#the pi seems very cool and very accomplished

[jungwookjins]

guys wish me luck for my first day of work at [REDACTED] im so sooooo nervy

#it's my first 'Real Adult Job' im so scared #i'll be a clinical research assistant at this big hospital #the pi seems very cool and very accomplished #and i rly need to make a good impression #😬😬 #ennuitxt

[mmavverickk]

I “love” the betrayal fics where the entire camp suddenly believes that this new guy has actually accomplished all of Percy’s achievements and Percy lied to all of them, like camp didn’t literally witness half of those accomplishments and like Percy actually outright says “I did X.” Percy says almost nothing about what he does, Camp hears about most of his achievements from others

oh, we've all seen those fics. new guy shows up, he's actually Percy's half-brother. Annabeth suddenly only has eyes for him, everyone suddenly hates Percy because new guy does too, Poseidon may or may not disown Percy, and then Percy runs away and joins Chaos.

it's been copied and pasted thousands of times in hundreds of ways.

not a single one of those fics has Percy's departure from Camp happen realistically. it's not even impossible to grow resentment between Percy and the campers, which is what these writers seem to want. but the way they go about it? a cookie cutter asshole pied piper OC who steals the spotlight and turns Camp into a hostile mob of angry demigods? Unrealistic. 0/10 trope, literally 50% of why i will not read fanfictions with OCs.

have some realistic ways of turning Camp against Percy or vice versa:

- Percy could be captured. The area he was taken from is drenched in blood. no one could survive that, Percy's gotta be dead, so Camp doesn't look for him. after [x amount of time] of captivity and probably torture, Percy gives up hoping for a rescue. he discovers darker uses for his powers, frees himself, and doesn't go back to camp, because they abandoned him. opens the road for angst and emotion and tearful reunions etc.

- Camp is attacked. maybe it was a lazy beach day. no one is ready, only a few campers have their weapons. they're outnumbered and maybe surrounded and definitely out of options. Percy won't let anyone die. two ways to go about this one:

A) percy destroys the attackers single-handedly, using every tool in his arsenal, every fucked up thing he can think of to make sure his people survive. he controls poison and blood and drowns monsters and, i don't know, freezes them into ice cubes or boils their skin or stops their hearts. Camp is terrified of him now. he leaves. or B) the armed campers fight back, but percy isn't fighting. he's busy keeping the injured from dying. how? he's controlling their blood. he won't let it deviate from its normal path. Camp is terrified of him now. he leaves.

- [x god] sends Percy on a quest. but, surprise! it's not a quest! it's a trick, to lead Percy to his death! Percy survives, but can't go back or he'll be revealing he's still alive before he figures out why [x god] tried to have him killed and if there's anyone else behind it. fun conspiracy vibes.

- percy adopts a new pet, except this time it's a drakon. "Percy," Chiron says very patiently and not-at-all exasperated, "you can't keep a drakon as a pet. it will eat your friends and we don't have the space." Percy flips authority the bird and strikes out with his new pet to find somewhere they can settle. kinda cracky but written right it could be funny.

- Percy pisses Zeus off. not surprising. Zeus wants to kill Percy. not surprising. for his own good, Chiron sends Percy on a roadtrip/changes his name and sends him to mexico along with multiple witness protection agents/quest to keep Percy out of sight for a while to allow the king of olympus time to cool down, because we like when percy is alive and also the war poseidon would wage at his death would kill us all.

are all of them 100% realistic? no, but neither is Percy leaving Camp. Hera had to literally kidnap him and erase his memory to keep him away. the point is that they're different and plausible, and not the same exact trope repeated over and over again until i can tell you the plot of hundreds of betrayal works in one sentence.

#mav.ask #agree those fics are like 'oh woo hoo it's dark percy!' #no it's not its you butchering the books to make him into a poorly disguised OC #'look he changed his name to omega and he's leading chaos's armies' #percy jackson #percy jackson headcanon #pjo #heroes of olympus #dark percy jackson

[voids-colourful-creations]

More and More, Still Moving Forward - An Ashpika Fic

[Read on Ao3]

Rated G - No Warnings Gen Pokemon Sun and Moon Pikachu & Ash 942 Words

Summary: It's the end of an era, the Manalo Conference is all wrapped up. There's a lot to think about, and a lot to say thank you for.

Notes: This version of the fic uses the English Dub Names (ex, Ash. Read the Japanese Dub Names (ex, Satoshi) version HERE. This was written for @ashpikazine ! It was a super fun time! Enjoy the fic =D!

-

For the third time, Kukui reaches down to ruffle Ash’s hair through his hat, not that Ash minds. He’s certainly earned it now, Alolan Champion, 30 minutes reigning. He’s worked good and hard to get to this far; he deserves to take pride in that. They do; Ash and his team, his friends and family.

“I’m so proud of you, you know that?” Kukui says softly. His voice is quieter than it needs to be. There aren’t any trainers in the backstage corridors of Manalo Stadium. Not that they’d mind, regardless.

Ash laughs sheepishly.

“Yeah, I know. Thank you, Professor. For the compliment and… everything else.”

He leaves it at that. Doesn’t need to elaborate.

Pikachu, curled up comfortably in Ash’s arms, chimes in.

“Pika-pikachu!”

Kukui laughs.

“You’re both very welcome.”

It’s comfortingly quiet for a moment, only their footsteps in-between the silence, stark contrast from the roaring of the crowd that had enveloped them moments earlier.

They round the corner carefully, returning to the same benches Ash had sat on before he’d entered the stadium for his final battle, contemplating whether this was finally it, if he would win.

Ash plops himself down on the bench, leaning back against the cool concrete wall. He’s still running hot with excitement, and it's nice to rest.

Kukui walks over, kneeling so their eyes meet.

“Now, promise me. No matter how much the rest of the class is dying to see you, don’t leave until I come to get you, okay?”

Ash knows, nods.

Kukui sighs.

“It’s not fair, I know. You should be able to celebrate with your friends, we just… we underestimated how eager reporters would be to interview the participants and…” He trails off momentarily. “Just wait for me, alright?”

Ash hums in reply, and then the professor is gone.

In all honesty, Ash doesn’t mind waiting all that much. In general, yes, waiting was awful, but this time… it felt nice. A breather, a break.

Pikachu curls into a little ball on Ash’s lap, vibrating lightly as he breathes. His breath is calm, steady. If it weren’t for the fact that he’d been there, Ash would never have known Pikachu had been fighting for his life a few moments ago.

Ash scuffs his shoe on the floor, mindlessly petting Pikachu as it purrs.

“Piiiiiikaaaa.”

For once Ash isn’t restless. Must’ve used up all his energy battling. He’s satisfied. It’s a wonderful feeling, satisfaction.

Pikachu’s claws press into Ash’s leg through the fabric of his pants. Pikachu sighs again, and Ash does the same.

“We did it buddy… we really did it…”

Ash breathes out, voice light in the silence. “But you and everyone did all the work! Rowlet trained so hard right at the last minute and Tor- Incineroar, evolving! And-“

Ash is cut off by Pikachu’s paw, reaching up to tap his face. It lands squarely on his forehead.

“Pika-pi-pikaaaachu! Chu-pichu!”

Ash giggles.

“And I helped. I helped too. It’s our victory.”

This seems to satisfy Pikachu, who settles back down in Ash’s lap.

“Really, though. Thank you, Pikachu. All over the world, all this time…. You’ve always been by my side! Look at all we’ve accomplished, all we have to show for it! The titles, the trophies, yes-“

He trails off for a moment, reminiscing on past battles. Ritchie, Harrison, Tyson, Tobias, Cameron, Alain. Old losses. Faba, Hau, Guzma, Gladion and Kukui. New wins. Whoever else awaited in the future. He takes a deep breath, regaining his composure.

“But more than that…”

Ash looks down. Pikachu looks up at him. His own face, wobbly and distorted, is reflected in Pikachu’s large, brown eyes.

“But more than that, you’re my partner. My most precious friend. We’ve met so many people all across our journey, and I know it wouldn’t have been the same without you. Thank you for choosing me, again and again through all these battles, through everything!”

He laughs again, a quieter, slightly bittersweet laugh.

“Sometimes I think you’ve trained me just as much as I’ve trained you! If it weren’t for you, I might still be the same brat I was when we met.”

Pikachu nods at this. “Pikaaaachu.”

“Hey! What I mean is that you’ve taught me a lot, shown me all the ways Pokémon and people should work together!”

“Pika-pika-pika-chu-chu-pika. Chu-pika-pi-chu!”

Pikachu sits up again, reaching out his claws in a grabby ‘Come here!’ motion. Ash leans down, obliging.

Pikachu smiles, pressing his face against Ash’s. Tiny crackles of electricity tickle Ash’s cheek, but Pikachu is careful, would never release enough electricity to really hurt him.

When Pikachu finishes, he stares up at Ash again, unblinking.

“Ka-pi-pikachu-pi?”

Ash grins sharply, determination piercing through his eyes.

“Hey, don’t think I’m giving up alright? We may be champions but there’s still a long way to go before we’re really Pokémon Masters!”

Pikachu raises his fists, squeaking in equal excitement.

“Exactly! We’ll keep moving forward together, more and more and more and more and mooooore!”

He stomps his feet, drumming them against the floor to match the pounding of his heart, like the roar of the crowd in his ears. He can hear it, picture it so clearly that the sound surrounds him even when it’s silent.

“Pipi-kachu!”

“Yeah,” Ash says with a smile. “You and me, buddy.”

He reaches down and wraps his arms around Pikachu, holding him tightly. Pikachu grabs onto Ash’s arms, tiny claws digging into his skin ever so slightly, but Ash doesn’t mind. He lifts Pikachu up and holds him against his chest again, close enough so that he can feel the Pokémon’s breathing.

“Thank you, Pikachu.”

“Pikapi-pikachuuu.”

He holds Pikachu tightly, pouring all his ambition and hope and anticipation into the gesture, hoping, knowing, that Pikachu will understand.

“Ash?” Kukui’s head peeks around the corner. “We’re all clear now.”

Ash smiles.

“Ready, Pikachu?” he asks as he stands. Pikachu nods happily. He’s asking in more ways than one, but Pikachu’s answering in kind.

“Then, let’s go!”

[End]

#anipoke #pokeani #pokemon #pokemon sun and moon #pokemon sm #sm pokemon #pokeani sm #pokemon fic #pkmn fic #voids fic #trainer satoshi #ash ketchum #pikachu #professor kukui #pokemon kukui #zine stuff

[cheesey-rice]

Theory on the Soul in Deltarune. (Warning for spoilers on all routes.)

In case you didn't know already, there are two routes in the new Deltarune chapter. I think each one gives us a different perspective on Kris's motivations and their relationship with the soul that inhabits them.

I think the important thing that underpins my take on the game is assuming that the two other lighters who accompany you in the game, Noelle and Susie, are used to voice perspectives that Kris as a silent protagonist might share but be unable to express. This is a common tool used in silent protagonist RPGs, but if you don't agree with it my take might not hold much water for you.

I'll start out by talking about a fairly regular pacifist playthrough of this part. The main scene I'd like to discuss is the one at the end, where it is discussed that opening a dark fountain could bring about the Roaring.

Because it's pretty obvious that we are to think Kris is the "Knight" sneaking off to create these dark fountains with their knife, some people think that they intend to bring about the Roaring. I think their intentions are far less malicious than such a theory assumes.

Because the main thing is that we know that Kris as a character cares about the people in their life. They have a loving relationship with their family and take care of their friends automatically without us prompting them. When Susie consistently alludes to wanting to stay friends with Kris throughout the pacifist rounds, I assume these feelings are reciprocated. I also assume that most of the feelings Susie expresses about the dark world, that it's cool and fun and easier than the real world, are also feelings felt by Kris.

There's also another layer we can see to Kris's feelings about the dark world that comes from their own reactions. We know that Kris is a weird kid in real life, a lonely kid who looks up to their older brother and doesn't have any trophies on their wall like he does. In the dark world, Kris does get trophies on their wall in the room Ralsei makes for them. In the dark world, Kris is a confident, accomplished leader who can make as many friends as they want to thanks to help and guidance from a goat who is very similar to their older brother who they can't contact because of the internet currently.

It isn't really a ground breaking conclusion to say that Kris probably likes the dark world just as much as Susie does, as she talks only of how she wants to go back and have another adventure. Because Kris is the one making the dark fountains, one can see that the worlds are made for them. Made for their adventure with friends in a world makebelieved out of all their childhood toys and imaginings.

We also know that Kris has the ability to walk around, slash tires, eat pies, and make dark fountains without any input from us at all. They don't need us for that and have the ability to take us out whenever they want.

So if the theory that they resent the soul that controls their actions held true, why would we still be in control? Why would they choose to let us do that?

This is where it's important to consider Noelle in the alternate route, whose inner feelings we are often privy to due to Kris's strong understanding of her from childhood.

The alternate route is activated by forcing Noelle to kill people in the dark world. At one point, Noelle asks herself why she's following Kris's commands when they're asking her to do such awful things. The conclusion that she draws is, "but I keep getting stronger... They're just trying to make me stronger."

If this is the reason Noelle obeys Kris, then perhaps in turn we can extrapolate that this is the reason Kris obeys us.

Because we get results.

No matter which ending you get, Kris had an adventure, became stronger, defeated enemies it would have been impossible to go up against without us.

We also see that in scenes where we don't help Kris, where we aren't in control, they often suffer at the hands of these enemies. How Susie hit then against the locker in the first game, howthe King almost strikes them down after they help Susie, how Spamton would have killed them all alone in the basement if their friends hadn't interceded.

Kris wants to be cool and strong and have a fun adventure. For that reason, they are relying on another, external force to make their choices for them. To make choices that will matter.

In the Pacifist run, Kris gets their wish. A fun adventure with their friends where no one has to get hurt. Kris can just sit back and enjoy as a friendly dark power holds their hand through the whole thing.

In the alternate route, however, we see the start of a darker path. One where the dark power with hold over Kris makes malevolent choices that make them question themselves. Is this really the right thing?

We see this hesitation in how other characters react to Kris in this route. After Kris and Noelle kill Bertly, Susie notes that Kris's expression seems to be off some how. That something seems wrong with them, even offering to heal them because of it. Later on, Noelle notes that she sees some other voice coming out of Kris, something scary that she needs to investigate, foreshadowing a continuation of this plot in later chapters.

Kris experiences some amount of turmoil due to the actions of the player. But they still open the dark fountain and put the soul back into themselves later.

How do they justify that to themselves?

Think about Yoshi. If you talk to Garrison's descendent at his grave, they tell you that Kris drops Yoshi into the pit on purpose to complete a level in the video game. In video games Kris is already the kind of player that can distance themselves from necessary sacrifices.

Maybe they justify it to themselves the same way Noelle does at first. It's in the dark world, things are different there, it doesn't matter, it's not real. I'm still getting stronger. Isn't this what I wanted? Who cares if Berdley is dead, he sucked anyway, let's close our eyes and not even look so toby doesn't have to draw the sprite when we hide his body in the wire closet.

Perhaps the resign themselves to it, acclimate to it, become numb to the traumatic event in order to justify carrying on, like Flower or Chara in Undertale might be assumed to on a genocide run.

Because that's what having the soul allows them to do. It allows them to carry on.

On the notion of Noelle carrying on her investigation, it would be interesting to me if the endgame of deltarune turned out to be a fight where all the friends whose levels you raised by killing turn on you and try to either a) save Kris from you, or b) stop a Kris who is too far gone into apathy. That ending would seem sort of karmic to me so I would enjoy seeing it. I think a battle where you play as Kris but try to make them lose to their friends in a pacifist run ending might be interesting too seeing as they are the "knight" and all and are being set up as the big bad.

So basically my actual theorizing boils down to a) on pacifist run you're like Kris's replacement older sibling cajoling them into making friends on a little video game adventure and they're trying so hard to make you stay, or b) you take the alternate route and are just kind of traumatizing Kris into thinking murder is ok if they get to be cool and have fun adventures.

I also have some things to say about how Ralsei takes on Asriel's place of influencing Kris to experience empathy and when you follow those actions Kris is reminded of their big brother who they love and how the alternate route makes Kris cut themselves off from that empathetic power as part of maintaining their own self justifications but I should just make a different post if I'm gonna talk about that.

TLDR; Kris just wants to have a fun adventure like everyone else, I don't think they resent our control but are instead actively seeking it out to make their life easier.

#deltarune spoilers #deltarune #kris dreemurr #noelle deltarune #deltarune theory #deltarune meta #Feel free to add on/disagree with me im in the mood to chat about this

[docgold13]

365 DC Comics Paper Cut-Out SuperHeroes - One Hero, Every Day, All Year…

Suplemental - Villains Who Are Sometimes Heroes  

Often times, the best villains are those who do not necessarily seem themselves as such.  They are the heroes of their own stories and believe their villainous actions are in the service of some form of a greater good.  As such, there are numerous instances in which a villain will come to act in the role of hero or antihero, where the bad guy is actually the good guy, or a former nemesis becomes a sudden ally.  Following the jump are some of my favorite villains who frequently end up playing a heroic role…

There can be no doubt that both Deathstroke and Bane are bad to the bone. Yet each have acting in the role of antihero more times than can easily counted. 

Poison Ivy is less villainess than ecological warrior.  Her actions may be evil in the minds of many, but for her she is merely defending the wellbeing of plant life and attempting to stave off mankind’s thoughtless efforts to make the planet inhospitable to both flora and fauna alike.

The Flash’s Rogues, especially Captain Cold, HeatWave, The Pied Piper and The Trickster are most certainly cads… yet they all abide by their own particular code of honor and conduct.  As such, they have been many a time where these rogues have fought along side heroes as opposed to against them.

The Shade has been one of the Justice Society’s most formidable of adversaries.  And yet it was later revealed that he isn’t that bad a guy and it was the malignant possession of the devious Culp who was responsible for most of his villainous deeds.  

Both The Star Sapphire and Goldface each began as villains but ended up heroes.  

Knockout and Scandal are wonderful and I’ll hear no bad words about them.  

Brainwave Junior‘s turn as a villain was initially attributed to his difficulties with mental illness, but it was later revealed to be the machinations of the evil Mr. Mind.  Once the little creep was expelled, Brainwave Jr. became good again. whew!

The second Tattooed Man started off a villain but later became a hero, only to be killed in Heroes in Crisis (hopefully he’ll get better like most of the victims of Sanctuary).  As for Harlequin, she only acted as a villain to get the attention of her crush, Green Lantern (Alan Scott)… boy was she barking up the wrong tree.

Bizarro is not necessarily bad, rather he’s naive and easily manipulated and the majority of his evil acts have been the result of coercion by way of more purely evil villains.  And under the right direction, Bizarro can very much be a force for good, such as the time he served as a hero among The Red Hood’s band of Outlaws.  

Anarky is a political extremist and Thorne suffers from some sort of psychological malady.  Sometimes their on the right side of a conflict, sometimes on the wrong.  Are they bad guys… whose to say?

This guy… where do I even start?  Lex Luther certainly does not see himself as a villain; he’s out to save the world.  And there have been many a time where he has achieved exactly that.  He could have been hero on par with the greatest in the DC Universe… if only he hadn’t stolen all of those pies!

Plastique began as a terrorist and villain yet spent a brief time as a hero, a result of her romance with Captain Atom.  Alas the affair between the two proved to be short live, and so time did Plastique’s time as a hero.  As he Deadshot, he’s a stone-cold killer, yet his time with The Suicide Squad and Secret Six has hoisted him into the role of antihero… a role that proved a surprisingly good fit for the deadly marksman.

Cheshire is a deadly assassin who has proven formidable nemesis of The Teen Titans.  When he daughter’s wellbeing is on the line, however, the killer is quick to aide her one time rivals.  

Painkiller started off as a villain yet has recently turned to the role of antihero; mostly a result of the character’s involvement in the Black Lightning television series.  As for Manchester Black, I’m never going to be convince to trust this creepy peet… yet Superman has decided to do just that, recruiting the cad into his new team The Elite.

Both Fataly and Bleez have very good reasons to be as angry and vengeful as they are.  And though both have battled the Green Lanterns on multiple occasions, they have also assisted the corps in joining forces against common enemies.  

Thomas Blake made for a rather lousy super villain during his early years as Catman.  After a much-needed Gail Simone make-over, however, he became a truly terrific antihero.  Plus, anyone who likes cats as much as he does can’t be all that bad, right?

Although technically villains, I wouldn’t classify Jenette nor Black Alice as necessarily bad…  They both just have a different way of looking at the matter of morality.

Don’t mess with Lady Shiva… let’s just leave it at that.

Polymath’s tenure as a villain was merely a result of her desperation to save her father.  Once the Wonder Twins helped her do just that, she resigned from her villainous ways.  Shado‘s deal is a bit more complicated.  The devious archer has proven a formidable adversary to Green Arrow, but there has also been many a time where the two have fought side by side.  

So Dex-Starr is a rage-filled murder machine possessing awesome power.  Yet that is pretty much the case for all house cats, so I don’t see what the big deal is…

Both Killer Frost and Magenta fell into the antiquated trope of powerful women becoming evil due to some sort of hysteria.  Sure they’ve been bad guys plenty of times, but they have each also acted as heroes as well.  

Just like his father, Icicle Junior has taken the road of villainy, becoming a member of The injustice Society of America.  When The ultra Humanite took over the world, however, Icicle joined forces with The Justice Society and played a pivotal role in saving the day.  As for Junior’s baby-mama, Tigress, she remains a villainess… in the DC Animated Universe of Young Justice, however, Artemis is very much a hero.  Feels like only a matter of time before the comic book universe follows suit, turing The tigress from villain to hero.  

Both Clayface and Man-Bat are less villains than they are victims of circumstance.  And while each have battled Batman more times than can be counted, there has also been times where the pair have aided The Dark Knight. 

Once heralded as the greatest of The Green Lanterns, Sinestro’s path to villainy came as a facet of his quest to bring order to the galaxy.  His tyrannical notions aside, there has still been plenty a time where he has once more joined forces with his former allies among the corps.  

Both The Rubber Band Man and Major Disaster began as villains, but switched over to being heroes.  Major Disaster even served for a brief while as a member of The Justice League International.  

Lobo is a genocidal trashbox who has most likely had inappropriate relations with space dolphins.  Yet people seem to like reading about this jerk which has foisted him into the role of antihero.  I still think he’s garbage, but will admit that his daughter is super cool.  

These three don’t even require particular mention.  Catwoman, Black Adam and Harley Quinn’s roles as hero/antihero have been enough that they receive placement on both the 365 Villains list as well a the 365 Heroes list.  Quite the accomplishment! 

A rarity on this list… Terra started out a hero but it was later revealed that she was a double agent, a villain sent by Deathstroke to infiltrate and betray the Teen Titans.  She perished but later returned again, either cloned or resurrected or something like that.  In any case, she’s a hero again so yay…

So there you have it, a collection of scum and villainy who have, on occasion, acted in the role of hero.  Have I missed anyone important?  Let me know.    

#365 DC Comics Heroes #cut-outs #paper art #DC Comics

[gumnut-logic]

Minerva (Bit 3)

Bit 1 | Bit 2 | Bit 3

Finally I have some writing to share. I might be getting my head back on straight, yay!

Buckets of Science!Gordon in this one. yes, I’ve let my inner geek out, sorry :D

Many thanks to @scribbles97​ for the read through and reassurance when I get wibbly :D

I hope you enjoy this pile of marine fluff :D Approx. 2000 words worth :D

-o-o-o-

Gordon grinned and clapped his hands together. “So, what shall we do next? A little Minerva 101? A walk on the reef? Or a swim?” Those hands were rubbed together eagerly.

“You’ve just eaten, Gordon.”

“So?”

Andre stood up. “It is my recommendation that we wait before attempting swimming.”

“Aw, Annie.”

The glare Andre shot his husband almost melted the stern of the boat.

Cecil grinned and winked at his husband.

Virgil bit his tongue. “You think you can lug me onto that reef?” In the distance, the open ocean crashed against the outer reef rim. It was hard to see if there was even any dry land from this distance.

Gordon’s grin turned fond. “Wouldn’t go without you, bro. Told you, I brought the water chair.”

Virgil felt the simple emotion behind that statement and his heart warmed. The water chair was something he himself had put together for Gordon all those years ago after the hydrofoil accident. His brother hadn’t been able to swim and the hoverchair could not operate under or over water. So, borrowing a little Thunderbird technology, Virgil had built one that could. With some feedback and suggestions from its over-the-moon recipient, Virgil had tweaked the design to the point that it could literally operate as a diver assist with minimal effect on its immediate environment while still enabling the operator to ‘walk on water’.

Tracy Industries now produced a trimmed down economical version for world-wide distribution. Gordon was the poster boy for the program and loved seeing people experience water in ways that had been denied them in the past.

But the original, the prototype, was kept on Tracy Island with Gordon. Virgil serviced it every couple of years and it had even been used a few times since.

But never by Virgil.

After stripping into their own water wear, it took some manoeuvring and both nurses to get into Virgil into some wet gear. It was awkward and frustrating, but both Andre and Cecil were gentle and understanding. Gordon stood ready to assist, his eyes warm, his hand briefly brushing Virgil’s hair.

Virgil was grateful, but hated every second.

The casts on his legs were specifically printed for him, a high-tech honeycomb of support, providing strength without the weight and bulk of traditional plaster. And they were water friendly, allowing both air flow and ultimately water flow around his injured limbs.

It took all three men to get Virgil safely into the inflatable.

“Virg, you’ve been stealing far too many of Scott’s apple pies.”

“Speak for yourself.” Virgil grit his teeth as they lowered him into the smaller boat. “Are you sure about this?” So much work to get one person onto a reef.

“Not going without you, bro. Apple pie butt or no.” The determined expression on his little brother’s face put an end to that argument.

The water chair was tucked behind a seat along with snorkelling equipment and a stash of Gordon’s scientific gear and within minutes they were motoring across relatively shallow waters spotted with tropical reef. Virgil peered over the side watching the ever so clear azure pass beneath them. The colours were amazing.

The atoll was obviously the remains of yet another undersea volcano. Living on Tracy Island, which was a volcano itself, gave him some familiarity with the symptoms. But unlike the islands in the Kermadec arc, this volcano hadn’t quite made it above the waterline. It had, however gotten close enough to bring its rim into the sunlit zone of the ocean, enabling coral to gain a foothold and build the reef that had accomplished the task.

As the rim grew closer, the water grew shallower, to the point where Gordon had to slow the inflatable or risk impaling it on submerged living limestone.

The roar of open ocean grew closer. The crash of massive waves that the coral rim was protecting them from. Virgil closed his eyes and soaked in the saltwater air, the breeze and the soundscape.

I was invigorating and relaxing at the same time.

At some point he became aware of eyes on him and he opened his own only to encounter Gordon smiling softly.

Ever so quiet. “That’s more like it.”

Virgil was caught between fondness and embarrassment. But Gordon didn’t say anything else and turned back to steering the boat. Neither Andre or Cecil appeared to have noticed, possibly through courtesy.

Virgil let one hand trail in the cool, clear water and closed his eyes again.

He might have just drifted off right there and then but for the sudden cease of the outboard which had been chugging along relatively slowly in any case. The inflatable drifted as Gordon deployed an anchor and Andre pulled out the water chair, unfolding the leg supports.

“Okay, Virg, let’s get your apple pie butt into the chair.”

Virgil growled at his brother, but Gordon only grinned, climbing behind him and, with Cecil’s help, lifting him enough for Andre to slide the contraption under said butt.

The chair’s gel morphed to his shape, fitting snuggly and supporting his back as Gordon strapped him in. Andre secured the leg braces, connecting them to his casts.

Andre jumped over the side and landed in waist deep water.

Gordon curled his hand around Virgil’s arm. “Okay, bro, let’s see how much fish you have in you.” Another teethy grin as he and Cecil lifted Virgil over the edge of the inflatable and lowered him with Andre’s guidance into the water.

Virgil palmed the seat’s control, which previously he had only used to test the contraption, and micro-thrusters fired up stabilising him as he slipped into the water.

A moment of wobble and the seat settled at waist depth in the water, its quiet hum barely audible over the ripples lapping against the boat.

“Well, it seems those apple pies aren’t going to sink you today.”

“Gordon!”

His brother only laughed as he joined him in the water with a splash…which landed mostly on Virgil.

He wanted to both throttle and hug Gordon to death.

Cecil joined them, smoothly sliding off the inflatable, and all four of them made their way towards the massive reef sticking a good foot above the low tide.

“Watch where you step. Virg has the advantage here. Lots of sharp nasties if you’re not careful.”

Virgil was too busy enjoying the water. The chair automatically adjusted to the surface and he was able to raise or lower it at will. As they neared the inner edge of the reef, he engaged the secondary thruster array and pushed himself above the waterline. The breeze caressed his skin.

The reef ledge was quite a step up. A purple-brown, the limestone sported a continual waterfall of seawater pushed by the swell from the open ocean on the other side.

Gordon slipped in behind him and gave the chair a nudge to get it high enough to engage with the raised surface. Virgil fiddled with the controls until the seat stabilised, hovering just a few inches above the rock and all the rockpools it held.

And there were a lot of rock pools.

Virgil had a sudden flashback to a young Gordon dashing from one rock pool to the next, yelling out his discoveries of this fish, that shell, the occasional ticked off crab…

The incident with the blue-ringed octopus particularly came to mind.

But his little brother had been six then. Theoretically, he was an adult now, one of advanced marine experience.

“Virg! Come and have a look at this!”

Then again...

Sure enough, it was a rock pool and it had some kind of eel trapped in it. Gordon started babbling Latin at him before Virgil had even made it close enough to see the thing clearly.

There was a camera, several shots, some holofilm and lots and lots of incomprehensible marine science-ese.

Virgil had to bite his lip not to grin like a loon.

Cecil appeared to be a disciple of Gordon, his knowledge obviously not up there with the aquanaut’s, but ever so interested and eager to learn. Gordon revelled in the opportunity and Virgil got to sit back and watch his little brother disappear into his element.

Andre hovered about his patient, on duty at all times. “You can relax, Andre. I’m good. Have a bit of fun.”

The quiet man smiled. “I am.” His eyes were on Cecil as his husband darted after Gordon from rock pool to rock pool chattering excitedly with the aquanaut.

Virgil pulled out his phone and took some photos of his brother and his student. “You may never get him back.”

Andre snorted. “I have my ways, don’t worry.”

An arched eyebrow found the nurse smiling again.

With Gordon off in science land, Virgil took the opportunity to do a little exploring of his own. He lowered the chair enough so he could reach down and touch the rock beneath the water. It was sharp, rough and covered in life. The rock pools were truly fascinating. Corals lived in niches, sea urchins huddled in all their spikiness, but it was the giant clams that caught his eye the most.

They had some brilliant colours and they reacted to his presence, closing up abruptly if he startled them. They were quite a distance down and he found himself poking into deeper pools as he scooted along the inner edge of the reef.

They came in a number of shades, but the most brilliant was a vivid blue. His eyes were attracted to the subtle patterns and his fingers itched to record them. His phone filled with shots at the thought of future paintings.

“Thought you might like those.”

Virgil nearly dropped his phone. That, of course, only produced a grin on Gordon’s behalf.

Virgil was hovering over a particularly deep rock pool and at the very bottom, wedged in a crevice, sat a beautiful blue example. It was still mostly open, displaying its variegated mantle. Due to a sudden lack of breeze and the clarity of the water, it was very visible, and Virgil had already taken several holoshots, a composition combining sea urchins, several of the bright red fish and the clam, already in mind.

Behind him Cecil was bouncing on his feet a few metres away gesticulating in excitement as he raved at Andre. Andre had that smile on his face again, the one where love and amusement met and each tried to take dominance.

“I think you’ve started something over there.” Virgil grinned at his brother.

A snort. “Cess has always had an interest. I’m just fanning the flames.”

“Luring him to cook for us forever?”

“Mmmmaybe.”

Virgil chuckled and earned himself a pair of sparkling amber eyes.

“Mel wants a clam count.”

A blink. “What?”

“She’s worried there might be poaching happening here. This place gets a lot of traffic. I had John check for yachts before we came and the fact there are none other than us here is a rarity.”

“People steal the clams?” Virgil stared down at the beautiful creature below.

Gordon sighed. “Is there anything people won’t do? Mel wants a count so we can do a population snapshot. Shouldn’t be too hard. I’ve adapted one of our lifesign locators for their particular form. Not sure it’s going to work, but I was hoping that between us, we could rig it.”

Virgil stared up at his brother. Gordon had planned this, but he had planned it well. Virgil couldn’t resist the challenge, and much like his aquanaut brother, certain stains on humanity really got his back up.

“Sure.”

Gordon’s smile was an honest one. “But no pushing it, Virg, or Scott will have my hide.”

As if summoned by his name, a roar swelled in the distance and out of nowhere Thunderbird One shot into the air space above them, VTOL flaring as she came to a sudden halt.

Their comms spat into life. “Thunderbird One to A Little Lightning, whatcha doing down there?”

-o-o-o-

Next

#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds #thunderbirds fanfiction #Virgil Tracy #Gordon Tracy #minerva reef #minerva #science!Gordon

[nureyevv]

Benzaiten lives! AU

Despite being polar opposites of each other, Benten has an absolutely killer Juno impression. He finds this immensely funny and, on a multitude of occasions, has attempted to fool Juno’s closest friends.

Buddy was fooled once and only once, but the first time it happened it took her a good 24 hours to figure out what was happening. She congratulated Ben on the accomplishment, but since then he’s never gotten another prank by her.

Vespa can not tell them apart even when they aren’t trying to trick her. She’s pulled a knife on real Juno four times and accused him of being Ben. It took Buddy assuring her that Ben had been out of town on work for a week for her to believe Juno when he insisted it was really him.

Jet... no one can really tell if he falls for it or not. He treats them with similar mannerisms so even if he did get them mixed up Ben would never know.

Rita seems like she’s been properly fooled but an hour later when Ben tries to leave she says to send Mista Steel over when he gets home. It just keeps happening. Ben is starting to think he’s the one getting pranked.

Unsurprisingly, Peter can identify an act when he sees one, especially when someone is pretending to be his partner. He can appriciate the challenge, however, and will often play along until one of them calls it off.

Juno has scolded Ben about it mutiple times but he just keeps doing it. He’ll show up to meetings only to have Vespa scold him for something he had done the day before (a day he’d spent out with Rita). The stress is adding years to his life. Also, there was one day where Ben was so in character that, when Juno had caught him in the act, he had begun questioning if he was the real Juno. He has yet to live it down.

Each twin has a nasty habit of raiding the other’s cupboards. Ben hasn’t gotten the chance to have a bowl of the cereal bought with his own money in three months. Juno swears he picked up mayo at the store but it’s always gone. Why just the mayonnaise, Benten??? He’s a literal PI and he can’t fucking figure out the motive there

It’s not really his style, but Ben loves painting nails. Luckily, Juno likes to have his nails painted (and for all his sharshooting he cannot seem to get the hang of the right hand). Every Saturday they get together so Juno can rock a new color. Rita and Peter are invited on occasion and the group makes a day of it.

“Hi, I’m Juno But Cool”

Buddy will send Ben and Juno on jobs together under the same alias so while one entertains the crowd witnesses who can attest where they were when the crime takes place the other steals the mark with ease

For the more gracefully challenged memebers of the crew Ben teaches dance lessons when they find themselves preparing for a high class job that will require basic waltzing skills to get by undetected

Peter and Buddy already know most of it but the refresher is beneficial. Jet is a surprisingly quick learner while Vespa threatens to stab someone with every wrong move she makes. Rita participates much longer than necessary for her because she just thinks it’s neat

Juno opts out. Except no one, especially not buddy, is gonna risk the mission on his pride. She insists he learns before he falls on his face and blows their cover

As a result, the team discovers that Juno is... a very good dancer. Not on the same level as Ben of course, but he’s been his brother’s go to partner for long enough to have picked up a few things.

Ben may or may not fix the lessons so Juno and Peter keep ending up partners, but it’s not like they can prove it. What can he say, he’s a fantastic wingman, whether Juno will admit it or not

Ben is the only one of the ship who can match Peter’s level of culinary disaster. They tried to surprise everyone with homemade dinner one day, and, on the bright side, they accomplished the surprise part.

Not a single one of them saw the emergency evacuation coming

And the poor bread pudding definitely didn’t predict its unholy fate...

“MooOoom, Juno stole my eyepatch!”

“Ben what on earth would you need an eyepatch for??”

“We’re space pirates, duh!”

As Buddy has determined herself the mom in this situation she attests that Ben has a point

Juno nearly steals Ben’s eye to see how HE likes it

Ben 100% shares fun childhood Juno facts. Some of them aren’t even true, but it’s too funny to watch Juno convince everyone he didn’t actually wear exclusively clown shoes in the eight grade

It was sixth grade, Ben, and I thought we agreed Not to speak of it

Ben stays impressively up to date with mars pop culture while Juno lives under a rock as much as possible

Juno: what does that even mean??

Ben: oh, you know, just get bees, bro

Peter, confused and afraid: what the fuck is a bee?

Ben makes no attempts to be subtle with Juno. Peter and him being pining idiots? Fine, but he’s gonna call them out on it

It’s just the “boOoOoOnNe??” scene from b99 but in space

Juno and peter: *tension*

Ben: y’all gonna smash already or what?

Ben is a horrible influence on Rita. He’s notorious for getting to go trouble and Rita is very good at making that possible.

On one occasion they decided to hack into the wealthiest bank on Venus. They didn’t even steal anything, it was just to see if they could.

The entire planet went into lockdown for a week

Ben also has all the best Juno insight and is the proudest of everyone to see just how far he’s come. He knows better than anyone how tough the journey has been.

Or at least, these are all the things Juno thinks of late at night, when he imagines what his brother and best friend would have been like if he lived past nineteen. He would have liked it, Juno thought. Juno would have liked to have him there too. The possibilities were endless, really. Ben could have done anything. He had his whole life ahead of him.

[harryandmolly]

Complicit // 10

summary: Shawn is under more pressure than he’s ever known. He craves release and comfort, the simplicity of sex. He gets more than he bargained for.

warnings: language, NSFW, turning up the heat on this slow burn

WC: 6.2k

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

Shawn’s right up against the mic, eyes closed, curls rustling against his forehead in the breeze. His eyes are closed, he’s strumming gently through the bridge of “Fallin’ All In You,” and he’s so lost in it at first he doesn’t notice the way the crowd suddenly starts shifting from cooing along with him to screaming. He opens his eyes, looks back and forth across them, then turns his head.

She’s in a long floaty Florence Welch-style dress and platforms, her butter-blonde hair sweeping behind her like she’s in a shampoo commercial. She lifts the mic in her hand and starts singing along with him. Behind her are Shawn’s teammates, carrying a big heavy cake designed like the Canadian flag and covered in fondant.

Shawn gives up on singing. He laughs, claps with the guitar pick still between his fingers and steps away from the mic. Bex keeps singing until the song is over and he plays out the last few notes. 

She swings her arms around his neck. She leans in. As he smiles, their lips touch.

Penny slams the laptop shut and backs away quickly, nearly tripping over Pammy. Her heart sprints, rattles hard in her chest like it wants out of her body. She doesn’t blame it.

Pamela stands alert, seemingly aware that Penny is distressed. Penny gulps down big breaths of air and continues striding backwards away from the laptop in her breakfast nook until she’s up against the fridge. She blinks. The cold stainless steel door is stabilizing and soothing. She lifts a hand to her forehead and shakes her head.

She didn’t even see the kiss, not really. She didn’t let it get that far. Something in her snapped, snapped hard. She folds her hands over her nose and mouth and focuses on breathing.

She can’t think about this. She can’t let herself. She has to do something else, anything else.

She looks down at Pammy, whose tail thumps against the rug.

“Go for a run?” Penny croaks, her voice high and unrecognizable, hopeful like she’s worried her dog will refuse her. Pammy’s little feet bounce against the rug as she reacts to her favorite word. Her tail thumps harder.

In a daze, Penny throws on leggings and a sports bra, a cap and sneakers. She leashes Pamela, locks the house and fucking runs.

+

Penny leans back with a deep sigh and opens her mouth again. A plump, cool grape slips inside, contrasting with the warm, rough texture of the fingers that are holding it. She gives them an appreciative suck and feels the chest she’s resting against rumble with a low hum.

“Hope I helped,” his quiet voice says. 

Of course he knew there was something the matter. He sees through everyone.

She chews and swallows before answering. “You did. You know you always do.”

She feels him smile and brush his nose against her hairline. He offers her another grape. She accepts it gratefully.

“Can I have you out to visit soon? I know how much you love London.”

His warm English brogue is only casually hopeful, not like the way Shawn invited her to Toronto -- he sounded like if she refused him he’d spend the rest of the day sulking under the covers. She blinks hard at the memory.

She regards him, sweeps some hair out of his eyes. “I’d like that.”

He seems satisfied. For the first time with this particular client, satisfying him seems to do very little for her. She had hoped for the opposite. His trip out to visit her was one she had been excited for -- three full days wrapped up in him in the hotel he likes in Malibu, the first she’s seen of him in a few months. It was tainted by turning down the other offer, the one she knows she should’ve refused even if she weren’t busy. This extended date just saved her from having to make the decision.

She knows he can probably feel that she’s not all there. She’s so grateful that he hasn’t complained. He goes to plop another grape in her mouth and she stops him, aiming around his mouth to kiss a feverish line out toward his ear. After all this time, she’s still never kissed him on the lips. She jokes with him that he’s seen Pretty Woman too many times. But a client’s wish is a client’s wish, so she obeys. And so does he.

He moans her name. She pushes him back into the pillows. She loves his voice, but she doesn’t want to hear it right now. So she shuts him up.

+

London. London. London.

When Shawn called to invite her to Toronto, he was too jarred by her refusal to mention that he was heading to London next. Now he finds himself sitting here at the baby grand in the living room of the house they like to let in Bloomsbury when he’s in town wondering who the hell her client in from London is.

London. London. London.

Summer rain plinks softly in rivulets down the window before him, slightly obscuring the quiet street. He peers through, past a copse of silver birches, and finds himself glaring for a few seconds at the guy in tight jeans and a smart jumper wisely carrying an umbrella down the sidewalk. He looks like he could be one of Penny’s clients.

And what if he is? Shawn sighs heavily, finding himself winding through the same territory he tread when he first saw her with Christian Becker at the Summer Lovin’ party. It’s exhausting when he thinks about it, the loops he’s run through in his mind for her. Frustrating, too, when he realizes how often he’s revisited the same thoughts and conclusions along the way. Insanity is doing something over and over and expecting a different outcome. So maybe he’s going a little insane.

It’s hard to reconcile with the rest of his life right now. He’s coming toward the end of a wildly successful festival tour. Unlike his last international run like this, he’s not working so hard to win over the crowd -- they’re largely there for him. And tomorrow, when he co-headlines BBC’s Biggest Weekend at Wembley Arena, that stadium will be packed with people screaming his words back to him. When he thinks about it, his fucking head swims.

Shawn fiddles with a loose thread on the leg of his Calvins and rubs at where the tag of his t-shirt scratches his neck. He’s feeling twitchy and scattered. When he gets like this, there’s one surefire way to even him out.

He starts poking at the ivories, his fingers falling into the familiar rhythm of “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” one of his festival cover mainstays. It’s not enough to distract his mind. He needs a new challenge.

He lifts his phone and props it up, scrolling through sheet music ideas on the tiny screen. He finds the one he didn’t know he was looking for and grunts, shifting in his seat, setting himself up to try it out.

The first few times he plays it through are clumsy. The next few times are a little better, firmer, more confident. By his tenth full run, he decides to sing along and see how it sounds.

“Regrets, I’ve had a few

But then again, too few to mention

I did what I had to do

And saw it through without exemption”

Shawn’s fingers work quickly to keep up. His bare feet skim and press at the pedals below him. His shoulders feel tensed and ready to snap.

“Yes, there were times, I’m sure you knew

When I bit off more than I could chew

But through it all, when there was doubt

I ate it up and spit it out

I faced it all and I stood tall

And did it my way”

His voice is growing hoarse and he’s trying to pretend it’s not because of the tears in his eyes. He pushes through it, singing louder like Frank does, belting through a vocal run toward the end even though it hurts.

“For what is a man, what has he got

If not himself, then he has naught

To say the things he truly feels

And not the words of one who kneels

The record shows I took the blows

And did it my way”

There’s no point in trying to pretend he’s not crying anymore. He doesn’t bother with swiping at the tears, and his hands are busy anyway.

“Yes, it was my way.”

Shawn sags. His fingers fumble off the keys and catch him before his forehead hits the top of the piano. Through his wrenching sobs, Shawn decides it sounded good. It’s good enough to play live. But he’s already lying to everyone, he doesn’t want to pile on.

Because all of this he’s accomplished lately, all the crowds and the shows and tabloids and the followers and the paparazzi photos…

… it’s not his way at all.

+

Penny props her head up on the edge of the sofa as she sits below it on the rug with Pammy beside her. She goes to reach for a pillow to support her neck until Peter shifts and pushes his leg up for her to rest against. She grins and pats at him.

Penny picked him up from the CalTech campus in the Aston Martin. Peter’s squeals were so loud she pretended to start to drive off when he reached for the passenger door.

He ducked his big, beautiful head in and gave her a toothy smile.

“Can I drive?”

“Absolutely fucking not.”

They turned their music on loud and talked even louder over it. They stopped and bought a lemon meringue pie from House of Pies, got stoned and ate Penny’s homemade spaghetti alle vongole on the deck.

The only thing Peter and Penny don’t talk through is Moonstruck. It’s their mom’s favorite movie and one of the precious few things they took from their parents that’s associated with exclusively positive memories. They watch it whenever they’re together.

Tonight, all the blinds are open in Penny’s window-filled living room. The moon is near full. Every few minutes, Peter looks up from the TV and chants “la luna! La bella luna!” Penny refills their wine classes with imported chianti to keep this up.

With her head against her brother’s thigh and a belly full of pasta and clams, Penny hangs on to every perfect second. Peter is in town for a CalTech event and she has to return him back to campus in Pasadena tomorrow morning. Their time is shorter than usual and Penny can feel it around them. There’s a sort of desperate energy, a need to be very close to make up for their truncated visit. They haven’t left each other’s sides all afternoon.

Peter plucks at a clump of Penny’s shower wet hair and traces it against his calf. He’s trying not to count the seconds until he has to leave her again. He knows some of it is the wine talking, but he loves her so goddamn much. She’s given him everything he’s ever wanted, made sure he had everything he needed, but he’s pretty sure if she didn’t, he’d still be ok because he has her.

But he wants more for her. He always has. She would very happily give up her entire life for him if she thought he needed her to, so Peter keeps himself busy by trying to make sure she has one worth having.

He bites his full lower lip and pauses. Before Penny can bark at him to turn it back on because it’s the part outside the Met where Nicholas Cage sees Cher all dressed up before the opera, Peter’s look silences her.

“Can I see the necklace?”

Penny blinks rapidly, startled. “Oh. Uhm, it’s in the safe.”

Peter stares at her, undeterred. Penny sighs heavily and pretends to struggle to stand. Peter leaps off the couch and yanks at her hands.

“Oh my god, if you’re gonna get weird about it, you’re not allowed to see it.”

Peter makes a face and crosses his arms. “Fine. I’m cool. I’m Lizzo at the VMAs.”

Penny purses her lips and leads him to the safe. She inputs the combination and listens as the stiff bolts pop open. The red box is front and center. She hands it to Peter like it’s an old Domino’s pizza rather than her most prized possession.

Peter turns and carries it out of the room on scurrying tiptoes before she can stop him.

Penny huffs and slams the safe, scampering after him. “Pete, what are you--”

“I want to see it in the moonlight!” Peter laughs, running into Penny’s bedroom with an evil glint in his eye. Penny marches after him.

“You want to try it on?” Penny snorts, watching Peter stand in front of the mirror to study the contents of the box.

He whirls around on a heel. “No. I want you to try it on.”

Penny’s shoulders drop. She sighs. She motions for the box. Instead, Peter shuffles her in front of the full-length mirror, the one where Penny saw herself try it on for the first time. She lifts her hair over her shoulder and Peter secures the fiddly clasp against the nape of her neck.

He steps back and beams.

“Well, don’t you look like a million fuckin’ bucks.”

Penny smirks. “Not a million. Several thousand, though.”

Peter props his chin up on Penny’s head and shrugs his arms around her, careful not to obscure the necklace. “Nah. Way more than a million. You’re priceless. I think he and I both know that.”

Peter knocks a raspberry kiss up against the side of her head. She squirms away. Peter wanders back to the living room. Penny follows after a few more seconds of admiring her reflection. She’s still wearing the necklace.

+

Silver accepts few excuses for tardiness and even fewer for poor attention span and the generally green tint to Penny’s hungover skin. On that short list of forgivable events is a visit from Peter. Silver would forgive murder for Peter.

Penny slumps into the crisp white wicker rocking chair on Silver’s back deck, her DVF kaftan fluttering out around her ankles. Silver pours her tea silently, attempting to reserve judgment.

“How is Peter?”

Penny smiles. “He’s good. He likes the boy he’s dating. Which I know sounds like a given but it’s not for Peter. I think he might be a keeper, at least for a while. And school is good, he’s… you know him, he’s a rockstar.”

Silver enjoys the lightness that surrounds Penny when she talks about her brother. He’s never a sore subject. They’re thick as thieves, the product of a less than ideal childhood bonding two souls irrevocably.

“Will he be coming to stay for a longer visit?”

Penny covers a grin with her delicate teacup. “You miss him.”

“I do,” Silver admits readily with a small smile, about as warm as she really gets, “He’s the only person I’ve ever met who’s totally comfortable with calling me “bitch.””

Penny’s laugh is striking. Silver adores it. She doesn’t hear it often enough. The last time she heard Penny laugh like this was at that 4th of July party on her date with Shawn.

“I wanted to follow up with you regarding the meeting last week. We’ve hit a small roadblock regarding the creation of the 501(c)(3) in a way that keeps it very much out of the way of the less legitimate arm of the business.”

Silver’s voice is carefully apologetic. Penny cocks her head and feels her messy hair spill out over her shoulder.

“Oh. Well, that’s ok. I don’t mind the delay.”

Silver’s knifelike brows lift. She places her teacup down on its saucer without a sound. “You don’t?”

Penny lifts a bare shoulder. “I want to make sure we’re careful with it, of course. And… I mean, it’s not like I’m going to be without income any time soon.”

Silver catches an edge in Penny’s words she’s not sure if Penny realizes is there. She wets her crimson painted lips.

“I see. I suppose when you brought me the proposal, I wasn’t sure. It seemed perhaps that you were leaning toward the way of giving up clients.”

Penny straightens up and reaches for a biscuit. Its snap does nothing to release the tension between them. She dunks it in her tea the way Silver hates.

“Well, I’m not. No reason to. I’m the perfect age, in excellent physical shape and have had more client requests than any of the women on the roster. It would be insane not to capitalize on that.”

Silver’s eyes fall to Penny’s twitching hands in her lap. She looks… disappointed. Not in the way her mother gets, like Penny’s errors in judgment are just the latest in a long line of her annoyances. This disappointment is more profound, more hurt, more like real hope lost. Penny’s breathing gets a little short in her chest.

“I understand,” Silver continues smoothly, “Even so, we’ll push ahead with the foundation. I will continue to keep you updated about its progress and consult you on any crucial matters.”

Silver’s usual formality has kicked up a notch. Penny tries not to notice the chill in the searing Southern California summer heat.

+

Two weeks later

Labor Day Weekend comes and goes. Penny spends it topless on a yacht off Catalina Island with Julia. She has no phone signal, it was jammed on the yacht per Julia’s orders. When she returns, she has a voicemail on her work cell. She waits until Gus, sunburnt and covered in bugbites from his weekend camping trip, drops her off at her door.

He doesn’t question why she’s standing outside with Pammy, whom he also dropped off after babysitting her for the weekend, instead of going in out of the damp heat.

But she can’t wait another second to hear his voice talking to her rather than in the highly personal songs he sings that the whole world can access so impersonally.

“Hey, it’s me… Shawn. Uh, I know it’s been weird. I’m just… saying that out loud because neither of us have yet. I’d like to see you, if you want. If you’re busy, that’s ok. I’m back from London on Tuesday. I don’t have a lot of time before I have to leave again. Um… yeah, so if you want to call or text me, that’s cool. I’ll see you soon. Hopefully. Ok bye.”

She stands on the porch for so long Pamela curls up at her feet and naps. Penny plays the voicemail over and over, thinking each repetition will get her closer to deciding what the fuck to do.

+

Penny’s never been good at giving up, she realizes as she hugs the winding curves of the road through Beachwood Canyon that will take her back to Shawn’s house. When she broke her leg falling off the uneven bars during gymnastics in 4th grade, she conned her doctors into letting her out of her cast early so she didn’t miss the big fall meet. When her snotty 10th grade chemistry teacher tried to give her an F on a test without possibility of extra credit, she hounded her until she got the chance to make up the grade.

So, really, Penny figures, it’s not that surprising that she won’t give up on Shawn. That despite all the confusing gestures and glances and words and unspoken feelings, she still wants to stick around and help. The idea of walking away now just to save her pride or her dignity or wallow in this stupid little crush she’s formed doesn’t make sense. She wants to see it through. She wants to see him happy. She knows she can still help. She just has to focus. On him.

Shawn’s smile is hesitant at best, a grimace at worst. Penny’s not surprised. She wonders what logic he used to convince himself to call her again after the odd heaviness of their last couple encounters. He doesn’t have the built-in excuse she does -- this is her job.

He guides her to the living room instead of straight on to the bedroom. Penny looks around. It’s big and sparsely decorated, like he’s still moving in and finding pieces that work in the space. She smiles down at the coffee table his mum spent a full day helping him pick. He told her that story a couple weeks ago before she rode him backwards cowgirl-style for the first time.

She looks him over. He doesn’t look too worse for wear, maybe a little anxious, but she thinks that’s more about her than anything else. She likes that he’s barefoot. She can’t trust a man who wears shoes in his own house. Self-consciously, she steps out of her own, a pair of Chloe block heels. She shrinks several inches and rocks back and forth from heel to painted shell pink toes. 

“How was Toronto? And London?”

Penny’s tipping her hand. He didn’t tell her he was going to London after Toronto. She’s been paying attention. Goosebumps flare across the back of his neck. He wills them away.

“Uh, good. Really good. I love playing in Toronto, obviously. And London was insane. That crowd was massive.”

Penny smiles knowingly. “You’re quite the draw, Mendes.”

He shrugs a shoulder but smirks a little. “It’s just this summer, man. Everything’s suddenly gotten really crazy. It’s… different.”

Penny decides it’s no time to bring up Bex and the success of his team’s PR strategy. He knows. He doesn’t need her poking it in his face.

She decides to sit and make herself comfortable, thinking maybe he’ll follow. She folds her legs and straightens the hem of her gauzy yellow chiffon wrap dress. She catches the way his eyes trail her smooth bronzed skin.

Good, she thinks, Focus on my body.

“How was your--”

Shawn stops and blinks hard, his face going blank. Penny knows he was about to ask after her London client and thought better of it.

“My brother came to visit,” she blurts, and she can’t see but she thinks she’s making the same face he was a moment ago. 

Penny’s not sure how she went from totally stable and focusing on sweet talking him into bed to bringing up her brother, potentially the most personal subject in her world. Her lack of self-control around him can be… maddening.

“Peter, right?” Shawn presses.

Penny nods. Shawn sits beside her on the couch, turned toward her. She wonders if she can get away with dropping this subject now. By the look of interest on his face, she thinks no, probably not.

“You’re really close with him.”

It’s not a question, it’s a statement from a man who knows it when he sees it.

“We’re close. Maybe not as close as I’d like.”

Shut… up…

It’s like her mouth is a fucking faucet around him sometimes. She blames the bold warmth of his eyes that follows her so closely.

“Yeah?” he nudges.

Penny thumbs at her Cartier ring, watching it glint. “I shouldn’t complain. I know he’s so busy. And he’s got a life, you know? He’s in college. Sometimes I just wish I always felt like his sister and didn’t sometimes feel like his mom.”

Shawn peers at her curiously. She curls her legs up beneath her, propping her elbow up on the back of the couch as she faces him completely.

“I know you said you’re not close with your parents.”

She smiles sadly. “There’s no traumatic tale there. My parents never should’ve gotten married, but they were supposed to, so they did. They never should’ve had kids, but they were supposed to, so they did. It took them too long to realize they’d be happier apart. They each remarried quickly. Pete and I stuck together, but I always felt responsible for him, you know? Maybe sometimes not in a sisterly way. I shouldn’t have had to be his mom. Neither of us deserved that.”

Her brows come together as she speaks. He wraps a hand around her ankle and thumbs across the protruding bone. The sub in him comes screaming out for her like he should’ve predicted it would as soon as she opened her pretty mouth.

He knows this wasn’t the plan. The plan was to see her, smile pretty, fuck hard, and get things back to how they were. The plan was to stay level, not to fucking overdose.

But he takes the hit anyway.

“It makes sense, though,” he babbles, “That’s so you. You’re a born caretaker. You take care of Peter, you take care of Silver, you take care of Pammy. You take care of your clients. I know you take care of me. It’s who you are. It’s how you got here.”

Penny watches him. If he were anyone else, she’d be waiting for his fingers to slide further up her leg, getting them closer to where they’re going. Instead, Shawn’s eyes lock on hers like he’s amazed she’s actually looking at him and his hand stays right where it is, rubbing firmer circles.

She reaches down and plucks it off with an extra hard throb of her heart. She stands and pulls him off the couch. He stumbles along behind her as she meanders toward his bedroom, shedding her dress and simple white bra and panties while she goes. He struggles to undress and nearly face plants tripping out of his jeans.

And then she’s naked in his bed again and Shawn wants to cry or document the occasion with pictures or… something. He stands above her, panting softly, waiting for her.

Suddenly she smiles and it’s not her naughty, seductive smile that Shawn loves so much, it’s another one of her smiles -- it’s the one that always makes him smile. It’s wide and toothy and gorgeous and it makes a pleasantly nervous giggle rise up from his chest.

“What?” he murmurs.

Penny lifts her arms over her head and squishes his pillows between her fingers, pulling her legs together to rub them like a cricket. Her eyes drift shut and she makes a low, sleepy moaning sound that has Shawn’s cock twitching against his thigh.

“Your bed is so goddamn comfortable, I forgot.”

Shawn preens like the compliment is for him. He climbs down and settles beside her, folding a bulky arm beneath his head.

“I know. I mean, thank you. I fucking love this bed.”

He glances over at her. Penny’s eyes are shut. He turns onto his side and skims a finger up her stomach to dance between her pretty breasts, watching her shiver.

“Wanna nap?” he offers in a husky voice.

Her eyes open lazily. Her lips curl. “Fuck yeah I wanna nap.”

Shawn groans softly and repositions himself on his side. Penny curls up around him like a big, beautiful spoon and soothes them both to sleep rubbing patterns with her thumb into his stomach.

+

The rhythm wakes him up. He swears he could hear it -- there must be someone playing it on the baby grand in his living room, that’s how distinct it is. It woke him up out of a weird dream where he was running back and forth between two train stations looking for his train but they were both empty.

He’s quiet for long enough to determine that there’s no one there. Or, no one that’s not in bed with him.

She’s still here. They shifted in their sleep so their chests are pressed together and he’s as tangled up in her physically as he has been mentally for weeks. He allows himself one little press of his lips to her forehead when he’s decided she’s still very asleep. He slips out of her weak, dreamy grasp and finds where he shed his boxers in their trail of clothes to the bedroom.

And then he follows the rhythm.

It’s not leading him to the guitar, it’s taking him to where the piano rests in a splatter of sherbet-y light coming through the west-facing windows. It’s sunset. The whole world is rosy. He opens all the blinds that corner in his gorgeous Steinway so he can bathe in it. He’s not really thinking, he thinks he’s only barely awake from his coma of an afternoon nap with her, so his actions are just instinct right now.

He sits at the bench and swallows, dropping his fingers to where his body seems to want them. He starts stroking, nice and softly, the way you would when you’re writing a song for a lover who’s asleep in the next room.

Shawn hums along, chasing down the rhythm that woke him up. It leads him, his voice follows, his fingers tripping along behind trying to keep up. When he grabs on, he straightens up, the intricately defined muscles in his back glowing magenta in the light as they flex and relax.

He’s found it. He’s not letting go.

It doesn’t have words yet, but that’s ok. He stands for only a few moments to hunt down his phone trapped between seat cushions on the couch so he can record this in case, god forbid, he loses track of it. But it doesn’t seem likely. It has hold of him now. Just like she does.

He repeats the same section a few times. He thinks it’s the first verse. He leans into it, squinting, pushing for a little more. The song feels like it’s teasing him, like he’s not in control, like he has to let it come to him. He strains against his instincts to tear into it, get himself bloody with it, get to its heart and its lungs and its guts. He leans back again and lets his shoulders drop, lets his head fall back. He surrenders. It brings him peace.

+

Penny stirs in an empty bed to the soft plinking of piano keys. She rolls over off her side and comes face to face with a pillow that smells just like him. She shuts her eyes and breathes, inhaling greedily, exhaling slowly. She makes a gentle murmuring noise and wiggles her toes, shifts her legs, rolls her hips, stretches her arms, and sighs.

Getting out of his bed isn’t as hard as she thought it would be, not as hard as it usually is to crank herself upright and face a world not coated in heavy, blue sleep. She likes the way the floorboards creak slightly as she wanders naked out of his bedroom toward the music.

She turns a corner and meets a wall of color and light. Sitting in the center of it is the piano and the man hunched over it like he’s in pain. They’re drenched in purpling pink light. His curls shiver and fall when he presses the keys harder. She thinks even with the floorboard music she’s making with her gentle steps, he can’t hear her. 

Penny approaches him slowly. By the time she’s standing beside him, she’s convinced he was completely aware of her the whole time -- maybe even so aware that he felt her wake up and get out of bed. He doesn’t look up at her until she lifts a curl out of his eyes and smoothes it back up into the sweet, wild nest on top of his head. 

He plays what sounds like the end of a song. Penny likes the way it feels like it trails off a bit unfinished, like the story’s not over yet, even though the song is. He slowly closes the lid over the keys and releases a long, slow exhale like maybe he had held it in for a while.

Penny goes when Shawn beckons. He closes his palms around her hips and gently guides her between his legs. He settles her against the lid and anchors his forehead to her breastbone.

Penny is flooded with the familiar urge to give him whatever he could need from her, but is paralyzed by the certainty that this… is it. She holds him, one hand massaging his scalp, the other drifting up and down from the nape of his neck to the hills and valleys of his back. His breathing evens and hers follows. 

It’s a while before he looks up at her. By the time he does, the sky is red, like maybe the sun burst and neither of them noticed. Her eyes look black in this light. With his eyes trained on them, he lowers his mouth to her breast, brushing his dry lips against her nipple. The gentle intake of breath and tightening of the little brown bud is automatic and electrifying. Instead of settling there, he moves across her chest to its twin. He leaves a wet kiss in his wake that makes her fingers clench a little in his hair.

Shawn’s hands run down over her bare ass and secure against the backs of her thighs. Using his biceps, he lifts her over the lid and on top of the piano, reveling in her little gasp of surprise.

Penny looks down at him, her hands gripping the lid, the heat from her palms forming little clouds on the glossy black surface. Her knees are parted. Her feet dangle on either side of him. 

Shawn doesn’t have to ask, and she doesn’t feel like making him. With a breathless mewl, Penny lies back, the cool lacquer of the piano stinging her sleepwarm skin. With her heels propped against the keys, she closes her eyes.

“Kiss me.”

Shawn starts at the inside of her left knee. His nose skims slowly down her inner thigh, smooth and warm until he reaches where she’s started to get wet for him. His breath has her legs shaking, tightening from her hamstrings. He massages them soothingly until her body melts against the instrument that’s not half as beautiful as she is.

He lifts his eyes. She’s on an elbow looking down at him. She sucks her lower lip between her teeth. He lowers his head and obeys, willingly, recklessly.

+

Niall’s barking laugh is neither subtle nor absolutely necessary for the non-joke that Shawn just told, but Shawn loves hearing it anyway. Shawn gets more self-conscious about Niall’s boisterousness when they’re out and about, or at least until Niall feeds him enough beer that he stops caring. But tonight, they’re in, relaxing at Niall’s place with some Australian golf tournament on TV and a case of IPA in the fridge. 

Shawn’s knee bounces like he’s ready to bound out of there, but he doesn’t know what for. He was the one who requested the quiet night in. Nearly every night he’s spent in LA lately has been out with Bex seeing and being seen. The other nights have been reserved for Penny.

Shawn has gone to somewhat embarrassing lengths avoiding his other LA-based friends to spend precious little time with Penny. He knows very well he’s about to be called out on it. He’s been hitting the pints a little harder than usual to prepare.

“Alright, mate, out with it, then. What’s the deal?”

Aaaaand there it is.

Shawn runs his tongue along the corner of his mouth, sweeping up an extra drop of beer in case it makes him drunk enough to have this conversation.

“Nothing. No deal. Everything’s cool.”

Niall scoffs. “Mendes, Jesus, no one’s seen you in two months.”

Shawn pouts. “I went to the 4th of July party!”

“With her!” Niall cracks back, “You left covered in hickeys! C’mon, mate, you can tell me. I’m the one who introduced you to all this.”

Shawn shrugs a shoulder and focuses on peeling the sweating label from his bottle.

Niall wets his lips and presses harder. “I get it. It was like this with me and Karina at the beginning. Saw her all the time, it just felt so fucking good. I don’t really know what changed; I think eventually I just lost the spark of it, y’know? Like… I remembered it’s not… real.”

Shawn chuckles but doesn’t look up. Niall bristles a little at the sound of it.

“Nothing in my life is real, man.”

Shawn’s words are chilling. Niall’s heard them before, muttered on long bus rides across Europe by the boys who used to be his best friends. Hell, he’s said them too while staring at his own smiling face in a magazine.

“Mate, that’s--”

Shawn laughs again and it’s dead and humorless and Niall wants to shake him.

“I don’t want to talk about this, dude!” Shawn’s voice is edging right toward true irritation. Niall barely recognizes it on Shawn.

“Ok,” Niall agrees, backing down slightly, easing back into the couch and reaching for his bottle, “Just… if you have a problem, you can talk to me. You can always talk to me.”

Shawn’s fingers stop picking. His dark eyes lift, along with the corner of his mouth. It’s not a smile.

“My problem is that I’m head over ass, fucking crazy, can’t breathe unless she’s in the room, madly, hopelessly in love with her. What can you do about that?”

Niall’s jaw drops. Shawn watches him scramble for words, then looks back at his label.

“Yeah, me neither.”

-----------

Taglist: @smallerinfinities @the-claire-bitch-project @achinglyshawn @infiniteshawn @mendesoft @singanddreamanyway @alone-in-madness @abigfatmess @shawnitsmutual @awkwardfangirl2014 @september-lace @sinplisticshawn @rollingxstone @yslsaint @randi-eve @fallmoreinlove @heyits-claire @itrocksmysocks @parkerspicedlatte @simpledomain @abeautiful-and-cloudy-day @thecurlsofgod @magcon7280 @bensbuttercup @shawnsmusical @paigeasourous @tell-me-when-ur-ready @softmendesss @searchingunderthestars @buggy-blogs @tnhmblive @greedydevil @tamegray @meltingicequeen @havethetimeeofyourlifee @normalcyisoverrated-beyou @t-i-n-y-d-i-n-o @hannahlouiseee @sarahlauramendes @shawnsmoose @mendezlatte @1dbetch @graysonmendes @shawnsababe @ineffsi @ultradreamologistblog @bluerose711 @sauveteen @valedictorian65

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[randomoranges]

hello, do you like long fics? do you like soft? here is a long soft fic.

so this started off - really, back in february when i was visiting my friends [when that was still allowed - lol] and we were discussing our ocs as we sometimes happen to do. that and how with time they get more ok with more “feminine things” and such.

i made a doodle inspired by that conversation.

then lockdown happened. and with my tablet i decided to digitally colour that doodle. i thought it looked pretty neat. as i looked at it i started to wonder what the “fem versions” of ed and ét would be like and look like and came to the realisation that NO ONE had ever thought of that.

then an entire fucking au was born from that because that’s the way i function, apparently.

i made a few art pieces and started writing this behemoth on april 12th 2020.

i got like 70% done and then stopped. got blocked or just didn’t have the motivation for it.

seeing as i go back to work tomorrow [god dont make me go] and this fic wasn’t done yet, i told myself that this quarantine fic would END NOW.

so i spent the last 3 nights hacking at the remaining 30%.

i could have split it up in parts, i know, but seeing as i suffered through the whole thing in one part so do you :) 

here we go for the genderbend au no one ever even asked for like literally.

evelyn = edward

éliane = étienne

also, how many song lyrics can i fit in one title lamao.

in total this one has more pages than keesha kee taen, but like 1000 less words.

Girl, You Really Got me Now [It’s a Love Story] [[The Ballad of Éliane and Evelyn]]

 Éliane Maisonneuve remembered the exact and precise moment that Evelyn Murphy waltzed into her life. She remembered the exact moment it happened for the simple reason that it changed her life. For the better.

 It happened one glorious day in September, about a week or so after school started, sometime after Labour Day. It was her senior year of high school, the world was sitting in the palm of her hand, and she had been busy recounting her rather exciting weekend to her friends, when their homeroom teacher had walked in, followed by a student. Éliane prided herself with knowing everyone and anyone in the school. Mostly, because she was a social butterfly, also because it helped when one was the vice-president of the student body (president had too many responsibilities, not enough fun). Therefore, she automatically knew that this was a new student.

 It was about as far as her analysis went for her brain stuttered when she got a good look at the new girl, while her teacher introduced her. God, but she was absolutely gorgeous. She had pretty, dark, brown hair cut slightly above her shoulders, a cute little barrette in her hair, the prettiest hazel eyes this side of the world, for sure, and the softest looking skin Éliane had ever seen. Her darker complexion went rather nicely with the colours of the school uniform and there was just something about the way she played with the hem of her sweater that tugged at Éliane’s heart.

 Before her homeroom teacher could even get to the part of asking for a benevolent soul to show her (her name was Evelyn Murphy – her brain had registered that much) around, Éliane had bolted out of her seat, only near tripping on herself to volunteer for the honour. She absolutely needed to become friends with Evelyn. It was a matter of life or death. She knew. Evelyn had offered her the actual cutest little shy smile Éliane had ever seen in her life and she had eagerly told her friend to change seats so that Evelyn could sit next to her.

 Even then, without fully knowing, she was already infatuated.

 Evelyn turned out to be a rather quiet girl. Éliane chalked it up to being new to the school and a little intimidated by it, but she vowed to herself that she would make sure everyone treated Evelyn right. She introduced her to all her friends, made sure she knew where all her classes were and gave Evelyn her phone number and e-mail address in case she had any questions. Éliane declared them friends by the end of lunch and the pretty little blush on Evelyn’s cheeks was a thing of beauty.

 Éliane even went as far as walk Evelyn home, despite her telling her that it was alright and that she knew how to get back, but Éliane wanted to spend more time with her and insisted, figuring she could tell her new friend about the cool hangouts around school (there were three – the dep’, the hamburger shack down the street and the alcove by the river (which was a good place to go make-out, but that was a detail – the rocks there were really cool, it was just a question of no one ratting you out.))

 Éliane, surprisingly, for once, managed not to spend the entire walk to Evelyn’s gabbing away about one thousand different trivialities and instead bombarded the new girl with ten thousand different questions. Luckily, Evelyn took it all in stride and patiently answered her questions. It was how Éliane found out that Evelyn’s father had been transferred and had started a new job here over the summer and how his position had been extended. The rest of her family had then moved over and by the time they were settled and her school papers were in order, school had already started, but here she was now.

 And goodness, here she was now indeed, Éliane thought.

 They became inseparable, fast, mostly due to Éliane doing her utmost best to include Evelyn in absolutely everything she did. Evelyn fit in nicely with Éliane’s group of friends, which was a good thing, otherwise she would have dumped their sorry asses and started a new, better group. But, the others took Evelyn in and Éliane called it a success.

 Éliane was head strong, brash, and impulsive and liked to stick her fingers in as many pies as she could. She liked to keep busy with projects that interested her and she was always ready to try something new. Therefore, even though term had already started, she decided, quite on an impulse, one day, to switch out one of her courses for home-economics, just because Evelyn was in it and had said nice things about it. It was a good thing Éliane was a well liked student by the faculty members and that this change actually made her advanced art program fit better in her schedule , but the secretary still gently scolded her and told her that she would have a lot of catching up to do.

 Luckily, Éliane had a plan.

 Her plan consisted on being her disastrous self in a kitchen and hope that Evelyn would take pity on her and help her out.

 Luckily, Éliane didn’t have to try very hard for her plan to work. During her first assignment, she managed to set the smoke detector off, twice. For the second assignment, she had to be rushed to the nurse’s office after she accidentally sliced her finger open. After the third assignment, she needed ointment for a rather nasty burn. Once the mid-term report cards came out and Evelyn found out Éliane was failing home-economics spectacularly, she took pity on her friend and teamed up with her for the following projects.

 It was a win-win, in Éliane’s opinion, even if she barely scrapped by and the class brought down her overall average, (but she was getting better – it had to count for something, right?)

 Éliane ended up spending a lot of time with Evelyn what with classes, hanging out together and after school extracurricular.  Evelyn ended up joining the theatre club and Éliane nearly lost her mind when she found out her quiet, mostly shy friend could act it out on stage like the best of them. It was a whole new side of her that she had only ever glimpsed and Éliane loved it. The girl had spunk. She was feisty. And slowly, slowly, Evelyn emerged from her shell as she got used to her new school and new surroundings. With time, Éliane got to get to know her better and discovered a treasure trove of other interesting things about her – like her sense of humour, which was dry and cutting and an absolute gift.

 Éliane wondered where Evelyn had been all her life.

 Once Christmas break rolled around, Evelyn’s mood took a dip, since for the first time ever, she would be away from her friends and family. Éliane took it upon herself to make sure her friend wouldn’t feel left out during the holidays and so she organised outings and parties with her and her friends to make sure Evelyn had a good time. The Murphy’s were even invited over for Christmas Eve and Éliane thought it was her greatest accomplishment yet. Throughout the rest of the holiday break, there were many outings to get hot chocolate, tobogganing, but by far, the best surprise came when Éliane suggested they go ice-skating, since the rinks were finally open and she found out that Evelyn could skate really well. Not only that, but the girl had a competitive streak to her as well and it was so very easy to get  her riled up if any type of friendly competition was presented to her. Evelyn had depth and personality and there were so many different sides to her that Éliane loved so much. It seemed that the more she got to know her friend, the more she found out about her and it was great.

 Winter break went by quickly, what with the myriad of activities Éliane orchestrated and it ended with by far, the greatest event to the start off the new year – Evelyn’s birthday.

 Towards the start of the break, Evelyn had quietly invited the inner circle of the friend group for a sleepover on the last Saturday of break, since her birthday fell on a Wednesday. They would be four in total and Éliane spent the better part of her days leading up to her friend’s birthday trying to come up with the Best Gift Ever, when she wasn’t busy spending time with her friends or stuffing her face with her grandmother’s baked goods. She was looking forward to the party and Evelyn kept reminding her that it would be a simple, quiet affair. They would get takeout, there would be cake, they would watch movies, they would eat too much candy and chips and chocolate – and eventually, they would all crash at some ungodly hour of the morning.

 Éliane still thought it sounded like the greatest thing ever.

 The party in itself turned out to be lovely and loud and boisterous. Mr. And Mrs Murphy put on brave faces and stuck around making sure everything was okay and to wish their daughter a happy birthday, while Evelyn’s younger sister had found herself a better place to be. They played games, spent the better part of the evening gossiping about school – their teachers, their classmates, another part worrying about which Cégep to apply to and what program, until Éliane declared that all “no-fun” school talk was banned. So, they watched a stream of movies, one of the other girls gave Evelyn a manicure and they ate too much candy and chips and chocolate.

 Somewhere around midnight, before it got to be too late, they took a break to change into their pyjamas. They were waiting for Evelyn to return and Éliane was waiting on the couch, wearing her own set of teddy bear patterned pyjama pants and long sleeved sweatshirt she had pilfered from one of her brothers (it was large, it was comfortable and it was warm), when Evelyn came to join them.

 Éliane cared very little about what others wore to bed. Normally, she wore boxer shorts and nothing else – unless it was cold outside, which it currently was. The thing was, she would have never associated Evelyn with the pyjama set that she was wearing. Evelyn rejoined their little group as if nothing was wrong with the world and went and plopped herself right next to Éliane wearing by far the most ridiculous (gorgeous), frilly (utterly inappropriate), matching set of what seemed to be lilac silk pyjamas. There was lace. There were motifs. It had little tiny straps that covered her shoulders (Éliane’s brain reminded her that this was the most skin she had seen on her friend and that she could see her clavicle and shoulder blades and the dip of her neck and – and then there were the shorts! The equally silk shorts that hugged her thighs just so and – maybe, maybe it was always really hot at the Murphy’s, which was why Evelyn slept in such a getup, because suddenly, Éliane found herself overheating. And then she had to give her friend one more (discreet – hopefully) one over and of course she had to notice the way the fabric hugged her chest, the shape she could guess underneath and – this really wasn’t fair.

 The thing was – the real issue here was – that Éliane M. Maisonneuve had accidentally gone and developed the stupidest of crushes on Evelyn A. Murphy and she was a complete goner.

 And now her friend was sitting beside her in her silk pyjamas looking like a goddamned gift and Éliane wanted to hold her close, furrow her face in the crook of her neck and ghost her hands over the fabric of her pajamas – and more. She was doomed. This was neither the place nor the time and she did her utmost best to keep her thoughts pure and innocent, but apparently, the universe hated her, because Evelyn slid extremely close to her, until she was half pressed on Éliane’s side and took a hold of her hand.

 “I get really afraid during scary movies,” She whispered in her ear and Éliane tried to suppress the shivers that ran down her spine and the sudden urge she had to turn around and kiss Evelyn’s stupid (beautiful, glorious) face senseless. Instead, she clutched at her friend’s hand in return, didn’t let go for the duration of the movie – and tried her best not to feel anything every time Evelyn gasped and clutched at her a little harder when she got scared. (And she tried really hard not to think of the way Evelyn’s body felt pressed up against her side.)

 Éliane knew what she liked – couldn’t care less about the gender of people. She had dated a little, had stolen kisses from girls behind cafés and had gone out on dates with boys. So long as she was interested, it didn’t matter and, apparently, her mind had decided that it was very interested in Evelyn. (And really, could she be blamed? Evelyn was mighty fine, thank you very much.)

 She was so screwed.

 Éliane swore to herself that she would keep her stupid crush to herself and bury her feelings so far deep inside of her that she would be long dead before they could ever resurface properly.

 Therefore, by Tuesday, over lunch, Éliane took her other best friend, Emma, aside, to spill absolutely everything to her.

 Now, Éliane and Emma had met on the very first day of kindergarten and had been placed in the same class. They had been sat next to each other and Éliane had declared her her best friend by the time lunch had rolled in. Emma had no idea how it was that they had remained friends for so long, but Éliane was her best friend and so, despite being quite exhausted by her friend’s daily ongoing complaint about whatever it was that was personally vexing her, she half listened to her friend.

 Normally, Emma would have been sympathetic and offered Éliane some advice, but Éliane was the absolute worst when it came to taking advice and instead preferred moping around and taking everything way too dramatically as if the world was against her.

 So she did just that and Emma couldn’t wait for Éliane to move on to a new hyper-fixation.

 Unfortunately, that never happened.

 “Why don’t you – and I’m just ball-parking it here – actually tell Ev’ how you feel and y’know, maybe she’ll feel the same way?” Emma reiterated for what felt like the millionth time. By February, Emma had heard her friend lament her unrequited crush so often that she could predict what Éliane would tell her almost verbatim.

 “But Ems, what if she doesn’t? What if she thinks I’m gross and then never wants to speak to me again? Emma, I can’t risk that!” She bemoaned, burying her face in her pillow. It was a quiet Friday night and Emma had done the mistake of throwing an impromptu sleepover between her and Éliane. She had hoped it would be a fun sleepover; instead, she was being privy to another round of Éliane’s love tribulations.

 “If she thinks you’re gross she’s dead to all of us.” Emma stated in her no-nonsense tone. The rest of their friend group knew of Éliane’s preferences and could care less about who she dated. If Evelyn had a problem with it, she would be more than happy to kick her out of the circle, “She’s not worth your time if she can’t accept you the way you are.” This was why Éliane liked Emma. She was straight to the point and wasn’t afraid to speak her mind, even over controversial matters.

 “I knoooooow, but I like her sooooo much. Emmmmaaaaaaaaaaa, she’s sooooo pretty, it’s not faaaaaair,” She whined and put on her best kicked puppy expression. Emma rolled her eyes and threw a pillow at her. She was immune to that look by now. Mostly.

 “I mean, have we even ever heard Evelyn express an interest in anyone at school?”

 “Noooo, but what if – what if she has a boyfriend back home and she promised to be true to him? Or like what if she’s super conservative or something? Aren’t they conservative back in Alberta?”

 “Don’t you think she would have mentioned having a boyfriend – or someone special – back home after all this time? And even if there are people who are conservative back in Alberta, who’s to say that she is? God knows she follows you around on half your crazy schemed ideas. Maybe she likes you and she’s shy. Maybe she’s just a friend. Maybe you should just fucking talk to her and leave me out of your love life, please, Éliane, I’m not even your therapist.”

 Éliane pouted and threw the pillow back at her.

 “Big baby. Just write her a Valentine’s and play it off as a joke if she rejects you.”

 “That is the worst idea ever. My heart would be shattered and I’d never be able to face her ever again.” Emma sighed as Éliane went off another tangent. Sometimes, she wondered why she bothered.

 Éliane did not take up Emma on her advice and so, come Valentine’s Day, she did absolutely nothing and played it cool, by her standards. This meant that she kept a close eye on anyone who approached Evelyn with Valentine’s and she was only too pleased (relieved) when no one had made any outlandish love declarations to her. (Not that Evelyn didn’t deserve outlandish love declarations, but Éliane wanted to be the one to do them, not some other person.)

 It also meant that her heart sank when Evelyn didn’t get her any particular Valentine and that she only gave her a small chocolate, like she did with all of their other friends. It wasn’t that she expected anything, but if Evelyn had made a move on her, it would have helped ease her mind and given her some sense of direction. Still, Éliane had to consol herself; at least Evelyn was her friend. It could be so much worse.

 Her crush only kept growing as the days went by and even when she tried looking elsewhere, hoping that a distraction from Evelyn would help, it seemed her heart and mind were set on Evelyn no matter what. It was utterly annoying and Emma was ready to murder her if she kept this on.

 Therefore, Éliane came up with another of her Brilliant Plans, which Emma agreed was absolutely stupid. With prom coming up at the end of the year, Éliane decided to put her big move there and ask Evelyn to go as her date. Emma politely reminded her that prom was in literal months and that a million different things could happen between now and then. Plus, there was also the fact that Éliane would be even more insufferable until then.

 Éliane was pretty confident that it would give her enough time to gather more intel on whether or not Evelyn liked her That Way and hence, would only help her out in the long run. If anything, if Evelyn was dateless by then, they could just go as friends and Éliane could save face.

 In the meantime, however, there was One particular incident that left Éliane even more confused than ever before.

 It was a known fact that Éliane Maisonneuve liked to sprawl out when she sat down. Be it chair, sofa, couch or stool, Éliane took up as much space as possible. The other known fact was that Éliane Maisonneuve was a very tactile person. She had never heard of personal space when it came to her friends and if she was sitting with her friends, it wasn’t an uncommon sight to see her using her friends’ laps as extensions of the surfaces she was sitting on. She was known to sit on their laps, drape herself over them, lay her head on their shoulders or laps, and so on. No one was safe from her sprawling, not even Evelyn.

 During the winter months, Éliane opted for the school pants as opposed to the skirt, since it was too bloody cold outside and even with stockings, she froze. However, with spring back on the menu, she was quick to ditch the pants and go back to the skirt.

 It happened to be a skirt-wearing day, when, during lunch, Éliane had elected Evelyn’s lap to sit on, since she was the first to have finished eating lunch. Now, normally, when Éliane sat on Evelyn’s lap, Evelyn would put one arm over Éliane’s own lap, to keep her from falling off, and her other arm would either wrap itself around her waist, or rest against the back of the sofa they claimed for themselves for lunch, when they ate inside, in one of the school’s hangout spots.

 However, this time – this time something monumental happened.

 Éliane sat on Evelyn’s lap like always, and at first Evelyn held on to her as she normally did, but then, a few minutes later, Evelyn’s hand that was around her waist shifted ever so. At first, Éliane thought little of it, but then Evelyn placed her hand to rest on the side of her leg, underneath her skirt, right on her skin. Éliane stilled and tried to think little of it. Evelyn had just found a better way to place her hands, there was nothing to it – that had to be it. This wasn’t planned. This had been accidental, clearly. But then – then her friend went ahead and started – rubbing her skin? With her thumb? In a small, circular way? Or something. Because, Éliane felt Evelyn’s thumb rub her skin in a circular motion, but there was no way for her to see and she wasn’t about to ask (because it felt really good and she didn’t want Evelyn to stop and if she was hallucinating then she would look like a fool.) Plus, Éliane did try to get a read off Evelyn’s face, but when she looked, Evelyn wasn’t even looking her way, instead focused on whatever else it was their friends were saying, a small, gentle smile on her face.

 What. The ever loving fuck. Did this actually mean?

 Éliane tried to remain still, tried to brush it off as nothing and tried to play it cool, but for the rest of the day, she was a right hot mess and she spent the better part of the rest of the week (and month) replaying the feel of Evelyn’s hand on her bare thigh and it did not help any of her little fantasies one bit. (Because good Lord, someone help her, how she had wanted Evelyn’s hand to creep up her thigh, touch her elsewhere, make her feel good – how she had wanted to wrap her legs around her friend, grind against her, get her hands underneath Evelyn’s silly school blouse, feel her up – hear her moan –)

 This was really getting out of hand.

 Éliane kept pinning from afar, much to Emma’s annoyance, especially since she was the only one in their friend circle to know about her crush and no other major incidents of the sort came to throw Éliane for a loop. She still convinced herself that she would do something about it for prom, but Emma wasn’t convinced, and quite frankly, neither was Éliane.

 And then it was Éliane’s birthday.

 Éliane had a rather busy birthday schedule, what with celebrating with her family and twin sister, wanting to do something fun with her friends and also doing something lowkey on the actual day of. As was the standard amongst their friend group, one of them made a birthday cake to be had at lunch, there were presents and it was a lovely day overall.

 On top of that, she had all her favourite classes today and it was honestly looking up to be the best birthday ever. She was looking forward to the weekend and her mind was focused on the end of the day, when she got a note from Evelyn during class.

 “Meet me in the park by the swing set after class,” The note said and Éliane tried to get her friend’s attention, wondering what this could mean and what game her friend was playing at, but Evelyn never looked her way and so Éliane was left guessing. She even tried to ask her after class, but Evelyn went ahead of her, while the teacher asked Éliane to stay behind for a bit, since she wanted to go over some of the texts for the upcoming school play.

 Therefore, once she could leave, she ran to her locker to drop off her books, changed out of her school shoes, grabbed her sweater and backpack, and then ran off to the park next to the school. She hoped Evelyn hadn’t been waiting long and that she wouldn’t think she had stood her up, even though she had seen Éliane with their teacher. Still.

 Éliane nearly tripped down the stairs to the park and was ever so relieved to see that Evelyn was still there waiting for her.

 “What’s up?” She asked, slightly out of breath.

 “I wanted to give you your birthday gift.” She said, smiling at her and Éliane’s stomach did a funny thing at the sight. It always did a funny thing at the sight. It was such a pretty smile.

 “But, you gave me your gift earlier with the others,” She said, giving her friend a quizzical look. Not that she minded more gifts, but she didn’t expect her friend to get her multiple gifts.

 “I know – but this one is special. Close your eyes?”

 Éliane did as she was told even though her curiosity was eating her alive.

 “No peeking!” Evelyn cautioned and it was very tempting to, but Éliane remained still, with her eyes closed, heart beating wildly as she waited.

 Evelyn took her hands and Éliane figured she would place something in them, but instead her friend held on. Éliane was about to ask what this was all about, but the following moment, she felt the softest of presses against her lips. She gasped and her eyes opened on their own just in time to see Evelyn lean away from her, a lovely blush spreading across her cheeks.

 “Did you just – was that just –”There was no way Evelyn had kissed her. She must have dreamt the entire thing up and blacked out, or something. Maybe she had really slipped down the stairs, fallen and hit her head. It may have been her birthday and all, but these types of things only happened in trashy romance novels she liked to splurge on.

 “Look ,” Evelyn started, blush deepening across her face and Éliane stopped talking all together, while her brain tried to reboot itself, “I like you. A lot. And I have, for a while now... and well, I wanted to take a chance. Since it’s your birthday and all. And, yeah – I – don’t hate me?” She stammered and Éliane could only stare at her.

 Evelyn Murphy liked her.

 The absolutely wonderful person that was Evelyn Murphy liked her and had kissed her on her birthday. Éliane might actually faint and go into shock.

 Instead, she launched herself at Evelyn and kissed her hard. Evelyn stumbled back in surprise, trying not to fall over, and wrapped her arms around Éliane out of reflex.

 “I like you too, you silly goose, and I could never hate you,” Éliane blurted out when she pulled away, before cupping Evelyn’s face with her hands and kissing her again, this time much slower and softer. She let out a breathy little gasp when Evelyn held her, their bodies pressed close. It was everything she’d been hoping for months and everything she’d never, in her wildest dreams, think she’d get. She chased after as many kisses as Evelyn allowed her and silently swooned at the softness of her lips against her own. She knew, already, that she could never tire of this.

 “Go to prom with me?” She added, catching her breath, riding a high she never wanted to come down from. Evelyn’s eyes widened and then she smiled and it caught Éliane’s breath. It was such a lovely sight, so beautiful and pure, and she wanted to be the cause of those smiles for a very, very long time.

 “I’d love to,” Evelyn told her, before kissing her again. And again. And again and again.

 --

 It was nice, finally being able to hold Evelyn’s hand whenever she felt like it. Éliane made it her personal mission to walk to every class she had with Evelyn by holding her hand and sometimes, if Evelyn let her, she carried her books as well. She was stupid in love with her and she couldn’t believe how lucky she was that Evelyn liked her – that they could hold hands and kiss and spend a stupid amount of time texting each other strings of heart emojis late into the night. Éliane never wanted the feeling to end.

 It turned out that Evelyn wasn’t out to her parents and she had no idea how they would take to her being attracted to girls, so they agreed to keep things under wrap around them when Éliane went over. Éliane had already done her own coming out to her parents, almost two years ago, but she supposed she had an easier ride, considering her eldest brother was gay and very much cohabiting with his boyfriend for the past several years now. She was thankful that her parents were okay with it and could only hope that Evelyn’s parents would be as well, whenever it was she decided to tell them.

 For now, it just meant that Éliane had to keep her hands to herself when she was over at the Murphys’, but she could make-out with Evelyn at her place all she wanted, (or until her sister told her to stop being so gross.)

 May also meant receiving Cégep admission letters and a whole flock of stress, anxiety, and high emotions. Evelyn found the idea a little dumb, but since her family was still in Montréal and she would have to do an extra year of high school if she went back home, she had found herself obliged to apply as well. She ended up applying to most of the Cégeps her friends wanted to go to, so that she could at least be with them and she surprised herself when their excitement turned contagious when her own acceptance letters started trickling in.

 The only problem was that she had no idea where it was she wanted to go.

 She was pretty convinced she wanted to be an engineer – maybe a civil engineer later on, but so long as she did something science and math related in Cégep, she would be fine. Where she did it didn’t matter. She kept her options open and waited to see where the others would go. Therefore, when Éliane got accepted into the program of her choice in visual arts at the Cégep she really wanted to, Evelyn quietly accepted her own offer at the same school. (And when Éliane found out, nearly two weeks later, she had been extremely happy and there may or may not have been many tears.)

 She knew that realistically her chances of having any classes with Éliane were slim, that their schedules might not even match up, but maybe they could share a locker and maybe they could take one of the mandatory gym ,or French, or English, or humanities classes together.

 They could make it work. (She really hoped they could.)

 Bu those were problems and thoughts for later and so Evelyn buried them deep in her mind and instead focused on the upcoming ministry exams, the end of the school year, finding a dress for prom, memorising her lines for the end of year school play, finding time for her girlfriend and her friends, and everything else that came with being a senior in high school.

 --

 Emma decided to invite everyone over to her place, before they went to prom, to take photos and have cocktails, since she had the biggest yard between them. They agreed to meet up there and then make their way to the hall where the reception would take place.

 Despite Éliane asking, Evelyn had refused to show her any photos of her dress. Éliane had begged for hints, a description, anything, but Evelyn had remained tight-lipped, preferring to surprise her girlfriend at prom. Éliane had done her best pouting and pleading, but Evelyn was apparently immune to it all. Therefore, Éliane was an impatient mess when she got to Emma’s, eagerly anticipating the moment Evelyn would arrive.

 As per their plan, Evelyn had told her parents that she was going to prom with her friends, since “no boys had asked her” and her parents thought it was cute how the girls were sticking together. It was a perfect decoy and it meant that she could have all the photos she wanted with Éliane and her parents would never think twice about it.

 Éliane was about ready to text Evelyn, to ask her where she was and whether or not she had forgotten that they were supposed to meet up at Emma’s before heading to the reception hall, but then the doorbell rang and Éliane swore the entire planet froze in time when Evelyn walked in.

 Evelyn was wearing a midnight blue, long dress with cap sleeves that fell off her shoulders. It had a sweetheart bodice and a ruched waistline that did wonders for her figure and her complexion. The material of the dress was elegant and airy and it gave Evelyn a regal appearance.

 Her girlfriend was absolutely, drop-dead gorgeous.

 Her heart was going to explode from how full of love it was for Evelyn.

 Éliane did her very best to contain herself and not launch herself at Evelyn, but she did walk up to her and envelop her in the tightest of hugs she could manage, trying to convey everything it was she felt inside.

 “You are so breathtakingly beautiful,” She whispered in her ear as she pulled away. She grinned when Evelyn turned a lovely shade of pink and Éliane was far too pleased with herself.

 “And you’re absolutely stunning,” Evelyn murmured back, leaving a lingering touch to Éliane’s wrist, which left her skin tingling.

 Éliane had opted for something a little more party like. It was a champagne coloured, short dress with an asymmetrical bodice. It had one sleeve and bold folds that looked absolutely stunning on her. It was, after all, their prom, and she intended to party, dance and have the absolute greatest of times.

 Prom, delivered.

 The prom committee really outdid themselves, if Éliane did say so herself and it turned out to be a great evening. She got to sit with her best friends, got to dance with her girlfriend, took a stupid amount of photos with absolutely everyone she had ever spoken to during her five years in high school and only cried once – maybe twice, when she realised for good that this was her last few moments with these people – that one chapter of her life was closing and that a new adventure was right around the corner.

 But, before she got too lost in her own thoughts, there was still an after-prom, a million pool parties to attend and the greatest summer of her life to live.

 Most of the graduating class had decided to go camping for their after-prom, on some semi-remote campground a few hours away. The grounds promised privacy, no curfew, and a lax attitude towards underage drinking. Éliane had considered going, but then Emma had decided to do something a little simpler and had invited their group over to her place. Her parents would be out, they could pile up and sleep in the camper van in the backyard, eat all the junk food they could handle, talk late into the night, watch the stars and go swimming in the morning. The best part was that Mr. And Mrs. Dubois would even leave them alone, as they had decided to visit Mrs. Dubois’ sister back in Ottawa, which meant they had the whole place to themselves.

 They arrived at Emma’s place well past one in the morning and the girls were a flurry of activity as they changed into pyjamas and their graduating sweatshirts. High-heeled shoes, dresses and make-up were removed in favour of comfort as they crowded around each other to settle and keep the night going. Chips, cookies, candies, and soda were placed nearby as they munched on the snacks and laughed their worries away.

 It was nice, Éliane thought, and she secretly hoped that twenty years from now she would still be doing this with this same group of friends. Éliane tucked herself between Emma and Evelyn and found herself perfectly at ease. If time needed to freeze and stop and chose this particular moment to do so, she would be content.

 It didn’t, naturally, but Éliane found she didn’t really mind and was happy to snuggle up next to Evelyn when the sun started to rise and they could no longer keep their eyes open.

 “Love you,” She murmured into the folds of Evelyn’s arms and only registered what she’d said a moment or so later, when she felt Evelyn still beside her.

 She feared she’d let her mouth run wild once more and had an apology ready at her lips, but then she felt Evelyn hold her close and press a gentle kiss to the top of her head, “D’you really mean it?” She whispered for her ears only and Éliane nodded.

 “Yeah, I really do.”

 Evelyn smiled and it was a real thing of beauty that warmed her insides and made her heart soar. She levelled with her and sought her lips, before kissing her fully, “Love you, Evelyn,” She murmured, unable to stop herself from grinning.

 “I love you too, Éliane.” Evelyn whispered back, as if it was their secret alone.

 --

 Seeing as this was their last summer all together, Éliane made her mission to make sure they would see each other as often as possible and create the best summer memories. Therefore, there were many pool parties (and nothing had ever prepared her for the sight of her girlfriend – her Evelyn in the actual prettiest bikini ever made on God’s green earth.), a handful of parties and even though most of them had part time summer jobs, they made it work and by the time summer came to an end, Éliane was ready for the next chapter of her life.

 Cégep turned out to be an interesting and roller coaster of a venture. For as much as Éliane pretty much enjoyed it – liked the freedom it brought her, the expanded horizons of possibilities and being able to have classes that she genuinely enjoyed, Evelyn found it pointless and useless. It was a means to an end – something she had no choice in doing and the only thing that made it tolerable was the fact that Éliane was in many of her classes, they rode in or out together when their schedules matched and some of their friends from high school were also at the same school.

 Other than that, she absolutely abhorred the time she spent there and kept reminding herself that in two years time, it would be over. It seemed that just as she’d settled in to the rhythm of her new high school, she had been yanked out and forced to adapt to what she considered a waste of education.  Éliane made the mistake of pointing out once that maybe it had to do with her disengagement with her own program, but Evelyn shut down that theory rather quickly.

 Still, despite her foul mood and deep hatred for Cégep, Éliane did her best to cheer up her girlfriend, left little notes of encouragement in their shared locker almost every second day and thankfully, with Éliane and some of her friends by her side, she was able to coast through her first semester without burning the building down to ash.

 However, for as much as Evelyn had nothing positive to say about Cégep, she had to agree that the winter break between the first and second semester was delightful. There was a little over a month and a half of time off and even though she had a few exams during the exam period, she still had a good month of vacation. When she found out, sometime after midterms, a great plan hatched in her mind.

 The truth of the matter was that Evelyn missed Edmonton something fierce. She hadn’t been back since her family had relocated to Montreal and even though she liked her new life – it didn’t always feel like home. She missed her grandparents, missed her friends, and missed her favourite hangout spots.

 Therefore, Evelyn did her research, contacted the appropriate people, and once she had everything in order, she brought up the idea to her parents of flying to Edmonton after the holidays for three weeks. She would be staying with her grandparents, who were more than thrilled at the idea of having her over, she had enough money for her plane ticket from her summer job and she would be able to do all the things she missed and loved. Her parents weren’t exactly thrilled with the plan, but eventually they agreed.

 It was then that Evelyn launched part two of her plan, which was to ask Éliane to come over with her. (She had asked her grandparents as well, had explained that Éliane wasn’t just her friend – that they were a couple and thank goodness, they had been very accepting of that and thrilled at the idea of potentially meeting their granddaughter’s girlfriend.)

 Of course, Evelyn was very much aware of the fact that her girlfriend detested winter, would probably have preferred to go somewhere warm, if she could and Evelyn didn’t even know if Éliane would want to go to Edmonton with her, or if she had the means to do it, but when she told her of her plan, Éliane had been one hundred percent onboard.

 They bought their tickets together, the moment Éliane had the okay from her parents and then, at least, Evelyn could keep a countdown to not only the end of her first semester of hell-school, but also to the day she would be going back home to Edmonton – even if it was for a short while.

 The moment they arrived in Edmonton, Evelyn was ready to show her girlfriend all the sights. She had made an elaborate schedule, had contacted all her friends and she only hoped that Éliane would like it.

Of course, Éliane loved it all, even if she did complain about the cold at every chance she got, but Evelyn was always there to lend her a sweater, tie a scarf around her neck or let Éliane snuggle up to her at night.

 Éliane enjoyed the city and loved meeting Evelyn’s friends. It was nice to see her girlfriend’s old stomping grounds and Evelyn’s grandparents took to her right away, which they were both thankful for. It was nice being here and it amused Éliane to no end that their first trip as a “couple” was to Edmonton, something Evelyn thought wasn’t quite as exotic or romantic as it should be. Éliane told her they could make up for it at a later time – for their next vacation and the thought of that – of something that would happen in the future sent butterflies to Evelyn’s stomach.

 Overall, despite her lack of interest in Cégep, two years ended up going by quickly, somehow. Éliane liked to refer to those two years as Evelyn’s rebel phase, for it was during that time that Evelyn decided to learn how to ride a motorcycle (something Éliane absolutely loved very, very much – there was just something so incredibly hot about her girlfriend dressed in nice, tight leather pants with nice leather boots and an even nicer leather jacket mounting a motorcycle. Éliane called it sex on wheels. Evelyn always turned the loveliest shade of pink at the comment.)

 It was also during their stint in Cégep that Evelyn decided, one afternoon, while bored between classes, to get the upper part of her ear pierced. One of her classes had been cancelled, and she couldn’t go home, since she had another class after that. Since Éliane and her other friends were all unavailable, Evelyn had gone out for a walk, had passed by a tattoo and body piercing parlour and had decided to get it done, on a whim and out of boredom.

 Éliane had a lot to say about the piercing. Notably, that it was very sexy and added an extra layer of badass to Evelyn. Evelyn thought her girlfriend was being ridiculous – Éliane had shut her up with a kiss.

 And perhaps, the other thing that happened over the summer between their first and thankfully last year of Cégep was that their relationship reached a highly more physical level.

 They had – fooled around some ever since that memorable time towards the end of high school, but, nothing beyond wandering hands and heavy make-out sessions. Evelyn hadn’t been fully ready and Éliane had given her all the time she needed. There’d been some touching, a very few topless make-out sessions which had left Evelyn yearning for more, but something had always held her back. Maybe the fact that her parents and sister had been home, or that Éliane’s own family could walk in at any time.

 But there came a weekend over summer after their first year of Cégep, when Éliane had the whole house to herself. Her brothers were officially moved out, her sister had gone camping with her friends, and her parents had gone over to her mother’s friend’s cottage for the weekend. Éliane had invited Evelyn over to use the pool and there hadn’t really been any thought that this would happen over the weekend.

 Éliane had been sunbathing on one of the lawn chairs, when Evelyn had gotten out of the pool and walked towards her girlfriend, with the intention of flicking water in her face. Éliane had (over) reacted just the way Evelyn had hoped – shrieking and protesting that the water was so very cold, which had prompted Evelyn to drape herself over her girlfriend to flick even more water all over her.

 Éliane had tried to push her off and get away from her, but she had been trapped. Finally, Éliane gave up and Evelyn settled against her, content, with the sun warming her up and her girlfriend running a hand up and down her back. They’d stayed that way for a while, peaceful and quiet, until Evelyn had nuzzled her way to her girlfriend’s neck and had started leaving feather light kisses on Éliane’s neck.

 The feather light kisses turned languid and hot when Éliane let out breathy little moans and wrapped her legs around Evelyn’s body. Evelyn left Éliane’s neck in favour of her lips when her girlfriend started grinding against her and her hands left her back to slide underneath the straps of her bikini.

 Evelyn had never gone all the way with anyone – had never lain naked beside someone else, even though she had had her fair share of fantasies and had done a bit of self-exploration over the past few months. They’d talked it over, a few times, about their experiences and lack thereof and Evelyn had known, all along, that she could trust Éliane – that her girlfriend would respect her, no matter what it was that they did or didn’t do.

 And so, when they parted for air and Evelyn took in the sight of Éliane’s kiss swollen lips and mussed up hair, she felt a deep hunger for her that swooped at her belly and made her want to touch and lick and taste and kiss and feel.

 “Should we go to my room?” Éliane asked, her hand kneading the skin of Evelyn’s thigh, her fingers hitching ever higher, playing with the strings of the straps of her bikini. Evelyn nodded at that, disentangled herself from her, and then helped her up.

 They’d made their way to Éliane’s room and once Éliane had closed the door behind them – in case – she had pushed Evelyn to her bed and they’d resumed from where they’d left off before. Evelyn let her girlfriend guide them both and let go of her millions of thoughts running through her head. She followed her gut, paid close attention to Éliane’s reactions, and let her hands touch and feel, let her mouth kiss and taste.

 Evelyn marvelled at the goose bumps over Éliane’s breasts, over the texture of her nipple on her tongue and over every little sound and noise Éliane made, which Evelyn meticulously catalogued and memorised to later replay in her mind like a favourite song.

 This was an experience she had never felt before and one that she would love repeating over the many years to come - hopefully.

 And later, afterwards, as Evelyn lay with Éliane running her fingers through her hair, Evelyn couldn’t help but be thankful that somehow or other, despite not being keen over the move away from her beloved Edmonton, she had managed to find Éliane along the way. She hoped, as she shared a tender kiss with her girlfriend, that theirs would be a relationship that would last, and that if it didn’t, they could always remain friends.

 --

 The only thing that motivated Evelyn throughout their second – and luckily – last year of Cégep was the fact that she would be making university applications by the start of March. The drawback to that was picking which universities to apply. Éliane, once more, had her whole plan set out and her preferred university in mind. She was applying to one school and one school only, and if they didn’t accept her, then – well, her plan didn’t have a section for that, because she would get accepted. Evelyn envied her for that – was slightly jealous of the certainty and faith she had in her plan, even if she feared it would backfire on her. Not that Éliane didn’t have the grades or the talent for it, but there would be others who would be applying as well. Still, Éliane was convinced and Evelyn could only marvel at her.

 On the one hand, she could apply to the same place as Éliane again and go where she went, but Evelyn also wanted to go somewhere that would actually set her up on her desired career path. If she wanted to become an engineer, it would obviously help if she went to a university that was known for their engineering programs. The other problem was that after nearly three years, Evelyn was incredibly homesick.

 She liked Montreal just fine – was getting the hang of the city and its peculiarities, but – it wasn’t home. She missed her friends and family that were still in Edmonton, missed biking through the River Valley, and missed weather that actually made sense (to her). Therefore, on a whim, she decided to apply to the University of Alberta and figured that – if she got in – she could make her decision then and have that conversation with Éliane at that point. There was no need to cause alarm just yet.

 Evelyn kept telling herself that if she didn’t get accepted at the University of Alberta, then it would be a clear sign that she wasn’t meant to go back – not now anyways, and that would be that. It would make her life easier, Éliane would never need to know, and life would move on. However, every time she started thinking that way, part of her really hoped she would be accepted there.

 In the end, obviously, because life never played out the way she wanted it to, she was accepted at two of the three schools she had applied to – one in Montreal and the other one in Edmonton.

 Before she broke the news to Éliane, she sat herself down and made a rather long and elaborate list of all the pros and cons she could think of about attending both schools. The problem was that her number one con about going back to Edmonton was that Éliane would be in Montreal and her biggest con about staying in Montreal was that she really missed home and wouldn’t get to see it for god only knew how much longer.

 When she finally brought the list to Éliane – when she finally gathered up her courage for this conversation, her girlfriend was a little put off about having been left in the dark, if only because she didn’t like the idea of Evelyn going through this burden alone, but she was ready to find solutions.

 “I could get transferred to UofA; I’m sure they have an art program,” She said as she started tapping away at her phone, looking up the offered programs as though this was the easiest and most logical of solutions.

 “El, don’t – I mean, it’s not that I don’t want you to come with, but – you had a whole plan and you were super psyched about getting into UQAM. Plus, you even said, they only take a few people per year, so that means your portfolio was really good.”

 “Exactly. So if UQAM took me then it shouldn’t be a problem for UofA. I can apply to get transferred for winter term and then we can be together again.” She smiled brightly at that, closed off her phone as if the case was solved and shelved, but it didn’t sit well with Evelyn.

 Evelyn loved that Éliane was ready to drop everything to follow her, but at the same time, she knew her girlfriend was impulsive – that she came up with plans in a blink of an eye and didn’t always think the consequences through. She knew, deep down, that eventually, for as much as Éliane would be charmed by the city and enjoy it, she would feel like a fish out of the water. She wouldn’t have her friends, she wouldn’t have her sister and she wouldn’t have her bearings with the city.

 She knew that, for as much as Éliane liked to play the tough act, for as much as she was the life of a party, that deep down, she was very sensitive; that even if she made new friends (which she would) and even if she ended up loving her program, the pillars of her own life would be missing and it would slowly, but surely, eat at her. The last thing Evelyn wanted to do was make Éliane miserable and she didn’t Éliane to resent her for it, in the long run, either.

 She brought up these points to Éliane, but just as she feared, Éliane rebuked every one of her arguments, because on top of everything else, her girlfriend was absolutely stubborn.

 “But, if you’re all the way in Edmonton, that means a different time zone, I don’t get to see you as often and – you might never come back,” Éliane finally admitted, hours later, when it felt as though they were going around in circles with this discussion. She sounded small and – insecure and it was then that Evelyn realised that the real root of the problem wasn’t that Evelyn wanted to study outside of the city, it was that Éliane knew how much she missed Edmonton and Éliane feared she would never return once she went back.

 The real problem was that Evelyn, for as much as she wanted to reassure her that she would – that she’d go there for the length of the degree and then come back – wasn’t sure she could say so convincingly. Who was to say what would happen when she got there? Who was to say that she would find a job in Montreal post-graduation? Who was to say that she and Éliane would still be together that many years ahead?

 “Look, I don’t know what’s going to happen between now and then – but I want this to work, between us. I’m not running away to Edmonton to find some other girl or to replace you and I promise I’m going to do my best to make this long distance whatever work between us.” She started and gathered Éliane in her arms. Her girlfriend made herself small and buried her face in the folds of her sweater, taking in a deep breath, committing the scent of Evelyn to her mind, already knowing she would be gone within a few months.

 “I promise too,” Éliane added softly, not meeting Evelyn’s eyes, already fighting to keep the tears at bay, “I mean – I want this to work too and I want you to be happy, so do what you feel will make you happiest.”

 “But you make me happy, El,” Evelyn pressed a kiss to the top of Éliane’s head and that at least got a smile out of her, “I like having you around.”

 “And I’ll still be here – after you’re done, but I don’t want you to miss out on this opportunity. I don’t want you to have regrets, twenty years from now or resent me because in a way I kept you here – that you stayed back because of me.”

 “Are you sure?”

 Éliane nodded, “I’ll miss you. I already miss you. But we can still talk and text, yeah?” She asked as if it was a question – as if Evelyn wasn’t already thinking of having weekly video call dates, or something of the likes. She would be going from having Éliane around her nearly every day to being miles and miles apart. It would be a big adaptation – for both of them, but with Éliane’s blessing, Evelyn felt a little more confident that it would work out in the end.

 --

 Their last summer together was – different, if they were to compare them to the previous ones. Knowing that Evelyn would be gone by the end of it, Éliane made it a point to spend as much time with her as possible and to create as many memories – good memories, so that Evelyn would want to come back.

 No matter how many times Evelyn reassured her that she would return, Éliane was still a little worried that this was it – that Evelyn would move on, but she still put on a brave face and did her best to be supportive and happy for her. (Which she was – but, why did Edmonton have to be so far away?)

 On the day that she left, Éliane went to the airport with Mr and Mrs Murphy and did her utmost best not to cry in front of them. (There would be time later – when she was home and alone in her bedroom. She didn’t want to cause a scene at the airport. She didn’t want to be that person.)

 “I’ll be back before you know it.” Evelyn told her when they shared one last tight hug. Her voice cracked a little and she did her best to swallow her own tears that threatened to spill forth.

 “I promise I’ll try to come over reading week.” They’d talked of the possibility and Éliane had been firm when she’d said she’d come to Edmonton at any chance she had – anytime they had time off. Evelyn admired her determination, but felt her girlfriend had forgotten how expensive the plane tickets could get.

 “Love you,” Evelyn chose to say instead.

 “Love you more.” Éliane stepped back and let Evelyn go. She watched as her girlfriend exchanged one more hug with her family and then went to queue up with the other travellers. She waved and waved again and tried not to think about the gap she suddenly felt in her chest.

 University turned out to be much harder than Cégep, but Evelyn enjoyed it a lot more. It wasn’t always easy, but the work was much more challenging and she felt like she was actually advancing with life. She got to reconnect with her old friends, made new ones and the only thing missing – the only person missing to make it all the more perfect was Éliane.

 They made it a point to have weekly video calls, just like Evelyn had thought of before she left, but it wasn’t always easy to keep with their schedule, what with different time zones, part time jobs, school work and the myriad of other obligations that got in the way. Still, every time they did talk, Evelyn felt as though the missing puzzle piece to her life was slotted into place.

 And, for as much as they settled into their new routine, slowly got used to not being around each other (Evelyn liked to say that absence made the heart grow fonder), there came a time when Éliane started to really think that Evelyn had moved on. When she would stay up far too late and see her girlfriend post photos on social media, out with her new friends, having a jolly good time, and some ugly thing inside of her whispered that Evelyn was replacing her – that this relationship would fizzle out. It also didn’t help that with time zones and busy schedules, midterms and projects, their weekly video calls became shorter and were sometimes postponed or cancelled.

 Éliane tried to tell herself that it was normal, that Evelyn had a life out there, that she was busy herself, but the fear kept gnawing at her and she hated that she thought this way. Deep down she knew it wasn’t true, but no matter how hard she tried to convince herself, there was still always an ounce of doubt that stayed.

 Eventually, it crept up in a conversation, just before winter break and Evelyn hated that her girlfriend thought she wasn’t as interested anymore.

 “Sweetheart, no – look, I know it’s hard, I miss you – a lot, but I promise I really want this to work between us and if ever, for some really absurd reason, I wasn’t interested anymore, I would let you know. I would never string you along, okay? And even if I’m in class, or asleep, you can still message me – I’ll answer you later, just like we’ve been doing, alright?”

 Éliane nodded and wiped the tears away from her eyes. She hated that she couldn’t be strong – that something so trivial had gotten to her, but at the same time, hearing Evelyn say those words comforted her a bit, “I love you,” She said instead, because it was true and because sometimes it felt like her heart was too small to contain all the love she felt for Evelyn.

 “Love you more, you silly goose. And I miss you. And I’m looking forward to seeing you this summer.”

 Éliane smiled a little at that – at the promise of two weeks with Evelyn mostly all to herself. It wouldn’t be the same as the other summers, but she supposed they had to make do with what they got.

 “Thanks for listening,” She said.

 Evelyn smiled softly and touched the screen for a moment, “Of course – I’m always here for you, just like you’re always there for me.”

 It didn’t suddenly get better or easier after that call, but Éliane felt just a little less alone. She stopped worrying that she was being extra clingy and reached out to Evelyn whenever she felt she needed it. She didn’t hold back when she wanted to send her a message, even if it was a simple heart emoji and the wonderful thing was that Evelyn replied to every single one and would send them back as well.

 For the first time since Evelyn had left for Edmonton, Éliane felt a little lighter and started to believe that they would grow stronger from this and that they’d find a way to make it work. It was hard work, sure, she didn’t always like the distance, but it made her appreciate the time they had even more and because it was worth it to her – to the both of them, it pushed them both to keep working towards it.

 If Evelyn sent her a sweater of hers for Christmas, well, maybe, just maybe it became Éliane’s favourite and she compulsively wore it all the time over the following four years, even after it stopped smelling of her girlfriend.

 Éliane still considered transferring to UofA, or at the very least, doing an exchange for one semester, just to be with Evelyn for a few months. When she told Evelyn about it, she suggested to go somewhere different – not to hold back just because of her. She didn’t want her to miss out on some great experience or opportunity and settle for this out of some skewed sense of obligation. She could always visit her in Edmonton, but how many chances would she have to go literally anywhere else in the world? Evelyn threw back at her the same words and wisdom she had given her a year before and, with Evelyn’s blessing, Éliane applied elsewhere.

 In the end, she went to study art in Italy, for the length of her second semester. She loved every moment of it, fell in love with the people, the food, and the culture, and sent too many postcards to Evelyn, until her entire wall was full of them.

 To top it all off, since the school schedule in Italy was a little different, Evelyn even managed to surprise Éliane at the end of the term, when she flew in to spend some time with her, and they got to spend two weeks together in Italy.

 And, somehow or other, they made it through undergrad together, even if they weren’t always in the same city.

 --

 When Evelyn had to apply for her Master’s degree, she once more decided to apply to schools both in Edmonton and back in Montreal. After four years back home, she felt that she had found the catharsis and closure she had been looking for all those years, after her father had sprung the move on her back when she was in high school. On top of that, she had really missed Éliane and – to her biggest surprise, she had also missed her life in Montreal.

 She still wasn’t sure where she would eventually settle, how that would play with Éliane, but she figured, if she studied in Montreal, it would buy them both another two years before they had to figure it out.

 This time around, she was accepted to the better of the engineering schools in Montreal and so, she took that as a sign that moving back was the right course of action – at least for now.

 To absolutely no one’s surprise, Éliane was very excited when Evelyn broke the news of her decision to her, a few days later, once she had accepted the offer and weighed in all the pros and cons, and Evelyn had to admit that she was looking forward to going back – to picking up where things had left off and moving forward.

 She was still a little sad that she was leaving Edmonton behind yet again, but this time, it was on her own terms and she knew that she could always come back and that no matter where she lived or where she went, the city would always be part of her.

 Her first year back was – interesting, to say the least. For starters, she had to get used to living with her parents again, which seemed like a strange thing to say, but she had gotten used to staying with her grandparents during her undergrad degree. On top of that, the commute was different from what she’d known beforehand and sometimes, she cursed the suburbs. It was so very far away and there was so much wasted time.

 Another thing she had to get used to again, which was also a strange thing to say, was being around Éliane again – or at the very least, the possibility of being around her again more often. It took them a while to fall back into their regular old patterns, even if they were happy to be able to be together again. At first, Evelyn had worried that maybe being away for so long had changed her feelings for Éliane, but once they talked it over and figured things out, she settled in her new routine and got the hang of it.

 During that first year, Éliane moved out of her parents’ place and got one of her own, which Evelyn started spending more and more time at, since it was much closer to school and it also gave them more privacy than in their former bedrooms. She was there so often, in fact, that by the end of the first semester, she had her own spare key to the place, in case Éliane wasn’t around and she wanted to crash, and by the end of the second semester, Éliane casually asked her if she wanted to permanently move in with her.

 Evelyn had been surprised and shocked by the offer. She had thought about it, they had talked about it, but she hadn’t thought Éliane would ask her so soon. Then again, she supposed she hadn’t taken into account her girlfriend’s impulsiveness. Therefore, over summer break, Evelyn moved her stuff halfway across town and finally, she was settled in with Éliane.

 Her second and last year of her Master’s was just as interesting as her first and came with its own challenges and adaptations. For starters, there was the fact that she was now living with her girlfriend. For as much as it was great, for as much as she loved the idea of having a place that was her own and that she and Éliane could build together, there were also times when they’d find themselves butting heads over the most inane of things. It was a test and exercise in compromise, patience, and communication and even though they didn’t always get it right on the first try, they kept at it and eventually found solutions to their problems.

 Finally, eventually, she finished her program, somehow or other, and on graduation day, her parents, her sister, and Éliane were there to see her receive her diploma. There was something – oddly soothing about having them all there, about knowing that she could have this – that her parents were accepting and welcoming, that she had the chance and privilege to have this, when so many others did not.

 To celebrate the occasion, Mr and Mrs Murphy took them all out to a nice dinner and Evelyn thought it was the perfect ending to her academic career.

 It was only later, when they were back at their own place and her parents and sister had left that Evelyn received the surprise of her life.

 “I have a gift for you,” Éliane said, which surprised Evelyn, since her girlfriend had already given her a gift earlier that moment. Then again, Éliane was notorious for such things, so really, it shouldn’t have come as a shock. However, what did come as a shock was when Éliane walked up to her, got down on one knee and then proposed to her – ring and all – speech and hopeful smile included.

 And – they had spoken about this, before – had brought it up a handful of times under different circumstances; sometimes as a joke, other times seriously, but – it still took her by surprise for the simple reason that she hadn’t thought Éliane would ask her on the day of her graduation – or that Éliane would be the one to ask. If anything, Evelyn was convinced that she would have beaten her to it.

 She said yes, obviously, and Evelyn wondered if it was possible to bottle up the giddy feeling she felt inside of her and drink from it for the rest of her life.

 --

 Éliane put the photo album she’d been perusing down when she heard the front door open followed by Evelyn’s usual “I’m home!” She craned her head back in time to see her wife remove her motorcycle helmet and put it down before she passed a hand through her hair. Éliane couldn’t help but smile, fond and still so very much in love after all these years, as she watched one of her favourite daily spectacles.

 She greeted her back and then watched as her wife then removed her leather jacket and put down her messenger bag before removing her boots and making her way towards her. “Hi,” She said, smiling wider as Evelyn bent down to kiss her properly in greeting. They went through their daily exchange of “how was your day” and “you’ll never believe what happened when,” as Evelyn settled beside Éliane and made herself comfortable, slowly unwinding from her day.

 “What have you been up to?” Evelyn asked as Éliane carded her fingers through her hair.

 “I was doing some cleaning and stumbled upon our old high school album! Ended up doing a lot of reminiscing and got a little distracted,” She admitted with a laugh. Evelyn chuckled and rolled her eyes, far too used to her wife’s antics, but was nonetheless fond. Éliane was notorious for this, but it was endearing in its own way.

 “Yeah?”

 Éliane nodded and retrieved the aforementioned album from the pile of what turned out to be other photo albums and opened it up to a random page, “Look! There you are!” She said pointing at a photo of the theatre troupe.

 Evelyn took the album out of her hands and brought it closer to her face to get a good look, she groaned when she saw the photo, “Ugh, what was up with my hair?”

 “Hush you; you had very nice hair – you still have very nice hair,” Éliane reproached, taking back the album as though afraid Evelyn would say more bad things about her past self and somehow or other insult the album in the process.

 “You were very biased,” Evelyn teased, grinning wolfishly at her.

 “No – I just have impeccable taste.”

 Evelyn laughed and pulled her wife closer, despite her protests at being manhandled in such a way (even though they both knew it was mostly for show), before she pressed noisy kisses to the side of her face, “Very, very biased – so biased. So biased that there’s a photo of you beside the definition of the word, in the dictionary.” She went on, grinning, inches away from her lips, “The most biased, actually,” She added before kissing her softly. She felt Éliane cup her face and kiss her back, soft and pliant, and so welcoming and loving – like always, like it had been those first careful times what felt like a thousand lifetimes ago.

 “Just for you, darling,” Éliane murmured, moments later, when they parted to catch their breaths, “Always just for you.”

 Evelyn laughed and the sound of it thrilled Éliane who held her wife close, loving her more with each passing moment – with each breath she took. She still thrilled and marvelled that even so many years later, they still kept choosing each other, every single day and she knew that for as long as she lived, Evelyn would always have her.

 FIN

#pc: montreal #pc: edmonton #pc: fem!montreal #is that gonna be a tag now lamao #pc: fem!edmonton #evelyn murphy #éliane maisonneuve #au #fic #it's DONE

[ladyatthecrossroads]

prompt list 40.“You’re sweeter than cake.” with Caduceus if its not too much trouble?

Sorry this took so long to complete, anon. It’s a bit longer than I expected it to be. I hope you enjoy!Title: Sweeter Than CakePairing: Caduceus x readerWord Count: 2435

It feels good to be back in Zadash. Your adventuring party had dragged you all across the continent of Wildemount and beyond, to the shores of the Menagerie Coast and the waves of the Lucidian Ocean. Finally back in the Empire, you were more than happy to put the relatively lawless ways of the ocean and pirating aside. You had missed this, just walking along the cobbled streets, passing the various vendors out and about with their wares in the Pentamarket. The city was a hectic place, bustling with activity, but it definitely was preferable to struggling to survive on a boat in the middle of the ocean. This was downright relaxing, comparatively.

“Man, I can’t believe Caduceus has never had a birthday party,” comes the trilling voice of Jester as the two of you stroll along the boulevard. The easily excitable tiefling skips along beside you, occasionally linking arms with you for the briefest of moments before rushing off towards whatever stall or tent catches her eye. You, however, have a goal in mind, a very specific goal.

Leaving the rest of your party back at the Leaky Tap, you recall the conversation that brought you here, snooping about the Pentamarket in search of the best variety of baked goods you could find. The subject of birthdays had arisen, and Jester had been very eager to share the details of the various past parties her mama had thrown for her as a little girl. This had led to each of you throwing in your two copper on the matter and your own personal experiences.

Of course, you hadn’t missed the far off look on the firbolg cleric’s face that spoke of fond memories. He had lazily scrubbed at his brilliant pink beard with that thoughtful expression he always wore, commenting plainly on how many seasons it had been since he last celebrated a birthday with his family. And when you had questioned him further on the subject, he appeared to grow sheepish and told you about how his family never really threw “parties,” per se. Birthdays seemed more a day to ponder your personal growth and reflect inwardly on how best to serve the Wildmother. Seeing that this answer didn’t exactly satisfy you, he then made mention that his parents would always cook his favorite food, at least.

You can understand; Caduceus is an incredibly humble individual, after all, and humble celebrations seem enough to please him. Still, you can’t quite shake the odd lingering disquiet you feel. You care for all of your comrades, but the firbolg cleric is very dear to you.

From the first time you had laid eyes on him, he had exuded such a calming aura and had been a paramount force in overcoming your grief and coming to terms with the losses you all had sustained on the road thus far. He always made time to listen when you came to him with a problem, offering helpful advice. He was so insightful, even if he was a bit naïve to the outside world. You’d both promised to lean on each other for support whenever the need arose. It was for your mutual benefit, and ultimately the good of the group, you’d told yourself.

It seemed to just come naturally that you had then fallen for him.

You want to do this for him. He deserves it after everything Caduceus has done for you. For all of you. He deserves to know that he is irrevocably and undeniably a beloved member of the Mighty Nein.

“Oh, what about this one?” Jester’s attention is caught by a baker placing hot fruit pies out to cool in a store window. The aroma seeping out the front door smells nice; the sweetness of candied fruits and the savory scent of freshly baked breads combine and you find yourself leaning forward in that direction to catch more of the delicious fragrance. Your feet move almost of their own accord, drawn in by the promise of tasty treats within. The tiefling cleric is very eager to bound to your side, linking arms with you once again as the two of you enter the shop.

The tinkling of bells announce your arrival, even though the front door is already wide open. Magic almost seems to permeate the air; there’s a palpable buzz of arcane energy, intertwined in the heady scents of the pastries. A young woman wipes her hands on her apron and looks at you, and you can see she is of some sort of Elvish descent; half-elf, you wager. Her blue eyes twinkle at you and though she is fair of face, you can see shining silver strands among her ashen brown hair. It seems impossible to determine her age, as you know that half-elves generally live longer than a human yet not as long as a full-blooded elf.

She regards you with friendly curiosity and a warm smile. “Welcome,” she says, a lilt to her voice that reminds you of a certain lavender-skinned tiefling, and you smile in fond remembrance, “Can I help you find anything today?”

A brief, but detailed conversation ensues, occasionally interrupted by one of many of Jester’s seemingly endless lines of random questions. The clerk seems to have infinite patience. You describe the occasion and general idea of what you’re looking to buy, and she is very helpful in selecting a treat of appropriate taste and size. You leave with a cake box of a medium size and a sense of accomplishment and anticipation. You hope Caduceus will like it.

When you reach the Leaky Tap, your eyes search for your ragtag group. You find them quite easily; even in the dim lighting, Caduceus’s tall frame and pink hair are not difficult to spot. The firbolg’s back is to you as he converses with Fjord and Beau, but Caleb is the one to meet your gaze. A quick assessment of you and the package you hold and he gives you a knowing look when you silently plea for him not to spoil the surprise. He puts his head back down to the book he’s reading but you catch a small glimpse of a smile he tries to hide.

You glance at Jester and the tiefling is practically vibrating in excitement beside you. Her hands go to press upon your shoulders and urge you closer. You can feel your heart beating faster. Together, the two of you cross the room as inconspicuous as you can. Fjord and Beau glance up and over Caduceus’s shoulder, eyes widening and eyebrows cocking, and that gives him the clue to turn around; and that’s when the two of you begin to sing.

It’s entirely worth it. You inhale deeply as Jester and you belt out a somewhat harmonious rendition of Happy Birthday. Your arms present the wrapped confection, held out before you as you circle the table to set it down. Caduceus’s expression is filled with mild surprise and wonderment, his light pink eyes travelling over the expanse of your face before trailing down to the cake box you hold and then back up to meet your eyes. His smile is warm and gentle and you think you can see a faint warming of color bloom across his cheeks. It might just be a trick of the light; you aren’t certain.

“Well,” he says, in that low, rolling rumble of his, “This was unexpected. How nice.” He retracts his hands from where they were folded together on the table before him, and you set down the box. He sits there, eyes glued to you and your face, still smiling, lazy and content.

You puff your chest up in pride and gesture to the box before him. “Well, go on. Open it.” And, watching as those large hands of his move to the simply-tied string holding the container closed, your own fumble together, twisting and wringing as you bite your lip in earnest. “I hope you like it.”

What he reveals is the modestly decorated cake you had picked out. Instead of icing, you had asked for powdered confectioners sugar to be sprinkled liberally about the sponge. The cake itself was actually a dome of a lovely muted shade of green tinted with brown from the baking process. It is a simple design, nothing too fancy, as you had chosen it for flavor rather than looks.

Despite the outward humbleness of the cake’s appearance, Caduceus looks pleased. “Oh, wow. Look at that. That looks…” He closes his eyes and inhales the sweet scent, and you can practically see his eyes roll back in his head beneath his fluttering lids. His smile grows. “I know this smell. It’s wonderful.”

“I thought you would. It’s a tea cake… or, rather, it’s a cake made with tea. Green tea,” you correct yourself.

His head turns and a hand goes to wrap gently around your shoulder and pull you down to him into a hug. “You got me a green tea cake. That’s so nice. You didn’t have to get me a cake.” There’s a light note of bashfulness to his voice and you smile, returning the hug.

“I know I didn’t have to, but I wanted to do something nice for you,” you admit, heat rising to your face and you silently thank the gods that there is very low light in the tavern. “You’re always doing things for us, healing us, you know.”

“Yeah, Caduceus,” the other cleric chimes in, that teasing note in her voice as she pops up over on the other side of him, “And you know we wouldn’t do this for just anybody, you know? We really like you. And, I mean, some of us really, really like you. Like, a lot. Like, just so much, you know, so—“

Dear gods, she really did have to just ham it up, didn’t she. You shoot her a glare from behind Caduceus’s back before Fjord pipes up.

“I think the man gets it, Jester,” he says, clearing his throat and trying to inconspicuously glance between the two of you with a look. The air has gotten noticeably warmer, or maybe that’s just you. Either way, you’re grateful for the interference.

The tiefling has the audacity to shoot you an innocent look, despite the mischievous smile clear behind her eyes. When Caduceus turns to look up at you, she makes a rather inappropriate gesture in your line of sight. You want to smack her, but Caduceus grabs your hand and your attention.

“Thank you so much. This is more than anyone’s ever done for me in a long time. Really, thank you.” His eyes are squinted with delight as he looks up at you and his long ears do a happy little flick, and it is the most adorable thing you think you’ve ever seen; a seven-foot-tall, pink-haired firbolg being absolutely giddy at being able to celebrate his birthday so far from his home. He tugs gently on your hand. “Come sit. Let’s eat.”

From his pack, Caduceus produces a set of cutlery to start cutting the cake and you take them gently from his grasp to divvy up the slices yourself. You reserve him the first and biggest piece after sizing up just how much to give to everyone else, after which you all eagerly dig in.

The flavoring is subtle and not overly sweet and you can tell from the expressions of your compatriots that it had been a good while since they had indulged in something to satisfy their sweet tooth. Beau, Jester, Fjord and Nott all seem to devour their shares within mere seconds, whilst Yasha, Caleb and Caduceus each take their time and savor the experience.

You’re focusing so intently on Caduceus’s reaction, taking in every minute shift in expression with each bite he takes, how he seems to chew so methodically and ensure he gets everything out of it; the taste, the texture, every little nuance and flavor he can possibly experience. It’s downright mesmerizing how one man can be so thorough and savor each little bite.

Jester’s foot connects lightly with your shin under the table, snapping you out of your reverie. Maybe you’d been staring for a bit too long. You snap to attention, bashfully returning you your slice and finishing it off. It was delicious and so worth the cost.

A quick prestidigitation spell cleans off the plates and utensils and you help Caduceus gather and sort them all and put them away while the rest of your crew begin to go about their own independent business. Caleb sticks his nose back into his spell books; Nott has slipped into the crowd and disappeared; Fjord and Jester have gotten into some conversation about what plans to make for the coming day; Yasha is brooding in a corner; and you think you see Beau wandering over to the bar, practically itching to start a tavern brawl.

You, meanwhile, are pointedly not looking at Caduceus, fixating yourself on cleaning up the remnants of dessert and simply enjoying the relative silence before things get too rowdy. After a moment, you steel your nerve, asking, hopefully, “Did you like it?”

You don’t know how he does it, how he’s always so content all the time, how easily he grins like the cat that ate the canary, slowly, languorously. Somehow the world just melts away and it’s only you and him. “I did, thank you.”

“And it wasn’t too sweet?”

“Mm-mm,” he shakes his head, pink eyes warming over your face, “The cake was sweet, but…” He lifts one large hand, fingers outstretched, and you are powerless to move away as he gently swipes them down your cheek. As he pulls them away, you see a small smudge of powdered sugar that he brushes his thumb over. You lift your hands to your face, semi-self-conscious now of having any more sugar there, feeling the blush rapidly rise to the surface; you pray the light is low enough that the firbolg doesn’t notice.

But then he looks earnestly into your eyes and you catch your breath. His face is so close now that his breath fans across your lips. His thumb catches your chin and he leans in to peck gently at your lips, and you’re melting all over again.

Caduceus pulls away from you, and you see his tongue flicker out to pan over his bottom lip just briefly. Honestly, you feel a little woozy. Did Caduceus just… kiss you? Did that really just happen? You could die happy. He smiles.

“Just as I thought,” he rumbles, “You’re sweeter than cake.”

#critical role x reader #critical role #critical role imagine #critical role campaign 2 #caduceus x reader #caduceus clay #caduceus #mighty nein x reader #the mighty nein #x reader #reader insert #request fill

[raendown]

Pairing: MadaraTobirama Word count: 5175 Chapter: 24/42 Summary: Not all wars are fought on the battlefield. Some are fought at the conference table, with whispers in the shadows, or even in the bedroom.

In a world where the Senju and Uchiha traditional lands were too far apart to have ever made them enemies, Butsuma and Tajima are the ones who come together and sign a treaty of peace. Madara isn’t happy to have his life signed away for him in a political marriage to strengthen the bond between their clans. He is even less happy to have Tobirama make assumptions of him from their very first night together. What follows from there is a journey of healing, of learning, and finding the places to belong in the places least expected.

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Chapter 24

“Have you seen – oh. Thank you.” Tobirama paused in tearing apart his half of the closet to accept the folded bundle of material that appeared beside his head. He stood still for Madara to peck him on the cheek and drop the missing clothes off before trundling away again, unaware of the red eyes following him with soft gratitude.

Now that he had his favorite yukata in hand Tobirama was free to hurry in to the bathroom so he could get changed. It still confused him a little that Madara could go to a public bathhouse and not bat an eyelash yet the two of them changing in front of each other was somehow not allowed but he had decided it wouldn’t get him anything to push the boundaries. All that would accomplish would be a flustered, irritated husband and possible backsliding in the relationship they had both worked hard to build together.

Reminding himself to keep his mouth shut, he rushed through changing his clothes and used the large mirror over their sink to make sure everything about him was as well put together as possible. Today they were attending a large gathering in honor of Susumu’s birthday and although he knew she wouldn’t think anything of it even if he showed up covered in honey and blood he also knew the Uchiha elders still had a tendency to look a little too closely at him. Many in the clan had warmed up to him quite a bit since he stopped holding himself quite so far apart but the difference in the way he presented himself to others was still a little strange to them and the elders often had a hard time figuring out whether or not he was truly content among their people.

“Quit primping your hair and get out of there,” Madara called through the door, making him roll his eyes.

“If either of us spends too much time on their hair it is you,” he called back. When he opened the door Madara was huffing but he did not take his words back. “The bathroom is yours, your highness.”

“Damn straight I’m highness. My highness? I’m a highness? Oh just shut up and let me get in the bathroom!”

Tobirama nodded with a solemn expression until the other man pushed past him and threw the door shut, then he allowed a smile to peek through. What a ridiculous person.

It did take Madara significantly longer to get himself ready but Tobirama was gracious enough not to mention it and they were heading out for the celebration only a few minutes after his husband stomped back out of the bedroom with his hair somehow messier than when he had stormed inside. Outside they passed by many other clan members who had no connection to the crotchety old baker who sometimes joked about poisoning her pies. Tobirama noted every gaze that followed the two of them down the street and tallied up the ratio of approving glances versus blank disinterest, pleased to conclude that there were more people happy to see them out on a stroll together than there were people who had other thoughts, whatever those may be.

Once they reached the streets closer to Susumu’s home they started encountering other party guests, a couple of whom tried to pull them in to speculation over what sort of scandal would go down this year. Evidently the old biddy was sort of infamous for causing some kind of scene every year on the one day she claimed she should be able to get away with anything. Tobirama still wasn’t sure how he felt about the story Madara told him the night before recounting the year Susumu disappeared in to the woods and made the whole party chase her down for an hour and a half. She had apparently only returned for the bribe of alcohol.

“Are we expected to announce ourselves to the woman of the hour?” Tobirama asked as they let themselves in to the home.

“Nah. She mingles and finds people on her own.” Pausing to eye the snack table with interest, Madara shrugged. “We’ll see her at some point so don’t worry about it.”

“If you’re sure.”

“Let’s get some of that food, I am famished.”

Tobirama followed along and thought that sometimes it was very clear how this man could make such fast friends with his brother. Straight to the food table would have been Hashirama's first move as well and he would have been wearing just the same kind of eager light on his face, though Madara at least made a poor attempt to retain his dignity by not grabbing at the treats with his fingers, using whatever utensils were provided to portion out a few morsels.

It seemed like such a simple idea to turn and scope out somewhere for the two of them to sit down or even a corner to stand in while they nibbled on their food but in the few seconds Tobirama had his head turned away it was almost as though his companion had fallen through to another dimension, gone by the time he looked back. Blinking around the room yielded no sign of Madara anywhere. How was it possible for a man with such thunderous footsteps to slip away that quietly? It just didn’t seem fair. Or maybe that was the instinctual discomfort talking as Tobirama realized he was now alone in a room full of people he didn’t know how to talk to.

Much too dignified to call out for his husband over the noise of the crowd, Tobirama opted for moving through the people scattered about the home with a look of concentration on his face that he knew from experience usually gave off the impression that he knew where he was going. Generally people tended to stay out of his way when he put on that face and it did the same job now – mostly. He made it over to the other side of the living room and through the kitchen before something small yet solid collided with his legs.

“Sensei!”

He knew that voice. Tobirama looked down with a tiny smile already growing, unable to make himself feel irritated for nearly dropping his plate.

“I hadn’t expected to see you here today,” he murmured. Kagami beamed up at him and squeezed his leg harder.

“Hi! I’m glad sensei came! All the other adults are being boring and talking about adult stuff but sensei always says interesting stuff. Say something cool!” With that demand he stared up at his role model with eyes almost as wide as his grinning mouth. Tobirama stared back at him and tried not to look over at the people he could see giggling in his peripheral vision, pretending they were only laughing at the exuberant child.

“What constitutes ‘cool’?” he asked because it was always good to know the parameters of a given task.

Unfortunately his question sent the little imp off in a fit of his own giggles while all the adults turned away to make their amusement less obvious. Tobirama hoped his ears were not burning. Clearly he was making a fool of himself somehow but it was not his fault Kagami refused to clarify!

“Have you seen Madara?” he asked, hoping to change the subject since that one wasn’t doing him any favors.

“Nope! Come over here with me, sensei, I want to show you the backyard!”

The easiest thing to do was give in to his fate so rather than fight it Tobirama allowed a small hand to wrap around his own and pull him through the rest of the house towards the sizable backyard. One corner was taken up by a small table and several lawn chairs, some of them shaded under umbrellas while others had been left in the open for sunbathing. Another corner had a small garden with messy rows of what looked to be a mish mash of probably whatever seeds Susumu could find at the time, no rhyme or reason and no scheme to be found, but it did have a homey sort of charm that still reminded him a bit of Hashirama's greenhouse.

Mostly the yard was filled with more adults milling about with drinks or food in hand. Kagami pulled him along in a slow march around the perimeter while pointing out every tiny little detail he could think of, all of which Tobirama had already noticed, though he absolutely refused to say so. It was good to see Kagami’s observational skills had improved so much.

At the end of the impromptu tour Kagami asked him brightly if there was anything else he wanted to see.

“Our host, perhaps,” he suggested. “I don’t suppose you’ve happened to see her around? I should like to wish her a happy birthday.”

“Yeah! Yeah she’s probably still over in the side yard!”

“Lead on, then.”

He let himself be marched onwards once more through a small gate and found that Kagami had indeed been correct. Susumu may be short but her personality was so big it would have been hard not to see her the moment he turned the corner in to a small alley of grass between the homes. More flowers were planted here, though it looked like the seeds might have been blown in by the wind rather than tended by any human hands. The birthday girl was dancing around directly on top of one as she demonstrated something for an amusing story she seemed to be recounting.

The moment she spotted him, however, the story came to a grinding halt so she could put both hands on her hips and grin at him in a way that made Tobirama consider turning around to flee.

“Don’t do that,” he told her admonishingly. “I don’t like that face.”

“You dog!” she cried. Then she leapt forward to smack him on the arm and laugh at the bafflement on his face.

“I am not a dog.”

“Oh you know what I mean. I hear you and that no good student of mine are very close these days.” To his embarrassment, it took a raunchy wink for her meaning to sink in.

Tobirama pinched the bridge of his nose and ignored the confused questions from Kagami as his own student tried to figure out what that was supposed to mean. “Do lower your voice, if you don’t mind. That isn’t the sort of thing one shouts out to an entire house full of people.”

“Aw take the breadstick out of your ass, we’re not even inside!” Susumu laughed his concerns away but he did notice she spoke a little lower this time.

“I came to wish you good tidings. Congratulations on making another trip around the sun without dying,” he told her in his driest tone. She roared with laughter and pounded his arm again. “I don’t suppose Madara stopped by to say the same? We lost track of each other as soon as he dropped whatever sugary monstrosity this is on my plate.”

Both of them looked down to see the baked treat directly in the middle of all the healthy vegetables he had chosen for himself. He knew it was likely she was the one who baked the treat but it wasn’t blueberry so he wasn’t going to eat it; Madara probably dropped it there just to annoy him. Or maybe because he’d run out of room on his own plate and he knew it would be safe there.

“Haven’t seen him.”

“Mn.” Tobirama very carefully did not allow his nose to wrinkle. Without Madara's company he wasn’t sure how long he could last without accidentally offending someone and ruining all the effort he’d put in to improving the goodwill between himself and the rest of the Uchiha clan.

“You look a little constipated,” Susumu distracted him before he could spiral. “Got something on your mind?”

Shoving down his first instinct to find offense in that, Tobirama blinked at her thoughtfully. Of all the many things he wouldn’t care to bring up with Madara for fear of upsetting the balance he couldn’t think of a single one that was likely to offend Susumu; she seemed fairly unflappable in all the interactions he’d had with her. Something must have shown on his face for her to see that he indeed had something more than well wishes to say.

He was a little concerned when she turned to the handful of people she’d been telling her story to and shooed them away but they took it with little surprise and no complaints, obviously used to this behavior. Susumu glared at their backs until they had all moseyed around to the backyard proper and then turned to set her gaze on Kagami. The little mite stared back at her with the emptyheaded sort of happiness only children and true fools could achieve. Tobirama had seen it often enough on his own brother.

“What do you think you’re still doing here?” she demanded.

“I want to stay with sensei.”

“Too bad! You can’t!”

“You’re not the boss of me,” Kagami pointed out. “Sensei is!”

Tobirama ignored the warmth clenching in his chest and dropped a hand to scrub at dark curls. “Your boss has a mission for you then. Find Madara and tell him he’s a naughty thing for abandoning me like that. Also tell him that he’d better not wait for me to find him first or else.”

“Or else what?” Kagami asked breathlessly. With a mild shrug Tobirama smiled.

“Nothing. I just want him to sweat a little bit.”

Making his student laugh was a simple joy that he felt no guilt for cherishing, clinging to the sound of it as Kagami turned and flew across the grass to weave his way through the party goers in search of his target. Only when he was entirely out of sight did Tobirama turn back to the woman waiting for him and clear his throat, entirely unsure of where to start.

She must have seen his struggle once more, giving him a brief command of, “Just be blunt.”

“Right. I was hoping to ask you something I don’t think Madara is prepared to talk about. As I understand it, in your culture sex is…important to a relationship, something not to be shared lightly. That bit is clear. What I wanted to know was, ah…” Rubbing at the back of his neck did nothing to quell the embarrassment rising thick in his throat, forcing him to forge on at nearly a full octave lower than his regular speaking voice. “Does that apply to all intimacies? Or merely the act of intercourse?”

Physical relationships hadn’t been a big deal to him since he was old enough to have the process explained to him and experiment a little with a few people close to his own age. Which also, however, meant that he hadn’t had to ask anyone for advice on sexual matters in quite a long time either and he was now discovering the utter awkwardness of it all. The eyebrow Susumu had lifted was not helping, either.

“You want to know if you two can fool around in the sheets a bit?” she summarized. Tobirama gurgled.

“Nothing so crass!”

“Oh don’t try to slip past me with fancy wording. Dress it up however you like, you want to get a little busy with my precious biscuit and you want to know if it’ll freak him out again!” The laughter she followed her words with, in his opinion, was not at all necessary.

Scowling to combat the mortification of having his motivations broken down in to something much too simplistic, Tobirama didn’t bother correcting her. He could see when he would not win that fight and there was no point in wasting his time trying to convince her of what he really had in mind for this topic. After a calming breath he tried to bring the conversation back on track before more company showed up.

“Is it against your culture or not?” he asked. “This isn’t exactly something we’ve ever sat down to have an in-depth discussion about and I would not like to make another misstep as I did on our wedding night.”

“Fine, fine. It’s…frowned upon. Madara is his own person and he is free to make choices for himself but he knows that if anyone found out somehow that he gave his body to someone he wasn’t in love with his peers would lose some respect for him. They would think he acted little better than a red district harlot.”

“Ah. I see.” Tobirama knit his brows together, a little angered by that but unwilling to speak out against a culture not his own.

“On the opposite hand, there’s some other factors to consider as well. The two of you are married and everyone knows you’re quite happy now. It’s not exactly far-fetched for a married couple to be intimate with each other, you know? And on top of that: wasn’t the hardest part of the beginning trying not to let the public know you weren’t happy? For all anyone knows the two of you have been boinking on every surface in your house this whole time.” Susumu snickered when Tobirama balked.

Boinking was not a term he expected nor one he appreciated being used in conjunction to his relationship with Madara. Half the reason he was asking was out of a desire to express his affection in the best way he knew how. From puberty he had learned to show how he felt using his body in whatever way was appropriate to the situation, small pats and hugs for his brother in private moments, holding Touka’s hand on the rare occasion she needed someone there for her and then never mentioning it again.

With Madara things were a little more complicated. He felt more than he currently had the tools to express and yet he didn’t feel comfortable using words that wouldn’t be returned in kind. Intimacy, however, was something he knew very well.

“Thank you for being so straightforward,” he said. What she had told him would need a little thinking on but his first impression was that it simply wouldn’t be a good idea to ask anything more of Madara than they currently had. The last thing he wanted was to drive a wedge between them again and in all honesty he truly was content with the way things were; if he were unable to express himself a little more, well, it wasn’t as though he would have expected Madara to know what he was trying to say anyway. If the best thing to do was to wait for Madara to initiate anything further then he would do so without complaint.

“Blunt is my specialty,” Susumu declared, tossing her head with a little snap of sass. It would have been much more impressive if her hair weren’t caught up in its usual tight bun.

“I do not doubt that. Should we rejoin the party?”

“Yeah, let’s go find your husband and pretend we’re both mad at him. Want to take bets on how long it takes him to crack and start apologizing for nothing?”

Tobirama granted her a tight smirk and offered a respectful arm. She accepted with an off-color comment he chose to ignore as he led them both around to the back of the house where several people gave them curious looks but he chose to ignore those too.

As predicted, Madara was already nervous by the time he shoved his way through the crowd inside the house to find them and spent several minutes dancing around his words trying to figure out what he’d done before demanding they tell him so he could just get the apology over with. He was not happy to have Susumu laugh in his face and declare herself the winner of the bet. Not wanting it to get too out of hand, Tobirama diffused the anger before it could properly build by brushing their hands together discretely, linking their smallest fingers together in what to him counted as quite a public gesture. He was embarrassingly thrilled to feel Madara weave their hands together properly – even if the man was still glaring at him.

Before he could allow himself to get too wrapped up in their own little bubble of intimacy Tobirama was distracted by the appearance of Kagami at his side once more, smiling brilliantly up at him with both hands on his hips.

“Did I do good, sensei? Was he scared? He seemed really scared when I told him he did something bad.”

“Snot-nosed little weasel,” Madara grumbled. “You were in on it!”

“And he did very well indeed,” Tobirama said.

Kagami squirmed joyfully for a moment. Then he visibly restrained himself and gave a sober nod of thanks. “Mama says I should treat you with more respect. So, uh, thank you.”

The effort lasted for perhaps ten seconds before Tobirama very solemnly offered him whatever baked sweet was in the center of the plate he was still toting around. As soon as he was offered a bit of sugar all thoughts of propriety flew out the window and Kagami was back to his usual self, bouncing and twirling in what appeared to be some obscure sort of dance as he devoured his gift. Madara glared at him a little harder for swiping his food.

As amusing as the two of them were to watch it was that much more interesting to watch Susumu’s head jackrabbit from one side to the other with something undetermined yet dangerous in her eyes. Before Tobirama could ask what she was thinking about she had disappeared to squirm underneath someone’s legs, completely ignoring their startled exclamation as she scurried along on her mission with no thought for dignity. Tobirama cocked his head to one side and followed her with his gaze as she disappeared in to the kitchen and reappeared only a minute or so later. He bit the inside of his cheek when she ducked under the same poor man’s legs to come back.

She looked more dangerous than ever as she pressed a fistful of something in to Kagami’s hand and closed his fingers over the bounty before anyone could see what it was.

“Would it be safer for us to evacuate the premises?” Tobirama asked hesitantly, not wanting to seem impolite.

“It’d save your nostrils, that’s for sure!”

“Right. Come along, Madara.”

Grunting when his arms was tugged firmly, Madara kept his eyes locked on Kagami and Susumu as he let out a protesting, “Hey! What gives?”

“I do believe the two of them are about to start in on whatever madness your teacher has in her head for this year’s entertainment.” Tobirama pulled his husband close so they could speak without being heard over the muted roar of several dozen conversations. “I’m not sure what she just handed to Kagami but I would bet a good week’s pay it was either smoke bombs or flash bangs.”

“Oh excellent.” Madara did nothing to hide the cackles that spilled out as Tobirama pulled them towards the front door and then thought the better of it.

Nothing would seem more suspicious than the two of them escaping the party to go home just before the excitement started and it seemed a pity to leave so soon after arriving. He rerouted them towards a side door when he spotted one and hustled the two of them outside on the opposite side of the house where nothing grew but weeds in an unmaintained side yard. The brick wall several feet from the side of the house probably had much to do with that.

“We’re not going home?” Madara asked and Tobirama shook his head.

“Just escaping the worst of the madness. Unless you’d like to go back inside and deal with whatever she and Kagami are about to unleash?”

“No, I think this is fine. Kind of boring though.” His husband looked around at the grass and brick and weeds with a distasteful twist of his lips, clearly judging as though he were some sort of landscaping expert disparaging the choices of whoever thought to build their home here. It made Tobirama smile. How soon they all forgot the frantic speed with which the original buildings had been raised and the slapdash nature Tobirama had not entirely been able to convince their fathers out of.

A dozen and more blueprints he had designed and still they had let buildings from each clan run free to create chaos as they would. The memory still made him shudder when he thought about it.

Looking back over his shoulder, Tobirama wondered how long it would be best to stay out here. He didn’t hear any shouting yet but he had no doubt it would start soon; it was probably safest just to wait for that to die out. Or maybe a little longer. Who knew whether Susumu had a secondary plan of some kind up her sleeve?

“I’m sure we could find something to keep you entertained,” he murmured after a few beats.

Rather than blink at him curiously as expected Madara dipped his chin to look up through his lashes with an expression that would almost be considered coy if it weren’t so blatantly hungry, clearly picking up on what Tobirama was really trying to say and offering no resistance.

Without another word Tobirama slid both hands around his husband’s waist and pulled him close for a warm kiss that almost managed to drown out the sudden cacophony from the other side of the door. It wasn’t fire and it wasn’t brimstone but in that moment Tobirama had everything he needed in one small village growing bigger with every day, everything he wanted between his hands and the strength not to hold too tightly for fear it would all slip away from his grasp. With an old woman’s words in his mind Tobirama let Madara come to him, asking no more than his partner wanted to give.

He yearned. Oh how he yearned. No one was here to see it if they pressed themselves against that forgotten brick wall where he could show this man more pleasures than he’d ever dreamed of and maybe take a few in return. Closing his eyes just a little bit tighter, he pushed those thoughts away.

So caught up was he in reminding himself to hold back that he nearly leapt out of his skin when he felt hesitant fingers pushing under the collar of his shirt to stroke along the lines of his collar bone. The move was unexpected enough that it shocked an involuntary sound right out of him, a groan that rumbled up from the bottom of his soul. Madara shivered against him and slipped another finger under soft cotton until Tobirama caught his wrist and gently pulled the questing hand away.

“You, husband, are a very dangerous man. Did you know that?”

“Um. Yes. Why does that mean you have to stop kissing me? We were busy, if you didn’t notice.” Madara huffed at him and he shook his head.  

Ducking in for one more kiss, he leaned forward to gently rest their foreheads together. “I did not mean dangerous in that sense.”

“Oh. Oh. Were you–?”

“You caught me off guard, that’s all. I promise to control myself a little better in the future.”

“No that’s– I mean, sorry?” Madara frowned and puffed his cheeks out with embarrassment but, to his credit, he didn’t make any move to pull away. “I mean I don’t…mind…if you like something I do…I guess.” With every fragment of sentence his frown deepened and Tobirama would have pitied him the awkwardness if he weren’t feeling quite the same.

He wasn’t entirely sure how Madara intended his broken words but the message which came across was that he didn’t mind if Tobirama found himself aroused by something as long as he didn’t wave it around or anything. The last bit was mostly implied by extension of logic.

“Do me a favor?” Tobirama murmured.

“Mn?”

“Stop talking and just kiss me again before one of us does something even more idiotic.”

“I can do that.” Gratitude stamped across his face, Madara pulled him down and all but devoured him. Other than the residual awkwardness in needing to keep his hips tilted away at just the right angle, Tobirama had no problem with that.

He did have a problem with being interrupted when the door opened some ten minutes later for Kagami to spill through it and almost send them both crashing to the ground. Unrepentant giggling proceeded a rather lackluster apology before the boy immediately set off on an excitable tale of why his hair was now covered with an unidentifiable red goop. Tobirama noted Madara inching out of sight behind him and valiantly kept his student’s attention occupied until the other man was finished readjusting himself.

Apparently he wasn’t the only one who enjoyed their kisses a little too much, a very interesting point that he would need to think about for a while before he could decipher the entirety of how that made him feel.

“You should come back in, Madara-sama. I think I heard someone say that Susumu-baasan went too far this time and they’re gonna take her head off and he didn’t like it when she laughed in his face. They’re fighting in the living room. Baasan said it was just sparring but that’s not how sensei spars with me!”

“Oh for hell’s sake,” Madara sighed exasperatedly. He didn’t seem too worried, though he did shuffle around Tobirama to head back inside. “Always cleaning up the old hag’s messes.”

“Should we be in any way concerned?” Tobirama asked mildly.

Kagami bounced over to pull him along as well. “Baasan always makes someone angry at her birthday parties. I think she thinks it’s funny.”

“That does sound like her,” he admitted.

It wasn’t quite the entertainment he had planned on going back to for at least another ten minutes but if the look Madara threw over one shoulder was anything to go by then this wasn’t exactly the end of their little distraction. With a smile Tobirama followed his two favorite Uchiha in to the chaos; he could while away a few more hours here if the reward was to have Madara all to himself later. That would always be a good trade in his books.

As they opened the door, however, Kagami piped up with another little nugget of information neither of them had expected to hear.

“Sensei should probably come inside too anyway. Your dad is here! Momma says I need to be extra respectful of him but he didn’t seem to like it when I laughed at him for having sticky hair. Do you think he hates me now?” He didn’t seem to notice that his words sent icy cold slithering down Tobirama’s spine.

“I’m sorry…my father is what?”

#rae writes #madatobi #madara #tobirama #kagami #susumu #fanfiction

[voids-colourful-creations]

More and More, Still Moving Forward - A SatoPika Fic

[Read on Ao3]

Rated G - No Warnings Gen Pokemon Sun and Moon Pikachu & Satoshi 942 Words

Summary: It's the end of an era, the Manalo Conference is all wrapped up. There's a lot to think about, and a lot to say thank you for.

Notes: This version of the fic uses the Japanese Dub Names (ex, Satoshi). Read the English Dub Names (ex, Ash) version HERE. This was written for @ashpikazine ! It was a super fun time! Enjoy the fic =D!

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For the third time, Kukui reaches down to ruffle Satoshi’s hair through his hat, not that Satoshi minds. He’s certainly earned it now, Alolan Champion, 30 minutes reigning. He’s worked good and hard to get to this far; he deserves to take pride in that. They do; Satoshi and his team, his friends and family.

“I’m so proud of you, you know that?” Kukui says softly. His voice is quieter than it needs to be. There aren’t any trainers in the backstage corridors of Manalo Stadium. Not that they’d mind, regardless.

Satoshi laughs sheepishly.

“Yeah, I know. Thank you, Professor. For the compliment and… everything else.”

He leaves it at that. Doesn’t need to elaborate.

Pikachu, curled up comfortably in Satoshi’s arms, chimes in.

“Pika-pikachu!”

Kukui laughs.

“You’re both very welcome.”

It’s comfortingly quiet for a moment, only their footsteps in-between the silence, stark contrast from the roaring of the crowd that had enveloped them moments earlier.

They round the corner carefully, returning to the same benches Satoshi had sat on before he’d entered the stadium for his final battle, contemplating whether this was finally it, if he would win .

Satoshi plops himself down on the bench, leaning back against the cool concrete wall. He’s still running hot with excitement, and it's nice to rest.

Kukui walks over, kneeling so their eyes meet.

“Now, promise me. No matter how much the rest of the class is dying to see you, don’t leave until I come to get you, okay?”

Satoshi knows, nods.

Kukui sighs.

“It’s not fair, I know. You should be able to celebrate with your friends, we just… we underestimated how eager reporters would be to interview the participants and…” He trails off momentarily. “Just wait for me, alright?”

Satoshi hums in reply, and then the professor is gone.

In all honesty, Satoshi doesn’t mind waiting all that much. In general, yes, waiting was awful, but this time… it felt nice. A breather, a break.

Pikachu curls into a little ball on Satoshi’s lap, vibrating lightly as he breathes. His breath is calm, steady. If it weren’t for the fact that he’d been there, Satoshi would never have known Pikachu had been fighting for his life a few moments ago.

Satoshi scuffs his shoe on the floor, mindlessly petting Pikachu as it purrs.

“Piiiiiikaaaa.”

For once Satoshi isn’t restless. Must’ve used up all his energy battling. He’s satisfied. It’s a wonderful feeling, satisfaction.

Pikachu’s claws press into Satoshi’s leg through the fabric of his pants. Pikachu sighs again, and Satoshi does the same.

“We did it buddy… we really did it…”

Satoshi breathes out, voice light in the silence.

“But you and everyone did all the work! Mukuroh trained so hard right at the last minute and Nya- Gaogaen, evolving! And-“

Satoshi is cut off by Pikachu’s paw, reaching up to tap his face. It lands squarely on his forehead.

“Pika-pi-pikaaaachu! Chu-pichu!”

Satoshi giggles.

“And I helped. I helped too. It’s our victory.”

This seems to satisfy Pikachu, who settles back down in Satoshi’s lap.

“Really, though. Thank you, Pikachu. All over the world, all this time…. You’ve always been by my side! Look at all we’ve accomplished, all we have to show for it! The titles, the trophies, yes-“

He trails off for a moment, reminiscing on past battles. Hiroshi, Hazuki, Tetsuya, Takuto, Kotetsu, Alain . Old losses. Sauboh, Hau, Guzma, Gladio and Kukui. New wins. Whoever else awaited in the future. He takes a deep breath, regaining his composure.

“But more than that…”

Satoshi looks down. Pikachu looks up at him. His own face, wobbly and distorted, is reflected in Pikachu’s large, brown eyes.

“But more than that, you’re my partner. My most precious friend. We’ve met so many people all across our journey, and I know it wouldn’t have been the same without you. Thank you for choosing me, again and again through all these battles, through everything!"

He laughs again, a quieter, slightly bittersweet laugh.

“Sometimes I think you’ve trained me just as much as I’ve trained you! If it weren’t for you, I might still be the same brat I was when we met.”

Pikachu nods at this. “Pikaaaachu.”

“Hey! What I mean is that you’ve taught me a lot, shown me all the ways Pokémon and people should work together!”

“Pika-pika-pika-chu-chu-pika. Chu-pika-pi-chu!”

Pikachu sits up again, reaching out his claws in a grabby ‘Come here!’ motion. Satoshi leans down, obliging.

Pikachu smiles, pressing his face against Satoshi’s. Tiny crackles of electricity tickle Satoshi’s cheek, but Pikachu is careful, would never release enough electricity to really hurt him.

When Pikachu finishes, he stares up at Satoshi again, unblinking.

“Ka-pi-pikachu-pi?”

Satoshi grins sharply, determination piercing through his eyes.

“Hey, don’t think I’m giving up alright? We may be champions but there’s still a long way to go before we’re really Pokémon Masters!”

Pikachu raises his fists, squeaking in equal excitement.

“Exactly! We’ll keep moving forward together, more and more and more and more and mooooore!”

He stomps his feet, drumming them against the floor to match the pounding of his heart, like the roar of the crowd in his ears. He can hear it, picture it so clearly that the sound surrounds him even when it’s silent.

“Pipi-kachu!”

“Yeah,” Satoshi says with a smile. “You and me, buddy.”

He reaches down and wraps his arms around Pikachu, holding him tightly. Pikachu grabs onto Satoshi’s arms, tiny claws digging into his skin ever so slightly, but Satoshi doesn’t mind. He lifts Pikachu up and holds him against his chest again, close enough so that he can feel the Pokémon’s breathing.

“Thank you, Pikachu.”

“Pikapi-pikachuuu.”

He holds Pikachu tightly, pouring all his ambition and hope and anticipation into the gesture, hoping, knowing, that Pikachu will understand.

“Satoshi?” Kukui’s head peeks around the corner. “We’re all clear now.”

Satoshi smiles.

“Ready, Pikachu?” he asks as he stands. Pikachu nods happily. He’s asking in more ways than one, but Pikachu’s answering in kind.

“Then, let’s go!”

[End]

#anipoke #pokeani #pokemon #pokemon sun and moon #pokemon sm #sm pokemon #pokeani sm #pokemon fic #pkmn fic #voids fic #trainer satoshi #ash ketchum #pikachu #professor kukui #pokemon kukui #zine stuff

[doraspn]

15x06 sort-of-coda

here it is sis, the third part @boysforpielie sorry that it’s been yet again prolonged lmfao i did NOT plan for this to get so long 

Cas left. Dean is drinking his feelings away. He may or may not pray to Cas. They may or may not end up making out. I honestly wouldn’t know, I’m not from around here.

1 of 4 | 2 of 4 | 3 of 4 | 4 of 4

Cas found himself standing in the glow of a fully decorated Christmas tree displayed in one of the many store windows. It was too early for Christmas decorations but Cas didn’t mind. The colorful lights it donned shone so bright against the surrounding night. It reminded him of the time he still believed in God, when looking at his father’s creations still made him feel sublime. Things like the tree before him were still worth looking at and Cas still loved humanity, but nothing felt quite as holy as before. Especially since he left the bunker, left Dean.

Cas knew it was only a matter of time before they reached the point of no return. And this was it. Dean no longer cared for him and there was no place for him in Dean’s life anymore. Cas wished he got to see Dean happy before he was forced to leave, see him safe and for once not fighting for the sake of the entire world. He loved the brief moments of peace they got to enjoy in-between the smaller battles, on their way to the bigger battles, when Dean would wear his novelty clothing with strange designs that almost always made Sam share a secret look with Cas behind his back, eat pie and passionately explain to Cas why one thing was better than another, usually in relation to television shows and cinema.

Cas told Dean he was going to move on but he knew, even as he was saying the words, that that’s impossible for him. Soon after meeting Dean even Heaven became a strange place, a place he had to return from, and the moment he abandoned the only home he’d ever known, Dean took its place. Cas was not of this Earth, space and time to him were such narrow constructs, so the only place vast enough to compare with Heaven, the only thing on Earth that wasn’t too restricting for the angel to tie himself to was Dean, so Dean became home. Every time Cas went away and no matter how much time he spent there, this never changed. So of course he missed Dean. So much so he allowed himself to imagine for a moment a Christmas tree in the bunker. Perhaps he would have baked some pie as he did learn a little about pies along the way. Jack would have gotten the most presents, at least two from each of them. Sam would have been the one to put the star at the top of the tree, since he’s the tallest among them. Dean would have organised a movie viewing and they would have all squeezed together to watch and listen as he explained why the Christmas movies he picked were better than all other Christmas movies known to man.

In that moment a little boy rushed past Cas, dressed in a Batman costume. Cas smiled to himself as he watched him run, unburdened and free. Dean would have probably been like that, if his life weren’t written by a selfish, cruel and capricious God. Cas already decided he was going to do whatever he could to help bring down Chuck, even if all that awaited for him at the end was The Empty. Not just for Dean, although he was a huge part of the reason why. He did want to give Dean his freedom, if it was at all in his power to do so. He also wanted to avenge Jack.

Cas pulled out his phone and navigated over to the text messages where Sam's unanswered questions waited for him. Cas knew he couldn’t be around Dean like he used to but he wanted to assure Sam that he was alright and make sure he understood that Cas was there if he, if they, needed him. He slowly typed out his response in the warm glow of the Christmas lights.

And then he heard his name, a mere whisper. Turning around yielded no results - only families, huddled together and walking by in good spirits. He almost thought he imagined it when he heard it the second time. This time it sounded more like a cry. Alarmed, Cas stilled completely, concentrating all his remaining power to listen in. Was there a problem? Were Sam and Dean in danger?

Then, in what was unmistakably Dean’s voice, though decidedly broken, he heard the words he remembered well. Dean talked about that particular scene for at least one hour, and that was before they even watched the movie. Contrary to Dean’s intentions, this made Cas spend the entire scene observing Dean instead of watching the screen. He was so engrossed, mesmerized. What was it that he said?

“it sounds lame but it’s not. Alabama, the girl, she’s cool, and so is Clarence Worley. I mean, he’s Clarence Worley! And when she tells him she’s into him, they’re on this roof top and she like, bares her soul to him. It’s raw and gritty and cool. You’ll like it, Cas.”

It was a confession scene, in more ways than one, and while Cas didn’t pay attention to the screen the first time it played out, Dean made sure he saw it by replaying the entire scene a couple more times. And Cas remembered it well. As embarrassing as it was to have to contact Dean for assistance while bearing the name Clarence Worley, Cas felt better keeping these moments as close to him as possible, even at times like these, especially at times like these.

He didn’t know if he had the necessary power to accomplish what he wanted to until he found himself standing in front of Dean’s bed. Dean’s head was hanging low, his hands together in prayer.

“Hello, Dean,” was what came out his mouth, as if nothing changed.

I took a while before Dean lifted his head. The first thing Cas noticed were the tears threatening to spill out of his green eyes. Dean stared at Cas in silence for what felt like forever, Cas did not use that term lightly. Then Dean suddenly stood up and closed the space between them in a few easy strides before wrapping his arms around Cas, embracing him. He held him so tightly that Cas was sure he would have been unable to breathe were he human.

Cas remained still for the longest time, too shocked and confused to do anything. Then he grew very concerned. Was there something wrong with Sam? But Dean didn’t answer or let go, he just cried, nestled in the space between cas’ neck and shoulder. Then the I’m sorry’s came and it didn’t seem like they’d ever stop. Cas finally regained some composure and put his hands on Dean’s back, trying to soothe him.

“It’s okay, Dean” he said, “it’s okay,” but Dean kept crying until sleep took him.

#wtf even is this #lmfao #sorry #sort of coda #flamingo writes

[peanutbutterjelly-pie]

Gubble-Hubble

content: Dean and Castiel have to face a hard challenge.

word count: 917

“Cas ...”

“I know, Dean.”

“Do you really think we should do this?”

“Do we have a choice?”

“There's always another way, Cas.”

“Not this time, I'm afraid.”

“But … I'm really not sure I'm gonna survive this …”

“We survived more than one apocalypse. You will be fine, Dean.”

“I hate to break it to you, babe, but we did die several times during those apocalypses –  uh, apocalypsi, whatever. This is seriously not your best argument here.”

“Just shut up, Dean, and stop being so overdramatic.”

“Jeez, Cas, why did I even marry your rude ass?”

Castiel chuckles before waggling his eyebrows in a way that is probably meant to be suggestive, but looks kinda dorky and weird instead, and Dean would've kissed him senseless here and now because he just can't resist his husband ever, even while having stupid fights, it's just his ultimate weakness – but then he's jerked back into reality when a plate is placed right in front of him.

A plate filled with food.

Food beyond recognition.

It sure looks like something a werewolf puked into a back alley.

Under normal circumstances Dean would've grimaced hard and offered a lot of profanities faced with such an abomination, but a pair of big green eyes staring right at him keeps him silent. Damn, he even manages a smile. It's forced and absolutely unconvincing, but their little daughter beams at the sight of it.

“You need to eat, Daddy,” Grace urges gleefully before sliding another plate toward Castiel who seemed to have surrendered to his fate as he grabs a fork and begins to poke the unrecognizable mass of … well, something.

Dean has no clue why their little girl suddenly insisted on cooking her fathers a meal. Maybe she saw it on TV, maybe her favorite Uncle Sammy, that bastard, suggested it to her, finally getting payback for all the pranks he had to endure in their childhood …

Yeah, Dean doesn't know what came over Grace, but she looks so proud of herself and Dean seriously doesn't want to steal her thunder.

“This looks very tasty, love,” Castiel says and somehow he accomplishes to sound sincere. “What is it?”

“It's gubble-hubble,” she announces, giggling.

It actually looks more like she threw everything they had in their fridge together into one big thing and sprinkled some Fruit Loops and wieners on top for good measure.

“We are honestly blessed with such a skilled and creative daughter,” Castiel says softly, smiling at Grace like she's the best damned thing that ever happened to him (and well, she totally is). “She's already creating her own dishes.”

Dean can't really argue with him on that one. Sure, her gubble-hubble or whatever seems absolutely inedible, but considering what kind of unusual and strange meals he made back in the days as a child in order to feed Sam he doesn't have a right to complain. Hell, it even looks slightly more not-awful than some of the stuff he created.

“Eat, eat, eat,” she pushes them, obviously excited about their judgment. And Dean has never been able to deny her anything.

As expected the food is terrible. It's spicy and sweet and salty and gravy and dry – and a million other things that makes it into the Top Ten of the most horrible things he ever had the honor to try. But nonetheless Dean chews and chews and swallows while simultaneously smiling at Grace though he feels more like crying.

He notices that Castiel next to him is doing the same. His disgust is very subtle (Dean's actually quite sure that he's the only person on the planet able to recognize it) as he rolls the food around in his mouth like he's savoring the taste.

“This is quite delicious,” Castiel eventually says after he achieved to swallow while some tears prickled in his eyes. “You are very talented, honey.”

“It would've been great for torturing demons,” Dean mumbles underneath his breath and promptly gets kicked in the shin by a scowling Castiel.

“So you like it?” Grace asks.

“Well, it's way better than anything I made at your age,” Dean offers, having not the heart to outright lie to her, but not wanting to tell her to cold, hard truth either.

“So I can cook now all the time?” she wonders, hope swinging in her voice.

Dean fights back the urge to pull a face. “You're more than welcome to help in the kitchen if you want. Dad and I can teach you some cool stuff.”

“Even making some pie?” she asks with big eyes. “All the pies for Daddy?”

Dean feels his heart swell at least three sizes as she lists all the different kinds of pie she wants to bake for him.

“We're gonna make some pie together tomorrow, how about that?” Castiel suggests. “Just for your father. He will like that.”

His gaze becomes so gentle when he turns toward his husband that Dean can't help but surge forward and capture those lips in a searing kiss. And though Castiel tastes like gubble-hubble and they're both smiling way too hard to turn this into a proper kiss, it's still probably the best one they ever had.

Right here in their kitchen, with the most disgusting pile of food poisoning their air and their little girl grinning at them.

#destiel #destiel drabble #fanfic #fic #fluff #established relationship #married!destiel #kid!fic #fanfiction: mine

[digikate813]

My Little Pony Re-Watch: Episode 53 & 54 The Crystal Empire

*We’re up to Season 3! The first season I watched as it was coming out. Not all of it because i was still a little embarrassed to be watching this show, but I was excited for it nonetheless. And this is yet again a controversial episode. For a while it was deemed the worst season premiere. But I’ve always liked it and i still do.

*Twilight stresses out over Celestia giving her an assignment. I know. I’m shocked too!

*Nah! Luna doesn’t have to come along. I mean come on. Luna on an epic quest with the Mane Six to a lost kingdom? Who wants to see that?! Well at least there’s a new stain glass window depicting Cadance and Shining Armor’s victory that’s very pretty.

*I love the idea of a long lost kingdom with the Crystal Empire. Though I’ve always felt that detail of the spirit that embodies the empire reflecting across all of Equestria has never been utilized as well as it could have been. I think it was just a way to build stakes but honestly protecting a very populated empire is stakes enough as far as I’m concerned. 

*And we are introduced to it’s former ruler and our villain for this episode, King Sombra. A pony of shadows of sorts before we got an, actual pony of shadows. A lot of people say he’s a very, very weak villain. And while he’s by no means the best villain, I say that reputation is a bit unwarranted. I’ll touch on this more as we go on, but Sombra is a villain that is nothing else, thinks ahead. He put the curse on the empire to make it vanish for 1,000 years. Possibly waiting until he could regain enough strength to reclaim it.

*Also there were a lot of fan theories for a while that Sombra was somehow connected to Luna becoming Nightmare Moon. I don’t know why either.

*The Failure Song is a cute song, but the most noteworthy thing about it is that it’s the first time Spike gets to sing. At all. I can’t believe it took this long, but it says a lot about how much the show just couldn’t find places for Spike in the early seasons.

*Going back to what I was saying last time about Shining Armor and Cadance’s sudden appearance not really bothering me because a lot of TV shows have siblings appear out of nowhere, more often then not those siblings also disappear barely to be mentioned again. And I like that this episode tells us that Shining Armor and Cadance were not just one off characters to tell a single story. They gave then important roles in this world, and they’re going to stick around.

*Also Cadance is casting the shield this time to protect the kingdom. Role reversal!

*Apparently the Crystal Empire is inhabited by crystal ponies. Which is cool. Not the most creative species in Equestria but y’know, I’m all for expanding the world. But Rarity’s reaction makes this scene!

*Pinkie Pie: Master Spy! How is there not a whole episode on this?! Also the Fluttershy costume and Fluttershy’s reaction to it is priceless.

*As I’m writing this, I’m realizing there’s a lot of great reactionary comedy in this episode. Another example is Twilight’s reaction of awe to the library. Whoever animated this deserves a raise because it’s so freaking funny.

*I really like the song putting together the Crystal Fair. It’s fun and bouncy and a cool way to see all sorts of Crystal Empire traditions. A great way to flesh out this location and it’s history.

*I never noticed that Pinkie playing the Fluglehorn is just her shouting  “Fluglehorn” into it. That’s great.

*And the crystal ponies regaining their crystal shimmer in their coats as they regain hope is a great visual

*Okay so here’s some more about how Sombra thought ahead. He supposedly disposed of the page in the Crystal Empire history book mentioning how important the Crystal Heart was, hid it away under many secret entrances loaded with traps, the curse he put on the land erased the Crystal ponies memories of it until they regained their shimmer, and is now a giant shadow cloud threatening to engulf the entire empire to regain his throne!! Sombra may not have much in terms of personality, but these aren’t really the signs of a weak villain to me. More like one with one heck of a contingency plan.

*Twilight may be determined to find the Crystal Heart on her own, but Spike still gets to come along. Spike finally gets to be part of an adventure! He gets to do things! Woo!

*On the other hand Twilight bolts out of the castle in urgency, only to run right back in. Huh.

*Pinkie is that jester outfit is too adorable. I probably love it more then i should, but it’s a really cute look for her.

*Twilight uses dark magic to gain access to some of Sombra’s secret passageways. Which is weird because she just, does it. And then it’s never mentioned again. Usually a character using dark magic of some kind to accomplish a goal is treated with urgency and regret, and comes with some kind of consequence. But here it’s just another, average spell. Alright then.

*There is a great moment where one of the roadblocks is seeing a doorway that leads to your worst fear. Twilight’s being failing Celestia’s test and the empire, and Spike’s being forced to leave and being abandoned by Twilight. It’s a small moment, but a nice look at our characters.

*And of course the running gag in this episode. Too. Many. Stairs.

*So Twilight can do gravity magic now. To quote ACRaceBest “That’s one way to give the middle finger to physics”

*I’m sorry, am I the only one who thinks this series of events is genuinely suspenseful? Twilight getting trapped, Sombra on the rise, Cadance’s magic almost completely gone. It works really well for a great climax.

*I’ll get to Twilight’s choice in a second, but let’s just appreciate that not only did Spike get to do a thing in this adventure, he got to do the most important thing. He got to save the day! Good for you Spikey Wikey

*Throw your wife! Such a classic moment. It never gets old.

*So Cadance is the Crystal Princess? I mean it kind of makes sense thematically since her greatest power as a princess is love, and this empire seems to revolve around maintaining light and love, and Cadance’s cutie mark appears to be the Crystal Heart. But this is what I meant last time by the show never did a great job at establishing Cadance’s role in the world. They told you what it was, but not really how that’s possible. Maybe this is explained in some supplementary material, but how is this alicorn, who is apparently not much older then Twilight, the destined princess of a kingdom that’s been lost for over 1,000 years? Is that why she was a foal sitter? Because the kingdom she was supposed to rule was still missing and she needed something to do?? It’s just weird, and something I really wish the show had established better.

*With that said, the moment when the Crystal Heart is returned is EPIC! The light and love powering the city, the mane cast getting crystal designs which are adorable, and Sombra getting obliterated! Not banished, not imprisoned, he explodes! It’s disturbing but pretty awesome.

*Okay so a big criticism of this episode is Celestia’s test for Twilight and the stakes it creates. Basically it was wrong to put an entire populated empire on the line to test if Twilight could do this on her own. But here’s the thing, I feel like just like a lot of other assignments Celestia sets up for Twilight, she knows she’ll do well, and if she doesn’t, she’ll be prepared. After all, if Celestia truly wanted Twilight to do this on her own, why would she let all of her friends come with her? This is the choice Celestia always wanted her to make, because this is the kind of choice that will eventually fit the role she’ll fill in this world. Twilight may have been determined to do this as the princess requested, but that was never how it was going to be. Because Twilight will always prioritize the well being of her loved ones over her own self gain. That’s the message. And it might be a bit sketchy in just how it’s presented, but I think it’s just fine. And i think self sacrifice is a lesson any hero in any kind of story needs to learn.

*A sweet and heartwarming reprise celebrating Twilight’s victory. Hooray!

*The princesses have a mysterious book. I’m sure that’s not important.

Sorry guys, but I think this episode is great! It was a great adventure story to start this shorter season. To reassure me that that scale and high stakes i saw in A Canterlot Wedding would still be present. and writing this has only made me enjoy it even more since I’ve always liked this episode and watched it for fun multiple times, but never really analyzed it before. This definitely made me excited for what Season 3 had to bring, and it certainly brings, a lot in a short amount of time. Next Time: Too Many Pinkie Pies!

#My Little Pony #MLP Rewatch Marathon #the crystal empire #My Little Pony Friendship is Magic Review #analysis #MLP:FIM

[kaylinwrites]

Life of Pi, The Martian, and Man vs. Nature

[Started January 2019]

By: Somebody who firmly agrees that chemistry is a sloppy b****, and got irrationally upset when Richard Parker didn’t say goodbye. What an animal.

I’ve been out of the loop on here for a while, and I’ve got oversharing-syndrome, so I originally started this essay with a very long explanation of how reading on my phone made me suddenly into reading again. But then I was like, what, is Audible sponsoring me or something? As if. 

So I’ll spare you the backstory. The short of it is, I ended up reading Life of Pi, and finished it within a few days. Reading a really good book is practically a drug, so I started a new book right away, another book everyone seemed to have read, The Martian. 

I got about four chapters in before I started to think things were looking familiar. 

If you haven’t read either book, you should. I’ll wait.

. . .   . . .   . . .

If you don’t have the time or patience for that right now, I’ll give you a quick summary of what goes on in each. If you’ve already read them and don’t care for my summaries, skip on down to the next row of dots.

Life of Pi is about an Indian guy named Pi, naturally. The first part of the book explains his childhood. Pi is the son of a zookeeper, so he knows a lot about animal behavior. When he’s sixteen, his family decides to move to Canada, so Pi, his brother, his parents, and a collection of zoo animals also headed for the Americas hop on a boat to cross the Pacific. On the journey, their boat sinks, and Pi is the sole human survivor. Other survivors and inhabitants of Pi’s 22 foot lifeboat include a zebra, a hyena, and briefly, an orangutan. (RIP Orange Juice.) Oh, and there’s also the tiger, but Pi doesn’t notice that at first because the tiger is seasick and was hiding under the tarp for the first, like, five days. 

(Side note, that’s a very fun reveal, because everybody knows Life of Pi is the book with the tiger boat, so when we think the tiger isn’t there, it’s all like “Hey, where’s the tiger? I feel cheated out of a tiger”, and when the tiger shows back up, it’s all like “Oh s***, there’s the tiger.” Extremely good book.)

So the second half of the book is about Pi’s very unglamorous day-to-day life at sea. He eats raw fish and drinks turtle blood, and walks the fine tightrope of keeping the tiger happy so it won’t eat him, while also making sure the tiger knows he’s in charge, so it won’t eat him. Good thing he grew up in a zoo! Pretty stressful, constant threat of death, but a happy ending. 

The Martian is a book set in, I’m assuming, the near future, wherein a group of astronauts are on a research mission to Mars. Six Sols (Mars days) in, there’s a big sandstorm, and the team has to evacuate and leave Mars altogether. Mark Watney, botanist, mechanical engineer, and all-around great guy, gets separated from the group as they make their way to their rocket (MAV, but whatever), and the team has reason to believe he’s totally dead, so they leave without him. 

Surprise! Mark’s not dead, but he’s soon-to-be, because Mars is a deserted, uninhabitable, hell-planet. So, naturally, he has a crisis, but then decides he’s going to try to survive long enough for rescue. He starts growing potatoes, and tries to keep his equipment running long enough to contact NASA and tell them they messed up big time. There’s a lot of Mars shenanigans, which is to say, Mark almost dies a bunch of times, but he’s pretty smart. Good thing he’s a mechanical engineer! And botanist, I guess, but potatoes are less exciting than blowing up rocket fuel. Very stressful, constant threat of death, but a happy ending. 

. . .   . . .   . . .

Way back in middle school, when we learned about conflicts, they taught us there were three types: Man vs. Man, Man vs. Self, and Man vs. Nature. I’ve heard they’ve added more now, but the only one I care about for this essay is Man vs. Nature anyways.

Man vs. Nature is all about the character(s) winning against a force of nature, be it a wild beast, a natural disaster, or even a zombie plague. Examples of Man vs. Nature stories could be anything from Lost to Jaws to Little House in the Big Woods to The Hunger Games. There’s a lot of possibilities, but the Man vs. Nature books that I’m interested in are survival stories.

More specifically, the type in which the main character is alone for most of the story. I haven’t actually seen Castaway, but I’m imagining that fits into this category. The idea is to throw a character into an unknown and hostile place, and see how they manage to survive alone. 

I believe the first story of this type I read was in elementary school: Hatchet. Looking back on it, it doesn’t seem nearly as hardcore as getting stranded on Mars or being trapped in a lifeboat with a tiger, but that’s hindsight. When I was reading this at 11, it was an absolute thriller. It even had a moment of sick horror for me. I remember reading the chapter where Brian find the pilot’s decaying corpse and freaking out a little because it was the most graphic thing I’d ever read up to that point. Nevertheless, I remember that book as being adventurous, riveting, and very real.

I think one of the most interesting traits of these stories are the realism. If you’ve ever read The Martian, you know that the author definitely did his research. There’s something very cool about watching a character work out problems not with magic, or because they’re the chosen one, but with their wit and sheer determination. Life of Pi would not be nearly as fun to read if the tiger was just magically chill. Pi only survives because he knows how to work with wild animals, and while to some, that may seem convenient, I find it makes for a fascinating story. 

This brings me to the first characteristic of survival stories that makes them so compelling: good old fashioned gritty problem solving. Because any problem that crops up in a survival situation has to be solved immediately or the outcome is likely death, it forces characters to find solutions. Sometimes these solutions are quite creative. Sometimes they go horribly wrong. 

This connects to the second reason survival stories are so interesting: the main character is alone. They have to do everything themselves. And if it goes wrong, there’s no one there to pull them out of the s***. 

The Power of Friendship is a fantastic trope. No one can deny that seeing characters band together to accomplish their goals and become closer as a result makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. And exploring the way characters interact with one another and develop their relationships is interesting, sure. But isolating a character is also a goldmine of a trope. Think of the episode of a show where the rest of the team is incapacitated and the remaining team member has to save the day all on their own. It allows that character to prove themselves as a competent problem solver, and show their strengths, and in the end, they save their friends, and there’s all the more Power of Friendship.

But when the character that’s isolated doesn’t have any friends, so to say, what happens? Being indefinitely cut off from the rest of the world makes for some interesting exploration of humanity as a whole. 

From a writing perspective, it’s a fascinating challenge. For one, when your main character is your only character, they have to be able to carry the story by themselves. In Life of Pi, the first half of the book is devoted to letting the reader get to know Pi, so they’ll be rooting for him, and understand his thought process a bit better. The Martian throws backstory to the wayside and tosses the reader headfirst into a catastrophe. The reader is hooked for the time being, and by the time the initial catastrophe is over, Mark has proven himself charismatic and likable, so the reader is alright with following this story through his lens. 

There’s also the psychological side of things, the reflection, which is the third thing survival stories do that’s weird and awesome. The writer can decide how much focus to put on the character’s sucky situation. The Martian plays this pretty light: Mark has a few moments of existentialism, but he hangs on to his humor and general will to live throughout the entire novel. Mark’s narration never truly loses the personality that made it so likable in the first place, even if it gets a stronger undercurrent of “F*** Mars” as the story progresses. In his situation, the threat of death is looming and ever constant. Everything seems to break, potato plants die, and one misstep means suffocating in the cold wasteland that is Mars. Life of Pi has a more passive dread. Once the tiger is reasonably under control, not a lot happens. This is the classic ‘stranded in the wilderness’ type of survival story, but with even less space to do things. All Pi can really do is collect water and fish. This makes his narration more introspective, and sometimes more numb. He spends a lot of the story grappling with his faith, which is a key component of his character. 

(Mark and Pi are interesting to compare in that regard: Mark is so obviously a man of science. He trusts in NASA’s work, and his own calculations. Pi has enough faith to practice three religions, and though he sometimes loses trust in God, in the end, his faith is stronger than ever.)

What I’m saying is, these stories can go one of two ways in regards to reflection. If a survival story is more immediately threatening, the story will focus more on the problems and solutions that come up and the writer will build a story more based around the events, though the main character’s personality is still important to keep the audience caring about the outcome. If a survival story is more slow moving and passively threatening, the story will focus more on introspection, and the writer will build the story around the character and how they react to their situation. Both serve the purpose of seeing how people deal with things alone, physically or mentally.

An honorary mention for things that make survival stories compelling is the lack of antagonist. Some may say the point of Man vs. Nature is that Nature is the antagonist (duh) but I would argue that it isn’t. Nature is really just doing its thing, and Man is the poor schmuck with bad luck. Despite what Mark Watney might say about Mars, it isn’t actively trying to kill him. It’s just existing and coincidentally killing him. And I know I said Life of Pi is more passive, but it might have a stronger claim to an antagonist in the tiger than The Martian does in Mars. But even then, Pi and the tiger reach a sort of understanding by the end, and there’s no longer a true threat besides starvation or one of the many other side effects of being stranded in the middle of the Pacific. 

(Speaking of side effects of being stranded in the middle of the Pacific, Life of Pi absolutely had my suspension of disbelief snatched right up until the part where Pi, half dead, meets another lifeboat out in the middle of the mcfreaking Pacific ocean. There’s no way he didn’t hallucinate that. It’s probably a metaphor, but it gave me so much whiplash I couldn’t figure out what for. Still a fantastic book.)

Survival stories above all give us perspective on our place in the world. As the world grows smaller and smaller, I hope we can remember to keep telling stories like them. They remind us of things we shouldn’t forget: Nature will always be stronger than us, though we can hold out against it. Mankind has a strong will to survive-- for ourselves, for our relationships to others, for our faith, or maybe just out of pure spite. I love both Life of Pi and The Martian for their exploration of these topics, and for being so unexpectedly but delightfully similar. 

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go live in the woods, surviving off berries and pheasants that I’ve shot with my bow, and contemplate the nature of man.

[TL;DR What does Mars and tigers have in common? They’re both orange. And also trying to kill the main characters of two well-loved novels.]

#writing #essay #reading railroad #book report #the martian #life of pi