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postmodernmulticoloredcloak · 4 years

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Time for The Witcher episode 4!!

So the last episode was Intense(TM) and also I finally realized that the show isn’t happening all at the same time but it’s following multiple timelines, which, better late than never. Now things make more sense...

Alright, bando alle ciance and let’s do this.

“Ciri! Ciri” Cirilla: yes? “Not you, I was talking to Siri. What’s the weather going to be tomorrow”

That’s such a stupid joke. Unfollow me right now, it’s okay.

Glowy Forest Intensifies... oh, there’s people now. Forest Dora Milaje aren’t happy to see her, which is understandable, I guess. But the boss arrives.

Meanwhile, except not meanwhile, a man has had a very bad day. Apparently the nickname White Wolf has stuck. Remember when we thought the MCU was going to make Bucky into a Black Panther character as the White Wolf, official media outlet even used the White Wolf as a title for Bucky, and then it ended up in nothing? Sorry for the digression but I really hoped we’d get Bucky written by Ryan Coogler and I was really disappointed when that didn’t happen but *waves around* all of that happened instead. I mean, technically it’s not too late to make it happen but Bucky is a Disney+ creature now, so, bye.

Hello Jaskier! My boy! I missed you.

Ah, the new media image campaign is working.

“You never get involved, except you actually do, all of the time” I love this XD “I don’t do emotions or attachments” character who does emotions intensely all the time and gets attached to everyone they meet paired with “sure Jan” character who calls them out is a very good dynamic.

Ah, yes, this is perfect. I’m sorry but dark brooding protagonist and bubbly comic relief sidekick is my secret weakness.

No offense, Geralt, but those clothes did need a good washing after your latest job, so don’t make that face.

Blah blah royal affairs I should probably pay attention to.

“I am not going to protect you” [*Spongebob font* five minutes later...]

But yeah, the princess is Cirilla’s mother, I suppose, and I’m sure the marriage that produces Scream Princess is super important. She is very pretty and has lovely hair. Sometimes I wish I had long hair I could braid artistically.

The princess doesn’t want to get married to some strange dude, but the queen is A Very Strong Woman(TM) and has no time for silly things like her daughter’s feelings over the most life-changing decision in her life. She’s an interesting character for sure, and the narrative doesn’t try to frame her as either definitely good or bad, which is interesting.

Oh! Rat Boy isn’t dead! That’s great. That makes sense narratively, native forest women who suffered genocide from colonizers wouldn’t kill an elf boy who went through the same thing.

Promised husband is a shitty dude. Queen Calanthe likes Geralt, which, relatable. But she and her entourage are racist assholes, and the next scene with Cirilla and Dara tell us that their anti-elf talk isn’t just talk.

By the way, now we know for sure how much time there is between Geralt’s timeline and Cirilla’s.

The queen doesn’t like feminine dresses. Lady is trying to overcompensate a lot. But her banter with Geralt is entertaining.

The first suitor is from Nilfgaard, and in hindsight it would have been a wise choice to unify the two kingdoms... C’mon, poor guy is just awkward, he doesn’t deserve the humiliation. Or is he the guy who’ll make war later? The pilot threw too much new information at me the other day.

Yennefer is bored... and apparently 30 years has passed since the last we saw of her. (I refuse to try to understand when in relation to the other plots that puts this scene. Things will click together at some point or I’ll just accept whatever happens and nod along.) And coincidentally she is paired with a woman who laments being only considered important as a baby-producing womb. Oops. Awkward.

Not relevant to the show but my parents never get inside my room as often as while I am watching something on Netflix.

Yennefer thinks life as a court mage sucks, queen Kalis thinks life as a baby-maker sucks. They envy each other for what the other has, but they’re probably both right.

Well, boredom is no longer a problem.

Oh, poor queen, her husband paid to have her killed because she’s only given him daughters. Two episodes in a row about female heirs to kings, plus queen Calanthe being female and having a daughter who’ll have a daughter. Theeemes!

You can’t be rude to the only person who is your only hope not to die horribly, girl.

Queen Calanthe is frustrated she isn’t a man, which we could guess. She also likes the simplicity of killing, which we could also guess.

Oh! It’s almost pre-decided husband’s time to claim the girl’s hand in marriage, but New Guy appears! He’s been cursed and Mr I Don’t Pick Sides Ever No Matter What, guess what, picks a side. The audience is shocked. No one could foresee this unexpected turn of events.

Noooo the baby!!! Yennefer loses a rare chance to acquire a baby. This is sad. Damn this show doesn’t shy away from killing children, such a different feel from most stories we’re used to.

These people are weird with destiny. Calanthe says fuck destiny, Geralt says lol mood but just because you’re a queen doesn’t mean you’re above sacred rules.

OOOOH Calanthe says fuck sacred rules and it does not go well. Is this happening because she tried to mess up with the order of the world and chaos said hi? Was the princess always magical or did this happen because destiny will have its way no matter what?

Ah, her grandmother had it, she never manifested it before until now, when circumstances awoke it.

Queen Calanthe acknowledges destiny, and of course they’re all dressed in green like the mages of Feminist Hogwarts aka Chaos School. I should have paid more attention to colors but green seems to be the color of magic slash chaos slash destiny.

Then bam, red. Men. Violence.

Everyone in the forest is also dressed in green... Colors aren’t really my thing, you might have noticed that I rarely analyze colors in Supernatural and I’m not particularly into what which color means and I only notice things when they’re very obvious like the purple of transformation-slash-death, so, yeah, I am not the kind of person who notices colors until they slap me in the face. I guess this is my slap in the face by this show’s color palette XD

Also consider that I watch everything with f-lux on, so I don’t even see colors the way they actually look, I guess that’s why it’s harder for me to notice colors when everything looks orange.

Alriiiiight *disables f.lux for current app*

Oh. Oh. So this is how this show looks like.

Awkward. This is so embarrassing.

I should rewatch the whole thing with real colors now... well, another time.

Anyway, Dara has drunk antidepressant juice, but it doesn’t work on Ciri, because she is Relevant(TM) to destiny so she can’t forget her past otherwise the plot destiny can’t happen.

Sleep well baby.

Aaah husband’s curse is broken! Yay.

Geralt accidentally acquires a bond with a baby. One baby dead and Yennefer’s potential bond with her lost, one baby on her way and Geralt’s future bond with her created. So this is all about parallels based on babies and births. Cool.

In the future, destiny has arrived and indeed wrought calamity on the court and the city. Someone makes something gross with Calanthe’s dead body--a spell to learn the location of Cirilla. Trouble is coming.

Oh! It’s him, he’s not dead? And taking something from Calanthe (that will be relevant later)?

Ciri drinks stronger juice and goes to the ancestral plane, er, I mean has a vision of a Very Important Tree, sorry I had Black Panther stuck in my head from before.

Well this is very interesting and things are starting to click together and yeah it’s a weird ride but I’m enjoying it! I suppose only at the end of the season you get the full picture of why and when everything has happened so I’m just sitting here metaphorically eating popcorn waiting for things to make sense on their own rhythm. There’s a theme of motherhood and babies and it seems that Geralt’s destiny is to become a metaphorical mother for Cirilla? Or am I mixing him up with a similar kind of character with a tendency to become everyone’s mom? Anyway, I’m looking forward to see what happens.

#the witcher

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7-wonders · 5 years

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All the Time In the World

Summary: Life has thrown you a few curveballs lately. Between absolute chaos wreaking havoc at your job, being too busy to sleep and your schedule not meshing with Duncan’s, you’re stressed beyond measure. So stressed, in fact, that you don’t notice you miss your period until you’re two weeks late.

Word Count: 2285

A/N: Hey guys, I hope you enjoy this oneshot I cooked up for you! This is tied into the Kiss Me Through the Phone universe, which you can read at my MASTERLIST. Feedback is always appreciated; leave a comment or note in my inbox about what you thought. If you liked this, please like and reblog!

Warnings: Talks of possible pregnancy, mentions of periods/mensuration.

The past few weeks have been extremely hectic and stressful for both you and Duncan. President Hale-Underwood had announced her extremely late bid for re-election, sending your workplace into a scramble as everyone attempted to reshape the political landscape now that the current powerhouse was back in the race. It’s been many long nights at the office for you as you research and formulate new statistics, work on creating new graphics for the various media outlets, and interview other candidates from both parties as they react to the incumbent President joining the election race. You’ve been so busy that it’s often easier to just sleep at your apartment lately, that is, if you can even make it back home before falling asleep at your desk. It’s closer to where you work than Duncan’s place, but it’s still difficult sleeping without Duncan.

Life hasn’t been too easy for Duncan, either. Since the Shepherds and the Underwoods have been feuding for years, this announcement has only fueled Annette’s need to ruin Claire. She’s been incredibly tense and, from what Duncan’s told you, five lower-level employees have been fired just this week. When Duncan’s not working on a new app (one that doesn’t involve stealing people’s information, thankfully), he’s being ordered to try and find dirt on the President. It’s a trying time for both of you, and not having Duncan around is really starting to take its toll on you. He’s the same way, so when he persuades you into not giving into your boss’s pleas to work this weekend, you do the same for him.

It’s the first time you’ve slept more than five hours for at least two weeks, not waking up until breakfast was more like brunch. Duncan, having been up first, ordered food from a nearby cafe to be delivered to the apartment. It was an extremely welcome surprise, and sitting at the table, holding hands with your love and just enjoying each other’s presence is much-needed. You sip at your coffee, pulling up the news on your phone when Duncan stands to go and wash the dishes left over from your meal.

Being so entrenched in the news already, there’s not much to read that you haven’t experienced first-hand by now. A politician said something controversial, war in the Middle East, hurricanes in the South: it’s all dated to you. Exiting out of that app, you swipe through your phone to see what else you can check up on. Instagram doesn’t seem too appealing, since you’d rather not see all of your classmates from high school and what they’re doing. Your Twitter timeline is dead this morning, and you get bored within thirty seconds of opening the app. Your eyes dart from each of the little icons on the screen. VSCO, Snapchat, Period Tracker, YouTube-wait, Period Tracker?

Your body tenses while you try to remember the last time you opened the app. Normally you’re very good about tracking your period, a habit stemming back to when you were a teenager and your periods were extremely irregular. While they’re more normal now, you do still have some off-months. Clicking the app, you wait impatiently for it to load. Duncan’s humming sounds almost too cheerful for a situation like this, but how is he to know that you might have made a giant mistake? When the screen finally loads, your heart nearly stops.

You were supposed to start your period two weeks ago. You haven’t been this late in years; normally when you are late, it’s by a day or two. You’re wracking your brain, trying to think of how this could possibly happen. You take your birth control daily, so that’s not an issue. You and Duncan use condoms, and you haven’t been lazy enough to go without a condom since--

“Oh fuck.” You curse, head falling in your hands.

“What’s wrong?” Duncan looks up from the sink, a dish towel slung over his shoulder.

“I’m late.” Your words are muffled by your hands, so Duncan asks you to repeat yourself. “I’m late.” You enunciate.

“Late for what? It’s Saturday, we don’t-”

“Duncan!” You snap. “I was supposed to start my period two weeks ago.”

The dish he’s washing clatters to the bottom of the sink, and you glance at him to see his jaw clenched while his face is devoid of color.

“But...how did you forget?”

“I’ve forgotten to eat regular meals for the past three weeks, my period was the least of my concerns.”

“Fuck.” He concurs with your earlier statement. “What do we do?”

“I mean, I need to go and buy a pregnancy test, I guess.”

“My assistant’s working today, I can text him and have him pick it-”

“No! God, please do not do that.” You know that you shouldn’t be snapping at him, he’s just trying to help, but you’re on the verge of a full-on panic attack and he’s not making it better. Duncan can tell that you’re freaking out, falling on his knees in front of you and grabbing your face in his hands.

“Hey, it’ll be okay. Whatever happens, we’ll deal with it together. Do you want me to go and buy the test? Or I can come with you, whatever you want.” You take one of his hands in both of yours, moving it to your lips and kissing his palm.

“I’ll just run to the store down the street and be right back.”

“You sure?” You smile slightly, nodding.

“I’m sure.”

The trip to the corner store and back, although most likely under twenty minutes, feels like it takes hours. You grabbed three different tests, two electronic and one with the plus/minus sign so there was a variety in the tests. Of course, the day you need to get out of the store quickly is also the first time you’ve ever seen a line in this store, causing you to have the most impatient wait of your life before making it to the front. The cashier, a woman in her mid-50s, shot you a look when ringing you up.

“Do you need the bathroom key, too?” She had asked.

“Oh, uh, these are for my-my friend…” You don’t know why you lied to a total stranger, but there was no going back once the words were out. She had looked at you, obviously unconvinced, but you just smiled awkwardly before taking the bag and rushing out of the store.

After taking the tests at home, the only thing left to do is wait. Duncan sits on the bed, shaking his leg nervously while he watches you pace back and forth across the bedroom.

“(Y/N), you need to calm down.” He says carefully, not wanting to aggravate you further.

“I am calm, I just don’t think I can physically sit down right now.” Duncan sighs but remains quiet, knowing you’ll talk about what’s bothering you soon enough. “It could be stress making me so late this month but...what if I am pregnant? We never planned for this. I just got a promotion at work, and you’re so busy with the Foundation.”

“What did I tell you earlier? Whatever happens, we’ll get through it together. If you are...pregnant, then we’ll carefully go over our options. No matter what, though, I won’t leave you.”

“I’m too young to be a mom.” Unexpected tears well up in your eyes. “Sure, loads of people I went to high school and college with have kids, but they’re good at being parents. I can barely take care of a plant, how could I take care of a tiny human?”

“You’re just overthinking, (Y/N).” Duncan soothes, grabbing your arms and tugging you against him. The hug immediately has a calming effect on you, reducing the shakiness you’re feeling and helping to level your breathing.

“How are you so calm about this?” Duncan shrugs.

“We can’t really change what happened last month.” Damn both of you for being too lazy to slip on a condom when you had morning sex. “Right now, we just have to focus on the present.”

“I hate when you’re right.” You mutter, feeling Duncan chuckle against you.

The alarm on your phone has both of you jumping from the sudden loud noise. Grabbing the device from your back pocket, you quickly silence it before looking back to Duncan. He’s patient with you, holding your hand while you work up the nerve to move towards the bathroom.

“We’ve gotta look sometime, babe.” You nod, finally walking in with him.

Your eyes keep flicking back and forth from each of the three tests, your brain trying to comprehend that what you’re seeing is real. Duncan’s obviously confused, picking up the boxes to try and decipher the symbols on each test. You don’t need a box, though, the signs being as clear as day.

“Oh, thank God!” You let out a breath that you didn’t even know you were holding, leaning back against Duncan for support. “I’ve never been so happy to see the word ‘no’ before.”

Duncan rubs his hands on your shoulders, but remains oddly quiet. After you slide each of the three tests back in their boxes and toss them in the trash, you turn around. He’s looking at the trash can instead of you, and you pout slightly at his indifference towards this.

“You okay? I thought me not being pregnant would be a cause for celebration.” Duncan finally looks at you, just barely smiling.

“No, it is! I just...well...uh, why haven’t you gotten your period, then?” It’s a question that’s very uncharacteristic for him, causing you to raise your eyebrows at him.

“Probably just because of how stressed out I am. I don’t know, if I still haven’t gotten it by next week then I’ll make an appointment with my gynecologist, it could be a cyst or something like that.” You know that it’s most likely stress, and now that pregnancy has been ruled out you can focus on not being stressed out in the hopes to get your period to show up. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine.” It’s the most unconvincing sentence you’ve ever heard, and he knows you’ve caught on when you fold your arms across your chest.

Before he can even make a move, you’ve wrapped your arms around him and stumble out of the bathroom and into the bedroom, using your strength and the fact that you caught him off-balance to help you. You land on the bed above Duncan, quickly straddling his torso and pinning his arms above his head. He obviously didn’t expect you to tackle him, eyes wide while he tries to figure out what you’re doing.

“I’m not letting you go until you tell me what’s wrong.” Duncan rolls his eyes and sighs, but you only tighten your grip on his wrists. “I’m serious, Dunc!”

“(Y/N), nothing’s wrong.”

“That’s bullshit and we both know it. I’m fine with doing this all day until you finally give in.” You glare at him, refusing to let him move no matter how much he squirms.

“Fine! You’re such a stubborn woman.” You stick your tongue out at him, but wait for him to continue. “I...this is so embarrassing.”

“Hey, no it’s not. I promise that whatever you say won’t be embarrassing.” You reassure him, watching as a pink blush paints his face.

“I-uh, I didn’t know how much I wanted a baby until those tests came back negative.” Your hands go limp, releasing Duncan from your grasp, but he doesn’t make any effort to move out from under you.

“You’ve never talked about wanting kids before.” You say quietly.

“I haven’t wanted kids with anyone until I met you.”

“You’d want me to have your kids?” You’re oddly flattered by this sentiment.

“I couldn’t imagine starting a family with anybody but you. I just--while you were at the store, my mind kind of ran away with the idea of you being pregnant. You, having to wear my shirts because your baby bump makes your shirts too tight.” Duncan’s hands drift to your stomach almost against his will. “Getting to design a nursery and pick out names for our little baby. I want all of it; I want to hold your hair back when you get morning sickness and go and get you whatever food you’re craving at three in the morning. I want to be sleep-deprived, but so happy that the cause of it is this tiny human that we created. Before I met you, I assumed I would just be some perpetual bachelor. I never saw a reason to change the way I acted. You make me want to change, (Y/N). That life, which I once saw as the only possible life for me, suddenly isn’t appealing anymore.”

“Really?” Your voice comes out as a squeak, causing Duncan to chuckle.

“I’m not asking you to have a baby with me right now, but...I plan on being with you for the rest of my life, and I hope you do too.” You nod eagerly, taking his face in both of your hands and kissing him deeply.

“Of course I do.”

“Yeah?” Duncan sits up, face to face with you now while you nod again.

“Probably no babies until after our lives calm down.”

“Definitely.”

“And we’ll plan for it, instead of having a scare like we did today.”

“Oh trust me, the first time we try, I’m putting a baby in you.” Your heart flutters at the dark look of determination in his eyes.

“You’ll be okay with putting the baby plan on hold until then?” Duncan smiles before kissing you again.

“I can wait.”

Tag List: @khaleesimel @sammythankyou @sloppy-little-witch-bitch26 @langdonslove @heda-mikaelson @readsalot73 @jimmlangdon @sebastianshoe @let-me-try-mom @trimbooohgodplsnoooo @pastel-cloudz @nana15774 @queencocoakimmie @lichellaw @ultragibbycentralworld @grim-adventures58 @dolceandchalamet @dandycandy75 @alexcornerthethird @everything-is-awesomesauce @ccodyfern @wroteclassicaly @langdonsdemon @trelaney @rocketgirl2410 @starwlkers @hexqueensupreme @divinelangdon

#duncan shepherd #duncan shepherd imagine #duncan shepherd x reader #hoc #house of cards #michael langdon #michael langdon imagine

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cinnbar-bun · 5 years

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RFA + V+ Saeran Acting As a Guardian to Teenage! MC

A/n: Have some headcanons to soothe the pain I just caused

Under the cut since it’s a long one! MC is about 16 in this one!

Also: might include some spoilers!!!

Yoosung

Finally, he wasn’t the youngest anymore!

He was so excited to meet you and honestly he was all sunshine and rainbows as he talked about how you were like a little sibling to him

So gushing and doting, he’s more of an older sibling than a parental figure, but he still does it so well

Always brags to his guildmates he has the best sibling ever, and he will fight (and lose horribly) to anyone who tries to say otherwise

Very concerned over you since you’re so young and caught up in the RFA’s mishaps.

So proud of anything you do, even getting out of bed makes him cheer for you

Always cooks for you, anything you want, he’ll make for you.

He won’t admit it until he’s at his worst- when the depression and the grief from losing Rika really gets to him- but he looks up to you. He kinda gets jealous of how young and talented you are (even if you don’t think so), and wishes to become better so you have someone actually worthwhile to look up to (in his mind).

He doesn’t seem to think that you like him, he still assumes he’s a bit of a nuisance and someone else could be better. You however, love him a lot and value his presence in your life. You don’t think you would’ve been as motivated without his help!

Sometimes he can get a bit irresponsible and you need to drag his butt to bed so he doesn’t game so much.

Taking care of you has been a roller coaster for both of you, but he still feels a lot better since you’re here. He has cut down on his bad habits and has slowly grown from his past issues.

If you talk about how you’re going on a date, he’ll cry.

“Waaaaaahhhhhh!!! How are you going on dates before I am????”

He’s supportive though, and makes sure your date actually cares for you. Probably the only one on this list you don’t have to worry about when saying you’re seeing someone

Zen

Okay so the first moment you met him on the messenger, you flipped out.

“ZEN??? AS IN THE ZEN???? JDSFJNAJGNLSJN OH MY GOD CAN YOU STEP ON ME?????”

Jaehee also feels you but outwardly tells you to relax

He goes full on dad mode. He immediately checks himself and everyone else, anything above a ‘g’ rating and he’s flipping out. No more flirting, no more swearing, no more smoking, he’s gotta be a father figure somehow.

Once he cools down, he finds that his paternal instincts come naturally. He is very easy to talk to and is easily your biggest supporter. He wants you to feel confident in yourself and see that he’s got your back no matter what happens, something he didn’t have growing up.

If you say you wanna act or join theater (especially if it’s because of him) he’ll just cry. He’ll sob about how his ‘child’ is the most precious thing in the world.

He’s a straight up PTA dad afterwards, always going to your school when he can and checking up on you.

All the mothers and teachers try to hit on him but he ignores them because his shining little star is there

He goes to all of your shows, all of your concerts, ANYTHING that involves potentially watching you do something, he is there in a second.

After anything, whether you give a speech or a finished a performance, he’s there with a large bouquet of flowers. He’s so proud of you and he feels so enthusiastic about you.

His narcissism drops about 200% because now he’s focused on you. His phone is full of pictures of you and your accomplishments, and after anything he makes sure to say it in the RFA messenger.

He’s really easy to have a heart to heart with because you’re his precious little angel and he’s just as (if not more) emotional as you.

HOWEVER!!! DO NOT!! I REPEAT!!! DO NOT MENTION DATING!!! THIS MAN WILL GO WALK UP TO WHOEVER YOU LIKE/DATING AND WILL GO INTO A FISTFIGHT WITH THEM.

He screams when you mention guys- ‘MEN ARE WOLVES!! THEY ARE HORRIBLE!! THEY ARE DISGUSTING DO NOT EVER DATE!! YOU ARENT ALLOWED TO DATE UNTIL IM DEAD AND YOURE 80!!’

Jumin

So, let’s cut to the chase, you REEALLy liked the fact Jumin was rich.

“Wow, so I DON’T have to starve everyday???”

Jumin is...not the most emotional at first. He is just getting used to having to take care of you so it will be a while before he opens up.

Jumin is great for when you want to rant or need to blow off steam. He doesn’t say anything and just listens to you. However, it’s horrible when you want emotional/physical comfort.

He tries, he really does, but since he grew up so detached with his emotions he immediately thinks you’re dramatic. It isn’t until Jaehee (and perhaps Zen too) step in and say how he can’t keep brushing off your feelings

So, he decides to try even harder and understand the enigma that is a teenage mind.

It’s difficult as shit

After a while, he begins to learn all your cues and patterns, and understands what you want when you need it. He can read you like an open book now and knows when he should give you space or step in and comfort you.

He’s actually really good at it

He is always pampering you to the extreme. You watch tv and muse, “cool... there’s a new video game out.” and forget moments later, he immediately walks in with over a hundred games and pre-ordered, deluxe gold editions of them.

He is the prime example of a father figure at this point, and all your friends get jealous.

He only gives you the best and will settle for nothing less. You are practically his own child at this point and like HELL is he gonna give you anything he discerns as not worthy.

He likes taking you out for nice strolls after you beg ask for you two to hang out. You always get excited at seeing a simple cafe or mannequin with a cute outfit, and he wonders at how nice it must be to be so innocent

Plenty of outlets had contacted him about you, but he makes sure your privacy is secure. He doesn’t want anyone taking advantage of you or getting too personal

But they do manage to capture snippets of you two walking, and some misunderstandings have occurred due to it

“Jumin Han is dating a minor!”

“Jumin Han has child after affair with mistress!”

He gets fed up with the rumors and explains right away that you are NOT his lover, and you are NOT his actual child. He lies and says you were the child of a good friend of his, because explaining what actually happened would be weird

He is one of the worst when you say you’re dating someone. He will hound his security guards to watch EVERYTHING you to do, and he WILL have 707 do a background check on whoever you are going out with.

“What are they doing?” “Uhhh...they’re eating.” “What about now?” “Still eating sir.” “Are his hands visible?” “Yes sir, he’s using them to eat a burger.” “B-burger? Where are they at?!” “McDonald’s sir...” “What kind of lousy date is this, why did (Y/n) accept this, does he think he’s good enough for my child with his peasant lifestyle???” “Sir...they’re 16????”

All in all, he’s trying to be a good father figure and guardian that he never really had growing up. But he’s so prideful at seeing how much you mature, and even though he’s blunt sometimes, he hopes you understand he loves you a lot.

He also tries dad jokes, but they’re so weird because obviously he rehearsed it and he says it so stoically that it makes it even funnies.

Jaehee

Jaehee is a sweet woman, and she is like your best friend and mother rolled into one.

She is so caring and considerate of your feelings, and is your number one supporter.

She may seem kinda stand-offish, and kind of annoyed because she’s already incredibly busy now she has to take care of someone else and-

Whoops now she’s in the PTA and runs it like a damn boss. She is all over your studies and fights the faculty if she feels the school is not running in tip top shape.

She gets exhausted a lot, as Jumin isn’t exactly the easiest boss to work for.

It was kind of hard at first, sometimes she wouldn’t come home until way after midnight, and she’d see your body passed out on the couch with a note on the table about how you tried to make her dinner.

Even though it wasn’t the best, knowing you tried so hard to stay up for her as well as cooking for her made the food taste even better than anything a five star restaurant could have made.

So she tries to make it up to you in any way she can. She’ll pick you up your favorite movie or snack on her way home, or even little cute gifts that reminded her of you.

She writes down any information she knows about you, and makes sure to write about your friends and teachers so she can keep up with you.

She gushes about Zen a lot, and you were a fan too, so you both would binge watch his movies and clips of him. ANY piece of media involving Zen was devoured by you two.

You two were constantly picking each other up and giving gifts, and when it was Jaehee’s birthday, you wrote her a letter about how much she meant to you and even got Zen to sign a poster for her!

It was also the first time you called her ‘mom’, and even though the Zen poster is proudly hung up in her office, she can’t help but smile at how you called her that.

She is a huge advocate of following your dreams. She does complain about how awful it is to work for Jumin sometimes, so she hopes to god you do something you love.

You also convinced her to start her own cafe! You helped her as much as you could, and she was just...so ecstatic.

Jaehee is easy to talk to, she is always prepared with good advice and comforting words.

Probably the second easiest to talk to about dating. She is hesitant at first because one, you’re young and stupid, and two, she just doesn’t trust people.

707/ Saeyoung

Okay, everyone in the RFA was hesitant to allow him to take care of you. They trusted him when it came to his work, but this was an actual human being. He could hardly take care of himself, how would he even take care of you???

Surprisingly, he’s an awesome guardian

A lot of them didn’t believe it at first and they were like ‘blink twice if he isn’t feeding you’ but you shrug and insist he’s great

He’s very nurturing and protective of you, and he sort of sees this as a second chance to make up for when he couldn’t help his brother.

He’s really good in the fact that he’ll allow you your space to grow, but he will step in if you’re out of line or in trouble

Will NOT hesitate to ruin someone’s life if they dare hurt you. He’s got connections and the prowess and like hell is someone gonna make his child cry.

Saeyoung is still as corny and crazy as he is in the chatroom, but in these instances with you, he means it a lot. He does anything he can to make you smile, even if it means he’d get hurt.

He is a lot calmer though with you, and his parental instincts kick in a lot more. The RFA was shocked to see him actually change some of his poor quality of life skills as a means to be a better guardian to you.

When he needs to go on a mission, he entrusts Jumin or Vanderwood to take care of you.

He never tells you about those dangerous missions, he only says he’s going to be at a conference out of the country.

He always makes sure to get you a souvenir or gift when he comes back from those trips.

Joy rides in his cars!! He loves to take you to the beach or sightseeing whenever he can.

He stills eats poorly, but it really makes him melt when you offer him some dinner you cooked for him. He started screaming and Yoosung (who was on the other end of the phone call) felt his ears bleed.

He gets so excited for your cooking, like he stops his work just to take a bite of your grub.

He hacks to get movies that weren’t even released to the public yet so you both could watch it on your downtime. He’s a hardcore softie though and you still have yet to see him shut up or not sob all over you as you two watch.

“You’re getting snot on me!!!” “I’M sorry it’s just....oh my god how could this even happen??????”

You accidentally called him ‘dad’ one time and he lost it. He was jumping for joy and hugging you in a death grip, screaming, “IM A FATHER!!!!!”

Oh and he will definitely not pass up the opportunity to make some Star Wars references.

You can’t hide anything from him. He tries to not be snoopy but holy shit you did not know just how far he’d go when it came to keeping tabs on you.

By the time he was done he knew the name of your first grade crush, an incident where you kicked your own self, and how old you were when you got your first cavity.

Likewise, he will already know if you’re crushing/dating someone. He’ll pretend he doesn’t know, but secretly do a background check.

OKay so this definitely happened on your first date out with your crush, you two went out for milkshakes when your phone started sounding like Saeyoung’s voice.

“HEY YOUNG MAN BOTH HANDS ON THE TABLE NOW!!!”

You both started SCREAMING and had to be told to shut up by the staff because what the hell, your phone was talking!

You screamed at him later on to mind his damn business

And god help whoever you were dating if they hurt you.

This man will go ballistic and start hacking their things like a crazy psycho

“DONT WORRY, GOD SEVEN WILL FIX THIS!!!!”

But seriously, this man adores you to the bottom of his heart. He’s made many mistakes in the past, but you will sure as hell not be another one of them. Anything you ask of him, he’ll gladly do!

V is a great guardian for those who don’t like pressure or stress. He’s so soothing and relaxing.

Hardly will ever raise his voice at you, and he practically never gets angry at you

He can’t see that well, but he seems to have a sixth sense that just makes him know where you are and when you are in danger.

He likes taking you out to more scenic ventures, maybe even get you into photography as well!!

He has so many pictures of you, you are like his favorite subject

He even made an exhibit just based on you, and after that, he got a lot of calls about who you were. He made sure they know that you are basically his child

He feels incredibly guilty you had to go through this whole mess. He really wishes nothing bad would happen and you just didn’t have to get involved, but you always encourage him and say you don’t mind, you met him because of it!

He melts and cries a bit later on

If you call him ‘dad’ he gets so happy, like he finally feels like he actually did something right for once

But occasionally he doubts himself and can get kinda stand-offish in fear of how he might hurt you later on

He doesn’t make the same mistakes this time, and he makes sure you can get the help you need. He’s not gonna allow you to hurt yourself or others, and he won’t enable negative behaviors.

He doesn’t talk about Rika to you. That was one of the worst moments in his life, and he thinks you’ll hate him because of it.

You don’t- and he wonders what he did to deserve you

V is not an idiot. He may be partially blind but oh honey, he WILL know if you are dating someone. Don’t ask how, he does.

He’s chill about it, but makes sure you understand what you are getting into. He’ll sit you down and start questioning you or your date’s intentions

It’s a side effect from his past with Rika, he doesn’t want you hurt, nor does he want you to hurt someone else.

He makes you have clear and concise boundaries

He’ll let you do as you please, just please, for everything holy in this world, let him know where you are and be back before 10.

If you get into a bad breakup he’s there to comfort you but also calls 707 to use his special skillset

I feel like V would use a lot of dad jokes. Like he doesn’t even know where it comes from and he’ll just say one, and 707 flips out.

Overall, just a calm dude who really loves you a lot. You’re allowed to grow and be your own person, but within some boundaries. He’ll stop at nothing to keep your smile.

Unknown/ Saeran

Okay so... he feels weird. You’re a child. A damn child.

He gets very conflicted because he gets flashbacks of how he was taken at a young age

He starts off as incredibly scary, staring you down to make you fear for your life, but you notice right away he’s become...softer

If anything, now he feels guilty. You were nice to him, even though he did all these things to you...

Saeran becomes a guard dog to you, watching over you like a hawk.

As thanks, sometimes you would make him sweets

He loves them a lot, they’re now his favorite things

Pretty soon, a friendship begins to form, and then a feeling of guardianship over you.

He’s noticeably a lot nicer and softer to you, he’ll be cussing out his brother in one moment but then if you ask him for something, he’ll stop and bend down to your level and answer you.

Saeyoung finds this incredibly hilarious and nice

Saeran feels a lot better having you around. He feels a lot safer and happier, and knowing that you are safe and happy makes him even more excited.

He likes gardens, so he takes you to them a lot, and he even decided to start one with you

On special days, or days when you are feeling down, he’ll get you a special bouquet of flowers with different meanings to cheer you up!

Baking is also a special hobby between you two. Sweets in general are where you two bond, so occasionally you two go out and try different sweet shops, cafes, or parlors.

You two always rank your fave desserts and places

Do not, I repeat, do NOT tell him about/mention/ or even THINK of dating. He’ll probably beat the crap out of whoever you’re dating because, ‘they are not worth it’

Very strict and will throw hands with anyone checking you out- he’s like an angry dog

Oh dear, if your date makes you sad or upset they will be dead. Saeran will take no shit if they made you frown, and they better start praying for their safety.

You and Saeyoung have to hold him back before he murders your date

He still has his anxious moments where his past may catch up and he’ll freak out, but you are one of the few that can easily coax him out of it. He’d never hurt you at all

If you refer to him as ‘dad’ I think he might feel his heart flutter but also feel nervous...what if he becomes like his dad? What if he hurts you or can’t protect you?

He’ll definitely teach you self-defense but Saeyoung will step in when he tries to teach you how to use a pistol because ‘SAERAN THEY’RE 16, DO NOT DO THAT!!!!’

He has his days when he’s more lax about you, but also has days when he’s breathing down your neck

It’ll take him a long time to be considered a ‘good’ guardian, please be patient, and gently let him know how he should improve.

He’s not good at dealing with your emotions. All he knows how to do is punch whatever made you feel sad, but he quickly learns he can’t do that, and takes advice from all the RFA to help you.

You can fight me but he probably has bought some guidebooks or pamphlets to try and learn to take care of you, and he’s LOST.

“So to comfort them, I hug them...then ask how they’re feeling? Okay, but then it says they might want space? So how do I know? IT DOESN’T EVEN SAY WHEN! WHAT THE HELL? WHAT A WASTE OF MY DAMN MONEY!” He chucks it across the room before promptly picking it up and trying to read it again

He sees a lot of shows and tries to do stereotypical ‘family’ things, but quickly realizes that neither of you are enjoying it and he breathes a sigh of relief because holy hell that made him so uncomfortable.

You both are pretty blunt with what you feel so you’re both on the same page, and try to work it accordingly.

Okay on occasion he’s got you outfits that are similar to his so you both can match and he loves it so much

The most awkward dad jokes. EVER. You’ll be like, ‘hey I’m hungry’, and he’ll remember that he read on a parenting website that dad jokes make your connection stronger or something, so he’ll murmur, ‘hi hungry, I’m dad’. You didn’t know whether to laugh or cry because he was in physical pain after saying that.

You both got a lot to work on, but he tries. Really. And he’s so happy he met you, and he’ll make sure you grow up with a better childhood than he did. Nothing is too big or too small for him to do.

#mystic messenger #mystic messenger x reader #mystic messenger imagines #platonic #707 #yoosung #jumin han #kim yoosung #luciel choi #jumin #zen #jaehee #saeran #ray #v #writing #headcanons #long post

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flydotnet · 5 years

Text

Tears of Venus

VRAINS Rarepair Weeks 2018-2019 - Day 10: Soulmate AU/Hanahaki

Summary: The first time she heard about the disease of unrequited love was when she was browsing the Internet for some stories to read while waiting for a pirated movie to download on her laptop. It seemed to just be a legend, a trope used by fanfiction writers and mangakas to have some tension, death stakes and angst for their characters’ relations. It was a way to add weight to a situation that, otherwise, may not have had it. This trope, because of its widespread character, was referred to “Hanahaki”. It was merely something to make people’s imaginations work and to break hearts in anticipation and suspense. It was all fiction even if, would she pay attention to probably false witness accounts, some said it was an actual thing, albeit very rare, and whose only cure really was reciprocated love. Ah, as if.

(Or: Ema doesn't believe in urban legends, and it bites her back)

Fandom: Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS Ships: Hireshipping (Ema/Akira), background platonic Ema & Aoi

Wordcount: 4.5K words

Notes: Realizing I'm writing these characters borderline OOC hurt more than it should have. (but hey at least it'll still be more accurate than most DSS-centric depictions of Yusaku and Ryoken amirite)

Y'all saw it coming, I saw it coming, everyone saw it coming, and I'm really proud of bring 4.5K words of Hire Hanahaki angst-H/C-whatever onto the table. This story is a weird mix but it was a blast to write, holy shit, I love angst and I love Hanahaki. But like I'm probably the one who proposed it in the first place for the event's prompt list so... Yeah. That has to be the longest oneshot I've ever written in one sitting.

Also, you'll quickly find out why this fic has a name that has nothing to do with flowers... at first glance.

Event hosted by @vrainsrarepairweeks

AO3 version available here.

The first time she heard about the disease of unrequited love was when she was browsing the Internet for some stories to read while waiting for a pirated movie to download on her laptop. It seemed to just be a legend, a trope used by fanfiction writers and mangakas to have some tension, death stakes and angst for their characters’ relations. It was a way to add weight to a situation that, otherwise, may not have had it.

This trope, because of its widespread character, was referred to “Hanahaki”. It was merely something to make people’s imaginations work and to break hearts in anticipation and suspense. It was all fiction even if, would she pay attention to probably false witness accounts, some said it was an actual thing, albeit very rare, and whose only cure really was reciprocated love.

Ah, as if.

It’s when scrolling through the Internet again that Ema remembers about Hanahaki. She has heard rumours about someone in Den City being afflicted by the curse of flowers growing in their lungs because their beloved doesn’t love them back. It has this sensationalist character to it that makes people instantly intrigued: of course that’d reach her ears and that only sceptical and boring people would ignore it.

Thinking of overly-rational people who tend to see things the boring, practical and down-to-Earth way, she wonders what Akira would think about that. Aoi would be at least intrigued, considering her favourite Monsters are partially based on flowers (Lilybell, Holly Angel, Narkissus, Bella Madonna, Nightshade…), but her brother would most certainly dismiss it as yet another irrational legend. Oh well, it’s funnier to imagine his dismissive reactions to it rather than Aoi’s developing teenage curiosity.

As such, she can’t help herself but mention these in a meeting they have for a new mission he’s giving her for, admittedly, a generous sum of money. If they were near her birthday, she’d see it as a gift: as it stands, it’s probably to be sure she doesn’t go to see if she can extort even more money from businessmen with little hacking knowledge (as it stands, Akira does have some and used to be better than her at it: his knowledge just caught all the dust around the place as soon as he could stop hacking to survive, or so she thinks at least). To be honest, when it comes to their personal relationship, she’s better off getting a bit less money but ensure she can tease her hirer about his awkward side.

“Have you heard about the person in the city who has flowers in their lungs?” she asks him as she thinks back to that story going across Link VRAINS and other social media outlets.

He doesn’t reply immediately, but when he does, it’s just as she expected him to do: “Hanahaki isn’t real, Ema. It’s just rumours going around.”

“I figured you’d respond that. You’re predictable, you know?”

He reddens at the insult before they part ways to go on their merry day and tasks.

Still, it’s quite the heavy tip for what’s that job is worth. It’s simply making sure an AI chip doesn’t go rogue again in his boss’s back. It’s not risky, it’s not the worst he’s asked her to do, and yet he’s paying her extensively. Did he get a rise in his salary or something? Or is it Aoi’s way to thank her yet again for all her services? In both cases, it’s unnecessary and, for once, she doesn’t feel like accepting this big sum. Well, why does she find it so weird? Maybe Akira just overestimated what the job was worth because of all the “doing that in the back of the big boss of a gigantic company” gig.

When she gets paid for it, merely twenty-four hours later, the payment has even more of a tip joined to it, along with what seems to be a virtual present. Okay, that’s it, Akira is really overestimating his missions’ worth and wanting her to stay here. Fine. He better not make such a fuss about it anymore: that’s embarrassing to see him dig his grave even deeper all by himself. She accepts the tip anyway, thinks of what perfume or makeup set she could by herself with it because the ones she has already start to grow old, and settles on something glittery for once.

The rumours precise themselves in the following days. The city now knows who the poor, poor sickie is: a man, presumably old enough to feel love but still young enough to worry himself over romance of all things. That’s all there is to it, but at least people have a precise noun or pronoun to use on that guy. Ema stays alert of it: it’s amusing to see all that speculation for something that has so many chances to turn out to be yet another urban legend spread through the streets and posts on social media. She never expected manga to have such an important cultural impact.

She starts to talk about it with Aoi over the net, the teenage girl being interested in what this is all about. Ema runs her through all she knows about it, from the little things she once read online to what is currently the consensus on today’s legends. A question then comes from Aoi who hesitates between believing in it for its Romanesque nature and doubting it because her brother taught her to be doubtful of everything she hears (even his opinions, but she has forgotten to do that for the most part), an interrogation that should have never interested Ema as much as it did: “Do we know what type of flowers it is? I’ve heard depending on the species that it can be a hint with flower symbolism”.

Frankly, Ema doesn’t know anything about flower language or symbolism because she simply never buys flowers for anyone. The only times she does are when visiting her late father’s grave: she simply does like her mother does every time and put there a bouquet of forget-me-nots. Kengo has a slightly other idea of what to put on there, but she hasn’t taken the time to research it either. They have never discussed it yet: she gives him the time to recover from the idea that they are, indeed, brother and sister and should probably stick together even if he always wants to work alone.

The rumours come to her again when Aoi brings these up herself in their little conversation. According to a few, differing versions, this affected person has yellow carnation, anemones or daffodils growing inside their lungs. Quick searches on the Internet confirm Ema in her idea that this is all an urban legend spread among teenagers and people in need of sensationalism: really, flowers symbolizing unreciprocated love, deadly illness or rejection? Come on, this is too cliché to be real, too much like a poorly-written shojo manga to be happening in her plane of reality. She tells Aoi about that, how artificial it all sounds, how everything is way too much of a coincidence, but the girl still believes this may be happening near her while not giving much details aside from that.

She takes another mission offer from Akira in a green-grassed parc in the city where cherry blossoms punctuate the floor and sky. He seems to not do so hot: if she isn’t mistaken, he’s usually not this pale and doesn’t have such dark rings under his eyes. Considering the recent crises at SOL Technologies which are, undeniably, partially caused by her doings, it wouldn’t be surprising for him to work overtime. He always manages to find a way to run himself to the ground anyway as if he was a fatigue addict. God, she’s glad she didn’t turn out to become a workaholic like him.

He coughs here and there, and that’s when he can’t keep it inside anymore, as he explains to her what it consists in this time. It’s eerily similar to last time, with too much money at the key again, and yet another element that shouldn’t be here: the way he slips in compliments on her capacity and resourcefulness, on how he’s grateful for her to always accept his mission offers. (That last part is wrong: she explicitly remembers turning down one or two offers in the past, and once of them recently on top of it). A sudden excess of gratitude coming from a man who never speaks about himself and his feelings simply gives off a wrong vibe on her? Does he want to seduce her or something? Because that won’t work. As it stands, Ghost Girl doesn’t do romance.

The noise of the ever-going, omnipresent rumours soon inform her of even more details she isn’t asking for. The sick man is in his twenties, working for a company and, as they say, never revealed being infected with the disease to anyone. There is no clear evidence to support these claims, albeit she slowly starts to think about how this description fits Akira more and more. On the other hand, there are a ton of other men in their twenties working for big companies in this city who wouldn’t want anyone to know they’re coughing up flowers of everything a human being could cough out. That’s just unbelievable because of how ridiculous and impossible it sounds.

There is still one picture that doesn’t live her mind. When she was leaving their meeting spot, she swore she could see him bent in half with a hand against a tree, coughing she guessed loudly. While this doesn’t exactly correlate to the rumour in its very details, the coincidence of this urban legend going around and a sudden striking coughing fit like that is still numbing at her mind from time to time during the day. Maybe she should wait for more information about the rumour’s sick man to confirm if this has any chance to be the case.

Well, she’s starting to believe it herself, and she finally understands for the first time was Aoi was willing to consider the possibility of the “Hanahaki Case of Den City” as it’s called to be real. The irony never stops.

Soon enough, before she ever expected it to in fact, she learns of a new aspect of the rumour: the man affected by the case of Hanahaki works for SOL Technologies. Is linked to it a witness account by a secretary of the man who swore she had seen him cough more and more often, along with finding a tissue filled with wet and sometimes bloodied flower petals in his paper bin. That is one coincidence too much: that description would match Akira’s to the point she is certain he’s the basis for it. Maybe that secretary is the original source of the rumour’s more precise details. She has to be for such tiny precisions and descriptions anyway.

It starts to somewhat link inside her mind. He did look ill when they last saw each other, with how pale his skin was and how bad his coughing sounded at times. The more logical explanation – the one he’d take, in fact – is that he simply caught a bad chest infection somewhere, and it has around ninety percent chances to be the case. But then… He wouldn’t be afraid to not being able to thank her enough would it just be an infection like that, wouldn’t it? He sounded like he was going to go soon and never see her again. With how big her latest pay checks from him have been, she doubts it’s because he wants them to part ways.

She gets a text message from “SOL Zaizen” on her phone right as she is about to ask Aoi if she has witnessed anything wrong with her brother. As soon as she opens it, she notices something has to be seriously wrong.

No matter what the offer is this time, she is going in-person to meet him and “discuss” the “matters”.

When she arrives there, Ema gets her breathing stolen. Her footsteps are slow despite how much her mind is racing: he looks even worse than the last time, with a mask on the lower part of his face and deeper dark rings, a sickly red barely visible under the white of the mask, and her heart starts racing because he just seems to be doing terribly. She, however, cannot bring herself to run. How did he even get out of his house in that condition? The world may never know, after all.

“What the hell happened to you?!” is what manages to exit her throat as she walks up to him back against the wall.

“It’s complicated, really… I’ve also got a confession to make: I didn’t want to see you for an offer,” he replies with coughs interrupting his words every ten seconds or so, she isn’t sure, but it’s intense and almost frightening to see.

Ema crosses her arms and waits in anxious anticipation for whatever he has to tell her.

“I’m… not sure of how I should go off about it,” he tells her in full honesty, hand in front of his mouth and the other arm around his chest, “so please excuse my abruptness.”

“You haven’t responded to my question, but go on, I guess.”

“I… I’m not sure how long I’ll last for, so… can you promise me to keep an eye on Aoi and Hayami for me?”

“Hayami is your secretary, right…? Wait, what the fuck are you going on about?!”

Akira gives her an excuse of a smile in return. There really is something wrong with this man.

“A… terminal illness of sorts, let’s put it that way… Which brings to something else I wanted to tell you…”

She cannot tell if his face actually is redder by the minute or if it’s just her noticing how ill he truly is.

“I… I may very well be in love with you, Ema…”

Her world stops and shatters before her eyes. There isn’t a lot of people who truly matter to her in this little sphere of hers: her mother, her late father, her half-brother Kengo, Aoi, perhaps Playmaker for saving her life… and Akira. They have grown closer with the years and it’s only now that she realizes how much he does matter to her and how terribly she is receiving this. A terminal illness, so suddenly, for a man who isn’t even thirty yet? This is… this is awful.

And he’s revealing right here and now why he was being generous these past few days. He knew he was going to die and, perhaps, wanted to please her one last time. She can barely handle the first part of the news: the second is finishing her off. She wants to cry, to deny this as lies, but she knows better than this from Akira: he has never been as dramatic as her, down-to-Earth. For him to tell her all of this, it has to be true and urgent.

Her breathing gets caught in her throat and she cannot find the strength to answer.

Ema externally freezes despite the storm taking place in her skull. Time has stopped and everyone else has disappeared from her consciousness as she helplessly stares, unable to move even a finger, at the man whose breathing suddenly gets worse and whose chest seems to squeeze before her widened eyes.

“I…” She attempts to respond. “I don’t know what to say…” She admits to him and herself all the same.

“It’s fine… I expected this to be sudden and shocking…”

Before he can finish speaking, another coughing fit takes a hold of him to the point of forcing him to uncover the bottom part of his face as to spit something.

Everything shatters when Ema gets to see what’s coming out of his mouth or, to be exact, his lungs.

Flower petals.

Hanahaki is real.

An entire flower tainted in dark reds and smelling like spring and iron.

The Hanahaki Case of Den City isn’t just a legend, and he is the one they were speaking about.

And it’s all because of her.

She swallows a sob back as he puts back his mask and looks at her, eyes glassy and almost unfocused, tempted to look away in shame. This is tragically real, tragically close to home. Fuck this! Fuck this so much, from Hell and back!

“I… I’m sorry for this, very much so, Ema,” he tells her as he goes from supporting himself with an arm against the wall to doing so with his back leaning against it instead.

She timidly picks up the entire flower and tries to identify it.

“It’s an anemone,” he attempts to state very calmly, as if to ease her back into what she’s used to, but it’s all a failed façade.

Ema then remembers what she read online and what Aoi told her before: anemones are a symbol of death, illness and forsaken love depending on cultures. She can distinguish a faint blue hue to the one she has in her hand.

“I have to go,” he suddenly tells her in a faint and groggy voice, starting to lose his capacity to speak, “please take care, Ema…”

“I promise I’ll watch over Aoi for you, then,” she tries to look stoic when she just wants to cry. “Please… take care too, Akira,” she continues and ends her sentence as her legs finally move and take her away from the scene.

Another timid, sad smile.

Her mind blanks during her trip back home on her bike, but as soon as she reaches her flat, all her tears fall from her eyes and trail on her cheeks. She pathetically lets her helmet go, takes off her shoes and lets herself fall onto her bed. She is causing another person’s death without ever meaning to, and one she cares about on top of it. Fuck. Akira deserved better than that kind of cruel and unusual death.

But there is nothing she can do about it, isn’t there? It’s uncurable and terminal unless feelings are returned, and there’s where it stings. She doesn’t love him the way he loves her: she has prevented herself from falling in love with anyone as to protect herself from heartbreak and ex-partner drama. She cannot respond back and that’s what is killing him.

This is all her fault, all her goddamn fault!

She’s surprisingly dramatic and heartbroken about it, for someone who has already lost her father to an illness. She remembers being torn and extremely saddened for a few days following his demise, crying after him even, but she cannot for the life of her figure out why this is also such a tragedy with Akira. They’re friends, at best. Shady friends making unwritten contracts behind everyone’s backs, but friends and that’s it.

That’s surprisingly hurtful to hear herself think.

She needs to calm down and think the situation through. Panicking and choking on her sobs isn’t going to make anything better. She gets up and paces in her flat, trying to piece together every fragment of her feelings she can decipher as to paint a global picture of her part of the situation. It’s a giant mess she’s facing with all the disdain she can have towards herself for never cleaning it up before today. Clean your room, they said.

There is no denial that she does care for Akira enough not to want to seem him go so early. Wait, early? That means she wants to spend more time with him, just like friends do. So, they’re friends, that’s for sure. Comparing to her other friends, she finds herself thinking more of what she felt towards now ex-partners… In a way, when she was surprised to hear him confess his love to her, a part of herself seemed to have rejoiced, or rather, to have been relived. That doesn’t make sense with all the sorrow she feels! Why would she be happy to be the reason why he’s dying young after spending so long trying to survive in the streets with a six-year-old under his wing?!

…Oh.

Ema smashes her fist into a wall she finally, finally understands everything. Of course, of course that had to turn out to be denial all along! If she was so broken, so glitched out when learning of his upcoming death and how she was its cause, it was because she had, all along, wanted to be the cause of this. Well, not that way, but she was hiding her feelings to herself to avoid heartbreak again. If nobody could love her because she was shady and prone to backstabbing, when why should she allow herself to fall in love with others?

And then came in Akira, and everything fell apart because that illness, eventually, means nothing. It has no place to be because she has just learnt how things truly were: he’s in love with her, and she’s in love with him, and it’s all going to go down the sewer if she doesn’t do something soon. She has the power to change the tide, to prevent his early death. She needs to act, quickly.

She gets out her phone and gives him a last meeting time.

The meeting happens the day right after, and she can guess by how he didn’t have any issue to respond “yes” to her pleas that he has been given an illness break by SOL Technologies (hah, surprising). To be fair, if Ema had made sure her motorcycle was all charged up, it was to ensure she could make it quickly to the hospital or the Zaizen flat in case everything would fall apart. As it turns out, she sees a familiar room and an even more familiar face come out of it.

Instead of waiting next to the tree where he asked her for the first time to do a mission for him and where he told her he loved her, she runs up to him in a worried hurry. Despite his bittersweet smile and his ever-so polite “Hello, Ema”, she feels how fragile he is in her arms, how she feels like she’s handling a crystal statue who matters so much to her, a statue she has fragilized by her own hands without meaning to. She has, after all, never truly wanted to destroy people, merely play with them and maybe be a bit mischievous. She wanted to be Aphrodite, to play with men and their desires and their capacity to spend money on her, not Death and her scythe reminding people of how feelings can suck.

But she’s no goddess.

Won over by the one naïve about love guy she’s met, that’s what she is.

They sit down on a bench, his head on her shoulder because she’s afraid he won’t stand on his own in his spot of the bench if he doesn’t have some support, his unnatural body heat piercing through her clothes. That’s ironic to say the least. Despite how simplistic it seems to say three words to someone, she’s still hesitant and doesn’t know how Akira, the always-stiff man with zero skill in romance, has managed to pull this off. Her pride vanished the moment she knew she was killing him from the inside: she has nothing keeping her away from it, except maybe her guilt that doesn’t waver.

“How many days do you have left?” she asks instead, out of concern and morbid curiosity as to tell herself that, maybe, later, she’ll be able to be cocky about how narrow she saved someone from his death.

“They told me a week at most, probably less” he replies with his voice even weaker than yesterday’s, a petal exiting his lips. “I didn’t expect you to call me again so soon… My doctor will be mad to learn that I’ve come outside to meet up with you… Haha…”

Why does he everything he say or do break her heart, these days?

Ema looks down, her sins facing her directly in the face.

“Akira, I’m not sure how I should tell you this knowing what’s going on with you,” she continues as earnest she could be. Her pride really ran away on her.

“It’s fine… I’m glad I didn’t scare you away yesterday… You seemed so shaken…”

“You’re not allowed to worry for me when you’re about to die, you… fool.”

Insulting the dying isn’t very cool either, Ema, you should know that.

“What I mean is that I have to tell you something too personal for it to be said on the network. It’d break its meaning.”

He sighs. She can just feel how weak his breathing has become over the past weeks through this single exhale and how barely audible it is. Declaring her love to a shadow hurts.

“It’s fine if you can’t do it anything about it… Just protect Aoi for me…”

“That’s where you’re wrong.”

Despite his heavily weakened condition, she can still see how surprised he is to hear her say that. He should know better than anyone else that Ghost Girl can do anything. She excuses it for today, forever even, and holds her hand in his.

“I wish I could have been more dramatic than this, like I usually am, but this is an urgent matter and I won’t let you slip away from me so easily when it’d be easy to win against the illness,” she starts rambling almost as a way to shield herself from her own words.

Funny enough how curing his Hanahaki case seems so easy all of a sudden. She glances at him to see his eyes desperately trying to focus on her.

“I love you too, Akira.”

There is a single, then a couple tears exiting his eyes as she finishes to tell that, and he somehow finds the strength to grip her hand as he coughs out what she guesses to be the last anemone to ever reside in his lungs without rotting away. She doesn’t know how the flowers in his lungs are going to fade away, but that’s not what matters for now.

She enlaces him from his side and pulls her against her own body, feeling the fever disappear in moments, breathing starting to sound normal again. He looks exhausted from fighting the illness, she is herself tired from crying and panicking, the smothering anxiety and fear of death soon to come taking their toll on them both.

“Could you… stay over for the night?” He asks her as he’s falling asleep. “The driver must still be here…”

“My pleasure,” she answers. “Let’s get there before I have to carry you like my bride to bed.”

As she carries him on her shoulder again, they leave behind a trail of pale blue petals smelling like copper and iron. The last one people will ever see, she hopes. The last ones she’ll see for sure.

End Notes

Writing about Akira almost dying is my new specialty.

#vrains #hireshipping #hanahaki #vrainsrarepairweeks #my writing

3 notes · View notes

pickalilywrites · 6 years

Text

♡

Real Beauty

Jeankasa. Celebrity AU.

6412 words.

He’s always unsure whether if it’s good or bad news when he’s told to come into Mr. Smith’s office. While Jean’s sure his work is decent enough to prevent him from getting let go (or, you know, fired) from the company, there’s always something about the CEO’s office that makes him uncertain. The last time he had been called up it had been about his debut as the head photographer for Sina, the biggest beauty and lifestyle magazine in the entertainment business. He had received a pat on the back for his work and a rare smile from the enigmatic Mr. Smith, but that had been months ago and Jean’s not sure if his boss holds him in such high regard now.

“Sir? It’s Jean Kirstein from photography,” Jean says, knocking on the door with a quick rap of his knuckles.

The room is beautiful in an untouchably perfect way. Jean’s afraid of even breathing in here, but Mr. Smith tells him to come in and sit down across his desk.

Mr. Smith flips through an old edition of Sina, an unfathomable expression on his face. As Jean watches him, he thinks that it’s a shame that his boss had never become a model or some other sort of Hollywood star at some point in his life. He has the air of an old Hollywood god, someone who knew everyone and everything that went on in the entertainment business, and perhaps it’s because he does. Mr. Smith has an impeccable eye for what people want to see even before it’s a faint idea in their mind, and Jean admires him for it. At the same time, it scares the absolute shit out of him and he’s not sure how much longer he can sit in the same room as his boss before he cracks under the stress of not knowing.

“You said you wanted to see me, sir,” Jean says, resisting the urge to tug nervously at his sleeves.

Mr. Smith finally looks up as if he’s remembered that Jean is also in the room. He doesn’t look pleased, but he doesn’t look unhappy either. Instead, he closes the magazine he was reading and slides it across his desk so that Jean can see it.

“Do you know what that is?” he asks Jean.

Swallowing nervously, Jean leans over to look at the cover. A beautiful blonde starlet stares back at him, an infectious smile on her face as she gazes at the reader. He remembers seeing pictures of the same girl, her eyes dead and her face in a permanent frown. It was only after she had rejected her stage name Christa, the one she had since she was a child, and reinvented herself into her true self that she was able to smile like this. Everyone had believed she was going to flop after making her debut as a singer, tossing away her acting career as if it was nothing, but even Jean noticed that her smiles were more authentic in her paparazzi photos and her actions more genuine instead of planned and fabricated like they were when she was just an actress. He had been surprised when Mr. Smith called him in to take pictures for this girl in Sina’s next edition. He was even more surprised when he meets the girl as she extends her hand and introduces herself as Historia. Her smile was even more brilliant in person and it was during that first meeting that Jean knew she was going to be an even bigger star than she already was, and he was right.

Her first album sold one million physical copies within its first week, a feat that’s unheard of in this day and age. She’s currently going on her stadium tour and, the last time Jean checked, nearly all of the venues had sold out. Historia had sent him flowers just the other week to thank him for working with her on the Sina shoot, writing on the note that she couldn’t have gotten this sort of recognition without him. Jean’s never thought that his photos could ever make such an impact and he’s half sure that most of Historia’s success comes from her own hard work and talent, but he’s happy to be remembered by someone like her.

Clearing his throat, Jean replies, “Of course. Historia Reiss. My first piece as the head photographer. How could I forget? She was wonderful to work with.”

“Hm.” He’s never sure with Mr. Smith’s answers. Sometimes he’d rather have a negative response instead of all the ambiguously neutral reactions he’s received. “Many people were impressed with it, myself included. But one person in particular called and said they were interested in working with you after seeing Historia’s photos. An Ackerman. Mikasa Ackerman, to be precise. You know her, of course?”

Is there anyone who hasn’t heard the name “Ackerman” sometime in their life? The Ackerman family is a family of every type of celebrity anyone could ever imagine – models, singers, songwriters, actors, you name it. They were a big name when Jean was a child and they still are now. He’s sure stars were invented when the Ackerman family came into existence, but they’ve dimmed since their ascension. After multiple scandals – stories about cheating, lies, drugs, all the bad things that came with being a celebrity – began to plague them and the family began to fade out, disappearing from the public and only reminisced by older stars and fans like they were legends instead of people who were still living and breathing today.

One of the Ackermans is a girl named Mikasa, a rising starlet that was a model-turned-actress. Jean remembered many people admiring her beauty and quiet nature before they all turned on her unexpectedly for becoming involved with another star: Eren Jaeger, lead singer of band Wings of Freedom. Jean can’t recall if they were ever really involved or not, but he remembers the backlash she received from fans on social media. All her accounts were bombarded with messages harassing her to leave the musician alone, that she was no good for him, that she was a dirty slut for even thinking she could get near him.

That wasn’t even the worst of it though. It seemed to get worse every day. Despite being critically acclaimed in the few roles she had in movies, people would find a reason to despise her.

There were fake nudes leaked of her, accusations of incest with her cousin who happened to be another popular celebrity, and even death threats targeted at her and her family. The media was no better either, poking and prodding her for details about every scandalous affair she was accused of despite her obvious discomfort about talking about such topics. The paparazzi and news media outlets, hungry for anything that had to do with her, would chase her down, invading her privacy just to take a photo of her no matter how crappy it turned out. It was no wonder that she began to disappear from the media along with the rest of her family. There were jokes about her falling off the face of the earth, and sometimes Jean believed she might never have existed at all. But it seems she is still here.

“I know of her,” Jean says instead. He might know many things about her, but he can never say he knows her. He’s sure many of the rumors that swirl about her are fake anyhow.

Mr. Smith sits back in his chair, his fingers steepled. “She says she’s considering coming back into the spotlight after her long hiatus. She read Miss Reiss’ article in our magazine when it came out and said she enjoyed your work,” he tells Jean. “She thinks you’re talented, that you can capture a person’s true essence with your camera. Your work, she said, is ‘beautiful.’”

Beautiful. Jean mouths the word, not quite believing that Mikasa Ackerman had used it to describe his photos. He clears his throat. “And this is her first magazine interview since her hiatus?”

“Correct,” Mr. Smith says. There’s a rare smile on his face again. “It would be foolish of us not to work with her, especially since she’s the one who came to us. Wouldn’t you think so, Mr. Kirstein?”

“Absolutely, I’d love to work with her!” Jean says immediately. One would be a fool to disagree with Mr. Smith. There’s a reason why he’s been in this business for so long. “I won’t disappoint you, sir.”

“I’m sure you won’t,” Mr. Smith says, but he goes back to the paperwork on his desk, not even bothering to send Jean out on his way.

Jean mumbles a clumsy goodbye that he’s sure his boss doesn’t hear, scurrying out of the office as quickly as possible. It’s silly, but he breathes more easily once he’s out of that room.

Once he gets back into his own office, he scrolls through the internet for pictures of Mikasa Ackerman. As he remembers, she’s beautiful. It’s a shame that the world demanded that she hide herself away.

He’s a bundle of nerves the day of the shoot. He doesn’t know what to expect. In interviews and talk shows, Mikasa had always been very reserved, a perfect lady, but there are stars that act differently behind the scenes. He’s tried contacting other beauticians and photographers that worked with her in the past, but they don’t really say much about her besides the fact that she’s stunningly beautiful as if he can’t already see that for himself. It also doesn’t help that she’s flown under the radar for the past couple of years. Perhaps he shouldn’t be surprised though. She had wanted to disappear, and she had done a successful job of it.

He stumbles into the room, disgruntled because he didn’t get the chance to talk to the hairdresser or makeup artist that worked on Miss Ackerman. They had merely rushed into his room, told him that Mikasa was ready for him, and disappeared. He had tried calling their name, running after them, but they had told him that she wasn’t anything special and that he would probably need luck to get anything out of her because she sure as hell isn’t sociable.

So he pastes on his professional smile and gets ready to be as civil as he can be. He prepares himself for stilted conversations with a brick wall, but once he sets eyes on her, he forgets everything.

Mikasa Ackerman, one of the mysterious Hollywood legends that disappeared out of the blue, is suddenly there in his studio and she looks magnificent in this brilliant red dress with its billowing layers of skirts and sparkles that Jean would think too extravagant on anyone else, but it looks perfect on her. When she hears his footsteps coming towards him, she looks at him with a cautious expression, a little lost and a little confused as if she doesn’t know how she arrived in such a place, but she gets up, holding onto her skirts, and walks to him. No, she doesn’t walk. It’s like she’s floating all the way towards him, gliding across the floor to him, and she extends a hand out to him. Her hand is so white and pretty that he thinks it must be made of porcelain, but her grip tells him that she’s made of something much stronger.

“You’re Jean Kirstein?” she asks, looking up at him through her thick black lashes. Her gray eyes aren’t cold; they’re cool, careful, cautious, and it makes him wonder why she had come in the first place. “Your piece with Historia…it was very beautiful. I spoke with her after I saw that issue and she told me that you have a natural eye for beautiful things.”

It doesn’t seem quite real, him talking to her like this. He’s surprised that her voice is so soft, delicate, and can’t believe that she’s said his name with those lips. When he had begun working at Sina, he had understood that there’d be a chance he’d speak with big celebrities, but Mikasa Ackerman isn’t like any of the actresses or Hollywood stars he’s met. She’s ethereal, some type of heavenly entity than one from this world.

He manages to stammer, “Thank you, Miss Ackerman. It’s an honor to work with you.”

She flashes him a wary smile, one he recognizes. It’s so different from the one she wore early in her career – beautiful, vibrant, genuine. This one is brief, forced, and polite. It’s the smile he’s seen in all the photos she’s been in before she completely disappeared, and he wonders if she even remembers the last time she smiled, really smiled.

Realizing that he’s been shaking her hand for a while, Jean clears his throat and guides her to the set where the lights are blinding. He hovers around her nervously, not quite sure how to speak with her. “This is where we’ll be working today. I’ll be taking a couple of shots – it’ll probably last until late this afternoon depending on whether or not you like the photos – but I understand you want this done in a day –“

“Will I have to look at the camera?” she asks him suddenly. Her eyes are cast downward, avoiding the bright light. Gone is the smile and it has been replaced with a frown. It worries him for a second before he sees that it is not one of displeasure, but one filled with worry. He’s sure that she’s done many shoots like this in the past, but perhaps she’s forgotten what they were like or she had never gotten used to them because she’s chewing so nervously on her lip that he’s afraid she’ll ruin her lipstick. “I know it’s strange but…would it be alright if I didn’t look at the camera?”

He’s about to open his mouth, confused and wanting to ask her why she would agree to a photo shoot even though she was unwilling to look at the camera, but he realizes the question is insensitive.

She’s been surrounded by cameras her entire life. Before she had even stepped foot on the red carpet, made her debut as a star, before she could even walk, she had been followed and harassed by the media and paparazzi. She’s been stared at and hunted down like a rare animal. She’s probably had enough of cameras and the spotlight to last the rest of her life. She might be returning to that life, but he can see that she’s reluctant to do so, so he might as well make it as easy as possible for her.

“No, not at all,” he finally says. He looks at her again, already thinking about how he wants to position her for this particular shot, and stumbles backward towards his camera, nearly stumbling over a wire lying on the ground because he isn’t looking. He sees that Mikasa Ackerman is looking at him, startled, but he waves his hand to tell her that he’s fine. “It’s alright. I do that all the time. Just sit down on that white box over there and we’ll get started.”

“Okay,” she says hesitantly, but she does what she’s told. The way she sits on the white box is stiff, more like she’s a robot than an actual human being. He remembers this too from the last photoshoots she’s done – her blank stare at the camera, her empty smile, her mechanical poses. She wears that same fake smile that she had when she first greeted him, and he wonders if he’ll even be able to get one photo of her smiling genuinely.

He remembers not to frown. If this is difficult for her, he doesn’t want to agitate her any further by pointing out things she’s doing wrong. It’s not as if she’s doing this on purpose, he’s sure. So he looks up from the lens and tells her, “If you don’t want to smile, don’t. You don’t even have to face the camera if you don’t want to.”

“Won’t that be strange?” she asks, but she turns away from the camera, looking to the right where the interns are flitting about to grab donuts and coffee and other things that the beauticians and makeup artists on standby are demanding.

“Not at all,” he replies, returning to look at her through the lens.

She doesn’t look as mechanical as she did when she had first sat down. It was probably the fault of the camera all along. He doesn’t blame her. His looks particularly intimidating, all black with his large lens and loud shutter noise. Looking away seems to ease her nerves somewhat though, and he hopes that he’ll be able to capture her more natural expressions before the shoot ends.

“What’d you do during your time off, Miss Ackerman?” he asks, still looking through the lens. He’s probably not the best conversationalist around – and he gets the feeling that Mikasa doesn’t talk very much either – but he doesn’t know how else to get her to become more comfortable. “Did you travel anywhere? Perhaps take up a hobby like scuba diving or hiking?”

She doesn’t answer for a while, perhaps surprised that he’s trying to strike up a conversation with her. At first, he’s afraid that she’ll just ignore him, not wanting to talk to him at all, but she finally replies, “I went to Europe with my cousin for a bit. It was very beautiful although the weather was dreary. I traveled to Japan as well to visit family members and stayed there for quite a while. The atmosphere there can be quite peaceful, and it made me feel at home.”

Talking seems to be working, so Jean decides to forget about his shoot, wanting to talk to her enough so that she feels comfortable taking pictures. Maybe he won’t get her to look at the camera, but perhaps he’ll get shots where she’s more relaxed and willing. Leaning against the camera, something he’s not supposed to do because the equipment is expensive but something he does anyway because the tripod it balances on is rather sturdy, Jean asks, “Japan, huh? I’ve never been there before, but I hear it’s beautiful in the spring. Do your folks live in the countryside?”

“They live in the Kyoto Prefecture,” Mikasa answers. She looks as if she’s remembering something pleasant. It’s not quite a smile on her face, but it’s a hint of one. “It’s magnificent in the spring when the cherry blossoms bloom. You should go visit if you ever have the time. If not Kyoto, then perhaps some other place in Japan. Tokyo or Osaka, maybe.”

“Maybe,” laughs Jean. Ah, if his work schedule ever allowed for it, although he could look into working for one of Sina’s other divisions if he really wanted a change of setting. “Would I like the food there?”

She sits still as a statue, and he thinks now would be a good time to snap a photo, but he doesn’t want her to stop talking. She’s lifted one of her eyebrows up. “Are you a picky eater?”

“A bit,” he admits, a sheepish grin on his face. “Is that bad?”

She shrugs. “There’s quite a bit of seafood, but there’s a lot of other things too. I’m sure you’ll be fine if you ever decide to go. I think you’d like it there since you like beautiful things.”

There’s the smile that he’s been looking for – an incomplete smile but the closest he’s gotten so far to her real smile. It’s similar to her old one – the bright and smiling one that she had when she had first started out before the world began to turn on her. Did she manage to find it after all this time?

He wants to run to his camera right now and snap the photo quickly before it disappears, but he finds that his finger hovers just above the button. It stays there for a while, but he finds he cannot bring himself to take the picture.

Lifting his head once more from the lens, he asks, “Would it be alright if I took the picture now? You can just stay as you are – you don’t even have to move – and I could just take it if, er, that would be fine with you.”

Mikasa stays there, unmoving, before finally saying, “Please take the photo then.”

He’s afraid that her smile would have faltered by the time the shutter clicks, but he reviews the photo and it’s still there. He can’t quite believe it – how perfectly her hair falls into place, how hesitant but beautiful her smile is, or how elegant she looks as she gazes off into space – and he looks up at her, opening his mouth to ask her another question, this time about how settling back in Shiganshina was for her.

That’s what they do for the majority of the shoot – he asks her questions and she answers, letting her guard down slowly and becoming more natural, and he asks every time before he takes a photo. It takes a much longer time than normal. Most of the interns and those standing around leave despite their earlier excitement at seeing one of the elusive Ackermans. Jean doesn’t mind taking a long time if that’s what it takes. Besides, talking to her is actually quite pleasant. She’s kinder than he thought she would be and very interesting, telling him about all the places she’s traveled and the things she’s seen during her time off. Before he knows it, he has dozens of photos of her to pick and choose from.

Jean looks them over while Mikasa is in the changing room, flipping through them one by one. She doesn’t look at the camera in any of them, but she’s beautiful all the same. He’s seen shoots with celebrities in extravagant dresses or suits, smiling with their pasted-on smiles and empty beauty. Mikasa isn’t like that in any of these photos.

A picture is worth a thousand words, yes, but there aren’t enough words in the world to describe her ineffable beauty. To capture her in a frame, to freeze her, should be a crime because it does not allow the viewer to see the elegance with which she holds up her head or the angelic atmosphere about her. True, it’s easy to see her wide cheekbones, her sculpted brows, and the effortless way that her hair falls to shape her face, but it’s still not enough if the viewer cannot witness her careful, cautious gaze as her eyes look across the room or even the grace she has in even the smallest of movements. It makes him want to delete all these photos at once because, while they’re stunning, they’re not enough.

“Are you alright?” a voice asks, and he looks up to see Mikasa looking down at him. She’s finally out of the fancy designer dresses she was made to wear for the shoot, clad in a simple dress with a black top and colorful patterned skirt instead. It’s much simpler and more casual than anything he thought she’d wear, but it’s a good look for her. It’s a nice change from the overly formal things he’s seen her wear on the red carpet. “Are we going to pick the photos now?”

“It’s fine. It’s better if we take a break from all this. We’ve been taking these photos for hours after all,” he says. Jean stands up, turning the camera off quickly so that she can’t look at it. In truth, he doesn’t want her to look at them. He doesn’t want her to be disappointed that the photos aren’t perfect; they’re as perfect as he can make them, but it’s still not good enough to satisfy him and he’s afraid she’ll feel the same way. It’s not a lie that he thinks they should take a break though. While he knows Mikasa’s a professional, she’s been away from doing photo shoots and other things typical of her career, so he’s sure she’s tired after all this. “Want to go out to the balcony? The city looks pretty amazing around this time.”

There’s that smile again. Each time she smiles, it looks a little more brilliant than the last. He’d snap a picture right now if he hadn’t already turned off his camera.

“I’d love to see it,” she says.

He leads her to the balcony that overlooks the city. While he sometimes tires of living in the bustling city and its cramped quarters, working in a towering skyscraper is one of the perks of living in a big city. He sometimes takes a breather here after particularly bad shoots with moody starlets who believe they’ve already made it big or grumpy actors who aren’t quite happy with how their photos came out. It’s high enough up to make everyone in the city look like ants as they drive away in their toy vehicles through the crowded streets. Mikasa seems to like the view too because she has such a serene smile on her face.

And it’s that one, Jean realizes as he stares at her wide-eyed. It’s that smile that he’s been chasing all day, the smile he hasn’t managed to see until now. Fumbling for his phone, he curses as he almost drops it, but he taps in his password before looking at her desperately, breathlessly.

“Can I take a photo of you right now?” he asks. He’s already tapped on the camera app, opening it up, but he forces himself to point the phone downwards until she gives her consent. “It’s not for the shoot, but you just look so perfect right now. If you don’t want to, you don’t have to say yes, but I just want you to see it. You don’t even have to look at the camera either. You can just look somewhere else if you want.”

“Yes.”

He’s babbling so hard that he almost doesn’t hear her. Pausing for a second, sure that he’s just imagining it in his crazed desperation, he asks, “What did you say?”

She purses her lips a little bit, amused, but the smile returns to her face. “I said yes,” she says again. The wind is blowing her hair every which way, so she tucks a lock of it behind her ear so that it doesn’t fly into her face. “I’d like to see it afterward.”

Blinking because he still can’t quite believe his ears, Jean shakes his head to snap out of it and raises his phone, not wanting to lose this moment. It only takes a second to snap the photo, and he shows it to her immediately afterward. He lets her hold his phone in her hands, looking at her carefully as she inspects the picture.

Looking at it over her shoulder, he knows that this picture is a lot messier than the ones he had shot in the studio. Her hair is in disarray and her clothes are so much plainer than the ones she had worn for the shoot. Still, he thinks it’s the best shot they’ve taken today because none of those photos has this smile. It’s not the one he had seen in the earlier days of her career. This smile is not as wide or carefree, but it has another sort of happiness to it. A fearless happiness, a brave smile that dared to exist even though the rest of the world tried to take it away.

She’s silent for a moment as she observes the photo, touching her own face as if she can’t believe that she’s the same person in the photo. At first, he thinks she hates it because she doesn’t say a word, but Mikasa turns to him suddenly, thrusting the phone back into his hands and asking, “Would it be okay if you sent it to me?”

“Sent it to you?” Jean asks, startled. He clumsily taps away at the keys, opening up his e-mail so that he can compose a swift letter to her agent with the attached photo. He’s tapping on all the wrong keys though and he curses under his breath. “I’ll send it to your agent if that’s okay. If not, I can send it to your e-mail too-“

“No,” she interrupts him, putting a hand on his wrist. She looks at him, biting her lip again in that nervous way she has. “You can just send it to me. I’ll give you my phone number. I just…I didn’t know I could look like that.”

He never thought he’d ever head the photoshoot for an Ackerman. Getting the phone number of one just makes this seem like it’s all a dream, but he gives her his phone so she can tap in her phone number and hit “send” so she can see what she really looks like.

“Thank you,” she says, beaming at her phone once she receives the photo. There’s that same brilliant smile on her face. He can only hope that it doesn’t fade away when she finally makes her return.

They go back to the studio after that and pick out her photos. Out of the many dozens that he’s shot, she picks out ten, but he e-mails the rest of the photos to her agent in case she changes her mind. She isn’t smiling in any of them; the closest she comes to smiling is the ghost of a smile she had when talking about her trips to Japan and Europe. It’s certainly pretty, Jean thinks, but he thinks even those who pick up the next issue of Sina won’t fully appreciate her beauty. They didn’t before and there’s a part of him that worries that she’ll be taken for granted again, beaten down, and thrown away.

“Thank you again, Jean. It was lovely working with you,” Mikasa says, extending her hand before she leaves.

“Likewise. Take care, Miss Ackerman,” he says, and he takes her hand in hers.

When she grips his hand, shaking it firmly, he thinks that he shouldn’t worry at all. She’s stronger than anyone gives her credit for.

Jean doesn’t expect to be called to Mr. Smith’s office so soon after the photo shoot. The last time he had headed a photoshoot, he just sent in the photos to be touched up slightly, got them approved, and then received a copy of the magazine as soon as it was published. He had thought it would work the same way this time, but the call from Mr. Smith’s secretary said that his boss wanted to speak with him about something.

Like he did the last time he had come to Mr. Smith’s office, Jean rapped his knuckles on the door nervously and said, “Sir? Jean Kirstein from the photography department. You said you wanted to see me about something.”

“Come in.”

When Jean walks in, he sees Mr. Smith sitting at his desk. A manila folder sits on his desk, opened. The contents are in Mr. Smith’s hand – Mikasa Ackerman’s photos. His boss’ face is expressionless as it flips through the many photos, both the ones that were chosen and the ones that were rejected. After Jean had been seated for a while, Mr. Smith finally looked up, giving Jean his full attention.

“So, Jean,” Mr. Smith says, putting the photos down. Jean thinks he liked it better when Mr. Smith would only half pay attention to him. The intense stare of his cool blue eyes makes Jean want to fidget in his chair. “How did the shoot with Miss Ackerman go last week?”

“Er, it went well, I think,” Jean answers. He hates that he tacked on the “I think,” but talking to Mr. Smith always makes him feel so unsure about himself. “She was charming to work with and seemed pleased with how the photos came out.”

“Her agent called earlier this morning. They want to pull her out of this edition,” Mr. Smith says. He looks at Jean carefully.

“Excuse me?” Shocked isn’t even the right word for what Jean feels. It feels a little like betrayal, like she had come over and ripped his heart out even though he had known that her return to the spotlight was a tentative thing. Still, she had seemed so ready at the end of the day. She had helped him pick the photos, she had shaken his hand, she had told him that it was lovely working with him. Why then would she decide against being featured in the magazine after having done the photoshoot?

But Mr. Smith seems to already be done talking about it. He’s picking up the photos off his desk, stacking them up, and putting them back in the manila folder. “Her agent says that she’s given it more thought, and Miss Ackerman believes she isn’t ready just yet to return to the spotlight.”

“I see.” Jean numbly takes the folder that Mr. Smith hands him. It really was too good to be true – the photoshoot, those conversations between photos, that last picture on the balcony. In the end, all his work – his photos and his words – meant nothing.

Mr. Smith must have excused him at some point because Jean stands up to leave and is heading towards the door, his hand hovering on the doorknob, when his boss calls him one last time.

“Jean,” Mr. Smith says. When Jean turns around, Mr. Smith is looking right at him again with those piercing blue eyes. “You did great work. Those photos were incredible. The reason why she decided not to do this in the end had nothing to do with you, I’m sure. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

Praise from his boss is rare, but it still doesn’t make him feel better. Still, Jean feigns a smile at Mr. Smith and mutters a quick “thank you” before disappearing to his office.

---

What had he done wrong? Was it letting her not look at the camera? Was it because he had been to personal in asking her questions? Or was it perhaps that last photo on the balcony? Jean doesn’t which it is, and he nearly drives himself mad thinking about all the possibilities that caused this to happen. He stares at the printed photos, scrutinizing them closely, but he doesn’t quite know what’s wrong with them.

It’s hurting his eyes to look at them for so long, so he drops them down on his desk and rubs his tired eyes.

After he thinks about it for a while, this was bound to happen. He’s far from experienced and the shoot with Historia Reiss was just a stroke of luck. To think he would find the same success with an Ackerman was pretentious of him. Of course, she would pretend to like them and then quickly change her mind as soon as she was far enough away. He would have done the same thing. If Mr. Smith ever allows him to stand behind a camera again, Jean would be lucky.

His phone rings and Jean picks it up without looking at the caller ID.

“Hello?”

“Hello, is this Jean Kirstein?” says the person on the other end. It’s a female voice, soft and delicate. It sounds so familiar, but Jean doesn’t dare to think about who it might be. It would be too good to be true.

“This is he,” he says cautiously.

“This is Mikasa Ackerman,” the speaker says.

“Mikasa?”

He can hear her smiling on the other end, can imagine it without having to look at her, and he wishes he had a camera with him right now so he could run over and capture it.

“That’s the first time you’ve called me by my first name,” she laughs. Jean realizes that he’s never heard her laugh before. It’s a short laugh, like a burst of happiness, but it’s beautiful like the rest of her.

“Yeah, I just…I’m really surprised that you called,” he says, laughing himself. He’s still confused and hurt, but hearing her voice makes him feel better. Perhaps he had overthought it. Maybe it really does have nothing to do with him.

“It’s fine,” she assures him. There’s a pause on her end and she finally says, “I’m sorry I changed my mind after everything. The pictures were amazing. I showed them to my agent and he said they were the best he’s seen in a while.”

Jean wants to ask her but wonders if he should. He has a right to know though. After all, he had been the ones to take the pictures in the first place. He’s not even upset about his photos not being featured on the front page. She had just seemed so happy that day and he wants to know what changed her mind. So he asks.

“I guess it’s because…it’s been a while since anyone has ever really seen me, the real me,” Mikasa says. He wonders if she’s chewing her lip in that way she does when she’s nervous. “And I really want people to see me in the same way that you do, but I’m not sure I want them to just yet. For now…I think I’m just satisfied if you can see me that way.”

The way she says that, so earnestly, makes him blush even though he’s sure she’s just being kind. But her explanation makes perfect sense to him. After being hurt by the world before, it’s not like she could return so easily. The fact that she had even thought to return at all is amazing to him.

“Well,” Jean says, no longer feeling upset. Rather, he feels hopeful that this isn’t the end – for her, for him, and for the two of them both working together. “The world better be ready when they see the real you.”

She laughs again and he closes his eyes, soaking in the sound of her happiness. “Yeah…I look forward to working with you again soon, Jean.”

“Likewise…Mikasa.” He sets down his phone once the call has ended and leans back in his chair.

The world isn’t going to be ready when they meet her again. That’s fine, Jean thinks as he opens up the photo of her he had taken on his phone. She smiles brilliantly back him, radiant as the sun. They’ll be blown away when they see Mikasa next, her in all her real beauty.

#jeankasa au weekend #jeankasa weekend #jeankasa #jean kirstein #mikasa ackerman #snk #celebrity au

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stillness-in-green · 6 years

Text

Scenes from a Wedding (2/4)

A look at Kudelia and Atra’s wedding, from proposal to planning to the main event. Expect copious Chad/Yamagi on the side. Also, the whole thing giving Eugene a big headache.

Chapter 2: Planning (Practices, Paraphernalia, and What to Do About Parents)

(Warning: No line breaks seem to be appearing on mobile, because we can’t have nice things, apparently.)

6 Months Out:

They kept the secret for about six months—better than Kudelia had hoped, honestly. By February, though, Cucubita had been stopped in the office three times by coworkers asking if the rumor that the boss was getting married was true. It was time to get out ahead of things.

Kudelia didn’t tell the news outlets directly—she didn’t need to. Rather, she set up a gift registry—something that normally would have been done months ago—and let Cucubita post the web address at the office. Sure enough, within the week she fielded the first question from a reporter about it.

Everyone held their breath, for what seemed like days—would the cover stories and the false last names hold against media scrutiny? Makanai and his aide had sworn there was no way to connect their names to Tekkadan’s payroll lists, seized by Arianrhod years ago, but…

But no one from Gjallarhorn had ever seen Atra, at least not anyone still living. A few hopeful photographers showed up at the farm—even the ones who didn’t come openly couldn’t hide for long from a horde of children at play—but between Dante’s colorful threats, Sakura’s ominous pronouncements about lawsuits, and Derma’s ability to dent camera lens casings in his metal fingers, no one stayed for long. Kudelia received a distant, genial note of congratulations from Rustal Elion, and that was as close as danger came to home for some time.

In the meantime, the preparations continued.

“Oh, it’s bigger than I remember!”

“It will seem smaller once you have chairs and the arch in it.”

Yamagi trailed Merribit and Kudelia up the room at Chad’s elbow, listening with half an ear as the two women went on talking about the wedding arch. The place was brighter than he remembered from Merribit’s wedding—the difference lighting made, he supposed—a long, bright, wood-paneled chamber with floor-to-ceiling windows on one side, showing the forest.

“Eugene’s going to hate the windows,” he murmured to Chad, who smiled, quick and lop-sided.

“Eugene already hates the windows,” came the low reply.

“How’s the guest list coming?”

Chad looked at a notepad he’d borrowed from the office, where he’d been jotting down notes in his careful, unpracticed handwriting. “They’re at fifty right now, counting themselves. They haven’t sent invitations yet, though—they’re expecting less.”

“That’s pretty small.” Yamagi looked around the room, mentally occupying it with chairs and barely filling a quarter of the space. “They could probably do the ceremony on one end and the reception on the other, with numbers like that.”

“If Eugene didn’t hate the windows,” Chad replied with another flash of the smile from before. “But the people here said they can wall off half the space, so I think we’re going with that.”

Yamagi nodded, looking back across the room as Kudelia turned in place, looking up at the slanted rafters of the ceiling. “How about the colors?”

“Purple and white.”

“No red?” An obscure disappointment pricked at him. Kudelia looked good in red, and Tekkadan had used it on some of its lily marks.

“She thought about it for a while. She said she thought it would be a bit much, for a wedding dress.” Chad’s expression, when Yamagi looked at it, was blank, the open sincerity of someone who had no opinion whatsoever about the matter. He’s probably learned everything he knows about wedding dresses in the last two months, Yamagi reflected, and muted a smile, turning back towards Kudelia and Merribit.

“What are you planning for the unity practice?” the latter asked, hands folded neatly over her elbows.

Kudelia looked at her, blinking. “Unity…?”

“The thing you do to show you’re coming together as a couple,” Yamagi filled in. He’d sat through several long conversations between Merribit and the old man on the topic, as Yukinojo’s rough sensibilities grappled with Merribit’s Teiwaz-influenced multiculturalism. “Drinking sake or tying knots or whatever.”

“I see.” Kudelia’s expression cleared. “We hadn’t talked about that yet.” She smiled with a thread of a chuckle. “Though it probably won’t be sake.”

Merribit sighed, briefly closing her eyes. Yamagi hid a smirk in his hair. Merribit was the most capable drinker he’d ever met, and it seemed to forever distress her that she couldn’t find more people who appreciated Teiwaz’s approach to alcohol—which, as far as Yamagi could tell, boiled down to, “Use it for anything you can find an excuse to.”

“It will have to be something,” was all Merribit allowed herself, though she said it in a voice with steel ribbing. “That symbology is even more important than the arch.”

“What else is there?” Kudelia asked, tilting her head. “I think on Earth they light candles.”

“A candle, typically.” Merribit counted off on her fingers. “Unity candles, sharing a drink from one cup or some kind of food with the right symbology. Tying knots in cords, or having your fingers tied together.” She flicked her pinky finger out in illustration.

Kudelia nodded thoughtfully, and Chad’s pen began scratching again as he wrote out “Unity practice?” at the bottom of his notes. When he finished, Yamagi leaned in, bumping their shoulders together, and wound one hand in around Chad’s arm. That close, he could hear the small, surprised hitch in Chad’s breathing. After a moment, in which the temperature probably didn’t rise from the blood rushing to Chad’s face, but felt a bit like should have, Chad tucked the notepad under his other elbow and dropped his arm, leaving their hands held lightly, fingers barely twined.

In mutually-agreed-upon silence, they went on listening to Merribit’s overview.

Within the next week, Makanai finally settled on a suitable florist, and with the venue and dress decided, the wedding party gratefully left him to harangue the shop at his discretion. Haba began to drop by the farm with samples of meals—fried dumplings, mixed rice dishes, carefully sliced sandwiches, cuts of meat, salad mixes, chocolates and pastries and more—to catch up with Atra and plan out the buffet menu.

A problem: there would have to be music, but it couldn’t be live music.

The solution: invite Zack over to the farm and spend an entire weekend putting together sample playlists between what he and Dante could pull from Ariadne, what Atra heard on radios around town, and what Cookie and Cracker were being exposed to at school.

A problem: Kudelia and Atra would need to be driven safely to the venue without too much time lost to reporters—or anyone else looking for a splashy headline, Eugene said ominously—but Atra’s address was now known.

The solution: Kudelia would stay at Cucubita’s home the night before, and Atra with Merribit at the same hotel Azee and Eco had booked. Eugene would drive Kudelia and Cucubita to Cyllene; Merribit the other group. This also neatly solved the issue of keeping the brides apart until the ceremony, as everyone agreed was traditional.

The guest list was finalized before long, with one lingering issue—the parental one.

Atra, of course, had no problems there, and Norman Bernstein was still persona non grata at any event involving his daughter, her wedding being no exception.

Tomomi Bernstein, though. Perhaps, perhaps… Kudelia chased the thoughts around her mind in circles, running them into tunnels of procrastination and warrens of welcomed forgetfulness. Later. She could figure out whether to invite her mother later. When it was closer to the wedding.

Yes.

3 Months Out:

The stylist—get it done right, Cookie and Cracker nagged, and Merribit insisted—was delighted with the pair of them. He spent nearly four hours tugging their hair this way and that, working it into up-dos, elaborate braids, or considered curls. Atra’s hair, with a natural wave that held true even as long as she’d grown it out in the last few years, and Kudelia’s thick, full-bodied true blonde, both held a wealth of possibilities so extensive that, by the time it was over, Kudelia had privately resolved to chop off the lot as soon as the wedding was over, if not before. Driving them back to the farm, a pink fabric rose still tucked behind one ear, Atra giggled at Kudelia’s woes and quipped that they could probably pay for several days of honeymoon if they both just switched to short cuts and sold the rest.

Soon after came the word from Makanai: the flower arrangements were almost decided upon, but final decisions were pending on the rest of the wedding party—specifically, their costuming. Send pictures, was the old politician’s dictate. Dress the men, and send pictures.

“You look so handsome!”

Chad ducked his head as the salesperson nodded agreement with Atra. He stole a glance at the store’s mirror, eyeing his reflection doubtfully. The suit was handsome, sure—a warm dark gray with a faint shine to the thread, all sharp folds and even lines. He looked as awkward in it as ever, though.

Across the room, Yukinojo, wearing the peanut-brown suit he’d worn to his own wedding, stood at something like attention, looking long-suffering as Merribit circled around him with a secretive smile on her face. She turned to the woman with the tape measure looped over one elbow nearby, but Dante’s arm descending around Chad’s shoulders distracted him from whatever she’d been about to say.

“She’s right; we do look pretty great. Right?” Dante, wearing the nicest formal black since their Teiwaz sakazuki ceremony all those years ago, grinned into the mirror at Chad, who found his lips tugging up despite his embarrassment. At the acknowledgement, Dante jostled him in rough support, then turned them around to face Yamagi, who’d been entrusted with documenting the excursion.

Yamagi was smiling—smirking a little, even. He raised the camera. “Smile for the Prime Minister,” he quipped. “Again.”

Chad did his best. And maybe with Dante flipping the camera a cheery thumbs-up, it wasn’t so bad.

With the mens’ clothes reserved, and Makanai in the final stages of negotiations with the florist, the wedding party turned their full attention to the menu. Within the week, Atra and Haba had finalized plans for the reception dinner and begun stockpiling the foods that would keep—a bottle of cooking oil here, a sack of uncooked beans there, dry stock like spices, sugars and cocoa.

Kudelia pulled her intended away long enough to film an invitation to their wedding. Paper was lovely, but pricey even in the low quality used by the average Martian business office; the quality one would want in a personalized wedding invitation made them an extravagance Kudelia was not willing to splurge on—to say nothing of the unreliability of interplanetary delivery times. They sent the video to most everyone who could be reached with LCS.

The next night, sitting alone beneath the humming of Atra’s kitchen light, Kudelia wrote out the exceptions by hand, using a fountain pen she’d barely touched since receiving it as a birthday gift years ago, back before she’d left her parents’ home.

Tomomi Bernstein received an invitation sent by courier. McMurdo Barriston had one handed to him by an underling, fresh off a Gjallarhorn-escorted carrier ship.

Ride was off-planet when Yamagi stopped by the last place any of the Tekkadan survivors had been able to track him to, a run-down apartment in Chryse’s eastern foothills. Trow, who invited Yamagi in after only a few seconds’ sullen staring, could not be convinced to say where Ride had gone nor when he’d be back, only that Embi was in touch with him. Yamagi managed a painful fifteen minutes—not record-setting, but far longer than Eugene could usually endure before snapping. He left Kudelia’s painstakingly written invitations behind, a small, neat stack of white envelopes that lent an out-of-place brightness to the apartment’s gloom.

Atra, who had not thought much about vows and the writing of them until the first of several evenings curled up on the couch with Kudelia and a pile of poetry books and philosophical essay compilations, found herself staring at the task head on. Once she had noticed it, of course, it sat at the back of her mind like a mouse, darting out of unexpected corners, chewing on her stray thoughts. She took a few sheets of paper from Chad’s notepad and folded them up to keep in her back pocket, and spent no small amount of her free time staring and scribbling and crossing out.

She spent a weekend scouring jewelry stores with Cookie and Cracker for Kudelia’s wedding gift, and hid the result away in her closet, tucked into the pocket of her old Tekkadan jacket, which she’d long since outgrown, and couldn’t wear out in public in any case.

Kudelia, meanwhile, had decided months ago what she wanted to give Atra for her wedding gift, but it wasn’t so simple as just purchasing one from a store.

“I have no idea how she made hers look so nice,” Kudelia lamented, pulling a tangle of red hemp cording out of her purse and setting it on the table between them. Yamagi—the only one who’d turned up for an intended double-date, with Chad staying late at the office to sort out a shipping order that had been garbled in transmit and Atra stuck at the orphanage dealing with a split pipe beneath the sink—set his beer aside to examine her progress.

“A lot of practice,” he opined as he pulled the tangle closer, flicking through it with deft fingers. “She used to make these as a hobby, you know.”

“She hasn’t in a long time.” Kudelia sighed, leaning forward on her elbows to watch. “Not since the last one she made Akatsuki.” A blue one to match Mikazuki’s, which they’d never recovered. There’d been no chance to, with the escape to Earth being as pressing as it had been back then.

“Why’d she stop?” Yamagi unknotted strands and stretched them flat against the table, only for them to bunch up on themselves again when he removed his hand.

“I’m—not sure. A sense of finality, maybe?” She stirred her martini absently, remembering Atra weeping in her arms as Akatsuki—just a baby, his ash blond hair soft and fine around the delicate curve of his head—sat in his crib and wetly gummed at Atra’s red bracelet. He’d pulled it off the corner post where Atra used to hang it until he was big enough to wear it properly.

She does still think it’s lucky, right? she worried. She must, or she wouldn’t still have him wearing them everywhere.

“Maybe” she went on, “maybe she thought that she wanted him to have all the luck she could manage? Sometimes people can get—stuck, on thoughts like that.”

Across from her, Yamagi hummed understanding. “Have you tried just starting over?”

“That’s rather the point of the gift,” Kudelia admitted, feeling a touch of heat in her cheeks that she certainly had not yet drunk enough to justify. “I want to remind her that…” She trailed off, wincing faintly and picking up her glass. Was it too selfish, or too naïve, to say, There’s enough luck to go around? Or, She should think of her own protection too?

Yamagi tsked softly, and she looked up to find him running a length of hemp back and forth over the edge of the table with more force than was probably necessary, then frowning when it wrinkled again stubbornly.

“I know what you mean by the gift. I meant you should just start over on making it.” He held up the half-woven bracelet, its loose strands crimped and uneven. “You’re never going to get a smooth line out of these.”

“…Oh.” She took it back from him and laid it out across the table. “That’s a good point.”

“I’d find something sturdier to work with for practice. Go back to the hemp when you’re more confident,” he advised, returning to his beer.

They passed a few moments in silence, Yamagi studying her as she forlornly pressed her fingers across the curving braid then lifted them away, a pensive repetition.

“She always put beads on them,” he said eventually. “Do you have one picked out?”

Kudelia paused, then smiled, gathering the bracelet off the table and letting it curl around her fingers and in the palm of her hand.

“Yes,” she answered softly, drawing the unfinished gift to lie close over her abdomen. “A lily.”

At the two month mark, Chad, Atra and Merribit had what Merribit called a working lunch at Chad’s apartment, away from all possible distractions, to finalize the specific details of the wedding day plan—a timetable and instructions for setting up, carrying out, and cleaning up after the ceremony and reception.

It turned into a dinner as well, afternoon stretching into evening as they made phone calls, shuffled papers, referenced photos, debated the order of events, and in all other ways hammered out the framework for the big day. By the end of the night, there was a copy of the schedule in each of their homes: Merribit’s locked securely in a desk, Atra’s pinned to the farm’s refrigerator, and Chad’s folded up and tucked in an inside pocket of his work jacket.

Two weeks later, Dante drove Atra to the city clerk’s office to file the request for a marriage license.

Growing up in the slums, Atra had developed a general, vague understanding that marriage licenses were hard to obtain, leading many of Mars’ poorer citizens to throw up their hands and decide to celebrate anyway, even with ceremonies that everyone knew weren’t legally binding. For years, she’d assumed it was just a matter of expense. She’d been shocked when she started researching what kind of paperwork went into a lawfully recognized wedding, at the level of vitriol and indignance she found in the public conversation about it.

The economic blocs, she read in article after article, had done everything they could to stop Martian citizens from building solidarity with one another, from union breaking to vote manipulation, from large-scale political interference down to the meanest level of meddling in Martians’ personal lives. The expense of getting a marriage license, it turned out, had only been the most obvious bit of obstructionism; the process had also demanded permanent addresses, documented family information, a detailed medical history, and proof of stable income. Even if they met all the requirements, it hadn’t been uncommon for a couple’s filing to be turned down on formalities, or for unclear reasons, and with no clear way to put in a complaint or ask for a reconsideration.

The whole mess was one of the earliest things that had landed on the Martian Union’s docket, and from there, been dropped down to individual cities’ councils to wrestle with, adding yet another item in a long list of considerations about what African Union policies Chryse was going to keep, what they’d modify, and what they’d throw out completely. The last referendum about it, enacted mostly as a stop-gap until the city council had the time to debate it in detail, had set an eight-year minimum for common law marriages, cut the price of licenses by almost two-thirds, and stripped out every requirement except for the permanent address and a bare-bones medical assessment.

The waiting period from before the planet’s independence was one of the only things that hadn’t changed—the city office required a month’s advance notice, after which it would issue a certificate to be used at a ceremony within the month and signed by both members of the union and two witnesses. Yukinojo, who had for years belligerently stamped his factory logo with the eye insignia that had once taken aim at Rustal Elion himself, roughly assured the brides that he and Merribit would witness for them.

When the Union next recessed, Atra gave Kudelia a few days to wrangle press appearances and business with the Admoss Company before stealing her away for more shopping—gifts, this time, for the wedding party. In the afternoon’s long warmth, the two of them strolled hand-in-hand through the rejuvenated downtown’s stores and shops, Kudelia in her sunglasses resolutely ignoring the familiar blond head tailing them street to street, Atra shooting Eugene cheeky, unrepentant grins when she caught his eye and found him scowling at the length of their browsing.

When she spotted a kitchen goods store, Atra swerved into it, teasing a fond smile onto Kudelia’s face. She trailed her fiancée through the different displays, asking questions when she—not infrequently—saw a tool or machine she didn’t recognize, content to let Atra be the expert.

She’d assumed it was a detour to buy something for the farm, and so she had no warning when Atra carefully tugged a boxed stand mixer off a shelf, settled one edge against her hip, and looked up to ask, “What should we do about your mother?”

“P-Pardon?” Kudelia stammered, blindsided.

“This is for Miss Haba.” Atra bounced the mixer box once in demonstration, a quick smile rising to her lips. “You’re supposed to buy presents for your parents, too, and—well, I thought about it, and she’s almost like a mother to me—she’s definitely the closest thing I have to one, anyway, and I want to tell her so.” Her smile slid away as quickly as it had come, her eyes resting on Kudelia with a solemn awareness of the weight of the topic. “I know your mother hasn’t responded to the invitation yet, but…”

“No, she…” Kudelia swallowed, taking a breath to collect herself. “We’ve barely spoken in years.”

“Weddings are a good time to mend broken bridges, everyone says.” Atra gave her an encouraging smile. “We should get her something. It doesn’t have to be anything too big. What does she like?”

“Goodness…” Kudelia released the breath again, thinking back on her mother, with whom she’d never shared a great many interests to begin with. “We had a garden, but she mostly just took tea there; I don’t think I ever saw her do anything more than cut roses.”

“She likes tea, though?”

“I suppose. It’s the sort of thing nobles do, drinking tea. And there’s so much class divide to it.”

“Class divide? With tea?”

Kudelia smiled, though it felt wan on her face. “All the finest tea is grown on Earth. That’s what the devotees tell you, anyway. I don’t know how much difference there is, really.” And I won’t import tea leaves all the way from Earth as a show of wealth, not even as a gift, she thought, with a twinge of guilt both for keeping the thought silent and for the angry resentment of having it at all.

“Mm… What else?” Atra adjusted her grip on the mixer again and headed up towards the counter. Kudelia drifted after her.

“She plays the piano, but I don’t know what I could get her for that that she doesn’t already have. Most of it belonged to her mother, anyway; it’s all heirloom. She knits, she—”

Atra giggled suddenly, ducking her head to hide a smile. “Seriously? She doesn’t do her own gardening and she has to import expensive tea, but she does her own knitting?”

Kudelia huffed out a short laugh. “When you say it that way, I guess it does sound a little unusual.”

Atra hummed, looking thoughtful as she rummaged in her purse for payment. Kudelia shot the girl behind the counter a polite smile, resisting the urge to brush back a lock of her hair and draw any attention to herself with such a self-conscious gesture. Once Atra had her change and the bagged mixer, Kudelia took her purse from her and they headed back outside.

“Does she have a yarn bowl?” Atra asked, picking the conversation back up again.

“A—bowl? No, I don’t think so,” Kudelia answered, puzzled. As far as she could remember, her mother had always just set her sewing basket beside her chair in the upstairs drawing room, alternating between her quiet work and long, distant stares out the window. She never would tell Kudelia what she was thinking about at times like that, sitting still and solemn and gazing at the sky.

Atra hummed assent and smiled, and Kudelia’s attention returned to her fiancée in a swift, warm rush of affection. “I think I have an idea.”

With all the biggest arrangements made, the wedding party turned their attention to the smaller things, all the little accessories and personal items that would be physical reminders long after flowers wilted and dresses were outgrown.

Some of it, they could go without—a personalized knife and server set for their modest cake would be an extravagance when Cyllene included everything they needed in the normal array of dishes and flatware. The same went for a dish to put under the shoe Atra would be leaving at the center of the dance floor.

The lodge had a price for renting champagne flutes as well, but Cucubita convinced Kudelia that those, at least, could be pulled out for anniversary dinners, and the memory would be worth the investment. The guestbook, too—if there was any place to splurge on a paper product, it was there.

The kneeling pillows, Atra made herself, a quick two nights’ work with the farm’s sewing machine. That weekend, she drove into town herself to pick up a length of silk, dyed the brilliant color of crushed strawberries, that she’d ordered after talking to Sakura about wedding practices months prior.

Something borrowed, something red, a piece of home and a lump of lead, the old woman had told her at the time in a firm, no-arguments-allowed tone, and so the words were folded into the planning. Red, in the silk scarf that would bind their wrists together—their unity practice.

Cookie and Cracker had provided her the something-borrowed; they’d come home from school for the weekend with a secretive sparkle in their eyes, and with a curious air of reverence, had each taken one of her wrists and tugged her into their bedroom. Knowing better than to even attempt prying it out of them, Atra waited patiently for Cookie to unearth a round box from the depths of their closet while Cracker stood by and squeezed Atra’s hand, smiling like a woman remembering a long-lost sweetheart.

The veil had belonged to their mother, they explained as Atra stared down at the folds of white organza trimmed with delicate beads and thin lace flowers. They’d use it themselves at their own weddings, of course, that was always the plan, but they didn’t think their mother would mind if Atra did too, and Atra could think of it as a gesture from both them and Biscuit, so—

And then they had to hurriedly pull the box away as Atra’s eyes overflowed and she dissolved into blubbering, and it took the better part of an hour and a pot of tea before they managed to get back to doing anything useful with the day.

For the piece of home, the party briefly discussed using some of the farm’s harvesting baskets to hold flowers, but hurriedly nixed that plan when Merribit pointed out, as gently as possible, that using plain woven baskets to hold the painstakingly arranged flower sculptures Makanai was overseeing would probably send the old man into apoplexy. Abashed, Kudelia proposed setting her fountain pen by the guest book instead.

The lump of lead came from Yamagi, who went into work early one morning and spent two hours working a cast-off scrap into shape, shaving off its rough edges, pressing it into a smooth, oblong disc, and buffing it to a smooth matte gloss.

Atra came by that night to pick it up, and stood very still as he placed the stone in her hand and folded her fingers closed over it.

“For good luck,” he told her, voice low, and she nodded, her smile soft with understanding.

(Like my writing? Consider buying me a coffee or other overpriced coffee beverage via the Ko-fi link at my About page!)

#mobile suit gundam: iron-blooded orphans #gundam ibo #g tekketsu #kudelia aina bernstein #atra mixta #chad chadan #yamagi gilmerton #my writing #ficcing #scenes from a wedding

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purplesurveys · 4 years

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885

What Rhymes With “AKE”?

[a-zebra-is-a-striped-horse]

1. Does any part of your body ache right now? Not at the moment, but I will say that I’m now sporting several gashes on my arms and fingers thanks to Cooper’s feisty teeth. His grip is a lot firmer now so there’ve been a few times where he was able to grab onto my skin harder than I expected while we played. 2. How do you like your steak? Barely cooked. Blood oozing once I cut into it and all that. 3. Which bone did you last break? I haven’t broken a bone before. 4. How long is your break at work? Back in my internship, we had an hour for lunch and then we were allowed 30 minutes to take a nap. That was awesome to find out, that my boss would give her employees nap time :) The office lights were all turned off and I would even be told off if they caught me working. 5. What did you do over Christmas break? How about spring break? We don’t have spring break. For Christmas I mostly stayed off of social media. Gabie allowed me to open my presents earlier than the 24th because she got me painting stuff and she wanted me to have something to do before Christmas, which is the period where I get most anxious and depressed. Then for Christmas my siblings and I got a Switch from our parents, so most of post-Christmas was spent getting acquainted with it.

6. Do you know anyone named Jake? My fact-checking instructor was a Jake and I absolutely hated his guts. I really don’t like it when a teacher says shit like “I could very much fail you all right now” and says it proudly, and I don’t like how he refused to help and correct us in our articles just because “what [we’re] supposed to do was already covered in a past lecture and [we] should know better.” That’s why we’re enrolled in your class dumbass. We want to learn, but we’re bound to make mistakes too. Anyway, that was four months of pure hell. 7. What’s your favorite thing to bake? I don’t bake a lot but baking cookies has always been nostalgic for me. I love when I get to do it with friends or when my dad allows me to help out in the kitchen. 8. Favorite kind of cake and favorite kind of frosting? Cheesecake. My favorite frosting is either cream cheese or chocolate, especially on my cupcakes.

9. Do you know someone who is fake? Most of the popular girls in my high school were fake but idk, they’ve since seemed genuine in the few times I talked to some of them throughout college. 10. Which lake is closest to you, geographically? Taal. 11. How would you like to make a difference in the world? Ending up the complete opposite of my mom. I just want to prove that some kids don’t always end up the same as the shitty environment they were brought up in. 12. When’s the last time you used a rake? Maybe in high school? We’d have special days where we were assigned to help our janitors and other auxiliary staff ~as a way of saying thanks~ and it’s likely I used a rake at least once. 13. What would you like to take a class in? If I could, I’d take all the history courses that exist. But other than that, I’d love to take a class that covered different countries’ cultures. It was too late when I found out my school has a department that offers classes that taught Japanese, Turkish, Russian, etc. cultures, so that’s a bummer. 14. Have you ever been to a wake before? Yes, a handful. I’ve been to the wake of the relative of my dad’s friend, Sophie, my grandfather...Nacho’s was the most recent. 15. Have you ever used the phrase “for Pete’s sake?!” Maybe once or twice. I’ve gone with its more inappropriate sibling, for fuck’s sake far more often. 16. When’s the last time you felt wide awake? Saturday evening. 17. Do you know how to change the brakes on your car? No. I always forget that you can do that, lol. 18. Do you enjoy listening to Drake? Sure, especially his songs that came out while I was in high school so from 2012-2016. Again, nostalgia just hits differently when it comes to his older songs. 19. When’s the last time you’ve seen snowflakes? Never. 20. Have you ever been called a flake before? I don’t think so, no. 21. When’s the last time you felt your body quake? Two days ago. I walked into the kitchen as my dad was kicking away a ball of dust and I thought it was a rat, so my whole body shuddered and shook lol 22. Favorite type of milkshake? Anything unhealthily sweet. 23. Do you ever try to shake something in order to get it to work again? That’s how I was when I still used TV remotes. I don’t shake things as much anymore. 24. Are you afraid of snakes? Only venomous ones, and ones that can swallow humans alive. I’m not scared of all snakes, in fact I’ve held a few and put them around me in the past. 25. Has your life ever been at stake before? Not that I can recall. 26. Have you ever had to do picture retake at school? I don’t know what this means since we don’t use this exact term, but I’ve needed my college ID re-done TWICE because I also ended up losing my replacement ID haha. In the end, my mom ended up finding my actual original ID just hiding in one of my bags. 27. Are remakes of things better, or the originals? Either have the potential to be better, it’s not black-or-white. Like I’ll always prefer the original 1976 Carrie movie, but I know that the most recent adaptation of Little Women got very good reviews too. 28. Do you call them hotcakes or pancakes? Pancakes. 29. Do you prefer cupcakes or muffins? Cupcakes. 30. What’s the last mistake you made? I shared an article about an update on Naya Rivera but I didn’t notice until after sharing it that it came from TMZ, and we all know how shittily they handed Kobe Bryant’s death. Immediately deleted my post after seeing that no other news outlet had confirmed that it was her body that was found.

Still, the team in charge of finding her in the lake confirmed that it was her a few hours after the TMZ report came out. I’m absolutely gutted. 31. What activity would you like to partake in right now? Any activity that would involve going outside. 32. Have you ever had a teacake before? How about a clambake? I’ve had neither. Clambake looks super appetizing though. It reminds me of a seafood paella that’s served at a local Fil-Mex place I love going to :) 33. What is one of your keepsakes? A Ferrari keychain that JM gave me and our other orgmates as a souvenir from his trip to Singapore to watch the Grand Prix last year. 34. Do you like cornflakes? They’re okay. I’d rather eat them as it is though, and not as a cereal. 35. Have you ever made a fruitcake before? Nope. 36. Do you like strawberry shortcake? How about coffeecake? I’ve had a few slices of coffee cake before. 37. Who’s the last person you gave a handshake to? Probably one of the applicants in our org. 38. Favorite flavor of cheesecake? Oreo! And New York-style. 39. Have you ever felt an earthquake before? Yes. Nothing too extreme though, like no books falling off the shelves or anything like that. They were strong enough for it to be just noticeable.

#survey #surveys

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cmdragonia · 7 years

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Thoughts on the Season Premiers

OK, so I’ve been thinking about the season premiers of Flash, LoT, Supergirl, and Arrow, and I have some thoughts.

Supergirl- WAAYYY to Emo Kid in the first half/two-thirds of the show. I get it, you had to say goodbye to your BF. But seriously, he’s not dead. It was a little too much for me. Also, when the sub was attacking the plaza, Alex and Maggie could have been doing a lot more crowd control than just standing there staring at the water. Just my thoughts. And can someone decide whether Catco is a newspaper or a magazine? They can never keep it straight. Plus, I’m always up for Adrian Pasdar being the bad guy, I’m just so happy that he shaved the terrible S.H.I.E.L.D. mustache. That being said, the scene with Alex and J’onn was awesome. They have always had such an amazing relationship.

Flash- It was the Flash. I am, however, intrigued by some of the things Barry said while his brain was scrambled. Maybe they’ll use flashbacks at times to show what the Speedforce did to Barry while he was in it? It didn’t seem like he was living a happy fantasy there. Iris was a BAMF, but is she still a reporter? The writers seem to keep forgetting what her job is supposed to be. I’m glad they’re giving Caitlin more storyline, especially now that she’s got the Jekyll/Hyde thing going on. The thinker was creepy, looked like Darth Vader without the front of his helmet.

Legends of Tomorrow- Ok. I have a lot of issues of where all the characters were before they decided to get the gang back together. First of all, if Sara was living in Star City, don’t you think Oliver would have given her a job? That way they wouldn’t have had to build a store set that was, in my opinion, a waste of time. You could have easily had her doing something mundane at City Hall without having to pay any of the Arrow cast to appear. And Ray working at a terrible dating startup would not be what I’d have him do either, and I found the jab that his boss made about ‘giving his company to a woman who ran it into the ground’ a bit callous and not true to what actually happened. I guess it irked my feminist side a bit. I did find it funny that the guy who played Caesar was in Spartacus as Marcus Crassus, adding yet another Spartacus actor to appear in the Arrowverse. Yay, geeky knowledge. Otherwise it was a decent episode, although have we ever seen Amaya use more than one animal at a time, or is that a new development? That was pretty cool.

Arrow- OK. This was very good. My headcannon was that Diggle had inhaled a lot of smoke/fire and had lung damage, which hindered his ability in the field, but something neurological is just as good. But he did have a scar on his pec as he was putting his shirt on at the end, right? So nerve damage works. Also, I know a lot of people were commenting on the “not just friends” chemistry he and Dinah had, but I felt that last season too between them. Either way, they still have a friendship that works for me. Also, did Dinah's voice change a bit from last season? I liked Wild Dog's suit upgrade, but at first I thought he was Vigilante because they looked similar. The flashbacks to the island were pretty choppy, and them all taking cover in the airplane was a little too convenient, but, hey, plot device! I’d be interested in seeing if they show any more of them getting off the island/ whole team reuniting. And everyone was right about the Thea in a coma outcome. I know some of the media outlets said that having everyone but Samantha survive was a little too optimistic, but given all that they’ve been through, plus she was only a secondary character, it seems appropriate. Everyone’s outfits were ON POINT, so props to wardrobe!!! Plus, Oliver character growth and Olicity flirting gave me all the feels. The Quentin guilt story-line was a bit over exaggerated, I think. I’ve decided to count all the times he says “my baby girl”, because they use that a LOT. I get he has grief, but they explained to him like 4 different times both last season and in the premier that she’s not his kid. (Plus, in my head, if Sara was in Star City per LoT, wouldn’t he be a bit happier because she’d be around/ probably staying with him? That makes a lot more sense to me.) Either way, very happy with the premier, bring on the new season!

Let me know if you have any thoughts to add!! I love hearing/sharing thoughts with others in the fandom!

#arrow #The Flash #supergirl #legends of tomorrow #lot #spoilers #arrow spoilers #flash spoilers #supergirl spoilers

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restoreamericanglory · 4 years

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New Post has been published on Restore American Glory

New Post has been published on http://www.restoreamericanglory.com/breaking-news/mainstream-media-finally-reports-on-bidens-accuser-with-sickening-bias/

Mainstream Media Finally Reports on Biden’s Accuser (With Sickening Bias)

Roughly a thousand years after far-left and right-wing internet media covered the story of Tara Reade’s accusations against her former boss, Joe Biden, the mainstream press finally decided to publish the story this weekend. On Sunday, stories were published at the Washington Post, The New York Times, and NBC News, catching up to the accusation – which Reade made weeks ago on a podcast with Rolling Stone writer Katie Halper.

Unfortunately, if you expected that these outlets would give Reade the overwhelming benefit of the doubt – if you expected them to guide the reader towards “believing all women” in this instance – you were gravely disappointed.

While none of the articles published about Reade’s accusation came right out and called Biden’s former staffer a crazy liar, they basically did everything but dismiss her allegations out of hand. The Washington Post story is perhaps the worst in that regard, even including in the subheading this early dismissal: “Joe Biden’s presidential campaign called Tara Reade’s accusations false. ‘It is untrue. This absolutely did not happen.’”

Remember when they treated Brett Kavanaugh’s denial with the same level of seriousness that they treated Christine Blasey Ford’s accusations? We don’t either.

The Post spends the first few paragraphs drilling it into our heads that Reade has changed her story – that she originally only accused Biden of inappropriately touching her neck and shoulders, but said nothing about the more serious sexual assault that she alleged in the podcast with Halper. This is similar to the way they emphasized how Blasey Ford never said a word about her woeful encounter with Kavanaugh for thirty years. Oh, they didn’t emphasize that? We keep forgetting…

They then turn to Reade’s political agenda, which they highlight by telling us she’s a shill for Bernie Sanders, she’s a shill for Russia, and that she supported the Obama/Biden administration. This is comparable to the way they ran a front page story the day Blasey Ford’s lawyer admitted that her client was desperate to keep the anti-abortion Kavanaugh off the Supreme Court. Also comparable to the way they dismissed E. Jean Carrol’s accusations against Trump due to her tweets praising The Apprentice. Oh right, they didn’t do either of those things.

Speaking of Trump, how about THIS paragraph from the Biden/Reade story:

The former vice president has been accused of unwanted hugging and other physical contact, but The Post found no other allegations against him as serious as Reade’s. More than a dozen women, by contrast, have accused Trump of forced kissing, groping or sexual assault, and he has been recorded on audio boasting about grabbing women between their legs.

Wow. Make it a little more obvious, why don’t you?

It seems clear already that, barring some video evidence (and maybe not even then), the media is determined not to take Tara Reade’s accusation seriously. Apparently, #MeToo is just useful when it comes to trashing Republicans and expendable Democrats. Biden is just too big to fail.

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mama-forum-ch-blog · 5 years

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everettwilkinson · 7 years

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THE BANNON intvw intrigue: what was he doing? — WHAT TRIGGERS TRUMP's temper — KELLY 'dismayed' — FIRST IN PLAYBOOK: Sessions remarks in N.C. — B'DAY: Ron Bonjean

Good Thursday morning. BANNON SPEAKS … TWO Steve Bannon interviews in the last 48 or so hours.

— NYT: “Trump’s Embrace of Racially Charged Past Puts Republicans in Crisis,” by Jeremy Peters, Jonathan Martin and Jack Healy: “Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, said in an interview that if Democrats want to fight over Confederate monuments and attack Mr. Trump as a bigot, that was a fight the president would win. ‘President Trump, by asking, ‘Where does this all end’ — Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln — connects with the American people about their history, culture and traditions,’ he said. ‘The race-identity politics of the left wants to say it’s all racist,’ Mr. Bannon added. ‘Just give me more. Tear down more statues. Say the revolution is coming. I can’t get enough of it.’” http://nyti.ms/2fN5ShN

Story Continued Below

— THE BIG WHAMMY — READ THIS: “Steve Bannon, Unrepentant: Trump’s embattled strategist phones me, unbidden, to opine on China, Korea, and his enemies in the administration,” by Robert Kuttner in the American Prospect: “Needless to say, I was a little stunned to get an email from Bannon’s assistant midday Tuesday, just as all hell was breaking loose once again about Charlottesville, saying that Bannon wished to meet with me. I’d just published a column on how China was profiting from the U.S.-North Korea nuclear brinkmanship, and it included some choice words about Bannon’s boss. …

“Far from dressing me down for comparing Trump to Kim, he began, ‘It’s a great honor to finally track you down. I’ve followed your writing for years and I think you and I are in the same boat when it comes to China. You absolutely nailed it.’ ‘We’re at economic war with China,’ he added. ‘It’s in all their literature. They’re not shy about saying what they’re doing. One of us is going to be a hegemon in 25 or 30 years and it’s gonna be them if we go down this path. On Korea, they’re just tapping us along. It’s just a sideshow.’ …

“Contrary to Trump’s threat of fire and fury, Bannon said: ‘There’s no military solution [to North Korea’s nuclear threats], forget it. Until somebody solves the part of the equation that shows me that ten million people in Seoul don’t die in the first 30 minutes from conventional weapons, I don’t know what you’re talking about, there’s no military solution here, they got us.’ …

“‘I’m changing out people at East Asian Defense; I’m getting hawks in. I’m getting Susan Thornton [acting head of East Asian and Pacific Affairs] out at State.’ But can Bannon really win that fight internally? ‘That’s a fight I fight every day here,’ he said. ‘We’re still fighting. There’s Treasury and [National Economic Council chair] Gary Cohn and Goldman Sachs lobbying.’ …

“I asked Bannon about the connection between his program of economic nationalism and the ugly white nationalism epitomized by the racist violence in Charlottesville and Trump’s reluctance to condemn it. … He dismissed the far right as irrelevant and sidestepped his own role in cultivating it: ‘Ethno-nationalism—it’s losers. It’s a fringe element. I think the media plays it up too much, and we gotta help crush it, you know, uh, help crush it more.’ ‘These guys are a collection of clowns,’ he added.” http://bit.ly/2w4q0lW

**SUBSCRIBE to Playbook: http://politi.co/2lQswbh

OK, LET’S REVIEW. This is super juicy. BANNON dumped on colleagues and contradicted the president on North Korea. There are two positions here: Axios’s Jonathan Swan writes Bannon did not know he was giving an interview. @jonathanvswan: “You might read some takes tomorrow saying Bannon is playing 5D chess & this was part of a devious strategy. Those takes will be wrong.” (Read Swan’s piece for more http://bit.ly/2i9eMqL). Bannon has told people he did not believe this was an on-the-record call. Kuttner, who wrote the piece, said he and Bannon never discussed it being off the record. Generally speaking, that’s a conversation you have if you want your remarks kept private. To believe Bannon is to believe that he was caught off guard after calling the reporter, forgot the rules of conventional journalism or believed a left-wing reporter would keep his incendiary remarks private.

— THE ALTERNATE VIEW: Bannon is an incredibly savvy political operator who talks to reporters all the time, and did these interviews for some reason. Yes, Bannon, who is a top adviser to the president who harps on leaking, is constantly gabbing with journalists. He gave two interviews over the course of roughly 48 hours. His job was on the line, then he found himself aligned with the president over protests in the south. He used the Prospect to dump on Gary Cohn, the president’s economic adviser, with whom he has clashed, and to get his views heard on China. Whatever his motivation was, he felt like he should dial up some reporters and get his take out there.

THE BIG PICTURE — MIKE SHEAR, MAGGIE HABERMAN and GLENN THRUSH: “The president’s top advisers described themselves as stunned, despondent and numb. Several said they were unable to see how Mr. Trump’s presidency would recover, and others expressed doubts about his capacity to do the job. In contrast, the president told close aides that he felt liberated by his news conference. Aides said he seemed to bask afterward in his remarks, and viewed them as the latest retort to the political establishment that he sees as trying to tame his impulses. Mr. Trump’s venting on Tuesday came despite pleas from his staff, including his daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner. …

“Mr. Bannon, whose future in the White House remains uncertain, has been encouraging Mr. Trump to remain defiant. Two White House officials who have been trying to moderate the president’s position suggested that Mr. Bannon was using the crisis as a way to get back in the good graces of the president, who has soured on Mr. Bannon’s internal machinations and reputation for leaking stories about West Wing rivals to conservative news media outlets. Many in the White House said they still held on to the hope, however slim, that the new White House chief of staff, John F. Kelly, could impose order on the disarray even as Mr. Trump hopscotches from one self-destructive episode to the next. Mr. Kelly, who watched the president’s performance on Tuesday with his head hung low, grimacing at some of Mr. Trump’s remarks, is frustrated, according to people inside the White House.” http://nyti.ms/2i7LnwM

THE PRESIDENT at 6:19 a.m.: “Publicity seeking Lindsey Graham falsely stated that I said there is moral equivalency between the KKK, neo-Nazis & white supremacists………and people like Ms. Heyer. Such a disgusting lie. He just can’t forget his election trouncing.The people of South Carolina will remember!”

— WE NEVER REALLY hear Graham talk about the presidential primary, which he dropped out of nearly two years ago (Dec. 2015). ALSO: Graham won his last election by 15 points, and won his last primary by 41 points.

— NANCY COOK and JOSH DAWSEY: “‘In some ways, Trump would rather have people calling him racist than say he backed down the minute he was wrong,’ one adviser to the White House said on Wednesday about Charlottesville. ‘This may turn into the biggest mess of his presidency because he is stubborn and doesn’t realize how bad this is getting.’ For Trump, anger serves as a way to manage staff, express his displeasure or simply as an outlet that soothes him. Often, aides and advisers say, he’ll get mad at a specific staffer or broader situation, unload from the Oval Office and then three hours later act as if nothing ever occurred even if others still feel rattled by it. Negative television coverage and lawyers earn particular ire from him. White House officials and informal advisers say the triggers for his temper are if he thinks someone is lying to him, if he’s caught by surprise, if someone criticizes him, or if someone stops him from trying to do something or seeks to control him.” http://politi.co/2wbZSWB

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): If you know only one fact about rising drug costs, know this one: drug makers set prices for prescription drugs. To help manage nearly double-digit price increases, employers, unions and government programs use PBMs to negotiate lower net prices to help curb costs for employers and patients. Learn more at affordableprescriptiondrugs.org ******

MORE FALLOUT — “Mitch McConnell’s secret fury over Charlottesville response highlights GOP’s Trump dilemma,” by USA Today’s Heidi Przybyla: “There was a reason why it took Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell an entire night to respond to President Trump’s chaotic news conference equating counter protesters with the Nazis they came to resist. He was livid. Two sources close to the senator, speaking under condition of anonymity to describe private conversations, said the pro-civil rights Republican who lived through the 1960s in Kentucky closely deliberated on the best way forward.” https://usat.ly/2x5LTyj

— WHAT MNUCHIN THINKS, per Bloomberg’s Saleha Mohsin, Justin Sink, and Margaret Talev: “As Treasury Department aides filtered in for a routine meeting on Wednesday, there was one main issue to be discussed: Secretary Steven Mnuchin does not stand with Donald Trump on the topic of neo-Nazis. Mnuchin, like other officials, had no idea the president would inflame the Charlottesville controversy by equating white supremacists to counter-protesters, the staff was told, according to two people familiar with the meeting.

“He stood beside Trump at the president’s news conference in New York, the one that devolved into a shouting match with reporters over race, but not with the intent of endorsing his remarks on the issue. And now the message was that it’s time to move on. The team was encouraged to look beyond the chaos of the past several days and instead focus on advancing Trump’s economic agenda, the two people said.” https://bloom.bg/2w4vj4Q

— “Former CIA director slams Trump’s ‘despicable’ comments in letter to CNN anchor,” by CNN’s Zachary Cohen: “Former CIA director John Brennan slammed President Donald Trump’s ‘dangerous’ and ‘ugly’ comments on the deadly violence at a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia — writing a personal letter to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer after ‘The Situation Room’ anchor spoke publicly about the fact that he lost all four grandparents to the evils of Nazism. … ‘If allowed to continue along this senseless path, Mr. Trump will do lasting harm to American society and to our standing in the world. By his words and his actions, Mr. Trump is putting our national security and our collective futures at grave risk.’” With the whole letter http://cnn.it/2uRYRid

–“Apple’s Tim Cook ‘disagrees’ with Donald Trump’s take on neo-Nazi violence in Charlottesville,” by Recode’s Tony Romm and Kara Swisher: “Apple CEO Tim Cook on Wednesday called for an ‘unequivocal’ denouncement of the recent neo-Nazi demonstration in Charlottesville, Virginia, stressing he disagreed with comments by President Donald Trump that attributed the violence there to ‘many sides’ — and not white supremacists. In a note to Apple’s employees, obtained Wednesday night by Recode, Cook also announced the company would donate $1 million each to the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League. Apple plans to match its employees donations to human rights groups — on a 2-for-1 basis — until Sept 30, while setting up a new system in iTunes, its music software, to ‘offer users an easy way to join us in directly supporting the work of the SPLC,’ Cook said.” http://bit.ly/2w4TUXi

— YASHAR ALI: “Rabbi That Oversaw Ivanka Trump’s Conversion to Judaism Slams Trump on Charlottesville Response” http://nym.ag/2fNDCeS

NEW STRIKING TIME COVER – The magazine devotes its issue to a special report on Charlottesville, with essays by Nancy Gibbs, Eddie S. Glaude Jr., John Grisham, Jon Meacham, Ilhan Omar, and Tavis Smiley. The cover shows a figure wearing an American flag giving a Nazi salute. See the cover: http://bit.ly/2uJpFp1

— MICHAEL SCHERER will be on “Morning Joe” this morning at 7:40 a.m. to discuss the cover story.

THE COMING BATTLE — @CoryBooker: “I will be introducing a bill to remove Confederate statues from the US Capitol building. This is just one step. We have much work to do.”

COMING ATTRACTIONS — “House Homeland Security Committee to hold hearing on domestic terror threats after Charlottesville,” by Washington Examiner’s Josh Siegel: “Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, announced Wednesday his panel will host a hearing next month focused on domestic terrorism threats, including that of white supremacist groups, following the weekend clash in Charlottesville at a rally organized by white nationalist groups. The Sept. 12 hearing was previously scheduled as part of an annual review of worldwide terrorist threats. But McCaul, R-Texas, said the hearing will be broadened to also address domestic threats.” http://washex.am/2i906I4

WAPO’S ASHLEY PARKER and BOB COSTA on JOHN KELLY — “Trump’s lack of discipline leaves new chief of staff frustrated and dismayed”: “The uproar — which has consumed not only the White House but the Republican Party — left Kelly deeply frustrated and dismayed just over two weeks into his job, said people familiar with his thinking. The episode also underscored the difficult challenges that even a four-star general faces in instilling a sense of order around Trump, whose first instinct when cornered is to lash out, even self-destructively. …

“This portrait of the White House under Kelly comes from interviews with 17 West Wing aides, informal advisers, Republican lawmakers and Trump confidants, many speaking on the condition of anonymity to offer a more candid assessment….Kelly has largely improved staff morale, and implemented a rigor and order that has made West Wing aides feel both more optimistic and less mistrustful of one another, several White House aides said. …

“Kelly has transformed the West Wing from a political Grand Central Station — with aides and hangers-on cycling through the Oval Office — into an actual place of business. One outside adviser recalls stopping by the White House to say hello to his friends on days he had free time. Under Kelly, he said, approvingly, ‘If you’re coming, now it’s, ‘Why are you coming? Who are you coming to see? And why does the White House care about what you have to say?’’ …

“Late last week in Bedminster, he gathered at Trump’s clubhouse restaurant for a relaxed, social dinner with the senior staff members. … As they reminisced about the campaign and told jokes, Kelly offered a quip. ‘The best job I ever had was as a sergeant in the Marine Corps,’ he said with a laugh, ‘and after one week on this job, I believe the best job I ever had is as a sergeant in the Marine Corps.’” http://wapo.st/2wcJWU6

NYT’S MIKE SCHMIDT and MATT APUZZO: “Trump Lawyer Forwards Email Echoing Secessionist Rhetoric”: “President Trump’s personal lawyer on Wednesday forwarded an email to conservative journalists, government officials and friends that echoed secessionist Civil War propaganda and declared that the group Black Lives Matter “has been totally infiltrated by terrorist groups.”

“The email forwarded by John Dowd, who is leading the president’s legal team, painted the Confederate general Robert E. Lee in glowing terms and equated the South’s rebellion to that of the American Revolution against England. Its subject line — ‘The Information that Validates President Trump on Charlottesville’ — was a reference to comments Mr. Trump made earlier this week in the aftermath of protests in the Virginia college town. ‘You cannot be against General Lee and be for General Washington,’ the email reads, ‘there literally is no difference between the two men.’ …

“‘You’re sticking your nose in my personal email?’ Mr. Dowd told The Times in a brief telephone interview. ‘People send me things. I forward them.’ He then hung up.” … The email’s author, Jerome Almon, runs several websites alleging government conspiracies and arguing that the F.B.I. has been infiltrated by Islamic terrorists. He once unsuccessfully sued the State Department for $900 million over claims of discrimination.” http://nyti.ms/2vLd8OX

WHAT TRUMP IS READING — “Republican Congressman Meets With WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange,” by Daily Caller’s Alex Pfeiffer: “After TheDC broke the news of the meeting, Rohrabacher put out a statement in which he said Assange ‘emphatically stated that the Russians were not involved in the hacking or disclosure of [Hillary Clinton’s] emails.’ The three met for three hours and Rohrabacher is the first congressman to have visited the WikiLeaks founder. A press release from the California congressman’s office stated that Rohrabacher ‘plans to divulge more of what he found directly to President Trump.’” http://bit.ly/2fMsDSS

–WE HAD HEARD earlier this week that Rohrabacher was planning on trying to meet up with Assange. When we emailed his spokesman Ken Grubbs to ask what Rohrabacher was going to do in London, he told us on Monday night: “[H]e’s on his way to meet up with his wife to celebrate their 20th anniversary.”

NIMBY — “Mayors taking swift action to avoid becoming the next Charlottesville,” by WaPo’s Janell Ross, Mark Berman and Joel Achenbach: “City officials across the country are nervously trying to figure out how to avoid becoming the next Charlottesville as alt-right leaders and white nationalist groups vow to stage more rallies in coming days. A group claiming it is advocating free speech has planned a rally for Saturday on the historic Boston Common, with a group advocating racial justice planning its own gathering in opposition. Boston officials said they have laid down strict conditions, including no sticks, weapons or backpacks. … A rally scheduled for Aug. 26 in San Francisco has prompted House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D) and several California lawmakers to urge the National Park Service to rescind the permit to gather on federal park land there.” http://wapo.st/2i8kEjL

— PHOENIX MAYOR WANTS TRUMP TO DELAY — by Arizona Republic’s Yvonne Wingett Sanchez: “Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton wrote in a statement Wednesday he was disappointed to learn of Trump’s visit so close to the violent events in Charlottesville. The mayor called on Trump to delay the visit. ‘If President Trump is coming to Phoenix to announce a pardon for former Sheriff Joe Arpaio, then it will be clear that his true intent is to inflame emotions and further divide our nation,’ the statement said.” http://bit.ly/2w1CI4N

SCOOP — “Trump Set to Roll Back Obama-Era Contraception Rule,” by WSJ’s Michelle Hackman and Louise Radnofsky: “The Trump administration is poised to issue a rule unwinding an Obama-era requirement that employee health benefits include contraception, which will spark a fresh round of litigation over an issue that has been before courts for six years. Federal health officials are expected to finalize a regulation that would allow employers with religious or moral objections to birth control to omit coverage for contraception from their workers’ plans … The Trump administration rule would allow a much broader set of employers to opt out of offering coverage for birth control, making moot a ‘workaround’ designed by the Obama administration that allowed women in some cases to obtain coverage even if their employers had declined to offer it directly.” http://on.wsj.com/2i8MgFH

PHOTO DU JOUR: University of Virginia students, faculty and Charlottesville residents attend a candle light march across campus grounds on Aug. 16. Hundreds gathered on the campus for a candlelight vigil against hate and violence days after Charlottesville erupted in chaos during a white nationalist rally. | Andrew Shurtleff/The Daily Progress via AP

FIRST IN PLAYBOOK – WHAT A.G. JEFF SESSIONS WILL SAY TODAY — Sessions is speaking about gang violence today at 11:30 a.m. to local and federal law enforcement from North Carolina at the Gangs Across the Carolinas Training Symposium in Winston-Salem, North Carolina: “According to the FBI’s most recent National Gang Report, approximately half of the gang investigators they surveyed said that gang membership and gang activity were increasing. Approximately one third of jurisdictions reported an increase in threats to law enforcement. … Whether it is MS-13, the Bloods, or Outlaw Motorcycle Clubs, gangs are targeting our youth and law-abiding citizens. But I have news for these vicious criminals: WE ARE TARGETING YOU. …

“President Trump is serious about supporting our state and local law enforcement. That is why he sent my Department three executive orders when I took office. One directs us to be supportive of law enforcement. A second declared that our mission is to reduce crime. And the third requires us to dismantle transnational criminal organizations. These are our goals and we are getting after them. … Since the beginning of this year, the Department of Justice has secured more than 1,200 convictions against gang members. … We will not let up. We will combat this threat, take the fight to them, and devastate these criminal enterprises. I refuse to cede one more block, one more street corner, one more inch to these gangs.”

FOR YOUR RADAR — REUTERS: “China military criticizes ‘wrong’ U.S. moves on Taiwan, South China Sea: “The ‘wrong’ actions of the United States on Taiwan, its South China Sea patrols and deployment of an advanced anti-missile system in South Korea have had a large, negative influence on military trust, a senior Chinese officer said on Thursday. Fan Changlong, a vice chairman of China’s powerful Central Military Commission, told Joseph Dunford, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, that mutual trust mechanisms between the two militaries had continued to improve, China’s defense ministry said. ‘But wrong actions on the Taiwan issue, the United States deploying the THAAD system around China, U.S. ships and aircraft’s activities in the South China Sea, the United States close-in surveillance in the sea and air near China have had a large, negative influence on bilateral military ties and mutual trust,’ Fan added.” http://reut.rs/2uScduN

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): Pharmacy benefit managers negotiate the lowest net price for prescriptions on behalf of employers and other health care purchasers; however, the list price – the important starting point for those negotiations — continues to rise, at a rate of nearly ten percent in 2016 alone. Increased competition, faster reviews of generics and biosimilars and ending anti-competitive practices can also bring down the cost of medications for patients. Learn more at affordableprescriptiondrugs.org ******

CASH DASH — “Lawmakers raise cash off Trump-Russia probe,” by Austin Wright and Darren Samuelsohn: “Rep. Eric Swalwell’s campaign website features ominous photos of President Donald Trump, Donald Trump Jr. and Jared Kushner. It warns about Russia’s attacks on last year’s presidential election and asks visitors to sign a petition demanding that a bipartisan commission investigate. Those who sign are then asked to contribute $5, $10, $25 or more to the California Democrat. Swalwell is one of the junior members of the House Intelligence Committee, which has long had an unspoken rule against engaging in partisan fundraising related to the panel’s secretive work.

“But the panel’s high-profile Russia investigation is now putting that rule to the test, and experts are warning that some committee members’ recent appeals for campaign cash could undermine everyone’s credibility. … Fundraising appeals from Intelligence Committee members have so far avoided detailed references to the panel’s investigation, but there is undoubtedly a connection. And these fundraising appeals come as outside groups, including some with ties to the Trump administration, are capitalizing on the highly charged issue to bolster their own war chests.” http://politi.co/2uSeLsQ

BEHIND THE SCENES — “The 48 Frantic Hours Before CEOs Broke With Trump,” by Bloomberg’s Melissa Mittelman, Jennifer Kaplan, Jing Cao and Zachary Tracer: https://bloom.bg/2vL2Z4Q

LIKE A PHOENIX — “Rahm Emanuel rehabs his national profile,” by Natasha Korecki and Kristen East: “Rahm Emanuel’s bungling of the Laquan McDonald shooting case in 2015 so sunk his stature with the African-American community, Hillary Clinton wouldn’t be seen with him during her campaign stops in his city. With one crisis of violence in minority neighborhoods and another with police department morale, he had all but been silenced on national politics. But 18 months after fighting off resignation calls and protests in the streets, the Chicago mayor has rediscovered his national voice — and with Donald Trump in the White House, he’s as emboldened as ever to use it. He’s on CNN. He’s on The New York Times’ op-ed pages. He’s dispensing advice to top House Democrats on national campaign strategy. He’s jetting off to Milan and London to forge mayoral alliances while brashly picking fights with New York. The biggest headlines have come from Emanuel’s decision to become the first big-city mayor to legally challenge Trump’s immigration policies.” http://politi.co/2x6J8ws

MEDIAWATCH — “Jennifer Steinhauer Named Editor of Live Journalism/D.C.” at the New York Times http://bit.ly/2w4sa4S

NYT BRINGS EVENTS TO D.C. — “The New York Times announced today that its celebrated TimesTalks event series will expand into the arena of politics, policy and current events with a provocative three-part series this fall in Washington D.C. TimesTalks/D.C. will feature Times journalists as they explore the most pressing issues of the day in conversations with leaders who are shaping our world. The inaugural event will feature a conversation between House Speaker Paul Ryan and The Times’s deputy Washington editor Jonathan Weisman on tax policy reform discussions in Congress and the legislative agenda. Speaker Ryan will provide insight on his party strategy and goals. This TimesTalks/D.C. conversation will take place the morning of Thursday, September 7 at the Newseum.” http://politi.co/2uLgLar

PLAYBOOK INBOX — Richard Viguerie, “A call to action re Steve Bannon”: “Dear Conservative Leader: The campaign against our friend and fellow conservative Steve Bannon has reached a fever pitch, and it is urgent that you join me in letting President Trump know just how deeply it would divide his winning coalition if he were to cave-in to those who wish to derail his agenda by removing Steve Bannon from the White House staff. … I believe that the campaign to remove Steve Bannon from the White House staff is part of a well-thought-out effort to isolate the President from his conservative – populist base, stymie our conservative – populist agenda and to make Donald Trump a one-term President.” The full letter http://politi.co/2vLDPDo

— ANN SELZER emails: “I’m writing to let you know that after eight years of working exclusively with Bloomberg on their national political polling, my firm is now available to work with other clients as Bloomberg takes a hiatus for this off-election year. This is not necessarily a permanent arrangement. We both like each other and foresee we will work on projects together again one day. This means I can take on new polling-related projects, collaborations, and consultative relationships with clients that were not possible while I held an exclusive arrangement with Bloomberg News. If you or someone you know might be interested in working with me, please be in touch.”

VALLEY TALK — “Apple Readies $1 Billion War Chest for Hollywood Programming,” by WSJ’s Tripp Mickle: “Apple has set a budget of roughly $1 billion to procure and produce original content over the next year, according to people familiar with the matter—a sign of how serious the maker of iPhones is about making a splash in Hollywood. Combined with the company’s marketing clout and global reach, the step immediately makes Apple a considerable competitor in a crowded market, where both new and traditional media players are vying for original shows. … Apple could acquire and produce as many as 10 television shows.” http://on.wsj.com/2w4rOeHe

SPOTTED enjoying Wednesday afternoon’s Nationals game together: Kelly Simpson, Dave Natonski, Brent Robertson, Charlie Keller, Alex Schriver, and Matt Haller.

OUT AND ABOUT – Pool report: “The British Embassy opened its doors yesterday to over 200 soccer football fanatics for a live recording of this season’s inaugural ‘Men in Blazers’ podcast, a show which ‘aims to enlighten the masses to the wildly entertaining world of soccer.’ At the event, which sold out to the public in 10 minutes, the Men In Blazers hosts Roger Bennett and Michael Davies sat down with CBS’s Major Garrett, CNN’s Chris Cillizza and British Ambassador Kim Darroch to talk soccer, the start of the Premier League season last weekend (which is celebrating its 25th anniversary) and the British brand’s popularity in Washington, where it has been one of the top local markets for Premier League coverage on NBC Sports over the past few years.”

TRANSITIONS — America First Action, a pro-Trump super PAC, has named Corey Lewandowski as a senior adviser and a spokesman. … Bustle has named political strategist Karine Jean-Pierre as a contributing editor. Jean-Pierre is the senior adviser and national spokesperson for MoveOn.org.

— PELOSI WORLD: Henry Connelly has been named as deputy communications director for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. Connelly is currently director of speechwriting. He is a graduate of Yale and an alum of former Rep. Janice Hahn’s office.

ENGAGED – Jeff Grappone, who works in corporate communications at Siemens USA, on Tuesday proposed to Amy Graham, who works in public affairs at the EPA. “Amy and Jeff met in 2012 at the Vice Presidential debate in Danville, Kentucky. She was part of the Romney campaign’s surrogate operation and Jeff was there with Sen. Kelly Ayotte. Amy and Jeff became instant friends at the debate and started dating in 2015. Jeff proposed on Siasconset Beach in Nantucket and they celebrated at dinner in town with friends before finishing the night at the Club Car’s piano bar.” Pic http://bit.ly/2w4n5tm

— Aaron Wells, a partner at The Smoot Tewes Group, got engaged this past weekend to Beth Florence, a nurse at Suburban Hospital in Bethesda. Aaron proposed at their alma mater, Augsburg University, followed by a celebration with family and friends in Minnesota. Pics http://politi.co/2x6V3dR … http://politi.co/2uLibBH

BIRTHDAY OF THE DAY: Ron Bonjean, partner at Rokk Solutions, celebrating with his “folks (my dad and I share the same birthday) at The Good Pants Ranch.” A fun fact about Ron: “In college, I was the announcer for the Milwaukee County Zoo’s Dolphin and Sea Lion Show. I still have most of the script memorized since we did it 5 shows a day, 7 days a week all summer long.” Read his Playbook Plus Q&A: http://politi.co/2wSCdIb

BIRTHDAYS: Glen Caplin, senior adviser for Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand … former Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) is 68 … Politico’s Alexis Williams … Rep. David Price (D-N.C.) is 77. He’s celebrating by discussing U.S. energy policy with a bipartisan group of colleagues at an Aspen Institute conference (h/t Sawyer Hackett) … Rep. Jackie Walorski (R-Ind.) is 54 … Jamie Smith, global chief communications officer for the BitFury Group, is 4-0. She’s celebrating with “a true throw back Thursday with the kids: Six Flags America (weather permitting). Lincoln Rose (4) and Elijah James (2) are thrilled to experience sun (or rain) with their mommy on her very special birthday” (hubby tip: Eric Pierce) … Ali Deckard … IJR CTO Carl Sceusa is 27 (h/t Anton Vuljaj) … Elyse Cohen of the U.S. Chamber Foundation and a Michelle Obama alum … Leah Nelson of Sunshine Sachs (h/t Clare Tonneson) … Derek McGinty … Sabrina Leigh Schaeffer, VP at the Herald Group … Mike Buczkiewicz, senior producer at “Morning Joe” … Josh Dubois is 35 … Chris Golden … Sonali Dohale … David Kusnet, former White House speechwriter and principal at the Podesta Group (h/t Jon Haber) … HuffPost’s Elise Foley … Mark Molaro … Aaron Kinnari …

… Matt Mittenthal, director of comms for BuzzFeed News … Carlee Griffeth, O’Malley/SCDP alum who now does comms for Rep. Kurt Schrader, “celebrating the end of being on her parents’ health care plan #ThanksObama. She’ll be feted by friends after work at Cantina Marina.” (h/t Matt Corridoni) … Tyler Nickerson … Alyson Chadwick … Eric Stark … Indonesia turns 72 on its Independence Day … Monica Fernandez … Carlee Griffeth … Ashley Harris … Nick Hawatmeh … Laura DeSimone … Andrea McCarthy … Kevin Lillard … Kate Gladney … Boston Globe’s Eric Moskowitz … Margie Glick … Yousef Saba … Mandy Matti … Rex Babin … John Hayes, the pride of Cedar Falls, Iowa … Suzy Loftus … Nancy Kirshner … Robyn Garnett … Diane Shust … Ken Bailey … Michael Alter (h/ts Teresa Vilmain) … Ken Bailey … Alan Bowser … Maegan Carberry … Kate Stacy … Kevin Mack … Mary Lou Foy … Lisa Stickan … Greg Murphy … Michael Kraft … former Chinese president Jiang Zemin is 91 … author V.S. Naipaul is 85 … Robert DeNiro is 74 … author Jonathan Franzen is 58 … Sean Penn is 57 (h/ts AP)

****** A message from the Coalition for Affordable Prescription Drugs (CAPD): The high prices that drug makers set for prescription drugs can put financial strain on patients, employers, unions and others who provide health care coverage to more than 50 percent of Americans. Pharmacy benefit managers negotiate the lowest net price for prescriptions on behalf of employers, unions and government programs. But, as list prices – the starting point for those negotiations — continue their nearly double-digit increases, the effects ripple throughout the system. The key to ensuring greater access and affordability lies in fostering greater competition. Facilitating faster reviews of generics and biosimilars, identifying off-patent drugs with little or no generic competition, and ending anti-competitive practices that keep safe, effective alternatives out of the market are also key to abating rising drug costs for patients. Learn more at affordableprescriptiondrugs.org ******

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