#a little emotionally stunted maybe sure but he was a teenage boy trying his best
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i'm an early seasons steve harrington apologist. sorry. he was not a bad person he was not a bad boyfriend he was literally just 17
#he wasn't even that bad. and he apologized when he was#also he literally thought his gf was cheating on him. with a guy who took sneaky pics of her like. valid actually sorry#and season 2??? why does he call himself a shitty boyfriend he was actually so sweet???#a little emotionally stunted maybe sure but he was a teenage boy trying his best#every time i rewatch i'm like what was everyone on about he's literally fine. i think ppl blow his king steve phase way out of proportion#steve harrington#stranger things#thoughts from my brain#1k
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if you’re going crazy, just grab me and take me
summary: after the worst year with this fucking family, Ransom proposes on ❄️ chrstmas eve ❄️ it obviously doesn’t go over as well as his emotionally-stunted ass thought it would.
warnings: every god damn word in this thing is a problem. rough smut. choking, anal, hair-pulling, biting, this shit makes the first chapter seem light, i’ll just say that. a lot of fighting. verbal and physical. there’s some fluff but don’t let ransom trick you like he’s obviously tricked me.
word count: this shit is almost 25,000 fucking words 😂😂😂. i dead ass kept being like why the fuck am I taking so long to post this? Then I saw the word count and I 😳🤭🤗😂 someone pls tell me i did not just devote 25,000 words to exposing myself as a weak ass hoe for Ransom. pls tell me this is a fever dream. i can’t.
pairing: ransom drysdale x reader
a/n: holy fuck, am i a disaster. i apologize, i kept falling asleep and wow, i’m just confused about my entire process for writing this bc it was abnormal af.
part one: x part two: x (however, you don’t really need to read them to understand this mess? pretty sure.)
Christmas Eve:
It somehow felt that the entire hellscape that you were currently living in had simultaneously transpired yesterday but also years ago. That was the common feeling one was left with in times of so much exposure to Thrombeys. It was a whirlwind, but there were the good moments, and then the really bad moments, but then the kind of fun moments… It was a rollercoaster, honestly. One you had incorrectly believed you could cope with.
Meg and Joni had called you in a panic from the ski lodge they’d gone to in Canada. There was talk of stopping all flights, how were they going to get home? And lord, what about their home? Were they really supposed to stay there? Since being cut off, Joni had made some career moves that were smart, but she still had to scale back. They were in a much smaller place than before, one that was only temporary—Joni claimed as much about one million times while signing the papers for it.
Jacob had been the next to call, a hysterical Donna could be heard in the background. They had also been moving into another home because of financial issues. You weren’t sure what the ploy was with having Jacob call. Out of everyone in the family, he was the one you spoke to the least, maybe in competition with his irritating mother. Perhaps that had been the angle, were you really going to leave them isolated with their possibly murderous son in such a small house in an unknown neighborhood?
The answer was no. You weren’t going to leave out any Thrombeys. The Drysdales, on the other hand… You had made your terms quite clear. So, with the news of a quarantine sweeping across the country, these overprivileged people flocked to the house they had once called their own. But it was your house now, and that meant it was well within your right to exclude Linda and Richard.
The night you had told Ransom about it was…quite a night.
March: the arrival,
Your grand idea was to deliver the news quickly, over a drink when he was in the best mood he could be. You casually told him that Joni and Meg would be arriving first, then Walt, Donna, and Jacob.
He stared for a long time before simply stating, “I will not let them in the house.”
You rolled your eyes. “Ransom—”
He leaned forward, slamming his glass down on the table between you. “It’s not happening.”
You arched an eyebrow. Was he trying to be intimidating? Oh, you would be just terrified if you were an elderly author or poor nurse tasked with caring for the mentioned author. Seeing as you were his girlfriend, he was out of luck on that.
“I will lock the doors,” he declared, standing to place his hands on his hips. “Not one of those assholes is getting in here. You understand me?”
Instead of answering, you grabbed your drink and returned to the magazine in your lap. That was probably Ransom’s greatest source of irritation, when you decided you were done with the dramatics and ignored him.
He scoffed. “The fact that you think this is happening… It just goes to show—you call me a narcissist, but clearly, you are the narcissist! It takes one to know one!”
It takes one to know one? “Are you five?”
He crossed his arms over his chest.
With a soft sigh, you turned the page. It was silent for several seconds and you weren’t sure if he was trying to build up to something or if he just had nothing else left to try. Whatever it was, you told yourself you were ready for it. How many years was it now? You couldn’t be surprised anymore.
“Are you only with me for sex?”
And you stood corrected. Narrowing your eyes, you looked up at him. “I’m sorry?”
“You clearly don’t care about my feelings—”
“Ransom, seriously, shut up. This is happening, okay? Your family is scared right now, you could try being human. This was their home for a time, of course, they want to be somewhere they feel comfort—”
“No, I’m putting my foot down.”
You rolled your eyes again. “You don’t have a foot to put down. This is my house, too.”
“Too,” he repeated firmly. “Too!”
“Ransom,” you snapped, getting to your feet and throwing the magazine on the table. “Stop acting like a child. They will be here tomorrow. I’m going to bed and if you wanted to join me, that would be great.”
He sat back down, a clear indication that that was not happening.
Things with Ransom, since the last argument, hadn’t been as tense as you thought they would be. Majorly, nothing really changed. Well, sex changed. You guys just weren’t doing that, which was major, because of the rate at which it had been occurring. But other than that, nothing changed. He wasn’t ignoring you, he wasn’t not touching you, there was very simple no sex. At all. But was that something you were okay with? Hell no. It was getting old and you were getting fucking tired of it.
“Fine, if you don’t, just know that I am keeping track.”
“Track?” he narrowed his eyes. “Of what?”
“How many nights I’ve slept without you and how many nights you’ve gone without fucking me.”
“After your last indiscretion, did you really expect anything else? Which you still haven’t apologized for, by the way.”
“Apologize?” you scoffed. “For keeping a fucking vibrator? What do you want me to say, Ransom? Sorry that I have yet to give you total control over my body?”
“That is exactly what I want to hear.”
Without another word, you simply rolled your eyes at him and stormed off to the room you had once upon a time shared with your boyfriend. Not that he officially moved out. In fact, he was still sleeping in there and kept his shit in there. But he was not falling asleep with you nor was he was present when you woke up.
You had no idea what he was doing in there and you were trying to be human, unlike Ransom. Everyone deserved privacy. Besides, he’d made you your sunroom and it afforded him a lot of forgiveness. It was this tiny extension of the house that had huge windows and was just small enough to fit your yoga mat, a couch, and about a billion plants. You read there a lot, you also escaped Ransom a few times. You could understand his desire for an office. But as frequently as he was using it? That was scary.
Admittedly, it was difficult to stay mad at him when you walked through the house that you’d almost now completely rebuilt together. The only exclusion being the office. It had been one of those Harlan rooms that you’d never actually been in prior because you were not family. Weeks ago, you watched Ransom remove everything, add new things, but you still hadn’t been inside. He didn’t so much tell you that it was his own personal room, but it was very clear in how he locked the door. Like, all the time.
You had already been prepping for bed, knowing that the discussion was going to be exhausting. You threw yourself straight into bed, not overly optimistic about the possibility that you were going to fall asleep.
Maybe it was the argument, the mention, the acknowledgment that you guys weren’t having sex. Did he even care? It didn’t seem like it. That caused concern for you. You’d always thought that you would be much older when the two of you would be having no sex. You wondered if things were changing, if your relationship was changing.
Officially, it was hopeless. You were not going to fall asleep. You were just about to get back up when you heard him walking up the stairs, you froze, held your breath, hoped that maybe he wanted to end this. Instead, he walked by the room and to the end of the hall, where said office was.
Fine, fuck him. You just had to get up and moving, there was no shortage of shit you had to prepare. Jacob, though terrible, was family, and a teenage boy. You were going to set him up in a smaller room on the bottom floor. Harlan usually had live-in staff stay in that room if they ever fell on hard times. You figured he would enjoy the privacy. Walt might even enjoy not sleeping in the same room as the next Ted Bundy.
Meg’s room was the most used since she stopped by on weekends sometimes when Ransom was gone for the day or stayed out late. They always met in the kitchen when morning came to argue and give you a headache, however.
She probably needed towels in the bathroom. She might even end up wanting different sheets. Jacob would need more sheets. Was there a color you should give him in the case that the little psycho killed someone, if you wanted to prevent stains? Joni’s room had been cleared out except for major furniture so you wanted to get that set before the morning. You had intended to set all of this up at some horribly early hour, but you were too annoyed to try sleeping. What better time than now?
Did you even have food? You would probably need to go to the store in the morning. You would make a careful list and ensure that no one would need to leave the house again because you were not going to let one of these rich idiots get you sick. Food, sheets because as you were walking through the linen closet, you discovered that you didn’t have really any sets of sheets. Then, you would need laundry detergent, fabric softener. Not all the rooms had pillows—
“What the hell are you doing?”
Ransom found you madly scribbling on a notepad in the center of Joni’s room. You didn’t bother to look at him when you answered, “Making a shopping list.”
“May I ask what for?”
“We have no sheets or pillows or food…or really anything, Ransom. Are we fucking vampires?”
He sighed as he made his way to you. “Okay, it’s time for bed.”
“Go away if you’re not going to be helpful.”
“No, get up now.” But he was met with nothing but silence. Instead of trying another round of verbal communication, he effortlessly grabbed your arms and picked you up.
“Ransom!”
He abruptly took your face in his hands. “They’re lucky they even get to be here. You’re not doing a single thing for these people.”
“Stop, okay? This is our house, we have to have these things—”
“No, you stop. Stop trying to do anything for them because no matter what, they’re going to complain.”
You glared. “Are you trying to help? Just go back to your stupid office and leave me be.”
He arched an eyebrow at you. “It is time for bed. I’m taking you to the room—”
“I’m just going to sneak out as soon as you leave for your office, so don’t waste my time or yours—”
He abruptly threw you up over his shoulder.
“Ransom!” you shrieked in absolute panic, he had never done this. Dragged you kicking and screaming? Yes. Literally pulled you along the floor by your legs? Yes. This? No, not once.
He was quick to get to the room, worried about how exactly you would react, what you were willing to do to make him drop you. He tossed you down on the mattress.
“You’re such an ass! I have to—”
He silenced you by pulling off his T-shirt.
So, he interrupted you because he wanted to have sex? After he had been withholding it? You feigned an unbothered expression. “Ransom, fuck off.”
He scowled. “Why did I have to find you? Why did life bring you to me? Personally, the meaningless fucking was fine for me, a lot less trouble.”
You scoffed. “Do you think I like being with you?! You’re the worst person I’ve ever fucking met, possibly the worst person on this fucking planet!”
He rolled his eyes. “Get on your knees.”
“You are not serious.”
“I am.”
“No, you’re seriously fucking insane, but you’re not serious in that you actually think that’s going to happen!”
“Get. On. Your. Knees. You can do it on your own or I can do it for you.”
You weighed your options. You wanted to have sex with your boyfriend, you wanted to be close to him. However, if he left you after you sucked him off, you might end up killing him. But what could you do? Ransom was apparently in a mood.
Whatever theatrics that were going to occur tonight were already planned, you realized. If he was going to walk away, he was going to walk away. No amount of arguing or any other behavioral tactics were going to change that. You would hit him, you were sure of that, but at least you could get back to making your home presentable.
You reached back for a pillow and gave him a challenging look. He arched an eyebrow at you as you slowly jumped off the bed, laid your pillow at his feet and got to your knees.
“The fuck is this? You suddenly a princess?”
“I’ve always been a princess,” you declared. “One day, a wonderful man or woman, who’s going to give me an even bigger house, is going to know it.”
He glared. “What the fuck is your problem? Do I need to start paying you to keep your mouth shut?”
You snorted. “You have money?”
And that was, apparently, a line crossed for Ransom. Furiously, without another word, he yanked his pants open and shoved them down with his boxers.
Instead of staring at his cock in front of your face, you looked up at him.
He sighed. “Y/N, suck my cock.”
You shrugged. “Why?”
He took himself in one hand and grabbed your hair in the other. He brought your mouth to the head of his cock and waited patiently. You did nothing, simply kept your gaze on him. Rolling his eyes, he pulled at your hair.
You attempted to keep your lips clamped but he continued yanking until you opened your mouth to cry out. Then, without hesitation, he shoved his cock down your throat. You gagged instantly, hands snapping up to shove at his thighs. He wouldn’t budge, he kept you there no matter how hard you tried to push him away—which, admittedly, since you were so wet, wasn’t very hard—or how many times you gagged.
His free hand touched your cheek. “You’re fucking beautiful like this.”
He could fuck off—as soon as he was done coming, you would walk away. You didn’t even want to be fucked by him anymore. But sadly, you had missed the taste of him, the feel of his skin on your tongue.
When he finally pulled you off his cock, you gasped for air. Then, once again, he was thrusting back in. You were choking on him, eyes watering, throat burning, drooling, sniffling, hands begging to be let up again with how hard they gripped his thighs.
But Ransom only let you off when he wanted. The second time, he allowed you to try to catch your breath. Your head was spinning since you were not quite getting oxygen back fast enough. You were blinking away those tiny black spots appearing behind your eyes. He used one hand to wipe away the tears on your cheeks and whatever was falling down your chin.
Then he was bringing you down once more. Holding you in place, he began fucking your mouth slowly, gently, two words that normally did not apply to Ransom. He took his time, he wanted you aching and craving him, and you really fucking were. You thought you wouldn’t feel a thing if he walked away after thing, but now, you knew you were going to set that office on fire if he tried it.
As he neared his end, he grew noisier. You liked that about Ransom, he didn’t hold back due to some insane fragile masculinity thing—no, that was often displayed in less conventional ways. He liked fucking you and he liked letting you know.
He picked up speed eventually, paying no mind to the sounds of you choking every time he thrust in a tad too hard. You didn’t even care, you knew you would be soaking wet, if you just reached down and felt…
He yanked you down when he was coming, buried deep in your throat, reveling in the feel of your throat moving around him, trying not to choke, trying to breathe. “Don’t make a mess, baby, swallow everything I’m giving you.”
You tried, really, you were not just playing your usual game of disobedience. But he really was choking you, so when you tried to swallow, things did not go according to plan. You gagged, nothing was swallowed. A mess you did create. On him, the floor, yourself, the pillow.
Ransom pulled you off and then grabbed your arm to haul you up. His hand still in your hair, he forced you to look up at him, bending your neck back almost uncomfortably. You were still struggling with lack of oxygen and just about fell into him completely, clearly being bratty was not on your mind.
He waited patiently, as if he wanted an explanation. No, you did not intend to do the opposite of what he had told you, but you weren’t about to let him know that. “Baby,” he cooed. His hand slid up from your arm to your neck where some of his cum was sliding down toward your chest. “What was what?”
“Out of practice, I guess. It’s been months since you’ve touched me.” Okay, it had just barely been two months yesterday, but if he could be dramatic, you were allowed as well.
He arched an eyebrow. “Considering you only need to say one word to me, I don’t think you really want it that bad.”
“You’re right, I don’t.”
His expression fell. He had hoped you would desperately blurt out an apology, clearly. Without another word, he shoved you onto the bed.
You stared up at him, face composed. “Don’t you have an office to be in?”
“You seem very jealous of that office, baby.”
“Why would I be? I finally get to be away from you.”
He leaned forward and grabbed your shorts and panties. The way he ripped them off you was damn near violent. You both wanted something rough tonight. “Then why is your pussy wet?”
You shrugged. “Couldn’t be for you. I can’t remember the last time you made me come.”
He leaned over, slowly crawling his way up your body.
Without prompt, you reached between your bodies and pulled your shirt over your head, arching a little more than necessary.
He took your forearms and pinned them to the bed. “Tell me how bad you need me.”
You shook your head. “I don’t.”
“I’m not joking.”
“I’m not joking,” you countered. “I. Don’t. Need. You.”
He took your jaw in one hand, forcing you to meet his stare. “Y/N, seriously.”
He really wasn’t joking, but again, neither were you. “Ransom, if you walk out before you fuck me, I will leave you. Do you understand me? I’ll fucking disappear, and you will never ever see me again.”
He smirked. “I understand.”
“I need you,” you breathed, free arm sliding around his shoulder, clinging tight. “I really fucking need you. I need you inside me. You know it’s been too long.”
Smiling like he just won the lottery, he rolled onto his side a little, turning your hips with him. “Yes,” he agreed. “Too long, baby, I’m sorry.”
You knew he wasn’t. You felt his tip at your entrance and you held your breath. He was a dick, yes, but you had been absolutely starving for his touch, his attention.
He pressed inside and it stung almost as bad as it had the first time. You turned your head away, hand pressed to your mouth to keep quiet. You hadn’t noticed your eyes were filled with tears until he touched your cheek and you blinked in surprise. You weren’t sure what you were crying about, the pain or the relief of finally feeling him.
You kept yourself turned from him, hoping he would just drop it. Of course, he wouldn’t. Of course, the one time you were willing to give Ransom a pass to be a complete ass, he wouldn’t want to take it.
“Sorry, baby girl,” he cooed. He had stopped, letting you adjust to him. However, Ransom didn’t have an ounce of patience and you knew his restraint was slipping. “I’m sorry, I’ll make it better.”
You also knew he wasn’t sorry. You squeezed your eyes shut until he was buried inside you. Feeling so full was something you had missed but feeling wanted was what you had been longing for. He could say the words, he could give you lingering looks when you were wearing a dress or a tight top, but it wasn’t the same. It didn’t convince you like when he just grabbed you and used you to satisfy every sick desire he had.
He grabbed your face and forced you to turn back but your eyes were shut. Instead of trying to get you to look at him, he kissed you. His lips moved over yours until you were finally curling into him, his arm wrapped around your back and pinned you against him.
Intimate, close, slow, but so fucking hard, that was how he made you come the first time. There were no words, just grabbing each other, gasping into the kiss, biting one another’s lips, tongue and teeth, scratching nails, pulling hair. He watched your face as you were coming down, hips still snapping up, fingers brushing along your cheeks.
He rolled onto his back and brought you with him. You hissed at the ache of this new angle, using your knees to pull off just a little. He took your hands and set them to the headboard. The way he stared up at you, like he was worshiping every inch of you, it made your skin burn.
“Ride me,” he ordered.
Hands gripping the bed, your hips began to roll. Ransom stared the whole time, where his cock was disappearing inside you, your moving breasts, your gorgeous, soft body. He used one hand to pinch your nipples alternatively and the opposite hand to focus solely on your clit.
You were breathless, shaking, chasing after that climbing high. You let the headboard go in favor of grabbing his hands, dragging them up to circle around your neck. As he began to apply pressure, you continued bouncing on his cock, unashamedly screaming now that he was stifling the noise.
Watching your eyes fill with tears, hearing those strangled sounds tear from your throat, it was enough to get him there as soon as your cunt started to tighten. He was coming with you, squeezing your neck tighter, so tight you tried to pull his hands off you.
But it was futile, and you wouldn’t have it any other way. He threw you down, rolling over so he was on top of you. You wrapped your legs around him, spreading your thighs and taking him in deeper.
He set one hand to the mattress to hold himself up but kept his other hand on your neck. He leaned over, forehead pressing to yours, breathing hotly against your skin. “Say it again.”
“Say what?” you choked out.
“You know.”
You always knew. He had only asked you for this one other time since you’d said it that first night. You stopped caring that he was probably never going to say it back. “I love you.”
His hips finally stilled. You weren’t sure what his response was going to be, but you knew what it wasn’t going to be. Yes, you’d stopped caring, but were you okay with it? You weren’t entirely convinced. But what were you going to do? Leave Ransom? That seemed highly unlikely.
So, you decided to speak before he could. “Even though you’re a fucking loser.”
He scoffed, shaking his head. “And I guess you’re hot enough to keep around even if that mouth annoys the hell out of me.”
That, you suspected, was as close as he was going to get to ever stating his feelings for you. “Are you going to let me get back to my list?”
He rolled his eyes. “No. Not done yet.”
You arched an eyebrow. “Really? You lasted, like, three minutes—”
He gave you a sharp look. “Must be my age, I guess I’ll need a minute before I can go again. But you, baby girl,” he grabbed one of your hands and brought your fingers up to his lips.
You watched closely as he kissed every knuckle before he brought your hand down and pressed your first two fingers to your clit. You shuddered. “Ransom, wait—”
“Since you like getting yourself off so much, you’re going to—”
You sighed. “Ransom, please—”
“And I’m going to watch until I’m ready to fuck you again.”
You pouted up at him. “You said it was time for bed.”
“I changed my mind.” He pulled your legs from around him and sat back to watch you. He pulled one thigh further from the other and gave you an expectant look. “I wasn’t asking, baby.”
For what felt like the first time in years, you were woken up by your boyfriend with his hand between your legs. You were laying on his chest, he was kissing the top of your head, tracing patterns along your spine and just barely teasing your clit.
All he needed to know was that you were awake and then had you pinned underneath him before you could say a word. Last night was nice but now the sun was shining through the blinds and you could see all of him. The freckles on his skin, the fine lines around his mouth because he does actually smile even if he doesn’t want anyone to know. And all his muscles—ugh.
“Good morning,” he said softly.
You smiled. “I have to get up and start getting ready.”
“No, baby. The only thing you need to do is open your legs so your boyfriend can fuck you like you deserve to be fucked.”
“Oh, deserve?” you scoffed. “I always deserve to be fucked. What changed your mind?”
He shrugged his shoulder. “Does it matter?”
Few things did when it really came down to your relationship with Ransom. It was all one huge give-and-take and neither of you shied away from taking advantage of that lack of communication.
He kept you there for nearly half an hour, insisting that you give him just one more finish, but he’d done that nearly four times. The reason you were able to escape was that there was someone at the door. As Ransom when to see who it was, you ran for the shower.
You were surprised when he joined you. One of your favorite things in your entire relationship was taking showers with Ransom, but it rarely happened. Whether that be because you were always on a time limit when you were getting ready or because he woke up later than you.
He wrapped his arms around your waist, chin resting on your shoulder.
“I miss taking showers with you, you’re warm.”
He turned to kiss your cheek. “You going shopping?” he muttered against your skin.
“Yeah, we don’t have anything either. We’re out of your favorite cookies, you know.”
He hummed. “Okay, just be safe. Wear a mask and try not to touch anything you don’t have to. Put everything in the back of your car, I put hand sanitizer in there so use it before you touch anything inside.”
You scoffed as you looked back, eyebrow arching. “You sound scared.”
He shrugged. “Well, you know… I just don’t want you to get sick.”
You smiled a little.
“Because I don’t want to have to take care of you.”
“Ugh, Ransom!” You brought your hand up to flick his forehead, but he caught your wrist and used the opposite hand to turn you around.
His arm slid across the small of your back and he picked you up to walk you to the shower wall. He pinned you against it completely, the shower head was almost directly over the two of you. Instead of attempting to watch him, you closed your eyes and pulled him into a kiss by his hair. He angled his hips up and easily thrust inside you.
Your mouth dropped and you gasped, he used that as his chance to bite down on your lip. You were sore between your legs, but the ache was a reminder that Ransom had put aside his pettiness because he had wanted you so badly. You brought your leg up to hook around his hip and used that as your leverage as you began to roll your hips.
He shuddered and bit harder on your lip still trapped between his teeth. He only let it go so he could turn down and press his mouth to your shoulder. “Slow baby, fuck me slow.”
You did as he directed. You slid off his cock and then slid back down, using all the restraint you could muster because you couldn’t wait until his broke. You couldn’t wait for him to grab you and take charge.
His hand slid between the two of you and he began pressing down on your clit, just slightly.
“I could kill you, Ransom,” you blurted out. “You better not ever go so long without touching me again.”
He nodded. “I promise, I will not.”
If you had a question about his tone, it died when his hands finally grasped your hips. “Tell me what you want.”
“Hard,” you pleaded. “So hard, please. I want to feel you all day, I want it to hurt until you’re inside me again.”
And goodness, did he make it hurt. He fucked you until you could no longer stand, until you weren’t able to coherently tell him that you weren’t sure you would ever be able to on your own again.
He had to set you on the floor of the tub when he knew it was time to get out. You weren’t sure why, and if you had been in a better mindset, you would have remembered the importance of always asking Ransom questions about his actions. However, all you could do was stay still, a little dizzy, vibrating pleasantly all over.
It somehow felt like hours but only seconds that he left you alone. When he was standing you back up, you still didn’t have the good sense to ask what the hell he was doing, but you absolutely melted when he pulled you from the shower and wrapped you up in a warm towel. A towel that had clearly just come out of the dryer—this man, that he could be so perfect and just chose not to be, deserved to be in jail. Yeah, the murder thing was a strike against him, you guessed, but this? Unforgivable.
When you got back home, there were several cars that you had never seen. Somehow, despite not getting an inheritance, the Thrombeys still knew how to make money. Which just made the whole Harlan thing even more annoying. Why all the dramatics? Rich people didn’t get poor the same way poor people got poorer. It was merely a showing of greed.
But you could not dwell on things like that, otherwise, this whole thing was going to go bad much quicker than you had suspected. You also couldn’t be the one that made it go bad. You weren’t an actual Thrombey or a Drysdale—and never would be since you fell in love with the least committal one of them all. You, despite extending your home and kindness, needed to be a lot more behaved than Ransom.
As you were bringing in the groceries, you glanced at the cars. There were five in total and you shuddered to think Jacob was driving. He was about that age, of course, but still, yikes. Meg and Joni probably showed up separately, which meant Donna and Walt did as well. Okay, weird, but you long ago stopped trying to guess why these people did what they did.
You wrestled with the front door for a moment and the noise of it brought in Joni and Meg. The older woman was completely decked out in crystals, unsurprisingly, you had just read an about how crystal shops were doing particularly well at this time.
“Hey, guys,” you greeted.
“Thank you so much for letting us stay here,” Meg immediately responded, taking some of the bags from your hands.
Joni followed her daughter’s lead. “Yes, honey, let us help you.”
Okay, suspicious. These people rarely did a thing that would constitute as the simplest of work—save for Meg, of course. “Thanks, but Ransom really should be helping me.” You gently pressed the door back with your leg, not shutting it completely but trying to keep the cold at bay. “Ransom!”
“He’s in the kitchen,” Joni informed.
“Great, we can head that way.”
On the walk there, you found Donna and Walt were in what was now one of many family rooms. They greeted you a tad overenthusiastically—regardless, you couldn’t stop, you’d just deal with it later.
“You didn’t need to go shopping for us,” Donna said.
“Oh, it’s fine,” you assured. “We needed a few things, I thought I’d get it done all at once so you guys wouldn’t need to worry about it.”
As if given a cue, they all began to thank you again. Again, you would need to deal with this when your arms were less full and there weren’t about a million bags in the back of your car.
You led the way to the kitchen, Meg and Joni on your tail. “Was the trip over here easy enough?”
“So weird,” Joni claimed. “People are literally going insane. I went to my usual crystal shop before I got here…”
Typical. She proceeded to tell you about how she had an “altercation” with a woman for a tiger’s eye finished into the shape of her animal spirit guide—which you were forgetting at the moment, a swan or something.
You stopped trying to recall those past conversations in case she quizzed you about what your animal was—she had stressed the importance of finding it and you promised you would the next time you saw her—when you saw Richard and Linda sitting at your kitchen table. Ransom was at the counter, a glass of whiskey in hand.
You merely glanced at them before turning to him. There were no words at all for the rage you felt at that moment. Joni had stopped speaking and was working to get the bags she’d taken from you onto a flat surface so she could grab the rest.
“Y/N!” Richard greeted. “Thank you so much for letting us stay here.”
You lifted your eyebrows at Ransom.
“She obviously didn’t know, Richard,” Linda pointed out. “Because she’s been trying to steal my son away since the day that she met him.”
You turned to her. “Are you—?”
“No, no, no,” Joni interjected. “She didn’t mean that!” She set the last of the bags down and touched your shoulder. “She’s joking!” She turned to Linda. “You’re joking, right?”
“Of course,” Linda claimed, unconvincingly with a smirk that you had come to recognize as smug. Not that you’d seen it much on her, but her son, on the other hand…
Speaking of Ransom, he looked beyond exhausted. Only, he wasn’t, he was just trying to convey that because it was clear that he didn’t intend to have this discussion with you. It never was a discussion, because, for some reason, he made all the excuses in the world for his mother and would obviously choose her over you.
Suddenly, in your mind, things all fell into place. Richard and Linda probably got here after all the others, the rest had been set to get there around noon. He’d kept you in bed to stop you from getting home before them because then you could keep them out of the house, you could have caused a huge scene. Now? It was clear that you were outvoted, the rest of the family probably would have thought of you as unreasonable if you kicked them out now.
Fine, it was all fine. You weren’t going to argue about this, not then. It would give Linda joy to see you have a complete meltdown. Ransom had already humiliated you enough by doing this completely behind your back, you weren’t going to give her anything else.
You turned to the counter to grab his keys. “Well, then you get to go back to the store.” You threw the keys at his chest, probably harder than you should have, and turned to head back out to your car.
It was silent until you exited the room, then Linda felt the need to voice her opinion no one asked for. “I’m just saying, I wouldn’t marry her. She’s shopping for essential items the day company was planned to arrive?”
You turned right back around but Meg was there to usher you back outside. She knew you needed a moment of fresh air and a moment away from Linda. Meg was a rather sympathetic person, she understood completely where you were coming from. In her mind, you were right and Ransom was so wrong for what he did, and Linda was wrong as well. But she also told you, this was how this family went. Linda was at the top now that Harlan was gone. If you sincerely wanted to be with Ransom—and she was confused about that—you would have to suck it up.
That much you agreed with, to an extent. It was clear that you were never going to be able to fix these people completely, but you were trying to create boundaries. Linda could not hit your boyfriend, her son. But how was she going to learn that if Ransom didn’t give a damn? She wasn’t.
You were suddenly wishing you’d accepted the invitation from your parents to stay with them until this all settled down. You had been too scared, however, because of the distance that seemed to be growing with Ransom. Now, you just felt like an idiot.
He lied to you. He did this behind your back, and he used intimacy to distract you from his plans, and that was absolutely disgusting. You couldn’t get over that. You felt used, by the one person you’re supposed to be able to trust more than anyone else in the world.
“Meg, can we have a minute?”
You turned away as soon as you heard Ransom off to your side. If you had a minute with him, you would probably murder him.
“Um,” she started, shifting awkwardly.
“It’s fine,” you assured. “Can you start putting away the groceries, please?”
“Yes, I will do that,” she eagerly confirmed. Meg liked to feel helpful, she often felt guilty about her privilege and wanted to be anything but another typical Thrombey. It was refreshing given all the other extreme personalities you would have to be living with for a while.
“I bought enough sheets for every single bed in the house for the next ten years,” you informed. “Those are fine. We’ll just need more food, probably—”
Ransom reached out for your arm, but you jerked away from him.
“Don’t touch me.”
“Hey—”
You finally turned to him. “I am not talking about this. You lied to me, you did this behind my back—”
“She’s my mom—”
“And I’m your girlfriend!” you hissed back. “And I am so fucking tired of this and you. Last night, you had sex with me to distract me so you could fucking sneak your parents in here. Who does that?!”
“That’s not why I had sex with you—”
“Really?” you demanded. No, you wouldn’t be having this talk, it wasn’t happening. Turning away, you sighed, “It doesn’t matter. I’m done talking to you about this, I’m serious. Do whatever the fuck you want, Ransom. That’s what you always do anyway. I’m done caring.”
“Look, we can’t be fighting with these people here—”
“You should have thought about that before you lied to me.”
“I didn’t lie—”
“I’m having a really hard time right now not running you over with my car,” you asserted, “So I’m going to go back inside. I just need you to go to the store for me, okay? Please, can you do one thing, literally, Ransom, just one thing to help me feel, like, 10% less stressed about all of this?”
“Okay. Yeah, I’ll go to the store.”
“Great.” You started to pull out more bags from the car.
“Can we talk about this later?”
“I don’t know yet.” Hell no, but you weren’t going to tell him that. With full arms, you stormed around him and back into the house.
Later, when he got home, he discovered that you had moved out of the bedroom. Yes, you had moved your shit to another room, locked it, and acted as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
April: the parents’ bedroom,
It was six in the morning, you had just failed at finishing your yoga routine due to your pounding headache. You’d thought a smoothie would make you feel much better, but see, that was with the condition that everyone else was still asleep.
Not the case.
Joni and Richard were currently in the middle of a debate about anti-maskers. Joni, surprisingly, given all her healing crystals shit, thought anti-maskers were idiots. Richard, on the other hand, believed this was a free country and people should have the right to choose anything and everything because “that’s America”.
You had a blender full of ingredients and when you finally got to turn it on, it was comparable to an orgasm. If only because you and Ransom were back to a no-touching arrangement. You could barely stand to look at him.
They seemed unbothered by the blender, their argument only getting louder. You went to the cabinet to grab some pills, anything that would make your head feel better. Could anything with these people? You weren’t overly optimistic about that prospect.
You took your place back at the blender, leaning down to fall into the pain of that instead of the politics conversation. They did this often. Last week, it was whether people should vote this November. Prior, it had been traveling bans, canceled events, whether unemployment should be giving people as much as they are. Linda and Walt interjected sometimes, even Meg because she couldn’t remain silent on a few occasions, but you, Ransom, and Jacob all but steered clear of it.
You felt a hand on your shoulder and stood up straight. You didn’t want anyone knowing you weren’t feeling well. Richard and Walt always acted like you were dying, Joni would start with her crystals and lectures about the importance of meditating.
Thankfully, it was just Ransom. He had been out, he was wearing a scarf, a heavy jacket, and his pale cheeks were flushed red. He nodded out of the room and you followed because silence seemed too tempting.
“What is it, Ransom?”
He narrowed his eyes. “I need a reason to speak to you?”
Your eyes fell shut and you pressed your fingers to your temples. He wasn’t being serious right now, was he? He wanted to have a conversation right now? You felt on the verge of death.
He touched your shoulder again. “Are you okay?”
“Just a headache. Not a big deal.”
“Not trying to be an ass—”
You opened your eyes. “But you’re so good at it.”
“I told you this was a bad idea.”
“Ransom,” you sighed, shrugging his hand off.
He caught you before you could turn away. “Hey.”
“Ransom, please, I don’t want to talk about this.”
“I don’t want to talk much either.”
You narrowed your eyes.
He shrugged. “You know I know how to make you feel better when you have a headache.”
You hummed. “Sex? Why? Are you trying to distract me again? Were you hoping I wouldn’t notice your inability to wake up at a reasonable hour for me, but how willing you seem to wake up at 5 in the morning to have coffee with your mommy?”
“I wasn’t asleep,” he insisted. “And she heard me come downstairs.”
“Yes, great cover. So convincing.”
“I do not wake up to have coffee with her every morning. I haven’t been sleeping well.”
You lifted your eyebrows. “Really?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
He glared. “It’s because I hate sleeping without you.”
“You made me sleep without you—!”
“That was not what you think!”
You narrowed your eyes. “It wasn’t a temper tantrum over the vibrator?”
“No, okay, stop. We’re not going back, okay? No talk about the past, we need to talk about now. You’re the one that made me promise that I wouldn’t withhold sex—”
“I’m not withholding sex, Ransom, I just have no desire to be around you.”
He rolled his eyes. “Doubt that.”
“If you’re having issues sleeping, maybe you should ask your mommy to read you a bedtime story and—”
He pressed his hand over your mouth and started dragging you across the room.
Immediately, you started screaming at him. What the fuck? And you continued to do this until you realized he was leading you to Richard and Linda’s room. Eww, if you didn’t want to talk to him, you certainly didn’t want to talk to her.
But despite your struggling, he forced you into the room and slammed the door before you could escape.
“What the hell?” you demanded.
“This fight is over.”
“No, it’s not!”
“You’re being ridiculous.”
“I’m being ridiculous because I care about you? I’m done, I can’t do this anymore. My parents want me to stay with them and I think I should—”
His eyes widened at you. “This is your god damn house—”
“You clearly don’t think so! I had one condition, just one fucking condition. I wanted her to apologize for trying to physically assault you and somehow that makes me the villain in this situation?”
“That’s not what I’m saying—”
“You went behind my back, Ransom.”
“I’m sorry about that.”
Wow, was that an actual apology? It didn’t matter. One apology a month later was too small. “Look, it’s too late, okay? I’m exhausted and I just want to go home—”
“This is your fucking home!”
“No, it’s your mother’s fucking home and it always will be if you let her do whatever the fuck she wants!”
“She apologized!”
“Oh, please,” you scoffed.
He reached into his pants and yanked out his phone. Easily, he found one of the last texts that they had exchanged and turned it to you.
Don’t tell your psycho, fragile girlfriend but I am sorry. I shouldn’t have acted the way that I did. I understand that it was out of line, it will not happen again. Can we come over? You know I don’t want to be alone with your father.
It took three seconds to go from partially angry to very, absolutely, completely outraged. You smacked the phone out of his hand and it clattered to the hardwood floor. “I’m going to fucking kill you, Ransom!”
He threw his arms up. “For what?!”
“Why didn’t you fucking tell me this earlier?!”
“She would have known that I told you.”
“And?!”
“And,” he began, “I…don’t really know what I thought would happen.”
You shoved at his chest and he didn’t even have the energy to step back simply to make you feel better. He didn’t move an inch because you shoving him was like a cat trying to push a lion. “You are such a fucking mommy’s boy! I’m done with this whole thing, I’m done with you!”
“No, you’re not!”
“Yes, I am! You can’t make me stay here, you can’t make me—”
“You love me!”
Your eyes widened. He made you tell him you loved him, never said it back, and now he was using it against you? “You are dead! Do you understand me?! I’m going to run you over with your fucking Beemer! Then I’m going to get a new boyfriend and I’m going to let him fuck me in that stupid fucking car!”
He grabbed a handful of your hair and your hands flew back to scratch at his forearm. He shoved you back onto the bed and made the mistake of rolling over to attempt to get away from him. He grabbed both of your wrists and managed to get them into one of his hands, then yanked down your yoga pants.
“You are tearing them, you ass!”
And then he smacked your bare skin hard enough that it echoed, loud enough that you were sure anyone in the kitchen could have heard it. Your entire body burned with humiliation, but you loved the pain. How had you survived so long without him doing this?
“Shut the fuck up,” he ordered.
“Are you seriously trying to fuck me in your parents’ room?” you snapped.
“No, I am going to fuck you in my parents’ room,” he corrected. “What? You’re not into this anymore? This wouldn’t be the first time.”
“They sleep here,” you reminded. “This is weird given your obsession with her.”
“I changed the sheets this morning.”
“Are you fucking serious? You’re her maid now?”
He smacked you again and you pressed your face down to muffle your scream. “No, I just always knew that I was going to fuck you here today.”
You waited until the pain subsided before you turned your face, Ransom was still working the yoga pants down, a task that seemed impossible with only one hand. “Where were you today?”
“I had a meeting.”
“With whom?”
“None of your business.”
“Yes, it is my business, you fucking dick! If you’re not going to let me go home—”
He spanked you again, harder now, it seemed like an angry action, not just a retaliating one. “You are home, this is your fucking home and if you suggest otherwise again, I fucking swear—”
“What?” you demanded. “You’re going to tattle to your mommy?”
“I should fucking strangle you,” he growled, and before you could say anything, his hand was at your pussy. He scoffed. “You are seriously this wet? You have so many fucking issues.”
“One issue,” you argued. “You.” But that was a lie and he was more than right. You could hear him moving his pants out of his way and you were nearly shaking with the need to feel him.
Abruptly, he shoved his cock inside you and you both moaned as you adjusted around him. It was loud, obscenely loud, there was no question about what you two were doing, and you honestly didn’t care anymore. Had he gotten bigger? No, that wasn’t possible. You were pretty sure it wasn’t.
You felt him moving to tear off his coat. “Don’t you dare throw that coat on this floor, Ransom.”
But he did and he did it so eagerly, like he wanted to irritate you. The floors were hardwood, Linda had her dogs in the home, and their fur got everywhere on Ransom’s clothes. He hated you, you hated it because he just threw things away—didn’t even donate them because he’s such a beast.
Next, you felt his scarf around your wrists and started struggling.
“What the fuck are you doing?!”
“Shut up,” he snarled. “You’re lucky I’m not fucking gagging you.”
As his hips began rocking just slightly, he grabbed your jaw and turned your head back. His lips found yours immediately and while you two were sharing a sloppy, unskilled kiss, he began driving his hips into you as hard as he knew you needed him to.
His skin was slapping against yours noisily, the bed was creaking, moving on those extra hard thrusts. He spread your legs out as wide as he could and held them there, fingers digging painfully into your skin.
Things became very clear to Ransom at that moment. You were underneath him, completely at his mercy since you were bound now. You were pouting, pretending that you didn’t like this, and he wanted to fuck that disobedience out of you. He sat back up, holding your hips as he kept steadily moving in and out of you. “I’m going to fuck your ass.”
You blinked once, twice. “What?”
He never pulled out, but he did lean over and start yanking on the drawers of one of the bedside tables.
“What are you doing?” No, he wasn’t going to actually…fuck you there. He’d never done it, he’d never even asked about it even though you brought it up a few times. He’d located your plugs that one time, he knew you were into it. But nothing. Why now?
“I know he has to have something,” he insisted.
“I don’t want to think about your parents like that.”
“Oh, no, just think of my dad like that,” he joked.
You shook your head. “Eww.”
“Oh, eww?” he checked. “Since when? You realize you can never talk about fucking him again, right? Looks like you’re going to have to provoke me in other ways now.”
“I didn’t mean ‘eww’ like that,” you claimed, “I meant ‘eww’ that your mom isn’t fucking him, and I definitely should be, because he totally deserves it for being such a great husband and father, but sadly, I’m here with you instead.”
“You’re such a fucking brat and—got it.” Ransom rarely moved fast, preferring to act like the cocky ass that he was, making it clear that he had all the time in the world to do whatever the hell he wanted. Because you were never going to say no. But now, he was acting like he was in a race.
Your body tensed up as soon as you felt the sharp cold against your skin. Ransom took his fingers and spread the gel over your skin, you gasped when you felt one of his fingers teasing your hole.
He did this a few more times, just making sure that you were properly prepped before his first finger dipped inside you. He set his free hand to your back when you tensed. “Relax,” he ordered. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” you assured. You’d done this in the past, liked it, but it had been a long time since.
He started pumping his finger in and out and you began to squirm. You were trying to stay still and quiet, trying to hide how good he was making you feel, but he knew. When you pressed your hips back, he added his second finger and you winced.
His fingers already had you feeling so full. That was what you loved most about being with Ransom, you felt almost incomplete whenever he wasn’t in you. Your body was made to take his, to mold to him completely.
“Here’s how this is gonna go, baby,” he began. “You’re going to start sleeping in our bedroom again. Because I am the only man on this planet who can touch you like this and you’re going to stop being such a brat and taking that for granted.”
You scoffed. You were taking him for granted? Of course, every day you didn’t wake up on your knees for him was probably ‘taking him for granted’.
“Yes?”
You nodded, cheek pressed to the mattress. You didn’t care about winning anymore, you needed to be fucked. You lifted your head to look back at him. “Yeah.”
He pushed his third finger as slowly as he could.
You kept your attention on him, watching as his fingers disappeared inside your ass. As he moved his fingers back and forth, he started to tilt his hips. You were hyperaware of everything, you knew where his cock and fingers were, the wall between your two entrances was thin enough that you could feel it all.
He always thought of you as an insatiable, greedy little thing but even he was surprised when you said you wanted more. You wanted his cock, not his fingers, and he figured you were ready for it because you were soaking his length and the sheets.
As he positioned himself over you again, he pulled his cock out of your pussy and you whimpered. He brought his cock up and spread the fingers inside your asshole to open you up for him. You had never experienced Ransom gentler than when he pressed just the tip of his cock into you. You observed in awe, mouth dropped, panting, desperate, soaking. You knew when you were going to feel him, but you were not prepared at all. His cock was bigger than any plug you had used and you were aching.
He groaned when his fingers were out and all that he could feel was you squeezing the hell out of him. “Fuck. Think you can get on your knees for me?”
You nodded but made no moves to do so. He did instead, lifting your hips, and then grabbing your upper arms to keep you there. You pressed your hips down, swallowing more of his cock, whining and moaning at the painful stretch of him.
“Fuck yourself,” he told you.
You were shuddering, body screaming at the uncomfortable angles you were moving. You pushed your hips up until you felt the head of his cock and settled back down until it felt like it was too much, over and over until he knew that your muscles weren’t capable of continuing.
“Almost there,” he promised, lips at your ear. “Almost taking all of my cock, baby.” He let his hands slide down a little, toward your elbows for leverage, and then he started thrusting. He was careful not to go too deep, listening to the sounds you made because words were not your strong point when he was inside you.
You leaned over a bit, unable to hold yourself up completely. You were hovering over the pillows, his hold on you tight enough that you weren’t worried about falling forward. You were practically choking on a scream when one of his hands moved around you to your clit, immediately feeling lightheaded.
You folded over more and Ransom released your arm to grab your hair. Since you weren’t strong enough to hold yourself up completely, he was yanking on the roots of your hair. Your thighs were quivering because you were using them as your only source of balance, and all of that distracted from the painful stretch of his cock driving into you more and more each time.
Your pleasure was slowly climbing. By the time you were coming, your pussy was dripping onto the sheets, you were sweating, shuddering, gasping for air that you couldn’t seem to get enough of.
And he was only halfway inside you. He shoved two fingers into your cunt and used his grip on your hair to shove your face down on the mattress. All his weight pressed down on you until you were flat on the bed, trapping his arm between you and the mattress.
He left you with some space to work, you rode out your high by fucking yourself on his cock and fingers. You were drowning in the sensations, overwhelmingly full of a man that you knew would eventually drive you crazy.
When your body fell limp, he released your hair and grabbed your hip, guiding you to another devastating orgasm. “You still doing okay, baby?”
For a moment, you could only respond with a moan. His thumb brushed over your clit and you gasped. “Daddy, please, please, please—!”
“You think you deserve it, baby?”
“Please make me come,” you begged.
He waited until you were finishing around his fingers and finally, shoved his cock in completely.
You buried your face in the bed, screaming, sobbing, crying his name. He brought his hand from your hip to your hair, petting and shushing you, and that was all you ever needed from Ransom.
He gave you only seconds before his hips were rolling, his fingers pumping in and out of you, thumb rubbing your clit. He paid no mind to you, he simply used your body, no matter how much you were shuddering and shaking from the aftershocks of your orgasm.
It was almost immediate that he pulled out after he finished and climbed off the bed to pull you with him. Your legs were shaking, but he held you tight to keep you up. He turned your back to him so he could watch his cum drip out of your ass.
When he turned you back to him, he gathered his cum from the inside of your thighs and ran his hand across your mouth. Fucked out, covered in him, you never looked more beautiful.
“This is your home,” he told you. “If you say it isn’t again, you won’t be able to walk for a very long time. Understood?”
You shrugged. “I’m not sure I’m convinced yet.”
Ransom tossed you onto the bed like you weighed nothing and went to the door just to lock it. Was it weird that you thought you might get something out of Linda pounding on the door while her son was absolutely pounding you?
May: the anniversary,
It was Linda and Richard’s anniversary and that meant that everyone living in the house had to celebrate because the Thrombeys were starting to face withdrawals from not receiving enough attention from others.
Joni and Walt had decided to cook dinner that night and it surprisingly did not end in disaster. There were some presents, the family was trying their hand at online shopping and as the days ticked by, more and more packages were showing up every day.
The night was ending with a game of charades, something you and Ransom elected not to take part in beyond watching. The first team was Meg, Walt, and Richard. The second team was Joni, Linda, and Donna, and Jacob was the referee. They needed one, every single game because they were oddly competitive and whenever things got too aggressive, they were given a card, from green to red. Red meant disqualification, you’d only seen it happen twice in all these years, but it was great when it did happen.
You couldn’t help but watch Richard and Linda. They’d been married for so long now, so you didn’t understand why Richard had had his affair when he did. She wasn’t overly young, she had no money, it just didn’t make much sense to you.
You were on Ransom’s lap in the chair in the corner of the room. He had been drinking all night, so you chose not to. You guys were a better team when you were coordinating like that. He was always weird about his parents, you figured that was why he’d been off all day.
“Do you think you could ever forgive someone if they cheated on you?” he asked.
You turned to him, eyebrow arched. “I would murder you.”
He scoffed. “Come on, be serious.”
“I am being serious, Ransom.”
“If I were going to cheat on you, I would have already done it. I meant in a general sense.”
“I don’t think you love someone if you cheat on them,” you reasoned. “So, would I forgive? Maybe, I guess, whatever that even means. But would I stay? Hell no.”
“Right?”
“You talking about your parents?”
“It’s so weird, isn’t it? I mean, not really. Men are men and don’t they all eventually cheat?”
“You are playing with fire having this conversation with me.”
He scoffed. “I just don’t get it, why would she stay?”
“I don’t know,” you admitted. “It seems like you all have your, like, comfortable environments. You don’t really want to leave them…at least she gave him that killer black eye.”
“Yeah,” he recalled with a small smile. “But…I don’t know, I don’t completely blame him, either.”
“Ransom,” you warned.
“No, I’m not saying it’s my mom’s fault, but…she doesn’t exactly love him either. Maybe he thought she used to.”
“Maybe she did.”
“Yeah, maybe…I don’t know, if you’re blackmailing someone essentially—”
“She’s not blackmailing him.”
“He has no money,” he insisted. “He’s terrified. She holds it over him constantly.”
“Ransom, right now, choose. Me or money?”
He turned to you. “No hesitation, I would choose you.”
You were almost surprised to hear that, you thought…you had always thought you were Ransom’s second love, honestly.
“What? Were you expecting something else?”
“I don’t know.” You didn’t want to make him think you thought so low of him. It was a pretty vile accusation.
“You do, that’s fine…because I do believe that if we didn’t have money, it would tear us apart.”
“No, it wouldn’t,” you argued.
He arched an eyebrow at you. “You love your diamonds and this house. And I like spoiling the hell out of you… I know those are simple things, but to have to work for things? We couldn’t make it.”
“Well, he obviously wasn’t that scared, or he wouldn’t have cheated. That was my point. You’re acting like money is the most important thing, if it was, he wouldn’t have risked it.”
“True. I don’t know if I would be able to deal with it.”
You wrapped your arms around his neck and laid your cheek against his. “Ransom, baby, you’re jealous of inanimate objects and you once fucked me every day for a week and didn’t let me come because you thought I was talking to my ex.”
“It depends how it started, that’s all I’m saying. People aren’t perfect, you know.”
“I am,” you declared.
He scoffed. “You let me fuck you while you were dating that ex.”
“You coerced me,” you argued. “I was innocently in my own room and you just showed up—”
“So, you’re saying I seduced you?”
You rolled your eyes. “Can we go to bed? I don’t think there are going to be any fistfights tonight.”
“I’m sorry, baby, I know you were looking forward to that.”
“A bit,” you admitted.
“I’ll tell you about the time my mom tackled Joni at my high school graduation.”
You gasped. “I love when you tell me stories.”
Ultimately, things had gone back to normal with you and Ransom. He was sleeping with you more nights than not, he was in his office much less, things seemed to be in a much better place.
June: the affair,
Until June rolled around.
Then all his office shit started up again, the late nights, the insane number of hours. You tried to be understanding, but then he was abandoning you at family dinners and there was the time some moron rear-ended you and you had to call Walt because Joni and Meg weren’t picking up their phones because it was five in the morning, and Ransom wasn’t either because Ransom wasn’t a reliable boyfriend.
He had been apologetic, and you were just relieved that it had been an overall easy situation, so you didn’t hold it against him. Not until you had to borrow his phone to call yours because you had once again misplaced it. You were, once upon a time, a very organized, together person. Then the Thrombeys moved into your home.
You saw dating apps. Dating apps! On his fucking phone. You had no idea how to react, so you just didn’t. You made the mistake of letting everything grow, everything just pile on top of one another until you were at your breaking point.
Linda liked to poke at you and normally, she couldn’t. Because normally, Ransom was around. Because Ransom knew how his mother was and he knew how you were, and he just didn’t want anyone to end up dead.
That changed one morning when you were making pancakes and she came in for her early morning coffee. She asked where Ransom was and that was really the start of it because she did know. She found it hilarious that Ransom had his own office and never let anyone else in. She hated that she wasn’t allowed in but was placated that you weren’t either.
But you told her where he was anyway because you were attempting to be civil. She pointed out how much time he was spending in his office and you pretended it was common, she then asserted that that was how Richard was behaving during his affair.
And honestly, why hadn’t you thought of it before? He had to be having an affair, you always heard him typing in his office. He was clearly on some website, probably some BDSM chatroom, and you were going to fucking kill him.
It all made sense now, last month when he’d asked you if you would forgive cheating. That was just Ransom being Ransom, he was trying to guess your reaction if you ever found out. Well, you hadn’t been exaggerating, you would kill him.
You stormed up to the office and started pounding on the door. The rest of the family was going to hear you, but they were smart enough to know they better just mind their own business in their rooms.
“Ransom!” you yelled after minutes of no answer. Again, you were met with silence and that was when your irritation became fury. “Ransom, I will kick this fucking door down! You know these doors are old and weak and I can do it!”
Long story short, the doors were stronger than you thought, and you could not do it. The low point of your life was probably having to crawl to Meg’s room and ask her to call their super-expensive home doctor because you had done something terrible to your foot.
Ransom showed up three hours later after you had been all wrapped up and the family was fawning over you. You were being forced to sit on the couch and they would not stop asking you if they could get things for you. You were already wearing three different crystals, Walt had made you hot chocolate, and Jacob was checking his horror movie collection for your favorites.
“What the hell happened?” Ransom demanded.
You glared at him. “Where were you?”
“I was out for a walk.”
“And you didn’t take your phone?” Richard pressed. “We were calling you non-stop.”
“I left it up in my office,” he informed, moving to your side. “Are you okay? What happened?”
“She tried to kick down your office door,” Linda answered.
Ransom gave you an incredulous look. “I’m sorry?”
“You should be,” you retorted. You never argued in front of the family because you and Ransom were a team. Yes, you fought, but you never wanted to give the family insight on the cracks in your relationship because you knew they would exploit them.
“Enough,” Meg cut in. “No arguing, Dr. Fields told her to take it easy.”
“You had to call the doctor?” he questioned. “What did you do?”
“Fracture,” Linda informed, “Not that big of a deal. Please, continue arguing.”
Everyone else glared at her while you and Ransom glared at one another. It was then that Jacob reappeared with one of the Saw movies. Typically.
August: the book,
You had taken to sleeping in Meg’s room with her because Ransom was a demon, but he wouldn’t try to enter her room. Ever. So, you comfortably stashed yourself away there every night and stayed there most mornings until noon. She didn’t mind. You’d gotten her a tv in there, so you watched Netflix a lot.
You had yet to confront Ransom with your accusations because you were scared. This family was obscene, being part of it was insane, every single person here was terrible in their own right. But you liked talking to Meg, you liked gardening with Joni, you liked reading the newspaper with Walt in the mornings and talking about the crime section. Even Jacob wasn’t the worst company, he liked to watch Dateline with you.
Ransom was convinced that you were just mad at him because you fractured your toes and couldn’t do yoga for a while. You were fine with him believing that because then you would have to have the conversation.
It was an odd situation to be in. You were sure he hadn’t physically done anything, but you weren’t sure if that should make you feel better or worse. He was connecting with someone and after your conversation, it was clear that he also believed you couldn’t cheat on someone you love. Given that he’d never said he loved you, you were rightfully concerned.
Did he ever love you?
Did you just spend almost 7 years with someone who was never going to feel that way about you? Did you throw away all those opportunities with someone else? Did you stupidly choose Ransom over your family?
Did you let this happen?
You had said you couldn’t forgive it, but now you understood why Linda did. If you love someone, you just don’t want to lose them. You hope that they don’t betray you, but what about when they do? It’s not easy to just leave.
You still loved Ransom, you always would. You didn’t want to lose any of the relationships you formed with the family, but it was different with Ransom. You didn’t want to, obviously, but you also couldn’t. You couldn’t imagine a life without him, you couldn’t imagine moving on, you couldn’t imagine being with someone else.
What did that mean?
You weren’t sure about the long-term answer, but short-term, it meant that you were going to pretend. He wasn’t cheating, he didn’t have dating apps on his phone, he didn’t even have an office as far as you were concerned.
Nothing. Everything was perfect.
Until Jacob’s birthday. You weren’t aware of it before, but unsurprisingly, he was a fucking Leo. You made a mental note to investigate the astrology of certain serial killers Jacob reminded you of, but you would do that with Meg later.
You were helping Walt and Joni cook this time. Apparently, they were the only Thrombeys that knew how to cook and were pleased to have another addition to the small team. It wasn’t a particularly difficult meal, lasagna with garlic bread, but it was Jacob’s favorite.
The plans had been made the week prior, Ransom was going to do one thing for you. Just one, you asked for so little. He would pick up the cake at noon and hide it in the second kitchen. Hide because Jacob wasn’t aware this was happening. He didn’t like to be the center of attention and if he knew this was happening before it was actually happening, he would do anything he could to stop it.
But come 2 PM, three hours after the cake was set to be picked up, you received a call from the bakery. You had let them know that your boyfriend was going to pick it up and you left his name with them and everything, all Ransom needed to do was show up.
The woman on the phone informed you that that didn’t happen, and they were about to close because of pandemic hours. You promised you would be in before she needed to shut the doors and since you were comfortable with your window of time, this was done. Over. First, you were going to yell at Ransom.
You quietly made your way to his office and listened with your ear pressed to the door. You didn’t make a sound until you heard him typing, then you started banging on the door with both hands.
It was seconds later that he answered the door, a confused look on his face over your apparent urgency. He looked like he’d pulled an all-nighter and smelled like a lot of alcohol. “What?”
“What the fuck, Ransom?”
“What? What do you need?”
You tried to open the door, but he held it in place.
“What the hell are you doing?”
You were getting into that office because you were going to find out what he was doing, he was not going to continue to lie to you. You kicked his shin and when his leg buckled, you shoved your way in.
“Hey!” He hurriedly shut the door behind you. He did not want anyone else getting in.
It looked like a normal office. There was a full bookshelf of titles that you couldn’t read because your anger was blurring your vision, there was a desk, a laptop, chairs, a bar cart, not a thing out of the ordinary. What the fuck was he doing in here all day?
There was only one logical answer. You finally turned to him, hands on your hips. “Who is she, Ransom?”
“What?”
“I know you’ve been cheating on me and I’m not going to play this game with you! I just want to know who the fuck she is!”
“Are you out of your mind?!”
“Yes, I’m out of my fucking mind! I’ve been living with your psychotic family since March, dealing with their shit on top of yours, and you are now cheating on me! Please explain to me how anyone else wouldn’t also be out of their mind!”
“I’m not cheating on you!”
“Really?! Then what the fuck are you always doing up here?”
He paused at that.
The camel’s back broke. This was officially over. You turned around and rushed to his computer. He only took a second before he realized what you were doing and followed you there.
“I swear to everything above, if you are in some pathetic chatroom—”
He leaned over you just as you reached for the laptop and slammed it shut. “I’m not cheating on you!”
“Then let me see your fucking laptop!” You didn’t care that he had his hands planted on it, you still grabbed the opposite ends and tried to pull it out from under him. It wasn’t a logical plan since he was much stronger than you, but you weren’t necessarily operating on logic.
“You are crazy,” he asserted.
You moved your hands to the top edge of the laptop and threw your entire body back into Ransom. More than anything, it probably shocked him into moving back. Had you known that it was going to work, you probably would have been better about keeping your footing. Since that wasn’t the case, you both ended up on the floor and for a split second, the laptop was only in your hands.
You dove forward, just inches from the door.
Ransom rushed after you, grabbing your leg to pull you back down.
You knew he was going to get you under him, you wrapped your arms tight around the laptop and started screaming. Joni or Richard might feel inclined to call the police if they thought the two of you were honestly fighting.
Ransom slammed his hand down on your mouth as he crawled over you, knees pressed to your hips to keep you pinned there. “What the hell is wrong with you!?”
You didn’t say a word and you didn’t let your hold on the laptop waver for even a second.
“If I move my hand, you better not scream again,” he warned.
Obviously, you were going to. As soon you could, you yelled, “Call the police, he’s going to kill—!”
Ransom covered your mouth again, eyes wide at you. “You have lost it!”
It was then that you realized you needed to do something. He had the upper hand, and he was going to get the laptop away from you if you did nothing. You started swiping at him with both elbows and knees, never catching anything, but making him nervous enough to back off a little.
Fuck it, he was done trying to be reasonable with you. He moved his hand again, but only to start fighting with you over the laptop again.
“Let it go!” you shrieked.
“You let it go!” he countered. “It’s mine!”
“Not anymore, cheater!”
“I’m not fucking cheating on you!”
“If you have some online BDSM girlfriend, I’m going to fucking kill you!”
“What? What the hell goes through your mind!?”
“You’re constantly in here and you won’t let me in, and you never tell me what you’re doing, you never tell anyone else either—”
“Because I hate my family,” he reminded.
“And clearly, you hate me!”
“I don’t hate you, you’re being childish.”
“Tell me her name, Ransom, or so help me—”
“I’m not cheating!”
“I saw the dating apps on your god damn phone!”
“I am not cheating!”
“Then what are you doing?!”
“I’m writing a book!” he hissed.
You froze. He was what?
He kept his voice quiet, “That’s where I was a couple months ago, the meeting that I told you was none of your business. I only had a few chapters, but I got a deal out of it—”
“Get off me.”
He blinked in surprise and then hurried to do so, helping you up, no longer interested in stealing away the laptop.
You held onto it because you weren’t yet sure if you were going to use it to cause severe bodily harm to him. He was writing a book and didn’t tell you? You didn’t know he was interested in writing at all. You didn’t know he could sit down and write more than one entire sentence. He was always moving around, throwing himself into mindless activities.
A book?
You were hurt. Getting a book deal was major and he didn’t tell you he was trying for it, but then he didn’t even tell you that he’d gotten it. He had this huge thing in his life that he kept separate from you and that hurt your feelings.
“That’s was the apps were,” he explained. “I was doing research. Honestly, I’ll let you see the profiles, they’re not even pictures of me. I haven’t spoken to anyone either, it’s just very basic—”
You held the laptop out to him.
He slowly took it back from you, preparing for any other extreme reaction you might have. What he wasn’t expecting was complete silence, he figured you must have been confused by this. It was rather sudden, even for him. “You going to say something?”
You debated for a long while. You wanted to ask why he was pushing you away. You wanted to ask if it was because he didn’t think you were supportive, if he just didn’t want you to know, then you wanted to know why that was. What had you ever done that made him think he couldn’t tell you about this?
“I have to go get Jacob’s cake.”
“Shit!” He ran his hand down his face. “I completely forgot—”
“Don’t worry about it.” Then you were rushing out, ignoring the curious looks from the family on the way.
October: Ransom’s birthday,
It had been seven weeks since you found out about the book and seven weeks since you last had an actual conversation with Ransom. That was your doing purely, and he made the attempts, but you ignored them.
Linda was thrilled. This was different than when you and Ransom were fighting, because fighting indicated that you had the desire to win, he had the desire to win, but then that meant a resolution would follow. If you were ignoring him, what did you want? She hoped it was the end of the road for the two of you.
You weren’t sure. About anything. But you just had to go day by day and listen to yourself. Up to now, you weren’t sure what you wanted to do. As time went on and you were left to wallow in your hurt feelings, you were wondering if maybe this was the end.
Seven years and he didn’t tell you he was writing a book? That was insane, that was inexcusable. You didn’t get to have any part of your life not completely exposed to Ransom and you were okay with that. Obviously, he didn’t feel the same.
Seven years, a nearly dead modeling career, no skills, no aim in life. You had no idea how you would start all over. You had no idea how you would live your life without being Ransom’s girlfriend. It was practically a title, like the queen, and you loved it. You loved him.
But he didn’t tell you about the book! How could you get over that? Well, you could talk to him, but you were not going to do that. You just weren’t ready because you would want to know why and all the answers that were playing out in your mind were not going to make you feel better.
It didn’t matter, or more correctly, it couldn’t matter. Ransom’s birthday was coming up and Linda was trying to fight you on everything.
It was October, the worst of the pandemic was over, wasn’t it? No, you didn’t think so and anyone with two solid IQ points wouldn’t either. She wanted some family over, some of his friends—Megan, you had heard her mention to Richard. You didn’t want a single person in your house, no one outside of the family.
She suggested going to a restaurant then, but you knew Ransom hated when they threw him parties like that.
She wanted him to have a red velvet cake and you knew that Ransom hated red velvet. He preferred lemon, but he told you that you were never allowed to get him a lemon cake because he would eat it all. He was fine with chocolate, didn’t hate it, didn’t love it.
If you weren’t going out, then she wanted catering from his favorite restaurant, and a minimum of 30 people over, the house was big enough for it. It wasn’t even his favorite restaurant, the one she wouldn’t stop talking about, you knew for a fact Ransom did not like 30 people, and the house was not big enough for it.
On top of all of that, she kept asking you what you were going to get him. She just didn’t want to get the same thing. Why would that happen? Why would she get him the same thing as you? You had no idea, but she insisted on knowing. Problem was, you didn’t have an answer to give her. You had no idea what you were going to get Ransom.
Three days before his birthday, Ransom found you on the floor of the kitchen with an icepack pressed to your forehead. It was three in the morning, you had most of the lights off, only your phone and laptop providing light. Even in the dim kitchen, he could tell that you had been crying, eyes puffy and red, tear tracks down your cheeks.
He had been in his office, more writing. He’d only come down for a glass of water, sure that no one else would be awake at such an odd hour. This was the first time in a long time that he had seen you alone, and this naked. Usually, you were surrounded by the family, Joni being the greatest culprit. And since you still weren’t sleeping in the bedroom, he hadn’t seen you in your tiny shorts and bralettes.
He sat down at your side, setting his hand on your thigh. “Hey, is everything okay?”
You tossed the icepack onto the floor. “I never got stress headaches before your family moved in.”
“Yeah, I noticed that.”
It was silent for several moments after that, you were thinking about how you wanted to approach this topic. It was clear now, in your mind, why he hadn’t told you about the book. “I never listen to you.”
He turned to you, eyebrows pulled together. “What?”
You were already crying again, tears rolling down your face. You had felt terrible these past few weeks and you were finally beginning to understand why. “I don’t listen, I’m a terrible listener.”
“No,” he protested. “You’re not a terrible listener—”
“I have no idea what to get you for your birthday. I never know, I never get you a good present.”
“Yes, you do,” he argued. “And you don’t need to get me anything—”
“Of course, I do!” you blurted out. Was he insane? This was his birthday, you couldn’t not get him something for his birthday. “This is why you didn’t tell me about the book, right?”
His eyebrows shot up. “What?”
“Because I don’t listen,” you explained. “Why would you tell me about it if I wasn’t even going to listen, right?”
“Baby,” he sighed, “That’s not why I didn’t tell you. I wasn’t trying to keep it from you, honestly—”
“You didn’t tell me you were writing, you didn’t tell me you were trying to get published, and then you didn’t tell me about the book deal.”
“I know…I was going to.”
“But?” you prompted. “How could you not tell me about any of it?”
“I was worried.”
“Why?”
“Because of fucking Harlan. He’s the world’s best mystery author, for whatever fucking reason. I was worried that you wouldn’t think I should do this. I was worried about how it would look. I don’t want to follow in my grandfather’s footsteps like the rest of my pathetic family.”
“So, were you just never going to say anything about it?”
“Well…maybe. There’s something else… I wasn’t sure I was going to use my name, so it was completely possible that I could keep you from ever finding out about them. And if you ever got suspicious, maybe publish a few of the others under my real name.”
“Others? What are you talking about?”
“So…my book deal is for, at the very least, three books. In a series. If they do well, I can do others, with the possibility of keeping this series going…whenever I feel inspired to do so.”
“Okay…what’s the series about?”
“A woman.”
You narrowed your eyes.
“A very mean woman,” he clarified. “She’s a black widow, you know, marries rich men, murders them, takes the money…and I’ve sort of been using your name.”
Your eyebrows slowly rose. “You’ve been writing about me?”
“No,” he immediately protested, then sighed. “Okay, a little, but she’s beautiful. I mention that a lot, I promise.”
Yes, you were relieved. But was he completely off the hook? You slapped his shoulder. “Are you serious?”
“Hey,” he held his hand to the skin that you had just smacked. “Ow, maybe don’t hit me just days away from my birthday if you didn’t get me anything.”
“God, Ransom, I was really hurt.”
“I’m sorry about that. Really, I know I rarely ever apologize and sometimes, I don’t mean it, but I mean it now.”
“Well, can I read some of it?”
He smirked. “I don’t know, baby girl, you haven’t been behaving lately. You tried to break into my office, hurt yourself, and then did break into my office to steal my laptop. You thought I was cheating on you.”
“I saw dating apps, Ransom.”
“After we talked about my parents—”
“You lock yourself in your office for, like, 20 hours at a time—”
“And some BDSM chatroom? Because you’re normal in bed?”
You rolled your eyes. “Look, I’m sorry for accusing you of cheating, but you should have told me about the book. Which you apologized for, so it just cancels out. Let’s do what we usually do and just pretend it never happened.”
“You told Joni to call the cops,” he reminded.
You shrugged. “I miss Wagner, he probably would have been over here immediately.”
He snorted. “Okay, we both made mistakes, but you’re right.”
With his agreement to move on, you climbed onto his lap and wrapped your arms around his neck. “Please?”
“I’m not completely convinced yet,” he teased.
Rolling your eyes, you kissed him. “Now?”
“You’re getting closer.”
You scoffed and kissed him again, reaching into his sweatpants to pull out his cock. It didn’t take long to get him hard and as soon as you did, you used your other hand to pull your shorts aside. You broke away from the kiss to watch his face as you slowly slid down his length.
His hands gripped your hips and he nodded. “Yeah, you can have whatever you want.”
You smiled. “Perfect, let’s get it now.”
He snorted. “Wow, now you’re a fucking comedian?”
“Well, you’re an author,” you retorted.
He nodded once. “You have a point. I vaguely remember what I wrote, want me to tell you?”
You nodded. You wanted to hear it in his voice, you were going to demand that he read it to you anyway.
“Her first husband was a writer,” he informed.
You lifted your eyebrows. Was that supposed to be clever?
“He often wrote poetry about how devastatingly beautiful he found her.”
You rolled your eyes a little, turning down to stare at his chest. He was wearing a shirt, but you could still see the muscles through the white material. “How did she kill him?”
“Scared him to death, she is very scary.”
You bit your cheek to prevent a smile.
“His fault, though. He was never healthy, did a few drugs he shouldn’t have. Drank too much, never ate right. He had a weak heart anyway.”
You hummed.
He wrapped his arm around your back and rolled you over onto the floor underneath him. He pulled your thighs apart before placing both hands on the floor for balance. Slowly, he pulled out and drove back in hard.
You gasped his name, arms winding tightly around his torso.
“He loves her skin,” he asserted.
You nodded encouragingly, you wanted him to tell you everything. “Mhm.”
“Loves how soft she is, especially her thighs, and he loves how she bruises.” He was steadily rocking his hips, speaking just loud enough that you could hear him over the wet noises of his cock sliding in and out of your body, but quiet enough that you were sure no one else would hear.
You reminded yourself you were downstairs, on the kitchen floor, it was important to remain quiet. Ransom’s family had caught you in a lot of low moments over the years, but this would take the cake. You turned your head, burying your face in the bend of his neck.
“He loves her neck, how perfectly it fits in his hands. He loves her lips, how they look wrapped around him, or when she’s smiling—”
“You wrote that?” you breathed.
“This isn’t some school-book-report shit like what Harlan was publishing.”
“Those weren’t children’s books,” you felt inclined to point out.
“Well, mine have sex.”
You snorted. “You’re going to write about other men fucking me?”
“A woman here and there,” he explained. “That’s why they have to die such horrible deaths.”
You laughed briefly, pressing your mouth to his shoulder when you worried you would moan.
“He loves her legs, how tightly they wrap around him.” As he spoke, he lifted your legs one at a time, pressing them to the sides of his body as a cue to hook your ankles together. “He loves her arms, how easily he can pin them above her head.” Again, he did just that and you were forced to lay flat on the floor, clamping your mouth shut to stifle the noises spilling out.
After managing to get both wrists in one hand, he placed his opposite forearm off to your side and set all his weight there. You could feel it in the way he got heavier against your hips, trapping you between him and the floor, controlling every aspect of how he was going to make you come.
He stared down at your face for a moment, watching you struggle to keep your composure as he was fucking into you harder now. He leaned down and your eyes fell shut, he kissed over both eyelids and said, “He loves her eyes, even when she’s looking up at him, demanding something, a new diamond necklace, a car, but won’t actually say the words because she’s so fucking spoiled.”
You smirked and he felt it, and his hips snapped up harshly to get it to stop. It only worked for a moment. You were smug, Ransom was pouring his heart out to you and confessed that he liked that you were spoiled? You would never let him live this down.
“He loves her cheeks,” he started kissing across your face and you couldn’t help but smile, “Especially when she’s doing that.” He stopped to pay special attention to your nose, “And he loves her nose, even though she hates it. And he loves when she pouts,” he lowered his mouth to give you several chaste pecks, until you were pouting because he wouldn’t just kiss you.
With a scoff, he finally let you kiss him back. It didn’t last long before he was on the move again, pressing his lips to your chin and proclaiming the fictional character’s love of that, then your jaw, your clavicle, and once he tore your bralette out of the way, your breasts.
As he continued to move down, he was sliding his cock out by the inch and you were trying to stop him from getting too far, you were desperately pulling at him with your legs, but Ransom was much stronger than you.
“He loves her stomach,” he muttered into your skin as he descended and finally, his cock slipped out. Because of that, he had to let your wrists go but you knew better than to try to move them.
“Ransom, please—”
“And he loves her hips.” As he pulled down your shorts, he kissed the skin he exposed, almost frantically alternating between left and right. Once the shorts were down, he spread your thighs and looked up at you. “And he fucking loves her pussy.”
You let out a strangled, high-pitched sound as he dove down and wrapped his lips around your clit. He stared at you the entire time as he sucked for a few seconds, then flicked his tongue back and forth, only to repeat the pattern until you were crying and squirming, staying in the position he had placed you in.
When he knew you were close, he pulled back. He only set small kisses to your aching center, hands moving up and down your hips, your stomach, your thighs. “He loves how sweet it tastes, he loves how fucking tight it is, how it feels like his cock was made to be inside it—”
“Ransom, please,” you blurted out. Your arms were stinging with the desire to reach down for him, but you knew that would change the path of this entire night. You just needed to be fucked. Simply. Intimately. None of the elaborate shit you both usually tried.
In seconds, he had made his way over you and was inside you again. You wrapped yourself around him, arms and legs, and held onto him tight enough that you were sure he wouldn’t be able to get away again.
“He loves every fucking inch of her,” he stated. “Because she’s his, she belongs to him and she’s never going to belong to anyone else.”
You scoffed. “But she kills him?”
“Well, she’s a complex woman.”
You rolled your eyes. “I’m not complex.”
He arched an eyebrow.
“I just want you and this house, and I want all of this shit to be over so we can get rid of your family.”
He kissed you shortly. “That makes two of us, baby.”
There was a difference between loving something about someone and truly being in love with someone. You’d always loved things about Ransom, but it took you about a solid year to confidently admit that you were in love with him. He could say that he loved everything about you, but that was not him finally saying it.
“Does she love him?” you wondered.
He shrugged a shoulder. “He thinks so.”
“Does he love her?” This wasn’t asking for too much. Ransom could hide behind this fictional creation of his and say yes, and you would never ask again. You just wanted to hear it once, that wasn’t unfair.
He considered his answer for a long time, breaking eye contact to look down at where his fingers were hovering over your shoulder. He began to trace shapes there, still contemplating. “Sometimes…she thinks so.”
“But does he?” you pressed.
Again, more silence. He was trying to gauge what he could get away with. He always knew this was going to wear on you eventually, but he never thought it was going to be during one of the times he was inside you. How could you not feel how he felt about you? “I think—”
“Are you fucking serious!?”
You immediately knew whose voice that was—Linda. Shutting your eyes, you let your head rest back on the floor. The headache you had been crying over earlier was returning.
“RICHARD!” She turned out of the kitchen and began storming back to her room. “Richard, wake up! You need to talk to your son! Is there no place in this house anymore that is sacred?!”
Ransom sighed deeply and you looked up at him. “Well, do you want to make you come first before we go upstairs?”
You shrugged. “Okay. Hurry up, we don’t have to be quiet anymore.”
November: thanksgiving,
Ransom was on his best behavior, you theorized that was because he didn’t want you to again ask him for more of that insane basic human emotion. Whatever, you could not dwell. There were people dying in this world, and you wanted to waste time crying over your boyfriend who gave you everything you wanted, but just wouldn’t say a certain word to you?
Well, the answer was yes, but it was Thanksgiving and the Thrombeys had about a million and one weird-ass family traditions. That meant you were short on time to be pouting.
It was a freezing, perfect day. It had snowed all night and the house looked like something straight out of a Hallmark movie. Yes, this was going to be a complicated day with a lot of personalities that were butting heads because everyone had been together for way too long, but you were feeling festive. You wanted to make the best of the day and you planned to force the rest of the family to follow your lead.
The start of the traditions was donating money. You were the one who brought it up as soon as Richard tried to skip down the list. It always started with donating. Harlan would write checks for half a million dollars and let every member choose where they wanted to donate, the past three years you were included in that. Harlan always liked you, probably more than he liked some of his actual family.
“I’m just not sure,” Donna was saying, “We haven’t made much money this year.”
“Are you kidding?” Meg demanded. “Your husband’s publishing company is still seeing sale increases.”
“Because of the death of the author,” Linda pointed out. “Meaning, we should be a lot more frugal. The money will not be coming in the same way that it was.”
“This is not up for debate,” you snapped. “Everyone pick a god damn charity. Harlan insisted on this every single year, and we are going to continue it. Unless you all would like to provoke his ghost to come murder us. He died in this house after all!”
“It’s money,” Ransom pointed out. “We have more than enough, some people don’t have any.”
Linda rolled her eyes. “My son is just trying to get you to have sex with him.”
You glared.
“Mother,” Ransom sighed. “This isn’t a discussion. Just pick your damn charity.”
“Donna, it’s fine,” Walt promised. “Meg’s right, we’ve had a great year. And Y/N is right, Dad always wanted us to do this. I will start with my usual charity, Homes for Our Troops.”
“Fantastic.” You took the check as soon as he handed it over. “Donna?”
“American Cancer Society, of course.” She held it out for you and then looked to Jacob. “I think this year—”
“I have a charity picked,” Jacob informed.
Everyone fell silent. Likely, everyone’s immediate suspicion was Trump’s request for donations since he was still insisting the election was fraudulent. However, no one said anything because no one wanted to be the first victim of Jacob’s impending murder spree.
“Can’t I pick my own?” he pressed.
“Yes,” you answered. “You can, because everyone can pick their own charity.”
“Yeah,” Walt echoed. “Of course.”
He wrote the name down and slid the check across the table to you.
Ransom’s hand tightened on your thigh, a reminder not to let anyone antagonize you this holiday.
“Canines for Disabled Kids,” you read. “Jacob, that’s really great…I didn’t even know that was a charity.”
He shrugged. “Yeah, well, I like the idea that they can have dogs as friends and don’t have to make human friends. Humans are so stupid.” Then he returned all his attention to his phone.
“And we’re back,” Richard muttered.
Donna’s head snapped in his direction.
“Okay,” you interjected. “Joni?”
She chose a foundation interested in ending childhood obesity, received a snide comment from Meg about how even her acts of kindness were vain, and you intervened before it became bigger than that. Meg chose an organization that works to stop childhood prostitution, Linda went for homeless youth, and Richard selected Make-A-Wish Foundation. Walt felt the need to sarcastically commend him for his originality.
“Enough,” you said before Richard could respond. “My dearest Ransom, what have you chosen?”
He smiled at you. “Animal Legal Defense Fund. Their tagline is: all our clients are innocent.”
You nodded. “They are. All animals are innocent.”
Linda rolled her eyes. “Can we move on?”
“Okay, mine is—”
“I can’t believe you don’t have a problem that she’s basically brainwashing our son,” Linda interrupted, turning to Richard.
“Linda, please,” Richard sighed.
“My charity,” you spoke loudly, gaining their attention once more, “Is Planned Parenthood.”
“Are you out of your mind?” she demanded. “You want to donate your money to abortions?”
You glared. “That’s not all Planned Parenthood does, but…yes, I do. Babies suck, if a woman doesn’t want to have it, she doesn’t have to.”
Joni nodded. “I agree, completely. I’ve been learning in my group about how we are only placed on this earth to offer up our vibrations to one another. Our obligations do not exceed that. We don’t have to be anything! Not a mother, not a wife—”
“Oh, shut up!” Linda barked.
“Mother, calm down,” Ransom dismissed. “I don’t believe for a second any of you have not either had an abortion or been an accessory to one in the past.”
“I would never!” she gasped, pointing a finger at him. “And you better not ever let her!”
“Yeah, don’t worry about that happening. I’ve been thinking about eliminating that possibility, surgically—”
Linda’s mouth dropped.
This was, of course, untrue. Ransom would, first, never sacrifice any part of himself for that reason. Second, the matter had not been discussed yet. You guys weren’t even thinking about marriage, so of course, children weren’t being brought up. But that morning, Ransom woke up in the mood for chaos, and maybe you sort of did, too.
“I wanted a second child,” she told Richard, “You said to stop after Ransom because he was “perfect”.”
“I did say that,” he muttered to himself, a look of pure regret on his face.
You smiled at Ransom. “You are perfect.”
He kissed you, gaining disapproving noises from most of the table.
“I will never be a grandmother!” Linda yelled, burying her hands in her hair and resting her shoulders on the table.
You glanced at Ransom.
He nodded toward the kitchen. “Now that that’s done, let’s start cooking.”
Joni and Meg were currently searching the entire house for the Christmas decorations. They always ended up getting put in the strangest places and since you and Ransom had moved in and not known where they were, you moved basically everything. It was possible that you were going to have to make do with the decorations you and Ransom had been using for the past five years at his house.
You had, however, purchased a lot of lights because the Thrombeys loved their blue lights. Tacky, you wanted the yellow lights and made sure to buy enough that even a single blue light needed to be on that house. Ransom was excitedly awaiting his mother’s reaction to that.
Every year, Richard and Walt would put lights on the house while the dinner was cooking. Ransom should have helped but no one actually thought Ransom would lift a finger, so no one wasted their breath. He was only helping you cook because, as mentioned, he was pretending to be a good boyfriend.
But he was a monster, a true monster that was currently squashing even more of your dreams. “The answer isn’t just no, it’s fuck no.”
You glared. “I wasn’t asking for permission.”
“You asked if it was a good idea.”
“I think it is.”
“Then why did you ask me at all?”
“Because I thought you would be nice for a second, just a second, Ransom. I’m not asking for a lot.”
“We are not getting Jacob a dog.”
“Why not?”
“Because I hate dogs.”
“Well, I hate you,” you hissed.
He rolled his eyes. “Enough of the dramatics. This day is tiring enough already—”
“We’ll get him a small one, it doesn’t need to be those huge horses your mother calls dogs. A chihuahua, maybe. A Pomeranian, a dachshund—”
“Absolutely not, we already have Joni here, I don’t want some yappy animal—”
“Ransom!” you whined. “If we get him a dog, he might not become a serial killer.”
“He already is a serial killer, love, these are just the early years when he’s finding himself. The answer is still no.”
“Ugh, fine, can you just make the pie crusts, please?”
“How many?”
“Three.”
“Three? For what?”
“Pumpkin, apple, pecan, Ransom. The same things your family has served every single year I’ve been here, and presumably, all the ones before that.”
“Ugh.” He stood at the counter reading the recipe, muttering his disapproval, up until he saw the ingredients on the counter. “What is all of this?”
“Um, you know that recipe in your hand? The final product doesn’t just appear.”
“No, what is all of this…gluten-free flour, oat flour? Where’s the normal flour?”
“That is normal flour, Ransom.”
“No,” he argued. “No, it’s not.”
“It’s normal to some people,” you countered. “And this year, it’s normal to us. Joni went out and bought the groceries. If you wanted something, you could have done it yourself.”
“You wouldn’t let me leave the house! You kept saying I was going to get sick and die.”
“You could have ordered them!”
“You can’t be serious. On top of this dreadful year, you’re trying to make us eat healthy food on Thanksgiving?”
“Ransom, make the pie crusts!”
It was silent for several minutes, probably because you were using the mixer to make the pumpkin filling. As soon as it was off, Ransom was acting like you’d asked him to perform surgery.
“What does toss mean?”
“What?”
“It says to toss the ingredients.”
“Um, like, stir, I guess.”
“You guess or you know?”
“Just fucking stir, Ransom. I make pies all the time.”
He huffed. “No, oh, no. No, this is telling me to touch things with my hands, that’s disgusting and I’m not doing that.”
You turned back, eyes wide. “Ransom!”
“I’m not touching butter with my hands!”
“What is wrong with you!? It’s cooking, you have to use your hands to cook!”
“I don’t like touching butter!”
“How would you know? You’ve never cooked a day in your life!”
“I’m not touching it,” he claimed.
You took a slow breath in and released it while counting to ten. “Then switch with me and make the apple pie filling.”
“Great.” He walked to your counter as you walked to his. “What is this? What’s in this bowl?”
“The pumpkin pie filling. Cover it and put it in the refrigerator. That’s where the apples are.”
His next question came after he pulled out the bag of apples. “These?”
You turned back, blinking. “Yes, Ransom, those are apples.”
“I have to cut them?”
“And peel them.”
“That’s going to take forever.”
“Ransom, I’m about to smack you.”
“This is a lot!” he pointed out. “Why are we the only people cooking?”
“We’re not, not anymore,” you decided. “Get out, you can go help your father and Walt with the Christmas lights.”
“And you’re going to cook alone?”
“I basically already am.” You turned around to walk to the sink to wash your hands. Unlike Ransom, you weren’t making one pie crust at a time, and you would only need to do this once. When you turned around, you knew Ransom was behind you, but you had no idea what he was doing.
You only saw how close he was when you felt something wet and cold against the side of your face. Whatever it was, he dragged it all the way to the opposite cheek. You smelled and tasted the frosting that you had made for the sugar cookies.
He peeled the frosted star-shaped cookie off your skin and ate one of the corners. “Your blood-sugar seemed low, I thought I’d help.”
You tore the cookie out of his hand and shoved it directly in his face.
He scattered back, eyes wide in shock—as if he expected anything less? “What is wrong with you?!”
You grabbed the retractable faucet from the sink and turned the water on.
“Do not!”
It was a warning you ignored. Within seconds, he was slipping along the kitchen floor, rushing back to you to get the faucet out of your hands. As soon as he had it, he turned it on you, and you screamed like a cat about to be thrown in a bathtub.
“Stop it!” you ordered. “You are ruining Thanksgiving!”
“You’re ruining it!”
You elbowed him hard enough that he dropped the faucet, then kicked your heels off to run to the counter with the cookies and frosting.
“Don’t you dare!” He rushed after you and wrestled the cookie out of your hand, ultimately crushing it into crumbs that scattered all over the counter and the floor.
You shoved your opposite hand into one of the bowls of frosting, whipping around to place your hand on his face.
“What the fuck?!” But he leaned down, clearly uninterested in an answer, and pressed his face into your hair.
“My hair?!” you shrieked. “I’m going to kill you!”
There were several sets of steps that you both heard, but neither of you wanted to let the other get the upper hand. When the family finally found you, you had slipped, ended up on your ass, and Ransom was holding you down, claiming that you caused too many problems when you were on your feet.
“What the hell is going on?!” Joni questioned.
“Ransom, get off of her!” Meg pushed her way between the two of you, pulling you onto your feet. “Oh, my god, what is going on? Are you okay?”
Well, you were both soaking wet, layered in frosting, furiously trying to get another cookie to throw at the other. Were you okay? Only physically. Mentally, you weren’t sure either one of you was ever on solid ground there.
“Enough!” Linda yelled. “What is this insanity!? We need to be eating in less than an hour and as per usual, you two can’t go five minutes without fighting! That’s it, everyone get out of this kitchen! This is why I cook, this is why I do everything! I’m the only one that can!”
She turned away to open the door to usher everyone out and you took your chance to get some type of retaliation that you had been longing for since before the damn stay-at-home order.
You were able to reach for a cookie before either Meg or Ransom could stop you, and no one had ever dreamed your target would be Linda, so for a detrimental moment, their reactions were nonexistent. Essentially, everyone could only stare in pure horror as they realized the cookie was darting straight for the back of Linda’s head. Which, in your defense, wasn’t your exact intention. You thought her back, not her head…but well, there was a reason you weren’t a professional athlete.
Gasps filled the room as soon as the cookie contacted Linda’s head, then again when it fell to the floor. Linda slowly turned, eyes wide, jaw set, shoulders tense—that must be where Ransom got it.
“This is my house,” you reminded. “You do not get to order me out of my kitchen!”
She looked at Ransom, silently urging him to make his alliance known right then. Before he had to say anything, yelling sounded from outside the house. Walt and Richard had yet to finish the one job they had, everyone figured that was the cause of the disturbance.
Quickly, you all made your way out to the front of the house. Richard had his leg wrapped up in a mess of lights and was hanging from the edge of the house. The same vines of lights were also wound around Walt, who was hanging onto the house for dear life.
“Oh, my god!” Donna yelled. “Oh, my god!”
“Are you serious?” Linda demanded. “There is a pandemic! You guys seriously want to end up in the god damn hospital during a pandemic?”
Joni sighed in utter frustration. “Walt, just hang on. We’ll get Richard down—”
“Oh, my god!” Donna continued, despite the lack of panic coming from literally every other single person present. Even Walt seemed less alarmed than her. She started running to Richard and on any other day, it would have been an effortless plan of action. On this day, that Massachusetts had just seen a hell of a lot of snow, when the pavement was dangerously icy, she fell.
Meg screamed. “Oh, my god, I’m calling Dr. Fields!”
“He’s a doctor!” Joni pointed out. “A physical doctor—he won’t know how to deal with this sheer stupidity unless someone broke a bone!”
Donna, now over her initial shock, was attempting to get up.
“Donna, I think you’re hurt,” Meg said. “Just stay—”
Jacob was cautiously moving closer to her, directing her to stay put when Walt had finally lost his battle with the house. His hands slipped off and he went sliding down the edge of the roof. Richard hit the floor first, eliciting more screams from Meg and Donna, and then Walt followed onto several snow-covered bushes, and everyone lost their minds.
“I’m calling Dr. Fields! I am fucking calling Dr. Fields right now!” Meg repeated, shaking so much she could hardly get the phone out of her pocket, let alone find which one she had placed it in.
Joni began making her way through the snow to check if Richard was okay.”
“Oh, my god!” Donna was still repeating.
“Mom, just stay down,” Jacob said.
“Jesus,” Ransom snapped. “How hard is it to put these god damn lights on this god damn house?” He was following Joni, confident in the theory that his father was simply being dramatic. Walt, on the other hand, might have needed medical attention.
Meg watched her feet as she was walking back inside. “Dr. Fields, we have a serious emergency right now. I think everyone’s dying!”
Ransom and Joni were helping Richard sit up when he turned back to you. “Hey, get inside, you’re wet and going to get sick.”
He had a point, so without argument, you turned to do so. You felt the boniest of hands on your shoulders before you were shoved down face-first into the snow.
That was when Joni started screaming. “Oh, my god, call the police! She’s going to kill her. Meg, call the police!”
Meg ran out of the house and saw what was happening and once again, started to panic. “Dr. Fields, you need to get here immediately!”
Before you even fully processed what had happened, Linda was on top of you turning you onto your back.
“You stole my house!” she screeched.
“Linda!” Richard scolded.
You saw her hands go for your throat—later, everyone would claim she was probably doing something else, she obviously wasn’t going to choke you. You did the only thing you could think to do, you grabbed a handful of snow and shoved it in her face.
She toppled over and you made your way on top of her. You weren’t going to hit your boyfriend’s mother, but you did proceed to throw snow in her face until Ransom had gotten you off her.
The grand total of injuries was seven. Yet, the total of injuries that had occurred directly in the incident was five. Donna had a bruised tailbone, Richard had a broken leg, Walt had a sprained wrist, your knee was cut up fairly terribly since you fell on it when Linda pushed you, and Linda had stitches on her cheek because the first time you threw snow at her, there was a huge block of ice that you weren’t aware of. After Richard pointed out that you hadn’t started the altercation, she punched him, and he now had a swollen eye. After Ransom had gotten you inside, Meg, in her state of panic, hadn’t seen the door was shut and walked straight into it, and her nose was broken.
You weren’t sure how this family had managed more disaster with nearly 300 fewer people, but there you were. Ransom had forced you into the shower to get all the frosting out of your hair and to hopefully prevent the cold he suspected you were going to catch given the tiny outfit you were parading around in outside.
He lured you out of the shower with a mug of hot chocolate. Every space heater in the house was gathered in your bedroom and as soon as you were in his reach, Ransom wrapped you up in at least three heavy blankets.
When he sat you down on the bed, he pulled your leg out so he could tend to your knee. You felt like a child with him sat next to you with a first aid kit, too-delicately prodding at your irritated, aching skin. He was babying you.
You didn’t feel guilty for what you had done to Linda, but you did hate that Ransom was in the middle. “I’m s—”
He held his hand up to you. “Don’t.”
“But—”
He turned up to you. “Babe, she attacked you.”
“I…threw a cookie at her.”
He snorted. “Yeah, that was a little crazy.”
“I am sorry,” you huffed. “We said we weren’t going to let them bother us today.”
“You finally told her this was your house. I’ve wanted that since we first moved in. I know what we said, but all in all, I think we gained more than we lost.”
“What did we gain, Ransom?”
“Well, she knows you’re scrappy so she might think twice before pushing you again.”
You rolled your eyes. “Anything else?”
“Everyone is going to be preoccupied taking care of each other, Joni doting on Meg, my mom basically doing everything for my dad, Walt and Donna being overly protective of one another…”
“So, we can have sex in the kitchen and there’s a higher chance we won’t get caught?”
“That was exactly what I was thinking.”
You shrugged. “If we got Jacob a dog—”
“You know what?” he cut in. “Get out of these blankets, I haven’t spanked you in a long time even though you’ve deserved it about five times over by now.”
He made a show of attempting to get you out of the blankets even though you both knew he wouldn’t do it. You laughed the entire time until Ransom laid himself out on top of you, uncaring about how heavy he was.
“Is everyone okay?”
“They’ll live.”
“Well, I know Meg will—she’s going to get a nose job.”
He snorted, rolling his eyes. “You are just going to have to live vicariously through her.”
“We kinda ruined Thanksgiving dinner.”
“I did not,” he argued. “The turkey is almost done, the pies are in the other oven, also almost done—”
“All three?”
He nodded. “Yep. Jacob, believe it or not, was happy to peel and cut the apples.”
You rolled your eyes. “I swear, Ransom.”
“As soon as everyone stops acting like they’re dying, we’ll be able to sit down…well, Donna might not be able to sit down.”
You laughed. “Your family is insane.”
“And clearly, you fit right in.”
“Clearly,” you muttered. Unfortunately.
Christmas Eve:
Sometimes, you wished that you had listened to him when he said this wasn’t happening. Because then you wouldn’t have needed to worry about so many god damn people! It would just be you and Ransom in absolute seclusion, but no. No, you would never have it so easy during this fucking holiday.
How difficult was it to pick up the presents that you had ordered? You picked them out, you organized it all, you had only asked Ransom to drive to a single location and obtain them for you. Why hadn’t he? Because he was sleeping at 2 in the afternoon.
What did you have for Jacob? Not a damn thing. You had no presents for the teenage delinquent you were terrified of. You weren’t family, he was going to store you away in the basement and torture you until he got bored. Ransom probably wouldn’t even realize you had been missing until Jacob placed your body parts all over the house. And three of Meg’s presents were also missing, you knew Linda was going to make another comment.
You would hit her with more ice. After you strangled her son, of course, who was currently hot helping in any way at all.
“Ransom, put your fucking drink down and hand me the tape!”
“Are your fucking hands broken?!”
“I’m holding the box!”
He slammed his drink down on the bedside table and angrily stormed his way to where you were surrounded by boxes, wrapping paper, and a million other things he wasn’t even aware you’d spent money on. This was too much for his family and he was just waiting for you to realize that they were nowhere near worth the effort you constantly put in.
Ransom picked up the tape, tore a piece off, and placed it between where your fingers were resting on the box.
“Thank you so much,” you responded, pure sarcasm.
And god damn, he had had enough of your fucking tone. “You are driving me insane!”
“I’m driving you insane?! Your family has been ruing my whole fucking life since March!”
“I didn’t want them here!”
“Well, I’m a human with actual empathy for others, so I logically knew that that was not an option!”
“You were going to leave my mother out of your precious sanctuary!”
“Because she’s abusive!” You shoved your hands into your hair and shook your head. “I’m done, absolutely done. I can’t have this conversation with you again. Your mother sucks, why is this news to you? I’m so sorry for trying to hold her accountable for her actions. Oh, but of course, every time someone tries to make any of you face the consequences for your actions, you act like it’s a hate crime!”
He glared. “I hate you.”
“I hate you!” you seethed.
“I can’t fucking believe I actually want to do this!” he turned away, scrubbing one of his hands down his face. “You make me so fucking crazy.”
“Do what?” you demanded. “What the hell are you talking about now? What god-awful thing have you decided to do?”
He made his way to the bed, tearing open the drawer to the bedside table on his side. He was muttering quickly under his breath and even if his speech hadn’t been so hurried, it was quiet enough that you had no chance of hearing anything.
It was silent for several moments before he turned back to you and threw something on the bed. He gestured to it then crossed his arms over his chest.
Since your bed was a mess of dark blankets, you weren’t sure what you were supposed to be seeing. You stood, carefully stepping your way out of the present-wrapping station you had created and neared the bed. You stopped dead in your tracks when you saw a tiny black box against the mattress.
You looked back at him, eyes wide, pleading. No…no, that was not happening. He wasn’t actually…
“Marry me.”
“What?!”
He actually seemed surprised by your reaction. He leaned over, snatched the box off the bed, and stomped back to you. “Marry me.”
“You’ve lost it,” you accused. “You’re actually literally insane. You need to be committed!”
“Yes, it’s insane that I want to marry you but for some fucking reason, I do!”
“Oh, my god, Ransom!” You slapped the box out of his hands and that was just too much for him. “I’m not fucking marrying you, you’ve never even told me you love me!”
He hurriedly picked up the box, tossed it back onto the bed, and then grabbed you by your arms. “You’re seriously fucking bringing that up now?”
“What does that even mean?! Yes, I’m bringing it up now. You marry someone when you’re in love with them and since you haven’t said it after seven years, I understandably doubt your feelings for me.”
“You are such a fucking brat.”
“You’re a brat!” you yelled, more exasperated than you’d ever felt. “You’re such a fucking entitled brat! There’s no other way to describe you. You just think I’m going to say yes and give you everything you want when you can’t even say you love me!”
“This is absolutely fucking ridiculous.”
“Just fucking say it, Ransom! If you love me, just say it!”
“You will not bully me into saying something that I don’t even deem as important.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Love is a word! Okay? It means nothing. My parents fucking say they love each other, then my dad fucked someone else. Neal and Joni said they loved each other every god damn second that they could but guess what. He still died. And don’t even get me started on Walt and Donna, their “love” created the next great serial killer of this wonderful fucking country!”
You were speechless, Ransom never talked to you like this. He never brought up the fucked-up aspects of his family that had consequently fucked him up as well.
He finally let you go when he realized you weren’t going to say anything, turning to walk away. You startled when he banged his hand against the wall. “God damn it!”
“Why do you make me say it to you then?” you demanded.
“I don’t know!” he admitted.
Again, you were both silent. You were thinking of the best way to respond, and you certainly couldn’t come up with that, but you knew what you wanted to say. “I’m not marrying you.”
He laughed.
It was a terrifying sound that gave you chills. He was going to kill you, you were 90% sure. As soon as he started walking toward you, you turned away to run to the bathroom, but Ransom had always known that would be your plan.
He effortlessly caught you and dragged you back to the bed. He shoved you down, pinned your arms to the mattress to stop you from hitting him, and slid his hips between your legs to make it impossible to kick him. “You’re going to marry me.”
“You’re going to force me to marry you?”
“I’ll drag you to the fucking courthouse if I have to.”
“The courthouse?!”
“I want to give you a wedding, the obscenely priced, overly dramatic show that I know you want. But if you won’t say yes, you leave me no other option.”
You rolled your eyes. “Then I guess that’s what you’ll have to do because my answer is no.”
Luckily for him, your outfit was not overly complex. He knew you weren’t wearing anything under your skirt because his hand was between your legs for most of dinner that night. You didn’t let him make you come because you were throwing a temper tantrum over the situation with the presents, but he was evidently not deterred.
After he moved your wrists together and kept you held there, he used his free hand to get his pants out of the way. In seconds, he was fully inside you and was offering you no time to adjust.
You realized why when you felt his hands moving over your head. Turning up that way, you saw him fumbling with the box. He was going to put the ring on your finger, and you had the sinking suspicion you might not be able to part with it if you saw it. But no, this was not happening.
You managed to get one of your hands free and yanked on his hair.
He kissed you because he had nothing left to do but bite your lip. Hard. He didn’t even falter when you cried out.
He was the idiot who let you keep your shoes on and you were limited on where you could get your heel. You did yoga, but you weren’t some contortionist. You had one option, and that was stabbing your heel into the side of his ass, and it was completely his own fault.
Finally, he pulled away and was forced to let you on top, which was the only advantage you needed. You smacked the box off the bed. However, now that he wasn’t overly concerned with holding you to the bed, he could pull your hair until you relented and fell back onto the bed.
He rolled over several times until you were both on the very edge, managing to kick your heels off in the process. He never stopped driving his hips into you, knowing that the only advantage he had was how weak you always got for his cock.
You could hear him reaching around blindly on the floor but with each brush of his skin against your clit, you got less scared about the idea that he would get the ring on you. You knew you didn’t want it. You knew you didn’t want to marry him and there was no way in hell you would willingly say yes, but fuck, you wanted to come.
You touched the side of his face and he finally looked back at you.
“Say yes.”
“Fuck you.” You pulled him down, your lips meeting his. There was blood in the kiss and your lip was throbbing, but you couldn’t care. Not when he was fucking you this violently, this angrily. He’d never fucked you like this before. You were no stranger to Ransom being a cruel lover, but there had never been so much pure wrath.
He had located the box, you could tell when his fingernails stopped clicking against the hardwood floor. You were panicking, not fully thinking through your plans, you just knew you needed to be able to reach the box. You threw all your weight at him and he was barely balanced as it was.
Despite his anger, he still had more of a mind than you—probably because he wanted something out of this, he needed to be mindful to get his way. He basically let you throw him on the floor because he worried about the results if he managed to fall on you.
Instead of retaliating any further, you grabbed his hand and brought it down to your center. He needed no further prompt than that, his thumb began to circle your clit as his other hand grabbed your hip and moved you along the length of his cock.
Where was the box? On his chest, he set this there because he was the cockiest fucking asshole in the world. He saw you eyeing it and smirked. “Go ahead, baby, take it, but you know I’ll fucking stop.”
That was unimaginable. Both hands reached for the one he had on your hip. You continued rolling your hips like it was the last time you were ever going to get to, dragging his hand up to your mouth.
“I swear if you fucking bite me,” he warned.
No, you weren’t going to do that. Yet. You choked yourself on his fingers, stifling all the pathetic sounds that were spilling out from you. Ransom simply enjoyed the show, enjoyed you fucking yourself on his cock, enjoyed you staring at him with those smoky, delicate eyes as you sucked on his fingers.
He stopped touching your clit once he felt you coming. He used that hand to hold you up on your knees and thrust his hips into you punishingly. You were dizzy, disastrously satiated and overstimulated. He finished with a shaking moan, a tell that he was trying to be quiet.
It wasn’t late, the family was undoubtedly aware of what was going on.
He turned down, staring at the place you were still connected. Ransom waited until his cum was spilling out of you and then yanked you back down to take his entire length. If there was anything that Ransom did love in this world it was filling you with his cum and watching it slowly pour out.
You only allowed him to do this several times before you finally bit down on his fingers. His hand lifted from your hip and tore your hair back hard enough that you opened your mouth to yell at him. When he could pull his fingers from your mouth, he wrapped that hand around your neck and pulled you flat down, your chest to his, the ring box trapped between you and him, digging painfully into your ribs.
He slammed you into the wall and you brought your legs up to hook around his waist. “Sorry, daddy, I didn’t mean to bite you.”
“After I get this ring on you, I’m gonna make you call your parents and tell them we’re engaged. And I’m gonna fuck you and make you call me daddy, just to remind your father how much of a daddy’s girl you used to be.”
“Why call when you could Facetime?”
“Then I’m gonna have you choking on my cock, baby, all they need to see is the ring on your finger.” The hand in your hair wedged its way between you and him and he located your clit once more.
It was too much but you knew Ransom wasn’t going to care. Begging him to stop would just provide him enjoyment and that was the last thing you wanted him to have. He kept his other hand around your neck because he knew you would say something that would annoy the fuck out of him if he let you.
When you were coming, his hips were moving once more and his hand abandoned your clit to move the box. You felt it sliding along your skin until it was gone and then you realized he wasn’t holding your neck anymore. He had your left hand held clutched in his and you felt the cold band he was sliding onto your finger.
You couldn’t do much, you had lost and you knew it. But you could leave a few more marks on him, so you latched your free hand onto his shoulder and dragged your nails down his back, and you bit down on his shoulder harder than you probably should have. He was a fucking animal, it seemed like he didn’t care at all. He just wanted to get the ring on you, and once he had, he grabbed your face and shoved you back.
You knew he was trying to get you to look at the ring, but you refused. Your eyes were slammed shut and nothing was going to change that.
He walked you to the bathroom, pulling out to bend you over the counter because he knew you would instinctually lift both hands up to the edge. Once you had, he shoved his cock back inside you and grabbed your jaw to angle your face in the direction of your left hand. “Look at it.”
“Fuck. You!” you growled.
He smacked your ass and even though you shrieked like he was murdering you, you did not open your eyes. He repeated this several times until his own hand was stinging almost unbearably. New plan.
He used his feet to kick your legs apart further and you felt a sharp, sudden slap against your cunt. Your eyes snapped open and a scream tore from your throat. He almost felt bad until he saw your attention on the ring. Was he an ass? Yes. But had he won? Also, yes.
That fucking asshole. His hand dropped to rub over your aching pussy, cock still moving at a painfully fast pace. Ransom was fucking furious and the only way he could take it out on you was by fucking you this way.
You couldn’t say you had any complaints about it. Tomorrow, when you were pretending you couldn’t stand to look at him, you would be bruised and sore everywhere that he had touched you. You would be wet all day thinking about how it happened.
The fucking ring. A huge cushion-cut diamond set in a halo on top of a diamond-encrusted band. It wasn’t simple, it sounded like it, but there was something so beautiful about it. Fuck, you wouldn’t let this ring go unless you were dead. Because he was right. You liked money and diamonds and you were materialistic, and this was from Ransom and you loved everything he gave you. And at the end of it all, even though you were saying no to him, he shoved that ring onto your finger because you were his and that was never going to change.
“Say yes.”
“No.”
“Fine.” He reached for your hand but stopped when he saw you make a fist.
“Try to take this ring from me and I will fucking kill you, Ransom.”
He scoffed. “Great, I’m gonna get my phone to Facetime your parents.”
You rolled your eyes. “Fuck you.”
“Not yet,” he pointed out. “First, I need to fuck your mouth, but then—”
From outside, the dogs started to bark.
You let your head fall onto the counter and groaned. “I fucking swear, every fucking time we’re fucking—”
He pulled out and rushed from the bathroom.
“Hey!” you called out. “What the hell?”
“Shit, shit, shit,” he muttered to himself as he searched for where he’d thrown his pants. When had he even gotten them off?
“Ransom?”
“Wait there,” he directed and then he dashed out of the room.
“Excuse you!” It wasn’t like you had much of an option, your legs weren’t working yet, and you were sweating and gross, and bruised and your lip was swollen and clearly bitten.
After several moments, he hadn’t come back. What the hell was he up to? You winced and hummed, made any noise that made you feel slightly better, as you tiptoed around the room looking for something to put on. You settled on one of his shirts and slowly, pathetically made your way downstairs. “Ransom?”
No response.
“Hello, anyone?” If someone else was around, you could force them to look for your boyfriend instead of having to do so yourself. But it seemed that you were out of luck on that.
The dogs were still barking like crazy, but why was no one else reacting? And why did Ransom care? He never paid attention to the dogs. You followed the sound of their barking, they had moved from the backyard to the side of the house. Which was odd because they never went there.
The garage? Your suspicions were confirmed when you heard Linda complaining about something, being constantly interrupted by Joni, Walt, and Ransom. Okay, again, unusual. He tended to ignore his mother, not argue with her.
His eyes widened when he saw you in the doorway. “No, no, this has to stop. I need everyone out of this room.”
“What the hell is going on?” you questioned.
“We don’t want to alarm you,” Donna began, “But—”
“Pretty sure he has drugs,” Meg claimed. “Like, hardcore drugs. Heroin, probably.”
Your eyes widened at him.
He glared. “I don’t have drugs, don’t be ridiculous.”
You gasped, pointing in the direction of the dogs still barking outside. “Those are German Shepherds, they’re drug dogs!”
Meg gasped, nodding at you with wide eyes. “I’m calling the cops.”
“Knock it off,” Linda scolded. “Ransom, show us what you’re hiding right now, or we’ll tear this room apart.”
He rolled his eyes, storming over to the corner of the room where a sheet was laid over something. “Fine, merry fucking Christmas.” He yanked it off one of the old kennels Linda used for her dogs when they were being trained.
There was a long list of things you were suspecting to see. Three sleeping puppies? No, they were nowhere on the list. And then you realized that was why he hadn’t gone to pick up Jacob’s present.
“You got me more puppies?” Linda inquired.
You, along with most of the room, glared at her.
“No,” Ransom snapped. “One is for Jacob and one’s for Meg.”
Both Jacob and Meg excitedly ran to the cage, startling the puppies awake. Much to Ransom’s dismay, the baby talk began without a second thought and the puppies were whining and making those small noises that always irritated him.
One for Jacob. One for Jacob. Then…the third. Oh, god.
He turned to you with a sigh.
“Yes,” you said, “Yes, yes, a million times yes!” You ran across the room, ignoring all your aching limbs and threw yourself into his arms. “And I’ll stop being so mean to you, and if you want to do this at the courthouse, I won’t even be upset because you’re so good to me and I’m awful to you. I’m sorry!”
“It’s okay,” he assured.
“No,” you protested. “It’s a million times not okay! I’m so sorry.” You pulled back to touch his face. “I’m really, really sorry. But I’m going to be the best wife in the world—”
“What?” Joni cut in.
That was the only thing in the world that could have drawn attention away from the puppies.
“Wife?” Linda repeated.
You checked with Ransom and he nodded. He had been looking forward to this. All you had to do was hold out your hand and Joni and Meg were excitedly shrieking. There hadn’t been a wedding in the family in so long.
“Wow,” Walt said. “Ransom? Engaged, showing commitment? This is the strangest year I’ve ever lived.”
Ransom rolled his eyes.
Before another word could be said, Linda collapsed onto the floor. Richard and Walt were the only ones who felt alarmed at the situation, while everyone else moved in closer to see the puppies.
“Which one is ours?” you wondered.
“Yours,” he corrected. “And the blonde one. She was the least yappy I could find on such short notice.”
Your eyebrows pulled together. “Where did you go?”
“The pound, obviously.”
“I fucking love you,” you blurted out, grabbing his face to pull him down into a kiss.
Once again, the room echoed with disgusted sounds.
“Which one’s mine?” Meg wondered.
“I couldn’t care less,” he admitted.
“I’m gonna name mine Hugh,” Jacob announced.
Ransom gave you an expectant look.
“I love you?” you tried.
“Gonna need a lot more than that.” He picked you up and because you knew Ransom wasn’t going to accept any kind of attitude from you for a very long time, you hooked your legs and arms around him and willingly went.
“I’ll take care of your dog until you guys are done being gross!” Meg promised.
chris tags:
@onetwo3000 @chris-evans-indian-fanfic @donutloverxo @kleohoneyao3 @cevans-fics
ransom tags:
@la-cey
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A Day In The Life Of Gorilla
Gorilla is a silent character but his inner thoughts are anything but. Hereby referred to as Ishmael because I doubt he would refer to himself as Gorilla.
---
The alarm clock went off and Ishmael got up for another day of work as Adrien Agreste’s body guard. Another day of subtly working around his emotionally stunted employer to let the socially inept teenager have a couple hours of normalcy while still retaining his job. It was a fine line but thanks to Gabriel’s frequent absenteeism and Adrien’s innate ability to sneak away it was not hard.
After getting dressed and having a long look in the mirror contemplating if he should shave the muttonchops Ishmael headed to the kitchen for breakfast. Nathalie was already there sipping some coffee and doing the newspaper suduko. She gave him a half-awake greeting and returned to her task.
Ishmael went to the cupboards and sighed. He understood when he moved to France that there would be cultural differences but he really missed big breakfasts. If he could get a weekend off he’d go visit his sister in Kirn. See how his brother-in-law is doing. Play with his nephews. Eat something other than a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast.
Soon it was time for him to drive Adrien to school. The poor boy looked like death as he slid into the backseat of the car. There had been an akuma attack last night that must have woken him up.
Upon getting to the school he waited to make sure Adrien got inside okay. One of Adrien’s friends, Nino, came up to talk to him along with some other classmates. Immediately Adrien perked up. Public school really had been the best thing to happen to that boy.
After running some errands it was time for Adrien to be picked up to go to his photoshoot. Unfortunately when he got to the school the scene playing out at the front entrance was the exact opposite of the happy environment Adrien had been dropped off in. Chloe Bourgeois was planted firmly in front of Adrien and loudly complaining at Adrien’s new co-worker Lila Rossi.
This ought to be good. Ishmael rolled the window down far enough to hear what was going on.
“It is utterly ridiculous! I will not condone this!” Chloe yelled.
Adrien said something but only Chloe’s screams could be heard from the car.
“If your dad wants someone to partner modeling with you then it is going to be me! Not this out of season, romper wearing, disrespectful, philistine.”
Philistine? He wasn’t aware Chloe carried that word in her vocabulary. He was a little impressed.
There was some more talking from Lila and Adrien to an angry Chloe before a third girl entered the fray. Marinette Dupain-Cheng. The little designer that lived in the bakery had all of Ishmael’s respect. Being one of the few girls in Adrien’s circle that had a crush on him but didn’t force herself on the boy.
Case and point, Marinette came up behind Adrien and tapped him on the shoulder before pointing towards the car waiting for him. He looked back at the car with a gesture to Marinette to follow.
Yes. Come on baker girl! Take the invite!
She nodded and the two quickly snuck away from the fighting girls and hopped in the car.
“Phew,” Adrien collapsed in his seat. “Thanks for coming by when you did, Marinette.”
“No problem.” Marinette beamed. “Thanks for letting me tag along to your photo shoot.”
“Well I know how into fashion you are.” Adrien teased sending the girl’s face aflame.
Ah, young love. Even if one of them was too oblivious to see it.
Speaking of photo shoots Ishmael should probably stop eavesdropping on a couple of teenagers and drive to said photo shoot.
“Adrien!” Chloe started stopping after the car with Lila right on her heels. “Wait!”
Nope! Ishmael peeled out leaving the other girls in the dust.
Adrien and Marinette continued talking in the back leaving Ishmael to his thoughts.
Maybe if he could find some really heavy traffic that could give the two kids in his backseat more time to talk. He was not above admitting that he really like the baker girl for Adrien. Now if only the boy would drop his crush on Ladybug to pursue it.
Ishmael understood where the infatuation with the hero was coming from but at a certain point it just wasn’t possible. He had read enough comics to know that heroes dating civilians never ends well! Secret identities, misunderstandings, kidnapping and ransom on the regular. It was enough to give Ishmael anxiety just thinking about it. He was hired to protect Adrien. He would lose his mind if the boy kept getting taken hostage by akumas trying to use him as collateral for Ladybug’s earrings.
This job was stressful enough with Gabriel Agreste constantly breathing down his neck. He didn’t need the rest of his hair to go full grey because Adrien wanted to be the next Mary Jane Watson!
They pulled up to the site of the photo shoot and Ishmael waited in the car.
He liked to use this time to look up everything he could about parenting, abusive relationships, and adoption legalese. Not that he was secretly planning to expose Mr. Agreste’s gaslight parenting and adopt Adrien as his own until his mother can be found. That would be crazy.
The work gave him some reassurance though. He at least had some understanding and preparation if Mr. Agreste did ever go too far and action needed to be taken. He cared about that boy so much. Had been watching over him since he was a little kid. Came to see him as a son even if he couldn’t outwardly show it. He’d be damned if he didn’t get custody in the event that Mr. Agreste had an...accident.
Okay. That got a little dark. Ishmael wasn’t about to go and beat up his employer for not being more involved or directly invested in Adrien’s life. The thought was tempting though. So...so...tempting.
CRASH!
Oh what now? And there was an akuma turning everyone into giant flowers. Great. Does Hawkmoth ever take a day off?
Ishmael jumped out of the car to find Adrien and get him to safety when the akuma spotted him and shot what looked like seeds at him. He shielded himself from the assault only to then wake up some time later sprawled on the ground.
Had he gotten turned into a flower? What kind of nonsense was that? At least if he was back to normal that meant that Ladybug and Chat Noir had restored everything. Past events gave him reason to believe that Adrien was fine but he wouldn’t be able to stop worrying until he saw the boy.
Quickly he rushed onto set and saw Adrien stroll out into the open. Thank goodness he was safe. Ishmael stayed outside on set after that. After they wrapped up he was supposed to take Adrien straight home but when the boy came up to him with that hopeful look in his eye and an innocent plea to stop by the Dupain-Cheng bakery for a couple minutes for treats with Marinette, Ishmael couldn’t say no.
As long as they got home within the hour it shouldn’t be bad. The teenagers walked into the bakery and Ishmael had to resist the urge to go in and pick up some goodies for himself. He was working. If he wanted pastries he should have picked them up while Adrien was in school.
A few minutes went by and Adrien bid Marinette and her parents goodbye before heading back to the car. A little pink box in his hands. Oh great. Now he was gonna be stuck in the car with the smell of fresh baked pastries teasing him.
Adrien got inside and popped open the lid. “Hey Gorilla,” Adrien scooted forward in his seat and held out a macaron for him. “I got you one. It’s green tea and white chocolate flavored.”
Ishmael took the offered macaron with a small smile. Green tea and white chocolate was his favorite flavor.
They drove home and Ishmael tried not to show his annoyance when they entered and Mr. Agreste was waiting at the top of the stairs. What kind of holier than thou intimidation tactic was this?
You are not a king overlooking his subjects! Come down to eye level! Where did this attitude come from? Before this jerk face got big he was living in a rundown studio living off of microwave meals and patching thrift store jeans. You’re not a haughty as you make yourself out to be, Gabe! The fact that Emilie agreed to marry you was nothing short of a miracle considering what a prominent and wealthy family she came from. You were a tortured artist hobo next to a happy-go-lucky princess!
Calm down. Let the overbearing prick in his peppermint ensemble complain about being ten minutes late. It’ll be over soon.
Adrien looked disheartened by his father’s words. He apologized and tried to rationalize that they were only ten minutes late but Mr. Agreste was having none if it. And to top it all off he had Nathalie take the box Adrien had brought home from the bakery.
Berate the boy for being late. Pair him with a co-worker he doesn’t like. Rarely join son for meals. Barely talk to son. All of that was one thing but to take the poor boy’s treats? Was nothing sacred?
Now thoroughly miserable Adrien ascended up to his room. Nathalie handed the box from the bakery to Ishmael. “Dispose of this.” She glanced up at Adrien’s room before following Mr. Agreste into his office.
Ishmael knocked on the door to Adrien’s room but no answer came. Quietly he opened the door but didn’t see anyone. He must be in the bathroom. He deposited the box on Adrien’s desk and left.
He may not be able to protect Adrien from everything but at least he could help him in other ways.
#i thought it was cute#and potentially funny#miraculous ladybug#the gorilla#adrien agreste#marinette dupain cheng#gorilla got sass
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frame-to-frame replied to your post “frame-to-frame replied to your post “chaoticunneutral replied to...”
That’s fair, this prob does partly come down to semantics – i.e. his being purposefully v. unconsciously unaware. B/c I agree in those terms that Griffith is purposefully unaware of his guilt, but I’m resistant to Griffith being unconsciously unaware generally, which this can easily be conflated with – that he’s so emotionally stunted he can’t recognize his feelings for what they are. A valid take ofc, just I think not my cup of tea?
Though I’m open to being convinced lol. This is such a subtle point to debate lol, but I still think both can be at play wrt his feelings for Guts – purposeful unawareness alongside an acknowledgement (on some level) of his attraction to him. Griffith is all about emotional repression, we know that, he needs it to keep his dream alive. I just don’t think this is incompatible with him also pining for Guts
I think it comes down to how in control of his feelings he thinks he is. What sells me on this reading is “How long ago did someone I was supposed to have in hand instead gain such a strong hold on me?” b/c that brings control right into the way he thinks about his attraction to Guts. He can still acknowledge his attraction & even try to seduce Guts while also writing those feelings off as a crush/lust (which he can tell himself he’s in control of)
Where the purposeful unawareness comes into play is wrt the true significance of these feelings: that they pose a threat to his dream. B/c however you read Griffith’s awareness, the “do I need a reason” scene is significant in that he has no coping mechanism to explain his actions. He clearly goes the route of purposeful unawareness afterward, but ofc it didn’t have to go that way if they hadn’t been interrupted
I’m not sure I understand why the ch12 friend speech interferes w this, I think your meta still works with this reading, so you’ll have to elaborate pls! B/c to me it seems that either way he’s trying to diminish the depth of his feelings for Guts in response to a perceived rejection from him – and he can still know that what he’s saying is BS in his heart of hearts. Sry for length
Yeah I’d say it’s definitely more of a purposeful unawareness. While I think he is emotionally stunted in some ways, he’s not at all ignorant or lacking in emotional intelligence. LIke he’s actually really (uncannily at times, eg Foss) good at picking up on other people’s feelings, he’s empathetic (eg his interactions with Casca after saving her from the nobleman), he’s very socially aware and competent, etc.
But imo where his own feelings are concerned he has a giant blind spot. And tbh I do think that he is kind of incapable of recognizing a lot of his own feelings, not so much because of naivety but because he’s too used to avoidance and not used to confronting them directly. Like, it’s a willful blind spot, like we’re saying, it’s an ingrained negative coping mechanism. Maybe it started when people started dying at his orders, or maybe earlier, but yk, imo he deals with negative or inconvenient feelings by not dealing with them, by denying them entirely, and because of that he just has very little experience actually trying to understand his own feelings. But yeah like, I don’t think that’s exactly undeniable canon or anything lol, it’s more of a headcanon, and fair enough if it’s not your thing.
Hmm and while I definitely lean heavily on his emotional repression to be fair I def don’t think he’s incapable of examining his own feelings without lying to himself. We’ve seen moments of vulnerable emotional sincerity, eg “maybe it was my dream that killed this boy,” “am I dirty?” “do you think I’m cruel?”
I guess that to me those moments feel fleeting and quickly replaced by the denial and the mask, while I could see others reading those moments and seeing them as glimpses of Griffith’s more typical inner thoughts, which he just hides from others, rather than from himself. But yeah to me it always comes back to that monologue in the river - I just can’t read it as Griffith knowingly lying to Casca, imo it feels like pure bullshitting himself through a near breakdown, and it feels like a very powerful encapsulation of Griffith’s character as a whole. His moments of emotional self awareness don’t last because they’re painful, so they get buried.
But when it comes to Griffith’s feelings for Guts, ia that his denial method of dealing with his feelings isn’t necessarily incompatible with him still pining for Guts. Like guilt is a very different feeling from love, so it makes sense that he’d bury guilt but yk maybe not love. And I agree that self control is a big factor for Griffith, so yeah I could definitely see that if he feels like he’s got a handle on his feelings he wouldn’t need to avoid them/deny them.
And also because thematically Griffith’s feelings for Guts do lead to greater emotional self awareness in contrast to how he buries most of his feelings in pursuit of his dream, it makes sense on that level too that he’d be more aware of his feelings for Guts.
But I like Griffith being an unselfaware idiot who doesn’t even know he’s in love until he’s in a torture chamber lol. I love pining, but I also love the idea of Griffith lying to himself about Guts too, telling himself Guts is just a tool to help him win a war, that Guts will in all likelihood die for him so he has to does see him as just a soldier, etc. And steadfastly refusing to think about his feelings when he can’t cover them with a lie.
Idk I get that it could seem like, awkwardly naive and weird, but the way I imagine it is more like... bear with me because I’m about to get self indulgent and just talk about my Griffith headcanons lol, but basically I don’t picture Griffith sitting down and dwelling on his feelings if he can help it. It’s not like he saved Guts’ life the first or second time and thought “oh why did I do that? weird, idk, he’s a good soldier I guess, that must be it.” The way I see it it’s more like he just puts it out of his mind and doesn’t think about it. He socializes, he reads every book in his study, he learns to be the best at the sword as a teenager, he leads and fights and thinks of tactics, etc etc. Guts spends a lot of his time navelgazing about his feelings, but I don’t think Griffith does
He can think about intellectual things, like his goals and fate and his life philosophy but to me those all feel like smokescreens obscuring the emotional truths behind them. And when he gets too close to thinking about those emotional truths, he would have a million ways to distract himself, like by now I figure he’s just pretty pro at derailing his train of thought onto safer territory.
But yeah like the “do I need a reason” scene could’ve easily lead to a moment of emotional honesty and awareness if they hadn’t been interrupted imo. I mean it already was, it just didn’t get a chance to get very far. And afterwards I could definitely see Griffith contemplating his feelings for Guts honestly, giving thought to the way he cares about him and what it means, because he doesn’t automatically avoid those particular emotions. Maybe he already knows he’s attracted to him, or maybe he doesn’t bc of internalized homophobia, but the realization of love is burgeoning. Or I could see him already knowing and accepting how he feels and wishing Guts would catch up and finally understand that he’s not just another soldier to him. Or I could see him turning his thoughts towards seducing Charlotte, buying more books, investigating the attempted assassination, and deciding to ask Guts for help because he trusts him innately, without ever stopping to properly think about what saving Guts from Zodd meant. (And I default to the last one but I like all three.)
Lastly wrt the Promrose speech I just meant more generally that it’s a direct contradiction in the story that requires the reader to put some thought into Griffith’s character to reconcile it. Griffith prioritizes Guts above his dream, 5 chapters later Griffith says he has no friends. (It also contradicts the river monologue nicely, “for no other’s sake, for him, himself alone... a dream” vs “but if for their sakes, for the sake of the dead, if there’s something I can do, that thing is to win.)
And imo that basically just means that the Promrose speech has to be bullshit because it’s contradicted by actions and words in a much more emotionally revealing moment, but it’s up to the reader to decide if it’s bullshit Griffith has convinced himself is true, or if he’s just lying to Charlotte. Not that it contradicts anything we’re discussing.
#frame-to-frame#replies#character: griffith#headcanons#convo#a#b#lol @ you apologizing for length when I respond with this whole thing#character thoughts#theme: repression#ship: griffguts
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Age Matters (1)
Damian Wayne x Reader
Damian falls in love with an older woman.
Warning: Talks about age when it comes to relationships. Not at all inappropriate.
[ Master List ]
For years you have been Damian’s crime-fighting partner. The two of you started off a couple of strong-headed kids as Batgirl and Robin. There was plenty of arguing and fighting because of the age difference. You were a few years older than Damian meaning you were put in charge most of the time and he couldn’t stand taking orders from you. He had actually told himself he hated you but the reality was far from it.
+++
Damian looked up from the sketchbook in his hands at the sound of a soft knock on the door. “What is it Grayson-” He immediately closed the sketchbook he had been intensely focused on when he looked up to see Dick wasn’t the one who had entered his room. His startled expression changed slightly when he took in the sight you in the Batwoman suit. It was more than his teenage lovesick heart could handle. “What are you doing here?”
A smile graced your lips reaching your eyes. “Looking for you of course.” Without hesitation you walked in, closing the door behind you. “Sorry I hope I didn’t interrupt you.” He looked startled by your presence which was totally understandable considering you technically had no business being at the tower anymore.
Damian shook his head, on the contrary, he was glad to see you. “It was just some recreational reading.” As he grew older Damian thought about you a lot more than he cared to admit.
Your brow arched taking a second look at the book he had just closed. “You read from your sketchbook?” His eyes narrowed in response making you retract with a soft giggle. “Sorry, none of my business, I know.” Damian valued his privacy which you respected for the most part. Sometimes you just couldn’t help snooping into his life. The boy was a mystery waiting to be solved. You missed him so much that you didn’t care if you got yelled at.
Damian stumbled back when you crashed into him. He had grown over the years but you were still taller than him making his head rest on your chest when you wrapped your arms tightly around his neck. The warmth that radiated off of you was intoxicating.
“I missed my crime-fighting partner. Do you know how peaceful my patrols have been lately?” You began rambling on and on about all the thoughts you have been keeping to yourself. These were things you would usually talk about with him when you were out on patrol. “I have no one to argue with. They changed the formula for my favorite mascara... I fed Bat-cow the other day... Bruce yelled at me for getting hurt... I was so excited when Bruce said you were going to be taking over as Batman on your twentieth birthday... We can be partners again!”
When you turned twenty you graduated from Batgirl to Batwoman leaving the Titans behind. It was a huge change for both of you. Before you were always together, you were always there by his side, you were his first crush. He started to miss you now that you were off on your own as Batwoman while he stayed with the Titans. Damian refused the very idea that he could ever fall in love yet he did nothing to stop the physical contact you had initiated.
The last time you hugged him like this was years ago. At that time he threatened to kill you if you ever dared to do so again.
His silence worried you. Was he so mad that he had gone completely silent? Was this the calm before the storm? You apologized as you backed off, “Sorry, I just really missed you.”
“Tt,” Damian turned his back to you. He spent seven years fighting, pushing you away pretending to be annoyed by your presence alone. Now he had no idea how to respond to the ache in his chest, the fluttering in his stomach, the restlessness. “I missed you too.”
His words came out as a whisper, nonetheless, you heard it loud and clear. “What? Did you just say you missed me?” Your cheeks were hurting from how big your smile had grown.
When he thought about it he realized his mother was right. Emotions really made people weak. He was no longer able to put up a fight against you. He had fallen in love with someone who only saw him as a little brother.
Just then Dick entered the room, the sight was strange, to say the least. You were smiling from ear to ear while Damian scowled. “The emotional range in this room is alarming.”
+++
“Damian you have to calm down.” Jon followed Damian to Gotham where they headed straight for Wayne Manor.
For months you had been fighting off Owlman who wanted you as his new partner. When you refused he tried various methods to force you. When none of them worked he decided the next best thing was to get rid of you. He was almost successful.
“Why did no one tell me!”
Damian’s entrance immediately got the attention of the two people in the cave.
Jon quickly apologized for the intrusion before trying to hold back Damian. It was all very useless because when it came to you he knew there was nothing he could do. Jon was probably the only person who knew Damian had feelings for you. He had seen it in his friend’s actions even before Damian realized it himself. When you were a Titan he noticed the way Damian’s heart skipped a beat at your appearance.
“The court of owls was never targeting the general population or the Titans,” Bruce stated in a very matter of fact way. It was just another way of saying, this was none of his business.
Of course, it only added the fire that was Damian Wayne. “Owlman was trying to get Y/N to join him, she’s MY partner!” He hated to be left out of everything just because his father thought it didn’t concern him. “If anyone should have helped her it’s me.”
It was starting to look like a fight would breakout making Jon put his hand on Damian’s shoulder.
“Relax Damian,” Dick got between father and son trying to de-escalate the situation. “It wasn’t Bruce who decided to keep you in the dark....it was Y/N.”
His expression softened, you had asked to keep him out of it. You were in trouble and didn’t reach out to him for help. Instead, you went to his father, or maybe Dick.
Jon didn’t know what to do, he preferred angry Damian over this one. “Where is she?” he asked thinking this was probably a good time for his friend to see you.
Dick took them up to the room where you were resting. Coincidentally it happens to be Jason’s room vexing him further. You were laying in bed, peacefully, hooked to an IV drip. “Is she unconscious?”
“No, she’s just resting after Jason insisted Bruce put her through like a hundred tests to check for a concussion and internal bleeding. Even before that she was awake for thirty-nine hours.”
Jon had heard all about the Batfamily sleep schedules but that was just insane. It did explain why you had gotten hurt, no way you were in top condition when you fought of Owlman.
Damian pushed past Dick to get a closer look at you. His chest tightened at the sight of a purplish-blue bruise that poked out of the bandages wrapped around your head. His eyes moved towards your arm that rested in a cast. Your hands a testament to how hard you fought back.
He couldn’t help himself, he reached out to hold your hand effectively alerting Dick. He didn’t want to hurt you so he opted to just brush his fingers against yours. “Why did she not want me to be informed?”
Watching his younger brother’s movements he concluded, “Damian are you two...?” He couldn’t bring himself to say it. There had been some suspicion. Damian had made a clear effort to seek you out even after you had gone solo. On off days he would hear about you two going to museums, he knew you both liked history and thought it was a shared interest that brought you closer together as a team but perhaps it was more.
Annoyed, Damian sighed. “No...” the two of you were nothing but friends if even that. You had distanced yourself ever since that day. “I was rejected.” After gathering the courage to profess his feelings to you Damian was ultimately dismissed.
“What-” you let go of Damian’s hands that you had previously been holding onto. It was all sweet and innocent affection until now. Hearing his confession made you painfully aware that you two were alone in his room. For the first time ever you felt like it was wrong to be there. Not only that but you were sitting on his bed.
“I’ll say it again if you don’t believe me.”
“No, don’t!” You stopped him, it wasn’t that you didn’t believe him. The problem was that you did believe him. Damian was honestly confessing his feelings to you but all you could think about was the age difference. Sure if he were thirty and you thirty-three it didn’t sound so bad but he was seventeen and you were twenty. “Dami, you’re just a teenager-”
“As were you only eight months ago.”
Silence overcame you not knowing what to respond. It was funny how something like age never seemed to matter once both parties were adults but in the transition between teen and adult, it was a complex situation. “Sorry, Dami... maybe if you were older but not as we are...” Suddenly you found yourself really looking at Damian.
He wasn’t the little boy you once knew, he was shaping up to be a great man. His morals were becoming clearer every day, his resolve to help others was stronger, and despite what others thought he wasn’t emotionally stunted. Being around him for so long made it easy for you to see how kind, thoughtful, and generous he really was. He still hated recognizing that he had emotions and couldn’t take a compliment either.
You shook your head knowing very well that you didn’t even have to ask yourself if you loved Damian. As a person, he was great despite his flaws but he was your partner, he was a kid you grew up with, and a great friend.
Damian was crushed but hopeful. Not once did you ever say you didn’t love him. If age was all that mattered to you then he would wait. “If I were Grayson or Todd’s age...” he paused before mentioning Tim even though he was the closest in age to you he didn’t want to compare himself to Drake. “Would you consider my feelings genuine?”
You nodded.
Dick gasped loudly, his little brother was growing up and he didn’t even see it coming. “I thought you were emotionally stunted by your mother and let’s face it Bruce isn’t any better in the feelings department. This is so unexpected!”
Jon and Damian both shushed him reminding him of your fatigued state. “Maybe we should go outside,” Jon suggested pulling Dick out of the room. He wanted to give his friend a moment alone to give that lump in his throat a chance to come out.
As soon as the door closed Damian sighed. Letting his guard down allowed him to focus on you. His eyes caught sight of the small lines that went across your bottom lip. It looked like a dotted line in a contrasting red color from that of your lips, they were the marks of your teeth. You always had a habit of biting your lower lip, no matter the pain, to keep others from knowing how much you hurt. This time you managed to permanently cast your teeth in the plush of your lips.
How he wished to be older, to be able to show you how much he loved you... With no one around he said it once more. “I love you,” and leaned down bringing his lips to yours in a chaste kiss.
-end-
pic credit; to the owner/artist. this is some of the best fanart- I swear older damian gets to me.
A/N: What do you think, should they be together?
#damian wayne x reader#robin x reader#damian wayne x you#damian wayne x y/n#robin x you#robin x y/n#damian wayne robin#batfam scenarios#batfam fanfiction#batfam#damian wayne#damian wayne fanfiction#damian wayne scenarios#robin fanfiction#robin scenarios#dcu#DC Universe
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August Media Madness
Well, August may have sucked for me personally, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t keep track of all the media I consumed this month! And spoiler alert, I watched a lot of movies involving adorable talking bears. Although, I have a feeling that as soon as the fall television premieres start, I’ll be watching a lot less movies.
July’s media
Movies!
Dear Evan Hansen
Thank you bootlegs. This isn’t a movie, but I didn’t want to make a separate category for plays when I’ve only seen one this month. Anyway, if you haven’t heard of it, Dear Evan Hansen involves an incredibly anxious teenage boy who is tasked by his therapist to write motivational letters to himself. Unfortunately, Connor Murphy, an angsty boy who goes to Evan’s school sees one of the letters, takes it, and promptly decides to kill himself, with the letter still on his person. Everyone ends up thinking he and Evan were friends and that this letter was a suicide note that Connor wrote to Evan...and a beautiful fake gay relationship friendship was born. Call me basic as hell, but I’ve watched this show twice now, and listened to the soundtrack more times than I can count, and it’s turning into my favorite musical. There are so many important messages in it, and it takes you on a roller coaster of emotions. Every character does good and bad things, and no one is blameless or innocent...except maybe Zoe Murphy. If anything just listen to the soundtrack. 10/10
Night on the Galactic Railroad
Cats...on a mystical train...This seems like the kind of movie they would show you in film school. Very dull plot and characters with the themes being the main takeaway. What even is the plot of this movie? Darker, grittier, furry version of the Polar Express? Incredibly boring slightly more religious version of Over the Garden Wall? I just kept watching it because the main character looks like a cat version of Kagayama Tobio in middle school...cat-gayama. 4/10
Paddington
An adorable bear from South America travels to London and gets into all sorts of trouble with an English family. It’s very charming and sweet, and the aesthetic in this movie is on point, like Wes Anderson directed a children’s movie. This is one of those movies you hear about where everyone loves it, and you think it can’t possibly be that good, but then you watch it and you were wrong! So wrong! 10/10
Paddington 2
Naturally. This time an adorable South American bear goes to prison, and his family tries to clear his name. Again, A+ aesthetic and imagery, but I think I preferred the plot of the first movie a little more because everyone was all together. 9/10
Christopher Robin
Do you like Winnie the Pooh? Do you like jaded adults finding happiness in their lives again? Do you think the movie Hook had a good premise but was extremely long and kinda boring and could have been a better movie with a little tweaking? Well this is the movie for you! Christopher Robin has grown into an overworked adult, and his old friend Winnie the Pooh inadvertently helps him reconnect with his wife and daughter (and also his inner child) just by being the sweet, clumsy, dry humored bear we all know and love. I was so skeptical of this movie at first, and I was absolutely blown away by how funny and meaningful it was. 100/10
The Road to El Dorado
Two lovable Spanish con men named Miguel and Tulio are accidentally swept away on a journey to the fabled city of El Dorado, where everything is made of gold. Once they reach the city, the locals believe they’re gods due to an (un)fortunate series of coincidences, and the con men try to keep up the charade with the help of the best character in the movie, Chel (who I’m pretty sure caused an entire generation of lesbians’ sexual awakening). This is one of my favorite animated movies of all time and one of the reasons I wish Dreamworks would go back to their 2D animation days, where the visuals and music were just as stunning as 3D movies are now. This movie is a classic, and I desperately want a sequel! 10/10
To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before
When Lara Jean thinks it’s a good idea to write 5 secret love letters to 5 boys that she’s had crushes on over the years, everything is fine until her little sister mails the letters to all the boys (because even a 6th grader knows Lara Jean is lonely and emotionally stunted as fuck). This is a Netflix original movie that was adapted from the book by Jenny Han...which I haven’t read, but now I really want to. Overall, this was super cute, but I wasn’t really crazy about the boys. They weren’t horrible people or anything, and they never pressured Lara Jean or made fun of her for being “innocent”, but they were just kind of bland. I’m much more interested in the other boys we didn’t see in the movie! But the family relationships were so heartfelt, Lara Jean’s fashion sense is AMAZING, and the acting/casting was awesome. 8/10
Summer Wars
I...don’t even know how to describe the plot of this one. A teenage boy named Kenji goes on a country holiday and pretends to date an acquaintance of his in order to impress her enormous family...but it’s really about an AI that becomes sentient and wants to mess up the world through this universal internet program called OZ that’s kind of like a mashup of Facebook and Second Life...but actually no it’s about family sticking together and using a Japanese card game to save the world…but apparently it’s got the same plot as the Digimon movie because they’re both directed by Mamoru Hosoda. Yeah...
Guys, I have a confession to make...this has always been my favorite Mamoru Hosoda movie. Everyone falls all over themselves saying Wolf Children is the best Mamoru Hosoda movie, and that’s great for them but it doesn’t even come in second for me. Summer Wars means a lot more to me personally because I come from a big extended family, and when I first saw this movie, I was blown away by how accurate the family dynamic was. There are so many characters, but everyone has their own personality. Not to mention the music makes the summer atmosphere so on point. And I’m not going to lie...I bawled like a fucking baby the first time I saw this movie. So anyway, I like Summer Wars more than Wolf Children, thanks for coming to my TED talk. 10/10
Atlantis: The Lost Empire
Unappreciated researcher Milo Thatch goes on an expedition to find the lost city of Atlantis.
Okay, there are two kinds of Disney fans in this world: Treasure Planet fans, and Atlantis fans. And I will support Treasure Planet as the best underrated vaguely steampunk inspired Disney movie until you can pry my 15 year old dvd copy away from my cold dead hands. But Atlantis is pretty good too. I could write essays comparing the two and why both of them should be successful but weren’t. My main problem with it is that the characters are great, but I feel like we don’t see enough of them, and as a kid a lot of the humor went by so fast that I completely missed it. Also the glowing eyes and spirits taking over the Atlantian princess’s body freaked me the fuck out as a child. NEVERTHELESS! This really is a great movie, with extremely well developed lore and well designed characters that chills me to this day. 8/10
Deadpool 2
The merc with a mouth is back, and man there’s so much going on in this movie I won’t even try to explain the plot. I literally had to go back and add this in because I was so into this movie when I was watching it that I forgot to write it down! Even though I really liked this sequel, I think I liked the first one better, just based on how much I laughed. There was so much going on plot wise, but it really seemed to work for this movie. There were also a lot of great new characters (Domino is my favorite character of the franchise now), but since there was so much stuff going on, a lot of jokes and plot lines were sort of hit and miss. Anyway, I’m sure everyone’s seen this one by now but just in case, I highly recommend it. 9/10
Books!
The Adventure Zone Graphic Novel: Here There be Gerblins by Clint McElroy (technically all the McElboys) and Carey Pietsch
Yeah yeah, for anyone who doesn’t know I’m Adventure Zone trash okay. TAZ is a DnD podcast where 3 brothers and their father create one of the most famous campaigns in history involving three idiot adventurers going on a quest to find a missing person and getting sucked into a much larger grand plan to protect the world. This graphic novel is a visualization of the first arc. I don’t even really like Here There be Gerblins all that much, and yet here I am. Oh well, the art was amazing, and of course I already knew the story. But it was kind of hilarious to see the name changes they had to make to some of the characters and places. I was a little disappointed that the ending was so rushed, and we don’t really spend time around the moon base before The Director is in our face changing the Lunar Interlude parts but whatever. 10 dead gerblins/10
The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken
When a disease that only affects children kills off nearly all the kids on the planet, the survivors are left with supernatural powers and are taken away to concentration camps in order to “protect” the public. I’ve been wanting to read this for a long time, and since the movie just came out I thought it was the perfect time. This is one of those books that some people adore and some people hate. I thought it was just okay. For everything that I didn’t like, there was something to make up for it. Personally, I felt that Bracken focused on the wrong part of the story. Everything takes place years after this disease has come, and I think it would have been more interesting to see everything from the children’s points of view when this disease was first starting. I would focus on each different character as a child and how they wound up in their respective camps. Oh well, there’s way too many pros and cons that I could delve into, but you like the YA dystopian genre then I say go for it. I didn’t like it enough to read the other two books (not yet anyway). 7/10
TV Shows!
Camp Camp
You know how there are summer camps that specialize in science, or acting, or space, or whatever? Yeah Camp Camp is about a summer camp that throws literally everything you can think of into one summer camp. If you don’t believe me, just listen to the theme song. Seriously though this is one of the best shows I’ve watched all year, but boy howdy this is not one for young children. It’s like Gravity Falls and Rick and Morty had a baby! Anyway, the characters are both surprising and hilarious. David the camp counselor (voiced by Miles Luna) is genuinely likable when you think he’d be the most annoying person on the planet, and the kids are so accurate it’s scary. Also Yuri Lowenthal is in it. And Griffin McElroy has a recurring role where he plays A GHOST! I’ve never been into Rooster Teeth stuff, but they have a winner with this one. 10/10
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel
After her husband leaves her, Midge Maisel gets super drunk, goes on stage, and gives a hilarious rant about her relationship at a small comedy/talent club and somehow gets sucked into becoming a rising comedian as a woman in the 1950s. It’s good. Great acting pretty funny, but Midge and her agent/manager Susie are the only likable characters. Everyone else just kind of...sucks 8/10
Voltron Season 7 (spoilers)
Okay, I know everyone had mixed feelings about this season, but I did come out liking a lot of it. It had a lot of flaws (I really thought it would be Shiro’s season, and man was I wrong), but this is the sort of thing we can’t really judge until the last episode of the series is finished. I like to think of the positives: the action was amazing as usual, HUNK IS GETTING MORE AND MORE DEVELOPMENT EVERY SEASON, I refuse to believe the team introduced Adam just to have him killed off immediately so he’s still alive in my mind, we get to see everyone’s reunions with their families, the lost in space episode was cool, and say what you want about the game show episode, but I loved it! There were a lot of good things so it was easier for me to look past the...not so great aspects of the season. 7/10
Galavant
A musical comedy mini series involving a renowned medieval hero named Galavant on a quest to rescue his ex girlfriend from her “evil” husband King Richard. But maybe she doesn’t want to be rescued. Well, that’s just the first season. It’s best to go in knowing as little as possible. I remember liking it when it first came out, and it’s still pretty cute...but sometimes I feel like it’s trying too hard. A lot of the music isn’t really...memorable, but the characters are likable so it’s still worth the watch. 8/10
Disenchantment
Speaking of medieval comedies...Princess Bean doesn’t want to get married, mystical elf Elfo doesn’t want to live in an enchanted forest where everyone is happy all the time, and Bean’s personal demon Luci just wants to watch people suffer. Honestly, I wasn’t very into this show at first, but something compelled me to just keep watching, and by the end I was totally into it! This is one of those shows where you think there isn’t going to be a plot, but then the last few episodes come up and smack you in the face! 7.5/10
Round Planet
A documentary parody...mockumentary...satire...That’s really not a great way to describe it. It’s a nature documentary with funny commentary. I like nature shots and animals so I liked it, but there’s a lot of tangents and running jokes and British references that sometimes don’t land. Oh well, if you like unconventional documentaries, just watch it. 8/10
Honorable Mentions
DnDnD: I don’t think I’ve ever talked about this podcast before, but there’s a DnD podcast made by Practical Folks (aka the Drunk Disney youtube channel). It’s pretty good! I want an Adventure Zone crossover now!
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild: Every time I think I’m out, it pulls me back in. I finally got the DLC and spent most of this month playing this freaking game AGAIN!
The Heathers soundtrack: I finally listened to the Heathers musical soundtrack...and I didn’t love it. There are some good songs in it, but overall I’m unimpressed. And I never could really get into the plot, I’ve always thought it was really weird and over dramatic.
Legendary by Stephanie Garber: I’m about halfway through this book, which is the second in the Caraval series. And it’s pretty good! More on that next month.
#media madness#long post#dear evan hansen#night on the galactic railroad#paddington#christopher robin#the road to el dorado#to all the boys i've loved before#summer wars#atlantis#the adventure zone#the darkest minds#camp camp#the marvelous mrs. maisel#voltron#galavant#disenchantment#round planet#dndnd#breath of the wild#heathers#caraval#legendary#deadpool
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i’m 100% for lainey labeling their gender in whatever way feels right for them, dressing however feels right, and using whatever pronouns feel right. i’m not gonna doubt or question their identity or anyone else’s. what rubs me the wrong way is how they emulate and almost fetishize the “teen” aesthetic. when they’ve said they look like a 12 year old boy and implied that it was attractive/hot/a good thing, i was kinda creeped out. idk how to explain it but i think it sends a really bad message.
Ah, yeah, that’s another thing I’ve been considering writing about for a while: how much Lainey seems to fetishize adolescence. Get ready for another one of my pointless tl;drs that nobody ever reads or cares about, y’all!
If Lainey was removed from the context surrounding the reasons why we all spend so much time scrutinizing her behavior in the first place, I doubt most people would have a problem with the fact that she seems almost pathologically obsessed with portraying herself as a 15-year-old girl in both style and personality, rather than as the 23-year-old wife and mother of two that she is.
But the issue, of course, is that Lainey’s preferences do not exist in a vacuum; they mean something, and that’s what we’re here to analyze. She is married to a man who fetishizes teenage girls himself, because they’re easier to control and manipulate. She indulges in, and relates to, a culture that heavily emphasizes youth and immaturity (referring to boyfriends as “daddy”, having a DDlg (Daddy Dom/little girl) fetish, being “taken care of” by men (and treated like a little princess in bed), constantly alluding to not knowing what they’re doing in life, assuming a guileless pose in selfies that reflect a certain youthful confusion and spontaneity, constantly referencing their childlike habits (”touch my butt and buy me pizza”, “I have no idea what I’m doing”, “im a crybaby” flavors of meme), dressing like a 12-year-old in overalls, children’s Pokemon panties, and pastel-colored hair and clothing with simplistic, childlike patterns, etc - not that I think there’s anything inherently wrong with any of these things, but all of these pieces of the puzzle fit together to paint the picture of a person who is unhealthily obsessed with living out their life as a teenager. You guys know the ~aesthetic~ that I’m trying to drive at here).
She indulges in cultural trends targeted towards children and young teens. Her entire personality revolves around sensitivity, helplessness, passivity; she exudes anxiety, uncertainty, and confusion; and openly discusses being so sensitive that she becomes completely overwhelmed by even the most simple of tasks that adults are expected to be able to do. And again, I’m not saying that these are inherently negative traits (although obviously when these qualities run your life, it can become problematic); but Lainey seems almost proud of these traits. She’s more than just open about it. She brags about them. She romanticizes them. She constructs elaborate internal fantasies around them. Her entire identity revolves around being a ~smol sensitive anxious space prince daddy~.
On top of all these things, almost everybody that she hangs out with or considers to be her friend (from Sarah, who lives with her, all the way down to the girls who she interacts with on Discord) is a teenager. She does not speak to women her own age. It’s bizarre. I used to have a friend who was quite a bit younger than me, by three and a half years - the first time we met in real life was on her 16th birthday, and I was 19, almost 20; and despite the fact that we were best friends and that I had so many other friends my own age, there was a very obvious and noticeable difference in our maturity levels. I’m not saying that uneven friendships like this can’t work or are inherently inappropriate, but again, within the context of Lainey’s life, it’s an enormous red flag that she seems to be unable to relate with women her own age, and can only form friendships with teenage girls between the ages of 15 and 21. Even outside of the context of her marriage (because let’s not forget that she’s married to a man who openly admits to having a sexual preference for young women, because they’re at “peak fertility” according to him), the fact that she relates the most with teenage girls is a huge indication that Lainey herself is either a) extremely mature, b) purposely seeks to enter uneven friendships with younger girls because it balances the friendship in her favor, giving her more power and control (which wouldn’t surprise me if true, given that she’s married to Onision - she needs to be able to exercise control in SOME way), c) is emotionally stunted and frozen at the age of ~18 due to Onision’s influence on her psychological development, or d) a sexual predator who herself prefers teenage girls. I’m sure everybody has their own theory on why this is, but personally I think it’s probably a mixture of all four, with option c being the most prominent motivation.
I think Lainey projects herself onto teenage girls because she feels very much unprepared for this world, threatened by it, and does not trust her own ability to navigate adulthood successfully. In this regard, I think Greg managed to find almost a perfect partner for himself - a girl who is trapped in her adolescence in perpetuity (largely by choice, but partly through direction by Onision), who purposely cuts herself off from growing and learning and emerging as a young adult because it’s less dangerous and challenging for her to remain within her psychological safe zone, being coddled like a baby and completely controlled and taken care of by Greg, who looks after all of the hard things in her life that she struggles with (doing taxes, making money, going outside to get groceries, paying bills, interacting with strangers, making appointments, earning a living wage) - all of the practical, adult things that Lainey is terrified of doing, because it’s so overwhelming to her. Greg, of course, loves this. Lainey is his ideal partner: a woman who needs to be with a man like him, who defines her entire identity for her. A man who directs her, tells her what to do, is domineering and aggressive, and who makes all of her decisions for her. Tells her what to do, who to be, what to feel, how to act. A man who has complete control over every aspect of her life. A narcissist (him) and an inverted narcissist, or codependent (her).
And so this is why Lainey is so obsessed with portraying herself as a teenager. Teenagers hit that sweet spot in between childhood and adulthood that Lainey feels trapped by in perpetuity. On the one hand, she is not a child - she is a sexual being; she has kinks, and preferences, and desires to express herself and her sexual identity. On the other hand, though, neither is she an adult - she is immature, self-absorbed, has an unstable sense of self, doesn’t know who she is, hypersensitive, anxious, gets overwhelmed easily, indulges often in her learned helplessness, and makes no attempt to change any of this - she revels in her dysfunction; she romanticizes it. And there is no age that typifies this combination of traits better than a teenage girl does. She doesn’t just relate to teenagers; she wants to be a teenager, forever–and in some ways, she really is, because the interference of Greg on Lainey’s emotional, psychological, social, and sexual growth has had a catastrophic impact on her development. She is essentially a 16-year-old girl trapped within the body of a 23-year-old mother of two. And that’s exactly what she wants.
I think what’s ultimately going to be what destroys Greg and Lainey’s marriage is that eventually, Lainey is going to be too old for Greg, and he’s going to feel compelled to pick up another 17-, 18-, and 19-year-old girl again from his existing pool of die-hard fans. Already it’s quite apparent that Greg is bored of Lainey (as evidenced by the fact that he is still actively trying to find women to cheat on her with, even after what happened with Billie); but once the cost of maintaining her becomes more expensive than the cost of replacing her with a new, hot, young, alternative, impressionable teenage girl, he will do what he tried to do once before with Billie, and eject Lainey in favor of a new wife to manipulate. And the whole process will start all over again, until the day that either Greg dies, or he becomes incapable of drawing in new women. And at that point, sadly, the fact that Lainey is still a teenager - but only on the inside - will end up becoming the most painful struggle of her life, when she is forced to take on all of the adult responsibilities that Greg currently carries for her, and realizes that she is dangerously under-qualified to live her life as an adult woman instead of a pampered, permanent 16-year-old girl.
(Sadly - or maybe luckily - I think that Lainey is the type of woman who needs to be in a relationship with someone like Greg (an inverted narcissist; in other words, a codependent), so I guess here’s to hoping that when this inevitably happens, she will quickly find herself a new narcissist to date and define her entire identity for her, I suppose?)
Press F to pay respects for this ridiculously, unnecessarily long fucking essay that I just wrote that NOBODY is going to read. Praise the Noodle Lord. Amen.
#onision#laineybot#anti onision#anti-onision#narcissism#npd#still gonna use the npd tag#deal with it
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Brighter than Sunshine Part I
Pairing: Avengers x reader
Summary: Ellora isn’t an Avenger, but she has powers. Specifically, her powers involve fire, but she doesn’t know how to control it.
Warnings: Cursing, death
Word Count: 6894
A/N: I’m the worst at summaries lol. I wrote this a while ago featuring an OC- Ellora (I posted a “teaser”). Here’s an officially official part I of the story. Enjoy, thanks for being here! PS: the beginning will be set in post battle of New York!
One of her earliest memories of realizing that something was off about her was when she was in elementary school. She remembered feeling so hot, like the sun was burning her up alive. She remembered wanting to rip her clothes off and jump into a pool, before realizing rather dryly that it was the middle of December and snowflakes were due at any moment. She slowly became accustomed to her furnace-like body temperature as the years went on- she would brush it off as simply being warm blooded whenever her friends accidentally brushed against her and commented on how warm she was. Her darker skin seemed to glow the older she got and her brown eyes began reminding her of faint embers once she reached high school. But still, she told nobody and no one. Admitting that something was biologically different about her out loud was a step that she wasn’t willing to take.
She was a generally calm person in her childhood years. It took quite a bit for her to get angry or upset when she was younger. However, when she turned fifteen, it seemed that a flip had switched. Suddenly, she was fighting with her parents every day, screaming until her throat went raw. Everything made her angry. How suffocated she felt, how angry she was at herself for being so ungrateful, how her parents just didn’t understand her. She could scream at the sky for hours, scream her voice into hoarseness and still, it wouldn’t be enough.
How silly was it, that she thought she knew herself so well at fifteen. The rage began building from then on and she physically felt it. Every time she lashed out, she felt coils of anger cozying up with the already present rage that had made a home in her. Her family chalked up her outbursts to teenage rebellion. She ignored their worried glances and knew that this was something more than teenage angst. Alright, maybe it was a little teenage rebellion. She was hurting everyone around her- her friends, family, her younger brother. Because she was too emotionally stunted to work through her anger.
It took her a few months, but she had become better at containing herself. Her containment included ways of stopping her thoughts short to prevent herself from getting even more angry. Her outbursts were scarce once she approached her senior year of high school. Her relationship with her parents was still a work in progress, but so was she.
A few months after she had turned 17, that’s when she noticed it. It was after her gal pals had snuck away from their respective houses and went to a house party. She remembered being glad that the house party was walking distance from all of them so that none of them would have to drive back, and could all get properly drunk off of shitty beer and vodka. Of course, a simple night had gone to shit rather quickly, as they usually did. Murphy’s Law and all.
She trekked down to the basement filled with juniors and seniors, even some sophomores, that she had grown up with. The majority of them were her fellow seniors, all excited about the prospect of the future after graduation. Ellora happily refilled her red solo cup with jungle juice, engrossing herself in conversation with her friends. She quickly noticed that her one friend was missing, and she sighed. Ellora set out to make sure that she was okay, a habit that had her friends frequently making fun of her.
Her legs carried her to the backyard, near the small gazebo that the party host’s rich parents owned. It would have been a pretty place to star gaze from. And that was when she heard it, the quiet sobs and loud voices. The familiar tremors of fury danced around in her veins and she tried her best to quash it. Her jaw hung slightly when she saw Anna quivering in fear, her body shrinking out of reflex in front of Kishan’s much larger one. He was yelling at her, shouting at her for speaking to one of the other boys at the party. His hand gripped her much smaller wrist tightly, and Ellora was sure it would bruise. The bead of anger flared up again, coaxing her to unleash her wrath on him.
Ellora knew Kishan was an asshole. But being an asshole was no excuse to scream at your girlfriend, or hold her so tightly out of anger that she would be reminded of it the next day.
“Hey, dickhead,” Ellora seethed, marching up to Kishan and pushing him out of Anna’s reach, “Who the fuck do you think you are?” Anna watched her eyes come alive, slick with embers.
“Stay out of it,” Kishan dismissed her, his eyes meeting her own. She was a good head shorter than him. The whole scene probably looked comical to anyone watching. Ellora pushed at his chest again, feeling the familiar heat rising inside of her.
“Don’t fucking touch me!” Kishan pushed her back without thinking twice.
“You should’ve thought about that before you started yelling at Anna! Get the fuck out of here, you’re disgusting,” Ellora snarled at him. Anna was about to tell her to stop, that she was fine, but then she noticed embers and smoke pooling around them. More specifically, embers were coming out of Ellora’s mouth in small sparks. Anyone would have missed it, if they weren’t looking closely. Her fingertips were glowing a faint orange, also easy to miss.
“It’s not my fault she’s a stupid bit-”
“Finish that sentence, I fucking dare you.” Ellora pushed him back again. Her blood had turned into fire, she was certain. Her organs had melted and were replaced by some sort of eternal flame. She was so fucking hot, she had to be sweating bullets, her skin was going to melt off-
She almost missed Kishan’s yelp of fear when her fingers made contact with his jacket. There were small holes in his jacket, almost as if they had been burnt off by her fingers. Which they had been. His eyes were wide, finally noticing the lifelike flame in her eyes, the burnt tips of her fingers, the glowing of her throat.
“What the hell? What the hell! You’re a fucking freak,” Kishan exclaimed, managing to escape her and running back into the house.
Ellora looked at her hands and almost screamed when she saw that there were literal flames coming out of her fingertips, sparking playfully at her. As much of a curveball this was, she was unsurprised- it explained her rage, her temper, her outbursts, her irrationally high body temperature, how her rage seemed to melt into her and caress her in a way that nobody else could. She lifted her hands up in wonder, seeing the embers coming out of her mouth and nostrils. And then remembered that Anna was behind her. They were both silent, Anna staring at the flames sputtering out of her and Ellora waiting for her friend’s reaction.
“So how long have you been able to do that?” Anna whispered in awe.
“Never,” Ellora whispered back, “I don’t know how to stop. How do I make this go away?”
“Take a few deep breaths,” Anna suggested, “In and out. Breathe with me, Lor.”
Ellora closed her eyes and took breaths in cautiously. She felt the heat around her dissipate slowly, almost retreating back inside of her. She coughed and her eyes sprang open at the cinders that came out of her mouth.
“Holy shit,” Ellora whispered, “Holy fucking shit. Please don’t tell anyone. Holy shit. Anna, what the hell.”
“Hey, don’t worry. We’ll figure this out,” Anna grasped her shoulder and pulled her in for a hug, “No wonder you’re always so warm. You’re like a real-life space heater.”
Ellora giggled at that, pushing her worries to the side for the time being.
“Hey, thanks for… getting him away from me,” Anna said softly. Ellora shrugged and scratched the back of her head.
“Wanna go home and eat ice cream?” Ellora asked, her face still feeling warm, but in a different way.
Anna nodded enthusiastically, her almond eyes alight with joy.
Anna had stuck by her through all of it. When she started to gain a little more control with her internal flame, Anna was there. When she lost control occasionally, Anna was there. She could even perform little tricks with her fire, as she had begun calling it affectionately. Anna would always love to see the shapes of animals that Ellora could make and she would always look like a child whenever her fire shapes chased each other happily.
They ended up going to college together, a few hours away from home. They had opted to try random dorming rather than dorm with each other. To venture out and gain more friends, grow their social circles a little bit. But they still found their way to each other and Ellora still trusted only her with her fire secret. They had both blossomed into confident, young women during their time at college. Ellora didn’t trust herself in physical relationships, afraid that she would lose control and hurt the other person. Anna tried coaxing her out of it, but couldn’t really blame her.
Anna was her anchor. Until, one day she wasn’t.
Ellora had blocked that particularly painful memory out of her head for a while. She had been in the car with Anna that day. Anna had been driving- it was supposed to be just a quick run to grab some food, ice cream, and margarita mix. They were planning to watch movies all night and gossip with alcohol and food. A true girl’s night.
Somehow neither of them had seen the car speeding down the road before it was too late. Ellora heard the crunching of glass, the grinding of metal against each other and tasted blood in her mouth before she could process what had happened. She coughed a few times, blood splattering on the dashboard. Blood was rushing to her head, and she realized that the car had flipped. Where the hell was Anna?
“Anna? I’m going to get us out of here, holy shit-” Dread filled her stomach when she realized that Anna wasn’t responding. Ellora barely heard herself screaming for Anna to wake up, she barely felt herself push through the metal and stumble out of the car to the other side. She didn’t feel the tears running down her face as she tried to push her best friend out of her car. She managed to melt through the car door with her flames, not caring about the implications of it.
Her phone. Where the fuck was her phone? She needed to call 911. Fuck it, she would use Anna’s phone. She fished Anna’s phone out of her purse and hysterically dialed 911 with shaky hands.
“I don’t know- I don’t- I don’t know if the other car, if they’re alive. Please help me,” Ellora’s voice was bordering on hysterical.
She tried, she really tried to calm herself down. Anna was so good at this. Anna. Please wake up, Anna. I can’t do this without you Anna. The operator instructed her to check if she was breathing and for a pulse.
“I can’t find a pulse, what do I do? Don’t let her die in my arms- she’s my best friend-”
Ellora placed her on the ground and began performing CPR, screaming for someone, anyone to help her. Her arms were about to give out, but she couldn’t stop. She wouldn’t stop. She felt the fire begin to rise inside of her but took a few deep breaths to quiet it. She couldn’t set herself on fire, not here and not now.
“Anna, please. Please. I can’t- I can’t- I can’t…” She was whispering, chanting her name like a mantra. She didn’t know how long she was there, sitting on the ground performing CPR on her best friend. She didn’t even know if the other driver was alive or unconscious or what. Some sick part of her hoped that he was hurt, for hurting her best friend. Her hands began to glow again and she quieted her mind, mentally stroking the ball of rage within.
The ambulance pulled up next to the wreckage and they were next to her in seconds, gently removing her hands and replacing them with her own. She felt like she was moving in slow motion somehow. Like she was watching a movie, a movie about herself. Her body was moving, her lips were trembling but her mind was still. Her mind was calm, as if this was a dream. As if she would wake up soon.
Once they got to the hospital, Anna’s parents were already there. She couldn’t look them in the eye, knowing that she couldn’t save their daughter. Her own parents were nowhere to be found. But she didn’t care, it was better this way.
They told her that Anna had gone into cardiac arrest. They did everything they could to revive her- but the blood loss was too great. Ellora didn’t understand- she had done CPR on her. Why hadn’t it worked? Why didn’t anything work the way it should? Why didn’t the other car stop? Why couldn’t she do anything right? Why? Why? Why?
For the first time in her life, she noticed, she was cold. Her flames seemed to retreat further into the depths of her mind, sensing her despair.
The funeral had been exponentially worse. They were surrounded by everyone who loved Anna- which was a shit ton of people. Everyone loved Anna- she was a positive ray of sunshine on any given day. She avoided eye contact with Anna’s family, too ashamed to look in their direction. Anna’s brother had been sneaking glances at her during the whole service, worry tinting his eyes.
Ellora focused on not setting herself on fire for the remainder of the service. She looked up at the cloudy sky, cursing herself, cursing whatever God was up there, and cursing everything in general. Speeches from the family came and went, and Ellora couldn’t help the tears rolling down her face. Then, it was her turn for her speech. She contemplated not giving a speech, but she had to. Anna was her other half.
“Ummm… I’m Ellora. Anna… Man, Anna’s my best friend. God, we did everything together when we were kids. Learned how to ride bikes together, learned what make up was, went through that awkward transition from middle school to high school,” There were a few chuckles at that, “She was… she was the sun. She was the sun on a cloudy day, she was the sun even when the sun was already out. She was so bright, and she just… she just radiated wherever she went. She made me want to be a better person. She set me on fire... and I’m just. I can’t…I can’t imagine we have to live in a world where her smile isn’t something I get to see every day.”
She couldn’t do it anymore. She stepped away and all but ran to the restroom, feeling a sob threatening to rip from her throat. She gripped the marble countertop, feeling her world beginning to spin a little. Her body shook with the intensity of her sobs and she crumpled to the ground, barely registering a pair of arms circling around her.
She looked up and saw Anna’s older brother, Adam in front of her. She was sure the solemn look in his eyes was a mirror of the same look in her own.
“I’m sorry,” Ellora mumbled. Adam kissed her forehead, his arms steady around her.
“It’s okay,” Adam said softly.
“No. It’s not okay, nothing about this is okay!” Ellora felt the fire beginning to rise for the first time in days. Suddenly Anna’s voice popped in her head, gently telling her to just breathe.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t save her,” Ellora looked away from him.
“What? No, we never blamed- Ellora, please look at me,” Adam pleaded with her gently, lifting her chin up to meet his eyes, “We never blamed you. The last thing we did was blame you. You are so goddamn brave, Lor. So, fucking brave.” Adam was crying, tears beginning to fall into her hair and then Ellora began crying again too, wrapping her arms around him, holding him tightly.
That was the first time she found herself missing the warmth of the fire.
She ran away to medical school after that. More specifically, she ran away to the heart of New York City, not too far from where she grew up. Ellora would be damned if someone else died in her arms when she could have done more for them. The fire had become something of a friend for her now, rearing its head when she was lonely, cheering her on when she was sad, and rising when she was happy. She hadn’t lost control of it in a while, but she still played with it often, enjoying the comforting feeling of sparks flying out from her fingertips.
The first time Natasha had caught sight of her, it was in a quiet, hole in the wall coffee shop. She was pouring over textbooks, a highlighter was stuck in between her teeth and she was feverishly typing on her laptop. Her hair was in a messy ponytail, her glasses sliding off her nose. She looked tired, but the determined fire in her eyes was worth noting. Natasha wished she could take a closer look, to see if the fire in her eyes was a trick that her mind was playing or if it was really there. She hadn’t noticed Natasha’s curious glances. She took a sip of her coffee, making a face when she realized it was lukewarm, bordering on cold. Without a second thought, her finger began to glow and sparks dipped into the coffee, warming it up for her.
Natasha raised an eyebrow with a small smirk. Suddenly the girl looked up and met Natasha’s gaze unwaveringly. Her mouth was set in a defensive line, her eyes refusing to yield. Natasha forced her eyes away, surprising both of them. But she didn’t miss the girl’s smirk.
Natasha found herself frequenting the coffee shop the girl did her work at more than she would like to admit. She would sit for only 15-20 minutes, sipping on coffee she didn’t necessarily need. For someone who was a trained assassin, she was taking an awful lot of time working up the nerve to speak to her. She knew it wasn’t a good idea, being a regular at this place. But she couldn’t help it. She half expected the woman to not be there some of the times she went in. But every time so far that she had gone in, the woman was sitting there, typing away furiously on her laptop and studying notes.
Natasha had noticed that she only left her hair down if it was straight. When it was in her natural curly state, she tied it up. She wondered why that was. Today, her hair was straight and she wasn’t wearing her glasses. Contacts, maybe? Yes, Natasha swore she could see the outline of her contact lens on her iris. She noticed that her hands were almost always gloved- maybe she was cold? Natasha had noticed the small embers spit out of her fingers more than once, and she wished she could see it again.
Ellora was damn near close to screaming. School was kicking her ass more than she liked to admit- deadlines and exams were rapidly approaching and there just wasn’t enough time in the day. Anna’s death anniversary was coming up and she just didn’t want to think about school. She wanted to go back to her apartment and bury herself under her covers for a few hours with some tea and with Netflix playing in the background. She wanted to sit with Adam and cry-laugh about their memories together. She felt the fire rising inside her once her mind flitted to the memory of the car accident and she took a deep breath, forcing the memory out.
It didn’t help that this intimidating red-headed woman was basically stalking her. She hadn’t noticed at first, but as the weeks went on, she saw the familiar green eyes watching her carefully. The woman looked somewhat familiar, but Ellora couldn’t place from where. Her features were all sharp, defined and jagged. But her eyes were soft, a pretty sea-green that reminded her of a lilies and rivers. Ellora sighed. She was lonely, she knew it. The fire had subsided for the last few days, making a rare appearance only when she got emotional. She wished she could speak to it. Or speak to someone. So, she took the bait and thought fuck it.
“Are you stalking me or something?” Ellora asked the red-headed woman who was sitting at the table in front of her. Ellora adjusted the scarf around her neck, peering at the snow beginning to fall. Winter was her favorite season- the cold air made her feel normal, it felt so nice on her overheated skin.
“Or something. The coffee here is really good,” The woman said smoothly. Her voice was velvety and Ellora swore she could listen to it all day.
“It’s alright,” Ellora said, “The cappuccinos are decent.”
“What do you come here for, if not the coffee?” The woman quirked an eyebrow at her, leaning forward.
“It’s quiet here. Easy to focus. You?”
“Same, I guess.”
“Oh yeah? What are you focusing on? You don’t have any papers, books or even a laptop with you,” Ellora cocked her head to the side, her eyes dancing. Natasha swore internally. She had been sloppy. She decided to be honest.
“I like people watching,” Natasha shrugged, feigning embarrassment.
“So, you are a stalker,” Ellora grinned, crossing her arms across her chest. Her eyes danced with mirth, and Natasha was sure that there were real flames in her irises.
“Well, I’m Ellora,” Ellora offered her hand to her.
“Nat,” Natasha shook her hand, forcing herself not to linger on the warmth of her gloved hand. Nat asked her about what she was concentrating on so heavily and Ellora sighed, telling her about her med school exams that were looming ahead of her. Nat gave her a few tips on concentration and how to focus for extended periods of time to which Ellora asked “what are you? A hypnotist?” Nat snorted at that with a genuine grin.
Their coffee shop friendship began to bloom after that. Most of the time, Ellora would be studying or doing work of some sort and Nat would be perusing her laptop or the newspaper- to which Ellora rolled her eyes and said “Who even reads the paper anymore?” and Nat would reply “Call me old-fashioned.”
Ellora found herself being faintly reminded of Anna. While Anna was pure sweetness and Nat was hardened a little bit, Nat and her shared similar traits- quiet sarcasm but mean when needed, an affinity for black coffee, a terrible sweet tooth, they both knew multiple languages, and they both seemed to be able to read her mind before she had to voice anything. Natasha wondered if she had her own friends from med school, or if she chose to spend her free time in this coffee shop with her. Either way, she was thankful for this little slice of normalcy.
Days turned into weeks which turned into two months, and Ellora found herself inviting Nat into her apartment for pizza and beer after a particularly long week. Anna’s death anniversary was this weekend and she found herself not wanting to be alone for the first time in a long time. A happy grin spread across her face when Nat enthusiastically shook her head yes. Ellora had finally remembered where she had seen Nat from- she was part of the battle of New York all those months ago. She was an Avenger. She had made the Black Widow nervous when they first met, and this realization caused her fire to purr happily.
“When were you going to tell me you’re an Avenger?” Ellora asked casually, grabbing two beers from her fridge. Natasha observed her cozy, minimalist living space. There was a bookshelf in right corner of her living room, next to a large window. The television sat comfortably on the wall and there were a few pictures on the bookshelf and the walls. There were candles and plants in random places- on the coffee table, kitchen island, even on top of the fridge.
“The same time you were gonna tell me you’re growing a fire inside of you,” Nat said without missing a beat. Ellora’s eyes widened and her fire grew at her fingertips. She quieted the glow of her fingers and Nat looked at her in awe.
“How did you know?” Ellora asked, sitting down next to her and removing the gloves on her hands.
“I saw you warm up your coffee with your very own sparks that first day I saw you in the coffee shop,” Nat said softly, “Look I didn’t mean to spring this on you. We don’t have to talk about it.”
“No, I want to talk about it,” Ellora surprised herself. She leaned back on her couch and took a swig of her beer. She passed the other beer to Natasha and propped her legs up on the coffee table.
And so she told Natasha- how she knew when she was a kid that something was different. How her body temperature always ran much higher than everyone else’s. That the rage inside her was always there, sometimes sleeping and sometimes roaring along with her. It never truly went away, it was like a pet almost. That the first time she saw fire come out of herself was when she was with… Anna.
The fire was rearing its head out again and Ellora welcomed its presence.
“We were seniors in high school. This guy wouldn’t leave Anna alone, he was yelling at her and his grip on her wrist was so tight, I knew she’d bruise. I just couldn’t think straight, it was like everything inside of me was replaced with fire and it wouldn’t stop growing. And then this happened,” Ellora twirled her fingers around, allowing them to glow prettily against the sunrise from her windows, the embers akin to miniature fireworks. She created a little fire fox and a husky dog with her fingers and they chased after each other. Natasha watched Ellora carefully, her eyes watching for any sign of distress. She watched the fox and dog chase after each other before they evaporated into embers and Ellora sighed.
“Anna loved when I made animals like that. Her favorite was the fox and the dog. She always said she was the dog and I was the fox,” Ellora twiddled her thumbs together.
“Was?” Natasha prompted. Ellora laughed bitterly.
“She’s dead. Car accident when we were 19,” Ellora said sharply. Natasha placed her hand on Ellora’s shoulder, who tensed at the contact. Ellora wanted to shudder from the intensity of Nat’s gaze.
“I don’t really have much control over it, whatever it is. Sometimes I get headaches if I don’t let my flames go once in a while. But nothing major has happened.”
“Have you ever lost control?”
“Once, after Anna’s funeral. I couldn’t stop the flames from engulfing me and I didn’t want to either. I lit myself on fire- I think I was hoping that I would burn along with the fire, too.” Ellora shrugged, drinking more of her beer. Admitting these things to someone other than Anna’s tombstone was cathartic. She hadn’t told anyone since Anna about her powers, and she hadn’t really opened up to anyone since then. She had forgotten how nice it was, to have a friend.
“I could help you teach you to control it,” Natasha offered, “Or I could find someone who could help.”
Ellora laughed. “I’m not a hero, like you Nat. I get by.”
“Well, you are studying to save people’s lives. If that’s not a hero, then what is?” Natasha asked with a coy smile.
Ellora let the moment pass, letting her words hanging in the air and settling in her uneasily.
Natasha almost felt guilty. Fury had asked her to keep an eye on Ellora shortly after the battle of New York, her fire breathing abilities had been on SHIELD’s radar since she was a child. She honestly wasn’t expecting an easy friendship out of this mission, but it happened anyway. She found herself looking forward to time spent with her, to hearing her rant about her long weeks of rotations, about shitty professors and preceptors, to hearing about how she wanted to become an emergency department physician when she was done- the adrenaline was unparalleled and she lived for it. She felt Ellora opening up more and more with her, telling her stories about her undergraduate years- how she used to be a big drinker, how she had lots of acquaintances back then but nobody was her friend. Somehow, Ellora knew that Natasha liked listening-anything to distract her from the horrors of her own mind.
Natasha had even introduced her to Sam and Steve and Ellora couldn’t help the starstruck expression of wonder on her face. She didn’t want to make them uncomfortable with her ogling but Natasha couldn’t help but laugh at the adorable, reverent expression on her face. Ellora had quickly charmed them, talking animatedly with Steve about growing up in New York City and shitty New York sports teams and passively flirting with Sam until they were both giggling in stitches. They hadn’t made any mention of her powers, which she was grateful for. Although, she was sure that Natasha had informed them by now. After all, they were the Avengers.
The sky was a sullen grey on the day of Anna’s death anniversary. The smell of fresh, overnight rain took over her senses as she made her way to the nearby florist that was on her way to Anna’s tombstone in Brooklyn. Ellora could practically hear her fire whimpering at her, quietly pleading to let it free. She sighed, silently telling herself to get herself together.
The cemetery was quiet. She knew Anna’s family would have been there in the morning, which is why she elected to go later in the afternoon- closer to the evening. She just wanted to sit in peace and quiet. She still couldn’t bear to look Anna’s parents in the eye. Sometimes Adam would visit her in her apartment. They would watch movies and drink wine together, falling asleep on top of each other in a mess of limbs. Ellora would be lying if she said that they hadn’t made out once in a while whenever he visited. They never talked about it after, but the mutual intimacy was nice in a time when they had both isolated themselves.
Ellora sat in front of the tombstone, pushing her hair back and shivering despite herself. The frigid air was picking up slightly, and despite her friendly little flame, she was beginning to feel cold. She placed the daisies and sunflowers in front of her grave next to the flowers her family had brought her earlier in the day.
“Hey, Anna. It’s been a while,” Ellora began with a soft chuckle, “God, I don’t even know where to start. Well, so… I’m friends with one of the Avengers. The Black Widow. Nat… Can you believe that? She actually wants to be friends with me.” Ellora laughed mirthlessly, tugging her gloves off. She waved her fingers slowly, creating the familiar fox and dog out of her fingertips and letting them run wild. She even created a bear, a bunny, a giraffe and an elephant to play with each other. The embers came alive with her fingertips and she felt a calmness settle inside her.
“I feel like maybe she was asked to look after me or something. Because of my powers. I don’t know. I met Captain America and the Falcon, too. Steve and Sam. You would have liked them. You would have liked all of them.” A shuddering sigh passed through her lips.
“I… School’s alright. Rotations are starting soon, that’ll be cool, I guess. I saw Adam last week. Don’t hate me, but we hooked up again. And I didn’t even heat up that much. Like I was warm but not that warm. Like I didn’t burn him or anything, although he could use a tan. He’s looking a little pasty these days.
“I know what you’d say if you could say anything. That you’re happy I’m branching out again. That you’re glad I’m not just wallowing, that I’m being myself again. I guess it took me a while to come around. But it’s nice. Even just to have one good friend like Nat. You know I showed her my fire the other day? I showed her that cool thing you liked with the animals and that thing I can do where it looks like a star is collapsing on itself. She called me a supernova.”
“I guess… I don’t know. I’m a little proud of myself. Sometimes the days are hard. Sometimes all I can see are your dead eyes, your blood all over the windshield, sometimes all I can feel is your heart stop in my hands. But it’s getting better, I think.”
Steve heard a familiar, soft voice in the cemetery. His eyebrows shot up to his forehead when he saw animals made of fire prancing all around Ellora, who was sitting in front of a tombstone, wiping away her tears with a small smile. He tried his best not to listen, but he couldn’t help it with his super hearing.
“I know what you’d say if you could say anything. That you’re happy I’m branching out again. That you’re glad I’m not just wallowing, that I’m being myself again. I guess it took me a while to come around. But it’s nice. Even just to have one good friend like Nat. You know I showed her my fire the other day? I showed her that cool thing you liked with the animals and that thing I can do where it looks like a star is collapsing on itself. She called me a supernova.”
“I guess… I don’t know. I’m a little proud of myself. Sometimes the days are hard. Sometimes all I can see are your dead eyes, your blood all over the windshield, sometimes all I can hear is the sound of metal crunching and scraping, sometimes all I can feel is your heart stop in my hands. But it’s getting better, I think.”
His heart clenched at her words involuntarily. Natasha had told him that her friend Anna had passed away from an accident when she was young, but neither of them knew details. Steve felt for her, he really did. He knew what it was like to lose a best friend so young. To feel responsible for it, to feel the never-ending guilt of why didn’t you do something more, more, more, more? Suddenly, he was on the train again, watching Bucky fall with a bloodcurdling scream. Steve sank into the ground in front of Bucky’s tombstone and placed a few flowers there. He missed his best friend, he really did. He wished he could tell him about Peggy, about what Times Square looked like now, about how Howard Stark’s son was infinitely smarter than Howard with a side of sarcasm and arrogance to match. Steve looked up again, watching Ellora giggling at her animals of fire. He watched her create shapes with her fingers, her whole body seeming to come alive with the fire itself. She was far away, but Steve could see the embers dancing around her. Her throat seemed to glow along with the fire inside of her. She was pretty, in her long peacoat and her curly hair and wild eyes. Ellora turned her head to watch the fox and dog chase after each other when she noticed that she wasn’t alone.
“Steve? Is that you?” Ellora walked over to him, her animals following her cautiously. Ready to protect her if they needed to. Steve waved at her almost guiltily.
“I wasn’t- I wasn’t spying on you,” He spit out awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck.
“Hey, it’s cool. We come here for a reason, don’t we? What’s your reason?” Ellora asked, smiling at Steve’s blush. Her voice was concerned, genuine and kind and he almost choked.
“Bucky. Bucky and my mother,” Steve replied, patting the space next to her.
“Bucky?” Ellora asked while taking a seat. Her animals scattered away from her, prancing off a few feet away from her.
“James. His full name was James Buchanan Barnes. But we called him Bucky. He went to war before me and we met up in Germany, after the serum. He… died there. His body never came back.” Ellora took Steve’s hand in her own, surprising both of them. The name sounded familiar to her- she recalled hearing that name in history classes during high school. His big, blue eyes were a million miles away, reliving one of the worst moments of his life.
“You would have liked him, if you knew him back then. He was so full of life- always making people laugh, never thinking about himself. The number of times he saved me,” Steve chuckled and Ellora smiled encouragingly, “He was… he was so confident and good with people. Not just girls- with older people, younger people, kids, parents, grandparents, you name it.”
“He would have liked you, too. He loved science and space. Your fire would have fascinated him,” Steve sighed. Ellora squeezed his hand. He found himself enjoying the extra warmth she radiated, feeling comforted by it.
“I’m honored I can hear about him from you, Steve,” Ellora said softly. And what else could she say, really? Watching your best friend die was something that never went away. The blood always stained your soul, no matter how much time went by. The most you could do was live your life. Steve found himself mesmerized by her eyes- Nat was right- her eyes contained golden flecks of ember in them. He wondered if she knew that her eyes contained a burning universe of their own within them.
A flaming rose erupted from Ellora’s index finger and she let it float on his tombstone for a few moments. The silence between them was comfortable, as Steve replayed old memories in his head- memories that felt faded and rusted around the corners. A slight breeze sent ruffles through her hair, causing the rose to sway a little bit. The sunset in front of them painted splashes of gold, orange and red across the New York City skyline. There was always something quiet about the moment when the sun started to set. It was a promise of the night to come, of the New York City lights, of the city to come alive. But also, it was a promise of quiet, of reading a good book, drinking hot tea in fuzzy socks.
Her eyes seemed to come alive as the sky burst in front of them. Steve watched her content, soft smile as the rose grew a little bit in front of them, almost testing how long it could burn before the sun set completely. Her eyes reminded him a little bit of the sunset, flecks of gold reflecting in her irises the same way that streaks of gold painted through the red and orange. Her brown skin even glowed a little bit, making her look like she had fallen out of the sunset and to him.
Ellora watched her fire animals fade away with a sigh, lingering on Anna’s tombstone for a moment longer before turning her head toward Steve.
“Hey, wanna grab a drink?” She asked quietly with a smile. She barely knew him, but she wanted to. He looked like he could use a friend, and frankly, she didn’t want to be alone either. Her face split into a contagious smile when he nodded.
“Well, come on then. Let’s go start our wild Saturday night,” Ellora grinned at him, slipping her hands into her pockets.
“Yes, a wild Saturday night after we just spent our day at the tombstone of our respective best friends,” Steve said sarcastically. He realized what he said after the words left his mouth and Ellora stared at him in surprise before laughing and clutching her stomach from her laughter. The corners of his mouth pulled into a smile as well and he felt light at the sound of her genuine laughter.
“Oh man, nobody told me Captain America was a sarcastic little shit.”
Steve wanted to correct her and say no, Steve Rogers is a sarcastic little shit, but he knew she meant well. With that, they made their way to a close by bar that looked relatively empty. The night began to descend upon them and Ellora felt lighter than she had felt in a long, long time.
tag list: @coal000
#avengers x reader#natasha romanoff x reader#steve rogers x reader#bucky barnes x reader#sam wilson x reader#avengers x ofc#avengers x oc#natasha x oc#natasha x ofc#steve x ofc#steve x oc#bucky x oc#bucky x ofc#sam x oc#sam x of#my writing#can you tell idk how to tag this
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Drabble idea, Bucky has been the winter soldier and he's fine now. But then they find out that Danny has been missing and when they find him he's winter soldier 2.0.
So I was writing this and I was almost done with it but then I went back and read the prompt again and realized I had written something that was sort of right but not really so here’s take two
--------------
Bucky had gotten along with Danny from the very first time the boy had awkwardly said hi to him. Sure, he had done most of the talking, but Bucky was an emotionally stunted ex-assassin, so that wasn’t really a surprise. And for Danny it hadn’t really been a problem. Bucky had trouble connecting to people sometimes, and was probably shit for comforting someone, but he was a damn good listener. And he may be bad with words, but he made up for it with his actions. When Danny said he wanted to try a new hair style, he had left a hair magazine on the coffee table. When he casually mentioned the stomach problems he’d been having, Bucky had gotten him food that was supposed to help with that. When Danny said he wanted to get better, Bucky was there to help him train.
None of that mattered now, though. Because Danny was gone.
Jazz had called Sam, because he apparently has real friends that don’t dress up for Halloween every night to punch douche bags in the face. She had sounded worried, asking about Danny, if he was still there of not. Sam had told her no, that he had left a couple days prior and had thought he was safely at home.
Now there was an unspoken, world wide search going on for the kid. Hell, they were even having Thor check the Ghost Zone just in case Danny took a detour and got stuck or something.
Bucky felt like he was running in circles, and he knew the others did too. But Bucky actually liked Danny as a person, considered him a friend and definitely one of the smartest people he knew.
But he was just a kid. A fucking teenager. Wherever he was, whatever he was doing, he wasn’t going to come out the same way. But that wasn’t going to stop them from looking, and Bucky doubted anything would.
They searched high and low, even in places he was mostly likely going to be. Like the fucking desert, or Arizona. He also hates Florida, for whatever reason, but says that it’s literal hell one earth (Save for NASA, of course). He wasn’t anywhere.
But when he was ready he sure let them know it.
Danny had been missing for almost a month when they finally found him again. Or, rather he found them. Bucky had been searching through the sewers for the third time that week looking for his new friend when he realized they had looked everywhere but one place.
He was regretting the sewers now.
He quickly climbed out, running past civilians and cars until he made it back to his bike. He hooked his Stark Phone to the jack and called all of the Avengers, because if Bucky was right then they were fucking screwed.
-----------------
Brest was, compared to some of France’s major cities, pretty deserted. The place had 50,000 or so people living there, and there were large castles and other similar looking structures. None of the public seemed to notice or care, but that was the thing about Hydra. They were good at blending in.
Bucky remembered being held in the basement lab of the smaller building attached to the main section of the Château de Brest. There was more lab equipment down there than the bank vault he had stayed in in D.C., and in some cases, smarter people. Some always seemed to forget that when Bucky had been captured, it had been by Hydra, and while they had aimed at America first, they were very much an international power. Meaning they had put Bucky wherever they needed him to be.
Sometimes that meant in the basement of some ancient castle.
Despite it’s popularity, the castle’s defenses were ridiculously easy to get through. The cameras seemed to be pointed away from windows and doors, and there was a severe lack of guards on the inside.
“Something is wrong,” he said quietly, looking around for any sign of life. This place was clean. Almost too clean. Usually, with castles, there was a sort of permanent layer of dirt within the rocks. It helped with authenticity, and was an absolute bitch to clean. Nobody was ever able to clean stone. Not all the way, anyway. There was always some speck of something left behind. Hopefully there would be a piece of Danny somewhere that could show them the way to their beloved child Avenger.
Steve was close to Bucky as he led them down to the labs. He knew more from muscle than actual recollection that this was the direction to go. Bucky knew Steve was worried about his mental state, what with coming back to one of the many places that held him against his will, but he wasn’t too close. Not enough to make Bucky uncomfortable, but if he needed support, his friend was there. Bucky really appreciated that, because he didn’t know how he would respond when he walked through those doors.
He sighed, looking at the walls as they descended the stairs, trailing his fingers against the wall until he felt it.
He stopped dead in his tracks and traced a crack in the stone, his finger coming back with a spec of green on it. He examined it further, noticing the dent in it. It wasn’t just some crack in the wall. There had been a struggle here.
“We’re on the right track,” Bucky told them.
“How did you know to even come to this one?” Clint asked him from behind Steve. Bucky shrugged.
“Low surveillance, best lab equipment, quiet town, and the fact that this place has been closed for a month for no reason at all. It’s a perfect hiding spot for a kidnapped superhero.”
Clint nodded, looking around with his bow at the ready as he followed the super soldiers all the way down, being stopped only by a large, metal door with a scanner next to it.
“The dust has been wiped away,” Clint said, looking at the floor and the scanner. “Someone’s been here recently.”
“Or are already inside,” Natasha added.
Bucky sighed, starring at his metal fingers as they whirred in harmony before looking back to the team that had accepted him as their own.
“It would be rude not to knock, right?” He asked. That was the only warning they got as Bucky swung his arm as hard as he could at the door, prying it open with the metal appendage. Once he got a little bit of it open, Steve forced his fingers through as well and started pulling. From there it didn’t take long for the door to come open, and the alarm on the other side to start blaring in their ears.
“We have to move-” Bucky started saying to them, but was cut off by the thundering footsteps behind him. He turned around, only to see dozens, maybe even hundreds of guards, all armed to the teeth and fully loaded. It was like a small army, all centered in this one room. This only proved that Danny, or something or someone equally as powerful was behind the mass of bodies.
Bucky was the first to strike, and once he started, he didn’t stop. Couldn't stop, really. He saw red, and let his mind go blank. His heart felt void of emotion as he pounded into breakable faces with his metal arm, dropping bodies left and right with the other Avengers right behind him, fighting their way through all of this.
Bucky knew the way. He just needed an opening. He looked around, trying to find anything he could use to get passed them. And then it hit him.
Or, almost did, at least.
Thor’s hammer, whose name Bucky still couldn’t pronounce, barreled through Hydra agents like they were bowling pins, and while Bucky had always been skeptical of the actual magic that the hammer held, it was probably his best option.
“Thor!” He called, just as he was catching his hammer again. The blonde’s head snapped his way. “Throw it over there!” He pointed to a corridor behind Bucky where the chair was.
Thor didn’t nod or hesitate in any way. No, he just chucked it straight to Bucky, who dodged in a split second, and grabbed onto the handle in the next. It all happened so fast that even as he was letting go of the hammer, he was still processing the fact that he had just been dragged through a hoard of evil fuckfaces by it. But a path had cleared and he was where he needed to be, and that was all that mattered. The others could handle the hoards, he was sure of it. But he needed to get down there.
The minute the corridor opened up, he didn’t waste any time killing the scientists. There was probably a better moral way to do that, but they’re Nazi’s and therefore not people. He was sure Steve and the others could live with that reasoning. Plus they took the kid, so that already made the braniacs on their shitlist.
He moved like as swift as water, knocking down the other door where the chair and his cryochamber were at.
His stomach dropped when he saw who was residing in his old chair that he had long since abandoned.
The screams that filled the room were unearthly, and thankfully stopped when Bucky snapped the one scientist’s neck and sent his metal fist through the control panels. The small of ozone was thick in the air and was almost enough to give him a panic attack. He grabbed his head, trying to block out all of the painful memories as they rose to the surface.
After doing that weird breathing routine Sam had showed him he stumbled over to Danny. His eyes were closed and he was held down with heavy straps that were built to hold him.
He peeled away the locks on the restraints and freed Danny, who, unfortunately for Bucky, was a light sleeper.
In a flash he was on his back, Danny’s hand at his throat and gleaming green eyes. Bucky gasped for air, prying at the fingers squeezing his windpipe.
“D...Danny,” he choked out. “I...It’s...us.”
The fingers loosened slightly, Danny looking at him, confused. After a few moments he stood up, leaving Bucky’s throat all together. Bucky shakily stood up after him, slowly and steadily.
“Come on, Danny, let’s take you home,” Bucky said. Danny turned to him, toxic eyes now desperate for answers.
“Who’s Danny?”
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Appearing before The Dramacourt: 20th Century Boy and Girl Eps 29 to 32 (Final)
***If this is your first time browsing The Drama Files, please read The Rules section first for our reviewing and rating system***
Issues:
Whether Young Shim’s character developed at all.
Whether the sudden love line between Anthony and the Director was necessary.
Whether the Lawyer Boss is still super awkward.
Whether Ah Reum’s “break up” with Woo Sung made sense.
Whether Young Shim’s Mom should have got a divorce.
Whether Ji Won not going to meet the ex is the best way to deal with the ex.
Whether Jin Jin and Ji Won are #relationshipgoals
The Rule(s):
Not really. We think she had the least character development of the lot.
Not at all.
Yes!!
No. Why all this angst at the last minute?
Definitely.
100%! This is exactly how exes should be dealt with.
Absolutely!
Analysis:
RedRosette J: IT’S OVER!!!!!! Now I have to go back to hating Mondays. Ugh. But real talk: overall, I thought the drama did very well is definitely in my top five dramas of 2017. The only problems that I had in these last few episodes were with the side characters and not really Jin Jin and Ji Won. It just feels like the writer spent all this time creating the perfect main leads and then scrambled at the last minute to finish the side characters so it felt a bit messy and all over the place. The biggest plot point that I wanted wrapped up was Jin Jin and her sister Ho Sung making amends. We did get a scene with Jin Jin at Ho Sung’s and I think that was the first step in them rebuilding their relationship. Everything worked out well for the other smaller characters too like Mi Dal and Assistant Boy who got married (!!) and Jin Jin’s little brother Min Ho who got rid of his pink hair and got a real job (LOL!).
Jubiemon J: Overall, I did enjoy this drama a lot, mostly due to the girls’ strong friendship and the cuteness between Jin Jin and Jiwon! Jiwon and Jin Jin seriously are relationship goals. I haven’t seen such a mature couple in a Korean drama for a while, so their dynamics were refreshing!
Like RedRosette said, there are still a few issues with how things wrapped up for the other characters. The biggest mystery of all is related to Ho Sung and her husband. At the end of the day, I still don’t understand why the family was so against Ho Sung and her husband. I wished that that had been explored in a deeper level. I also really didn’t like how stunted Young Shim’s character turned out to be. She seemed to be growing as seen from her attempts at punctuality and her standing up for her mother. Then . . . she just showed that nothing had really changed in the last episode. She suggested that her mother get a divorce and then later get all mad at her mother for wanting to go through with it. Like what? How immature are you? You’re not a middle school student or some kid anywhere. You’re already 36…. -0-‘
Making amends like…
When you aren’t buying whatever scheme your friend is trying to sell…
Such cuties
Super adorbs ❤
RedRosette J: I only wish that Jin Jin’s parents hadn’t found out about Ji Won and Jin Jin through the news like everyone else. It would have been nicer if they had just told them (but Min Ho’s horrified reactions made up for it so I’m not all that mad about it). Dad’s reaction bugged me a little but then again, I guess it can be disturbing for a parent to find out their “pseudo-son” is seeing their daughter LOL! I’m glad we also got some explanation as to why Jin Jin and Ji Won lasted all of three seconds together back in high school! Spoiler: Dad caught them kissing in the elevator!!
Jubiemon J: I was really confused about the dad’s reaction to Jin Jin and Ji Won. In previous episodes, he seemed to have noticed something between them and was all supportive and what not. Then when he really confirmed that they were together, he even threw out Ji Won’s shoes and started going all aggressive at him. Okay . . . Jin Jin is already 36 years old; she’s no longer a baby. It’s not like Ji Won is some criminal . . .
*cringe*
Hugs solve all problems
When your family finds out you’re dating someone…
This is what horrified looks like
Dealing with scandals head on
Happy family 🙂
Issue 1: Whether Young Shim’s character developed at all
RedRosette J: Young Shim’s character was the least well written. Her mousy, pushover persona didn’t change at all throughout the show. It would have been nice to see some character growth with her because she needed to change to stand up to her father and to be better at work. Although there was some change in her relationship with her father, there really wasn’t any change in her attitude or behaviour. But then again, in real life, people don’t really change all that much and maybe that’s what she represents.
Jubiemon J: I sort of alluded to this issue in the beginning of this post, so the short answer here is this: No, she did not develop at all as a character. I have to mention it again. I really was irritated when she told her mom to have a divorce and then the next day when she found out her mom wanted one, she got all angry at her mom. Okay . . . you’re the one that pitched the idea so own up to it.
Girl, you need to change.
Issue 2: Whether the sudden love line between Anthony and the Director was necessary
RedRosette J: OMG where did this come from? This whole Anthony ❤ Director Lady was done for “jokes” because actress Kim So Yeon who played the Director Lady is Lee Sang Woo’s real life wife. What the hell? It wasn’t even funny or cute and tbh there was like zero chemistry between the two of them anyway. This Anthony story line would have been so much better if he had retired from acting gracefully, got a real job doing something much better, the manager girl found a real actor for her agency, and if he went and found a normal girl and called it a day. Either that or if I was the writer, I would have sent Anthony on a Eat, Pray, Love style “self-discovery” journey abroad and called it day. Anthony seriously needed to get his priorities straight. Ugh.
Jubiemon J: The last part was totally unnecessary. I think the writer wanted everyone to have his/her happy ending, but life isn’t like that. Not everyone needs to be in a relationship to be content, okay? Not everyone gets together at the same time period, all right? I also don’t think it was fitting that somehow Anthony had some happy ending. He, as a character, didn’t develop much either. Sure, he did try his best to act, but . . . there didn’t seem like a difference. He also still liked to play the hero. So ugh.
Issue 3: Whether the Lawyer Boss is still super awkward
RedRosette J: Every week I keep hoping for him not to be awkward, and every week he ends up becoming more awkward. I can’t. I’m done with him.
Jubiemon J: The awkwardness is born within him. That random “you can hold my hand” scene made me laugh so hard and cringe on his behalf.
Issue 4: Whether Ah Reum’s “break up” with Woo Sung made sense
RedRosette J: I really didn’t understand why Ah Reum wanted to break up with Woo Sung. It seemed like she was afraid of the person she was becoming in front of her potential in-laws but that hardly seems like a reason to break up. She talked about how she just wanted to married and didn’t really think about what marriage actually entails and then maybe I missed something but somehow all of that got resolved and there she was getting back together with him. Huh? And girl, you can’t be doing this to the poor guy. Breaking up and getting back together with him whenever you want; that’s some serious emotional mind games girl. Honestly, Ah Reum seriously needed to grow up. She was constantly behaving like a teenager and come to think of it, she didn’t really change much either.
Jubiemon J: I think Ah Reum just got cold feet with all the seriousness of what a marriage entails. Getting married doesn’t just mean marrying the guy; it’s about marrying the family too. I think she was also super worried that her own lifestyle would be changed and just wasn’t ready to face that. Her idea of marriage had always been this super idealized, albeit Disney version of this. Then when she met those sisters, reality sort of sunk in more and she probably got scared and thought everything would be better if she were single. I wished she had dealt with her fear better and talked to Woo Sung about her worries instead of running away from her fears. That made me feel like Ah Reum, as a character, had fallen flat.
Issue 5: Whether Young Shim’s Mom should have got a divorce
RedRosette J: Absolutely she should have got a divorce! She lived in actual fear in her own home! Young Shim’s Dad may not have hurt her physically, but he was emotionally abusive to her to the point where she was afraid to eat in her own home. What the hell? that’s not a good environment to be in. At the end, we do see Young Shim’s Mom fighting back by not responding to every demand the Dad makes but it hasn’t lessened his barking at her at all. Ideally, she should have actually gone through with the divorce. However, the reality is that for many women like Young Shim’s Mom, divorce would leave them with no real way of supporting themselves financially, so this means that many women like her end up staying in toxic relationships.
Jubiemon J: I think it’s hard to say whether or not she should have gotten a divorce because divorce is really a sensitive/personal topic. I, personally, don’t feel comfortable saying directly whether someone should have divorced/not in this case. I can see why she chose not to and I’ll list them here. First, her mother has no source of income and doesn’t seem to have much money saved in her own account, and so she is very dependent on her husband. Second, her mother doesn’t seem to be the type that is strong enough to just start living independently and to find any type of work by herself. Third, Young Shim showed that she was against this divorce, so the mother might have felt that and was influenced by Young Shim’s behaviour. Fourth, perhaps Young Shim’s mother is scared of being alone.
RedRosette J Aside: Also Young Shim giving advice to her Mom regarding her divorce in a professional capacity is a no-no because there’s a huge conflict of interest when it comes to family and is generally not recommended.
Get someone else to help.
Issue 6: Whether Ji Won not going to meet the ex is the best way to deal with the ex
Jubiemon J: I am so happy that Ji Won didn’t go off to meet his ex and resolved this situation over the phone. I think Ji Won is one of the more developed characters in this drama. He realizes that he can’t keep dwelling on the past and to move on, he has to directly respond to his ex. The only thing that I wished he had done was to tell Jin Jin about his ex, instead of Jin Jin confronting him. Jin Jin was seriously super kind and open minded to not get mad at Ji Won for hiding this past of his.
RedRosette J: I agree. I really wish more drama male characters would make choices like Ji Won. It was enough to resolve his issue with the ex over the phone. All it required was an honest conversation and didn’t require a face o face meeting. Also, calling your ex under the pretense of returning old shoes? Really? Does she honestly think that Ji Won was born yesterday? What a snake! I also agree with Jubiemon that Ji Won should have told Jin Jin about the ex first. She’s already so open minded and accepting, its the least he could have done. And honestly how refreshing was it to see two drama characters talk about the ex in a mature, logical way instead of behaving like hormonal pre-teens?
That’s right. Don’t be meeting your snake of an ex!
Issue 7: Whether Jin Jin and Ji Won are #relationshipgoals
RedRosette J: These two have been by far my favourite kdrama couple of 2017. It’s rare to see a mature, loving relationship with two well written characters and these guys are definitely #relationshipgoals.
The feels…
Awwww
Cake Proposal: simple yet super romantic
When you wanted to go out but he takes you to your usual hangout…
Did it just get hot in here? *fans face*
#goals
Conclusion: Appeal Allowed.
Rating: 5 = KYAH! ❤ (We absolutely loved this drama and it will be sorely missed!)
File No: 20th-Century-Boy-and-Girl-EPS-29-to-32 (Final) Appearing before The Dramacourt: 20th Century Boy and Girl Eps 29 to 32 (Final) ***If this is your first time browsing The Drama Files, please read
#2017 drama#2017 kdrama#2017 korean drama#2017韓國電視劇#20세기 소년소녀#20세기 소년소녀 analysis#20세기 소년소녀 critique#20세기 소년소녀 ep 29#20세기 소년소녀 ep 30#20세기 소년소녀 ep 31#20세기 소년소녀 ep 32#20세기 소년소녀 episode 29#20세기 소년소녀 episode 30#20세기 소년소녀 episode 31#20세기 소년소녀 episode 32#20세기 소년소녀 final ep#20세기 소년소녀 recap#20세기 소년소녀 review#20세기 소년소녀 thoughts#20th Century Boy and Girl#20th Century Boy and Girl analysed#20th Century Boy and Girl analysis#20th Century Boy and Girl comments#20th Century Boy and Girl critique#20th century boy and girl drama recap#20th century boy and girl drama review#20th century boy and girl ep 29#20th century boy and girl ep 29 recap#20th century boy and girl ep 29 review#20th Century Boy and Girl ep 29 thoughts
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