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thesassypadawan · 1 day

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Repair Kit (Hayden x FemReader)

Summary: You’re the on-set medic for the new Obi-Wan series. A verily simple, straight forward job…except when it comes to a pair of dumbasses. Who have no problem texting you in the middle of the night when they overdo it practicing…or when your new boyfriend accidentally gets out drunk. And tells you some things.

Warnings: 18+ (mdni), because there’s a slight hint of smuttiness. Some drunk dumbasses and a booty grabbing Hayden.

Notes: Happy Hayden's (And Mine) Birthday Event! In honor of the man, the myth, the legend; I will be posting nothing but Anakin, Vader, and Hay stories all April long!

A little something for @ittybitty-rt ! It was truly a pleasure to write this! I had a lot of fun with it! Hope you like it! ❤️

- It was 2am when your phone goes off. You only know this because it was glaring at you from the lock screen. Along with an interesting message from a certain ‘hello there’ saying gentleman… ‘Vader Repair Kit’. Bring. Hayden’s trailer. Now.’

- “Oh, what the hell now,” you grumble. Begrudgingly rolling out of your nice, cozy bed; you hurriedly throw on the first thing you can find. Grabbing the requested ‘kit’ on your way out.

- This was your job; well, to a certain degree. You’re the on-set medic for the new Obi-Wan series. Normally, during the DAY, you can be found fixing up beaten knuckles…soothing minor burns…maybe even stitching up a wound or two. Pretty much you just keep everyone happy and healthy.

- Simple enough. Except when it comes to a particular pair of grown ass men who act like stupid teens the moment they’re together. Who see absolutely no problem with texting you in the middle of the night. About the most moronic things…aka usually practicing after hours and completely overdoing it.

- However though, that wasn’t the case tonight…

- Before you can even knock, the door flies open. Revealing ‘Dumbass #1’ in all his grinning glory. “D-Darling, you look stunning.”

- Stunning…they must have fucked up good. “Shove the sweet talk, Ewan. Who did what this time?”

- Rubbing the back of his neck, the ‘jedi master’ laughs nervously. The smell of alcohol VERY noticeable on his breath. “Well, y-you see-”

- “Meee, I did!” A familiar voice calls out drunkenly.

- Shooting Ewan a look, you push your way inside. To find…

- ‘Dumbass #2’ sitting on the bed; big, goofy smile on his face. Arms flung wide open. “There’s my angel!”

- Staring blankly, you let out a heavy sigh. “Seriously? Don’t make me regret agreeing to date you.”

- Not paying any mind to the whines of ‘how mean’…or the ungodly adorable pout…you immediately get to work. Pulling out various rehydration items and whatever can possibly lessen the inevitable hangover from your ‘kit’. “All right, dark lord, you know the drill. Just like when you overheat in the Vader suit. Drink and take what I give you. And you’ll be sort of good as new.”

- Right as you’re about to hand him a bottle of what you both so affectionately call ‘blue milk’ and some aspirin. Those arms you’ve been avoiding wind around your hips and… “Heh-heh, booty.” …unceremoniously pull you down onto their owner’s lap.

- “Hay, what the…stop!” You squeak, face all flushed while trying to wiggle out of his hold.

- “No!” He giggles excitedly, squeezing your plush posterior like crazy. “Booty!”

- You hear the sound of Ewan clearing his throat behind you, a slight smirk in his voice. “You h-have this under control. I’ll l-leave you two love birds b-be.” Followed by the trailer door closing. Bastard…so much for being your only hope.

- Barely a second afterwards, Hayden has his face buried in the side of your neck. Nipping and sucking your sensitive skin. Hands still kneading greedily. “He right, ya know. We that…because I loves you.”

- Did he really just say that? You haven’t…he hasn’t… “You’re drunk. You don’t know what you’re saying,” you mutter. Scratching the back of his head, doing your best to ignore the awakening beast pressing into your stomach.

- Pulling away, not before giving your collarbone a gentle bite, Hay looks up at you with puppy dog eyes. Whining a bit while not so subtly grinding. “Maaaybe, but don’t mean it not true. I loves my angel. Wanna shows her.”

- Forcing back a soft moan, it takes everything you have to not cave. Sure, you’d love nothing more than to do so; to just tear it up like nobody’s business. But right now…right now he needed you in a whole different way.

- Despite his protests, you untangle yourself and slide out of his lap. “How about this?” You coo, sitting besides him and wrapping an arm around his waist. “You drink your ‘blue milk’ and get some rest. And…you can show me as much as you want in the morning. Okay?”

- “Fine,” he huffs, resting his head on your shoulder. “You numb me?”

- Although this isn’t exactly how you pictured the two of you saying it, you can’t help but smile. “Yeah,” you whisper, kissing the top of his head. “I love you too.”

- “Good, because I no give up booty,” Hayden mumbles. Giving aforementioned booty one last good pinch before dozing off.

Tag List: @espinathena-17, @myheartwillgoon2022, @wifeofasith, @princessswifie, @kenobiskywalker16, @loverforoldermen

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assistant-of-drama · 1 day

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Assistant Noah's World Tour!

After Jamaca...

Noah screamed into his hands as he sat in the confessional, blushing like crazy.

He felt hot. Both in anger and in lust. Anger that Alejandro's latest scheme to eliminate the final member of Team Victory almost got DJ sent to a hospital. And lust that Alejandro's evil brain was so brilliant. It didn't help that the manipulate charmer somehow looks even handsomer, while he was being so deliciously devious.

Oh god, does Noah seriously have a thing for bad boys?!

And did Alejandro seriously have to wear a speedo of all things?!?

The dude might as well be in his underwear!

No sane person would wear that type of swimwear!

Noah shakes his head and splashes cold water from the sink on his face.

Noah was tempted to buy Alejandro a pair of regular swim trunks… but then the Spainard might see it as his handsome body finally getting to the Cynic… and flustered Noah refuses to give in.

Noah looks in the mirror, ignoring the confessional camera and begins to take deep, calming breathes.

Noah quickly bangs his head against the bathroom's mirror to get rid of those thoughts of that stupid, evil man.

With a sigh, Noah leaves the confessional after finishing what he had to say and cleaning his face, then putting his sunglasses on. When Noah returns to the beach, he decides to enjoy while he still can.

Noah wants to stay as far away from stupid sexy Alejandro as possible, taking a spot at the other end of the beach. He'd rather focus on the beautiful view and the warm sun on his skin than on the Spaniard's charm. It didn't take long for Noah to sink into the soft sand, watch the sea and letting the sounds of it wash over him.

Alejandro however had different plans. His gaze locked on the dark-haired man on the beach. He smiled to himself, feeling a thrill run through him at the thought of teasing Noah again.

As the flirty man approached, he gives a playful smirk. "Hola, Noah. You seem to be enjoying the beach." He says, leaning down to place his towel down beside the other man's. "Or are you just avoiding me?"

Noah glances over at him, keeping his eyes away from the speedo. "Is it that hard to believe that I want some alone time?"

Alejandro begins to casually stretch his muscles in front of Noah. The cynical assistant is able to keep his face stoic and blush-free. But not even he could stop the passionate, burning, fire-like feeling inside his heart and body.

"I don't know…you seem to be avoiding me a bit too much. Don't you like me anymore?" The charmer asks with a playful pout, running a hand through his wet hair.

Noah chuckles sarcastically, rolling his eyes with a small smirk. "Oh please. I never liked an eel like you."

They both know that was a lie.

Alejandro smiles at Noah's retort, enjoying the way the other man's cheeks flush under his tan.

"Oh, I see. So you don't like me because I'm an eel, huh?" He asks, his voice dripping with fake hurt. "Well, that's too bad. I was hoping you could help me out with something."

Noah glances over at Alejandro, arching an eyebrow. "And what's that?"

Alejandro grins manically, his voice dropping to a husky whisper. "Well, you see, I've been in the water for quite some time now, and I think I've gotten a little…overdone. And I was hoping you could help me out, rub some sunscreen on my back. Maybe give me a nice massage while you're at it."

The taller man lays on Noah's towel, revealing the toned expanse of his back. Noah feels his heart skip a beat as he takes in the sight of the Spaniard's broad shoulders tapering down to his perfectly sculpted waist. Even his back is attractive. Alejandro smirks at Noah's obvious hesitation, his green eyes sparkling with mischief. "Will you help me, Noah? I'll put sunscreen on your back, if you do mine first."

Sighing, Noah drops to his knees beside Alejandro. He takes a deep breath, trying to steady his racing heart as he reaches for the tube of sunscreen. His fingers brush against Alejandro's skin, sending a shiver down his spine. He can feel the heat emanating from the Spaniard's body as he slowly rubs the cool gel onto his back.

Alejandro moans softly in satisfaction, arching his back and pressing closer to Noah's touch. The feel of the charmer's smooth, warm skin beneath the cynic's fingers is almost unbearable. Noah's heart pounds in his chest, his blood flowing hotter and faster as he continues to massage Alejandro's back.

Noah can't help but wonder what it would be like to feel those strong arms wrapped around him, pulling him closer.

When Noah was finished with Alejandro's back, Alejandro told Noah to lay down, so Alejandro could return the favor.

As Noah lay on the towel, he felt Alejandro's strong, warm hands begin to knead his shoulders with sunscreen. It was such an intimate, sensual feeling that Noah could barely contain himself. He let out a soft moan, arching his back slightly into the touch.

Those strong, warm hands moved everywhere, massaging Noah's upper back and then down to his lower back. The cynic felt a shiver run down his spine as Alejandro's fingers dug into his flesh, eliciting a deep, satisfying relief. It was as if the Spaniard was trying to wring every tense cell in the muscles loose.

Then when Alejandro was done, he flipped Noah over on his back and began playing with the smaller man's soft chocolate hair. Noah felt too relaxed to stop him. Noah and Alejandro gazed at each other, with peaceful smiles. One laying down, while the other was sitting. Their faces were quite calm, their bodies were more relaxed, but their hearts were pounding.

Alejandro slowly lowered his head, his eyes locked on Noah's lips. The taller man leaned in, his breath warm against the smaller man's skin, as he prepared to close the distance between them. Noah felt his heart race, his body tense with anticipation. He could feel the heat emanating from Alejandro, could practically taste the Spaniard's mouth on his.

But then Noah turned his head last minute, so Alejandro would only kiss his cheek.

"Nice try." the relaxed Noah whispers, pleased with himself. "I don't kiss people that injure animal lovers."

Alejandro simply smiles back, and they continue to peacefully gaze at each other. "But you're willing to let them massage your back?"

"I'm not a perfect person." Noah says softly, with a small shrug.

But Noah actually was perfect. At least to Alejandro he was. The Spaniard couldn't help but feel drawn to him, admiring the way he handled himself, his intelligence, his boldness, and of course, his sass. It was refreshing, a much-needed breath of fresh air in a world full of people who only have a few braincells.

So, when Alejandro felt that Noah was turning his head to avoid the kiss, he felt a little disappointed, a little rejected even. But he wasn't going to let that show. He understands why Noah keeps rejecting him.

Noah doesn't want to be used. Which is fair, cause Alejandro did want to use him at first. But now, the thought of using Noah makes Alejandro feel sick and he doesn't know why. He doesn't feel shame when using others. Why is it different with Noah now?...

...And why does Alejandro want to kiss him, without getting anything in return?...

...Anyway, the charmer glad that the assistant is willing to be friends, or at least friend-like acquaintances.

Noah's friendship should be enough for Alejandro… right?

#assistant noah's world tour #assistant noah #total drama #total drama world tour #td noah #alejandro burromuerto #alenoah

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cookinguptales · 1 year

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wah I wanna write but my fingers are just slightly out of joint and I keep making typos

#just me #I mean also it hurts but the inability to type prooperly is getting me more #I'm just complaining lmao #currently in The Bad Part of the month #there are three main activities that usually really fuck up my hands #1. tying shoes #2. opening jars #3. writing with pencil/pen #so I try to avoid those things as much as possible #usually typing is fine but brooo the bones are wiggly this month #I'm so frustrated lmao #cw:#disability #chronic illness

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coquelicoq · 5 hours

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In talking about Chaucer (p. 74), I said that, in general, puns and verbal connections of sound were unimportant and not to be sought out; and now, you will say, I have been using them to explain cruces in Shakespeare. Alas, you have touched on a sore point; this is one of the less reputable aspects of our national poet. A quibble is to Shakespeare [Johnson could not but confess] what luminous vapours are to the traveller; he follows it at all adventures; it is sure to lead him out of his way and sure to engulf him in the mire. It has some malignant power over his mind.... A quibble was for him the fatal Cleopatra for whom he lost the world, and was content to lose it. Nor can I hold out against the Doctor, beyond saying that life ran very high in those days, and that he does not seem to have lost the world so completely after all. It shows lack of decision and will-power, a feminine pleasure in yielding to the mesmerism of language, in getting one's way, if at all, by deceit and flattery, for a poet to be so fearfully susceptible to puns. Many of us could wish the Bard had been more manly in his literary habits, and I am afraid the Sitwells are just as bad.

William Empson, 7 Types of Ambiguity, ch 2 pp 100-101

i'm sorry this is so fucking funny. that pathetic loser shakespeare who loved puns so much it cost him everything, except of course his status as the most famous, most read, most immortal english-language author of all time. but everything else, he lost and it's all because of how weak he was to resist a pun :/ pouring one out for my sad little girly man who could have had it all if only he was better at writing, the thing he is the most famous guy in the world for.

even empson, who disagrees with johnson that shakespeare "lost the world", is like, too bad our favorite poet is susceptible to the thing that made him famous :/ really tragic that the guy whose wordplay we've been talking about for 300 years likes wordplay :///

also i can't get over writing a book about the types of ambiguity and NOT INCLUDING PUNS?? sorry but puns are ambiguous! that's where their juice comes from! imagine liking ambiguity so much you write a book about it but never mention puns except to dunk on them. imagine being a POET and POETRY CRITIC who looks down on sound-based ambiguity! could not be me!!

#puns are a device just as much as any other kind of ambiguity! this value judgment is hilariously nonsensical to me #why are puns bad but other ambiguities aren't? you can't just call them feminine and expect me to be like oh okay in that case #next time my dad makes a pun i'm just going to sigh sadly about his lack of decision and willpower #what a feminine pleasure in yielding to the mesmerism of language i will say. not very manly of you dad :/#i'm annoyed too because one of the types of ambiguity he respects is when one word has multiple meanings possible #in the context of the text. but that is in a sense a kind of pun. he says puns are homophonic but guess what #when one word has multiple meanings another way of saying that is that those are different words that happen to be spelled the same #that is then homophonic ambiguity! aka a fucking pun!!!!#i'm not just quibbling over the exact definition of a pun. i'm saying the boundaries are THAT porous i don't see how you could possibly #like semantic ambiguity as long as the spelling is identical but suddenly think it's facile when the spelling/etymology is different #that's not at all based in rational thinking but he's over here like 'the mesmerism of language is for girls'#pot meet kettle much???#poetry #ambiguity #puns #shakespeare #my posts #there was one other thing i was gonna say what was it. OH YEAH. he also was saying a few pages back that spelling was completely #unstandardized in shakespeare's time...so then why does it matter???#okay and one more thing. he keeps trying to convince me that various verses are syntactically ambiguous if you ignore the punctuation #okay. if we're ignoring punctuation we must be hearing it orally. which means we also don't know what spelling was used!!!!#i think probably he would say he cares more about etymology than spelling. words with different meanings that are etymologically #related are allowed and manly but words with different meanings that came from different roots are a weakness to be avoided #like i'm sorry dude but that is so arbitrary. and you are just cutting yourself off from an immensely rich body of possible ambiguities #by disallowing that kind of wordplay. why would you want to do that????

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medicinemane · 3 months

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As always, if you wonder why I don't talk about certain current events but do others, a lot of it comes down to whether I think it's something that other people are talking about a lot

If it's something where I figure you're going to be well informed and need a break, I tend to keep it to a minimum on here cause you already know

If it's something I rarely see talked about, then I'm more likely to mention it

World's bad, we're all doing what we can, I know people have said to me before they appreciate me more keeping to cats and frogs and random stuff, so I mostly try to do that, but... in the end I just kinda share whatever my brain decides to share

Want to give my thought process though

#and in this case it's a matter of that Syria really does feel forgotten and I won't deny I often forget too #but with the stuff that's going on right now I really prefer to when I can be reblogging stuff that has something at least a bit actionable #stuff that says where you can donate to give aid via reputable sources... that's what I like to try and focus on #but yeah... man; only place I really ever tend to see Syria mentioned is in Ukrainian circles #so that's why I wanted to highlight that one #man I wish I could do more in the world #so many people suffering and... and... well; and I can't do shit about it and that sucks #just keep trying to slowly get things together around here; and trying to slowly be able to help more and more people #and just hope that if you help people; it'll make them want to help people like they were helped #and maybe if enough of us get stable ground under our feet and know how it was to be helped... maybe some day we can collectively help enou #...try to avoid making things feel hopeless with my posts; cause things certainly feel hopeless #so I try to... try to focus on the good and what can be done to fix things as much as possible #want to keep people in the fight to try and make things better; not drain them by posting nothing but the bleakness of the world #things will never be right; those who've died can't be saved and we've failed them forever #which is all the more reason we can't give up and have to keep trying to make things better #because if we can never make things right; then the least we can do is try and make things better in the future #to at least stop adding to the list of people we'll never be able to fix things for #...something like that #it's bleak and I'm depressive anyway; but show must go on; you know?#so that's my thoughts here #I just feel the need to explain it sometimes; because people have a way of making assumptions #that if you don't talk about something you don't care #no... that's not it; I care; I just don't want to burn people out #and you can say they shouldn't burn out but I try to deal in practicalities and descriptivism; and people can be burned out #rather keep them in the fight to make the world better #so if there's a situation... like the George Floyd protests; that was another one where I didn't post much on it #cause we all knew... we all were paying attention and... I just figured people needed space #...I'm sad... sad more police reforms and accountability couldn't get pushed though but... at least we got something #...and I'm not gonna act like I'm some front line fighter when it comes to justice #I barely can deal with my own shit; I'm not saying I'm worth a damn thing in any cause

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literalgrill · 4 months

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Do NOT Support Hard Drive On Patreon

You might see friends today suggesting you support Hard Drive on Patreon today. You know, the funny video games version of The Onion? As a journalist, I will firmly tell you DO NOT GIVE THEM A DIME.

The CEO has pushed out all former staff that have built the site up to its current greatness and has been pushing the use of AI. The staff begged to have a Patreon before basically all being pushed out, but the idea was refused until now, when it will only line the pockets of a single person instead of hard working writers.

I know they might have provided laughs before, but Hard Drive is a shell of what it was once. Let it die and support the people who actually made those moments of joy possible. Don't believe me? Check out what former employees are saying below:

Kevin Podas: Okay you know what, I would feel bad saying nothing about this, so here goes:🚨SAVE YOUR MONEY🚨

We passionately advocated for a Patreon at Hard Drive & were aggressively shot down. The talent & people who built the site were pushed out. To see this now is beyond upsetting. For the past few years or so I put a lot of myself into this website. I pitched a ton of jokes, got over 120 articles published, & met a lot of great people. I'm sure if you've been following me for some time you could easily see this.

However, there is a lot of misinformation. I was eventually promoted to Managing Editor of the site & was ecstatic. Grateful for the opportunity. Felt like all of my hard work in the comedy mines was finally paying off. But things took a turn for the worst, & each day there were new surprises that affected our livelihoods. These were all very avoidable surprises, mind you.

A patreon was going to be our hail mary, but alas, for some reason, the power that be did not want it. Causing us to leave a dream job behind. "At least we did all we could," we consoled ourselves afterwards. I put a lot of myself into this project. I pitched all sorts of ideas that could have helped-- we all did. Merch collaborations, Patreon-integrated YouTube content, so much more. And most of them were shot down out of sheer stubbornness and nothing more. To see lie after lie spread, and multiple big publications and YouTubers that I am a fan of promote this Patreon under these pretenses is incredibly upsetting. There are so many receipts.

Please share this and consider pulling out if you've already put money into this. On Hard Drive using AI, also from Kevin Podas: I can't personally confirm that part aside from some of the recent header images for articles on both Hard Drive and Hard Times are being made with AI. As far as writing, it's been mentioned in the past, but I personally do not know. Maybe others do, maybe not. MORE From Kevin Podas suggesting the owner denying a Patreon being set up earlier cost an artist a job that was replaced by AI: We had a social media person who was awesome! He made the images until this AI implementation. He had to leave because ad revenue was low and a Patreon was aggressively refused.

Luca Fisher: at the risk of burning some bridges, i have to back up kevin here. i've only been part-time, in-and-out of hard drive since i got in last year, but i can corroborate that management doubled and tripled down about not hosting a patreon/crowdfunding and that many other suggestions and ideas, including mine (and ones much smarter than mine!), were shot down in really long, apocalyptic threads of everyone left on deck desperately trying to come up with ways to keep the lights on. managerially it has been messy and sad

i've written for multiple publications that have long since died, ones that were in the process of dying, and ones that, in this case, are soon to be put in the ground. it is sad and sucks every time. i don't know what could have been done differently, but i do know that a lot of great writers and content creators were left shorthanded and unhappy by the way things have gone. and it is sort of puzzling to see the sudden championing of patreon after we were all told plenty of times that it couldn't work and we should move on also, just to add my own personal two cents here, i was really disappointed by the shuttering of many different article sections on the site over the past 6-8 months. i understand cutting corners in a deficit, and i know it had to be done. that said…

all in all, i'm really sad to see this all happen. i don't fault anyone, if only because i don't really know enough about how this all can happen to make sense of it. games journalism is in a sad, sorry state, and will likely no longer be a thing in the next decade

VideoSealMan: I'm gonna say this because I think I deserve to. For months, MONTHS on end I was bugging Hard Drive management about a Patreon. Often I got ignored for a week+, but when I actually got a response I was encouraged to - of all things, write up a Google Doc pitching the concept I did it regardless. I wasn't the only one trying to sway management on a Patreon, but so fiercely was I fighting for it that last night, I was accused of making this comment directly by the CEO! With no evidence whatsoever! After I'd been gone for over a month.

I vouched so hard for Patreon because I wanted all the writers and creatives working with Hard Drive including myself to get paid better. When I actually got a response, the idea was often shut down. Eventually due to the state of my company, my pay was cut for a second time I confronted management alongside a couple other important figureheads at the org and told them that if we couldn't do a Patreon - I could no longer financially justify staying there. The answer was still no, so I left. Baffled at the decision, but whatever.

It is unendingly frustrating to know that myself and many other people who put their soul into Hard Drive LEFT because of management's absolute refusal to compromise on a Patreon, to then see them launch one anyway a month later and get over 1000 people pledging money. I'm seeing a lot of things float around about greed and people being fired. No one was fired. Everyone who left, left because they were sick of management's decision-making. And honestly, management is a lot of things but I would not call them greedy. (From my experience.) They did genuinely make an effort to pay people as much as possible. I found the pay very fair for a while. I am not disputing that I was paid what I was owed - yet management frequently feels the need to remind critics of that. Lmao, yes. I was paid what I was owed. No one is disputing payment. You did the bare minimum a business owner should do and paid everyone their due, very well done. I make no allegations of greed, cheating or foul play. I make allegations of poor management and incompetence that has fucked over other people.

Basically the only people left at Hard Drive have been there for about 2 months. They will reap the rewards of this successful Patreon I and so many others passionately fought for for so long. We will not see a dime.

I do not know the new people at Hard Drive, But I feel bad for them. They were haphazardly thrust into Hard Drive's workplace with little to no explanation on how anything works, or given any context on the state of the place. Even now managements feeds them half-truths and misinformation about other people's grievances. I am broke and have been for a while. I had to move out of my flat in Reading and back with my family because of how little money I was making. This has basically doomed my flatmate to moving back in with abusive parents, which is something I feel guilty about every day. If we had gone with the Patreon I worked myself hoarse over back then, this could have been avoided. Some of my other good pals could also not have been fucked over.

It was a bad judgment call, but it's not a crime. It's just management getting it wrong.

So should you give to the Hard Drive Patreon? I don't know! I don't think any of the new people working there to patch up the holes left by the recent mass exodus have any bad intentions. Maybe they deserve it! But it is not the same site you knew a year ago, or even a month ago. Myself and many people who were there far longer than me and did far more for it than I did are all gone now because we could not deal with management's terrible decision-making and dogass communication any longer. That's what you should know, imo

I had an agreement in place with management that I would receive the next 8 months of revenue from the Hard Drive YT channel from my leaving in November. This was a deal I appreciated, and thought was very fair on management's behalf. So far, the deal has been honoured for 2 months. However as of last night I was removed from the Hard Drive Slack without warning, and as an editor for the YouTube channel. This means I no longer have any way of verifying how much I am owed, I just have to take their word for it. I'm sure management will make their own statements full of half-truths and weird language on the many cases being brought against them - I'd take everything they say with a pinch of salt if some of the screenshots I've seen of them talking about me are any indication lol

To management; I do not want to talk to you. I want you to DM me a screenshot of how much I'm owed every month and then send me the money per our agreement until June, then we can go our separate ways. Do that and admit to your mistakes, and maybe you can recover your reputation! That's it from me, lol. If they pull out of the deal and fuck me over I'll have more to say, but most of what I know is other people's stories of incompetence and poor decision-making, lol. I genuinely get no pleasure out of doing this; I do not think management is evil - I just think they're really bad at what they do and it's cost other, more talented people, lol. You should believe the writers imo

One last thing I wanna say btw, management did often stress that no one should try to make Hard Drive a full time thing. They were transparent about that, and that is fair. I was working on it because at a few points, I was lead to believe we actually were doing a Patreon. Many other ppl have similar stories of being strung along by management changing their minds and stop-starting shit every 2 weeks. We all made the fatal mistake of overestimating our manager - who would tell you one thing one day and something totally opposite the next week lol

Hunter R. Thompson:

I'm not your dad, but speaking as a Hard Drive writer, I don't know that funding Hard Drive on Patreon is worth it

The driving talent on the back end—behind the kickass site I joined in 2019—have peaced out over the years as the site's been (in our view) increasingly mismanaged. Mismanagement like, not setting up crowdfunding before the ship sank and all its best crew failed; or publishing a screenshot of Andy Ngo pedojacketing a trans writer, complete with her deadname; or a disgruntled ex-writer getting falsely accused of shit-talk, by actual staff. I'm grateful for the writing I've gotten to produce for HD (and will forever be kicking myself for not writing even more, in the four years I've had to do it!! i'm a dumbass!!!) but it is very much no longer the site I signed up for.

I don't want to resign as a contributor altogether, because I'm open to the idea of the site recovering and bad practices being retired as finances level out-- it would just be dishonest for potential backers to not be Aware Of The Circumstances, I think.

Jeremy Kaplowitz: i truly don't want to start shit, but feel compelled to say: i want to see Hard Drive succeed w/o resorting to throwing former writers & editors, myself included, under the bus. surely there's a way to save the site without building it over the corpses of those who left. my $0.02 i don't blame anyone who wants to sign up for the HD patreon and i support the website, but that includes those who worked on it for years, have complaints, and don't deserve to be treated like bitter assholes like this kind of stuff is just objectively true, meanwhile there's these new writers who joined the site after i left (meaning, in the last ~3 months) claiming people are liars. decide for yourself if you care, but this is what happened! [Quotes this Tweet]

Seth Finkelstein: Writing for Hard Drive has been a privilege the past few years, and it makes me so angry to see people I looked up to get jerked around behind the scenes. The amount of grenades the editors jumped on our behalf is immense, and I don't think the way they're being treated is right.

Other Bits On AI: We do know for sure however that AI art has been used by the site. Its fucking owner confirms it here:https://twitter.com/MattSaincome/status/1743040541603123622. Seems the owner pushed AI written articles as well! TayFabe: My vaguetweet is making the rounds & these made me apoplectic. - owner regularly lobbied using ai. Once he tested it & said ai was writing better satire than 25% of the HT/HD writers. - ai images were used on the site & socials w/o consulting the team or disclosing it publicly I found the ai bit relevant to include bc 1) it illuminates a stark change in HD's current direction & leadership, 2) ai images have previously been used on the site and (since deleted) ig posts, 3) ai content fucking sucks, and repeatedly pushing to use it is a telling quality The "handful of writers who chose to leave" includes 2 editors-in-chief (both cofounders who wrote a combined total of >1,000 articles & defined the voice of HD), & at least 3 other editors. These guys put in WORK since 2017, so cool to be corrected by ppl who joined in Nov 2023 [Link to mentioned vague tweet from post.] More from TayFabe: owner continuously lobbied for using ai in every possible way. No one else wanted to do it, but he kept on, saying ai was writing better satire than 25% of the HT/HD writers. Also, ai images were used on the site & socials without public disclosure or consulting the team.

The owner has responded now multiple times in a private discord... Thank you for people sharing screenshots! First Screenshot:

Kevin's Response: He banned me from the server for speaking out, so no, I didn't see it. And he gave no indication of a timeline, it was just "we'll do one when *I* say so" and gave every inclination he was totally against it. It bred an environment that pushed our hands to have to leave. Screenshot Round Two:

Kevin's Response: "Starting one in 3 months" is an absolute lie. He denied it, I have screenshots and others who can confirm. No timeline was given. Just "this is what it is now" and like, I couldn't live off of that. I wanted to do more but he was allergic to good ideas from others around him.

Matt, owner of Hard Drive, responds publicly on Twitter.

Matt: Kevin, the patreon launch was delayed because I didn't think it would work. Everyone is happy that it did work. Everyone who left the site because we didn't have money to pay for creative content which didn't revenue is welcome to return home. But unclear why the hostility.

Hard Drive paid out literally every dollar it had, then a bunch more, to creative people who worked on the site. When we ran out of money, we couldn't pay anymore. We did our best.

Kevin: Right, and my point of this thread was that it was completely and totally avoidable. This is reasonable to be upset about. How could I have been any more clear?

Matt: If we knew with 100% certainly that the community would have supported us via patreon, we would have done that. We didn't know. We had tried 4 years ago and got no support. We were wrong this time. We did our best to figure it out. We paid all the money we could.

Kevin: So you knew with 100% certainty this time? Or you took a leap of faith?

Matt: It was a last gasp panic effort after ad rates got cut in half on january 1st due to seasonal spending changes. We didn't know it would work. We were embarrassed to ask for support. We wanted to figure it out.

Kevin: Every site has a Patreon. Every YouTuber, comedy group, etc. But you insisted that nobody cared about Hard Drive. Which is wildly untrue. I know you see that now, but again, I think you can see why I and many others are pretty upset. A last ditch panic effort was long overdue. A couple more things from Matt:

It was about the size of the hole we needed plugged budget wise, the time I had left of personal resources, and the past data I had about us trying a patreon (which turned out to be a bad indicator). I didn't think the Patreon would help us fast enough. I made a bad estimation

aka "if we make $1000 more dollars a month via patreon, which would be 10x what we got last time, we will not solve any of our problems. If instead we try to plow down path B, we might make it out in time." That was the thinking. I chose the wrong path, but didn't mean to Kevin also retweeted this comment from the user Matt was responding to: So you're saying that you're bad at running the business, didn't listen to any of your employees until after they were forced to leave their jobs, and now you're going to get more of the money from the Patreon that was their idea in the first place? Matt's Response: Respectfully, I made a mistake delaying the patreon decision. But keeping a comedy site alive for 9 years is not easy, there are lots of potential ideas, and think overall we've done a good and honorable job. Will leave this thread in peace now to allow people their space.

Sorry for linking to Elon's hellsite (derogatory), but sources need links so...

#video games #patreon #hard drive #ai critical

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ithebookhoarder · 6 months

Text

Truth or Dare (Anthony Bridgerton x Wife!Reader)

Summary: Married only a few months, you are very much one of the Bridgerton brood - something that often drives your poor husband mad, especially when you happen to be every bit as chaotic and unruly as his siblings... Also known as, you, Benedict and Eloise take a game of ‘truth or dare’ a bit too far.

A/N: What can I say? It’s well and truly fluff-tober over here on my blog 😅

Warnings: Alcohol, mild smut, swearing, Anthony losing his mind, typical Bridgerton sibling shenanigans

Masterlist

There weren’t many nights Anthony spent away from your side.

They were few and far between, but that didn’t lessen how irksome you found them when the odd occasion called for him to leave you over night. You didn’t know what it was exactly, but you never truly slept well without your husband there to hold you.

Of course, it had to be one of those nights that you truly found yourself in a spot of mischief. Though, in fairness, it had all started rather innocently.

Un-beknowst to you at the time, it was Benedict that had been first outside on the garden swing, sipping from a stolen bottle of whiskey he’d pilfered from the kitchens. He’d been sat there perhaps ten minutes by himself, staring at the stars and lamenting about some problem or other.

Then Eloise had come along.

As was her habit - you later discovered - she had been swift to follow her brother’s example, sneaking out of the house in her nightgown for a reprieve in the night air… and a cigarette or two. Apparently her second-eldest brother was something of a soft touch when it came to her, not that you could blame him for it. You doted on Eloise too.

Then, finally, completing the eclectic cast of characters, there had been you.

Now, in your defence, you hadn’t intended on going out into the garden that night, but had found no other alternative suitable given the blasted summer heat. It was worse tonight that it had been all week, and without Anthony in bed beside you, you saw little point in enduring with the effort of trying to get any rest.

So, you’d decided to make your way quietly through the house and sit outside a while, and pray for a breeze. You hadn’t, however, expected to find both Bridgerton siblings already sat there, having had a similar idea.

“My, what do we have here? Another night owl?”

It was Benedict who spoke first, smiling warmly at the sight of you appearing out of the darkness. He was quick to rise, offering you his swing as a perch to rest upon, beside Eloise.

You were about to protest that it wasn’t necessary and that you could find somewhere else to sit, but a warning glare from Eloise was enough to silence you.

She was all too eager to pat the seat next to her in invitation, looking remarkably pleased to have another addition to their little party.

“Come. Sit,” she ordered. “We were simply discussing how tedious Lady Tremaine’s luncheon will be tomorrow and how we could possibly avoid the whole thing. Now that you’re here, you can help us plot our escape. Benedict’s only suggestion thus far has been some kind of contagious summer cold.”

“I think I actually said that I would use such an excuse, sister,” Benedict corrected with a teasing grin. “Not that we would share it.”

“Traitor.”

“Hardly. It is every man - or woman - for themselves. Right, Y/N?”

“Alas, I think your mother would be rather suspicious at all three of us suddenly being absent,” you sighed by way of explanation as both their eyes turned to you. “Besides, I only came outside because of this heat, not to join some conspiracy.”

“Hardly,” Eloise chuckled. “We simply had the same idea, but I am rather glad you came to join us. Perhaps we should form some secret kind of club - Bridgertons against boredom?”

“And do what? Constantly find excuses not to attend social events we deem too tedious or odious to be dragged along to?”

“Sounds like a marvellous idea to me.”

“It would, sister dear,” Benedict teased. “You always have a talent for causing chaos and anarchy. You’d suit the cause perfectly, even if we both know our mother would never stand for it. She somehow sees through even our best efforts.”

“In which case, it’s time I take a leaf out of your book, Benedict. After all, you always say social events become far more bearable after a good drink or two,” Eloise smirked, gesturing towards the bottle of whiskey Benedict had been steadily nursing. “Perhaps I should follow my brothers example and learn to hold a drink, maybe then things will be more fun.”

“Oh no.” Benedict was quick to shut down that idea, holding the bottle possessively to his chest and shaking his head. “No. I am not allowing you to start drinking. Mother would have my head if she caught you, not to mention Anthony would have all ours heads on a platter in no time.”

The thought of it made you laugh. Your husband was hardly a tyrant, even if he’d been known to have a temper but he was easy enough to handle. A few soft words in his ear or a kiss on the cheek and he was putty in your hands, helplessly and completely in love with you. Just as you were in love with him.

“Don’t tell me you’re scared of Anthony, Benedict?” you giggled, causing Eloise to join you. “I assure you, he’s more a kitten than a lion and he’d probably prefer you to allow Eloise to sample alcohol here, under your supervision, than when she inevitably decides to rebel and has her first drink later on, in the middle of some public ball…”

The warning was clear and you all knew very likely true. Still, Eloise was beaming in victory as Benedict cursed to himself, muttering about Bridgerton women and the likely death he’d receive should Anthony ever find out he had allowed Eloise to sample whiskey. “Just a few sips, El. I mean it.”

“Oh hush,” she snorted, taking the bottle before he could change his mind. She was quick to throw back her head and down a rather brave mouthful, causing you to laugh even harder as she scrunched her face up in disgust. “Oh! That is revolting.”

“I told you.”

“Now you, Y/N,” Eloise grinned, turning and offering the offending item towards you. “Go on. Join us trouble makers - I won’t say a word about it if you don’t.”

“Oh, for goodness sake… Give me that then,” you sighed, earning a cheer from them both, knowing it was better to simply surrender rather than try and fight their mischievous whims. It only increased as you took an ambitious swig from the bottle, wincing at the acrid burning sensation it left in your throat.

If only Anthony could have seen you. He’d have probably had some kind of seizure - especially as you took another quick swig before handing the bottle back.

“There. Your turn again, brother dearest.”

“My my. You really are quite surprising,” Benedict sniggered, before winking up at you in admiration. “Who knew it? You can hold your drink better than Colin. He seems cursed to choke any time he drinks anything stronger than a brandy.”

“Well, it is your sex that falsely deemed us the weaker,” Eloise quipped. “It’s not our fault you were ignorant.”

“I’d like to remind you I wasn’t part of that decision and you also looked ready to choke a moment ago, El.”

“Doesn’t matter, you’re still one of the enemy,” she giggled, earning another raucous laugh from you. Oh, you loved her. If you’d ever been so blessed to have had a sister, you hoped she’d have been just like her. “Now, it is your turn again, brother.”

“Oh … joy.”

“Else we shall have to have some kind of forfeit.”

“A forfeit?” you scoffed, finding the idea absurd. “Like what?”

“How about… truth or dare?”

Benedict froze. “Oh no. Not again. Pall Mall is one thing but we swore we would never play that game in this family again-“

“But Benedict-“

“What’s truth or dare?”

Your innocent question ceased their bickering instantly. Their eyes widened as they turned to you, a knowing and nervous look passing between them. Somehow, you knew this evening was about to get wildly out of hand.

Sometime later, you’d been fully apprised of the rules of ‘truth or dare’. In fact, you’d been something of a natural at it, even if you knew the copious amounts of whiskey you’d all consumed was more than likely the responsible culprit. Else, you’d probably have known better and snuck back off inside before you could make a fool of yourself.

By the end of the night, Benedict had climbed a tree, confessed to being oddly scared of spiders, and been forced to sing the national anthem in French.

Eloise had also made an admirable effort, despite her obviously lower tolerance for drink. She still permitted Benedict to try and arrange her hair, before daring to steal a sock from Colin’s room whilst he’d slept. Then she’d loosened a leg on a dining chair. (Alas, none of you could remember which one but that somehow made it even funnier - even if it would not be come morning when you were forced to sit at the table for breakfast in some kind of roulette.)

You could only pray you didn’t choose said seat.

You could also only pray neither of your conspirators shared your contributions with your husband. You weren’t exactly sure how Anthony would feel at the fact you gone for a midnight paddle in the pond, nor that you’d mixed up the papers on his desk, all before finishing the night with a final dare that involved stealing several cakes from the kitchens… you still swore Mrs Reynolds would notice, come morning, that there were no longer twelve perfect cakes.

That, and Benedict had somehow knocked flour all over the counter, causing you all to erupt in drunken laughter as you’d bolted back outside.

Needless to say, you all looked a sorry sight as you lay in the grass together, staring at the approaching dawn. Had you not been so tired, or drunk, you may have suggested retiring back to your rooms before the house awoke shortly.

“Now that… was fun.”

“Fun? That was more than fun. I haven’t laughed like that in ages.”

“Told you it was a good idea.”

You hummed in agreement with your sister in law.

“I can see why you all favoured this game so much,” you sniggered, winking at Eloise as she sat in the grass beside you. “I can also see why you all agreed to stop playing it… I don’t know what Anthony would say if he saw what we’d been up to.”

“Something sensible and disapproving most likely,” Benedict sniggered. “Our brother, and your husband, can be a right prig, no offence.”

“Oh hush. At least I didn’t let my sister dress me up in her petticoat when she was five.”

Benedict’s jaw dropped.

“Who told you about that?” he demanded indignantly.

“I have my sources.”

Benedict’s eyes narrowed as he turned his head to glare at his younger sister. “Well, you can tell your source that she’s going to have to find someone else to fetch her lemonade at the Cowper’s ball tomorrow night unless she apologises. You can also tell her that I’ll accept either a verbal or a written apology as long as it’s suitably abject. And that means very, very abject,” he added darkly.

“Tell me, Benedict, was it a lacy petticoat?”

With a wordless grunt of annoyance, Benedict groaned, but it was hard to hear over the laughter echoing from you and Eloise. You resembled more a pack of hyenas than two noble ladies - you probably looked just as feral after your night of mischief.

And of course, as was always your luck, that was exactly how your husband found you mere seconds later.

How Anthony had arrived without any of you hearing a carriage pulling up to the house at this time of the night - morning? You couldn’t be sure - was a mystery. Yet, there he was, hands on hips and looking thunderous as he stormed towards the three of you with all the fury of an exasperated headmaster.

“What in God’s name are you all playing at?”

You all froze.

It was as if someone had poured a bucket of ice water over you as your eyes widened, and you all turned to stare sheepishly at him.

“Oh, darling. You’re home?”

“Don’t ‘oh darling’ me,” Anthony sighed, attempting to scold you but without much success. His attempt at seriousness was somewhat undermined by his brother’s heckling, singing ‘here comes mother’ and that ‘someone’s in trouble’. That, and with the way you were lying, he was upside down. “What are you doing up at this god forsaken hour? And why are you … is that flour? And why are you soaking wet?”

“I went for a swim.”

“A - you went for a -“

“And Benedict did my hair,” Eloise interjected suddenly, waving her arms about as she gestured to the tangle of hair upon her head. “Isn’t it marvellous?”

Anthony’s expression very much said that he did not think it was marvellous. Nor did he find any of this vaguely amusing.

In fact, by the way he took a long deep breath, you knew he was doing his best not to lose his temper and wake the entirety of the household. His brow always creased like that when he was faced with dealing with his family, but the expression only made him seem more adorable and handsome to you, rather than authoritative. However, you’d never told him so, knowing it would hardly be deemed a compliment in his eyes.

You also doubted he’d appreciate your usual response right now, which was normally to kiss said brow until it eased back into its relaxed form.

“We were just playing a game to escape the heat, darling,” you soothed. “We couldn’t sleep and all had the same idea to seek refuge outdoors… we simply got carried away passing the time.”

“What game?”

“Pardon?”

“I said, what was the game you were all playing?” Anthony suddenly quipped, the warning clear in his tone. That, and his eyes landed squarely on his two siblings, who at least had the decency to look sheepish… and afraid. “Because there is but one game I can think of that would result in a mess like this one, and I’m confused, because I know for a fact that we banned that game under this roof, and any other roof that houses the Bridgertons.”

No one moved.

No one even breathed.

It was as if you were all too scared to risk answering Anthony, even if the empty bottle of whiskey did most of the talking by itself.

“I don’t recall the name,” you blinked. “Right, Benedict?”

“Oh, uh… we… we were just- Eloise?”

Eloise froze, the guilt written all too clearly on her face for her to even try and salvage the situation - though that could also be down to the whisky she had consumed… it was honestly hard to be sure at this point.

“Well, dear brother,” she began, only to trail off as Anthony lifted his hand.

The silence was instantaneous.

No one dared to say another word, let alone move.

You’d never seen Eloise or Benedict so still in your entire life. Hell, you weren’t even sure they were breathing - probably out of fear Anthony would decide to inform their mother about their mischievous exploits.

If Anthony Bridgerton was scary when vexed, then Violet Bridgerton was a nightmare brought to life in human form. After all, as the matriarch of a family of eight children, she had learned a long time ago how to keep her unruly children in line - a harrowing experience you had only had occasion to witness once or twice since your marriage into the Bridgerton family. Once had been when Colin and Gregory had broken a priceless vase when racing around the house, despite being explicitly banned from doing so. The other had been when she had caught Eloise and Benedict smoking outside on the terrace one night.

It was easy to say where your husband had inherited it from.

“Not. Another. Word,” your husband growled, bending down and sweeping you up into his arms in a move that made you squeal in surprise. “Right now, I am taking my wife to bed and I suggest you two do the same - after you clean up your mess. I’ll deal with the lot of you in the morning.”

A laugh escaped you as you tried not to look like you were enjoying the sudden turn of events too much. After all, you doubted he’d be too happy once you were more sober and he discovered the true extent of your nightly activities.

It was why you were only too happy to let him put you to bed, grumbling all the while about letting his siblings run wild. He really was most handsome when he was flushed - a fact you were reminded of as he hastily changed for bed, flashing you a tempting glimpse of his bare torso in the process.

You could tell without asking he was tired from his journey home, as well as fighting the urge to rip his hair out over the chaos he had found upon his return.

Thankfully, his need to be in your arms outweighed the need to scold you over letting yourself be drawn into his siblings’ schemes. All it took was you pulling him down onto the mattress, and climbing into his lap to turn him into a needy, lovestruck puddle.

You’d equally missed having him in your arms, but you’d be lying if you said that your sudden forwardness wasn't also due to a mixture of the whiskey you’d drunk, and the residual giddiness from a night of mischief. A confidence radiated from you as you began to run your hands over his bare chest, taking care to graze the areas you knew made him groan.

“You’re lucky I love you so much,” he teased breathlessly, visibly unable to refuse your advances.

“Is that so?”

Anthony chuckled, nodding as he surged his lips towards yours. “Yes, so come here, my delinquent drunken wife, and let me kiss you before you and those doe-eyes of yours drive me insane. Now.”

Your laughter and surrender was immediate. “As you wish.”

Alas, for poor Anthony, that was not the end of the ordeal.

In fact, it was the next morning as you made your way into breakfast that you faced the final consequences of your delinquency.

Despite wishing to remain abed for the entire day, you’d been granted no such reprieve as your maid had entered your room at the usual appointed time and proceeded to open the curtains with no regard for the fact that you had slept a mere handful of hours. Whereas you would normally greet the day with a reluctant smile, you were in no state to manage much more than a groan as you were harshly ripped from your slumber.

If you had somehow not yet come to the conclusion that last night had been a bad idea, then the sudden flare of pain in your head at the bright intrusion was all the proof you needed. That, and the sudden churning in your stomach.

You would never let Benedict or Eloise coax you into drinking with them again.

You had not realised, despite how the idiom went, that what went up was sure to come down again - and you had come crashing down.

Hard.

“If you’re ready to dress, my lady, then breakfast will be served shortly,” your maid chirped, a dress already picked out for you to wear. She either couldn't detect your fragile state, or didn't seem to care as she continued speaking at a painfully loud volume. “My Lord sent me to wake you as he is finishing business in the study. He was up frightfully early, I could scarce believe it went the housemaids told me they’d already found him awake when they went to start the fires this morning. Gave young Samantha a right fright he did, scribbling away at his desk.”

“Oh?” you croaked.

You hadn’t even noticed the empty space in the bed bedside you until then.

Clearly Anthony had risen early, if he’d even gone to sleep at all. Why were you not surprised? Your husband was perpetually in motion, always claiming there was something or someone that needed his urgent attention as the head of the Bridgerton clan. It was just one of the things that made you love him so much.

“Is he still there?”

“Yes, Ma’am,” the young girl continued, breezing about your room. “And that’s not the only strange incident this morning. It will tickle you rotten when I tell you the latest drama, but you see, Mrs Reynolds was ranting and raving about how she swore she had made three trays of fruit tarts last night, yet this morning, there were only two. The youngest kitchen maid, Betsy, is convinced it must be a ghost but my money is on Carter - the groom’s boy - he’s always snooping about the kitchen...”

You winced. Ah. Maybe you hadn't been as stealthy last night as you’d hoped after all...

With as much enthusiasm as you could muster, you began to peel yourself from the mattress, trying to appear as if you were listening to your maid’s theories as she dressed you for the day. It then took all your resolve to make it downstairs and to the breakfast table without tripping over your own feet, or emptying the non-existent contents of your stomach.

To your relief, only Eloise and Benedict had so far taken a seat at the breakfast table - and both looked about as miserable as you felt.

“Good morning,” you mumbled, taking your usual chair next to the head of the table. You were quick to accept the steaming cup of coffee Benedict handed you, shooting him a thankful look. “Dare I ask how we feel?”

“I think better than you and my dear sister here,” Benedict chirped, gesturing at a miserable looking Eloise. She had her head in her hands and was desperately trying to look at the plate of food in front of her with something other than repulsion. “Then again, I must admit I am somewhat more experienced in the art of late-night mischief than you both. I also did not have to deal with my brother before going to bed - thank you, again, for that noble sacrifice.”

“Your welcome,” you chuckled, a faint heat rising in your cheeks as you remembered the exact events after you and Anthony had gone to bed. “I just feel bad that you both got left to clean up the mess.”

“Don’t be. I think we got it all.”

“You say that but I can’t remember anything after you started singing in French,” Eloise groaned, massaging her forehead once more. “I have the oddest feeling we may have forgotten something.”

You paused. You could only hope for your sake she was wrong.

However, you were saved from such discussion by the arrival of the rest of the Bridgerton bunch. All conversation about your night-time escapades were quickly forgotten as Colin, Hyacinth and Gregory entered the room, bickering about something you couldn’t quite make out. They were swiftly followed by Violet and Francesca, who both looked unfairly cheerful for so early in the morning.

You could only wish to look so fresh and composed before your first cup of whatever caffeinated beverage you could get your hands on.

Then, finally, came your husband. Entering the room last, he turned and shot you a warm smile. Clearly, your shenanigans had been forgotten - for now - replaced instead by the memory of your other activities, much to the relief of you and your co-conspirators.

In fact, you swore you saw Eloise exhale a breath of relief when Anthony didn't immediately launch into one of his lectures. Instead, he chose to join the rest of his family in helping himself to the awaiting breakfast spread, laid out on the sideboard for them, listening to some ongoing debate between his mother and youngest brother.

“-but you said we could visit the park this afternoon.”

“I know, sweetheart, but I have to take Francesca and Eloise for their final fittings at the modiste. We shouldn’t be too long, and we can go after? Unless, perhaps your brothers will take you. Colin? Benedict? Anthony?”

Benedict looked physically pained at the idea of an afternoon at the park, what with his current delicate constitution and all. You honestly couldn't blame him. “Well, I uh - have a drawing class, this afternoon. Very last minute. Sorry.”

“And I... um, have a meeting at the club?” Colin stammered hastily. “Anthony?”

“Please, Anthony?” Gregory begged, all but pouting at his older brother as the pair made their way to the table. “I promise I’ll do all my lessons this week without complaining if you say yes. I’ll even let you have my pudding tonight.”

“As you asked so nicely, brother, I don’t see how an hour or so at the park could do any harm -” Anthony began, pulling out the chair next to you and lowering himself onto the seat in a moment that felt like it lasted forever as a horrifying sensation swept over you.

You remembered what you’d forgotten.

The chair.

“Anthony, wait-!”

The sudden crash was startling, as was the sight of your husband being sent flying backwards as the chair collapsed beneath him.

No one moved.

No one said a word.

Benedict looked across at you and Eloise, the horror clear in his eyes as he choked the word you felt on the tip of your tongue: “Run!”

#Bridgerton #anthony bridgerton #anthony bridgerton x reader #anthony bridgerton x you #anthony bridgerton fluff #bridgerton x reader #benedict bridgerton #eloise bridgerton #ithebookhoarder #thesilentmage #masterlist #Violet Bridgerton #gregory bridgerton #hyacinth bridgerton #francesca bridgerton #bridgerton fluff #jonathan bailey #colin bridgerton

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signedkoko · 3 months

Note

Oo could I request romantic Vees with a reader who's this famous singer/idol in Hell? (Think, way more than Fizzarolli-level famous)

Valentino | Velvette | Vox [Romantic]

In which you are one of the most popular performance artists in all of hell. Reader is female.

Your name was more than just 'known'; it was plastered along buildings and chanted by millions

He was always scouting for personalities, following trends in people to see who he could drag down into his vicing grip

But you were untouchable, the first thing he couldn't command to their knees before him

Even so, if Val wanted to meet you, he could, and it was extremely new to the overlord to have to go out of his way to meet someone, but he felt it was worth it

He claims it was because you had possible talent, but those closest to him know he had a bit of a celebrity crush

Valentino is not one to be nervous; he would be direct when telling you that he wanted you, again and again, until you eventually granted him at least one night out, just the two of you

Once he has his chance, he'll pull out every stop just to hear you say that you'd like to see him again

He gets so distracted with you that he forgets the part about getting you into his company, eventually brushing it off by saying you 'didn't suit what he was looking for'

Avoiding being under his contract meant he could never command you, which meant he never had anything to be angry with you about

According to him, you were a role model for all the demons he owned

Famous stars require famous stylists, and who better than Velvette?

You'd actually reached out to her personally, since a lot of her work inspired your current stylists, and you wanted an upgrade for your tour of hell

Idol's like you were the exact thing people like Velvette dreamed of having in their portfolio, and she insisted on meeting you so she could see what you were looking for

In all her years, she'd never met an idol so genuine—most were snobbish, greedy, or just told her to 'do whatever'

You came in with photos of things you liked, hell, even fabrics you preferred, and a set list of what your songs would look like in order

She was already in love

You get her personal creations, and she insists on being the one to tailor you herself

" Only the best for the best, right? "

She can feel her bitchy attitude melt, and though she gets extremely bothered when anyone interrupts your sessions together, you ground her

It's not long before you two become official, and while she can't follow you into the deeper rings of hell, she will always be sure to watch your performances in the background while she works

She constantly calls you 'doll', because she's always dressing you up

Influences, aristocrats, idols—none of it was new to the king of social media

Everyone contacted him for their social management, or his team, at least

He didn't do much of the personal work himself; he had far too much on his plate, but he always checked on who was requesting his services

Mostly for the ego boost, knowing the image of so many self-proclaimed "stars'' relied on him

But there was also a list of people he wanted to work for, a list that brought his ego back down and told him he hadn't met his goals yet and had to try harder

You were at the very top

He'd seen a plethora of your performances recorded and reuploaded: best takes, most underrated performances, and unforgettable sets

But he'd never had the chance to see you live until he got a PR package regarding your newest album release

Him? It was certainly interesting to...no shot, you sent him hidden tickets for 'friends only'

He is not fangirling except maybe a bit; he's already cleared his schedule that evening so he can get there and making sure his outfit is cleaned up and ready

Your performance was out of this world, and he is beyond pleased when he is invited backstage to speak with you

There you were, taking off your earrings in your dressing room, smiling at him as if you were old friends

" How was the performance? I'm so glad you came. "

For a moment, hes almost worried you have the wrong person; he seems uncertain of what to say until you continue

" I heard you are hard to win over, so I figured I'd go all out before I ask if you'd consider running my new album compaigne? "

He acts cool, but when he gets home that evening, he is pumping his fist in the air and screaming

Author's Note - I was thinking lilith-level famous, you are THAT girl... Thank you for requesting! I went for a fem! reader because it was no specified

#koko writez #hazbin hotel #helluva boss #hazbin hotel x reader #helluva boss x reader #reader insert #x reader #valentino #valentino x reader #velvette #velvette x reader #vox #vox x reader

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derinwrites · 3 days

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The Three Commandments

The thing about writing is this: you gotta start in medias res, to hook your readers with action immediately. But readers aren’t invested in people they know nothing about, so start with a framing scene that instead describes the characters and the stakes. But those scenes are boring, so cut straight to the action, after opening with a clever quip, but open in the style of the story, and try not to be too clever in the opener, it looks tacky. One shouldn’t use too many dialogue tags, it’s distracting; but you can use ‘said’ a lot, because ‘said’ is invisible, but don’t use ‘said’ too much because it’s boring and uninformative – make sure to vary your dialogue tags to be as descriptive as possible, except don’t do that because it’s distracting, and instead rely mostly on ‘said’ and only use others when you need them. But don’t use ‘said’ too often; you should avoid dialogue tags as much as you possibly can and indicate speakers through describing their reactions. But don’t do that, it’s distracting.

Having a viewpoint character describe themselves is amateurish, so avoid that. But also be sure to describe your viewpoint character so that the reader can picture them. And include a lot of introspection, so we can see their mindset, but don’t include too much introspection, because it’s boring and takes away from the action and really bogs down the story, but also remember to include plenty of introspection so your character doesn’t feel like a robot. And adverbs are great action descriptors; you should have a lot of them, but don’t use a lot of adverbs; they’re amateurish and bog down the story. And

The reason new writers are bombarded with so much outright contradictory writing advice is that these tips are conditional. It depends on your style, your genre, your audience, your level of skill, and what problems in your writing you’re trying to fix. Which is why, when I’m writing, I tend to focus on what I call my Three Commandments of Writing. These are the overall rules; before accepting any writing advice, I check whether it reinforces one of these rules or not. If not, I ditch it.

1: Thou Shalt Have Something To Say

What’s your book about?

I don’t mean, describe to me the plot. I mean, why should anybody read this? What’s its thesis? What’s its reason for existence, from the reader’s perspective? People write stories for all kinds of reasons, but things like ‘I just wanted to get it out of my head’ are meaningless from a reader perspective. The greatest piece of writing advice I ever received was you putting words on a page does not obligate anybody to read them. So why are the words there? What point are you trying to make?

The purpose of your story can vary wildly. Usually, you’ll be exploring some kind of thesis, especially if you write genre fiction. Curse Words, for example, is an exploration of self-perpetuating power structures and how aiming for short-term stability and safety can cause long-term problems, as well as the responsibilities of an agitator when seeking to do the necessary work of dismantling those power structures. Most of the things in Curse Words eventually fold back into exploring this question. Alternately, you might just have a really cool idea for a society or alien species or something and want to show it off (note: it can be VERY VERY HARD to carry a story on a ‘cool original concept’ by itself. You think your sky society where they fly above the clouds and have no rainfall and have to harvest water from the clouds below is a cool enough idea to carry a story: You’re almost certainly wrong. These cool concept stories work best when they are either very short, or working in conjunction with exploring a theme). You might be writing a mystery series where each story is a standalone mystery and the point is to present a puzzle and solve a fun mystery each book. Maybe you’re just here to make the reader laugh, and will throw in anything you can find that’ll act as framing for better jokes. In some genres, readers know exactly what they want and have gotten it a hundred times before and want that story again but with different character names – maybe you’re writing one of those. (These stories are popular in romance, pulp fantasy, some action genres, and rather a lot of types of fanfiction).

Whatever the main point of your story is, you should know it by the time you finish the first draft, because you simply cannot write the second draft if you don’t know what the point of the story is. (If you write web serials and are publishing the first draft, you’ll need to figure it out a lot faster.)

Once you know what the point of your story is, you can assess all writing decisions through this lens – does this help or hurt the point of my story?

2: Thou Shalt Respect Thy Reader’s Investment

Readers invest a lot in a story. Sometimes it’s money, if they bought your book, but even if your story is free, they invest time, attention, and emotional investment. The vast majority of your job is making that investment worth it. There are two factors to this – lowering the investment, and increasing the payoff. If you can lower your audience’s suspension of disbelief through consistent characterisation, realistic (for your genre – this may deviate from real realism) worldbuilding, and appropriately foreshadowing and forewarning any unexpected rules of your world. You can lower the amount of effort or attention your audience need to put into getting into your story by writing in a clear manner, using an entertaining tone, and relying on cultural touchpoints they understand already instead of pushing them in the deep end into a completely unfamiliar situation. The lower their initial investment, the easier it is to make the payoff worth it.

Two important notes here: one, not all audiences view investment in the same way. Your average reader views time as a major investment, but readers of long fiction (epic fantasies, web serials, et cetera) often view length as part of the payoff. Brandon Sanderson fans don’t grab his latest book and think “Uuuugh, why does it have to be so looong!” Similarly, some people like being thrown in the deep end and having to put a lot of work into figuring out what the fuck is going on with no onboarding. This is one of science fiction’s main tactics for forcibly immersing you in a future world. So the valuation of what counts as too much investment varies drastically between readers.

Two, it’s not always the best idea to minimise the necessary investment at all costs. Generally, engagement with art asks something of us, and that’s part of the appeal. Minimum-effort books do have their appeal and their place, in the same way that idle games or repetitive sitcoms have their appeal and their place, but the memorable stories, the ones that have staying power and provide real value, are the ones that ask something of the reader. If they’re not investing anything, they have no incentive to engage, and you’re just filling in time. This commandment does not exist to tell you to try to ask nothing of your audience – you should be asking something of your audience. It exists to tell you to respect that investment. Know what you’re asking of your audience, and make sure that the ask is less than the payoff.

The other way to respect the investment is of course to focus on a great payoff. Make those characters socially fascinating, make that sacrifice emotionally rending, make the answer to that mystery intellectually fulfilling. If you can make the investment worth it, they’ll enjoy your story. And if you consistently make their investment worth it, you build trust, and they’ll be willing to invest more next time, which means you can ask more of them and give them an even better payoff. Audience trust is a very precious currency and this is how you build it – be worth their time.

But how do you know what your audience does and doesn’t consider an onerous investment? And how do you know what kinds of payoff they’ll find rewarding? Easy – they self-sort. Part of your job is telling your audience what to expect from you as soon as you can, so that if it’s not for them, they’ll leave, and if it is, they’ll invest and appreciate the return. (“Oh but I want as many people reading my story as possible!” No, you don’t. If you want that, you can write paint-by-numbers common denominator mass appeal fic. What you want is the audience who will enjoy your story; everyone else is a waste of time, and is in fact, detrimental to your success, because if they don’t like your story then they’re likely to be bad marketing. You want these people to bounce off and leave before you disappoint them. Don’t try to trick them into staying around.) Your audience should know, very early on, what kind of an experience they’re in for, what the tone will be, the genre and character(s) they’re going to follow, that sort of thing. The first couple of chapters of Time to Orbit: Unknown, for example, are a micro-example of the sorts of mysteries that Aspen will be dealing with for most of the book, as well as a sample of their character voice, the way they approach problems, and enough of their background, world and behaviour for the reader to decide if this sort of story is for them. We also start the story with some mildly graphic medical stuff, enough physics for the reader to determine the ‘hardness’ of the scifi, and about the level of physical risk that Aspen will be putting themselves at for most of the book. This is all important information for a reader to have.

If you are mindful of the investment your readers are making, mindful of the value of the payoff, and honest with them about both from the start so that they can decide whether the story is for them, you can respect their investment and make sure they have a good time.

3: Thou Shalt Not Make Thy World Less Interesting

This one’s really about payoff, but it’s important enough to be its own commandment. It relates primarily to twists, reveals, worldbuilding, and killing off storylines or characters. One mistake that I see new writers make all the time is that they tank the engagement of their story by introducing a cool fun twist that seems so awesome in the moment and then… is a major letdown, because the implications make the world less interesting.

“It was all a dream” twists often fall into this trap. Contrary to popular opinion, I think these twists can be done extremely well. I’ve seen them done extremely well. The vast majority of the time, they’re very bad. They’re bad because they take an interesting world and make it boring. The same is true of poorly thought out, shocking character deaths – when you kill a character, you kill their potential, and if they’re a character worth killing in a high impact way then this is always a huge sacrifice on your part. Is it worth it? Will it make the story more interesting? Similarly, if your bad guy is going to get up and gloat ‘Aha, your quest was all planned by me, I was working in the shadows to get you to acquire the Mystery Object since I could not! You have fallen into my trap! Now give me the Mystery Object!’, is this a more interesting story than if the protagonist’s journey had actually been their own unmanipulated adventure? It makes your bad guy look clever and can be a cool twist, but does it mean that all those times your protagonist escaped the bad guy’s men by the skin of his teeth, he was being allowed to escape? Are they retroactively less interesting now?

Whether these twists work or not will depend on how you’ve constructed the rest of your story. Do they make your world more or less interesting?

If you have the audience’s trust, it’s permissible to make your world temporarily less interesting. You can kill off the cool guy with the awesome plan, or make it so that the Chosen One wasn’t actually the Chosen One, or even have the main character wake up and find out it was all a dream, and let the reader marinate in disappointment for a little while before you pick it up again and turn things around so that actually, that twist does lead to a more interesting story! But you have to pick it up again. Don’t leave them with the version that’s less interesting than the story you tanked for the twist. The general slop of interest must trend upward, and your sacrifices need to all lead into the more interesting world. Otherwise, your readers will be disappointed, and their experience will be tainted.

Whenever I’m looking at a new piece of writing advice, I view it through these three rules. Is this plot still delivering on the book’s purpose, or have I gone off the rails somewhere and just stared writing random stuff? Does making this character ‘more relateable’ help or hinder that goal? Does this argument with the protagonists’ mother tell the reader anything or lead to any useful payoff; is it respectful of their time? Will starting in medias res give the audience an accurate view of the story and help them decide whether to invest? Does this big twist that challenges all the assumptions we’ve made so far imply a world that is more or less interesting than the world previously implied?

Hopefully these can help you, too.

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4theitgirls · 1 month

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building my rebrand

getting my money right

one of my main goals right now is to get my money right and save as much as i can. here are some things i am focusing on:

getting a job with lots of opportunity for growth

picking up as many shifts as i can

trying savings challenges on pay days

spread out spending on wants; want something for at least 2 weeks before considering buying

meal plan and buy groceries for those meals rather than buying random things

fill gas tank full when possible rather than filling a little at a time

sleep schedule

my sleep schedule has been off for a little while now due to stress and sickness, so i am focusing on going to sleep at a reasonable hour and around the same time every night and waking up at a reasonable hour and around the same time every morning.

healthy body, healthy mind

taking care of the physical body helps not only your physical health and wellness, but the mental as well. here are some ways i am working to take better care of my body:

some form of exercise per day, even if it’s just stretching

stay mindful of the nutrients in your food, including vitamins, protein, sugar, and fat

stay mindful of water intake and try to drink as much as possible

when sitting or lying down, do not stay in one position for too long. shift and move around regularly.

taking care of your looks

while this may be a bit controversial, it’s important to take care of your appearance, even if it’s in your own way. not only will you make a good impression on others, but you will feel more positive and confident about yourself. some ways i am doing this are:

researching good skincare products and staying consistent with a skincare routine

hair oiling at least once a week

avoid super oily or sugary foods

again, stay hydrated!

strength training and cardio

if you wear makeup, make an effort to find the best style for your face shape

know your body shape and undertones and how to dress accordingly

mindset

arguably the most important part! your mindset is everything, as having a negative mindset can ruin even the best experiences for you. constantly reminding yourself of your power and worth among other things is crucial for everything else to fall into place.

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svmjaeyvn · 27 days

Text

hidden love, l.hs

synopsis: there were two things that park jongseong reiterated to you growing up.

1: he was the better, funnier, smarter, awesomer sibling and always would be, and 2: you were to never, ever, fall for any guys like his friends, literally and figuratively.

the first was a lie, one you always rolled your eyes at and the second was something 12-year-old you always agreed to without hesitation. but with time, they soon both became a fib from your lips, 14-year-old you coming to the disastrous realization that boys weren't as icky as you once thought and your older brother's best friend had the prettiest smile (when he wasn't being annoying.) as you continued to grow older, those fluttering emotions grew as well, even with him heading off to university it seemed to leave you with a sense of longing, happier than ever when he'd visit.

until you were 16 and he came home with a girl, one that was far prettier than you were able to compete with in your head and nice enough to be a saint. your hopeless, devastating one-sided crush was forced to be swallowed without much pride, though it held no avail until you dramatically decided to never speak to heeseung again. and it worked, ignoring all his calls and texts, avoiding your family home like the plague whenever your brother was home for break if he was visiting, and simply acting entirely clueless in the unfortunate circumstances that you did end up caught by him, chalking it up to dramatic teenage hormones.

once you reached the age of it being your turn to head to college, you signed up for every exchange program possible, leaving you traveling the world for three years that passed with no contact and your once-upon-a-time crush nearly forgotten. that was until you came back home, finally settling to finish uni and all of a sudden you were a kid again, fawning over your brother's best friend who didn't know how to leave you alone. this time though, heeseung didn't see you as that annoying kid who followed jay around, he saw you for you which scared him so much more with how you've grown and nothing was worse than him feeling something for his best friend's off-limits little sister.

featuring: lee heeseung, park jongseong, sim jaeyun, park sunghoon, nishimura riki, kim sunoo, yang jungwon, hanni pham, kim chaweon, yoon keeho, yoon yechan

status: writing. start: 03/30/24. end: tba.

genre: non-idol!au, college/young adult!enha, heeseung x reader, slight age gap (4 years), brothers best friend trope

content & warnings: age gap??? (slightly questionable morality but no romantic feelings or grooming since they end up with no contact for years until adulthood), cursing, drinking, all that jazz, innuendos, sexual humor, suggestive content, possible smut, forbidden relationship, sneaking around, overprotective jay, jay tries to fight heeseung cause duh, crazy exs, stalker mention, slow burn since they're both in denial, heeseung kind of toxic mentality which is forced to be fix, angst but fluffy ending (?)

a/n: based off the cdrama. watched it months ago but shit had me giggling and kicking my feet even if it's cliche. heeseung is so forbbidden older love coded i had to. im trying to make this a oneshot so well see how long it is,,,,,,, the plot will develop from when they were kids to adulthood to provide some background. once the actual romance starts heeseung will be 24 and reader will be 20 (the year will be 2025). all my drafts and writing has been about jake so im branching out (i love my man tho so he'll have his moments here). anyway! lets see how long it takes me to finish up this one

word count: 6k (as of now)

taglist: closed! (86 of you have responded omg)

#enhypen #enha x reader #enha #enhypen masterlist #enhypen heeseung #heeseung #lee heeseung #lee heesung x reader #heesung enhypen #lee heesung smut #enhypen x reader #enha fluff #enhypen smut #enha masterlist

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marcsburnerphone · 3 months

Text

And they were roommates

(Captain John price x F!reader)

Summary: that captain wants somewhere more homely to settle down and when an offer like yours comes alight on Zillow he must take up on it.

Warnings: some awkward moments but nothing crazy.

part 1 - Part two!!! - part 3 - part 4

—————-

You indeed did not see John price the next morning but what you did see was a handwritten note stuck to the fridge beneath a magnet.

“Good morning, as I mentioned my job is demanding. I’m not sure how long I'll be gone for but I can estimate at least a month. If you need me, my phone number is below along with my check for this month's rent and the next. - John price”

You reach for the envelope that is attached behind the note and pull it open and what the fuck. You knew he had to have money but in what world would someone pay this much rent for a house with a roommate? You immediately grab your own checkbook and write him for the amount that’s overpaid, making a mental note to make sure you give it to him.

————

Weeks pass slowly and life goes on as it did before. The only difference is you're no longer struggling to make ends meet. So to celebrate your success you order that 6 foot canvas you’d been wanting for ages and a new oil paint.

When you got the notification that it had arrived, thank god for two day shipping, you squealed and ran to grab it before the mailman even walked away. He offered to help you as he watched you give it a bear hug and waddle it through your door yelling out a meek ‘no Thankyou’. You dragged it down the hallway and into the sunroom resting it up against the wall. Ripping the clear plastic film off of new canvases comes in third place to the best things in life.

Sitting in the sun that evening you stroke deep blue oil paints that try their best to replicate ocean waters, and white specks that wish they could induce the same feelings stars do.

You’ve been at this same painting for 3 weeks, coming home and straight to it. Now that it’s finally done it sits sunbathing till it dries. You still visit it and admire its larger than life beauty.

John’s been gone for 1 month and 3 weeks now and in that time some problems have arisen, 1. The faucet in the kitchen leaks and below it the pipe also leaks and the only plumber that’s willing to drive out to your house and inspect it says he won’t be available for another week which means the water bill will sky rocketing till then. And 2. you have no idea where the huge painting will go.

You walk around wondering where to place it. You thought maybe the living room, or even in your room but after testing both those places it still didn’t look right. You can only think of one other place which is the hallway to John’s room. Of course that spot is perfect, maybe he wouldn’t notice since he only spent one night here. You grabbed the drill and got to work mounting it immediately. Once all was said and done you gave it a once over, smiled, snapped a picture of it to send to your sister and walked away.

———

John arrived back exactly at the two month mark early in the AM. He opened the house door as quietly as possible and removed his boots by the door to avoid the creaking wood of the floor and continued sluggishly hauling his bag to his room. Being the man he is, he notices everything, those watchful eyes of his never miss a detail so he does indeed notice and take a second to admire the newly found painting hung in front of his bedroom door before unlocking it to set his stuff down.

After a much needed and appreciated shower he reads the clock at 7AM thinking he can sleep for a little, that is of course until he hears a knock at the door. Making his way down the hall he peeps through the window and sees a handyman?

“Good morning sir, how can I help you?” He says opening the door.

“Good morning, your wife called for a leaking pipe, told her I’d come by sometime today.” He looks down the hall towards your room and confirms the fact that you're definitely still very well asleep.

“My wife? Oh yes my wife, that lady I could’ve sworn I told her to cancel this appointment we actually got it all sorted out.” He lies like it's second nature.

“I actually charge a late cancellation fee that must be paid upfront.” He inquires slightly annoyed.

“How much?” John replies feeling sorry for this man that drove out here and is now being sent away.

“100$ flat.” John shuts the door and quickly fetches his wallet from the pocket of his cargo pants and returns with two bills one for the inconvenience and sends the man on his way.

Sleep can wait.

—————

You wake up to the sound of clanking in the kitchen and as a woman that technically lives alone in the middle of the forest you're terrified.

Grabbing the bat beside your bed still fully dressed in the least threatening attire, you tiptoe to the source of the noise and breathe out the strongest sigh of relief ever known to man.

“Jesus Christ John you scared me, what’re you doing?” You loudly admit startling him in return.

“Fixing this pipe that you called an overpriced handyman for.” You stare at him subconsciously admiring the way he looks, slightly disheveled, face screwed in concentration and strong hands twisting the wrench in his hand and let’s not mention the rise of his shirt.

“You okay?” He says removing himself from under the sink leaning back on his knees to stare up at you.

“Yeah, yes I’m so sorry, um so where did the handy man go?” He stands with a grunt and leans his back against the counter.

“On his merry way.” He replies, turning around to turn the faucet on checking if it leaks, then off to see if it still drips and as he expects, it does neither.

“How much do I owe you for the late cancellation fee?” That man has handled your plumbing issues before and you’ve definitely canceled late more than once.

“Technically you didn’t cancel on him, I did so don’t worry.” He says picking his tools up off the ground placing them messily into the tool box.

“Well Thank You.” You say awkwardly.

“Of course.” He smiles making the dimples beneath his beard awfully noticeable.

“Oh and by the way your rent is only two thousand five hundred a month.” You say walking to the kitchen drawer beside him and pulling out a check that’s already filled out and handing it to him.

“Utilities included?” He asks, grabbing the check written out for three thousand and also taking in notice that same scent that clung to those sheets you made his bed with weeks ago as you sweep by.

“Yeah I don’t mind paying more cause I mean look around, this place has my style written all over it which makes it feel more like mine than yours.” He looks baffled at your reasoning.

“I actually like the decorations, not sure I’d change a thing about it.” You laugh at what has to be a lie.

“I doubt it.” You chuckle and slightly blush at his kindness.

“No I'm serious, I especially love that painting in the hallway, where’d you get it?” You seem surprised at the mention of it and even more flattered at the compliment.

“I actually painted it.” He gives you a surprised look.

“See you’re even hand painting the art, please I can afford much more than twenty five hundred.” You act like you're considering it for a moment.

“As much as I’d appreciate it, I'm already grateful for what you pay.” You say truthfully.

“Also, welcome home.” You quip before turning around walking back towards your room to get ready for the day

—————

John’s been home for nearly two weeks now and he’s slightly growing on you and you on him. You co-exist in harmony most times. That doesn’t mean the two of you still don’t clash from time to time.

“Good morning.” He says scrambling eggs in a pan as you walk into the kitchen reaching in the cabinet for a coffee mug.

“Morning to you too.” You say groggily, setting your feet flat on the ground and placing the cup on the counter, reaching for the pot to pour some coffee.

“If I can just- oh I’m so sorry.” He says accidentally bumping into you making the coffee spill on the counter.

“Oh no don’t worry about it, I can just clean it.” You say turning around quickly to go grab paper towels and end up accidentally running into his chest.

He grabs your shoulders to hold you in place and let your brain catch up with the speed of events.

“We will learn to both be in the kitchen together someday.” You affirm with a laugh that makes you feel alive.

“Hey the first week this happened almost everyday. If anything this is a huge improvement.” He jokingly abides.

“True.” You say as he turns around handing you the kitchen towel to clean it up. He watches you with amused eyes and a smile that still hasn’t left either of your faces and for a second something alights in John something that scares him so bad he doesn’t hear a thing you’re saying.

“John, I said did you sleep well?” You speak a bit louder, snapping him out of it.

“Yeah darling sorry I’m just going to take this to my office. I've got some work to cover.” He says hurriedly plating his food and scurrying off.

“Okay well I’ll be heading to work soon.” He doesn’t even let you finish before closing the door leaving you to stand there a little stumped.

“So I’ll assume he didn’t sleep well.” You say to yourself before pouring another cup and heading to your room to get changed.

——————

Comments and reposts are appreciated <3

@beebeechaos

@ttsbaby01

@arminarlertssword

@quakeroaksguy

@waves-against-a-cliff

@depressed-but-make-it-cute

#captain price x female reader #john price #angst #barry sloane #captain john price #john price x reader #task force 141 #john soap mactavish #kyle gaz garrick #simon ghost riley #cod modern warfare #cod mwii #cod x reader

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surftrips · 3 months

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SHAPESHIFT | CLARISSE LA RUE

pairing: clarisse la rue x female!reader

summary: clarisse wonders if you know just how much she likes you.

word count: 2.1k

author's note: this is the first part of a two part series i'm writing based on jenna doe's songs: shapeshift + pink slips. this is from clarisse's pov and the second one is from readers' :) lmk if you want to be tagged in part 2 <3

i. i think you have a type, and it's not me

Clarisse has been watching you from the second you arrived at camp. Since you spent every day doing more or less the same thing, she was able to pick up on your routine pretty fast. Two sugars in your coffee every morning. A walk around the lake in the afternoon. Archery practice before the sunset.

She felt weird going to practices at the same time as you, but she couldn’t help herself. Whenever she got a chance to sneak away from her siblings in the Ares cabin, she always found herself back in your presence. However, the thought to approach you like a normal person had never crossed her mind. Clarisse is the kind of person that needs to be in control, and talking to you one-on-one would mean letting her inhibitions take over, so she always made sure to keep her distance.

Once or twice, Clarisse had seen you on dates with another camper. At first, she thought you were just having a picnic with the girl from Aphrodite, until the two of you began holding hands. The next day, Clarisse saw you in the other girl’s sweater, which made her so sick she avoided you for an entire week.

The Aphrodite girl (her name, Clarisse later found out, was Stacy) began showing up with you more often. Stacy wore bows in her hair and pearl necklaces, whereas Clarisse’s mascara was always smudged and accessories that didn’t double as weapons felt wrong on her. For the first time, Clarisse wondered why she couldn’t just be like all the other girls. Or at least, a girl you would pay attention to.

It wasn’t for a lack of trying. Clarisse tried to make her penchant for you as obvious as possible, while actively hiding it from the rest of camp. This proved to be difficult because at the same time, she also didn’t want to get too close to you because, well— what would she even say to you?

Her flirting consisted of winking at you during Capture the Flag or from across the dining hall. She had an ongoing list of nicknames of what to call you when no one else was around, but those moments were few and far between. Once, she even went as far as brushing away a stray piece of hair that had fallen on your face. There seemed to be nothing left for her to do except put bows in her hair or maybe paint her nails, and the thought of doing either of those things made her almost as sick as seeing you and Stacy together.

Between her and the Aphrodite girl, she knew which girl you would choose. Had chosen.

ii. mold me how you want me to be

Still, that was not going to stop Clarisse. She had never backed down from a fight before, and this was no different. Even if Stacy didn’t know it, she had become Clarisse’s number one enemy, even more so than that Percy Jackson kid that had recently shown up at camp. It just wasn’t fair that she had been watching you for so long and here comes Aphrodite’s daughter out of nowhere to sweep you off your feet.

Since Clarisse knew your routine by heart, she devised a plan to get you alone. She decided that she would finally make a move, and then you could pick for yourself who you wanted to be with. Easy enough, right?

At night, Clarisse lay awake in bed thinking about you, Stacy, then you and Stacy together. Though she didn’t want to go there, her brain wondered what the two of you were doing at that very moment. Her thoughts ranged from tame, to slightly more unhinged. Like, were you lying underneath the stars on your picnic blanket? Or was Stacy doing your makeup as she straddled your lap?

Clarisse didn’t pray often, but ever since she met you, she had taken to silently wishing you would acknowledge her. Each time she saw you with your arms wrapped around Stacy, she yearned to know what that would feel like. Not that she thought you would come near her with a ten-foot pole. Stacy is sweet, like bubblegum or strawberries from the fields, and Clarisse is the opposite. If you tasted her, she might make your gums bleed.

Before you, she was never the kind of girl to care about her appearance. Gods, she was the daughter of Ares, they weren’t known for their beauty but their strength and power and when it came to those categories, Clarisse knew that she had Stacy beat.

And yet, Clarisse would change just about anything about herself if it would make you like her more. In your hands, she would turn into putty, moldable clay to take the shape of your ideal lover. Hell, she would change her name if she thought you didn’t like the sound of it.

iii. kill anyone if you ask me to

A few weeks later, the Ares cabin and yours happened to be on the same team for Capture the Flag. It was the closest Clarisse had been to you ever since you began dating Stacy. The proximity to you was killing her, but she had to stay focused—on winning the game and your heart.

Putting aside her wandering thoughts, Clarisse barked out instructions to the campers. When she got to your cabin, she assigned you and your half-siblings to be the second line of defense for the flag. Clarisse figured this way, she could keep you out of harm’s way. Also, this was her one chance to talk to you without Stacy hanging off your body and she wasn’t going to let this opportunity pass.

After the first conch blew, Clarisse went on high-alert mode. Her team had lost the last game to Luke and Annabeth’s team, but she was not going to accept defeat this time. Her eyes darted back and forth between blind spots in the forest and you and the flag.

As she absent-mindedly waved her new spear around, Clarisse heard soft footsteps behind her. She whipped her head around with her weapon aimed in the air, preparing to fight whoever had approached her.

“Shit, Y/N, you scared me.” It was just you. Wait– it was you.

“I’m sorry, didn’t mean to,” you responded, your hands in front of you.

Clarisse almost couldn’t believe her eyes. Did someone poison her earlier and she was hallucinating right now? Okay, keep it cool.

“Is something wrong?” Clarisse managed to ask after composing herself, realizing that you had moved away from your post.

“Uh, no. I- um… heard about what happened to your spear last week, and I just wanted to say I’m sorry,” you smiled nervously.

“Why?”

“Why…. am I sorry?”

Clarisse wanted to slap her hand across her forehead. Why did she say that? She meant to ask why are you talking to me right now? What did I do to deserve this? But she didn’t know how to word that in a way that wouldn't make you think she was crazy.

When she didn’t respond, you began backing away. “Look, I’m sorry if this is a sensitive topic. I just felt bad, is all.”

“No!” Clarisse began panicking. “I didn’t mean it like that- just, why are you talking to me now? We’ve never had a real conversation before.”

“Does it matter?” She expected you to be confused, but the look at your face seemed more amused than anything.

“No, I guess not,” Clarisse couldn’t help but smile. Gods, why was she so awkward? Anyone else, she would’ve been perfectly fine, but in the last few minutes, her mouth had gone dry and her legs felt as though they would give out at any second.

“Great,” you beamed in return. Clarisse’s eyes catch yours and the two of you stare at each other in content for a minute. Or at least, you are. Clarisse is convinced an Aphrodite kid has changed her pupils to hearts. “I haven’t seen you around lately,” you broke the silence.

“What do you mean? I’m always around,” Clarisse stammered for an excuse.

“Well, sure. It’s a small camp.” You seemed to be enjoying seeing Clarisse fumble for words. “But I used to see you all the time. At breakfast and archery.”

Clarisse ignored the implications of your comment. “Oh, I guess we just started going at different times then. You know you’re always with Stacy now—”

At the mention of your girlfriend’s name, your face contorted into something strange and unfamiliar to Clarisse. But before she could figure it out, a noise behind you caused the two of you to turn around abruptly.

“Y/N, watch out!” Clarisse shouted at you, but it was too late. Someone had dragged you backwards, knocking your weapon out of your hand. You struggled to free yourself, but whoever was holding you had revealed a dagger and you didn’t want to risk accidentally cutting yourself.

“If you know what’s best for yourself, let her go.” Clarisse breathed furiously, pausing between the last three words in her sentence. You couldn’t see who was restraining you, but you could feel their heart rate quicken at the sight of Clarisse’s spear getting dangerously close.

“And what if I don’t?” they responded. You knew that they were just putting on a front, you could feel their chest heaving up and down on your back. Clarisse seemed to know this too, she’s always been able to sense fear in people— mostly because she is the one that invokes it.

“I don’t think you want to find out,” she grinned, a wicked smile on her face. The next second, her spear had jabbed into the camper’s side, causing them to let go of their hold on you. You dropped to the ground.

“Shit!” the camper swore, rubbing their ribcage. “You’re not supposed to actually hurt me!” You could see their face now, one of Hermes' kids you’ve seen hanging around Luke.

“Now, what’s the fun in that?” Clarisse laughed. “Besides, the spearhead is blunt. You’ll be fine, drama queen.”

The kid scrambled away, leaving behind the dagger they had previously threatened you with. Clarisse ran over, instinctively putting her hands on your face. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I think so.” You began to stand up, but Clarisse pushed you back down.

“Clar, come on, I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? Let me just get a look at you,” she insisted, ignoring the way your nickname for her made something in her stomach flip over. You relented, knowing it was useless to argue with her. You allow her to scan your body for any signs of harm. Clarisse took her time, unsure of when the next time she would be this close to you again. Most of your body was covered by your armor or clothes, so her eyes drifted toward your exposed arms and the area where the kid had touched you.

Hesitantly, she reached for the side of your stomach. “Are you sore? Did they leave a mark?”

“No, I don’t think so,” you shook your head, lifting up the hem of your shirt to see. You heard Clarisse’s breath hitch. “What? What’s wrong?” You were fully sat up now.

“N-nothing!” Color rushed into Clarisse’s cheeks, causing her to turn her head away suddenly.

You giggled, her reaction not going unnoticed. “Thanks for saving me, tough girl.”

“Of course.” Clarisse pulled you up on your feet. “Anything for you, pretty girl.” The words slipped out of her mouth before she could register it. The two of you stared at each other again, it seemed as though eye contact was your main form of communication at the moment. And right now, Clarisse’s eyes were sparkling with something familiar, almost like how Stacy looks at you—

“Oh my god, babe! Are you okay?” Speaking of the devil, Clarisse rolled her eyes at the sight of your girlfriend running up.

“Stacy! How’d you know something was wrong?” You were pulled into a stifling hug, the air thick with floral perfume.

“Silly girl, I am the daughter of Aphrodite. I have a heightened sense for these things,” Stacy pulled her arms away and gave you a once-over, presumably to check for injuries, before smothering you with kisses.

Clarisse coughed, once, and then again a little louder. “Oh!” Stacy turned toward her. “Clarisse, I didn’t see you there.”

“I wouldn’t be standing here if it weren’t for her,” you said, sensing Clarisse’s uneasiness.

Now, Stacy’s face contorted into something strange. Shamelessly, Clarisse took pride in being the cause of it.

“Well, thank you,” she responded tersely. “Come on, let’s get one of the Apollo kids to look at you.” Stacy pushed you away before you could protest. You offered Clarisse a weak smile before turning around.

Clarisse sighed, maybe if she had been a daughter of Aphrodite, she could shapeshift into someone you walked away with— not from.

That night, she prayed to Ares for the first time in months.

#WHERE ARE ALL MY SAPPHICS #WOMEN LOVERS #WARNING: YEARNING #clarisse la rue #clarisse la rue x reader #percy jackson series #percy jackson #pjo #dior goodjohn #dior goodjohn x reader #clarisse la rue imagine #pjo x you #clarisse la rue x you

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penny00dreadful · 11 months

Text

So does anyone remember that post that was like "Robin and Eddie meet when she does that thing that's like 'hello, please pretend you know me so I can get away from this person' then Steddie happens?" Because I do. I cannot for the life of me find it. If anyone knows the post I'm talking about please let me know so I can link it, this is very much not my idea, it's that persons idea but the brain worms got me so here we are. 🤷‍♀️

We found it! It's this post by @wynnyfryd Thank you Anon! Obviously I went in a different direction with it but this post was 100% my inspiration so thank you for helping me find it!

AO3 link for those asking! 🖤

Robin should be royally pissed off with herself right now. She would be if she wasn’t so damn scared.

That guy was still trailing behind her, no matter the twists and turns she’d taken down different streets trying to lose him and the only thing she’d gained from it was to get totally and completely lost. It could be something completely innocent, the guy might be coincidentally going in the same direction as her but she wasn’t willing to give him the benefit of the doubt if it meant keeping herself alive.

The distance between the two of them was slowly closing as she was followed through the dark and empty streets of the city, hoping, praying for some kind of shop or restaurant or something to make an appearance so she could hide inside but apparently Robin was able to find the one street in this city where everything was either closed for the night or boarded up.

Her heart was pounding in her ears and the beginnings of tears were starting to sting her eyes and all she could think of was how sick with worry Steve was going to be in the morning when he woke up to no missed calls, no missed texts and no Robin. She’d scoffed at him hours earlier when he’d offered to go to the ‘work thing’ with her but she'd told him she was a big girl and she could look after herself and not to be such a worrywart mom.

And now she had no idea where her phone had gone, if she'd left it behind or dropped it somewhere, no idea where she was and no idea of what she was going to do.

If she’d been a bit more present in her head she probably would have noticed the loud, braying, male laughter coming from just ahead of her and crossed the street to avoid them before it was obvious she was avoiding them. But as it was she could barely see straight through her tears and panicked tunnel vision while simultaneously trying to keep an eye on the slowly encroaching guy behind her. She was practically already in the group’s space and one of them had definitely already seen her though he didn’t pay her any attention.

But even through her blurred vision and panic, she finally registered what exactly she was looking at. Four men standing around the entrance to what looked like the diviest of empty dive bars, chain smoking and being as loud as humanly possible, but that’s not what caught her eye.

Long hair, chains, leather, denim, tartan, rings, tattoos, subculture. If Robin had to choose a group of men to approach, any kind of subculture would be the best option. They knew what it was like to be other. There was no guarantee these guys were safe, but they were probably safer than a group of frat boys.

The next thing that caught her eye that nearly made her cry in relief as she got closer were the patches and pins.

A rainbow ‘A’ against a black and white striped background pinned on one guys collar, a yellow-white-purple-black patch on another's arm, a pink-yellow-blue patch over the third guys heart and a progress pride flag pinned to the largest guys pocket.

Her people.

Without a second's hesitation she made a bee-line for them, planting herself firmly next to yellow-white-purple-black patch person who had a mess of thick light brown curls that reminded her of Steve’s hair. They fell painfully silent at her arrival.

The four of them blinked down at her, with her tearfilled eyes and wild aura of panic around her they were probably, understandably freaked out.

“Hi guys!” She called out to them, probably a little too loud, hoping her voice carried back to the fucker following her, tensing as she could actually hear his footsteps approaching now.

The guy with the longest hair and the pink-yellow-blue patch standing directly in front of her glanced quickly over her shoulder before returning his gaze to her. His face split into a wide warm grin, tapping her shoulder lightly.

“Hey girlie. We thought you weren’t coming, we’ve been waiting.”

The footsteps behind her audibly slowed down. Robin laughed, a little maniacally, keeping her frantic gaze on him, not daring to turn around. “Yeah, I uh- g- got sidetracked.”

“Eddie, what-”

Pink-yellow-blue patch guy, Eddie she supposed, slapped ‘A’ patch guy lightly on the stomach with the back of his hand, shutting him up as her pursuer passed them by, giving the group a wide berth.

“Hey, no worries. You’re here now, right?”

Pride patch guy kept his eyes on the guy who’d been following her the whole time, only looking away when he eventually turned the corner, disappearing into the night.

Robin immediately felt her posture slacken now that he was finally gone, the full weight of everything coming down on her. Her tears began to spill over and her whole body shook as hysterical sobs started to pour out of her body.

“I’m sorry. I’m- I’m sorry. I didn’t know what else to do. I think I left my phone behind and I don’t know where I am. We only moved here a couple of weeks ago and I got lost trying to get away and- and-”

“Hey, hey. It’s okay.” Yellow-white-purple-black patch person squeezed her shoulder lightly, keeping their distance. “You’re okay. Don’t worry about it.”

“We can call someone for you, if you want?” Eddie asked, crossing his arms tight like he was trying not to reach out to her, probably worried it would freak her out more. “Boyfriend or girlfriend-”

“Or romantic partner.” The person with their hand on her shoulder interjected lightly.

“Alright Baron from the Baronies.” Eddie snorted. “But fair point, Gareth. Romantic partner or friend or whatever?”

“Um,” Robin’s voice was still shaking. “I don’t… I’ve never been good at memorising numbers…”

“Me too, terrible at them.” Eddie smiled again, pulling his phone from his pocket. Robin’s fear and panic was almost entirely gone now even though she was still hiccuping and sniffling underneath their concerned gazes. They were all firmly keeping their distance, keeping any touches short and fleeting, not moving too suddenly, trying their best to make sure she knew they weren’t a threat and it was really helping her to start feeling safe again. “But we could try to find them online? Instagram or something?”

“Yeah. Yeah we could try that.” She wiped her eyes roughly against her sleeve as she shuffled over to Eddie’s side. “My best friend, Steve, he uh- he’s probably asleep and I don’t think you can call him if you don’t have him added…”

“You can send him a message.” Eddie replied easily, handing his phone over. “And if he doesn’t wake up, we’ll try something else.”

“Don’t worry we’ll get you home.” ‘A’ patch guy smiled down at her while pride patch guy nodded along.

Robin sniffed again. “Thanks.” She was able to conjure up a small watery smile as she opened the app and found Steve’s profile, shooting off a quick message begging him not to freak out and explaining the situation as concisely as she could.

“Here.” She handed Eddie back his phone who glanced down at it for just a second before his eyes widened slightly as he scrolled through Steve’s profile.

“Oh shit. This is your friend?”

Robin nodded. “Mm-hmm.”

“He’s… he’s really pretty.”

That managed to pull a startled laugh from her. “Oh god, don’t tell him that, you’ll give him a big head.”

“Let me see?” Gareth asked, whistling low when Eddie turned his phone around showing a photo of Steve and Robin at their last pride parade cheering with the crowd, Steve with the pink-purple-blue of the bi flag smeared across each cheek and Robin with the pinks, oranges and white of the lesbian flag draped around her shoulders. “He is really pretty.”

Eddie snatched the phone back, cradling it to his chest. “Fuck off, Gare. I saw him first.”

Robin smiled again. “Any response from him?”

“Hm?” Eddie asked distractedly, scrolling through Steve’s photos before pride flag guy punched him in the shoulder. “Ow! Wh- oh, sorry!” Eddie frantically scrolled back up before clicking into his messages again and shaking his head. “Nothing yet.” He held the phone out to show her.

“Okay.”

“What’s your address? If he doesn’t respond, we'll find a way to get you there.”

“Uh…” Robin was drawing a complete blank, only able to remember her parents home address hundreds of miles away.

“Or tell us something nearby.” Eddie added, not missing a beat, clearly picking up on Robin’s lack of an answer. “What’s on your street?”

“Um,” she closed her eyes, trying to picture it in her head, “there’s a couple of Chinese take outs, Asian food store, paint store… there’s… I think it’s a tattoo parlour? There’s designs painted on the window, a tower on either side. I think they’re from Lord of the Rings?”

“Inklings? Is that the place?”

Robin opened her eyes. Eddie was grinning at her conspiratorially. “That’s it. You know it?”

“Would you believe me if I told you I work there?”

“No way.”

“Way.”

Hope was starting to grow feathers inside Robin’s chest. She could go home, she didn’t have to stay out all night waiting for Steve to wake up and never let her out of his sight again, she could hug her best friend and drink coffee out of her favourite mug and curse at their finicky fridge and steal his hair products again. She could go home.

“Is it far?”

“Nah, only a few streets away. Ten minute walk, tops.”

“D’you- I mean… do you think you could-” Could she really ask them to walk her home after they’d already done so much for her? Would she be asking too much? Could she be putting herself in more danger?

“I can take you there if you want? Let you get back to your… Steve.” There was a slight blush dusting over Eddie’s cheeks. Maybe he did have an ulterior motive, but it wasn’t an ulterior motive involving her. If she wasn’t so wrung out and aching to crawl into her own bed she’d be thinking up teasing material to lambaste Steve with. But as it was, she was desperate to get home.

“Would that be okay?”

“Yeah.” Eddie replied, bright and easy. “It would just be me and you though,” he held his hands up in surrender, “and you can totally say no, like if you're uncomfortable or whatever. Gareth is Grant and Jeff’s ride home and you’re still on the clock, right?” He turned to Gareth towards the end of his sentence.

“Yeah, but I get off shift in about an hour so could come in if you wanted, wait around in the back room until then if you wanna go as a group?” They answered.

“I think… I think I just want to get home.”

“Okay, cool. No worries I’ll get you there safe and sound. Here,” Eddie pulled his phone out again, “I’m gonna message Steve to let him know we’re on the way in case he wakes up,” he showed her the short message only sending it off when she gave a nod, “and I’ll get you to navigate just so we don’t get lost.”

He handed his phone to her with the maps app open, directing them towards Inklings tattoo parlour. He was playing it off like an easy joke, instead of another way to assure her she was safe. He was making sure she knew exactly where he was taking her at all times, he was making sure she had the ability to call the police or whatever if he turned on her, he was making sure she knew he didn’t need or want her address if she didn’t want to give it.

This fucking guy.

He definitely wouldn’t be the worst choice Steve had ever made if it did go that way.

“I don’t know how to thank all of you, seriously. I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t run into you.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Grant smiled at her before hesitating. “Uh, I just realised we don’t have your name.”

“Oh!” She laughed at herself, feeling lighter. “I’m Robin.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Robin.” Grant held his hand out, shaking hers once she took it.

“Likewise.”

“And don’t worry about thanking us, just pay it forward, yeah?” Jeff said.

“Plus.” Gareth took on a nonchalant tone even though they had a smirk plastered over their face. “We’ll see you again at Steve and Eddie’s wedding.”

“Shut up!” Eddie scowled but didn’t hold onto it for long in the wake of Robin’s giggles.

She sighed once the giggles subsided, a weight lifted off her shoulders. “I look forward to it.” She raised her hand in salute as the three of them headed back inside, turning to Eddie as he held his elbow out.

“Shall we?”

Robin tried to suppress her smile but took Eddie’s arm anyway. They only made it down one street and around one corner, Robin clutching tight to Eddie’s phone before he finally asked.

"So."

"Best friend Steve." Eddie twirled his rings around his fingers. "Is he…"

“He’s single.” She answered lightly. “But you might be arriving into his life at the wrong time. He’s recently sworn off men.”

“Well we’ve all sworn off men once or twice. Men are terrible.”

“Agreed.”

“Is it because of a bad ex?”

Robin threw her head back with a groan remembering the giant breakdown that had finally finally ended it. “Tommy was the worst. He’s the reason we even moved out here, there’s nowhere to get away from an ex in a small town, you know? They’re everywhere. I’m not going to go into what happened, it’s not my business to say but it was bad.”

Eddie nodded, his eyes down on the ground, running through everything in his head.

Robin could see the tattoo parlour up ahead, the glorious sight of their apartment building just a few buildings away.

“Do you think… with time… he could open himself up to men again?”

Eddie had such a tentative hope in his eyes, it was adorable really. Looking over him, she thought about the type of people Steve would constantly thirst over, blip in the matrix Tommy Hagan notwithstanding.

Lithe bodies with full lips and giant eyes, hair he could run his fingers through and something unusual about them. Something odd.

He’d never explicitly gone for someone so heavily into a subculture before but he’d never turned them down either. And based on Eddie’s job at the tattoo parlour and the way he was dressed, he almost definitely had some ink on him. That alone would be enough to make Steve swoon.

“I think he might. Will you walk me up?” Robin asked, holding the door to the building open, offering Eddie the same kindness under the guise of doing a favour that he had offered her so many times tonight.

“Yeah, sure.”

They’d managed to make it up to the third floor, walking down her hallway before Eddie’s phone started to ping incessantly.

She turned the phone over in her hand, looking at the screen. “He’s awake.”

Robin, where are you?

Are you okay?

I’m on the way.

Please be okay.

Their apartment door was flung open just as they reached it. Steve was standing there panting and terrified, his hair a mess, his glasses askew, his jacket and shoes thrown haphazardly over his pyjamas.

“Robbie.”

Steve slammed into her, holding her tight before immediately letting go to inspect her face and running his hands over her body, checking to see if anything was wrong.

“Are you okay? Are you hurt? What happened? What do you need?”

“Steve.” Robin caught his fluttering hands in hers and squeezed, nearly crying out in relief just to have him with her again. “I’m okay. Eddie and his friends helped me.”

“Eddie-” Steve looked to the side, noticing her saviour for the first time. “You’re Eddie.”

“I’m Eddie.” Eddie gave him a short little wave and a dazzling smile that quickly dropped in shock as Steve pulled him into a crushing hug, his blush returning with full force.

“Thank you, thank you so much. I don’t know what I would’ve-” Steve took a big breath in and loosened his arms from around Eddie’s shoulders. Robin saw his eyes slowly trail over his face before very briefly flicking down to the pink-yellow-blue patch then back up. “Come inside, the two of you. Can I get you anything? Tea? Decaf coffee? A glass of water? Like, literally anything to say thank you.” He asked, ushering the two of them into the apartment.

Steve caught Robin’s eye behind Eddie’s back and mouthed ‘oh my god he’s fucking gorgeous!’

Robin snorted and thought to herself ‘sworn off men, my ass.’

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