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harryskalechips · 3 years

Text

one and done

A/N Hi everyone! I’m back with a one shot :) I know I don’t write as often anymore but since I’m self quarantining and I’m just about finish with high school, I thought I should try and give it another go? I’m also re starting up my jewellery business so ahhh many goals in mind but no motivation ??? Okay, I hope you guys enjoy this one!!! It is definitely a slow burn with smut but part 2? I dunno!!

Y/N and her brother’s best friend Harry, has had some pent up sexual frustration for a while. Wouldn’t it be best if they just had a one and done? you know to get it out of their system ;)

*smut includes spanking, choking, male and female receives oral, harry dom but Y/N rides, magic face cream treatment for anti wrinkling results? Yes, and what else? sub space, hair pulling, gosh I forgot please read it 😁

Word Count: 6.1k // Masterlist // one and done PLAYLIST

“Don’t you think it's a bit of a cliché to be crushing on your brother’s best friend?” Ness teases Y/N as they walk out of her house. They were just on the steps about to go on a walk around the block. It was definitely one of their favourite things to do as the sun was just about to set.

Y/N had her butt sat on the spruced wooden steps as she ignored her best friend’s comment. First off, she knew it was a cliché. Secondly, her last encounter with him just seconds ago was already making her plan her own execution.

In her head, it was simply her just jumping out of her window multiple times until she lost consciousness. Ness on the other hand was standing up, watching the poor girl tie her laces. “Okay, I was just teasing. We can change the topic.” She lends her hand out for Y/N to take.

“It’s not just that Ness.” She gladly accepts the gesture and stands up. She wipes off her butt and glances back at the door. “I’ve never had a thing for him! Ryan and Harry have been best mates since what? 8th grade and for some reason ever since the cruise from last summer, I can’t stop thinking about him.”

“It’s because he was shirtless half of the time.” Ness laughs as she hands Y/N’s water bottle to her. “Okay, we can admit it though. As a senior he is 10 times more attractive than he ever was. He looks like a frat boy that could jump my bones.” Y/N stops walking and just stares at Ness while the girl continues to walk. She grabs her hand and pulls her forward. “Okay, I’m sorry for the bad comment.”

“He is hot though. Really hot.” Y/N smiles.

“See, that’s why you should sleep with him.”

“What are you crazy? Ness, Ryan would kill me or him -maybe the both of us!”

“It’s pent up sexual frustration. Harry legit watched us walk out your door while eating a banana and you still managed to trip on your shoes.” She laughs.

“He was making eye contact with me!”

“All I’m saying is that he throws parties at his house and always invites us despite y’know us being juniors. Just offer, do it, slip out, and never say anything about it ever again.” Ness elbows Y/N as she crosses her arms.

“Maybe I will.” She laughs pretending to actually sound confident in the idea.

“Good, there’s a party this Friday anyway.” Ness shrugs her shoulders. “It’s the best remedy sis.”

“Harry, can we talk?” Y/N follows him into the kitchen while everyone else is God knows where around the house.

“Ryan is in the backyard, trying to get Cassidy back.” He barely glances at her as he pours himself a drink. He notices an empty one in her hand so he decides to pour coke in hers.

“I um wasn’t really drinking coke.” She states confusedly as she watches the bubbles in her cup dissolve.

“You think I’m trying to get you drunk at this party. One alcoholic beverage is good enough for yeh.” He smiles at her as he screws the cap shut and taps the top of her head. He was treating her as if she was a child, which definitely pissed her off since she was going to ask him a really fucked up favour in the matter of 60 seconds.

“I can handle myself, you know.”

“Yup.” He rests his back against the counter and bites the rim of the plastic cup as he looks at her. “What do you need though?” He genuinely asks her. Although they weren’t that close, Harry knew her long enough to know she wouldn’t start random a conversation with him. It was more like a hi and bye situation. Not her trying to actually talk to him.

“I have a favour and you can’t tell Ryan.” Y/N lets out a big breath as she watches his reaction change into a confused one.

“Look Y/N, if you want to try and smoke a blunt, I think it’s best you find yourself a dealer that doesn’t know your brother.”

“No, not that.” She whispers as she moves in closer. There were more people entering the kitchen and this was about to get really fucking awkward.

“What?” He looks at her and notices her body shifting closer to him. Her chest was touching the side of his arm, making his eyes look towards the cabinets instead.

“I-”

“Yes?”

“Do you wanna fu-?” His eyes widen as he downs the rest of his drink in one go. Harry doesn’t even let her continue as he steps away from Ryan’s little sister.

“I’m sorry do I already know the rest of that question?” He tries not to obviously choke on the liquid in his mouth.

“Well, I don’t know you didn’t really let me finish.” Her sassy tone comes out. Her cheeks were really red and although Y/N came to the party with Ness feeling really confident in the dress she picked. She just wanted to go home and not show her face to him ever again. This was the stupidest idea! Why on earth did she think Harry would want to sleep with her when there are so many girls that try to get his attention.

“I’m sorry Y/N.” He bites the inside of his cheek and watches some familiar people leave the room. Once it’s clear again, he speaks up. “Like are you serious?” He could feel his throat becoming more stuffy. “You and me?” She nods. “Really?” She nods again. “That’s crossing the line and Ryan is pretty overprotective. I can’t do that to him.”

“Cool.” Y/N stands perfectly still as she tries her best to maintain eye contact with him. She takes a sip of the coke but later, grabs the bottle of alcohol and pours it into her cup regardless of him watching her. “Well, don’t let Ryan know.” She shrugs her shoulders and laughs. “Thanks for answering my survey!” She gives him an awkward smile then walks out of the room. How can a guy pass up on her??? First rejection has gotta sting.

This wasn’t some weird guy she was asking though. This was Harry, Ryan’s best friend. If Ness was put in his position, she wouldn’t want her to say yes either. God, she was also going to kill her best friend for putting the most ridiculous game plan in her head.

And although the party continued on, Ness and Y/N didn’t let the earlier events bother them. The two spent hours just fucking around until they found a comfy spot in the living room.

“Y/N, don’t look.” Ness sits beside her on Harry’s couch watching a few strangers play an unfamiliar game on the floor.

“What?” she quickly looks up to see what Ness is talking about. It wasn’t a surprise to see Harry holding Carla Laws’s hand as they walked up the stairs. They looked pretty excited for a room tour too.

Oh hell no, everyone knows a girl doesn’t go to Harry Styles’ room to just hold hands and a cute sentimental room tour!

“Are you sure he didn’t want to with you?”

“Yes Nessa.” She rolls her eyes and drinks her third cup. “Whatever, if anything at least I don’t feel attracted to him anymore. I found a new ick. He doesn’t even find me attractive.”

“Good. Rejection may hurt but it makes you wake up and face reality.”

Okay if there was one thing Y/N could say now, it was that she is finally over Harry. Overall, he was nothing but a phase. Yes, she was crushing on him for the first semester of the year but after that weird conversation they had, it made sense why they couldn’t work out anyway. He’s a stuck up douche - a typical senior, all while she was a junior who was either too infatuated with him or too horny. Maybe both?

It’s been about two weeks and although Ness made sure to keep trash talking the guy, Y/N knew there was more to him than what her best friend thought. She knew him for years! Maybe the fact he was athletic, charismatic and just kind that made her realize what a perfect guy he was. She knew he was a bit more complex than what other people thought of him and it wasn’t bad at all.

What she never thought was how awkward it was going to be the next time she saw him. “Hey, Haz.” Ryan opens the door for his buddy as Y/N covers herself with the blanket more all while pretending to watch TV.

For the past couple of days, Ryan was going over to his house and maybe Harry asked him too to come over, but what she didn’t expect was to see him again so soon.

“Hey Ryan.” Harry takes his jacket and boots off as it just begun to snow outside. “Hey Y/N.” She quickly glances at him and waves.

“Let’s go to the kitchen first, I wanna get snacks.” Ryan suggests as he walks away, assuming Harry would follow him like usual.

After thirty minutes, Y/N thought the boys would be upstairs but as she entered the kitchen wearing nothing but her shorts and her brother’s old t-shirt, she was surprised to see Harry and Ryan eating sandwiches at the breakfast bar, looking pretty serious. Did Harry tell him?

As she walked closer, she noticed both boys were just on their phones, scrolling through different social media platforms. She quickly brushes past them to put her dish in the sink. Ryan seemed unbothered but she could definitely feel Harry’s eyes on her. Once she makes eye contact with him, he quickly takes a sip of his juice and looks at his phone once more. “Y/N can you grab the chips in the cabinet please?” Ryan looks up at his phone and notices his sister was standing right in front of the cupboard.

“Yeah, no problem.” She turns her back on them and opens the cabinet. She goes on her tiptoes reaching for the only bag of chips. Once she grabs them, she puts them on the counter and walks out of the room, only hearing her brother murmur a thank you.

It was about 6:30 PM and the parents weren’t home yet. Ryan and Harry decided to chill in the living room when the doorbell rang. Pausing the game, Ryan opened the door to see Tom standing in front of him. “Y/N it’s for you!” He calls out for his sister since he knew Tom was her friend.

“Who’s that?” Harry mouthed.

“Her boyfriend.” Ryan shrugs as he unpauses the game.

“Tom? What are you doing here?” Y/N walks down the stairs, pulling her shirt down.

“Vanessa told me to come by. Apparently you need help with the calculus homework? I’m free tonight anyway.” He smiles and gives her a hug. Tom was a really good friend of Ness and Y/N. He was a smart boy that was really kind and obviously had a big crush on Nessa. There was anything he could do for her.

Y/N instantly bit her cheek and laughed as she remembered Ness’ text message a couple of hours ago when she told her Harry came by. This was definitely one of Ness’ master plans. “You’re so sweet.” She pulls away and laughs. “We can go upstairs, I have a few questions to ask.” She quickly glances at her brother who doesn’t care all while Harry tried his best to maintain his eyes on the screen.

“Y/N, Put some shorts on!” Ryan finally yells out as the two went up the stairs.

“I don’t get why he throws parties every weekend.” Ness takes a sip of her drink as they sit inside Harry's dining room. They probably weren’t going to stay too long. Everyone was inside due to the cold weather with the occasional smokers outside. Being the only few juniors, there wasn’t much the girls could do other than loiter around, drink a few cups and play the games they knew so well. Y/N wasn’t the type to have random hook ups but you know her exception with Harry.

“Gemma has gone off for college and Anne is always working really late shifts at the hospital. He’s pretty much anywhere and everywhere besides his house unless it’s a party.”

“True.”

“I’m going to say bye to my brother then we can head back to mine if you want?” Y/N offers as Nessa nods and downs her drink.

“I’m going to drink a cup of water. Meet you at the front?”

“Mhm.” They both stand up and leave the room. Nessa was heading straight to the kitchen while Y/N began to wander around the house.

“Y/N.” Harry calls out her name over the music. He was wearing a while long sleeved shirt that was unbuttoned. It made him look really attractive which almost made Y/N lose her breath.

“Hey Harry, You know where Ryan is?” The only typical thing she would ever ask him before that one time. (Pretending as if she didn’t sexually harass him last time.)

“He’s downstairs with the rest of the boys.” He glances around at everyone and looks at her once more. “I’m sorry, are you um- leaving?”

“Yeah me and Nessa are going to call it a night.” She wraps her hoodie around her figure and tries to make her way to the stairs.

“Want me to give you girls a ride?”

“No no, it’s okay!” She smiles and waves her hand at him. “Nessa drove. You also have a party to h-”

“It’s kind of late maybe she should head home and we can-” And that’s when it hit her. Was Harry Styles trying to isolate her?

“Oh.” She widens her eyes and slowly nods. “Okay. I’ll let my brother and Ness know. Should I meet you in your car outside?”

“Yeah.” He runs his hand through his hair and quickly leaves her side. After bidding her farewell to Ryan and explaining her interpretation of Harry to Ness, she was quietly leaving the house as she watched Nessa walk by herself to the car down the street. What surprised Y/N more was to see him in his brown jacket standing by the passenger door.

“Did you tell Ryan I was dropping you off?” He nervously smiles as he opens the door for her. He makes sure no one is watching them leave together as he feels the butterflies forming in his stomach.

“No.” She puts her hood on and sits in his car. She was picking on her stockings trying to avoid the awkward tension between them. Once Harry sat inside and they both put their seatbelts on, they were on their way to her house. It was weird knowing she was actually leaving a party with her brother’s best friend so she could suck his-

“What happens if they notice you’re gone?”

“Um, I’m sure they’ll think i'm elsewhere doing stuff.” She knew what he was thinking about and that made her a bit uncomfortable but it didn’t change the fact it was true.

“Are you still down to y’know?” Harry honestly never thought he would be this nervous talking to Ryan’s little sister.

“Yeah.” She bites her lip as they glance at each other.

“Cool. Are you like a virgin or something. I mean is there anything that I should know about?”

“No.” She shakes her head and low-key observes how he drives.

This was going to be one hell of a night.

Harry has seen Y/N’s room a countless number of times but to actually be with her by themselves in Ryan’s house made him feel really guilty. That guilt however, was shoved in the back of his throat. The girl in the room with his was obviously the best distraction. “I like your room.” he smirks at her as he looks at her soccer trophy collection from grade school.

“Thanks.” She laughs lightly as she takes off her jacket. She quickly texts an update to Ness before putting the phone on do not disturb.

“So before we start, what made you ask the offer?” He takes his jacket off and throws it on her chair. He sits on her bed and glances at the time. It was still early, so people probably weren’t going to be looking for him.

“This is going to sound really dumb but I’ve had this crush on you since the cruise last summer. Well, you know Nessa... she had this thought and she thinks it is just pent up sexual frustration?” She shakes her head of saying the whole idea out loud. “So I thought maybe I should just get it out of my system.” Harry laughs as he takes in of what she just said. it made her smile as well.

“You were checking me out all summer?” He asks her in disbelief. “Little Y/N wanted to jump my bones?” He started to smirk at her. Although they didn’t know each other too well, the awkward tension was gone with just one simple laugh of his.

“Stop laughing.” She throws a pillow at him. “I didn’t think you would say no.”

“I didn’t want to say no Y/N are you crazy? I’m laughing because I kept checking you out in those tiny bikinis you used to wear.” He throws the pillow to the side and shakes his head. “I don’t want to cross Ryan like that but I think i need to get you out of my system too.”

“Mhm and why’s that?” She locks her door and sits on the bed with him. “Because Carla couldn’t distract me from seeing you in my sheets.” He leans in and kisses her. “Tom coming by a few days ago with you wearing nothing but those little shorts was already making me lose my mind.” He whispers and kisses her again.

Y/N immediately sits on his lap while trying her best to keep his mouth on her’s. Everything about this was so hot. She was about to just rip his clothes off.

“One and done yeah?” Y/N rubs herself on him as her fingers tangle themselves in his hair. He kisses down her neck while grabbing her ass.

“One and done. Just to get you out of my system.” He confirms with her as he gently throws her on the bed. He’s pulling his long sleeve off and taking his shirt off but once he begins unbuckling his jeans, he couldn’t help but notice Y/N trying to take her shirt off as well. “Fuck.” He murmurs as he gently unbuttons her long sleeve to help her take it off. In a flash, he’s on his knees unzipping her skirt and taking her stockings off as well. “You looked really pretty tonight by the way.” His cheeks flush as he throws her bottoms behind his back. Y/N laughs quietly and she sits up and brings his face closer to hers.

“I actually would like to say the same exact thing.” He leans in to kiss her once more. Her lips were extremely soft and forbidden and it was making him slowly lose his mind all over again. Y/N thought Harry was just a phase but that seemed impossible as she was already dreading the fact this was a one and done situation.

“You’re just so fucking soft and alluring.” He whispers in her ear as he unclasped her bra. “I already know I need to fuck you hard.” Y/N eyes’ roll back as she feels his wet mouth on her nipple as the other one massaged the other. Her hands were trying really hard to focus on the task at hand which was to undo his pants but it was definitely not working with the way he was distracting her. Not a single thought could process in her mind.

“I think since this is a one and done situation, you better make this memorable.” She whispers and bites her lip as she tries to hold back a moan. His fingers were teasing her covered entrance but Harry could feel her drenched spot already clenching at his presence.

“Memorable? I’ll definitely leave my mark on you.” He sucks on her mouth more roughly than usual as he rubs his fingers on her centre. “You wanted me so bad baby? You just had to beg me huh?” He gestures his hips more forward to help her with his pants.

“I’m kind of new to this. Be a bit patient.” Y/N laughs as she gently unzips his pants after numerous attempts.

“You just ruined the moment.” He laughs with her as he kisses her forehead and takes his pants off as well. “Just kidding, this is probably the most fun I had.” He hovers over her again and teases her entrance.

“What do you mean?” She lays on her back and roams her hands all over his chest.

“Never got the chance to tease the fuck out of a pretty girl then fuck her hard.” He slaps her clit and bites down on her lip. She suddenly lets out a moan that makes her eyes flutter and her chest rise closer up to his face.

He brings two of his fingers to her mouth and slowly lets her lick on it before rimming her entrance and shoving it in without any warning. His thumb slowly rubs her swollen numb as he can’t help but rub himself on her sheets as well. “You mind if I get a little bit of a taste? I’ve been dying to know. I saw you earlier at the party and I had to jerk myself off seeing you in those little stockings of yours.”

“You. You jerked yourself off thinking about me, baby?” She looks down at him and smiles softly. He gives her a little smirk before pulling his hand away and heading his head down a bit south. His tongue dips slowly on the left side of her leg as his hands grip her thighs tightly, sure of the bruises to form soon.

“You’re like a fucking wet dream. How can I say no to you?” He urgently swipes his whole tongue on her centre. “I saw you earlier and had to go to my room.” He takes another lick. “Fuck baby, the best i’ve fucking tasted. Fuck oh fuck.” He precisely observes the way your whole swallows his fingers in and clench so tightly around him. His tongue dipping and switching with his fingers because he honestly can’t decide which is best.

“Harry, fuck me please baby.” Y/N moans loudly as she harshly grabs on her boobs. She’s never been fucked this good. It was honestly feeling like a dream. With that being said, she’s only had sex a handful of times but Harry seemed like such an expert in the field. “Oh God.” She tries to pull away. She wasn’t sure if she could continue on with Harry obsessively licking and sucking on her wet centre.

He looks up and watches her eyes roll back as her fingers begin to pull on his head aggressively. His only reflex is to spread her legs wider. After her first orgasm, Y/N lays on her back staring at her ceiling trying to catch her breath.

“Fuck me.”

“We aren’t done yet, love.” He laughs at her cuteness. He can’t remember the last time where he wasn’t rushing to finish himself off. He was taking his time with Y/N since it’s what she deserves. He lays down beside her and kisses down her chest. “Tell me when you’re ready to go, yeah?” He dips his tongue on her shoulder until it reaches the huge hickey he left on her collarbone. He gently licks around it and sucks on it again.

He was a bit surprised to see Y/N sit up and grab a condom from her drawer. “Thank you for fucking the shit out of me, I’ll gladly return the favour.” She smiles and tucks her hair behind her ear as she focuses on putting the contraceptive on him. Just touching it was already forming butterflies in her stomach.

“I could’ve been fucking you on that cruise.” he mischievously smiles at her as he watches the way her pretty tits move.

“You were sharing a room with my brother.” She hisses as she holds onto his shaft trying to gently ease the pain as she fully sits on him.

“But you were alone.” He grabs onto her waist and helps her. “You’re so beautiful fuck.” He sits up on her headboard as her palms rest on his chest. Both of their eyes couldn’t help but watch the way he was easily penetrating her.

“Was touching myself because of you.” She mumbles out as her speed begins to increase.

“What did you say baby?” He almost chokes on his breath as he can feel her fully taking him in.

“Couldn’t stop thinking of you on that cruise. I needed you to rail the fuck out of me.” She moans louder as she starts to feel his hips meet her.

“Fuck me. So perfect, Shit.” He quickly turns them around and shoves himself back into her. His hand immediately tightens around her neck and once he is about to pull it away, she keeps his hand on her.

“Fuck me harder.” She cries out as his arm begins to push her legs up. He spits in between their centres before thrusting as hard as he can. All you could hear was her headboard banging against the wall as his hand continuously choked the fuck out of her.

“I bet you like getting spanked too huh?” He bites his lip and semi turns her body before slapping her ass.

“Harry fuck.”

“Come on, baby. Be a good girl and come around my cock.”

“Fuck fuck fuck.” Y/N cries out as her fingernails scratch his back. “Come in my mouth. I want to taste you so bad please.” tears begin to form in her eyes as she continues to clench around his dick. Harry immediately pulls off the condom and helps her sit up on her knees. She absolutely could not feel a thing below her stomach but with Harry’s hard cock in her mouth, she was already closing her eyes and trusting him with everything she was. She’s never been this fucking vulnerable, she was literally about to pass the fuck out.

She was softly holding onto his thighs but her hands found comfort on his waist as he began to fuck her mouth harder. Harry on the other hand, kept his eyes on how her mouth was taking him in. He watched the way his fingers wrap around her hair tightly as he brought his hips closer and closer until he could feel her gagging on his dick. Without a warning, he immediately pulls out and spills all over her face.

“Why’d you do that?” She opens her eyes and pouts. She was pretty upset how she couldn’t taste him spill into her mouth. So her finger immediately takes a swipe of his spill and puts it in her mouth. Without hesitation, she’s taking his forming soft dick in her hands before softly licking it clean and softly sucking on his balls. She takes his shaft and swipes her cheek once more before licking the rest of his spill from his shaft.

“You’re going to make me hard again if you keep doing that baby. Might not be as nice as I was this time.”

“Maybe I want another round?” She gestures him to lie down as she continues to kiss and suck on his cock.

“Thought it was a one and done.” He softly smiles as he removes some of the hair from her face.

“How about a one and done night?”

“Deal.”

And although they thought this was crossing a line, they already knew the moment their lips touched, they wouldn’t be able to stop.

“Wait so he changed his mind!” Nessa laughs as they drive back home. “Bitch how are you at school today? I literally saw you limping at lunch.”

“Shut up.” Y/N mouth widens as she rubs her face. “I don’t know what happened okay? We said one and done but we honestly went a couple of rounds before I had to wake him up so he could drive back home.”

“But is he out of your system? Don’t get me wrong Harry’s a fine guy but like dating wise? He’s been with other girls but somehow always goes back to Carla. They’ve been like that before you and Ryan moved here.”

“Yeah, he’s out of my system.” Y/N laughs but truth be told, some nights when she can’t sleep, she’ll find herself staring at the ceiling.

“Why are you guys home so early?” Nessa asks once they step inside the house. There was a good comparison between Nessa and Ryan with Y/N and Harry. First off, Nessa literally saw Ryan as her older brother which meant they were pretty vocal towards each other. Secondly, Nessa was very comfortable at Y/N’s house almost as if this was her second home.

“Carla and Cassidy are coming over.” Ryan smirks as Harry cleans the living room behind him. “During the party last night, I may have asked if they wanted to come over for a double date game night thing. Mom and Dad are cool with it since it's a Monday which is their date night too.

“Oh have fun.” Y/N buds in and laughs. “Make sure to actually vacuum please. You don’t want the girls finding your crumbs on the carpet.” She takes her jacket off as Nessa follows behind her up the stairs. Harry obviously tried to ignore the fact, she bluntly ignored him.

“Double date? Damn, you guys really did just fuck and brushed it under the carpet.”

“It meant nothing right. So?” Y/N tries to brush off the topic as she sets her backpack down. “Why won’t you sit down?” “On that bed?” Nessa smiles awkwardly as she glances at the double bed near the wall.

“I changed the sheets.” Y/N takes her shirt off and replaces it with another loose top. She unzips her pants and wears her black tights instead.

“So should we invite ourselves to their double date?” Nessa raises her eyebrows as she lays down on the bed.

“No because it’s weird and I don’t want Harry to think I’m jealous.”

“I think you are.”

“Nope, I told you I don’t like him like that anymore and he’s out of my system.” She tries to ignore the fact, how she swallowed him without hesitation.

“Okay but wouldn’t it be better to prove to yourself you are just by being around him.” And although Y/N wanted to protest that, the two best friends ended up being invited by Ryan to play downstairs anyway.

“You girls want a refill?” Ryan sits up from the coffee table as he cleans up the empty red cups. Ness, Carla, and Cassidy wanted a new one which made Y/N go help her brother out in the kitchen.

“Are you having fun?” Ryan asks as he throws the cups in the recycling. Y/N pours the preferred drinks in the new cups as she looks up at her brother.

“Yeah, I was wondering why you invited Ness and I. Don’t you think we’re cock-blocking?”

“Harry suggested you guys hang out with us while we played games. More competition is fun y’know. Plus you and Nessa can leave whenever.”

“Oh cool. Thanks, I guess?”

“Yup.” He grabs two cups as she does. She couldn’t help but notice how Ryan suddenly started cheering. “Yeah, Styles get it! Woooo!” Y/N turns her eyes to notice Harry and Carla making out on the floor by the coffee table.

“Are you guys dating again?” Cassidy laughs as she tries not to watch them make out.

“Sure.” Carla pulls away and pecks his cheek. Nerissa was just watching Y/N’s reaction and she knew it was a bad one.

“Y/N could you walk me to the car? Appa just texted me and he’s wondering where I am. I forgot it was his birthday.” Nessa speaks up.

“Oh shit.” Y/N was clueless of her excuse. Which thankfully made her seem more genuinely in a rush to get out of the room. She sets the drinks on the table before going upstairs with Ness.

“How did you forget it was Appa’s birthday, Ness?”

“I don’t know.” She packs her things up. “Why don’t you come with me? He’s gonna blow his cake soon.”

“Oh, I don’t want-”

“Come.” And if there was one thing Y/N knew well about Nessa, it was that she wouldn’t ever forget it was Appa’s birthday, especially if she just celebrated it a couple of months ago. Without a fight to say no, Y/N immediately grabs a hoodie as they walk down the stairs.

“Ryan, I’m going to Ness’ to celebrate Appa’s birthday. I’ll be home soon before Mom and Dad comes home.”

“Oh okay.” Ryan waves at his sister as his arms rests on Cassidy’s shoulder.

“Bye guys!” Ness and Y/N wave as they both exit the house immediately. Harry stays unbothered as he takes another sip of his beer.

“Thank you for getting me the fuck out of there.”

“It’s okay. We don’t actually have to leave you know. It’s 6 PM, I can drive the car to a different neighbourhood and you can cry all about him there.”

“I love you.” Y/N begins to tear up.

“I love you too.”

“What’s Tom doing here?” Ryan’s eyes are in shock as he watches his sister hold hands with the familiar boy. What’s confusing is that Y/N went to Ness’ for a birthday.

“He just wanted to come over.” She smiles innocently as she waves hi to the same party. It was just about 7 PM and the double date duo was watching an unfamiliar movie on TV. Nessa called Tom and Y/N had to explain their situation. Although he didn’t really want to do it. He knew Y/N wanted to prove something to the Harry guy. So as long as they didn’t do anything romantic or weird that would cross his boundaries, Tom was okay with it.

“Aw, I didn’t know you were dating Thomas?” Cassidy smiles as she walks in with a bowl of popcorn. She hands it to Carla who is cuddling up against Harry on one of the sofas.

“We aren’t dating.” They both look at each other and laugh. Tom shakes his head and pulls Y/N up the stairs instead.

Once the pair is gone, the dates begin to watch their movie again. “Ryan, you really don’t care if your sister is by herself with that boy?” Carla laughs as she feeds herself and Harry popcorn.

“I’m definitely not going to interfere with that, they’re probably doing the nasty already.” His eyes widen as he stuffs more popcorn down his mouth and although, Harry was keeping his eyes on the screen, there wasn’t anything sitting well with him knowing the girl he was with on the weekend was already in somebody else’s arms.

The goal was to get each other out of their systems, why the fuck are they so jealous then?

great plan Vanessa.

Part deux ici

#harry styles angst #Harry Syles #harry styles smut #harry styles fluff #bestfriend!harry #Dom!Harry #one direction #one direction fanfic #onedirection one shots #one direction smut #harry styles fanfiction #frat boy harry #slowburn #cute harry #jealous!Harry #harry styles stories

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yellowocaballero · 3 years

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Buffy the Vampire Slayer fic: Buffy’s Mom falls for a real estate scam and plunges them all into hell.

“So,” Buffy said, excruciatingly slowly, “find out anything interesting at work today?”

Mom slowly unzipped her purse and dug through its voluminous depths before dumping a fistful of brochures on the table. Upside down, Buffy could read SUNNYDALE DOESN’T HAVE TO BE SUNNYHELL: 10 TACTICS FOR SURVIVAL and DEMONS, DEMONS, DEMONS...AND YOU!.

“I have the manual in my backpack,” Buffy said sympathetically. “Want to take a look?”

“I’d rather get drunk, thanks.”

Buffy understands how this Slayer thing works.

Wake up, go to school, save the world. Never tell anybody who you are and what you can do, let your Watcher dictate your life, and then die in three years. Sunnydale will not be any different, and there’s no way it has a good hair salon.

But there’s definitely something weird about Sunnydale, and it’s not the Hellmouth. It might be the vampires at the nightclub and the demons in her math class. It’s probably the nerdy girl who writes manuals on the undead, the dweeb with a stake watching out for any suspicious ‘Watchers’ or ‘Slayers’, and the overly confident Queen Bee who might single-handedly be fighting crime. It’s definitely the overly Catholic vampire divorcee with a soul.

Maybe Buffy didn’t understand as much as she thought she did. But hey - at least she doesn’t have to worry about a secret identity, right?

The rest of this 20k story under the cut. I have no explanation for this.

In retrospect, the house had been suspiciously cheap.

Buffy and her mom hadn’t really been in a position to complain. They were caught in a strange, all holds barred standoff of mutual resentment and guilt: Buffy, for getting expelled from school for reasons that were totally not her fault, and Mom, for divorcing Dad and having to find a job on the quick that pulled them all the way to Sunnydale, California.

Of course, it was hardly as simple as that: Buffy secretly wondered if Dad had bounced because she was just too much trouble, and she knew that Mom thought Buffy was a delinquent because of her subpar parenting and the trauma of divorce. Yeah, as if divorce was her problem right now.

So when Mom drained her savings to buy a gorgeous and cheap house in the middle of Lame Street, Suburbia, Boringville, Buffy tried only to complain about the stupid stuff. And if Mom got on her case for being distant and only talking about her closet, then she just totally wasn’t getting that Buffy was trying to help. Sometimes not bothering your mom meant just not telling her stuff.

Buffy started school only half a week after they moved in: barely enough time to get their boxes unpacked and then sit around exhausted from the strain. Mom complained about her aching back, and Buffy badly pretended that the fridge was too heavy to lift. She knew that this dumb year had knocked a screw loose, because she caught herself wishing she had read some of Pike’s geeky Spider-Man comics. Kind of a Secret Identity For Dummies type deal, except Spider-man was fictional and she was not nearly that lucky.

She needed more than a weekend of lying in bed exhausted and flipping through Teen Beat before starting school. She had to put together the perfect outfit, carefully apply her best makeup that won her Homecoming Queen at the 8th grade dance, and try desperately to make up some kind of amazing backstory that had no demons, vampires, ghouls, or ghastlies. Buffy Summers had moved to Losertown because she wanted some more sun, get away from the yucky LA pollution, rediscover nature…

“Remember, honey,” Mom had said, smiling that new smile in the idling and sputtering car in front of the weirdly gigantic suburban high school. “This is a fresh start, okay? Everything’s going to be different from now on.”

“Is that supposed to be comforting?” Buffy asked. “That’s not comforting.”

Mom didn’t drop the smile, but she didn’t need to. It was so pained and fakey-happy. It was new and awful, but somehow it wasn’t all that different from her old smiles. Maybe Mom had always been fakey-happy, and Buffy had been too busy being fakey-happy with her to notice. “Please, Buffy. I’m just asking you to try.”

“I’m trying, I’m trying!” Buffy slid out of the seat, slamming the car door behind her. “What’s the worst that can happen? I’ll burn down two cafeterias?”

“Don’t even joke.”

Buffy walks onto the campus of Sunnydale High with her chin held high, her hips swaying seductively, ready to conquer high school - and, maybe, even her own life.

Twenty steps in, somebody is already staring at her. Buffy assumes this is because she is just that sexy and cool.

Thirty steps in, an entire group of kids kicking a ball around are staring at her. Buffy’s ego is through the roof, although she’s also a little uncomfortable.

Thirty five steps in, some nerd in a Hawaiian shirt loudly yells, “Holy shit, is that a new girl?”

And then everybody’s staring, and Buffy promptly loses control over the situation.

Ten minutes later, Buffy’s found herself mobbed by a group of girls with teased hair lead by a particularly bossy and tall girl who was quick to assert that her name was Cordelia, she lived in the North side of town, thank you very much, and where did you buy that eyeshadow? Anyway, so, like, what are you doing here?

“Uh,” Buffy said, hemmed in on all sides by a ring of gawking students. Was this their first time seeing a girl from LA? “Going to...school?”

Cordelia gives her a look of abject sympathy, ready to put five dollars in her tin cup on a street corner. “So you’re here because you’re stupid, huh?”

“Aw, Cordy, lay off,” the nerd in the Hawaiian shirt said, pushing through the crowd and cheerfully ignoring the looks of mild disdain everybody was bestowing upon him. “You call this a Welcome Wagon? Wait ‘til first period to scare her pants off.” The nerd smiled brightly at her, in a way that he probably thought was winning but was painfully teenage boy awkward. He held out his hand. Buffy eyed it warily. “Xander Harris, Mr. Welcome Wagon, can I show you around? Get you a drink? It’ll be from the vending machine, so ten percent chance you’ll get Cherry Coke, but guaranteed it’ll be cold!”

“Ugh, Xander, don’t threaten a girl with Cherry Coke.”

“How can I threaten her when you’re standing right next to me, Cordelia!”

A short, painfully adorable red headed girl in a fuzzy sweater tugged at Xander’s garish sleeve, expression softly folded in gentle recrimination. “Xander! Be nice.” She smiled sweetly at Buffy, assailing her eyes with a bright pink butterfly hair clip. “I’m Willow Rosenberg. Uh, I like your hair. And your shoes. And your makeup is nice.”

“Thanks,” Buffy said reflexively, “I like your…”

“Take your time,” Willow said magnanimously.

“Points on the good taste, fresh meat,” Cordy said, somehow also magnanimously.

She crossed her arms, taking a long hard look up and down Buffy. The crowd around them held their breaths, waiting for her verdict. Buffy straightened, pushing her chin up and setting out her shoulders. She’s known dozens of wanna-be Queen Bees in her life, but somehow Buffy had the sense that there was only one Cordelia. Nobody in the world but Pike had ever recognized that there was only one Buffy. There was no way she was going to out-popular this girl who clearly held the school in an iron fist, but Buffy didn’t back away from vampires and she sure as hell didn’t back away from girls who wore that shade of purple.

Finally, Cordelia decreed, “She has potential. I give her two weeks.”

Buffy instantly shot back, “Ye of little faith. Want to bet?”

“Didn’t the principal ban the dead pool?” Willow asked, distressed.

“The what?” Buffy asked, having admittedly not known what the bet was.

“One week,” Cordelia amended.

Buffy was growing increasingly concerned. Kids around them were audibly making bets. One short boy wearing another unfortunate shirt was clearly acting as bookie. “One week of what?”

“Survival,” Cody said, grinning brightly and happily, “like, duh.”

“Excuse me, hello, hi, I’m Buffy Summers. Wonderful to finally make your acquaintance. I like your hair. What did Cordelia mean by survival?”

Willow stared at Buffy, wide eyed and confused. She looked around, as if Buffy could possibly be speaking to anybody else, but all she saw was the math class talking loudly amongst each other and horsing around. The math teacher wasn’t even trying: he was just sitting at his chair, feet on the desk and snoring away with a magazine over his eyes.

They were three periods in, and half of the classes so far had been like this. Buffy’s homeroom was a flop - the teacher didn’t even bother trying to introduce her, and she was put under the thumbscrews by gawking kids grilling her for her life story again - and her first period actually seemed to involve some English, but second period Science was just half a period of limp lecturing before passing out some worksheets. Mom had been promised a good school district! So much for the propaganda that these nice suburbs had good schools.

“Uh…” Willow pointed to herself and Buffy nodded very slowly. “Yes! Yes, right, um...I’d ignore Cordelia, really. She comes on a little strong.”

“Yeah, her and half the school.” Buffy held up a completely blank notebook, devoid of everything but a dozen phone numbers. “Half the guys here are losing their minds meeting a girl they haven’t known since kindergarten.” Somewhat anxiously, Buffy felt the need to assert, “I mean, that’s also my total good looks. I had, like, five boyfriends freshman year.”

Willow’s eyes goggled. “Wow! Five boyfriends?”

“In a row,” Buffy promised.

“Wow. Life outside of Sunnydale really is different, huh.” Willow seemed a little distressed by this, as if there were a million other things happening outside of Sunnydale that she had no methods or means of witnessing. “Well, don’t listen to Cordelia. She’s a pessimist. I’m sure you’ll do just fine here. And - and people live longer than a month all the time! For example - I’m fifteen years old. That’s much longer than a month. One hundred eighty six months, if you wanted to get specific -”

“Okay, nerd.” At least someone here could do math. With the quality of this education, it was a miracle she could do double digit multiplication. “Look, as fun as it is being - sorry, did you say live?”

“Until old age,” Willow swore up and down. “I promise! If you follow every guideline in the handbook and follow all municipal laws, then your chances of making it a year are 80%! I would know, I helped write it! My mom’s on the committee. She says it teaches civil engagement -”

Buffy had a headache. Maybe it was a good thing that math wasn’t happening today - she couldn’t take two things that killed her brain. She had thought her first day at school would be a stressful, harrowing ‘Rumble in the Jungle’ type thing - not a murder mystery, with her as the corpse! “What handbook?”

Willow stared at Buffy, eyes wide and jaw slack. Her eyes widened and widened, until they were as circular as quarters. Panic bloomed across her expression.

She abruptly whirled around in her seat, grabbing a nearby pencil and lobbing it at a blonde boy laughing with his friends in the back of the room. “James! You stupid jerk!”

Her pencil’s aim was true, and it hit James squarely on the forehead. He moaned and massaged the red skin, grimacing. “Damn, Willow, what’d I do to you!”

“Your stupid mom’s real estate company is what you did to me!” Willow said, with a soft fury that somehow fit in perfectly with her fuzzy sweater. “They ran that con again, didn’t they! The Mayor outlawed that! There was a municipal ordinance!”

“You and your municipal ordinances,” James complained, before he caught sight of Buffy. His eyes widened too as he obviously put the pieces together. Real estate con plus new girl plus suspiciously cheap house equalled…? “Oh, shit. Mom totally ran the con again.”

“What con?!” Buffy yelled, two seconds away from hysteria.

But James just looked grim, and his friends glanced at each other nervously. A group of girls on the other end of the dinky classroom started whispering. “Mom hooked some suckers from the big city.”

“She didn’t pass out the flyers,” Willow indicted.

“Wait,” another girl said, leaning over, “new girl hasn’t read the brochures?”

“Please tell me you’ve gone to the orientation,” Willow begged Buffy.

“What the fuck are you people talking about?” Buffy asked blankly.

“Ugh, I hate my mom,” James said glumly. “She does this all the time. It’s just to meet her dumb quotas. She’s totally gonna get the firm in trouble. She lists the house for dirt cheap, she gets some...I dunno, recent divorcee or something, and then she conveniently doesn’t tell them about the demons. Like, you’re supposed to put the Hellmouth on the listing. It’s in the zip code. You don’t need the bonus that badly, Mom, God. Your dumb real estate company’s a money laundering front for the vampires anyway!”

“Oh,” Buffy said, “is that all?”

***

Willow was a sweet girl, and she was appropriately horrified on Buffy’s behalf that she was a) scammed into buying a house for more than its market price of zero, and b) didn’t know about the demons.

She was so distressed about it that Buffy didn’t have the heart to tell her that she had already known about the demon thing. It looked like everybody knew about the demon thing. Buffy was beginning to feel a little self-conscious that she had only found out about the demon thing a year ago. Like, had the rest of the world found out about it when they were twelve and she just missed it? Was she late in finding out about the demon thing? That was so embarrassing. She felt like such an idiot.

But Willow was giving her such a well-rehearsed and educational speech about how yes, demons are real, and vampires do lurk in the night, and how you probably shouldn’t walk home alone in Sunnydale. But we’re very culturally competent here at Sunnydale, and we value diversity in our residents! Half the swim team were fish men, and they won championships every year! And she tutored a Brachen demon named Brad in math, he was super nice! It was about tolerance and coexistence, or so Willow preached.

Willow’s explanation lasted the rest of math and extended into lunch, and she was clearly very tickled to hold the attention of the hot and exciting new girl. She quietly pointed out all of the kids walking past them in the halls who were perfectly nice demons!, but also stay away from the Hyena boys, please, they were not very nice demons. As a general rule, if they’re part of “the Debate Team”, don’t talk to them. You could try talking to “the Book Club”, but they mostly just hummed ominously. “The Knitting Club” was best left unmentioned.

Xander, when he caught up to them during lunch in a move that was so clearly instinctual that Buffy automatically understood the two were best friends, was far quicker to tell her exactly who were the dicks in Sunnydale, which was most of them (“But not murderous jerks”, Willow stressed). Xander clearly relished in telling her the gory details, while Willow just screamed ‘girl who desperately wants to be helpful at all times’.

“I know!” Willow said, stopping in front of the cafeteria double doors so she could whirl around. “Let’s go to the library! I know we have three copies of the orientation manual in there. It’s very important that you memorize all of the demons who are chronic hunters, Buffy. We have some nice safety tips in there, too. You can borrow my bear mace until you get your own!”

“I love girl talk as much as the next guy,” Xander said, effortlessly steering them both in a completely different direction than the sweet siren song of food, “but can’t we avoid the library? The new librarian gives me the creeps.”

“It’s not his fault he’s English,” Willow said loyally. “He seems really nice.”

“He’s a liar.” Xander stressed the word, shaking his hands in the air - as if it was an unbelievable thing, alien and disturbing in this chronically honest Sunnydale. “You heard the guy! He won’t stop going on about how he’s just ‘a normal librarian’ and that he found the Hejarrak demon like that!”

“He could have!”

“It was beheaded! He was holding an axe!”

“Is the librarian a demon too?” Buffy asked, alarmed. Willow and Xander were quickly leading her down a hallway with an ominous set of public school double doors at the end of it, and Buffy could swear that she felt a slight aura of evil and malevolence emanating from within. It had to be a library. Only libraries were that evil. “How much of the staff are demons here?”

Xander’s expression darkened. “Does Snyder count?”

“We need to give him a warmer welcome,” Willow insisted, stopping them all in front of the double doors of the library. Buffy could swear that it stank of sulfur. “Just because everyone’s saying -”

“Just because he is -”

“You don’t know -”

“Your attitude’s awfully funny, Willow, considering that Rule #24 of your handbook is to ‘always listen to rumors’ -”

“I like to give people the benefit of the doubt!”

“Fifth grade dance class,” Xander threatened.

“All ballerinas are evil,” Willow protested, pushing open the library doors and pulling them all inside. “I’m not going to let this town erase my faith in human and monster nature, Xander! If you look for bad everywhere you go, bad is all you’re going to find.”

“Bad’s everywhere we go,” Xander said flatly, following her inside and leaving Buffy to catch up. “It’s bad all the way down.”

The school library was strangely nice, for a school library. There was hardly a textbook or graphic novel in sight, which was both a relief and slightly a bummer. Instead, the shelves seemed to be stocked with...thick tomes. It was like the entire library was the reference section. People actually checked out books from here?

Buffy floated closer to one of the shelves as Willow made happy small talk with the highly suspect librarian. He was...a middle aged white man in a vest, who looked like he’d rather be alphabetizing his tea than working in a public school library. He looked a little intimidated by Willow, as if her five foot two jumper-wrapped glory was more terrifying than any hellspawn.

She squinted at the shelves, working hard to pick out the creased black titles in the leatherbound spines. Magik Moste Evil. Five Hundred and One Curses and Incantations. Death of a Salesman.

“What is wrong with this school,” Buffy whispered.

Was it her? Did this shit just follow her wherever she went, like Karen McNeil to her Justin Timberlake. She thought Sunnydale would be an escape - an escape from the looming and lurching LA, from the blood and ghost of Merrick frowning with disapproval down at her. She couldn’t believe she felt guilty that she was leaving - as if she was running away from all danger to waste the rest of her life in a suburban pit. Where ‘hellhole’ meant poky shopping mall with bowling alley carpets.

Xander sidled up next to her, leaning on the front of the bookshelf as she perused the side. He crossed his arms, giving the library a seemingly instinctual once-over before glancing at Buffy. He cocked an eyebrow and smiled at her, but his attempts to look cool and suave were paper-thin. They barely hid a real anxiety and tension in him, a strange cousin of Cordelia’s hidden steel and Willow’s hidden passion.

“Don’t let Will’s everything fool you,” he said. “I once saw her stake a vamp with her bat mitzvah Torah.”

Somehow, Buffy couldn’t fight a grin. “The fuzzy kitten sweater’s the last thing they ever see?”

“You don’t live that long being that nice unless you’re a bit of a badass,” Xander said proudly. That, at least, was genuine - the guy who started bragging about how great his best friend was the second she was out of earshot. But when he glanced back at the enthusiastic librarian talking to an equally enthusiastic Willow his expression darkened a little. Buffy couldn’t quite identify it - something left of bitterness and right of caution. “Not to be rude, but you seem - well, normal, right?”

Buffy couldn’t hide the bitterness from her voice, either. She felt way too young to be this bitter. It was going to give her wrinkles. “I used to be.”

“Yeah, you gave up all intellectual rights to that when you moved here.” Xander tightened his shoulders uncomfortably, eyes not leaving Willow. “But popular girls like you know how important gossip is. And everyone and their bartender’s saying that Mr. Giles over there is a complete and total Watcher.”

Buffy’s brain short-circuited.

Xander drastically misinterpreted the expression on her face, because he jumped in to clarify. “Not in a creepy way! Except, yeah, in a creepy way - look, Watchers are like the weird nerd sidekicks of Slayers.” At Buffy’s mounting horror, Xander quickly said, “Not like the band! Wait, that’s probably not what you’re worried about - I mean, Slayers aren’t bad. But they’re like these complete Terminators whose sole purpose in life is to kill demons and slay vamps and everything. They’re totally demon boogeymen.”

“Wow,” Buffy said, panicking completely, “sounds...good! Sounds like a good thing to have around. I love having, you know, bodyguards against vamps and stuff. Very multipurpose people, Slayers!”

“Yeah, you’d think. But the last thing we need right now is some Batman charging in and stirring everything up. Sunnydale has rules! A balance! And if you don’t know the rules, you’re fish food. When people like Slayers don’t know the rules, we’re fish food.“ Xander glanced over at Mr. Giles again, frowning. “Wherever a Watcher is, a Slayer’s gotta follow. So much for a normal school year.”

“I don’t know,” Buffy said. She was giving up all hope of a normal school year too. She didn’t know why she even tried. Hope was just a flashing neon sign to the universe - ‘hey, come on down here and stomp all over me!’. “Maybe she doesn’t really get a choice in this either.”

“What -”

“Buffy!”

Buffy and Xander jumped a foot in the air, but it was just Willow. She was still standing at the circulation desk, waving enthusiastically at Buffy and beckoning her closer. But behind her, the librarian seemed just as surprised. His jaw had dropped, and Buffy watched his gold wire-rimmed glasses fall on the desk.

It felt strongly as if she had just walked into her new dentist’s office. Buffy felt like such an airhead for not even realizing. British? Tweed? Book-crazy? Freak? That checked off every single Watcher box for sure.

But it felt stupid to think that way, too. She didn’t even want to think that way. She would rather remember Merrick as special. One of a kind, just like her - the last in a long line of idiots. She wanted to think of tweed and think of him; think of a bristling mouche and remember the way it would shake when he yelled at her for some stunt or another. Every time she held a stake, she heard his voice in her ear: thumb this way, hold it like that, keep your elbows in, for god’s sake.

Ugh, was the tweed a uniform? Truly unfortunate.

“Mr. Giles, this is Buffy Summers.” Willow gestured proudly, as if she was a magician in a sparkly leotard. Buffy glared hard at Mr. Giles before walking up and standing behind Willow, arms crossed. “She needs some of your demon prep manuals, please!” She lowered her voice, looking around the completely empty library surreptitiously. “She’s new.”

Mr. Giles looked like a stiff breeze would knock him over. He obviously looked her up and down - not in a creepy way, but definitely in a ‘am I sure I’ve got the right address?’ way. Buffy wondered if he had been expecting someone a little less short and blonde. “I see,” Giles said weakly. “The new student. Yes, yes, I’ve - I’ve heard of you, yes. I mean, I heard you were coming. That we were receiving a new student, yes.”

“What, is it a once in a year occurrence?” Buffy asked sarcastically.

Xander popped up behind her, grinning brightly. “We had one in the eighth grade! What was his name, Will?”

“Henry...something?” Willow frowned. “Or was it Hank?”

“Could have sworn it was Jeeves.”

“Hank Jeeves or Henry Jeeves?”

“We can check the gravestone after school!”

“Oh, good idea!”

“Oh my,” Giles said.

“Yikes,” Buffy said.

“But I’m sure that won’t happen to you!” Willow said quickly, apparently only distantly aware that she was being objectively upsetting. She gave Buffy two thumbs up, her grin strangely identical to Xander’s. Slightly desperate, definitely manic. “Not with my handy dandy manuals!”

“Yeah, Mr. Giles,” Buffy said pointedly, glaring as hard as she could at Mr. Giles and hoping that Slayers had laser vision, “I could use some manuals. To teach me about how to defend myself. Against vampires.”

Mr. Giles looked at her blankly. He looked down at a painfully cheerful Willow, then up at a highly suspicious Xander with his hands jammed in his pockets.

“Hm,” Mr. Giles said. “This is a very interesting situation, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” Xander said pointedly, “it’s pretty interesting how you’re an academic, Mr. Giles. Would you say that you like studying demons? For, hypothetically, demon killing purposes? Or watching purposes?”

“I’m sorry,” Mr. Giles said, still apparently somewhat overwhelmed. He stepped away from the desk, bending down and hefting out a truly thick stack of spiral bound manuals before dumping them on the desk. They made Buffy sneeze. “I’m still not familiar with the cultural mores of America. Is killing demons a taboo around here?”

“Turnabout’s fair play,” Xander said flatly. “Personally, I’d love to have Ms. Rambo come in and knock off some of those monsters like Darla.” Willow made a face. Buffy wanted to make a face too, if only at the tacky name. “But I remember what happened the last time someone decided to play demon hunter. That’s a no thank you from me, buddy.”

“I miss the arcade,” Willow said mournfully. “They never rebuilt it.”

“Miss the arcade? Damn, Willow, I miss the Petersons!”

Buffy and Mr. Giles exchanged looks. He twitched an eyebrow at her. Buffy grimaced, before jerking her head towards the door.

“I do believe lunch will be over soon,” Mr. Giles said suddenly. He tried to smile reassuring at Willow and Xander, but it came out more like Buffy popped a lemon in his mouth and told him to swallow. “You two should hurry on back to your classes. Ms. Summers, if you’ll stay behind, I can write you a late pass and give you a - crash course, if you will, on Sunnydale.”

“You’ve lived here for a month, dude,” Xander complained. “What makes you think you know anything about Sunnydale?”

But Mr. Giles just smiled thinly. “As it happens, demon academia is my specialty.”

“I knew it!” Willow cried, excited. Xander grimaced. “Of course a demon academic would move to Sunnydale! I bet this is, like, field work. Teenage Demons In Their Natural Habitat: A Compendium! Do you need a co-author? I have notes!”

“Do you really?” Mr. Giles asked, fascinated despite himself. “My studies have been rich on the theory, but woefully lacking on the practicals.”

“Wow, is that the bell?” Buffy said quickly. She gently took Willow’s shoulders and steered her in the direction of the library doors, leaving Xander to play catch-up. “You two are probably really busy, I wouldn’t want you to be late to your next class -”

“We’re never busy,” Willow said proudly.

“Mr. Finkel noticing if anybody’s late to class is the first seal of the apocalypse,” Xander said.

Mr. Giles just looked alarmed. “Is it really?”

“Sorry,” Xander said, “black humor is our blood and butter around here. Get it, Wills?”

Willow patted his arm reassuringly. “You are so funny and clever, Xander. Women love you.” She perked up, spinning around in excitement to face Buffy. “I know! Why don’t you come to the Bronze with us tonight? That’s our local nightclub slash teen hangout slash only hangout thing. It’s totally safe, I promise - there’s a treaty and everything. I wouldn’t walk home alone, but that’s what we’re here for! Think of it as a bona fide Sunnydale tour!” She faltered a little, her own words catching up to her. “I mean, if you aren’t busy. You really don’t have to, I know there’s a lot of unpacking and...stuff. Or if you want to go with Cordelia, that’s fine.”

Buffy had the feeling that Willow and Xander were social suicide. Willow was a geek and Xander was a nerd, and they both looked like they had wandered out of the wrong end of a thrift store. They obviously didn’t hang out with any other friends during lunch, and would rather spend their time in a stuffy library with a creepy librarian just so they could help out the new girl. If Sunnydale was going to be Buffy’s fresh start, then spending her time hanging out with these two was falling on her face right at the starting line.

But Willow was smiling at her so hopefully, as if she was already imagining all of the good times they would have if she said yes, and Xander was smiling so wryly, as if he had already accepted that she would say no. And, somehow, Buffy found herself saying, “I’ll be there with bells and my dancing shoes on. I don’t need to, like, bring a shotgun, do I?”

Willow squealed with excitement, jumping up and down and clapping her hands. “Don’t worry, I can bring the weapons! This’ll be so much fun! I’m so -”

The bell cut her off, and all four of them jolted. Buffy pasted a big smile on her face, quickly made something up about how excited she was, and finally vanquished Willow and Xander from the library. They waved goodbye enthusiastically, whispering with heads together as they pushed open the doors and vanished down the halls.

But Buffy’s hearing was supernaturally keen, and she heard Willow whispering excitedly to Xander as they disappeared. “ - real friend! And she’s -”

If Xander replied, Buffy didn’t hear him. Mr. Giles interrupted her, coughing slightly for her attention. She turned around to see him leaning on the circulation desk, twisting his glasses between his fingers in a strange show of anxiety. Merrick had always been so confident and sure. Mr. Giles probably wasn’t half the Watcher Merrick had been. But Buffy was always half the Slayer she should be, so maybe they were a good fit.

“I have to say, this assignment isn’t quite what I was expecting.”

“God, tell me about it.” Buffy sighed, leaning against the circulation desk with her arms crossed. The library really was nice. It would probably be cozy if you found books comforting. Buffy’s favorite books were the very heavy hardback ones that made good improvised weapons. “So much for my painfully normal civilian life. I’m Plain Jane compared to these people.”

“Yes, I’ve found the students quite eclectic so far.” So that was why he was terrified of Willow - was it the sweaters or the repressed bloodlust? “I suppose there’s no need for introductions, then. I am glad that you’ve finally arrived. I’ve found myself rather drastically underprepared for this assignment. It’s far more dangerous than the briefing implied.”

“God forbid demon hunting be dangerous,” Buffy said flatly. “Look, Mr. - what’s your first name?”

“It’s Rupert, actually.”

“Look, Rupert -”

“It may be more appropriate for you to call me Giles -”

“Look,” Buffy said, and Giles shut up. “Rupert. I’ve tap danced to this before, okay? You’re the Chosen One, no more little buddies for you, stop wasting your time on hair care and go make with the Slayage. Was that the speech you wanted to give me?” Giles’ silence was incriminating. “Stellar. I’m sure this is the beginning of a wonderful working relationship. I dearly look forward to you trying to control my life. I will cherish our training sessions where you try to hit me with a stick. I’ll try to shed a single stoic tear when you die.”

Silence stretched through the library, both of them standing together and far apart. Buffy knew she was coming across all defensive, but she didn’t care. He wasn’t going to get attached to her - Merrick had made that very clear - so she didn’t have to get attached to him either. Nothing in life really lasted all that long - homes, marriages, schools. Slayers, Watchers. Better to just work hard, play hard, and live life to the fullest. Buffy had a lifetime of living to get in for the next - three years, max, so she was going to get her money’s worth. And maybe a good life insurance policy.

Finally, Giles said, “Mr. Merrick was a well regarded member of the Watcher’s Council. I had quite a bit of personal respect for him. He talked highly of you, you know.”

Buffy’s throat closed up, and she rubbed hard at her eyes. “He thought I was an idiot.”

But Giles just hummed. “He thought I was an idiot too, so I’m afraid you’re in good company. What was it he said...oh, yes. ‘She’s a frightfully stubborn, hard-headed girl. But she’ll make it.’ He had a great deal of faith in you, Buffy.” Buffy rubbed harder at her eyes, and Giles’ voice softened. “I know we’ve just met, so forgive me for saying so. But I agree with him. And if you let me - I fully intend on making sure that you live to graduate from this blasted secondary school.”

“I don’t even know what that is,” Buffy croaked, rubbing hard at her eyes. She sniffed, and finally turned around to glare hard at Giles. He straightened, expression somber, but she just jabbed a finger up at him. “Don’t give me the no friends speech.”

Giles abruptly looked very uncomfortable. “You must dedicate yourself to your training -”

“Oh, it’s not as if this place gives homework anyway, I can multitask. I can work on other homework!” She grabbed the manuals, dragging them closer and flipping open to a random page. She frowned down at it. “‘Hellmouth 101’? Nobody’s explained what a Hellmouth is yet.”

“The manuals are rather useful, aren’t they?” Giles asked eagerly, but Buffy just stared at him blankly until he deflated. “They’re a sort of weak point between hell dimensions and ours. Think of them as...if demons and demonic activities are fruit flies, then hellmouths are rotten apples. The supernatural always arises as a sort of chaotic element - a natural consequence of the ineffability and unpredictability of the universe, one might say - but a hellmouth feeds antimatter into the surrounding area in such drastic quantities that reality itself weakens. The unpredictable proliferates itself, and arranges into atomic structures and malevolent background radiation. Of course, that’s a drastic oversimplification.”

Buffy stared at Giles blankly. Giles sighed.

“Hellmouths are demon magnets. They are also Slayer magnets. It’s no coincidence that you’ve found yourself here, Buffy.”

“What, was suburbia my destiny?” Buffy paused a beat. “God, that’s more depressing than the five year life expectancy.”

“The Powers That Be certainly keep its employees busy,” Giles said, faux-philosophical and definitely nonsensical. Buffy was beginning to get a taste of who Giles was: somebody who desperately wanted to be a perfect Watcher like Merrick but knew that he wasn’t even close. “I suppose this is an unconventional assignment for the both of us. No need to keep the secret of the supernatural or worry about keeping our actions covert. Although judging from some of the unsavory rumors that have been flying around about me -”

“You mean the true ones?”

“ - I’m afraid that Slayers and Watchers don’t have a good reputation in this town.” Giles hummed thoughtfully as Buffy crossed her arms and looked away. “I’m somewhat surprised. I would have thought the townspeople would view a Slayer as a savior. Instead, she seems to be somewhat of a...loose canon. I suppose I can’t blame them for their distrust of powerful and maverick supernatural entities. Although I wouldn’t call us maverick, precisely -”

“It’s stupid, isn’t it?” Buffy asked suddenly. To her horror, her throat was kind of thick. This was such a stupid thing to be upset about. Bad things should have a limit - like, max time to be upset about something is a hundred hours. And then it doesn’t bother you anymore. That should be how it worked. “This is the worst town in America. It’s on a hellmouth. There has to be something in the water that makes all the other kids freaks, and I’m the freaking new girl again. But I’m not alone here, Giles. I don’t have to pretend demons aren’t real, or that the world isn’t terrible. But I’m still the Slayer. The one place where I can fit in...and I’m still a freak.”

It was obvious that Giles didn’t know what to say. She didn’t blame him. He was, like, fifty. Middle aged men didn’t worry about being freaks or not having friends. There was no way he understood how she felt. Adults were always looking at her, a hot and popular teenage girl, and totally writing her off. She was dumb, flighty, irrational, and none of her problems mattered. Demon hunting was the only important thing to them, so it must be the most important thing to her too.

But it was Buffy’s life. It was all she had. She wasn’t going to give it away to people who ran through Slayers like toilet paper, and she wasn’t going to let them design it for her based on what they thought was important. Even if her life wasn’t important to all the old farts across the pond, it was important to her.

Killing things and almost dying every night was easy. It was life that was hard. And even Merrick had known that Buffy never took the easy way out.

“In that case, we better get to it,” Giles said finally, uncomfortable with her teen girl feelings. He put his glasses back on, shifting through a large stack of books until he drew out a slim leather bound notebook. “Now, I’ve drafted up a training schedule for your Slayer duties. I think five hours a day and two hours of patrolling per night ought to be sufficient, don’t you? Eight hours on weekends?”

“Yeah, sufficient to kill me. Big pass.” Buffy grabbed a pen and scribbled over his itinerary, eliciting a mournful sound. “Sign me up as a library assistant for seventh period. You get three hours after school and a two hour patrol. Fridays off, that’s party day.”

Giles looked scandalized. “There are no days off when fighting the forces of evil, Ms. Summers.”

“Tough nuts. You’re lucky I’m giving up cheerleading for you.” Granted, the hours were probably still less than cheerleading, but that was why Buffy knew she could do it. Slaying was easier on her knees, anyway. “You get five hours on Sunday but Saturdays are mine.”

“The weekends are the most valuable time - I have field trips planned!”

“I will go on strike, Giles.”

And, somehow, they figured everything out just like that.

Maybe Giles wouldn’t be too bad. Maybe school wouldn’t be too hard. Maybe becoming a Slayer hadn’t stolen her ability to make friends. Maybe she’d survive to graduation.

A girl could dream, right?

********

Mom picked her up from school, which was so weirdly embarrassing Buffy silently swore to figure out the school bus. It was bad enough she was the new girl. The last thing she needed was people to see her Mom’s rinky dink SUV. Dad had gotten the Mercedes in the split.

Mom wasn’t looking so good. Her perm was totally ruined and her unfortunate suit jacket was balled up in the back of the seat. Buffy silently sat in the passenger seat as Mom easily peeled away from the school, joining the scuttling streams of high school drop-offs and meandering between high school drop-outs.

They sat in silence for a few minutes before Mom apparently remembered that mothers and daughters talked sometimes. Her voice was hoarse and strained, as if she had seen the unseenable a few times too many today. “How was school, honey?”

“Oh, you know.” Buffy shrugged. “New girl disease. They had to quarantine me.”

“That’s nice,” Mom said vaguely.

Halfway home, Mom turned off the main street and stopped in front of a liquor store. She unbuckled her seat belt as Buffy stayed in the passenger seat, feeling exceptionally awkward.

“Hitting the happy juice a little early, Mom?”

“Mom’s just celebrating her new job,” Mom said, still vague and distant. “Just a little one woman party. Stay in the car, honey.”

She came back with a bottle of whiskey ten minutes later. Buffy appraised it thoughtfully and resolved to steal it later. Pike had taken great pains to educate her on the best booze. He was a fantastic influence and a good friend, no matter what Mom had said.

“So,” Buffy said slowly, “how was...work?”

“Oh, you know,” Mom said. “Very boring.”

The rest of the car ride was spent in silence. Buffy, who had spent five whole minutes mentally composing the thrilling tale of her first day of school so Mom could make all the appropriately horrified noises, felt a little cheated.

Buffy and her Mom used to be close. She couldn’t even blame the whole Slayer thing for this one: they stopped really getting along when she entered middle school. But elementary school overflowed with memories of Mom. There were albums on albums of Buffy in elementary school dressed up in increasingly adorable outfits engaging in painfully adorable extracurriculars, and Buffy’s early childhood memories were crowded with Mom. Horseback riding lessons, dance team, choir, tennis...Mom always stood at the sidelines of each game, and she always spent the entire drive home criticizing the moms of all the other girls. Honestly, why did Helen let Rebecca out of the house dressed in dinosaur pyjamas?

But Mom got bored of that after a little while, and Buffy started focusing on cheerleading, and suddenly Mom was spending all of her time at the Monday book clubs, Tuesday wine nights, Wednesday volunteer service at the food bank, Thursday wine nights, and so on. It wasn’t as if they never saw each other, since Mom stayed at home and did basically 100% of any actual parenting, but it was really obvious that Mom found the stay at home thing boring. She used to have a very exciting job, or so she would tell Buffy all the time. She used to manage art galleries. Isn’t that so refined?

She had been thrilled to get right back in the saddle. This whole thing was very exciting for Mom. She had been such a terrible mother to Buffy the last few years, which had to be the reason why she became a JD, so time to finally hit those special mother-daughter notes! Finally, freedom from the shackles of financial comfort and not needing a job: time to be feminist! This was her Live, Laugh, Love moment, and Joyce Summers was getting her groove back!

Honestly, kind of sad.

Two hours later, Mom was sitting at the kitchen table with a glass of whiskey on the rocks staring into the distance and Buffy was reorganizing her closet for the fifth time in a blatant avoidance tactic. She should probably put the heels in the back of the closet, no matter how cute they were - oh, no, not the Marc Jacobs, these were surprisingly comfortable and an excellent getaway shoe. What about dancing clothes? Could this clutch hold a stake?

After Buffy regretfully stuffed the purses that couldn’t hold stakes in the back of her closet - the sacrifices she made for Queen and country - she laid out her nightclub clothes for later that night. That took another twenty minutes, because your first time at the local nightclub was a time for impressions. She picked the rad baby blue number, totally tight and very slinky with a surprisingly good range of motion and shoulder stitching that didn’t impede her torso movement. She was all about the fashionable and the functional. Modern girls really could have it all. Of course, she’d have to figure out how to manage the purse situation…

Buffy leafed through her Cosmo. She organized her makeup. She tried to do homework, before realizing that nobody had really assigned her any.

She went downstairs and stood in front of the kitchen table. Mom was on her second glass of whiskey. She stared directly at Mom. Mom took a robotic sip of her whiskey.

“So,” Buffy said, excruciatingly slowly, “find out anything interesting at work today?”

“I have the manual in my backpack,” Buffy said sympathetically. “Want to take a look?”

“I’d rather get drunk, thanks.”

“Oh-kay,” Buffy said, feeling a little as if she had lost control of her life. “So...are we moving or what?”

But Mom just buried her hands in her hair, pulling them through the carefully and primly permed wheat blonde brands and thoroughly ruining it. She didn’t even seem to care anymore. “What, and sell the house we just bought? To who? I have no money, no savings. What am I going to do, go crawling back to your father?”

Okay. Buffy stepped back, a slimy worm of awkwardness writhing in her gut. “So what are we going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Mom said. “I’ll...find a buyer, somehow. See if there’s a return window. Raise hell. Maybe sue.” Mom brightened a little, the idea of legal action always comforting. “I still have that card from Wolfram & Hart. This has to be fraud, right? We bought this house under false pretenses. There has to be something…”

It should have been good news. Buffy could kick back, relax, and let Mom worry about it. Money, real estate, bills and work was all Mom’s job. Buffy had way too many responsibilities on her plate for any fifteen year old, but at least she wasn’t paying a mortgage. Small favors.

They could leave. Escape Sunnydale and leave it behind, brochures and manuals all. Giles would probably be forced to follow her, wherever she ended up. She wouldn’t leave behind the vampires, but that was fine. She probably wouldn’t leave behind the demons, but at least there’d be less of them…

What would she be leaving behind, exactly? Demons existed wherever night fell. The only thing she’d be abandoning was people who understood her. Kids who didn’t make her pretend to be normal. Xander and Willow.

“I don’t know,” Buffy found herself saying. “It’s not all bad. The life expectancy is actually pretty good if you compare it with Medieval England.”

“Oh, so long as we’re better than Medieval England, Buffy!” Mom gestured sharply with her hands in frustration, vague and ineffectual. “We can’t possibly stay here. Half the people at the grocery store had hatchets in their shopping carts. The graveyard has a hot dog stand.The co-director of the art gallery has a Brachen demon for a husband! I don’t even know what a Brachen demon is!”

“They’re really harmless and squishy, but watch out for the spikes,” Buffy said reflexively, before pausing a beat. “According to the manual.”

“We aren’t like the people here, Buffy!” Mom cried. “We’re - we’re normal people!”

It shouldn’t have hurt her feelings. Mom didn’t mean it like that. Buffy was a normal person, and she was darn proud of it. She liked all the things normal girls liked and some dumb Slaying night job wasn’t going to take that away from her.

But Buffy couldn’t help but think about Rebecca in dinosaur pyjamas and Willow in fuzzy sweaters and Cordelia in abrasive surety. Maybe in Sunnydale you had better things to worry about than whose daughter got the most ribbons in horseback riding.

“You’re right, Mom,” Buffy said finally, with a fake pep and chipperness natural to any cheerleader. “In Sunnydale, we’re the freaks. Looks like we better get used to it!”

An hour later - way before typical party time but before sunset, which was probably the point - Buffy was out the door with a vague explanation about a party. Mom had never required more than that (“Honey, I can’t possibly keep up with all of your parties”), which was useful with the whole demon slaying thing. Willow had even helpfully drawn a very detailed and precise map, complete with a large circled warning at the top (“DO NOT LEAVE AFTER SUNSET”) and a suggested list of weapons. Buffy liked the cut of Willow’s jib.

The map took her all the way down to the Bronze, which was predictably disappointing. It was a smallish run-down building sandwiched between a Pizza Hut and Blockbuster, sagging under the weight of days that weren’t necessarily better, but definitely less leaky. Buffy wondered morbidly if the Blockbuster’s horror movies were filed under ‘slice of life’. The entire town had a truly weird abundance of alleys, feeding into Buffy’s already growing theory that the place had been built by demons, and Buffy knew that if you took a wrong turn behind the building you were stuck wandering through a maze of alleys with vampires hanging at the end of each one looking for drunk teens. The lengths people would go just for some watered down beer.

Willow and Xander were waiting for her outside. Xander was dressed in a predictably terrible over-long dress shirt and jeans, while Willow was engaged in an actually painfully adorable tank top, ruffly skirt, and capri pants situation. The only bizarre aspect was the fact that Cordelia was locked deep in an argument with Xander as Willow calmly read a book next to them. Other teenagers milled around, with what looked like Cordelia’s posse huddled a safe distance away from the carnage.

The distinct smell of teenage musk assaulted her nose, heavy with the sweet scent of heat and sweat and sweltering air. The ebb and swell of the bassy music from inside the Bronze was already assaulting her ears - nightclubs had become impossible since the Slayer thing, definitely the worst aspect of the entire deal - but when she finally got close enough she could make out the details of the argument.

“ - treaty, they’re not going to do anything.”

“Are you even listening to what I’m saying?” Cordelia was dressed to the nines in high heels and a dress just as slinky as Buffy’s, although it was obviously much tackier. She was holding her own suspiciously long clutch purse, hitting it against her thigh in a move that was somehow threatening. “Hello? My intel is totally reliable. We gotta shut the whole place down tonight.”

But Xander just scoffed. “First off, the Bronze didn’t close when the fires of hell rained down upon us last Valentine’s Day. And second off, nothing’s going to happen! Vamps talk a big game, but even the biggest bad’s not going to risk getting a lifetime ban from the only decent cocktail place in the town. Your intel just fell for the shittalk.”

“You know, you actually used to care about this crap.” Cordelia crossed her arms, expression pulled tight as she stared down Xander. “You used to actually try and help people. Now all you do is sit around and mope.”

“Cordy, that’s not fair,” Willow protested weakly.

“And you used to have a spine! What happened to you two?”

Xander’s expression darkened, face barely illuminated by the buzzing neon of the lurid sign and the soft golden trickles of twilight. “You know full fucking well what happened.”

“For God’s sake, Xander, Jesse was months ago! Just get over it!”

Judging from the way that Willow hissed, it was a low blow. But Xander’s mouth just twisted unhappily, as if Cordelia wasn’t saying anything he didn’t already know. “I know that you have an excess of expendables, Cordy, but I don’t got that many friends to lose. So sorry, not sorry, but a terrible side effect of caring about people is moping a little bit after they get eaten. I know you can’t relate.”

“You’re an idiot,” Cordelia condemned. She hit Xander on the arm, ignoring his exaggerated wince. “Moping’s a real ugly look on you, Xander. And it’s a real ugly look on me, so listen to what I’m freaking saying!”“Christ, it’s hard to miss your infernal harpy screeching -”

“I’ll show you harpy, you trash bag in plaid -”

It was downright impossible to tell if those three were in a frenemies situation, if they genuinely couldn’t stand each other, or if they cared about each other too much to be normal about it. Buffy couldn’t begin to interpret it. She had her own rotating cast of expendables, flushed down the drain as surely as this Jesse was. Maybe she didn’t know how to care about people, especially in their weird and awkward way - where you couldn’t share a civil word, but they were the first one you asked for help. But it was awkward listening to this, and Buffy had already thought about death more than enough for one night.

“Hey, guys!” Buffy said, artificially chipper and trying hard to come across as if she had just gotten here. “So, does the Blockbuster shelve horror movies in the slice of life section, or would they go in the comedies?”

Everybody whirled around to face her, and she watched all traces of fury drain from Xander’s expression as his jaw dropped. Willow flushed a very deep red, opening and closing her own mouth before hiding behind her book. Cordelia just scanned her quickly and made a somewhat approving noise.

“Seven out of ten,” Cordelia said. “Not bad but you could do better. Go sleeveless next time and emphasize the biceps. Guys here are into muscular girls.”

“Muscular girls,” Willow whispered. She abruptly stuffed her book in her rainbow tye-dye tote bag, which clinked ominously. “I mean, hi! Nice night, isn’t it?”

“I can definitely confirm. That’s why this twig here can’t find a date.” Xander instinctively dodged Cordelia smacking him on the arm with her clutch. “Now that the gang’s all here, and if Cordy doesn’t have any more death threats, maybe we can get a little dancing in!”

“Oh, forget it.” Cordelia stalked forward, pushing past Xander and Willow as her posse roused themselves into action. But she waved them away, stopping only for Buffy. She jabbed a finger at her, expression intent and oddly furious. Buffy noticed for the first time that a strand of her hair was eskew - a little less than perfect. Maybe even frazzled. “This is your problem now. Try not to get those losers over there or my guy on the inside killed. All the stress is making me break out, I need an emergency face mask.”

Before Buffy could process why anybody but Giles was telling her not to get anyone killed Cordelia was already striding off, high heels clicking confidently against the pavement until she disappeared into the crowd. Buffy watched her go, the image of that one vagrant hair sticking stubbornly in her mind, before Willow grabbed her hand and dragged her inside.

The Bronze was like every loosely carded club: a little run down, with a cracked dance floor and a staticy karaoke machine singing a siren song of entertainment. A band staffed by three pimply college students were grinding out fuzzily distorted notes on antiquated guitars, providing a wobbly rhythm for the partiers that had already started migrating to the dance floor.

Human teenagers sat around rickety tables and competed to see who could talk the loudest, pushing each other and laughing. The scene could have been plucked out of a shitty club in LA if it wasn’t for the distinctly non-human contingent lurking around the corners.

As the Slayer, Buffy had a pretty good vibe for demons. She thought it was woman’s intuition until Merrick had started rambling about the resonance of supernatural energy. There were definitely some demons at the bar wearing a human face - older than the rest of the partiers, sipping a dark amber liquid and talking quietly amongst themselves. A large, thin table in the center, splitting the dance floor and the table area, had vampires sitting on every seat, drinking out of opaque water bottles and shoving each other. But there were far more obvious contingents too. A group of men at the corner pool table had scales all up and down their skin, and a giggling group of women had tough red skin with nails way longer than even the most unfortunate pedicure.

Willow caught her goggling, and she quickly launched into an explanation as Xander steered them towards a small table closer to the back that seemed to be their standard hangout spot. “The Bronze is where all the teens and demons hang out! The adults all go drinking at Montgomery’s, and I think the community college students hang out at a bar on campus. There’s another nightclub on the other end of town, but they don’t let anyone under 21 in there. I hear some really hardcore demon stuff goes on inside.” She looked around obviously before leaning in and lowering her voice. “They say that some of the college students and the demons hook up.”

“This town is insane,” Buffy said flatly.

“There’s grinding,” Willow whispered, alight with the lure of forbidden knowledge.

“Drinks, drinks, who wants drinks!” Xander yelled, clapping his hands. “Enough about demon sex, Willow, we’re getting smashed and hitting the dance floor. I have a fake ID and dubious morals.”

“They don’t even ID here, Xander.” Willow squinted at Xander. “And since when do we dance?”

“I bet Buffy likes to dance,” Xander hinted desperately. “And I’d never leave her alone on the dance floor, would I?”

Willow sighed before turning to Buffy, the picture of long-suffering. “You don’t want to date him. You’re a beautiful young woman and you can do better.”

“Why, yes, Willow, you’re a great best friend, who’s always there for me in my time of need, who just wants my happiness -”

“Trust me, I’m aware,” Buffy said. She reached out and gently patted Xander’s hand in sympathy. “You seem nice, but not on your life. Let’s just be friends.”

Xander looked a little as if his night had just started and it was already ruined. “Okay, to be clear, I accept this friendzone and I’m happy with the friend. This is the last you’ll hear of it from me. But you don’t even know me! I’m not a hideous man! I could be boyfriend material!”

“The only material you wear is polyester,” Buffy said sympathetically. “Trust me, it’s nothing personal. You just aren’t my type.”

“What is your type?” Willow asked, strangely focused. Buffy wondered if she had memorized a list of ‘things girls talk about’ from her American Girl magazine before she left the house. “I bet you dated the quarterback in your old high school.”

“Lacrosse captain,” Buffy said humbly. Willow made appropriately impressed noises as Xander muttered something about how he could do sports. “But I’d say that I like tall, dark, and handsome. He has to be thoughtful, you know? Sensitive. And really into poetry.” Buffy may or may not have had an extremely formative crush on Hamlet as a child. “Oh, and he has to be older. Older is mandatory. Seventeen at least.”

“Wow,” Willow whispered, eyes wide. “You are so cool, Buffy.”

Buffy tossed her hair. “Of course, I’ve been settling until now. Mr. Lacrosse couldn’t recite anything more complicated than the Fresh Prince theme. I’m looking for a guy like…” Buffy scanned the room, picking through the guys at light speed. She found herself skidding to a stop at the corner, her attention caught by a man tucked in the corner of a booth. “A guy just like him.”

He was perfect. Strong chin and piercing eyes. His hair was dark and elegant, and she could see his well-toned muscles from across the room. He had a quiet, intent expression on his face - as if he was thinking about the secrets of the universe, or reflecting on the nature of man.

“Wait.” Willow craned her head to follow Buffy’s line of sight, struggling to connect the dots. “Angel?”

Xander instantly and reflexively grimaced. “Ugh. Hate that guy.” Then he paused a beat, Buffy’s words clearly processing. “Wait. Angel? Buffy, I’m sorry, I know you’re new here, but that’s Angel.”

Okay, so maybe not a perfect guy after all. “What’d he do?”

“Technically nothing,” Xander complained, as if this was an unforgivable crime, “but seriously. It’s Angel. He’s, like...the me and Willow of vampire society. Except a thousand times more awkward. He sits alone at the cafeteria table in Dracula’s castle, if you catch my drift. He’s just embarrassing.”

Wait. Rewind. “He’s a vampire?”

“What’s Angel doing here?” Willow pushed herself up in her seat, squinting over the room. “He hates being in places where other people exist.”

“Humans and vampires don’t really hang out much, but those guys get so cliquey.” Xander rolled his eyes, propping his elbow on the table. “There’s basically around three main gangs. They’ve been around since we were kids. Tons of random vamps are always just happening naturally, but either they join one of the gangs or one of the gangs kills them because they ate someone on Main Street or North Avenue or something. There’s always a gang on top, and that shifts a bit. Lately it’s been Darla and her crew reigning over us lowly humans.”

This was all very West Side Story. The scene in LA was nowhere near this organized. Vamps weren’t really smart enough to keep up any city-wise hierarchy or organization. Someone elects themself king of the hill and they get their head ripped off the next week. Vampires were too cannibalistic, backstabbing, and impulsive to form up anything as complicated as groups. “So who’s Angel with?”

Xander grunted, making a wavy hand gesture. “He, like, hangs around Darla? I think they’re the kind of exes who hang out just to bitch at each other and, like, go shopping.”

“But he’s really nice,” Willow said quickly, despite the mental image of Angel carrying Evil Vampire Boss’ Nordstrom bags. “You know, for a vamp. And for someone who married Darla. At least I think he’s nice. He doesn’t talk much. I think he’s scared of teenagers. And maybe everything?”

“Yeah, he’s a nice guy who’s terrified of kids and not Darla.” His tone soured a little, the cheerful explanation of local politics curdling. “She’s been daring lately. Raiding the fucking high school. Who even does that, anyway?”

Willow squeezed Xander’s hand, and they sat in silence for a second. Buffy picked at one of her cuticles, glancing sideways at Angel and searching for ways to change the subject. For nerdo supreme, he was really cute…

“I can’t believe a guy that hot isn’t popular.” Buffy sighed, propping her chin on her hands and unapologetically staring at him. She could look at that jaw for days. What a shame about the evil thing. And the mid-twenties thing. She liked old, but not that old. Guys who were that old were great to look at but terrible to date - something about not being able to get a girl their own age was very unsexy. “I swear human blood has to be the best moisturizer.”

“Oh, but that’s the thing about Angel. I think it’s why none of the other vampires like him. He doesn’t even drink -”

“Whoah, whoah, whoah! Angel on the move, guys! Angel on the move!”

Sure enough, Angel had stood up from his booth and was undoubtedly making his way towards her. Willow’s jaw had dropped. Xander was making big ‘X’ gestures with his arms, trying to make Angel go away.

Sirens were ringing in Buffy’s head. Two dual impulses raged. Hot guy alert. Hot guy about to flirt with her alert. But he was a vampire. She was a Slayer, technically, and she should be killing these guys. They definitely killed people and Buffy did not date murderers. Or loser twenty somethings.

One day in this town and it was doing something to her already. She had staked dozens of vamps, maybe hundreds, but after barely an hour in a crowded nightclub where demons hustled each other at pool and vampires chugged blood from water bottles it all seemed so...normal. Not benign, not harmless - but just a facet of life, as easy and confusing and terrifying as everything else.

She would let him flirt with her and then let him down easy in a show of virtuous piety. Merrick would turn in his grave a little, but he wouldn’t spin like a shirt in a washing machine. That was the important thing.

Angel almost ran into a teenager and mumbled a lot of apologies before promptly almost crashing into a table. They all winced.

“He’s not meant to be in public,” Willow said sadly. “It’s like seeing a Husky in a desert.”

“Or a Mormon in Sunnydale.”

The band’s set ended with a show-stopping riff that sounded like a screaming banshee, and Buffy and Angel winced as one. As the room clapped listlessly he finally made it to their table, grabbing the high surface as if it would anchor him against the roiling tides of B.O. and drunk teenagers.

The hottest guy Buffy had ever seen looked straight at her and said, “You! You’re blonde!”

“Uh,” Buffy said, as Willow and Xander gave her sympathetic ‘I told you so’ looks. “It’s natural?”

“And you’re here with Willow and Alexander,” Angel said, clearly proud of himself. “Great. I was worried. You all just look the same, and - oh, hi Willow, Alexander.” He squinted at them as Willow waved happily and Xander rolled his eyes. “Did you two get taller?”

“Yeah, from when I was twelve,” Xander bitched. “And for the last time, it’s Xander. Ex ay en dee -”

“Hi, Angel! We were just talking about you.” Willow conveniently did not mention what they were saying about him. “Buffy, this is Angel. He’s really nice. He’s always walking people home and keeping an eye out for little kids. He’s kind of like a guardian angel, so that’s why we call him Angel!” She lowered her voice, still completely audible. “And I couldn’t pronounce his name when I was six…”

“He decapitated this vamp who caught me and Willow on the way home from the playground when we were six,” Xander elaborated. Angel looked a little embarrassed. “He’s always doing stuff like that. Just hanging around outside of elementary schools like the weirdest stalker of all time -”

“I’m Buffy Summers,” Buffy said firmly, sticking out her hand. Angel looked at it in complete and abject confusion before human social norms caught up with him and he hastily shook it. Buffy was beginning to worry that he wasn’t here to flirt with her. “New girl extraordinaire. I have a stake in my purse, so can I help you?”

Angel hastily dropped her hand. Smart man. “I’m just here as a favor to a friend. She told me to, uh - ‘handle any trouble?’. Which I didn’t really want to do, but it’s hard to argue with Cordelia -”

“Cordelia?”

“Oh, right!” Willow said, who really should have mentioned this sooner. “Aren’t you two friends?”

Angel grimaced. “I didn’t have a lot of choice.” Everybody nodded in understanding, even Buffy. “Anyway, but now that you’re here I can go, right? I really don’t want to get in the middle of all of this.”

The pounding bass and the rise and fall of voices made it hard to think, much less process what Angel was saying. It was his posture that tipped her off more than anything he said - the way that was subtly leaning back from her, how he was almost wringing his hands. The way he always kept an eye on her, as if she was a venomous snake in the grass.

Both of her friends were making confused noises, but Buffy ignored them. She grabbed the front of his navy blue cotton t-shirt, pulling him sharply in.

“Who else knows.”

Angel held his hands up in a ‘please don’t shoot’ pose, not bothering to fight her grip. She knew it was like iron, and her fingers were already tearing through the fabric. “Nobody! Look, I really don’t want any trouble -”

“Then who told you?”

Angel winced. “Cordelia?”

Okay. What?

“Uh,” Willow said, “what are we talking about -”

“Why the violence,” Xander said, “but please don’t stop on my account -”

“And do you want to tell me why Cordelia knows?” Buffy asked pleasantly.

“I think she just figured it out. It’s Cordelia, you can’t hide stuff from her.” Angel tugged lightly at her hand, and she reluctantly let him go. He huffed, frowning down at the holes. “Look, she told me to come here in case you weren’t coming. She said you’d be blonde and hanging out with Willow and Alexander. So you’re here to take care of this, right?”

Buffy felt dizzy. She really did feel like an airhead sometimes. Why did she ever expect that she’d get one night of fun? The universe must disapprove of underage drinking. It had to be punishing her somehow. “I just came here to dance, Angel.”

But Angel just frowned in confusion - as if a Slayer dancing at a nightclub was outside the range of his comprehension. As if it was only natural that vampires and demons liked partying the night away, but all Slayers ever wanted to do was stake vamps and polish their guns. As if there was no situation in which a Slayer would want to do something so normal and fun as dance.

“I don’t -”

He stopped short. His nose flared a little, and he obviously sniffed the air. Buffy automatically did the same, and felt her own heart stop. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the vampires sitting at the long table in the middle of the room stiffen, a tension rippling through all of them.

Despite the bad lighting, crowded atmosphere, and drunken revelry, the humans of the Bronze caught onto the thickening anxiety in the air. They stopped what they were doing and looked around, moving closer to each other and grabbing their large bags. A few women slipped out of their high heels.

A hand grabbed her arm and Buffy almost twisted it off, but it was just Willow. She was calm and composed, but every inch of her was on edge. She held a finger to her lips, her fingers digging in just a little too hard on her arm.

“Everything’s going to be just fine,” Willow whispered. “But you can’t panic, okay?”

Xander had Willow’s tote bag on his lap, and Buffy caught a large wooden handle poking out of the corner. “I can’t believe Cordelia was right,” Xander muttered. “And that cannot be the last thing I think before I get eaten.”

And Xander was right. It couldn’t be the last thing he would ever think, and Buffy couldn’t be the last person Willow ever touched. Buffy gently shook Willow off before reaching out a hand across the table. “Do you have a knife in there?”

“Okay, you’re more likely to stab yourself with that, how about a nice stake -”

“Condescend, much?”

Doors slammed open.

Every door. Buffy had already counted three exits when she walked in - front door, back service door, and fire escape - along with an entrance to a kitchen that might serve as another building entry point. The invading parties clearly had no interest in being quiet, or being subtle about blocking off all of the exits.

Buffy grabbed her own clutch, subtly unclasping it and putting it on her lap as more and more vampires strode in. They were clearly vampires - if the smell didn’t give them away, then the scattered assortment of twisted faces did. Buffy hated looking at their ugly-ass faces, but some part of her was thankful for them. She hated killing things that looked too much like people.

Nobody moved, and the living barely breathed. Buffy counted a vampire at each exit, and four other vampires filtering in and parting the dance floor like Moses and the red sea. The vamps had to be familiar to everybody else in the room, because even the vamps sitting at their table looked uncomfortable. The jukebox’s crackling music slowed to a stop and fizzled out, waiting for a new quarter.

Finally, a woman entered. She was platinum blonde and making a truly risky fashion decision with a semi-slutty Catholic schoolgirl outfit despite clearly being in her late twenties. She had a game face on, and wherever she walked everybody tripped over themselves to get out of her way. In their first active sign of fear, Willow shrank back and Xander’s fist clenched.

“Hello, Sunnydale!” Darla - because only someone with the name Darla wore a Catholic schoolgirl outfit - crowed. She easily jumped on stage, kicking aside a stray microphone stand and scattering it. “How are we feeling tonight?”

Silence reigned. Darla’s eyebrow ticked, and she grabbed the base of the microphone stand.

“I said, how are we feeling?” She threw it into the crowd, sending teenagers screaming and scattering. Her cronies laughed, exaggeratedly snapping and snarling at a group of young girls as they cowered. “That’s more like it. Don’t kids these days know how to have fun?”

A vampire in a trucker hat nursing a beer stood up, moustache bristling. “Darla, the hell’s wrong with you? You don’t go making trouble at the Bronze.”

“Because of the treaty, right?” Darla said, sickly sweet. Her voice was awful, reedy and high with a plastic falsetto. “That pathetic treaty? The same one that says we should roll over for the weak? That’s funny. I always thought the strong had the right to rule the weak.”

A demon in the corner opened her mouth, then closed it. Her friends leaned in and whispered to her. The ones playing pool were muttering unhappily to each other. None of the humans moved.

Darla made a gesture, and one of her vampires - Buffy counted ten in the room, outnumbering the other group of vampires - eagerly grabbed a pool cue and cracked it in half. He jammed it in the middle of the pool table, dragging it down and ripping the thick green velvet. He was grinning and laughing. Another of her vampires had chased off the bartender, grabbing a large handle of vodka and throwing it at a wall. It shattered explosively, raining glass shards and alcohol over the heads of the red demons. They all shrieked, shielding their eyes from the glass.

From where he was standing at her shoulder - when had he gotten behind her - Angel muttered, “Oh, real mature.”

Darla heard him. She stopped short, head swivelling to look straight at Angel. Straight at Buffy, and she felt Darla’s sicky yellow-eyed gaze pierce straight through her.

“Excuse me?” Darla said pleasantly, and the room froze. Buffy resisted the urge to step away from Angel and out of the line of fire. “What are you even doing here, Angelus? You hate being seen in public.”

“I wanted some sun,” Angel panned. But he slouched away from the group anyway, rubbing the back of his neck and projecting a self-effacing and sheepish air. “Look, Darla. Don’t you think this is more trouble than it’s worth? You’re already on top. You don’t need to knock over beer bottles to frighten people.”

But Darla just sneered, the motion pulling naturally into the ridges of her face. “The Angelus I knew would have never -”

“Oh, here we go again.”

“ - never settled for being the biggest fish in the pond. He would have become king.” Darla’s dark eyes flashed, and another vampire jokingly lunged at a shrieking girl. “Why coexist when you can dominate? Queen of the Hellmouth doesn’t sound so bad to me.”

But Angel just rolled his eyes, as if the rant was as familiar as a slutty Catholic school girl uniform. “We were King and Queen of Bristol for two months before we got bored. That was ten times as hellish as California. If you’re that bored then just go turn yourself another boyfriend.”

“Your jealousy isn't as sexy as it used to be,” Darla said loudly, propping her hands on her hips. Xander pinched the bridge of his nose hard. “You know, Angelus, I’ve been taking pity on you. I felt sorry for you. I am a good Christian and I was a dutiful wife until I dumped your ass, and in sickness and in health I’ve been tolerating your tragic mental illness.”

Angel looked exceptionally pained. “Darla. I’m not mentally ill. It’s called having a soul.”

“Tautology doesn’t suit you, dear.” Darla sniffed, crossing her arms. “But this is the 21st century, Angelus, and I’m a liberated woman. I’ve found a much...stronger man.” Somehow, Buffy wasn’t surprised that the evil vampire only had a rudimentary understanding of feminism. “Things are going to change around here. I’m going to shift the entire balance of power in this godforsaken town.” Darla smiled, flashing her teeth in the fuzzy white spotlights. “I’m bringing in a real player. Then we’ll see if you finally start obeying me again.”

She made a cutting hand gesture, and a vampire lunged for Willow.

Buffy was fast. She wouldn’t have made it a year if she wasn’t. She had her stake out as the vampire leapt, and was out of her seat almost as quickly. But Angel was far faster than she was.

So it was so quick that even Buffy could barely see it. Angel reached out a single hand and grabbed the vampire’s neck, and in one smooth motion he twisted the vamp’s head straight off his neck. A horrible crack and a crunch echoed through the Bronze, the sound of neck snapping and a spinal cord shearing into fragments, and the vampire sloughed into dust.

Angel opened his hand and let dust trickle down onto the pile on the floor. He had barely even moved - one hand was still in his pocket, and his posture was still languid and loose. Buffy had never seen a vampire display that kind of speed or strength, much less while staying so placid and calm. It wasn’t a show of force or an intimidation tactic - he had just seen a danger and removed it.

“Don’t involve me in this,” Angel said simply. “I’m retired.”

That was it.

Sunnydale had monsters that Buffy had never seen before. New flavors of monster jumping out from every corner. Familiar dangers standing twice as powerful . Giant warring vampire gangs and entire civilizations of demons just underground. A vampire so powerful that she commanded the town and still wanted more, and her ex-husband who was so powerful that he didn’t have to.

And the moment a Slayer arrives in town, whispers of a more powerful monster appear on the horizon. Buffy knew how this would go. A force of Light appears, and a force of Darkness arrives to beat it back. And she’s left on the defensive again and again, fighting off the next monster after monster. Making her life miserable so they could knock over just a few more teen clubs.

It was Buffy’s first night on the town. It was Buffy’s fresh start. And she wasn’t going to put up with this.

She was already standing with stake in her hand, halfway to save Willow, so she just shifted the stake to her left hand. With her right, she leaned over and grabbed the wooden handle poking out of Willow’s tote bag. She withdrew it to find that it was an axe: gleaming and sharp, well-kept and twice as long as her forearm. She gave it an experimental swing before turning to face Darla. Good heft.

Darla, for her part, just laughed. She looked down on Buffy, powerful and strong, the spotlights shining down on her and illuminating her platinum blonde hair like a halo. “Why, I think you’ve inspired someone! Have we found a new hero in Sunnydale?”

How must this have looked to her? A fifteen year old girl, small for her age, in a tight dress and high heels standing against a monster with a warped face and a twisted ego. She tilted her head up and looked straight at Darla, facing her down.

Darla’s grin faded somewhat. For just a second, she looked almost disturbed.

“Who are you?” Darla asked.

Buffy walked forward and easily hopped up on the long table. Its far end pushed almost directly up against the stage, and Darla obligingly moved to step down and stand on the other end. Two of her gang moved to stand at the sides, snarling and snapping their teeth at her.

“I’m new in town,” Buffy said simply. “And you’re the baddest bitch here, huh? In those thigh highs?”

Darla grinned, teeth dripping with pearly spit. “You must be awfully brave to stand in front of California’s greatest vampire in that dress. If you’re a do-gooder hunter, I suppose we’re just lucky you aren’t wearing camo.”

“I knew a girl like you in sixth grade,” Buffy said, seemingly randomly. She stepped forward, and Darla stepped forward too. Not for much longer. “She was really big shit in elementary school. Everybody wanted to play My Little Pony with her, she won every tennis competition, and for six sweet years her life was perfect.” Buffy twirled her axe in her hand. Darla’s eyes followed the motion. “First day of sixth grade, she insulted my hair. And by the end of sixth grade, she was eating alone during lunch.”

“I’m sorry,” Darla said pleasantly, “What are you talking about?”

“There’s a new bitch in town, Darla.” Buffy looked around the room, letting her eyes rake over each and every vampire and demon before snapping back to Darla. “And this Little Miss Slayer doesn’t want plaid within two hundred feet of her.”

Buffy moved.

She threw her stake at the vampire to her left, piercing his heart with perfect aim. The second she saw him start dissolving she turned to the vampire on the right, kicking down and spiking her heel directly into the flesh of his eye. The vampire screamed, a horrible and blood curdling moan of pain, and Buffy swung her axe in an arc and chopped through his head straight into his neck. She gave the axe a good yank, pulling it out of the corpse as it dissolved into nothing, and continued advancing on Darla.

She was distantly aware that the vampires around her were retreating fast. Everybody was retreating fast - the entire room making a hot break for the exits as they left Buffy and Darla to their showdown. She hadn’t really anticipated getting in a fight with the top dog of the town her first day in, but in retrospect it was probably good business sense. It was better to strike an intimidating first impression. Made sure they didn’t fuck with you. The vamps in LA never really got scared of her, mostly because of her absolutely dismal performances her first few weeks out. Time for her fresh start.

Darla was fast. She didn’t have a weapon, but next to her speed Buffy felt almost clumsy swinging the axe around. They exchanged hot and fast blows, so rapid that Buffy didn’t even have time to think about them or plan them out. She swiped for Darla’s gut and Darla jumped back - Darla grabbed her wrist and tried to break it as Buffy socked her in the face - Buffy made another swing with the axe and Darla grabbed the handle - Darla tore the axe out of her hands and snarled -

Buffy kicked her solidly and forcefully in the chest, throwing as much weight behind the blow as she could. But somewhere Merrick was calling her an idiot girl, and as Darla topped off the table Buffy overbalanced and fell right with her.

They both landed ignobly on the deserted floor, Buffy catching a big mouthful of vampire ash. Mega gross. For just a second, they looked at each other - both in equally vulnerable positions, the only weapon in the room on the other end of the table, and both equally without backup or help. It was a quickdraw, and they were both paralyzed with tension.

Darla was faster than Buffy. Darla was stronger. Buffy did not have a weapon. Buffy did not fancy getting killed in this tacky nightclub.

“My third removed fledgling has killed two slayers three times as skilled as you,” Darla snarled.

“If your fledgling’s here I’ll fight them too,” Buffy said pleasantly. “Are you still paying child support for that?”

They both lunged forward at the same time. They both missed each other, skidding on the ground, and somewhere along the way they both made the same decision.

Darla made it for the back exits and Buffy made for the front. Neither of them were winning today, and neither of them felt prepared. Buffy sure didn’t. One stake out of her hands and one lost weapon did not a victory make.

Merrick’s first lesson, taught as he threw a vampire at a terrified fourteen year old gripping a piece of wood like a pencil: always run from a fight if you aren’t confident you’ll win.

She burst out of the front of the nightclub, panting hard and wiping sweat away from her brow. There was a thick crowd of teenagers and demons loitering around the front, talking excitedly to each other or shaking from fear. Groups of vamps were huddled together, arguing furiously. The doors clanged against the wall and everybody stopped and stared at her, eyes wide. Half of them were slowly backing away - vampires, demons, and humans all.

“Rule number one,” Buffy yelled, making the crowd shirk back. “The treaty will now be enforced. Comprende?” Everybody nodded very quickly. “Good. Now get out of here, the new sheriff’s cranky.”

The crowd dispersed with equal speed, although Buffy could have sworn some of them made pig noses at her. The only ones who stayed were Angel, leaning against a street light that illuminated his pallor with a sickly yellow glow, and an uncertain pair standing in the middle of the cracked pavement.

Xander and Willow stared at her with wide eyes. Willow was clutching her tote bag to her chest, and Xander was holding a large hunting knife slack at his thigh. They were both looking at her as if they’d never seen her before. As if she was a ghoul rendered frightening because it was unfamiliar; a novel terror in their endless parade of misery.

The adrenaline abruptly drained out of Buffy’s system, and a wave of exhaustion overtook her. She stumbled forwards, toeing off her splintered and cracked heels, and she let her stockings scrape against the pavement. She slowly bent down and picked up the heels, letting the straps dangle from numb fingers.

“You two better get going,” Buffy said blankly. “It’s only getting darker.”

Willow’s arms tightened around her tote bag, hugging it protectively. Xander put a hand on the middle of her back. “Buffy…”

“Go!” Buffy yelled, her voice hoarse and cracking, and Willow and Xander went.

She watched them go, Xander gently steering Willow along, and waited until they turned a corner and disappeared from sight before she tore her eyes away. So much for that.

Slayers were not human. Buffy was possessed by a migratory demon spirit or something. She didn’t know, she had fallen asleep while Merrick was trying to explain it to her. Slayers were created by humans to protect humans, harnessing and enslaving the primal demonic spirit so it could serve humanity and act as their defender against evil. The birth of Slayers had been cruel, and its cruelty propagated itself.

Sometimes Buffy could swear that humans understood that she was cruel. Not many humans ever saw her doing her thing, but the Watcher’s Council had always treated her with a kind of distant revulsion. And when she did her saving people thing in front of humans, they never really looked that relieved or happy. They only ever looked like Xander and Willow: frozen stiff and scared, because they had seen a demon in the body of a girl.

How was it, in this strange little town where the natural and supernatural twisted so closely around each other that they became indistinguishable, that Buffy still didn’t belong?

Buffy strode forward, letting her stockings scrape across the pavement. Angel didn’t move or say anything - he just watched her walk past him, then stop and turn to look at him.

His eyes were dark and lifeless, like any vampire’s. But they were weirdly sad - a look no vampire ever had. It was a strange fit on his face, like the two elements were at war with each other. Uncomfortable in his own skin.

“Did you know that was going to happen?” Buffy demanded.

Angel raised his hands again, but this time the gesture rang so fake it was almost mocking. “Do I look like I can stop Darla from doing anything? I did everything Cordy asked me to do. I would have defused the situation if you hadn’t been there to help.” He lowered his hands, looking at her with a strange and blank intensity. “I try to help where I can, you know.”

“Oh, puh-leeze.” Buffy scoffed, somewhat offended. “You eat people. You don’t get anything besides an ego boost out of trying to help them.”

But Angel just blinked at her. “Did nobody tell you?” I got here last week,” Buffy bit back, irritated and grumpy and really needing a hot bath. “Tell me what?”

“Darla mentioned it.” He was still staring at her, and Buffy realized for the first time that he didn’t blink. Vampires didn’t need to blink. It made sense, but - well, she had never quite stopped and looked at one long enough to notice. “I don’t eat people. I have...ah, I have a soul.”

Buffy stared at him blankly.

Angel shrugged. “Witch’s curse.”

Buffy stared at him some more.

“So...that means you shouldn’t stake me?”

Buffy pinched the bridge of her nose, hard. Why couldn’t this night be over? “You’re walking me home. That’s a story I have to hear.”

********

The story, as it was, turned out to be way more interesting than she would have liked.

Sunnydale rolled up its sidewalks at night. The Bronze was located near the center of the town, deep amidst shopping centers and plazas and car repair places and Goodwills, but every parking lot was empty and there were no shoppers. Sometimes she saw shambling figures lurch down the street, but they always took one look at Angel and continued on their way. Buffy knew that soon they would be taking one look at her and continuing on their way. Despite everything, she was kind of looking forward to it.

There were no stars, but that was familiar. Streetlamps flickered and hummed, and cicadas ground their eternal chirps and whirls in the night, but that was familiar too. The only unfamiliar thing was Angel, and how the world felt abandoned and empty except for Buffy and Angel.

“Darla turned me ‘round...that was during the Cromwell thing, I think, so mid 1700s. She turns a lot of men, but after a little they usually disappoint her and she eats them. I was, ah...very incentivized not to disappoint her.” His mouth twitched in strangely placed humor. “For decades I didn’t really understand why she picked me. Blessed me, empowered me, cursed me, whatever. It took a long time before she finally ‘fessed up. Apparently she had walked into Galway and asked the first barmaid she saw who the nastiest motherfucker in Ireland was. And that led her to me.”

“Jeez,” Buffy said, impressed despite herself. “I’d hate to see her at speed dating competitions.”

“You know, that’s exactly what Cordelia said. I spent the 19th century…” Angel trailed off, pausing a beat. “To be clear, staking me would be very rude and I’d hate for you to try.”

“You’d hate for me to succeed,” Buffy corrected.

But Angel just smiled thinly. “Try.”

“Will you get to the point, already? If we’re going through every year of your ridiculously long life then I’ll have to invite you in for coffee. And you are not scoring an invite to Casa de Buffy.” Never mind the fact that two hundred fifty, closer to three hundred, was insanely old. Buffy had never met a vampire that old. Vampires could theoretically live forever, but the vast majority were way too stupid to last more than fifty years. The idea that she couldn’t kill Angel, even if she really wanted to…

“I’m getting there,” Angel chided gently. “This information is important if you’re going to be dealing with Darla. Darla and I...we were pretty awful.”

“Big whoop. All of you are awful.” Buffy had seen some shit. She wasn’t new at this. “Murder, death, killy stabby kill, the works. I get it.”

“I was a sadist, Buffy,” Angel said plainly, and Buffy shut up. “You’re right. The average vampire’s a bloodthirsty, murderous monster. They kill to sustain themselves, and like any animal they take great pleasure in eating. I liked eating, obviously. Eating people’s great. Still great, honestly, even if the guilt kind of ruins it these days. But I mostly liked killing. I wouldn’t even bother eating half of them.” Angel sighed, burying his hands in his jean pockets. His tone turned almost wistful. “I would spin some bullshit to Spike and Dru about how the abject despair of seeing your entire family massacred or something tenderized the flesh. Those two are pretty stupid, they’ll believe anything. People are so pumped up on - what’s the little thingamagummies in your blood called? Cortisol? They’re so pumped up on cortisol by the time you’re eating them that they all taste the same anyway. Spike would, like, philosophize about it. Man, Dru picked a dumb one.”

“What do I look like, your priest?” Buffy asked. She didn’t bother to keep the disgust and horror from her voice. It was bizarre to look at that broad, solemn face, and know that hundreds of people had looked up at that same face as it killed them. Their families. Tortured them to death. People just like her, except for one important detail. “I don’t need the play by play. So what, you ate the wrong person and a witch stuffed the human back inside Vampire Ted Bundy’s body. That fucking sucks for you, I guess.”

“That’s what I’m saying,” Angel said, almost patient. As if he was trying to teach her something. What did he possibly have to teach, Marauding 101? “A soul isn’t you. I’m not the human Darla killed. I am the exact same vampire who pillaged his way through Europe for hundreds of years. A soul is a conscience. It’s the voice in your head that tells you right and wrong. It’s...regret. I was given the ultimate punishment for my sins, far worse than any Hell could possibly give. I understood what I had done.”

“Which made your wife divorce you,” Buffy said, straight-faced.

“Which made me go completely insane for decades.” Angel sounded a little defensive about the divorce thing. Still a touchy subject after a hundred years, huh. “She...took care of me, I guess. Until I snapped back to it. She was so excited. Everything’ll go back to normal, Angelus. This is our fresh start, Angelus.” Angel’s tone soured a little, scraping his foot against the pavement. “I tried. I was different, but - I could still be with them. The people who had always made me feel so good, who had worshipped me. We could just re-brainwash Spike and Dru into loving us - they had gotten a little rebellious, but you just have to be firm with Spike. All I had to do was suck up my reservations and start eating again. Maybe orture some people every few months. It would be fine.

“But I just couldn’t. I wasn’t that person anymore. I tried to be him, and I couldn’t. I wanted to be that demon again so badly. That’s - I could excuse everything else I did. I didn’t have a soul. And before that, I - I was just a dumb kid, kids make mistakes. But there’s no excuse for that.”

“So what are you doing in Sunnydale?” Buffy asked. She actively decided not to ask for elaboration on half of that. She knew that she didn’t really want to know.

“I left for a few decades, found myself, yadda yadda.” Angel made a circular gesture, sweeping away decades with one hand. “And then I realized I needed to repent. There was a lot of tele-evangelism at the time, which is of the devil and everything, but they had a point. Are you Catholic, by the way? Protestant?”

“Not answering that.”

“Yeah, sorry. Anyway, I decided to...make up for it, I guess. Or at least stop running. Darla’s my responsibility, so when she moved here I did too. I’ve been doing what I can since then.” He scrubbed the back of his neck, suddenly self-conscious. “The Bible talks about redemption. Not that anybody reads the Bible anymore, but - right, but it talks about it. You achieve redemption through atonement. So I don’t do any of it anymore. Haven’t tortured anyone in years. I just keep my head down.”

Keep your head down?

Buffy stopped short, and Angel stopped too. They were underneath a streetlight, and without her heels she was left craning her head to look up at him. He was a foot taller than her, no matter how small he hunched or how much smaller he tried to make himself. He held himself too still, and stared too blankly with eyes long dead. If he had a soul, she couldn’t see it in his eyes: only in his face, which always seemed just a little sad.

“So what you’re saying is that you were a supervillain, and then you dropped out of the game to hang out with your ex-wife,” Buffy said flatly (“Please stop calling her my ex-wife”). “That’s not joining the good guys, Angel. That’s just giving up! That’s dropping out! If you really feel so bad about your puppy torture, then why didn’t you help me in there? You don’t stake vamps, you just scare them off. You could rule this place and clean it up, but you just run errands for Cordelia!”

“Buffy, you’re young. You have no idea how young you are.” Angel’s expression creased as Buffy scowled at him. “And you’re never going to grow much older than you are now. It’s convenient that way. You know those Watchers don’t tell you anything on purpose, right? They keep all of it from you, because so long as you’re reliant on them they can control you. Trust me. I would know.”

If Angel was expecting a denial or a fervent defense of Watchers, he didn’t get one. Buffy just stood there fuming, because he was right and there was nothing she could do about it.

“They sold you this lie about good and evil,” Angel continued. “That you’re made for good and us demons are created for evil. I mean, hey - demons, hell, Satan, right? I swear, we need to update the terminology.” Strangely enough, this looked like a pet peeve. “I would know better than anyone if I’m an emissary of Satan, right? I’ve never even met Satan. If I ever met Satan, I’d get mad that he was telling me what to do. And Hell isn’t in dimensions, it’s on a heavenly - anyway. Thinking of it as God and Satan, good versus evil is easier. But I’ve met demons who lived a holy life. There are humans who were far worse than demons, Buffy. I’ve met humans who were worse than me.”

“What are you saying?” Buffy asked. Her heart was thumping hard in her chest - why? What was so oddly terrifying about Angel’s words? So strangely liberating? “That they cut my life expectancy by sixty years for no reason? That I just exist to hurt people and be hurt?”

“Yep.”

Buffy punched Angel on the arm. It was like hitting a lamppost. Before Slayer powers.

“Real inspirational, buddy. I can tell that soul thing really helped your pep talk skills.”

“But that’s what I’m saying,” Angel complained, rubbing his arm. “None of it matters. It doesn’t mean anything. What your life means is just between you and God. And He only judges you on the life you’ve led. Do you get what I mean?”

“No! I’m not Catholic!” Buffy threw up her hands, walking forward and away from Angel. The gritty cement dug into her stockings, and she knew that she was tearing holes in them. She’d have to throw them out. If that was the total casualty count of a night she was lucky, but somehow it filled her with so much frustration and pain. She couldn’t have anything. She had nothing. “Ugh, you know what? Fine. You’rethree hundred and I’m barely in high school, what do I know. I’m sure you’ve figured it all out. But at least I’m doing something. You’re giving yourself the grand prize for not being a terrible person.”

Angel jerked back a little, strangely surprised. “Do you have any idea how difficult it is for me not to kill people? I’m doing the best I can.”

“No, you aren’t! I want to stab catcallers on the street too, but I don’t!” Buffy had no idea of how to phrase this. She didn’t know how to make Angel understand. She didn’t even know if she understood. So she just walked away instead, fighting the urge to stomp. “This isn’t something you can be neutral about. You can’t play both sides, Angel. You’re a coward.” She stopped short and turned around, because she wasn’t the kind of person who called someone a coward without looking them in the eyes as she did it. “Beating yourself up over doing the wrong thing is easier than doing the right thing. I didn’t step in back there because I was in danger, or because the Watchers made me. I don’t care about duty, or - or responsibility. I just can’t stand watching powerful people push around the helpless.”

“You’re not like them, Buffy,” Angel said. From this far away, he looked more like a smear of black clothes and pale skin under the yellow light. He fit strangely in his surroundings, out of place and strange. As if he belonged to a different time, and never should have left. “You’ll always be between two worlds. You’ll live another three years on average in struggle and misery, and then one day a demon will get lucky. You have to abandon this while you still can.”

“Do you know what I think!” Buffy yelled. Her voice was swallowed up by the cicadas and the night, but she didn’t care. Yelling at Angel wasn’t raging against her fate or his stupid little Catholicism, but he was the only one standing in front of her. “I think if none of it matters, and if my life is so short and pointless, then - then all that matters is what I do with it! If all I do is make sure that Willow lives until one hundred and eight, or that Xander finally finds a girl who’ll tolerate him - even if they hate me, even if they don’t care about me - then good! That’s the point of my life! And you don’t get to tell me what to do with it!”

She could probably stand here arguing with him until the sun came up, but Buffy’s eyes were gritty and her fists were sore, and she had better things to do than argue with someone who’d already given up.

So she turned around again and kept walking. After a few seconds, she heard Angel walk to catch up with her. He didn’t say anything to her, and she didn’t say anything to him, but they walked each other all the way home.

***

The next morning, after Buffy fielded Mom’s annoying interrogation about why a man in his mid-twenties had walked her home through fervent assertions that he was annoying, Buffy stopped by the library before school.

Everybody stared at her as she walked through the halls. Buffy found herself unconsciously imitating Angel and hunching a little, trying to make herself seem less like the unholy lovechild of Rambo and the Terminator, but it didn’t work and she didn’t respect Angel anyway. So she stood straight instead, and kept her eyes fixed in front of her even as the other students scrambled to get out of her way or avoided eye contact.

Giles wasn’t going to be happy, but - well, they both knew it would happen soon enough. Judging by the rate that gossip spread in this town (although Darla hadn’t seemed to know about the Watcher rumors - maybe high schoolers could keep a secret after all) Mom would know soon enough, so Buffy should probably have that talk. She really didn’t want Mom to find out about the mystical destiny thing from the grocery store clerk.

But when she pushed open the doors of the library, she didn’t see Giles. Or Giles wasn’t the first thing she saw. He was easy to find, standing in front of the circulation desk holding a very thick book and a very wicked stake, but it was Willow who Buffy saw first - Willow, who was standing at the front of the table in the center of the room, who turned around when Buffy came in and looked straight at her.

They locked eyes, and Buffy found her breath catching. She didn’t know why. She didn’t know why she wanted to look away from Willow so badly - in shame, in guilt, in fear - and she didn’t know why she couldn’t.

Then Willow ran forward and hugged her, squeezing her tight, and Buffy knew why.

She separated from Buffy, smiling brightly. There was something tired and stressed about it, but it was nothing like Willow’s smiles from yesterday. There was something firm in it, strong and determined. Whatever had been missing in Angel yesterday was in Willow, and it had transformed something about her.

“Good, you’re here! Come on, I was just talking to everybody about our game plan.”

Game plan? Everybody?

When Buffy looked over Willow’s shoulder, she saw that every seat around the table was occupied.

Xander sat closest to her, and when he saw her looking he raised a hand in a faux-jaunty greeting. Across from him sat Cordelia Chase, who was back to her usual pristine self in an admittedly nice mod dress and chunky earrings. She was impatiently tapping her fingers against her arm, but there was a terrifyingly thick manual lying flat on the table in front of her, completely marked up and annotated in color coded highlighters.

Behind her sat Angel, who just weakly lifted a hand in greeting before letting it drop. That was probably why Giles was standing so far apart from the group, and why he was holding a stake.

“Hello, Buffy,” Giles said, perfectly pleasant. “Do you mind telling me why Angelus is in my library?”

“Oh, relax, worst he’ll do is bore you to death.” Cordy smacked on her gum, waving a careless hand towards the sadistic serial killer. “Get on with it, we only have twenty minutes before class starts and I have studying to do.”

“You can take your online classes whenever you want, you know,” Xander said brightly. “You don’t have to take them at all, actually!”

“How do you want me to get into Yale, Xander? Let me know how you want me to do that and I’ll get right on it.”

“What’s this?” Buffy asked weakly, and everybody shut up. “Why are you all…”

“Why do you think we’re here?” Cordelia demanded, as if Buffy had asked the stupidest question possible. “You’re the Slayer. Giles over there is your babysitter. We’re the ones who would prefer to cut down on the almost getting eaten alive every two seconds, thanks.” She slapped Angel on the arm, who just pulled a pained expression. “And he said he’s here to make sure I don’t get myself killed. Thanks for that, by the way, didn’t know you cared.”

Angel slouched in his seat, looking around in complete discomfort. “Is this what a high school looks like?”

“Do I want to know how much education you finished before you had the worst sexual experience of your life?” Cordelia asked flatly. Angel opened his mouth. “Never mind. I’m signing you up for my online classes. Sharpening the mind reduces the risk for Alzheimer’s, you know.” Angel stared at her blankly. “Ugh, shut up, I know you don’t know what Alzheimer’s is.”

“Now that we actually have a Slayer around to help keep us alive,” Xander said loudly, “I think it’s our job as law abiding citizens to help her. You know, hold them down as she punches them.”

“We can help teach Buffy about Sunnydale!” Willow said eagerly, moving to sit down next to Xander. Her backpack was already sitting on the table, stuffed and overflowing with books. “We’ll teach her the rules, and together we can see what demons need slayin’ and what demons need - you know, crisis mediation. We can help keep the peace!”

“I’m sorry,” Buffy repeated, struggling to connect all of this in her head - the nerds, the Queen Bee, the vampire, the Watcher, and her. What put them all in this room? This wasn’t the way it was supposed to work. “You aren’t possibly suggesting...what I think you’re suggesting.”

She looked at Giles, as if he would interpret the entire situation into something that made sense, but he obviously didn’t understand either. He rubbed at his temple, keeping the stake pointed away from his forehead.

“It appears some of your friends have volunteered their help,” he said mildly. “Normally I’d never allow such a thing -”

“Who cares about what you allow or not?” Angel said, somewhat nastily.

“ - but I don’t believe I can stop them.” Especially not Angel, went unsaid. Giles deflated a little, and Buffy realized that he was looking to her for answers. This was so far beyond his wheelhouse - either of their wheelhouses. Maybe, in the entire sordid and sad history of the Slayers, it was the first time this had happened. “I believe this one is up to you, Buffy. Of course, should they die, on your head be it, but -”

“Oh, no, really?” Xander said. “Something might be dangerous? Say it ain’t so, G-Man, I’m quaking in my boots.” He glanced at Buffy, sharp and quick, and she wondered if he looked like this before Jesse had died. “One girl against this dumbass town’s bad odds. I think helping her out increases our life expectancy.”

“It’s not as if it’s not scary,” Willow said fervently. “It’s super, duper, mega scary! But the scariest thing is - you know, not being able to do anything about it. Or not being able to help. Being a kid in this dumb town, you always feel so helpless and alone. But the Slayer’s a kid just like us, and she can punch Darla in the face! Watching her yesterday, I felt like I could do anything too!” She faltered just a little, uncertain for the first time. “And Buffy’s so nice, and her taste in clothing is so good. We can’t make her do this all alone. That just isn’t fair.”

Buffy burst into tears.

She couldn’t help it. She didn’t even try. She didn’t even know why she was crying. All she knew was that it wasn’t fair, and that a dozen people had told her life wasn’t fair but only one person had ever volunteered to help. There was no good or evil, no mystical destiny or fate - just Willow and Xander and Cordy and Angel and even Giles, who wanted to help.

And then Willow was hugging her again, and Angel was asking in a panic why she was crying, and Cordy was berating him, and Xander and Giles were talking over each other, and Buffy cried and cried and cried in complete and total relief.

#buffy the vampire slayer #btvs #buffy summers #angel #buffy #my writing #i have not seen buffy in an exceptionally long time but every second is burned into my memory #this show is the bedrock of my family and an aspect of my soul i am not always proud of #if you've ever wondered why im like this buffy is partly to blame #so: i'm completely capable of writing these teens in character and i want you to know my decisions are on purpose #i understand angel on a very deep level. the epic divorce man is a choice.#LET! ANGEL! BE! CATHOLIC!#I also gotta establish that I gratuitously overused italics while writing this in order to get the voices of the actors down #and tumblr formatting kills that. so you're missing out on a lot.

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xlostinobsessionsx · 3 years

Text

Good Girls are Bad Girls that haven't been Caught | Luke Patterson

Pairing: alive! 1995! Luke Patterson x fem! Reader

Warnings: none

Word Count: 4,038

A/N: A big thank you goes to @bass-ic-deaky for proof-reading and making this fic much more vibrant! 💖

This fic is based on "Good Girls" by 5 Seconds of Summer.

Masterlist

Luke and (Y/N) knew each other since they were kids. They had been neighbors since childhood, so it wasn’t uncommon for them to be playing with each other in their adjoining backyards most days. But time went by and slowly they got older. On his 8th birthday, Luke had gotten a guitar and quickly realised his dream of becoming a rock star. After meeting Alex Mercer and Reggie Peters in middle school, the dream slowly became reality. Sunset Curve was born. (Y/N), on the other hand, took on violin instead.

As time passed, they slowly began to grow apart. One would describe Luke’s style of music and dress as more rock n’ roll grunge. (Y/N), however, looked the total opposite, elegant, poised, which could also be heard through her playing throughout the neighborhood. (Y/N) listened to classical music and took ballet lessons while Luke continued his guitar lessons and went to ice hockey practice. It seemed like after all this time, the two had nothing in common anymore.

Now they were in high school and they barely knew the other existed anymore. The only times Luke saw (Y/N), even though they were still neighbours, was when they ran into each other in the hall or if they just so happened to leave for school at the same time, which these days was very rare. (Y/N) was quite the early riser, and was often already off on her way while Luke was still lying in bed half asleep. Though they had two classes together, they hardly spoke to each other. It was as if their friendship before this had meant nothing.

Sometimes Luke missed the old days. Back then, (Y/N) didn’t seem too different from him. He could still remember them sitting in his treehouse, sharing gummy bears and listening to an old Led Zeppelin album. Now all she ever seemed interested in was studying. But even despite their different paths, they talked to each other from time to time. Their parents, on the other hand, were still very close. Occasionally they met at one of their homes, cooked together, talked about their jobs and even more so about their kids. Luke had learned from his parents that (Y/N) planned to go to Harvard once they graduated. Of course, when they told him that, he couldn’t stop himself from rolling his eyes. He knew his parents wished he had the same or at least similar plans for his life. But Sunset Curve was finally starting to take off. After they played their first gig at a small bar in L. A., more and more bars and clubs were willing to let them perform. Luke had loved rehearsals before, now they were even more fun, especially knowing that they’d get to perform their new songs in front of more people than just Bobby’s parents. Bobby became a part of the band when he moved to L. A. four years after they had formed. With Bobby’s arrival the band not only found a rhythm guitarist, but also a place to rehearse. Before that, they had to rehearse in Reggie’s basement, between boxes and useless junk. Then of course his parents constantly fighting upstairs didn’t make for the best working environment.

Whenever Luke fought with his parents and just needed space to clear his head, there was no better place for him than a small shed in Bobby’s backyard which they had affectionately dubbed their studio. The words from his parents still rang in his ears as he pulled out his bike, guitar case slung over his back.

“Why can’t you be more like (Y/N)?! She has good grades and a bright future at Harvard!” His mother had wailed.

“Being a rockstar is not a realistic goal, it won’t bring you any money or stability.” His father tried to convince him.

Every time it was always the same. Luke jumped onto his bike and made his way through the backyard towards the gate, when he stopped in his tracks. In the corner of his eyes he could make out a dark figure, running through the yard next to his. At the end of the driveway, he could make out the lights of a car, shining through the trees and the figure running towards it. When the figure finally came into the light, Luke could finally see who it was. She turned around, taking one last look at the house behind her before she opened the car door and got in before promptly speeding off into the darkness. Who did (Y/N) just leave with?

Luke was tired the next morning. Despite spending the night in the studio, far away from the trouble with his parents, the young guitarist hadn’t slept a wink. His mind was racing with thoughts of (Y/N) and the mysterious person she had left with. During their lunch break at school, he told his band members of the encounter. “Wait, you mean to tell us that (Y/N), the definition of the perfect daughter, snuck out?” Bobby asked in disbelief.

Luke nodded. “Yep, got into a car with someone. Can’t say for certain who it was.” The eyes of the four guys wandered to said girl, who was sitting with her friends at a table not far away from their own.

“I’ll dip into the school gossip and see what I can find out. I’ll deliver the goods.” Alex smirked. And deliver he did at their band practice later that day. “So you know Tori, the girl who sits next to me in chem class and never shuts up? She told me that she heard from one of her friends, who was told by one of his friends that (Y/N) was spotted with Brandon Jones in the back of the library.”

“Brandon Jones?” Luke asked with a raised eyebrow.

Alex nodded “Yeah, the captain of the football team who always drives a really expensive car.”

“How do they even know each other? Isn’t he usually on the brink of suspension?” Reggie asked curiously to which Alex shrugged.

“Well, well, well, seems like your little (Y/N) likes bad boys, Luke.” Bobby laughed, while throwing an arm around Luke’s shoulders.

Luke quickly shrugged it off with a grimace. “She’s not my (Y/N).” He snapped. “It just surprises me that she sneaks out to meet him. That doesn’t sound like her.”

“Yeah, ‘cause you know her so well after barely talking to her for years and only making eyes at her from afar.” Bobby countered.

“I’m not making eyes at her!” The guitarist defended himself much too quickly to be believable. Back in the day when he still was friends with (Y/N), he may have had the tiniest of crushes on her. Luke had to admit that (Y/N) was indeed very beautiful, but he most certainly wasn’t making eyes at her as Bobby had suggested.

A few days passed. Luke sped through the house looking for his jacket so he could get going to band practice, which he was already running late for. “Mom, Dad. I’m going to Bobby’s” He shouted through the house, hoping his parents had heard him. Finally finding his jacket under his bed, he shrugged it on as he made his way through the kitchen.

He was about to open the back door, when his mom appeared behind him. “Don’t you have a french test to study for? (Y/N)’s father told me about it.” Emily looked expectantly at her son, arms crossed over her chest.

Luke rolled his eyes and turned around. “Yeah, that’s why I’m going to Bobby’s. We’re gonna study together.” He lied convincingly.

Emily nodded slowly, a bit skeptical. “(Y/N) studies every night alone and gets good grades. Maybe if you would just concentrate more, you could study alone, too.” Emily suggested. Luke laughed silently. (Y/N) studying every night? That was rich, if only her parents really knew their daughter.

Luke mentally shook his head out. “Sure, but Bobby is better in french than I am. So he can help me. Work smarter not harder, isn’t that what they say?” He shrugged.

Emily looked at him thoughtfully. “You could study with (Y/N). She’s nearly fluent in French now.”

Luke nodded, a slight laugh escaping his lips as he opened the door. “I’ll think about it, alright? Now I really have to go!” He quickly said and made his way outside, slamming the door behind him. He couldn’t be late, after all Sunset Curve was playing another gig tonight. Luke took his bike from its spot against the fence and made his way towards the gate to the front yard when he suddenly saw a figure out of the corner of his eye again. Her hair was flowing in the wind as she quickly made her way through the darkened yard only this time instead of just watching, Luke went after her. Before (Y/N) could reach the car that was waiting for her behind the trees, Luke touched her shoulder. Startled, she let out a yelp of surprise as she spun around. “(Y/N)?”

“L-Luke...hey.” She laughed nervously.

“What are you doing out here?” He asked her confused, he was half expecting her to be up in her room studying like the perfect little princess she was.

(Y/N) clasped at his wrist and pulled him behind the trees, out of the sight of her house. “Don’t you dare tell my parents about this!” She hissed at the guitarist through gritted teeth.

Luke laughed. “What? That their little princess is sneaking out?”

“I’m not a princess!” She angrily countered.

Luke shook his head “Nah, you’re right, you’re clearly the living definition of a goody-two-shoes. Such a good girl, eager to please.”

(Y/N) rolled her eyes “You clearly forget everything you thought about good girls.”

Luke furrowed his brows. “What do you mean?”

Suddenly a voice interrupted both of them “(Y/N) you’re coming?” Brandon Jones, cool as ever with a cigarette poised elegantly between his lips, sat in the car beside them, looking with raised eyebrows at the girl in front of Luke.

(Y/N)’s gaze wandered between the two boys “I gotta go.” She murmured as she opened the car door. But before getting inside she paused and turned to Luke again. “Good girls are bad girls that haven’t been caught.” She winked as she got into the car immediately rolling down the window. “Now be a good boy and just turn around and forget about this encounter, alright?”. With that, she sped off leaving the guitarist standing there dumbfounded. Luke shook his head in disbelief, what had just happened?

When he arrived at Bobby’s, (Y/N) words were still running laps through Luke’s head. He was quick to tell the rhythm guitarist about the encounter. “‘Good girls are bad girls that haven’t been caught’.” Bobby murmured.

Luke nodded. “That’s what she said. Sounds pretty rad don’t you think?” He looked at the other guitarist who nodded in agreement. “Yeah...” Suddenly it was extremely and rather awkwardly quiet. “Do you think that they-” Luke started.

“Are seeing each other?” Bobby finished his friend’s question, the lead guitarist nodding in confirmation. “Would it matter?”

Luke shrugged. “I mean, I just don’t want her to see her being pressured into something she doesn’t want to.”

Bobby laughed quietly. “OR you just don’t want her doing anything with Brandon.”

“Okay, I am definitely not jealous!” Luke countered, shaking his head.

“I never said you were, but now that you mention it…”

“Oh shut up...besides I’ve barely spoken to her in years!”

“But people don’t really change that much!” Bobby countered.

Luke huffed dramatically. “Well she did!”

“I don’t know about that, bro. Sneaking out? Doesn’t really sound like the (Y/N) we know from school.” He paused a moment. “The (Y/N) you knew when you were younger, the one you’ve told me about, that’s her down to the letter.” He shrugged as rose from his spot. “But enough about this. We’ve gotta go pick up Alex and Reggie. Otherwise we’re going to be late!” Luke quickly nodded, grabbing his guitar before following Bobby outside.

The club was completely packed with people. Luke could hear the audience’s chattering from backstage. “This is so cool!” Reggie excitedly said after taking a look through the club. “There are so many people here from school, too!”

Luke took a deep breath. Adrenaline was starting to course through his veins. He could practically hear his heart beating in his chest as the band made their way onto the stage. He blinked a few times as he tried to get used to the spotlights. His gaze drifted down through the crowd in front of them as they quickly set themselves up. Suddenly he stopped. At the back, right next to the bar, there she was standing. Their eyes met and a small smile played around her lips. Luke laughed to himself quietly before taking a step closer to the mic. “We’re Sunset Curve!”

After their gig, Luke made his way through the crowd. Everytime someone patted his shoulder to tell him how good they were, she nodded thankfully but his eyes always stayed fixated on (Y/N). When he finally stood in front of her a giggle left her lips “Good show, Patterson.”

He smirked, leaning against the bar. “Thanks.”

“Just like we imagined when we were kids.” She slightly bumped against his shoulder.

The guitarist felt his heart beat faster at this. Nervously he rubbed the back of his neck. “I guess.”

“So that’s what you’ve been up to all this time...?” She quietly asked, her gaze drifting through the crowd. Luke nodded in reply. “And soon you’re gonna be famous!” She smiled suddenly much more excited.

Luke laughed “I think that’s still a long way off. What about you? What’ve you been up to?” He asked her curiously.

“Oh, you know violin and ballet lessons, the usual. I haven’t told my parents yet that I’m sick of it!” She nonchalantly took a sip from her coke and looked at him.

Luke furrowed his brows, he was genuinely confused. “I thought that’s what you liked? I mean you got your violin around the same time I got my guitar.”

(Y/N) shook her head “I practically begged my parents to get me an electric bass so we could form a band but they got me a violin. Said it would be better for me.”

Luke was surprised at those words. “A band?” He saw (Y/N)’s cheeks taking on a pink shade.

She shrugged. “Like Led Zeppelin.” Suddenly ‘Whole Lotta Love’ started to blast through the speakers of the club. (Y/N) laughed “That’s creepy. Like they’ve been listening to us talk about it.”

But Luke barely listened to her. Instead he had been transported back to 1987. He had just found the old Led Zeppelin EP in one of his dad’s boxes he kept into the attic. He had immediately called (Y/N) to meet him in the treehouse. They had been listening to the songs when suddenly (Y/N) had told him about her best female friend (Y/F/N), who had told her that she had kissed Fynn, a boy from their class. “Like a real kiss? On their lips?” Luke had asked with wide eyes. He, of course, had asked her if she ever had kissed a boy on the lips. (Y/N) had admitted that she had never. In her childish recklessness, or could it be her boldness, she had told him that he was the only one who she would have wanted to kiss. Luke remembered how nervous he had been, when (Y/N) had leaned in, ‘Whole Lotta Love’ playing in the background when their lips touched but for a short second.

Luke looked wide-eyed at the girl in front of him, who didn’t know the memory that was playing in his head at the moment. His gaze fell from her eyes to her lips. Maybe Bobby had been right. Maybe (Y/N) hadn’t really changed that much and maybe he still had those feelings he had for her when he was smaller. He quickly shook his head. He couldn’t have those thoughts. (Y/N) was here with someone else. “So where’s your shadow?” He asked, referring to Brandon. He turned to the bar to order a coke.

She sighed “Having a smoke.”

“Already missing him?” He laughed.

(Y/N) huffed, slightly annoyed. “Yeah, sure.”

“I thought you were a thing?” Luke asked, turning to her again.

(Y/N) furrowed her brows “Who told you that?”

“Nobody. I just thought because you always sneak out to meet him and because you’re here together…?” He shrugged.

(Y/N) laughed. “No, I mean it’s fun to hang out but I would never...I mean...he’s a player and only plays with girls.”

Luke looked at her amused. “So you’re just hanging out with him for the sake of hanging out?” (Y/N) nodded.

“I was just tired of everything. Of my life. It seemed like a good escape, you know? But now...it’s really hard to make it clear to him that nothing will ever happen.”

“Just be careful, alright? I don’t think he’ll let you get off the hook so easy.”

(Y/N) shook her head “Soon he’ll get tired of me and look for someone else.”

“And what about you then?”

(Y/N) took a deep breath and turned to him, something obviously weighing heavily on her mind. “Luke, I-” She started, but before she could finish her sentence they were interrupted as an arm found his way around (Y/N) shoulder.

“I’m back.” Brandon smirked, eying Luke suspiciously.

“Hey Brandon.” Luke smirked, annoyance evident in his gaze, before turning to (Y/N) again. “It was nice catching up, (Y/N). See ya around.” With that he made his way through the crowd, trying to stop himself from thinking about (Y/N).

Days passed. Once again, Luke barely saw (Y/N) apart from their classes. He was sitting in his room, writing down the lyrics to a song that had been stuck in his mind for days, when suddenly the doorbell rang. He ran down the hall of the family’s ranch style home and was met with her beautiful eyes, when he opened the door. “(Y/N)! So good to see you!” Emily greeted with a big smile, appearing behind Luke. “Come on in.” Luke stepped aside to let the girl inside. With a questioning glance, he looked to his mother. “I called (Y/N)’s parents to ask if she could help you in french. I think that would be better than having to go all the way to Bobby’s, right?”

Luke nodded slowly “Uhm, yeah. Sounds good. Uhm, we could go into my room?” He suggested, looking at Emily.

His mother nodded “Yes, but leave the door open. I’ll bring you some snacks.”

Luke nodded in agreement and turned to (Y/N). “Shall we?” (Y/N) nodded in reply and followed him down the hall to his bedroom. “Take a seat, I guess.” He pointed to the chair in front of his desk as he took a seat on the bed. “What are you doing here?”

“Helping you in french.” She laughed.

Luke nodded slowly, a sly, teasing smirk appearing on his face. “And, uh, is Brandon alright with you hanging out with me?”

“Who cares?” (Y/N) rolled her eyes at the mention of his name. “Right after your concert I told him I couldn’t see him anymore.”

Luke furrowed his brows. “Why?”

“As I already told you, at first it was just an escape but...he wanted to do more the entire time and I just didn’t want to...at least not with him.” She laughed.

Luke looked at her, a playful glint in his eye. “Not with him, huh? So someone else has caught your eye then?” he laughed.

(Y/N) shrugged, casting her glance downward. “Maybe. But that won’t happen, so…”

“Why not?”

(Y/N) sighed, nervously keeping her gaze trained to the ground, before looking up at him again. “Luke...you see...I know we haven’t had that much contact over the last few years, but...I wish it was different and I’m sorry. I thought...well I had hoped...“ She paused, inhaling deeply. “Maybe we could start over? Being friends again?” She asked, hope evident in her voice.

Suddenly Luke felt his heartbeat just a tiny bit faster. “Friends?” He croaked, before clearing his throat. “You mean like back in the day?”

(Y/N) nodded. “Yeah, and uhm maybe…” She nervously played with the necklace around her neck. Luke’s eyes drifted to the pendant. It was the necklace he had given her when she had turned seven. Inside it he had put a picture of the both of them. (Y/N) eyes softened when she saw what Luke was looking at. She took the chain from around her neck and slowly took his hand, placing it in his palm. She looked expectantly at it before looking up at him. Luke opened it and found himself looking at his and (Y/N)’s younger selves. In the picture he had his arm slung around her shoulders. Both of them were smiling brightly.

Luke sighed as he smiled at the memory of that day. “I had a little crush on you back then.” He admitted quietly, staring at the toothy grin of her younger version.

“You did?” (Y/N) asked.

He nodded, his eyes never leaving the picture. “I was so sad when we stopped talking, but it...it had just happened, right?”

“I wish it hadn’t...I uh...I had a crush on you, too.” she murmured.

Luke laughed quietly, the pieces of the puzzle slowly falling into place. “So if we want to go back to how it was then…”

“You would have a crush on me?” (Y/N) smiled hopefully.

Luke shrugged. “Maybe I still do.” He felt his cheeks heating up as (Y/N) clasped at his hands.

“Maybe I still have a crush on you, too.”

Luke’s heart felt like it was going to beat out of his chest. His eyes met (Y/N)’s and he couldn’t stop his smile from growing wider if that was even possible. “Just maybe?” He asked cheekily, as he slowly leaned in closer.

“Alright, so definitely.” (Y/N) giggled as their lips connected in a tender kiss.

“Please, you have to come!” Luke whispered into the phone in the kitchen where the landline was. It was already dark inside the house, his parents already having turned in for the night.

“Okay, fine. But you tell my parents that you have a good influence on me the next time they see us.” She laughed through the speaker, before hanging up.

They met behind the trees at the back of their yards. He leaned in to greet her with a short kiss. “I missed you.” He murmured, hiding his face into her neck.

“We just saw each other a few hours ago.” (Y/N) laughed.

“That’s so long ago!” He countered as Luke got onto his bike and looked expectantly at (Y/N), who stood on the tire spokes behind him. “Hold on tight!”

The venue was filled with people dancing and chattering. (Y/N) followed Luke to the side of the stage. “Stay here so you’ll have a good view of the stage and that way I can see you, too.” He said, looking at her with a wide smile.

“Knock ‘Em dead, rockstar!” She beamed at him, leaning in to give him a good-luck kiss.

“Alright, enough of that lovebirds. We gotta go!” Bobby laughed, interrupting the cute moment pushing Luke toward the stage.

Reggie smiled at them. “Look at all the people! It’s gonna be sick!”

Alex shrugged nervously. “I hope they like us...”

(Y/N) smiled at the other band members “You’re gonna rock this, I’m sure of it!” She hugged them and wished them good luck, before the band went onto the stage.

Luke’s gaze immediately fell to his girlfriend, who gave him a thumbs-up. He winked at her before getting closer to the mic. “Hey, we’re Sunset Curve, thank you for having us.” The crowd erupted in cheers. “Thank you.” He laughed “We directly wanna start with a new song. It’s inspired by a person who means the world to me.” His gaze fell to (Y/N) again, who was smiling at him. “It’s called Good Girls/Bad Girls.”

“She said to me forget what you’ve thought, cause good girls are bad girls that haven’t been caught.”

#luke patterson #charlie gillespie #luke patterson x reader #luke patterson x y/n #luke patterson oneshot #luke patterson x fem!reader #jatp #julie and the phantoms #sunset curve

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moogieandadhd · 3 years

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ADHD Awareness Month Day 3: My Identification/Discovery Story

October 3rd, 2021

** CONTENT WARNING: This post discusses heavy and potentially triggering topics such as mental illness, substance abuse, and suicide. Read at your own risk. **

i believe my diagnosis journey is one that many people - namely, other women - with adhd can relate to. in my elementary school and early middle school years, i was incredibly dedicated to school. i loved to learn. i was in gifted (advanced learning) classes. i was mainly an A-B student, but straight A’s were not a rare occasion. at home, i would do my homework and read for hours. i wasn’t very organized and i didn’t take the best care of myself in terms of hygiene. my teachers would write notes on progress reports and report cards: “so smart! a pleasure to have in class! however, her desk is always messy. needs to participate in discussion more!” and my parents would brag about my academic success to anyone who would listen. if you have adhd or are familiar with the different ways it can present itself in early childhood, can probably pinpoint everything that was a ‘sign’.

then, in middle school, i suddenly began losing interest in school. my grades and attendance began to slip. i didn’t read books anymore. i began to buck up against authority and befriend people who weren’t considered good influences. my disorganization and messiness turned into a whole new beast. to most people, this was just a typical teenage angst fueled by puberty and hormones. i would get over it eventually. i tried as hard as i could to fit in, all of my attempts were useless. i was rarely accepted - and when i was, it still wasn’t for the real me. my teachers didn’t give me the time of day and my parents always asked “what happened to you? you used to be so bright.”

the next that came was comorbidity. anxiety, depression, self-harm, substance abuse, self-isolation and s*icidal thoughts. i was placed into therapy in 8th grade after telling my mother that i did not want to live anymore. to my therapist, i was just a depressed and anxious teenager. she wasn’t wrong, but she wasn’t exactly right. the first time i attempted to take my own life was the summer before i entered high school as a 9th grader.

in high school, i thought my depression melted away. i was still anxious, and i would have frequent panic attacks, but i was fine. i did drugs, i skipped school to go have fun somewhere else, i lied about anything and everything so nobody knew really how bad it was - i don’t think i even knew how bad it really was. i stopped seeing my therapist at the end of my 9th grade year. i was fine. but i still couldn’t bring myself to focus on the work in front of me at school, i couldn’t even pretend to. i couldn’t keep my bedroom clean. i was detained by police officers for trespassing and truancy but, at some stroke of luck, no official arrest was made.

not long after, something clicked in my head and i knew i couldn’t live like this anymore. i still can’t pinpoint what exactly pushed me to try life again. i dropped out of high school my sophomore year and tried to do online high school in attempt to graduate. i ended up just getting my GED. i went to therapy again; this time, the therapist told me i was a lot like her other ADD/ADHD clients. this was the first time i ever heard anything like that. she recommended me to a psychologist who was shocked that i went this long - i’m now 18 years old at this point - without any kind of assessment or diagnosis that reflected ADD or ADHD.

after testing and ruling out other possible diagnoses, my psychologist gave me the official diagnosis of ADHD combined type. everything started to make sense - the times where i would try to do homework but couldn’t even get pass the first question, the times where i thought i was going to die because i was understimulated and bored, the executive dysfunction, the restlessness, the racing thoughts, and the more solid evidence that when taking adderall recreationally, that i felt the most clear-headed and calm in my entire life.

then i got angry. angry that, if i were a boy, i would have gotten a diagnosis a lot sooner and i could have had a better chance. i felt like my life was taken away from me. i was angry at my parents, at my teachers, at my old therapist, at my school counselor, at my friends... i sometimes still feel this way. it’s very hard to accept how different my life could have looked like had i just been listened to for a little longer. i was miserable.

now that i’m away from home; now that i’m in college, married, and slowly picking up the pieces from the teenager that i used to be that felt so betrayed, alone, failed; it’s a slow healing process. researching my diagnosis and staying in touch with my psychiatrist and finding help from other ADHDers is a weekly occurrence. i’m still so young, and i still have so much work to do - but i at least have the tools to get there. i’m sometimes still angry and my heart breaks for the me in the past. how i wish i could comfort her. it’s like mourning.

i’m slowly but surely climbing out of a dark place and getting to where i need to be. i have adhd and that’s okay. i’m not broken, i’m worthy of love and compassion and respect, i’m going to be okay. i just have to get to where i wanna be a little bit differently than most people.

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soldrawss · 3 years

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Could you please post more of your lovely wholesome Rottmnt content? Your AUs are golden and I’m sure all of us would appreciate, love and cherish anything you give us.

I’m ALWAYS down for posting some ROTTMNT AU content, thank you so much for your sweet words and the chance to bombard you with more of my au stories. (You didn’t specify which rottmnt content so I’m taking artistic liberty and answering with BBM content) He’s another little story I wrote for my Big Brother Mikey AU. (Zach had asked if Raph ever outgrows Mikey because he’s genetically built like a freaking tank and I not only said yes, but Leo and Donnie eventually outgrow him too, and then this short was born)

So Mikey's not like, TALL by any means. At around 20 he reached his peak height of 5'7, and that was that. But for a good portion of their childhoods, he was the tallest. Only naturally so, since he was the oldest.

But then the twins turned 16 and hit a goddamn growth spurt and shot up like vines from a fairy tale and effectively outgrew Mikey. Which Mikey saw coming... sorta...

The twins had been around his height for a while, so it wasn't too surprising when the day finally came that Mikey, as he was standing in the kitchen making some scrambled egg tacos, noticed Leo walk up beside him and reach for the stash of chocolate peppermint bark that Mikey had to use a stepstool to stash up on the top shelf, (He hid them up there from their Christmas holiday party because Raph and Donnie had kept eating them to the point of getting sick) and Mikey finally thought, "oh my god, there goes my best treat hiding place". And sure enough, when he forced the twins to stand by the hallway wall, (where they had all their heights measured with color-coded crayon lines, something they used to do as kids with their dad that Mikey didn't really grow out of continuing despite all the times they've moved) the blue and purple lines had overtaken the orange line as the tallest height.

And it was a little bittersweet, Mikey DEFINITELY teared up about it despite Leo and Donnie giving him hugs and teasing him good-naturedly about it, but it was a good bittersweet. Leo and Donnie were growing up. They weren't the fierce and protective kids they used to be, guarded with nervous and untrusting anger that kept cultivating in their unstable childhoods. An anger that was almost seemed second hand, there without them having to reach for it, and Mikey used to lose sleep over hoping that they wouldn't feel like the world was against them forever. He hoped they could be kids for a long as they could be, much longer than he ever had the chance to be.

They were so small, they'd always been so small. Born a month and a half premature, and tiny in Mikey's already small 7-year-old arms. He figured they'd always be that small, always fit right there, perfectly in the circle of his arms.

They still do, but not in the fearful and sheltered and scared way they used to. Not in the perfect way that made Mikey seem bigger than life, and able to shelter them from the worst of the world’s hurt and pain and cold.

Now it's with a bounce in their step and a wry smile on their lips and a contented sigh in the mornings on their way to school, and Mikey lifts his arms up because how DARE they think they can just sneak off to do cool teenager things and not give their embarrassingly affectionate big brother a hug goodbye. And they sorta crouch now, bending over so that Mikey can wrap his arms around them, but they do it, and it feels right, and they hug back just as hard and Mikey is thankful they didn't outgrow this. Mikey isn't upset when the twins grew taller than him. But it's a completely different story with Raph. Because Raph was always a big kid. He was a brick as a baby. Round with baby fat and soft cheeks that Mikey used to blow fat raspberries into to make him giggle and no matter how big he got, he was never too big for Mikey to carry around and hold in his arms forever. At least, that's what Mikey thought, anyway. He didn't notice when Raph stopped jumping into his open arms whenever he got home, not at first. Racing like he had something to prove from wherever he was in their little apartment complex to meet Mikey at the door with a tackling hug to Mikey's middle with all the force of a runaway freight train. Mikey never stumbles or falls back from the familiar weight, because he knows, like he knows all the freckles on Raph's nose and all the curls in his baby brother's hair, that he'll always be there to catch him no matter what, so it was never something Mikey was consciously aware of. And sure, maybe he's a little aware of Raph's growth, but again, Raph was always a big kid. Mikey was always buying him new clothes and shoes, because he either ripped or outgrew his old ones, and he never quite fit into Leo's or Donnie’s or Mikey's quite right. It isn't until Raph's in 8th grade, and he's coming home with a note for Mikey to read about him joining the football team as a freshman come the next school year, and the coach want's Raph to do summer training with the rest of the team, that Mikey has to take a step back because WHAT? Raph is a baby, no WAY is he ready to play football what on EARTH is the coach thinking. It isn't until LH, after hearing Mikey complain about it to him later that night, "Because I don't know El. Raph was pretty excited about it, but Football is whole worlds dangerous. Weren't you just telling me last week about the statistics on brain damage and the correlation it has with contact sports like football? And how that damage is permanent? Raph could get hurt, like SERIOUSLY hurt. I don't know WHAT the coach is thinking putting a Freshman on a varsity team," tells Mikey, "Well, I mean, look at him, Mike. Kid's built like a brick wall. He could probably take a few hits better than some of the seniors can," that Mikey finally looks at Raph and REALLY looks at him. Because,,, yeah ok, Raph IS built like a brick wall. 13 years old and suddenly he's a whole head taller than Mikey and about as big as 4 of him and WOAH when did Mikey's baby brother, this kid, HIS kid, the only one Mikey will ever have, the one he raised since he was 12 year's old, and holding to his chest, shielding from a pot of boiling water, get too big to hold to his chest anymore. Too big to shield. And Mikey has to sit down and not have a panic attack because oh no oh god oh no. All his brothers, all his little brothers, that Mikey put his EVERYTHING into raising, providing, protecting, are suddenly not so little anymore. Not so in need of protection anymore.

Donnie was off in grad school, getting a billion degrees and doctorates because he was smart enough to do everything and anything, and Leo was on a basketball scholarship at NYU, full ride, and he's skating through life on charm and smarts and innate talent to turn everything he touches into gold and Raph is 13, but he's already getting offers to be a centerline guard on a football team at a high school he doesn't even attend yet, and coming home shining bright and brilliant because of it, the same way he comes home after acing a bio test or landing another lead role in his theatre club and suddenly they don't NEED Mikey anymore.

They don't need him like they used to, and certainly not in a way Mikey needs them. Because they're growing up. Growing into their own people, with their own lives, and it's exactly what Mikey wanted, of COURSE, it is. Mikey used to kill himself, working days and nights and holidays and THEN some, working on borrowed time he didn't give to himself, to make sure that his brothers GOT the opportunity to grow like this. To be the magnificent and amazing people they were always meant to be, despite the situation the world put them in. But Mikey has only ever lived, really, for his brothers. Mikey never let himself have anything. He always gave it to his brothers, freely and willingly. But now that his brothers don't need him anymore, what's there left of Mikey? What was Mikey supposed to do now? Mikey stopped growing at 20, but his brothers kept growing and getting bigger and brighter and outshining the universe, and when Mikey wasn't looking, he thinks they got too big from little him anymore. (Cue an existential crisis from Mikey at age 28, where LH and Raph call Leo and Donnie at college, to come down and have an intervention with Mikey because OF FUCKING COURSE THEY DIDN'T OUT GROW HIM ARE YOU KIDDING??? Mikey will always be their big brother and they'll ALWAYS need him. Maybe not need him the same way they did when they were kids. But they'll still need his weekend phone calls, and daily cat videos sent in the group chat, and kisses to their temples and pillow fights on the nights Leo and Donnie spend a weekend home and warm hugs and warm breakfast casserole and the constant "I love you"’s that wouldn't fill their hearts the same way if it came from anyone other than their big brother. And Leo and Donnie are 21 and are tall enough to be trees, and Raph is 16 and can bench press all of them if he tried, and Mikey will never be taller than his little brothers again. But they'll never be too big for Mikey's hugs or love. They'll never be big enough where they won't need their big brother. Mikey is the only thing that they’ll never outgrow.)

#my fic #big brother mikey au #bbm au #rottmnt #rottmnt human #rottmnt human au #tmnt #rise of the tmnt #tmnt human #at age 28 mikey is 5'7 #at age 21 leo and donnie are 5'11-6 foot respectfully #at 16 raph is 6'2 #april is 28 and 5'6 #and LH towers over all of them at 31 and 6'5 #and that's the family babes

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uncurlinglikeflowers · 3 years

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Queer Trauma, Coming Out, & the Long Road to Self-Love and Healing

As I’ve reflected on my past, I’ve discovered that my adolescence may be one of, if not THE most traumatic time of my life thus far as a queer person. The last few months with my incredible therapist have made me realize that the years of anxiety, panic, fear, self-loathing, confusion, and depression have scarred me deeper than I had previously thought. She also made me realize that this is at least partially because I have never really talked about it openly and in depth in a healthy and productive way before, which is what inspired me to start this blog to share my experiences with others that are currently struggling with their identity, or to allow those that are also currently healing from the trauma of their previously closeted life feel a little more seen.

I knew from a VERY young age that I was different, but didn’t know how or what it meant. I was a lonely kid for a lot of my childhood without many friends. I didn’t want to play football with the boys during recess. I sought companionship at lunch with a table full of girls more often than not, which in itself also made me feel incredibly self conscious at the time as well.

I asked, (with incredible shame) for the “girl’s toy” from the backseat in the McDonald’s drive-thru because I loved to play with the mini-Barbies and craft entire storylines for them. They were easier to hide in my room than regular sized Barbies. I spent most summers off school alone playing video games and reading book and book after book. I didn’t really click with the boys down the street. I was obsessed with Britney Spears and the color purple. I was lonely without really knowing what it meant.

I feel as though that fear I felt in my childhood and adolescence held me back from SO much. Middle school in particular was absolute hell. I hated it. I always felt constantly insecure and uncomfortable. I had absolutely zero confidence or self love. I hated my body and how I looked.

While other kids experienced their first relationships and first feelings of romantic love, I was convinced that it was just not a possibility for me. On top of being deeply closeted, scared, confused, lonely, and in deep denial, girls didn’t go for me anyway. I was the awkward chunky guy struggling with his identity feeling like he had to make up for it by working extra hard to get perfect grades and give himself 100% to other people. I tried not to think about it too much, but hearing about relationships, seeing people kiss in the hallways between classes, and girls talking about what they liked in boys which was the complete opposite of me... it was hell.

To make my self consciousness worse, I felt supremely uncomfortable in gym class and the boys’ locker room in particular. I was ashamed of my body and also self conscious for wanting to look at the other boys; terrified that they would catch on and beat me senseless. Hearing them consistently call each other f*g in a very VERY negative context drove me deep into the closet as the identity I already felt shame for was directly correlated with being a ridiculed outcast, and something that was inherently, disgustingly wrong and unacceptable. The worst insult teenage boys could deliver to each other in the safety of an unchaperoned locker room in a hick town often not kind to queer people or those that were different. I SO desperately wanted to fit in with the other boys instead of being any version of who I actually was.

Part of that façade of blending in with my hetero peers involved having a girlfriend for two months in 8th grade. We didn’t even kiss, let alone approach any sexual situations. I’m sure she had her suspicions. I was utterly obsessed with the concept of blending in by having a girlfriend like the other boys and just having someone special in my life, even if we really didn’t even do any couple things.

Upon reflection, I don’t think the concept of ever being sexual with her ever crossed my mind in the slightest. Even the idea of kissing her scared the hell out of me, and not just from first kiss nerves. Deep down I knew it wasn’t right for me. Don’t EVER tell a kid they’re too young to know. Fast forward to modern times, my first kiss with a girl was with a close friend YEARS after I came out. Go figure.

The idea of caring about and loving myself was non-existent at that time. It’s a very VERY new and ongoing journey for me. I didn’t really care about myself at all. I hadn’t learned how to. Mom was in and out of cancer treatments, and would later pass during my senior year of college and kick off my coming out process, but that’s a whole other post for another day. Spending pretty much my entire childhood watching mom deal with being sick, I didn’t want to cause my family any more discomfort. I was full of self loathing, fear, and confusion, but it seemed irrelevant and unimportant because I didn’t want to be a hindrance.

Instead, I tried so desperately to be the perfect kid and son by befriending my teachers, being a model student, and joining band and a bunch of organizations to stay as busy as possible to stay distracted and impress everyone else.I didn’t love myself because I didn’t think I was allowed to or deserved to in my own head. While I did finally make more meaningful friends in high school, I continued to go through the motions to make my family proud to make up for the scared closeted kid who thought he had to make up for his queerness as though it were a shameful weakness, and it seemed to be the only thing that could possibly matter at the time.

Non-surprisingly, I never really knew any openly queer boys in grade school. It probably legitimately wasn’t all that safe to come out in that environment. I’ll never forget the two boys I saw holding hands in a Wal-Mart that absolutely shook up my entirely reality, because I had never seen romantic same-sex affection in person before.

There was a lesbian couple at my school, but people said awful, degrading things about them behind their backs constantly and acted like they were the biggest freaks. Another boy in my grade in high school hadn’t come out yet officially but was very flamboyant, and thus was treated just as awful as the lesbian couple, if not worse. Other kids just regularly said despicable things about him without even knowing him at all. I even heard parents make blatantly homophobic jokes about him.

His life had to have been hell, and as a fully out queer adult, I still regret not being able to stand up for him more. That definitely forced me deeper into the closet. He wasn’t even out but got talked about like he was some disgusting abomination. How could I ever assume that I could ever come out, let alone kiss, date, and love another boy? I HATED the idea of any attention being placed on me, so I just wanted to survive school at that point.

I had multiple people throughout high school ask me if I were gay just as though it were the most casual question rather than a triggering inquiry that sent me into a mental frenzy every damn time it was presented. Having one of the jock boys ask me such a deeply personal question in passing on the way to my seat in Algebra class was traumatizing. I of course always said no, as at the time I was still convinced it was a passing phase and that I couldn’t actually be gay.

At home, in the days of Myspace, I got anonymous messages telling me they were pretty sure I was gay. The anonymity was arguably worse in some ways.

At a young age, I became hyper aware of how I carried myself, talked, and acted. I loathed hearing my voice or seeing myself in pictures, for fear of sounding too feminine or standing or emoting too gay. I obsessed over the concept that boys and girls carried their books a certain way, or the boys would be labelled as queer. I was paranoid about where I shopped for clothes, the colors I wore, and the length and fit of my shorts.

In middle school, I got a lilac colored trapper keeper for school that I ultimately had my parents take back to the store for a different one because I felt so self conscious about it all day. At home I played with my little Barbies, but didn’t dare tell the kids at school for fear of rejection and isolation. Overall, I felt grossly incompetent, irrelevant, and unimportant in my own mind. Unworthy of love and of course, deeply ashamed for my attraction to the other boys.

I never had anyone whatsoever to help guide me through the coming out process, because I didn’t know a single queer person who could. I’ve now dedicated a good amount of my energy trying to be that person I desperately could have used then for anyone else that needs that role to be filled, and for someone to tell them that someone is incredibly proud of them. An obscene amount of queer people don’t ever hear “I’m so proud of you!” when they really need it the most.

I also didn’t have any good queer representation on TV or in movies, so I really did feel completely alone at times. Most queer characters in media existedly solely to be made fun of and mocked, ratcher than celebrated, properly represented, or God forbid, given a legitimate love story, and the public’s reaction was so frequently one of such repugnance and disapproval.

This was also probably about the time that a close family member told me that he had punched a gay guy for hitting on him when he was younger, a story he again felt the need to share with a now ex-boyfriend and I when we were dating, as though that’s not a horrifying thing for an already scared and closeted queer to hear from their own family.

I think during middle school in particular is when my anxiety and depression issues started, but I assumed either that I was being a baby and that my feelings were invalid, or that it was just teenage angst. The idea that boys and men should mask their emotions and feelings and feel shame rather than expressing them was, (and seemingly appears to continue to be) a very real thing in small towns and society in general.

It didn’t occur to me at the time that I was experiencing varying levels of almost daily trauma that would fuck me up well into adulthood. If you take anything at all from this post, let it be that the conversation around mental health, (and men in particular in this instance) NEEDS to change.

Another particularly noteworthy event in my queer adolescence was when two of my friends, (both girls, shocker) discovered gay porn on my computer. While they pestered me about if it were mine while they laughed, I of course lied. I felt a deep shame and utter humiliation. On reflection, fucking IMAGINE if they had been able to be gentle and understanding with me and told me they loved me and still would even if I were gay. From then on I was terrified that they would bring that day up to our other friends as a joke. Perhaps they did a time or two, I don’t recall. These same friends made jokes about the queer kid I mentioned earlier, and both parents of one of the girls regularly gossiped and made homophobic jokes about him when I was at their house

By the time school dances rolled around, I knew I would never be able to go with anyone but friends. Even if I weren’t still deeply closeted, I’m pretty sure my school still had pretty strict rules against bringing same-sex dates to Prom. While I definitely had fun with my friends at the dances we went to, I so desperately longed for a world where I could dance with a boy who loved me like everyone else was able to.

The loneliness and isolation I felt at the end of those nights could be unbearable because it didn’t seem possible for me, even as I looked into the future. I was fully convinced I would live a very lonely life without anyone to love me the way I craved. I didn’t belong in that world, and wouldn’t ever be set up for that kind of happiness, joy, and feeling of content. I would live for everyone else but myself because that’s just the way the world worked for us queers.

I wish I had had just one single person then who gave me full permission to be my authentic queer self on any level. Someone who could hug me and tell me life after high school and college could and would be vastly different. Someone to tell me I wasn’t an unlovable disgusting freak, but rather a kind-hearted boy who deserved a deep love someday because I was a valid and gentle soul who deserved the world. I certainly deserved more than the shame and pain that constantly haunted me.

Maybe then I wouldn’t have thought about death before 30 so much and obsessed over it well into my college career. I might have realized that I needed to learn to be gentle with myself and take care of and prioritize me and my own happiness. So many people let me down and convinced me that I was a filthy sinner and an over-emotional kid with invalid perspectives and feelings. As most of my closest friends, (that I cannot stress enough have been the ones to save my life and encourage the authenticity that I present so proudly today) came into my life after I had already come out fully, they weren’t around during those dark early struggles.

Sometimes as an adult I still wonder what it would have felt like and how profoundly different my life could be if someone had held me close and sincerely told me they’re proud of me for what I survived and overcame, and told me that they can’t wait to see my eyes light up with the love I’ve always dreamed of in a boy, and that I still continue to seek.

Young, baby gay Travis would be in absolute awe if he knew what life had in store for him back then. To see a future version of himself painting his nails, wearing whatever he wanted, dancing with strangers at pride festivals, having the time of his life at drag shows with his queer family and falling in love with boys? Proudly holding a boyfriend’s hand walking downtown in a busy city? Openly telling his dad about the cute boy he’s going on a date with? Going Facebook official with a boy? Being a super vocal advocate and inspiration and mentor to not only queer family, but to people he hardly talks to but manages to influence and inspire just by unashamedly being himself? Genuinely looking forward to kissing his new husband in front of family and friends on his wedding day, knowing it’ll be one of the happiest days of his entire life?

Holy. Actual. Fuck.

Travis of six or seven years ago wouldn’t have even dared to dream this big, let alone baby gay Travis. He probably would have been utterly mortified but SO comforted to see that future life when he didn’t believe it to be any level of possible.

I’m so fucking proud of myself for this journey, and no one will ever take that away from me or water down my trauma or the grueling work I’ve put in. Genuinely, this is the one thing in my life that makes me absolutely burst with pride.

I think I want to learn how to keep baby Travis in mind with this pride without having to revisit the trauma in the process. Look back at him with open arms, excited to see him learn and blossom into his actual self someday. Even if he could have desperately used someone like the me I am today, he survived then, and continues to persevere today.

He’s queer as fuck, and proud to shout it from the rooftops. He’s a voice and an advocate for the voiceless. A shining light and beacon of hope for those still navigating their terrifying escape from their closeted life. He’s going to meet a man someday and love him so deeply in the way baby Travis always dreamed of. Above all, he’s going to continue to make that little guy so incredibly proud because he knows now the importance of loving himself in the process.

I’m so proud of that scared little boy. I just wish he could have known then how proud he would make himself one day.

As you talk with the queer people in your life, please keep in mind that just about all of us have incredible trauma directly tied to our identities. Talk to them with love, compassion, and understanding. Tell them how proud of them you are for pursuing their own happiness in the face of oppression and rejection.

Demand better from elected officials. Advocate for us. Shut down homophobic ideals, even if you think it’ll make your family and friends uncomfortable to hear. Support queer content, artists and creators. Be a proud ally, but don’t ever allow yourself to take the spotlight away from actual queer people or our queer spaces. Mourn, love, and celebrate with us.

Understand why pride is SO fucking important to us, and why you never have to worry about needing your own pride events. Listen to us and love us for exactly who we are, and were always meant to be. Love is the most incredible, beautiful, and often rare human experience we’re able to experience during our short time on this planet, and it should always be celebrated.

Happy Pride!

#pride #gay #lgbt #journaling #love #queer #coming out #coming out stories #queer trauma #adolescent trauma #self love #healing #trauma

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findingnemo19 · 3 years

Text

Because of Seaweed (Percabeth AU)

A percabeth AU fanfic. That I had originally made because my friend didn't believe my writing was good, and now he's refusing to read the damn thing. Oh well. You guys will read it. That's more than enough. And, Shout out to my friend, Isha. She helped me with the plot to this fic. For this (mortal) AU, Malcolm is 2 years younger than Annabeth. Annabeth and Malcolm are Athena and Fredrick’s kids. Summary: Annabeth froze. She’s heard the 8 words multiple times in a teasing voice from her brother and her friends. She’s replayed the time she’d meet her soulmate in her head multiple times in multiple different ways. But never had she thought her soulmate would manage to get seaweed on one of her favorite books.

Read on AO3

She matured early, according to her parents.

Since Annabeth was 8, she hated the idea of “soulmates”. Why does she have to spend her life with someone? Why does she have to fall in love with someone? And why isn’t it her choice?

Of course, her parents tried explaining it to her, ( “It is your choice. The soulmate idea is like… telling the future.”) but she wouldn’t have any of it.

Unfortunately or fortunately, the fateful 10th birthday of Annabeth’s rolled around. Most people would wake up on their 10th birthday, immediately looking at the inside of their dominant hand wrist. Annabeth on the other hand avoided even letting that side of her right hand in her line of sight until her dad came back from work right before dinner.

Both her parents and her 8yo brother, Malcolm, were fed up with Annabeth delaying to look at the words her soulmate will tell her. Rolling her eyes at this, she turned her wrist over, “‘ You’re more worried about your book rather than yourself? ’” She recited the words slowly to herself, the bold cursive writing, murder on her dyslexic eyes. “‘ You’re more worried about your book rather than yourself?’ ” She spoke more clearly, looking up at her family around the dining table. “That’s what it says.”

Athena let a teasing smile across her face as Annabeth’s father and brother burst out in laughter. “Fitting. Very, very fitting.” Annabeth scowled at her mom, “Be quiet.” she grumbled. Stabbing her fork in her noodles she took a bite, stuffing her face with food.

->->->->->

She’s in middle school, and maybe she’s stopped absolutely loathing the soulmate idea. Not that she’s 100% ok with Fate deciding her relationship or anything. But maybe she didn’t hate it.

Plus, the 8th-grade halls are (oddly enough) filled with people asking each other out, and then arguing over the fact that “YOU’RE NOT MY SOULMATE.”

Apart from that, at least Annabeth has friends now. (Read: Piper, Frank, Hazel, and Reyna.) And thank whatever god is up there, her friends aren’t the annoying 8th graders fighting over soulmates in the hallways.

She’s happy and content. Apart from the assload of homework she gets, content. Content with her family, her friends, her classmates, and teachers-

(Ok maybe she wants to stab that “Caleb” guy in the eye with a very sharp pencil if he says anything about Annabeth being “a dumb blond” one more time. And her Science teacher. If he says “Mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell” one more goddamned time-)

->->->->->

Annabeth unlocked the door to her house, wincing a little in reaction to the yelling between her parents from the inside. She shook her head, stepping inside, praying that her parents aren’t near the stairs so she wouldn’t have to face that. God must have decided to be nice to the blond-haired girl, because her parents were arguing in the living room, and couldn’t even see the staircase from there.

No. It’s not out of the ordinary for her parents to fight. They’ve been doing it almost every day now. However, Annabeth hasn’t been able to understand why they fight. But they do and it bothers her. Let a girl and her brother in high school get some rest, would you?

About an hour later, she was typing up an essay that she completely forgot about, that's due the next day, when there was a loud sound from downstairs, the sound of someone running up the wooden staircase, and a frantic knock on her bedroom door. Confused and slightly concerned, she said, “Come in!”

As the door opened, Annabeth pushed her chair back across the wooden floor, cringing at the sound. “Malcolm?” Annabeth stood up as her brother shut and locked the bedroom door behind him. “What happened?”

Malcolm rolled his eyes, sitting down gingerly on Annabeth’s (for once unmade) bed. “I went downstairs to ask mom a question about homework, started talking before getting down the stairs, and she threw a plate- I wouldn’t say at me but pretty much at me.”

Annabeth raised her eyebrows in shock. “That's- that’s new,” she muttered under her breath.

Her brother scoffed, “No shit, Sherlock.”

Annabeth chuckled with no humor, saving her word document before sitting down next to the blonde-haired boy. “You ok though?”

Malcolm rolled his eyes fondly, “Yeah I’m fine, Beth.”

“Good.” A beat of silence passed between them before, “You could’ve just asked me for help instead of going to mom.”

He pondered this, “I guess.”

Annabeth chuckled, flopping down back on her bed, covering her eyes with her arm, “I’m tired.”

Malcolm fell into an almost imitated position, staring up at the ceiling, “Of what?”

Annabeth sighed, “Everything. It’s so stressful. Homework, essays, finals coming up, college applications, our parents fighting practically 24-by-7. It’s just too much-” Her voice cracked and she silenced herself.

“Yeah, I get it. Ninth isn’t much easier. Oh god, I forgot to tell you. Remember Calissa? From middle school?”

Annabeth nodded, “Mhm. The middle school ‘Bitch Girl.’ Why?”

“She asked me out today.”

Annabeth took her arm off her eyes and sat up looking at her brother with an unreadable expression. “ What?”

“Whoa, whoa Annie. Don’t go all “protective older sister” on me. I’m 15, I can handle this stuff myself .” Malcolm sat up as well. “I told her I’d think about it.”

Annabeth raised her eyebrows, crossing her arms at her chest, “You’d think about it? Malcolm this is the same girl who bullied 75% of your middle school. Including you. Are you-”

“Beth. Breathe. I’ll say no. I just said that at the moment.”

Annabeth scoffed, getting up from the bed and walking to her desk. “You better say no.” Malcolm hummed in response, getting up from the bed and leaving the room.

The sound of a ceramic cup breaking made Annabeth flinch (don’t ask how she knows what it was. She’s a little clumsy ok?). She bit her lip, turning to face the half-closed door, “Malcolm?”

“Yeah?” her brother’s muffled voice answered.

“Work in my room.”

->->->->->

Annabeth loved reading at the beach. The light wind messing up her hair, the random, delicate spray of water refreshing her; it was calming, relaxing, soothing...As long as she was a solid 30 feet away from the surfers.

Yet today was a different day, for Annabeth had actually come down to the beach with her brother and Calissa. Turns out, Malcolm ended up saying yes to go out with Calissa because he hasn’t “actually dated anybody.” So great.

To get her mind off things, she had decided to bring a book down to the beach like she always did. Picking up “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” for the 7th time in her life, she opened the book to where she left off.

She was engrossed in her book when she heard the loud splash before she felt the water. Gasping, she stood up, facing a boy only slightly taller than her, maybe the same age. He had raven hair, which was splattered across his face from the ocean water. His eyes were a startling sea green color. Annabeth, with all the people she knew, had never come across someone with that color of green eyes.

Shaking her head slightly to get the seaweed out of her hair (and maybe that slight trance the guy in front of her left her in.) Picking up her book from the ground where it fell she winced, “What the hell!? You got seaweed on my book, damn it.”

She saw the guy in front of her rolling his eyes. “You care more about your book than yourself?”

Annabeth froze. She’s heard the 8 words multiple times in a teasing voice from her brother and her friends. She’s replayed the time she’d meet her soulmate in her head multiple times in multiple different ways. But never had she thought her soulmate would manage to get seaweed on one of her favorite books.

“Well shit.” She heard from in front of her.

Laughing humorlessly she ran her hand through her hair, “yeah shit.”

“Annie!” Annabeth looked over to her right, seeing her brother and Calissa walking over to them. “Found your soulmate?”

“Malcolm. Were you spying on me? You’re on a date, aren’t you?”

“We got bored.”

The raven-haired boy in front of her chuckled. “Annie.?”

“It’s a nickname.” She snapped. “That I will not allow you to call me.” Annabeth sighed, putting her hand out in front of her. “Annabeth Chase.”

The guy smiled, slipping his hand in Annabeth’s. “Percy Jackson.” Percy Jackson. Jackson. She recognized the name. Percy must’ve read her expression, for he laughed and said, “Yes, Sally Jackson’s son.”

Annabeth’s eyes widened, “Oh my god, her writing is beautiful. Her characters are so well written. The way she carries the series, oh my god it’s incredible!”

Percy laughed. From beside Annabeth, Malcolm gave Percy a look, “She's a little obsessed with Sally Jackson’s books.”

“A little?” Percy asked, teasing.

Annabeth glared at him, “Whatever.” My soulmate is Sally Jackson’s son. Oh my god.

Percy cleared his throat, “Uh. Sorry about the seaweed and everything. I lost control for a bit.”

Annabeth hummed absent-mindedly, wrinkling her nose in annoyance at the realization that her book was covered in saltwater and seaweed and she probably won't be able to save it. “Well, one of my favorite books is now soaked but I guess I’ll forgive you.” She then added, “But only because you're the son of one of my favorite authors.”

Percy laughed lightly, “Not surprising. All my friends love my mom more than me.” Percy reached his hand out and brushed off a piece of seaweed from Annabeth’s hair. Suddenly, it seemed like she forgot how to breathe. Annabeth saw Percy’s eyes search her face, his hand delicately resting on her cheek.

Too soon, Percy pulled back, and Annabeth wasn't sure why that bothered her. He glanced at the setting sun, “I should get going before my mom gets worried.”

Annabeth blinked, “Uh yeah, yeah ok.”

Percy smiled, turning, grabbing his surfboard from the ground, and yelled to some people in the distance, “Hey, Thalia! Jace, Neeks, we gotta go.”

“Don't call me that, Jackson!”

Annabeth smiled. “Hey, uh, Percy?”

Percy looked back at her, a smile still on his face, “Yeah?”

“Could I- Could I have your number?” Wincing, as she worried she might’ve stepped over a line.

Percy’s smile only grew, “Of course.”

->->->->->

She was happy. More than happy. In the past two years, a lot happened.

A few weeks after the beach incident, Annabeth had called Percy, asking to go out on a date, because, “we’re soulmates anyway, might as well.” He agreed. 2 weeks and 4 dates later, they had their first kiss. Under a street light that was already dying out, with a leaf or two, landing on Annabeth’s head, which Percy teased her about for weeks. ( “It was just a leaf Annabeth.” “We were kissing. Can you blame me for getting startled?” “No one’s blaming you. I’m just teasing you, Wise Girl.” “Yeah, I can tell, Seaweed Brain.” )

Oh and the nicknames. They’re stupid because they’re cliché. ( “But clichés are only clichés because they work, sweetie.” “Sure, Mrs. Jackson.” “Sally.” )

And Percy’s mother is a gem, and so is his half-sister, Estelle Blofis. Apparently, Percy’s parents are divorced, and Percy’s mother remarried, to an English teacher, Paul Blofis. Percy’s friends are great too. Thalia, Nico, and Annabeth immediately hit it off. Percy met Annabeth’s friends as well, at some point, and she found it cute how nervous he was.

Also, she got accepted to Queens College. And better yet, so did her boyfriend.

->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->->

Thanks for reading!!

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thebooki3h · 2 years

Text

I received parental validation growing up, I did. I was encouraged to learn and my interests were supported.

That sounds all well and good until I add that everything was building up for college. That’s all my dad thought about.

He pushed me to learn more math than I needed to at my grade level, for college.

He encouraged me to try clubs and sports for college.

He encouraged me to read more, even though it was fiction, for college.

This wasn’t always explicitly stated especially around my own interests, but the undertone of “for college” was always there.

There are very few things I can think of that weren’t somehow tied to me getting into college. Everyone in my family talked about college to me.

I get that as you get older especially in high school that’s what you hear but my father was talking to me about college in 2nd grade.

I was praised for my achievements, but they never felt like enough for college, there was never enough.

I was constantly grilled about my friends and their ambitions, and they were always placed on a scale of college worthy or not. I could see it in my parents eyes that they were looking for bad influences to lead me away from college.

Acedemic success was the primary source of praise that I received once I hit 3rd grade. Everything else was secondary. My interests were allowed as long as they didn’t get in the way and for a long time that was fine.

I could read in class because the material was easy to absorb. I could read for hours at home because the homework was easy and I enjoyed the pursuit of knowledge. When actual success and achievement played a role in how my parents loved me, that was when it began to crumble.

I had no study habits and I avoided making them because I could usually get away with doing nothing extra bedsides homework. When I was forgetful or I procrastinated I was told to “try harder” or “do better”. Any actual advice amounted to those two sentiments but never helped.

My parents couldn’t figure out why when they told me to just study, it didn’t work. When grounding me and punishing me for reviving bad grades did nothing but push me away.

I tried asking for help, for something that would actually be useful to me, but their advice always amounted to the same things. Then I became an age where it was my fault, which frankly was too early. My forgetfulness and lack of ability to focus on studying, even when I asked for help was always my fault.

So by the time I got to the 8th grade I stopped asking and I was told that I would bring my grades up (Which were mostly As with the occasional B)

For college was my only source of validation, it was when I was given affection or at the very least validation. They told me they loved me I could feel it in the sense that they meant it but it always felt conditional.

I’m in college now and it’s very conditional because now it’s for medical school. Everything is for medical school which was a deduction that I made at 10 because I was given 3 options.

Doctor, Lawyer, engineer. I choose doctor because it sounded nice. If it wasn’t for college it was for medical school. It feels like that’s what my life has become even if it’s much more of a disappointment to them.

They can’t imagine I should struggle so much when I was so academically successful in elementary school.

My life has been for college, and I don’t even know what I want anymore other than to just exist and be loved for me and not the future accolades I could provide for my parents. I want to be held and feel loved and not feel for college. I’m tired of college, I’d like to be free of college, I wonder what that feels like?

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froegs · 3 years

Text

My Stardew OC’s!

long post, but feel free to read up if u wanna ask questions or request to see more of them!!

Ivy Sodbuster!

Quick Facts about Ivy:

She worked in customer service @ joja for 6 years

She was a dedicated scene kid 8th grade and all through high school, unfortunately she had to trash (almost) all her clothes and redye her hair bc of joja 😞

She only wore business casual bc she would go and work for seven hours and come home, sleep, repeat. When she started working on the farm she was broke as hell so she had to rip the sleeves off her shirts and cut her jeans into jorts so she could have work clothes

Emily was her first friend in town bc she saw ivys busted ass and said..... let me help you

She became friends with Sam second just because. He was around.

She inherited grandpa’s farm with her cousin, Oakley (my friends oc, once she finalizes a design I’ll draw them more).

Oakley’s more “mature” (bc shes 30) but she just is really anxious. Ivy tries to set her up with Leah but they don’t click,,, Oakley ends up falling for chicken man.

Sam introduces Ivy to Seb and instead of Farmer falling for NPC its the other way around Fr.

Seb crushes on Ivy immediately

His first attempt at flirting was like “hey ivy...... wanna see me beat Sam at 8pool for 3 hrs straight?” And Ivy immediately joined Sam’s side and demolished Seb in 8ball.

Ivy ended up hanging out with the ASS trio on a daily.

Seb and Ivy started dating Fall 1 of year 1 after they confessed their feelings for each other during the dance of the moonlight jellies festival

They moved in together 3 days after Seb’s bday

And were married Summer 10

They fast burned this bitch but they are so stupidly in love

In Year 3 Spring Ivy’s other cousin on her moms side became pregnant and chose to give it up for adoption, but beforehand she asked everyone in the family if they wanted a baby

Ivy looked at Seb like 👀

So on Year 3 Winter 1 they brought home their son, Finn

I think this is a classic trope for all Sebastian lovers but he def dresses Finn up in a frog onesie and calls him tadpole !!

Her favorite activity is fishing, that’s how’d she find excuses to hang out with Seb by the lake

She loves making artisan items, especially truffle oil. Oakley prefers large crops and agricultural designing and ivys like fuck yeah mushroom >:D

Milo NoLastName!

Quick Facts About Milo:

Milo was smuggled into Pelican Town by the Traveling Merchant when he was 6 and was taken in by Gil and Marlon.

Gil was 55 and Marlon was 46 when they “adopted” Milo

Gil took the most care of him and Marlon kind of had the attitude of like... a dad when your family pressures him to get a dog. First week their like FINE I GUESS we have to TAKE CARE of HIM. Next week: me and the bestie!

Milo looks up to Gil so much. His favorite brown jacket was Gil’s old one.

Marlon took Milo into the mines when he turned ten as a sort of “coming of age” trip and.... a bat nipped a part of his ear off.

Marlon said it’ll build character

But he was freaking out about it

Gil was upset but got it patched up.

I head canon that Evelyn taught the kids in town before they went off to high school, so four times a week (he’d usually stay home Friday to reset and relax or help out his dads) he’d have to socialize with the others

But he was always a few years older than them so he felt kind of distant

The others in question were Alex, Penny, Sam, Abigail, Sebastian, and Maru

Once he graduated middle school he convinced Gil to let him homeschool so he could find geodes and sell them during most the day.

When he was 17 he finally reached floor 120 of the mines, but on his way climbing back up he got attacked by three squid kids and void spirits, lost his left ear, and blacked out

He was rescued by Marlon, who rushed him home and took care of him

Because Pelican Town didn’t have a doctor at that time, the bus was broken down, all Marlon could do was try and clean up his ear and give him antibiotics and make sure it didn’t become infected

He lost his hearing in that ear

That was the biggest injury he’s gotten so far, but he was grateful when Harvey moved to town

Harvey opened his clinic, fresh faced (ish) at 26 and immediately some scruffed up 24 year old saunters in like “thank GOD ur here dude, here’s fourteen years worth of problems. Good luck.”

It didn’t actually go like that

But

Basically

Milo’s not really a social person, at 25 he discovered he could easily buy a car and drive out to the desert to try his hand at skull cavern. He came prepared but ended up needing emergency surgery that night anyway

He slowly but surely became friends with Sandy and the desert trader. He liked the trader for her prices and Sandy for her kindness.

He also fell in love with....... HARVEY!! (shocker)

Harvey actually fell in love with him first :))

Idiots to lovers slow burn

Hell they’re not even together by the time ivy rolls around and they met like.... 6 years ago??? My god these bitches.....

Pheobe Dy

Quick facts about Pheobe:

Pheobe actually grew up closer to the desert than Zuzu City or pelican town!

Her parents own a decent sized cacti farm and she’d bus into town for school where she met Sandy and Emily!!

I like to believe there’s another town (not as small as Pelican) but close knit in the desert. I hc that Sandy’s shop, skull caverns, and the trader are just like the entry road to a nice desert town

Anyway

She got into fashion and design when Emily pulled her and Sandy into it in sophomore year of high school

Sandy didn’t like it that much and would usually hit glue or staple pieces bc she’d procrastinate the whole time lol

But Pheobe and Em where DEDICATED

they’d hang out after school to design clothing and critique each other’s work (with love, of course)

Pheobe went to college for clothing design with her backup being IT and computer work (another passion of hers)

She started dating Sebastian when she met him during a trip to a small computer repair store in ZuZu city

He thought she was cute so he gave her his number and they met at Stardrop Saloon

She felt a need to like him, not because she was actually attracted to him in any way, but because she was a ~closeted lesbian~

So that relationship didn’t last too long

Ok maybe a little

2 years

But she’s bad at cutting off things, ok?

That’s when she realized she liked her best friends... Sandy and Emily

Emily and Sandy were already in a pretty open relationship by the time Pheobe came around, but it still took her some courage to admit her feelings to them.

They started dating when all three of them were around 26.

Emily moved with her sister Haley to pelican town a year into their relationship, and Sandy and Pheobe followed.

They bought a car so Sandy could maintain her shop in the desert

There is now a house where that garden that Harvey stands in 25/8 is. And Sandy and Pheobe live there. I don’t make the rules.

Pheobe and Emily work together on a small clothing company, they design the clothes together, Emily makes them, Pheobe made a website and uploads them there, and Sandy sells some at her shop :D

The three of them would like to tie the knot one day, but right now they’re super content on where they are, so sometime in the future :)

#long post #stardew valley #stardew valley oc #sodbuster farms #farmer ivy #sdv art #sdv ocs #anyway thanks for coming to my ted talk #Pheobe sdv #Milo sdv #that’s all folks

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hyunsracha · 4 years

Text

six — lee felix

word count: 6.6k

summary: six months in which you realize you’re afraid of growing up.

warnings: uhhh reader is sad? not depressed but just like. sad. so if u don’t feel comfortable reading that!! also blood mention and like one or two suggestive lines hehe

august.

You fondly remember the moment you realized you had feelings for one of your best friends, Lee Felix. You were in 8th grade, and Felix was walking you home from school. Your dad had been out of town for the past 2 weeks, and Felix felt bad about you walking home alone. He stopped on the sidewalk in front of your house, “Well, here you are.” You had pouted, really enjoying the conversation you were having with your best friend. Your dad would be coming home tonight, so this would be the last of your little walks.

“Wait right here!” You had squeaked before running into the house. You had a cute little orange tree in your backyard, and whenever Felix came over he would pick one or two and snack on them. There was a bowl in the kitchen full of them, so you plucked one from the top and ran back outside.

“To thank you for walking me home.” He smiled at you then, quickly knocking all of the air out of your poor adolescent lungs. When did he get so...radiant?

He’s radiant even now, leaning towards the front seat of Hyunjin’s car and honking the horn outside your house. You huff, yelling, “Shut up!” out the window as you hurriedly push a comb through your messy hair. It’s not like you’re going to be late. It only takes twenty minutes to get to the edge of your pathetic little town.

Hyunjin’s been driving the five of you to school ever since he got his license. You and Seungmin can also drive, but Hyunjin insists. He’s obsessed with the beat up little car he got with his own money; money that he got from working as a lifeguard one summer. Jisung sits in the passenger’s seat, claiming it’s his assigned seat since he’s Hyunjin’s boyfriend. Felix sits in the middle of the backseat, with Seungmin on the right and you on the left. You’re hyper aware of how nice Felix looks today. His hair is parted down the middle and wavy, a little dry from the many bleaches you did to it over the summer. He’s sporting a leather jacket with a Nirvana shirt underneath, and you suddenly feel like rolling down the window to get some air. That itself is a struggle, because Hyunjin’s car has manual windows that you have to roll down with a crank. The warm August breeze flows through your hair, but it’s not unpleasant. You’ve always liked summer; no school, spending all of your free time with the boys in the car, driving to surrounding cities and wreaking havoc all over the county.

You all make small talk on the drive to school, mostly chattering about your senior year. Your last year in this hellhole of a place. You’ve been going to this school since 7th grade, since there aren't enough people to separate the middle schoolers from the high schoolers. You could maneuver these hallways with your eyes closed, and you hate it. In fact, you hate everything about this town. Almost every building is the same color beige, and almost every person sports the same blank, lifeless look. The people in this car are the only things keeping you grounded; if it wasn’t for them, you would have fled for the hills the second you got your license.

Another thing you hate about this town: everybody knows who you are. There’s no escaping yourself. You’re reminded of this during your lunch period, when the five of you walked into the one diner in town that hasn’t been renovated since the 1950s. When you enter, the waitress greets you all by name, a name that tastes like poison on your tongue. Everyone you know was born and raised here, leaving absolutely zero room for freedom. You itch to get out of here, to turn into someone you don’t even recognize. You long to walk into a restaurant in clothes that aren’t your style, and speak in a voice that isn’t yours, and even give anyone who asks a fake name. It’s not that you hate yourself, really. You just want the choice to be whoever you want to be. Here, you’re the same old (Name), the kid whose mom walked out when they were just a toddler. That’s all anyone around here really knows you for.

Except for them. They’re sitting around you now, happily chatting away. You grew up with them, just like you grew up with every other kid around here, but they’re different. You were never the kid without a mom to them; you were just (Name), their best friend who just so happened to have a mom.

That’s another reason you like Felix, you think. He’s never mentioned your mother. Not once in the entire 17 years you’ve known each other. He understands you better than you even understand yourself. He’s always been the most caring person you know, refusing to step over boundaries you didn’t even know existed. He always does what’s best for other people, and never expects anything in return for his kindness.

He’s too good for you, you think. He’s all sunshine and happiness, and you’re thunderstorms and eternal dread. It sounds cheesy, you’re aware, but it’s the truth. No matter how badly you want to be with him, you know it would never work out. It doesn’t matter how often you think about holding his hand in a more than friendly way or giving him quick kisses as rewards during study sessions. The two of you just wouldn’t work out, and it would certainly put a dent in your friend group. You convinced yourself all of this many moons ago. It’s just a silly crush, you tell yourself. A silly crush that’s been going on for four years. You could never be with Felix; it would ruin everything.

It’s better this way. You get to preserve this perfect image of this perfect boy, and you never have to see what he looks like once you’ve accidentally broken all of his ribs to stomp on his heart.

october.

Crying in the middle of the diner really wasn’t your plan on this Thursday afternoon. But you can’t help it. You took a big math test on Tuesday and got an 89% on it. Jisung scoffs when you first complain about it, whining that he would be crying tears of joy if he got an 89% in your level math class. And that is when you start to cry. Hyunjin immediately takes you into his arms, running long fingers through your hair gingerly. He rolls his eyes at the other boys as he tries to calm you down.

Truth be told, you’re not just crying over a math test. You’re crying over everything. You would rather have had this session in your room late at night but you can’t always get what you want. Applying for university has been stressing you out so much. It’s so expensive to apply and you don’t even know if you’re going to get in? Sounds like a scam. You applied to 7 different schools, all in big cities that are your ticket to leaving this shithole forever. And that’s exciting to you, but then you lay in bed at night and realize that you’ll be thousands of miles away from the only people who have ever looked at you, a fucked up mass of cigarette burns and bruises, and decided that they love you because of it. That terrifies you. You’ve cried about it almost every night since you started your applications, and you change the subject whenever your friends notice the puffy redness surrounding your sad eyes.

In the midst of your mini meltdown in the middle of the diner, you don’t notice Jisung ordering your favorite thing off the menu, adding a strawberry milkshake because he feels bad. He pays for you, too, before pulling you out of Hyunjin’s hold and dragging you to a booth in the corner. He sits you down, plucking a napkin from its holder to pat under your eyes. He’s mumbling sweet words and apologies through you, but you’re not listening. You’ve completely zoned out at this point. You only come to when Seungmin slides a plate of food and a glass in front of you. Hyunjin nearly coos at the widening of your eyes, a fond smile growing on his face as you gratefully sip on the milkshake.

The rest of your lunch period is normal; filled with jokes that make your sides hurt and throwing food at one another when they say something unsavory (Jisung is a fan of yo momma jokes). You find yourself mindlessly gazing at the boys around you as they talk to each other. They really are your whole world, huh? They’ve been by your side pretty much since you could walk, and you can’t imagine getting this far without them. Tears sting the back of your eyes and your vision starts to blur. You can’t cry again, (Name), not like this.

You shake your head, “Do you guys wanna hang out tonight?”

“Why? Do you miss us?”

“Yes, Jisung. I miss beating you at Uno and making you cry.”

“We agreed not to talk about that - !”

You all laugh, and you hear echoes of them saying that they’ll come to your house later. They’ll figure out something to do. They’re the most exciting people you know. Definitely the most exciting people in this town.

And you were definitely right. You hear a knock on your door at about one in the morning. You were in the living room, scribbling French notes in an old notebook. You open the door, coming face to face with your four best friends wearing t-shirts and swim shorts.

“Why are you wearing swim shorts?” You ask in a monotone voice. They quickly hush you, aware of your father sleeping in the next room, and they tell you to go get changed. You oblige with a huff.

You can easily figure out where the boys are taking you. It’s a short walk, but everything in this town is a short walk. There’s only one pool in town, next to the middle/high school. It’s obviously closed now, but that’s never stopped you guys before. Felix uses the stick of one of his earrings to unlock the gate, ushering you all in. Hyunjin and Jisung waste no time peeling off their shirts and jumping right in, screeching at the feeling of cold water against skin. Seungmin rolls his eyes before following suit, choosing instead to take the stairs into the water. You and Felix are last. You glance at him out of the corner of your eye after removing your cover-up, “I bet I could push you in before you push me in.”

You see him narrow his eyes in your direction, “Bet.” And you’re immediately at each other’s throats, palms pushing against each other’s bare skin. The boys in the pool have their eyes trained on you, a mix between wanting to make sure you don’t fall and kind of hoping one of you does fall.

Felix ultimately wins your little fight. He grips your biceps, walking you backwards before practically dropping you in the water. It’s definitely cold, but not cold enough to scream over. You think it’s actually kinda nice.

You take a deep breath as you emerge, glaring daggers at the boy still standing on the concrete. He’s cackling, and you kind of want to kill him. The next best thing you can do is grab his ankle and pull him in yourself.

The five of you splash around for a while, screaming and splashing at each other. Seungmin chases you around, grabbing at your feet to pull you under. Hyunjin, Jisung, and Felix are playing Marco Polo. Jisung is a cheater, slowly climbing out of the pool before calling out, “Polo!”

A little while later, you and Felix are sitting next to each other at the top of the stairs, your chest heaving as you pant. Your hair smells like chlorine, but it’s the first time you’ve felt true bliss since the school year started. “Let’s play Truth or Dare.” Hyunjin suggests from the deep end.

You roll your eyes, “What are you, twelve?”

“Twelve inches deep in your mo-”

“Jisung.”

But you decide to play anyway. It starts out small, with Seungmin daring Jisung to steal a candy bar from the convenience store down the street, and Hyunjin asking Felix the weirdest thing he’s ever gotten off to. Definitely not the weirdest thing to come from the five of you playing this game.

But then, Jisung turns to you, “(Name), truth or dare?”

“Dare.”

A wicked smile covers his thin lips, and you immediately regret speaking, “I dare you to kiss Felix.” Your face immediately turns a bright red. Fuck you, Han Jisung, your mind is screaming. You sit up a little bit straighter, observing Felix out of the corner of your eye. He doesn’t even react to Jisung’s dare; he just turns his body to face you and gives you a lazy smile.

“You know you’re gonna have to shave your head if you don’t.”

“I know that.” You mumble before leaning in, stopping a mere few centimeters before his lips. You can feel everyone’s eyes on you. You want to just disappear. Felix, always the sweetest person you’ve ever known, does the work for you, closing that centimeter gap. He’s gentle; oh, he’s so gentle. He kisses you like he’s afraid of hurting you, like you’ll evaporate if he applies any real pressure to your mouth. Suddenly, all of your veins are filled to the brim with Felix and you want more, more, more. But you can’t get more, because your other three friends are right there. And once he pulls away, you can see it in his eyes. He will only ever see you as his best friend made of paper cuts and despair.

december.

Felix has been looking at you differently since that night. You don’t understand it at all. At first, you would ask things like, “Do I have something on my face?” and he would just shake his head and look away, leaving you more confused than before. It’s the same look every time, like you’ve grown two extra heads or a tail or something. It’s so analytical; so different than how Felix used to look at you. It makes you feel like a stranger in your own body.

“Guys…” Hyunjin whines as he pulls up to your house after school, just having finished the last day of the first semester. Midterms have kicked your ass, and you’re not really in the mood for Hyunjin’s pouting. You always get dropped off first, because your dad is hardly ever around, so sometimes you all just hang out there. “It’s our last Christmas Eve before college!”

You glare at him from the backseat. Must he always remind you that you won’t be able to spend every day together in six months time? You push open the door, “See you guys then. 10, right?” When you get a nod from Seungmin, you shut the door before hurrying into your house, your thin jacket hardly protecting you from the December air.

The next three days pass terribly slowly. You watch TV and scroll through TikTok and take many naps before it’s the night of Christmas Eve and you head to the park.

The five of you have done this every year. When you were little kids, you would spend the day of Christmas Eve together, running through the streets and playing games. As you got older, your hangouts got later and later until they were eventually an evening affair. Like now, it’s 9:45pm and you’re walking in between streets to get to the one park in town. It’s a small park, with a plastic playground full of primary colors, a swingset in the mulch, and an open grassy plain.

As you approach, you see that Hyunjin and Jisung are already there. That doesn’t surprise you at all; those two are always attached at the hip. They’re chasing each other around the field, and you can hear their giggles from across the street. You wish you were more like them sometimes. Happy and in love and free. You zip up your coat and make your way to the swingset. The swings have always been your favorite. You get to kick your legs and go high in the air, nearly free. But you never go all the way. Your ice-cold hands grip at the chains tightly, afraid to just let go and fall. You’ve always been afraid to fall, haven’t you?

Seungmin and Felix are last, and they came together. They’re neighbors, after all. Only two streets away from you. Hyunjin and Jisung are one street away in the opposite direction. Seungmin joins you on the swings, but he doesn’t go as high as you do. He doesn’t really swing at all, actually; he just kinda sways, the tips of his sneakers brushing away any mulch in their way. Felix is everywhere. He runs around with the others, climbs to the top of the playground and yells nonsense, and pushes Seungmin on the swing. There’s never really a plan with the five of you. You could do nothing together and still have a good time.

Your phone isn’t on you, so you don’t know how long it’s been before Felix calls your name. He’s halfway hidden behind the slide, one hand ushering you towards him. Confused, follow his gesture.

“What do you want? And why are we hiding back here?”

“Look, I know it’s tradition for us to not give each other any gifts, but…” He pulls a small box out from behind his back. You click your tongue disapprovingly, “Lix! I don’t have anything for you.”

“You don’t need to get me anything, (Name). Just...accepting this will be enough.” He hands you the box, and you open it slowly, afraid of its contents for some reason. You cannot stop the gasp that pushes through your lips as you look inside. There’s a small, delicate ring sitting inside the box, looking like it would fit perfectly on your pinky.

“Felix…” You begin, but no other words come out. A hand meets your chin and ever so gently tilts your head to meet Felix’s eyes. Right now, he’s the shyest you’ve ever seen him, the tips of his ears red from the cold as his eyes still manage to sparkle in the almost dark.

“It’s a promise ring. So, I have to promise you something, right?” He chuckles then, a deep sound that spreads warmth throughout your chest, “I know that, in a few months, we’ll probably be far away from each other. So, (Name), I want to promise you that I will always be with you. No matter how far away I am physically, I am always right with you, in your heart.”

You think his words are stupidly cheesy, but you can’t help but feel giddy at them anyway. You smile at him, taking the ring out of the box and slipping it onto your left pinky.

Felix thinks the smile you grace him with in that moment is the most genuine smile he’s ever seen on your pretty lips. So genuine, in fact, that he can’t help but to immediately kiss you. This kiss is different from the last; confident and playful as opposed to the shyness of the one before. Felix feels as though he’s finally clicked in the last piece of a puzzle and his mind can finally be at ease. He’s been wondering why he’s been feeling so weird since that night in the pool. Why he feels butterflies in his stomach whenever he looks at you. Why Seungmin insisted he was in love with you when they went to buy your Christmas present. It all makes sense now. Seungmin was right.

Felix is definitely in love with you.

february.

Lee Felix is not your boyfriend. You are not Lee Felix’s partner. And oh, God, does it burn. Sure, the two of you have kissed a few times since that night at the playground, and every kiss makes you feel like he’s trying to steal all of the oxygen in your lungs. Like he wants to steal your very essence; the very core of who you are.

A few days ago, he came to your house to study. The two of you sat on the boring grey carpet in your living room, on opposite sides of your boring grey coffee table. History books sat in front of you, and a plate of orange slices were being borderline inhaled by the blond. Midway through reading a passage about the War of 1812, he fell asleep, leaving you to finish reading on your own. In his slumber, you heard him mumble under his breath. This doesn’t surprise you at all; Felix has always been a sleep talker. What does surprise you, however, is when you hear him mumble something akin to your name. Your breath gets caught in your throat as you lean closer to Felix, hoping to hear him say it again. And he does. Your cramped living room suddenly feels very hot. He was dreaming about you. It’s like he wants you to fall in love with him.

It’s definitely working. You’re definitely in love with Felix. Ironically, you realize this on Valentine’s Day, when you wake up and immediately check your phone, your face turning bright red at his stupid good morning text filled with emojis. It wasn’t any different than the text sent the day prior, or the month prior, or the year prior, considering that he’s been sending you texts like these almost every morning since you both got phones. But this one made you feel different, like you were just some poor lovesick kid, hearts practically shooting out of your eyes at everything you did.

You cry about this situation to Seungmin that night, tangled up in his arms as your tears wet his pale blue sweater. He’s always treated you like a baby for reasons you don’t know. You hated it when you were younger, but now you want nothing more than for him to rock you back and forth and mumble gentle words of care. He did this a lot when the two of you were kids; he was always more mature than he needed to be. Specifically, when Jisung would push little (Name) off of the swings. Seungmin has been the glue that holds your group together since you were in elementary school. He’s staring at the wall in front of him now, trying his best not to roll his eyes at your blubbering. He loves you, he really does, but you were reading this situation all wrong.

“(Name)...” he sighs, “You’re running out of time.”

You pull out of his grasp, watery eyes showing clear confusion. He can read you like a book, so he continues, “If you want to be with Felix, you have to go for it now.” You stare down at your lap, furrowing your brow. Your mind feels scattered. There’s no way that Felix loves you back. You’re his best friend. The person who brings him oranges from the single tree in your backyard every once in a while, just because you know he likes them. The person who he walked home for 2 weeks straight in 8th grade because your dad was out of town. All you would ever be is Felix’s best friend, and you’re okay with that. It just hurts sometimes, knowing that you could never happen. He’s too good for you; too bright and too good and too perfect. You would crush him, you think.

Seungmin huffs from across from you, “Get out of your head. He loves you.”

You scoff, “Yeah, I know. He loves me like I love you.”

“No,” Seungmin pushes himself off of the bed, hurrying over to the other side of the room. He rummages through his desk, a somehow organized clutter of pens and crumpled up sticky notes. He retrieves a small receipt, a victorious smile on his face. He hands it to you, urging you with his eyes to read it.

“This is a receipt from a jewelry store. The one in the mall in the town next store, right?” He nods, “Why do you have this?”

“It’s Felix’s. I was the one who took him to the store to buy that ring for you.” Your hand comes up to your chest, fingers wrapping themselves around the ring you wore on a thin chain around your neck.

“Hearing the things he said about you would be gross coming from any other guy in love, but I think it was worse from him. And he was talking about you! It’s like Jisung and Hyunjin all over again!” You know he’s being dramatic to lighten the mood, and it definitely works. You sniff away any remaining tears and giggle while he sits next to you once again, “Look. It’s obvious that he likes you. He thinks you’re some sort of angel.” He drapes an arm around your shoulder and pulls you into his chest, “That ring was his move. It’s your turn now.”

It’s your turn now.

When you’re walking home that night and you get a text from the one and only Felix, Seungmin’s words cross your mind. It’s a simple text, really, just him asking when you want to study together next. You tell him to just come home with you after school on Monday, and you think about Seungmin again. It’s your turn now.

But you know you won’t be able to. You know you’ll look at his bright, warm eyes filled to the brim with pure love for everyone around him, and your confident facade will crack. You’ll melt under his sunshine gaze, crumbling into nothing but lovesick ash.

You’ll give up your turn. It’s for the best, right?

april.

You’re going to Seattle. A shocked chuckle bubbles from your throat as the acceptance letter shakes between your fingers. Seattle. Somewhere much bigger than here. Half of your heart swells; you’re getting out. But the other half sinks.

Because Seungmin is going to Washington, D.C.

Because Hyunjin and Jisung are going to New York City.

Because Felix is going to Los Angeles. Of course he is. Lee Felix is the sun, and he could only survive in a place covered by his rays.

It’s only 1,000 miles, you tell yourself. And you know he’s telling you, too. You can see it in the way he keeps stealing glances at you; you can practically hear him yelling, “It’s only 1,000 miles! That’s like...ten 100 mile trips!” Not like you have any idea what it feels like to be even 100 miles away from the blond. You all met up behind your house earlier, under your orange tree, to open letters together. The five of you have never felt tension like that before, when you all sat in a circle, the realization that you wouldn’t be five minutes away forever sitting in the middle.

You feel like screaming. Your fingernail is caught between your top and bottom teeth to keep the sound inside in the backseat of Hyunjin’s car that night. Felix’s hand is wrapped around your free one, sending warmth throughout your otherwise cold body. It’s a short ride, and nobody is talking. It makes fifteen minutes maximum to get to your destination. As soon as he parks, you’re pushing against the door, desperate for air.

There is an open field on the outskirts of town, unkempt wildflowers poking out of the grass. There’s an abandoned farmhouse smack dab in the middle, once a vibrant red, now dull against the black sky full of stars. You’ve heard many rumors about that house. It was a pretty common party house in town, and almost every year, some poor girl gets pregnant after a party there.

You have to turn on your phone’s flashlight to see once you’re in the house, nose turned up at the mess. There are empty beer bottles and trash everywhere, and your light can pick up the dust particles floating in the air. No doubt nobody has cleaned this place in years. You pick up one of the bottles, twisting it around in your hand as if it were a foreign object. Then, without warning, you throw it against the wall. Hard. The glass shatters everywhere, and you don’t even flinch as small shards cover your face and hands. The boys don’t react. They’re not paying enough attention to react.

Hyunjin, always on your side, follows your lead. He lets out a small yelp as his bottle hits the floor, and even more miniscule pieces of glass pierce your skin. In less than a minute, all of you are smashing bottles, not a word behind shared. All you can hear is the sounds of glass crashing against wood, and the occasional shaky sigh from your own lips. You thank whatever god is up there for generations of slobby high school students, for you have never felt so relieved. You’re bleeding quite a bit, but it feels good. You swipe your hand over your face, staring down at the red liquid smeared across your palm. It makes you grin. You feel sick.

Some time later, you’re all outside. It’s mid-spring, and it’s warm. The five of you are standing in a line, facing the tree line that seems miles away. You step forward, and you start to scream. Scream about how you hate this town, and how you hate every blank faced person in it. Every person who woke up one day and decided that this empty shithole was the place to live forever, to go to college and start a family and die. You hate your father. You hate your mother. How dare they be born here, spend 18 years here and decide they want to stay? Even worse, how dare they bring you into this hell when you never asked for it. You think you hate your father more. Your mother had the good sense to leave when you were a toddler. Sound rips from your throat at the thought of her packing her bags, looking her only child in the eyes and deciding to leave them behind. You could’ve been in some big city somewhere, a vibrant red or blue as opposed to the grey you feel. But then you never would have had them.

They start to scream with you, similar cries about how miserable they are and how badly they want to be free. You scream until your throats are raw and you picture it bleeding. You’ve all started crying without noticing, the salty tears making the small cuts on your face sting. You think you like it.

You’ve never been angrier. You don’t even know why you’re angry, and that makes it worse. You pull Felix by the front of his shirt, nearly smashing your lips together. It’s all teeth and tongue, sending shockwaves through your body. You can hardly hear the cackles and cheers of your best friends over the sound of your heartbeat. You’re not angry at Felix. You’ve never been angry at Felix. Your chest aches at the thought of leaving him before you’ve even really had him. Because Lee Felix still is not your boyfriend. And now, you know he never will be. You never really had a chance, you tell yourself. He is the sun, bright and warm. You know people need him to live. You don’t want to dim him with the grey that spills from every word you speak.

“It’s not that far,” he whispers into your lungs, but you know it is. He will forget you in a sea of new faces; you feel far too plain to be remembered. He will meet people with rainbow veins, and he will forget you and all of the greyness that surrounds you. You only kiss him harder; you will never forget his face full of stars, no matter how many people made of moon dust you meet.

june.

This is it.

This is it, you think, watching Seungmin bite down on his lip, hard. You know he’s doing it to keep the tears from spilling. He’s standing across from the four of you, hand twisted around the handle of his suitcase.

This is it. He’s leaving. He’s going to get on that plane and fly a million miles away, leaving a cracked foundation behind. He’s practically staring through you guys at this point. He can almost see the thoughts of fear swirling around in your minds. He promised himself he wouldn’t cry until he was safe on the plane, but he nearly cracks looking at all of you. His favorite people in the whole world, looking at him like he’s their lifeline. His heart is aching in his chest, but he clears his throat and pushes the pain away, putting on the stoic expression he used to deal with fights between the group.

“Take care of each other,” He says, his voice wavering more than he would like it to. You notice, but you can’t speak through the lump in your throat. Tears are slipping from your eyes, but you can’t be bothered to wipe them away, “I’ll see you on Christmas Eve.” And he turns, dragging his suitcase behind him as he walks. You give him about 15 seconds before your demeanor snaps. You chase after him, the other boys quickly following after you. Seungmin turns back around at the sound of rapid footsteps, a short oof coming from his chest as you collide. Your arms are squeezing around his middle, and you’re sure you’ve stained yet another one of his sweaters.

“You have to promise.” You mumble into the fabric. There are three more sets of arms encompassing you two, “Promise what?”

“Promise you’ll come back. That you’ll always come back.”

He chuckles, a stray tear dropping onto the top of your head, “I promise I’ll come back. And I promise that Felix will come back, and Hyunjin and Jisung will. And that you will.” You release your hold on him, looking up at him with bleary eyes. He gives you a smile, one that says all of the words you know he’s too shy to say out loud.

You let him leave this time. The remaining four make their way to the wall of windows, watching his plane soar through the sky. That’s when all of your tears start to get loud, as you all collapse into each other, gripping onto fabric like it’s the last time you’ll be able to feel each other. You won’t say it out loud, but you’re terrified. You’re terrified that once you get on the plane to Seattle, things will never be the same. That you’ll get too caught up in studying and new faces to make it home. That you’ll be too busy with exams and work to even send a text to the only people who matter to you. That you’ll end up losing them.

You jolt when you feel a soft hand on your wrist. It’s Felix, turning your hand palm up to see your tattoo. He places his wrist next to yours, looking down at the skin with a watery smile. You match his grin, thinking back to when you got it done.

It was the night of your high school graduation. You were at home, having just returned from a miserable celebration dinner with your father. The two of you didn’t exactly get along, seeing as he didn’t even know you that well, and he seemed to despise the parts of you he did know. You were exhausted, and you just wanted to call Felix and fall asleep together.

What you got was better than that.

What you got was a text from Jisung that simply said, “outside.” He waved at you from the passenger seat of Hyunjin’s car, Seungmin and Felix in the backseat.

“What are we doing?”

Hyunjin gasped, “You don’t remember the promise we made in freshman year?” You stared at his reflection in the rearview mirror blankly, blinking a few times as you tried to recall what this promise was. The five of you had made too many promises; you couldn’t keep up.

Felix grabbed your hand, tracing letters into the skin with his pointer finger. He knew Hyunjin wouldn’t drive until you remembered. Your eyes fluttered shut as you focused on what he was writing.

“T...Ta....oh! Tattoo! Oh- oh?”

And he was off. The nearest tattoo parlor was in the next town over, as was any actually cool place. The five of you stumbled inside, in a fit of giggles from some stupid joke Jisung had told. You all paid and played rock, paper, scissors to decide the order. You were last.

“Fuck-” You had nearly shouted, suddenly stressed. Hyunjin laughed at you, a high pitched cackle that made you want to throttle him. Felix’s hand found yours again, with a promise of, “I’ll hold your hand the whole time, okay?” coming from his lips.

You were able to ignore your anxiousness while watching the boys get their tattoos done. You recorded all of their reactions, from their yelps of fear to their hisses of pain. Seungmin handled it the best, gritting his teeth as he made conversation with the artist. Felix was true to his word, a tight grip on your free hand the entire time you were getting your tattoo done. It hurt more than you thought it would. You squeezed his hand tightly, trying not to show too many reactions, fully aware of the camera in your face.

Once you were done, Hyunjin took a picture of all of your wrists in a circle, blue “5”s on each and every one. It wasn’t a very big tattoo; only about the size of a quarter. But it meant a lot to you. You would be a piece of them forever. Whenever they shook someone’s hand, or held hands with a future lover, or even wrote on a post-it, you would be there.

“What are you thinking about?” the Felix of the present whispers, his breath fanning over your ear. You snap out of your daze, tears all dried up.

“Graduation night.” You answer, looking up at him. He nods, tongue poking out slightly. You can tell by his expression that he thinks you mean later in the night, when he walked you up to your door and kissed you soft and slow, mumbling i love yous into your mouth. When he asked to be your boyfriend and said no, telling him that you had missed your chance. That if he still wanted you after college, you’d be all his, but you were too scared to have your heart broken by your best friend.

He leans forward a bit, lifting up the chain that held his ring, “After college, we’re gonna come back here and hide behind the slide again...and I’m gonna put another ring on this necklace. Okay?” Your eyes go wide as you realize the weight of his words, stuttering an okay in response. How is he so confident? Is he not afraid of losing you, of losing all of this? He just assumes that nothing is going to change. That come Christmas Eve, you’ll all come back. Seungmin will still be the glue of your group. Hyunjin and Jisung will still be stupid and in love and filled with youthful glee. You’ll still be melancholy and grey, and Felix will still be in love with you.

Maybe he’s got the right idea. Always the optimist, always hoping for the best and seeing the best in people. Maybe things won’t be so bad. After all, they’ll always be a piece of you. When you shake someone’s hand or hold hands with a lover or write on a post-it, they’re always with you. No matter how far.

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