#Stacey’s Mom has not got it going on anymore
Note
Part 4 of Hell Diver!!!!!
[I promise the other requests are coming soon too but this story just comes so much more easy to me and I honestly needed a bit of an easy fix to get back into writing after volume 2 lol]
Stranger Things: taglist / Masterlist / Inbox
no explicit warnings. swearing. mention of shitty friends and strict parents
Chapter 4: Hamster Wheels
The rest of the day had gone by insanely slow. Most days had already felt like they took an eternity, but that Monday… was some cruel joke from the universe. The minutes just would not pass while the hours took on forever to finish. People around you were suffocating you. Not in the literal sense. Just in the "could everyone please shut up for a second so I can finally hear myself think!" insanity. Since lunch hour, all you wanted was to be alone, which was almost impossible in high school. And the feeling of guilt over what you had done to Eddie didn't make any of it any better.
Once that final bell rang, you stormed out of the classroom, speeding towards your locker to grab your jacket. If you were quick enough, you could get it and get the hell out of there before any of your friends caught on to you.
'Hey.' Well, it was nice to dream. You were, of course, too slow. Mary walked up behind you. Her smile was broad in the type of menacing way. 'We were gonna go get some milkshakes. Wanna come?'
'Uhm, no, I can't. ' Usually, you would never have even let the thought be put up for consideration. How could you say no to a milkshake that would most likely be paid for by some cute guy ha! But now, a place where all those people would be was the last place you wanted to step a foot in.
Mary raised a brow, hearing your unexpected answer. 'Oh. Got plans then?'
'Yeah, I got to study for the chem test.'
'That's not until next week, though.' Why couldn't she just let it go?
'I know, but I really need to nail this one or my mom will kill me, so I'd rather start early.' That must have done the trick, for Mary's whole demeanour relaxed. All your friends knew how overbearing your mother could get. She was that kind of tough love kind of parent, who really just wanted the best for you… even if it wasn't exactly what you had in mind for yourself.
That was why you had had to lie to her about why you had come back home so much later than agreed last weekend. For all your mother knew, you were at Stacey's for study club– it's what all of you had decided to use as a cohesive ruse in case your parents started asking questions among each other. If anyone needed an excuse or an alibi, study club is where it's at. You had never really found a use for it before, never having been much of a party person nor had a lot of guys asking you out, which your parents didn't approve of, but Eddie…
Well, you didn't have to think much about that. No matter how you would put it, there was no way that your parents would let you within a ten-foot vicinity of the guy. He was what they called a "degenerate". Those you had clear instructions to stay away from. And Hellfire… well, let's not even bother.
'Have fun then,' Mary said with the last twinge of a smile before walking away in search of her boyfriend's arm to hang onto. The second she was out of earshot, you let out a deep sigh and closed your locker again, letting your head fall forward and lean against it. The cool of the metal was pleasant to the touch, heavily contrasting the actual texture of the door as it had bumps and the edges in the slits were sharp, pushing into your forehead.
You bumped at it again, then again, but quickly stopped, feeling someone's eyes on you.
And when you turned around, they were hard to miss. The pair of puppy brown eyes, glancing at you from across the corridor. Eddie saw you as he walked out of the building. Had he been walking by, and you hadn't even noticed? Did he hear you talk to Mary again? Well, at least you hadn't been talking about him this time. There was nothing to worsen the situation anymore.
As you made your way outside, you wondered if you would ever get the chance to talk to him. Would he ever let you come over to his trailer again to talk about D&D? Would he still let you join the campaigns? Hellfire?
You hoped so.
By the time you reached your bike, you could see a cloud of dust practically trail behind the same van you had seen at his trailer. It drove off at high speed. If only you could get out of there so quickly… but the wheels on a bike still went waster than just your feet. Sure, you would have preferred to take your dad's car again, but you only got the keys for that on the weekends.
The road to the town library was a relatively simple one. It mainly was following the road leading out of the parking lot of the school, down Main and taking the third crossing to the left until you were greeted with the sight of the large and old building. Even if it had only taken you about fifteen minutes to get there, the scorching sun above you made sure you felt the energy be sucked out of you from the exercise. With deep breaths, you locked your bike again and walked up the small steps to the entrance.
Inside, the air was colder but not cold in any way. Even worse, it was stuffy, with no proper ventilation anywhere. You could practically smell the dust of the old books that no one had bothered to borrow in the past few decades.
You walked past the front desk, giving Doris a kind smile as you passed her workstation, as you knew exactly where you wanted to go.
For years already, the library had become somewhat of a sanctuary for you. A safe haven. Not from anything in particular. Probably just "life" in general. Whenever people started to feel like a bit too much, and you just wanted to get away, you would come here, grab the first book that sparked some kind of interest, sit in a corner, and read until it was time to get back home again. That is kind of how you found your love for all things fantasy. It was the purest way of escapism.
You walked straight ahead, through the aisles and aisles of books, to the section you had basically devoured already. Today, you weren't in the mood to search for something new. You needed something familiar that you could grab and go and get sucked into all over again. And you knew exactly where it would be.
Where it should have been.
'What?' you said to yourself as you mentally went down the alphabet repeatedly. M… N…O…P. It should have been there, that orange-yellow, almost gold, cover. It practically jumped out of the shelf, and yet… it was nowhere to be seen now.
You had almost given up the search when you noticed the familiar colour in a gap between books. Lying on its side, the spine called to you from the other side of the shelf, its neighbouring aisle. You had no idea what it would be doing there, but it didn't matter. It was there, and you could easily reach it.
With your hand already stretching out to it, your heart pumping with excitement to have managed to find the book, you almost scared yourself to death when suddenly you saw something else between that gap of books. The back of the head, looking at the books across, and locks of dark curly hair.
With a shriek, you pulled your hand away. It couldn't have been that loud, but in a quiet and almost empty library, there was no way he hadn't heard you, and you could just about see him turn in your direction before you knelt down. Keeping your head down, you walked as quietly as possible out of the aisle, hoping to get far away from that library section. Why was this happening right now? Why was Eddie Munson the only other person there with you? While all you wanted was just some peace.
Not that he wouldn't give it to you; he wasn't the problem. You knew you were. Your mind had already started spinning at the idea of "Eddie". Should you go up and talk to him? Or maybe better ignore him completely? The guilt from school, the same guilt and gnawing feeling in your stomach you had been trying to escape, was coming back even stronger. What was he doing there? Would he just take some books and leave, or was he planning on staying longer, like you? And in that case, could you let yourself stat as well? Maybe this had all been a giant mistake, and you should just go home, but no, this was your idea first. Even if you had no idea when Eddie decided to visit the library, you knew for sure you were the first to come up with that idea.
Yeah, you were spiralling, and it had taken less than a minute.
You had, however, made it over all the way to a different part of the building. The letters on the covers of the book had become all blurry in your head, the language not processing what the words were actually saying to you anymore. A feeling in your gut, or perhaps the vast acoustics in the room, told you someone was approaching, so you pulled out the closest book to you, trying to read the back cover of it as Eddie Munson turned the corner.
'y/n?' He seemed genuinely surprised to see you when you turned to look at him. 'I thought I saw you back there.' He smiled, making you remember to smile as well; your whole body had really started to feel miles away. You blinked slowly, before pushing out a smile and a sheepish laugh.
'Where?' You played dumb, and thankfully, Eddie went along with it.
'The fantasy section.' He cocked his head back in the direction of the bookshelves you had just escaped from.
'Uhm, no, I think you must have been mistaken. I've been here the whole time.' You went back to pretend-read your book. Eddie, still enjoying this little play you were putting up, took a step closer, letting his arm lean on the shelf.
'Are you sure? Because I could have sworn, I heard you.'
'Oh yeah? What did I say?' You had no idea where this cheekiness was coming from, as it really was not you, but Eddie was bringing out plenty of new sides to you.
'It wasn't so much words more like a–' he copied your little shriek, 'It kind of sounded like a hamster, if I have to be completely honest.'
'I do not–' you cut yourself off quickly, 'I do not think hamsters are allowed in here.'
'Yeah, that's what I thought, so then it must have been something else, shouldn't it?' He was coming closer and closer, his smile only getting bigger while your heart only started beating harder and louder. Eddie must have heard it by then.
'Well, I've just been here the whole time, so–'
'So you've said,' he chuckled, 'And I'm sure… The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money' he peeked at the title of the book you were holding, and so did you, realising you had ended up in the Economics section of the library. Trying to hide your embarrassment, you looked back at Eddie as he continued: '-is a fascinating read, but I really think I had seen you back there.'
'What makes you so sure it was me?'
'I suppose it is a bit of a far stretch.' He was now entirely leaning on the bookshelf. 'I mean… we are the only people in here, so the chances of it having been you are… pretty small.'
'Ha ha,' you rolled your eyes, putting the General Theory back in its place. 'You still have no proof, Munson.'
'I guess I don't. See you later then.' He let his weight fall back on his feet as he straightened up, tapping the book he had been holding on the shelf before turning around. The bright yellow cover made your jaw tighten.
'Mhm, see ya.' You let yourself roam the Economics section once more, just waiting for him to walk away… with your book.
You waited a few seconds, but he didn't seem to be going away any time soon. He stood there, a few feet away, arms crossed with a big amused smile. So, you looked back at him, getting a bit annoyed now– you weren't even annoyed at him, just at everything in general. But you pushed it back when you gently asked: 'Can I help you with something?'
'No, no,' he shook his head, 'I'm good thanks. Was just wondering when you would ask.'
'Ask what?'
'For the book.' He showed it to you again, almost taunting you with it.
'Why-'
'Here,' he put it down on a shelf near him and started walking backwards. 'It's good. I'm sure you'll like it.'
'I know.' you reached out for it, unable to hide the smile from seeing one of your favourite books. 'Uh- but, thanks.'
'Don't mention it.' And with that, he disappeared into another aisle. You looked at the cover of the book, being greeted with the image that in itself had already brought so much comfort to you. As you walked between the shelves to your usual sitting spot, you let the pages slip through your fingers. It was a bit unconventional for a public indoor space, as you didn't go for one of the designated reading spots or one of the large desks in the middle of the room where people usually did their reading.
You liked to sit down in one of the corners of the library, around the biography section, where the books could quite literally embrace you from all sides. There was a window right above you, too, so the natural light was better than the artificial yellow glow from the old lamps. You sat down on the ground and started reading.
In a distant and second-hand set of dimensions, in an astral plane that was never meant to fly, the curling star-mists waver and part…
You read about ten pages, but quickly realised you had barely comprehended anything that was happening on the pages. The words flew into your mind and immediately left as soon as your eyes moved on to the next. If it weren't for the fact that you had already read the book a few times in the past year, you would have no idea what was happening.
The thought of Eddie Munson having picked out the same book you had wanted to read was occupying your whole being. And the fact he had just given it to you… it made you feel even worse about everything that had happened at school.
You couldn't just sit there and read, so you got up and started looking in the hopes he hadn't left yet.
You went through every aisle, turning each corner, hoping you would see him standing in all his Eddie Munson glory that you had slowly started to miss whenever he wasn't around.
Eventually, you found him at one of the large oak tables. A whole pile of books next to him, as he was scribbling away in a notebook and only looked up from it when you were standing in front of him.
'Hey,' you said, waving, for some reason.
'Hi.' he said, a bit unsure, not knowing what you had come for. He glanced down from your face to see you holding the book close to your chest. 'Done already?'
'Oh, no, couldn't really get into it today.'
'That's a shame.' Eddie looked down to scribble down some more words onto the paper. 'Do you want to–' he pointed at the chair opposite of him.
'No, I uhm, I just– wanted to apologise.' You held the book tighter for a bit of support as it let you focus on something besides Eddie's piercing gaze on you. The way he had his head, slightly crooked, in curiosity for your next words, made a warm and fuzzy feeling grow in your stomach. 'Since I'm sure you had heard what I had said at school, and that was really a shit thing of me to do.'
'You have nothing to apologise for, y/n. Heavy is the head that wears the popularity crown.'
'I'm not popular,' you scoffed, 'but that's not the point. I don't want you to think that I'm like, ashamed, or something, to be seen with you. You're a really cool guy. But people are so cruel and well, we are not exactly the types to usually be seen together, and then that is just fuel for others to be nasty, to either of us.'
'We are in two separate worlds, and you're scared that if we spend too much time together, those worlds will collide and will end in a giant disaster?'
'Sorta… yeah.' He had phrased it so much better than what you had managed to come up with while you had been searching for him.
'I get it. And I'm not mad, either way,' he said, closing his notebook. 'I get how it is; school sucks, and for what it's worth… I'm scared of my friends seeing me around you too.'
'What?' your heart dipped a few inches down to your gut.
'Yeah, what will they think when I start ditching them to hang out with the prettiest girl in school.'
A warm feeling crept up on your face, and you suddenly couldn't look directly at him. But your peripheral vision still let you enjoy the glimpse of his smirk at you, trying to process the compliment. Then, you needed to change the subject, so you looked at the books he had stacked up on the table. Most of them you recognised to be different Dungeons and Dragons manuals, giving you an idea of what he had come to the library for, but you still asked: 'What are you doing?'
'That is highly confidential and secret information, my dearest y/n, so I unfortunately can not tell you.'
'You're working on the next campaign?' The campaign he had told you to join. The excitement started bubbling up inside you.
'If I tell you, I'll have to kill you,' he whispered the words, already looking around himself as if the walls had ears. You doubted anyone in town would care what he had been up to and what he had written in his notebook, and perhaps you wouldn't even have cared if he hadn't made it so enticing to know.
'C'mon, there must be something you can tell me?'
'As the Dungeon Master, I have taken an oath to protect and keep the secrets of the world, and there is nothing you can do sway me to your dark side.'
'Nothing?' you quizzed, giggling at his antics.
'Nothing,' his dark eyes were so serious, yet you could tell he was having the time of his life right there. More thoughts interrupted your moment, that you quickly pushed aside. Flirting would not be the right direction for this. If it had been some guy offering you a milkshake, you would have gone for it, but you and Eddie seemed to be really hitting it off. Even after these very few interactions you've had with him, you could tell that a great friendship could come out of this, so there was no need to go and ruin this now just for a silly joke about the campaign.
Maybe, not even that deep down, you did want to walk across to him and pull him by the collar and kiss him, but those thoughts were quickly stomped down. He was a nice and good-looking guy. Obviously, you felt a slight urge to do it. But, it didn't mean anything.
'Ok, fine, I give up.' You put a hand up in defeat, 'I'll just have to wait like everyone else.'
'That you must,' he would have said something else, but he was suddenly caught off by a deafening thunder rumbling outside. You could immediately see yourself having to cycle back home in that storm. Where had it even come from? It had been a perfectly sunny day when you arrived at the library, but when you looked out from the windows, the sky was dark grey, and the rain was hitting the glass hard.
'Shit.' Was all you said in reaction to the thunder.
'What's wrong?' Eddie asked, looking up at you as you still had not sat down.
'Nothing, I'm just gonna have to cycle back home in that.' The once silent library had been entirely taken over by the rain pounding on the outside.
'I'll drive you,' he got up, grabbing his notebook.
'What?'
'Most people reply with a thank you,' he quipped, 'but you can put your bike in the back of my van, and I'll drive you home.'
'Why?' Your responses weren't getting any better, much to Eddie's amusement.
'Let's say it's an investment. By driving you home, I'll make sure you don't catch pneumonia or some shit and won't be then eaten alive by endless guilt.'
'I wasn't really planning on going back home yet,' you admitted, and you could have sworn Eddie's shoulders slumped lightly. 'But can I maybe join you here, for now?'
'Go right ahead.' And you took the seat opposite him, opening up your book again as Eddie returned to work. Every few pages, you would look up and see him work, flipping through the books around him, tapping his pencil on any surface in a random beat. At one moment, he looked up at you as you had been at him, thinking you were bothered by the drumming.
'Sorry,' he smiled, stopping subtly.
'No, you're good.' You told him, giving him a smile before going back to your own book. It was very pleasant, the two of you being together yet not. Joined at the table but separated by your own doings. He had his campaign; you had your book.
At some point, you got so into your book that everything else slightly faded away, and you were only brought back to the real world when ring-covered fingers tapped the top of the book spine. You looked up and met Eddie's eyes, as he leaned over the table to reach for the cover.
'What's up?'
'Just checking in,' he shrugged. 'Just let me know when you want to go home, yeah?'
'Mhm,' you nodded, 'but if you want to go now, that's fine. You don't have to wait up on me; I can just cycle home later.'
'That is pretty selfish of you, y/n– since you know how guilt-ridden I will be if anything happens to you– just to go and suggest that.'
You had no response to that, and so you continued your ventures on parallel sides of the table until the sun was starting to set once again, making the skies even darker than they were to begin with. The librarian walked up to you to announce that the place would be closing soon.
'If you're not planning on checking anything out, be a dear and put them back,' she told Eddie with a kind smile, to which he saluted. Almost a second after the woman left again, he was up on his feet, collecting the books in his arms. You were about to reach for his notebook to help him out, but he grabbed it quickly, taking it between his teeth, letting the pages flap about as he walked.
'I can help,' you told him, seeing how heavy the books seemed.
'Thank you, milady, but I shall go on this quest on my own.' None of the comedies you had watched in the cinema matched up to the comedic timing of Eddie having said that and almost immediately falling over by stumbling into the chair he had been sitting on previously.
'Are you ok?' You asked apprehensively as he regained his balance. With the notebook still in his mouth, Eddie's response only came out as a disgruntled muffled sound, but he seemed to be doing fine.
You hadn't finished reading your book, but it wasn't your plan anyway. You had just needed to escape for a little bit, so that had been accomplished… whether it was the actual act of reading of your companion in it…
Eddie put all of his books back, one by one, so you did so as well with yours. Obviously, you were done much quicker so you came back around into the aisle in which he was standing, and without a moment for protest, grabbed the top books in his arms.
'This shall be no solo quest, today, my good sire.' That was enough from you to leave him speechless. With a chuckle, he let you take the books; noticeably, they were all lighter than the ones that remained in his arms, but still. Somehow, it had become a bit of a competition to see which one of you would be done first. You only had one final book left to place, but it was on one of the highest shelves, just a bit out of your reach.
'Wait,' before you could ask what was going on, Eddie grabbed you and pulled you up just high enough for you to reach the shelf you needed. It had been a surprise, so the squeak sound that you had made earlier, which Eddie lovingly commented on its similarity to a rodent speech, came back up.
'Did you hear that?' Eddie said, putting you back on the ground. 'I think the hamster came back.'
'Hamster or not, I won.'
'Only because I let you.' He smirked, and you became very aware of your proximity to him. With your back against the bookshelves, you had nowhere to back away, and Eddie was so close that your chest was nearly touching his.
'Now, why would you do that?' You asked softly. There was no need to whisper. The library was soon closing, and you were the only ones still there. Not to mention, you hadn't exactly been quiet before either. But this situation called for soft, intimate tones.
'I'm not sure… maybe it's because I like your smile.' Now it was his turn to leave you speechless. A lump formed in your throat as you tried to process what he had said, which was even harder since he was so close. When he reached out to brush some hair out of your face, you had to suck in a breath. His calloused fingers only ghosted over your skin, but an electricity sort of spark shot through you.
'We should probably go,' you mustered out, 'before she locks us in.'
'Wouldn't want that.' Eddie's voice had also become much softer, almost a whisper. You could have sworn his eyes had, again, whisked down to look at your lips, and that idea made your head spin. It would only be even if you did the same for him now, right? Just a quick glance at his lips. They were perfect, just like the rest of him…
'Come,' he said, so close to you now you could feel his words on you.
'Huh?' You blinked slowly.
'Let's get you home.' and so, he took a step back. The emptiness between you felt personal, almost internal. Like by stepping away, he had actually ripped something out from between you. A bandaid ripping at your skin, leaving a weird tingly sensation behind.
Eddie's van was parked just behind the library, which is why you hadn't noticed it on your way inside. The rain had started to slow down, the lightning and thunder hadn't been heard for well over half an hour, but it was still pouring heavily. You grabbed your bike as quickly as possible, and Eddie had already opened the car's back doors and was waiting for you inside. He didn't wait, just grabbed the front of the bicycle and pulled it inside, then offered his hand to help you in.
'Thanks,' you sputtered out. The two minutes in the rain had been enough to thoroughly soak you, so you were definitely glad to take Eddie's offer and let him drive you home.
It was a short drive, in which you mostly tried to get some information out of Eddie on what he had been working on.
'C'monnnn, tell me something. Anything.'
'What would you like to know?' he asked as he turned a corner into your street.
'I don't know.'
'That doesn't really help me, sweetheart. You got to be specific, otherwise I could go on for hours and maybe not even tell you anything worth your while and we'd waste both our times.'
'That's impossible,' you laughed, 'You could never waste my time.'
Eddie clutched onto the stirring wheel, stopping the car as you near the house. Before you had started driving, you decided it would be the smartest thing not to drive up all the way to the front lawn, so your parents wouldn't see you step out of some "random guy's" dingy van.
'Maybe next time I'll let you hear all my secrets.' he put the van in park, and you thanked him again. Then, you both climbed out to the back to get your bike. Eddie opened the doors and jumped out, taking the bike out and again helping you make the little jump. His hand fit perfectly around yours, and even though you were standing quite steadily, neither of you let go.
'Hey uhm,' he said, the rain making both your hairstyles worse, 'just so you know, I'm really not mad… about anything.'
'I'm really glad for that.' you squeezed his hand, to which he pressed back.
'Just, promise me one thing, if you can.' He wiped the hair out of his face, and you did the same. The weather should have been getting better, but it really wasn't.
'What's that?'
'Promise not to run away from me again?'
I like you way too much to watch you walk away from me; that's what he had said when you were leaving his trailer. And how many times had you run anyway? Too many to count, which was too embarrassing to keep track. So maybe he just asked out of annoyance, but the fuzzy warm feeling was overcoming you anyway, which might have been a bit foolish since, in reality, you were freezing in the cold rain.
'I'll try.'
To be Continued...
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An excerpt from 4x4
(Episode written by Stacey Harman)
_____
Laura’s surprised to see her son awake and in the living room. She’d left him alone to go out on her date with Sid Weinberg (a very wealthy television producer at a studio called Lorimar), after arranging for a neighbour lady to check in on him and put him to bed.
LAURA: (greets Johnny in a puzzled voice-) Sweetie.
Johnny lowers his soldier toy down to the coffee table and glances over at his mom, as we hear Laura ask-
LAURA’S VOICE: What are you doing up?
We cut back to Laura, who’s putting her beaded clutch purse and keys down on the table in front of the owl figures.
LAURA: I called Mrs. Wilson. She says she tucked you in.
CHILD JOHNNY: (staring at his mom) I couldn’t sleep.
Laura doesn’t seem terribly upset. In fact, as she approaches Johnny, she says-
LAURA: Well. It’s good you’re up. (kisses her son’s head) Cuz I got some big news.
Laura sits down on an armchair close to where Johnny’s sitting on the floor, asking him with a smile-
LAURA: Do you remember that man Sid that we went out to dinner with?
Johnny doesn’t smile back or respond in a happy voice like the one his mom’s using, because he definitely remembers Sid.
CHILD JOHNNY: (displeased) The fat, bald guy?
Johnny’s careful not to tell his mom how on the night they went out to dinner, when she was in the ladies' room, Sid called him a little brat and yelled at him for accidentally knocking over a wine glass. Before Johnny's mom came back to the table, Sid warned Johnny that if he said anything to his mother, she wouldn’t love him anymore — and might even send him away to a place called boarding school.
LAURA: (scolds in a mild tone after Johnny’s comment about Sid-) Don’t say that. He’s a very accomplished man.
Johnny (who isn't sure what “accomplished” means) wishes his mom would stop talking about Sid. He remembers the other time he met Sid, around Christmas — when Sid came over to the apartment and brought him lots of new toys. At first, this made Johnny think Sid might be fun and nice.
But before Johnny could even remove his new toys from their packaging, Sid took all the toys away and said he was just playing a joke and they weren’t really for Johnny. Sid told Laura the toys were actually for less fortunate children. He convinced her that making Johnny think the presents were his was part of an important lesson about being selfish, and the lesson was Johnny’s real “present”. Sid even convinced Laura to take away most of the gifts she bought for Johnny!
Sid called Johnny a spoiled brat that day, too; he whispered the words into a crying Johnny’s ear when Laura was busy gathering up the gifts.
As Johnny remembers these encounters with Sid and looks worriedly at his mom, Laura says to him-
LAURA’S VOICE: Guess what.
Laura beams at Johnny and holds out her hand, revealing a diamond ring on her finger.
LAURA: (proudly tells Johnny-) He proposed!
Johnny frowns down at his mother’s new ring. He doesn’t know what “proposed” means, either; but he thinks from overhearing his mom say that same word to their neighbour Mrs. Wilson that his mother might be in a wedding.
Johnny has a general idea of what weddings are, and is pretty sure only girls like them. He wants to please his mom by smiling back at her; however, he isn't quite able to do so.
We briefly linger on Laura’s shiny, sparkling engagement ring as Laura says-
LAURA’S VOICE: Isn’t it beautiful? (adds casually-) This means you’re gonna have a new daddy.
Johnny stares at his mother in consternation and fear, realising she means Sid. He shakes his head.
CHILD JOHNNY: But I don’t want a new daddy!
Laura, smiling and nodding, replies-
LAURA: Trust me, sweetie. Things are gonna be better.
Johnny wants his real daddy to come back, though — and if that never happens, then he wants it to stay just him and his mom. The idea of mean old Sid becoming his new daddy makes Johnny very upset and very angry! He looks directly at his mom, his face mad as a thundercloud.
CHILD JOHNNY: (shouts-) NO!
Johnny gets up from the living room carpet and goes running down the hallway. Laura sighs, her eyes on her diamond ring. A few seconds later, Johnny slams his door with a loud bang; Laura winces at the impact.
Then we see Johnny in his bedroom -- sitting on the floor a few inches away from his green-and-white striped polo shirt (which Laura hasn't put in the laundry yet), and right next to his bed. Pensive music plays in the background, as Johnny pulls a cardboard box out from under the bed. The box is filled with things that Johnny's father left behind when he took off several months earlier.
Johnny doesn't know why his father went away. But he found some of his daddy's things around the apartment and saved them in an old cardboard box, just in case his father comes home and wants to have them back again. Johnny likes looking through the box when he most misses his daddy; the stuff inside helps him feel less sad.
We glimpse a big brown boot in the box, and a white clothing item with black and yellow stripes on it that looks like some type of scarf. There’s also a leathery object that might be a baseball glove, a camera, and a few 8-tracks — including one by Seals & Crofts.
In addition to the already-named items, we see a crushed Coors Banquet beer can. The can suggests that present-day Johnny inherited his alcohol addiction (or at least his penchant for Coors Banquet) from his father.
Six-year-old Johnny thinks the crushed Coors Banquet can is a sodapop can, though. He takes the can out of the battered old box and stares at it longingly for a second, before dropping it back in the box.
Laura comes into Johnny’s bedroom a moment later.
LAURA: Johnny, please.
Laura notices the cardboard box. Surprised and concerned, she walks over to examine it.
LAURA: (asks Johnny, her tone agitated-) What do you have there?
Johnny lifts up the scarf with the stripes on it and puts it back in the box, not answering his mom. Laura takes the box from Johnny and sits down on Johnny’s bed. She removes the Coors Banquet beer can and stares at it incredulously.
LAURA: You saved his things?
Johnny doesn’t know how to tell his mother that the things inside the box make him feel like his daddy’s still with him in some way. He stays silent, looking solemnly up at his mother as Laura says-
LAURA’S VOICE: Johnny. You shouldn’t hide this from me!
Laura holds the Coors Banquet can and the scarf in her hands for a second, and eyes the box on her lap in dismay.
LAURA: (tossing the can and scarf back into the box) We have to move on.
Johnny hangs his head. Laura rifles through the box, and for some reason picks up the can again along with the camera. Then she puts them right back in the box and says-
LAURA: (her mind made up) I’m…throwing it all away.
Panicked, Johnny looks back up at his mom and yells in protest-
CHILD JOHNNY: (reaching for the box) NOOO!
Johnny tries to take the box from Laura, causing it to fall from her lap. Johnny shouts something that sounds like Ugh! and Laura cries Oh! as the big brown boot and all the other items spill out of the box onto Johnny’s bedroom floor.
Laura's done dealing with Johnny for the night. She scoops the items back into the cardboard box and says in a very cross voice-
LAURA: Johnny! E-nough! (glares at Johnny) He left us!
Laura wags her finger at Johnny, who stares at her with a stunned expression. Laura grabs the box of things Johnny saved from and for his father, and yells-
LAURA: (worn-out and fed-up) You have a new daddy now! Now, go to bed!
Laura then stands up and carries the cardboard box over to the door of Johnny’s bedroom, adding sharply-
LAURA: Now!
Johnny watches his mother walk away with his daddy’s things. He waits for a moment — hoping she’ll bring the box back, tuck him into bed again, kiss him goodnight, maybe even tell him she was just pretending about Sid and the new diamond ring on her finger is really from his daddy. But Laura slams the door shut behind her without another word.
Johnny never saw the cardboard box or its contents again. Laura married Sid a short time later; and Johnny's "new daddy" started addressing Johnny by insults like Stupid and Loser, as if they were Johnny's actual first name. It only got worse over time; every day, Sid drilled into Johnny's head how much of a useless disappointment he was, just like his no-good bum of a father.
Things improved for Johnny in his high-school years, though — when he was Ali’s boyfriend, Kreese's star student at Cobra Kai, and a two-time All Valley champion. Sure, Sid still treated him like he didn’t deserve to breathe. But Johnny’s relationship with Ali and his karate made him feel like he was worth something (even though Sid kept telling him the opposite).
Then Johnny lost the 1984 All Valley to Daniel LaRusso, and nearly got killed for it by the man he trusted more than anybody aside from his mom. Kreese’s betrayal sent Johnny into a chronic downward spiral that lasted for the next several decades. His life finally took a significant upward turn again after he met Miguel and got back into karate; yet even now, Johnny remains affected by the abusive behaviour of his father figures.
Meanwhile, Johnny mostly only has good memories of his late mother, Laura (who died of unknown causes shortly before Robby’s birth). Johnny misses her a lot, and keeps a framed photo of her in his apartment. He understands that she married Sid because Sid could provide for them, and she wanted to give Johnny a better life.
Still, little did Laura know on the evening she announced her engagement to Sid that nearly 50 years later, her son would remember the night as an unhappy one. Or remember it at all.
But present-day Johnny indeed remembers; and as his flashback ends, we get the sense that his past with Sid has something to do with why Johnny isn’t ready to break the news about his and Carmen’s new relationship to Miguel.
Johnny crushes the Coors Banquet beer can in his hand. Angered by lingering thoughts of Sid, he throws the can over his shoulder. Then he turns back to his computer with a weary sigh.
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But professor… - c.9
Summary: Walter and Penny can almost welcome their kid, however Penny starts to become very anxious
Professor!Walter Marshall x Penny Townsend (Asian ofc)
Wordcount: 2.3k
Warnings: Just mentions of punching people
Masterlist // But professor… masterlist // Previous chapter //
I’m thirty weeks pregnant and I know that I have around eight to ten weeks to go, however, this pregnancy has been pretty straining on my back, my pelvis and basically my entire body. Moving around is painful and my mom is over at our place a lot of the time to help me out. I’m thanking the heavens that I am not doing cosmetology school now as well, knowing for a fact that I probably couldn’t keep up at all.
If I’m not sitting on the couch reading, I’m crying because I am sitting in the nursery and think about having a little baby and all the bad things that could happen to them.
Walter is drained from a rough day of patrolling and he plops next to me on the couch. Just like any other day, I barely moved, however he still asks me the question.
‘How was your day, princess?’
‘Boring,’ I mumble. ‘How was yours?’
He simply shrugs, probably because something happened and he doesn’t want me to worry. I rest my head against his chest and without thinking it seems, he places his hand on my stomach. ‘Have they been good to you?’ he asks
‘They sure have been,’ I chuckle. ‘Just hate the fact that I’m practically glued to the couch.’
Walter nods, pressing a kiss on top of my head. I know he worries a lot and therefore confides to my mom, asking her what more he can do to help me out. Walter is being the perfect boyfriend, because even my mom said that he is doing literally all he can to help me out. One night I found him scrolling and searching for tricks to ease the pain and discomfort, though he never lets me in on it.
‘If you’re up for it, we could have dinner,’ he says, ‘somewhere other than our living room.’
‘Where do you want to go?’
‘I don’t know what you’re craving. I’m up for anything.’
‘Pizza?’ I ask. ‘I would really love a Hawaiian Pizza.’
Walter frowns for a second—probably remembering how I told him multiple times that I hate pineapple on pizza—but then he nods. ‘Of course, princess.’
✎ ✎ ✎
We’re sitting at a restaurant across from each other and it’s nice to be out and about again. I mean, I go to town with my parents a lot, I hang out with the ladies from the pregnancy class, but going out with Walter has been a while, especially because he has been working long hours and I’m tired after one trip to anywhere basically.
Walter actually stretched out his leg underneath the table, towards my side, so I can rest my feet on it. Every time I have a crust left, I hand it over to him and with a small smile he accepts them. ‘So,’ I say, ‘I’ve been thinking about a name.’
‘Tell me.’
‘I would say that for a girl we could call her Emma.’
Walter tilts his head. ‘Emma Marshall, sounds cute,’ he says with a smile. ‘You have a name for when it’s a boy?’
I shrug. ‘I don’t know. I actually think they’re a girl.’
He starts to laugh. ‘Why do you think that, princess?’
‘Just a gut feeling,’ I chuckle. ‘What do you think?’
‘I have no idea,’ he says, holding out his hand for me to take. When I placed mine in his, he adds: ‘I actually have a name for a boy. Wanna hear?’
‘Always.’
‘Declan.’
Oh, that’s a lovely name. I don’t think I even know someone who is named Declan. ‘Declan Marshall. That sounds so cute. I absolutely adore it, Walter.’
Walter smiles and gives me a kiss on my hand. ‘We’ll see how we name them.’
‘Yeah,’ I chuckle. ‘Just around ten weeks or less,’ I say. ‘Kinda nervous.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘It’s giving birth, Walter. That’s scary. All these other ladies are so confident and proud of what their bodies can do and all. I mean, sure, that’s awesome, but it also terrifies me.’
‘Understandable,’ he says. ‘I’ll be there for you, every step of the way.’
‘I know,’ I chuckle. ‘It’s just that… I don’t know. With being pregnant, it’s just all a fantasy. With a newborn, it’s the real deal.’
Walter nods, taking in my worries. ‘Well,’ he says, ‘you and I can manage.’
‘You’re being awfully nonchalant about it.’
‘That’s because I need to stay calm for you. Believe me, princess, I’m freaking out on the inside.’
I frown, because that’s the first time he actually told me those words. Usually he says that he cannot wait for this baby to arrive, though it is a little scary every now and then, but saying he is freaking out?
That’s new.
‘What?’ I ask him. ‘Are you serious?’
He nods. ‘I mean, being a parent is difficult. Growing up I didn’t have the love and support I needed. I basically raised myself and judging from the person I am today, I didn’t really do a good job.’
‘You did an excellent job,’ I retort. I know about his youth and how he had to raise himself, how you can still notice it in his day to day life. ‘Walter, please tell me about your worries. You don’t always need to be the protective big bear who prevents me from any harm. I’m a big girl and I need you to confide with me. Please?’
He sighs as he is looking everywhere but to me. This is hard, I can see it, but from the looks of it, he is gonna agree with me. ‘Okay, I’ll try.’
✎ ✎ ✎
Dinner ended not so great. As we were walking back from the restaurant to our car, two guys thought it was necessary to whistle at me (I didn’t even notice at first, but then Walter’s entire demeanor changed, so that’s how I was informed about the matter).
Let’s just say, it evolved into an argument and then one of the guys thought it was an excellent idea to push Walter. I applaud him for having the guts to push my boyfriend, but it was honestly one of the stupidest things for him to do, because Walter wouldn’t be Walter if he punched the guy and his friend.
Multiple times.
I have been ignoring him for the entire drive and once we’re home, I still don’t know what to say to him.
‘Princess,’ he whispers, carefully trying to approach me as I’m sitting on the edge of the bed in his shirt. ‘Please talk to me.’
I purse my lips together, as tears burn in my eyes.
He sits behind me, placing his hands on my upper arms. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says.
‘Sorry for what?’
‘For scaring you. I was just protecting you, darling.’
‘What’s wrong with just ignoring the matter, Walter?’ I ask him, turning to the side so I can look at him without craning my neck. ‘You scared me back there.’
‘I’m not gonna let some dip shit whistle at you, especially not when I’m next to you,’ he defends himself.
‘You’re an officer,’ I tell him. ‘I don’t think this is proper behavior.’
‘I wasn’t gonna let anything happen to you,’ Walter retorts.
‘That’s not the point. The point is you put yourself in danger.’
‘Hardly.’
I glare at him. ‘I don’t like this,’ I say. ‘Have you any idea how stressful it was for me? You know what, never mind. I’m going to sleep.’
He scoots back and I wrap my arms around the pregnancy pillow, with my back towards him. I love Walter, I really do, but this… I saw it all unfolding in front of my eyes.
It would start with an argument, some light pushing, until the other guys would pull out a knife, stab Walter, which would result in a trip to the hospital. Possibility of death. Me having to bury the father of my child.
I push my face in the soft fabric of the pillow, as hot tears slide over my cheeks. Walter sighs deeply next to me and starts to toss and turn next to me. His leg bumps into mine and it causes him to hold his breath. ‘Sorry, Penny,’ he says.
I dry my cheeks on the pillow. ‘Walter,’ I whisper, ‘you know I worry when you go to work.’
‘I know,’ he says, ‘but you don’t need to.’
‘You’re gonna be the father of our kid,’ I continue, ‘and I’d like to raise them with you, not in memory of you.’
‘Princess,’ he whispers, ‘we’re gonna raise this kid and eventual others together. You know, before I met you, I was an adrenaline junkie, detective or not. I got into a lot of shit, hence the reason I was suspended and started teaching. You, my love, made me realize that chasing danger like I used to, is not gonna get me further in life. Now I have you, I have the love of my life here with me and I’m never ever gonna do anything that’ll put me or you or our child in danger.’
‘Then why did you punch him?’
‘Because he started it,’ Walter says, only for him to realize how toddler like that sounds. ‘I just want to protect you against anyone,’ he says in a softer tone. ‘Because I love you, Penelope Townsend. You are my everything.’ He wraps his arm around my upper body, pressing a kiss against my temple. ‘I’m sorry I scared you, Penny. I never meant to do such thing.’
‘I know,’ I whisper. ‘Sorry for overreacting.’
‘No, no, no, you’re not overreacting. Maybe I was.’ He pulls me closer to his own body and places his hand on my stomach. ‘Just know that I will forever protect you and the baby.’
I chuckle. ‘I know that. Promise me you won’t do anything stupid anymore, not when I’m around at least.’
He smiles. ‘I’ll tone it down a notch, princess.’
✎ ✎ ✎
‘Is that that colosseum thing you were talking about?’ Walter gestures towards my chest and I look down, spotting two tiny wet patches near my chest area, before bursting into laughter.
‘Colostrum, Walter, not colosseum.’ Oh dear, he is totally blushing, because of his mistake. ‘Can you grab me another shirt?’
I barely asked the question, when he jumps up and rushes upstairs. I rub my stomach a little bit, slightly scared at how much it expanded. I’m close to the end of my pregnancy, having reached thirty nine weeks yesterday. I wonder how it’ll ever go back to normal.
Walter comes down again and without me asking he changes my shirt. ‘Have I told you I loved you today?’
‘A few times.’ I give him a kiss and whisper: ‘I’m proud of you.’
He frowns. ‘Why are you proud of me? You’re the one growing an entire baby here.’ He carefully places his hands on the side of my stomach. ‘The least I can do is to make things as comfortable for you as possible.’
‘But you always do it without complaining,’ I say. ‘I heard that Stacey’s husband is such a pain in the ass. Always complaining, groaning about how much he has to do nowadays.’
Walter scoffs. ‘Well, pregnant or not, I’d like to worship you, make your life as easy as I possibly can.’ He gives me a kiss. ‘What can I do for you, darling?’
‘Sex,’ I say, before I curl my lips in. Oh gosh, never have I been so straight forward. My cheeks heat up. ‘No, please, forget what I said.’
‘Is my girl asking me for sex?’ Walter starts to laugh. ‘The day Penny Townsend asked me for sex has finally arrived.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I laugh nervously. ‘It’s just been awhile.’ Awhile equals three months. I hate how he sometimes initiates, but I simply shake my head. It’s a combination of a very low sex drive, not feeling pretty and being in pain nearly twenty four seven.
He leans forward and kisses me. ‘Want to go to the bedroom, princess or is the couch acceptable as well?’
‘We can stay here,’ I whisper.
‘Then let me close the curtains and lock the door, okay?’
‘Okay,’ I mumble.
When he comes back, he takes off his shirt, so I can admire his beautiful strong body. There is something so special about Walter. He looks strong enough to left a car up with one arm, but he is a mushy man the second the front door closes and we’re together. He kneels in front of me, pressing open mouth kisses on my lips. ‘Shit, I love you,’ he says against my mouth. He disregards my shirt and admires me.
‘Stop,’ I say, rolling my eyes.
‘No, no, no, I could never stop admiring you.’ He places his hands on my expanded stomach and says: ‘You’re so beautiful.’
He gives me a long kiss and then I whimper. Not out of pleasure, but out of shock.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asks me.
‘I think my water broke.’
✎ ✎ ✎
Twelve hours later, I am looking at Walter, who holds the little baby in his strong arms. He sits next to me on the bed and wraps one arm around my shoulders. ‘Penny, princess,’ he says, ‘I don’t think words can describe how proud I am of you and how much I love you.’
I nuzzle my face in his chest. ‘I love you too. Thank you for not freaking out.’
‘Externally freaking out you mean, because on the inside I was fainting,’ he chuckles. He gives me a kiss on my temple. ‘I’m a dad.’
I actually see some tears in his eyes and I cannot stop my own either. ‘I know.’ I place my hand on the little bundle and whisper: ‘We’re officially parents. It’s so surreal.’ I let out a deep and content sigh.
The little baby opens their eyes and I cannot stop my smile.
‘Hi, little one,’ Walter says. ‘Oh no, Penny, we’ve created an exact copy of yours.’
I chuckle. ‘Good luck saying no to him,’ I say. ‘We love you so much, Declan Marshall. So so much.’
#henry cavill#henry cavill fanfiction#walter marshall#henry cavill x you#walter marshall x penny townsend#walter marshall x asian ofc#walter marshall x ofc#walter marshall x oc#asian ofc#penny townsend#but professor
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Hi ma queen would you be able to post at least some of the Byram article from today plz 🥺🥺🥺🥺
i live to pirate the athletic to you all (source)
trigger warning: talks extensively about depression, medical issues within the NHL, and concussions at length.
Bowen Byram was sick of it. Sick of thinking he was better, only for symptoms to return. Sick of not being able to put everything into his offseason training. Sick of not feeling like himself.
The Avalanche defenseman called his mom one day this summer when the load got too heavy. He had felt totally out of it skating that morning. Months of frustration — of setbacks and symptoms and not knowing what was wrong — had built up. When Stacey Byram answered, he confessed a growing worry: that his career was slipping away.
“What am I going to do now?” he remembers asking. “I can’t play hockey anymore.”
Sitting in his Toyota Tacoma in Vancouver, where he trains during the offseason, he was a worn-down 20-year-old, struggling and scared. He’d never suffered a serious injury before the 2020-21 season, but in his first full year as an NHL player, he’s dealt with multiple concussions, vertigo and COVID-19, all of which have limited him to only 30 games.
At times over the summer, Byram didn’t know what symptoms were caused by what. His medical situation was perplexing, and the recovery process hasn’t been fun. The family thought at various times they were done with it, and then something else would go wrong.
Now, after it finally looked like he weathered the worst of his problems, an errant elbow has thrown him back on the roller coaster once again.
Byram, who often sports a youthful grin, is confident and chatty when he feels like himself. He’s a jokester, someone who occasionally talked too much while growing up in Cranbrook, British Columbia, but was constantly kind, looking for ways to include classmates and teammates, his mom says. When New Jersey defenseman Ty Smith met Byram four years ago on Canada’s U18 team, he couldn’t believe how outgoing his new teammate was, and Avalanche forward Tyson Jost calls Byram bubbly, a “salt of the earth guy” who brings good banter to the dressing room.
“He’s a social being,” Stacey says. “He’s touchy and interactive and wants to look in your eyes.”
So the isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic posed challenges for Byram. He didn’t appear in any games for the Avalanche in the 2020 playoffs but skated with the team in the Edmonton bubble, spending more than a month within the strict parameters there. Then, at Team Canada’s training camp ahead of World Junior Championships, he had to quarantine for 14 days in his hotel room after two teammates tested positive for the virus. He ultimately captained Canada to a silver medal and, in January 2021, arrived in Denver to join the Avalanche and take the first step in a lifelong dream: playing NHL games.
But the 2020-21 season was far from normal. Colorado instructed players to remain cautious of the virus, so there weren’t the normal get-togethers or team outings. His parents weren’t in the stands for his NHL debut; they watched from their couch in Cranbrook.
Byram, the people lover, spent his free time by himself, all while adjusting to being a young defenseman in the world’s hardest league.
“Of course, he was ecstatic being down there,” Stacey says. “(But) I could tell he was really lonely.”
Then came the concussions. Byram doesn’t know what caused the first one, which he sustained in a late-February game against Arizona. He just woke up the next morning not feeling right.
When the team diagnosed Byram with a concussion, Stacey decided she needed to be there. She drove 17 hours to Denver from Cranbrook, presenting a note from the team at the U.S.-Canada border saying she was coming to help her son.
Byram recovered fine from the first concussion, returning to the lineup 19 days later. But then, with the Avalanche hosting Vegas in late March, he found himself chasing a puck toward the side boards. As he flung the puck out of the defensive zone, Golden Knights forward Keegan Kolesar flew toward him, leaving his feet and making contact with Byram’s head. The defenseman grabbed his helmet before skating off the ice and heading to the dressing room.
With fans not yet allowed in Ball Arena due to COVID-19 regulations, Stacey watched on TV from her son’s apartment. She texted her husband, Shawn, after the play. They worried and waited, but the fear dissipated when Byram eventually returned to the game.
That relief faded as soon he got home.
“I could tell the minute he walked in it wasn’t good,” she says.
Byram was upfront with her, saying he didn’t feel well but would go to bed and see how he was doing in the morning. When he woke up, there was no improvement. He felt foggy. Not like himself.
That hit began a yo-yo of progress and setbacks. Concussion recovery isn’t linear, so at points Byram would feel better, only to hit another rut. He started dealing with vertigo, too.
“I’d be so dizzy, I’d be over the toilet almost throwing up,” he says.
During times he felt up for it, Byram and Stacey would go for walks. They’d play cards or go for a drive, one time making a trip to Red Rocks to take in the sandstone formations.
On other days, Byram couldn’t do much.
“I just wasn’t really up for it most of the time just because I was feeling not like myself,” he says.
The Avalanche set him up with a sports psychologist, and that helped. He also took to meditating, using the Calm app on his iPhone almost daily, which allowed him to play guided audio tailored to specific situations, be it for when he was relaxing or getting to sleep.
“(It) helps you lift that weight you’re feeling off your shoulders at times,” Byram says. “I just felt like nothing was going my way. … It was kind of an escape.”
Ten days after the Kolesar hit, as Byram started feeling better, he joined the team on a four-game road trip, and Stacey headed back home to British Columbia. But as he neared a return to game action, he dealt with a setback of a different kind: He tested positive for COVID-19 while the team was in Anaheim.
Byram took a car service back to Denver, sequestered in a taped-off backseat for 16 hours. He felt a little sick for a few days after his positive test, but it wasn’t too bad. After going through protocol, he worked out a few times and — finally — got back on the ice.
That didn’t go as planned.
“After I skated, I felt like I was a corpse,” he says. “I was dizzy, couldn’t see. It was crazy. It was like somebody was pounding on my head. It was tough, and everything snowballed on top of it.”
His vertigo episodes became more frequent after he got COVID-19, and he didn’t always know what was causing his symptoms. It was, as he put it, an undocumented area. One doctor told him that COVID-19 picks on weaker parts of the body.
“And Bowen’s weak part at that time was his brain,” his dad says. “We think it put him back a long way.”
“If you have a head injury, then you get an illness that affects the neural system, you have all these side effects that nobody’s really studied yet,” says trainer Jordan Mackenzie, who worked with Byram over the summer.
With Byram’s mom back in British Columbia, his girlfriend, Kailey, visited from Nova Scotia, where she’s in college. He was frustrated with his situation and, like his mom had, his girlfriend provided moral support. Avalanche center Nathan MacKinnon also helped out, paying for Byram to work with his personal trainer, Marcin Goszczynski.
Goszczynski did functional neurology exercises with Byram, and the defenseman had an upswing ahead of the playoffs. The medical staff cleared him to play, but, while he skated with the team throughout the postseason, coach Jared Bednar didn’t put him in the lineup. The coach hadn’t been blown away with the games he’d seen Byram play earlier in the season, and he was hesitant to throw such a young player into a physical second-round playoff series against a strong Vegas team.
“Would’ve loved to have him back a few weeks before the season ended, be able to experiment with him a little bit, see how he played, and then he could’ve been a good option for us,” Bednar says. “But he just wasn’t healthy.”
When the Avalanche lost Game 6, Byram watched his first NHL season end from the press box. He had pushed to get back in the lineup, but in retrospect, he believes it’s good he didn’t get into game action, because his situation took a turn south when summer training began.
“I just went downhill again and kind of fell apart,” he says.
Byram arrived in Vancouver in mid-June, motivated for an offseason training with NHLers Brendan Gallagher, Milan Lucic and Ty Smith, only to feel the lingering effects of his injury return. Mackenzie, who has worked with Byram since 2018, noticed his recovery times were slower during workouts. He had less energy.
Mackenzie knows Byram as a loud guy, happy to talk with anyone and joke around with serious veterans like Lucic. But that aspect of his personality was lacking at the start of the summer. He normally loves skating and working out in the gym, but he physically couldn’t put all his effort into it. That sucked out the enjoyment.
“I’ve just totally been invested since I can remember,” Byram says. “I’ve always said I’m going to be a hockey player. That was the scary thing for me: not totally knowing what the future was going to hold.”
He didn’t necessarily feel terrible; just off. And the buildup of not feeling like himself led him to the call with his mom. Stacey’s heart stopped when she heard how dejected he was.
“It was probably a bit over-reactive from myself, but when you’re in positions like that and not feeling good, it really is hard to keep a positive mindset,” Byram says.
Mentally and physically exhausted, he needed to vent, he remembers, and Stacey mostly just listened. She also gave him some perspective: Just because he was injured then didn’t mean he’d always be injured.
Mackenzie and Byram’s goal for the summer was to get “Bo back to being Bo,” the trainer says. That meant pouring time into treatment. The clinic he trained at in Vancouver had a massage therapist who worked on the soft tissue around his neck, and he saw a specialist with experience in post-concussion management. He tried to check every box, hoping for a breakthrough.
That also meant seeing a therapist in Vancouver. Byram says he wasn’t depressed, but he felt on edge after months of frustration. He needed someone to help him take a step back.
“You don’t want to admit something is wrong, but when something is wrong, it needs to be taken care of,” he says. “I’m not afraid to tell anyone I saw a therapist now. I’m proud. I think everybody should. It helped me so much and it helped rejuvenate me as a person and eventually on the ice again.”
He saw improvements and, at the end of July, went on a 10-day wilderness trip in the Yukon with his dad. They camped near Kusawa Lake, completely isolated and unplugged from the outside world. To get there, they had to drive more than 24 hours north and then, since drivable roads extend only so far, take a small plane into the bush.
“There’s a lot of hardship and physical exertion and pain that goes with it,” Shawn says. “You’ve got to be motivated by something you can’t always explain.”
Byram felt symptoms on a couple of days during the trip, his dad says, but he mostly just valued the grounding presence of nature. It was hard work — they hiked more than a dozen miles some days — but good for staying in the moment. On their last evening, with a plane set to come the next morning, father and son built a fire. Byram kicked off his shoes and sat against a rock, his toes near the warmth of the flames. There was a sense of exhaustion between them, and accomplishment, too.
“That (trip) kind of gave him — and I think his nervous system — a chance to really settle down and take in all the work that had been done over the past three or four weeks before he left,” Mackenzie says.
When Byram returned to Vancouver after the trip, Mackenzie saw a shift. He radiated enthusiasm walking through the door. “Let’s go!” the trainer thought to himself.
Bo was back to being Bo.
Earlier this month, Byram glided toward the Columbus net on a two-on-one, sandy hair poking out of the back of his helmet. He waited calmly for a pass from teammate Nazem Kadri and, when it came, flicked the puck into the net. Not all defensemen have this type of offensive skill, especially at 20 years old, and Byram wasn’t done. With less than a minute left in the game and the Avalanche trailing by a goal, he flung a shot on net and watched as it zipped in for a goal. He turned, full of adrenaline, and pumped his fist.
In that moment, it felt like a statement game, like Byram had arrived as a truly dangerous NHL player — maybe even a star. He showed all the tools that led Colorado to draft him fourth overall in 2019, as well as confidence he believes he lacked during his 19-game stint last season.
“Every time I step on the ice and I feel good, it’s such a breath of fresh air, because, seriously, for a while there, I was like, ‘I’m done,’” he said at the time, noting that most of his lingering injury concern had dissipated.
A thought struck Stacey after she watched her son force overtime with the Blue Jackets. She felt like — after everything — the family had finally made it through. Sure, there had been scares since his return, notably when Byram took a dangerous cross-check into the boards against Minnesota, but her son had continually been fine. He told his mom about how good he was feeling: better than he’d felt since before his days as a major junior player in the Western Hockey League.
Then came the elbow.
With the Avalanche hosting the Canucks on Thursday, Byram skated toward Vancouver captain Bo Horvat, ready to fight for a puck along the boards. As the two collided, Horvat’s elbow hit Byram’s face and the defenseman fell to the ice. He got up quickly but skated gingerly to the bench and went down to the dressing room.
An all-too familiar problem was back.
“It’s scary stuff,” teammate and close friend Alex Newhook says.
Byram felt great the morning after absorbing Horvat’s elbow, and he skated with the team, laughing between drills like normal. But concussions are cruel and unpredictable. The next day, this past Saturday, he woke up feeling not well. By Monday, the team had put him back in concussion protocol.
“That’s not something you ever want to see,” teammate Andre Burakovsky says.
Bednar doesn’t have a return timeline, and how could he? He said this week that Byram is out until he feels better. Then, once again, he can begin the process of easing himself back into action.
Given the injury and Byram’s history, it’s unclear when that will come.
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Stood Up Part 6
Requested: hey, I was wondering you could write a stile stilinski fic where 5 years earlier he leaves the reader at the altar and comes back five years later and turns out they have a kid
Pairing: Stiles Stilinski x Reader
Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5
Third Person POV
Scott moved towards (y/n) before taking a crying Lilly into his arms. “What’s going?” His question was intended for (y/n) but Stacey giggled before she moved towards the three.
“What’s going on? I’m just here to see my step-daughter, it’s only right that I get to know her before she comes and lives with me, wouldn’t you agree (y/n)?” Stacey looked at her, pure evil in her eyes, there was no way around that, even with her six-month pregnant belly she looked nothing innocent.
“You have no right to be here, leave.” Scott was losing his patience. Between Stiles and Stacey, he didn’t know how he was going to protect his girls.
“Oh but I do. Like I told (y/n) earlier, this isn’t going to end well for her. She's only making this harder on herself. The faster she comes to terms that Lilly is going to be ours soon, the faster we can get out of her hair.” Stacey placed her hands on her small bump.
“She’s not yours! She’s not a fucking doll that you can just come and take. She’s my daughter and as an expecting mother I would hope you’d understand the pain Stiles is putting me through for trying to take her from me.” (Y/N)’s chest heaved as anger rolled out of her, stepping next to Scott as Lilly cried into his neck.
“Oh, I understand quite well. You kept her from him for five years, what do you think that has done to him? You've had your time now it’s his turn. How much money do you have (y/n)?” Her eyes wondered through her home. “Because to me it looks like you don’t have much. How are you supposed to take care of your daughter if you can’t even afford to live in a decent place? Child Services won’t be lenient with you, I hope you realize that.” She smirked and looked at Scott. “You think just because you have a man here that everything will be alright, that he’ll protect you and Lilly but what Lilly needs is her father, she needs a place where she can see a future for herself, we can give her that. We can be her perfect family.” Lilly’s sobs broke the banter (y/n) was about to unleash.
“I don’t want to leave mommy.” She sobbed as her red eyes looked at (y/n) Scott rubbed her back as he kissed her head.
“You’re not going anywhere baby, I promise.” (Y/N) gulped, the tears burning her eyes as she tried her best to be strong for her daughter.
“I think you should leave; you’re not welcomed here.” Scott, ever the sweetheart, spoke calmly.
“You can run me out as much as you want, I'll always be around. I’m tied to her now, I hope you realize that.” She grinned before turning her back towards the three and walking out of the house. (Y/N) instantly sagged her tensed shoulders and looked down at her feet, the tears spilling like a waterfall now.
“Don’t cry baby, I won’t let anything happen to either of you.” Scott promised as he wrapped an arm around (y/n) and pulled her into him. Lilly lifted her head and looked at the tears in her mother’s eyes and continued to cry as she reached for her. She’d always seen her mom smile, she’d only seen her cry recently and it scared her. (Y/N) took her into her arms and sighed as she kissed her head.
“Don’t cry babygirl, everything is going to be okay.” Only it wasn’t. (Y/N) had no idea what Stiles plans were, she’d fight heaven and hell for her daughter and no matter what happened she wasn’t going down without a fight.
_____
Days passed without a word from Stiles which was worrisome. The last thing she needed was for him to take action out of the blue. Every day that passed was pure hell in waiting to see what was going to happen. She held Lilly close in the weeks that came, fear of losing her getting the best of her. Scott was the one to balance them out. He was always positive, (y/n) didn’t know where he got the energy to lift their spirits up but she was more than grateful for him. Their relationship blossomed in the short weeks, the years they hidden their feelings for one another helped. Scott loved (y/n) and Lilly with his entire heart, he didn’t know they’d mean so much to him. He’d always wanted her, but he’d never tell his best friend about his feelings for her. They’d blossomed over the years in high school when she’d been there for him when no one else had. It was hard for him to keep his feeling in, but he’d never imagined Stiles leaving her. “Daddy!” Lilly yelled as she ran towards him, her arms wrapping around his legs. Scott smiled as he placed a kiss on (y/n)’s forehead. Despite only being gone a couple hours his heart had been happy to be back in the presence of his girls.
“What are you up to?” Scott picked Lilly up balancing her on his hip.
“Mommy and me are making cookies!” She wrapped her arms around Scott’s neck and placed a sloppy kiss on his cheek that made him chuckle.
“Does mommy thing more sugar is what you need?” Scott raised his eyebrow as his eyes landed on (y/n).
“She definitely doesn’t need anymore.” She laughed and shook her head. “They’re for her bake sale in school, but we might have baked a few extra ones just for you.” She gave Scott a smile that made him melt.
“You spoil me.” He pecked her lips quickly before he looked at Lilly, the resemblance to Stiles was perfervid. “How about we go see what grandpa is up to, yeah? I heard he was dying to see his favorite princess.” Scott smiled at Lilly but there was something up, (y/n) sensed that the moment he suggested they’d go see Noah.
“I’m grandpa’s favorite princess?” Lilly gasped and when Scott nodded she squealed as she squirmed to get out of his arms. “Mommy let's go!” She padded to her mother and grabbed her hand and dragged her to the door.
“Not so fast, go get your shoes on. I need to get the cookies out of the oven.” Lilly ran to her room and both (y/n) and Scott moved into the kitchen. “So what is it now?” (y/n) sighed, her eyes didn’t meet Scott’s as she opened the oven.
“Can’t really say for sure, but they’re going through beacon hills like they own it. We have to stop them before they get further in, I won’t have you or Lilly in danger.” Scott shoved his hands in his pockets.
“Then I'm coming with you.”
“No.”
“No?” (Y/N) looked at Scott as she slammed the tray of cookies on the counter.
“I won’t have you in danger.”
“In case you’ve missed the past couple of years I've fought by your side to protect this town. I’ve been in danger every god damn day of my life.”
“Things are different now.”
“Things are different now?” (Y/N) scoffed as she crossed her arms over her chest. “Why are things different now Scott? Because we’re together?”
“Yes.” Scott shrugged causing her to huff out a breath of air.
“You’re being ridiculous.” (Y/N) threw the oven mitts on the counter before giving Scott her back.
“I’m not. I care about you enough to keep you safe, why can’t you see that?” He took steps towards her but stopped when she turned around.
“Who’s going to take care of you Scott?” He sighed and shook his head, no, he wasn’t going to have her in the face of danger, not while Stiles was around. Not while nothing was secured with Lilly.
“I can take care of myself.” He had done it for years. Being the Alpha there were many things Scott could do.
“You shouldn’t have to.” She stepped closer to Scott, her arms wrapping around him as she placed her head on his chest. Scott didn’t hesitate to wrap his arms around her pulling her closer to him. “I love you Scott but sometimes you can be so fucking stubborn.” She sighed. “I want to take care of you the same way you want to take care of me and Lilly. We’re a family now, can’t you see that?”
“Of course, I can. But I'm not going to have you out there when Stiles is here. If something were to happen to you Lilly won’t be able to stay here with me, she’d go with Stiles and then I'd never see her again.” Scott shook his head. “She’s just as much my daughter as she is yours (y/n). But she needs you more than she needs me right now. I’ll be fine. I’ll come back to you like I always do.” He would. No matter how beaten he’d get, no matter how exhausted he was. He’d always come back to her; he’d move heaven and hell for (y/n) and she’d seen just about that before.
With Lilly and (y/n) in Noah’s house Scott couldn’t help but wonder what he’d gotten himself into. He hadn’t bothered letting anyone else in on what he was doing, (y/n) would reign hell on him if she knew what he was really up to. Secrets weren’t something Scott should be keeping, not from the girl he loved. But he had no choice, he’d die before he’d let Stiles and his witch of a fiancé take Lilly from (y/n). Something hadn’t been right with Stiles since the day he returned to Beacon Hills and Scott knew that. He’d stay up for hours on end to find out just what the fuck had happened to his best friend. With his hands in his pockets Scott sighed as he walked through the door of the abandoned building. Only then did he see Stiles, his own hands in his pockets as he glared straight at Scott. “Took you long enough.” He huffed and Scott rolled his eyes.
“Had to calm (y/n) down, didn’t want her knowing I was meeting you.” Stiles laughed.
“I can’t believe how fucking whipped you are. After all these fucking years you’ll still do whatever she asked you to do. You can’t even make your own choices without her.” He shook his head at Scott.
“I’d do anything for her, that’s the difference between us Stiles. You chose yourself; you’ve always chosen yourself. I want you gone, out of Beacon Hills, away from (y/n), away from Lilly.” He stepped closer to Stiles, both of them full of hate and anger towards each other.
“Firstly, you can have (y/n). The bitch couldn’t satisfy me anyways, she’s not why I'm here. Secondly, I don’t remember you having much of a say concerning Lilly. You may think you’re her daddy but there’s no blood there. My DNA is what runs through her blood, or have you forgotten that? I mean hell she looks just like me.” Stiles chuckled.
“Just because you share the same blood doesn’t make you a perfect fit to be a father. You got your start over; you have a child on the way. Just leave them alone Stiles all you’re doing is creating more problems.” Stiles smiled and tilted his head.
“That’s the whole point Scotty boy.” Stiles threw his arms out. “Do you remember that time your dad left? I mean how could you forget, right? You were so heartbroken you didn’t even know what to do.” A step closer had them nose to nose. “You want me to leave Lilly alone? Then I'll need you to leave just like your father did.”
“I’m not fucking doing that.” Scott fumed.
“Then I guess I'm just going to stick around and take her from you both. I mean it’s kind of selfish of you Scott.” Stiles stepped back.
“Why do you want to hurt her? Why do you want to take everything from her?”
“Because she took everything from me!” Stiles roared making it echo in the empty building. “The real reason I stood her up the day of our wedding wasn’t because I was too young or because I wanted to humiliate her. I saw her, three weeks before the wedding, I wanted to surprise her so I tracked her on her phone and made my way to her. I should have known something was up the moment I arrived at the hotel.” Stiles shook his head. “How much do you know about (y/n) Scott?” Scott furrowed his eyebrows. “I’m asking legitimately, how much do you know about her? Did you know her parents weren’t really her parents? Did you know that when she moved here, she was looking for something? Do you want to know what she was looking for Scott? She was looking for a pack.” Scott took a step back to look at Stiles.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Surely Stiles had lost his mind, there was no other way to explain this.
“I’m talking about the fact that (y/n) isn’t who she says she is. For fucks sake Scott she’s not human, she’s a witch.”
____
forevertags; @bojabee@imperfect-circle@dakotapaigelove@a-gir1-has-n0-name@riverdalehoeeeeeee@sabertooth-potato@heyitscam99@peterstarksstarker@royal-fanfic@vixengustin88
Story tags; @anyasthoughts @iclosetgeek @chipster-21 @chonisberonica @teenwaywardasgardian @yuukiahim @greyfairie @deansbbyblog @jdroman5432 @robindoesntloveme @confuscita
#teen wolf#teen wolf masterlist#teen wolf fanfic#teen wolf imagine#Scott McCall#stiles stilinski#malia tate#Peter Hale#derek hale#allison argent#lydia martin#theo raeken#liam dunbar#kira yukimura#Melissa McCall#noah stilinski#chris argent#scott mccall imagine#scott mccall fanfic#scott mccall x reader#stiles stilinski fanfiction#stiles stilinski imagine
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It’s Electric - One Shot
a/n: I have no idea what this is or why I thought of it, but enjoy CEO!Harry with a blue collar!Y/N
Warnings: Smut (slow burn, I’m so sorry.) Not proofread, sorry!
Words: 15.2K
Being a female, blue collar worker was interesting to say the least. Most of the guys you worked with were either fresh out of college and starting their apprenticeship, or they were in their mid-forties, married with kids. You did the college thing, and got a degree in mathematics, but you didn’t want to be a teacher, and you sure as hell didn’t want to go into computer science. Your father was an electrician, and you asked him for help getting into his union. Electrical work involved a lot of math, especially trigonometry.
You were in your mid-twenties, able to live alone, and working a job that had good benefits. A lot of your friends didn’t quite understand it because you sometimes had to work traditional holidays, and you really couldn’t take time off. But the overtime pay was incredible, and when you were able to take a vacation, you had plenty of money for a good time. The one thing you were sort of missing was companionship.
Most of the guys on the job just assumed you were gay. It was a stupid stereotype. To be fair, you did have to wear a lot of flannel and you never wore makeup, and you constantly had hat hair from your hardhat. Again, a lot of stupid stereotypes.
Your union had gotten a contract together to do maintenance on a specific building in the city. It happened to also be where one of your best friends works so you’d be able to go on lunch together.
“Y/N!” She squeals. “Look at you, I’ve never seen you on the job before.” She tugs at your flannel. “I think you’re the reason mom jeans came back into style, you look so cute.” She was the best hype man there was.
“Thanks, Stacey.” You chuckle. “I don’t wanna get in trouble, I’ll see you at lunch, okay?”
You had never changed so many lightbulbs in one sitting. You hated maintenance work, but it beat being on unemployment. Next on the list was to run some tests on the electrical outlets. You make your way through specific people’s offices. You see your friend again, her desk was outside the CEO’s. She was his executive assistant.
“Let me just make sure he’s not on a call.” She says and you nod. She knocks on the door and opens it. “Mr. Styles? The maintenance crew is here to run inspections in your office.”
“Thanks, send ‘em in.”
She smiles and gestures for you to go in. She grabs you first, pulling you back.
“Remember, he’s British, and very hot.”
“Stacey…you have a boyfriend.”
“I’m well aware, I’m just preparing you.”
You roll your eyes and walk in.
“I’ll try to keep it brief.” You tell him and he nods. You click your pen and make a few notes on your clip board. You grab your outlet tester from your tool belt and get to work. He tries to continue typing at his desk, but curiosity gets the better of him.
“This might sound rude, but I was expecting some old guy to come here for this.”
“Sorry to disappoint.” You smirk at him and continue around the room. “This office is huge.”
“Well…it should be. Worked hard enough for it.”
“Right, you’re the CEO?”
“That’s right, darlin’.”
“Don’t call me that.” You make a disgusted face.
“Sorry, it’s just something I say.” He blushes.
“I need to get under there.”
“Excuse me?”
“Under your desk, I need to check the floor outlets.”
“Oh.” He stands up and moves his chair out of the way. He looks away as you get on your hands and knees, but he’s a man, so his eyes flicker down to your ass. He looks away immediately. You stand back up and make some notes.
“Alright, all set. Have a good one.”
“That’s it?”
“Pretty routine inspection. You all take good care of your offices. Nothing to worry about. We replaced all the lightbulbs that needed it, made them all LED.”
“Thanks.” He smiles.
You walk out and confirm with Stacey where you’ll be meeting her for lunch. Harry notices this. After you’re gone, Harry goes out to Stacey’s desk.
“Stacey, you’re friends with that woman?”
“Yeah! We go way back, Mr. Styles. She’s my best friend, actually. We’re having lunch in a bit, would you like to join us?”
“No.” He chuckles. “No, that’s alright. Um…so she’s an electrician?”
“Mhm, she’s really smart. She was top of her apprenticeship program a few years ago. She’s part of some union now that he dad was in. She likes it.”
“Ah…” He looks away for a moment. “You and I know each other pretty well at this point, right?”
“I’d say so. I mean, my boyfriend and I have been to your house for parties.” You giggle. “Why?”
“Is she single?”
‘Y/N? Yeah! Totally single.” She beams. “Not that she can’t get a date, she can. She’s just been busy lately.” She bites her bottom lip. “Do you…want me to give you her number?”
“Only if she wants to. See what she thought of me on your lunch, would you?”
“I’m on it.”
//
You and Stacey meet up at a Panera Bread not too far from the office building. You’d be doing inspections there all week, on every floor.
“Alright, I’m just going to come right out and say it. Harry wants your number!” She squeals.
You nearly choke on your salad.
“Who?!”
“Harry! Mr. Styles, my boss. The CEO of-“
“Okay, okay. What the fuck, I talked to him for like two seconds. He also called me darling, I didn’t like that.”
“He calls everyone darling, or love. He’s British, remember.”
“What does that have to…? Never mind.” You shake your head.
“He must think you’re cute. He hasn’t dated in a while, as far as I know. He’s super sweet, Y/N. Can I give him your number, please? He could really sweep you off your feet.”
“I’m not looking to be swept, I’m looking for a partner, someone to spend time with. Not someone who flashes cash around.”
“You’re making excuses.”
“Fine.” You shrug. “Give him my number.”
Stacey can’t wait to get back up to her office to give Harry your number. She knocks on his door and enters. He’s just finishing his lunch.
“Here.” She slaps a piece of paper on his desk. “That’s her number. I’ll warn you, she’s stubborn, so…play it cool.”
“Don’t I always?”
“I said cool, not suave. She hates that shit.”
“When should I call? I don’t wanna seem too eager…”
“She might think you’re playing around if you don’t call her tonight. Call her after work.”
//
You were hanging out on your couch, fresh out of the shower in a tank top and shorts, digging into a pint of ice cream. Your phone goes off, and you see it’s not anyone you know. You swipe to answer and stick your phone between your cheek and shoulder.
“Hello?”
“Hi, uh, is this Y/N?”
“This is she.”
“It’s Harry.”
“Who? Oh! Mr. Styles from the office building.”
“Yeah.” He chuckles. “That’s me.”
“Stacey gave you my number?”
“She did. I hope it’s alright that I asked her for it.”
“Hey, however your relationship works is none of my business.” You take a bite of your ice cream. “So, why’d you want my number anyways?”
“So I could ask you out.”
For the second time today you choke on your food.
“Excuse me, one second.”
He hears you coughing and he tries not to laugh. You get a glass of water, and sit back down.
“Sorry about that.”
“No worries.”
“Why do you want to ask me out?”
“I, well, to be blunt I’m attracted to you.”
“Why?” You scoff. “Got a thing for girls in loose jeans?”
“They weren’t that loose.”
“What?”
“Nothing, listen, I think you’re pretty and I just thought-“
“Pretty? Wow.” You scoff.
“You’re really going to make me work for this, aren’t you?” He sighs.
“Hard work doesn’t seem foreign to you. It’s how you got that nice office of yours isn’t it?”
“Y/N?”
“Yes?”
“Would you like to go out for dinner with me some time?”
“I’m free Saturday if you are.”
“I’m free.”
“Pick me up at seven, I’ll text you my address when the time comes.” You hang up before he has a second to say anything else.
You text Stacey to let her know you’d be going out with Harry on Saturday. You were actually sort of excited.
//
On Saturday, you go to your hairdresser for a blow out, and to have your nails done. It was a very nice treat. You get your make up on and pick out one of the dresses you never get to wear. It was black and simple, but you were exited to wear it. You get a call from Harry right at seven.
“Hello?”
“Just pulled up, I’m downstairs.”
“Be down in a second.” You grab your purse and head down.
Harry had a suit on and was standing outside a black car. His jaw nearly drops when he sees you. All he had to go on was that day in his office. You looked like a completely different person.
“You look…lovely.”
“Thanks.” You smile. “I don’t get to dress up very often.” You blush slightly.
He opens the back door of the car for you and you raise an eyebrow.
“I have a driver.”
“Oh…fancy.”
You slide into the car, and Harry comes around on the other side. He taps on the partition, and the car moves.
“I hope you like Asian food.”
“Love it.” You say. “Oh! Are we going to that hibachi place?”
“No, but it’ll sort of be like that.”
“Do you always use a driver?”
“For city stuff, yeah. When I’m out at the beach or upstate I drive myself. Sometimes I get my picture taken when I’m out, learned a long time ago it’s best to just have a driver.”
“Like…paparazzi?”
“Yeah…sometimes. Not that often anymore. There was this, uh, model that I dated a few years ago-“
“Tell me again, why were you so attracted to me?”
“You caught my attention. Not a lot of people do.”
Your cheeks grow slightly red. You feel the car come to a full stop. The driver gets out and opens the door for you. Harry slides out after you. You watch as he tells the driver how long you’ll roughly be. As you walk into the restaurant, the hostess greets Harry almost immediately. You follow her past the main dining area, and are brought into a private dining room. There was a table for two set up already. You give him a confused look.
“I like my privacy.” He pulls your chair out for your and you sit down.
“Is there any particular reason we’re sitting next to each other.”
“The chef is going to make our food for us in a few minutes. Told you it was sort of like hibachi.” He grabs the bottle of wine on the table and opens it. “Would you like some? It’s plum wine, it’s delicious.”
“Um…sure.” He pours you some and you take a small sip. “Hm, different.”
“So, how does one become an electrician?”
“How does one become a CEO?” You smirk. “Lots of hard work, school, and luck.”
Before Harry can speak again the chef walks in, and a few other follow him in with a cart. There was a flat top where he’d be able to make whatever you wanted. One of the waiters brings over a tray of sushi to start with. You grab your chopsticks and take a piece.
“Oh, that’s good. I love sashimi.” You say.
“Good evening, folks.” The chef smiles. “Tonight I’ll be preparing a delicious steak, kale salad, and for dessert fried banana ice cream.”
“That all work for you? I sorta had to tell them ahead of time.”
“Sounds amazing.”
You watch as the chef prepares the steak and the kale. It smelled delicious already, and it was cool to watch as it was done. You and Harry continue to enjoy the sushi in the meantime.
“Are you going to answer my question?”
“About what?”
“Becoming an electrician.”
“Oh…well, my dad was one, and he was in a union. I have a B.S. in Mathematics, but I didn’t really know what I wanted to do with it, so I asked my dad for some help getting into the union, and the rest was history. I get to use my degree every day. Not a lot of people can say that.” You smile and take a sip of the wine. “Do you always do this?”
“Do what?”
“Schmooze on a first date.”
“I’m not schmoozing.” He gasps.
“I’m just saying…this is, like, really fancy. You could have taken me to a burger joint, I’m not picky. I just don’t want you thinking you to need to flash your cash around. I get it, you’re reach and do well for yourself, you know? I wanna know what’s underneath all that.”
Two plates are put in front of you.
“Thank you.” Harry says to the chef and everyone else leaves the room. “I wasn’t trying to flash my cash.” He cuts his steak and takes a bite. “I just wanted to show you a good time.”
“By booking a private room at a really nice restaurant?” You smirk and take a bite of your steak. “Although, this food is delicious.” You use your napkin to pat the corners of your mouth gently. “How’d you get into the business that you’re in?”
“Well, I always wanted to be in sales, do a little bit of traveling, that kind of stuff. When I was in uni, the idea of property management sort of intrigued me, so I looked a little more into that. I started off in the mail room while I was getting my MBA, and then just sort of worked my way up. I bet my company has provided a lot of work to your union, other than just maintenance.”
“It definitely does, I recognized the name. You guys have put up buildings all over the place. You’re kind of like Richard Gere’s character in Pretty Woman.”
“I suppose I am! I love that movie.” He clears his throat. “So, you didn’t want to become an engineer or anything?”
“Nope, I like working with my hands.” You shrug and take a sip of your wine.
“Is it hard being in a male dominated profession?”
“Isn’t it pretty male dominated up in your office?” You raise an eyebrow at him. “Most of the women up there were either assistants or other low ranking positions.”
“Are you saying your friend works a low ranking position as my executive assistant?”
“Stacey likes what she does, she feels fulfilled and needed, at least that’s what she tells me. I’m just saying, anywhere I would have gone, it would probably look the same. Besides, I’m not the only woman on the job, I’m just one of few, and I’m one of the younger ones. The guys are all nice enough.”
A few moments later a waiter comes in to clear the plates and someone else brings out the fried ice cream.
“I’ve never had this before.” You smile. “I’m excited to try it.”
“Fried ice cream is delicious, especially after eating a steak with so many spices in it.”
You both dig in. You lick your lips after taking a bite.
“Mm, that is so good.”
“I’m glad you like it.”
Harry squared up the bill, and out the two of you went. You thanked him over and over for paying. He wanted to ask if you felt like grabbing another drink anywhere, but he wasn’t so sure if you’d be into it. Maybe that could be saved for a second date. His driver brings you home and Harry gets out to walk you up the steps of your building.
“I had a great time.” He blushes. “I’m glad we could do this.” All you do is smile and nod. “Um, well, so I have your number, I’ll give you another call sometime?”
“Okay.” You get your keys out of your purse. “Thanks again for dinner.”
You key into your building and he watches you disappear inside. He was stunned. Not even a goodnight kiss, hell, even a hug would have sufficed. Usually when Harry took a woman out on a date at the very least he got a kiss on the cheek, if not that most of the time he would get invited up. Did he do something wrong? Were you not as attracted to him as he was to you?
//
“Tell me everything! I wanna know what to expect tomorrow morning and if I need to add a caramel swirl to his coffee.” Stacey giggles over the phone with you the next morning.
“It was…okay.”
“Just okay?! Didn’t he take you to that nice Japanese place?”
“Yeah, the food was excellent, but the atmosphere was weird.”
“What do you mean?”
“He had us seated in a private room and we basically had this personal chef. It was awkward when things got a little quiet. There was a little music in the background, but I would have felt more at ease in the main dining area.”
“He likes his privacy.”
“So he said. Apparently sometimes paparazzi follow him?”
“Yeah, about a year ago he was dating this Italian model. He started getting photographed. They followed him around a bit after they broke up, but we haven’t seen too many in a while.”
“I don’t know why he’d want to go from a model to me…”
“Oh, stop it. You’re gorgeous! So…are you saying you won’t see him again?”
“I don’t see why I would. I didn’t feel any sparks flying between us. He seems sort of hollow, Stace.”
“No! He’s so sweet! He can just be sort of…I don’t know…awkward. He’s amazing when he’s making a deal, but outside of work I know he can be a little social awkward.”
“I don’t think I wanna be with someone as rich as he is.”
“He was just trying to impress you, I’m sure. You didn’t have any fun?”
“I had a little…but not enough to go on a second date.”
Stacey swallowed hard. Harry was a very sweet man, and extremely respectful…but he wanted something he worked for it. There was no way he was going to let this, or you, go.
//
“Morning, Stacey.” He says to her with a smile. He grabs his coffee from her desk.
“Morning, Mr. Styles.”
“Have a good weekend?” He asks as she follows her in. He looks at the mail she’s already put on his desk.
“Yeah, Dan and I visited his parents out at the lake. It was nice.”
“Good for you guys.” He looks at her and smiles. “Been together a few years now, right? When’s he popping the question?”
“Oh, Harry.” She swats a hand at him as he chuckles. “Soon. Anyways, you’ve got a meeting at nine, and then this afternoon you’re to go to that new property we just bought. The construction workers will be there, it’ll be good for you to meet the crew.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know the drill. I’m dying to see the place again. Haven’t been since we saw it last.” He sits down at his desk. “Hate wearing those hard hats though, they always mess up my hair.” He smirks.
“I don’t think anything could mess up your hair.” She laughs and turns to leave to go back to his desk.
“Wait, uh, did you happen to speak with Y/N at all?”
“Oh! Um, was this past Saturday the big date?”
“You know it was, quit playing.”
“We spoke, yeah.”
“Did she mention me at all? Trying to gauge when I should call her next.”
“Oh, so you wanna see her again?”
“I do.” He smiles. “So, she say anything?”
“Yeah…um, she said she had a nice time.”
“Was that it?”
“Pretty much, but to be fair, we talked more about my weekend. Barely let her get a word in, you know how I can be sometimes.”
Stacey walks awkwardly back to her desk. She prayed that if he did reach out to you, you’d at least let him down easy.
//
Harry leaves around one in the afternoon to head to the property. He and the COO go together in a car. When they get there they both shake the foreman’s hand and walk around the property.
“The electrician’s showed up this morning. They’ve certainly got their work cut out for them.” The foreman says. “Great workers though, union contract just how you like.”
Harry nods and continues walking. He notices the electricians on their afternoon coffee break.
“Check out the suits.” Frank says to you. You smirk and look over your shoulder. You immediately look back at Frank. “What?”
“I know that guy…the one in the blue suit.”
“No shit, how?”
“He, uh, took me to dinner on Saturday.”
“What?!”
“My friend is his executive assistant, she gave him my number after we met last week doing those inspections.”
“No offense, but I thought you were gay.” He rubs the back of his neck.
“Frank.” You pinch the bridge of your nose.
“So…some big wig took you out? How was it?”
“I don’t wanna talk about it, and I certainly don’t want to-“
“Y/N?”
You turn around slowly to look at him.
“Hi Harry.”
“Y/N, you should address him as Mr. Styles.” Your foreman says.
“That’s quite alright, we know each other.” He smiles at you.
“We sure do, excuse me.” You grab your hard hat, stick it on, and head inside with Frank.
“How do you know her?” The foreman asks Harry.
“She’s good friends with my assistant.”
The foreman brings Harry and the COO inside to show them the bit of progress that’s been made on the interior thus far. Harry sees you up on a ladder helping a wire get fed through a hole.
“Got it!” You yell up, and secure it.
Harry and the COO stick around for quite some time making sure everything was to their liking. He’s there until the end of the work day and sees you walking with your toolbox to your car. You wave goodbye to Frank as you get everything in your trunk. It was a nice size SUV. He watches as you unclip your tool belt and slightly rub at your hip bones. He decides to come over to you.
“Hi again.” He smiles and you nearly jump.
“Jesus, you’re just everywhere.”
“Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you, darling.” You scrunch your face at the word. “Sorry.”
“You apologize a lot.” You shake your head and throw your hard hat into your trunk. You take your hair out of its bun, and shake your hair out. “Can I help you with something?” You close your trunk and lean against your car, crossing your arms.
“I just, um, well, I was wondering when I could see you again.”
“You’re seeing me now.”
He chuckles and shakes his head.
“I mean, when can I take you on another date?”
“Harry…” You look down, then back up to him. “I…”
“I should have texted you afterwards, right?” He sucks his teeth. “I didn’t wanna seem too eager.”
“You really had that good a time with me that you wanna take me out again?”
“Well, yeah. Didn’t you?”
You had two choices. You could either crush the man in front of you and walk away, or you could cut the guy a break and give it another go. Would it be so bad to let him take you out again? Maybe this time you could call the shots.
“I did.” You swallow. “I’d like to go out again.”
“Great!” He beams at you. “I was thinking we could-“
“I’d like to plan it.”
“Oh…well, alright. What did you have in mind?”
“You’ll find out Friday night. You’re free then?”
“I can definitely make myself available.”
“Perfect.” You turn on your heel and get into your car. Once again you leave him standing there, stunned.
//
“You’re giving it another shot?!” Stacey practically screams through the phone.
“Mhm.”
“What made you decide?”
“Well, he was just standing right in front of me. I felt sort of bad. I figured maybe I was being too harsh before. It can’t hurt to go out again.”
“Where are you going to take him?”
“I haven’t decided yet. I was thinking of going to that bar I’ve been to with Frank. I’ve taken you a couple of times.”
“Oh! That place with the darts and the live music?”
“Yeah! I think he needs a night to be a little less fancy, don’t you?”
“Definitely! He won’t know what hit him.”
//
Harry was on cloud nine all week. He couldn’t wait to see you again. He even had flowers sent to your job site. You were thoroughly embarrassed. The guys all gave you shit for it. He was a little surprised when you didn’t even text him to thank him for them, but he just brushed it off and kept his cool. When you did finally text him Thursday evening, he nearly squealed.
You: what’s your address? I’ll be picking you up around eight tomorrow
Harry: late start to the evening, where we headed?
You: that’s for me to know ;)
His stomach filled with butterflies all because you sent a winky face. He was having a few doubts that maybe you didn’t like him that much, but you were being playful with him now. This was good.
//
Your hair was down and wavy, you had a white tank top on with a dangly necklace, and some jeans. You drive to Harry’s building. It was much nicer than yours, naturally. You text him and let him know you’re on the street. He comes walking out moments later in a black silk shirt and a pair of yellow patterned dress pants. You squinted through the window and noticed they were sort of tight around his thighs. He waves at you and you wave back.
“This is fun already.” He says as he buckles up. He looks down at you. “I’m overdressed.”
“Not at all. You’re dressed like you, that’s good. This is how I like to dress.”
“You look cute.” He says.
“Thanks.” You start to drive off towards the bar.
“So, now will you tell me where we’re going?”
“To a bar, hope you’re thirsty.” You smirk at him.
As you continue to drive Harry takes note of the music on the radio and even the way you drive the car. You were only using one hand, on the bottom of the wheel. You were so easy going.
“This is a nice car.”
“Thanks, bought it last year. I used have a dinged up old truck.”
“Do you miss having a truck?”
“Not really.” You shrug. “I wanted something more like this. When you have a truck everyone always wants your help with stuff. It’s bad enough that I’m the handy friend.” You chuckle. “I’m always being asked to help repair stuff or whatever. I don’t mind, but sometimes it’s a lot.”
You get over to the bar and find a place to park.
“Can’t remember the last time I was on this side of town.” He comments as you walk inside.
There were a lot people around, and the bar itself was packed. There was some sports game playing, but it wouldn’t be on long once the live band would start. There were people playing darts and munching on popcorn.
“Go snag a booth, I’ll get us some beers.”
“Oh, uh…”
“What’s a matter?”
“I don’t really like beer.” He takes his wallet out. “I can grab the drinks, tell me what you want.”
“I want you to go grab us a booth. I’ll get you something other than beer.”
You turn and go up to the bar. You greet the bartender who knows you pretty well. You decide that if Harry didn’t want beer, then you wouldn’t get one either.
“Two long islands.” You grin.
You get your drinks and find Harry at a booth. He stuck out like a sore thumb, he wasn’t hard to find. You place the glasses on the table.
“I’ll grab us some popcorn. We’ll grab some real food later.”
You go up to the popcorn machine and grab a bowl to fill up. You say hello to some people you recognize and head back to the booth.
“What made you decide on a long island ice tea?” He raises an eyebrow at you.
“Thought it would be fun to just get drunk.” You smile. “What sort of mixed drinks do you usually get?”
“I don’t. I usually just get a scotch or something.”
“Ew.” You grimace and then take a sip of your drink. “This is much more fun.”
“You could have gotten a beer still.”
You toss a piece of popcorn into your mouth and take another sip. Harry takes a sip as well and coughs when he’s done.
“Bit heavy handed.”
“I can get you something else…”
“No, it’s fine.” He smiles. “Do you come here a lot?”
“Sometimes. Some buddies from work brought me here, and I liked it. They have free darts, and live music. The band should be starting soon.”
You were two drinks in, and you both were giggling messes. The band was loud, but fun. You had gotten into a little game of getting popcorn into the other’s mouth. Maybe Harry could let his hair down a little and act like a normal person.
By the time you each were on your third drink, you definitely knew you were drunk, and so did Harry. He was having a great time.
“I’m hungry, are you hungry?!” You had yell over the music.
“Starved!”
“Come on!”
You grab his wrist as you walk out of the place. It’s a bit chilly outside, and without thinking, Harry wraps his arm around your shoulders as you walk. You wrap yours around his waist, and he feels butterflies again. You lead him to a McDonald’s and walk in.
“Two medium big mac meals, please.” You slur as you walk up to the counter.
“I’m paying.” Harry insists.
“Nope, I got it.” You slap your credit card down. “Go fill up our drinks, I’ll wait for the food.”
Harry shuffles over to the drink station and fills the paper cups up with coke. You come over to the table he found and you both dive into the greasy food.
“Mm, I can’t remember the last time I had McDonald’s.” He grunts as he eats the food.
“Right?! It’s like, the perfect drunk food.” You suck down the coke. “I would have gotten us some flurries but the machine’s broken.”
“I have ice cream back at my place…got stuff to make sundaes actually.”
“Are you kidding?!”
“Nope, always keep that stuff around. Never know when you’re gonna need some hot fudge.”
“Well, I know where we’re going next.”
“What about your car? We’re both way too fucked up to drive.”
“It’s called uber.”
“Nonsense, I’ll call my-“
“He’ll be here in two minutes, finish up your fries.” You say, looking at your phone.
“You’re very impulsive.” He chuckles and throws some fries into his mouth.
“Live a little.” You yank him out of the booth and go outside.
You both crawl into the uber, and giggle during the ride. Harry hadn’t had this much fun in a long time. When you get to Harry’s building, he says hello to the doorman, and you just smile and wave. He keeps his hand on the small of your back as he leads you into the elevator. It was a beautiful lobby. You watch, through your foggy eyes, as Harry presses the button for the top floor where all of the pent house suites were. He leads you down a hall and keys into his place. You jaw nearly hits the floor.
“I didn’t know they made apartments this big. It’s like…a house in here!” You walk around. “Is this a staircase?!”
“Yeah, it’s two stories. There’s four bedrooms total. My main guest room is down here, and then upstairs are the rest. Got an office down that way, nice big balcony.”
“What’s a single guy need all this space for?”
“Got family and friends that come to visit. I end up hosting functions quite a bit too. Catered events, and all that.” He grabs your hand to lead you into his massive kitchen. “Can I get you some water?”
“Nope, got any alcohol?”
“You want more to drink?!”
“We’re going to have ice cream right? How about some kalua?”
“You know, I do have some. I could put it into some shot glasses.”
“Works for me.” You smile.
Harry get everything out for the sundaes. His kitchen looked like it belonged in a restaurant, but it made sense since he did say he had catered events. If he had cooks come they’d need state of the art equipment. He runs the scoop under some warm water, rolls up one of his sleeves and scoops the ice cream into two bowls. Your eyes widen as you see the veins in his hand and forearm peek out. He adds the warmed up fudge, sprinkles some nuts, and then adds some whip cream.
“Why do you have all this stuff?” You ask as you make up the shots.
“We had an ice cream social here a week or so ago. I like having themed parties.” He bites into his ice cream and moans. “I hate throwing out leftovers.”
“This fudge is really rich.” You lick your lips after taking a bite.
“Shoulda made milk shakes with this.” He takes his shot of kalua and so do you.
“Next time.” You spoon my ice cream into your mouth.
“Next time, eh?”
“Sure.” You smile. “I’m having a good time.”
“Better than last time?”
“Harry.” You put your bowl down and put a hand on his shoulder. “I’ll admit, I was pretty skeptical, but when you let your hair down, you’re a lot of fun.”
“So…you didn’t have any fun last time?”
“It’s not that I didn’t.” You say, shoveling more ice cream into your mouth. “But I feel like I got to know you better tonight.” You hop up on his counter and sit there comfortably as you finish your ice cream. A little bit of hot fudge lingers on the corner of your mouth.
“You have a little, uh…” He taps the corner of his mouth to show you. He moves to stand between your legs and you look up at him.
“Did I get it?”
“Not exactly.” He cups your cheeks and leans in. You can feel his breath on you. He runs his thumb over the spot. “Got it.” He sucks his thumb into his mouth and smirks at you.
Just as he’s about to turn to grab the bowls you grab at the collar of his shirt, and pull him to you, crashing your lips to his. He sinks into it, only for a second before backing away. He presses his forehead to yours.
“What’s wrong?” You breathe.
“I don’t want this to happen like this.”
“Like what?”
He steps away and looks at you.
“We’re both pretty out of sorts, Y/N.”
“It was just a kiss…”
“But it could lead to more, and I don’t feel comfortable with that.”
“Are you really going to tell me you’ve never hooked up drunk?”
“I have.”
“So…I’m sorry, I’m just really confused.” You hop down so you can stand on your feet.
“Y/N.” He cups your cheeks so you’ll look at him. “I want to be completely sober so I can fully enjoy you.”
“You’re…such a weirdo, Harry. Who says shit like that?” You step away from him.
“You know, most people find me charming.”
“Well, then I guess I’m not most people.” You roll your eyes at yourself. “Ugh, I didn’t mean for that to sound like I’m not like other girls, that would be a weird thing to say. I feel like you say things you think I’d wanna hear.”
“No, I really feel that way. I don’t want…look, if we decided to do it, I’d wanna remember it, that’s all I was trying to say.”
“So just say it like that!” You start laughing. “That I can understand.”
“I don’t know what to say around you. It’s like everything I do is wrong.”
“Not true.” You grab the whip cream can and spray some into your mouth. “You make a mean sundae.”
“Don’t hog it.” He opens his mouth and you spray some whip cream into his mouth. You both giggle.
“So…you don’t even want to keep kissing?”
“I do, but I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
“What do you wanna do instead? My car’s all the way back at the bar, I’m way too fucked to drive…”
“You could stay here if you want. I could give you some pj’s and-“
“No, I’d rather sleep in my own bed.”
“I could call my driver.”
“This late?!”
“He’s on call.” Harry takes out his phone and sends a text. “It’s his job.”
“You’ll come for the ride?”
“Of course!” He smiles. “I have a question for you…”
“Alright.”
“Did you get the flowers I sent you earlier this week?”
“I did.” You move some hair from your face. “I’m sure you meant well, but you shouldn’t do that while I’m working again.”
“Why?” He frowns.
“It was embarrassing. Some of the guys gave me shit for it. Just…if you do it again, I mean, I like getting flowers, just have them sent to my apartment. I don’t need gifts at work. I didn’t even know where to put them.”
“So, we’re definitely seeing each other again?”
“I’d like to.” You smile.
“Great.” He smiles back. “Sorry…I didn’t mean to embarrass you. Do you want me to have someone fired? Cause I can do that.”
“No.” You laugh. “But thanks.”
Harry leads you down to the car and you both get in the back seat. You sit really close to him. You were incredibly riled up and horny. It was the alcohol, but you were sort of disappointed that you wouldn’t be getting laid, and it sort of turned you on that Harry was being such a gentleman. You look up at him.
“Harry?”
“Yeah?” He looks down at you.
You move his arm to put it around you, and you look up at him with big eyes. He sighs and leans in to kiss you. His lips were so soft, and he still tasted like the hot fudge. Your hands slide up to his hair and tug on his curls. You just wanted his tongue in your mouth, but he was being so timid. His other hand goes down to your thigh, and he squeezes it, his thumb digging in to your inner thigh. You whimper slightly and then he lets go of you. The car comes to a stop, and your door is opened by the driver. Harry gets out to walk you up to your door.
“I’m going to be out of town for the next ten days.” He says, tucking some hair behind your ear. “But when I get back, I’d love to see you again.”
“Me too.”
“Good.” He gives you one last kiss before getting back into the car. He makes sure you’re inside the building before he lets the driver go. He presses the button for the partition to go down. “Charlie, I had my doubts, I really did, but she likes me, mate.”
“That’s great, sir. I’m glad she agreed to see you again.”
“Me too. She’s so…different! She’s sort of blunt too. I like that. I feel like women always just like me for my money, but she could care less! This could really be something, I can feel it.”
//
You told Stacey all about your date with Harry, and how good of a kisser he was. You weren’t sure how’d you last the next ten days without his lips on yours again, but you’d find ways to manage. Work was a great distraction. However, your friends continued to shit on you. One of them snuck a magazine that had Harry on the cover into your toolbox.
“Very funny.” You roll your eyes as they laugh. “What’s so funny that he likes me?”
“It’s not funny, think they’re just jealous.” Frank smirks and looks at the magazine. “It’s just odd that you’re into him.”
“He’s not exactly the type of guy I’d usually be interested in, but he means well. He’s sweet…in his own weird way. He’s quirky. I took him to that bar we’ve been to on Friday, we had a great time.”
“Look at you, trying something for a second time. When do you see him next?”
“I don’t know. He’s out of town for a couple of weeks.”
“Doing what?”
“How the fuck should I know? I didn’t ask.”
“Why not?”
“It’s none of my business. It’s not like he’s my boyfriend.”
“Yeah, but he is the guy you’re seeing.”
“I’ve been on two dates with him, nothing’s set in stone.” Your morning coffee break ends you sigh. “Great, time to go into this stupid basement.” You put your hardhat on and a mask and head in with Frank.
//
On Thursday evening, you were just hanging out, watching TV after a long day of work. Your phone goes off and you see it’s a call from Harry.
“Hello?”
“Hi, beautiful!”
You’re sitting there with your hair up in a messy bun, pimple patches on your blemishes, and a raggedy t-shirt with stains all over it. You roll your eyes.
“What’s up?”
“Well, I finally got a free moment, and I wanted to call you. Are you busy? Should be about eight o’clock, right?”
“Yeah it is…where are you?”
“I’m in London.”
You think for a moment and you gasp.
“Harry, it’s like two in the morning over there!”
“Like I said, I finally got a free moment. I’m just getting into my flat, getting cozy.”
“What did you go to London for?”
“Business of course…and to see some family. Killing two birds with one stone.”
“Do you travel a lot?”
“Sometimes. There were some buildings I wanted to look at out here.”
“How come you didn’t bring Stacey?”
“She doesn’t always need to travel with me. We’ve connected, don’t worry. I’m not one of those helpless idiots who can’t survive without their assistant. Besides, need her there to hold down the fort.” You hear some shuffling and then the creaking of a bed, and a big sigh from him.
“So…what kept you out so late?”
“Business.”
“What Business could you possibly need to conduct at two in the morning?”
“Things operate differently over here. People like to go out late. I actually left early because I was tired.”
“That’s wild.”
“Very.” He chuckles. “What are you up to?”
“I was just watching some TV before I hit the sack.”
“Anything good on?”
“Not really.” You laugh and turn the TV off. “Kinda like hearing your voice.” You slap your forehead because you literally don’t know what possessed you to say that.
“Like hearing yours too. Sorry I haven’t been able to text much.”
“It’s okay.”
“It’s not, really. I wouldn’t want you to think I wasn’t interested or something.”
“I didn’t.”
“Good, because I’m still really interested.”
“When do you come back?”
“Monday evening, then it’s back to the office Tuesday.”
“You never stop, do you…”
“It’s hard not to, but I like what I do.”
“I would hope so.”
“How’s your week been?”
“You should get some sleep.”
“Can’t, too awake now. Tell me how your week was, how’s the building coming along?”
“I’ve been in a dimly lit crawl space in the basement feeding wires all week. Tomorrow’s the last day of doing that. Then next week my group of people will move up to the regular basement, and then after that we’ll move on to the lobby. Other people are working on the outside as well, and then once all that’s done we’ll be able to move on to the individual offices inside.”
“Wow, that’s a lot.”
“Mhm, but it’s honest work. I can take a step back at the end of the day and see what I’ve done. I like that.”
“You’re a visual person, then.”
“I am.”
“So am I.”
“Nice to know we have one thing in common.”
“We have other things in common.” He sounds offended.
“Like what?” You giggle and sit with your knees hugged to your chest. His voice over the phone was oddly soothing to you.
“Well…I’d say we both enjoy a good joke. We both like food, although, I have to say, my stomach was pretty angry with me after I had that bic mac.”
You burst out laughing.
“So was mine. It’s always good going in.”
“Mhm, and we like each other.”
“Oh, we do?” You ask sarcastically. “Teasing. I like you.”
“You didn’t at first though.”
“You didn’t make a great impression by calling me darling in your office.”
“If I knew how derogatory it was going to come off, I never would have said it. It’s just…part of my vocabulary.”
“It’s okay, I know you didn’t mean anything by it.”
“When I get back, I’d love to see you again. Maybe we could have lunch or something.”
“On my jobsite? I don’t think so.”
“We could go out for dinner, then? I mean, I’ll be coming by the site next week to check out the progress.”
“Please, don’t even acknowledge me if you see me. I want things to be professional.”
“Reputation to uphold?”
“Sort of. I have a couple good friends, but not all of the guys are so accepting of women on the job. I don’t want any of them thinking I’m getting special treatment or anything because I know you. Someone put a magazine that had you on the cover in my tool box as a prank.”
“I’m sorry…I don’t really know what the big deal is though.”
“It’s like I’m in elementary school and everyone found out about my cruck. Boys never really grow up, so I’ve come to find out.”
“Can’t say I can argue with that. We’re an immature lot.” He chuckles and then yawns.
“You should really go to sleep.”
“But I like talking to you.”
“You can call me this weekend.”
“Oh, that sounds nice.”
“Goodnight, Harry.”
“Goodnight…sweet dreams, Y/N.”
You sigh as you hang up. Your stomach felt weird. Did you have butterflies? You never had butterflies. Harry was definitely growing on you.
//
Wednesday morning, Harry came to the jobsite to check things out. He stayed in the trailer with the foreman with quite some time before going inside the building. He didn’t see you, and he was sort of sad about it. He hears a whistling noise and sees a bunch of people filing out and taking their hard hats off.
“Morning coffee break.” The foreman explains. Harry nods and squints at everyone. His eyes widen when he spots you.
He watches as you grab your thermos and pour your coffee into the little cap that works as a cup. He desperately wants to go over and say hi, but he also wanted to respect what you asked of him.
“Hey, Y/N, isn’t that your boyfriend?” One of the guys says and makes kissy noises. “Go say hi, give him a big wet one for us. Show him some appreciation for giving the union so much work.”
“Very funny.” You roll your eyes. “He’s not my boyfriend. We’ve been out two times.”
“That guy’s dated models, what’s so great about you?”
“Bob.” Frank says, warningly. “Don’t be a prick.”
Harry watches as the group laughs, and Frank puts a hand on your shoulder.
“Everything alright over there?” He asks the foreman.
“Yeah, they’re just giving her a tough time. They seem to think you’re her boyfriend.”
“And what if I was? Is that supposed to be funny?”
“No, sir, of course not…it’s just…up until a couple weeks ago everyone thought she was gay, or at least, just not into dudes.”
“Why? Because she didn’t try to fuck one of the other guys? She’s a beautiful woman, and-“ Harry stops himself. He can feel his blood boiling. He wasn’t your boyfriend, and he knew that, but he still wanted to defend you.
“What’s it like fucking a dude with so much money? Surprised you haven’t quit yet to become his live in lady.”
“Bob, I’m about two seconds away from ripping your balls off.”
“Not a very nice thing to say.”
“You’re being a dick, Bob.” Frank says. “Why do you wanna know what it’s like to fuck Mr. Styles for? You like him too?” He smirks.
“Frank.” You pinch the bridge of your nose. “What’s happening here, you’re going to turn this around to make some gay joke to defend me? Not cool. You all need to grow the fuck up.” You finish your coffee, put your hardhat back on and storm off.
Harry watches the scene and goes over to the group of men since you now left.
“Everything alright over here?” He asks them. The foreman was shaking behind him.
“Just fine, sir.” Bob says.
“Are we sure? Because that worker seemed a bit upset. I hope you’re all working as a team, I hate to see people not being team players. It makes getting a job done well very difficult.”
“The guys have been ragging on her because of you.” Frank says. “Apparently they think it’s funny that you’ve been out a couple of times.” He turns to all of them. “I think you all forget that she works with us and has fun just like the rest of us, but she’s still a woman. She’s allowed to go out on dates with people not like us. Just because she doesn’t want any of you doesn’t mean she doesn’t deserve to find someone.”
Frank huffs and storms off himself. Harry was impressed by him.
“I don’t have much to add to that other than that her personal life is just that, personal. Please remember that, and keep things professional. Then, none of his will have a problem.” He says sternly and walks away. The foremen glares at all of them and follows Harry.
He just wanted to make sure you were okay. He saw you inside, back to work, as if nothing had happened. Frank was holding the latter you were on. He still wanted to respect what you had asked, so he turns and walks back out of the building.
//
Stacey had her phone out when Harry got back to the office. She was texting furiously with someone. Her eyebrows were furrowed and she had a frown on her face.
“Everything alright, love?” Harry asks, concerned.
“With me, yeah.” She looks up at him and smiles. “I’m proud of you.”
“For what?”
“For not stepping in to defend her. She’s good at taking care of herself.”
“So that’s who you’re texting?”
“Mhm. I’m gonna meet her after work for some drinks. When do you see her next?”
“Friday.”
“Good, that’ll be nice.”
“So I shouldn’t show up while you’re having drinks?”
“No! She needs girl time. You mean well, but keep doing what you’re doing. Don’t suffocate her.”
“It was so hard to not run over to her earlier. We chatted a bit over the phone while I was gone. It was so nice.” He sighs and leans against her desk.
“You’re a romantic, Harry, and I love that about you. But…Y/N…well, she prefers to save that for the movies.”
Harry’s eyes widen and he gasps.
“I just figured out what I’m gonna take her to do Friday!” He hugs Stacey quick. “Thanks, Stace!” He rushes into his office and closes the door.
//
By the time Friday rolled around, you were exhausted. You really didn’t want to do anything crazy, and Harry assured you that you’d just be hanging out at his place which put you at ease. His car comes for you around seven. You come out in a pair of jeans, a nice shirt, and your hair down. He gets out and practically runs over to you. He takes you in his arms and kisses you.
“Missed you.” He says against your lips before kissing you again.
“I guess I missed you too.” You smile. “Thanks for being so cool at the site the other day.”
“No worries, I just hope those guys have cooled it.”
“They have.”
“Good.” He smiles and leads you into the car.
“One of these days I’m going to see what you look like behind the wheel.”
“That just means you’ll have to come out to my beach house.”
“That doesn’t sound too terrible. It’s getting warmer out by the day.”
“I hope you’re hungry, I’ve got something good prepared.”
“Did you cook?”
“God, no. I’d burn the house down if I made something other than a frozen pizza.” He chuckles. “No, I had someone come and make everything I wanted.” You make a face at him. “Oh, stop it. You’ll be thankful once you see it, trust me.”
“I’ll take your word for it.”
Once you’re at Harry’s place, he leads you inside. You take note on how he always says hi to all of the workers. You liked that he was so kind to them. When he gets you inside your jaw drops. There was a popcorn machine full of popcorn, hot dogs on a rotisserie, and all of the fixings on a table next to it, a nacho station, and homemade candies and chocolates.
“So, this is, like, the concessions area, and then down the hall is my home theater. Thought I’d bring the movies to us. Do you like it?”
“This is so…extravagant.” You walk up to where all of the sweets are.
“I had my chef make up those chocolate covered cookie dough bites, I thought you might like them.”
“I love those…thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He kisses you cheek. “Well, let’s make up what we want and then we can go find our seats.” He chuckles at his own joke and it makes you giggle.
You each make up a tray of snacks, and head down the hall. You gasp when you see a movie poster on the wall outside of the door.
“Pretty Woman?”
“I remember you mentioning it on our first date. Would you like to watch it?”
“Sure!”
You walk inside the room. He wasn’t kidding, it really was a home theater. Three rows of luxurious recliner seats, a large screen and a projector in the back.
“Where would you like to sit?”
“Middle row?”
“Works for me.” He smiles and follows you up. He sets his food down on the chair next to him and takes his phone out. “There’s an app linked to the projector so I can just it play from here and even dim the lights.”
“Pretty cool.”
“Very cool. Makes things so much easier.”
The lights dim, and previews start playing.
“Previews from when the film first came out, makes it more immersive.”
“Nice touch.” You saw, biting into your hot dog. “Oh, wow. This is delicious.”
“All freshly made with a natural casing. Still not the best for you, but at least it’s made with good ingredients.”
You sip on your soda and toss some popcorn into your mouth as well. Once you both finish up some of the cookie dough bites, you set your trays aside, recline the chairs, and get comfortable. Harry lifts the armrest between you and puts his arm around you.
“This alright?”
“Mhm.” You cozy up to him and sigh as you watch the film.
Even though you thought he was flashing his cash again, you knew he wasn’t doing it for bad reasons. He wanted to give you a nice evening, and this was how he knew to do it. You appreciated him putting all this effort in just for you. It made you rethink your first date completely. He was just trying to show you a good time, and you felt bad for being sort of rude. You’re happy you gave him another chance.
You sling your arm over his lower stomach, and put one of your ankles over his. His cologne smelled so good, you just wanted to have him closer to you. Harry was swooning. He hadn’t felt this happy in so long. His hand strokes your arm and shoulder mindlessly as the movie goes on. You both laugh and giggle at the funnier parts. When it gets to the part of the film where Vivian goes down to where Edward is playing the piano, and she sits on top of it and they start having sex.
You bite your bottom lip and look up at Harry whose eyes are glues to the screen, but you could feel his heart beating rapidly. He notices you looking up at him and he looks down at you with a slight smile. You reach one of your hands up to the back of his neck to pull him down to you. His lips brush over yours, and then you both sink into it. You tug him by the collar of his shirt so he’s hovering over you on the large seats. You wrap your legs around his waist to have him as close as possible. You swipe your tongue along his bottom lip and he opens up for you. You both groan into the open mouthed kiss, happy to feel the other’s tongue.
He kisses down your jaw and makes his way to your neck. Your hips buck up towards his when he starts to suck on your skin. You crane your neck to give him more access, and you practically push his head further into you. You whimper and bite your bottom lip as your hips move up towards his again. He sits up and pulls you on top of him so you can straddle him. Your lips find his again as you roll your hips down on his growing bulge. You tug at his hair as you suck on his bottom lip. His hands were press on your back to keep you close.
“Y/N?” He breathes.
“Mm?” You mumble as you kiss on his neck.
“Do you wanna take a break so we can finish the movie?”
“What, why?” You pout with your now swollen lips.
“Well, it’s just, that scene where Jason Alexander tries to…um…you know, is coming up and I’d feel weird making out while that happens.”
“Oh.” You chuckle and move off of him. “Makes sense.” He puts his arm back around you as you both catch your breaths.
Eventually the movie ends and the lights come back on. You have to blink a few times to get used to it. You and Harry grab your trays and go out the kitchen to clean everything up.
“Did you enjoy that?” He asks as he loads up the dishwasher.
“Yeah! I mean, I love that movie, and it was cool to watch it privately like that.”
“That room used to be another bedroom, I had it renovated shortly after I moved in. I’m glad I did. It got difficult to go out once the paparazzi started following my every move. Plus, it’s fun for parties. My family loves it when they come to visit.” He dries his hands on a towel and tosses it on a counter.
“Do they still follow you around?”
“Not as much anymore, thank god. At least, not to see who I’m dating. Sometimes after I do an interview for a magazine they follow me to see if I’m going out to get drunk or something.” He scoffs and shakes his head.
“You end up on a lot of thirty under thirty type magazines.”
“Yeah…I’ve done those, made it onto Forbes too, that was pretty cool. Then in a couple of years when I do turn thirty, it’ll be forty under forty. It never ends.” He shakes his head.
“How’d you end up dating some Italian model?”
He steps closer to you and tucks some hair behind your ear.
“Is that something you really wanna talk about?” He asks, just above a whisper as he starts to kiss on your neck again.
“No.” You gasp as his hands squeeze your hips. “Can we go to your bedroom?” You hear him sigh against you and he leans back against the counter.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Not ready for that yet?”
“You make zero sense!”
It’s true. Harry wasn’t making much sense. He was used to moving too fast with women, and it always went wrong. He really liked you, and he didn’t want it blowing up in his face.
“It’s not that I don’t want to.” He squeezes your hand. “I just think we should go out on a few more dates before we get to know each other like that…don’t you?”
“No, I’d like you to take me to your room and fuck me.” You cross your arms.
“Y/N.” He chuckles. “I promise, it’ll be worth the wait.”
You knew he was right. You felt his fully erect dick when you were grinding on him earlier.
“I just want us on the same page, make sure we both want the same things before diving into all that.”
“God, of course you’re, like, a good person.” You roll your eyes. “Fine, let’s go out a few more times.”
“Great.” He smiles. “I want you to know, too, I’m not seeing anyone else.”
“Neither am I.”
“And you won’t start, right?”
“Why would I?”
“I don’t know.” He shrugs.
“Harry, I barely have the time to juggle one guy, I don’t think I’d have the energy to entertain more than one.” You laugh.
“Alright.” He blushes slightly. You step closer to him and wrap your arms around his neck.
“I’m surprised there isn’t a line of women knocking at your door.”
“Oh, there is, I just ignore it.” He smirks and you roll your eyes. “Kidding.”
“Mhm.”
You both smile and stand there kissing for a little while. Harry makes sure you get home, giving you a ride in his car. Just like last time, you spent most of the ride making out in the back seat. You really didn’t want to leave, but it was late and you needed to sleep. You say goodnight to each other, and he makes sure you’re inside before letting Charlie drive away.
//
“Mr. Styles, don’t forget you’ve got that gala this weekend.” Stacey says to him Monday morning.
“Shit, I’ve completely forgot about that.” He sighs. “Do I have to go?”
“Unfortunately, yes. I saw the guest list and…Carina’s going to be there.”
“Of course she is!” He groans and slumps into his chair. “Fuck, and I don’t have a date.”
“You could ask Y/N.”
“Do you think that’s something she’d wanna go to? She’d need a ball gown and-“
“She’s an electrician, but she’s still a woman. She has a lot of pretty clothes. I actually borrow a lot from her when I have events to go to.”
“She’s having me over for dinner tonight…I suppose I could ask her then.”
“Wait, she’s having you over?!”
“Yeah…” He raises an eyebrow of confusion at her.
“Wow.” She smirks. “She must really like you. She never invites guys over.” She winks at him and leaves his office.
After work, Harry has Charlie drive him over to your place. He rings your buzzer and you let him up. Your door was open a crack for him already, so he goes tight in, loosening his tie.
“Hi, Harry!” You smile.
Your hair was up in a messy bun, and you still had all your work clothes on, but your flannel was unbuttoned, revealing your white tank top and plenty of cleavage. You go over to him and give him a kiss on the cheek.
“Not as big as your place, but it has what I need.”
“It’s lovely. One bedroom?”
“Mhm, and two bathrooms.” You say proudly. “I hope you like food from the crockpot. I set up some chili this morning before I left.”
“Chili sounds amazing, I love spicy food.” He takes his suit jacket off and throws on your couch.
“Great.” You smile and grab some sour cream and cheese from your fridge. You grab a couple of bowls and some spoons and you both serve yourselves. You both sit down at the small table you have in your kitchen.
“This is delicious, thank you.” He smiles.
“Oh, I’m so glad you like it.”
“I’m happy we could get together tonight.”
“Me too.” You smile.
You had fully warmed up to Harry at this point. You’d been seeing each other for a few weeks, and you had let many walls down. You liked him, you really liked him. You two also hadn’t done more than make out, and it was absolutely killing you.
“Do you have plans Saturday evening?”
“I don’t believe so, why? Another movie night?” You ask sort of excitedly and he chuckles.
“No, I wish. I have this charity gala to go to that I actually forgot all about until Stacey reminded me this morning. I’d love for you to join me.”
“Oh…a little fancier than I thought, but, sure.” You shrug. “I could do that. I’ll have to call my hairdresser to see if she can squeeze me in, I’m assuming I’ll probably want my hair done?”
“Only if you feel comfortable…”
“Will I need a gown?”
“Yeah.”
“Alright, I have a couple to choose from in my closet. Do you know what suit you’re wearing?”
“Uh, yeah, here.” He takes his phone out to show you. It was pink with a design on the front. It was beautiful.
“Hm, I think I have a green dress that would look good with this. Pink and green look so nice together.” You use your napkin to wipe your mouth and stand up. “Come on.” You nod towards the hallway.
“Come on what?”
“I wanna show you the gown I have.”
“Oh, alright.”
He follows you into your room, but he stands in the doorway as you go into your closet. It was much smaller than his, but he liked the way you decorated. You utilized a lot of space. You can always tell when a tradesperson lives somewhere because everything always looked really nice. Here were built in shelves and storage units.
“You make those?”
“Mhm, and I made this closet twice as big.” You find the gown you’re thinking of and hold it up in front of your body to show him. “What do you think? Will it do the trick?”
“It’s beautiful, Y/N. Why do you have it?”
“When I was younger I used to participate in pageants. The scholarships were super helpful for college. Anyways, past winners get invited back pretty often and you’re supposed to dress really nice when you go, so I have a couple of formal gowns for when I get those calls.”
“I never would have taken you for a pageant girl.”
“I’m not really…but I needed the money, and I figured out how to play the game. I came in first twice in two different competitions. However, the girls I participated with weren’t very nice, so I wasn’t exactly sad when I got too old for it.” You hang the dress back up. “Don’t worry, I’ll be able to look the part with all your fancy friends.” You smirk and walk out of your room. You sit on your couch and he sits next to you.
“A lot of them aren’t really friends. Acquaintances really. Um, Stacey showed me the guest list today and my ex is apparently going to be there.”
“The model?”
“Yeah.”
“Wonderful.” You scoff. “So are we finally going to have the conversation?”
“What do you mean?”
“She was your last relationship right? Tell me what happened.”
“Not much to tell. We met at a dinner party for a mutual friend. We met in London, actually, but we both had places here in the city, so we kept seeing each other. I didn’t realize how well known she was, so that’s when the paparazzi started. We were together almost a year before it just got to be too much. She wanted me to basically give it all up for her so I could travel with her, but I thought it was selfish of her to ask me to do that, so we broke up.”
“Did you love her?”
“I did.” He says bluntly. “But it wasn’t the type of love I wanted. I don’t have any feelings for her whatsoever, I want you to know that.” He places his hand on your knee. “I just know she’s going to come over to me and look you up and down, and she’s going to be really snotty. She’s…well, she’s a bitch, to put it simply.”
“And you dated her for a year because?”
“Vanity. On paper, we were the perfect match, but I realized it felt like I wasn’t living my own life anymore. I’m much happier now.” He gives your knee a squeeze.
“Alright, well, I’m sure we’ll have a good time. Is it a sit down dinner?”
“It is.”
“Open bar?”
“Yup.”
“Dancing?”
“A little.”
“Sounds like a good time to me.” You smile.
“You’re amazing, thank you.” He leans to kiss you and that was that.
//
The day of the gala, your hairdresser was able to squeeze you in for an updo. You showed her the dress you’d be wearing, so she gave you an elegant bun. You had your nails done as well. You were glad you did because you had a nasty bruise on your thumb. That’ll be the last time you use a regular hammer and not just a nail gun.
When you get home you take out an old pearl necklace that was your great-grandmother’s that would go perfectly with the green dress. It was strapless and fit to your form, with a nice slit starting at one of your thighs. You found a pair of heels that went perfectly with it, and a white shall. You apply your makeup, and take a step back to take yourself in. You looked perfect. You take a selfie to send to Stacey.
Stacey: omfg!!! You’re gonna give Carina a run for her money, have fun!
You smile at the text and find your clutch that goes with the dress. Harry picks you up around seven. You gasp when you see a limo, and not just the regular car he usually picks you up in.
“All this for the two of us?” You ask as he gets out of the car. His suit looked so good. His jaw drops when he sees you.
“You look stunning, Y/N.” He gives you a gentle kiss on the cheek, and help you into the limo. “The limo’s just to keep up appearances. We’re essentially walking down a red carpet into the building. Know how to pose?”
“Oh, I can give face when I need to.” You smirk. “It was fun getting all dressed up since I don’t get to often.”
“I like your flannels too, I hope you know how sexy you look in your work clothes.”
Your cheeks heat up. Harry didn’t really talk like that to you often.
“I’ll have to wear my tool belt for you sometime…just my tool belt.” You whisper in his ear and then face forward. You send a shiver up his spine. He couldn’t wait for that.
When you pull up to the event, Harry gets out first. Cameras start flashing, and he extends his hand out to you. You stand up and nearly feel blinded, but you get through it. You walk with him, his hand on the small of your back. You’d stop occasionally to be photographed. There were reports asking Harry what your name was and other questions, but he didn’t answer a single one. Once you were inside you took a deep breath.
“You did amazing, thank you.”
“No problem. How come they wanted to know who I was?”
“So they can print some story about us. I don’t wanna give up your privacy, so my lips are staying sealed for now.”
You’re brought into a large ball room. There were silent auction items all around the perimeter that Harry would need to put some money down for.
“I hate these things. I’d be happy to just donate without having to get anything in return, you know?”
You walk around with him to look at the items.
“How come you’re not writing anything down?”
“I’m waiting for other people so I can put a larger amount down. They deduct the value of the item from the actual donation, so I wanna make sure enough money gets put down.”
“That’s…really philanthropic of you, Harry.”
“All the proceeds tonight go to inner city schools to get them new computers and other technology they’re in desperate need of.”
You weren’t sure if you’d ever meet Harry’s mother, but you hoped you would just so you could thank her for raising such a kind man. You both mingle with a few people, and eventually Harry puts his bids down for a few different items.
“If I win I’ll just donate this shit. I don’t need anything else.” He shrugs.
Waiters come around with h'orderves and drinks. You snatch a flute of champagne and a shrimp puff.
“Good, babe?” He smiles at you as you lick your lips.
“Very.” You giggle.
His smile fades when he sees Carina from across the room. She had a lovely blue gown on, and some man’s arm was snaked around her waist. She sees Harry and she sends him a small wave. He clutches your hip a little tighter. You look up at him.
“Are you alright?”
“Yeah, uh, wanna find our table?”
“Sure.”
You find your table and you both take your seat. You chat with the woman sitting next to you, and other people begin finding their seats. As the event gets started, waiters come around with food. Someone on a stage comes out and announces who has won what items. People clap. Harry won a couple of the items he bid on. He stands as people clap, and you clap as well. You kiss him on the cheek as he sits back down. Once dinner is through, some people start going out to the dance floor, and others stand around to mingle.
“Well if it isn’t the CEO himself.” Harry turns around the second he hears the accent. “Hi, Harry.”
“Hi, Carina.”
She takes him in for a gentle hug, and kisses him on both cheeks. You want to gag, but you know it’s just a cultural thing.
“And who might this be?” She looks you up and down.
“I’m Y/N.” You extend your hand and she shakes it. “Nice to meet you.”
“Same to you.” She smiles and looks at Harry. “I’m surprised to see you here with someone.”
“Could say the same to you.” He nods over to the man she came with. He was over talking with some other people.
“Oh, that’s Richard. He’s lovely. We met a few months back. He works remotely so he’s able to travel with me. It’s perfect.”
“Good for you.”
“What do you do?” She asks you.
“I’m a union electrician.” You say with a bright smile. “I got a degree in Mathematics and then I joined the trades world.”
“Oh my…I never would have guessed.” She smiles nervously. “Harry, may I borrow you for just a moment? Andrew is here too, and he misses you so much.”
“Um…sure.” He looks at you.
“Go ahead, I need to use the ladies room as it is.”
He watches you walk away and turns back to Carina.
“Andrew’s not here.” Harry says to her.
“I know, I just said that so we could chat. She’s not for you, and you know it.”
“What makes you think you have the right to say that to me?”
“Harry, you can’t be with some blue collar worker.”
“And why not?” He scoffs. “I’ll have you know she’s lovely and elegant, but she’s also not afraid to go to McDonald’s and stuff her face. In fact, she’s not afraid of food at all.”
“I’m on a very strict diet and you know it.” She huffs.
“Why don’t you worry about yourself and Richard?”
Harry turns on his heel and walks towards the restrooms. You were just coming out when you see him waiting.
“Are you alright?” You ask him.
“Yeah, feel like having a dance?”
“Definitely.”
You take his hand as he leads you back into the ballroom and onto the dance floor. The band was only playing slower songs, but that was just fine. Harry was really light on his feet. It made you smile as he led you around.
“You about ready to get out of here?” He whispers in your ear.
“Mhm.”
He smiles at you and leads you out. He says goodbye to a few people, and gets you outside. There were still reporters, but he gets you into the limo quickly.
“So…your ex…was she civil with you?”
“Yeah, nothing to worry about.” He throws his arm around you and kisses your hairline. “Okay to come back to mine?”
“Definitely.”
He gets you up into his place and gets you a glass of water.
“I had a lot of fun tonight.” You tell him.
“Me too, you definitely made it more fun. Those things can be so dreadful.”
“I just look at it as a free dinner.” You laugh.
“Oh, is that all it takes with you?” He smirks.
“Pretty much. I’ll go to a party like that with you anytime.”
“Good to know.” He wraps his arms around your waist and pulls you close to him. Yours go around his neck and you start kissing. You giggle when you let go of him and see your red lipstick all over his mouth.
“Sorry.” You try to rub it off with your thumb.
“No worries.” He chuckles. “Would you like to come upstairs?”
“I would.” You take your heels off, and follow him up.
He leads you into his large bedroom. You gaze at the beautiful furniture.
“I’ve got a walk in closet too.” He says. “You’d probably appreciate the craftsmanship.”
He opens the door for you and you step inside.
“It’s beautiful. I love built ins. Whoever did this did a great job.”
“I only hire the best, but you knew that.” You grip at his suit jacket and push him up against the doorframe of the closet. You slot your lips over his and he welcomes it.
“I want you, Harry.” You say against his lips.
“I want you too.” He kisses on your neck and bites down on your shoulder.
He walks you over to his bed until your legs his the frame. He keeps you steads as his hands find the zipper on the back of dress. You push his suit jacket off his shoulders and let it fall to the ground. He unzips your dress, but holds it up.
“Are you okay with all this?” He asks.
“God, yes.”
Your dress falls to the ground and pools at your feet. Your fingers work to unbutton his shirt. His eyes widen as he looks at the underwear set you’re wearing. You were wearing a strapless black bra with a black lace thong to match. Of course you still needed to wear a bra, your breasts were too large to without. You get his shirt off and you take a step back to admire his tattoos.
“I didn’t know you had so many.” Your hands trace off the ones on his collar bones, his torso, and his hips. “Even your arms.”
‘Got a few on my legs too.” He loves the way your hands felt on his body.
“I thought you just had the cross and the anchor. These are so cool.”
“Thanks.”
Your hands move to his belt buckle and get it undone, his pants drop to the floor moments later. You lick your lips when you see his tight boxers.
“Fuck, Harry, I want you so badly.”
You push him down on the bed and straddle him. His hands go to your hips, rubbing circles into your skin with his thumbs. He reaches up to unhook your bra, and tosses it to the floor. You switch positions so you’re lying on your back. He caresses your breasts and kisses on each of them. He puts his face between them and just enjoys the way your skin feels on him. You start giggling and he looks up at you.
“Breast man, huh?”
“Sorry, was that weird? You just have such a beautiful body.”
“Not weird at all, they’re yours to play with.” You grin.
“Oh, I like the sound of that a lot.”
He takes one of your nipples into his mouth and sucks harshly. You gasp as your hips buck up towards him. He does the same thing to the other before kissing down your body. His hands tug your thong below your hips.
“Can I take this off?”
“Please.”
You lift your hips to help him. He looks down at you and then up to your eyes.
“Can I?”
“Can you what?”
“Make you feel good.”
“Sure, but I wanna hear you say what exactly is going to make me feel good.”
His eyes darken as he looks at you.
“Y/N, I’m going to lick into your cunt until you’re screaming that you can’t take it anymore.”
Your mouth falls open as he parts your legs. He kisses from your knee to your inner thigh. Sucking on where he pleases. He uses his forearm to hold your hips down when he finally gets his tongue on you. He licks a flat stripe from your center up to your clit. You clutch at the soft blankets on his bed as you watch him. He makes eye contact with you when he starts to suck on your clit.
“Oh my god.” You moan as your head falls back. You feel him smirk against you. You start to tug at his curls when he swirls his tongue around you and then flicks it quickly on the nub. “Christ.” You say through gritted teeth.
His tongue moves back to your center where he licks into you. He groans at the taste of you. His middle and index finger move to rub your clit in circles while he uses his tongue to essentially fuck you. Your body was starting to feel hot all over, and you could feel a familiar knot tightening in your lower stomach. He assumes you’re starting to get close because you were starting to tighten around his tongue. He licks back up to your clit, and plunges his fingers inside you.
“Oh, fuck!” You cry out as his fingers work your insides. Your eyes roll into the back of your head when you feel him knuckle deep. “Harry, it’s so good, don’t stop!”
He groans his response as he sucks on your clit again. He curls his fingers up against your front wall where he knew you needed it. He feels you pulsating around him. He could hear you panting and it was music to his ears.
“Shit, oh, fuck, oh my god!” You scream as your orgasm washes over you. He continues to pump his fingers slowly to help you ride it out.
He sits up on his knees and wipes the slick away from his chin with the back of his hand. He licks his lips and smirks at you. You catch your breath and look up at him. You sit up slightly and grab at the band of his boxers.
“Do you want me to-“
“Next time, I really just want to fuck you.”
You bite your lip and nod at him. He takes his boxers off and your eyes grow wide when you see his full length. You spread your legs back apart for him, and he lines himself up.
“Shit, uh…condom.” He backs away from you and rummages through his night table for one.
“I’m on the pill…”
“Found one!” He looks at you. “What did you say?”
“I’m on the pill…if you didn’t feel like using one.” Your cheeks were starting to grow red. “I’m clean. Wouldn’t have let you go down on me if I wasn’t.”
“I’m clean too. So…you don’t want me to use one?”
“Nah, I kind of want you to come inside me if I’m being honest.”
“Jesus.” He grunts and tosses the condom aside. He gets back between your legs and rubs his tip along your slick folds and clit. “You’re positive?”
“Yes.”
He leans down to kiss you as he slowly pushes inside. He swallows you gasp and moan once he bottoms out. You tighten around him involuntarily. He gives you a moment to relax and adjust to him. You hadn’t been stretched out like this since god knows when.
“Go on.” You whisper.
He smiles into your neck as he starts to rock in and out of you. Your arch up into him. Your hands search for a nearby pillow.
“Hold on.” You tell him and lift your hips up, sliding a pillow under you. “Okay.”
“You’re killing me.” He breathes.
He sucks your bottom lip into his mouth as his thrusts pick up the pace. You wrap your legs around him and move along with him. Your hands slide down to his ass so your nails can sink into the fleshy area. He bites down on your collar bone as you keep moving along with him. He was used to women just starfishing under him, this was so nice. He felt really connected to you.
“Oh, shit.” You press your forehead into his chest. “Harry.” You moan.
“Gonna come again?”
“Mhm.”
He snakes a hand between the two of you so he can rub your clit, and that pushes you over the edge. Your nails rake up from his ass to his back as you come, making him moan out at the overwhelming feeling of being marked up by you.
“Can I bend you over the bed?”
You moan out your response. He pulls out of you and gets you on your feet, bending you over. He grips your hips and slips back inside you. All you can hear is his skin slapping against yours. You prop yourself up on your elbows and arch your back. He was hitting so fucking deep, and his tip was brushing against your g-spot. One of his hands goes back to your clit while the other grips the back of your neck while he pounds into you.
“Taking it so well, Y/N.” He grunts.
“Feels so good, fuck!”
He watches as your back arches more and sweat slides down your spine.
“I’m, I’m close.” He says.
“Yeah? You wanna come?”
“Yes, fuck.” He moans out and fills you up while you come again with him.
He had you screaming just like he said he would. He hold you close to him for a moment, his chest flush with your back. He kisses your back before pulling out. You clamp your legs together before anything has a chance to make a mess.
“Let me get you a rag.”
“S’okay, I’ll just use the bathroom.” He helps you stand up and you turn to face him. You grab him by the back of his neck to kiss him. “That was really nice.” You giggle.
You waddle to his bathroom while he grabs a fresh pair of boxers. You clean yourself up and come back out.
“Can I give you something to wear?”
“Please.” You smile. You couldn’t stop smiling, really.
He hands you one of his bed shirts. It had his initials embroidered on the chest pocket. He watches as you button it up.
“Comfortable?”
“Very.” You crawl onto the bed with him. You throw a leg over his and rest your head on his chest. He looks down at you and cups your cheek, pulling you in for a kiss.
“You make me really happy, Y/N.”
“You make me happy too, Harry. I may even let you stay over at my place sometime.” You chuckle.
“I’d like that.” He kisses your forehead. “But only if I’m staying over there as your boyfriend.” He grins.
“I think I’d feel comfortable with that.” You kiss his soft, swollen lips.
“Really? You’re into all this, you’re not just saying that because we had some hot sex?”
“Harry.” You giggle. “The sex was really hot, and I may have had my reservations about you, but we’ve gotten to know each other well, I’d like to be your girlfriend. Let’s make it official.”
“I have to warn you, I’m gonna want to spoil you rotten. You may get annoyed with me.”
“You can’t buy my affection, just remember that.”
“I know, I just can’t help wanting to just give you everything you want.”
“You’re what I want. I don’t care about all this.” You gesture to his extravagant bedroom.
“I know you don’t, I think that’s why I like you so much. You could care less!” He laughs. “It’s amazing. You’re totally not shallow. It’s refreshing.” He settles down further into the bed and you kiss him a few times on the cheek.
“I get busy a lot. When there’s over time I take it. I may have to break dates once in a while.”
“Same here.”
“If you’re traveling, I won’t be able to just drop everything to go with you.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to. I like that you work hard and that you actually want to work. You have an honest job, and I really admire that.”
“Thanks.” You kiss on his chest. He liked that you were a kisser. Harry loved being loved on. “However, if you want to plan a trip to that beach house of yours…I certainly could put in for some vacation time.”
“You’d love it out there. It’s nice and private, we’d have our own beach. I have a boat too with a kitchen and bedroom below deck. It’s great.”
“This will definitely take some getting used to.” You laugh. “I’ll have to keep bringing you to dive bars so to knock you down a peg.” You joke.
“Whatever you need to do.” He smirks.
“I’m also going to teach you how to cook. We don’t need to have a catered meal every time we hang out here.”
“That seems fair. Could we start with that chili you made? It was so fucking good.”
“Sounds like a plan to me.”
You sigh happily and snuggle into his chest as he holds you. You both slept really well that night. You weren’t sure what exactly being a girlfriend to a CEO would entail, but as long as the both of you stayed on the same page about your values, you saw this relationship lasting for a very long time.
#harry styles#harry styles one shot#harry styles imagine#harry styles fic#harry styles fanfic#harry styles x reader#harry styles slow burn#harry styles x y/n#harry styles y/n#harry styles fluff#harry styles fluff fic#harry styles smut#harry styles smut fic#ceo!Harry#harry styles au#pls tag if you reblog#feedback is always appreciated!!
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Dizzy, foggy and feeling ‘like I was a corpse’: Inside Bowen Byram’s harrowing first year with the Avalanche
Bowen Byram was sick of it. Sick of thinking he was better, only for symptoms to return. Sick of not being able to put everything into his offseason training. Sick of not feeling like himself.
The Avalanche defenseman called his mom one day this summer when the load got too heavy. He had felt totally out of it skating that morning. Months of frustration — of setbacks and symptoms and not knowing what was wrong — had built up. When Stacey Byram answered, he confessed a growing worry: that his career was slipping away.
“What am I going to do now?” he remembers asking. “I can’t play hockey anymore.”
Sitting in his Toyota Tacoma in Vancouver, where he trains during the offseason, he was a worn-down 20-year-old, struggling and scared. He’d never suffered a serious injury before the 2020-21 season, but in his first full year as an NHL player, he’s dealt with multiple concussions, vertigo and COVID-19, all of which have limited him to only 30 games.
At times over the summer, Byram didn’t know what symptoms were caused by what. His medical situation was perplexing, and the recovery process hasn’t been fun. The family thought at various times they were done with it, and then something else would go wrong.
Now, after it finally looked like he weathered the worst of his problems, an errant elbow has thrown him back on the roller coaster once again.
Byram, who often sports a youthful grin, is confident and chatty when he feels like himself. He’s a jokester, someone who occasionally talked too much while growing up in Cranbrook, British Columbia, but was constantly kind, looking for ways to include classmates and teammates, his mom says. When New Jersey defenseman Ty Smith met Byram four years ago on Canada’s U18 team, he couldn’t believe how outgoing his new teammate was, and Avalanche forward Tyson Jost calls Byram bubbly, a “salt of the earth guy” who brings good banter to the dressing room.
“He’s a social being,” Stacey says. “He’s touchy and interactive and wants to look in your eyes.”
So the isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic posed challenges for Byram. He didn’t appear in any games for the Avalanche in the 2020 playoffs but skated with the team in the Edmonton bubble, spending more than a month within the strict parameters there. Then, at Team Canada’s training camp ahead of World Junior Championships, he had to quarantine for 14 days in his hotel room after two teammates tested positive for the virus. He ultimately captained Canada to a silver medal and, in January 2021, arrived in Denver to join the Avalanche and take the first step in a lifelong dream: playing NHL games.
But the 2020-21 season was far from normal. Colorado instructed players to remain cautious of the virus, so there weren’t the normal get-togethers or team outings. His parents weren’t in the stands for his NHL debut; they watched from their couch in Cranbrook.
Byram, the people lover, spent his free time by himself, all while adjusting to being a young defenseman in the world’s hardest league.
“Of course, he was ecstatic being down there,” Stacey says. “(But) I could tell he was really lonely.”
Then came the concussions. Byram doesn’t know what caused the first one, which he sustained in a late-February game against Arizona. He just woke up the next morning not feeling right.
When the team diagnosed Byram with a concussion, Stacey decided she needed to be there. She drove 17 hours to Denver from Cranbrook, presenting a note from the team at the U.S.-Canada border saying she was coming to help her son.
Byram recovered fine from the first concussion, returning to the lineup 19 days later. But then, with the Avalanche hosting Vegas in late March, he found himself chasing a puck toward the side boards. As he flung the puck out of the defensive zone, Golden Knights forward Keegan Kolesar flew toward him, leaving his feet and making contact with Byram’s head. The defenseman grabbed his helmet before skating off the ice and heading to the dressing room.
With fans not yet allowed in Ball Arena due to COVID-19 regulations, Stacey watched on TV from her son’s apartment. She texted her husband, Shawn, after the play. They worried and waited, but the fear dissipated when Byram eventually returned to the game.
That relief faded as soon he got home.
“I could tell the minute he walked in it wasn’t good,” she says.
Byram was upfront with her, saying he didn’t feel well but would go to bed and see how he was doing in the morning. When he woke up, there was no improvement. He felt foggy. Not like himself.
That hit began a yo-yo of progress and setbacks. Concussion recovery isn’t linear, so at points Byram would feel better, only to hit another rut. He started dealing with vertigo, too.
“I’d be so dizzy, I’d be over the toilet almost throwing up,” he says.
During times he felt up for it, Byram and Stacey would go for walks. They’d play cards or go for a drive, one time making a trip to Red Rocks to take in the sandstone formations.
On other days, Byram couldn’t do much.
“I just wasn’t really up for it most of the time just because I was feeling not like myself,” he says.
The Avalanche set him up with a sports psychologist, and that helped. He also took to meditating, using the Calm app on his iPhone almost daily, which allowed him to play guided audio tailored to specific situations, be it for when he was relaxing or getting to sleep.
“(It) helps you lift that weight you’re feeling off your shoulders at times,” Byram says. “I just felt like nothing was going my way. … It was kind of an escape.”
Ten days after the Kolesar hit, as Byram started feeling better, he joined the team on a four-game road trip, and Stacey headed back home to British Columbia. But as he neared a return to game action, he dealt with a setback of a different kind: He tested positive for COVID-19 while the team was in Anaheim.
L.A. Kings right wing Adrian Kempe checks Bowen Byram into boards. (Kirby Lee / USA Today)
Byram took a car service back to Denver, sequestered in a taped-off backseat for 16 hours. He felt a little sick for a few days after his positive test, but it wasn’t too bad. After going through protocol, he worked out a few times and — finally — got back on the ice.
That didn’t go as planned.
“After I skated, I felt like I was a corpse,” he says. “I was dizzy, couldn’t see. It was crazy. It was like somebody was pounding on my head. It was tough, and everything snowballed on top of it.”
His vertigo episodes became more frequent after he got COVID-19, and he didn’t always know what was causing his symptoms. It was, as he put it, an undocumented area. One doctor told him that COVID-19 picks on weaker parts of the body.
“And Bowen’s weak part at that time was his brain,” his dad says. “We think it put him back a long way.”
“If you have a head injury, then you get an illness that affects the neural system, you have all these side effects that nobody’s really studied yet,” says trainer Jordan Mackenzie, who worked with Byram over the summer.
With Byram’s mom back in British Columbia, his girlfriend, Kailey, visited from Nova Scotia, where she’s in college. He was frustrated with his situation and, like his mom had, his girlfriend provided moral support. Avalanche center Nathan MacKinnon also helped out, paying for Byram to work with his personal trainer, Marcin Goszczynski.
Goszczynski did functional neurology exercises with Byram, and the defenseman had an upswing ahead of the playoffs. The medical staff cleared him to play, but, while he skated with the team throughout the postseason, coach Jared Bednar didn’t put him in the lineup. The coach hadn’t been blown away with the games he’d seen Byram play earlier in the season, and he was hesitant to throw such a young player into a physical second-round playoff series against a strong Vegas team.
“Would’ve loved to have him back a few weeks before the season ended, be able to experiment with him a little bit, see how he played, and then he could’ve been a good option for us,” Bednar says. “But he just wasn’t healthy.”
When the Avalanche lost Game 6, Byram watched his first NHL season end from the press box. He had pushed to get back in the lineup, but in retrospect, he believes it’s good he didn’t get into game action, because his situation took a turn south when summer training began.
“I just went downhill again and kind of fell apart,” he says.
Byram arrived in Vancouver in mid-June, motivated for an offseason training with NHLers Brendan Gallagher, Milan Lucic and Ty Smith, only to feel the lingering effects of his injury return. Mackenzie, who has worked with Byram since 2018, noticed his recovery times were slower during workouts. He had less energy.
Mackenzie knows Byram as a loud guy, happy to talk with anyone and joke around with serious veterans like Lucic. But that aspect of his personality was lacking at the start of the summer. He normally loves skating and working out in the gym, but he physically couldn’t put all his effort into it. That sucked out the enjoyment.
“I’ve just totally been invested since I can remember,” Byram says. “I’ve always said I’m going to be a hockey player. That was the scary thing for me: not totally knowing what the future was going to hold.”
He didn’t necessarily feel terrible; just off. And the buildup of not feeling like himself led him to the call with his mom. Stacey’s heart stopped when she heard how dejected he was.
“It was probably a bit over-reactive from myself, but when you’re in positions like that and not feeling good, it really is hard to keep a positive mindset,” Byram says.
Mentally and physically exhausted, he needed to vent, he remembers, and Stacey mostly just listened. She also gave him some perspective: Just because he was injured then didn’t mean he’d always be injured.
Mackenzie and Byram’s goal for the summer was to get “Bo back to being Bo,” the trainer says. That meant pouring time into treatment. The clinic he trained at in Vancouver had a massage therapist who worked on the soft tissue around his neck, and he saw a specialist with experience in post-concussion management. He tried to check every box, hoping for a breakthrough.
That also meant seeing a therapist in Vancouver. Byram says he wasn’t depressed, but he felt on edge after months of frustration. He needed someone to help him take a step back.
“You don’t want to admit something is wrong, but when something is wrong, it needs to be taken care of,” he says. “I’m not afraid to tell anyone I saw a therapist now. I’m proud. I think everybody should. It helped me so much and it helped rejuvenate me as a person and eventually on the ice again.”
He saw improvements and, at the end of July, went on a 10-day wilderness trip in the Yukon with his dad. They camped near Kusawa Lake, completely isolated and unplugged from the outside world. To get there, they had to drive more than 24 hours north and then, since drivable roads extend only so far, take a small plane into the bush.
“There’s a lot of hardship and physical exertion and pain that goes with it,” Shawn says. “You’ve got to be motivated by something you can’t always explain.”
Byram felt symptoms on a couple of days during the trip, his dad says, but he mostly just valued the grounding presence of nature. It was hard work — they hiked more than a dozen miles some days — but good for staying in the moment. On their last evening, with a plane set to come the next morning, father and son built a fire. Byram kicked off his shoes and sat against a rock, his toes near the warmth of the flames. There was a sense of exhaustion between them, and accomplishment, too.
“That (trip) kind of gave him — and I think his nervous system — a chance to really settle down and take in all the work that had been done over the past three or four weeks before he left,” Mackenzie says.
When Byram returned to Vancouver after the trip, Mackenzie saw a shift. He radiated enthusiasm walking through the door. “Let’s go!” the trainer thought to himself.
Bo was back to being Bo.
Bowen Byram takes in the mountain view while in the Yukon. (Photo by Shawn Byram)
Earlier this month, Byram glided toward the Columbus net on a two-on-one, sandy hair poking out of the back of his helmet. He waited calmly for a pass from teammate Nazem Kadri and, when it came, flicked the puck into the net. Not all defensemen have this type of offensive skill, especially at 20 years old, and Byram wasn’t done. With less than a minute left in the game and the Avalanche trailing by a goal, he flung a shot on net and watched as it zipped in for a goal. He turned, full of adrenaline, and pumped his fist.
In that moment, it felt like a statement game, like Byram had arrived as a truly dangerous NHL player — maybe even a star. He showed all the tools that led Colorado to draft him fourth overall in 2019, as well as confidence he believes he lacked during his 19-game stint last season.
“Every time I step on the ice and I feel good, it’s such a breath of fresh air, because, seriously, for a while there, I was like, ‘I’m done,’” he said at the time, noting that most of his lingering injury concern had dissipated.
A thought struck Stacey after she watched her son force overtime with the Blue Jackets. She felt like — after everything — the family had finally made it through. Sure, there had been scares since his return, notably when Byram took a dangerous cross-check into the boards against Minnesota, but her son had continually been fine. He told his mom about how good he was feeling: better than he’d felt since before his days as a major junior player in the Western Hockey League.
Then came the elbow.
With the Avalanche hosting the Canucks on Thursday, Byram skated toward Vancouver captain Bo Horvat, ready to fight for a puck along the boards. As the two collided, Horvat’s elbow hit Byram’s face and the defenseman fell to the ice. He got up quickly but skated gingerly to the bench and went down to the dressing room.
An all-too familiar problem was back.
“It’s scary stuff,” teammate and close friend Alex Newhook says.
Byram felt great the morning after absorbing Horvat’s elbow, and he skated with the team, laughing between drills like normal. But concussions are cruel and unpredictable. The next day, this past Saturday, he woke up feeling not well. By Monday, the team had put him back in concussion protocol.
“That’s not something you ever want to see,” teammate Andre Burakovsky says.
Bednar doesn’t have a return timeline, and how could he? He said this week that Byram is out until he feels better. Then, once again, he can begin the process of easing himself back into action.
Given the injury and Byram’s history, it’s unclear when that will come.
(Illustration: John Bradford / The Athletic; Photos: Kevin Light, Michael Martin,
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Destiel Chronicles
Vol. LXVI
It was a love story from the very beginning.
You are the one in my heart (Part II)
(11x13)
Hello! I bring to you another meta from this collection – the second part! We will keep talking about broken hearts and how in love Dean is with Castiel. I know you love this topic. And I just decided this will have a third part because I have so many things to say...
First of all, I want to say thank you to @destielle , she's the beta reader of this mess. Thank you for making my meta look so pretty 😘💕💕
Cheating and love triangles
Episode 11x13 is titled 'Love Hurts' and it fits perfectly because, remember how Dean felt so hurt when Casifer tried to use him as bait? Okay. We all agree he suffered a heart break then, and that’s why the Banshee could get to him. Now, this episode talks about broken hearts, too… but also about a cursed kiss: Amara's kiss.
The episode opens with a husband cheating on his wife with their babysitter. It’s a love triangle functioning as a Destiel mirror, but they add in some spicy confusion to the subtext: Melissa (the depressed wife) is the Cas mirror, we have Stacey, the babysitter, for Amara and Dan as Dean.
So when we have Stacey saying: "Ew, I can taste her mom lipstick…you’re telling her tonight, right?" we get the mirrored thoughts of Amara after kissing Dean, who is, too, already taken, compromised – bonded with Castiel.
And when Dan says: "I told you it’s not that simple. Mel and I…we’ve been together since we were your age. We have a house, a baby…we have a whole life together." He's talking about marriage, a serious commitment, which works as the perfect parallel to Dean and Castiel’s long-term relationship.
So when the Qareen appears in the form of Dan and rips Stacy's heart out from her chest (and vice versa a little further into the episode), we are still talking about broken hearts. But we get confused because Dan admits his love for the babysitter, and therefore could never hurt her. Because you don't hurt the one you love (obviously if Dean had listened a little closer to Dan, he surely would have recalled that nefarious chat with Casifer where he proposed to put Dean in danger).
So, going with the assigned roles, let’s say if Dan is Dean and Stacy is Amara, does that mean when Dan is saying he loves Stacy, not his wife, that Dean loves Amara, and not Cas? No. Not at all. Because the upcoming scenes and what Dean says by the end of the episode will clarify: THE KISS AMARA GAVE HIM IS A CURSE AND HE IS NOT IN LOVE WITH HER.
Now, I want to share with you my beta's clarifying thought, that calmed my shipping heart...
"Hi, destielle here, rudely taking advantage of beta’ing to add a thought: I think the babysitter merely posed as a temptation, something Dan tried out because it’s kind of forbidden and dangerous and therefore exciting, plus conquering a girl stimulates his self-worth but - breaking up with his wife never really was a heartfelt intention. Because getting it on with the babysitter is not only a clichée, but also only fun for a little while, because everything, in the end, will lose its newness and therefore allurement and so I suspect he knew that sticking to what he has, a long-term thing that lasts, is the better road to go by far. Plus there’s a difference between true love and excitement induced infatuation. The ladder will fade, love will last and grow stronger bc it’s built upon a solid foundation."
This is so true, and couldn't be more agreed! Thank you Hannah! 😚💕
The Cursed Kiss
This was a very blatantly straight forward episode, because first it was opened with a recall to AMARA's kiss to Dean. And then they showed us how the Qareen’s curse jumped from one to the next victim via kiss. So, you have a deadly kiss, a cursed kiss… The mark of Cain’s kiss, darkness’s kiss, AMARA's kiss… that wasn't love, that wasn't good. AMARA's kiss is dark, bad, cursed and deadly.
AMARA's kiss poop? 🤣
Who's in Dean's heart?
We already know the answer, but let's dig into it anyway…
The first scene with the Winchester brothers takes place in the Bunker's kitchen the morning after Valentine's day and Dean is having a hard time trying to restore himself… he's walking funny on his way to the fridge… if you know what I mean. But mostly we wonder why that is. He's not the guy for a one-night-only-girl anymore, so what was the matter? And immediately after that question we asked ourselves Dean says this to his brother…
Sam: Is that a hickey? (Dean spits out his food)
Gif set credit @spnwhenever
Dean: And? It was valentine’s day. I can’t help it if I’m a hopeless romantic.
Sam: You got half of that right.
Dean: Just doing my civic duty. Helping all the single ladies. You know the best thing about February 14th. You don’t have to be Mr. Right. Just Mr. Right Now
Sam: That’s classy
Is this the old Dean talking? Nope, definitely not. It’s Mr Dean ‘Broken-hearted’ Winchester talking. And we get it now… Saint Valentine's day, he wasn't with his Mr. Right (Cas)... He just took what was right in that moment. It’s very very sad. But Dean needs to frame it more classy, to make it more cool.
Now, I want to talk a little about Melissa. When she realizes she maybe went too far with her spell, she turns to Dean and Sam, and she says this…
Melissa: yes. A return to love spell. All I had to do was chant it and seal it with a kiss. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I swear. I just wanted my husband back.
This is sad too, and gives us, if we take that as a feeling mirrored from Cas, a perfectly reasonable explanation as to why he said ‘Yes’ to Lucifer in the cage. And again it’s the motive of the CURSED KISS, one with dark intentions… we already learned AMARA's kiss is bad and not good, but now we get even more confirmation of this when Dean kisses Melissa, taking the curse on him that way. WE GET IT WRITERS!
Gif credit @clairvoyantsam
Sam: So the curse is transmittable?
Just like Cain's mark, the curse, the kiss, the love spell, all of them are transmittable.
Sam: Apparently not in him. The person who holds the Qareen’s heart is the one who commands it.
Sam is giving us a lot of clues here: Who has AMARA's heart? Dean. But who has Dean's heart? Castiel. So Dean can direct his own will to reject AMARA's offer. And this is the secret why DEAN CAN RESIST HER.
So, with this statement in our heads, let's analyze the Qareen’s and Dean’s encounter…
The Qareen takes the form of people’s darkest desires. So… he took AMARA's shape.
The Qareen sensed Dean's longing in his heart, but it failed in personifying it. Because Dean's darkest desire is not dark, it’s full of light, but is hidden, because it’s so repressed. His deepest is a secret, it’s his love for Castiel.
Amara: Who I am doesn’t matter. The real question is who are you?
Dean: What do you mean who am I?
She can't read him, Dean Winchester is a mystery, she can't get to his true feelings, she can't reach them. Dean has them sealed away very, very deep down in his soul. Like a treasure.
Amara: You’re a mystery. I can see inside your heart. Feel the love you feel. Except it’s cloaked in shame. When it comes to this, you can’t help yourself, so why fight it. Just give in.
When she says Dean Winchester is a mystery it’s because she really can't read the truth in him, but she knows it’s somewhere in there. She feels it, but can't quite grasp it. And she says 'it's clocked in shame.' Because it is, because Dean Winchester is ashamed of his feelings for Castiel. He knows he shouldn't feel how he feels for his best friend, for a ‘man’, for an angel. He thinks he doesn't deserve him. So, when the Qareen touches herself saying 'when it comes to this, you can't help yourself, so why fight it. Just give in.' It’s simple when it’s about women, when it’s about a curse, a love spell, the attraction is there, the curse is there, he knows it, but they're not Mr. Right. They're just there… the girls on Saint Valentine's Day are available and Amara is almost irresistible because of the curse. But Dean Winchester doesn't give in to that because he loves Castiel.
And then, Qareen!Amara can’t rip Dean's heart from his chest. Because she is not the one in his heart.
We need more evidence? What about this last dialogue between Sam and Dean…
Dean: It was Amara
Sam: That surprise you?
Dean: That doesn’t surprise you?
Sam: Honestly?
Dean: Honestly? You seriously think the sister of God is my deepest darkest desire?
Sam: She isn’t?
Dean: No! She can’t be!
Gif credit @samwinchesterlesbian 👇
Dean puts all his fierceness into these words, BECAUSE HE IS SURE! HE KNOWS POSITIVELY IT CAN'T BE, BECAUSE HE LOVES CASTIEL.
Sam: Why not?
Dean: Why? Because if she is that means that I’m…
Sam: Means you’re what? Complicit? Weak? Evil?
Dean: For starters, yeah
Dean is afraid of the power Amara has over him, that’s it.
Dean: Standing here right now, every bone in my body wants to run her through. Send her back to that hole she crawled out of. But when I’m near her, I don’t know. Something happens and I can’t explain it, but to call it desire or love…it’s not that. I’m screwed man. We wanna kill the darkness. We need to kill the darkness. And I don’t think I can. I’m sorry to do that to you, ya know, but when it comes right down to it…
The most important thing here is that Dean is aware of the curse, of the power, he knows what Amara does to him, and he is sure that it is NOT LOVE. How can he be sure that it’s not love? BECAUSE HE KNOWS WHAT LOVE IS, BECAUSE THERE'S SOMEONE IN HIS HEART ALREADY, AND THAT'S CASTIEL.
To Conclude:
If the episode with Mildred showed us Dean was pining for someone, telling us Dean is in love with someone, then this one is yelling in our faces that person isn't Amara. And if it’s not Amara plus ‘cloaked in shame’, and Dean has gotten his heart broken recently by someone we know, we are talking about the same person: Castiel.
So it’s logical! And we made the equation just like the writers wanted us to solve it: DEAN WINCHESTER IS IN LOVE WITH CASTIEL, BUT HE'S ASHAMED OF THIS FEELING. AND AMARA HAS A DARK POWER OVER HIM THROUGH A TRANSMITTABLE CURSE: CAIN'S MARK. CANONICAL FACTS! But yeah, I'm not discovering a new world here...
I hope you liked this mess. See you in the next one!
Tagging @metafest @magnificent-winged-beast @emblue-sparks @weirddorkylittlediana @michyribeiro @whyjm @legendary-destiel @a-bit-of-influence @thatwitchydestielfan @misha-moose-dean-burger-lover @lykanyouko @evvvissticante @savannadarkbaby @dea-stiel @poorreputation @bre95611 @thewolfathedoor @charlottemanchmal @neii3n @deathswaywardson @followyourenergy @dean-is-bi-till-i-die @hekatelilith-blog @avidbkwrm @anarchiana @dickpuncher365 @vampyrosa @foxyroxe-art @authorsararayne @anonymoustitans @mybonsai1976 @love-neve-dies @wildligia @dustythewind @wayward-winchester67 @angelwithashotgunandtrenchcoat @trashblackrainbow @deeutdutdutdoh @destiel-is--endgame @destiel-shipper-11 @larrem88 @charmedbycastiel @ran-savant @little-crazy-misha-minion @samoosetheshipper
@shadows-and-padlocked-hearts @mishtho @dancingtuesdaymorning @nerditoutwithbooks @mikennacac73 @justmeand-myinsight @idontwantpeopletoknowmyname @tenshilover20 @teddybeardoctor @pepevons @helevetica @isthisdestiel @dizzypinwheel @jawnlockwinchester @horsez2 @qanelyytha
@imjustkipping @destielle @agusvedder @spnsmile @shippsblog @robot-feels
If you want to be added or removed from this list, just let me know.
If you want to read the previous metas From s11, here you have the links: Vol. LXII, LXIII, LXIV, LXV.
Buenos Aires, June 16th 2020 18:45 PM
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My head’s hurting from work, so I’m going to type on here about the Marvel Comics February 2021 solicitations, for no reason, just to get my fingers moving about something besides whatever it is I do around here (?). (Does anyone know how to lawyer good?? Please send fried cheese).
Venom is looking for light that can pierce darkness, which they invented years ago-- it’s called “light.” That’s what light is, dummies.
There’s a comic character called Gwenom now... I guess that’s the Venom version of Gwen Stacey, a girl that Peter Parker killed when he threw one of his spunk-ropes at her legs at an inconvenient time. Spiderman: the relatable franchise!
Everybody’s fighting something called Knull this month. Knaaaah-I’m-good. Knothanks. Humor! Whee! Knull is actually the Korean version of a null-- if a null could be 12-15 beautiful, dancing hairless men, that would be the Marvel Universe’s greatest villain and art critic John Ruskin’s greatest contribution yet to popular culture. Just like I always said. (A fun thing on the internet is articles about Kpop stars balding, though, in case that got by you... kind of a fun topic...)
Black Panther is about Black Panther dealing with the “yearnings of his heart.” I sure hope this isn’t one of those “Obama wanted to sex up a leggy bisexual socialist” situations (a weird thing for Obama to be rambling about, but I mean, who among us, etc.).
They keep talking about a King in Black. Is that supposed to be a reboot of the King in Yellow? I guess black is cooler than yellow, for goths and what have you. Is this for the goths? Remember when goths were a huge genre in comics? “Life is a black flower in a cemetery, and when you open your mouth to scream, only the darkness can hear it. Anyways, here’s a comic book full of gags and laugh-em-ups.”-- Slave Labor Graphics, 1995-2005. Are those still a thing? Or are there comics now about whatever Generation Z does instead of being goth, like, I don’t know, watching people saying the n-word while playing videogames on twitch....? Are there comics in that genre?? I have no idea-- I don’t know their ways! The youths terrify me... (I spent like 2 minutes at lunch today looking at a Buzzfeed article about how a Tik Tok star vomited a snail and I had to stop because I felt blood coming out of my eyes... It got pretty J-Horror...)
“a mob of Knullified inmates” -- wordplay!
There’s a comic writer with the last name “Grønbekk“ now. I think that’d be neat, having a name that force people who write it to have to figure out how to do special characters on their keyboards for. I mean, it’d make filling in bubbles for the PSAT harder, and all, but when was the last time you took the PSAT? Last week??? During a pandemic?! In this economy? Aurora borealis???
I have a hard time pronouncing S.W.O.R.D. I keep wanting to pronounce the W. But I have an easy time not buying it! HEY-O!!! Proud of myself!
Oh right, they have Esad doing Eternals comics now. That’s like the biggest Kirby thing that I never liked very much, not including Golden Age stuff that I don’t really know. (I mean, there’s always some Golden Age comic about little kids at a ranch who are learning about their bodies or whatever, and who’s even read any of those except for your mom, judging by how much she knows about young men’s bodies). It felt like that was the one where he let the 70′s get to him. Or I don’t know-- the designs aren’t cool. The main guy, Blonde Man, he just has like a crotch-bib, and a bunch of badges he got from a Horseshoe Manufacturing Convention pinned to his plunging-neckline-for-men henley shirt, and like... It just wasn’t Kirby’s best day. (I mean, Kirby’s best day was probably when he murdered a bunch of sleeping Nazis that he came across in the woods who never knew what hit ‘em, but I mean, artistically). Yeah, yeah, the Celestials-- all the big weird Celestial shit-- sure, sure, I mean, yes, he was still Kirby. He was Kirby till the end. But. It’s just not stuff I’ve ever managed to get past like page 5 on... I’m sure Esad’s good or not or whatever, I like his work, but you know, I don’t feel any great like nostalgia or affection for that franchise, so. But there’s going to be a Kumail movie, so it’s like... the MCU’s getting into the Stuber business. I’ll end up seeing it and having to reevaluate eventually...
X-Men Legends, except the first legend up to bat is Fabian Nicieza. A finger goes down on a monkey’s paw somewhere.
X-Force. One of my nephews asked me what an X-Force was out of the blue the other day. I have no idea where he heard about it, but it was pretty worrisome stuff. Have you ever tried to explain what an X-Force is to a child? Not easy! “But you see then Rob Liefeld took over the New Mutants, but here’s the thing: Louise Simonson still had a great career on Superman, which I think shouldn’t go overlooked here”... I'm not great with kids...
“Cable gets together with his – ahem – intimate friend Domino.“
The Iron Man #6 solicitation is longer than the script to some of these comics. Calm it down, Alan Moore! It includes the phrase “With Hellcat on the psychological ropes” -- oh, the psychological ropes and what have you. Those ropes! You wouldn’t want people who are into the ropes in a tumblr way to get the wrong idea. (I’m not into the ropes-- I followed a girl on here who got into the ropes and it just... She seemed happy! I mean, I can’t judge it, but needing a merit badge in knots just to make out-- isn’t life hard enough?).
People in superhero comics are always struggling with their aunt’s sister and their uncle’s nephew. Boy, events are certainly happening to characters. Tensions are at an all-time high. Can things ever go back to how they once were???
There’s a sequel to Marvels except it’s called Marvel...? Kind of a reverse Alien, I guess. A copy of NFL Superpro is going to burst out of Kurt Busiek’s chest. RIP.
Are all of these characters on boats now??
“MARDI GRAS VARIANT COVER BY HUMBERTO RAMOS” Humberto Ramos is going to show us his tits for beads! Finally! Beads! Beads! Beads!
The new issue of Conan will be a “perfect jumping-on point”. You know: for people who worry that they wouldn’t be able to understand a fucking Conan comic without a helping hand. MENSA-types, scientists, philosophers, dreamers, rainbow-connectioners, and what have you. Aiming for that braniac crowd with a jumping on point for Conan, something that’ll help them see through the fog and really finally at last comprehend what’s going on. (Remember when Time Magazine called the Conan movie “Star Wars for psychopaths”...? Reviews for that first movie are a lot of fun).
The new Star Wars series is called the HIGH REPUBLIC. Yeaaaaaah man, George Washington grew that shit. You can make paper out of it. Star Wars knows what’s up. (You know that I was 1000% the “you can make paper out of it” guy for most of my life, you can guess that-- I'm not ashamed; the internet’s judged me too many times for it to hurt anymore!!!).
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Here’s chapter 5! Trust
After a few days of swimming through currents to get back to the place where she last saw Maria, Emily began to grow tired. "Maria, where'd you go?" She said. "Emily!" Shouted a voice behind her, Emily turned around and saw her three other friends, Alice, Bianca and Stacey. "Guys! what are you doing here?" Emily said worried they might get in trouble, "We came here to make sure you find Maria, did she come with you to your mom's place?" Alice asked, "No, she ran away after the shark attacked her mom..." Emily said. "Hmmp!" Alice scoffed, Emily looked at Alice, did she think that was funny? "What was that for?" Emily asked, "Its just how I think, where did Maria go?" Alice said "Uhh, Northeast... I've been tracking her scent so we probably should follow it so it could lead us to her." Said Emily. Alice nodded and the four girls went through the current that quickly rushed them through the same trail it took Maria.
Swimming back up to where the battle-scared shark killed her sister and to where Maria was swimming away, Doria swam up to the current and smelled around for her niece's scent, "There!" She said and began too follow the scent trail to Maria, carrying her sister's bow and arrow and spear and wearing crab armor she was going to make sure that nothing happens to Maria.
The next morning, Maria woke up to a partly cloudy sunny day. She yawned and stretched to wake herself up and then looked down and saw that she had turned back into a siren and that everything was wet, but that wasn't what freaked her out, it was the new fish smell again! She sniffed around to see where this 'new fish' was when she looked beside her on her left and saw Alberto, only it wasn't Alberto, it was a Sea Monster! Maria gasped and took a good look at it. Looks like Alberto wasn't joking at all last night. Then Giulia opened her window and starting singing like a trumpet noise which startled Maria as she accidentally falls off behind the tree. "I can't be seen like this!" She said as she began patting herself down to quickly get dry and as she did her fins, gills and scales went away and she was back to human form. Alberto woke up startled by Giulia's trumpet noises "Do you have to do that everyday?" He asked a little annoyed, "Yep! Hey, where's Maria?" She asked looking around for her "I-I'm here! Heh, just waiting for all of you to get up." Maria said awkwardly smiling coming out from behind the tree, "How'd you get down there?" Giulia asked, "Oh! Um, Alberto kinda scared me when I woke up, heh..." Maria said "Well I told ya, me and Luca are Sea Monsters!" He said jumping down from the tree and shaking the water off him dry so he could turn back into a human, "Does the whole town know about this?" Maria asked "Yep! But its cool. They're fine with it!" Alberto said walking up to Maria and grabbing her hand to pull her back inside the house, but strangely Maria took her hand back and quickly walked into the house, Alberto just shrugged his shoulders as nothing just happened and went inside the house too. They all sat at the table to eat breakfast, which was pesto again, and ate. When finished, they all went outside to play, Giulia, Luca and Alberto went to the water to play. Once Luca and Alberto went into the water they transformed into Sea Monsters, "C'mon, Maria! The waters fine!" Alberto screamed for Maria to join, Maria was standing at the edge away from the water nervous, "No, its fine! You... continue to have fun!" Maria said "Aw, c'mon!" Alberto said coming out the water help Maria to the water, but Maria kept backing away which made Alberto a sad look "Maria?" He said sadly, "Hey, Alberto!" Luca screamed "Come play catch!" Alberto started to head back to the water, he turned back to Maria and gave a sad look then looked back towards his attention to Luca, did he do something wrong? Giulia came up to Maria, "Aye, Amica, what's wrong?" She asked. Maria sighed, "Can I talk to you alone? Please?" She said and grabbed Giulia's hand and went behind some rocks. "What is it, Maria?" Giulia asked. "I'm a siren..." said Maria, Giulia gave a weird look to Maria confused to what she just said, Maria sighed and went to the water still hidden from the others and dunked the top half of her body in the water and came back up. She had scales that were silver grey like a fish and had fins on her back, elbows and ears. "Oh Mio Dio!" Giulia gasped "Ok, so why is this an issue?" She asked, Maria sighed, "Its because its forbidden for Siren's and Sea Monsters to meet, befriend, marry, or even talk to one another!" "Why?" Giulia asked, "Because Sea Monsters are apparently the cause of our exposure!" Maria exclaimed, "Why?" Giulia asked again, "Because that means humans will go down deep into the ocean to find us and kidnap us! Err... that's at least what I've heard..." Maria said. "Aye Amico! C'mere." Giulia said wrapping her arm around Maria walking back up, Maria quickly dried herself so she won't be seen.
"What do you see?" Giulia asked Maria,
"Uhh, Alberto and Luca playing with the human children?" Maria said,
"Exactly! And do you see their parents there?" Giulia said pointing to the childrens' parents,
"Yeah?" Maria said looking at the humans
"Do it look like they're grabbing a weapon and coming after Luca and Alberto?" Giulia said,
"No? But-" Said Maria,
"Then its fine! Your free to be yourself here!" Giulia said
"But does Alberto and Luca know about the forbidden rule of the ocean?" Maria asked,
"Probably not, but just go out there, come on!" Giulia said pushing Maria towards the water.
Maria was very anxious about this whole situation, what would they think of her? After all, she not a Sea Monster like they were. "Hey Alberto, Luca! Maria's gonna come swim with you! Giulia said, "Wait, what are you doing!?" Maria said as Giulia was pushing her more towards the water, "Giulia, WAIT!" Maria screamed but it was too late, Giulia had already pushed Maria into the water, "All Right!" Alberto screamed in cheer but Maria didn't come back up, "Maria?" He said still looking at where she disappeared hoping she'll come back up to the surface, but she didn't. "Maria!?" Alberto said and quickly ducked underwater to look for her, "MARIA!?" He said calling her name, but didn't see her. He then heard splashing from the other side and thought Maria was trying to get out of the water, "Phew! Maria, don't scare us like that." He said while swimming up to Maria, "STAY BACK!" Maria said hiding behind a rock underwater, "Maria? You can talk underwater? Are you a Sea Monster like us?" Luca asked, "No... not really..." Maria said still scared and hiding, "Then, what are you?" Luca asked, "Let us see." Alberto said asking her to come out, "Only if the both of you promise you won't freak out or attack me or... or try to kill me!" She said wanting them to promise. Alberto and Luca looked at each other confused and then back at Maria's direction "Ok, we promise." Luca said, Maria took a deep breathe and swam out in front of Luca and Alberto. Alberto and Luca were truly amazed, they've never seen a creature like her before, She had silver-grey scales and didn't have any legs, it just looked like they fused together into a long silver-grey tail. She also had fins on the side of her tail, elbows, back and ears, she also had gills on her neck and you can even see some breathing on her torso sides underneath her pageant dress. "I don't know why you were scared, you look amazing!" Alberto said, Maria looked at him in shock. Really? She didn't look hideous or freaky? "But what are you?" Luca said, "A Murine siren" Maria said, "Cool!" Alberto said, "But, why were you so afraid to come in the water with us? Did you think we might hurt you? Or cause we're Sea Monsters?" Alberto asked "First off, kinda... You and the humans... Second, yes." Maria said looking down "Cause its the forbidden ocean rule..." Maria said. "Well that's a stupid rule." Alberto said "Good thing your away from 'cross country!' So you don't have to follow it!" Alberto said grabbing Maria's hand and bringing her back up to the surface with the children, Maria was speechless, she had no idea what to think, so she just brushed it off and forgot about it and smiled.
As they went back up to the surface, they continued their game playing with a beachball. The ball bounced to Maria and she swam under and kicked it with her tail, it flew up high and bounced off some kids, they all cheered and continued playing. About an hour later, they all got out the water and turned back into humans. "Ok, I'm gonna go and change my swimsuit." Giulia said, "Ok! C'mon, Maria! Let's go grab some ice cream!" Alberto said grabbing her hand again, "Wait! She can't go dressed like that!" Giulia said, "What's wrong with what I'm wearing?" Maria asked looking down at her ripped royal blue pageant dress. "Its ripped at the bottom and dirty. C'mon! I'll take to the tailor of this town! He'll make you a new dress!" Giulia said "But first, let me change out of my swimsuit!" She said running back inside to change.
Giulia took Maria to the tailor so he can make her a new dress, Alberto followed close to make sure Giulia wasn't trying to take his friend... again. "Heya Chipo! I got a customer here for you!" Giulia said introducing Maria, "Hello, Giulia! How have you been!" He said, "I've been great!" Giulia said, "Who're your friends here?" The tailor asked, "This is Maria and Alberto!" She said introducing them, "Ha ha! Perdere, this your boyfriend?" He asked "No-" Maria started to say before she was interrupted by Alberto "YES! Yes she is!" He said putting his arm around her, "W-Wait, what? Alberto!" Maria said, "Relax Maria, your 'forbidden rule' can't effect us here! Its ok, you don't have to be so afraid anymore!" He said with his usual cocky smile, "Uhh, ok..." Maria said, "Anyways, what can I do for you today?" The tailor asked. "Maria needs a new dress, hers is... a bit destroyed." Giulia said, "Ah! I got just the one for a beautiful signorina like you! Come with me!" He said, Giulia moved her head signaling Maria to follow him to the back, Maria followed the tailor to see what new dress she was going to wear. Giulia gave a smirking look at Alberto,
"What?" He asked,
"You like Maria?" Giulia said smiling,
"Yeah, she's pretty cool." He said smiling
"And beautiful?" Giulia said getting closer to his face smiling,
Alberto sighed as if he was annoyed, "Yes, she's beautiful, even in her 'Siren' Form, there! Are ya happy?" Alberto said.
Giulia squealed, "I can't believe it! You got a girlfriend! And I'm Pretty sure she likes you too, big guy!" Giulia said punching his arm and putting her hands in her pockets.
A few hours later, Maria came back wearing a light ocean blue, one shoulder and belt, tulle, laced dress that went down to her knees and a blue bow in her hair. Giulia and Alberto eyes widened in amazement, Maria looked absolutely beautiful. "What do you guys think?" Maria asked, "PERFETTA!" Giulia yelled as she ran up to Maria and tightly hugged her, the both of them laughing. "Alberto! What do you think?" Giulia asked but Alberto was totally mesmerized. Maria chuckled and repeated his words the first day they met as to joke with him, "Yeah it sure is! The scenery NEVER gets old, right?" She said laughing, "Hehe, yeah! You look amazing!" He said, "Hehe, Thanks!" Maria said smiling, "Ok, Lovebirds! Lets go! Thank you, Chipo!" She said while leaving the shop and grabbing her bike, "Your welcome, Giulia! Come back anytime!" He said waving goodbye. Alberto and Maria hopped on to the back of Giulia's cart as she rode them back home. "You uhh... Really want to be my boyfriend?" Maria asked, "Yeah! Well, that is, if you don't already have one." He said "No, I don't... I don't have that many friends either, heh..." She said a little sad, "Well, your here so, you can do whatever you want!" He said putting his arm around Maria, Maria layed her head on his chest smiling, "Yeah... I guess so." She said, Giulia smiled and turned her head back to pay attention to where she was riding. Back home, Giulia's dad made their favorite pasta again for dinner, they ate, then Luca and Giulia went into Giulia's room so Giulia can tell him about Alberto and Maria. Alberto and Maria went back up the tree and layed down, Alberto layed down with his hands behind his head and Maria layed next to him on his chest, "So, how was your first few days here?" Alberto asked her, "They were amazing! I'm definitely staying here!" Maria said excitedly, "So... What's so 'forbidden' for our species to not meet each other?" Alberto asked, "Oh... uhh... In my world, its forbidden for Sea Monsters to befriend or even meet Sirens, apparently, my world doesn't trust yours cause they say that YOUR species is the reason why ocean homes are getting discovered!" She said, "What's so wrong about that?" Alberto asked, "Uhh, From what I heard, when humans see us, they kidnap us and kill us so, we're not really 'friendly.'" Maria said sadly. "Like I said, that's a stupid rule. Where do you live? In the ocean I mean." Alberto said, "The Mariana trench, in the challenger deep, it a giant hole that goes very deep into the ocean, if you keep swimming down to the bottom you'll see a kingdom, that's where I live." Maria said, "Good thing your far away from there, I mean, have you and your... fellow sirens even have proof that we do that to you?" Alberto said raising his head up a bit annoyed, "I... Don't think so..." Maria said, "Good, so that means their wrong." Alberto said laying his head back down.
"So since your a Siren, does that mean you can sing?" Alberto asked,
"Yeah, but the Siren song is dangerous, it hypnotizes people into a powerful trance, you can't break free unless the Siren can undo her spell." Maria said
"Then don't sing the Siren song, sing something else." Said Alberto,
"Like what?" Maria asked
"I dunno, just whatever you feel like." Alberto said Maria took a deep breathe and sat up, "Ok, only if you promise that you won't get hypnotized, and if you do, you'll promise me you'll try your best to fight it or tell me, got it?" Said Maria with a worried expression, "Relax Maria, I'm not gonna get hypnotized." He said. Maria took a deep breathe, "Ok... "
"Let's run away into the sea
As I hold you close to me
Let's slide beneath the waves
Down into the caves
If you wanna escape with me, come take my hand
We'll run away to a better land, a better land."
"Wow, you sound amazing." Alberto said
"Heh, thanks. Are you hypnotized?" Maria asked trying to see if he was caught in her trance,
"Nope!" He said
"Alberto." Maria said trying to make sure,
"I'm fine Maria, relax." Alberto said and layed back down with his hands back behind his head. Maria sighed and just hoped he wasn't hypnotized, she layed back down on his chest in snuggled closer to him as he put his arm over her shoulder, "Goodnight, Alberto." Maria said, "Goodnight Maria." Alberto said back and they both dozed off into a deep sleep. Giulia and Luca was watching them and heard everything, "See? Told ya! They're in love with each other!" Giulia said excitedly, "Wow, I never thought Alberto would get someone like him. They seem more happy together too." Luca said, "Yeah, we should probably go to sleep too. I'm exhausted!" Giulia said as she and Luca closed the window, turned the light off and went to bed.
Chapters: Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4
#luca movie#luca 2021#pixar luca#Luca Paguro#Giulia Marcovaldo#Alberto Scorfano#massimo marcovaldo#Maria Rose#Through The Ocean Currents#fanfic#ercole visconti#Alberto x Maria#Malberto
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#68 Jessi and the Bad Babysitter: Chapter 9
Phew, sorry for the long delay! Real life happened and I’ve been super busy. But I’m back now!
So last we left off, Jessi caught Margo shoplifting when they went to the party store to buy props for their BSC Project du Jour. But since this is the BSC, Jessi doesn’t tell the Pikes or even Mallory what she did. *eyeroll*
Also, something is rotten in the state of the BSC and it isn’t the 2-year-old box of Ring Dings in Claudia’s closet...
Next BSC meeting on Monday. Mallory doesn't say anything about Margo, so Jessi concludes that, sure enough, Margo didn't tell her parents. She frets about what to do and still doesn't say anything to Mallory! Oh my god, TELL HER!
Mallory's at the meeting, by the way, but still looks like she's going to nod off at any moment. Hey, as long as she's there. Or else there would be bad things on the horizon for her for missing another meeting. *cue lightning and thunder clap*
Jessi's mind is taken off of shoplifting and Margo briefly when the clock changes to 5:31 and Wendy isn't there! Uh oh! *cue more lightning and thunder clap* Jessi says it's the third time she's been late. Um...they were exactly on time the first BSC meeting she attended and they got to the Barretts a little late, I'll give them that. But the only meeting she had ever been to, they were on time! Geez! Kristy gets all huffy and demands to know where she is. Jessi says she can't be sick because she was in school today and Kristy snips that she should have called. It's a fucking minute, calm the hell down!
And what do you know, tons of the neglectful parents of Stoneybrook start calling in to get someone else to do the child-rearing while they're off doing who knows what and it's all jobs that Wendy could have taken. Steam is now pouring out of Kristy's ears at this point. Jessi, trying to defend her friend, suggests that maybe Wendy had a sitting job run late. But a scan of the record book shows that she had none scheduled. Kristy, shaking like a geyser about to explode, says she'll call Shannon to see what she can take on. Um, why don't they just have Shannon come to meetings if they're calling her so much? And for that matter, Logan too. Are they that busy? I mean, Shannon at least is home whenever they call her! That’s the logical solution but as we all know, the BSC lacks logic.
Before Kristy can call Shannon, Mallory says she wants to call her mom to come pick her up. She also tells the club that her mom finally remembered that she isn't the live-in nanny and made a doctor's appointment for her the following evening. The club (well, most of them, because Kristy is still simmering with rage) is relieved and Claudia says she was starting to get really worried. Mallory says she's worried for herself and then realizes...hey wait. The rest of the Pike Army needs someone to watch them! Jessi's the only one free but since there's so much of the Duggars Pikes, they need another sitter. Hey, what about that "Vanessa's really responsible" thing from the last chapter? No? Already forgotten? Ok.
The only other one free is Wendy and Kristy reminds everyone that, uh...she isn't at the meeting. So she's useless. Mallory calls her mom and goes to wait downstairs. Claudia and Jessi hope there isn't some serious, terrible disease afflicting Mallory, and they get an *eyeroll* from Kristy. And I'm posting the next exchange in its entirety because I don't know whether to laugh or get the urge to punch Kristy. Or both.
“She's probably got some kind of flu or something. And I hope we don't all catch it. If we have to close up for a couple of weeks we might just have to close up for good.”
What a horrible thought! “Why?” I asked.
“Because everyone will find other sitters,” said Kristy. “And once that happens they'll stick with their new sitters. We haven't heard from the Hills once since we couldn't take that job last week.”
Ok, what the fuck?! The BSC shutting down for a couple of weeks?! What about all those times the club went on a group vacation, Kristy? Did Shannon and Logan take every single job while you guys were away? Geez, being an associate requires a lot of time! And Kristy's whole rant doesn't make sense. I guess the Hills are still dead to the BSC because Mr. Hill did the unthinkable and said he would have to call other sitters.
Stacey, saying what we're all thinking, tells Kristy to stop freaking out about the Hills not calling, they probably just didn't need a sitter since last week. But...but...but this is Stoneybrook! Parents are ALWAYS going out and ALWAYS need someone else to raise their children! Kristy shoots down her argument:
“Maybe, but I don't like it,” Kristy grumbled. “It makes me nervous. The Hills may not be our biggest customers,” but Norman sure is our biggest charge, hoo-boy is he a fatass! “but I don't like to lose even a single client.”
I love how Kristy is freaking out because a family hasn't called for ONE WEEK. No calls for one week = they hate us and are moving on with another sitter. Paranoid and delusional, party of one!
Stacey reiterates that they haven't lost them, they probably just haven't needed a sitter since and Kristy says, “We don't know.” Good lord. Calm the fuck DOWN! Another job comes in, it's another Wendy could have taken and Kristy orders Jessi to call her. Jessi does and no one's home. Oh, if Wendy shows up and it was a family emergency, would Kristy still yell at her? Yeah, she probably would.
The meeting goes on, Logan and Shannon are called many times, it sounds like some jobs have to be turned down, so I guess more families have made it onto the “DEAD TO THE BSC” list. At 5:55, Wendy strolls in. Uh oh...she's in for a bad punishment now! *cues lightning and clap of thunder again* What will it be...50 lashes? An hour in the stocks? Babysitting for the Rodowskys without a crash helmet?
Kristy blows up at her and demands to know where she's been. Wendy, bewildered, says she had a babysitting job run late. She asks if any jobs came in for her and Kristy says, “Plenty. But you weren't here.” Oh, it's on, bitch!
Jessi says Wendy “didn't react the way I would have. I'd have been mortified and apologetic. Wendy grew angry in return.” Yeah, because she hasn't had the BSC Kool-Aid yet! Of course she's going to react with anger, instead of bending down and begging for an apology from Kristy.
Wendy asks what's the big deal, why does she have to be here if Mary Anne can tell from the record book when she is and isn't available. Kristy, whose face is turning pink again, growls, “Because you have to be.” God, Kristy is such a bitch in this book.
Jessi reminds Wendy that she HAS to be at every single BSC meeting on penalty of death unless it's an emergency. Wendy says it was, she had a babysitting job, she couldn't leave the kids alone. Well, then you bring the kids WITH you! Gosh!
Mary Anne tells her to call next time and wants to know why Wendy took a job without telling them. Wendy's confused and Kristy explodes, “That's the second club rule you've broken! First you were late without calling, then you took a job that wasn't offered to the rest of the club.” Wendy, completely dumbfounded and now irritated, says she had no idea and is shocked that she has to hand her regular jobs over to the BSC.
And why is Kristy yelling at her for breaking the rules? NO ONE EVER TOLD HER WHAT THE BSC RULES WERE!!!!! Remember? You gave her a dumb entry “quiz” and didn't explain ANYTHING about how the club operates, except for showing her how jobs are assigned! I understand the concern over her being late but how the hell was she supposed to know that she's expected to hand over her own personal sitting jobs?
Stacey explains, “We all share jobs. Even if a client asks for a certain sitter, we offer it to everyone in the club. That's the only way to be fair.” And avoid any potential bitch fights if a client asks for someone specific and the club flips out at said sitter. See: book #15 (shameless plug - I’ve done that one on here! Check the tags!)
So Wendy is supposed to tell all her clients, who the BSC doesn't know, “Sorry, I can't be your main sitter anymore. You must call this number, 3 times a week, ONLY at this time, and reach other sitters too. Sorry, but that's the only fair way! Hail Kristy!” That is so stupid.
Wendy apologizes and says she'll call next time she's late. She also accepts the Pike job with Jessi, who begs Wendy to please please PLEASE be there on time. After the meeting, Wendy bolts out of there and Jessi catches up. Wendy asks Jessi what we've been wondering for ages, “Who does Kristy think she is?”
Jessi, ever the brainwashed BSC member, responds Kristy Thomas is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever known in my life “She's the president of the club. If she wasn't strict, things wouldn't run nearly as efficiently as they do. Our customers wouldn't be as happy and neither would we. It's better that Kristy makes everyone obey the rules.” Yeah, but there's a difference between strict and crazy dictator. Mallory shouldn't feel guilty about being sick and Wendy shouldn't be yelled at for breaking rules she had no idea existed.
Wendy calls Kristy crabby (that's an understatement) and Jessi insists she's just worried that the club is in trouble. And Jessi ponders...is the club really in trouble?
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All Night Long
Aka Regarding Dean
Beyoncé- all night long
Pairing- Dean x Black Reader, Sam x Reader( Best friends),Kelly x Reader(best friends)
Warning- cursing (and the episode. Everybody and they mama know how emotional this episode was.)
Summary- Sam gets his Best Friend and Rowena’s help to find a powerful family of witches after Dean gets hit by a spell that is rapidly erasing his memory did I forget to mention that’s she Dean’s Ex. What could possibly go wrong.
Y/f- your father name
F/h-favorite hairstyle
Your thoughts in italics.
A Wounded man running through the forest as fast as he can. He is bleeding from a wound on his side. He stops to make a call. Cellphone ringing.
“You have to. No! Listen to me...Get out of there.” The man voiced into the phone.
Dean is seen running after the man. He sees the man stopped by a tree and fires a shot at him.
“Just go! Now!”he uttered.
The man runs off again, leaving behind a smear of blood on the tree. Dean appears again looking for the man. He sees where his bullet hit and the smear of blood. He hears a rustling sound and heads towards it gun drawn. He comes upon the man on one knee facing another tree.
“You people. You never learn, do you? Always trying to run. “ Dean Announced.
The man turns around, and we see that he has carved something into the tree which is beginning to glow with a purple light.
“Dearmad!” The man yells.
There is a flash of purple and Dean is knocked to the ground unconscious.
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Somewhere in upstate New York
A beautiful two-story yellow wrap around porch house that sits near a lake is where Y/n and Kelly are currently living to hide from supernaturals.
Kelly currently sitting down in a rocking chair in the living room with Y/n sitting on the couchWatching TV. ”It’s been bugging me for the past two days what’s going on with you and our neighbor I saw how he was lookin at you another day.” Kelly Announced unexpectedly to Y/n.
“Nothing and even if I wanted someone else I would look for similarities to Dean in them and that’s not fair.” Y/n replied in a calmly tone.
“You’re still love him” Kelly stated instead of asking.
“He still leaves messages of what’s going on with him, Sam and Cas.” Y/n said with a Controlled smile dodging Kelly’s question with ease.
“I was doing some reading on Angel Lore and found out that I’m going to die given brith.”
“Kelly.-“
“No this was my choice he is going to need mother and I want you to be his.”
“Kelly let’s worry about names before you give me The responsibility of taking care of a child ok” Y/n Informed Thoughtfully.
“I was thinking Y/f after my best friend father” Kelly Happily declared.
“No no you don’t have to do that what about Jack after my best friend father. “ Y/n replied with a kool-Aid smile.
“Ow.” Kelly grunted.
“Are you ok is something wrong” Y/n rushes to Kelly.
“It’s nothing he’s kicking I think he likes that name Jack “Kelly replied with a fond look.
Y/n smiles hiding her uneasiness.
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Eureka Springs,Arkansas
Dean is laying on the ground. There is a rabbit sitting beside him. Dean wakes up suddenly, looking hung over.
“Ohh...”Dean starts to sit up a bit, brushing leaves out of his face.”Ugh.”He looks down and sees the rabbit. “Hey, buddy” He moves the rabbit behind him and stands up. “Mm. Ah. Wow.” He looks around, unsure of where he is. He pulls out his phone to make a call and sees the screen is badly cracked and his phone no longer works.“Oh, come on.”
He turns around and sees a walking path not far from where he's standing. There are several people walking/jogging along it.
“And I was like, "Andy, the dog's vegan." The women with a stroller exclaimed to whoever she was on the phone with.
“Hey. Hey.” Dean said trying to get the ladies attention.
“How could you give him–“ The woman finally notices Dean.“Excuse me. Do you mind if I– “. Woman gasps and recoils from Dean. She reaches into her purse hanging off the stroller and hands Dean some money. “Wha-“
“Just don't buy a drink.” The women answer. The woman's baby makes some noises as she starts walking away. “I-I know, Stacey.”The women remarked.
“Huh” Dean said in a courteous manner. Dean looks around again and sees a man jogging towards him with a dog. He walks up to him to talk. “Hey. Hey, hey, hey. Excuse me.” Dean Announced making The man stops jogging.
“Look, uh, uh, I'm not a – not a bum, okay?” Dean started. The man removes his ear buds to hear Dean. “Just somebody who really needs to use a phone. Do you mind?” Dean asked.
The man hesitates, and then unplugs his headphones and hands Dean his phone.
“Great. Thank you.” Dean said with a note of relief. Dean walks a short amount away from the man to make his phone call.
“Okay.”Dean dials a number and the phone starts ringing. Sam's phone light up with a phone call. Sam picks up.
“Hello?” Sam questioned”
“Sam?” Dean replied.
Sam is relieved to hear from Dean, and concerned about where he's been all night.
“Dude, where the hell have you been?” Sam wondered. Dean looks around the park confusedly, and at the man jogging in place.
“I’m not really sure about that.”
“You—Well, where are you now?”
Dean looks around again.
“I'm not real sure about that either. I, um... “ Dean replied. He hears truck horns blaring and sees a Waldo's Waffles sign.
“Oh. Ha ha. I'm starvin'. How you feel about waffles?” He Asked Sam.
Sam makes a confused noise. “What?”
“Dumb question. Right. What psycho doesn't love waffles?” Dean grinned. Sam is totally confused by what Dean is saying.
“ I mean, they're fluffy. You got the little pockets full of syrup. You just cover 'em in whipped cream. Am I right? Anyway, meet me at Waldos', okay?” Dean explained then hangs up and gives the phone back to the jogger. Sam is very confused and tries to say something, but Dean has already hung up. “Hey—Ma–.”
The murmur of quiet conversations and the door closing as Sam walks in and heads towards Dean, who is sitting at the counter, eating waffles. Dean turns towards Sam and feels disappointed that he doesn’t see Y/n as he walks up to the counter. “Oh. Hey, did you bring any, um...” Dean grimaces and motions to his head.
Sam holds up and shakes a pill bottle.”Yes.” Dean beamed grabs the pill bottle as Sam sits down next to him.
“Sounded like you could use it.” Sam noted as Dean opens the pill bottle.
“Oh, man.”
“Rough night?”
“Rough morning.” Dean answered takes the pills out of the bottle and takes them with his coffee. Sam watches him bemusedly.
“Wh-What happened? I mean, you just went out to get some food.” Sam stammered.
“I don't know.” Dean murmured.
“What does that mean?” Sam asked.
“I-I guess I blacked out. And judging from this hangover, it was epic.”Dean motions to his head.
“Well, I tried to call you.” Sam Told Dean.
“Um....”Dean pulls out his destroyed cell phone and holds it up for Sam to see. “Oh.” Dean tosses his phone on the counter. “Not sure how that happened.”
“Great.” Sam pulls out his own phone. “All right, well, I'll text Mom, make sure she knows to get a hold of me in case of emergency. And Cas, in case he tracks down Y/n and Kelly.
Dean's face screws up in confusion at the mention of Kelly. Sam looks at Dean incredulously. “The mother of Lucifer's love child? Also the one you made Y/n chose over you.” Sam told Dean.
Dean suddenly remembers who Kelly is. “Right. Right. Yes, the Devil baby mama drama.” Dean grins, looking quite amused with himself. “Say that five times fast. Devil baby mama drama.”
Sam turns towards Dean and glances at the plate of waffles he's eating and the one that just arrived. “All right, Dean, you know, uh, you had a good run, but maybe let's pump the brakes a little bit. I mean, you're not 20 anymore.” Sam voiced.
Dean just stares at Sam for a moment. “Okay, one, the Rat Pack partied till the day they died. And B, I can still kick your ass.” Dean answered turns to face the front again and takes another bite of waffle. Sam scoffs at him. Dean, with his mouth still full calls for more waffles. As he does so, a group of young women enters. One of them appears to recognize Dean before joining the rest of the group which has sat down.
“Mm. Got a man who needs some waffles down here.” Dean called out.
“ –Oh, no. I'm—I'm fine. I'm...” Sam noted.
“You can just take these if you want.” Dean said pushes a plate of waffles towards Sam.
Sam puts his hand up to get the bill, and checks his watch. “No, Dean. Look, the morgue opens in, like, 10 minutes.” Sam shared as Dean takes a sip of his coffee and again looks confused.
“The morgue?” Sam stares at him.
“The autopsy results. Are you still drunk?” Sam questioned. Dean turns his head slightly towards Sam, but doesn't look at him. “I don't think so.” Dean stated as Sam leans over and sniffs Him.
“All right, our—our case?” Sam began. “The dead guy, throat stuffed full of money. Any of this ring a bell?”
Dean seems to remember what Sam is talking about and is nodding his head. “Right, yes. Right. Um...the accountant. Barry Gilman.” Dean replied.
“Right.”
“Right.”Dean turns towards Sam. “Uh, and you think he got his ticket punched by a demon.” Dean proposed.
“Maybe.” Sam guessed.
“Okay, but when we went over to his place yesterday, we got a whole bunch of jack and a little bit of squat. There was no hex bags, no EMF, no sulfur, which means no case.” Dean replied turns back to his waffles as Sam sighs deeply.
“Yeah, but if it's not a case, then what is it?” Sam stated while Dean picks up his coffee and turns back to Sam.
“I don’t know. Death by money? You know, maybe the guy got whacked by, uh, some mob dude with an ironic sense of humor. “ Dean said taking a sip of coffee. Sam chuckles and turns.
“All right. Well, I'm gonna go scope out the body. If you wanna spend some more alone time with, uh, your waffles...all right. Have fun.” Sam disclosed and gets up from the counter. The group of women that previously walked in, with the one woman turned to face the boys.
Dean wipes his mouth with a napkin and turns to get up as well and follow Sam.
“Fine, hold up.” Dean called to Sam and he turns to Dean and motions to the counter.
“Did you pay?” Sam queried then Dean stops and reaches for his wallet.
“Oops, no. Right.”
“You got it?” Dean tosses some cash on the counter. Behind him we see the girl from the group approaching.
“I got it.” Dean said.
“This is last night ” Said The woman looks angry. She then smacks him across the face and storms back to her friends. Sam gives Dean a questioning look, watches the girl as she walks away and then looks back at Dean. Dean stands there for a moment, then nods once.
“Yep. Epic night.” Dean said in a dry tone.
Dean walks past Sam out of the restaurant. Sam stares after him.
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Y/n is outside in the backyard chopping wood when her neighbor Nathan Jones Mr. Tall, dark, handsome. He kind of puts you in a reminder of Superman and not the Superman Returns but the Man of Steel.” Hey how are you” Nathan said walking up to Y/n.
“Good just chopping up some logs trying to clear my head. You.” Y/n said in a Casual tone.
“Oh nothing I was just about to head into town and thought you might need somethings.”
“Oh wow Thank you Nat that’s so sweet” Y/n grinned as she stop chopping wood to really look at Nathan.
“I realize you don’t like to leave Kelly alone so I thought I would help you out” Nathan finished looking at Y/n with sincere written all over his face.
Y/n hugs Nathan. “You’re the best um I’ll get you a list and then when you get back I’ll pay you back” Y/n promised.
“Or you could pay me back with a date tonight we don’t even have to go out I’ll cook for you.”Nathan said in a flirtatious way.
” You can cook.” Y/n Breathed out.
“I’m a man of many talents.” he answered smirking at Y/n.
Y/n giggled uncontrollably.
What the actual hell is wrong with me.
Y/n looks up at Nathan.
Maybe I should let Dean go.
”I would love too” Y/n beamed at Nathan.
“So seven” he replied.
“Seven is perfect.” Y/n said in a soft voice smiling.” I’ll go get that list for ya.” Y/n said walks in the house getting a grocery list Kelly already made and walks back outside to Nathan and hands it to him.
“Well I better get going I’ll see you later” Nathan told Y/n before walking away.
○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○
Driving up to the morgue Sam and Dean gets out the. Car Sam proceed to walk into the morgue but Dean hangs back and Sam notice.
“You coming”Sam asked Dean.
”Ya I’ll be in an minute I have to find my badge.”Dean lied trying to be alone.
“Ok I’ll head in” Sam replied as he walks inside the morgue.
As soon as Sam disappears into the morgue Dean pulls out his phone and dial Y/n’ number. Dean waits for the voicemails to hear her voice because he knows she will never answer the phone not anymore.
“It’s Y/n leave a message.”
“Hey I was just calling to um I don’t know I was going to but-“ Pauses.“I miss you I didn’t realize how much I missed you until this, morning when I saw Sam walking into Waldo’s alone and him remind me why you left. I hope there’s a part of you that listens to the messages I..I gotta go.” Dean said in a sad grimace hang up the phone. Clearing his throat so he won’t sound too emotional when he walks into the morgue.
The body of an older man on an autopsy table with his upper torso uncovered. The boys are in their FBI suits standing beside the body. One of the morgue staff walks in carrying a box with evidence from the body in it. She hands it to Sam and turns to leave.
“Hey.” Dean said getting Sam’s attention
Sam takes the box the staff member is holding.
“Uh, thank you.” Sam said to the morgue staff.
“Great. We’ll let you know if we need anything else. Thanks.” Dean said. The staff member leaves, closing the door behind her. Dean looks slightly uncomfortable.
Sam places the box on a stand beside the body. “All right.” Sam Asserted as he begins looking through the autopsy report. “So cause of death was suffocation. Officially.”
“Okay. We already knew that.” Dean told Sam.
"See evidence bag B 1-4." All right.” Sam replied puts the report down and opens the box and looks through the bags in the box, which all contain items that are covered in blood.
Dean cringes and turns away. “Ugh. Mm.”
Sam pulls out a bag full of very bloody money. Dean looks like he may throw up.
“Huh.”
Sam turns and shows the bag of money to Dean.
“Says they pulled all this from his stomach.”. Sam answered as Dean is trying to avoid looking at the bag while trying not to throw up.
“Mm-hmm – Mm. Big breakfast.”Dean Breathed lookin briefly at the bag and then turns away covering his mouth. “Okay.”
Sam looks at Dean and turns to put the money back in the box. “All right.” Sam noted.
Dean continues to make gagging sounds while Sam looks through the box. He finds a small bag with a small pink hex bag inside. “Mm. Ugh.”
“Well, well.” Sam started as he takes the bag with the hex bag inside out and shows it to Dean. “You were saying about an ironic mobster?”
Dean sees the bag and sighs. “All right, so...a witch force feeds old Barry here a hex bag and then casts a spell.”
“Yeah, a spell that pumps him so full of cash, he dies choking on it.”Sam said turning and puts the bag back in the box.
“Ugh. Witches.” Dean murmured as Sam picks up the report again and looks through it. “Well, I guess it's true what they say. Mo' money, mo' problems. Right?” Dean proclaimed smiles and chuckles to himself and walks past Sam and out, as Sam just stares after him.
“I hope you're still drunk.” Sam mused follows Dean out.
The boys leaving the morgue and walking to the car. “So why would somebody want Barry dead? I mean, what, did he screw up a tax return?”Dean questioned.
“He's actually more of a money manager.”Sam explained.
“Well, whatever he was, looks like he, uh certainly made one hell of a...uh... “Dean trailed off. Sam stops and looks at Dean he tries to remember what word he's looking for.
“Enemy?”Sam finished for Dean.They reach the car and continue talking briefly before getting in.
“Enemy. Yeah. Those guys.” Dean murmured.
“Maybe he blew the wrong person's savings.” Sam wondered.
“All right, well, let's check out his clients.” Dean disclosed as he fumbles around with his keys.
“Which one? Barry worked for the richest families in town.” Sam questioned as they both open the doors and get into the car. Dean is sitting in the drivers seat looking through his keys as though he doesn't know which one he needs. Sam watches in disbelief.
“Wow. Man, you were serious about epic. It's the square one.” Sam joked.
Dean seems slightly confused.“Yeah. I know.” Dean inclined.
“You-“ Sam started.
Dean starts the car and puts it in gear. He looks behind him, getting ready to back out. He gives it gas and ends up going forward and crashing into 2 newspaper boxes, where a woman is looking at a paper. Sam looks up startled.
“Son of a bitch.” Dean said in a casual tone.
“Come on!” The lady yelled.
“What the...” Sam voiced.
“Really?!” The lady said with Fire.
“Sorry! Our fault. I... “ Sam explained as he looks at Dean in shock. Dean seems to be quite confused as to what's going on.
“R for "reverse," Dean.” Sam commented to Dean as he just sits there confused occasionally looking up at Sam. He seems unable to focus on what Sam is saying or to what's going on around him.
“Listen, man, I-I know we haven't had it easy lately. This thing with the Devil's kid, getting tossed into West Guantanamo and Y/n leaving makes me wanna crawl into a bottle, too, sometimes, but...dude, you're wrecked.”
Dean's gaze is wandering and unfocused.
“And we got a case to work so get it together, all right?” Sam made public but Dean doesn't respond.
“Dean? Dean?” Sam called.Dean looks up and turns towards Sam.
“Who's Dean?” Dean question and Sam looks very confused and concerned.
○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○
Y/n is getting ready for her date looking at reflection in the mirror as Kelly waddles into her room.
“You look Smokin hot is you getting all dolled up for neighbor boy.” Kelly beamed as she looks at Y/n’s hair it’s in her F/h. Y/n’s outfit a Black leather jacket with a red and black shirt and blue jeans, and some Dr. Martens Hurston Chelsea Boot.
“Yes I am he asked me out on a date. He’s going to cook for me” Y/n squealed.
Once again what the hell is wrong with me... maybe it’s about food and I’m not cooking it ya let’s go with that.
Phone rings that pulls Y/n out her thoughts as she goes to see who’s phone is ring. It her’s she answers it without checking who’s calling.
“Hello?” Y/n questioned.
“Y/n?” Sam questioned standing outside his and Dean motel room.
“Sam?”
“I honestly didn’t think you would answer....I’m glad you did.”
“In all honestly I didn’t see who called I thought it was Nat.”
“Nat who’s Nat?” Sam wondered in a curious tone.
Y/n chuckled. Man I miss Sam.”He’s a friend”
“Hmm well I called you to tell you that um Dean in trouble he’s losing his memory. I know that you left because of Dean but it would mean a lot to me if you could come to Eureka Springs,Arkansas.” Sam asked.
“I’ll be there.”
Sam is Flabbergasted he didn’t think it would be that easy.“Thank you Y/n.”
“You don’t need to thank me Yosemite I will always be here for you.” Y/n said with a fond look. ”I’ll be there as soon as possible bye.”
Y/n hangs up the phone then finds Kelly.
Kelly is sitting in her Rockingchair.
“Hey Um something came up and I have to go to Arkansas.” Y/n revealed.
“Why what happened.” Kelly asked in a small panicky voice.
“Dean he is in trouble and Sam needs my help it’s bad Dean is losing his memories and Sam worried that Dean will become and empty shell.”
“Ok do what you have to do.” Kelly said hiding the disappointment in her voice.
“You can come with me if you want you’ll just be stuck in inside the Hotel room until all of this is over.” Y/n Remarked.
“No no I’ll be fine here.” Kelly insisted As she gets up from her Rockingchair and walks away from Y/n.
“Kelly what’s wrong.” Y/n asked as she follows her.
“Y/n what if they put a tracking device on you. What if they follow you back to me-.”
“Sam is like a brother to me and if anything ever happened to him when he called and asked me for my help I wouldn’t be able to live with myself. I won’t let them find you OK you have my word on that and my word is my bond” Y/n answered.
“Just be safe.” Kelly replied trying to hide her worried.
“Of course I am I’ll be back before you know it.” Y/n said getting ready to walk out the door but Kelly’s voice stops her.
“What about your date with Nathan.”
“Damn it that is to nights.”
“What are you going to tell him.”
“The truth someone I care about is in trouble and they need my help.” Y/n said as she walks out the door closing early she walks over to Nathan’s house she knocks on his door anxiously waiting for him to open it
Right when I’m about to mover on Dean Winchester ruins it-
Y/n thoughts gets cut off as Nathan opens the door.
“Your early I just about to start cooking looking amazing” Nathan Announced
“I really like you Nat but something came up someone I care about is in trouble and they need my help.”
“Ya it’s ok go be there for then.” Nathan answered.
Y/n smiles and kiss Nathan on the cheek.
“As soon as I get back I’m cooking you dinner thank you for understanding I got to go.” Y/n told Nathan then walks away.
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“I told you, I'm fine.” Dean Announced to Sam as he walks into their motel room.”What were you do out there?” Dean asked wondering what took Sam so long to get into there room.
“Nothing nothing...Dean, you forgot your own name.
“For a second. Okay, yeah, that was weird.”Dean commanded as he walks over to one of the beds and takes his jacket off.
Sam closes the door and walks towards Dean.
“All right, look, we know we're dealing with a witch, right? Maybe you got hexed.” Sam pointed out as Dean takes his jacket and gun off and tosses them on the bed.
Dean turns to Sam in slight amusement.”Dude...If a witch got a clear shot of me, I would be dead, okay? I wouldn't be freakin', uh...Dory. “ Dean explained.
“Dory?” Sam asked Dean.
“I'm not gonna apologize for loving that fish. Not to you, not to anyone.” Dean declared.
“Right. Okay. All right. If you're doing so well, name all the members of Bon Jovi.”Sam insisted.
Dean scoffs.”Okay. Uh, we talkin' circa 1983?” Dean began.
“Sure.” Sam agreed.
“Done. We got Bon Jovi.” Dean pauses, unable to remember the rest.”Whatever. This is stupid. Sam, I'm fine. Okay?”Dean disclosed turning and walks back towards the bed.”I feel great. Look, Uh... “Dean stated.He turns and picks up his gun and looks back at Sam.”This is a gun.” He pointed out dropping the gun back down and points to his coat. “This is a coat.” He walks over to the lamp in their room and gestures at it. “This is a...a...a...light stick.”Dean noted.
Sam is startled at Dean being unable to remember the proper word then Sam pulls off the sticky note and stands up. He walks over to the lamp and puts the sticky note on it. It says Lamp.
“Fine, but until you get better...”Sam told Dean as he looks at the note and snaps his fingers.
“Lamp. Right. So close.” Dean commented.
A poker game taking place in what looks like a server room of sorts. Rowena is playing with 3 men. He pushes all his chips to the center of the table.
“Shall we end the suspense?” One of the man said laying his cards down and Rowena lays her cards down and they are much better than the man's.
She laughs.”What's that? Six in a row? Beginners luck.” Rowena commented.
She reaches over the table to pull all the chips towards her. Her cell phone rings as she's collecting her chips. She looks at the number and excuses herself from the men to take the call.
“Oh. Gentlemen, if you don't mind.”Rowena Asked walking a short distance away and answer the call.
“I'm a wee bit occupied at the moment. Rowena shared.
“Yeah, well, we need your help, Rowena.” Sam revealed.
“Oh, really?” Rowena answered.
“Come on, man. Rowena? I mean...” Dean trailed off. Dean is inspecting the mini fridge as Sam speaks to Rowena.
“Yes. Really.” Sam confirmed.
“Hey?” Dean called out and Sam turns to Dean.
“Tiny vodkas. Score.” Dean grinned and Sam shakes his head.
“Am I saved to your contacts now? Tell me. Have I got my own ringtone?” Rowena wondered.
“This is serious. Look, I think Dean's been hexed okay? He—He's been forgetting things.” Sam announce.
Rowena turns to look back at the poker game as she speaks.“Maybe he's just drunk. Oi!” Rowena question.
“He's not drunk.” Sam answered.
Dean picks up the ice bucket and points inside it. “We need ice.” Dean announced as he continues pointing at the bucket. Sam just shakes his head at him and ignores him.
“We could do a memory spell. But did his hair fall out? His body too?” Rowena made public.
“What?” Sam questioned.
“From the neck down, is he smooth like a Ken doll?” Rowena asked with a curious tone.
Sam looks grossed out at the thought of that. “I don’t know. Uh, and I'm not checking either.”bSam avowed.
“Rules out a mnemonic curse. The obliviate spell wipes the memory clean over time, but it's intricate magic. I... “ Rowena started.
“How do I break it?” Sam asked.
“Theoretically? Kill the witch. Or true love kiss so you know you would have to talk to right.” Rowena declared.
“Ya got it. She already on her way” Sam answered.
“how do you pull that one off” Rowena wondered.
“Y/n still cares about me and Dean so of course she’s going to help if one of us is in danger now I got to go.” Sam replied hanging up the phone and turns to talk to Dean only to find out that Dean has left to get ice.
“All right. So...Dean? Dean!” Sam said in a small panicky voice running out of the motel room and looks around outside.
“Dean!” Sam shouted as He runs up to the second level and keeps looking.
“Dean?” Sam called out as he walks around a corner and finds Dean trying to get into another room with the ice bucket tucked under his arm.
“Dude, what are you doing?” Sam Queried then Dean turns to look at Sam.
“Getting ice. What are you doing?” Dean asked Sam.
“That's not our room.” Sam commented.
Dean looks around confused and then shrugs and walks away.”All these dumps look the same.” Dean replies as they start walking back down to their room.
“So this spell, I'm stuck in some sort of "Memento" crap?” Dean Stressed.
“Right. The fix sounds fairly simple. You just find the witch who did it and kill it or true love kiss.
“Oh, Halle-freakin'-lujah but there’s no way Y/n coming to help us so plan a kill the freakin’ witch.” Dean noted.
“So Y/n is your true love?” Sam Asked and Dean gives Sam a look that can only mean shut up.
“Right well I think you got hexed last night.” Sam revealed
“Yeah?” Dean Asked.
“Yeah. We need to retrace your steps. All right, think.” Sam replied as they stop just outside of their room. “What's the last thing you remember you did?” Sam questioned.
Dean thinks about it and the taps the ice bucket and opens the lid. “Uh...I got some ice.” Dean replied.Sam looks frustrated with Dean.
The boys looking around Barry Gilman's office again.
“Okay, from yesterday, the last thing I kinda sorta remember is us being here in um... “Dean trailed off. He snaps his fingers to try and remember as he wanders over to the desk.
“...guy's office. Uh...” Dean mumbled.
Sam is looking through shelves in front of the desk.”Barry Gilman.” Sam informed.
“Yes. And...we were here and we were, uh, we were looking for leads.” Dean pointed out, as He opens a red lacquered box on the desk and finds cigars inside. He takes one and puts it in his coat chuckling. Sam is now standing in the middle of the office. “Yeah. Douche tax.” Dean claimed.
“Yeah, you did that yesterday, too. All right, come here.”Sam answered.
Sam walks over to a wall with pictures on it. Dean joins him there.“Check these out. Do these shake anything loose, these pictures.”Sam Asked.
Dean looks at the pictures. He seems to look at one a couple times, but doesn't remember anything. Then Dean looks over at one photo in particular of the accountant and another man in a blue jacket. “No. None of them.” Dean noted.
“Okay, think hard. What happened next? I went to hit the lore. You went out for a burger. So... “ Sam trailed off.
Sam looks hopefully at Dean.“So....” Dean shrugged.
Dean gets frustrated that he can't answer.“What do you want me to say? I-I ate 'em?”Dean questioned.
Sam is getting frustrated with the lack of information.“Okay, okay. You know what? It's not a big town. How many burger joints can there be? Come on.” Sam stated as they walk out of the office.
Hailing a taxicab Y/n pulls out her phone and texts Sam.
Y/n- I’m here
Sam feels his phone buzz in his pocket and he reachers for it and see it’s a text from Y/n.
“Hold on.” Sam called out to Dean as he is about to walk into a pub then calls Y/n.
“How did you get here so fast” Sam questioned.
“I got on a plane three hours and seventeen minutes so where am I going?” Y/n told Sam.
“Meet us at Blue Boar” Sam replied.
“Ok I’ll be there in ten.”Y/n informed hanging up the phone getting in to the taxicab.
“Blue Boar please.” Y/n told the cab driver.
Part 2
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Creepy, Evil Wrestling Coach Gets What's Coming To Him
Disclaimer: This is a story that happened to me in high school over 5 years ago and I was encouraged to share it. This is a really long one, but you'll love how it ends. I promise.
TL;DR added to the bottom.
Background: My parents separated early in my childhood (around 5-6 y/o), but both remained very cordial and friendly with each other. They agreed that both parents should be involved so they shared custody of my younger brother and I. Shortly after separating, they both started seeing other people and they have been a part of my life ever since. They are, in essence, my step parents without the official title. There is no animosity between my parents and stepparents whatsoever. Now, my mom does not wear make-up, but she looks really young. Like, she has been confused on MANY occasions to be my sister. I don't know if its her genes or she found the fountain of youth, but she is very attractive. This is all important as you'll see.
Story:
So in middle school, I joined the intramural wrestling team because I was bullied a lot and needed a place to let off some steam. I was a sensitive teenager and going to wrestling practice was my form of therapy. I even joined an outside wrestling club a few towns away I'll call "WC". While there, I had many coaches including the main coach of the story I'll call Coach Mitch. Mitch was a total douche bag; one of those jocks who brags about how drunk he got, how many girls he banged, and how many illegal things he did. He would walk into WC with this black leather jacket, a backwards cap, and sunglasses and talk up a storm about his nightly conquests. Wrestling was his life and his job at WC was the most important thing to him. On the mat, he was a rough and strict coach who prided himself on his insane cardio training program. If you did anything not to his standards, you would get a stare full of anger and hate we called the "Mitch Glare" and sent to run gassers. I went to every single one of those practices and he remembered my face.
I joined high school and the high school wrestling team as a freshmen, but ultimately didn't wrestle much due to a concussion and other injuries. After the wrestling season ended, the head coach announced he was leaving the team to help his wife diagnosed with breast cancer and there would be a new head coach next year. Sophomore year rolls around and there was an announcement for students to meet the new wrestling head coach after school. So I go with a bunch old teammates and new recruits and in walks Mitch with a leather jacket and a stride full of swagger. My heart sank. After the meeting, Mitch pulled me aside and told me he expected great things from me after wrestling in his WC program.
The first year under Mitch was hell and difficult to adjust to, but I managed. I made varsity for the first time, but I wasn't skilled enough to win many of my matches which Mitch did not let me live down. Every opportunity he got after a loss to make his frustration known, he seized. I would often look to the sidelines to see him giving me the Mitch Glare. I was disappointed with my season and desperately wanted to improve.
I went back to WC that summer with a renewed sense of purpose. I went to every single practice that spring and summer including Mitch's session and the improvements were noticeable to everyone. Everyone except Mitch. After one practice in the summer, Coach Mitch told me that he wanted me and another wrestler to come 30 minutes ahead of practices to practice take-downs. I agreed I would, eager to hopefully get on his good side. I should have said no.
One day over the summer, my mom drove me to WC and we arrived before Mitch so the doors were locked. Since it was a hot, sunny day, my mom stayed until Mitch came. We were chatting when around the corner came Mitch's black Cadillac and parked right next to us. I thanked my mom for the ride and got out of the car to greet Mitch. As I walk a few feet away, my mom rolls down the passenger window and yells to me that I forgot my water bottle. I go back and reach through the window to grab my water bottle and turn around to get a face full of Mitch. I was about to say something, but Mitch, in one fluid motion, shoved me aside with his left arm, pull his right hand on the roof above the passenger window, and reached his head inside the passenger window. To my horror, he begins to flirt with my mom right in front of me! At first, Mitch thought that she was my older sister, but then he realized she was my mom which made him VERY interested. I managed to extract him from the window and we went inside. Once inside, he refused to do anything except talk about my mom. It was very unsettling to hear a 30 y/o man talk about getting with your mom. When I told him that she was with my stepdad, he scoffed and said for now.
The rest of the summer and into my junior year was constant torment from Mitch about my mom. It was not long until Mitch brought up to all the wrestlers and my teammates how hot my mom was, how he was going to rock her world and bed, and how he was going to replace my stepdad and I would call him dad. My teammates laughed and joined in on the tormenting. They even replaced the words of that classic song "Stacey's Mom" to my mom. Every single bus ride to a meet or tournament, Mitch would blast that song. Every. Single. One. Teammates and Mitch would send texts in the group chat about my mom and videos of them singing to that damn song. Mitch would often look up into the stands for my mom (who was a regular at my meets) and would tell me while I'm warming up that she'll be coming home with him afterwards. While this was all going on, I felt embarrassed and powerless, but also angry. I kept my head down and pretended like it didn't affect me despite the fact it did. I thought if I pretended like it didn't affect me, then he would lose interest and stop. But it never stopped.
My junior season was incredible from a wrestling standpoint; I won numerous tournaments including sectionals and went to states where I lost the round prior to placing. Sectionals and states are the equivalent to the playoffs in football/baseball/etc. I vowed to return next year and place at states. Senior year came, and I was winning tournaments and matches again. And while Mitch never got on me for my wrestling, the tormenting of my mom continued despite the fact at this point he had a girlfriend. Many times after walking off the mat, Mitch would come up to me and tell me that it was a good thing I won because he didn't want his stepson to be a loser. This made me rage on the inside, but I refused to give him the satisfaction of a response. But there is only so much that I could take and there was gonna be a day that I finally snap.
It was the weekend before sectionals and we were at the league tournament where I was about to face my arch rival from a few towns away in the finals. I was pumped because we had faced each other in the finals of last year's league tournament and I won. I was warming up off to the side with my mom, stepdad, and dad all sitting together in the stands. I was on deck when Mitch strolled over to me and told me that I better beat this punk or I wouldn't have a bed when he and my mom got married. I pretended to not hear him, but that made my blood boil.
I ended up losing the match and was really upset with myself as I ran off the mat to retrieve my clothes. And seeing the opportunity to kick me while I'm down, Mitch barrels towards me, gets chest-to-chest with me, and starts yelling in my face in front of the whole gym although not loud enough for everyone to hear. He was telling me that I should be embarrassed, that I would never amount to anything, and that he doesn't know if he could marry my mom anymore because he would be associated with a loser. I LOST IT! I shoved Mitch away, told him to fuck off, and stormed out of the gym into the parking lot through the back doors. I was so angry and frustrated that I was seeing red. My parents saw what happened (but could not hear it) and my dad ran after me. He caught me in the parking lot, shaking from anger and helplessness. I wouldn't talk to him and told him him to leave me alone. As he turned to leave, Mitch entered the parking lot (Mitch Glare in full affect) and told me that I was suspended indefinitely from the wrestling team. I didn't say anything to him as he walked away. I turned to my dad and told him we needed to talk tonight and to grab my mom and stepdad. It was time to to get my revenge on the man who tortured me for years.
I return inside to collect my medal and to take a few forced pictures on the podium. I did not return to the team bus and instead had my mom and stepdad drive me home. I spilled EVERYTHING during that car ride home. Their collective reaction was of horror, rage, and disgust. My stepdad, who is a avid health nut and gym rat as well as a former wrestler, wanted to introduce Mitch to his fists; but we convinced him that was not the way to settle this. They vowed to not let this go unpunished and together we hatched a plan. We were gonna take everything from him.
That Monday came and my mom, dad, and I called a meeting with the vice principal, the principal, the athletic director, and the superintendent. I recounted the entire saga all the way back to WC and showed them the texts and videos from the group chat. Unbeknownst to me at the time, my dad, who always videotaped my matches so I could review them later, caught the exchange between Mitch and me but without the audio. The men stared in horror as I shared everything, like wide-eyed fish gasping for air. Then, my mom turns to the men and tells them that she has been in contact with a lawyer and that they are plan on suing under Title IX against the district for sexual harassment unless something was done immediately. I did not know if we actually could sue and if this was a bluff, but the effect was instantaneous. I have never seen a group of four men flinch in unison together and stumble over one another to assure us that they would take action immediately. Mitch was fired that day.
But we did not stop there.
Mitch was so enchanted by my mom, right? So much so he sent text messages and videos to proclaim how much he wanted to be with my mom. Well, I found Mitch's girlfriend on Facebook and sent her over all those messages/videos and told her how he had tortured me for close to two years. SHE WAS LIVID! I wish I could have been there for the fight that ensued, but she dumped his ass and her relationship status turned to single.
But we did not stop there.
My mom and I then returned to WC later that spring and talked to the manager and other coaches about Mitch's behavior towards me while a member of WC. At first they didn't fully believe the story, but after showing them the messages and videos as well as having some legal persuasion from my mom, they quickly backpedaled and assured us that there was no place for that behavior at WC. We stood at the counter with the manager as Mitch walked through the door. The look of horror that crossed Mitch's face was absolutely priceless. While we could not be present for the dismissal in the office, we watched as Mitch reappeared from the office and left WC with his stupid Mitch Glare on his face. My mom and I high-fived in the car and laughed the entire way home.
To finish the season, my suspension was revoked and the assistant coach was promoted to interim head coach. I ended up placing fourth at states that year and it was the proudest moment of my life. I had dealt with so much drama that I felt all of it was finally worth it and I had accomplished my ultimate goal. We had won the battle against Mitch, I placed at states, and I was going to a great college to wrestle with a nice scholarship.
But it does not end there!
That summer going into my first year at college, I dislocated my arm at the shoulder and tore my labrum which required surgery. The morning of the surgery came and my mom was driving me to the hospital when we came across a brown and grey pick-up truck broken down in the right shoulder. My mom slows down because it a one lane road with on-coming traffic on the left. As we pull alongside the truck, from the front of the truck around the driver side stepped Mitch in a yellow safety-vest and tan cargo shorts. Time seemed to slow as we made eye contact and his face twisted into that Mitch Glare. Gone was his nice black Cadillac and nice clothes and replaced with a broken pick-up truck and construction attire. As we drove by, my mom and I looked at each other, asked if we both saw him, and then laughed ourselves all the way to the hospital. Karma is great!
To this day, I still cannot listen to Stacey's Mom.
TL;DR - Sadistic wrestling coach harasses me for years including making sexual comments about my mom. I take away his head coaching position, his job, and his girlfriend.
(source) story by (/u/Large_Fail)
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DaNcInG-iN-yOuR-dUsT.nEt
.x.Welcome.x.
Welcome
to Dancing-in-Your-Dust.net. The name comes from the AFI song Paper Airplanes (makeshift wings). This is just a place to express my thoughts and ideas, if you don't like it..simply leave. If you do however, stick around and enjoy =D
.x.Girl.x.
Lizzy. Arizona. sXe. Vegetarian. Sarcastic. AFI. Tiger Army. Nekromantix. <3 <3 Davey Havok. Make-Up. Music. Movies. <3 Johnny Depp. HUGE Dork. Despair Faction. TNBC. Lock, Shock & Barrel. Jack Skellington. Halloween.
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Since:
June 20th, 2003
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This is the 9th layout for DIYD. It features the Movie Sleepy Hollow ! =). The pictures are from
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.x.Content.x.
Come's in a Pop-Up
Hiatus (Be Back Soon)
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.x.True Fucking Love.x.
<3 Sadey
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.x.Current Events.x.
08-11-03: My B-Day
09-09-03: Jeanelle's B-Day
09-10-03: Work @ Merch Booth 4 the Starting Line
09-20-03: EdgeFest 03'
09-24-03: Seeing AFI/Hot Water Music/Bleeding Through in Fresno
09-26-03: Seeing AFI/Hot Water Music/Bleeding Through in Las Vegas
09-27-03: Seeing AFI/Hot Water Music/Bleeding Through in Utah
10-13-03: Kevin <3 <3 & Ashley's Birthday
10-14-03: Nightfall
10-30-03: Seeing AFI/Hot Water Music/Bleeding Through in Universal CA for Halloween Eve show
10-31-03: Halloween AFI'S Halloween Show??
.x.Playlist.x. Smile--AFI
Jack of all Trades--Hot Water Music
Unstoppable--Death by Stereo
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Who Killed the Cheerleader--Nekromantix
A Single Second--AFI
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The Man Who Sold the World--David Bowie
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DancingInUrDust
E-Mail:
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.x.At the Moment.x. Date:October 1, 2003
Mood: Tired
Eating: Nothing
Drinking: nothin
Watching: nothin
Hearing: Transplants
Wearing: Night of the living dead Shirt and duck pj's
Thinking: AFI IS ONLY 28 DAYS AWAY!!!!!!!
Talking to: nobody
Drooling over: Davey Havok
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MORE??
.x.Last Look.x.
.x.Desktop.x.
October 6, 2003
Hello all..thought I'd write in here since I have pretty much nothing else to do. I've been up to pretty much nothing. Sadey and I went to the mall and bought our AFI limited edition Art & Artisha dolls..which cost an arm and a leg. We also talked to kevin..just him tho cuz Bobby-o wasn't there today. It was hilarious because when we were leaving I go to hug kevin and I accidentally hit his nose...he's all like "oh great she's trying to beat me up too!" good times man, good times. Anyway in other good news, Sadey's mom is thinking about opening a store sorta like Hot Topic @ the mall..and it's gonna be hella rad cuz well, I can work there =D We'd carry much more cooler things than Hot Topic..I mean I like that store at times but, they never really carry anything that cool now. Speaking of HT im gonna start working there prolly in mid november. Im putting my 2 weeks @ Target in tommorow. Anyhoo while I was at HT I saw this rad velvet black dress with like flared sleeves and I want it for the show in Universal but I checked the price and its like 90 bucks so I was like hell no..so Im gonna have my mom make one for me and im adding shit on it like red laced trim...its gonna be so super awesome =D Im trying to think of what else that has happened..Oh I was sick this weekened and I called in for work and Nickey (the LOD) got all pissed and told me im not taking my job seriously anymore and all this other BS and she hung up on me...so she basically called me a liar....and im telling you, I was really sick! So I woke up the next morning and it was already like 11:00am and my shift was supposed to start at 9 and I was like shit...they're gonna fire me. So I called Nickey and she apologized for hanging up on me and that she doesnt wanna lose me as an employee and that she values me and shit..I was just like yea, well you're in for a rude awakening cuz im quitting haha..no I didn't say that but I was thinking it..so she told me to just take the day off. I was like cool ok. So I guess thats all that really happened...I went to this wedding party thing on Saturday night w/ sadey a whole bunch of Italians from brooklyn...awesome as hell im in love with their accents..lol. There was this annoying kid there that was trying to impress Sadey and I by acting all drunk and telling us how much he had to drink when in all reality he wasn't really drunk he was just pretending because all his mom would let him have was one drink..little does he know we're sXe..haha loser. Alright anyhoo I guess thats all for site news.. my wonderful katie (rapturous voice davey fansite) is leaving me ::cries:: she bought a domain,
davey-havok.net
Ill miss you much Katie =D Go visit her now BTW. But the good news is that I got a new hostee,
Barbara
. She's gonna open the fanlisting for AFI's
Morningstar
which I am very happy about..it's about damn time someone decides to make a fanlisting for that song cuz it is such a beautiful song =D Alright so..enough of my rambling im out, later =D
--Lizzy--[Deadjournal] | [Plug]
(8) are dancing in the dust
October 1, 2003
[EDIT]
Ok Im taking my blog down because it was wayyy too long and for some reason my ftp is not letting me write anything else on to my notepad sorry kids..if ya wanna know what happened just drop me a line on AIM @ dancinginurdust or email me at [email protected] and ill be sure to tell you everything...you can still click the pics and look at those if you like =D
[/EDIT]
Happy October..new layout in spirit of Halloween..ill have loads more halloween ones than this..being as this is my fave holiday =D
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17, 18,21, 22, 23, 24, 25
click here for autographs =D
--Lizzy--[
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Plug
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(7) are dancing in the dust
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Episode Reaction: 9x08 Rest in pieces
@echoesout | @its-a-goode-day
Alright, we’re almost done. While I was watching the episode I kept having this feeling that it seemed to be mostly a set up for the finale. Almost every scene consisted on the characters getting ready for the final act/fight/event. That said, it made for a very entertaining hour.
The deadly trio
Now that we know who the deadly trio is, it seems so obvious. But in all honesty, I wasn’t considering Bruce at all. I wondered if we would see him again, but I didn’t expect that he would play a significant role in the final stages of the story. Not complaining, though. I find his wannabe ways highly entertaining. On the other hand, while I don’t believe Margaret’s plan will be successful, I find it quite logical and very business-oriented, lol.
I still feel silly because I literally had this whole thing about Bruce heading towards the camp and being a fan of Ramirez and in all that not once did it occur to me that they’d actually probably meet XD I love all three of them together though, it’s a very fun team dynamic.
The ghosts
It was really interesting to see the shift on Montana when she found out that Ramirez had changed since she first met him and after Richter all but told her that she was the cause for that. At first it seemed like she was going to just be depressed about, and almost could detect a hint of guilt in her, but I loved how she pick herself up and rejected the idea of being another woman blamed for a man’s actions. (Also off-topic, kind of, but Montana’s face when Trevor mentioned that no good aerobics class were left anymore. Priceless. Billie is being great this season).
I loved the speech, but honestly, I thought her whole “Ricky wasn’t like that when I knew him!” thing was really random. He was already in the news as the Night Stalker, albeit his streak was just beginning. He was already a Satanist. Seriously, he killed some dude at her aerobics studio and licked the blood off her feet. And she liked it. So, I don’t quite get in what way he’s turned out different than she expected, or why she was depressed about it considering how many people she’s killed just for fun these past few years. It definitely seems like they’re trying to backtrack with everyone one by one--Donna, Jingles, Montana--so we know the real villains are Margaret and Ramirez, and I don’t mind giving her character more depth, but I’m not sure this was the best way to do it.
I do hope Montana and Ramirez meet again in the next episode, if only because I have no idea how it would go. Ramirez seems pretty attached to Margaret and I wonder if he’s thought about Montana at all. Plus, I wonder how Xavier’s gonna handle the news of Montana getting together with Trevor (I still don’t understand them together either. They almost had sex one time in a lake and apparently he’s been in love with her for years since).
Brooke + Donna
Who else thinks Donna will be the final girl? They made such a big deal of it not happening. It’s very interesting to watch her trying to help Brooke, even though her experiment is over (or is it?), she’s still thinking on scientific terms (’you don’t have to act on those feelings and become a murderer’). As for Stacey the reporter, I wonder if she’ll show up as a ghost next episode.
Brooke and Donna were super cute in the roller rink and they seem like a great team, but I still feel like we just blew over the fact that Brooke knows about Donna’s role in the 1984 events. At the very least there should have been some acknowledgement of it, whether to say Brooke forgave her or is just teaming up with her because they’ve got bigger problems, etc., but something. And like Nora wonders if Donna’s experiment is really over, I wonder if Brooke is really Donna’s ally. It doesn’t seem like a huge stretch that once Margaret is taken care of, Brooke might punish the other people who had a hand in that terrible night
Benjamin
I’ve heard a couple of different things about that ending (I’ll let my partner in crime here expose her initial idea on that), but the feeling I got is that it’s not “real”. I believe it’s Benjamin’s very own afterlife, the same way in AHS universe everyone goes to their own hell. So the Lavinia there was not the Lavinia we saw last episode, but the one in Benjamin’s idea of heaven. One that has been reunited with her dead son and loves Benjamin. The real Lavinia is still roaming around the camp, and will probably never rest.
That ending did look like the end of his story, didn’t it? If it is, I liked it very much. Although depending on how accurate the theories are about Finn playing playing grown up Bobby (the son, not the brother), we may see more of him.
Also, I wasn’t expecting to see Lily again, so thanks for that, even thought it was only a few minutes.
I agree-that’s definitely not the real Lavinia. She never even liked him before Bobby died, and it’s really weird that they’d skip over any sort of reunion between her and Bobby if it was real and Bobby was literally hiding in the lake the entire time just waiting for his big brother so they could be a family again or something.
I’m skeptical on the afterlife bit, though. The last time we saw him, he was begging not to be thrown into the lake because his son would die if he couldn’t stop Ramirez. From what we know of past ghosts in the Murphyverse, he shouldn’t be able to move on to the afterlife until he’d made peace with not saving his son, not go to the afterlife in order to make that peace.
Honestly, I’m not sure what it’s all about. One option is that he’s hallucinating from oxygen deprivation. Obviously ghosts don’t need to breathe, but they can experience pain and other physical sensations, so theoretically he should still experience all the feelings of drowning and maybe this part, too. Other than that, it’s crossed my mind that it could somehow be Bobby’s doing. Benjamin and Jonas talk a little bit about the void ghosts go to between “dying” and coming back, but what if Bobby gave him a dream or somehow talked to him instead?
Either way, unlike my lovely co-writer, I feel like having Bobby drag him into the water so he can go have a nice talk with an idealized version of his mom would be a disappointing end. Without him as the bridging factor, I doubt we’ll see Lavinia or Bobby again, and I’d really want to see them reunite and for Benjamin to get to see real brother again. There has to be a reason why Bobby showed back up now after all these years. I have an imagine of Benjamin waking up on the banks with Bobby standing over him looking like he did before he died instead of all swamp-monster-y.
Season Finale
The plot summary goes like this: Camp Redwood draws in a lost soul looking for closure.
Aren’t there a few lost souls looking for closure? I’m guessing they are talking about Brooke, but they couldn’t be more vague if they tried XD
I don’t have many theories other than Donna being final girl (if there’s any at all) and what I mentioned in a past episode reaction about Margaret’s fate. Other than that, I’m curious about how the flashforward to present time is going to play out. If Finn is really playing Benjamin’s son, I can see how it can go with him going back to the camp to seek revenge. It is AHS after all, so I’m not looking for a clear cut ending.
I think it could be Bobby himself who’s the “lost soul.” Say someone kills Margaret, prevents anymore murders. Brooke and Donna and anyone else still alive would probably just disappear into anonymity, knowing that one one would believe their story. So, the official story still remains that Mr. Jingles committed the 1970 massacre, and Bobby would think his father was a mass murderer. But also, he was left to be raised by a neighbor, some who would probably tell him stories about what a lovely couple his parents were and how much they loved him. I could easily imagine Bobby going to Camp Redwood as an adult just looking for some way to reconcile the two stories. It’s a lot of “probably”s and guessing, but it’s my best theory at the moment. Although yeah, considering AHS is not one for cut-and-dry endings, I think it’s definitely likely they’ll go darker. Maybe Margaret was the final girl after all and after hearing the real story, Bobby goes after her and becomes a killer himself.
Also, this is completely random, but like, I want Lavinia to kill Ramirez. She may not like Benjamin, but she’s still a mom and knows what it’s like to lose a child, and I think it would be awesome if she took it into her own hands to make sure her grandson wasn’t harmed.
Season 10 theme
So, according to Ryan Murphy, there’s a clue about season 10’s theme in this episode. I should probably rewatch and pay more attention, but the two things that caught my mind were Stacey’s mentions of Bigfoot, Loch Ness monster, which makes me think of urban-legend creatures, cryptids and such, and Small Wonder, that is, robots. Of the two, I’d say the first one is more plausible, but I’d like to hear more theories.
A cryptid season would be so much fun and could go in so many different directions, although I do wonder if it might be too similar to this season--people being terrorized in the middle of the woods and all. On the other hand, this isn’t the first reference we’ve gotten to robots. I remember everyone making a big deal of Mrs. Mead singing the robot’s song from Space Odyssey as she died. People have been wanting a space/extraterrestrial/future/robot/etc. season forever, so maybe it’s finally going to happen. Murphy’s said he’d never do something actually set in space because it’s American Horror Story, but we’ve seen the aliens and their technology on Earth before in Asylum. I’d especially love a direct follow up featuring Kit’s children.
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Hold On
Who: Sam & Peyton @southsidepey
What: Peyton and Sam finally see each other after a week passes
When: Nov 30th, Nighttime
Where: Peyton’s place
Regular: Peyton
Bold: Sam
Notes: Many, many emotions
Word Count: 5371
Sam had felt bad about forgetting to text Peyton after they'd last seen each other. His mind had fallen elsewhere in the past days, but he'd finally worked up the courage to text her and go see her. His morning had been worse than most, as his mom accidentally broke one of her bottles of alcohol, the shard's covering the floor and her foot getting cut in the process. He wasn't exactly sure when it had happened, sometime in between his walk with Stevie and Stacey to school, but Sam had gotten back to the trailer to remains of vodka on the floor. He'd taken a Xanax in the morning, which had started making his aggression levels go up. Sam pushed his anger down, cleaning up the mess and bandaging his mother's foot. After eating his breakfast, he walked into his bathroom, doing a line, courtesy of his purchase from Eric yesterday. Once the high had set in, Sam made his way over to Peyton's place, his nose itching throughout. He quickly rubbed his nose, knocking on her door, waiting for her to answer.
Peyton had been a wreck; she wasn't going to lie about that. After everyone had left the house, she snuck out to go back to her place on the Southside to grab some more clothes. She hadn’t been eating anything, just because of how upset she had gotten, didn't have the hunger sensation. She was grateful that Vivian had stepped up and covered for her at the flower shop because she couldn’t stand being there at the moment. Once she paid the cab driver, she got out and saw that Sam was at her door. She furrowed her brows at him rubbed his nose and wrapped her arms around her body as she made her way to the porch. "I hear, if you don't text someone, then that means they don't want anything to do with you anymore." She spoke up, stepping at the stairs of her place. "Or I could be totally wrong." She noticed that bitterness seeped into her voice, but she didn't care at the moment.
Sam's head turned as he heard the cab behind him. He let out a sniffle, his eyes widening as he noticed Peyton get out of the car. He stuffed his hands in his pockets, letting her speak. He could hear the bitterness in her tone, making him furrow his eyebrows. All Sam could think was, 'What the hell?' He was the one who had a bomb dropped on him, yet he wasn't allowed to want some space? His frustration was getting to him, crossing his arms as he pushed his anger down. He didn't want to lose her, despite how he felt, so let it go, dropping his head and letting out another sniffle, rubbing his nose before he spoke, "I'm sorry, Peyton. I've been busy and I just needed time." Sam stepped closer to her, looking into her eyes, "I-I still want to be with you. There's just been a lot going on with me."
"I get that, I do and I’m sorry for being so bitter with you just now. Hadn't been sleeping well." Peyton replied as she watched him sniffle and rubbed his nose. Then she raised a brow when she saw eyes and shifted her weight on her other foot as he spoke. "Then let me in, don't keep me out like Elisa did with Anna, while they lost their parents." She took a step closer to him. "If we're going to be in a relationship together, I don't want any secrets between us."
Sam nodded, letting out a breath, wondering if she hadn't been sleeping well because of him, "It's okay, and I'm sorry." He shook his head, "Elsa had some pretty good reasons, though." Sam swallowed hard, diverting his eyes from hers. He knew he couldn't tell Peyton he was doing drugs. She was already so out of his league; he didn't know if she'd still want to be with him after knowing that. He also thought that she might make him stop, which he would, eventually, but he couldn't do that right now. Then there was his drunken-high hookup. He knew telling her would hurt her, and she'd already made it clear she was having trouble already. Sam couldn't be the reason she was even sadder, even if it was killing him inside to keep it from her. He brought his lips into a tight line and nodded, "You're right. We can't have secrets between us."
Peyton swallowed hard when she heard him apologize. "Elsa thought her powers would kill Ana, but they didn’t. They had to find out through the hard way, but eventually, Elsa let Ana in." She said softly as she cupped his cheeks gently, hoping it was okay. "No, we can’t." She closed the gap between them and dipped her head to meet his eyes. "How about we go inside, I'll get you whatever you want to drink or eat, and we can talk it out, please." She placed both hands onto his shoulders and rubbed them gently.
Sam gave Peyton a grin, "Yeah, but Elsa was also under a lot of pressure that she didn't want Anna to have to deal with." He let out another sniffle, feeling his nose itch again from before, bringing his hands up to his nose to rub it again, trying to make it look nonchalant. He felt himself get more and more nervous, wishing he could step away and take a pill to calm himself down. He let her hands settle on her waist, nodding as spoke, and meeting her eyes again, "Yeah, I'd like that." Sam stepped aside to let Peyton open her door, standing behind her.
Peyton couldn’t help but smile when she saw his grin. "Well, Anna was perfectly fine dealing with a lot of pressure. Elsa just needed to trust her." She reached up, threaded her fingers through his hair, something that she had been missing and watched him rub his nose again. She felt his hands on her waist, nodded slightly when he met her eyes again and opened her door once she pulled out her keys. "Good because I'd like that as well." She stepped inside and waited for him to step in before she could close the door behind him.
Sam bit down on his lip, "Elsa just thought it would be better for Anna if she didn't have to worry about her all the time." Sam sighed at the feeling of her hands in his hair, nodding as he let her go to open the door. Sam walked in, sticking his hands in his pockets as he walked inside. Last time he was here, things were so different. He was so much happier, even with everything going on, because he had Peyton. Sam felt himself get fidgety, swallowing hard and shooting Peyton a smile, "You mind if I use your bathroom before we start talking?"
"Well, I guess Elsa has to realize that no matter how many times she tells Anna, she's going to worry about her all the time and there's no way of stopping her because she's stubborn as hell," Peyton said with a firm nod. She closed the door behind him, hung up her keys and took off her hoodie, feeling her shirt getting stuck to it and felt the cold air hit her stomach. "Feel free to use it, I'll be getting us something to drink and maybe some food if you're hungry."
"Anna should learn then that Elsa knows how to take care of herself." He didn't know how to take care of himself anymore, but Peyton didn't need to know that. He didn't want her to have to deal with his problems, considering she still had her own to worry about. "Thanks, and yeah, that'd be great." Sam nodded, walking into her bathroom and shutting the door behind him and locking it. He pulled the bottle of Xanax out of his jacket pocket, popping one in his mouth and swallowed it. He felt himself sigh in relief, bending down to flush the toilet so it wouldn't look suspicious, before hiding the bottle back in his jacket and returning to her living room.
"Yeah, well like I said, she's stubborn and will continue to argue with you on it." Peyton sighed as she put her hoodie down and headed into the kitchen, didn’t want to struggle with her hoodie and shirt getting attached to it. She made him a peanut butter & jelly sandwich and grabbed two hot cups of hot chocolate, which was thankful for her Keurig. "So, I didn’t have any tea, I hope that hot chocolate is okay and made you a PB&J sandwich." She placed the plate down on her coffee table that she had gotten the other day, along with the cups.
Sam simply shook his head. After coming out of the bathroom, he felt a lot calmer than before, grateful that he'd stepped away, not really knowing how their talk was going to go. Sam smiled, taking the cup off the coffee table and taking a sip, "It's perfect. Thank you." Sam took a bite of his sandwich, chewing it down slowly and swallowing before taking another sip of the hot chocolate. "So, I guess we should talk..."
Peyton sat down from across him, placed her hands together and rested them on her legs. "You're welcome." She replied softly. She nodded as she pulled her long sleeves to where they're at her fingers and swallowed hard. "Yeah, we should...since both of us want to be together..." Peyton let out a breath as she glanced down at her feet, not knowing where they should start. "I’m going to come out and say it, these past few days have been shit because I wasn't talking to you and it was driving me not, being able to text you a quick hello or good morning or goodnight." She paused as she tried to form the words before she stopped talking.
Sam nodded, letting her say something first. He stayed quiet as she spoke, taking sips of his drink, finally letting out a breath, "I know, Peyton, they've been rough for me too. When you told that you slept with Sebastian and Asher, I was upset." He finally realized that Peyton was right, that they couldn't keep secrets from each other. He could never tell her about the drugs, but he knew he had to tell her about the hookup. He didn't know the girl, and he couldn't risk her hearing it from someone else. "And, um, I made some bad choices after we talked. Ones that I regret a lot."
Peyton listened to him and nodded, started to rub her hands together as he spoke. She froze when she heard his next words, looked at him as she could feel her heartbeat against her chest. "What happened?" She asked, not knowing if she wanted to hear it, but she needed to if they were going to be together.
Even with the drugs in his system, it didn't make what he said next any easier. And it shouldn't have been. Sam had been broken over Peyton sleeping with someone else, how would she feel when he turned around and did the same thing? "I, uh, I was really upset, so I went to Wyrm, and might've gotten too drunk, and I, um, hooked up with a girl." Sam swallowed hard; his head dropped to stare down at the ground.
Peyton felt her heart drop and wasn't for sure what to feel. "Ooh." She whispered as she ran her hands over her thighs, her mind going miles a minute and let out a breath. Her vision started to get blurry since she was already on the verge of tears anyway. "W-who is she?" Sam let out another breath, knowing his next answer wouldn't be any better. He could feel his heartbreak little when he glanced up and noticed how upset Peyton looked. He picked his hands up, running them through his hair and looking back up, "I, um, I don't know."
Peyton swallowed hard as she let out a shaky breath and nodded as she started to play with her fingers. She didn't know what to think since part of her felt it was his way of getting back at her for sleeping with Sebastian and Asher, but the other part of her was heartbroken. "Anything else?"
Call Sam a coward, but he couldn't tell her the rest. He couldn't tell her he'd taken drugs that night. He couldn't tell her that he was still using. He couldn't tell her that he was on them right now because he was becoming too much of a coward to deal with his world. So, Sam paused for a second, thinking before he opened his mouth "No, that's it."
Peyton nodded as she wiped away a few more tears as she sniffed and let out a breath. She pushed her hot cocoa away from her as she stood up, took off her hoodie and tossed it onto her couch. "D-did you hooked up with her to get back at me?" She asked as she looked at him.
Sam could feel his high from the coke this morning coming down, making him fidgety. He started tapping his knee on the floor, and shook his head, "What? No, of course not. I wouldn't do that to you. I was just, I was upset, and I felt rejected... and she was just there." Sam looked around, finally meeting her gaze.
Peyton wrapped her arms around her as she nodded after seeing his knee started to tap on the floor. "So, you thought, hey matter as well hook up with this random chick, because the girl who I like, slept with two guys and it might hurt the girl I like in the process?" She met his gaze. "I understood that you felt like that and needed time to think but I just." She sniffed as she wiped away her tears.
Sam felt his nose start to itch again, praying that a nosebleed wasn't coming on. He hadn't gotten another all week, but with his bad luck, who knew what would happen? He rubbed his nose and sniffled again, shaking his head, "That- That's not what happened, okay? I didn't go into the bar, intentionally looking for someone. It was a moment of weakness." One of the worst side effects of Xanax was the aggression that could come with it. In the past week, Sam found himself getting angrier and more annoyed much quicker, "What about you, Peyton? Like you said, you slept with two guys, not just one, on two occasions. Were you thinking about me while you did Sebastian and Asher?"
Peyton looked at him when he threw Sebastian and Asher in her face. She opened her mouth, closed it and let out a bitter chuckle. "How long have you been doing drugs, Sam?" She asked as she looked at him, ignoring his question, since she was done talking about the threesome. "Also, it clears up the confusion if you really want it, I slept with Sebastian, twice and I slept with Asher once. I also felt horrible afterwards, go and ask Riley if you really want to know, because outside of you, she is the only one who knew about it. I still feel horrible. Now, going back to my question, how long have you been on drugs, Sam?"
Sam was taken aback. Eliana was the only one who knew, and he knew she hadn't told anyone. He also noticed that she'd completely ignored his question, only making him more annoyed, "No, answer my question first, Peyton, were you thinking about me, when you slept with Sebastian, twice, and slept with Asher, once?" Sam shook his head, pulling at his hair, "And you don't think I didn't? You think I didn't feel like shit after it happened?" Sam ignored her question, feeling himself get frustrated. He wasn't acting like himself, at all, and his actions reflected the same thing.
Peyton watched him pulled at his hair, which was something she hadn't seen before and knew that she wasn't going to let her anxiety get the best of her. She wasn't going to go run away just because he was getting upset. "It was a moment of weakness." She looked at him. "I don't know, because you never said anything about feeling bad afterwards. Did you feel bad afterwards?" Peyton looked at him. "Now, answer my damn first question Samuel Evans, I answered yours. Are you fucking high right now and don't you dare deny it because you never pulled your own hair if you're sober and you never get this easily worked up? Maybe run your hand through your hair, sure but never pulling at it. I should know because I pay attention to your little habits and body language a lot more than you realize."
Sam scoffed, shaking his head again, "Moment of weakness, just like me, right? Of course, I felt bad afterwards!" Sam gulped, averting his eyes from Peyton. He didn't want her to find out, he really didn't. But she'd all but made up her mind, and Sam was thinking that lying would only make it worse for them. "It's not a big deal." And it wasn't, at least to Sam. So, what if he needed something to help him? Nobody could really understand how much stress he was constantly under, and how broken he was inside.
"If you're saying the many times, we've hooked up were a moment of weakness for me, then you're wrong because I’m falling in love with you," Peyton said as she quickly covered her mouth and closed her eyes when he shouted those words. She dropped her hands, from her mouth and walked over towards him. She kneeled in front of him, placed her hands onto his knees before she cupped his cheeks carefully. "Baby, hey look at me."
Sam's eyes widened as she spoke, "Wait, what?" He didn't know how she could be falling for him. She was so beyond his league, not to mention a complete and total mess. He wouldn't be surprised if Peyton wanted to run for the hills, he wouldn't blame her for not wanting to stick around. As she came around to him, Sam couldn't meet her gaze, thinking that she was just disappointed in him. "I'm fine, Peyton."
Peyton swallowed hard as she looked at him. "......I’m falling in love with you a..and it scares me because I don't know if you'll be there to catch me." She replied as she looked at him. She shook her head before she gently pushed him back softly against the couch before she straddled his lap. If this was one of the ways she would have him look at her, then so be it. "You're not fine, Sam. You haven’t been."
Sam didn't know what to say. Of course, he'd known since the day they were in that bar together that he was falling for her, eventually realizing he was falling in love. But he wasn't right for her, he knew he wasn't okay, and he didn't want to put Peyton through his crap. Against any of his better judgment, he spoke without thinking, "I'm falling in love with you too, Peyton," Sam let out a breath, finally meeting her eyes as she was in his lap, "I'm as fine as I can be, Peyton. I don't have a choice."
Peyton wanted to kiss him, something she had been wanting to do but she knew that it could wait. She ran her fingers through his hair once more and shook her head. "You do have a choice, Sam. Please, let me help you. I don’t want you to go through this alone and it would break my heart if I just let you continue down this road. It would break my heart if something happened to you a..and I didn't do anything to help you." She licked her lips, noticing that her lips were dry. "How would you feel if I told you I didn’t have a choice with my dad?"
Sam shook his head, "No, I don't Peyton. My family... they're falling apart. My mom won't get out of bed, my sister has these terrible nightmares, and Stevie, God, he wants to join the fucking Ghoulies." It was so much for Sam, every second of the day. He didn't think anyone would understand how it feels to see yourself failing every day, not even able to process that Sam was fatherless. He couldn't abandon them; he didn't even know what would happen if he did. "I told you, Peyton, you say the word and I'll make sure he never bothers you again. One of us deserves to have a normal life."
Peyton rested her forehead against his, cupped his cheeks and caressed her thumbs. "Tell me what I can do to help you out, baby and I'll do too. I’m so sorry that you've been dealing with this all alone. If you want, I can come over and help you out with your family, okay?" She said softly to him and kept caressing his cheeks. "I want to be there for you and deal with that, with you." She shook her head gently against his head when he said that one of them deserves a normal life. "We both deserve a normal life, Sam. Then, you say the word and I'll make sure I'll do everything I can to help you with your family."
Sam couldn't do it to Peyton. He knew firsthand how emotionally taxing it could be, he just couldn't do it to Peyton. It was his family after all, so it was his responsibility to take care of, "No, Peyton, I can't ask you to do that. It's temporary, I swear. I'll stop when everything calms down, I promise." Sam closed his eyes for a moment, letting the feeling of Peyton's hands on his cheek relax him the tiniest bit, "I wish it were that simple, Peyton. But I won't let your life be affected by the mistakes of my father. That isn't fair to you."
Peyton looked at him knew that she would cry. "I’m way past asking, I’m at the point where I’m going to gather up my old clothes and give to Stacey. Talk to Stevie, get your mom out of bed, help you around the house and help you with Loki. If we're going to be together, then we have to learn that we can't carry the burden alone." She said softly as she watched him close his eyes for a moment and continued her moments. "I know it’s not fair to me, but it’s not fair for you to do this by yourself. At this point, I don't care about it affecting my life. My life isn't perfect, it never has been. I appreciate you looking out for me, but I've made up my mind."
It was never as simple as Peyton made it sound, "I really appreciate it, Peyton, but I just don't think you'll be able to help. I've tried, just about everything in these past few weeks, all they need is time. I just have to be there for them, even if it means doing some things I don't like." Then there came the drug situation, which had in some way strayed away from just his family life. Sam knew he'd been unhappy for a while, and well, the drugs helped him. They helped him feel better and he didn't know if he would be emotionally available to anyone if he stopped. They'd made him feel calmer, happier at times. He knew it wasn't really helping, but in his broken and messed up state of mind, they were saving him. "They're my family, Peyton. I won't let you take responsibility for something that you shouldn't have to."
"Like the drugs?" Peyton asked as he looked at him, dropped her hands from his cheeks and slightly pulled away from, but still sitting on his lap. She didn’t know what to do and she didn't like it. She didn’t like it when she didn’t have the answers and she didn’t like this situation. She chewed on her bottom lip as she looked away from him, letting a few tears fall, which she was surprised by it. She let the words sink in, ran her fingers through her hair before she rested her head on Sam's shoulder. "Can I just be there for you, please?"
Sam could feel her pulling away, making his voice quieter, "Um, yeah." He leaned forward and wiped the tears that were falling from her eyes. Nothing about this situation was good, but it was Sam's reality, so he'd suck it and up and deal with it. He nodded, biting down on his lips. He let his hands run over her shoulders, "Of course."
Peyton swallowed hard as she nodded against his shoulder as she felt his hands ran over her shoulders. "So, what are we going to do?" She asked softly. "Are we going to be together or are we going to be one of those people who want to be together but can't be together."
Sam was conflicted. On one hand, he wanted to be with Peyton, he wanted to have her in his life, the only thing that wasn't screwed up. But Sam also thought that it was selfish of him, to keep Peyton around when he wasn't at his best, "I mean, I want to be with you, so much, but if this is too much for you, then I understand if you don't want to be together.
Peyton bit down on her bottom lip as he spoke. She didn’t want him not in her life, it was already terrible not talking to him. She was literally losing sleep & not eating not being with him. "Under one condition." She said as she lifted her head and met his eyes. "If I see you spiraling downwards, I will literally kick your ass and take you somewhere so you can get help. Got it? Because I refuse to ever lose you."
Sam nodded, sighing in relief. He really didn't know what would happen if he lost Peyton. Maybe he actually would spiral, but he knew if he had her, he'd find a way to be fine, "Deal." He would've promised her that too, but some days were harder than others, which just made him want to take more. Eliana had given him some advice, but sometimes his emotions got the best of him, "I'll... I'll try my best, Peyton."
Peyton let out a breath of relief when he said deal and rested her forehead against his as she wrapped her arms around his neck. "That's all I’m asking, Sam." She whispered softly, knowing that she didn’t really want to kick his ass but knew that she would if that was her last resort. "Is for you to try your best."
Sam was grateful Peyton was being understanding, that she wasn't running for the hills now that everything was out. He brought his arms around her, pulling her into a hug. "Thank you," He whispered, his voice cracking the tiniest bit. He'd missed holding her so much, she'd brought warmth back into his body.
Peyton returned the hug as she pressed her lips against his head and started to play with his hair. "You're welcome," She whispered back as she kept her eyes closed and heard his voice cracked a bit. She didn’t realize how much she had missed being in his arms, until now and she didn’t to let go.
Sam could feel himself begin to relax as Peyton's hands met his hair. He let another breath of relief, closing his eyes for a moment. Sam brought her closer his body, not ready to let her go just yet. Sam brought of his hands up to her hair, running his hand through it.
Peyton continued to play with his hair as he ran his hand through her hair. "Do you want to go laid down and I'll hold you?" She offered softly, not wanting to move but her legs began to hurt, and she wasn’t ready to let go of him. Especially when he pulled her closer to him.
Sam nodded into her hair, "Yeah." He absentmindedly let out another sniffle, not sure if it was from the drugs this time, or because deep down, he just wanted to cry. When everything first happened, Sam didn't have it in him to cry at the time, but as time passed, Sam had suppressed his emotions to the point where he didn't know if the tears would ever really come out.
Peyton pressed another kiss against his head. "I’m going to pull away and I'll walk with you to my room, okay?" She said softly, not wanting to disturb the silence that fell between them and untangled her fingers from his hair. Sam nodded, letting his hands drop from Peyton's back and letting her go, "Okay." He moved to help her up, running his hands through his hair, and getting up after her. One of his hands found its way to the small of her back, keeping it there as they walked to her room.
Peyton told him thank you when he helped her up and felt his hand on the small of her back. Once they arrived at her bedroom, she closed her curtains and turned on a small light that she had then slid off her shoes. She laid down first, since she was going to be the big spoon and opened her arms from Sam.
Sam got into the bed after Peyton, bringing himself down onto the sheets and next to her. With her behind him, he took one of his hands and linked it with hers, letting it sit on his chest. He let out a breath, closing his eyes as he tried to relax again. It helped with Peyton's body next to his, but he still felt a little fidgety from everything, secretly wanting to go the bathroom again so he could calm himself down. Peyton wrapped her other arm around him once she scooted behind him and placed a kiss against his head. "Do you want me to run my fingers in your hair?" She asked softly, knowing that she would do it for the boy if it helped him in anyway. "Or just hold you like this?" Peyton hoped she wasn't being too annoying or bothering him, but she wanted to make sure he was feeling okay.
Sam nodded, letting out a whisper, "Yes, please." He just wanted to forget everything that was happening in his life, and be in this moment with her, which was much harder for him than it sounded. Especially after what happened at the Wyrm with Eliana a few nights ago, Sam was trying to slow himself down, which was also, much harder than it sounded. He was hoping being back with Peyton would help that, but really, only time would be able to tell.
Peyton nodded as she pressed another kiss against his head as she began to run her fingers through his hair. She closed her eyes, really hoping that everything was going to be good again between them. She bit down on her bottom lip as she entangled their legs together then rested her forehead against the back of his head as she continued to run her fingers through his hair. She knew the other talk that they needed was about their jobs, but she didn't want to bring it up right now.
There were still things to talk about, Sam knew that. But he was enjoying the comfortable silence between them, even if he knew it wouldn't last long. And if it was anything like their last talk, Sam knew there would likely be some sort of fighting between them. He brought his hand behind him, letting his fingers rub against her side. He let his eyes close, just enjoying the peacefulness of the moment.
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