in hand, drawing, sketching, brow furrowed, until, finally, it soothes – but backwards – she still doesn’t understand how, despite knowing that it’s moving backwards, seeing that it’s moving backwards, her mind still rearranges things in the order they should be – and maybe that’s part of what the visor does, changing things into something that her brain will understand, or maybe that’s her brain itself, rearranging how she sees things the way it always does.  As a student, she’d learned that actually her eyes see things upside down and that her brain – as does everyone else’s – flips the image right-side up to make better sense of things.  Perhaps it does this now with everything moving backwards, just giving those glimpses of things the way they were, the way they should have been.

Then the table is gone, and Lionel, and so many other things in the warehouse – and in this way, Helen gets the answer to her question: Lionel may have reinforced the wood covering the windows, but they’d been there long before he had, covering the broken windows that stand firm, though shattered, when time finally slows back to its normal pace.

Somehow, Helen believed that when she was sent back in time, she would also be sent back to the proper place.  Claire never asked for a place, but when she gave her the date, she’d assumed Claire would know where she wanted – where she needed �� to go.  But no, when Helen finally finds herself able to move again, she is still in the warehouse, still in that spot exactly where the container was – or, in this case, will be in the future – and not—

How very nice of that shithead, to not give her any idea that she would need to actually get to Andi’s house.

Fucking asshole.

But if Claire had figured out a way to get from this warehouse in the middle of nowhere to Andi’s, then Helen is absolutely certain that she can, too.  It’s not like it’ll be hard.

~

…it isn’t hard in the slightest.

There’s a car sitting outside the warehouse, and Helen finds the keys stuffed into one of her pockets.  She didn’t put the keys there, doesn’t remember Claire or Lionel putting them there, but highly suspects that Claire must have, given that she finds them in the same pocket where she’d tucked away the second ring.  One of them must have left this car here, must have brought the keys back through on one of their trips, so that they wouldn’t ever have to worry about getting away from here ever again.  She doesn’t know much about either of them – by choice, not because they don’t keep trying to include her – but that feels like the sort of decision Lionel would have made, perhaps making a trip specifically to bring the car here and the keys back through.

If he’d ever taken a trip to the past in the first place.

Helen doesn’t internally thank Lionel, but she does – begrudgingly – thank Claire, who she expects chose an early enough time of day so that she wouldn’t arrive at Andi’s long after dark.  The sun seems to have just risen.  That should be more than enough time.

Although, if what Lionel said was true and she doesn’t have to go back until she presses the button on the ring thick around her middle finger, it shouldn’t matter how long it takes for her to get to Andi or not.  She could get there when it’s dark, find a hotel room, and wait until the next day to talk with her.  She could stay a week with her.  She could—

~

This isn’t the first time Helen has been to Andi’s house.

The first time Helen went to her sister’s house was after Andi died.  Everything was a mess – the bookshelf thrown down to the floor, books scattered everywhere; drawers pulled open with forks and knives tossed all over the floor, which could have been dangerous if anyone worried about stepping on them; clothes ripped from her closet, falling off of her unmade bed.  At the time, she’d thought of it as her sister’s state of mind after the loss of Alpha, but now she knows better, knows it as the harebrained attempts of one shithead to find an envelope he had, eventually, found.

But the thing of it is this: in her timeline, Helen has visited Andi’s house, but in this one, she hasn’t.  She’s never been to the house while Andi is alive.  That shouldn’t scare her, but rumbling the car up and parking in the driveway, looking up at what is, for her sister, quite a modest house, something inside her twists and turns the same way it had on the boat with all the shitheads, sailing to that stupid island with only one friend to her name.

(Perhaps she should have called Blanc about all of this.  He would likely have told her what she already knew – not to trust a single one of those shitheads – but he might have also counseled her to do just precisely what she is doing: take advantage of the opportunity to see her sister again.  Who can say?  She certainly can’t.)

Helen’s lips press together as she gets out of the car, and that roiling in her stomach only grows as she walks to the front door.  Her throat tightens.  For a moment, just a moment, she considers pressing the button on her ring and leaving without a second thought.  Sure, that means there’d randomly be a weird car parked in her sister’s driveway, but Andi could handle that.  It would be easier that way.  To not knock on the door.  To simply stand here, scared out of her wits, unable to think of anything to say.  That’s what a lot of their last meetings had been like: Andi full of ideas and stories about her shitty friends and Helen unable to think of anything that would get her to stay.  They’d still been sisters, but it had felt like….

Then Andi passes the window, and Helen catches a glimpse of her sister behind the curtains, and she takes a deep breath through her still tightening throat, and she knocks on the door.

Andi barely gets the door open before Helen is through it, scooping her sister up, and wrapping her arms around her.  This is even more telling: when Helen pulls her sister into a hug, Andi tenses, and she doesn’t hug her back.  “Helen,” she says in that fake rich bitch voice, “what are you doing here?”

“I missed you.”

Helen can feel how her sister tenses, can feel the slightest ways she pulls away, and yet she still doesn’t let go.  Tears spring to the corners of her eyes; she tells herself not to cry, because that isn’t fair to the living Andi of now, who has no way of knowing that in Helen’s future, she’ll be dead in only a few days.  She smells different alive than she had on that cold metal table where she’d smelled like too much car gas and sanitizer; she smells different now than she had when they were growing up, and as Helen lets her go, she’s certain – as near to certain as she can be – that whatever perfume Andi is wearing now is the same one that Claire was wearing before she’d sent her back in time.  She waits for Andi to invite her in, but her sister doesn’t do that either, just gives her a wary, uncertain look.  This is maybe why she didn’t want to knock on the door in the first place.  “Aren’t you going to invite me in?  It’s breezy out here, and you know how I hate a breeze.”

“I wasn’t expecting you.”

Andi’s gaze flicks over Helen’s shoulders, and while the emphasis wasn’t there, it’s clear what she meant isn’t I wasn’t expecting you but I wasn’t expecting you.  Even now, with Helen standing in front of her, abandoned by all of her so-called friends, Andi expects one of them to show up – would likely rather have one of them show up – than her own sister.  Then her gaze flicks back to Helen, and she offers her a quirk of her lips, not even a smile, but close enough to one.  “Come in, come in,” she says, stepping back inside and away, holding the door open with one arm as she crosses the other about her.  “Mama would kill me if I left you standing out there.”

And for just a moment, Helen almost catches the drop of that fake rich bitch voice, almost catches Andi’s true accent underneath it all.  Almost, but not quite.  She holds on to that.

Better to hold onto that than to that comment about being killed.

Helen steps inside and looks around as Andi shuts the door behind her.  It looks the way it was meant to look – bookshelves in place, books where they should be, drawers shut, forks and knives put away, all swept clean as though her sister has decided to do that with her newly found free time, even though Helen remembers her sister as being the neat and tidy one of them from the first – and yet Helen still sees the disarray of her first time here, and it shocks her.  Distracts her.  “I should have been here,” she says, and she means then, she means earlier than this, but she also means during the trial and every other time besides.

“You couldn’t have done anything.”  Andi gives a shrug of one shoulder as she sweeps past her sister and curls up on her corner of the couch.  “I don’t know why you’re here now.”

“Someone should be here.  Why can’t it be me?”  Helen sits on the other side of the couch, hands in her lap.  The second visor feels sharp against her arm; she’d barely moved it from where she’d hidden it after taking it from Claire and had honestly nearly forgotten it was there.  “You need a friend, and I—”

“I have friends, Helen.”  Andi’s teeth grit together.  She doesn’t look up.

Helen resists the urge to say anything about the shitheads.  That would only start a fight.  She doesn’t want to fight.  Not now.  Even if that is the only thing they’d done the last several times they’d met.  If she had visited before Andi died, it probably would have been a fight then, too, full of I told you sos and complaining about the sort of shitty people her sister had surrounded herself with.  Andi would likely have still defended them, mad as she would have been, other than their king, would have felt forced to do so by anything Helen said.

Not defending them.

Defending herself.

“Maybe you need your sister for a bit.”

Andi clasps her hands together and hunches forward, resting her elbows on her legs.  She still doesn’t look up.  “I don’t need anyone,” she hisses through gritted teeth, quiet as a snake.  Then she shakes her head, lowers it.  “This isn’t a good time, Helen.”

“You’re waiting on someone,” Helen says then, and if she didn’t know what would happen if things are left undone, her brows would furrow.  She’d be mad.  Now, though, she feels only sadness.  “One of your…of your shitheads—”

“Don’t call them that—”

“Fine.”  Helen feels it anyway, the anger, the frustration, because she’s…she’s here, and she never did anything, and those—

Helen’s hand clenches, and she forces it down, and as she forces it down, she feels the visor scratch against her skin.  She takes a sharp breath in before standing.  “You don’t want me here, I won’t take up your time.”  Her lips press together, and then she steps forward, crossing the distance between them, and holds the visor out to her sister.  “I came to give you this.”

“What the—”

“And this.”  Helen digs into her pocket as Andi takes the visor and pulls the spare ring out.  “You ever feel like you need to get away from everything, you just.  Put these on.  Press this button.”  She taps the button on the side of the ring, the same little red light that looks like it should be a Christmas tree light and maybe had been, before Lionel harvested it.

Andi stares at the visor.  At the ring.  Finally, she looks up at Helen with a perplexed expression.  She studies her, like maybe she’s never really seen her sister before now.  “What sort of tech bullshit—”

“One of your shitheads made it.  You’ll trust them, right?”  Helen tries not to glare down at her sister.  The anger’s just hurt, and it’s not all those, either.  It’s sadness, too, but that’s all caught up in the hurt.  They all fuel each other, this tangled messed up mass of emotions, and she doesn’t even try to untangle them, doesn’t try to make heads or tails of them.  Just lets them linger.

And still, Andi stares up at her, brow furrowing.  “You hate them.”

“Still do.”

It hasn’t changed.  Probably won’t change.  But Helen thinks of the visor dangling from Claire’s wrist, thinks of how easily it slipped from Claire to her, thinks of I’ll do it right this time, and says, finally, “But a couple of them have moved time for you, so maybe they aren’t all shitheads.”  She crosses her arms.  “Doesn’t mean I like any of them.”

Andi continues to stare at her.  “Am I supposed to know what any of that means?”

“No.”  Helen shakes her head.  “No.  You wouldn’t.”  She sighs.  “I should have been here,” she says.  “The first time.  Coming back a second time…it doesn’t change that I fucked up the first time.  That sometimes you fuck up and you don’t get a second chance.  So, if you…if you ever want out of this shit show and to be with people who actually care about you.”  She holds her own hand up, shows Andi her matching ring.  “You put that visor on, and you press this stupid button.”

And she presses the button on her ring.

~

Which.  Means the car gets left in front of Andi’s house, but Helen’s sure that Andi will think of something to do with it.

~

The button flashes a bright red, and in the few seconds she has before she begins to shift backwards along her own timeline, Helen realizes she’s forgotten her visor.  Lionel is going to kill her for that.

She’s…honestly surprised that she cares.

Helen screws her eyes shut and pulls her shirt up just enough to cover her face and hopes that’s enough to keep out the insanity.

~

“Where is your visor?”

Lionel says it before Helen even opens the machine’s door.  He can tell – he isn’t great at telling the shape of general figures through foggy glass, but he knows what they look like with the visor, so he knows that she isn’t wearing it – and so the words are out before Helen can even understand what he’s saying.  If she can understand it anymore.  There’s always that chance of insanity, after all.

The door clips open, and Helen stumbles through, shutting the door behind her.  Claire gets to her first; Claire barely moved from her spot near the machine; and she catches Helen, whispers something to her when she gets through, brows raising in the way they do when she has something of an important question.  When Helen doesn’t respond, Lionel starts to move forward—

There’s another figure in the machine.  This one, at least, is wearing a visor.

Claire keeps her hands on Helen’s shoulders, holding her steady, even as she looks past her at the second figure in the machine.

This time, when the door opens and the woman inside slips through, she shifts the visor from her head and lets it rest around her neck.  She glances around at everything and then sighs with a curling, curving smile playing at one corner of her lips.  “She was right, you know.  You really are shitheads.”

#bandit fic #lionel makes a time machine #glass onion #claire debella #andi brand #helen brand #lionel toussaint #lionel troussaint #AUroulette2023

[viridiave]

Octopath and loose ends

so as much as I want these travelers to just have a happy ending and live peacefully after everything (and I do mean EVERYTHING)

there are. several things. that I feel like in-universe they really need to address and it has been driving me nuts for weeks

oh yeah MASSIVE spoilers btw so proceed with caution it’s gonna be a long ride of a LOT of loose ends that I REALLY want to see get addressed by the characters in some form

OPHILIA’S TALE - Just. Ophilia- you know. the Flamebearer.- was drugged in Chapter 3 by her sister after the passing of Archbishop Josef. After the Bishop of Goldshore's daughter was fucking kidnapped by cultists. - And it turns out the fucking Bishop didn't fall ill he was fucking murdered and oh my god an investigation needs to be fucking launched - Speaking of investigation- Wispermill in its entirety was almost wiped out by a cult led by some merchant they had in the Lionel Consortium. Whatever the hell that is.

CYRUS’S TALE - Quarrycrest and the blood rituals in the sewers. Cyrus has also killed the culprit, by the way. In self-defense, so it's all good- but there were fucking blood rituals happening in the fucking sewers man what- - sO YOU WOULD THINK THAT CYRUS KILLING HIS EMPLOYER AND HIS ASSITANT WOULD LET HIM GET OFF SCOTT-FREE. TO BE FAIR, IT WAS ALL IN SELF-DEFENSE, BUT THERE IS NO WAY THEY AREN'T INVESTIGATING THIS. ESPECIALLY SINCE THERESE IS A NOBLEWOMAN RELATED TO THE ROYAL FAMILY. SERIOUSLY WHAT THE FUCK. - And there's no way that Cyrus is going to keep his mouth shut over the tomes in the Ruins of Eld. Somehow I don't doubt that there's going to be messy politics surrounding those books given that apparently they don't have a fucking printing press yet.

TRESSA’S TALE - So Quarrycrest doesn't just have a fucking kidnapping problem, but it also has economic problems- which doesn't really sound good when most of the town's economy hinges on the provisions that the person who owned that territory gets sent packing by a tiny merchant. It's great that they don't have someone who deals in slavery anymore but there ain't no way people aren't freaking out over this sudden lack of management. - The Grandport Merchant's Fair was infiltrated by Obsidians. I don't have any real idea how much of a problem this really is, but dang a person could have died that day in the sewers so

OLBERIC’S TALE  - Erhardt. Just… Erhardt. The man. Is an actual war criminal. Who has committed the highest form of treason. The guy killed his king and was directly responsible in some way for the fall of an entire Kingdom. And you're gonna tell me??? He's not gonna get charged??? For any of this??? Erhardt I love you but wHAT THE FUCK MAN- - Riverford had public burnings at the stake and this has been going on for several years- long enough that the town got fed up with it and finally got enough ball to start a revolution. A whole-ass revolution that the Unbending Blade- who is alive and has been walking around and should be legally dead at this point and is also the wINNER OF A WELL-KNOWN TOURNAMENT IN VICTOR'S HOLLOW- has assisted in, alongside the Blazing Blade who may I remind people has committed fucking REGICIDE on WERNER'S ORDERS

PRIMROSE’S TALE - Primrose's entire kill quest is her taking down a whole-ass criminal organization that has been terrorizing the continent for presumably decades. This should be investigated for more reasons than just her charges of first-degree murder. - Stillsnow??? Should really be investigated??? Because what the fuck the Obsidian Manse is a whole fucking human trafficking site??? And the entire town is privy to this information?? IT'S SO CLOSE TO FLAMESGRACE HOW MUCH BALL DO THEY HAVE TO KEEP UP THIS CHARADE - Man if Noblecourt wasn't already such a political mess then it'd be an even worse mess by the time Primrose leaves it- the Obsidians may be shitty but it's implied that they were pretty much running Noblecourt. There's gotta be SOME form of anarchy going down in that city even if it's ultimately better off without the Obsidians running the show - AND SPEAKING OF RUNNING SHOWS THERE'S EVERHOLD AND IT'S NOT LIKE SIMEON'S BODY TURNED TO DUST AFTER THE ENTIRE THING LIKE MATTIAS'S HAD AKSJAKSLAS

ALFYN’S TALE - Surprisingly clean but Goldshore has got to be extra wary of passing apothecaries ever since Vanessa came and fucked them up with the Gaborra Evergreen - Alfyn himself is kind of sus because what even is slumberthorn that sounds like a hell of a sedative- aND WHY DOES HE JUST CASUALLY HAVE SOMETHING LIKE THAT

THERION’S TALE - sO NOT ONLY IS WELLSPRING HOME TO AND DEPENDENT ON A WAR CRIMINAL'S PROTECTION BUT THEY ALSO HAVE A BLACK MARKET. EITHER BALE AND ERHARDT ARE JUST CONSTANTLY DRUNK OR THEY LEGITIMATELY HAVE NO FUCKING CLUE THAT THIS MARKET EXISTS. OR MAYBE IT WAS CUZ OF THE LIZARDMEN BEING REALLY CONVENIENT DISTRACTIONS??? EITHER WAY THIS MARKET NEEDS TO BE INVESTIGATED JESUS CHRIST - So if Darius is a formal lord of Northreach. Shouldn't. People be investigating his death. Or at least his disappearance. Namely at the hands of the guy that has actively been a thorn in his side and has been featured in Wanted posters. Bro-

H'AANIT’S TALE - Surprisingly H'aanit's tale is the most legal. She's literally on a church-sanctioned hunt so pretty much everything she does in her tale is legal. I mean excluding the siccing of various monsters against her obstacles, her record is just clean as fuck and that amazes me.

POST-GAME - SO IS NO ONE GOING TO TALK ABOUT GALDERA AFTER THE FACT??? THIS SOUNDS??? LIKE A VERY IMPORTANT THING TO TALK ABOUT WITH EVERYONE IN THE CONTINENT? THERE IS NO WAY THAT THE GATE OF FINIS IS GOING TO BE KEPT A SECRET ESPECIALLY IF IT CONTAINS A THREAT LIKE GALDERA INSIDE OF IT, EVEN IF RIGHT NOW THERE'S NO FEASIBLE WAY FOR HIM TO BE RELEASED. THIS WAS WHY THE KINGDOM OF HORNBURG FELL FOR GOD'S SAKE. - AND KIT- WHERE THE HELL DOES KIT GO??? AFTER HIS FUCKING BLOODLINE HAS BEEN SHOWN TO BE CAPABLE OF RELEASING WHAT IS ESSENTIALLY SATAN UPON THE WORLD??? HE'S ALSO THE ONLY REMAINING CROSSFORD SO IS HE JUST BANNED FROM HAVING KIDS SINCE THAT'D JUST MEAN MORE POTENTIAL KEYS TO UNLOCK THE GATE WITH???

#octopath traveler #octopath #8path #vir rambles about octopath yet again #THE POSTGAME IMPLICATIONS #OF EVERYTHING #I MEAN DON'T GET ME WRONG THEY ALL DESERVE TO LIVE HAPPILY AFTER GALDERA #BUT SOME OF THESE THINGS ARE JUST #THEY NEED TO BE QUESTIONED AT LEAST #octopath spoilers #spoilers for pretty much every chapter after 1

[ruinedrainbowpooka]

. ItI am such a fucking slut for details and the set dressings for Glass Onion are just Thee Best Shit.

Claire’s kitchenette that has a very Lived In look and not the neat-n-clean Company Is Here look. The kids living in their pjs. The utter lack of anyone with a mask, even among the staff with her. The lived in mess that extends to the front half of her office but doesn’t touch where she’s doing her conference. The flag in front of the bookshelf in a prominent spot that blocks off access to a small section that if it actually lived there would be obnoxious. The little fucking shudder at the mention of Miles. The signs of how toxic her marriage is (including the healing black eyes she has that you can see so fucking well in the pool scene later; Claire has so many easily missed signs of being in a dv relationship - both with Miles and her husband - that my survivor ass was just going LOOOOK at).

Lionel’s set up at his lab. he small raised bit with the beanbag chairs on a carpet. A remote on one of them. They’re grouped so tightly that it’s probably where he’s sleeping. Water cooler, cereal dispensers, microwave, toaster, pitchers, disposable plates/napkins/utensils, TV that’s above him whether he’s standing or laying down (because of social religious things, for most people, looking up causes feelings similar to praying). And then that wide shot where we see the ping pong table and the office module. And how huge and vast the area is with that spotlight, illuminating just a circle around the delivery guy (head to toe in basically hazmat gear) and only him, just screaming how utterly isolated and alone Lionel is. And then immediately contrasted with the office area and how big and close the screens for his zoom calls are, making them literally life-sized on the other end. How neatly and precisely all of his papers are set on the table, but even in here, the lighting is focused on himself and just the few spaces he knows he’ll need the most. His connections to the outside world being his literal lights in the darkness. And then the camera changes angles and we see an utter mess of fax pages; Miles is the disaster in the centre of his order.

Birdie... man just the immediate set up that Peg is the adult in the room and Birdie is a fucking toddler. This massive party around her, she’s bored, so she immediately starts crying for mommy, who then has to walk her through admitting why she’s been grounded from her phone because her friends there (fuck toys of the night?) - who have some beautiful judgmental faces while Birdie isn’t looking - are going “mommy’s mean :(” and then the reminder of how long she’s grounded for. (One of two people I want More About: the man in the vampire tux. Who are you and why are you credited as ‘ Vampire in Tuxedo’?)

Duke’s fucking Gamer room, with that massive gamer chair and massive tv. His twitch room with the two cars, motorcycle, and sports things. But no interactive sports, they’re all solo sports. And then the fucking shelving units full of protein powders. [And then Ma who is Not Putting Up With His Shit (Ma, who are you; gimme stories about Ma. And is she the ‘guy’ who put together the puzzle boxes, since she just can tell him what’s going on in it without even looking?) and demanding that he doesn’t tell her to shut up or defend his being an asshole to her. Like I’ve seen people be like “Ma is abusive and that’s why he’s like he is” but look at his body language when he’s going off on her. It’s very threatening. Like she passes off the laundry basket when his hands come up.]

All the packing boxes and tarps in Andi’s garage, the focus on Andi’s emotional, heavy breathing, the silent signs of rage before she just obliterates the box. 

But then motherfucking Benoit’s bathroom. There’s at least four lotion-shaped bottles around the tub, another three bottles of hair-type things. The massive wine bottle, a decanter, and a glass of... what looks like lemonade?. That stack of like 30 books against the bathtub, a cup with a few pens in it, magazines, a couple crossword books, his rubber duck, the two laptops. His. fucking. toothbrush. (The Old Queen way he says ‘my mind is a fueled up racing car and I’ve got no where to drive it”)

The fucking DETAILS of it all.

#glass onion #long

[calronhunt]

whats the plot of the new raphael story?

The story is largely the same as it was in the original just with more stuff for Lionel to do outside of Raphael related stuff. Raphael and Lionel meet up, they have a relationship, they come to face their own individual traumas, they come together at the end, they kiss and get married and junk.

Raphael's plot is largely the same with the royal hell politics and such along with his hypersexual lifestyle and his desire for attention and love and such. A large part of his arc/his story is coming to terms with the fact that he should stop trying to get love from family members who will never give him the time of day and instead spend his energy on the people around him who care about him. That the only love he can get from his family members (for the most part) is if they can get something out of putting their energy into Raphael themselves and that he deserves better than that, and that he doesn't have to sell his body to get attention and love from others.

Lionel's plot on the other hand is about allowing himself to fuck up without feeling like everything is his fault and that he should be punished. He needs to stop feeling like an inherently awful person. This is a build up internal criticism of being sold to a gang as a child, being raised in an abusive environment where the only way to get attention was to be as awful as possible, and then being forced into an environment where all of that trauma and such was treated like a flaw that he had and something that could be beaten out of him. that if he just shut up and acted like a normal person he wouldn't be punished.

So you understand how Lionel and Raphael coming together and forming a bond could help both of them.

I'm currently reworking it into a 3 act story, with ups and down the whole way across. It is primarily about Lionel and Raphael though, without a lot of the side plots or anything anymore. if it doesn't relate back to Lionel or Raphael in some way it's probably going to be cut. It is just Lionel and Raphael's very slow burn romance where they have a really bad time about it for a while.

#ask #i'm having a fun time with it though #i'm so thankful my therapist gave me the reframing i needed to like come at the story again #i just needed to give lionel a different set of my issues

[cryptidwritings]

Dark Water

Chapter 33 : Talon Eye Pt. 1

prev | next | masterlist

There's trouble on the horizon.

cw: light demiphobia, drinking

Getting a straight answer out of pirates when inquiring about a specific supposed Lumrey naval officer was an impossible feat that, in hindsight, Anne should have seen from a mile away. The suspicious glances, however, were extremely obvious.

She left a few times, drink in hand, wondering to herself how in the hell she was going to earn enough; eventually revisiting the bidding war idea. She could auction his body in pieces; a leg for eight silver, an arm for five. What's that? Two gold for the head?

"Ye know a man named 'arper?"

"A pirate?"

"No. Rumor is 'e from Lumrey."

"I don't know anyone from Lumrey, and anyone askin' needs to piss off."

"There's money in it."

"What did I say? Piss. Off."

She found herself in the opposite corner, two days in, surveying the crowd, letting the rum fall into her empty stomach. It was already heavy as lead, sinking from dread and the thought that maybe there was no Harper at all.

"Ye been walkin' 'round askin' strange questions," a woman's voice came from her right.

She glanced over; the older woman was just an inch taller than her, with a stern face, wrinkled into an admonishing glare.

"Ye startin' trouble, Anne?"

"No, Mrs. Cuthbert."

"Then why ye harassin' the customers?"

Anne sighed, looking to her feet with a small smile, "well, I was 'opin' one of them would be able to give me the recipe for ye..." she met her gaze, "mead, was it?"

The glimmer in the older woman's eye led to a mischevious smile.

"Lass, only Richard knows that. It dies with 'im."

"What a shame," Anne looked around, "can't imagine the place without it."

"Exactly," she shrugged, "so why ye really 'ere then? Is it an excuse to..." her head tilted, and eyes moved across the pub to where Burke was sitting. He was talking with two other men; having a good conversation, it looked like, judging from the body language.

"I saw ye two talkin', thought that was goin' somewhere's."

"Oh," Anne looked at Mrs. Cuthbert. Agatha, was her name, but she hated it. "Maybe a little. He's... fine."

"Good with words."

"Aye."

"And other things."

"Now 'ow would ye know that?" Anne's brows raised, and the older woman chuckled.

"I don't, lass. No one does. The girls say ye can tell by the way a man moves."

"Pah!" Anne took a sip, "sounds like someone who got paid ta keep their mouth shut- ow!"

The small slap sent tingles up Anne's bicep, and Mrs. Cuthbert gave a warning glance before relaxing again. Burke looked over and nodded at Anne. She took a drink and dropped her eyes.

"Turns out 'e's more of a romantic," Mrs. Cuthbert crossed her arms, "Needs connection. Hasn't found it."

"Some would call that barely a man," she took a sip, staring at the liquid as it fell to her lips.

"Some find it refreshin'," she leaned closer to Anne, "the lad is keen on ye, so snatch 'im up, or someone else will."

"Is that a threat, Mrs. Cuthbert?"

"A warnin', more like. Get to it!" With that, the old woman walked away.

Anne waited a few minutes; she wasn't sure why. Maybe to not give the old woman the sense of satisfaction? Whatever it was, something was wrong with her; she knew that. Anyone else would be giddy with anticipation that a successful man—a powerful man— had any interest in them, but Anne knew that Burke was only as powerful as he was allowed, just like her. Just like everyone else in the world.

Burke saw her coming and excused himself, standing.

"Anne," he smiled, "this is Jonah and Lionel. Woodsmith's, lookin' to open up a shop, maybe even a mill."

She smiled at them, "Nice ta meet ye both!" then she focused on Burke, "can I steal ye, Burke? Just fer a moment?"

He excused himself, and followed Anne outside where she took a deep breath, unenthusiastically hitting the heel of her boot on the ground as she turned back to face the harbor master. He had gone home; changed clothes, offered her the same though she refused. She was still in the same dress from two days ago, looking more like a maid than a lady by now, as if she ever appeared like the latter.

"Any luck?" He asked.

She shook her head, squinting to block out the sun.

"Seems they're on edge," he pondered underneath the blacksmith's shrill strike on metal, "Probably the rumor."

"Rumor?" Anne finally brought her hand above her forehead, looking Burke in the eye. He reached for her.

She stepped back.

He put his hands up and backed up into the shade of the building, offering her a spot beside him. She sighed, and took it.

"Sorry, ye were sayin'?"

Burke leaned against the wall, "apparently a navy-man found his way on Talon, likely bartered or sold off as a slave."

"So? It wouldn't be the first time."

"So," Burke looked out at the sea, watching people go by his stall and towards the dock, "this particular snake is a killer. Likely why he's even here. Some think he might've been the one that did the Regent's son in."

"Hm," Anne fiddled with the dwindling coin in her pocket. She didn't have time for this. At this rate she would spend a year running around. Maybe now that his brother was dead, that's what Reid really wanted; a workhorse that couldn't complain and had no stake in the Capo name. She could try and placate him... she shuttered at the thought of him anywhere near her.

Burke pushed off the wall and scooped a rock from the ground, not deterred in the slightest by her lack of interest, "Vince says he was recruited from Windover. Imagine that, a farmboy turned assassin?"

Anne stopped fidgeting.

Burke chucked the rock away, then looked at her, "Ye think it's the same lad ye barterin' for?"

"Who told ye this?"

The sudden question surprised him, "it's goin' around. I'm surprised ye haven't heard it-"

"-and ye just thought of tellin' me now?" she rolled her eyes, shaking her head, "c'mon Burke, I thought ye were 'elpin' me. Now I look like a snitch!"

"Ye not a snitch, though."

"It doesn't matter!" she could almost laugh, "if enough people say it, it becomes true. I- I 'ave to right this somehow... and I can't just leave..." she slumped against the wall, burying her face in her hands as she slid down.

Burke kneeled in front of her, "It'll be alright."

"I don't see 'ow," she sniffed, "I'll 'ave ta show up empty 'anded. Who knows what 'e'll want instead-"

"-Don't be rash, get up. Ye tearin' me up, thinkin' like that," he touched her arm, gently pushing his fingers underneath to get a gentle grip, "come on. Let's try again, one more day, aye?"

The rushed sounds of boots approaching made Burke turn. Anne lifted her head to see Vincent, with his hat in his hands, approaching from the direction of the Harbor Master stall.

"Burke!" He called, breathing heavily, "I have a problem."

The Harbor Master stood, spinning on his heel as Vince came to a stop, shoving papers at Burke.

"I-I-I guess my partner didn't like the terms. He drew this up and... I signed it, but I don't remember- c-can ye look over it?"

"That's just fine, um," he looked down at Anne, "Ye comin' in?"

Vince then looked at Anne, and nodded respectfully as he breathed heavily in panic and the effort of his likely long walk.

"Aye," Anne responded, "in a minute. Go on."

Burke nodded, then looked at Vince, "let's go sit down. I'll buy ye a drink."

"No, I'm off the stuff. For good, this time."

taglist: @sparrowsage @kixngiggles @honey-is-mesi @annablogsposts

#pirate whump #captivity whump #multiple whumpers #multiple whumpees #whump community #whump series #dark water by jovi #tw alcohol

[lisomoon]

german phillips appreciation post

yooooooo all of them are so talented its insane. like omg i did not see all of them in the role of phillip but in other roles and these ppl are so sosososososo talented...

hisham

ive never seen hisham as laurens/phillip but two times as laf/jef and man hes so talented and such a funny guy. i acc got to talk to him and hes also so kind and friendly. his acting and interpretation of the characters were so amazing and i really loved his jefferson.

2. ricci

sadly i neither had the chance to see ricci perform as phillip but ive seen him as mulligan/madison two times and one time as m6 and hes also such a talented guy. the way he plays hercules is so funny and then the way he plays madison is so serious. its honestly amazing to see. i also think that he once cried during the election of 1800 bcs at the beginning hes was sobbing while saying "yes" or in german ,,bitte". hes also a very sympathetic person and i once talked to him and gave him some sweets.

3. lionel

okkkk ive seen him 2 times as laurens/phillip and he absolutely slayed both times. i LOVED (ew capital letters) the phillip rap. he was so amazing and i cried my heart out both times when he died as phillip. his laurens was very subtle abt being gaygaygaygaygaygaygaygaygaygay but it was DEFINTETLY noticeable like you could see it but not that extreme.

4. oliver

gay.

like bro they almost kissed eachother on the lips and he kissed his cheek but he also was close in a rather not so friendly but romantic way to peggy and yo maybe not gay but definetly bi like this was so noticeable like omg i cant shut up abt this. BOTH times i saw him as laurens/phillip he almost kissed alex and aswflknegklengengioegin. his phillip also was amazing cried both times when he died and his rap was also great and a little funfact both times at the beginning of blow us all away the audience would cheer and he broke character both times bcs he needed to laugh. i also saw his a.ham the first time i watched it and yo i was not prepared for dear theodosia. this made me cry sosoossosososososososososososs much even tho its not supposed to. when he died at the end i felt like a part of me died i was emotionally destroyed. i screamed, cried and was shaking at the end it was not normal like omg. i also met him and yo hes such a sweet and kind person and has such a beautifully positive energy like thank u for existing oliver.

#appreciation post #hamilton #hamilton obsession #hamilton germany #hamilton hamburg #hisham morscher #riccardo haerri #lionel von lawrence #oliver edward #phillip appreciation #man nennt mich phillip #needed to write this down

[random-nerd-queer]

@sunnybugz here's your birthday present.

It was just enough day at the office for Brennan, Cam, and Angela. That was until Brennan’s phone started ringing, it was Booth as usual. He really was the only reason Brennan was answering her phone recently, she had started working on a new novel and when she’s in the zone she is in the zone. As Angel found out one night when she tried to bring her some take out and it ended up on the floor when she startled Brennan. 

The body was a bit too fleshy for Brennan’s taste when they arrived, so they called in Cam. It was like time slowed down when Cam walked in, Brennan could barely keep herself breathing. She didn’t like it. She didn’t have control. But at the same time it was exhilarating. She felt like she could trust Cam, with anything. Even when she was knee deep in people parts. 

Brennan was back in her office, pouring over case files and book ideas. She just couldn’t focus. She couldn’t stop thinking about the way Cam’s dress hugs all her curves just right. How fast her brain moves when it comes to a body. How smart she is. How she can just talk to people, people she likes, people she’s interested in. Even people she hates. Brennan couldn’t tell if it was jealousy or maybe something else she was feeling towards Cam. She had never felt something like this before. She felt something similar for Booth but that was just her disdain for his brash acts and disrespect of science. Cam was different, Cam was her equal. They were scientists, rational, logical. Nothing about this feeling was logical. Angela knocked on the door, breaking Brennan out of her stupor. 

“Hey, you’ve been staring at that paper for a while now. You alright sweetie?”

A warmth bubbled in Brennan. Safety, home. 

“Yeah, I’m just thinking. Weird case.”

“Yeah right. No weirder than any case before. Actually I think it was significantly less weird than some we’ve had. The boy with the bleeding heart? The slave ship. Not to mention the buried pirate treasure.”

Brennan gave a dry laugh. Angela was right, this case wasn’t the weirdest they’ve had but it felt weirder. Something was different. 

“Do you remember that case, the one where we got locked in the lab for Christmas because Hodgins got drunk? Lucky Lionel, Booth called him”

“Yeah. The one Booth pawned off on me so he didn’t have to do paperwork. What about it?”

“Do you ever think about them? Ivy Gillespie and her granddaughter. What they’re up to now?”

“Ivy died, last year. Lisa graduates this year. She’s going to be a doctor, got her internship at Johns-Hopkins” 

“Look at you, caring about people.”

“They send me a card every Christmas” 

Angela had made herself comfortable on Brennan’s sofa like she always did when Brennan got stuck too far in her head. She’d been in this position far too often recently, but Brennan wasn’t budging on what was truly bothering her. Usually she would give after a little bit of talking, but lately she’d been shut tight. Nothing was slipping through her wall. A wall Angela had spent years breaking down, but Brennan had been building it back up recently. Brennan sat down next to Angela, leaning into her side. 

“What was your favorite case?”

“Agne, what are you talking about?”

“Your favorite case. You know, the one you think about on nights when you need a feel good story. Something to rival, It’s a Wonderful Life”

Brennan was silent for a moment, leaning deeper into Angela who started running her hand through Brennan's hair. 

“Do you remember Samantha Winslow?”

“Yeah yeah, the deaf girl who was kidnapped, she ended up killing a man” 

“I think of her and her parents. Reunited after all those years and they loved her just the same. Her and that pink bunny.”

It fell quiet between the two of them after that. Angela just stroking Brennan’s hair, Brennan lost in her own world. 

The sun came up, Cam came in. The light in Brennan’s office was still on. When she peeked around the corner she found Brennan and Angela asleep, curled up on each other on Brennan’s couch. Cam snapped a picture before laying a blanket on the two and closing the door, letting them sleep on until work needed to be done. 

Brennan woke up with a sore back but a heart full of love. Angela was still asleep. Brennan pulled herself away, replacing the blanket when she was finished. Angela looked so soft, so peaceful, sleeping there. Even if she was going to have a wicked crick in her neck when she woke up. Brennan went to the decontamination shower before settling into her desk for the day. Somehow she felt better. Better than she’d felt in the past few days. Maybe all she needed was a good night's sleep. Or at least that’s what she thought. 

Angela woke up about mid-day, no case had come in so it was a quiet day at the office. Brennan was deep in her writing, so much so she didn’t even notice Angela get up and leave. Angela didn’t go very far though. Her phone buzzed as she left Brennan’s office, Cam had sent her the picture from that morning. Angela knocked on Cam’s door.

“Hey Cam”

“Hey Ange”

Angela gave Cam a small kiss on her cheek.

“You two looked so cute this morning I couldn’t help myself. Have you asked her yet?”

“No. She’s got this wall that I just can’t seem to break down. Like she doesn’t want anyone to get close to her again. I don’t know what’s wrong”

“Hey hey sweetheart, this is not on you. I know you want to be there for her, but if she doesn’t want you there then you can’t force it. She’ll come to you when she’s ready”

“I know but I don’t want her to go back to how she was. Closed off. No friends. Only her work to keep her company. I want her to thrive, to know she’s loved”

Angela sat on Cam’s lap, wrapped in her girlfriend's arms. Everything would be okay.

It's not perfect but I wanted to get it done before midnight, at least midnight my time.

#happy birthday

[hellfirehaley]

Strange Love Chapter 10

Songs referenced: Lovely Day by Bill Withers and All Night Long by Lionel Richie, I Was Made For Loving You by Kiss, Smoking In the Boys Room by Motley Crue.

CW: mentions of being roofied in the previous chapter, coarse language.

AN: HIIII BITCHES I'M BACK! I sort of went on a hiatus to deal with a death in my family but after taking the proper time to mourn and adjust, I'm back. Thank you to all who reached out and checked in on me. You're amazing and I fucking love you. I'm dedicating this chapter to my amazing beta reader/tumblr bestie @mvnsoneddie86 because the end of the chapter was actually something she wanted to see in the series so THANK YOU KAYLA FOR SAVING ME FROM WRITER'S BLOCK and for being an absolutely amazing friend.

MASTERLIST:

You woke up the next morning and the first thing you felt was a warm body next to you. Assuming it was Robin or Ali, you ignored it and tried to fall back asleep. That was until you heard a tiny panting whine and it sounded like a jackhammer.

“Ugh Robin shut the hell up!” you say but regret it because the sound of your own voice was not even close to a welcome sound. Fuck I feel hungover, you thought. The panting continued for a solid minute before you rolled over and opened your eyes. It wasn’t Robin.

“Hi Norm?” you say, confused how you’re home. You sit up and sure enough, you’re home in the comfort of your own bed. It took you a minute to wake up fully but when you did, you looked at the nightstand by your bed and saw a glass of water and a pair of pills. You leaned over and grabbed the water, taking a few gulps as you thought back to last night. You remembered getting to the party with Robin and Ali; you remembered the shots and the dancing but after that, it was fuzzy.  For some reason you remembered Eddie being there too but played it off as your imagination. You took the pills from the nightstand and swallowed them with a gulp of water. You pulled back the covers and got out of bed, standing up to stretch out. You were definitely sore but nothing unmanageable. You looked down and saw your costume laying on the floor haphazardly and picked it up, putting it in your hamper. You opened the door and let Norm out first, assuming he was hungry too. 

When you started down the stairs, you were smacked with the smell of bacon from the kitchen and it made your stomach growl. You descended down the rest of the stairs and you heard the sound of two men singing along to a R&B song in the kitchen. You were really confused now because you didn’t remember bringing anyone home with you. When you arrived at the kitchen, your anxiety melted away at the scene before you: Eddie Munson was cooking breakfast in your kitchen with your uncle Dave. Eddie was mixing pancakes in some of your brother’s old sweatpants and a hoodie while Uncle Dave was flipping pancakes and working on the eggs and bacon. The coffee was in the pot dripping away slowly. You recognized the song as Lovely Day by Bill Withers.

“Then I look at you and the world’s alright with me. Just one look at you and I know it’s gonna be a lovely daaaaaaaayy.” Dave sang as Eddie sang back ups on the Lovely Day’s. You enjoyed the scene in front of you of your favorite two men dancing and having fun together. You giggled at the scene before you and that made Eddie perk his head in your direction.

“There she is! Morning Y/N!” Eddie greets you as she misses the last of the batter.

“Morning guys” you say with a smile. “All this for us?”

“Yep. Nothing fights a hangover quite like grease,” Dave said, plating the rest of the eggs.

“Well thank you, I really appreciate it boys.” you say.

“Anytime Peanut. Are you feeling alright?” Dave asked.

“Yeah, just a little hungover and confused about how I got here last night.” you say as you brush the small hairs out of your face. 

“I can fill you in later. You need to eat first,” Eddie said, motioning towards the empty seat at the counter. You take the hint and go towards your normal seat. You settle in and watch them as they continue to cook. Eddie goes to the cabinet and grabs a mug then to the fridge to grab some milk and then over to you, putting the mug and milk in front of you.

“I would recommend the first few cups of coffee be a bit stronger this morning.” Eddie said as he grabbed the pot and poured your glass of coffee. You thanked him before taking a timid drink. You never drank your coffee straight black but today called for it.

“So what is the plan for the day kids?” Dave asked as he plated the meats.

“I’ve got a paper I need to work on, otherwise I was gonna hang out at the house today.” you say as Eddie placed a plate in front of you and one to each side of you.

“I was gonna run home after breakfast to go change but I was gonna come back later to check on you if that’s alright.” Eddie said.

“Yeah that’s fine. I’ll just be buried in my books,” you note as the plate of bacon and sausage is slid in front of you.

“Well I have to run the store for a few hours but then I’m gonna be home for the rest of the day if you kids need me,” Dave says as he flips the final pancake.

“Thanks Uncle Dave.” you say.

“Anytime Peanut,” Dave says. Eddie takes the seat to your right, closest to the wall and starts to pile up on the food with you following his lead. Dave joins you a few minutes later after setting up the rest of the breakfast buffet. You eat in a very comfortable silence apart from the sounds of silverware hitting the plates.

“I’m really sorry about last night guys,” you say after a while.

“It’s okay Peanut. You did the right thing by having Eddie call me to come over. You did nothing wrong.” Dave said, grabbing your hand.

“Dave’s right. You immediately found me last night and told me you didn’t feel great so I took you home. I’m just sorry for what happened to you Princess.” Eddie said. You sigh and nod, thinking about how thankful you were for these two men. Once you finished breakfast, you put your plate in the sink and went upstairs to go change. You put on a pair of black jeans and a t shirt, grab your history book and notebook. When you got back down to the kitchen, Eddie and Dave had finished eating and were talking quietly among themselves so you decided not to disturb them. You went to the dining room, setting up the books while you debated what album to study to. You went to the entertainment stand and perused through the albums. You decided on David Bowie’s Let’s Dance album, turning on the record player and putting on the vinyl on the middle motor before dropping the needle. The sounds of Modern Love started blasting through the house as you danced around the dining room back to your set. You open the books but don’t sit down as you walk to the kitchen to get yourself a soda.

“And you’re sure about this Eddie?” Dave asked, face written with concern.

“Yeah I am. I’ve seen it happen before so that’s how I knew what was going on. I just wanna find the fucker and make him pay for it.” Eddie whispered/ yelled.

“”Trust me, I get it but we don’t need you going to jail.” Dave pointed out. Eddie nodded along after that. You decided it best not to ask as you made your way to the panty and grabbed a bag of barbecue chips. You settle at the table with your snacks and crack open the history book, turning to the section about the 1950s and 1960s. A few minutes into reading, a pair of inked arms wrapped around you. You relaxed into the notion and sighed.

“Alright kiddo. I’m outta here for the day. Call me if you need anything.” Dave's voice said as he pulled you in tighter.

“I will, I promise.” you say as his arms loosened and left. Soon enough, Eddie had returned to the table in his costume from the night before: a pair of overalls.

“So I wasn’t imagining last night” you note.

“Nope. Fraid not darlin” Eddie said with a laugh as he modeled his costume around for you, erecting a laugh from you.

“Now I’m mad I didn’t get to enjoy it in all its glory” you admit. 

“I’ll bring it back eventually, just for you” Eddie said with a wink.

“Are you gonna come back later?” you ask.

“Yep. I’m giving you a few hours to yourself while I’m at practice but otherwise we’re hanging out all day long and watching movies.” Eddie said as he sat down next to you.

“What are we gonna watch?” you ask as you turn the page.

“Not sure yet. I was gonna decide when I got there.” he said with a smile. You giggle at the thought of Eddie browsing the shelves of Family Video.

“Okay but one condition: No horror. Last night was enough for me,” you say. 

“Okay but just because you asked so nicely.” Eddie said.

“Thank you,” you say.

“Anytime Y/N. I want you to know I’m always here for you. Good days, bad days. I’m here and I’m not going anywhere.” Eddie said softly. You offer a sweet smile, taken aback by his words.

“I’m always here for you too Eds,” you say with a smile and squeeze of his hand. You stayed like that for a few minutes, just holding hands in a comfortable silence until Eddie squeezed twice and let go, getting up.

“Alright, I’ve gotta run home and change. You gonna be okay for like an hour?” Eddie asks.

“No, not at all. I won’t be able to survive with you.” you sass.

“Glad to see your sense of humor is still intact. I’ll be back soon with movies and snacks for a study break.” Eddie said as he went to the door and plucked his key out of the bowl. He waved to you goodbye and left.

You had to decide on a topic involving cases where civil rights and/or civil liberties were violated and it caused the course of history to change so you chose to cover the Supreme Court case of Tinker vs. Des Moines. Where 13 year old Mary Tinker wore a black armband to school as an example of protesting the Vietnamese War and once the principal caught wind of the protest, he threatened suspension due to the armbands being such a distraction. You were almost tempted to make a trip to the Hawkins Library to look through old newspaper articles when there was a knock at the door. Norm got to the door first, barking at the new guests. You got up from the dining room chair and thought how it couldn’t be Eddie yet. Eddie…God I owed him an enormous thank you and a huge favor after last night, you thought.

“All night long…all night long…once we get started, you can’t sit down. Come and join the fun, it’s a merry go round,” you sang as you started dancing towards the door, “Everyone’s dancing their troubles away. Come join our party, see how we play. Tamboli de say de moi ya, yeahhh, jumbo jumbo.” you finish as you open the door, revealing Steve and Ali.

“Hey guys” you say, opening the door for them to come in.

“Y/N! You’re okay! You were really out of it last night.” Ali says, pulling you into a hug. You groan at the impact and hug her back.

“Yeah I'm good. I don’t remember much but I guess Eddie and my uncle stayed over to take care of me so I can only assume it was bad.” you say, grimacing at the thought.

“Do you remember us saying we were gonna come over?” Steve asks gently as he’s petting Norm.

“No, I remember dancing with Ali, her going to find you, some creep jock dancing on me and then fleeing outside. After that, it’s all a blur” you say, trying to remember.

“Well thank God you found Eddie because you were really fucked up by the time he brought you home. He was holding you up and you were looking like you were about to pass out,” Ali said, pulling away as you closed the door.

“I am too. I can honestly say I thought I had dreamed it until I came down for breakfast.” you say smiling at the memory of this morning. You thought about Eddie on a sunday morning, making pancakes for you and him after a late night concert and you would hang out on the couch and just make out. You smiled at the thought.

“Why are you so smiley?” Ali asked, noting the dazed look in your eyes.

“Oh nothing, just was thinking about earlier” you say, brushing it off as nothing.

“What about it?” Ali pressed.

“Eddie cooked me breakfast and it was really sweet,” you say with a blush.

“Oh my god you DO have a crush on Eddie Munson” Ali gushed.

“Yeah I do. So what? We’re friends and I’m not about to ruin that.” you say.

“So what? You’re just gonna sit here and fall in love with him and do nothing about it?” Ali asked.

“Yeah it seemed to work out well for you.”  you say laughing, earning one out of Steve.

“Not funny. Also I had you and Robin orchestrating the entire thing so it wasn’t like we all of a sudden got together.” Ali said.

“I mean it worked out well for us. Ali made the first move by asking me to that corn maze and she basically attacked my face when we got there.” Steve recalled.

“STEVE!!” you girls yelled.

“Okay you’re right, not the point. My point is that ladies can make the first move too.” Steve said.

“Okay but how?” you ask.

“That’s something you’ll have to figure out for yourself,” Ali said before looking at the table. “Were you doing homework? On a Saturday?!”

“Yeah I was trying to clear my head of all the shit last night but it didn’t work.” you say.

“Duh!” Ali said with a giggle as she grabbed your hand and dragged you to the living room and plopped you on the couch. She grabbed the remote and turned on the tv, tuning it until she found some cartoons, landing on the Smurfs.

“Steve, could you make me a cup of coffee?” Ali asked as you watched Dreamy Smurf enter the Smurf Village.

“Sure baby” Steve said, going to the kitchen.

“So where is Eddie right now?” Ali asked as soon as Steve was out of earshot. 

“He went home to change and grab movies,” you say.

“Aw that’s sweet. What movies?” Ali asked.

“I don’t know. I didn’t exactly ask and he didn’t say,” you admit.

“Better hope he isn’t in a horror mood” Ali says as Steve returns with a mug of coffee “Thanks Handsome.”

“Anytime angel” Steve says back as he settles into the recline and grabs the morning paper. You watched a few episodes of the Smurfs and Scooby Doo before the Dungeons and Dragons cartoon came on. Right as the opening credits started, Eddie walked in, holding a large pizza and a stack of tapes stacked on top of the box.

“Oh good! They’re here” Eddie said as he eyed Steve and Ali. “I got a large one just in case they came over too. Hey guys!” he greeted as he put the pizza in the kitchen 

“Hey Eddie!” Ali yelled from the living room.

“What movies did you rent Eds?” you ask. Eddie returned to the living room with three tapes proudly on display.

“I got lucky and Buckley was opening so these bad boys had been returned: We’re having a Star Wars day!” Eddie announced as you all cheered excitedly, the inner nerd in each of you coming out.

“Fuck yes! Can we do it after this cartoon?” you say turning your attention back to the tv.

“What are you watching?” Eddie asks, sitting next to you on the couch.

“Dungeons and Dragons” you say nonchalantly.

“Fuck off” Eddie said, looking at you.

“I’m serious. Watch this”  you say as he gets immersed with the show, hung up on every line. You ended up watching Eddie’s childlike wonder more than the show itself. He kept turning back to you and explaining what each character would look like on paper, what the dexterity score would be or what their initiative would be. He explained to you how barbarians and paladins are misunderstood and if you have a party full of “tanks” (or overpowered big characters with higher stats and gear), you should play as a magic user or a healer. You soaked up every single piece of information.

“So what do the boys play? Are they tanks?” you ask.

“They like to think they are.” Eddie said laughing, “No but really they’re great players who understand the game well. They just have weird ways of communication, almost like it's a language all their own,” Eddie said. You and Steve exchanged a knowing look.

“Trust me we know” Steve said with a chance.

“So we ready to go to a galaxy far, far away?” Steve asked as the credits rolled. You all nodded in agreement as Steve got up and inserted the tape into the VCR.

“So what are your plans for this weekend?” Ali asked after a few previews had passed.

“I’ve got practice until like 5 or 6 today” Eddie said.

“I’ve got nothing planned. Why what’s up?” you ask.

“I wanna go see the new Stephen King film but I would feel better in a group setting so why not invite my best friend and her best friend?” Ali explained innocently.

“I mean you had me at Stephen King” you say, looking to Eddie for his answer.

“And I’m a sucker for horror so I’m in too,” Eddie said with a smile.

“Excellent. Let’s say 7 tonight?” Ali asks as you all nod. You watched the first movie and spent the majority discussing fan theories and favorite parts of the movie. Steve even joked about how he and Ali should go as Han and Leia for Halloween this year. Once the first movie ended, they got up.

“Okay guys. I’ve gotta run errands before it gets too late in the day and I get sucked into the movies. Wanna meet at the theater around 6:45? I hate missing trailers” Ali said.

“Sure Ali. I’ll have us there at 6:45,” Eddie said.

“Perfect then we will see you guys tonight,” Ali said with an excited wave as they left out the door. You got up and switched the tapes.

“So why the moon tattoo?” Eddie said out of the blue. You looked at him for a minute before responding, genuinely curious where the question came from. 

“Uncle Dave took me on my last birthday and told me to get whatever I wanted. I used to be really into space, the stars, the constellations and like zodiac signs and that kind of stuff so I thought the moon was a great representation for it because everything is ruled by the Moon. It causes people to do weird shit, hence the term lunatic.” you ramble.

“That’s actually really cool. Do you wanna get more?” Eddie asked as you returned to the couch.

“Yeah eventually. I would love to get more, maybe add a comet or something or a sun,” you say.

“Seems very you,” Eddie said.

“So what’s up with the dragon? I’ve always wondered about that one,” you ask, pointing to the specific tattoo.

“It’s actually a Wyvern. It’s supposed to represent war, envy and strength. Wyverns are basically two legged dragons with wings and it’s one of my favorite creatures when I was learning Dungeons and Dragons.” Eddie explained.

“I love that.” you say.

“Thanks Y/N” Eddie said. The movie started and right as Han and Luke were taking shelter in the Tan Tan, Eddie looked right at you.

“Wanna get matching tattoos?” Eddie asked.

“Wait what?” you ask, turning to him to make sure you heard him properly.

“Matching tattoos. You and me,” Eddie said.

“I mean yes but what design?” you ask.

“I don’t know yet but I’ll come up with something,” Eddie said.

“It’s gotta be something we both like and can live with, even if we aren’t friends anymore,” you say.

“Are you…are you breaking up with me already Y/N?” Eddie asked, putting his hand over his heart in mock pain.

“No! NO! I’m just saying in the universe that something happens to us,” you say.

“Phew! I thought I was already in trouble. I promise it’ll be something we can both be happy with,” Eddie said.

“I trust you Eddie, more than anyone else. Just don’t betray it.” you say.

“I won't, princess I promise.” Eddie vows.

“You better not or I’m gonna kick your fucking ass Edward Munson,” you say.

“I believe you,” Eddie says as he turns his attention back to the movie. You tried to pay attention but your mind began to wander back to last night. You were grateful for Eddie coming over. You couldn’t help but wonder what the hell happened last night. Rather than let your mind eat away at the negative thoughts, you attacked the topic.

“Eddie?” you ask

“Yes princess?” he responded.

“What really happened last night? Don’t sugarcoat it please. I need to know what happened,” you plead. Eddie looks at you for a minute, trying to figure out how he was gonna word it. You waited patiently, not wanting to spook him.

“You were taken advantage of last night,” Eddie started to explain, “You came outside last night and found me and the guys. I could tell you had been drinking, which is fine by the way. I’m not one to judge especially considering what my side hustle is. I figured it was just drinking too much but then you kept talking about some douchebag who was dancing with you.”

“He called me Miss Witch” you recall.

“He probably did. I think he put something in your drink so that’s why I got you out of there,”” Eddie said.

“Is that why I can’t remember much of last night?” you ask.

“Yes. I’ve seen it happen before and I couldn’t let it happen to someone I care about” Eddie said as he grabbed your hand.

“And Uncle Dave?”

“You were rightfully freaked out, begging me to call him so I did. We stayed the night to make sure nothing happened. You gave us quite a scare Y/N” Eddie said.

“I’m really sorry for everything. I really had no idea and I still can’t remember much of last night. I honestly thought seeing you last night was a dream until I saw you in the kitchen,” you say.

“If you don’t wanna talk about last night anymore, we can do that.” Eddie said softly and you nodded..

“Yeah I'd like that,” you say.

“What are you gonna do during band practice?” Eddie asked.

“Probably nap. I still feel exhausted and I don’t need Ali giving me shit for passing out during the movie” you say with a yawn.

“Sounds like a solid plan,” Eddie says as you start to lay down, putting your head in his lap. As the movie proceeded, you started to feel sleepy and it didn’t help when Eddie started to play with your hair, lightly scratching your head as he went along. You were almost asleep when Eddie spoke again.

“Hey Y/N? You awake?” he whispered.

“Barely,” you mumble. 

“Well go on back to sleep. I’m gonna get to practice and I’ll come over after and wake you up,” Eddie said softly as he got up.

“Okay Eds, I’ll be here” you say yawning as you settle back down on the couch, getting comfortable.

“I’ll be back before you know it,” Eddie said as he opened the front door and left. It didn’t take long for you to fall back asleep, dreaming of a certain curly haired metalhead.

You weren’t sure what time you woke up but the sun was setting when you looked outside, the deep yellows and oranges painting the sky. You got off the couch and stretched out. The clock in the living room read 5:45 so you had just enough time to shower and get ready before you had to leave. You got up the stairs and picked out an outfit: an orange sweater with a pleated black skirt and some black tights. You brought the clothes with you as you went to the bathroom, putting the clothes on the counter. You turned on the shower to warm and waited on it to heat up. You stripped bare and watched as the bathroom started to steam up. You stepped in and immediately started to feel better as the water transcended down upon you. You felt the grunge of last night wash off as you scrubbed yourself down with your loofah. You even found yourself singing along to I Was Made For Loving You by Kiss while you washed your hair. You shut off the water and wrapped yourself up in a towel, savoring the last moment of warmth as you started to get dressed. Once in your bra, panties and tights, you started to work on your hair, putting in your products and finishing it off with hairspray. You put on some brown eyeshadow, eyeliner and mascara before putting on your sweater and skirt. You added a darker red lip and called it a day. You opened the bathroom door and walked out to the living room where Eddie was waiting patiently on the couch watching the news. 

“Hey gorgeous. Did you have a good nap?” Eddie asked as he took a look at you.

“I did, yeah. I slept til sunset then I hopped in the shower to wash last night’s filth off me.” you say with a smile as you sit next to him.

“Well I’m glad you got some sleep.” Eddie said with a smile.

“Me too. How was band practice?” you ask.

“It was fine. We practiced our new song and it’s getting a lot tighter,” Eddie noted.

“You’ll have to play it for me later.” you muse.

“Absolutely darlin. You about ready to head out?” Eddie asked. 

“Yeah I’ve just gotta feed Norm and then we can head out,” you say as you get up, going to the kitchen and scooping some kibble into Norm’s bowl. Norm immediately was at your side and started eating as you gave him a few pets. “You’re such a good boy buddy. I love you,” you say to the dog before going to the door and grabbing your boots from last night and your purse.

“So do you know anything about the movie?” Eddie asked.

“Not really. I know it’s Stephen King’s take on a werewolf story so it’s gonna be pretty cool I hope,” you say as you laced up your boots.

“Ah see that’s more than I knew,” Eddie said as you laughed.

“Yeah I figured. You ready?” you ask

“Yep. After you Y/N” Eddie says, getting up from the couch. You opened the front door locking the bottom lock behind you and started towards the van. Eddie closes the door behind him, running past you to open the van door for you.

“Oh why thank you. What a gentleman” you say getting into the van and sitting down before he closes the door, running over to his side and getting in. He started the van and turned up the head for you. The radio was playing a familiar hair metal song that made you and Eddie both laugh.

“Guess this is a good sign huh?” Eddie says.

“I guess so Eds,” you say back between laughs.

“Checking out the halls, making sure the coast is clear; Looking in the stalls, nah, there ain't nobody here. My buddies, Sixx, Mick, and Tom To get caught would surely be the death of us all” Eddie sang loudly

“Smoking in the boys room; I was smoking in the boys room. Now teacher, don't you fill me up with your rule 'Cause everybody knows that smoking ain't allowed in school. Hey, can I be excused?” you join in, banging your head lightly along to the song. You two jammed out for most of the short drive to the downtown area. 

“Do you want to split a popcorn or something?” Eddie asks.

“Sure I can never finish it all by myself anyways,” you note.

“Candy?” Eddie counters.

“Sure! I’m here for the entire movie experience,” you say as Eddie turned down the street and made his way towards the movie theater.

“Are you always this easy going? Like you always seem to just go with the flow.” Eddie noted.

“Yeah pretty much. I’m kind of that friend who will run errands with you or just hang out. I’m okay with just about anything except for a few hard boundaries,” you say as Eddie parks a few stores down. You undo your seatbelt and get out of the van, waiting for Eddie. 

“Think we beat em?” Eddie asked.

“Maybe. I know Ali likes to get here early to round up the troops but since she and Steve were doing God knows what, we might have a shot,” you say as Eddie gets to your side and grabs your hand. You walk towards the entrance and see Steve’s burgundy BMW parked out front.

“Looks like they beat up,” you note.

“Good thing we didn’t bet on it,” Eddie said with a laugh.

“Yeah that’s true. It would’ve made it more interesting though,” you say, returning his laugh as you got to the little ticket booth.

“Hi, two for Silver Bullet please,” Eddie said to the ticket holder while pulling out his wallet.

“Seven dollars please,” the girl behind the counter says as Eddie fishes out a five and some ones. He hands her the cash and grabs the tickets.

“Enjoy!” the girl says as you wave her goodbye.

“So popcorn, a Coke and some Reeses Pieces?” Eddie asks as you walk in.

“It’s like you know me so well Munson” you gush in a girlier voice.

“Anything for my best girl Y/N” he said with a sweet smile. You walked into the lobby and saw Steve and Robin waiting with popcorn and soda in hand. 

“Yes! They came!” Ali said as soon as she saw you two.

“Hey guys. How did your errand running go?” you ask as you walk up to them while Eddie gets your snacks.

“Boring but we got them done. We ended up having to carpool the kids around because someone can’t say no to his children,” Ali said jokingly.

“Oh come on, it’s not my fault. Henderson wanted a ride to Timbuktu and back.” Steve countered.

“And you’re the one who says yes to begin with Babe,” Ali said as Eddie joined them.

“We ready to go in? Eddie asked as the group nodded and headed towards their theater, Eddie’s hand finding its way back into yours and you weren’t about to complain. The theater was pretty empty minus a few other couples so you all sat in the middle back to avoid being seen. Steve and Eddie sat on the outside with you and Ali on the inside. As the previews started playing, you all got settled in and started to relax. Ali was completely engrossed in the previews noting which movies she wanted to see next; Steve happily obliged her by promising to take her to every movie she mentioned. You noted how you wanted to see Clue over winter break. Once the movie started, all conversations ended as you focused on the film. It was a pretty campy film so you and Eddie spent most of it making fun of the pace and how the special effects looked. At one point when reaching for popcorn, your hands met again and you felt the same spark you had been feeling but it was stronger for some reason. There were a few jump scares though and out of the corner of your eye, you could see Ali jumping every few minutes with Steve pulling her close as a way of protecting her. You did fine until the transformation scene started. It had caught you off guard so you jumped and hid into Eddie’s chest. He wrapped his arm around you and pulled you closer to him.

“It’s alright love. It’s just a movie,” Eddie cooed as he rubbed your back. The scene moved on and you were able to watch the rest of the movie just the way you were: cuddled into Eddie’s chest, well protected from the fictitious werewolves.

“So much for no horror huh Y/N?” Eddie whispered in your ear at one point which made you laugh, momentarily forgetting to fake gore on the screen. He critiqued every aspect of the movie for its remainder and his debunking of the film helped make it more enjoyable. When the credits started rolling, you sat back up like you had started and you laughed at how ridiculous you were for being scared.

“So? What did we think?” Eddie asked the group as he stood up and stretched.

“It was good, definitely scary,” Ali said.

“Dude, it was so cheesy. The effects were so bad and the whole mob mentality is totally played out,” Steve commented.

“Says the dude who works at a movie store.” you say with a snort.

“I’ve seen better and I’ve seen worse” Eddie noted as he offered you his hands to help you stand up. You took his hands as he pulled you to your feet.

“Well that was fun,” Ali said as she was being helped up to her feet by Steve.

“Absolutely. Thank you for inviting us and letting us crash your night,” you say following them out of the aisle.

“We are definitely doing this again soon,” Ali said.

“Yes!” you agree. You walk them to Steve’s BMW and hug Ali before you go your separate ways for the night.

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