#mine is from my grandmother it was hers since the 40s I think?

[wigglebox]

Comfy & cozy are we ✨🎄

#spn fanart #destiel #destiel fanart #dean winchester #castiel #spn #supernatural #wiggleart #spnfanart #worked on this on and off the last few weeks as I finished the coloring book #so I could remember how to use color and not get burned out by doing line art all month lmao #added the ceramic Christmas tree bc I’m obsessed with mine #mine is from my grandmother it was hers since the 40s I think? #idk I was fascinated by it as a child and so when my grandfather died I got it #I love it to bits lol

[katy-l-wood]

You know, I talk about my family Cabin on here a lot, but I don't think I've ever actually explained what the Cabin IS. So. Story time. We haven't had a story time in awhile.

This story starts sometime in the early 1900s with my great grandfather losing half his right hand in some sort of logging/mill/mining accident. The stories vary depending who in the family you ask. (He also ran mule trains over the mountains at some point.) But however he lost it, he ended up in the local hotel (which was a facade building, I believe, so just a glorified tent) because there was no hospital. There was also no doctor. Somehow somebody tracked down a nurse somewhere and brought her to the hotel.

BUT!

It was improper for this young woman to be alone with a man, even if she was trying to make him not be dead. The scandal!!!

So that nurse became my great-grandmother. No idea what their actual wedding was like, but I imagine it was rather interesting given they'd only known one another two days and he was still half delirious because of major injury.

Now we'll skip forward a bit. They decide to buy a few acres over in Middle Park/Grand County, and they're gonna start a little ranch up there. They pay some dude for the land and pack up the wagon (yes, wagon, the Colorado mountains didn't get the message that the century had changed until about 30-40 years after it happened). But then they arrived and, on no, they've been lied to! No land is waiting! They managed to get themselves a few acres anyway and went about starting their ranch and having 10+ children, all but one of whom lived to adulthood which was damn impressive. (Also worthwhile to note here that, until sometime in the 1950s, there was only one doctor in the whole county and she was a grumpy old lady who didn't believe in pain meds.)

Their youngest daughter died at 4, I believe from whooping cough, and less than a week later my great-grandfather came in from the fields, said he wasn't feeling well, laid down, and died. So now here's my great-grandmother in the middle of the Rockies in the 1920s with 10+ kids, some of them still under 10. And let me tell you, she kicked ass.

But what does all of this have to do with the Cabin you say? Well, see, those 10+ kids spread out all over the county, buying their own lands and marrying into the other families up there. Then along came the state saying "hey, we want to build a reservoir where your house is, get out." To which my great-grandmother said "fuck you." She said fuck you enough times that the family eventually ended up with 1000+ acres in exchange for moving off their little plot. They literally just picked up the house and moved it about 1/4 mile up the hill, and that original house is still there today.

Now, ever since then the family has sold off some of the land, but we still have a lot of it. The family cattle ranch is still operational as well, now run by one of my second cousins. A couple of my great-uncles also built houses on various parts of the property over the years, which is how we get to the Cabin.

My grandfather, the youngest living child of his parents, eventually moved down to Denver. But he still loved his home in the mountains, and wanted his 10 kids to experience that as well. One of the houses on the family property had fallen into disuse, to the point cows were living in it and having a grand old time. My grandfather decided to fix it up so that he and his kids could have a place to go up there. This was the first Cabin, referred to as Camp Grub. Until his sister-in-law, who technically owned the house with his brother, realized he'd fixed the house and went "oh, how nice of you! Get out, it's mine now."

Thus, the second Cabin came into being. Not wanting to give up on having a place up there, my grandfather found another cabin a few miles away and rented that. It was called the White House because it was. Well. White. This is where my dad and his 9 siblings grew up going all the time. Lots of fond memories of hunting, fishing, and general shenanigans. But then, early in the 90s, the owner of the property didn't renew my grandparent's lease.

This time, my grandparents wanted to get something they OWNED and couldn't be taken from them. They settled on the Cabin, which was again several miles away in a different spot. This third Cabin is the one we still have today, the little A-frame. It was named Moose Camp.

None of his children wanted him to buy an A-frame. Because A-frames are terrible. It could only sleep six people and, at this point, there were a good 20+ family members that wanted to use it. But my grandfather did not care. So we ended up with an A-frame that sits on 60ish acres and, at the time, was on the only tiny little flat spot of the entire 60ish acres.

My dad and his siblings, mostly in their 20s and early 30s at the time, took one look at this and decided nope. Must fix. So they promptly set about hand-digging a basement to add four more bedrooms, and they dug out a huge chunk of the hillside to create a flat spot for the garage and parking. Half the garage is a garage, the other half (separated by a wall) is an outdoor livingroom/dining area. There has been some other odds and ends projects done over the years such as cutting a couple RV parking spots out of the woods, but nothing else major.

Now, this is the Cabin I grew up in and the one we still have. I have spent nearly 30 years of my life going up there almost every weekend. After my parents divorced they started moving at least once a year each so from a very young age I never had a stable home except for the Cabin.

The whole family used it, and you never knew who was coming. It could be just a few people, or twenty. Sometimes people brought friends. Sometimes distant cousins showed up. My cousins and I had the run of the place, and the whole 60 acres. It was a grand old time, and I wouldn't trade it for the world. We all learned to shoot, to hunt, to be safe in the woods. We heard all the family stories, and visited the family that still lived up there. There were always at least two fridges full of food and it was just sort of a free for all of who ate what, didn't really matter who brought it. There were campfires out behind the garage. There were lazy days in the gazebo my dad and his siblings built for their mother from scrap wood.

After my grandparents died, the Cabin was put into a trust so that now all of their kids have an equal share in it. (Except for one, who we do not speak of, because she is not welcome in the family anymore, and another who has died.) Over the years, most of the family has used it less and less. My dad and I are now the ones who use it the most, and do most of the upkeep. I've got an uncle and an aunt (my dad's brother and sister) who come up a fair amount as well, but the uncle is getting a bit too old to really help out with the heavy projects and the aunt...well...she tries.

Other family does still come up, though. Some a handful of times every year, others only once a year or so. They usually find something to complain about (specifically one aunt who is a very my-way-or-the-highway person) or some project they think needs done, and they'll moan about it not getting taken care of, but never do anything about it. They leave and my dad and I continue to tinker with the plumbing, cut firewood for everyone else to use, clean out the fridges, restain the siding, fix the basement when it floods in the spring, plow the road, and everything else that needs done, never really bringing up the fact that we're the only real caretakers left of the place. If the rest of the family does manage to decide to do some sort of project my dad and I usually end up putting it back in order once they're gone, and they never notice.

We still visit the surrounding family, we still hunt, we still explore. But it's quieter now. It'll always be home, though. The only real home I've ever had. According to the rules of the trust, the property has to stay in the Wood family unless every member of the trust agrees to sell, which they'll never do. So it'll be there, in some form, for quite awhile.

(Putting the words Long Post in here so the tumblr filters can hide it even if other people don't tag it as such.)

#The Cabin #The Wood Family #Storytime #Long Post #Story time

[mariacallous]

The recipe sold itself as “unique.” Toward the end of March, an anonymous blonde woman appeared on the TikTok page @foodfuns3 and committed a culinary crime. First, she poured an entire box of angel hair pasta into a blender, then she blitzed it into dust, added a couple of eggs, and rolled the resulting dough into new pasta strips. Gamely, she took a bite of the thick, grainy Frakenpasta after cooking it; unconvincingly, she ended the video with the words, “Mmm! It’s like the perfect consistency.”

Despite this onscreen bite, it’s probably safe to assume this pasta dish ended up in the bin.

It’s no longer news that disgusting food videos on TikTok are intentional rage bait, designed to rile up viewers and gain comments, shares, and views for creators. Yet while no one eats the food in these ridiculous recipe videos, they do feed an entire online ecosystem.

Shortly after the blonde woman blended her pasta, The Washington Post tested her recipe on its own social media channels, while the British newspaper Metro made its own video about the “dish.” On TikTok itself, multiple creators responded, superimposing themselves over the video and adding their own commentary. Thanks to the sheer number of hideous recipes that now populate TikTok, a new job has emerged: Recipe Reactor.

Chef Reactions is not the name recorded on Chef Reactions’ birth certificate. Despite the fact that he has more than 3 million TikTok followers, Chef Reactions closely guards his real name and identity because, he says, “I get death threats every single day.” Fiercely protective of his family and a carer for his 88-year-old grandmother, he’s only been recognized three times in public since he exploded on social media a year ago, and he wants to keep it that way. “I’ve worked in kitchens my whole life,” he says. “I didn’t start this with the intention of becoming famous.”

What provokes the death threats? Multiple times a week, Chef Reactions picks an online recipe video and—it’s in the name—reacts to it. He is known for his deadpan delivery, liberal use of swear words, and very evident culinary knowledge. (He really is a chef with almost 20 years’ experience.) The 40-year-old creator reacts to everything from genuinely delicious-looking chocolate sculptures to people cooking inside their toilet bowls.

Some have accused him of bullying, “which I didn’t understand, because most of the videos that I talk about are purposely made for shock value.” (Some recipe videos are also fetish content.) The chef’s angry reactions are unscripted and authentic: “I come from a background of not wasting food, both in my professional life and my personal life. When I was a kid, I was forced to sit at the kitchen table until I finished everything on my plate, so wasting food is a pet peeve of mine.”

Chef Reactions created his TikTok account in May 2022 because, he says, “a dishwasher that worked for me had a video go viral … and it was really stupid, it was maybe the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” Deciding that if she could do it, he could do it too, the chef created his first video, a silly three-second clip in which he makes eyes at some butt-shaped dough.

The Chef Reactions channel grew quickly. He recently quit his job; brand deals, merchandise sales, and Patreon supporters enable him to recipe-react full time. “I’ve been a chef for so long that it’s hard for me to think of what I do now as work, because I worked so very hard before,” he says. He notes that while he is by no means rich or “set for life,” he could afford a year off to be with his family if he stopped making videos right now. “This has changed my life in ways that I never thought were possible,” he says.

Yet in the year Chef Reactions has been creating his videos, he says the number of rage bait (and fetish) recipes on TikTok has grown. “These accounts are multiplying like gremlins,” he says, “And now people say that I’m partially responsible for that.” Some viewers believe that gross food creators are making videos specifically for the chef to react to, meaning he’s taking the bait and feeding the baiters. While he says it would be “egotistical” for him to believe that videos are made specifically for him, he does acknowledge his part in this strange new ecosystem.

“Without them, I wouldn’t be where I’m at today, so it’s kind of a double-edged sword,” he says. Equally: “I’m not the only person that does food reactions.”

Tanara Mallory is perhaps currently the most famous and quotable recipe reactor on TikTok; her catchphrase “Everybody’s so creative!” now regularly pops up in the comment section of food videos. The 47-year-old, Philadelphia-based production cook is—as Chef Reactions himself puts it —“hilarious”; her faux-enthusiastic response videos have earned her 3.4 million followers.

Unlike Chef Reactions, however, Mallory has found it hard to profit from her fame. She told The Philadelphia Inquirer earlier this month that the money she has earned so far only covers “gas and groceries,” even though the hashtag #everybodysocreative now has 486 million views. It’s a problem as old as social media itself: the ability of any creator to monetize their content often depends on their race. “Mallory’s situation,” journalist Beatrice Forman wrote in her profile of the TikTok star, “is all too common for Black social media creators, who have shaped internet culture for decades.” (Mallory didn’t respond to interview requests for this story.)

Yet while recipe reactions may not always be profitable, they do remain popular. Beyond comedy value, why do people like to watch?

Zoë Glatt, a digital anthropologist and postdoctoral researcher at Microsoft’s Social Media Collective, argues that “​​what makes bad recipe videos so perfect for reactions is the ambiguity around whether the original content is made sincerely.” Numerous disturbing recipes have been reported as real trends over the years, and therefore it is undoubtedly satisfying for audiences to hear a straight-talker “reflecting on just how bad these recipes are.”

Glatt says that “reaction videos have always existed as a sort of meta-economy that feeds off of and into the genres of content.” While some reactors do “the bare minimum,” riding the coattails of an original video’s popularity, the best reactions, she says, “offer meaningful or entertaining commentary, reflecting and reifying the feelings that audiences have toward the video and helping to create a sense of community and shared understanding.” Arguably, shared understanding is crucial when you’ve just watched someone blend angel hair and you have to decide if the world’s lost the plot or you have.

It’s unclear how long recipe reactions will continue to be popular. Chef Reactions says, “I think of myself always as on my 14th of 15 minutes of fame.” He is branching out onto YouTube because of rumors of a TikTok ban, and he hopes the world will continue to have an appetite for his content. But being uncertain about the future doesn’t trouble him too much. “If you were to ask me a year ago what my retirement plan was, I would have said, ‘Having a heart attack hovering over an empty deep fryer.’ I didn’t have a retirement plan,” he says. He still doesn’t, but he does now have a flourishing online career. “If it all goes away tomorrow, I can always fall back onto my skill set and continue being a chef.”

[diariodelissa]

Jake and MC

****Another part of the fanfiction. Jake goes to visit MC in Duskwood. He tells of his history and why he started hacking.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

As he walks through the old alleys of Duskwood toward the MC's apartment, wearing a black T-shirt and jeans, Jake's sharp mind reflects on recent changes in his life.

The hacker, who has spent many years moving stealthily through avenues and subways from metropolis to metropolis, always apprehensive and solitary, can now walk peacefully and even, if he wishes, observe passersby and places, unhurriedly. The world he had known since he was a boy was so impassable, gray, and violent that he had never imagined it could present new colors and a sea of possibilities. Never, until he came across a love so intense and so strong that it was able to break through the barriers of a prison and a history of trauma.

He continues on his way, with his thoughts on MC, when he comes across a flower shop.

Hesitant, he enters the store, remembering that the girl likes flowers. He is approached by a friendly and communicative employee who presents him with several options of bouquets and arrangements. He finally opts for an elegant bouquet of 40 red tulips, capriciously wrapped in luxurious black paper and gold ribbon, after the florist describes the meaning of the flower: true and eternal love.

Minutes later, he arrives at MC's apartment. Embarrassed, he waits for her to open the door, smelling a pleasant aroma of coffee.

“ Jake!” - MCs eyes sparkle when he sees the hacker. - “Are they for me? Really? I love the flowers.” - Delighted, she admires the bouquet. - “Thank you!”

The hacker doesn't quite know what to say. Enraptured, he notices that the girl is wearing a light and tight dress, similar to the one in the photo he keeps so fondly.

“There's a card, but I think I'll turn red if you read it in front of me.”

“Are you still blushing?” - she asks, finding his behavior adorable.

“It's ridiculous, I know, a guy acting like that, like he's a virgin boy.” - he blurts.

 “It's not ridiculous at all, Jake!  On the contrary, I think it's so cute!”

Jake sits at the dining table, which is set with a coffee pot, a white porcelain tea set, a basket of bread, butter and jam. The apartment emanates such a good vibe. He listens to a song, probably from a playlist playing on his laptop. Meanwhile, MC puts the flowers in a vase.

 “This game I got from Cleo”. - the girl says. - “She was always annoyed that I only had a few stripped down mugs to serve my guests”. - Pouring the tea into the cup, she hands it to the hacker. - “Here, it's melissa tea with mint. I learned it from my grandmother. It has calming effects and is great for fighting insomnia”.

Realizing that Jake is hesitant, she laughs. - You don't like tea, do you?

The hacker replies. “Actually, I've never been in the habit of taking it”.

 “I can imagine, - MC smiles. - “You must be a fan of energy drinks and coffee”

“You read people very well” - Jake smiles.

"Oh, that wasn't so hard to deduce, you insomniac and night owl hacker! If you want, you don't have to take it. I thought I could help you."

 “That's fine.  It's not that bad” - he jokes.

“You can't tell me that your grandmother, unlike mine, never made you drink those teas with a hundred things in them when you had the flu?”

At this, MC realizes the lapse. “Oh, I'm sorry, Jake! You haven't participated in many family moments, have you?”

The hacker's gaze lingers for a moment, remembering fragments of his life.

"My mother took me away from my maternal grandparents, when I was a very young child. They did not agree with the life she led, always self-destructing or isolating herself. They tried once to get custody of me, but my mother threatened to kill herself"- There is a glimmer of sadness in Jake's gaze, which makes MC's heart squeeze. - "I had a neighbor, who saw my situation, and tried to help me. Her husband was from the government intelligence agency. The couple had no children, so they sort of adopted me for a while. - The hacker gets excited when he remembers the kindly man, who had a personality very similar to his and was just as brilliant.- "He gave me my first high-performance computer and taught me many programming tricks."

"That's great, Jake! He was your male reference.* - MC notes: "Do you still have contact with them?" - she asks, curious.

A new gleam of sadness came over Jake's face.

"He denounced a corruption scheme and ended up being murdered by corrupt government agents. I was in the car when he was shot. -" Shaken, Jake closes his eyes for a moment and continues to relate,"- Afterwards, fearing for his life, his wife left the country.  She wanted me to come along, but my mother wouldn't let me.

MC  asks Jake.

"Jake, does this have to do with the information that you have disclosed in the past?"

"Yes. It was the way I found to avenge his death, which was treated as a robbery". - He recalls the dirty scheme of important government officials, who did everything to cover up the crime. - "It's very complicated to beat them"

"My God!  I am so sorry about that!"

MC wraps her arms around the hacker and, being shorter than him, can hear the uncompensated beating of his heart. The smell of the hacker is so good.

Jake, seeing that MC is so close that he can smell the delicate scent of her perfume, wishes to kiss her ardently. However, he resists, as he wishes to respect the time she has asked him to take.

#duskwood #duskwood jake #duskwood jake x mc #mc duskwood #duskwood fanfiction

[chaoswithkaycee]

A Farewell to Papaw

He was born in 1946, two days after Christmas, the third son of an Appalachian coal miner and his bitch wife. You may think I’m being too harsh on my great grandmother - but trust me, if you’d known her, you’d agree. West Virginia was a beautiful place to grow up, poor as they were, and Papaw told me stories all the time of his upbringing. He got into making moonshine shortly before he married my Gramma in 1964, when he was 17 and she was 16. I saw the picture once, of them on their wedding day. She was wearing a tea length, cream-colored dress, her curly brown hair pinned back and swept off her neck, and little lace gloves. He was wearing gray slacks and a mismatched jacket. At 17, he already had calluses on his hands and dirt in every pore, no matter how hard he scrubbed, from working in the mines with his daddy. He told me, when he showed me the picture, that right after they’d gotten married, he’d gone right back to work that day. He worked everyday to give “Annie” (my Gramma) everything she deserved. 

At some point, West Virginia lost its luster and they moved to Texas before their first child, my aunt, was born. Not too much later, their second child, my father, came around too. Around that time, Papaw gave up moonshining and got sober himself. Once he left rehab, he never touched alcohol again. Coal mines aren’t a thing here on the gulf coast, so he moved into the next most common working poor job we have here - a refinery plant. He worked at the same plant until he retired, some 40-ish years later. That job paid for him to buy a little three bedroom house with a shed, paid for the tools he used to maintain that house and yard, paid to keep his sweet wife at home to raise their kids and grow her rose garden and plant a pear tree in the middle of the backyard. That job paid for his kids school clothes and shoes, for all the food that filled their bellies - and they never went hungry, that was a rule he had from his own time as a poor child in the Appalachian region - paid for Annie to go and get her hair done at the salon down the road every other week, paid for the small donations they could muster at church. And when Annie got sick, it paid for her treatment and surgery, and eventually, her funeral. He taught himself how to make rosaries, and made her one every day from the time he retired to the time she passed away. 

Of course, all of that happened long before I came around (Except her death. She passed when I was 13). He was still working when I was born, though. I grew up in the same house that he raised my daddy and aunt in. He helped my mama put my bedroom together, bought a swingset for the backyard, and built a playroom add-on next to the laundry room, attached to what would become my bedroom. He and Gramma helped to baby proof the house, bought toys and books and clothes, and talked my terrified parents down a hundred times over. 

When my aunt announced the birth of her second child, mama was devastated to find out it was a girl. Now my aunt, daddy’s older sister, had given birth to both the first grandson and the first granddaughter, a month before I would be born (well, really, it was three months before I was supposed to be born, but I surprised them two months early). Mama said she sat on the swingset out in the backyard and cried. Papaw came out to talk to her, and asked her what was wrong. She said she was scared that I wouldn’t be special to him, since I wouldn’t be the first granddaughter. Papaw looked her dead in the eye and told her every baby that came into his life was special, and I was no different. He would love me just as much as the first two, and he’d love every one that came after just as much as the ones before. Years later, when I told this story back to him (as mama had told it to me), he told me a little bit more. “She was my special girl, your mama,” he said, adjusting his cannula and stopping to catch his breath. “Annie liked her well enough, but I loved that girl. Day she married your dad, she became my daughter, and I loved her just as much as my own baby girl. She’s still my special girl, tell her that next time you see her.” I did tell her, and she cried.

I was born two months too soon, and he was there at the hospital as soon as his shift was over. He sat and prayed with my mama, he gave money to my daddy so he could call off work to be with me and mama. When the doctor predicted I’d die, he told me I wasn’t allowed to. I don’t remember it, but he’s told the story back to me so many times that I feel like I can. I was in an incubator, in a diaper so small he said it couldn’t have been any bigger than a tissue (according to him), and I wasn’t crying or anything. Just fighting for every breath. And he said he told me I wasn’t allowed to die, because he hadn’t been allowed to hold me yet, and I would break his heart if I died before he could hold me.

I’m sure my survival is far more likely because of the dedicated team of nurses and doctors that took care of me around the clock for the next month, but my Papaw believes it’s because he told me to stay. Maybe both are true. I have so many memories of sitting in his lap while he learned how to use a computer, watching tv with him, laying on his chest and listening to his heartbeat. He always smelled like gasoline and tobacco, which are both considered extremely acrid smells, but they smelt like home and comfort to me. I remember how he used to hand me a comb and some oil and let me comb his beard and mustache, and even when I got snagged on knots he never yelled or gave any sign of discomfort. I remember the silver watch he wore, an anniversary gift from my gramma to celebrate their first year together. His hair was already thinning when I came around, but it still had a little curl to it, and he let me comb that too. 

I remember how he used to take me to the park in his pick up truck when the fair was in town, how he’d buy me a caramel apple even though I would just eat the caramel part. He always ate the apple for me. When he went to the grocery store, he’d go to the candy section and pick out all the banana Runts to bring home to me in a little bag. To this day, I can’t eat banana Runts without thinking of him. Even when he moved up to Tennessee and I only saw him once every few years, he made it a point to go down to the store and buy me all the banana Runts he could find, enough for me to snack on for the next week.

When I came out of the closet, I expected him to stop loving me. To tell me that it was wrong, that God would be angry, that he was angry. I was so scared of his reaction that I hid it from him for almost ten years after I told everyone else. He found out when my dad accidentally mentioned my girlfriend at the time, and he called me to talk about it. “Monkey,” he said, because that was his nickname for me, “tell me about this girl.” And I did. I told him about how her smile made my insides feel like melted butter, how she smelled like chocolate dipped strawberries and laughed at all my jokes. “Sounds like she makes you feel like Annie made me feel.” He told me. Gramma had already been gone for awhile at this point, and he sounded sad when he said it, but I knew what he meant. “Don’t be afraid to tell me something ever again, baby girl. You’re always my Monkey, and I love you no matter what.”

Last time I saw him was in 2018, a few months after that phone call. He was already pretty sick then, and a little confused. He told me probably a hundred times that I was his Monkey and he loved me so much. I thought it was because he forgot he already told me, but now I wonder if he knew I wouldn’t see him again and he wanted to make sure he said it enough times to fill up my life when he was gone. He wouldn’t let me comb his beard this time, but he sat and played checkers with me for awhile, then candyland with me, my sister, and my dad.

Papaw wasn’t perfect. But he loved me, and I loved him. He helped shape who I am, taught me kindness and steadiness to counteract my chaos. I got the news yesterday that he isn’t expected to make it another week, and I’m a wreck. He always told me that as long as you love someone, as long as you remember them, they’re not gone. So I thought I’d tell y’all about him, and maybe y’all could love him and remember him too. Thanks for letting me ramble.

#griefjourney #loss #grandparents #papaw #saying goodbye #end of life #appalachia

[vintageseawitch]

i don't think i will ever recover from the fact that eddie boi disabled bella's truck so she couldn't drive to see jacob because what if she needed it for emergency reasons not related to this?????

i know it's not the worst thing that anyone could do (not that this is a contest, mind). i can't decide if it's the worst thing eddie boi has done throughout the series... but you know what? maybe it could just be another red flag to add to the list of red flags he demonstrated throughout this outrageous franchise. like, it makes me angry how forgiving bella is towards him esp when he does shit like this. i get that bella has her own set of problems, low self-esteem amongst them (on top of problematic shit she does but that's not the point of this specific post). obvs her mind & experiences & age aren't the same as mine but like... glob, i like quite a bit of this franchise & while i like eddie being angry on bella's behalf when she was sa'd by jacob, that doesn't excuse his emotional abusive tendencies (plus i get angry - esp when reminded of the exact circumstances of the "kiss" in the book - thank you fellow rattie in the TSP group on fb for the reminder because it seems like my brain doesn't want to remember the exact details of that disgusting scene despite having read the books again recently - that bella accepts jacob's graduation "gift" & fucking WEARS IT PROUDLY BECAUSE HE'S HER BFF WTF THEY ALL NEED THERAPY).

like, this is personal. if in 1918 eddie was 17 then that means he was born almost 40 years before my paternal grandfather. i never knew my grandpa as anything other than a kind, gentle man. even though i knew he did some not-so-great things (TW PLEASE BE MINDFUL... he was never a predator if you catch my drift, but he also wasn't perfect even if his behavior towards my paternal grandmother - whom i sadly wasn't able to meet due to her passing from illness before i was born - was typical of the times. not that it excuses anyone from this behavior but i hope you understand where i'm coming from), he also had the capacity to LEARN. my uncle told me about a conversation he had with him when my uncle was in his later 20s regarding a personal matter & long story short my grandpa did a whole fucking 180° turn. a little before i was born my grandfather became the gentle, caring man i knew throughout my adolescence & eventual early(ish) adulthood up until his passing 5 years ago. i don't hate him for what he was because he had the fucking strength to completely change his behavior. like, i think he would be HORRIFIED if he ever learned of his kids & grandkids doing certain things - especially things he once did.

(i'm all over the place with my posts like this but that's just how my brain is & editing is just not what we do here lmao so if you're still here i appreciate it)

basically, one of things my grandpa did back in the day was disable my grandma's car (this post isn't for me to hate on my grandpa fyi; it's to emphasize the immense strength he had to change this problematic way of being that so many of his generation absolutely refused to do) in order for her to not hang out with her bff (whom was a woman & no one has ever talked about the possibility that my grandma swung in that direction again if you catch my drift lol (like, no one has ever suggested that she was suspected of cheating or anything, ya know? my grandpa simply didn't like her bff which makes it weirder since he married that bff a few years after my grandma passed because apparently that's what "looking out for each other" meant but again, not the point of this post lol) - btw i identify as bi & i will be forever sad that i wasn't able to come out to my grandma (she was extremely catholic but she sounded so nice & i feel like she would have been a safe person to talk to??? 🥺) let alone find out if she swung that way too lmao). like, this makes me so fucking ANGRY on my grandma's behalf, & it's not just because of how personal it is, but because of how COMMON it is, & not just from men (or people since men aren't the only ones capable of such abusive tendencies obvs but seeing as how most are men... yeah). i truly don't want to victim blame & i can't blame bella for her response since she doesn't seem to realize certain things she's become accustomed to are actually problematic & abusive but also WTFFFFF i LOOOOOATHE that she kept her damn window open despite her being justifiably angry at her boundary-smashing bf.

so basically TL;DR lol: it was fucking disgusting that eddie boi disabled bella's truck & it was fucking disgusting that smeyers wrote her as being so lacking in backbone that she forgave him IMMEDIATELY. i HATE that i sound like I'm victim-blaming here because smeyers made sure to write bella in that way ekbfijdrhjrjekd it's fuckingn GROSS. i don't WANT to victim-blame & i also don't want bella to be with someone with not just despicable tendencies but also the LACK of being able to change, grow, & become a better person (like my grandpa was able to do!!! despite the generation he was from!!!!!!! maybe i'm biased but those kinda stories aren't exactly common ya know?????) EVEN ON HER BEHALF.

can you imagine how he'd be if bella remained human????? great fucking Balrog of the Mines of Moria nothing like seeing smeyers continue to have eddie boi display disturbing stalker tendencies because tRuE lOvE gtfo lol

ps i loved my grandpa & am proud of the steps he took to become a better person. i just wanted to emphasize how very personal this all is to me why i obsess over it. this is not the first time i say this nor will it be the last - i basically like almost everything else that's happening OUTSIDE of the main "love triangle" since i don't like how smeyers wrote bella or edward or jacob (post bella "totally not unaliving herself per alice's vision" ofc since he was actually tolerable before this) & felt like sharing this & i wanted to vent & i don't feel comfortable doing this elsewhere. okay thxbyeeee~

#twilight #twilight renaissance #the twilight renaissance #new moon #eclipse #breaking dawn #edward cullen #bella swan #jacob black #ab*se #justifiable conversation no matter who you ship #i get that this is fiction #but like #y'all know our brains can't tell the difference #it's important when it affects you like this #this needs to be talked about dang it #no matter who you ship #or which team you're on lol #i'm onna different team #team marcus tbh #but we're not talking about the volturi here #problematic love triangle #I DON'T JUDGE YOU FOR BEING EITHER TEAM #BUT YA GOTTA KEEP THIS NONSENSE IN MIND #glob by all means enjoy this trash media #glob knows that i do lmao #but also keep in mind almost everything and everyone else around them are far more interesting #this gets personal *shrugs* #i love my grandpa

[hwrryscherry]

 The one where the reader meets Harry as Jack

characters: HARRYxREADER!FEM

blurb: Harry is filming Don't Worry Darling in Palms Springs while Y/N is moving in in her new house in the neighbourhood where the movie is being filmed. Turns out the fate wanted to cross Harry and Y/N's way as a box full of books is very intriguing to Harry and Pride and Prejudice becomes Harry's new favorite.

word count: 2.7K

author's note: Heyy guys, it has been SO LONG and honestly I don’t think this is best work yet lol but anyway, I had the worst writer’s block of my life so it was so hard for me to write a single word. Honestly, I felt kinda pressured to write. I felt like I was pressuring myself for that so I had to take advantage of this block and take this idea out of my mind. I want to say something important too; I really want to say that the only story of mine that I’ll keep the face claim is HARRYxMODELY/N, just because I like to use the photos to make instagram posts sometimes. I will no longer describe types of hair as I used to say ‘’long strands of hair’’, it will be neutral for you to imagine yourself in the story. It’s all about you guys and how you can visualize the story and the character, if you want to imagine a face claim that’s cool but if you don’t want to it’s cool too. Feel free to read and visualize, it’s all about you. Thank you for the support on my account and my writing. I’m aware that I’m not the best lol, but I also think that I have so much to learn from you just as I have to teach. I’m so grateful for everyone who reads and like my stuff. Never forget that you’re unique, you’re loved, you’re so golden and treat people with kindness always.

   "Why is it so hot in here? It's fucking December!", you'd think to yourself as you drove your new car through the streets of Palm Springs. The thing is that after you moved from Columbia to reside so many years in New York while you were studying English Language and Literature in Yale, you just got so used with the usual colder weather from NY and it's just a different vibe from California. You had such a hard time to decide what you wanted to do after graduating, though. And after a few weeks and some long conversations with your family, you decided you would go to California. Palm Springs, to be more specific. You decided that because you remembered all the times you went there when you were a kid because your grandmother lived in there before she passed. You remember spending your summer vacation with her and how cool it was. It was in the early 2000′s and there was many kids on your age that lived on her street. You remember playing with them all day and then getting back into your grandma’s house and feeling that cinnamon scent that for some one only her house had. It wasn’t a usual cinnamon scent. It had something special in it. It made you feel so warm and welcomed. You remember helping her to bake the most delicious cookies, brownies and cakes in her kitchen. You remember the kitchen had a yellow counter, but the entire kitchen was white. All very pale and then the cheerful yellow in the kitchen that colored everything. You remember going to play bingo with her and how it made her happy to having you around. You both were so close and you had such a hard time when she passed, but the most important was she taught you so many things during your time together, and you’d never forget those things and her.

    As you drove, you’d remember those streets vaguely. You’d pass through the soccer court you typically used to go with the other kids and spent hours playing in there. You were vibing with the song in the stereo as you started getting closer to your new house’s street. It was Carolina by Harry Styles; you have to admit you’re not the biggest Harry Styles fan in the world, but you were definitely a One Direction fan when you were around 16, but you couldn't be considered a directioner either. You just listened to a few songs and thought it was good. But anyway, this specific song is one that you particularly like. It may have something to do with the fact that you’re from Carolina, of course. But it’s more about the vibe and the melody that by being animated it could actually cheer anyone up and the lyrics were undeniably good though, a little sexual, but good. It’s more about the vibe and the melody that by being animated it could actually cheer anyone up and the lyrics were really good though, a little sexual, but good.

    When you turned the right way into the street of your new home, you came across much more than you expected to see on your moving day. There were, as it seemed, paparazzi. Apparently they were shooting a movie right in your street, and it had also many people with many cameras and trailers that probably were dressing rooms. Naturally, you knew that thousands of films were shot in California, that’s obvious. But you didn't expect one to be shooting exactly on your moving day and specifically in your street, let alone that the street would be this crowded since the world is experiencing a global pandemic, ironic. You observed some of the people walking down the street, or should you call it a set? You don't know, but there were many people and many cars, at least they were all wearing masks. It had many classic cars, probably in the 40s or 50s style. They were colorful; vivid colors, though. Colors like yellow, blue and lilac was really present. To resume, the whole street looked like a movie from the 50s and for sure that was the intention because you could notice some extras walking around the set dressed up as 50s people used to.

    As you carefully drive through the street, you’d notice that from what seemed like a divine miracle, there was a vacant parking spot right in front of your house and you can’t help but smile when you see it. The first time you came here to see the house. You were with your family, and that was about four months ago. You just loved the house completely as it had such a different vibe from the place you used to live in New York, and honestly, just the thought of the house made your creativity activate as it had some really cool colored walls and you bought some colored mobile as well. Anyway, you stopped the car right in front of your house finishing the engine and grabbing your mask and putting it in your face as you'd use your hand to get rid of the seat belt and your other hand to open the car door and get out of the car.

    After closing the driver's seat door, you go around the car walking to the trunk where you use the car key to open it. When you open it, you are faced with two cardboard boxes. One was full of books. Books of all kinds, books of period novels, books of suspense, books of investigation and etc. Books that piqued your curiosity and made you want to finish reading it as quickly as possible. The other box was already full of clothes, those last clothes that you would finally be taking home. Your mother has done the biggest job in the moving issue; she was the one who was bringing the furniture and your things while you finished packing the rest of your things to leave New York. You try your hardest not to pay attention to the set of recordings and the people who walked back and forth, at the same time that you tried hard not to make any noise, because if you accidentally disturbed a scene, you would feel extremely embarrassed and would probably not even show up at the gate until the end of filming, but that was not the case. You removed the two boxes from the trunk just before closing it completely. You chose, perhaps, to enter the clothes box first. You bent down taking the box in your arms and walked to the door of the house where you used the key you received from the real-estate agent to unlock it before entering. You immediately noticed that some sunbeams reflected on the living room floor due to the white linen curtain that covered the glass windows. You observed the contrast of the sofa in such a light tone with the lilac wall just behind it. You walked with the box in hand by the door extension to the room where you placed the box on the small coffee table in front of the sofa. Returning out of the house, you can see the figure of a tall man dressed in a brown suit crouched in front of the box of your books. He had brown hair and properly cut. It didn't look like he was messing with your books, but he was definitely looking at them and it seemed like he was trying to read the covers of it for some reason. You slowly got closer to the man's body without making too much noise while you analyzed him, you crossed your arms upon your chest as you noticed the book cover he was looking at: Love is a mixtape by Rob Sheffield.

— This one is amazing! — You said, surprising the man that stand up fastly with the book in his hands connecting his green gaze with yours. He was tall, really tall by the way. His suit seemed perfect, just as his hair. He had a black mask on as a protection but the 16 year old teenager inside of you could never mistake those eyes. It was Harry fricking Styles. You considerated being quiet as you, yourself were pretty surprised now, but then you took your gaze to the book in his hand and then back at his face — It's like comparing love to a popular song that we usually search to define love. Just to find out that love is like oxygen, or love is a kind of drug, or a battlefield for some... — You said referring to the book with a tender smile on your face that Harry couldn't essentially see, but talking about a book that you loved caused this on you. And as you talked you didn't notice that Harry had a smile on his face as well. Maybe it was because you completely ignored the fact that he is Harry Styles and he was messing up your books as he's on the set filming a movie, or maybe it was the fact that he loved this book just as much as you did. He'd use to say this is probably one of the books that if he had to read just one book to the rest of his life, he'd chose this one and he usually had so much to talk about this book and so much to put on an argument about it but now he was completely speechless. He was just tongue tied. He was tongue tied about your reflection of one of his favorite books and how it looked so identical to his own personal reflection. He was tongue tied for the number of great books that he always wanted to read that was on that box. He was tongue tied at the owner of those books and her beauty, her intelligence of her voice and her voice as well so he just chuckled. A nervous chuckle as he leaned his head to look at the floor for a second before looking at you and holding out the book in his hands to you that calmly took it from his hands.

— I know! It's one of my favorite books! — Harry'd ultimately manage to say it as he observed you admiring the cover and running your fingers through it as a truly book lover would do — It's very interesting the interpretation you have of it.

— Don't you agree? — You'd interrupt him rising your head to examine at his face. He seemed paralyzed by some way, little did you know that Harry was mesmerized. He enjoyed the informal way you were speaking with him, and it genuinely felt like you already knew it each for years.

— That's the intriguing part. We have the same interpretation! — He'd say serenely, and then running his hand through his hair as he frown a little because of the sun that just hit on his glowing eyes.

— Well...Maybe you're just trying to imitate me to impress me! — You'd joke, with a mocking expression on your face making Harry giggle at your words and your face. It was the sense of humor to him.

— Oh really? And what makes you think I'm trying to impress you? — Harry'd say back with the same mocking tone that you formerly used. He'd observe your face go from playful to thoughtful in just as you to come up with a response.

— I mean...you were the one looking through my stuff, mister! — You say raising your eyebrows as you utilized one of your hands to take some strands of hair out of your face.

— Right... — Harry said with a defeated voice before as he compressed his lips together and moved his suit away from his shirt a little as he places his hands on his waist — I'm sorry about it, though. There was this box hanging here and I guess I was just intrigued! — He said shyly making you start walking towards the box walking closely to him causing him to feel a hot warm from your body as you passed. You'd bend over to grab the box but was stopped by Harry taking the heavy box from your hands — Let me help you with this! — Harry said as he held the box on his arms.

— There's no need for that. It'll ruin your splendid suit! — You'd say gently to him as he was standing up in front of you carefully holding the loaded box. Legitimately, he looked hot. He properly looked like a 50s husband helping with the moving with this outfit — And if you piss off your costume designer because of me I'll die! — You'd complement receiving a loud laugh from Harry's lips that shook his head while looking at you.

— She’ll be fine! — Harry'd argue back, then get a sigh from you before nodding at him as a statement.

— My house is right there! — You'd say using your right hand to point at your house, watching Harry turn his back to you and start walking towards it. You followed him through the door that was already open. Harry looked at the house immediately. It had a good vibe, and he wouldn't deny it. The choice of colors was exceptional, but he also noticed it was not very tidy, which would probably indicate that you were moving today.

— Where do I leave it? — Harry asked, referring to the box as he went farther into the living room.

— You can just leave it on the floor — You serenely said crossing your arms together and watching as he left the box on the floor and turned around to face you, but then deflecting his gaze to the ceiling before staring at your face again.

— It's a beautiful house! — Harry said as he moved his gaze through the room. He observed everything. He likes to observe. He likes to notice things that maybe other people didn't — Just like the owner, if I might say — Harry said cheekily and charming hearing your giggle invade his ears as you started walking towards the box of books that he previously set on the floor.

— The owner says thank you — You said bending down and starting to take the books out of the box and place it on the coffee table beside you as Harry watched your movements. You shyly looked at him thinking for a second and them smiling under your mask — For both compliments! — You said getting your attention back to the books. It's not that you don't want to give him your attention. It's that you genuinely think that he's just being nice, and he's probably not even interested in anything that you say.

— So... I have to go back to the film now but maybe you can give me your number so we can talk about your interpretation of my favorite book — Harry said shyly. His words took you by surprise actually but you couldn't hold back the smirk you had under your mask as you stand up again turning to face his green eyes. You noticed that he had his phone on his hand, hoping and waiting that you'd give him your number even though both of you knew that the book excuse was nothing more than an excuse as he was truly interested in knowing you.

— Well, it depends... — you said slowly as you took a deep breath before actually saying anything — If you agree to read my favorite books too, I'll give you my number!

— I'd be honored! — Harry chuckled after letting a sigh out feeling relief that you asked for something so simple that he'd love to do if that would make you happy — What's your name? — Harry said as he unblocked his phone screen and started to save your phone number.

— Save it as Elizabeth Bennet in there! — You said fastly with a proud smile on your face as Harry giggled and did as you ask and then looked at your face as he put his phone back on his pocket.

— Only if you save my name as Mr. Darcy when I call you! — Harry said knowing that after this, Pride and Prejudice would definitely become one of his favorite books ever.

#hwrryscherry #harry and y/n #harry styles and y/n #harry x reader #harry styles x you #harry styles x reader #harry styles x y/n #harry styles au #harey styles blurb #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles blurb #harry styles one shot #boyfriend harry styles #harry styles imagine #harry styles imagines

[fairlyspnfanfic]

Rifts

Request from @elsamc13

Summary: Takes place S13e10. Dean and Sam are trapped in Apocalypse World, as the Wayward Daughters do everything they can to rescue them.  Will their plan be enough?  Will the reader be able to move beyond her past with Dean in order to save him?  

Words: 4793

Warnings: Trauma, breakup, Bad Place, martyrdom

It had been a hell of a night.  I had been scouring the town for any explanation of the haunting at the bus depot but had come up with more suspects than answers.  Homeless people that had passed away at the bus station, accident victims of cars gone astray or out of control in the parking lot.  There had been a mountain of possibilities.  But the silvery, shrouded woman that had continually thrown me against, and eventually through, the wall of the bar across the street eventually narrowed my suspicions down to one.  

The woman had just turned twenty-one and had gone out to celebrate.  Only to end up being horrifically assaulted and left to die in the freezing cold behind the defunct busses that had been permanently parked.  The ghost’s strength was evident in the bruises that battered my face.  I looked into the rearview mirror, sighing and wincing as I attempted to clean myself up.  The cuts were fairly superficial, and I didn’t think I needed any stitches.  But the thin cut that tore across my bottom lip was still bleeding, coating my chin in the sticky liquid.  

My cell phone had been laying in the passenger seat and now, it made a low hum as it vibrated against the leather.  I hesitated before reaching for it, knowing that the last few dozen missed calls I had had were from him. The ex.  The almost was. The not anymore. The One that Got Away.  Whatever you preferred to call him.  And I didn’t relish the thought of seeing his name flash up on the screen yet again.  

I took a deep breath, closing my eyes tightly, ignoring the pain that shot through my right eyelid from the black eye that was beginning to flourish.  Turning the cell phone over in my hands, I opened my eyes as the screen lit up.  “Jody,” I whispered as I read the name of the missed call aloud.  

Quickly, I pressed Jody’s name, listening to the dead air as the call connected.  

“Y/N?” Jody’s frantic voice picked up almost immediately.  

“Hey, sorry I was finishing up a job.  What’s up?”  

“Oh, thank God you’re alright.”  The relief that flooded Jody’s voice stunned me.  

“Yeah, Jodes, why wouldn’t I be?”  

There was a beat of silence as my question went unanswered. “Y/N, I need you to come home. Now.”  

“Jody, what’s going on?”  Jody had never been so adamant before, or so worried.  It had been three months since I had moved in with Jody, using the Sheriff’s Sioux Falls home as my home base.  Jobs had taken me away fairly regularly and I hadn’t spent more than two consecutive nights in the bedroom that had been designated as mine.  But that didn’t change the fact that it was home.  

“You just need to get here now, okay?  I mean it.  Get on the road now.  I don’t care if you’re in the middle-”  

“I just finished the job, Jodes.” I cut her off.  “I’m only about an hour away.  I’ll be home soon, okay?”  

“Just....” Jody hesitated. “Hurry.”  

The phone call disconnected and I sat starring at the cell phone in confusion before turning the ignition and pointing the car towards home.  

I made the hour-long drive is just under 40 minutes, having put the gas pedal to the floor.  Flinging the driver’s side door open, I practically sprinted up the steps, slamming the unlocked front door open in my wake.  

“Jody,” I called out in a panic.  

She quickly stepped out of the kitchen and walked directly towards me; arms outstretched and tears in her eyes.  

“I’m so glad you made it home,” Jody whispered, pulling me into her tight embrace.  

“Hey,” I began.  “I’m okay.  I’m here.  I’m right here, Jody.”  I wrapped my arms tightly around her, holding her as she trembled.  “Jody? What’s going on?”  

Slowly, she backed out of my embrace, swallowing hard as her eyes fixated on the floor between my feet.  “Y/N,” she began, her words coming out as if she were choking on them.  

I waited in silence, knowing she’d tell me once the words were there.  But before she could, a face peered out at me from the kitchen.  It was a face I didn’t recognize.  A girl with dark olive skin and black wavy hair that barely touched her shoulders.  She was holding a bowl and quickly throwing popcorn kernels into her mouth as she stepped closer to us.  

“Hello,” I said, attempting to sound as normal as I could muster.  “I’m-”

“I know who you are,” her voice was high, but cracked as she spoke.  “Did you tell her?”  The stranger looked at Jody expectantly as Jody shook her head.

“I was just getting to that.”  

“Tell me what, Jody?”  My voice was full of panic now.  Secrets never gave me the warm fuzzies and now that this stranger was in on it, my anxiety was skyrocketing.  

“Y/N, this is Patience.”  Jody gestured towards the newcomer as she introduced her.  I nodded my head as I inclined it towards her by way of welcome.

“Nice to meet you,” I grunted, crossing my arms and waiting for the shoe to drop. 

Loud footsteps came stomping down the stairs to my right as I heard Claire’s voice ring out.  “Y/N?  Is that you?  You aren’t dead?”  The surprise and outrage in her words left me wide eyed.

“What?!” I yelled. “Why would you think I was dead?”  

Claire hopped over to me, tucking herself into my shoulder as she gave me a quick one-armed hug, her eyes focused on Patience’s face.  

“Ask the psychic,” she explained.  

I turned my face to meet Patience’s, my face set in a hard line and my eyes bugged out of their sockets.  “Why does she think I’m dead?”  

Jody took a step closer, placing herself between Patience and I. “Claire’s right,” she started to explain.  “Patience is a psychic.  She’s Missouri Moseley’s granddaughter.”  Her words were succinct, and I knew right away what she was implying.  

“Patience,” I began, my voice low and empathetic.  “I’m so sorry.  Your grandmother was,” I hesitated.  “She was a very special woman.  Very beloved.”  

I watched as Patience absorbed my words but she gave no response. Jody had let me know about Missouri’s passing when it happened.  I had been on a case in Iowa, clearing out a Rugaru issue when the Winchester’s had worked with Missouri for the last time.  It was the only time in the last few months that I regretted my avoidant personality.  

“I still don’t get it.  Why did you think I was dead?”  

“Because I saw you die,” Patience explained, her words matter-of-fact, if not unfeeling.  

I looked at her incredulously. “What?”  

After an hour that seemed to last for days, Jody and Patience had explained everything to me.  Patience’s visions, her seeing me die, and the fact that the Winchester’s were in some alternate universe that just so happened to be the same one where I died.  My mind was swimming and I couldn’t seem to get my head above the water to take a breath, let alone understand.  

“Y/N?”  Claire rested her hand on my shoulder, giving me a slight shake as she tried desperately to get my attention.  

I brought my eyes up to meet hers, but couldn’t find any words.  

“We’re going to get them back, Y/N.”  Claire’s attempt to reassure me fell flat.  

“Sam and....”  I swallowed hard.  “And Dean.  They’re missing?”  I could hear my heart pounding in my ears and my breathing felt like it was getting shallower and shallower as I struggled to maintain my calm, something I was failing at desperately.  

Jody shook her head slowly, confirming my fears.  “But we know what we need to do.”  

I looked at her, my eyes pleading with her to give me more information.  

She rolled her eyes in return.  “They were working with a girl, Kaia.  She knows where they’re at and how to get there.”  

“Okay, so let’s go!”  I stood up dramatically, pushing my chair back as I did.  

“Wait,” Jody said, reaching out and grabbing my hand.  “We can't talk to her”  

While I hadn’t thought my eyeballs would be able to stress themselves beyond my skull any further, her words quickly proved me wrong.  

“What do you mean?  Why wouldn't we talk to her?  Jody, what the hell!?”  

“She bolted,” Claire explained.  “She was in the hospital, I went to talk to her, and she bolted.  There were these bizarre monsters outside that attacked her,” my eyes widened even more. “We took care of it,” Claire stressed, holding her hands out to me as if to stop me from running.  “But she’s down for the count.  They got a few good licks in and she went down.  She’ll be okay.  Alex is patching her up, but, Y/N,” Claire hesitated, taking a deep breath.  “She’s from that universe.  Where Sam and Dean are.  The Bad Place, she calls it.”  

Claire’s face was that of a repentant child, as though any and all of this should fall on her shoulders.  

I took a few deep breaths, attempting to steady myself as I pinched the bridge of my nose with one hand, resting the other on my hip as I began to pace.  “So, you’re telling me that Sam and Dean are in some bizarro world, and the only person that can get us there is too busy having her boo-boos kissed to tell us how to get there?”  My voice rose in volume with each word, my illusion of calm rapidly fading.  

“It’s more than just that,” Jody said, standing up and slamming her hands on the dining room table.  “Y/N, you’re missing a vital part of this puzzle.”

“What part, Jody?  Sam and Dean are missing and we’re supposed to, what, sit on our thumbs and wait? I don’t think so!”  I began walking towards the garage, knowing Alex would have the girl that was the key to all of this in there with her.  

“The part where you die, Y/N!”  Claire screamed at me with tears in her eyes.  

“I don’t see how that matters even a little bit!”  My answer bit at her, and I watched her recoil, surprise evident on her face as she did so.  

“This isn’t negotiable.” Jody’s voice was deceptively calm and firm.  “You go over there, you die.  You aren’t leaving this house, do you hear me?”  Jody squinted as her words came out full of anger.  

“If Dean’s over there,” I caught myself. “If Dean and Sam are over there, then there’s absolutely no question as to where I’m going to be.  My place is there.  Saving them.  And you know it.”

“I can’t lose you, too!”  Jody’s exclamation took me by surprise.  

“Jodes,” I began, but she held her hand up, effectively silencing me.  

“No.  Y/N, no.  Okay?  You’re staying here.  I won’t lose another child.”  Her eyes glistened with unshed tears and my heart lurched at her words. “I won’t do it, Y/N.”  

I let out a deep breath.  “It’s Dean,” I whispered.  

“Yeah, I know it is.  I know you two had a nasty breakup.  I know you haven’t spoken in months and I know you regret it every day.  But you cannot be the one to go over there.  I won’t let you.  If you go, I lose you, and I am not about to lose you, or anyone else.  Is that clear?”  

I attempted to swallow the lump in my throat that refused to diminish.  “All that matters is Dean, Jody.  I have to go-”  

“Damnit Y/N, if he was all that mattered to you then you would’ve said yes when he proposed to you instead of turning tail and running for the hills!”  

I took a step back to steady myself as my eyes focused on Jody.  “Look,” Jody began, her voice calmer now.  “Donna and I will go over there as soon as Kaia tells us what she knows.  We’ll take care of this and you will stay here.  There’s no other plan. This is it.”  

My eyes flitted from Jody to Claire and back, both of them giving me the same pleading expression and both too stubborn and strong-willed to change their minds.  

I nodded my head slowly, agreeing to their plan out of necessity, as Alex came running in through the garage door.  “It’s Larsen’s,” she blurted out.  “Larsen Brothers Shipyard off Route 14.  That’s where the door is.”  A small, dark haired girl with scratches adorning her face walked in behind her.

Jody and Claire were already grabbing supplies as we all piled into our vehicles and headed for the shipyard.  

We arrived in less than ten minutes and gathered at the sidewalk in front of the entryway.  

“Donna and I have got this.  But that door, it’s been open for a while and there’s no telling what crawled out in the meantime.  So, you guys?  You’re playing defense, okay?”  We all nodded in the affirmative as each of us armed ourselves accordingly.  

Donna was standing at the end of the sidewalk, hugging Claire and Patience as they walked by her.  I kept telling my feet to move, but no matter how loudly I shouted at them in my head, they wouldn’t respond.  I felt an arm snake its way over my shoulders, pulling me into a half hug.

“He’ll be alright, Y/N,” Donna’s friendly voice sang out to me as she pulled my head towards her.  

“I know,” I acquiesced.  “Just bring him back safe, okay?”  She gave me a quick nod and a smile before I watched her and Jody disappear into the building.  

It had been a while since Jody and Donna had gone in.  Too long.  Claire, Kaia, and Patience had all begun to get antsy a while ago and my trigger finger was more than itchy in their absence as I reacted to each and every sound that came out of the building in front of us.  

We heard a gunshot and all of our breaths stopped as we collectively stared at the building.  “That’s it,” I said, cocking my handgun and holding it down to my side.  

“You guys can stay here but I’m going in.  Something’s wrong.”  I began walking towards the front door, just as Claire wrapped her delicate hand around my wrist.  

“Wait,” she said.  “You can’t.”  She flicked her eyes over to Patience and stared at me silently.  

“It’s Dean,” I offered her as my explanation.  “What good is being alive in any world if he isn’t in it?”  I could feel moisture building in my eyes and I did my best to hold my tears at bay.  

“I’ll go with you.”  An unfamiliar voice sang out from the crowd as Kaia stepped forward.  “You won’t know where you’re going if I don’t.  I know where to go.  And where not to.”  She looked down at her fingers as she fiddled with her nails, nervously.  

All four of us walked into the building, our eyes searching endlessly for any sign of Donna or Jody.  

“Jodes!” I yelled into the emptiness.  We heard the beating of feet above us as I dove for the staircase, yelling for the others to follow me.  

By the time we found them, they had been surrounded.  Unfamiliar monsters with sickly glowing red eyes stared at them as if they were a feast.  I raised my gun and pulled off two shots directly into the back of their skulls.  I watched as their bodies slumped to the floor in front of us, and Jody and Donna each turned their heads towards me.  

Just beyond them, there was a glowing orange line that seemed to spark and fade.  

“There,” Kaia yelled, pointing her hand towards it.  “That’s the door!”  

I watched as it slowly began to shrink. “No!” I shouted as my feet broke into a sprint with Kaia close behind me.  

We leapt over Jody as she lay bruised and beaten on the floor, and made a break straight for the gateway.  I tumbled to the ground, taking in the monochromatic surroundings I found myself in.  Glancing back towards the rift, I could see it was still open, but just barely.  And there was no telling how long it would remain that way.  

“Come on,” Kaia said as she stood up, her teeth chattering in fear as she turned away from the door and walked away, beckoning me to follow her.  My handgun remained clenched in my hand as I reached for the pocketknife that had been tucked away in my back pocket.  

“Lead the way.”  

We seemed to be walking for hours and I was sure that any portal that there had been had closed by now.  Kaia continued to assure me that we hadn’t even been there an hour yet.  I ran my hands through my hair, tugging at the ends as I tucked it behind my ears.  

“We have to find them, Kaia,” I begged. She gave me no response but continued on until we heard the sounds of breaking twigs and crushed leaves.  Kaia hunched down in front of me, getting as low to the ground as she could as she held a finger up to me, insisting on my continued silence.  

We peaked out of a threadbare bush to try to identify where the sound came from, when two figures began walking towards us, their movements tentative and quiet.  

“Dean?” I whimpered as I lunged myself out into the clearing and towards him.  

My name hadn’t fully left his lips when I crashed into him, my arms wrapping around his neck as tears forced their way down my cheeks.  My breathing was ragged, but I’d never been so relieved.  I felt his arms wrap around me, pulling me into him as if he needed to know I was real.  He repeated my name again as I sobbed into his shoulder.  

“I thought,” I cried.  “I thought I’d lost you.” I leaned back and released my hold on him, finally meeting his eye.  

He was blinking fast, confusion coloring his entire face and stance.  But his eyes held mine as I stared into the deep emerald orbs that had always captivated me.  He raised his hand, wiping the tears that had been falling down my face away with the gentle pad of his thumb.  I closed my eyes, relishing in the feeling of his touch; his calloused fingertips smoothing over my skin sending shockwaves through me.  

“Same here,” he said, as his jaw set into a hard, locked line, his eyes still focused on me.  

“I’d hate to interrupt,” Kaia spoke up from behind us. “But we’re running on borrowed time here, if we aren’t out of time already.  We’ve got to go.”  

I pulled myself away from Dean, going against every urge in my body as I did so.  Wiping my hands down my shirt to smooth it out, I dusted myself off and attempted to focus yet again.  

“Hey Y/N,” I heard Sam’s voice calling from beside me.  Turning my head to him, I took in the smile that was plastered on his face, giving him my own smile in return.  “Heya Sammy,” I called as he reached out and squeezed my shoulder.

I turned around to face Kaia again, gesturing for her to lead the way. She seized the opportunity and began walking quickly back the way that we had come.  I followed behind her with the boys in tow.  The trek back to the gateway seemed to go faster, as if time had sped up now that Sam and Dean had been found.  

A few minutes into our hike, Dean's hand wound its way into mine, interlacing his fingers with mine as he squeezed my hand tightly; a gesture he had often given me when he knew I was uncomfortable or stressed.  I turned my head to make eye contact with him again as we continued walking.  

“It’s just up there,” Kaia pointed ahead of us as she continued, panting.  We could see the orange break in space hovering above the ground.  It didn’t seem to have shrunk in size, but its vibrance had died down significantly.  

“Run,” I instructed them, pushing Sam and Dean ahead of me as Kaia took off towards the rift.  I followed behind, close on their heels.

We were feet away from the doorway when I felt it.  A menacing, hooded figure clad in black sneaking up from behind.  When I turned my head, I could see them throw their arm forward as the long, aerodynamic weapon they were holding came flying towards us, pointed directly at Dean.  

“No!” I screamed, diving at him as I shoved him towards the doorway and put myself between him and the spear.  I watched in slow motion as Sam and Kaia made it through to the other side.  But, to my horror, Dean had stopped to turn around and face me, watching as the head of the spear sank itself into my back.  

“Y/N?”  Dean was screaming my name repeatedly as he reached for me, glaring over my shoulder at my assaulter and his would-be murderer.  I fell forward, kneeling to the ground as I turned my head to look at the hooded figure again.  I watched as the black hood fell back, revealing a familiar face and a sinister grin.  “Kaia?” I whispered.  

My vision began to go black as I felt Dean’s arms wrap around me, jerking me up to my feet before he lifted my legs in one arm, cradling my shoulders in the other.  My head lolled back and in an instant, everything went black.  

Dean was pacing the floor in Jody’s garage as Sam and Alex examined Y/N’s wound.  She’d passed out before they had even made it through the doorway, but Dean had made sure that they came back home safely.  The rift closed almost immediately after they came through.  

“Dean?” Sam had called to his brother once they were back in their own world.  But the only response he received was the garbled cries of Dean’s anguish.  

“No,” Sam had uttered beneath his breath as he ran towards them, convinced that what he was seeing couldn’t be real.  “No, she’s fine, Dean. She’s going to be fine.  Let me take a look at her.”  

He pushed his way to his brother, every step feeling like his feet were made of lead and concrete.  But when he pressed his fingers to her neck, feeling the small pulsations of her carotid artery, he let out a sigh of relief.  

“She’s got a pulse.  A weak one, but it’s there.  We need to get her some help.  Now.”  Sam reached out for her, wanting to remove the physical burden from Dean as he watched his brother collapse to the floor.  “Dean!” Sam was yelling, desperation flooding him. “We have to go.”  

Jody ran up to them, taking in the sight that she had feared.  “We didn’t stop it,” she muttered.  Patience walked up behind her, holding her hand over her mouth as if in astonishment.  

“This is it,” she said.  “My vision.  This is what I saw.”  Jody gasped, allowing the panic and heartbreak to set in.  

“We’ve got to move her,” Sam told them. “She’s got a pulse, but she won’t for long if we don’t get her somewhere safe.”  

Jody shook her head slightly, focusing yet again.  “Get her to the car out front. Alex’ll patch her up at home.”  

Before her sentence was finished, Sam was bolting towards the car, taking the steps down two at a time. Dean followed behind, his movements empty, as if a man possessed.  

Jody wove her arm through his, hanging onto his elbow as they walked quickly towards the exit and to the car.  

“I just got her back,” Dean said.  “I just got her back.  She can’t be gone already.  I can’t...” He left his sentence unfinished as Jody rubbed a loving hand up and down his back, attempting to reassure him.  

“It’ll be fine.  She’ll bounce right back.  She’s a fighter, yeah?”  Jody opened the back passenger door of her car, urging Dean into the seat as Sam was laying Y/N across from the other side, resting her head on Dean’s lap.  

Jody jumped in the driver’s seat, throwing the car into reverse as she pushed the “Talk” button on the steering wheel and called Alex.  

“It’s Y/N,” she said succinctly.  “We need you.  It’s...” She hesitated, looking up into the rearview mirror at Dean.  “It’s not good.  We’re a couple minutes away.  Be ready.”  The one-sided conversation was quick, direct and to the point.  

The tires squealed to a stop as Jody parked the car in the driveway, slamming the transmission into park and flicking the engine to the off position before everyone began hopping out of the car.  Dean stayed where he was, slowly stroking Y/N’s hair as he attempted to soothe her into waking.  

Alex was running out of the front door towards them, her scrubs still stained with Kaia’s blood from patching her up earlier, and her stethoscope still hanging from her neck.  “Bring her inside!”  

Dean did as he was told, sliding out of his seat, careful not to let Y/N’s head fall as he slowly pulling her out of the car and cradling her in his arms.  In seconds, they were all standing in the garage as Dean laid Y/N down on the gurney and pressed a kiss to her forehead.  

“Everyone, take a step back,” Alex ordered, listening to Y/N’s heart as she did so.  “Jody, I need you to bring me an IV bag.  We’re going to need to get some blood in her now along with as many antibiotics and as much saline as possible.  She’s losing blood fast.”

The words seemed to all blur together as Dean dropped into the chair behind him, cradling his head in his hands.  “This can’t be happening,” he repeated to himself, his eyes fixated on a drop of her blood as it fell to the floor.  

Two hours later, Dean was sitting next to Y/N again, squeezing her hand between both of his as he stared intently at her face.  Alex had assured him that she was fine.  That she’d been all patched up, that the dehydration and blood loss had been combated, and that everything was going to be just fine in time.  But he longed to see her eyes open and looking at him like she always had.  Like she could see into his soul.  He yearned to hear her voice, even if she yelled at him and never wanted to see him again.  As long as she was alive.  

He lowered his head, muttering “Please,” to himself over and over.  

At some point, he must have drifted off to sleep, her hand still clenched in his, with his head resting on the side of the bed.  She began to stir, grunting as she did so and squeezing his hand back.  

My eyes were heavy and hazy.  The pain that had flown through me on our way to the doorway seemed a distant memory and my body felt as though I were floating in the ocean; one wave after another pushing me closer to shore.  I opened my eyes tentatively, hesitant to take in my surroundings for fear that the monochromatic world would still be surrounding me.  

But in my hand, I could feel the warm familiarity that was Dean’s fingers interlaced with mine. I squeezed my hand around his, desperate to prove to myself that it was truly him.  

“Y/N?”  He woke with a start, his eyes focusing on my face as he brought one hand up to cup my cheek.  

I gave him a smile, my eyes closing in a slow blink as I opened my mouth.  “Hey there stranger.”  

Dean leaned down quickly, pressing his lips firmly against mine, seeming to blow life into me with his kiss.  The one that never failed to take my breath away.  

“Don’t you ever do that to me again, do you understand?”  

I nodded as I laughed quietly, Dean’s forehead pressing down into my own.  

“You got it,” I confirmed for him.  

“Marry me?”  The question came out as a plea as he pushed his head closer to mine, rubbing our noses against one another.  The same question I’d run from so many months ago.  But now, after all this time and after all that had happened, there was only one answer that I could give.  

I smiled at him, holding my breath as my cheeks began to ache from the tension. 

“Yes.”  

Taglist (Tag requests are open):

@vicmc624 @waywardprincesa @heyyy-hey-babyyy  @carissime72  @deans-baby-momma  @formulafun  @woodworthti666  @yetanotherreader  @crashlyrose  @hobby27  @gabby913  @jxackles  @polina-93 @supernaturaladdictsblog  @fandomoverdose666  @deans-baby-momma  @deanwanddamons  @tazzi-baby  @acertainhero  @lilulo-12​

(Desperate attempt to get my faves to notice me) @thinkinghardhardlythinking @smol-and-grumpy @wonder-cole-reads @watermelonlipstick @that-one-gay-girl @waywardbaby

#sam winchester #dean winchester #jody mills #claire novak #patience turner #kaia #the bad place #dean x reader #reader request #reader insert #spn fanfic #supernatural fanfic #supernatural fanfiction #spn fanfiction #jared padalecki #jensen ackles #reader imagine #supernatural x reader #spn #spn fluff #spn angst #fluff #angst #oneshot #series #fairlyspnfanfic #Rifts

[emelkae]

When you get this, respond with 5 things that make you happy. Then, Send this to last 10 people in your notifs. You never know who might benefit from spreading positivity✨

Thanks for this! I've been answering with five things that've made me smile today instead of just listing things.

- I remembered I only have three or four shifts left at a job I'm not very fond of, which made me happy to think about :D

- A few weeks ago Tumblr just randomly axed almost 40 followers from my list?? And I don't think they were all bots? I know it happened to other people too and some lost over 100. I'm really lucky. Anyway, I'm finally back up to where I was before the Big Cull. I know it shouldn't matter but I do like it when certain numbers go up. And I've been getting to meet lots of awesome new people!

- Came up with a VERY GOOD plot twist for WARRIOR that I'll have to handle super carefully. But it's way better than what I was gonna do. Only problem is that people will have to deal with a Not Great trope in WANNABE to get there, but hey, I'm learning from my mistakes

- My grandmother is letting me borrow her car to get to work today, which is very sweet of her since mine is in the shop still

- I woke up to a bunch of nice tags and mentions and I just love you guys haha

#thanks for the ask! #writingamongther0ses #me.

[fishmech]

i don't need to play night in the woods or see it ever again because I already learned the active brutality of capitalism and the passive brutality of what's left when industry leaves in a small town in Pennsylvania.

Because my grandparents always took me to see where grandma had lived, and where great grandma on grandpa's side had lived before that chunk moved coastward to a mill town that never fully ran down. And when we were in those places we saw my surviving relatives from the old, dead, mining mill towns, who themselves were run down with dreary lives. And there were barely any children left in any of the neighborhoods.

We went, diligently, at least once a year to the mine park outside Scranton that takes you down and tells you exactly how underpaid, how deadly, how young you'd start these short lives, short lives recorded in the family trees and genealogy of our own family, who never worked that particular mine but sure worked similar ones . If you want to use that cringe term, I was already "radicalized" by age 8 over this, over the sheer weight of it all.

Now sure I'm talking places that started their dying in earnest in the 20s, 30s, 40s. By the time my grandmother was attending the high school in Pottsville, the place had already lost 4% of the population it had just 10 years earlier, before the war, the peak of the town. By the time I first visited with her, it was now down 36%. Today? It's down 45%, and if I were to visit the last relative I think is still alive there, it would be in a neighborhood where the trees were already taking over vacated lots in 90s.

Silently it declines out there, and nothings' ever bringing it back. You got so many towns running on little more than old inertia and the fact that marginal ongoing industry chooses not to leave. And there's not even the hope that maybe somewhere close by is fine, the whole damn county has lost 60% of its population since 1930, that's 95 thousand people.

And one of the few things that keep them together out there? Lotta white supremacy shit, Lotta trump shit. And of course massive antisemitism in the mining industry that slowly drove my grandma and her family away near entirely.

#How horrible Pennsylvania gets away from the lowlands by the Delaware

[keanureevesisbae]

The Tran-Cavill Grandkids

Henry = 79 / Olivia = 70 / Vanessa = 47 / Elodie = 40 / Heather and Chloe are 36

Olivia: We have 8 grandchildren. It has been sixteen years since I first became a grandmother, but I still have to get used to it.

Henry: I love being a granddad. I love everything about it, especially when they all come over and we have seventeen people over.

Oliver (16)

Olivia: Oliver is Chloe’s and Joon Ki’s first son and our oldest grandson. Chloe was still in college and scared out of her mind when she found out she was pregnant. I stayed over in her dorm from her twenty fifth week of pregnancy to the thirtieth, since poor thing was suffering from a lot of panic attacks and because of their different schedules, Joon Ki and her friends couldn’t be there for her. I forgot how disgusting those dorms were. After that, she took online classes, because she was really fatigued and uncomfortable. She stayed at our place again up until the birth.

Henry: When Oliver was born, my life stopped for a moment. I was officially a granddad. I mean, I always knew I wanted to become a father, but a granddad… I never really thought that far into the future. But Oliver is such a wonderful young man. Takes his job as the oldest grandchild very seriously.

Olivia: He comes over a lot, since our house is on the route when he goes home after school. He helps us with some chores or just comes over to drink some tea with us. Oliver even offers to do groceries for us every Saturday.

Dylan (14)

Henry: Dylan is Vanessa’s and Trey’s first son. We were delighted that we were going to be grandparents of two boys. However, it was pretty hard for Vanessa and that absolutely broke my heart. My poor girl was in a lot of pain and discomfort and there was nothing I could do about it.

Olivia: Vanessa became dehydrated pretty early on in her pregnancy, forcing her to quit her job. I actually quit my job too, because I realized that I needed to be there for her. 

Henry: Finally, after all those years of her saying that just because I am rich, doesn’t mean she should stop working. 

Olivia: Anyways, my poor baby was really out of it and I moved in with her and Trey for a while, because they obviously needed to prepare a lot for the arrival of their little boy. So Henry and Trey decorated the entire nursery, while Vanessa and I tried to come up with a birth plan, me telling her about the whole giving birth thing and how scary it can be. We even went to a few therapy sessions, simply to put her mind at ease.

Henry: However, Dylan was born ten weeks too early and it was a trying time for all of us. We spend so much time in the NICU. Thankfully the entire family stepped in to help Vanessa and Trey out. Dylan was a pretty weak baby, also really tiny and had troubles eating. Though he was sick and tired pretty often, he grew out to be such an amazing kid, who understands the limits he has and despite that, still manages to participate in certain sports. We are so proud of him. 

Megan (9)

Olivia: It took five years before Vanessa got pregnant again and thankfully this pregnancy was easier on her. We were so excited when we found out she was pregnant with a little girl! Our first granddaughter. Megan is such a bright young lady. When she was four, she saw a picture of Henry having a tea parties with her aunts when they were around her age. The next time she came over, she brought a dress and her cups and saucers and forced Henry to partake. 

Henry: I thought those days were over, but I’m a push over and I couldn’t say no to her. Megan is such a happy go lucky kid, with the most infectious giggle. I remember when she was a baby, she started to giggle and didn’t stop. Nowadays, she can just stare at you, before bursting out in a fit of giggles. She also forces me to dance with her, but thankfully every Tran-Cavill girl tells her that it’s for the best that I don’t dance.

Jake (8)

Henry: Jake is Chloe’s second second and that is one special kid. He was already dancing in the womb, according to the sonographer. I think he was only two months when I was playing some music in the background and Jake was in his seat. He started to move his arms right on the beat!

Olivia: He is now going to dance classes and I have to say: that kid knows how dance. He can appear to be a bit more introverted, isn’t really in your face when they come over to visit. All in all, he is a pretty timid kid, but the second he hears music or is on a stage, he dances his heart out. So amazingly talented! When he visits, he always gives us little previews of the dances he taught in class. 

Kiki (4)

Henry: Heather was never the type of woman that dated. She was always more focused on her own career. It did shock me when she told us that she got pregnant and that she had to tell her boyfriend about it, since we all had no clue that she was even dating someone. Not even her own twin sister knew! 

Olivia: What a fucking doorknob that guy was. Heather wanted me to join her, when she would tell this Tom dude she was pregnant. Turns out she really is a daughter of mine, because she found herself a man that is the spitting image of Wesley, appearance wise and personality wise. He got so mad when she told him and even had the audacity to tell Heather that she got knocked up by someone else. He really wasn’t hiding the fact that he was an idiot, because he told my sweet Heather all that, when I was right next to her! Long story short, I broke them up, slapped Tom in the face and threatened to kill him if he ever sought out to her or the baby.

Henry: That’s my girl.

Olivia: But Heather is a real trooper and manages to take care of Kiki just fine. Thankfully we love her dearly and didn’t kick her out, because she got pregnant out of wedlock (like my parents and brothers did). We are the go to baby sitter for Kiki and it’s so much fun to pick her up from school. It reminds me of the times that we would pick up our own girls from school.

Henry: Kiki is such a happy go lucky little girl. She is a ray of sunshine and we are so lucky and grateful that she is in our lives and that that idiot Tom is not. I fear the day that I run into him, because I will throw him in front of a bus. Accidentally of course.

Olivia: Henry, honey, remember: you’re nearing the ripe age of eighty. What if you break a hip or your wrist?

Lewis (14)

Olivia: So, Katie, Elodie’s wife, used to teach English in Secondary school, but after she lost her job, since her school had to close, she became a substitute for three months at another school. That’s where she met nine year old Lewis. According to her, he was a shy kid, but every day after school, he’d linger around the classroom and talked to Katie. He would help her out with cleaning up, make his homework and often they would walk out of the school together.

Henry: Unfortunately she had to leave after three months and according to her, it was pretty hard leaving Lewis. Two weeks after she left the school, she got a call in the middle of the night. The principal of that school informed her that Lewis was removed from his home by the police. The neighbors called it in, since they heard the abuse going on. Later on, it turned out that Lewis was the victim of abuse on a daily basis. He lingered in Katie’s class room to postpone the moment of going home to his father. He was in desperate need of someone who would take him into emergency foster care.

Olivia: However the only person he wanted to stay with, was Katie, so she and Elodie took him in. It was supposed to be for a week, but a week turned into a month and after a nasty trial, they officially adopted Lewis on his tenth birthday!

Henry: I remember him coming over for the first time. Maybe it was a bit mean to let him meet everyone at once, but despite his nerves, he managed quite well. Now we know Lewis as such a hardworking young man, who desperately tries to help others and makes sure that they can reach their full potential.  

Stella (8)

Olivia: Elodie and Katie got into foster care a whole lot more seriously after they adopted Lewis and three years ago, they had to foster Stella, who had lost both of her parents in a tragic accident and there wasn’t anyone that could care for her. I remember Elodie and Katie having a bit of trouble with Stella, because she would lock herself up in her room and not talk to anyone.

Henry: It was hard, but Lewis swooped right in and the two of them had such long conversations. I think it was because of him that Stella opened up to her moms, but also to the rest of the family. She and Lewis are definitely partners in crime. She is quite something. Very mischievous and sneaky. She loves to scare people, hiding behind doors, but she doesn’t do it to us (thankfully), because she is afraid will scare ourselves a heart attack. So considerate. 

Olivia: In a lot of ways she reminds me of Vanessa. She is very eloquent and uses fancy words to throw you off guard. I love taking her out with me, because, just like Vanessa, she “whispers" something to you (most likely she’s gossiping), but the people she is talking about, can always hear it. I know I shouldn’t condone this, but I love the faces of the people when they hear Stella say: ‘Grandma, why is that woman wearing those shoes? The straps are too tight. She looks like a ham.’

Henry: You allow that? You should discipline her.

Olivia: I have been raising kids since I was twenty three and I always made sure to discipline them. Now that I’m a grandma, I can let it slide for a few times.

Charlotte (2)

Henry: And last but not least, little Charlotte. They fostered her since she was a year and officially adopted her six months ago. We don’t know exactly what happened to her, since she was abandoned at around nine months. No one actually knows what her exact age is, let alone her birthday. 

Olivia: It’s such a shame that something this horrendous could happen to such a precious little bean. She is, despite the things that happened to her, a lovely young girl, who kind of reminds me a lot of Elodie. A bit shy, a bit quiet and not a smiler.

Henry: Definitely not a smiler to strangers at all, but when she does… She’s so precious. Lewis and Stella are really good with her as well. These two were made to be older siblings. I can’t wait to see what kind of girl Charlotte becomes!

◎◎◎

Olivia: We are so blessed with our beautiful grandchildren and it’s my goal to become at least a hundred years old, so I can see every single one of them at least graduate!

Henry: And I want to hold my great-grandchild, so yeah, I agree, my love. We should become at least a hundred years old.

Taglist: @thelastsock​ // @flhorah​ // @sausagefest1996​ // @laufeysodinson​ // @xxxkatxo​ // @memoriesat30​ // @henrythickcavill​ // @crimsonrae​ // @henryobsessed // @madbaddic7ed​ // @summersong69​ // @lyrafraiser​ // @peakygroupie​ // @coldmuffinbanditshoe​ // @mary-ann84​ // @thereisa8ella​ //@crazyandanonymous4u // @xuxszx​ // @emmaofgreengabbles​ // @jimmypagesandbrianmayshair​ // @onlyhenrys // @omgkatinka​ // @oddsnendsfanfics​ // @speakerforthedead0 // @agniavateira // @gearhead66 // @chamomilebottom // @diegos-butt // @yoyoanaria // 

#henry cavill #henry cavill x ofc #henry cavill x oc #henry cavill fanfic #henry cavill fandom #Olivia Tran-Cavill #henry cavill x Olivia Tran #mister cavill your dog is kinda fat

[nastasyafilippovnas]

40 and 45 for santhony :)

I did the 40 one. If I do the other, I'll tag you. I hope you like it!

santhony + exes meeting again after years AU, post-canon, wc. 2.1 (ao3)

Siena wouldn’t lie, over the years she had imagined many scenarios for meeting Anthony again. He would attend one of her performances, she would spot him among the crowd and miss the next note, making the audience gasp collectively. Or they would cross paths down the street, with her coming out of Genevieve’s shop and him coming in with his mother and sisters. They would freeze for a moment, caught in each other’s eyes, then she would run as fast as she could in the other direction. Or maybe, just maybe, she would finally attend one of Anthony’s balls, in the arms of another gentleman, and he would stare helplessly at her as she waltzed the night away. 

But soon a year passed and they didn’t meet each other once. She left for France with her new protector and, shortly after, Genevieve wrote to inform that, just in case she was wondering, the Viscount Bridgerton had finally married. Genevieve enclosed a sketch of the wedding gown she had designed for the bride. Siena understood her friend’s message loud and clear. It wasn’t cruelty. It was simply time to let go.

Of course, as much as she told herself that, her heart wasn’t as easily convinced. And sometimes, in the dark of night, she still indulged in fantasies and dreams. He would come to France on business and their paths would cross at a Parisian café. Or his wife would die of consumption and he would finally come running back to her. This one left her so horrified at her own selfishness that she found herself back in church, lightening a candle and praying for the Viscountess’ health.

Then time passed, as time ought to. Ten years went by in the blink of an eye. She went from Paris to Vienna to Milan. From Le Théâtre National to the Theater in der Leopoldstadt to La Scala. She was famous all over continental Europe. She was adored. And she had accepted that Anthony belonged to her past. She would remember their time together fondly, instead of tormenting herself with what ifs and regrets. 

And now, here he was, hat in hand, standing at the door to her grandmother’s house, in the Tuscan town that carried the same name as she did, twelve years after they had parted ways. Older, yes, with some gray hairs and rug lines that the boy she had known didn’t possess, but equally handsome. 

Siena couldn’t hide her astonishment as she openly stared at him, without knowing what to do.

“What…what are you doing here?” 

“I stopped by the theatre first.” He answered simply, as if it was the most common thing. As if they had an appointment to meet for tea she had forgotten about and now he came to remind her. “Signore Maldini told me you were here.”

Siena bet he did. Signore Maldini, who managed the day-to-day affairs of the Milanese theatre, was the biggest gossiper she knew. He must have been delighted to tell Anthony where she was staying. And by now, the whole cast of La Scala - and probably half of Milan - already knew that some English gentleman had come looking for her.

“He mentioned you were sick.” He kept moving the hat in his hands in worry. “Are you feeling better?”

“It was just a cold that wouldn’t leave.” It had been a bit more than that. It had kept her from performing. Siena had remembered how scared she had felt when week after week went by and she couldn’t sing an aria without having a coughing fit. “The doctor recommended a change of airs and warmer climate.”

Anthony nodded, but the worry still clouded his eyes and she didn’t understand it. She didn’t understand any of it.

“My lord, why are you here?”

“Do you think I could come in?” Anthony asked and Siena noticed then they were in the same position as when they had last seen each other. Her at the door, and him in her steps. All that was missing was the other man. “That is, if you don’t…” 

Siena stepped aside, showing him inside. “I’m sorry for my manners. I guess I was a bit surprised.”

“It’s understandable. Is this your house?” He looked around the place curiously.

Siena supposed that compared to his usual lodgings, it wasn’t much. The house was a good size, and it even had two floors, but it was in desperately need of repairs. The living room only had one couch, a writing desk and a chair on one side and the fireplace occupying the other side. At least she had fixed the leaking in the roof before Anthony arrived. She would’ve been mortified if he had seen that.

“It's my grandmother’s. Well, it’s mine now. She died last year and left it for me.” 

Despite all the conditions, Siena had never been more relieved to have this place than when she had gotten sick. Leaking or not, it ensured she at least had a roof over her head and, with the money she had saved over the years, it was enough to live comfortably for some time. And although the house was far from the city center, which meant long walks to the market whenever needed, it also had a huge backyard and a great view of the Tuscan hills which had done wonders, if not for her health, at least for her soul.

“I'm sorry for your loss.”

Siena shrugged her shoulders. “It's okay.”

“Siena…”

They were still standing on the living room, she realized now. And whatever Anthony had to say, she didn’t want him to say it here.

“Come.” She said, already walking from the living room to the kitchen and taking the tea set she had left there for her afternoon tea and adding another cup to the tray. “We can sit on the patio and you can say whatever you have to say there.”

Anthony nodded and moved to follow her. 

Siena opened the garden doors and felt some of the excitement over Anthony’s arrival leaving her, the calmness she had grown used to here returning to her. This was her favorite place in the house, probably in the city. The patio had a set of iron chairs and a table where to she directed Anthony and set their tea. It was spring and the whole backyard was blooming with flowers she had tended to herself. It filled her with pride to know she had turned the garden around all on her own, and maybe she wasn’t creating art, but at least she could help nature give and nurture life.

From their seats at the patio, they could also see part of the road and some of the Tuscan hills so many painters had tried and failed to capture the beauty of.

“It's beautiful here.” Anthony said in amazement. 

“I know,” she answered, smiling. “I’ve been here for six months and it still takes my breath away every time.”

“Thank you for bringing me back here.”

She poured the tea for them. It was one of the few English habits she still kept, drinking a cup of tea while watching the Tuscan sunset, though she hardly ever had any company. 

“You're welcome. Now…why are you here, Anthony?”

During all the time they spent together, she hardly ever used his name. But, after so many years, and inside her own idilic corner of the world, she felt she was finally allowed to.

Anthony let out a small chuckle, “I guess the scandals of the ton don’t make their way to little corners of heaven in Italy.”

“I'm afraid we don’t yet receive Lady Whistledown’s papers, no.” She said and, because she also worried about him, added, “Is everything okay? Is the Viscountess well?”

Anthony smile grew bigger at her question and he laughed. “The Viscountess is very well. She is currently enjoying herself to our country house with her lover. Female lover.”

“Oh.” That was certainly unexpected. Siena snorted. “I'm sorry. I’m sure that must have been most distressing for you.”

“Not as much as it should’ve been.” He answered seriously, staring directly at her.

Siena bit her lip and turned away from him, looking at the garden. “I see.” She paused and took a sip from her tea. “Are there any kids?”

The last news she had from Anthony were of his marriage on Genevieve’s letter. Afterwards, she never asked and, if she knew of anything, her friend never mentioned it.

“No. None.”

The answer didn’t shock her as much as how unbothered he seemed by it. That had always seemed so important when they were together, to have an heir. It had been his duty, after all.

“You could always get an annulment and marry again.” 

When he didn’t offer any reply, Siena looked back at him. “But you won’t.”

Anthony sighed and drank his tea before answering it. “It seems…unkind to separate the Viscountess and the woman she loves, doesn’t it? Why should they suffer for being in love?”

She smiled softly. Anthony Bridgerton. She had always known he was a hopeless romantic.

“And the title?”

Anthony shrugged. “Benedict has two boys and so does Colin. It shall pass to one of them upon my death. Though, hopefully, a long time from now.”

“You seem to have made your peace with it.” It amazed her he wasn’t right now back in England attempting to perform his duties to perfection.

“Did you know I had never left England before?” Siena shook her head, though it didn’t come exactly as a surprise. She had travelled all over Europe like a gipsy, but he had stayed, strong and steady, since becoming head of the family at twenty. “Simon left to see the world and so did Colin. But I stayed. I never even considered leaving, except…” 

He paused and looked away from her as both of them remembered the one time he was talking about. He didn’t finish that sentence, he didn’t need to. 

“When the rumors started, the Viscountess left for the country and I didn’t see the point of staying in London, hearing the catty comments about my failed marriage.”

Siena nodded in understanding.

“You should know,” he continued, “I didn’t set out to see you.”

“Is that so?” She didn’t know if she should feel offended or not at that when he ended up at her door all the same.

“I went to Spain first. Not Italy. Not France.” The no country that would’ve reminded me of you was implied, but she understood it.

“That's a beautiful country too. I performed there for the King once.”

“Of course you did.” He smiled fondly at her. “So, I was walking down the streets in Barcelona one day, seeing all these marvelous things around me, and I realized there was only person I wanted to share that experience with. One person I wanted by my side. The same person I have always wanted. And I was wasting my time. I was letting my injured pride and my fear of another rejection prevent me from pursuing her.”

He looked directly into her eyes through the whole speech. After all this time. It was preposterous and fantastical and her heart was beating so fast it felt like it would leave her chest.

He raised his hand to her face and caressed it softly, tracing the contours of her lips and her chin just like he used to do. Siena closed her eyes and focused on the sensation of his fingers on her skin once more.

“Then you went to Milan?” She asked.

“No.” He answered with a little laugh and she opened her eyes. “As far as I knew, you were in Paris. So I went there. Then to Vienna. And finally to Milan. Every place I went, you had already left. It figures I would have to come to your city to find you.”

He grabbed her hands into his and dropped a kiss on top of it. She could hardly believe what was happening.

He had gone through quite the journey. For her. Back to her.

“I don’t know if I can sing anymore.” She blurted out before she could stop herself. 

“What are you talking about?” Anthony looked back at her in confusion but didn’t drop her hands.

“Ever since I got sick, I can’t… The coughing was too bad. I’m better now, but… I’m afraid of trying and not being able.” It felt good to finally confess her feelings to someone. “And, to be honest, I don’t know if I want to go back. I miss singing but I don’t miss the stage.”

He kept caressing her hands through her confession, providing her support. 

“You should do whatever makes you the happiest.” He said simply.

Siena got up from her chair and sat on his lap. Her hands on both sides of his face, looking directly into his eyes as she asked, “And you?” 

“That’s also up to you. I will stay for as long as you will have me.”

Forever, Siena thought. Then she kissed him, again and again.

send me a ship + a number from this list and i'll write a short story

#truegodofthearena #answered asks #santhony #anthony x siena #bridgerton #anthony bridgerton #siena rosso #my fics

[geo-winchester]

The dance (1940’s AU)

Soldier!Poe dameron x Singer!reader.

Summary: Poe came back to his hometown after a mission where General Leia invite him to a party and he had a great time with one of the singers.

A/N: Hi everyone! I hope you like this story it came to me when I heard put your head on my shoulder and even if I know it’s not from the 40’s let’s pretend it is. If you got any feedbacks I love to hear them and sorry if there’s a few mistakes.

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Poe would lie to everyone if he said that the last time he was on his hometown was the day when he go to fight on the big war, but no, the last time he was there was a few months ago and now he was there because after a success mission General Leia throw them a party so they could relax or have sometime with their family, Poe wasn’t much of a party person and he wasn’t planning on going to the party but after his father insisted he change in to his uniform and make his way to the party, he knew Leia always pay for a singer, most of his friends were excited to see who is going to play that night, as he was talking to his friends Leia came to the group.

-Captain Dameron, I though you wouldn’t came- she said.

-I wouldn’t miss it- he said faking a smile.

-Your father make you come, right?- he smiled as he nod -Well I know you’ll be happy with one of the singers.

-Someone I know?- he asked.

-You’re about to find out- she said as the lights from the scenario turn on -Enjoy the show Dameron.

-Thank you ma’am.

This wasn’t the first time Yn sing for this squadron, but that doesn’t mean she wasn’t nervous, maybe it wasn’t the fact that she was about to sing for 50 people, she was nervous because she saw Poe coming to the party, it seem like it was a long time ago since the first time she saw him and she had to admitted she loves how he look on that uniform. As she walk through the stage she could hear the whistle and the applause from the audience, a few seconds she and her companions start to sing one of their famous song and as the show keep going, the crowd keep whistling and start to dance, but most of the time she never leave Poe’s eyes. When she was done she and a few of the lady’s went to the bar looking for something to drink, they were talking about some of the soldiers, until all of them look behind Yn as they giggle.

-Can I get you a drink Miss YLN- she heard Poe behind her, she turn around and nod with a smile, they sit a little far from the crowd after he order their drinks -Is nice to meet you again.

-The pleasure is all mine, it’s been a while since you were here.

-Long enough to miss it- he said, she took a sip to her drink.

-So tell me captain, is there someone you came to see?- she asked.

-I came to see my father, he’s been fine and everything is going well with his dinner- he said and she nod -and of course I also came to see my beautiful girlfriend, she had this beautiful voice and it’s the most beautiful woman I ever seem, with this smile that make me think that I’m the most lucky man in the world, and she is funny and clever- he said looking at her.

-She sound nice.

-Yeah, Actually she is over there talking with Snap- he point at one of her friends and she punch him in the arm making him laugh -I’m just messing with you, honey.

-You better be, or you are going to see me dance with Ben- he tense and she smirk -Relax baby, I’m just messing with you- she use the same tone he used, he roll his eyes before he put his arm around her shoulder, she cuddle beside him and she could feel how he kiss his forehead.

-When’s the next show start?- she shook her head.

-I’m done for the night, Leia thought you may want my company- she said with a smile.

-Remind me to thank her later- he said and finally kiss her, he could feel her smile between kisses.

They stay for a moment that way, they keep talking about their days, he told her about his day with her father and that he visit his grandmother.

-She told me that you visit her- she shrugged.

-I always love that woman beside she promise me that she’ll show me how to cook you favorite dish- he smiled.

-She always loved you too, did she told you that the times she invited you to dinner it was because she want to help me to asked you out- she couldn’t help but laugh.

-You took a lot of time to do that- she said.

-Well that’s because I knew that you were going to be the last girl I ask her out, after I asked you, I wouldn’t think about any one else, I always going to love you for my rest of my life- he said as he look at her in the eyes.

-I thought you never saw me that way before- she whisper making him shook his head.

-I love you, since I saw you in your window reading that book...

-It was a book from H.P lovecraft, I didn’t sleep that night- both of them laughed, they hear that the next singer was getting ready, they stay in there places as most of his friends took their partners to the dance floor.

-Where’s your next show? Maybe... I can asked Leia for a couple of days and go with you- she smiled.

-Then you should come here- he look at her confused -This was my last show, I’m tired of doing this and I been talking with your father and he offer me a job, so you’re seeing the next sub-chef of your fathers dinner- she said proudly.

-I thought you love to sing.

-I do, but I also miss my home and my family... and I want to be here when you come back- she said, he cupped her cheek before he kiss her.

-I got the feeling that this would be over soon- they haven’t realize that Yn’s favorite song start to play until a few of Poe’s best friend join them on the table.

-Yn please, as a friend of Poe I beg you teach him another song- Snap said.

-What do you mean, this is an amazing song, one of my favorites- she said.

-Ahh, now I get it Poe- he said smirking at Poe, who finish his drink and took her hand.

-Let’s dance- he said, she follow him to the dance floor and he bring her to his chest, she put her head on his shoulder as they start to dance slowly, she could hear him whisper the song on her ear -Put your head on my shoulder, hold me in your arms, baby- she smiled as he keep singing -Put your lips next to mine dear, won’t you kiss once baby, just a kiss goodnight maybe, you and I will fall in love- she put her arms around her neck as he put them on her waist, he had a smirk on his face.

-I thought you didn’t like this song.

-But you love it, and it always remind me of this, you in my arms as you sing it lowly- she blushed.

-So that’s why snap hate it?

-Maybe or maybe it was the fact that I put it all the time- she giggled -I mean everything I said before you know?- she nod -Marry me...

-What?- she couldn’t believe what she heard.

-Pleas Yn Yln, would you make me the happiest man on the earth and marry me- she look at him as he was crazy but when she realized that he wasn’t joking she kiss him.

-I have a condition.

-Really? You have a condition?- she nod.

-You have to promise me that you are going to come home safe and sound... and then we’ll get a small house we’re we going to live happy with a cat and our kids- she said making him smile.

-I’ll promise- he said before he give her a quick kiss.

-You know...- she start to said -The city hall is still open...- he looked at her with confusion but then his look turn into surprises and excited.

-Are you sure? I mean we could wait until the war is over and our families could be there, on a little church- she shook her head.

-I don’t want to wait dameron- she said getting closer to his face -I want to marry you now, so when you get back to the fields you have a wife to get back and in your letters you will write dear mrs dameron, beside I don’t need a fancy wedding to marry you, all I need is you by my side...- he cut her with a passionate kiss.

-Then lets go Mrs Dameron.

Both of them giggle like little kids as they run to his car, in all the way to the city hall Poe took his hand and every time he could he kiss it, when the car stop in front of the building both of them look at each other.

-Are you ready, Mrs. Dameron?- he asked before they get out of the car.

-As ready as You are, Mr. Dameron- they smile and kiss one more time before he get out of the car and help her to get out -I knew it was a good idea to pick white dress for the party- she said before they made their way to the building.

#poe dameron x reader #poe dameron imagine #poe x reader #poe dameron fanfiction

[tsarisfanfiction]

Night At The Opera

Fandom: Thunderbirds Rating: Gen Genre: Friendship Characters: Scott, Penelope, Parker, Tracy Family

So this one took forever and is my longest single contribution to @gumnut-logic‘s irrelief so far (’Toffee’ will end up longer but that’s a multichap and this is not).  We’re using @darkestwolfx‘s prompt “Any characters (but maybe including Scott) – going to the opera” this time, although there’s not much opera actually in this, whoops.

Thanks to Nutty for helping me out with things to see in Sydney - any errors are my own lack of research, laziness, and the excuse “it’s 40 years in the future, things might have changed” - and how timezones work.  I also seem to have transplanted TOS!Penelope’s personality into her TAG counterpart because it fit better, oops.

Surely an invitation to the opera was better suited for Virgil?  Or one of his other brothers?  No?  Okay, then.  Wait, what do you mean he had to wear a suit?

Despite reassurances to the contrary, Scott was still fairly sure there’d been a mistake.  The invitation may have come from one Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward, a woman who most certainly did not make mistakes, but why a ticket to the opera would come for him rather than, say, Virgil – or even Gordon, if he was reading the air between the pair of them correctly – was utterly beyond him.  Hell, it was the sort of thing he’d expect her to drag John to, for a bit of social time with no requirement to talk.  An opera theatre was not exactly where you’d expect to find Scott Tracy.

An air show was more his speed, preferably as one of the performers.  Not sitting in a secluded box for people of importance and expected to sit still and quietly for several hours.  In a suit.

“Scott, are you ready?” Grandma rapped on his bedroom door loudly and he jumped, almost dropping the tie he was fidgeting with.  “Lady Penelope’s almost here!”

He was almost ready. A crisp sharp grey suit had been dredged out of the dark part of his wardrobe – the area where clothes he disliked hid away, and all suits registered highly on the ‘disliked’ list – and pulled on with extreme reluctance.  Cufflinks, silver with diamond studs and in the shape of small planes, had been begrudgingly pulled out of hiding, and additional gel had been called upon to slick his hair back entirely, rather than its usual half wind-swept style.

It all felt stifling, and once the tie went around his neck it would all be complete.  The man looking back at him in the mirror was stiff, and it was only years of scoldings from Grandma that stopped him scuffing his shiny shoes on the floor, just to break the perfect gentleman look.  Scott was a perfect gentleman, thank you very much. He didn’t need to dress up all fancy for that.

But Lady Penelope had insisted, and when Lady Creighton-Ward insisted, there was very little anyone could do to stop her.  Just ask John.

His door hissed open, and he jumped as his grandmother entered the room, her eyes raking him up and down.

“Grandma!” he yelped, scurrying back a step or two and tugging at his jacket sleeves again, just to make sure they were absolutely perfect.  The big Three-Oh might be looming in his not too distant future, and he might be the interim commander of International Rescue, but his grandmother could always reduce him to feeling like a child with his hand in the cookie jar with nothing more than a simple look.  “What if I was still getting changed?”

She shrugged at him, unconcerned.  “I used to change your diapers, kid.  It’s nothing new.”  She’d also dragged him, battered and bleeding and barely conscious, out of his uniform less than a week prior.  He still had the stitches and bandages from the worst wounds, carefully hidden beneath the suit.

Neither of them mentioned that one.

“But I’d say it’s a good thing I came in,” she continued, striding forwards and plucking the tie out of his hands.  “You can’t wear this one.”  This one was a simple navy tie, plain and unassuming, and therefore Scott’s favourite – if he had a favourite tie.  He didn’t.  “Honestly, child, you know the man should complement the Lady’s attire.”

She rummaged through his collection, and years of experience led him to back off and just let her do what she wanted.  When Grandma got an idea into her head, there was little chance of dissuading her.

“I’m not going as her date,” he protested, though, just to make it clear.  As a friend, perhaps, work colleague at worst, but he’d seen the aftermath of Gordon’s jealousy after the charity auction and had no desire to be on the receiving end of it himself.  Teasing younger brothers was all well and good until they retaliated with goop and other questionable substances at inopportune moments.  John avoided the worst of it by virtue of being on Thunderbird Five, and not even Gordon was willing to ruin his entire rare stays Earthside.  As a permanent resident of Tracy Island, Scott had no such escape, and he was fairly sure being the eldest brother meant anything went in their resident prankster’s eyes.

“You’re escorting her, and no grandson of mine will be embarrassing us or her by wearing the wrong colour tie,” Grandma rebuked, finally pulling out a light blue tie and approaching him with it.  The height difference was no obstacle to the formidable woman as she slipped it around his neck and tied it with a flourish into a Windsor.  “There.”  She patted his jacket lapels down before stepping back.

“Lady Penelope’s here,” Virgil said, poking his head in through the door.  “Gordon’s drooling worse than Sherbet, just so you know.”

A not insignificant part of Scott had hoped his brothers would be out on a mission when his ‘h’escort’ arrived.  The raised eyebrow from Virgil and betrayed pout of Gordon had been bad enough when the tickets had arrived the previous day, and had only increased when Scott had immediately contacted their London Agent to point out the mistake, to be told there was no mistake, Scott, and we’ll be collecting you at four pm tomorrow.

For once, the world was silent, and all four brothers were there, if one holographically, to observe as he somewhat stiffly made his way into the den, where Lady Penelope was waiting in a stunning pale blue evening dress – the exact same colour as his tie; clearly someone had been co-ordinating behind the scenes, and that someone was probably Grandma – and a matching bouquet of lace and faux flowers atop her head that Scott didn’t think deserved the name of ‘hat’, but women’s fashion had never been his strong point.

Gordon was, as Virgil had said, almost entirely oblivious to anything in the room except the blonde woman, although sadly not oblivious enough to miss Scott’s matching tie. Amber eyes narrowed at him and Scott offered them an apologetic smile.

“Scott!”  Perfectly manicured fingers caught his arm, Lady Penelope gracefully linking their arms together in a way that made it look like he was in control.  It was an illusion – he wasn’t.  Gordon’s eyes narrowed further, and Scott made a mental note to attempt to talk him down from whatever revenge he was no doubt plotting as soon as he got back. “You look amazing, dear,” she continued. “Boys, I’ll be borrowing your brother for the evening.”

“By all means.” Virgil was grinning broadly.  “You two have fun.”

“Oh, we plan to, Virgil,” Lady Penelope reassured him.  “Don’t wait up for him; I’ll bring him back tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”  Scott hadn’t heard that before, and from the strangled noise Gordon made, he wasn’t the only one who hadn’t been told that little detail.  “But…”

“The performance doesn’t finish until midnight,” Lady Penelope informed him.  “I’ve made all the arrangements for the overnight stay, and we’ll have you back here by this time tomorrow.”

“But-”

“No buts, young man,” Grandma cut in, her hand coming to his elbow.  Between them, the two women started to steer him down towards the hangar, where Parker and FAB1 were no doubt waiting.  “Go and enjoy your downtime.”

Downtime.  The thing he’d been on since that mission.  That thing he would still be on until Grandma and Virgil decided the stitches could be removed and that he was ready for duty again.  Suddenly things started slotting into place.

“See you tomorrow, Scott!” Alan called cheerfully, echoed by Virgil.  Gordon made a noise that sounded more like a grunt than words, and Scott decided the best thing to do would be to ignore it as he was led downstairs.

“h’All the bags are packed, M’Lady,” Parker greeted them as he held the door open.  Sherbet yipped at them from the back seat.  “Shut up, you.”  Manners drilled into him by his grandmother indicated that Scott should assist Lady Penelope into the car first, but before he could even make a move, she was slipping off of his arm and sidling all the way across the back seat, scooping Sherbet up in the same fluid movement.  “h’After you, Mister Scott, sir.”

With a nod to Parker, and stooping just enough for Grandma to kiss his cheek lightly in farewell, he folded himself into the remaining seat and pulled his seatbelt on.

FAB1 was not a usual Tracy ride.  Scott wasn’t familiar with the car like he was their fleet of transportation – both Thunderbirds and regular craft – and had rarely had the opportunity to travel in the pink Rolls-Royce.  Much of that was down to his preference to pilot himself places, rather than be a passenger, and being trapped in a suit normally didn’t stop him firmly placing himself in the pilot’s seat of whatever plane was being used.

Grounded for injury as he was, however, the option of piloting had been forcibly removed by the family medics, leaving him with no choice but to recline in the back seat as Lady Penelope gave the order for them to leave the island.  Palm trees didn’t show the car the same respect as Thunderbird Two, and stayed rigidly upright as they passed between them, FAB1’s flight mode engaging with plenty of time to spare before they ran out of runway.

The car was, for obvious reasons, not as fast as his usual rides.  Even the regular aircraft they kept for official non-IR business went faster than Parker was currently going, and Scott quickly found the expanse of water passing below them monotonous.  No doubt Gordon would find it fascinating, if he could tear his eyes away from Lady Penelope, but Gordon wasn’t here and water wasn’t Scott’s preferred view.

“Are you sure you didn’t mean Virgil or Gordon?” he asked, glancing over at the woman beside him.

“Quite sure,” she confirmed. Sherbet let out another yip and jumped onto his lap, demanding to be petted.  Scott acquiesced, running a hand over short coarse fur to the pug’s obvious pleasure.  “I’m aware that the opera house is not your usual preference, but your family agreed that a change of scene would be good for you.”

“Even Gordon?” he asked, and was surprised to see a hint of colour in her cheeks.

“Gordon was not involved in the discussion,” she admitted.  “It was mainly your Grandmother and John, although I believe Virgil also had some input.”

Why did that not surprise Scott in the slightest?

“Of course it was,” he sighed.

“How are your injuries?” she inquired, and he winced.

“Healing,” he evaded. She didn’t press further, not that she needed to.  No doubt Grandma had filled her in on exactly what injuries he had and therefore situations to avoid until they were healed.  As it happened, sitting down for extended periods of time was one of the few things he could do under her instruction.  No doubt the opera would fit the bill precisely.

Small talk was not Scott’s preference, but Lady Penelope was a master of the art.  Coaxed into discussions about his brothers and the newest GDF fliers, the journey to Sydney passed quickly.  The fact that it was four pm when they arrived might have thrown Scott at one point, but jetting all over the world daily had long since dulled him to timezone changes and, thankfully, jet lag.

“I’ve secured reservations for dinner in our hotel,” Lady Penelope informed him as FAB1 gently set down on tarmac and folded in her wings, returning to the usual form of a regular, if expensive car.  “The performance begins at nine, but the doors open at seven thirty.”

“You really have this all planned out, don’t you?” he asked, thoroughly unsurprised.  She smiled and gestured towards the opera house, now visible as they headed towards it.

“’Ere we are, M’Lady, Mr Scott,” Parker said, pulling FAB1 to a gentle stop outside a hotel.  It was suitably lavish for Lady Penelope’s accommodations, no doubt five star with a three star restaurant nestled inside. Diamond-studded cufflinks fit right in, and Scott viewed it with some trepidation as Parker opened the door for him. Cars were not designed for long-legged Tracys to be in for any length of time – one of the many reasons Scott adored Thunderbird One was her unlimited legroom on longer flights – and it took him a moment to straighten fully, by which time Lady Penelope had materialised on his arm.

“Shall we?”  He sent a glance back at where Parker was opening FAB1’s deceptively large boot to reveal their overnight bags.  “Parker will take care of the bags, Scott,” Lady Penelope assured him, and without waiting for a reply began to steer him into the building.

The interior matched the exterior, marking this as a hotel clearly aimed at the upper class upon their visits to the Opera House.  Holograms gave him a changing view of the Opera House itself through the years, its iconic silhouette particularly striking in dusk views in Scott’s opinion. Undeterred by the lavish interior, Lady Penelope whisked him through to the desk, where Parker had already materialised, bags in tow, to claim both room keys.

It was easy to forget, with Parker’s h’attitude and ‘misspent youth’, that he was perfectly competent in his primary role as butler and chauffeur to the Creighton-Ward estate. Watching him in what should be an arena far outside his status – one that felt far outside Scott’s, despite the fact that he was, in fact, a multi-billionaire – never ceased to amaze Scott, who was content to let the Brits whisk him through the foyer, through some glass elevators and into a large suite with too many chandeliers hanging from the ceiling.  Through one open room he caught sight of a king sized bed.

Lady Penelope didn’t bother asking him if it was good enough for him – she had, once upon a time, but Scott was fairly sure she’d got fed up of being told the various rooms she found for them were excessive and now just swept them up in the extravagance and expected them to appreciate it, or at least have the good grace not to comment unprompted.  Scott had learnt that lesson, too.

Still the suite was a far cry from sharing a bedroom with two brothers in a small house in Kansas, and while Scott was getting used to being dragged to such places, he still preferred to stay more down to earth.  Not having to share with a brother was enough for him (sure, he loved his brothers, but personal space was nice, too).

He was abandoned with his luggage – luggage he had not packed, so he had no idea what was in it and prayed that the person responsible had packed something comfortable and not just another suit – while Parker showed Lady Penelope to her own quarters next door.  Parker had told him not to touch his luggage and that he would be back soon to unpack for him, but Scott had never had a butler and no intentions of starting now.

His stitches pulled worryingly as he picked the case up and he froze.  Tearing stitches and bleeding through bandages was always a nuisance, but in the stuffy suit he’d been coerced into, it would be an utter nightmare.

“h’I told you not to, Mr Scott.”  Suddenly Parker was there, whisking the case out of his grip and making a beeline for the bedroom.  “Your gran would ‘ave my ‘ead h’if you tore your stitches ‘ere.  M’Lady, too.”  Scott winced and followed him.

“At least let me unpack my own clothes,” he said, jumping in as the case opened and Parker started to pull clothes out of it – oh joy, another suit.  Why?  It was only one evening!

“You ‘ave h’one ‘our h’until the restaurant reservation,” Parker informed him, subtly blocking his attempts to get at his own clothes.  “M’Lady h’expects you to take a walk h’around the garden with ‘er.”  The older man had Scott hustled out of his own quarters before he even realised what was happening.

Lady Penelope emerged from her room at the same time, and Scott had known her far too long to even entertain the notion that it was coincidental.  He didn’t bother to comment on it, allowing her manicured talons to curl around his bicep once more as she left her room key with Parker – who had never even let Scott touch his – and swept back towards the elevator, Tracy firmly in tow.

“The gardens are delightful at this time of year,” she informed him as though this was his first time in Sydney.  Admittedly, it wasn’t a place he’d visited much, and when he had been there, the scenery was usually the last thing on his mind.  “We shall visit them properly tomorrow, but a short stroll will do us both wonders after our journey.”

Not one to turn down fresh air at any point, Scott was willing to step outside the rear entrance of the hotel – just as grand as the front – onto neatly manicured lawns.  Beyond them, the botanical garden loomed, with its trees in full bloom.  Neither of them wore shoes designed for walking on grass – or far at all, in the case of Lady Penelope’s heels, although Scott knew she could do a lot more in them than appearances implied – so they restrained themselves to the paths.

It was certainly easier terrain than Tracy Island boasted.  The rocky, volcanic island had been chosen precisely for being remote and inhospitable, allowing them to train in secrecy, but it lent itself less well to the walking injured.  Not that Scott considered himself walking wounded, but Grandma and Virgil both did, and restricted his permitted movements accordingly.  To that end, he admitted it was good to get away from the island and the worried smothering of his family for a few hours.

The company certainly didn’t hurt, either.  Scott had a lot of respect for Lady Penelope, but thanks to their respective lines of work and commitment, rarely got to spend any time with her.  There was also the constant worry of the paparazzi and rumours of more than just friendship flying, what with them both being filthy rich heirs and famous (even if Scott was technically not an heir anymore), but if Lady Penelope had proposed the visit, then that angle was certainly being taken care of. Kayo had been suspiciously absent over the last couple of days with no real reason given, and Scott chose to believe she was working some magic somewhere.  After all, if his sister was on the case, nothing unwanted would be leaked – and even if it somehow got past her, there was John ready with a digital nuke.

He’d pulled that one before, more than once.  It had proven very useful, even if its legality wasn’t even debatable and the GDF were turning an obliging blind eye to the fact that sometimes information just vanished.  Or they plain hadn’t noticed; that was also possible, although Scott liked to think Colonel Casey was a little more observant than that.

Their hour in the comfortably warm Sydney sun passed quickly.  Scott wasn’t the best at keeping track of time, relying on John for that when it was important, but Lady Penelope seemed to have a built-in pocket watch because they wandered into the restaurant at precisely one minute to five to be seated by a waiter in a sharp pressed suit who held out a seat for Lady Penelope and himself before Scott could even grasp the back of his own chair.  Scott prided himself on his quick reflexes; serving staff were truly in a class of their own.  His injuries weren’t slowing him that much, although he ruefully noticed that after an hour’s easy stroll the act of sitting down was appreciated by his body.

Maybe he did need the break from rescues, not that he’d be admitting that to anyone any time soon. Sharp blue eyes followed his every moment, but Lady Penelope had enough tact to keep her observations to herself, so Scott wasn’t unduly concerned about her.

Eating at a three star restaurant was far from Scott’s usual fare, and he left handling the waiter entirely to Lady Penelope.  The idea that they’d be attending the opera later that evening didn’t phase him in the slightest as he offered them a shorter menu that would allow plenty of time for the final course to settle before they made their way towards the Opera House, and while Scott hoped that three star did not mean food arranged in an overly fancy manner but with very little actually on the plate – there was a lot of him to feed, especially in comparison to the delicate form of the Lady opposite him – he agreed with Lady Penelope’s assertion that that would be perfect, thank you.

It took some dredging up of strict lessons on dining etiquette when he was younger and Dad was making his first millions from the depths of his memory, but Scott was quite pleased with himself for not committing a faux pas during the meal.  The portions had been small, as he’d feared, but still filling enough that he thought he could probably survive an evening of opera.  Which, now that it had sunk in that it really was him going and not one of his brothers, didn’t seem all that terrible an idea. After all, he could appreciate good music – it was impossible to live with Virgil and not, although Alan was doing a good job at it, but that was teenagers for you – he just rarely had time to.

Time was something he had been rather forcibly given, courtesy of a rescue that had felt perfectly successful to Scott – no-one died, after all – barring an inconvenient injury that had him just coming out of forced bedrest.  His family were rather unfortunately more influenced by the so-called ‘cost’ of the rescue – a fair bit of Scott’s blood, an unexpected nap for a few hours and a dozen stitches – than the success.  So maybe he’d given them a fright when he’d collapsed out of his ‘bird and narrowly missed getting splattered on his own ‘bird’s hangar floor when he didn’t quite land square on the extended access ramp (apparently – he didn’t remember that bit but John was insistent), but that was nearly a week ago and he was fine now.

Well, near enough, he mentally amended as he stood up from the table and his stitches tugged threateningly again.

“Come on, dear,” Lady Penelope tutted, once more scooping his bicep into her grip and guiding him out of the room and… back upstairs?  “We’re a little behind schedule, so you’ll have to get changed quickly.  Parker should have your new outfit laid out for you already.”

“Get changed?”  Scott looked down at his crisp suit.  “Why?”

“We’re two of the richest people in Sydney right now,” she said, as though that should mean something. “Being seen in public in the same outfit twice just won’t do.  Don’t worry, I’m sure Mrs Tracy has found something you’ll be comfortable in.”

Suits and comfortable were two words that did not go together, but Lady Penelope was a force to be reckoned with and subtly manhandled him into his own suite before vanishing into her own, neighbouring suite.

“There you h’are!” Parker exclaimed, ushering him forwards.  To Scott’s chagrin, there was indeed another suit laid out for him.  “h’I’m under h’orders from your gran to check your stitches, so h’off with those.”  He gestured at the suit Scott was still wearing, and he cringed.

“Do we have to go through all this fuss, Parker?” he asked.

“h’Oh yes, Mr Scott.  ‘Er Ladyship’s changing ‘er dress and h’I wouldn’t want to be the h’one to make M’Lady look bad by not wearing the right clothes, h’if you catch my drift.”

Scott did catch his drift. That didn’t mean he liked it, but both Lady Penelope and his grandmother were terrifying women when they wanted to be, and upsetting them would lead to nothing good.

There was some glee in getting rid of the tie, too, even if it was only going to be replaced by a black bow tie, by the looks of it.

According to tradition, stereotypes, and everything else, women took forever to get ready.  But by the time Parker was satisfied his stitches were as they should be and got him into the new suit – a light blue waistcoat over a white shirt underneath the navy jacket, and matching trousers – Lady Penelope was waiting for him.  Her dress was almost the same colour as before, but in a different cut and with a different assortment of lace and fabric perching on top of perfectly coiffed blonde curls.

“You look fantastic, dear,” she informed him as he escaped Parker and his lint brush.  “Are we ready?”  A matching clutch purse occupied one of her hands, but the other resumed its default position of curling around his bicep and guided him back towards the elevator.

Even amongst other ridiculously rich people in their suits, Scott felt overdressed as he pretended to escort Lady Penelope, who was very much actually escorting him, to the doorway as Parker vanished, only to reappear in FAB1 by the time they left the building.  Scott had no idea how the man did it, but it was a relief to slip into the pink car and away from any watching eyes.  He was conscious that he wasn’t at his best, and had no real desire to advertise to the world that the interim commander of International Rescue was injured.  The suit did its job well and hid the bandaging, but Scott couldn’t shake the uncomfortable feeling that everyone looking at him could see.

At least at the opera no-one would be looking at him.

Getting into the Opera House, however, required once again walking in front of crowds.  A pink car drew attention, even in front of a spectacular building like the Sydney Opera House, and as Parker assisted first Scott, and then Lady Penelope out there was the tell-tale flash of photography. Scott hoped Kayo and John were on top of that.

“h’I shall be ‘ere when you come h’out, M’Lady, Mr Scott,” Parker said as Lady Penelope once again positioned herself on Scott’s arm.

“Thank you, Parker,” she said.

“He’s not coming in?” Scott asked, surprised, as they made their way inside.  Behind them, FAB1 drove away.

“The opera isn’t Parker’s style,” she answered, flashing their tickets at the assistant, who promptly called for someone to lead them to their box.  “He’ll find his own entertainment for a few hours.”

“Doing what?”

“Oh, I’m sure I don’t know.” Scott knew a conversation end when he heard one; whatever her butler was up to, Lady Penelope knew and had no intentions of sharing.  Then again, considering Parker’s so-called ‘misspent youth’, ignorance was probably a good idea. Having four younger brothers had taught Scott the value of plausible deniability long ago.

They were ushered into a small box, high above the stage, with enough room for four people to seat comfortably.  Only two chairs had been set up, however, leaving Scott with the relief that he wouldn’t be sat with strangers for several hours.  Lady Penelope chose her seat, sitting down elegantly and looking entirely at ease in the velvet-lined chair, with her no doubt several-thousand-pound dress (Scott had no idea if it was actually a British dress) arrayed around her without so much as a crease wrong.

In comparison, Scott felt decidedly ill at ease as he sank into the surprisingly comfortable chair in his own far too expensive suit, leaning back until he found a position where the stitches didn’t complain.  The box had ample leg room even for a man over six foot in height, and Scott took full advantage of the fact that the box was almost impossible to see into, even if anyone wanted to people-watch instead of opera-watch, to stretch out his long legs.

There wasn’t even as much as a tut from his companion, and in slight surprise he looked over to her to see a smile gracing her face.

“You may as well be comfortable,” she agreed, although she remained prim in her posture.

“What about you?” he asked, and she laughed lightly.

“I’ve been taking posture lessons since before I could walk,” she reminded him.  “This is perfectly comfortable for me, but thank you for your concern.”  Pacified, Scott relaxed and turned his attention to the stage below them.

It was empty, the show still not due to start for another hour, according to the holographic interface on the inside of their box, ticking down the minutes until the show began. 00:59:01 ticked down to 00:59:00 and then so on, counting it down to the second.

It had been a long time since Scott had last been to the opera, or any stage performance – was it normal to have the timing of the start down to the second?

“Not everywhere,” Lady Penelope told him when he asked.  “But Sydney Opera House is one of the best in the world, and when you’re the best, the timing is expected to be precise.”  Scott could respect that; enough air show routines had been down to the millisecond for him to appreciate the importance. He just hadn’t expected to find it in an opera.

Lady Penelope picked up a pair of what looked like miniature binoculars and raised them to her eye delicately.

“Shall we see who’s in the crowd tonight?” she mused, training the lenses at the not-box seating below.

“Using binoculars?” Scott asked, glancing down to see many men in stuffy suits and women in fancy dresses. “Really?”

“Opera glasses, Scott, they’re called opera glasses.  And of course.  They have fantastic levels of magnification.  Oh, that poor woman – whoever told her salmon and lemon work together like that?”

Scott blinked, lost at the sudden change in conversation.

“I thought you were supposed to put lemon on fish?” he asked, only for Lady Penelope to turn her head and stare at him for a moment, before shaking her head lightly.

“The colours, Scott, not the food.  See that woman sat in the third row?”

He squinted, and she tutted before handing him the binoculars – opera glasses.  Reluctantly he raised them to his eyes and peered through.

“The one dressed in pink and yellow?” he asked, finally locating someone who might have fit the vague description.

“The colours are salmon and lemon,” Lady Penelope corrected.  “But yes, her.  See how the lemon overpowers the salmon?  It makes her complexion look quite ill.  I dare say she’s wearing the wrong undertone foundation as well.”

“The wrong what?”  He supposed the woman in question did look a little off colour.

“Undertone foundation,” she repeated.  “The undertone of the foundation is important; using the wrong one ensures that even if you have the perfect hue, it won’t match your complexion properly.”

“If you say so,” he said dubiously, beyond relieved that Kayo barely wore any make-up to his knowledge, and didn’t expect him to know anything about it anyway.  Then again, knowing Kayo her lipstick – lipgloss? Lip-thing – was probably modelled after that one Batman villain’s and was toxic.

“I do,” she said, shooting him a quick smile.  “Your turn.”

“What?”

“Pick someone,” she explained, gesturing at the ever-increasing numbers finding their way to seats below. “We’re people watching.”

Scott gaped at her.

“Isn’t that supposed to be rude?” he asked, gesturing at the opera glasses they both held.

“Everyone does it.” She brushed his complaints off.  “See, in the box opposite; the light just glinted off of their opera glasses.”

“But why?”

“It’s interesting,” she smiled.  “And also good practice.”

Good practice for what, Scott managed to stop himself from asking, finally remembering that he was at an opera house with one of the best spies in the world.  “So I just… pick someone?” he asked instead, beginning to scan the crowds with more intent.

“Anyone,” she confirmed, just as his gaze was caught by a teenage boy who clearly didn’t want to be there.  He reminded Scott of Alan, for all that this teenager was a redhead and shorter than his brother. Lady Penelope laughed when he mentioned it, before finding him with her own opera glasses and agreeing.

People watching was surprisingly fun, once Scott got the hang of it, and found himself caught out when the lights dimmed and the stage was lit in spotlight.  The holographic countdown declared 00:00:28 when he glanced at it, and following Lady Penelope’s lead he focused his opera glasses on the stage, where at precisely nine pm, the show began.

And at precisely midnight, three hours of singing and a short interlude where refreshments had been offered (and devoured by a hungry Tracy), the final note cut off, accompanied by the lights, plunging the entire room into darkness.  The applause was genuine, if at a polite volume, echoing through the darkened arena.  Scott was more than happy to join in, having enjoyed the performance more than he’d expected.

It was even worth being stuffed into a suit for several long hours, although he’d keep that part quiet from his brothers.  He had something of a reputation to uphold, after all, and as much as he’d enjoyed it, it was probably still more Virgil’s thing.

The main lights slowly brightened, and Scott stretched his legs out.  Even with the leg room, the lack of actually moving had stiffened his muscles up somewhat.

“So how long do we stay here?” he asked, looking at Lady Penelope only to find her already on her feet.

“No longer than necessary,” she quipped, holding a hand out to him.  “How are you feeling?”  It was only the second time she’d referenced his injury all day, and Scott found that after the opera he was feeling slightly more charitable towards it being mentioned.  No doubt an anticipated reaction from the short woman with him.

“I’m not designed to sit still for several hours,” he shrugged, accepting her hand and hauling himself to his feet, ignoring the familiar twinge of a healing wound.

“No, I don’t suppose you are,” she agreed.  “But you enjoyed the evening?”  He smiled down at her as her hand once again found his bicep.

“More than I thought I would,” he admitted.  “Thank you for this.”

“What are friends for?”

Parker was waiting for them, as promised, when they left the building, draping a thin fur coat over Lady Penelope’s shoulders as they were exposed to the slightly cooler midnight air.

“Thank you, Parker,” she said, gliding effortlessly into the back of her car and picking up a sleeping Sherbet – who Scott had seen surprisingly little of since their arrival in Australia, now that he thought about it.  “I trust you had a successful evening?”

“h’Oh yes, M’Lady,” Parker responded gleefully as Scott got in and shut the door behind him.  “Most successful.”

“Successful?” Scott asked, and Parker laughed.

“Those ‘ooligans down at the casino never knew what ‘it ‘em, Mr Scott, sir.  H’It’s h’always worth taking them folk down a peg h’or two, h’if you catch my drift.”

So Parker had been cheating cheaters out of their scammed earnings while they were gone.  Scott supposed that wasn’t surprising; Parker made no real secret that his underground skills remained sharp – indeed, all of the Tracys could cheat their way around cards, in no small part thanks to tricks taught to them by the butler himself.

“Well, it’s been a long day, especially with all those timezone changes, so I think I’ll turn in for the night when we get back to the hotel,” Lady Penelope said.  “I’d like to see the botanical gardens properly and I did promise to get you back to your brothers by four pm Tracy Island time tomorrow, so that will mean an early start, I’m afraid.”

“I don’t mind getting up early,” Scott assured her as they arrived, and she smiled.

“Then I’ll see you for a seven o’clock breakfast?”

“Do I have to wear a suit?” She laughed.

“I’ll have Parker pick a less formal one out for you,” she promised, and Scott groaned.  “Sorry, dear, but this hotel has standards, and your usual attire doesn’t quite cut it.”

Parker caught up with them before they even reached the elevator, FAB1 parked away safely for the night, and Scott wondered if he and Lady Penelope were that slow, or if Parker was that fast.

“Seven am,” Lady Penelope repeated as they reached his room, and Scott agreed.  Parker opened the door for him with a “h’I’ll see you h’in a moment, M’Lady”, and followed him inside.

“h’Another stitches check, h’I’m h’afraid, Mr Scott,” he said, and Scott rolled his eyes but submitted to it with minimal protest, glad to get out of the formal clothes and, once Parker was well and truly dismissed for the night, a third suit glaring at him accusingly from where the butler had laid it out, finally into something properly comfortable for bed.

Crossing timezones tended not to bother him after so long in International Rescue, but without the adrenaline rush of a rescue he found himself wearier than he would usually be at midnight. He glanced at his communicator, which he’d discovered packed in the bottom of his case, and debated calling John for a chat before remembering the time difference.  Even if John probably wasn’t asleep, Scott should not be encouraging bad sleeping habits in his brothers.  The same went for the rest of them, and he had no idea where Kayo was, so contacting his family was dismissed for the moment and he sank into the soft mattress of the huge bed gratefully, only for a spike of pain to warn him that if he wanted to sleep through the night, he should take the next dose of painkillers – also packed without his knowledge, most likely by Grandma or Virgil.

Pills were thrown back with an accompaniment of Australian spring water from the minibar, and then he crawled back into bed.  Sleep claimed him almost immediately.

The next morning came quickly, Scott’s internal clock disturbing him at six.  He didn’t need an hour to get ready for breakfast, even if getting ready included pulling on another suit, but going back to sleep would be an exercise in futility if he wanted to be on time for breakfast.

Spying his communicator again, the timezone now worked in his favour.  Six am in Sydney was a more sociable hour on Tracy Island, and he’d hooked up a line to Thunderbird Five before he’d finished considering doing it.

“Morning, Scott,” John greeted him immediately.  “How was last night?”

“I could have done without the suits,” Scott admitted, rolling over onto his back.  “But it wasn’t bad.”  John, a brother well versed in the pains of being chosen as Lady Penelope’s arm decoration, gifted him a small smile.

“I know the feeling,” he agreed.  “Are you still in bed?”

“Yup.”  Scott popped the ‘p’ and made a show of stretching out, even if John could only see his head and shoulders.  “Big bed.  Nice bed. Comfy bed.  I have an hour ‘til breakfast.  There’s time.”

“Scott Tracy being lazy; I never thought I’d see the day,” John commented, and Scott scowled at him.

“I have to wear another suit for breakfast, John.  For breakfast!”

“So you’re procrastinating getting dressed by calling me,” his brother surmised.

“Can’t I check on how my brothers are doing?” he asked maybe a little defensively, raising an eyebrow.

“You could, except you haven’t asked yet.”  Pesky smart younger brothers.

“I’m asking now.” John raised an eyebrow at him in return, but humoured him.

“Everyone’s fine; they had a late-night rescue but that went fine, no injuries.  Does mean they’re all still in bed, though.”

“Even Gordon?”  It was a very tired squid that didn’t surface with the sun, regardless of what time he went to bed.

“Even Gordon, luckily for you.”

Scott blinked.

“Luckily for me?”

“The usual rumours aren’t flying around, but there are still pictures of the two of you going to the opera last night on the net.  The less time between him seeing those, and seeing you, the less time he has to scheme.” Scott groaned.

“Can’t you just get rid of them?” he asked.

“It looks more suspicious if I delete everything regarding the two of you,” John told him. “All of the captions refer to you as friends or work colleagues, though.  Kayo and I made sure of that.”

“Thanks.”  Well, it was better than nothing, he supposed. His eyes fell on the suit Parker had laid out for him the previous evening and he groaned.  “I’d better get up,” he grumbled, glaring at it.  “I’m supposed to be meeting her at seven for breakfast and I want a shower first.”

“Watch your stitches.”

“Yes, Virgil.”

John chuckled.  “See you later, big brother.”  His hologram vanished, and Scott set aside the communicator before reluctantly leaving the bed and heading for the ensuite.

Showering with stitches was always a nuisance; they were old enough to get slightly damp without consequences, but it was still annoying to have to mind them.  Still, the wound was getting better and Scott was cautiously optimistic that he’d be allowed back on duty soon – he’d have cleared himself a few days ago, but Grandma and Virgil called had that ‘nonsense’ when he’d suggested it.

Dried off, he left the room with a fluffy towel around his waist to find Parker standing there, already perfectly dressed for the day.

“Morning, Mr Scott,” he said, seemingly unfazed by the fact that Scott was wearing nothing but a towel. “h’I’ve been h’asked to check your stitches h’again before you get dressed.”  Scott snatched at his underwear and beat a hasty retreat back into the ensuite to pull them on.

“Give me a minute, Parker!”

From the timing, he heavily suspected this occasion to be John’s fault, and made a mental note to complain at him later.

Parker’s presence did not vanish after the stitches check, the butler instead insisting on helping Scott with his suit and tie – a pale pink one, this time, not that Scott had known he owned one in that colour – and piling on the hair gel when Scott attempted to return to his usual style.

“Aren’t you supposed to be Lady Penelope’s butler?” Scott asked as the man wrestled the comb away from him and made him sit.

“’er Ladyship h’is less of h’a disaster when h’it comes to dressing ‘erself for the h’occasion,” Parker retorted, and Scott groaned.

“You’re not exactly aristocrat class yourself, either,” he pointed out, slumping forwards until a light jab in the back made him straighten up.

“h’I learnt from the best, Mr Scott,” the older man retorted.  “h’And you should respect your h’elders.”

“Right, sorry.”  There was a large mirror on the wall opposite, and Scott watched his transformation back into the perfect rich gentleman with a small amount of despair as Parker added one last dollop of hair gel, combed it in, and pronounced himself satisfied.

The clock proclaimed 06:57, and with no small amount of gratitude to his father for not employing an army of servants and putting him through that rigmarole every day, despite reaching billionaire status, Scott left his room to meet up with Lady Penelope – dressed in a pale pink to match his tie, as Scott had suspected – for breakfast.

It had always been drilled into Scott that breakfast was the most important meal of the day, and it was clear that the Australians agreed.  Unlike the previous evening of small plates of food arranged artistically, breakfast was a far more hearty affair, much to the delight of Scott’s stomach. Lady Penelope offered an amused smile as he dug in.

“A change from your grandmother’s cooking?” she asked, daintily picking at her smaller breakfast.

“Definitely,” he agreed, and they both laughed.  “So what’s the plan for today?”

“Nothing much, I’m afraid,” she said.  “The time difference between here and your home works against us this time, so we’ll only have time to visit the gardens before we have to leave.”

“Do I have to get changed again?” he asked, and she smiled.

“No, I think we can spare you the trauma of a fourth suit,” she laughed, and Scott relaxed, finishing off his plate with gusto and draining his coffee.  “Shall we go?”

“What about our rooms?” he asked.  “Don’t we need to check out?”

“Parker has that all in hand,” she assured him.  “I just need to collect Bertie from him, and then I’ll be ready for our walk.”

“Sherbet’s coming with us?” Scott asked, somewhat surprised.  After the lapdog’s absence from everything the day before, he’d expected him to remain in Parker’s care.

“Of course,” Lady Penelope told him, correcting his assumption.  “Bertie loves going out for walks.”

Well, Scott had no particular issue with the small dog, so he had no complaints about the additional companion as Parker materialised outside the restaurant, dog in arms and ready to be handed over to his mistress.

“We’ll be back by midday,” Lady Penelope informed him as she took her dog, Sherbet making contented little noises as he settled into her arms.  “If you could arrange a packed lunch for our journey back that would be appreciated.”

“Yes, M’Lady.  h’Enjoy your walk.”

“Oh, I’m sure we will. Shall we, Scott?”  With her arms full of dog, there was no subtle grip on his arm, but Scott remembered the way out of the hotel well enough from the previous day, and it took very little time for them to leave the building and end up back in the manicured lawns of the hotel’s garden.

Unlike the previous day, they didn’t stick to the lawns, but headed towards the trees and other fantastic flora visible in the botanical gardens themselves.  Unsurprisingly, despite the relative earliness of the day, there were already some people milling around, admiring the flowers.  An unspoken agreement had the pair avoiding them, seeking somewhere more quiet after the previous evening.

The gardens were huge, however, and it was simple enough to slip past the other admirers of nature to find a quieter area.

“A nice change from your usual atmosphere,” Lady Penelope observed, and Scott laughed, thinking of noisy brothers and roaring engines.

“Less chaos, for sure,” he agreed, “a few less rocks, too.”  While Tracy Island had some greenery, it was at its heart a volcanic outcrop – great for challenging exploring but not so much for casual strolls to admire nature.

If he didn’t know Lady Penelope as well as he did, he might have thought that she was picking her route at random through the large area.  High heels did nothing to stop the woman from finding the less even paths amongst the trees and higher shrubs, and while she was not walking with purpose, she was steering him slowly in a single direction.

Their eventual destination, after an hour or so of very casual walking, turned out to be a carved seat, overlooking the harbour.  Lady Penelope sat herself down on it gracefully, gesturing for Scott to join her.  Sherbet yapped as he did so, wriggling out of his owner’s grip and landing on Scott’s lap, looking up at him expectantly. Relaxing back against the sandstone, he scratched the dog behind the ears.

Underneath the shade of the trees, protected from the Australian sun, it was easy to relax and watch the ships manoeuvring in and out of the harbour.  Scott couldn’t actually remember the last time he’d just sat and watched the world go by – usually, he was having to chase after it in a Thunderbird as disasters struck, or there was the endless paperwork to juggle.  With both Thunderbird and paperwork strictly forbidden and out of reach, and a very determined Lady beside him, he’d been left with very little choice and found it was actually quite peaceful.

Was this what John saw, when he got a break from calls?  Maybe he should ask him about that at some point.  Birds sang overhead, and a light breeze ruffled the leaves above him, although not quite strong enough to free his hair from its heavily gelled confines. For the first time in a long time, Scott just let himself exist in the moment.

“As lovely as it is here, we must be heading back.”  Lady Penelope’s voice broke the silence suddenly, and Scott was startled to discover more than an hour had passed.  “I would like to keep my promise to your family, so we do need to leave Sydney by midday.”

Scott could just imagine the fuss if he wasn’t back by then – not because they didn’t completely trust Lady Penelope and Parker, but because the pair had a reputation for arriving where they said, when they said.  It would take more than having a single Tracy guest to delay them.  A delay would be concerning, to say the least.

Still, it was with some reluctance that he found his feet again, brushing his back off and hiding a wince as painkillers decided they’d done their duty and had worn off at some point while he was distracted.  Blue eyes focused on him, but Lady Penelope didn’t comment.  She did, however, scoop Sherbet up with only one arm, linking her other through with his.  Scott knew better than to refuse the silent aid, if only because it was Lady Penelope, and let her guide him back towards the direction of the hotel and the waiting Parker.

It was just before midday when they arrived, Penelope sliding into the car before Scott joined her.

“h’I h’obtained some sandwiches for you, M’Lady, Mr Scott,” Parker informed them as he lowered the travel table in the back of the driver’s seat and placed the paper plates laden with said sandwiches on it.  “There are drinks h’in the cup ‘olders.  h’I ‘ope that’ll do?”

“Indeed they will, thank you, Parker,” Lady Penelope assured him.

“Mr Scott, h’I took the liberty h’of putting your painkillers and some water h’in the door,” he continued, and Scott spotted them.

“Thanks,” he said, and reluctantly fished them out as the car began to move, trundling through the streets before the wings engaged and they lifted into the air.

Parker was no stranger to the appetite of the Tracy family – or the lack of cooking ability exhibited by their grandmother – and the sandwiches turned out to be numerous enough to keep Scott quite content as they flew over the ocean, back towards Tracy Island and the brothers that were no doubt waiting for him, provided they weren’t out on another rescue.

Sure enough, Thunderbird Two was still happily in her hangar when FAB1 trundled in at precisely four o’clock, according to the communicator Scott had strapped back to his wrist, uncaring of whether or not it belonged there while he was in a suit.

Also there was Virgil, who left his tools at the sight of them and hollered a call of “they’re back!” into his comm as he jogged over to the car.  Gordon immediately tore into view, clearly having been waiting as much as doing maintenance on Module Four, and in an echo of twenty four hours previous immediately zeroed in on Scott’s tie, which matched Lady Penelope’s current dress perfectly.

“Lady Penelope, you look amazing!” he gushed, almost knocking Scott out of the way in his haste to help the woman out of the car.  Sherbet yipped at him and the aquanaut flinched backwards, to Scott’s amusement.

“How are you?” Virgil asked Scott, drawing his attention to his dark haired brother as worried brown eyes looked him up and down.

“I’m fine, Virgil,” he assured him.  “You can ask Parker if you don’t believe me.”  Virgil had an annoying habit of never believing the words ‘I’m fine’, for some reason.

“Parker?” his brother immediately asked, and Scott sighed, drifting away as the questions about his health started again.  An entire day of not being treated like a patient had been a welcome break.  Unfortunately, that put him in Gordon’s line of sight, as Kayo materialised and headed straight for Lady Penelope, elbowing the blond out of the way.

Amber eyes looked him up and down in an echo of Virgil’s, only there was less worry and more scrutiny in the gaze before Gordon locked eyes with him.

“Gordon-” he started, hoping to head off whatever storm was headed his way, but Gordon interrupted him with a raised hand.

“Uh, uh.”

And then he was tackled in a hug, Gordon’s arms carefully avoiding his stitches.

“Gordon?”

“I’m still not happy you got to go and I didn’t,” his brother grumbled.  “But you look better than you have all week, so it was obviously for a good cause.”

“I- thanks?”

“But the next date is mine,” Gordon added, glowering up at him.  “Got it?”

“That’s not my call to make,” Scott admitted, as much as he’d like to say ‘yes’ just to get Gordon off his case.  “The only one who gets to decide that is her.”

They both looked across at where the two women were discussing something in hushed tones, the words “Sydney”, “arrested”, and “GDF” floating into earshot.  For some reason, that seemed to cheer Gordon up, as he released Scott and took a step back.

“Yeah, well, you look ridiculous.”  Parker’s carefully crafted hairstyle was mussed up, and Gordon made a face at the amount of gel that came off onto his hands, wiping them vigorously on his shorts. “Gross.  Go get yourself back to normal and stop looking like a pampered billionaire.”

Scott grinned at him. “But Gordon, didn’t you know?  I am a pampered billionaire.”

Gordon whacked his arm. “Go.  Change.  Don’t worry about the luggage – Virgil’s already got that.”  Scott whirled around and sure enough, his case was being carried towards the stairs by his brother.

“Seriously?” he sighed, leaving his younger brother to his failed attempts to get Lady Penelope’s attention away from Kayo and jogging to catch up with Virgil.  “I can carry my own bag.”

“Doesn’t mean you’re going to,” Virgil retorted, moving it out of reach when Scott tried to reclaim it. “Go take the elevator up.”  Scott matched him, step for step, and Virgil stopped, grumbling under his breath, before turning and heading back down.  “Fine, we’ll both take the elevator.  Come on.”

Admitting defeat, he followed, leaning against the wall as it carried them up to the den.

“Where’s Alan?” he asked, noticing a lack of his youngest brother.

“Freighter ran into some trouble just out of orbit,” Virgil shrugged.  “Brains went with him, and John’s joined them with the exo-suit.  They should be finished soon.”

“Why didn’t Kayo go?” he wondered, and Virgil laughed.

“Turns out Lady Penelope had some other business in Sydney as well as going to the opera,” he said. “Kayo’s been handling the fall out while you two had a nice walk in the park and gave Lady P. an alibi.”

Scott stared at him, making no move to get out of the elevator when it arrived.

“You mean I was playing distraction in a spy mission the whole time?”

“Seems that way, bro,” Virgil grinned, taking hold of his elbow and guiding him out, towards the final set of stairs.  “Judging by the papers, you made a fantastic one.  They’re full of conspiracy theories why you two were at the opera last night, although John’s culled the worst offenders.”

Scott sighed and picked at his bejewelled cufflinks morosely.

“No wonder they were so determined that I wear overpriced suits,” he moaned.  “Get me out of this thing; I’ve had enough.”

Virgil laughed again, pushing his way inside Scott’s room and putting the case down on the floor.

“I’ll leave you to it,” he said even as Scott all but ripped the tie away from his neck, letting the expensive pink material fall to the floor.  “See you in the den when you’re done.”

“Sure.”

It took very little time to get the offending clothes off, and his usual, comfy attire on.  His hair was a lost cause that required washing to get all of the gel out, however, so Scott just left it in its Gordon-ruffled state to be dealt with later, especially as the unmistakable sound of Thunderbird Three roared through the house; a glance out of his window showed him the large rocket returning to her silo, youngest brother presumably on board.

What he hadn’t been expecting, as he made his way back down to the den to find everyone gathered there, was the third person on board.

“You look better,” John said bluntly, crossing the room and putting a hand on his shoulder, surveying him critically like two of their younger brothers already had.  “I thought as much this morning, but holograms can be deceiving.”

“This morning?” he heard Gordon ask, but Alan chose that moment to leap at his two eldest brothers and hug them both, John’s recoil coming too late to escape.

“How was it?” the youngest asked excitedly.  “Did you see the bridge?  Was the Opera House all lit up?”

Scott didn’t get a chance to answer before John cut in.

“Get off, Alan.”

However, their youngest brother was like a limpet when he wanted to be, and with Scott not particularly trying very hard to escape, John’s struggles were fruitless, much to the amusement of everyone else in the room.

“Dog pile!” Gordon yelled suddenly, and Scott joined the laughter as Virgil got willingly dragged in, the four youngest brothers making a ring around the eldest.

“Guys!” John complained, but there was no real bite to his tone.

“Well, isn’t that just a picture,” Grandma commented.  “Kayo, be a dear and take a photo of my grandsons.”

“Already done.”  She flicked it up onto a holoprojector, and after a few moments the five boys disentangled enough to see it.  Four of them were laughing, with the fifth wearing a reluctant smile.  It was a total mess, with limbs everywhere and Gordon in danger of falling over where he was half-clinging to Virgil’s back.  Alan wasn’t even facing the camera, a bright blob of blond shielding most of his face from view.

“That’s awful,” John said, at the same moment Lady Penelope asked Kayo for a copy.

The two long term friends looked at each other, one frowning, the other openly amused, before John shook his head and extracted himself entirely from the crowd of brothers. Scott watched the exchange, amused, before realising his brother was heading back towards the hangars.

“John, where are you going?” he asked.

“Back to the office, and sanity,” the redhead retorted.

“You don’t even want some cake?” Lady Penelope asked.  “It’s chocolate.”

Cake?  “When did we get cake?” Scott asked, turning away from where John had paused to look at her, still dressed in her posh pink dress.

“h’I did, Mr Scott,” Parker waved.  “While you were h’out on your walk this morning.  M’Lady h’asked that h’I pick h’up the cake she h’ordered yesterday.”

“It’s in the kitchen, ready to be eaten,” Grandma interjected, and Scott blinked as his three youngest brothers vanished in a stampede, Kayo already long gone.

“Fine, I’ll stay for the cake.”  John’s reluctance was entirely put-on, in Scott’s opinion.  “Come on, Scott, or the vultures will have eaten it all before we get there.”

Scott laughed, and hauled himself back out of the sofa.

“Race you!”

As he and John tore down the stairs, both slowed down by injury or gravity, he heard more laughter from the den, and the click of another photograph being taken.

#irrelief #irrelief2020 #thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds are go fanfiction #tsari writes fanfiction #scott tracy #lady penelope creighton-ward #aloysius parker #grandma tracy #virgil tracy #gordon tracy #john tracy #alan tracy #kayo kyrano #thunderfluff

[clockworkotter]

been a while have a fuckin’ ramble of a rant lol

Today my parents called me looking for a fight because I asked them for the nth time to be mindful of shit they click and sign up for because they were getting shit sent to my email again. They did not take this well.

Like, lemme set a scene here--- today has been a DOOZY of a day including, but not limited to: a cat jumping out of a window onto my face and sliding my jaw out of socket in the process, a different cat possibly has a tumor, and my grandmother in law had a big health scare that ended with them going to the ER. (For now, she is fine and back home.) Today has been a lot of pain and stress.

My dad sent me a bunch of texts earlier that I saw but forgot to hit send on a reply to because so much shit was going down. Later in the day I checked my email and noticed I had yet another dumbshit newsletter IN HIS NAME sent to my email. Here’s the thing with that--- this has been a problem for a few years now. It started when they got a new car, they somehow managed to use my email address to set up their account with the dealer. I fully believe them when they say this was not on purpose because they DON’T KNOW MY EMAIL BY MEMORY. They have to look it up in their phones or on the computer. They would not be capable of writing it out on a paper form unless they whipped out their phones and checked and that’s stupid even for them. I figured they must have gotten some sort of sign up text or email and accidentally let autofill put mine in.

Ever since then, I’ve gotten things that they clearly intentionally signed up for because it’s related to shit I know they’ve been talking about or looking into. I get shit from shops local to them, in their name. None of this shit has had my name on it. Today I sent my dad a screencap of the latest thing I got with a message saying STOP THIS.

Now, to be faaaaaaaaaaair I didn’t nicely go “stop and check what y’all are clicking and signing up for” in this email, mostly because I have REPEATEDLY TOLD THEM this has been happening and that they need to be more mindful. I just said STOP.

This apparently sent them both into a rage because I got a call from my dad that I ignored at first because I was in the middle of a good stress cry and didn’t wanna interrupt that but he leaves a voicemail like call me NOW so, because there’s some major family drama going on on that side I was like well shit did something happen.

Call starts with him immediately huffing and saying he most certainly didn’t sign up for anything with my email. Before I can really answer he interrupts and gives a sort of perfunctory “oh and how is [grandmom]” and before I can even give a full answer on that my mom SNATCHES the phone from him (like i can HEAR as she grabbed it) and she starts in all super pissed about the email thing. Just totally offended and unreasonably defensive. I tell her that this has been an ongoing problem and I’m tired of having to remind them to be careful and she tries “this is the first time I’m hearing about it”

No it the fuck is not. We’ve had talks about this multiple times.

So she just gets progressively more and more angry because I won’t back down on it. I keep telling her this shit doesn’t happen in a vacuum and it shows me that they’re not careful about data they enter into things and I want them to pay more attention. She tries all sorts of shit including “well you used to live here so your email is tied to our address” nope, that’s not how it works but ok. “we haven’t even been to a car dealership” BITCH YOU JUST GOT A NEW CAR A FEW YEARS AGO AND THAT’S WHEN THIS STARTED. After I pointed that out, in nicer terms, she switched gears yet again. Each time I had to stand firm and remind her that it’s not the specific emails that are a problem, I have a magical tool called delete, the issue is that they clearly don’t know what kind of info they are using or giving out and because they’re both intentionally pigheaded about technology I think it’s a fair assumption that they’re not careful with their own info either. 

I dunno man they called specifically to pick a fight and they got one I guess. I stood my ground until she got so mad she hung up on me, which honestly felt pretty good. For years she got her way by getting angry and throwing tantrums until I backed off just to make her shut up, but pandemic has help me let go of a lot of family shit because hey, I ain’t gotta see ‘em at Christmas! 

In the end I guess she got a little of what she wanted because it ruined my day even more. I’m still pretty fucking pissed that they had the information that someone I love went to the fucking ER today and chose to push a fight instead of caring about that. Fuckin’ dumb. 

anyway that’s my novel I just had to fucking rant about it even though I’ve ranted about it to friends and huzbutt like 40 times already because it just fucking pissed me off. 

#personal #long post #venting #ranting #hi it's me i exist i just forget about tumblr

[thelanternlight]

Source

Witchy Asks!

Hello fellow witches! Here’s 50 Witchy Asks written by the-lunar-vixen. Please follow if you enjoy them. Blessed be!

1    What type of witch are you?

A gay one.

2    What deities do you like to work with, if any?

Angels, faery, guides, Mother God, Father God, Christ, saints, and ancestors. I'll also work with deities from various religions as they pertain to a spell or ritual (e.g. I may work with Hathor for a love spell).

3    Have you ever created your own spell?

Absolutely, most of the spellwork I do is original at least to some extent.

4    What’s your favorite time of year?

All the year is beautiful and wonderful for a myriad of reasons but Springtime is sacred to me.

5    Do you have a witch you look up to?

I think I have teachers that come and go in my life. They can be famous or not famous, witches or not, etc. Currently I'm loving Ember Honeyraven.

6    What makes you feel powerful?

Balance and freedom. Knowing that I'm on the side of what's good and right.

7    Do you have a favorite myth?

I'm an author and storyteller so I have many, many favorite myths. Off the top of my head I love the stories of Medusa, Apollo, the Christian Creation myth, Germanic and Scandinavian folklore, Anansi and his stories, Arthurian legends... the list goes on, but yes I LOVE stories. I think have so much meaning and wisdom to share.

8    Which famous/fantasy witch do you relate to the most?

I've grown up watching witches in movies, television, reading about them, etc so I've related to witches one way or another since day one. The Charmed Ones (all four) were role models for me when there were no role models for little, effeminate weirdos like myself as a child. The Sanderson Sisters were person heroes to me and I tried to emulate them from the very first time I saw the film; in fact those three are perhaps the original witches with whom I related the most. Since then there have been SO many wonderful characters in entertainment and in real life that inspired me so incredibly much that they've become a part of me.

9    Are you a wiccan?

I am not.

10   What’s the most unique item you’ve ever used in a spell?

I guess a dildo? I think 'unique' is a relative term.

11   Do you own any witchy books?

Apart from my personal book of spells I've owned many books on witchcraft but have parted ways with the majority of them. I'm currently trying to downsize the amount I have currently as it happens. Anybody want some free books?

12   Which misconception about witches annoys you the most?

That magic isn't real and this is all nonsense. I think it's especially irritating when people of other faiths criticize my own as if a prayer is anything different from an incantation. In fact I would argue that spells direct energy in a more concentrated way to affect change than simply petitioning a deity.

13   Have you ever created your own sigil?

You bet. Sometimes you just need something original and unique for the rite/spell.

14   What element are you most drawn to?

Water.

15   Do you have a familiar?

Some people use the word "familiar" interchangeably with "pet". I do have a pet but she's not my familiar. Other people define "familiar" as "spirit animal" which I'm not entirely sure is correct either. I'm in a bit of a gray area on this subject, but I see question 17 below touches on it as well.

16   Are you a part of a coven?

No. I've tried working with others to do magic but I think the synergy/chemistry has to REALLY be on point to do effective magic. Very often there's a clash of philosophies or practice that sort of spoils things all too easily whereas working alone allows me to concentrate so much better.

17   What’s your spirit animal?

Again this is a vague term that means different things to different people. I consider my spirit animal to be more or less my "familiar". When I was younger I was walking in the woods one evening praying really hard about something that was weighing very heavily on me. Then suddenly I looked up and there was this gorgeous and perfectly white stag looking back at me. He stood there for quite a while before slowly walking off again and the whole situation had such a profound sense of meaning to it. I saw the stag a few more times until finally, late one night while I was walking through the woods by a lake under the glow of a bright full moon I saw the stag one last time on the far side of the water. Ever since then the white stag has been sacred to me. So that's what I consider my spirit animal/familiar. It's a guide of sorts, a good omen, a sign, a representation of Spirit/Soul/God-energy and Self. I identify with it. So that's my spirit animal.

18   Do you do tarot readings?

I do indeed!

19   What’s your favorite witch movie?

I have several, but Hocus Pocus has been my favorite since I was a wee tot.

20   How many crystal do you have?

I actually don't really know. I don't go out and buy crystals but sometimes they come into my life and then go when they've served their purpose. For example, I had a beautiful large quartz that my grandmother had bought me from the nature store when I was a kid. I loved it so much. But one Halloween night I was doing a ritual with a friend of mine in the woods and ended up losing it. Interestingly, that friend was pursuing me romantically unbeknownst to me while also hooking up with the guy I was hooking up with and also really liked (ugh, gay culture). And during that ritual I was speaking with my grandfather (husband to the grandmother who bought me the quartz that I lost that night). So what does all that mean? I have no idea. But I figured all things considered maybe it was just time to let that thing go, along with other things that night.

21   What’s the most unique item on your altar?

I don't really have the privacy to set up an altar but generally I like my "work area" to be neat. Everything has a purpose and a meaning and a function. If I need to burn something I have the item/items, the cauldron, the lighter, oils, and anything else needed for what I'm doing. So nothing in particular stands out as "unique"... unless... Well I do have a small copper cauldron with a handful of dirt from my grandmother's house that I've kept for almost twenty years now. I guess that's unique?

22   Have you ever enchanted anything?

Oh god, yes, lots of things. I've enchanted things so as to protect them, or so that the item will protect someone else or some place... I've enchanted things for love, or to keep something or someone away. I've enchanted things to help in a greater ritual or spell. And so on.

23   What’s your religion?

I was raised Christian Baptist but following one horrible experience after another I've absolutely left that faith well behind long ago. I don't have a particular religion in the sense of organized religion. I'm spiritual and I cast spells. I also believe in science. I don't call myself a witch but I do everything a witch does.

24   Do you have a favorite crystal?

"I could no sooner choose a favorite star in the heavens".

25   What are some of your favorite spells?

Oooo I'd have to say I'm rather partial to love magic. I'm particularly good at it too.

26   What do you like to do to cleanse your space?

After physically cleaning a space I like to use the Violet Fire to cleanse an area as well as cleansing using a broom and a wand and/or athame.

27   When do you feel the most powerful?

When nature and I have our little moments. When the wind is warm and strong. When I'm out in a storm. When I can "feel" things growing during the Spring. The silence of a frozen winter night in the woods... Also when I'm cooking. I fucking LOVE charging a pot of boiling ingredients with good juju.

28   Do other people know you’re a witch?

A few people close to me know I practice witchcraft. Others think I'm just a little bit daffy.

29   Has one of your spells ever gone wrong?

Definitely. Mostly when I was still learning and practicing. Like this one time in sixth grade I cast a spell so that a popular girl in school would like me and we could start dating. Obviously since I was gay I didn't really want to be with her, I only did it because I wanted to be cool (although I did like her and we ended up being fairly good friends until we went to different high schools). That spell backfired and I ended up 1. not getting the result I intended because I was doing it for the wrong reason and simultaneously trying to force another to do something against her will, and 2. I ended up having one shitty fucking love life for the longest time.

30   What outfit makes you feel the most witchy?

Oh I love me a good cape. Even just walking around with a long blanket around me.

31   Have you ever tried astral projection?

Yes, successfully, several times. I like to use it for meditation. Often I go to the artic sea where there's just ocean, ice, and darkness.

32   Do you have any enchanted jewelry?

Probably.

33   What does your altar look like?

A space on the floor where I cast a circle and set up my stuff.

34   Have you ever seen a spirit?

YES! I've seen fairies, spirits, ghosts, shadows, sparks, heard voices, etc.

35   What’s your favorite spell sachet?

I can't say that I have one.

36   Do you have a favorite sigil?

I'm especially fond of the Sigil of Venus.

37   What’s your astrological sign?

Sun sign Virgo, Rising Pisces, Moon in Sagittarius

38   Have you ever interacted with a deity?

Well, yes, of course... per the previous questions.

39   What color are you most drawn to?

Purple.

40   Do you believe in past lives?

Without a doubt.

41   Where do you like to practice your craft?

Wherever I have privacy and calm.

42   What’s your favorite season?

Springtime, as mentioned previously.

43   Have you ever cursed someone?

That's not what my magic is for. Yes I'm familiar with the how-to, but no I don't partake in that kind of thing. The "worst" I've ever done is cast binding spells to keep someone from harming me and/or even coming into my presence.

44   How long have you been a practicing witch?

I'm telling on myself now but I'd say about 24 years practicing in earnest.

45   What drew you to witchcraft?

A natural inclination.

46   In what moon phase do you feel the most powerful?

The Moon itself does not change with the phases of its shadow. The phases are representational, of course, and its symbology can be evocative and meaningful, but otherwise the Moon is what it is. Therefore I'd have to say I personally feel most connected or at least most aware of the Moon when it's full. Else, I would say when it's waxing as that's when most of my spells are done simply because of the type of spell I usually work.

47   What’s your favorite holiday?

Wisterlimas, and then Halloween. Although I love all the holidays.

48   Do you know anything about your past lives? (if you believe in them!)

Yes, wow, I've done extensive work on discovering my past lives. I've lived in San Francisco at the turn of the century, in Scotland, England, France, Japan, China, as a woman, as a man... It's all very fascinating but you can't delve too deep because it's simply not necessary. You're not really *supposed* to know about your past lives. That defeats the purpose of the great forgetting once you're reincarnated. Yes, you can revisit the major themes and lessons learned, but one shouldn't really fret too much about what happened in the past.

49   Have you ever done an energy reading?

Certainly. I think most people do energy readings even when they don't know they're doing it. There's "reading the room" or "getting a bad vibe". There's also reiki and the like. And healing work. And of course magic is all about directing energy so to achieve a specific goal.

50   What time of day do you like to practice your craft?

Usually at night but it has more to do with the individual spell. Astronomical positioning is also important as well as weather, season, personal mood, day of the week, et al.