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dahniwitchoflight · 4 years

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Homesquared Chapter 3

So i have seen smidgens of this on tumblr but just havent had time to do anything about it

and jesus christ Callie Jade is so horrifyingly creepy, and you know the things she’s narrating the characters can also hear which is also hilarious, it just reminds me of that comic about how “yeah sure there’s a giant ominous red floating eyeball in your kitchen, constantly staring, constantly judging, but can you be sure that’s a bad thing?”

and then someone tries to talk to it, but it doesn’t answer and the person goes “fine be an asshole i dont give a fuck”

thats exactly the dynamic happening with Callie Jade right now

Grumpy DaveKat is hilarious

and Hey! we finally get to see how people look, I really dig Roxy’s look

“ROXY: dude doesnt "believe" in "substances"”

This line from Roxy makes sense, as a person wholly ensconced in the idea of their own self and always being in control of themselves and their own mind and faculties they would hate anything at all that causes that iron mental grip to slip

That’s probably why Dirk avoided sleep even when his dreamself was awake, even sleeping and dreaming was considered a form of himself losing control over himself that he couldn’t integrate the idea himself and his dreamself were the same person rather than two identical people and also I remember that the Jujupop didn’t affect him either

Later on Dirk in the narrative will say something about his own trauma, but not really go into what it is, but if I had to hazard a guess (and really it’s not much of a guess at this point)

Dirk probably has memories of a version of himself being under the mental influence of another, Lil Cal, LE, Doc Scratch etc what have you, So Narrative Dirk may actually be a version of Dirk who’s not quite yet poisoned into being a version of those 3, but his words also hinted that just because he’s aware of a certain way that he’s acting doesn’t make him more likely to stop it

Like he’s equating that you can be aware of the influence something else is having on you and in the exact ways it is influencing you without being able to stop, the exact thing he is traumatized and afraid of being most likely

So his one driving fear, is he does not want to lose control of his own soul, his own being, his own way of life and existing, to something else, something other. Even though he most likely is fully aware of the things and mannerisms of the other that have slipped into himself? Like he’s probably fully aware of the similarities between himself and those mentioned above, but maybe the thing that he’s hinging on is that instead of those guys poisoning him into being like them, instead perhaps he can convince himself that it’s his own self influencing others to act like himself instead. His influence reaching out and expanding instead of shrinking as he fears it

Anyway, Dave and Kanaya have a cute moment, I really like that

We get a nice shot of them in shadows against a backdrop of stars and Kanaya starts talking about a story Rose would once tell so that’s story is already gonna be dripping in metaphorical potential

“ A Wriggler Story About A Young Prince And The Beloved Flower He Loved And Lost”

Though that’s a story I’m actually familiar with

KANAYA: A Singular Wild Rose He Failed To Cherish When He Had Her

KANAYA: And His Journey Of Discovering What She Meant To Him All Along

KANAYA: Culminating In A New Quest To Find Her And Win Her Back

KANAYA: The Story Comments On The Nature Of Friendship

KANAYA: And Of Course In Turn Love

KANAYA: How Once They Connect There Is No Distance Or Circumstance That Can Seperate Them

KANAYA: How The Worlds In Each Ones Mind Take On Contours Shaped By Their Memories Of The Other

KANAYA: Places And Moments And Orbiting Passersby Becoming More and More Entangled In The Context Of Their Mutual Affections

KANAYA: Such As With A Garden Calling To Mind An Engagement Once Declared There

KANAYA: Or Something To That Fucking Effect

So obviously Dirk and Rose

Dirk has Rose with him, discovers an actual genuine connection with her, likely because he already viewed her as an equal, despite his manipulations of her, and chapter 4 spoilers but he genuinely wants to play a game with her when there really isn’t any reason for it, so he is actually curious to see who comes out on top of it, Him or Her, so Dirk is probably in some way desperate to have an actual equal partner in some way instead of drowning in himself all the time, not surprising. But Rose, obviously, will leave and reject him, likely when the manipulation comes around and is revealed/Kanaya and all them reach her/that part of the story

But then the story tinges onto a romantic nature and is framing Dirk trying to get her back as a romantic quest to save his partner/friend something something love and friendship, “no distance can separate them” yeah that doesn’t sound like obsession with the first person you’ve ever truly seen as an equal/a real person,

yeah “A Garden calling to Mind an engagement once declared there” definitely sounds like the garden of eden/adam and eve paradise fantasy that Dirk has been trying for some reason, to setup on the new planet

Really begs the question for why Dirk cares at all to do all of this? Except we now the answer is already its not the thing itself he cares about, its the value hes putting into the story as something that generates interest in the audience

He doesn’t care about actually making a society or being gods or whatever, he just knows thats what the audience wants to see and cares about so therefore he does it

and the reason he does all of THAT is because is ties into his trauma of his sense of self eroding away becoming a person he’s unfamiliar with

I wonder how he’s going to handle how much he’s going to change in order to fit the role of the story he’s writing when all is said and done

the Dirk at the end of this is going to be very different than the Dirk that started in Homestuck, despite all of his fears and intentions, and that he could not say all of it wasnt his own doing because of the iron control he made sure to have from the very beginning, I honestly think that will be kind of a shock for him if a meeting like that ever one day happened

Specifically for the fact that he seems to be aware of the romantic in nature tropes hes writing himself and Rose into and for now still seems to be avoiding them, not having gone that far, but, well

Maybe this is where we’ll start to see where Doc Scratch’s odd tendencies starting coming from

You know he was always really weird with Rose and Vriska (Maybe because he sees Light players all as extensions of Rose herself?)

Anyway yeah this is def the story metaphor I think we’re going to see in this, but Kanaya doesn’t fully get it, she thinks the story refers to herself and Rose

DAVE: that seems kind of wack for a kids story

KANAYA: Its Possible I Am Projecting Slightly In This Specific Circumstances

KANAYA: It Was Just A Metaphor

KANAYA: But In A Way I Feel As If It Is the Greater Universe Trying To Tell Me Something

KANAYA: It May Simply Stem From My Longing To See Her Again And How Much Is Indicative Of Something More Sinister

Which is cool because it makes this opposing connection between Dirk and Kanaya as opposites, which I like because it solidifies a tiny bit more the idea of Sylph being Passive Create to A Prince’s Active destroy.

Oh yeah, there was a tiny hint of Mind metaphor as well, can’t forget Terezi is with them

KANAYA: How The Worlds In Each Ones Mind Take On Contours Shaped By Their Memories Of The Other

KANAYA: Places And Moments And Orbiting Passersby Becoming More and More Entangled In The Context Of Their Mutual Affections

KANAYA: Such As With A Garden Calling To Mind An Engagement Once Declared There

Basically the idea that your experiences of a person and your memories of them shape who they become as well, the boundary between you and I is controlled by both of us, so each has an effect of the personality Heart of the other through our own decisions and Mind

like the way people tend to mimic those they like and want to be close to, or the way they actively try to distance themselves and what they are like from those they hate

But that at all seems to be more about Mind in general than referring to anything specifically Terezi

though it is exactly that understanding of Mind versus Heart and how one affects the other that could make Dirk realize that in the question of the self he’s only had half the picture the whole time, he’s only had the understanding of Heart and has thus far not been able to understand how Mind plays a role in the sustaining of the self, how what other people do to help you to be you, which is his entire philosophical conundrum

“DAVE: the dude youve spent the last 7 years convincing yourself isnt an egomaniacal anime villain

DAVE: and who isnt actually lying in wait to completely decimate your life and your emotions and shit“

oh, that makes me sad, this is def bringing up some bad trains of thought for Dave ):

“ KARKAT: KANAYA BARELY EVEN TALKS, CALLIOPE WON’T LEAVE THEIR CABIN, JADE JUST FLOATS AROUND LIKE A CREEPY BALLOON THAT’S MOSTLY MADE OF HAIR.

OH RIGHT, I forgot Calliope is actually WITH them on their journey, despite seeming to want absolutely fuck all with Jade Callie, I totally thought she was gonna stay back on Earth C but I guess not!

It’s so odd to see them so terrified of their alternate self like this when they’ve interacted mildly before. I still don’t know what to think of that much, other than they seem to be doing that weird thing that the other kids went through, like how John scribbled clowns on the walls unknown to himself for the longest time due to Gamzee’s unseen mental influence

that’s exactly the type of shit Dirk would be afraid of, so I wonder if that’s what Callie was afraid of as well? Maybe its Jade Callie that’s influencing them this way not Gamzee, to scribble strange things on the walls and not come out, but it’s the same fear of the other regardless manifesting and changing the self.

It is a very oddly non social thing for Our Calliope to do, when the point of different between the two Callie’s was how social Calliope was versus how antisocial Jade Callie is. Worries me ): but at least they’re here I guess

KARKAT: SOMETIMES IT ALMOST FEELS LIKE WHATEVER SLATHERING MONSTROSITY OF A COSMIC HELLBEAST THAT PUT ALL THIS SHIT INTO MOTION...ACTUALLY LIKES ME?

ROXY: fucked up if tru

Karkat is really popular as a character in the fandom lol

and that’s that one, time to get to Chapter 4, which has a lot more juicy exposition

With all the Garden of Eden metaphors though I can’t help but think of the Apple of the Garden of Eden when I think of “story exposition” now

The juicy tantalizing forbidden red fruit that when you bit into it you suddenly understand and know things you did not before and you’re eyes are opened, I wonder if that’s enough to just make Apples a solid Symbol of Light in Homestuck’s context? Most of it’s association with knowledge is external to Homestuck, just referenced symbolically, it’s not actually used in any cirumstances pertaining to knowledge, but more as the metaphor of it being the gate to leave the garden of eden, more like a teleporter, Rapture and Revelation in general rather than just Knowledge itself

aka my new headcanon is that one thing needed to Alchemize a Transportalizer is inexplicably going to be an Apple, if that ever comes up at all

#Homesquared #Homestuck^2 #Dirk Strider #Rose Lalonde #Terezi Pyrope #Apples are the essence of Portal Technology #long post

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avengerscompound · 5 years

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The Grind House - Chapter 4

The Grind House: A Bucky Barnes Fanfic

Series Masterlist PREVIOUS //

Buy me a ☕ Character Pairing: Bucky Barnes x F!Reader

Word Count: 1729

Rating: E

Square filled: @marvelfluffbingo - Slow Burn

Warnings: None for this chapter, future smut most likely

Synopsis: When Bucky Barnes stops to get coffee and warm up at your coffee shop, he had just expected that caffeine might lift his mood a little. He didn’t expect to fall head-over-heels for you over a game of chess.

Chapter Four

Bucky had gone home feeling a little melancholy after he’d won the game of chess with you. He knew logically there was no reason not to go back in again, he just had this niggling little voice that said, the game is over, she was being nice. Time to leave her alone.

You had invited him to the games night though. So there was that. He decided he’d go but he’d take people with him. It was just proving a little harder to convince people to come along.

“You really think this is a good idea? We all show up and it’s gonna just draw autograph hounds and the paps.” Steve said.

The group sat around the coffee tables by the big bay windows, drinking and playing a game of poker for peanuts. Clint was currently winning but Bucky was 100% sure that he’d been dealing from the bottom, and he couldn’t quite understand why no one had called him out on it yet.

“Not everyone has to go. I just wanted to see if anyone wanted to go.” He said. “She asked me and said I can bring people, and she knows who my friends are.”

“She did huh? And who’s she?” Natasha said, she looked at her hand and then at the pile of nuts in the middle of the table. “Call.” She added pushing a small pile of peanuts into the pile.

“She’s just this woman at the coffee shop. She’s nice.” Bucky said.

There was a chorus of ‘oohs’ and Natasha nudged him. “Well, I’ve gotta go now. I’ll be there.”

“Yeah, I’ll go too. Not like anyone ever asks me for an autograph. I swear I got asked one time and they thought I was some dude name Iron Fist.” Clint said with a shrug.

“Yeah, I dunno. I’m not sure sitting around a coffee shop playing Dungeons and Dragons is really my thing. I’m out.” Tony said. “All in.” He added pushing a huge pile of peanuts into the pile.

Bruce, Steve, and Thor all folded. “There’s gonna be Dungeons and Dragons? I’ll come.” Bruce said, a little glint of excitement in his eye.

“Oh Brucie bear, such a nerd.” Tony teased.

“I’ll call,” Clint said and threw his hand down. Full house, Aces over kings. Tony cursed and threw his cards down. Everyone else who still had cards in shook their heads and Clint dragged all the peanuts on the table over to him.

“I’ll come and so will Steve,” Sam said as Clint started gathering up the cards.

Steve put his hand on Clint’s. “No more dealing for you.” He said gathering up the deck. “Yeah, I’ll go too.”

Bucky relaxed a little. If Steve and Sam were there that was enough. Having Nat and Clint and Bruce and any of the others were extra assurance. He just hoped that they didn’t all embarrass him too much.

Friday night came around and Bucky wasn’t sure what he should wear. Obviously, he didn’t want to dress up too much. This wasn’t a suit and tie event. He also didn’t want to go in wearing an old henley and a ballcap. He wanted to look nice, but not be conspicuous and he couldn’t quite figure out what that meant.

Eventually, he settled on jeans, a button up shirt not buttoned up all the way with a leather jacket on over the top. He thought he looked okay and when no one made fun of him for it, he figured it must fit the medium ground he was going for.

In the end, the whole group, including Tony, went. The coffee shop was crowded when they got there and it had been rearranged. Card tables had been brought out and the larger, more comfortable chairs were gone. They’d been replaced with fold up chairs. You were flitting around the room when they got there, finding places where people could sit and among several other people putting plates of food on the table. There were obviously people being paid to work the room. The espresso machine was going flat out Just a conveyor belt of people making espresso shots while other people turned them into drinks and then another went and delivered them to the tables.

You saw them when they came in and your whole face lit up. “Bucky!” You said coming over and kissing his cheek. “You brought everyone.”

He chuckled. “Yeah, do you have the room?”

“We’ll find it. Might have to shut the doors though. Might have reached our legal capacity.” You said moving past them and putting the ‘Sorry, we’re full’ sign on the door and latching it. “Here follow me, we’ll get a table with my friends and yours.”

You lead them to a table at the back and everyone took a seat and introductions were made. Your two friends, Meagan and Belinda definitely had a case of starstruck. Where you seemed completely at ease around everyone, like meeting assassins and billionaires and 100-year-old soldiers, was all part of your day to day normal, they kept blinking around at everyone and falling over their words.

When everyone had food and drinks and games were underway, you sat down at the table. “We were going to play cards against humanity. Are you okay with that?” You asked. “It’s pretty easy.”

“Oh, hell yes,” Tony said rubbing his hands together and taking his glasses off.

“What are the rules?” Steve asked, which Bucky was thankful for. He didn’t want to look like the out of place one for a change.

You and your friends pulled out a long black box and the three of you began separating cards up and shuffling. You put a stack of cards into the middle of the table as one of the others deal out some of the other cards. “So,” You said. “These are the question cards.” You flipped a card over. It was black and written on the front was ‘I work my ass off all day for this family, and this is what I come home to? ______!?’ “What you need to do is answer the question the funniest way you can with the cards in your hand. An answer will look like this. You flipped a white card over with ‘Sperm whales.’ Written on it. “You give your answer to the person who dealt and they chose who wins. First to five wins. Easy.”

Steve looked very unsure of himself while Clint and Tony both looked completely delighted.

The game was different, but it wasn’t long until even he and Steve had relaxed into it. It was gross at times. Tony seemed to like making it very gross. He won the first hand ‘___, don’t try this at home.’ with ‘Firing toothpicks out of your penis like it was a machine gun.’

It made Steve groan and set the tone for the rest of the game. Steve made Tony completely lose it when he saw Steve reply to the card ‘What’s on my back?’ with ‘Shots. Each one grants +10 Charisma and -5 Heterosexuality.’ Nat’s hand ‘The Hills are Alive with the sound of ____.’ ‘Ripping into a man’s chest and pulling out his still beating heart’. Made Clint howl with laughter. And while it didn’t win the round, Nat appreciate Clint’s playing ‘Flunking out of Clown College.’ on the prompt ‘____. That was hard.’ Telling him it was funny because it was true.

The biggest laugh of the night came when you played, ‘Genetically engineered super-soldiers.’ on ‘In an attempt to reach a wider audience, the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History has opened an interactive exhibit on ______.’

“Too late, already got one on this punk.” Bucky had teased.

He had felt as relaxed as he had ever felt. Your friends had ended up relaxing too and even with people coming over and asking for photos and autographs or just trying to talk and connect with the Avengers, they let their walls down. He let his walls down and he got time to talk, even if he could feel Nat and Steve’s eyes on him anytime the two of you started to connect.

That’s what it felt like too. Connection. You and he were connecting. He hadn’t felt that in so long. There was some with the other Avengers, but he often guarded himself. They’d seen him at his worst and he sometimes worried that that would taint their view of him forever. You had not, and while he worried that there was gonna be something he could say that would make you reject him outright because of who he was and what he had done, he also felt more relaxed that right now it was an empty canvas and you hadn’t painted him as anything yet.

He almost felt confident enough to ask you on a date. Almost. One problem was that there was no way he was getting you alone to ask tonight. It was too busy and you were just as in demand with people as Tony was. There was also no way he would ask you out with the team watching. Shit, he couldn’t even do it if it was just Steve. He couldn’t handle the pity looks he got before you even had a chance to turn him down. He knew that’s what would happen too. They’d watch and they’d pity him because he’d have to be an idiot to think that a regular person would want anything to do with the fucked up mess that he was. Or that even if you could be interested, that he thought it might actually last.

So he’d wait. He did say goodbye to you though. You’d asked if you’d see him soon and he’d felt something in his chest unwind. He’d promised you he’d be back very soon. He’d meant it too. He was planning on coming back just as soon as he could when he knew it was quiet so he could ask you out properly.

“She was really nice, Buck. You gonna ask her out?” Sam asked as the team headed back to the tower.

Bucky shrugged. He knew it was probably safe to tell Sam. He just wasn’t sure if he could.

“You should, man,” Sam pushed. “She likes you. It’s really obvious. You deserve some happiness.”

Bucky nodded. “Thanks, Sam. I might. I like her.”

It made Sam chuckle and pat his shoulder. “That’s really no secret either, man.”

// NEXT

#marvelfluffbingo2019 #bucky barnes #bucky barnes x reader #the winter soldier #the winter soldier fanfic #fanfic #fanfiction #reader instert #fluff #the grind house

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crashdevlin · 6 years

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Good Things: Part 2

part one

You were lucky, when the demon started making its way through the wake, to be wearing a silver anti-possession amulet. Elvis, Alicia and Jody weren't so lucky.

At one point, you were searching the manor with Mary, the stunningly beautiful and young mother Winchester. "I saw how Dean was looking at you. His father used to look at me like that." She said, quietly, not looking at you. She concentrated on clearing the room.

"Oh?" You couldn't think of anything better to say.

"I rejected John when he first asked me out. He was a Marine. I didn't want a soldier. Spent my whole life around hunters, didn't need more of the macho BS in my world." Mary finally turned to look at you. "Dean looks at you like he's trying to figure out how to win you over."

You cleared your throat. "I... don't... Dean has a reputation." You weren't sure why that was what came out of your mouth.

"I've heard." She confirmed.

"And I'd've been fine with that rep, but he was talking about some chick he had a connection with and I'm not the kind of chick guys like Dean cheat on their girlfriends with... I mean... I can't... Look at me."

"He doesn't have a girlfriend." Mary put her hand on your shoulder. "You should talk to him when this is over."

You did. After the exorcism, as you were watching Asa, Randy and Elvis being sent home in smoke, you bit your lip and approached him. "Thought I should actually say 'Goodbye' this-"

"You should come to breakfast with us." He interrupted. "We're takin' Mom to get some bacon. What do you say?"

You smiled. "Well, does this look like a body that says 'no' to bacon?"

You sat between Sam and Jody in a diner booth in North Dakota. Dean sat across from you, sharing a large plate of bacon with Mary. "Okay, craziest thing you've ever hunted?" Dean asked.

"Uh, probably the transsexual witch who cursed her community college to wake up in the body of someone of the opposite sex so they'd understand how she felt." You answered, before taking a bite of pancake.

"When you say 'she'..." Sam trailed off. It was a genuinely curious question.

"Born 'Michael', became 'Michelle'."

"What'd you do with her?" Mary asked, drinking down some coffee.

"Well, she hadn't actually hurt anyone, just confused the fuck out of 'em for about 16 hours, and she did it out of an overwhelming desire to be understood, so I put her in contact with a Wiccan priestess I know. Last I heard, she was flourishing in her new coven, really embraced the 'Harm ye none' thing."

"Wicca is new agey white-" Dean started to explain, but Mary shot him a death glare.

"Gardnerian witchcraft has been around since the Fifties, Dean. 'Wicca' replaced 'Witch' because the hippies wanted to beat the negative connotations, wanted everyone to know they weren't wart-covered crones in candy houses trying to curse everyone and eat little children."

"Oh, we met her." Sam spoke up.

"Who?" You and Jody chimed in together.

"The witch from 'Hansel and Gretel'. She was turning crappy adults into shitty kids so that she could eat them. Hansel was in on it."

You looked between the brothers. "You're bullshitting."

"Swear to God. She was one of the last old-timey witches from the Grand Coven. Probably only a small handful of 'em left. Rowena doesn't count." Dean answered Sam's unasked question.

"Who's Rowena?"

"A tiny Scottish ball of fury and dark magic. Not really evil, but definitely not one of the good guys." Dean responded.

"She got kicked out of the Grand Coven for being too ambitious." Sam followed up.

"Not to mention: you know Crowley? That's his mom."

"Crowley, the demon?" You asked.

"Crowley, the douchebag." Jody snorted derisively.

You laughed. "Okay. Somebody else, weirdest hunt you ever been on?"

"There was a Shifter who spent a year following Paul Simon's tour. He was killing people who had tickets to the shows so he could take their spot." Mary said, around a piece of bacon.

"Being the reason Bobby Singer found out Leviathans are allergic to borax was pretty weird." Jody provided.

"What's a Leviathan?"

"They almost ate the world, what, five years ago?" Sam asked Dean, who nodded. "They were seriously low-key about it, though. I'm not surprised you haven't heard of them."

"You sound like a hipster." You laughed. "So, what about you two? The legendary Winchester Brothers must have been on some ridiculous hunts."

"Oh, all kinds. Let's see, top of my head. Bloody Mary, killer clown ghost, haunted movie set where I got really into my role as PA, we killed Santa, the angels once wiped our memories and gave us new identities working office jobs. There was that time with the dragons. Oh, and when we went back in time and met Samuel Colt and killed a phoenix." Dean went through the list alternating between excitement and boredom.

"Not to forget everything Gabriel did to us. That was all ridiculous. Oh, and that alternate universe Balthazar sent us to where our lives were a moderately successful primetime TV show." Sam added.

"And Chuck's books about us."

"And finding out that Chuck was God."

"And not dying in the dust-up between God and his sister." Dean turned to Mary with a smile. "And getting Mom back as reward for mediating a reconciliation between them."

You stared at the table, going through everything you just heard. "Holy shit." You gasped out, finally. "I... I knew you guys started and stopped the apocalypse a few times, but... holy shit. Back and forth through time, alternate realities, you know God and he has a sister?!"

"You should stick around. We're bound to blow your mind some more. Crowley and our angel friend, Cas, are working together to find Lucifer, who was most recently seen in the body of has-been glam rocker, Vince Vincente."

"Oh, holy... Lucifer was in Ladyheart."

"No, Lucifer was in a dude who was in Ladyheart." Dean corrected.

"Wow. Your lives really are legendary."

"Well, you never know. Stick around. It might rub off on you. Then, you could be a legend." Jody nudged you, lightly, as Mary looked down with a smile. The moms were conspiring together.

"Yeah, well... I'm not sure if I could handle that."

"You don't know til you try, do you?" Dean smirked at you from across the table.

You took a deep breath. You had one more tool in your tool-bag to try to fend off whatever the hell was happening here: blunt, honest confrontation. "You are putting in a lot of effort here to get your 'I Fucked A Fatty' badge, aren't'cha?"

Everyone at the table jerked and the mood immediately fell into a limbo of apprehension as Dean blinked at you. "What?" He said after several long seconds.

"Oh, come on. This is obviously some Playboy Scavenger Hunt, right? Your list of conquests, a 'Fuck-it List'?" You took a bite of your pancake and looked pointedly across the table at him. "I'm a novelty, right? Bang a black chick, bang a latina, a milf, a mature... twins?"

Dean nodded, slowly, and licked his lips. "You think I've been flirting with you, trying to get you in bed, so that I can cross 'fat chick' off my list? Just makin' sure I got this right." You took a drink of your coffee and returned his uncomfortable gaze. He nodded again, then leaned forward. "When I was twenty-three, I met a chick named Ursula Green at a bar. She was five-foot-nothing, three hundred pounds, wearing a red halter top and a skirt with a split in the side clean up to her hip. She danced like no one was watching and threw a beer bottle at the redneck who told her to 'take her fat ass home' and I grabbed two nice big handfuls of her ass when I took her back to her home that night."

You swallowed. His green eyes bored into your soul as he continued. "She crossed 'fat chick' off my list." The way he said it was like he couldn't believe he was saying those words. "Now, I don't know what you've heard about me and I'm sure that I've earned a bit of that reputation... but I am not gonna sit here and let you think that I've been talkin' to you just because you're a little on the chunky side and that makes you a novelty. I don't know what kinda men you generally let into your life, y/n, but I don't play games like that."

You opened your mouth but no words came out. The other three occupants of the booth table all looked very uncomfortable, so you cleared your throat and stood. You threw a ten dollar bill on the table and walked out of the diner.

"Where the hell are you going?"

"I'm going home, Dean." You grabbed the handle of your driver's side door and pulled your key.

"Yeah, I got eyes, y/n." He growled, putting a hand on your car door to keep you from opening it. "Why?"

You turned to him, exasperated. "Because I don't know what to do!" You shouted, pulling away from your door and leaned against the backseat window.

"I've never had a man want me for anything more than a single-night novelty fuck, or worse a pity fuck, Dean, and I don't know what to do about a man like you wanting-"

"What do you mean, 'a man like me'?" Dean interrupted.

"A preposterously handsome biblical hero who shouldn't even look at a woman like me."

"What do you mean 'a woman like you'?" Dean shook his head. "Look, y/n, more than what I saw from you last year and-and what I saw from you with Jael last night, I have asked about you. Every hunter I've talked to since Spirit Lake has a story about you, some way that you've helped them in the past." You opened your mouth to argue that you weren't anything special and you'd always just done what any hunter would do, but Dean stepped closer to you and you were suddenly struck with how tall the man was. "You think outside the box, you put others first, you are the epitome of selfless and goddamn it, you're gorgeous."

You looked down. "That's not true..."

"Stop acting like you don't see it." Dean demanded.

For some reason you needed to resist him. "See what? I've got mirrors in my house, Winchester. I see-"

"You obviously don't see. You don't see what I see."

"Are you kidding me?! You really expect me to believe that you met me, spent two days with me, and I-I somehow impressed you enough that you've spent the last year with me on your mind? I'm not an idiot!"

"Yeah, not an idiot but you sure are blind." Dean took another step closer to you, looking down at you with a confused annoyance. "Fuck, y/n. Why the hell won't you-"

"Because it's too good to be true!" You exclaimed, pushing off from the side of your car and standing up to him, ignoring that his height was so intimidating.

"Good things don't happen to me, Dean, they never have. So when I have a stunningly handsome man telling me I'm gorgeous, it sets off my bullshit alarm."

"Good things don't happen to you because you run away as soon as they start!" Dean insisted. "You think those extra pounds around your middle are your defining characteristic, but they aren't. That weight is nothing and you need to stop focusing so much on it. I didn't even clock you as fat until you started that shit inside. This isn't bullshit, y/n. I leave my lies for when I'm on a hunt."

You bit your lip and looked up into his stunning green eyes. "Dean, I-"

His face softened. "I'm not trying to get you to jump in bed with me, y/n." He reached out and brushed a stray hair out of your face. His hand rested against your ear and his fingers twirled your hair. "But don't run. Stay. Let the good things happen... in their own time."

You pulled your phone out of your pocket and presented it to him. "Put your number in. I'll text you."

"You're still gonna leave?" He asked, disappointed, as he took a step back and took the phone out of your hand.

"I've got a hunt in Tennessee. Only reason I'm not on it already was for Asa." You answered. "But... I'm interested in... letting the good thing... this good thing... happen."

"The cautious approach. I'm all right with that." He said, tapping his thumbs against the screen of your cell phone. "I just texted myself so that I have your number, too. A warning: I drunk text." He smiled as he handed your phone back.

"Okay. As long as you don't send pictures I haven't requested... I'm okay with that."

"There gonna be pictures you do request?"

You chuckled, turning your forgotten key in the driver's door. "Maybe, Winchester."

"Can I request pictures?" He asked, as you got into your car.

"Not yet." You smiled as you turned your engine over and headed out.

Part Three

#spn #reader-insert #fanfic #dean/reader #eventual smut #plus size reader #self esteem issues #cassie writes stuff

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kootenaygoon · 5 years

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So,

They called it the suicide blanket—the ominous, low-hanging fog that settled over Kootenay Lake and plunged Nelson into a perpetual grey gloom.

Paisley and I huddled under porch blankets as the trees frosted at the summit of Elephant Mountain, the white descending slowly on to the city. Winter is coming. From the comfy warmth of our little hermitage I watched YouTube theory videos about Game of Thrones and scribbled on my chalkboard wall, creating character lists and fine-tuning a timeline for my ever-evolving thesis manuscript. I wanted it to be composed of multiple interlinking stories, like my favourite novel A Visit from the Goon Squad, but I was constantly swapping out one story for another, never reaching any conclusion.

While Paisley worked on her desserts I huddled down at my laptop and hammered away at my real work. Journalism was still only a secondary concern in my head, a means to make money until I sold this manuscript and vaulted up into the world of novelists. I sent out excerpts to literary journals, receiving a flurry of rejection letters in response, and tried to ignore the fact that I hadn’t made any legit progress on my fiction since arriving in Nelson. I felt this insistent fear that I wasn’t good enough, that I wasn’t going to live up to my ambitions, while meanwhile Paisley would remind me that we had a pretty nice life and maybe I needed to chill out a bit, okay?

“I don’t think I can go into work today,” I said one morning. “I feel like somebody’s sitting on my chest. I can’t do this.”

“So take a sick day.”

“I don’t have any yet. You have to be an employee for like a year before you start getting them.”

“This is your mental health, Will. Calvin can handle things without you.”

I hesitated.

“Stay home and I’ll take care of you, okay? I don’t have a co-op shift today.”

Around that time I wrote a story for the Star about a music video called “Junkyard Bettie”. It was directed by a local dude named Jonathan Robinson and featured an Aussie singer named Sofiella Watt. She was backed up by her banjo-plucking hipster band the Huckleberry Bandits. Set in an actual junkyard just outside of town, the video told the story of a lonely young traveler struggling to make it through a Canadian winter. Oh, lady winter, you have done me wrong, you’ve done me wrong. Oh dark December, won’t you please be gone, please be gone? Played by Sofiella’s friend Lauren Herraman, the dark-eyed protagonist wanders morosely through a bleak landscape populated by derelict cars, only to discover some friends and end up at a barnyard dance party. When I interviewed Sofiella, she told me the lyrics were a true story she picked up from a housekeeping co-worker at a local hotel. The woman’s boyfriend had left her, her cat went missing, and all her missing posters were rained on and got torn down.

Then the junkyard dog bit her.

“It was one of those quintessential blues song scenarios where everything goes wrong. I said ‘that’s terrible, but such an amazing story’. I asked her if I could write a song about that, because I could never make up something that good.”

I admired Sofiella’s ability to take a dark experience and create something beautiful out of it, but wasn’t sure how to accomplish that in the Star newsroom. Calvin had found himself embroiled in a number of community conflicts, and his stress level was rubbing off on everyone around him. I made excuses to leave the office when he was upset, setting up interviews across town or just wandering down to the park to take some pictures, because I couldn’t stand being around his energy. Tamara felt the same way, and when he wasn’t around we’d sit commiserating over all the unnecessary drama he’d brought into our lives.

“At the end of the day, you have to take care of yourself. And if Calvin’s negatively affecting your mental health, maybe that’s something you should report to management,” she said.

“I feel like such a whiner.”

“You’re not whining — you’re just expressing your truth.”

“The truth is I think he’s going to quit any day now, and I can’t wait.”

It wasn’t just work getting me down. Though I couldn’t admit it to myself, cannabis had become my primary mental health problem. In Victoria we’d been consuming a little baggie of weed a week, maybe two, while in Nelson we were literally burning through hundreds of dollars’ worth of pre-rolled joints a month. Was it the solution, or was it the problem? It was like an extra rent payment. Somewhere along the line we started buying pot before groceries, and a few times we ended up with an empty fridge while we waited days for the next paycheck. Sometimes we went begging to our parents. It was our ritual, the way we bonded, watching Pineapple Express and making candy runs to 7-11, but it was also the way we coped with our feelings post-fight, it was how I treated my depression and she treated her pain, and increasingly it was more of a chore than a fun time.

As we started to make friends our age, it became apparent that we weren’t alone. We were surrounded by functional chronics, people who operated in a perma-stoned state, and for many of them cannabis was nearly interchangeable with coffee. Both were something you consumed to tweak your mood and outlook, both lasted a few hours, and both cost around five bucks a hit. I found myself hosting never-ending debates in my head about the benefits and drawbacks of my new lifestyle, trying to weigh what it was costing me against all the benefits I was becoming dependent on. Was my memory worse? Was I less present? Could I really stop smoking if I wanted to? Paisley and I repeatedly made vows to quit, sometimes lasting a few days, but inevitably it crept back into our lives. Whenever her parents visited we had to do a thorough job of hiding the evidence.

“I never would have predicted that I’d become a stoner,” said Paisley. “My whole life I avoided it, never touched it, was never interested. And now it’s got this fucking hold on me.”

“You can’t blame yourself.”

“Watch me.”

Despite this, Paisley’s job at Kootenay Co-op was going well and she was making new friends. Her desserts were generating us a third income, and she was writing recipes and coming up with new culinary innovations all the time. From September to December she was happily busy, walking downtown once a week to practice her burlesque routines at Boob Camp with Charlotte Coco Orchid, and the rest of the time she spent nesting with the dogs and decorating our house. She went out and purchased the costume she was going to need for the upcoming show, then showcased it in our living room before heading out to a photo shoot with the other women. She looked adorable, in clown makeup and fishnet stockings, and I held her in my arms.

“I’ve been thinking,” she said. “Maybe you should be in the show.”

I snorted. “It’s next week.”

“Charlotte’s looking for a male performer to pick up the clothes left on stage between sets. I was thinking about it, and you went to theatre school. You should totally do it.”

“I’m not going to do burlesque.”

“Why not?”

That was a good question. She continued to push the issue until I agreed to talk to Charlotte, and pretty soon I’d been recruited. Paisley took me out shopping for a pair of white “manties”, a baggy Speedo decorated with bright red hearts, then we bought a set of blood-coloured wings that matched the plush bow and arrow I would be carrying. I did love being onstage, and had arguably done more outrageous things in high school, but the concept of prancing around in my underwear in front of a bunch of Kootenay strangers definitely gave me pause. It would be a spectacle. For it to work properly I was going to have to be thoroughly shit-faced, I knew. I worked my way through four or five beers before we even headed down the hill to the show, at the Hume Hotel.

“You’re not allowed to hit on the other girls,” she said. “And don’t be creepy.”

“I won’t be creepy.”

“I mean it.”

“The only one I care about is you, okay?”

Once we arrived in the warm-up room, it was game on. Women were rushing in and out, changing from one costume into another, and some wild-haired dude was giving himself a sponge bath in the sink. Show-tunes and party anthems were blaring from nearby speakers. I met a little person named Cotton Candy and an older burlesque legend named Suzanna Sultry who the women all worshipped. We all posed together for a photo. One of Paisley’s friends took charge of decorating my torso with lipstick, inviting the others to leave kisses from my treasure trail to my collarbone. Don’t be creepy, I reminded myself, as they took turns kneeling in front of me. Over the months that Paisley’d been doing Boob Camp I’d come to know a bunch of them, and a few of us ducked into a back alley to smoke a joint. Upon my return the photographer grabbed me, and said she wanted a few shots of me with Paisley. I turned to her, held her close to my chest, and gave her a gentle kiss as the shutter snapped. Eventually Charlotte gathered everyone into a circle for a pep talk. The topless woman standing across from me was missing one of her nipple tassels, so was clutching her boob with one hand.

“Look at all the power in this room,” Charlotte said. “I am so proud of each and every one of you. You’re going to go out there and blow them away. You’ve done all the hard work, and now you get to reap the reward.”

Standing back-stage clutching a beer, feeling cold sweat collect in my hairline, I wondered if I was about to humiliate myself. There had been no rehearsals, no real instructions. Was I supposed to go out between every number, or just a select few? Was I supposed to dance, and if so, what kind of dance was I supposed to do? There’s a subversive element to burlesque, I knew, and a sense that nothing is sacred and everything is silly. I could get down with that. For her first performance Paisley marched out with the five other women, working her way through an elaborately choreographed sequence that saw the women crawling across the floor, hurling themselves on to their backs and spreading their legs wide. I congratulated her as she came breathlessly off-stage, then kissed her as Charlotte beckoned me forward. I was in bare feet, brandishing my bow and arrow, and upon my entrance the audience roared with approval. I gyrated, spinning around to bend over like a porn star, and frolicked drunkenly as I went searching for the various layers and lacy bits that had been left behind. Charlotte was loudly announcing something into the microphone as I gave the audience a last wink and departed. My back and shoulders were shimmering with sweat, my hair wet against my forehead, my limbs vibrating.

I can’t believe I just did that, I thought.

While the show progressed I stood at a gap in the curtains and looked out at the rowdy crowd, some of them in costumes, who were roaring and shouting for the performers onstage. These are my people, I thought. Charlotte was a champ, commandeering the entire thing while performing multiple sets herself, and Paisley cuddled up beside me. Charlotte chased Cotton Candy around the stage, both of them half-naked, and then a boylesque performer did a leather-clad striptease. I was continuing to drink, and somewhere along the way I’d been forgotten — which I was fine with. I wanted to get back into my real clothes, but that would mean cutting through the parking lot in my underwear. I was just planning my escape when Charlotte introduced Isla Valentine, who was performing her first ever solo set. A milky-skinned brunette, she slinked across the stage and threw herself down on a chair. She smiled languidly at the audience, undoing her bra. Upon release she whipped it into the air triumphantly and flung out her jiggling breasts — dislodging both her pasties, which flew into the audience.

“Oh, shit,” said Paisley, as the crowd gasped. “She must not have glued them right.”

Isla quickly clasped her hands to her nipples, her face furrowed, and for a moment it looked like the number would be over. But as we watched, a look of determination crossed Isla’s face. Fuck it. She dropped her hands, stood up, and continued dancing to elated whoops. Striding from one edge of the stage to the other, she jutted out her hips and whipped back her hair, grinning defiantly.

“Wow, she really went with that,” I said. “Good for her.”

“No, not good for her. She’s going to get Charlotte in trouble. She told us ahead of time: the hotel can get fined for nudity.”

“Really? You think they’ll actually fine Charlotte?”

“They could.”

“It was a mistake! What was she supposed to do?”

Paisley frowned. “You don’t get it.”

The remainder of that evening is a haze, but one memory remains intact: meeting Ryan Martin, the owner of the hotel. I’d heard from multiple people in town that he was an important person to know, a powerhouse in the business community, but we hadn’t crossed paths yet. While I padded along the carpet coming back from the bar, double-fisting and still in my underwear, I nearly bowled him over coming around a corner. As soon as I realized who he was I was embarrassed, and felt like I needed to explain myself. Nearly naked, with lipstick smeared all over my stomach and the crimson wings drooping over my shoulders, I knew I was something of a radical sight. I stammered out that I don’t actually drink that much, told him this wasn’t usual behaviour for me. He grinned and clapped me on the shoulder.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “This is the Kootenays.”

The Kootenay Goon

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