#all the pictures are from her old twitter
Text
Thinking about Actress!Reader who finally got to change into a pair of shorts and a crop top after being in a corset and long dresses all day after shooting was done for the day.
Actress!Reader who gets invited to go get Gelato with Peter to help cool off after being stuck in such stuffy clothes for the past six hours.
Bodyguard!Miguel who had to suppress a scowl when you told him that you were basically going on a date with your fellow actor. But that didn’t deter him from volunteering to watch over you both when you went to walk through the streets of Rome. He’d rather be the one watching over you than Peter’s bodyguard.
Actress!Reader and Actor!Peter who didn't notice when a group of passersby recognized them, snapping a few pictures of you both without your knowledge. You weren’t completely used to the whole “having photos taken of you without your permission or contact” but that was unfortunately a price to pay when you’re new and on the rise.
Actress!Reader who finally went home to relax, getting a good night's rest now that the jet lag has finally stopped.
Actress!Reader who wakes up the next morning with 24 missed calls, 35 new messages and her name trending on twitter.
—
Jake (Manager): (Y/N).
Jake(Manger): (Y/N), call me when you wake up.
Peter 🐝.: Did you look at Twitter yet?
Peter🐝.: Or like any social media yet?
Bestie💝: Girl…
Bestie💝: You’ve got some explaining to do.
“What’s… happening?” You mumbled as you scrolled through your new messages as you waddled into the kitchen of your hotel suite, where Miguel was already drinking his cup of coffee. Glancing up at him for a moment as he greeted you.
“Morning.” He mumbled as he placed his mug down. “Your manager told me to have you call him when you're up.”
“Do you know why?” You asked him as you scrolled to Jake’s contact info, receiving a grunt in response, a no.
“(Y/N) (L/N), would you like to explain what went on yesterday after you finished up on set?” You felt like you were five years old and being scolded by your mom all over again, except you genuinely didn’t know what you did.
“Um, I went to go get a snack with Peter. Why-“
“A snack.” He repeated, his tone questioning despite it being deadpan.
“Yes, a snack.” You huffed, your confusion turning into irritation as your brows furrowed together. “Why? can't I have a snack after work with my coworker?”
“You can have a snack after work, but from what I’m looking at here it doesn’t seem like it’s with a coworker.” His words make you pause.
“What?” All attitude now gone, confusion settles back in. “What are you talking about?”
“You haven’t seen the pictures yet?”
“What pictures?”
“Oh dear God…” Jake mumbled under his breath, before letting out a sigh. “Go on twitter, and check the trending tab.”
You put him on speaker and did what you were told, waiting for the little bird app to load, before clicking on the explore tab. Eyes widening as you read out the headline at top.
“Peter B. Parker and (Y/N), coworkers on a new upcoming movie, spotted out on date?!?”
Miguel almost started to choke on his coffee after he heard you recite the words, having to hit his chest to clear his windpipes as you frantically started to scroll through the tag.
“No, no it wasn’t a date though Jake, it wasn’t-“ Your words died on your tongue as your finger stopped scrolling once you hit a particular picture.
A picture of Peter making you try his flavor, by spoon feeding you.
Fuck how can I be so dumb? How could I forget that happened? It was only 2 seconds Max. And now it’s trending.
“I need you down at set an hour early. We have some things to discuss with Peter and his team.” Jake sighed before you heard the dial tone of him hanging up the call.
Shit.
—
Part 4<
Not proofread.
Word count: 600
Taglist: @famouscattale @strawberryjuice9 @loser-alert @maomaimao @franceseca-the-1st
@mcmiracles @mangoslushcrush @queerponcho @yournextbimbogf @tinybirdhideout
@laysmt @migueloharasoulmate @fruityfucker @pigeonmama @scaryplanetdestroyer
@migueloharastruelove @krentkova19 @genny1019 @maiyart
@stressed-cherry @haveclayeveryday @miguelzslvtz @scaleniusrm @xerorizz
@enananawoah @messicampeon @anastasia1972 @lauraolar14 @huniedeux
@bluesidez @nommingonfood @chrishy973 @m4dyy @night-spectrum
@electricgg (to be added click here)
#miguel o hara fanfic#miguel o'hara x reader#miguel o'hara#miguel o’hara au#spiderman 2099 x reader#astv spiderman 2099#astv miguel#miguel spiderverse#spiderman 2099 fanfic#miguel ohara spiderman#miguel fanfic#miguel ohara x reader#miguel x reader#bodyguard!miguel#miguel spiderman#miguel ohara blurb#miguel o’hara blurb
197 notes
·
View notes
Text
Arwa reached out to me to help share her fundraiser. She is urgently raising money to help evacuate she and her 5-person family from Gaza to Egypt. She is almost halfway to her goal at kr223,990 NOK raised out of kr500,000. Let’s help her get all the way there by sharing and donating, and if you can’t donate, please still share!
Arwa’s Twitter/X account: @ArwaDwaba
From Arwa’s GFM:
*Please note that the conversion rate is 1 USD =10 NOK
10$ = 100 NOK
50$= 500 NOK
100$= 1000 NOK
200$= 2000 NOK
I orgnize this fundrising on behalf of Arwa Abudawaba who i know and want to help to get her family out of Gaza. For more informastion her instagram is: @arwadwaba
I am Arwa from devastated Gaza, and this is a picture of my beautiful family. Just 5 months ago, I had a father, two brothers, and a very beautiful home that we bought just 10 months before the war. My beloved father passed away just days before the war after a 4-year battle with brain cancer. Then the occupation decided to completely demolish the intelligence towers, so we were forced to flee from our home multiple times in search of safety. Our home and the entire neighborhood were destroyed.
On November 17, 2023, my brothers Mohammed and Mahmoud were martyred. Mahmoud, the handsome one, was 19 years old in his second year of university. Mohammed, the brave one, was 33 years old, a father to two daughters, Nahla and Naya, who like the moon. I wish I could have hidden them in my heart.
On the second day after their martyrdom, we were forced to flee to the south through the so-called safe road claimed by the occupation, amid our tears that hadn't dried yet. We have nothing but the clothes on our backs, and we couldn't even protect ourselves from the winter cold.
We were separated from Noha and Naya, the daughters of my martyr brother Mohammed, and his wife. Our family is now scattered, some in the north and some in the south. Only my mother, my younger sister Nebal, and I remain. My mother suffers from chronic diabetes, and since the martyrdom of my brothers, her health has been deteriorating, with no medical care or basic necessities of life in Gaza.
I never imagined losing my young brothers and being left without support. We lost our father, my brothers were martyred, the occupation destroyed our home and my martyr brother's home, and I lost my source of income and my personal project—I had an online clothing store with $5000 worth of inventory inside the house. I was also deprived of completing the second year of my master's degree and preparing my thesis. We are now homeless and destitute. Everything is difficult now.
So, I ask for your help in raising the funds and travel expenses for six people. To facilitate the evacuation of my family from Gaza to Egypt, I am preparing a GoFundMe campaign to raise $5,000 for each person:
my beautiful mother,
my younger sister Nebal,
my martyr brother Mohammed's wife,
and Noha and Naya, the daughters of my brother.
and me .. Arwa
This means $30,000 to evacuate them from Gaza, not to mention their expenses for living in Egypt, renting a house, and the living expenses for 6 people without a provider.
Help us reunite our family outside of Gaza. Your support, whether big or small, will make a big difference in ensuring our safety. I am grateful for your sympathy and generosity at this difficult time. Please share this link with friends and colleagues. Thank you for standing by us. Help us start our lives anew. Even though there is no life without those we have lost, it is life.
Thank you for your time "
61 notes
·
View notes
Text
If you want another woman manga author who’s just as obsessed with her characters as Ryoko Kui, but the focus is on human rights and disability/accessibility/accommodation, PLEASE read Witch Hat Atelier:
There's a diverse cast of characters!!
Queer representation with a storyline focused on how partners aren't counted as legal family (like in Japan)
Neurodivergent charaters who are outsiders but end up finding a way different than the norm to solve problems
The main atelier is like a found family with Qifrey and Olruggio leading all their students together
She also focuses on decorations and embellishments in the text, giving it a more fairy tale or mythological feel!
Modern day au's often show up on her social media as well, giving us little bonus glimpses into the character's lives
And she is a huge supporter of human rights irl as well -- the same themes in her work, she fights for personally.
Anyway, read Witch Hat Atelier <3
#all the pictures are from her old twitter#i saved some stuff when it was crashing and burning#witch hat atelier#kamome shirahama#wha
281 notes
·
View notes
Note
HI!! Hope you are well! I was wondering if you could do a smau, ferrari!reader (daughter of the ferrari family, like hier to the company? Idk how to explain lol) x max verstappen, where they have known eachother for a while through Jos and stuff, and they are really close, but everyone thinks it's just because they are friends? And then max hard launched reader because everyone is shipping her with one of the ferrari boys? Thanks! <3
hard launch ✧ max verstappen
max verstappen x ferrari! fem! reader
masterlist
had so much fun writing this! thank you for sending in your request anon <3 (requested)
[twitter]
[instagram]
yn_ferrari
liked by charles_leclerc and 1.830.616 others
yn_ferrari eat pasta drive fasta 🍝
view all 1.828 comments
scuderiaferrari See you tomorrow boss 🫡
username mother is mothering more than she has ever mothered before 😍
charles_leclerc bet you were drunk after drinking that amount of wine
↳ yn_ferrari stop spreading lies
↳ username never beating the couple allegations
↳ username i ship it🥰
username “CHA” for CHArles?!??! 🥺🥺
↳ username GIRL😭😭
maxverstappen1 🫃
↳ yn_ferrari papa asked you to let charles/carlos win for once🥹🙏🏼
↳ maxverstappen1 As much as I love papa, I’m afraid I can’t do that💙
↳ yn_ferrari @/nicorosberg please do your magic
username IS THAT MAX IN THE 3RD PICTURE?!
↳ username it’s charles😌
yn_ferrari
liked by carlossainz55 and 1.288.711 others
yn_ferrari always a meaningful race at monza! so glad to be back and see all the tifosi that came to show their support❤️ congrats to @/carlossainz55 for the podium! (and to @/maxverstappen1 for breaking the record 😒)
view all 1.172 comments
maxverstappen1 Thank you, Y/N😚
↳ yn_ferrari it’s all your fault! @/nicorosberg 🙍♀️
↳ nicorosberg Forza Ferrari❤️
↳ yn_ferrari you’re welcome, i guess you deserved it🤷♀️
↳ username is it just me?? but i feel like y/n is so rude to max sometimes :/
↳ username girl chill😭😭 that’s just how they are, they’ve been friends for over twenty years now
scuderiaferrari Lovely to have you and bossman here! Please visit often❤️
↳ yn_ferrari i think i still have to recover, feels like my hand is broken by how hard papa squeezed it throughout the race
username “ferrari fans always in spain (without the s)” SO TRUE 😩
charles_leclerc Are we still on for the family dinner tonight
↳ yn_ferrari you’ve been uninvited, you almost gave papa a heart attack
↳ carlossainz55 😂😂😂
↳ yn_ferrari you too mr. sainz
↳ carlossainz55 THATS NOT FAIR
username i just love the banter between charles and y/n😭 i want what they have
[message]
[instagram]
maxverstappen1
liked by yn_ferrari and 4.716.109 others
maxverstappen1 You still make my heart beat fast, Ferrari❤️
tagged: yn_ferrari
view all 3.166 comments
yn_ferrari i thought i told you to keep it PG😡 5 SECOND PENALTY FOR MAX VERSTAPPEN
yn_ferrari unoriginal caption taken from song lyrics?! 183621 SECOND PENALTY!!
↳ maxverstappen1 I love you🥰
↳ yn_ferrari love you too 😮💨
username SCREAMING CRYING WTF😭
username i can’t see i’m blind😵
redbullracing SLEEPING WITH THE ENEMY?! 😮
↳ scuderiaferrari FORZA FERRARI SIEMPRE!!!🐎
papaferrari Please delete
papaferrari @/yn_ferrari I think we need to have a little chat
↳ yn_ferrari i’m not the one who posted the pictures😭
↳ papaferrari Okay… Please tell Max not to come to the dinner tonight 👍��
↳ maxverstappen1 WHAT NO, I CAN EXPLAIN
username b-b-b-but charles + y/n? 🥲
↳ username we lost💔
username a good day to be a ferrstappen shipper
↳ username WAR IS OVER
username THE 2ND PIC I-
charles_leclerc Took you guys long enough🙄
yn_ferrari
liked by maxverstappen1 and 3.921.551 others
yn_ferrari some things never change
tagged: maxverstappen1
view all 2.419 comments
username okay i guess they’re cute or whatever🙄
maxverstappen1 ❤️💙
papaferrari Can you just give this old man a break…
↳ username i volunteer to be your daughter 🧎♀️
username fell to my knees in the middle of walmart
charles_leclerc 20+ years of this 🫠
↳ yn_ferrari 😬😬😬
↳ maxverstappen1 💪💪💪
username i just need to know papa ferrari’s current favorite grid son, given all the situations happening right now😂
↳ yn_ferarri will always and forever be @/sebastianvettel
↳ charles_leclerc WOW
↳ carlossainz55 WOW
↳ maxverstappen1 WOW
↳ kimimatiasraikonnen Wow.
↳ sebastianvettel 😁😁😁
_
pictures (c) to pinterest and instagram
#max verstappen#formula 1#f1#max verstappen x reader#max verstappen x you#max verstappen x y/n#max verstappen fanfic#max verstappen imagine#max verstappen one shot#max verstappen social media#max verstappen smau#f1 x reader#f1 x you#f1 x y/n#f1 fanfic#f1 imagine#f1 one shot#f1 social media#f1 smau#archiverstappen
5K notes
·
View notes
Text
FULL OF FAN BEHAVIOR
req: Saw your post for smau requests, maybe a Max Verstappen where people don't realise his girlfriends account is you know her official verified account. Because practically every single post is about Max. Full on fan behaviour, in the sense she was his first fan as his childhood friend, she has been there supporting him since they were kids, and now they're adults and together, but some habits doesn't change.
(bonus if the posts makes people question why she choose Max as her mans.)
summary: everybody knows that this account is full of max. from his first win to now, from his most random things to his glory time, she's always there to post his pictures. they only know her as his friend and nothing more, but who is she actually?
2016 - 2018
verstappenight
liked by maxverstappen33, and 1,942 others
verstappenight WOOOO P1🏆🏁 congratulations to you maximus, i'm soo proud of you!
view all 125 comments
maxverstappen33 I won't say anything about the name Maximus, but thank you 😄
danielricciardo Well deserved! 👍🙌
username look how young he is
username I love a supportive fan ^^ Plz post more of this man.
⤷ yourusername glad to be on your service, ma'am
username how old is he?
username He's so happy, he turns red.
username I usually don't trust redbull after Sebastian, but he might be my new exception🤷♀️
verstappenight
liked by danielricciardo, and 1,230 others
verstappenight that eyes glint with mischief. #throwbackthursday
view all 65 comments
maxverstappen33 Oh my god, I thought I trusted you by taking this years ago
⤷ yourusername never trust anyone
username The half smile😂
username He's been pulling the red string with Red Bull from a long time ago, and look at the hat. I bet it's not a coincidence.
username how is she even managed to get this out? this looks so ancient
⤷ username It's not ancient, it's probably old, but not ancient.
danielricciardo He looks like he's planning to steal one of the cars steering wheel
⤷ username exactly! 😂😂
username if it's a throwback, how old is this pic then?
⤷ username i mean he looks way younger than him on her recent post, so just figure it.
⤷ username he always looks younger
verstappenight
liked by victoriaverstappen, and 963 others
verstappenight how is it feel to have a duplicates?
view all 72 comments
maxverstappen33 Why are you taking the second one?
⤷ verstappenight and why are YOU posing to that one?
username Why is he looks younger and younger each time?
⤷ verstappenight i don't know, but i definitely recommend him to have a slug treatment for anti aging.
⤷ username username it's him in torro rosso, so that's why he looks more like a teenager.
username it's not even thursday yet, but i had a bad feeling for this week's throwback thursday.
verstappenight
liked by carlossainz55, and 3,573 others
verstappenight boo! happy halloween #throwbackthursday
view all 269 comments
username what did i say, my feelings are never lying
carlossainz55 Got you! 😆🤣
⤷ maxverstappen1 If I got a heart attack next week, it'll be completely your fault
landonorris is halloween on 29 or 30?
⤷ username depends on what region you're in, i guess?
⤷ landonorris don't guess, answer.
maxverstappen1 And how are you even managed to take this?? Seriously. yourusername
username I can't believe it's actually Carlos who did this
⤷ username Yeah, but I think this is so Carlos-like behavior.
username i would do that face too if someone dressed as scream beside me
username Who is running this fanpage?
username why are you liking him so much?
⤷ yourusername because he is so nice, cool, and he looks like sid from ice age which is my favorite character.
⤷ danielricciardo we got a whole stack of characters here: first we got maximus the horse from tangled, sid from ice age, and then what? jimmy neutron?
username 😂😂😂ajajaja mira su cara!
verstappenight
liked by redbullracing, and 3,782 others
verstappenight found this on twitter and now i can't stop laughing! can't wait to send this to my family group.
view all 90 comments
maxverstappen1 I really can't trust you with my digital footprint 🤦🏻♂️
⤷ verstappenight i found this on twitter alright, it's not taken by me!
⤷ maxverstappen1 Still.
⤷ carlossainz55 Ooh, someone's upset...
username who is this person behind this account?
username Why is his reaction is always looking so hilarious
username Max: 😦
username i feel him
username you sure it's not throwback thursday?
MID 2023
verstappenight
liked by charles_leclerc, and 97,182 others
verstappenight i changed throwback thursday with this questionable sense of max's fashion. hope that's alright.
photo credit via verstauri on twitter.
view all 348 comments
username NOOOOOOOOOOOO
username #bringbackthrowbackthursday
charles_leclerc If you get rid of throwback Thursday, how am I going to tease him?
⤷ verstappenight by searching it on pinterest🤷🏻♀️
username Is that real or photoshopped?
username Okay, I know throwback thursday is made a long time ago since 2015 but man I really miss it sm... 💔💔
⤷ verstappenight same, but some people don't need that old max (except for charles). we need the new one because life goes on -max via my message
⤷ maxverstappen1 I don't remember saying it
⤷ verstappenight shut up
username oh cmon i know charles want it because he's in love with max
⤷ username should i be surprised?
⤷ username i mean if there's no throwback thursday, who's going to tease him with his past when she's not there
⤷ username Daniel and Lando or Y/n could...
⤷ username oh come on, i don't even know who's the person behind this account anyway, for EIGHT YEARS
⤷ username As if you've never heard of twitter, just search her username and you'll see her REAL face.
THE TWEET SHE MEANT:
verstappenight
liked by schecoperez, and 113,809 others
verstappenight guess which one is the real one
view all 462 comments
schecoperez The first one of course!😂🤣
username since when did checos ass becoming that juicy
⤷ username since he listened to daddy yankee's song on repeat
⤷ danielricciardo His actual morning routine:
username the first one because what else would he be doing if not eating omelette and seeing checo's ass in the morning
⤷ username even checo himself agrees
username I'm glad that she still post here, even though there's no throwback thursday anymore😞😔
⤷ username but i guess even though we did not have throwback thursday anymore, we still have this crack post of him😄
TWITTER, 3 DAYS AFTER THE COMMENTS ON VERSTAPPENIGHT'S DADDY POST:
maxverstappen1 added a photo to their story! 2h
ON THE OTHER HAND, HER ACTUAL IG:
yourusername
liked by maxverstappen1 and 82,147 others
yourusername good moooorniiiiinggggg from my room<3
view all 97 comments
username Thank God it's not private
username damn yall work faster than the fbi
username Anyone come here from twitter?
username Omg I've never realized max pulled this hottie ever since they were born
username THIS IS VERSTAPPENIGHT ADMIN?????
⤷ username eight years of waiting is finally getting payed off..
username why are you even choosing max to be your man when there's charles or daniel who's sexier
⤷ yourusername sometimes i don't need looks to see to be having someone like max. he's my best friend first, and i'm glad i choose him right the first place.
⤷ username Oh that's sweet...
⤷ maxverstappen1 I love you too, My biggest fan.
⤷ username I LOVE YOU TOO??????💔💔
⤷ username oh my god max is having a REAL relationship with a fan account admin
⤷ username AWOOP🚨🚔 THEIR MEDIUM LAUNCH????
yourusername
liked by maxverstappen1, and 278,903 others
yourusername nobody knows that this phone addict is once my best friend. happy birthday maximus! 🥳🤍
view all 486 comments
landonorris happy birthday facebook dad.
maxverstappen1 I once again not going to take the Maximus name. It makes me feel like a horse from Rapunzel.
⤷ yourusername wait, you've watch tangled before?
danielricciardo Happy birthday, Big boy.
redbullracing Happy birthday to our number one champion! 🥳🥳
username awww baby maxiee🥺🥺🥺
lewishamilton Happy birthday, mate!
carlossainz55 To be honest, your real account is sometimes still kinda feels like your other one.
⤷ yourusername force of habit probably?
⤷ carlossainz55 No, it's because you're acting like Max's biggest fan everywhere.
⤷ maxverstappen1 That's probably because she is.
⤷ yourusername wipe that smug smile off your face while you're typing
username He looks the same weirdly or not
username AHA I FOUND YOU VERSTAPPENIGHT ADMIN
username i love how she just hanging to his arm like they're been a couple since god knows how long
username SHE'S SOO LUCKYYY
username i'm gonna melt
username i feel like it's a hard launch, but she have been doing this for a long time ago
sophiekumpen 🥳🥳🥳
maxverstappen1
liked by zedd, and 627,834 others
maxverstappen1 How was I going to get her bad side if she's there and looking so beautifully?
👤: yourusername, verstappenight
view all 446 comments
landonorris poetic. remember your other girlfriend's waiting
⤷ maxverstappen1 I don't remember having another one?
⤷ charles_leclerc How are you even forget about us?
yourusername awww i can't believe you tag the fan account one too!! i love you so much!!!
⤷ maxverstappen1 I love you too❤️
username #justiceforcharles #lestappenforever
username SHE'S SOOOO CUTE no wonder max pulled her
victoriaverstappen I didn't know you pulled this cutie
⤷ danielricciardo Me too until I found out yesterday at the club
username poetic max is going to be the end of me
username I really had a bad feelings of he becoming poetic and gets all over like this
username Okay, this is max's hard launch. And now I'm waiting for Y/n's
⤷ username i thought she already doing it for so many times at verstappenight? 😏🤭
yourusername
liked by redbullracing, and 579,420 others
yourusername 💌
📸: landonorris
view all 461 comments
username PARENTS CONFIRMED???
username YESS (adopt me pls)
username is verstappenight still going to be there? let's see for the next two days...
username verstappenight nation how do we feel after this? (we can get a new max pic daily)
username i'm gonna thank lando forever for this
username With the bouquet, the dim light, and the black and white + sepia filters. What are they doin that night?
username AWWW ROMANTIC😍😍
danielricciardo They left Charles in the back that night
⤷ landonorris aww poor him. but anyway...
username how are you converting from lestappen to this one so fast?
TAGLIST @queenofmanydreams @muglermami @4limq @avengers-assemble123456 @cabbyhabs @meowtastick @4mula-1 @miarabanana @amel1ee @dinosushilun1 @auggieblogs @namgification
#✶!#max verstappen#max verstappen x y/n#max verstappen x you#max verstappen x reader#max verstappen imagine#max verstappen fanfic#max verstappen fluff#max verstappen smau#f1 fluff#f1 imagines#f1 imagine#f1 fic#f1 fanfic#f1 x reader#f1 smau#f1 instagram au
2K notes
·
View notes
Text
our baby | oscar piastri x fem! reader
summary; in which a few silly comments from oscar and y/n led to a big misunderstanding for fans
fc; yunjin huh
warnings; none (?)
notes; oscah
masterlist !
liked by oscarpiastri, landonorris, and 903,067 others!
yourusername: winter photo dump w bae :p
tagged; oscarpiastri
oscarpiastri: i hate this.
yourusername: hello????
oscarpiastri: where is my child
oscarpiastri: OUR baby
oscarpiastri: why’d you leave baby angel out 🙁
yourusername; you drama queen, she’s like 8 weeks old she’ll be okay 🙄
username: did oscar say a CHILD??
username; my fave grid couple 🥹🥹
username: oscar’s comment??? uhm is that why y/n wasn’t in the paddock for a bit ….
username: now that’s making sense
username: mother and father ( literally )
username: i’d kill to pull off orange like y/n😩
landonorris: did u trip
yourusername: maybe 🤫
username: I SAW THEM AT ST MORITZ N OSCAR SEEMED TO BE XTRA CAREFUL W HER
username: oh u rich rich
username: maybe it’s bc that’s his gf
username: what if they fr had a baby and that’s just him being careful during her recovery 🤔
username: why would they be in st moritz after just having a baby…
username: 8 weeks = 2 months , no? baby should be fine at home w a babysitter
username: what are yall talking about… liked by yourusername!
liked by oscarpiastri, lilymhe, and 912,764 others!
yourusername: how’d osc pull me ?
oscarpiastri: with rizz ( free boba )
yourusername: real 👩❤️💋👨
oscarpiastri: wow you are gorgeous.
yourusername: £\!£\¥~£|^ h&:&,$jdkcjskfkd
oscarpiastri: you look like our daughter in the last picture
yourusername: yeah cos i had her in my womb for 9 months and birthed her 🤰
username: WHAT
username: THEIR COMMENTS?? SHE FR HAD A DAUGHTER??
username: why haven’t they said anything abt their comments…
logansargeant: if i remember correctly there was a lot of stuttering and blushing , not from u tho
yourusername: so true
oscarpiastri: ok come on, it wasn’t that bad
logansargeant: h-h-hey y/n, h-how was y-your day!
yourusername: ya babe you were like that…
oscarpiastri: 🧍♂️🧍♂️
username: everyone talking abt possible oscar piastri jr but im focused on how good she looks 😫😫😫😩😍😍😢😢
username: it’s giving poison ivy🤩
lilymhe: WOWWWWWWW
lilymhe: you’re soooo fine 😍😍 marry me💍
yourusername: anytime bbg👩❤️💋👩👩❤️💋👩
oscarpiastri: oh! you can’t , we have a child
lilymhe: i’ll be a stepmother 👩🍼👩🍼
alex_albon: we have our real children at home ( albon pets 😞 )
yourusername posted to their story!
liked by oscarpiastri, landonorris, and 1,004,304 others!
yourusername: last photo dump of 2023 ft. our 8 week baby angel 🕊️ yes , she’s our baby daughter 👩🍼
tagged; oscarpiastri
oscarpiastri: angel is the cutest baby ever despite leaving fur everywhere
yourusername: she’s just a baby!
oscarpiastri: the prettiest girl, can’t believe you’re all mine
yourusername: ur mine 4ever you cant get rid of me or angel 😈😈
oscarpiastri: and i never plan to!
username: IT WAS A CAT ALL ALONG???
yourusername: not just a cat! a ragdoll kitty :p!!
username: oomf on twitter was right abt it being an inside joke 😭😭😭
username: so no baby piastri 2024?
yourusername: she is my baby piastri 😠
username: LMFAOOO IT WAS A CAT???
username: baby piastri being a cat is so on brand for y/n 😭
landonorris: my niece angel 😇 did she enjoy my gift🥰
oscarpiastri: by gift meaning a cat tower with your face on it? yes, she enjoyed scratching your face 😊
username: the kitten is so cute 🥹
username: the last picture of oscar driving w angel😵💫😵💫😵💫😵💫😵💫
username: the most perfect kitty for the most perfect couple 🥹🥹
#f1 scenario#formula one imagines#f1 imagine#formula one social media au#f1 smau#f1 scenarios#f1 x reader#oscar piastri imagine#oscar piastri x reader#oscar piastri smau#oscar piastri scenario
1K notes
·
View notes
Text
reminiscing ꩜ ln4
type: instagram/twitter au
Fans suffer days leading to love's holiday without their favorite couple.
lily said: hi! my first fic here, my first social media au ever, hope u enjoy :) will be a part 2 and 3..maybe more as well. whatever my heart desires and such
call her daddy podcast, 2/6/23
alex cooper and special guest: y/n l/n
y/n l/n: my friends keep trying to get me on dates, but i don't know, i'm just too much of a homebody right now. trying my best, but i'm rusty.
alex cooper: right, and i totally don't want to bring it up, if you don't want it out, but...
y/n l/n: no, it's totally fine. and yes, i'm single. it's one of those things i figured people will start to pick up on, it's kinda how life like this goes.
alex cooper: like a microscope on your relationship?
y/n l/n: exactly. made stuff super stressful, especially since we started dating when we were 19.
alex cooper: shit, 5 years is longer than i thought!
y/n l/n: we grew up together, had so many highlights and growing pains, and i don't want to get on your show and wallow or pout, that's really not what i feel. and i hope no one thinks anyone did anything wrong, it's just a growth thing. some people, as they grow, grow differently. and apart, i guess.
alex cooper: but you still have love for each other, i know that for sure.
y/n l/n: i'll never ever lose that love, i don't think.
Liked by pierregasly, arthur_leclerc, and 1,264,997 others
landonorris Quite a birthday today! Another year around the sun, another year of me kissing your face. Love you the most.
user1 yassss OUR girlfriend!
yourusername To the moon and back baby!!!!
yourusername Not pictured: his slobber on my cheek
landonorris You quite like my slobber, no?
oscarpiastri I surely don't
user2: you two really are growing up together :')
View more comments...
Liked by zendaya, kendalljenner, and 1,754,132 others
yourusername Sweet boy took me for a picnic, had too much wine hahaha. Thank you all for the birthday wishes, my heart is singing!!!! 23, woah am I close to getting old?
user1 SWEET BOY oh you people are sick
landonorris The most stunning girl, even napping
landonorris and yes you're old now
user2 CORNYYYY (i'm ready to end it all)
user3 "you're old now" and what are you??
emrata Wine's always a good idea
bellahadid happy birthday baby! come visit soon
user4 does that say lando on her necklace . i'm gonna snap soon
sza Loveeeee. U my favorite, Happy Solar Return!
View more comments...
Liked by alpinegoss, paddocktea, and 16,821 others
f1gossipcentral submission from a fan today in monaco:
i met lando today with a few others, he was so nice! we didn't want to ask flat out about y/n, he actually brought her up in passing when someone mentioned being from the same hometown as her, and he pointed it out himself. he didn't have the same energy we're used to when speaking about her, but it's obvious there was love in his voice, a lot of it. he's still got her friendship bracelet she made him last year on, but i think it's the type you'd have to cut to get off. regardless, i hope the best for him, and her too.
user1 you're telling me just the name of her hometown and he BLURTS about her?? AFTER being broken up??? yeah we're never seeing pearly gates atp
user2 is this what a broken home feels like?
user3 SHATTERED home. and yes.
user4 y/n lando please. come home the kids miss you
user5: single y/n...don't hate me but i would love a baddie era
user6: oh this is not a safe space for you.
View more comments...
#f1 imagine#f1 x reader#lando norris imagine#lando norris x reader#social media au#f1 social media au#f1 instagram au#f1 instagram edit
1K notes
·
View notes
Text
Double Trouble
Dad Series
Toji Fushiguro
Warnings: Pure Fluff
Discord 18+ - Twitter - Ko-Fi
“I want a baby sister!” Koemi randomly spurts out one faithful morning. It makes Toji choke on his breakfast, hitting his chest a couple of times to cough up the bit of food that’s in his throat. There’s no way that Toji will agree to that, especially after he got them into a preschool and he has his life back.
Toji has never glared at Koemi before, but for the first time in his life he does. You agreed you don’t want more kids because twins are more than enough. Toji looks at you, and you’re taken back just as he is. You shake your head, and Toji says, “Never in a million years.”
“It’s not fair! Kisho has Megumi and I have no one.” Koemi yells, and Toji decides that he won’t start his day by arguing with someone that still has their baby teeth.
“You have your brothers, honey. You don’t need a baby sister.” You assure her, but that isn’t enough to convince her tiny brain. She’s stubborn, just like her father.
Koemi is smart, she knows how to convince you. She sneaks and takes the photo album that you have for the twins, leaving it on the coffee table. She runs to you when you notice it and pick it up, looking innocently as she asks, “What’s that, mommy?”
“Oh, nothing, baby. Just photos from when you and your brother were babies– When you couldn’t properly talk since you two are still babies in my eyes.” You tell her, and you decide to take a seat on the couch and look through the album, making Koemi join you.
You look at pictures of the twins from the first ultrasound to their first steps. Newborn babies aren’t all that cute but you had the cutest babies. They cried a lot, but you always managed to take pictures because they were too adorable. The biggest smile comes to your lips seeing a picture of Megumi with the twins, he holds Kisho while Koemi is on the couch, trying to reach her twin brother. Then a picture of Megumi who manages to hold both of the twins on the couch, who look to be around five months old.
You keep going back to this one picture that’s three pages in, it’s what gets you. Toji smiling at his newborn babies. Toji has many more pictures in the book, but that has to be the best one because you had never seen Toji so happy before. Sure, he was over the moon when he married you, but this was a level of happiness that only his kids could achieve.
“What are you–” Toji approaches you, and his eyes fall on the photo album. For the second time, he glares at Koemi. Given the tears that are welled up in your eyes, she’s convinced you. She’s a sly one. She’s his daughter after all. He has to think of some way to get her to back down. What’s something that’ll make her stop wanting a sibling? And then it dawns on him.
“Koemi, since you want a baby sister so bad, you’re going to learn how to share your toys. Mommy and I will call the stork if you’re willing to share all your toys.” He says, knowing that Koemi hates sharing. Toji makes sure to get two toys each for the twins since it’s a never ending fight with them, because of her. That’s something he doesn’t bother correcting because Toji also hates sharing. “Even with Kisho.”
She furrows her brows and ponders on it. She shakes her head, and Toji takes it as her backing down. She’s not willing to share her toys. “I don’t want a sister anymore.”
She ends up standing up and walking away, but that doesn’t fix the mess that she caused. Toji doesn’t have to think much about convincing you though, he only has to mention, “Morning sickness.”
“She’s right, she doesn’t need a sister.”
#[dad series]#jujutsu kaisen#jjk#toji fushiguro#jujutsu toji#toji zenin#dilf toji#fushiguro toji#toji fushiguro x you#daddy toji#toji imagine#dad toji#jujutsu kaisen toji#jujutsu kaisen x reader#toji fushiguro x reader#toji x y/n#jjk toji#toji fluff#toji x reader
2K notes
·
View notes
Text
KINKVEMBER DAY: 8
[prompt: phone sex]
male reader x shin ryujin
16k words
The phone rings one too many times, and Ryujin is in the middle of scrunching up the paper slip that Chaeryeong handed her earlier that afternoon when she hears your voice.
The sounds of her scrambling for the receiver and her head smacking against the headboard come through in pretty good quality.
That never gets old.
"Stimulating conversations," you offer smoothly, like it isn't a euphemism and instead some high-brow intellectual pursuit. "How can I help you?"
Ryujin is speechless for an unbearable five, ten seconds until she lets out the kind of low chuckle that probably sounds better than it looks. "Hi," she says, "hello, I, uh- I don't know how all of this works."
"Why don't we start with who you're looking to speak with tonight?" you ask.
Ryujin sighs. She runs a hand through her hair, looking at the messy tangle of clothes on her bedroom floor with mild resentment. She’ll take her chances, figuring a direct approach is the best route when she doesn't really know where any of the lines get drawn or who is allowed to say what and who isn't.
"Um. Okay. Who you got?"
"We have a large variety of operators to suit any taste," you explain kindly. She appreciates that. "Do you have someone specific in mind? A gender perhaps, to start?"
"Well," Ryujin starts, running her tongue along the edges of her teeth. Lia has this thing she constantly says, that there's always a thousand and one reasons not to do something, and Ryujin is the first person to make fun of her for it - but here she is, finally putting that adage to use.
"I was actually calling to, um," she exhales loudly. "A guy? I mean look - girls. Girls are great, but if you - mmm." She clears her throat. Because she knows how she wants to do this, and it's most definitely: "A man."
You wait for a second before replying, and Ryujin allows the stillness to expand over and fill out every corner of her bedroom before a bright, "Alrighty, well," comes filtering out her phone, tinny but as enticing as ever. "That would be me."
"Oh."
"Yeah," you reply, easy and unhurried. You sound exactly like the kind of person whose company people pay handsomely to be around; the professionalism is undeniable, but there's something to be said for your tone. The softness to the vowels, the almost imperceptible upward lilt to the words - Ryujin gets that, maybe.
You're pretty confident in the answer, but you ask anyway, "have you ever done anything like this?"
Ryujin opens her mouth and hesitates for a brief moment.
"Well," she muses. She's tried porn, she's tried her own fantasies, she's tried cranking up the hot water and touching herself with the head of the shower aimed somewhere she's told by other girls: it's there, free of charge. "I haven't."
"But you have a boyfriend," you state. "You have a man, who you enjoy things with?"
Ryujin laughs nervously. "It's...it's been a little while. Not recently. Sorry. I know you don't-"
"No, no, not at all, you're doing fine, it's just that you sound very attractive over the phone. Excuse the assumption."
Ryujin laughs and rakes her fingers through her fringe. She knows it's a line, but she laughs anyway. She could - if she was looking for the deranged fulfillment of it - pore through a billion comments on instagram, on twitter that call her a lot of things: gorgeous, beautiful, hot. The last comment she read before almost deleting her app entirely was someone who decided to textually imitate a dog barking to a picture Yeji had taken of her in a coffee shop. There's a novelty, she thinks, in being charmed by someone who has no idea who she is.
"You have good ears then," she says, smirking into the receiver. "So do you normally do, what, ask questions? I have no idea."
"Yeah, it helps me build a profile," you reply, "but if you had something else in mind-"
"No, please, shoot." She grabs the pillow from behind her back and flops against the mattress, staring up into the ceiling fan.
"Do you feel comfortable sharing your age with me?"
"Twenty," she answers without missing a beat, even though that isn't right. It's weirdly important to her, keeping it private, and she isn't sure why - but then you say something pleasant and complimentary about college and new experiences that she's unable to register, and you ask her for her name so quick she just blurts it out:
"Ryujin."
"Pretty."
"Fuck," Ryujin grins, immediately chewing on her knuckle to bite back a gasp. "Sorry. The name is cute or, whatever. Whatever. Sorry for the curse. God, I don't really have a filter - what about you? Do you have a name, Mr. Operator?"
"I do."
Ryujin lifts a leg up and puts it down again. She doesn't know if she should already have taken off her pajamas or if that's weird. Or if the fact that it doesn't bother her means this is more or less wholesome. She turns over onto her stomach, humming into the phone and now she doesn't know why she's thinking about your face. You could be- well, fuck, you could be anyone, but there's this gnawing compulsion to put something together.
You tell her your name and she scoffs for a second, before quieting down and returning you a, "pretty."
"Ryujin, tell me." There's probably a slightly too long pause from your end of the line before you get on with asking her, "when was your last orgasm?"
She drops the phone right in her face. It bounces off the bridge of her nose before landing in bedsheets beside her and her eyes are welling with tears while she scrambles blindly across her bed, cursing into the receiver and squirming. She pulls the phone to her ear and catches the last couple seconds of you reassuring her that it's okay, that it's completely fine if she's hung up or gone.
"Actually, I have," and she curls her fingers into a fist, "never came in my whole life."
You clear your throat to keep a less than professional sound from coming out. A quiet space she feels necessary to fill: “Not even once.”
"Really?"
"I know. And I've only recently realized that's, uh - er- a pretty un-normal thing." Ryujin makes a waving motion with her hand even though you can't see it, trailing off into silence and blushing furiously. "Sorry," she apologizes. She doesn't know what she’s apologizing for, but she does it again. "Sorry about that."
"I should be the one feeling sorry for you," you rib.
"Fucking tell me about it."
"Hey, this reminds me, would you be averse to the idea of touching yourself?"
The question stutters Ryujin in her tracks, and she doesn't even say no but a drawn-out "nngh" leaks out before she can stumble into something more intelligible. "Isn't that, like, what you're supposed to do on these calls?"
"Every call is different, Ryujin."
She chews on her lower lip, rolling it under her front teeth. You say her name like you know her, and it's throwing her for a loop. The comfort you have with the whole situation - asking her a million questions and not demanding answers, taking cues and reassurances in stride and turning everything into some sort of ploy for getting her naked. Fuck, she'll take a bit of a plunge:
"Should I be touching myself?"
"It's not my place to say."
"Okay, well that's kind of a frustrating answer."
"So you're saying you like being told what to do," you tell her, and you hear the sharp inhale in reply.
"If I knew what I liked, you think I'd be calling a sex hotline and hoping some stranger might take pity on me?"
You laugh out loud, and her response is the quickest, the cutest little, "seriously!" before she chuckles too.
"Ryujin?" you ask.
"Yeah?"
"Are you straight?"
She nearly chokes - because it's like you're able to just read her mind - and if you can do that then there's nothing you can't do, maybe. And here, excitement feels a lot like apprehension. She twists and curls in on herself, thighs rubbing together, the flat of her hand traveling across her stomach.
"I'm-"
"Because no one should have to pretend that they're interested in guys," you interrupt her and, god, for as much time as she's spent dwelling on that, she wishes it were that simple.
It would be a hell of a lot easier if she knew why she wanted to get her face between Yeji's thighs and drag her tongue all over her clit until that prettier-than-perfect face of hers cinches up in a pleasure that comes with just the right amount of agony - or if she knew why she didn't feel anything like remorse or guilt or envy when her boyfriend came around instead of wanting, you know, to get on her knees with her mouth around his cock too -
Fuck, it's all very complicated.
"Straight," she answers. She likes cock, as much as anyone realistically can, and she knows the body on a man can get her dripping and easy in all the right ways. So, she just swallows. Says, "straight enough."
"If you were to touch yourself, right now, and someone - say, a man - were telling you exactly what to do: what would spring to mind, if anything."
"Mmm. Is this you asking me to touch myself?"
"Again. That's up to you."
Your voice is light. Very pleasant. Very male, Ryujin realizes. She gulps.
"Can you, I mean," she says, running a hand down the length of her thigh, pressing down at the hollow.
"Ryujin,” you say, letting her mull over how it sounds in your mouth. “Take a breath for me, please."
Her exhale leaves her with a heavy push and she tries not to laugh. Nervous tic. She's getting goosebumps, but she feels warmer than before.
"We could say this isn't the first time, you and me, in some very broad and abstract sense. How does that make you feel?"
"Strange." She touches her outer thighs again and arches her back. "Kind of horny," she admits. And it is odd - your words, the things you say - and maybe it's her nerves because the experience is new, and so are you, and so are her feelings, all wrapped in one.
"Do you want to do something about that?"
There's silence between you for what seems like a very long time, your breathing quiet but apparent - a signal you haven't abandoned her in some state of vulnerability. Ryujin inhales deeply. She's shaking in her fingertips. The tension has her taut and waiting, and that's funny, really, because it's what she's been doing for years. The rubbing. The touching.
Her hips rock forward gently and she answers the unasked question with a sweetly husked, "uh-huh."
"What are you wearing?"
"Ah, really?" Ryujin laughs. Her fingers pause at her waistline. "That old, bad porn trope."
"I like hearing about people's clothes, is all," you excuse yourself lightly. "Helps me get a sense of things."
"Yeah, alright. Sweats. Baggy ones." Her lips fall apart. "Shirt."
"Is that all? Nothing sexy."
"What's sexy?"
"Sexy is…"
She listens to you mull it over, listening for a ruffling or two. "For a girl with a nice body - some body - some curves," you continue, and Ryujin has to drop another finger to the hot line of her thigh, her lower belly. "You need lace. Silk. You've gotta leave the best bits a little hidden, at least for a while longer."
"Wow. You sound a hell of a lot like you'd enjoy taking someone's pants off," she half-teases. "Do you make all your calls like this? One sordid fantasy at a time, huh?"
"Something like that," you reply. And then, as if reading her mind, "are you doing anything, right now?"
"I'm touching myself," she exhales. "Are you?"
"Ryujin, not yet. Please be patient."
She makes a face even though you can't see it or taunt her. That's an unfair request - you have an unfair request.
"Just, wait," you tell her. She's drawing lazy, winding circles across her thigh. "Let me show you something, will you do that for me?"
"But, what."
"Tell me everything. All the things you're thinking. Things you want to do."
"Everything?"
"Yes."
She blinks away her initial disbelief and reaches around for her lamp to switch it off. Until it's just the hallway light peeking in through the crack between her door and the door jamb and you, a stranger who won't be seeing her face or hearing her say anything stupid. She shakes out a few more breaths, shuffles against the sheets, and glides her fingertips past her belly button.
Her hand rises up her stomach in one decisive movement, until her fingers curl beneath the bottoms of her bra, trapped in its underwire. "I'm thinking - unh - about, ah. My friend?"
You're quiet and let the silence linger, until she seems like she might not find her way; so you repeat, "Go ahead."
"And a guy she used to like, fuck, she'd show up here, drunk on, ah. A weeknight. Somewhere, fuck, around midnight. Walk past me into the kitchen where we had the - the light. God." Her hips stutter and she grits out the rest through her teeth. "In the refrigerator. Ah, yeah, a midnight snack. Always looked way too fucking good for, um, oh, for a casual booty-call."
"Does your friend have a name?"
"Yuna," she practically pants, and immediately realizes she shouldn't have said that either.
"Did you always know what was going on? Between Yuna and her-"
"Boy-toy, yes - it was so obvious, I always knew, yeah," she said, clumsily grabbing the sheets with one hand as she drifts further between the peaks. "Just - fuck - he'd be picking at, ah, something with chopsticks."
"In your kitchen?"
"My, uh, table. And I'd be working up the nerve to ask."
You sigh over the phone, "ask him what?"
"What it was, like, I knew she was only- shit." She keens high in her throat. "What it was like, fucking taking that cock of his, and bending Yuna's tight little, ah, ass over and, mm, railing her on the side of her fucking bed - and just pumping her full of cum just like that until- Jesus, she would walk around after and sometimes-"
You groan softly. This encouraging little sound.
"-fuck - sorry, I mean. Yeah, he, sometimes he'd make her walk around with his, ah, stuff inside. Down her fucking pants and, it's like, fucking disgusting, I swear-"
"And?" You breathe a heavy edged noise over the line.
Actually okay, so maybe this was more than she bargained for, maybe she bit off more than she can chew - maybe, she feels like her insides are collapsing; all the fire pooling around in her stomach and gathering into a melting sort of weightlessness.
"And it makes me feel fucking-"
"Fucking what."
"Why am I talking about this, why-"
"Talking to me? Fucking wet, Ryujin, answer the question."
She pants down at her phone and then turns her face into her forearm, rubbing and making sounds. She thinks about, oh, fucking Yuna and how she showed up to hang out once, with cum leaking down the crease of her inner thigh, smearing against her skin and down between her legs.
"Wet." She swallows. "How do I-"
"Say that you wish it was you," you tell her. "That you wanted that, to be fucked. To feel a cock inside."
Her head falls back. "That," she manages, "fucking, that."
You drawl so that the question might roll off, easy: "Is that the kind of girl you are? Told not to curse, not supposed to let anyone else play with you - you just need it, don't you? Do you need someone's cum? Just tell me."
"I think so, ah," and she stops moving her hand. "I think I'm gonna go now. This is fucking embarrassing, like. Okay, sorry."
"Don't hang up," you tell her, and the soft edge to it is one she really wants to indulge. "Don't," you repeat, a little louder.
You start talking, about the same sorts of things she's imagined herself: the sex and the sounds and what he can do to her. You build a slow and aching heat between her thighs that has her dripping through her underwear and grinding against her fingers. Telling her how she's the one that needs to be filled, needs a man who can wrap her legs around his waist, get to the deepest parts of her, the parts untouched and willing.
Ryujin gets that - she wonders, half out of it and stroking faster than she usually would be, how much of it has anything to do with who the voice is on the other end of the receiver, and how it could be what a desperate, pathetic, tired part of her has always wanted.
"Are you?" she asks, panting over the phone.
"Am I what?" you whisper back to her.
"Are you," and you hear how she inhales sharply through her nose, a desperate gasp leaving her lips on the exhale, "going to, um. Are you touching yourself right now?"
Your reply is immediate, and her eyes flutter and close the second you tell her exactly what she wants to hear:
"God, yes."
She drags her hand up the center of her body, runs her fingertips over her jaw and presses the heel of her wrist to her neck to feel her pulse slamming hard.
"I'm fucking throbbing, Ryujin; you sound gorgeous like this, like nothing I've ever heard, I'm stroking my cock just picturing you, please-"
"Tell me." She's mouthing into the center of her palm, saying the words, tasting salt and musk. "Fuck, ah," she babbles, "tell me what you would do with me."
"I'd get you on your knees," you tell her without hesitating for a beat.
"Fuck."
"I'd come up behind you and tell you not to be scared, baby. I wouldn't hurt you, I'd just touch you real gentle. Push my fingers past your tongue, slide a little down your throat."
"Uh huh," she moans, her head falling back and rolling, rocking against the mattress.
"Want you sucking on my fingers. Need your hands around my cock, or better, my balls, play with them. You're going to take those fingers - every finger I got, all five, yeah?- all ten of them," you joke, "and open up your tight cunt - like you are now, like such a good fucking girl-"
The girl fucking yelps. Just this honest sound of depravity; it's what she's paying you for. It's a silly line of bullshit, but it makes her bite hard and ache a little around her own knuckles and moan in her palm and dig her nails hard into her flesh. Her thumb fumbles across the top edge of her underwear and you pant again into her ear as if on cue, giving her a small bit of guidance that has her jolting in pleasure. She didn't know that was there, fuck, fuck-
"Like that, Ryujin. Breathe," and she does.
"Please," she whines, trying to find somewhere for her arm to settle, resting finally in her hair - setting the phone to speaker in a foolish moment of lapsed-judgment, just before it nearly clatters off the side of her bed.
Keep going - she's telling you over and over - keep going, and you’re picturing her there: eyes closed, legs spread wide, bent knees quivering and toes curling into the sheets. It doesn’t sound fake - you've heard a million of them, you've learned them in their different tones and accents and you can spot a faker a mile away. And the girl on the phone right now isn't pretending or thinking about whatever's happening somewhere else.
(You don't join in for everyone. You can't. It's an asinine consideration that you'd be rubbing your fist up and down your cock while it's sore and wanting - aching from the neglect or lack of rhythm. You have to remind yourself it's just a job, that the logistics just can't support such selflessness.
But then there's the very fucking premise.
That the girl on the other end of the line is inches from the goalposts, fingering her cunt and sighing into the throes of her first orgasm - first ever, because you did this, you brought her this far - you're the fucking culprit, and no matter how many girls, or boys-pretending-to-be-girls, how many people have gotten off with the help of your voice, your instruction, this one sets a different fucking precedent.
You're not lying when you say, "I'm rock fucking hard, Ryujin," or "there's precum all over my knuckles, baby."
Because there is, and the poor thing chokes out another desperate sound when you tell her.)
"I'm right there, ah, fuck, keep going-"
"I've got my hand around my shaft, just enough that I can fuck it, can't I? The head is getting slick - baby - and my palm is gliding nice and easy. Are you cumming, Ryujin? You better be, you better be cumming right now."
There's a heaving gasp and she calls out for you, babbling curses and "please" and "fuck" in alternating succession, with enough punctuation for you to have to let your lip slip under the hard bite of your front teeth. "Don't stop," she tells you, voice thready.
"You need this so bad."
"Yes," she gasps. "How would you-"
"How would I fuck you?" you finish her thought.
She waits a moment, sucking in shallow breaths and then replying weakly, "I really like... I like doggy."
"On your knees?"
"Yeah," she stammers, "I like when, like- ah, like, pulling my hair."
"Fuck, I love that," you say into her mewling. "Splayed out with your tits against a pillow and getting your pretty, little pussy pounded? I bet that'd feel so good, huh? Hands so rough on your hips, on your throat, squeezing your neck so you'll turn pink. Just to see you smile, I'd probably fucking let you take whatever you want."
You're met with a broken moan, a long string of syllables ending on a note that has your shoulders clenching and cock jumping in your grip.
Tense over the things you can't see: Ryujin biting down into the side of her hand, the other knocking painfully against the wooden side rail on her mattress, her thighs tightening and screaming and clamping around her wrist as she pulls weaker, wilder whimpers out of her chest each time her fingers drag across her slit and the sensitive curve of her swollen clit. She's dying, she thinks, she's going to fucking die - the in and out of her soaked pussy, through all that sticky, satiny skin, slick fingers diving in, twisting until there's nowhere for them to go.
No other recourse than to fuck in, fuck, fuck, like that, fucking god.
There's heavy silence on the line for god knows how long - well, you have to check the log. But for her, it feels like fucking forever. That was - that was it. It's so fucking mind-wracking how good it was, she can't quite wrap her brain around it. Nowhere near. She thinks she'll have a better idea after two rounds, definitely by four. She'll buy something, use the discount, go shopping - an orgasm just to make sure she's not bullshitting herself.
You clear your throat.
She moves sluggishly, away from the side and against the headboard - the heat still unbearably oppressive, her t-shirt clinging and sticking. "That," she stumbles through the afterglow.
"Do I need to apologize to you?" you ask lightly.
"What? Oh god, no - no way. No way. I just."
"Yes?"
"Like I didn't know it was this-"
"Did you just cum, Ryujin?"
She's laying there with the phone pressed to her brow. A hand palmed over her own racing pulse. The faint smell of her own cunt lingering around her face.
"I don't know," she tells you, and promptly hangs up.
-
The darkness in Ryujin's bedroom is punctuated only by the faint, hazy light streaming in from the hall, and her bedroom fan making its creaking little circles, as she waits in her post-nut-high for her breathing to normalize. Her mind is buzzing, and out of all this, she has a hell of a bill and a couple conclusions:
She's a coward and a pervert, but definitely, definitely bisexual.
Or, like. She's in some weird gray area between not liking whenever anyone buys her drinks, but also the girls at least let her dance a little close. That's a strange thing, isn't it? For how often her mouth does stupid shit - you think at least someone would figure it out for her.
But you, oh fuck. You-
She's fucking shaken up, for sure.
-
(It's a home office set-up, actually.
Your desk isn't organized; you're sure the photos on the wall are askew and the paint looks slightly worse for wear if you were to turn the lights on - which you never really do. There's an aging lamp tucked into the back corner, a bottle of scotch next to your handset that's closer to halfway empty than halfway full, and you can't stop imagining it.
Promise, This never happens.
You've got the name stuck to the roof of your mouth even though you know it's fake. Stuck with something so painfully abstract. Imagining this girl that is probably as brash and bawdy as her voice, or more exciting than either - maybe her hair is long enough to brush along her breasts. Or maybe it hangs just over her shoulders. God knows just how that would frame her features.
You can see it, really. You pump a handful of coconut oil into your palm and the details solidify so easily in your head: her pretty mouth, nose, the dimples in her cheeks - eyes glazed and sultry and gazing at you.
Smelling sweet, all the places you need, skin hot, clit swollen-
Just- fuck. Fuck.
Ryujin, huh, imagine that.
Ryujin.
And you jerk off right into the soft embrace of a tissue.)
-
A little more than a week later:
Ryujin's all wrapped up on the couch, with an arm cushioning her head and watching TV when there's a sudden commotion from the front door. Yuna - her friend, her very nice, very male friend who never shows up after midnight unless there's a promise of sex - comes bumbling into the room.
He has no regard for boundaries.
So,
Yuna starts to say, smug, from where the hallway becomes the living room, "Ryujin - look at us. Stuck on a Friday night. You gotta boyfriend or something?"
She's completely unfazed by this interaction. She's pretty sure he has his own key, so like, he should be used to it by now too.
"Kind of." She shuts off the TV to turn her attention towards the topic at hand. "Why?"
Yuna runs a hand through all her long, silky hair and gestures her cock-du-jour on over to the door of her room. "Waiting for a call, maybe." She waggles her eyebrows. "Are you any good, I mean, you never seem to..."
Annoying brat.
Ryujin smacks the back of her neck and interrupts, "you gonna fuck him? Go ahead and fuck him, Yuna." She checks the lock. The kitchen. Gets up and tries to ignore the heat flaring behind her ears.
"We could pretend," Yuna muses, tugging the waistband of Ryujin's shorts around her fingers before she's out of arm's reach. The elastic flips back into her waist with a dull snap.
"Dumb idea. That's a dumb, dumb idea," she reasons, because she knows Yuna has no self control. None, and it's showing; the second her shoulders sag forward and her eyes dart, craving, Ryujin steps back in. "Don't be stupid."
Yuna's lips are tilted, playful. Ryujin wants to smack that look right off her face. Like she fucking deserves any kind of victory just because she found out she can fuck anyone she wants while lacking the self-awareness to somehow be contented with anyone. She's not going to call her a slut - out of a matter of principle - but god, does she fucking want to.
"Gotta get ready, is what you should do," Ryujin mumbles under her breath.
"Fine." Yuna shrugs and pecks an annoying kiss to Ryujin's temple on her way to the shower, waving a hand over her head with a casual, "If you want something, you've only got a half-hour."
Ryujin pushes her hair out of her face and does what she does best: overanalyze and overthink the situation.
Whatever. Yuna won't give it up regardless, not in any way she'd actually be able to enjoy. Her cheeks go a little redder while she pretends to not be considering it.
God, a threesome in total functional harmony however: her working her mouth on Yeji (Ryujin doesn't know why she's thinking about Yeji, but she is), Yeji working her mouth on her boyfriend, her boyfriend working his mouth on her -
That'd be something, she thinks. Like one of those Escher diagrams, but one where everyone cums at the end.
The thought makes Ryujin wet enough to squeeze her thighs together and stand up a little straighter.
Then she hears the showerhead turn on, and she wonders just why, exactly, Yuna is such a spoiled asshole.
-
Turns out,
The universe just has this habit of providing Ryujin with what she wants right alongside everything she doesn't.
She’s stretched out in her sweats, sat up at the top of her bed again and touching herself beneath the sheet in a pointless attempt to contain the mess. Fucking horny - it's honestly unbelievable - and her left hand's making lecherous, slick noises until it's absolutely gross. Until Ryujin's gasping and panting and sweating from the nape of her neck and the back of her knees.
All because Yuna's the loudest little-fucking-whore of a roommate anyone has ever heard.
She's moaning like she's getting fucking plowed into the next life. And apparently, the cock she's got in her cunt is fucking huge if those little murmuring whimpers are anything to go on. She keeps begging the guy, coy, for a kiss while she's probably folded up like a lawn chair in there, getting railed, and the fact that the boy keeps obliging is as admirable as it is kind of insulting.
"Goddamn," she thinks out loud, because the walls are paper-fucking-thin. The apartments in the area are built in an earthquake-safe way, which in reality, means they can either withstand a magnitude 6.0 and come out without any severe structural damages - or that it's so cheaply constructed the building will go down like a matchbox house before it stands a chance against a tremor of any significance.
They're easier to replace that way she’s told. And Ryujin's apartment is definitely of the latter; she can hear everything.
The skin on skin, their bodies sliding together in the slippery sheets. Her mouth smacking wet around his tongue as he bucks forward and asks her to do a hundred filthy things, asking her where it feels best - that sort of thing, which gets her wound and agitated and frustrated, and fucking horny as fuck. Ryujin's bent-inward and panting when he really gets to work - the creaks and groans, their mingled pants and the constant thudding and swaying of the headboard smacking into the wall.
She doesn't even need to put her ear to the partition like she's sixteen years old all over again, hoping to catch her old brother going at it while her mom was out. Trying to figure out this whole sex thing - what all the fuss was about.
Just the way Ryujin sighs is nothing short of despondent. Slightly pitiful.
And every tight circle she's running over clit feels so fucking good, until she realizes the room goes real quiet for a bit. The stillness - no slapping, no movement, just wet, panted-breaths and muffled speech. She nearly asks aloud what's wrong - but she hears it: Yuna's hushed but totally undeniable,
"Been so long- don't, don't- hold up," she croons in these high, sing-song little huffs. "That - uhn, ah - that's my - that's my good spot, there, keep - yes, harder!"
Ryujin slams her eyes closed, dropping down onto the mattress and wishing she'd slipped her hands into her sweats sooner. Fuck. And as Yuna's back starts banging against the wall - so rhythmic and fucking thorough - Ryujin can feel the heat curling behind the backs of her knees, radiating along her calf and reaching into the smalls of her feet. Fuck. Fuck, she doesn't even get to watch.
Right there. So good, please, so fucking good, is what Ryujin can’t not hear coming right through the drywall.
She’s three knuckles deep in her pussy, all stretched out, and she's practically drooling - "spread me, baby. Hold the, fuck, spread my lips open. See me- unh. Ah - see me? Please, do it-" - the boy groaning about it as he fucks her, and then, Yuna, needling him with a quiet, breathy, "harder, can't you?"
The answer seems to make Yuna squirm and scream.
And Ryujin's nearly rolling - rocking, fucking humping her own fingers because it's starting to ache a little, a cramping in her wrist and arm and jaw that she's trying really hard to ignore, rubbing and fingering and fucking herself closer, the heels of her feet sinking hard against the sheets, throbbing and aching around the flicks of her knuckles, harder, faster - faster -
"Fucking hell-" she seethes and stops moving all at once - because god, Yuna is un-fucking-believable.
The absolute bitch, she's doing it again: squealing and cursing and calling his name into her orgasm and just basking, it sounds like, right in it. Because she always does this, every single fucking time, she acts like it's the best feeling in the fucking world and she fucking loves everything, and that shit just - Ryujin grits her teeth and grimaces and pulls her slick fingers from her body - that just ruins it.
All that build-up and for what?
Fuck, Yuna really has the nerve to go there too. She's talking about sucking her own damn cunt or some bullshit-
Yeah, it's not fucking fair, Ryujin concedes.
Or maybe she's being punished. She could live with that, but god. The unfairness of it all. She tries, for a half a minute, to let her throbbing stop being a goddamn nuisance. But the noises coming from the other room are making her crankier, more angry, more irate - and definitely hornier than she ever really intended, even though she knows Yuna is thoroughly distracted in there.
Ryujin sits up a little straighter. Squares her shoulders, steadies herself and fishes around in her pockets with her uncoordinated, cum-coated hands until she finds her wallet, a credit card, her cell -
And there's an aching, a sore pulse of neglect between her legs; that's all too much. A quick peek down confirms that, yep, she's practically dripped right out of her shorts and even gotten a dark spot in the front of them. How great is that.
Yuna is over there, all, "thank you - ah - can you please do me a favor and fuck my mouth with your big, big, huge, fucking cock-" and this guy, he sounds so patient, telling her how he wants to do exactly that, but he wants to fill her tiny pussy up first, fuck her here, fuck her there, fuck a baby right into her. Wants to get his cum all over her face, smear her mouth and her throat and her cheeks -
Ryujin inhales through her nose and holds, eyes falling closed in something between misery and anguish.
He's telling her, yeah, of course he'll fill up her throat - give her so much it's leaking out of her fucking nose - and Yuna sounds like she's moaning and garbling an objection to that last part - but it doesn't actually fucking matter.
"Geez," is Ryujin's quiet, little gasped-out response. He just fucking pounds her right back into place; her next orgasm. Fuck-
And there it is: the slew of moans that start back up and just keep on keeping on.
Shin Ryujin is going to lose her fucking mind.
-
Ryujin only lasts a handful more days before she calls again.
It’s another Wednesday night, if only to increase the odds that you’re working. Yeah, she could go with another guy, but another guy might not do everything you did, talking quietly and calmly - so composed while Ryujin was losing some part of her sanity to the thumb she pressed on her clit.
No, it has to be you.
That's what Ryujin makes herself say when the operator apologizes and explains you're busy.
"Will he be working much longer? Please, I, um-"
"If you give me your number," the operator tells her, "I can add him as a preferred associate. You'll get him next time instead of going to the line."
Ryujin pauses, finger held to her chin. Will he know that? There's all this implication isn't there, that maybe he won't. Maybe you're popular - are you? It's a lot like texting someone for the very first time. And if you did - know, she means - would she be acting like a stalker? It would feel weird, probably, but no worse than some people do it already.
Oh god, this is kind of fucked up.
Maybe a little. Maybe.
Ryujin pauses, finger to her chin. Will he know that? There's all this implication, isn't there, or maybe he won't. Maybe you're popular - are you? It's a lot like texting someone you like-like for the very first time. And if you did - know, she means - would she be acting like a stalker? It would feel weird, probably, but no worse than some of things other people are undoubtedly doing with this service, Ryujin decides, and rattles off the digits so fast the operator asks for clarification.
"If your schedule doesn't open," the line says, "call back and leave a message with when."
Ryujin shrugs and says, "yeah, okay."
-
You make Ryujin sit through forty-five-fucking minutes of on-hold music - this barely audible synthetic noise that signals a connection is still there, truly a genre for no one - all before she just cuts the fucking line and lays down on the couch.
Okay.
Okay, fine.
Whatever.
-
(You are… going through the motions.
Some girl on the other line is barely holding it together; you can hear her thighs making slick noises. God. She sounds desperate, she's holding the phone all tight and saying your name. She's fucking babbling; it's not attractive, not while you're tilted back as far as your office chair will go and staring up in the ceiling.
You're bored, mostly.
"Please, please, I'm-"
"Going to cum, I know, princess." She asked you to call her that. "Mouth all open? Can't help it? Just need to lick it nice and fast?"
The answer comes all choppy: "I can't, ah, a-ah-nymore, no, I, can't, need-"
"Do you have any idea? How hard I'm fucking stroking my cock right now? Sitting right in my lap. Jerking it right for you," you say, and then she makes an embarrassingly wet noise, gasping through a choked whine, "so I'm ready to give you what you really fucking need."
"Yes," she chokes. "There - um, please, I just-"
"The biggest fucking load," you tell her. She has no idea, really, that you've got one hand on the receiver, the other just pinching the bridge of your nose - neither of which are you jerking the cum out of your cock and balls like a fucking hydrant as you’d described. What she doesn't know won't hurt her, and you keep your face turned to the side as she starts screaming. As it starts running into one noise that lasts forever - so unbearable that, this time, you consider going out to the bathroom to grab a glass of water and a handful of painkillers. "Need it deep. Let me pour it in, yeah?"
"Yes," she gasps again, heard on this distant frequency because, yes, yes, you've plugged your ear with a finger.
"That'll satisfy you. C'mon, now, princess - give it right up," you tell her, but your eyes are a little dull when her moan turns out all-gagging and twitchy and spasming through it, until finally:
"Ugh."
You wait a moment for the gasping and hitching to finish.
"Good girl," is your distant reply, followed by a polite, perfunctory, "call back anytime.")
-
Ryujin feels like she's in grade eleven again as she stares at her phone. Boys. Drama. Girls. The drama.
The overanalyzing, the wondering, the hesitating. Fuck. She wishes she knew a way to change this, because she doesn't feel particularly mature and is somehow reduced to this girl, this idiot sitting here all embarrassed and staring and moping about a thousand different calamities at once.
She's looking right at the lock screen: the wallpaper of her and Yeji and Chaeryeong out getting coffee on a random Sunday, all bundled up. Winter. Like three, four years ago, maybe.
Ryujin looks like shit, it's funny.
But Yeji -
How she can make the winter pallor look good is beyond Ryujin's understanding. It's unfair. All the things are. Her brain is back and forth and spinning, spinning like the hands on the old clock hung up on the wall in the kitchen. So stuck on what's not quite normal. Stuck on what doesn't fucking matter - who even fucking cares who the fuck she's attracted to?
She feels it between her legs.
Has been for like a month, or longer, without an outlet. Without anything to give her the hint that maybe she can get back to it - the right it.
She doesn't need to call, she tells herself. She's not some weirdo who's sitting on this for days just in the hopes that her boyfriend is having a bad week with work or whatever. It's only Wednesday, technically. Still way early. Just another few days, she reasons, another few hours - what does it matter?
Wednesday. She can feel the word settle inside of her.
Though only once her bottom lip is chewed to hell, does she pick up her phone and decide she will.
-
(You're in your bedroom this time around, finishing up your own weekday workout - on the bike, fifteen-second sprints - when your phone goes off. A simple dinging. Very unassuming.
The operator comes in with a cool, level, "line two, callback."
Then there's nothing but silence for a few beats.
You towel some of the sweat off your face. It's warm - your skin, flushed. Bouncing your phone in your palm. The same feeling that's been tugging at your throat for the past two weeks starts to flare and swell.
Not quite a hope, not quite expectation: just something close.
"Are they still there?"
The operator confirms. "Shall I put them through?")
-
Ryujin fumbles in her own rush of bravado, hands pressing against the fronts of her thighs in an unflattering, nervous little gesture as the connection clicks and picks up.
"This is him," comes your voice, a little husky and raspy from all the day-to-day talk, but even and easygoing and maybe - just maybe - something she can hang on to. Ryujin gives an acknowledging "Mmmn," like the phone call isn't causing her major inner-turmoil.
"Right, ah." You sound kind of, dare she say, nervous yourself. You clear your throat into the line and ask, "what brings you here, stranger?"
Ryujin pauses at this; the red in her ears reaches her fucking jaw. Stranger. Jesus christ, okay, okay-
She laughs. Stops immediately at how self-conscious she sounds. Clears her throat and tucks some of her hair back - settles herself into it like her life hangs in the balance. "I'm here to get my rocks off."
"It's not usually my place to say," you begin in earnest, "but if you're anything like me, and this is gonna sound completely off-the-cusp, but those two weeks really seem to build up, don't they?"
God.
She pulls her sock off her ankle. There's eczema on her heel, and it's the kind of thing she can imagine Yeji telling her to not scratch - that she's going to fuck up her skin. It's funny the stupid fucking things she can remember and all the things she forgets. Like just now, with your voice in her ear, a little unsure in a way that says you've got other, much more important things you should be doing. But you're here with her.
With Ryujin.
God. She might hate herself a little.
"Um," is how she finds her bearings. "Actually."
"It's a joke. Not that- I mean." She hears some rustling - assumes it's coming through the ear piece. There's an abrupt slamming on her side of the line and it seems like the worst kind of deja-fucking-vu. Her neighbors. She forgets it's even this late into the evening. That other people don't have to work so hard in their free-time.
"Maybe this isn't a good night," she says, not so much as thinking the words.
"What?" you ask. Then it dawns on you. "No, no. If you're there, I'm here." You clear your throat. "Besides, there's nobody I'd rather hear from than a woman so desperate she's signed onto my frequent flier's club."
She stops chewing the insides of her cheeks long enough to give you a tired, irritated sound. "Whatever."
And you nearly choke trying not to laugh.
"I don't, um-"
"What, do I have a nice voice?" You laugh quietly.
Under normal circumstances, that wry edge, the bit of try-hard-humor would have her rolling her fucking eyes clean out of their sockets. So when instead she opens her mouth and a fatal-fucked-flirty-feminine, stop, comes out, the vowel pulled long like a plea or a request - well, Ryujin's forehead drops against her bedspread in immediate regret.
You seem startled by it too, going quiet for a second.
"I-I'm-"
"Cute," you decide.
Her ears are red-hot and her cheeks have to be pinking and god, she hates this. That she's hearing this so soon, and it's making her brain hazy and soft and stuttering through, um's and yeah, well, um's. A part of her can't believe she's paying for this, and then, at the same time, she can't believe she's not actually putting cash down for more right this second.
Because it feels -
Like maybe -
Her shoulders rise. She wants this to be quick; she hates this feeling of embarrassment creeping its way in and grabbing onto her with both hands, like this weird, pseudo-affection. She's a grown fucking woman and here she is, letting all her guard down for someone she doesn't even fucking know.
You can feel the tension, hear it. Your lips purse. You try for something easy.
"Go on and give me the details, Ryujin."
Before you'd even picked up, she'd already half-undone her shirt, the flaps of the collar hanging loose with her hands gently petting her ribcage - so easily giving and pliant that there's a good portion of her, in spite of the doubt, in spite of what seems completely illogical about all this, that has her realizing maybe she wants this more than she can possibly understand.
God, she feels like a fucking fool.
"It's pretty boring."
"Not to me. I've spent the last few weeks talking to a bunch of assholes who don't appreciate what they got in the first place," you reply. She imagines you're a little playful about it. Wonders, momentarily, how good that smirk looks - if your eyebrows are lifting like you've been teasing her since day one. Fuck.
“Your operator is a total asshole too, by the way."
"Don't say that," is Ryujin's shy reply, practically moaned out. "You sound like someone I'd absolutely fucking hate, jesus, stop that."
"Just because you don't get on with someone, doesn't mean they can't get you off."
"Smooth, or something."
"I'm taking a break, relaxing a little, enjoying an overrated TV show or whatever this is - not really minding my business," you say, but your smile is so audible it's fucking offensive. And she's - she's maybe, definitely into that. Like the fucking embarrassment in this is turning her on. Ryujin puts the tip of her finger in the waist of her shorts, experimentally, gently, this small brush and press to her sensitive lower stomach. And it's true. All she hears is her own breathing in the receiver, a bit labored over the slightest, least indecent touch. It's amazing, how much her body can want even when her head can't seem to catch up.
"What do you like?" she asks. “You’re a person, working bits and all, something’s gotta get you all worked up and flustered, no?”
"Will you believe me if I tell you this is my absolute favorite?"
"Do you always dodge the question?"
"It's just like a courtesy," you clarify, "it's not personal."
"Now I sound like a desperate pervert."
"On the contrary," is your warm, buttery reply, and it is fucking aggravating just how well this works on her. "I think there are much better things people can say about you."
God, that - the thought, the possibility of something about her that has nothing to do with how 'thick' or 'thin' her thighs are, or the silhouette of her ass in safety shorts, or how her voice makes guys want to ask if they can take her home and fuck the answers from her, or any of that; it's kind of liberating, just a tiny bit. That it can be a good thing for some reason. God.
Ryujin rubs herself. "Yeah, well."
She wants it all the same and says nothing, shifting a little until her hips tilt slightly upwards, letting her pull at the drawstring of her shorts, loosening the grip. She's already kind of feeling woozy in all the best ways, soft and feminine in how she slides her hand underneath her shorts. Over panties first, with no clear idea if you can tell and honestly, too distracted to wonder about that, if she should care or not, too caught up with her fingertips over the raised seam in her underwear - where the fabric's wet from her.
A shush comes into the line when Ryujin swallows.
The ache between her legs grows louder.
"You still there, Ryujin?"
"Of course," and then, she finds a little more reassured finality: "fuck, yeah, fuck. Please, I..."
"Ryujin," you say with all the calm and control in the world, "talk to me."
-
(So - truthfully, honestly, factually - you are a total wreck.
You're sitting there in a heap of bedsheets and a cold sweat when Ryujin finally mutters into the silence, "thanks, for that, I, uh- that felt really good, exactly what I needed," and hangs up before you can ask about her day or comment on the weather or suggest calling back tomorrow.
She is just perfect, the way she lets a small "I..." slip when she's close. Perfect, how she groans her little broken, satisfied sigh of a yes, her last, fleeting exhale just a sweet, high, barely there please, her body tensing with every little shudder and moan and pant. How the pace goes fast and then slow - like she's gotta think it out a second, her own fingers bringing her closer and closer until there's nothing but a flurry of movement and ragged breaths - an enthusiastic little mmph noise - followed by Ryujin's wet and slick little laugh that sounds like relief.
Like you did something to help, like she needed you and wanted you.
There's cum sticking all up your torso and along your wrist, the inside of your thigh - everywhere you could manage, frankly - and, shit, it's not fair, you realize:
She can find you, whenever she needs you.
And you -
You're just sitting here. Nowhere near sure she'll even call again.)
-
There's a sizable difference between being lonely and being alone, Ryujin thinks, running the cloth under the stream of the shower and then pressing it damp against her throat, wiping at the backs of her knees.
Lonely means that something's missing - it's something she feels when she catches a glance at the handsome arm reached around Chaeryeong's waist, the way she dances so close to someone she just met, or whenever she tells her that she's thinking about, maybe, probably, definitely, absolutely going home with him if her friends don't stop her from leaving. God, her smile is always so cute when he's near. When someone's calling her over for drinks - hips sashaying like she doesn't know the whole bar is staring at the creases where her thighs flare into her ass - because he gave her a look from across the room, and she's swaying from drink to drink.
Like, of course, they're fucking; it's a known, unsaid thing.
She knows it, he knows it. Chaeryeong fucking owns it.
Alone however, is just what it says on the tin.
That's something else Ryujin has yet to learn - that everyone loves differently, cares for different things. Yuna is still single after all, and she can never shake the feeling that it's simply to spite her for some perceived slight or another; Yuna can't live without company, no matter how brief or short or meaningless, so perhaps it's better she never catches on or finds anyone worth keeping around.
And Yeji?
Ryujin sighs, rakes the comb through her wet hair.
The showerhead is running hot between Ryujin's fingers, and the water coming off of her skin turns to steam instantly, filling the bathroom with a permanent cloud, stuck in flux - rising towards the ceiling. She passes her fingers under it, watches the flow, a quiet hm escaping the back of her throat - and she considers the way it feels beating against her throat and chest.
Down the concave curve of her stomach. How it burns red right over her thighs. The pressure slips and sinks low, lower - and when she puts a palm out for a little stability, her left leg can't help but buckle just so, lifting itself out and off to the side. So she stands, toes pointing against the shower floor, face first into her arm against the cool tile.
Ryujin sees where the rivulets of water have gathered above her clavicle - feels them trail down over the tightness in her breasts and between. A couple images pass through her mind at once - thoughts of fingers trailing a line back up the center of her body and a gentle tap against her chin, turning her face to some perfect all-consuming kiss - a hand squeezing at her calf, rubbing her muscles gently - Yeji smiling into the crook of her neck, the grasp on her hip, wrist flexing. Her back bowed and fingers, broad and experienced -
"Don't need you," Ryujin quietly says to nobody, which -
You're doing so well, Ryujin hears back in her imagination, you're so beautiful, you can keep this up, I know you can. I bet it feels good, doesn't it? Just let go and I'll...
Ryujin whimpers out. She can feel that line deep inside her going taut, buckling in her core, the reverberations down to her wrists and fingertips and toes. If she didn't have the wall in front of her, she knows she'd be on her knees - kneeling to the hot water pulsing around the knots of nerves right behind her clit. The pressure hitting her like the crack of a whip.
"Fuck me," she says to no one, gasping in that way you only can when no one is listening.
Yeji's smile is what's gotten her this close so many times, the smell of the ends of her hair tickling Ryujin's nose. Hell, she can't stop thinking about the way her nose crinkles or her dimples flare just when she finds Ryujin's name in her mouth.
It's not fair.
She's so close to cumming and letting whatever happens happen. The slick of her release pouring right out into the drain of the shower, washed away with the excess. So when her whole hand shifts and catches in just the right, delicious, frustrating way, Ryujin inhales so deep through the end of the sentence that, as a result, her knees wobble.
She feels like fucking crying.
It's that sweet little lilt in Yeji's voice, saying things like: "It's alright. I promise you can keep this up a little longer." And "Oh, god, baby." And, at worst, the way her voice shakes with a "come here, honey. Let me-"
Ryujin has to catch herself when her footing slips a little from under her. Then, your voice, coming in distant at first, grows louder, clearer. Into something catastrophic, right against her throat, like it knows the very inside-and-out of her, "go on. Fuck, please, cum all over me, baby - show me a face no one else gets to see."
And for the first time,
Ryujin gets herself off. Alone.
She moans and sighs out. Gasps, "there you go-" and whispers an, "ah, jesus." She manages the most silent, the least decipherable, fuck, as it leaves her mouth like a prayer. Her left knee twitches, body curling into itself, and her hand moves - fingers closing and her eyes clenched shut, a wave, cresting - she just-
Collapses.
Wanting: Yeji, sure - and she came - but the only thing she can really wrap her head around is the truth that she's so, utterly fucked.
-
"Are you sure there's no one you can bring?" Yeji asks in the middle of slapping the ever-loving shit out of a coffee maker that has, for as far as anyone can remember, never worked.
"Uh," is Ryujin's inconvenienced reaction, the tips of her fingers idly sorting through her credit card statements, which a more-sober, less-horny version of herself is a little out of sorts over. "I'm not sure there's anyone I'd want to bring."
"Uh huh," Yeji replies.
She pauses and rests the bottom edge of the coffee maker on the edge of the kitchen counter, stopping herself mid-smack - leaning away to try and give the stupid thing a once-over.
"Who the hell says it's got to be someone you wanna make babies with? Maybe it's just someone you'd think would look good beside you, smiling at the cameras with. Or."
"Or."
Yeji's lips tilt. "Or someone you wouldn't mind screwing in the bathroom."
Ryujin spins the pen in her fingers and gives Yeji a look that says back off and can you chill out already, in the sort of way it takes years to ferment - the silent understandings, the good-natured naggings, the good-fucking-luck-with-that-buddy's. Yeji knows she's getting on Ryujin's nerves. Knows that has never stopped her before.
"In my defense," Yeji clarifies, "I can count at least a hundred people that would crawl over broken glass to sleep with you and, uh-" She knocks the coffee maker off of its stand and holds it gingerly to her chest like some child, motherly. "-I don't wanna take a bullet for your unintentional chastity, Shin Ryujin."
"First of all, don’t pretend you’re doing me a favor here," she replies. "Second-"
"Can't hurt just asking, right? I could set you up, you know, someone you've never even met - no pre-burnt bridges to maneuver."
There’s a world, and Ryujin imagines it for all of a second, where she stands up and grabs hold of Yeji by her cute little ponytail - if nothing else, just to stop the way it bounces every time she steps - and maybe, she also kisses her on the mouth so hard she stumbles. Or perhaps she could pull that ribbon free of its holdings and unravel it down against Yeji's jaw. Pull a whimper, a tiny little ah that says this was inevitable. Maybe they crash onto her bed. Maybe she gets her fingers sticky with how soaked through the cotton of Yeji's shorts have gotten in those short, heated moments - what a world that would be.
"One of what's-his-name's friends? I’m assuming."
Yeji looks annoyed and proud and beautiful; all at once.
"Yes, and what's-his-name's pillow talk is exceedingly whiny about how my best friend is so incredibly standoffish and abrasive and-"
"Okay. I'll go." Anything to stop the image of Yeji with the comforter pulled up to her tits and hair splayed all over the place; red and flushed. Her lips curling with the curve of the sheets and god -
"Just for an hour?" Ryujin asks.
Yeji finally places the coffee maker back onto its stand.
"I mean, nothing much happens an hour into a birthday party," Yeji reassures. "It'll be fun."
"Uh-huh."
"Trust me."
Ryujin wonders just how far Yeji could go - if she knows that she can snap her fingers together, and Ryujin will be there: ready to do anything.
-
Ryujin is trying to go to sleep, is how she'll explain it if anyone asks. Though she prays to god no one ever will.
She tries books. And she tries scrolling aimlessly through Instagram. And there's this one guy she kinda-sorta-dated's updates: photos of a vacation to Boracay, which seems nice; his chest is a little more defined, more chiseled than when she was seventeen and kind of fumbling her way around a college boy and his stupid fucking preoccupation with who should be paying for drinks at whatever run down establishment was his pick of the night. Ryujin makes a face at the screen, pursing her lips; there's a girl in the photo - she looks too young for how her ass is falling out the one-piece. To the extent that she makes sure to send an unsolicited meme she's tagged herself in - like "here is my past and here are his balls", and gets a block and a report as a thank you.
It makes her feel good. That's what's most important.
And then, with little other distraction and a decent lack of luck, she picks up the phone.
It rings for a while before the operator comes in and says, "You're at number nine."
"What?"
"The queue. This call has you at number nine."
Ryujin slowly leans up from the pillows and squints into her bedroom.
"Huh."
"Would you still like to be connected, miss?
Ryujin thinks it over for a moment. Of course you're popular, a part of her mind comments, because you've got a voice like gravel-slung honey-gold. She's imagining eight other girls just like her, laying in their bed, panties on their ankles and thumbs covered with spit. All desperate for you. All curled up - one right after the other - with no fucking idea.
"Miss," the operator comes back with.
The line goes quiet - a few beats, but not too uncomfortable a silence. Then she gets a soft little exhale out, saying, "can I leave a callback number?"
"If you like." The operator considers the idea. "I can’t promise whether he’ll call you.”
“No, yeah.” Ryujin curls an arm under her chest and plays a finger against the swell of her breast through her night shirt. Gets lost in her own consideration. “Don't think he would anyway."
-
A new day is defined by new possibilities, or something or another you read once stitched into a frame; Something you muse over the rim of your coffee, nose-deep in the laptop at the kitchen counter top.
Last night ended a bit unexpectedly - this not considering the couple's awkward fight which took up two-thirds of the evening. Or the girlfriend-slash-fiancée of that guy, which somehow led you to wonder just how old was too old. But as you were logging your final client session of the night a ping came through the employee portal and let you know that someone had left their number with the operator in the hopes you'd call.
You swig back the rest of your coffee, roll your shoulders and shrug. Oh, there are at least a million reasons not to call a number that randomly, offhandedly arrives in the middle of the night and gets patched through a phonesex hot line under the cover of darkness.
The same number could be out there, defacing the wall of a truck stop bathroom, or inked into the skin of a squat prison convict who's got a brow like the horizon. Maybe, it belongs to that married business man that took your personal phone number as his private line and spent all the time bragging how he was going to quit his wife and make a run for it with you - just you - even though you'd rather stab him with a fork than be involved with that kind of psychopathy and are honestly just looking for that extra bump in commissions every time his wife calls to ask the exact same thing.
Your clients call. You talk.
You take the cash.
The point is: there's more fucking deviants out there than there are stars in the sky. You would know; you talk to a new handful every goddamn day.
Yet it doesn't really matter. You're gonna do it. Because you're feeling restless. Because - and it sounds insane - there's at least some probability, no matter how remote, that you will pick up that receiver and punch in a number and the line will connect with the girl who's been on your mind almost constantly for the better half of two months. That you might listen to the dial tone turn into her answering with a genuinely indifferent, "this is Ryujin," or whatever her name actually is -
You're living in a pipe dream. You're probably reaching, actually. And all you know about this woman, is, what? What does it really, factually, truly amount to, the amount you feel you've come to know about her.
You know more about how she prefers to methodically, meticulously begin, then draw out, and finally end a blowjob to someone that ain't you than you do about any detail in her life story, frankly. You're reaching, and you know it.
You pick up the phone and dial.
-
(It goes straight to voicemail, and get this: that’s her real fucking name.)
-
Yuna has the audacity to ask, as she slides into the booth, "who do you keep texting?"
Ryujin's eyebrow arches.
The younger girl nods towards where Ryujin's thumbs are practically flying over the keyboard.
"No one." Ryujin puts the phone on her lap and crosses her arms over her chest. Then the words seem to echo through the inside of her skull, so she shakes her head a little, in emphasis. "It's nothing, don't worry about it."
She's right though - and maybe that's the problem. Maybe that's why it's hard to answer.
Chaeryeong washes the shot of whisky down with a swallow of lemon-lime. Her eyes slide open to Ryujin as she wipes at her bottom lip. Then she spikes a finger into Ryujin's ribs.
"Spill."
It's a dangerous order, and she doesn't realize it at first. Chaeryeong's bad ideas have an annoying habit of flinging themselves on Ryujin, like a bomb dropped at low altitude - sudden, quick, and more than enough to shake everything up. Chaeryeong will make Ryujin go out dancing - and then she'll lose her clutch purse. Chaeryeong will remember she started the evening with a scarf - so they need to walk out a whole block or two to find it.
More importantly: Chaeryeong is not a great drunk.
So, of course she spills. She relays her findings, carefully and as deliberately as she can muster.
"Does he have a nice voice?" Chaeryeong asks.
"It's kind of deep?”
Chaeryeong snorts. Apologizes immediately.
"Not... deep. Sultry. I guess. Smooth, easy to hear." Ryujin tells the two across the table.
Yuna whistles low. "Romantic as shit."
“Fuck, I don’t know. In, like a sexy sort of way." Ryujin raises both palms in a vague gesture. She clears her throat at the two pairs of eyes staring back at her as though the words coming out of her mouth belonged to a foreign language. "Uh. Sort of raspy, or something, sometimes, like he's... on the phone a lot, and you know," Ryujin flushes, suddenly caught and wondering where all the confidence went, "yeah."
Yuna's leaning forward, chin in her palm. "I'm having a hard time believing texting is a sort of standard operating procedure."
"Well try a little harder," Ryujin snaps, eyes finding Yuna's and making herself fucking clear.
Chaeryeong has this look about her, she's trying to keep it all in, but then there's her eyes, cinched at the corners and dead-fucking-giveaways. She puts an arm against the table and points at Ryujin with an up-reaching thumb. "This is the cutest shit, like ever, and you two are texting like actual lovers instead of two, apparently rando-stranger fuck buddies, or whatever."
Yuna - for whatever reason - feels at liberty to throw gasoline on the fire. "Does that mean you think he's going to get jealous if you bring some dude along to Lia's birthday?"
Ryujin sucks in a breath; the fact that he'd never - well.
"Ryujin's in love," Yuna adds for dramatic effect, for the sake of being the worst fucking person. She can be so fucking petty. It's a side of her no one ever sees, because she's just so sweet all the time. Like right now, she's doing that smile-smirk thing that gets Chaeryeong giggling against her hand and then coughing into it a second later.
"Jesus christ," Ryujin starts gathering her jacket and purse. "He's- not- this is- God, I'm done." She slips her shoulder under the strap. "Thanks for listening to me sound like a teenager."
"Isn't that just normal for you," Yuna quips back, pulling at her straw until there's only air rushing through the bend of it. "Where are you going?"
"I can't stay here," Ryujin says as if it's obvious, as well as her point, the argument she's trying to make. "Besides, Yeji is gonna want me to get my dress and shit all sorted out."
"Don't fall in love with one of the robot voices at the cross-walk on your way home, or anything!" Yuna laughs out, giving a flippant wave goodbye.
Ryujin lets her eyes roll because sometimes, she hates her friends.
-
It still throws you for a loop whenever Ryujin pings your phone with a text that says something like:
have you jerked yourself off to exhaustion or is there one more in you for someone like me?
Or,
my roommate is getting pounded through the springs of her mattress, wanna see if you can hear it?
Or,
are you free? I really fucking need to cum. bad.
Each text is something you tuck into yourself. Save and mark and spend all your time in those long-form responses imagining how her face looked when her brain typed out the words for you. You wonder if she's sighing through her fingers or hiding her lips behind a pillow while the heat coils in the pits of her hips.
As time goes by, Ryujin slips a little more. From one text about whatever book or series she was rereading last and another about the sadism of politicians and how people are more likely to agree with what they've heard someone else say than the facts of a given subject, to texts with a few scattered thoughts to strings of sexting that has you cumming into the palm of your hand and through your sheets and in the middle of a dream in which there's no clothes and a pretty fucking filthy proposition.
"How have you been lately," you decide, and consider, briefly, the very strong likelihood this call is gonna send her right through the goddamn roof.
When Ryujin eventually finds herself able to get out: "fine," there's a tell-tale pause, then an even longer pause, that implies she'd definitely rather say anything else. Then she kind of stutters a, "pretty good. Not too bad. All that stuff, I suppose."
And not to say any part of this has felt like routine. Both of you breathing into the end of a telephone and letting your eyes clench tight while you cum all over yourself - imagining everything she told you she wanted you to do to her, how it'd all go: "fucking with my arms grappled behind my back," she'd hum, "head pushed into the bedsheets, you're smothering me, ah- I'd let you cum wherever the fuck you like, but please-" or maybe a bit simpler: "so my thighs are straddling your face?" is about the gist.
A second goes by, another, a third.
"Hang on," you end up having to tell her sometimes, "I need a fucking towel-"
"You really are, huh, jerking off with me- I get you that hot, is what you're telling me? Or is just too much imagining how you'd fuck your way right into my guts through my pretty little pussy? Ah, jesus," the cadence of her voice climbs high before ending up back where it belongs, "Jesus, fuck."
"Can you imagine," is how it'd start, "how good it'd feel? My pussy, or- anywhere, everywhere. I think you'd ruin me for anyone else - you- with how, god-"
You can hear Ryujin shift on the sheets, licking at her bottom lip. Silently cumming. Cumming for you.
"Okay."
"Okay what," Ryujin quietly says back.
The gears turning.
You press your hand into the side of your neck. "Fuck me. Now, in a second. Tell me the last fucking thing in the world you want me to be or do and-"
"Wait."
There's this half-breath. This hmm that almost trips off Ryujin's tongue. Her eyes squinting open to a new thought. You think she's about to be sly. About to surprise you with an offhand fuck yes I'd ride that face like a bus seat; that she might come back with, yes I'll put you right in the middle of the best part of me, god you'll love it, and I promise not to make you cum if you're nice enough not to let your hands wander. But.
It's funny how things are -
"I have a confession," she says, matter-of-factly.
That's not entirely unusual. You've had more of those come through your line in a year than a confessional grate might get in a lifetime. So it doesn't sound like something special to you; Ryujin and you are in this candid don't-ask-don't-tell in regards to payments and the exchange of goods and services, but here you are, still using lines and bits. Practiced.
"In the name of the father, and of the son, and-"
"Funny." Ryujin gets the hint to backtrack. "Uhm, I mean. Remember the roommate I was telling you about?"
You hum a, "maybe."
"Uh," and now the hushed voice from her throat sounds distant, suddenly out of the scope of the receiver, "can I be totally, honestly- just really, extremely honest here, are you- or?"
You stop thinking about the ebbs and flows of her voice, how it dips down then arches up a little. Because now her voice has become something that is nervous, bordering on uneasy. So you stop, take stock and hold on. You weren't expecting a voice of worry or tension, or not at least while she wasn't thrown back into her bed and rubbing furiously at the ache between her legs.
"Yeah, of course," you offer her up.
"This is so embarrassing," she's saying, and some part of you feels ready to sink - you haven't the faintest idea for what, but there is something. Your chest clenches.
You can't help the worry and reply: "Okay, um. I mean- yeah. Me too, I can admit I feel a bit- and you can, y'know, be a little-"
"I'm not straight," she says finally, with a little quiver of her voice right at the tail end.
A blink comes, another - there's nothing coming out of you and you have no idea why that should be at all difficult, so the silence grows long. A new sort of awkward; the kind that you find out isn't just the rush of cum cooling in a pair of sweat-damp underwear. No - this is embarrassment, the kind that taints you.
"What?" You exhale a strained laugh, almost too-bright. "Are you- is this some sort of-?"
"Nope, no, this is crazy, sorry." She laughs. "Sorry."
"You certainly had me fooled." You sit up straighter in your bed, resting elbows on your knees. The moon is filtering through the windowsill and bathing the room in blue - casting light all the wrong ways. Making your own heart beat just a little too fast. "Fuck, um. Can I ask a personal question?"
"Sure." Her voice sounds uncharacteristically soft.
"What are you into?" and you as soon as you ask, you're laughing - because you've heard Ryujin wax lyrical for weeks, pontificate about every manner and way she'd take a cock between her hands, lips, fingers. Every. Single. Place, she wants one in - and now you can't believe this is what you went with: "I mean, like girls?"
"It's probably safe to assume I have some, y'know- degree of- yeah."
You chuckle a bit. The stiffness in your shoulders settling out.
"I've been in love, I realize - boy, with my roommate - for a while."
It's said with a sad laugh - as if this were a little shameful. Some deep, dark secret no one could ever be privy to; some stain on her soul that might wash out only after one final scrubbing with dish detergent and the cruelest bristles. A thing that keeps her up at night -
“Not the roommate, by the way, who we listen to get fucking railed like she’s on-demand pornography every weekend. Just to be clear."
"Good, jesus, that'd be fucking something."
Ryujin sounds more cheerful when her voice comes back through the line, "right?"
You wipe the perspiration of your top lip. You laugh nervously at this girl admitting to being in love over the phone - a stranger, truly, in all ways - to some fucked up audio-fetish sex line personality. And now - the fuck's wrong with you?
"Are you mad?" she asks, and some part of you is wrung. A small string of tension twisting so hard inside your gut, you're losing touch.
"No," you let her know. "No, not at all."
And that is honest. This is honest. There's this itching little scratch all over the insides of your skin that seems intent on driving a fucking wedge. Right at the center of your chest, tearing you apart. It feels as you've lost - not an object, not a material. Not an idea, nor a concept - but a feeling, that for once, was distinctly, overwhelmingly yours, without your wanting, or permission, or comprehension.
Ryujin sighs, this elongated relief coming in. She sinks back against the headboard.
She tells you everything. How Yeji smiles, and it's like the whole fucking room has gone up in lights, just from her and her alone. How there is nothing that she'd rather spend all her days around. She talks and you sit there, silent and listening. She talks about her. Her name and everything Yeji does and everything she wants.
The more you listen, you realize it's all real; she's not confused, or mistaken, or out to play a game or convince herself of something she believes is inherently untrue. She's not frustrated, or longing. She doesn't have this stomach-rolling pit of anxiety digging a cavern at her center because she just can't go through the rest of her life, living a life like everyone else. Not ever.
Because, all you really notice is-
She loves Yeji. The quiet kind. And she's sitting there, legs curled under her ass, crying. Not sad, or frightened, or wounded, just this beautiful sort of awed: it's the kind that only someone who is too inexperienced at crying should have. Where you just-
Look away.
"I'm not taking my phone into the bath with me," is the last thing she says to you, tears flooding out in her last couple words, before you can only offer her a meek: "anytime, Ryujin, I'm here."
-
(Four, five weeks go by in the blink of an eye. A month where you figure it's best to let her text or call or make it clear she wants your voice.
She never does.)
-
Lia is taking her sweet time to apply concealer over the cut Ryujin earned herself trying to get a stupid thing off a shelf - that's how low and unreasonable her tolerance for anything mildly inconvenient is.
"That fucking hurts," Ryujin tells her, wincing.
Lia ignores her.
She keeps on dabbing at the spot on her temple with the makeup brush until there isn't any trace of bruising, or where the jagged scar of a cut ends and skin begins, not anymore. At this point, she has gotten better, has developed a kind of surgeon's eye: zeroing in and unblinking, until every inch of damage is looking like Ryujin did when she was brought into this world -
(which is not perfect, but what it ought to look like, all things considered.)
Lia holds her hands in place on either side of Ryujin's head. "Stay."
It takes less than five minutes, and during those, Yuna just offers from around the bathroom door, "Ryujin, sweetheart, you’re looking hot tonight."
There's nothing more Ryujin wants to do than set the girl straight - the girl can't not keep a chirp to herself, for once in her fucking life. Because this flimsy slip of a dress around her middle feels too tight, the air choked out of her lungs if she shifts her weight onto the wrong foot. The hem rides way too fucking high up her thighs. So, if anyone didn't want a good long look at her ass tonight, they better come up with a plan B if she has to so much as approach a staircase.
"Have I ever not," she bites.
Yuna snorts.
And luckily for Ryujin, Lia feels the same way:
"Yuna, would it kill you to find something productive to do with your time?"
Yuna opens her mouth like she has something to say (she usually does) before retreating further away, the edge of her hair disappearing around the doorway. Then Ryujin's grinning - eyes taking in how Lia glowers a bit back, silently judging the stupidity in Ryujin's expression and also, admiring how good the girl looks. "Not bad, though, really."
Lia tells her with an underhanded wave of the brush and a wink: "historically, you do always get laid on my birthday, remember?"
Ryujin jerks a little, and the scar above her eye throbs into Lia's thumb. "Thanks?"
-
The party is miserable, but it's not Lia's fault. It's not really Yeji's fault either. They tried, that's really all she can say for them - her and her permanent-plus-one whose face Ryujin wants to both claw at and kiss until it’s swollen-
What she really can't wrap her mind around, though, is the guy sitting right fucking beside her. The idiot.
"Really, I'm telling you," her date - who is about 3.5 out of five stars at best and not so much handsome or hot as he is 'okay in a pinch' - grins up at her with the smarmiest of smiles, "if you'd just have taken me up on dinner, I would've spent all our time talking about you. We’d figure out how to enjoy ourselves."
"Likely story."
This fuckwad has the absolute goddamn gall to look wounded when his arm starts circling its way around the space where her dress is suffocating her at the waist, and Ryujin starts to shimmy her way out of hot water - again. God, she thinks, god save me-
"I think," she manages with a stilted grin, "I'm going to make myself useful- drinks, no?"
When he leans forward to grab her hand, it's only so she doesn't leave.
"You're not going to ask for my order?" he presses. The only reason Ryujin hasn't knocked out a couple of his front teeth is because Lia would be the one hearing Yeji whine about cleaning up the fucking mess.
"Just scotch. Neat."
Ryujin's a natural when it comes to smiling fake; it's part of her goddamned job. "Of course," she says, like she's not absolutely loathing him.
"Try the oakier, single-barrel variety, alright," he explains, because what's hotter than a man who's an expert in alcohol and being an insufferable tool? Nothing of course. She hopes he knocks back a few too many and his liver explodes - the painless way out. If god would ever fucking allow it.
She barely manages a half-strangled laugh over the blare of the music before he finally releases her wrist.
The absolute fucking prick.
-
Here's something Ryujin never thought she'd come to appreciate:
Being alone.
It's just her and the breeze through the open doors of the rooftop garden, which is something every bit as refreshing as it is teeth-chatteringly cold. The wind picks up in gusts and billows, until it starts nipping up the fabric around her knees, like it's any one of the drunk, stumbling guests milling about and looking for a noncommittal lay.
Her left foot slips a step outwards, the uncomfortably tall heel bouncing on the edge of her toe and tapping a tune against the brick. Ryujin slouches on the railing that encapsulates the entire terrace, arms pressed over it, hands folded one-over the other - letting the night sky caress her bare shoulders with its wind-brushed kisses. This, is okay. It's better.
Maybe not ideal, but better.
And all it really took was a few fucking moments where she isn't smiling with pursed, stressed lips; where the pressure in her jaw finally settles out enough for the knot in the back of her teeth to fall loose and for her mouth to actually feel, y'know - good.
Not forced, is what. Not fake, or not real, or whatever-
Ryujin almost fishes her phone from her clutch. Almost. Almost texts to tell you that: this fucking night, like all the others in the past month or two or year, has left her feeling particularly done for, and yeah, no, it isn't helping that she'd take whatever would be the alternative if it meant a face like yours came in handy to lean against, or your shoulder or thigh to use. Like some pillow - that's all.
And you are, like. An option. But not, she sighs out, exactly the right one.
An errant chill shudders through her and down her spine.
"Shin Ryujin."
She'd recognize the tilt of that voice anywhere; even if her ears were pounding and her head filled with static and noise, she'd be able to place Yeji at the end of the world. The truth is easy to see, if only Yeji knew where to look: the corners of Ryujin's eyes screw up tight for a second, an immeasurably long time, in order to not do what they wanted. What it would mean.
She does anyway. "I'd hug you," Ryujin throws behind her with an airy sigh, "but I know where you've been."
Yeji's jaw has set at this point; a twist is still in her lip and she lets out this dry, half-laugh, half-not sound - which is the thing that drives Ryujin a little crazy. Yeji turns her attention from the concrete ground, to Ryujin's profile, her body leaning forward, toes tipping in: "sometimes I wonder if my partner in crime can breathe without saying something incendiary."
"Nope." Ryujin offers no further response or follow-up. Instead, the quiet gush of air makes itself the center of attention and a victim of silence.
"Sorry about-"
"Don't be. Don't give it a second thought." Ryujin stretches, leaning a little over the railing. Her fingers arch before her. Her words sounding the slightest bit cold, "can't win 'em all, right?"
Yeji's eyebrows pull together. "That's not how this was supposed-"
"God, Yeji." Ryujin smiles. Yeji hates that she never knows what that means. "I'm trying, really, I am, but you know - I really, I have tried my best, so can we just lay it to rest?"
Yeji leans over the railing - the fucking moon reflecting in these lustrous pools where her eyes go darker than night - and doesn't say anything for the longest moment. Ryujin chews her tongue, and tries to look as interested in the void of stars and night clouds as possible.
"Fuck's going on with you, lately?"
Ryujin just laughs back.
"Really," and the last word dips in a groan. It's almost childishly tragic how petulantly she insists, "talk to me."
But Ryujin has nothing else to say - no witty, scathing remarks. No deadpan observations or funny asides, not even a morose comment to throw back. There are times and moments and fucking periods of her day where she'd happily chew glass if it meant that Yeji would sit there a second longer, be beside her for a while and smile, just smile at only her, once - for once.
Her only response is the worst kind of lie, this soft: "really nothing."
The moment where it slips and hangs between them, when it lingers the longest -
She could reach out, a hand on her thigh, the small of her back, if she could only reach. And Yeji, she'd listen to her, for once. She'd really, genuinely hear what Ryujin says; like she can see it, plain as day, everything there's in Ryujin's eyes, the thoughts inside her head, written on her goddamn face and across the open night air in neon:
I love you. I'm in love with you, you're too close to me.
The seconds pass. They tick, they stretch and grow thin. Yeji looks at Ryujin expectantly, and Ryujin knows. It is something like being put on the spot and called in. Something like a long, pained whimper caught somewhere in her throat.
She is very much still, unmoving, and feeling nothing at all.
Maybe she can blame the alcohol, the dark, the series of events that saw her hiding away behind a bunch of decorative trees and fighting for breath where the wind blows a little cooler. She can pretend like the stars aren't absent above her, and it doesn't hurt a goddamn bit.
“Yeji, I-” She licks at her lip, ready, willing-
Ryujin grabs at her waist with a hand. Her knuckles white around the black of the railing. And with no further fanfare, she spits it out like venom, with no small measure of shame or guilt or worry for how Yeji will take it - or worse: how she herself would react in the wake of admitting it aloud -
“I love you,” Ryujin says, and it pops out of her mouth as neatly as it had the first thousand times practicing alone in her car.
A blink, and another. The look on Yeji's face is hard and blank, as if she'd understood every syllable, but didn't hear it at all - maybe. Her gaze drops, it trails a path along the long line of Ryujin's pale neck. Of the two ways it could ever go in her head, stuck on loop for as long as she can remember, Ryujin had never considered that Yeji might turn this still and vacant. A sudden feeling, a pull or a grip, starts in the lowest part of Ryujin's guts.
"And not-," she hears her own voice falter, "like-"
Then - it's on the back of Ryujin's head and in her hair, a hand curled at the base of her skull and pulling her head a little downward and her, until their foreheads meet. And before she has a chance to walk it back - to stuff it down where it came from and seal the bottle tight - before she can clench her eyes, shake her head, and spit out anything else like the fact that there was not much that had to change, between them -
Yeji just says plainly: "Yeah, hun. Love you too."
And it's shockingly, the most painful thing - that she just squeezes her hand and pats her back like it's all they could ever be. Without even the wherewithal to reject her properly; to tell her something like "don't ever say that again, god," or "oh shit- Ryujin. Sorry. So, no," or at least to spit back with a scathing laugh: "welcome to the fucking party," like what she always does.
"Yeah." Yeji clears her throat quietly and starts retreating back from the brink - with no apparent aim but to pull away as she draws herself away from the warmth of Ryujin's space, "uh, don't forget to say hello to some of the staffers before they go home, okay?"
Ryujin is left with nothing but the air that follows Yeji's outline; left with her heart sinking into the depths of the night; left trying to make sense of the bitter sting ripping her chest in two.
Left with her own hopelessness - the pining - when Yeji walks away.
To be lonely, to be alone; neither are the same.
And she hates knowing she is so incredibly both.
-
The worst part is she knows how it looks.
Her pace just on the verge of unsteady, the way her feet come up from the ground: Left foot, the right. The other. Back and back and forth again, faster and then slower and- fuck.
A damsel, severely distressed.
She sits down on the curb. She wants to cry, but even just the way she looks, carrying her heels and struggling with this fucking dress she wishes she'd never bothered with at all - oh, the tabloids would be sure every detail gets pinned under all the wrong lights. A breakdown would only serve to confirm all the right things; it would paint a story for anyone who cares enough to glean from her crestfallen posture and red cheeks that she is yes, a little broken, and that everyone wants to be loved and she's no different - and -
She sucks a breath. This time, when her tears fall, it's a quick, perfunctory action, no show in it.
Her palms rub her face - and she wipes, and wipes, and wipes - smearing at the foundation under her eyes before she takes a long drag of night air. Deep from her core, filling up her lungs until she can't hold anymore. Until it hurts and stings the backs of her ribs - it's enough for a single, fleeting moment. The street is mostly empty; an occasional car will speed by every now and then and it's those few and far between intervals that hurt most, that nearly shatter her: if she can barely do this, alone, how can she possibly be enough for anyone?
Ryujin’s smiling only to hold back her tears, and it fucking stings. She flicks hurriedly past the lock screen of her phone and swipes through the message stream with blurry eyes - there’s a whole host of people that want to know where the fuck she went, if she's safe, why she up and vanished the moment Yeji couldn't keep an eye on her. And well. The girl sighs.
Finds your name in her contacts and puts her thumb right beside it.
It rings exactly three times, and she hates the number. She hates how many things can be associated with that number in those seconds alone.
Four, the pause where you must have had the opportunity, but didn't decide to pick up - just leave it be. Then five - Ryujin is definitely no longer looking forward to any of this.
Six: it stops.
There's this crackle, and through the night -
"Just what brings you here, stranger?"
For an indistinct amount of time, Ryujin drifts in the whirlpool current of that question; it sinks her deeper, into the currents of your voice and the tone and what it's suggesting and demanding from her. All the things your voice is giving her permission to ask of and with and-
Until finally she answers back: "do you ever just, like, wish," a shallow pause for the hitch in her breath, "something, someone was a little more for you- or to- with you-"
The swell of a smile through the receiver; and you can't help your laugh, soft.
"Sometimes," is what you say, "that's just human, don't you think?"
She doesn't understand how something like love or life or desire should be a universal trait.
"Uh, maybe," she shrugs out, and thinks.
"It's pretty normal," you tell her.
Quiet, as if you were right in front of her.
"Look," you start, and you can hear how she sniffs her nose and swipes the pad of her hand right along the side of it, to catch anything stupid and stupid sounding leaking down to her upper lip. "You don't have to. Let's just hang out. Tell me anything."
And for once, she does.
She talks.
-
(The whole story.
From the first time Ryujin realizes the world is never going to be fair - that she shouldn't have to look at herself like she's unlovable because she's seen her friends be held as though they are - or at Yeji like she's completely unattainable or somehow, unlovable, and that someone as amazing as Yeji should have been loved from the moment she was born.
The rest comes through as fragments: the truth of her career. Yeji.
The balcony, the breeze, the bitter-fucking-disappointment.
And what came of that -
When Ryujin isn't a million and one words per minute, it feels, almost, it feels - she'd swear there was less noise in her own head: this thrumming in her brain has settled out; the walls around her and the echo coming off of them - the booming and pulsing - it's, gone.
Because even though there was an indistinct shape for where she had landed, in the aftermath, and nothing much had changed - all that did. You listen, and that alone makes it so you're both exactly where you’re supposed to be, even if this, tonight - you are unsure, if it will actually fix anything - if anything needs fixing at all.)
1K notes
·
View notes
Text
Amy's fortune cards
The Sonic fandom has long been the kind of fandom that takes minor details very seriously, for better or worse. On the one hand, this means fans will really dig for the diamonds in the rough, latching onto fun character interactions, animations, bits of background worldbuilding, and more in pieces of Sonic media that many would write off as "the bad ones." But it also feels like every week another needlessly hostile debate over Sonic minutia erupts on Twitter, whether it's over individual lines of dialogue, fanart that makes Tails' shoes blue, or the ideal length and volume for Sonic's quills.
So it was probably inevitable that a fandom-wide debate would erupt upon seeing Amy's new gameplay style in the DLC for Sonic Frontiers, which takes the once-obscure fact that she enjoys reading tarot and shines a spotlight on it like never before.
I mean:
The thing is, while I basically always try to tune out Sonic fandom bickering... for once, I kind of sympathize with the detractors? Don't get me wrong, I like Amy's tarot stuff, and people on all sides of the discussion are being overly nasty about their opinions, as usual. (Sonic Twitter remains my personal hell.) But when I set aside the hyperbole and zoom out, I do think I understand why some fans are put off by the sudden shift in focus for the character, even if I think it's cool.
It's complicated. Let me attempt to present the cases for and against Amy's fortune cards
For years, I was always one of those fans who thought it could be fun if they played with Amy's tarot reading, or even leaned into some kind of magic with her. Part of that is my own biases showing, but there's just something that makes sense there, especially when you look at Sonic, Tails, and Amy as a trio. (I would argue that's the real "Team Sonic" these days, especially in the comics where Knuckles is more likely to be stuck on Angel Island or otherwise doing his own thing.)
You could argue that Tails is all about logic, relying on science and technology and deductive reasoning to solve problems. But Amy is all about emotion. She wears her heart on her sleeve, is extremely empathetic, and is very prone to magical thinking - both figuratively and sometimes literally. Her origin story has always been that her tarot cards told her it was her destiny to meet Sonic on Little Planet. She's claimed to be able to "sense" peoples' presences - particularly Sonic's. She's the type to believe that The Power of Love is a literal magical force. So, on some level, it makes sense to mirror Tails's science by having Sonic's other best friend believe in magic. And then Sonic is somewhere in the middle, primarily following his own gut instincts but taking advice from both of them as needed. This isn't totally accurate to how their dynamics actually function in canon stories, but I think it's a mode that could work for them.
Going off of that, it's fun to lean all the way into Amy being a magical girl, or even a witch, using her fortune telling as a foundation. Take, for example, this version of Amy from Diana Skelly's old Sonic cast redesigns from before she freelanced for Archie and IDW. This is one of MANY such redesigns for Amy.
Fast forward to the 2020s, and Amy's tarot cards are, in fact, finally getting brought up again in canon. Which is fun! I like seeing that. I like all of the individual stories involving Amy's fortune cards. This is a fun character trait for Amy, a fun nod to old lore, AND a fun storytelling device, all in one. It's really cool that the Sonic universe has its own thematically appropriate arcana, and that the cards are getting made as physical merch. And sure enough, the official card backs and borders were designed by none other than Diana Skelly, in yet another cool example of an ascendant fan leaving their mark on the series.
BUT... when you step back and look at the big picture, I get why some fans find this shift in focus jarring. At the moment, it's starting to feel like every new story about Amy involves her fortune cards to some degree.
The most recent mainline comic arc to feature Amy as the lead character, 2021's Trial by Fire arc, prominently features a sequence where she reads fortunes while camping with the girls. The Origins version of Sonic CD now bookends the game with scenes of Amy and her tarot cards. Sonic randomly mentioned it in a scene in Frontiers. And now, just this week, we got the (very cute, gorgeously illustrated) Amy's 30th Anniversary comic with a story revolving around Amy's tarot cards, followed the very next day by the Frontiers DLC in which she gets a brand new tarot-based moveset. Even her base melee attack now has her throwing tarot cards instead of swinging her hammer. Again, I like all of these individual things, but after years of it almost never coming up at all, it's VERY noticeable that Amy's tarot cards are suddenly everywhere.
To be fair, I'm looking at this from the perspective of a superfan who's actively following ALL Sonic media. Casual fans - especially kids - aren't necessarily going to be reading the comics every month, buying the thousandth rerelease of the Genesis games, or playing the ultra-hard new alternate ending DLC for a game that came out last year. Each of these stories is going to be someone's introduction to the idea that Amy can read tarot, and that's probably part of the idea behind this unified push.
But to play devil's advocate, for my fellow superfans, I understand why it feels like a very minor footnote of Amy's character is suddenly becoming the entire focus of her personality. While Amy has always been said to enjoy fortune telling, that wasn't really a character trait in and of itself, but rather an example of her being a typical girl who hopes she'll be able to find true love one day. It's less that Amy can literally predict the future and more like her using a cootie catcher or going "he loves me, he loves me not" while picking the petals off of a flower. So I get not vibing with this stuff, or feeling like it's being pushed very hard out of nowhere.
What I don't agree with are comparisons like "it's like if they made Knuckles' moveset revolve around him liking grapes." Like, I get it. Ian Flynn loves shoehorning in his little winking references for us nerds, and mentions of Amy's tarot cards were previously on the same level as other random bullet points from old Japanese manuals. But a multifaceted hobby like fortune telling that opens up so many narrative and aesthetic possibilities is obviously very different from having a favorite food. It's ALWAYS been a part of her story, not just a random fact, and there's no reason why the fortune telling can't be elevated to something more.
And, hell, even if it wasn't an established character trait, there's nothing inherently wrong with injecting new ideas into a character. One of the best Amy stories in recent years, the Free Comic Book Day special "Amy's New Hobby" written by Gale Galligan, came up with the idea that Amy's secretly been drawing little comics about her and her friends. Is this based on Lore? No. But it's cute, and helps tell the story of a younger Amy who's still coming out of her shell as both a hero and a friend.
Certain fans are also looking at Amy's Frontiers moveset and using it as evidence that once again the Vile American Contributors like Ian are CORRUPTING Sonic Team's perfect vision of Sonic with their misinterpretations. And like. Come on. Ian does not control the gameplay. He's a freelance writer. The tarot stuff is clearly something that Sonic Team likes if they made it the basis of Amy's new moveset - and, you know, if they keep approving comics and animations about Amy's fortune telling. None of this gets made without their blessing, and lord knows how much they can micromanage shit and shoot down ideas over the most minor of details.
Like, yeah, Amy's fortune telling was probably conceived less as a sign that she Knows Magic and more as a pretty mundane hobby for a lovesick young Japanese girl to have. But you're gonna sit there and tell me that using Amy's tarot cards for more than that could only be the result of a cultural misunderstanding? That nobody in Japan uses tarot card theming and aesthetics (or the general idea of magical cards) for the cool factor? Stardust Crusaders? Persona? The Astrologian class in FFXIV? Cardcaptor Sakura?? Hello??? Do you think Capcom put Gambit in Marvel vs. Capcom ironically because they thought using magic to throw cards at people was stupid? There's tons of precedent for this! It's nothing like Knuckles throwing grapes at people, be for real.
Giving Amy a very magical girl-esque moveset also just makes a lot of sense. For decades her hammer attacks have literally made sparkly heart shapes appear around her. Leaning into both that and her tarot cards in her new moveset makes a lot of sense to me.
But, admittedly... I do think it's very odd that her hammer is treated as a secondary element here, rather than having her primarily use her hammer and adding the cards for extra flair. If hitting the attack button made her swing her hammer instead of throwing cards, I'm not sure we'd even be having this discussion right now.
But the tarot-cycle and Amy riding her hammer like a witch's broom are fucking SICK and I will not concede on this point
The thing is, this whole fortune card discourse is but a small piece of a bigger problem. Amy's been a character who needed some work for ages, but there's basically nothing you can do with her without pissing SOMEONE off.
Years of stories where Amy's crush was her primary motivator and Sonic went "Ew, cooties!" have lead many casual fans to believe that being Sonic's obsessive fangirl is Amy's entire personality. At best people might call her Sonic's Minnie Mouse. This isn't just a matter of Amy having haters within the fandom - venture outside of that bubble and you'll realize that this is how MOST video game playing people seem to see her to this day. I don't feel like this is a fair assessment of the character, but this idea didn't come from nowhere. No matter how much good deeply entrenched Sonic fans may see in their old dynamic where Amy perpetually chases Sonic, this is a very real problem that Sonic Team has to contend with for their leading girl. Of course all those games where the way-past-cool protagonist thought Amy was annoyingly clingy and tried to get away from her made people think less of her.
If new stories were to go back to emphasizing Amy's crush on Sonic a little more, they'd probably be taken as confirmation that Amy's just the girl with a crush on Sonic and that this is her entire personality. Conversely, when the crush is played down, you piss off the hardcore SonAmy fans who don't seem to understand that they're Charlie Brown and Sega is Lucy holding the football. You can't win.
And so here we are. In the absence of what was once her defining trait, now reduced to an occasional blush or wink in Sonic's direction, new stories are trying to mine Amy's past for additional material to work with. Having been a thing fans wanted to see for years, right now we're getting a lot of tarot, but we're also getting reminders of her compassionate nature and her desire to go out of her way to help the little guy. This is an ongoing process. I continue to hope that her bubbly, exuberant demeanor can shine more in future stories. Now, I also hope that the tarot stuff gets balanced out a little better with other traits of hers. But I don't want it to go away. I think it's fun.
This course correcting is far from exclusive to Amy. Knuckles is getting stories that remind us that he's a competent fighter, an experienced treasure hunter, and even a self-taught archaeologist after years of him being perceived as either the dumb one or just the guy who stands in front of the Master Emerald all day. And Tails has been getting some stories reminding folks that he's a capable hero in his own right and not just Sonic's timid kid sidekick.
But no supporting character will ever compete with the sheer number of new ideas Sega has tried with Sonic himself. Like Amy, his Frontiers moveset has also given him half a dozen new superpowers that he never had before, from the Cyloop to air-slicing projectile attacks to his own take on Shadow Clone Jutsu and beyond. He's also been a hoverboarder, a swordsman, a time traveler, an Olympic athlete, a racecar driver, cursed with a Flame of Judgment, imbued with alien power, a fucking Werehog with stretchy powers, and on and on and on.
If Sonic can do all that, Amy can try out using a tarot-cycle.
Anyway TL;DR the REAL problem with Amy's current characterization... is where the FUCK is Amy's bestie, Honey the Cat???????
1K notes
·
View notes
Text
Family Friend [PG10]
Summary : You and Pierre had been dating for a while but the last thing you expected was to see a picture of you kissing on social media. Except that's not how your brother's found out it was him.
Pairing : Pierre Gasly x Leclerc!Reader
Warnings: Google Translate French
When you woke up that morning, the last thing you expected to see was a billion text messages from only three people. Charles, Arthur, and Lorenzo. Reading through the texts, they were all variations of
You looked down with Pierre’s arm tightly wrapped around your waist. You opened the Twitter well now X app to see millions of pictures of yourself kissing a guy -Pierre- explaining all the texts from your brothers. Your face dropped as you shook Pierre awake
‘When were you going to tell us?’
‘Who is that?’
‘What the hell Y/N’
“Amour? Qu’est-ce qui ne va pas?” (Love? What’s wrong?) He asked, voice deep and full of sleep
“We’ve been caught. There’s pictures of us kissing. My brother’s have already seen it” You panicked as he pulled you closer now more awake.
“Chérie. Take a deep breath.” (Darling) You copied his breathing. Your head placed against his chest, his heartbeat against your ear resting right above his heart, relaxing you more.
“I guess. I miss your blonde hair” You changed the subject as you always did when you panicked.
“Now let’s see this picture?” He muttered, taking your phone and looking at it
“Okay. So it’s just a picture of you kissing someone. It’s also a very old picture Chérie” He rubbed your arm gently with his hand
“You’re changing the subject. This could be anyone in this picture, so let’s continue with our plans of a day on the boat. There’s gonna be other people there, so let’s get ready for that” You nodded, kissing his jaw.
An hour later, you were following Pierre onto Charles’ boat after not answering any of your brother’s texts. Lando thankfully followed behind you so it didn’t look too suspicious. Not that he knew that you were using him to hide your panic.
“Look who finally showed up” Charles rolled his eyes, and you dropped your head
“It’s an old picture. I promise. I was like nineteen in those pictures. Like four years ago” you sighed, sitting down next to Pierre. It's more like you had been hiding your relationship for four years. It was perfect. You got to quarantine together and just pretend it was because Pierre’s house offer had fallen through. Well, it had, but he definitely could have got another.
“Qu'est ce qui ne vas pas chez toi?” (What is wrong with you?) Arthur asked Charles, pushing him aside and wrapping his arms around you from behind. Being just a year younger than Arthur, you had always been close. He was more interested in who it was to annoy you about it than Charles, who wanted to kill whoever it was. Lorenzo just wanted to be nosey and know all the details. A little longer, you were talking about stories of your childhood with the Leclerc brothers. Pierre had left to go to the bathroom and then get the next round of drinks.
“Y/N started a fight once, and it got a little too violent” Arthur laughed, and you shook your head
“I did not start the fight. I joined in on the fight and got violently attacked” you replied, rolling his eyes
“Violently attacked?” Lando asked, and you nodded
“Enzo pushed Cha. Who fell into me, and I went through the glass table. Maman was not happy. I broke her glass table but was even less amused when she realised I was bleeding” You looked at Arthur, who was sitting on the other side of you.
“It’s a nice scar now. One for the history books” Arthur laughed
“What scar?” Pierre asked, handing you a glass of wine as he took his seat back next to you, his hand instinctively going to your thigh, which was hidden by the table you were sitting at.
“The one from going through the table when the boys were fighting”
“The one on your right ribs?” He asked, and you nodded. He paused only now, just realising what had left his mouth. Shit.
“Que viens-tu de dire?” (What did you just say?) Charles asked, standing up and rounding the side of the table
“I didn’t” He shrugged, and you rolled your eyes
“It’s not exactly hidden, is it?” You asked with a shrug
“I’m sure Lando even knew it was there” you added, and Lando shook his head
“Of course you didn’t” This really wasn’t how you wanted your relationship to come out. Your leg bouncing under the table. Arthur took your hand, giving it a squeeze, knowing exactly how this was about to go. Arthur had definitely pieced it together today, and he didn’t care.
“C'est bon. Il s'en remettra” He whispered in your ear as Charles continued to go off on Pierre for getting with his little sister. You stood up, pushing Charles back
“Shut up! Charles. You’re not my keeper. No wonder I spent the last twenty-three years hiding all of my relationships. Including this one. Pierre looks after me, Charles. More than you ever had during your travelling. It’s all I’m the best with you. Arthur’s never been good enough, I’ve never been good enough. So stop it, will you?” You shook your head walking inside the boat, Pierre, following behind you. His arms wrapped around your waist as your hands rested against the counter. Your head fell back onto his chest as you tried to hold back your tears. His head resting on your shoulder.
“Amour. Je t'aime et je t'aimerais toujours” (Love. I love you and always will) He kissed your neck softly as his thumbs gently rubbed against your hips.
#f1 x reader#f1#f1 fanfic#f1 imagine#f1 fic#charles leclerc x reader#charles leclerc x sister!reader#charles leclerc x sister#arthur leclerc x reader#arthur leclerc x sister!reader#pierre gasly#pierre gasly x reader#pg10 x reader#pierre gasly x leclerc!reader#lando norris x reader#pierre gasly x you#pierre gasly x y/n
880 notes
·
View notes
Text
Wingwomen
Hardersson x Child!Reader
Part of the Big Adventures Universe
Summary: The Wingman episode
"We are your wingwomen for today," Morsa says to the camera attached to the car," This is Pernille Harder. She plays for Denmark. She plays for Chelsea." She smiles at Momma. "I know you pretty well, I can tell you that."
"You do," Momma says," I can introduce you too. Magdalena Eriksson, captain for Chelsea FC. Playing for the Swedish national team, making a lot of tackles on the football pitch but, also, at home sometimes."
Morsa laughs awkwardly. "Oh, okay."
You laugh too and Morsa reaches back to wiggle your leg. "And our little baby," She says," y/n. The future of Sweden."
Momma rolls her eyes as she pulls out of the spot. "Denmark."
"Sweden."
"Denmark."
You giggle again. "I like Arsenal!"
Momma and Morsa both groan and you beam a sunny smile.
"We started off as just friends, playing together for the same team in Sweden," Morsa says during the drive," Pernille asked me if I wanted to take a math course with her and then we studied math. And yeah, the rest is history."
"Momma doesn't like math!" You say from your seat as you make your girl-swan and girl-moose kiss.
"I like math, princesse!"
"Don't teach me math," You say back, sticking out your tongue.
Morsa laughs. "Now the producer wants to hear about the photo."
"The photo."
"The photo, yeah."
Momma smiles. "Which one? The one with us or Princesse? Because both of them kind of blew up."
"Our one first."
"It was taken at the world cup.. Yeah, after the game I kissed you. The picture was taken and we suddenly just had twenty-thousand more followers on Instagram and Twitter. I didn't get it, like, what happened?"
"After that picture," Morsa says," We really became role models. A lot of people were looking at us and were happy to be able to see that people can be open. If you're two girls in love or a girl and a boy or two boys, it doesn't matter, whatever you are. That's the message we wanted to share. It was a complete coincidence that the picture was taken but it ended up becoming a really beautiful thing."
"And the medal picture?"
"The medal picture," Morsa says softly. She turns her head to look at you. "What's the medal picture, princesse?"
"When I was wearing your medal!" You reply with a silly grin," I was very little but you still gave it to me."
"She did," Momma says," We've got that picture framed somewhere in the house. It was very cute."
"I was just making sure she understood how heavy it was," Morsa laughs," For when she wins her own."
"I'm gonna win a World Cup medal!" You insist.
"Of course you are." Morsa presses her finger to her ear to listen to the producer man before turning to Momma again. "Who or what convinced you to join Chelsea? Anyone in particular?"
Momma laughs. "Morsa thinks she's the reason we moved to Chelsea, princesse."
"She is," You say, stubbornly crossing your arms over your chest," Could've stayed at Wolfsburg."
Momma rolls her eyes. "I just think it was just the perfect timing and obviously you were playing on the team."
"It's a little bit of a bonus."
"That's a bonus, yeah. No more bath time duties, no more having to play all the time. You definitely have your uses."
"Morsa plays with me a lot," You cut in," And she does my hair in the morning. It's not always good but she tries."
Morsa turns to look at you in betrayal. "What do you mean it's not always good?!"
You shrug. "Sometimes you tug too hard."
Morsa still looks at you, mouth open wide before she reaches back to tickle your sides. You shriek and try to wiggle away but you're still strapped into your seat so you can't go anywhere.
"Do you have a funny story about the party?" Morsa asks," After winning the league?"
Momma's face lights up. "Ugh, yes!"
Morsa hides in her hands. "Are we really sharing this?"
"Morsa got excited," You say," Because she had a party with the team and forgot that she's too old to party."
"I'm not old!"
"Yes you are."
"No I'm not!"
"You're a Morsa. All Morsa's are old! You're too old to party! You went blergh everywhere!"
Morsa rolls her eyes and looks at the camera. "Because of Covid, because of everything, I hadn't been able to party in over a year. I didn't really know how much I could handle in that evening and..."
"And Morsa threw up in the toilet!"
"And I was taking care of her," Momma says," Like the good girlfriend that I am."
Morsa smiles weakly as you giggle. "Yeah, you had to do girlfriend duties."
"And Millie had to take over babysitting the princesse."
Momma pulls up to the restaurant and you eagerly look out the window, kicking your little legs. It's not often that you get KFC.
"Okay, Pernille," Morsa says," It's time. It's called The Colonel's Quiz." She pulls out a little KFC bucket.. "You can start."
"I'll take the first one."
"And just so you know before we start, Princesse gets to choose a forfeit for the loser so there's a lot at stake, okay?"
"Okay," Momma says," What is my favourite food?"
"I would say..." Morsa thinks for a moment. "Like sushi or Japanese food."
Momma nods. "It's Japanese slash Mexican."
"That's what we had yesterday!" You giggle.
"That's right, princesse. I got one correct answer!"
"Okay, so the next one," Momma says," What is my worst habit?"
"It's you sometimes ask too many questions," Morsa replies.
You think for a moment. "Er...You make me speak English at home!"
Morsa and Momma laugh.
"I said I ask questions before I try to figure it out myself."
"Two points for Morsa!" You announce. You like this game. It's fun.
"How many times did I win player of the year in Denmark? I mean, if you were a really good girlfriend, you actually should know."
"Five times?" Morsa asks, not looking too sure.
"Is that your final answer?"
"No, six times?"
You frown. That doesn't sound right either.
"Is that your final answer?"
"That's my final answer. Is it correct?"
"Yes?"
"Is it correct?"
"Yes, it is."
"Oh my god!" Morsa celebrates
You shake your head. "No," You say," Morsa's wrong. It's seven, I counted all of them at home."
Morsa laughs. "Pernille, the producer says she's right. It's actually seven."
Momma's eyes go wide. "Oh, is it? I thought it was six!"
"Momma's won too many," You say earnestly," 'Cause she can't keep up with how many she has." You shake your head almost in disappointment. When you win prizes when you're older, you're never going to forget how many you've got.
"Two out of three is not bad," Morsa says.
"No."
"Not let's see how well you know me." She picks up the slip of paper. "Who is my favourite music artist slash band?"
"Er..." Momma looks a bit worried. "Leonard Cohen or something."
"It's Lana Del Rey."
"Are you sure?"
"Momma," You say," I think Morsa knows who her favourites are."
Morsa laughs. "Thanks, princesse. Next question, what is my party trick?"
"I know! I know!"
"Let Momma answer."
"Er..." Momma doesn't look like she knows. "You get drunk and you throw up."
"Shut up!"
"Those are bad words, Morsa! You have to put money in the swear jar when we get home!"
"Yeah, I don't know."
"Princesse?"
"Morsa can open a bottle of beer with her teeth!" You say," She's going to teach me when I get all my big teeth!"
"Magda!"
Morsa tries to change the subject quickly. "Zero points for you, Pernille. We already have a winner but let's do the last question just to see if you know me a little bit. Which team did I make my international debut against?"
Momma blows out all of her and you giggle.
Morsa sighs in disappointment. "Oh, okay well...I'm gonna get out of this car now. This is not good."
"I think it is..." Momma thinks for a while. "Ukraine?"
"No."
"Hungary?"
"No. It's France."
Momma sighs.
"The forfeit is yours. Princesse?"
"Er..." You hadn't actually thought of one in advance. "Er...You...You have to order the food in an English accent!"
Momma looks stricken and Morsa laughs, leaning back to give you a high five.
"Princesse..."
"You have to!" You wave a finger at her," 'Cause you got the forfeit! Forfeits aren't meant to be fun!"
"Are you ready to practice your accent?" Morsa teases.
"You have to say please and thank you a lot," You say helpfully.
Momma pulls up to the window and in a shockingly bad accent speaks," I'd like a Twister Wrap and I'd also like a salad, please."
"Is there anything else?"
"Princesse, what do you want?"
"Popcorn chicken! And er...Fruitshoot!"
"What flavour?"
"Apple and blackcurrent!"
"And a kid's popcorn chicken and an apple and blackcurrent fruitshoot," Momma says in her bad accent.
As you pull away from the machine, the car is filled with laughter.
"Yeah," Morsa laughs," I don't know what the hell that was but it was great. It's so funny that you're like a farmer girl from Denmark doing a posh accent."
The laughter keeps going when Momma drives past the window and then tries to take the tray with her.
"If you're going to eat in the car," Morsa says as she passes you your food and drink," Then you can't spill anything."
"I won't!"
"Okay," Morsa says as you start the drive through," We've got another question here. Which of the players from our team would you want to see doing a Wingmen episode?"
"Well," Momma says," The first one I was thinking about is Sam and Erin."
You giggle. "Sam and Erin are very silly. Like clowns!"
"What about Emma Hayes doing an episode?" Morsa offers.
"Yeah that...that wouldn't be quiet," Momma replies.
"Coach Emma talks a lot," You say," She talks and talks and talks-"
"Where are we?"
"-And talks and talks and talks-"
"This is Harry Potter's World."
"-And talks and talks-"
"I don't know. I've never seen it."
You stop your repetition to gasp. "Momma! But we live in England now! That's...That's really bad!"
Momma laughs. "Sorry, princesse. I didn't realise you were this passionate about it. Who even showed you them?"
"Millie did," You say," She's fun. I like Millie."
"Is she your best friend?"
You think for a moment. "Erin and Sam are my friends too and Guro but they're not my best friends."
"Who's your best friend?"
"Jessie! I like Jessie!"
Morsa laughs. "You and Jessie are two peas in a pod. Best friends forever!"
"Jessie's my bestest friend."
Momma unlocks the car and hoists you out. "Home sweet home. I think we've been some good Wingwomen. "
"I mean this was great fun." Morsa gets out too, pressing a kiss to your cheek before smiling at Moma. "I loved you English accent, that's the best thing for me today."
"I liked the food!" You say, stuffing some chips into your mouth.
"We're never going to get her to eat healthy again," Momma laments.
"Enjoy it while you can, princesse," Morsa says," Because you've not getting anymore fast food for a while."
You stick your tongue out at them. "My bestest friend Jessie will buy me some!"
#woso x reader#hardersson x reader#pernille harder x reader#pernille harder#magdalena eriksson x reader#magdalena eriksson#woso community#woso fanfics#woso imagine#woso#The Big Adventures Universe
509 notes
·
View notes
Note
Hullo, hope you're doing okay. I was wondering if I could request a smau with Carlos.
Y/N is an upcoming but less known film scriptwriter and has a significant age gap from him (6-7 years younger than him). A lot of fans bully cause she's a struggler in Hollywood and not your typical model either. (she doesn't make the effort to look good for Carlos they say)
There is an Oscar winning film but her credit was taken away and fans finally support her (something dramátic like this idkk your choice!!) ty tho <3
Doesn’t Come Easy. (CS)
note: hi, i’m doing well, i hope you are too :) and yes, i love this sm!! i hope you enjoy! (no summary for this, j read the rec lol!)
pairing: carlos sainz x film scriptwriter!reader!fem. carlos is 29 and reader is 22.
fc: alani (alanikaii on insta)
warnings: fairly aggressive hate comments (happy ending tho)
masterlist here -> masterlist link
^ check my list for all posts! ^
liked by: carlossainz55, carmenmmundt, and 47,104 others
y/n.user: lots of work this week☕️📝
view comments…
carlossainz55: cariño❤️❤️
↳ y/n.user: ❤️❤️
user7: not the messy bun pictures 💀
f1wags: no one could ever make me hate y/n, wtf is wrong with you guys??
vroom99posts: the lack of effort she puts in to talking with the other wags, making herself presentable…why is he even with her?
user2: “work” is making up little movies? nope, babe
cschili55: facecard = 0
y/nhatepage: get this guy OUT. ain’t no way he’s happy with her…
user4: the way carlos doesn’t even defend her in these comments LMAOOOO
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
your instagram story:
seen by: carlossainz55, charles_leclerc, and 39,027 others
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
twitter:
Claire @claireblogsstuff8 •2hr ago
It’s about time someone made one of these threads:
Why we don’t like Y/n Y/l/n, Carlos Sainz’s girlfriend..:
|
|
Reason 1: She makes no effort to look good for him or the cameras. The only clothing she wears to the paddock is jeans, sweats, tee’s, and tennis shoes. Other wags give us dresses, skirts, like?? Try harder.
|
|
Reason 2: Y/n and Carlos have a 7 year age gap… This one speaks for itself………
Reason 3: Her job makes no money, shes mooching off Carlos. Being a film scriptwriter is great, if you’re actually good. Which she’s not.
|
|
Reason 4: She makes zero effort to be friends with the other wags. As a girlfriend, you should try and connect with your boyfriends friends girlfriends. She just ignores them on race weekends and it’s rude and lazy.
|
|
Reason 5: Y/n has no career in her field.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
liked by: carlossainz55, landonorris, and 63,248 others
y/n.user: little 5 year old me would be so excited that i’m finally able to say: my film script that i’ve worked four years on perfecting is finally in the works and being casted and filmed!🥹 this is surreal. i’m going to go cry some more.
view comments…
carlossainz55: hermosa❤️❤️ you’re amazing. i love you
↳ y/n.user: i love you more carlos❤️❤️
user3: uhhuh….
landonorris: CONGRATULATIONS 🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳
↳ y/n.user: TY LANDO!!!!
f1editpics: mmmm it’s gonna be soo bad😭
f1wags: GO Y/N‼️🫶
yourbsf: i’m so proud of you, i love you🫶
↳ y/n.user: i love you so much🫶
user5: mhmmm, we all know where this will lead😐 FAIL
formula1edit: nahhhh💀
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
liked by: y/n.user, lewishamilton, and 2,945,019 others
carlossainz55: Where do I even begin? Y/n, my world, my bestfriend, my soulmate. Ever since we met in Spain 4 years ago, I knew you knew what you wanted. When you told me your dreams, you didn’t expect them to become reality. Yet, here we are. I’m so proud of you, cariño. Te quiero❤️
view comments…
y/n.user: carlos🥹i couldn’t have done any of it without you. te quiero, amor❤️
↳ carlossainz55: ❤️❤️❤️
f1wags: UGH they’re so cute idcccc
user8: i still don’t think it’ll be good. and when tf is she gonna up her game bro
charles_leclerc: congrats y/n!!
↳ y/n.user: thanks charles!
user1: the way this film will flop and then he’ll break up with her💀
cs0ln0: sloppy, yawning, boring
user9: naurrrr🤧
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
F1 Gossip Blog Post:
Goodmorning…I have no entrance for you, because I am shook to the core today. It has been about a year since Carlos Sainz’s girlfriend, Y/n Y/l/n, went to the movie premiere of the movie she wrote.
Today I woke up and saw something that shocked me! Last night, this movie won an Oscar, but Y/n was no where to be found. She didn’t attend the awards and she wasn’t even credited.
The petty “I don’t like her” needs to stop. We need to support her, she’s talented, smart, and yes, beautiful. Us, as fans, don’t know how hers and Carlos’ relationship is. Although I would assume pretty good… (via the recent paparazzi photos, lol)
Her credit being taken away is awful, and shouldn’t be glossed over. Sign the petition at the bottom of this post to support Y/n, and bring attention to the fact that this film happened because of HER!
sign here!
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
your instagram story:
seen by: carlossainz55, oscarpiastri, and 167,204 others
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
liked by: carlossainz55, lilymhe, and 345,024 others
y/n.user: First off, I want to say thank you to Carlos for being the most patient, loving, and kind boyfriend. I see the “she’s not good enough for him” comments and the hate posts. Carlos doesn’t say anything because I simply don’t want him to. I can’t even count the amount of times I have to tell him to not respond. Judging a relationship you know nothing about is silly.
I also want to say thank you to the other wags for being patient and understanding with me. I do hangout with them, I just keep that private. Not everything needs to be aired out on social media.
A huge thank you to fans of Carlos’ that have supported me and my journey with this film. I appreciate all the kind messages throughout the process of writing and even now with the Oscars.
Thank you to my family and friends, for supporting me from when I was a little girl watching movies and pretending I was in said movie for a week straight, writing alternate endings and embarrassing you at theaters.
There’s nothing that can be done about what happened with my credit for the movie at the Oscars. It’s unfortunate, but true.
Oh, also, Carlos and I got a puppy. His name is Calvin, that’s all.
view comments…
*comments have been limited by the creator of this post*
carlossainz55: I love you, cariño❤️
lilymhe: here for you🫶🫶
landonorris: keep your head up, dude😁 miss you!
maxfewtrell: cute dog!! loved the movie too, goat film writer
francisca.cgomes: love you!!💖
charles_leclerc: amazing film, you’re so talented🙏
lailahasanovic: prettiest girl made the best film and is living her best life 🥰
carmenmmundt: keep your head up!! george and i send hugs🫶💓
danielricciardo: you’re slaying with this post💅
alexandrasaintmleux: ❤️❤️
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
liked by: carlossainz55, carmenmmundt, and 227,284 others
y/n.user: back to writing🙃 #quentintarantinoishelpingmewiththisscript
view comments…
f1wags: yesss, queen!! so looking forward to the new script you write 😋
carlossainz55: bonita❤️❤️
↳ y/n.user: guapoooo❤️❤️
user3: i want the love they have
jvroom8: i like how everyone switched up on y/n, i’ve been saying she’s the best wag and no oneeee listened
tarantinouniverse: so excited for your new work!! the fact that you worked with quentin is so awesome!
zendaya: can’t wait!💜
↳ y/n.user: 💜🪩
moviecritic: y/n and zendaya?? duo i didn’t know i needed
landonorris: she’s busy writing guys💅📝
user7: living for your posts!!
maxverstappen1: DU DU DU DU BEST WRITERRRR
↳ y/n.user: ….what has gotten into him?
↳ charles_leclerc: 🤷♂️
↳ y/n.user: *cough* lestappen *cough*
↳ maxverstappen1: oh my
↳ alexandrasaintmleux: AHAHA i live for lestappen
↳ charles_leclerc: 😐
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
(reposts, comments, and likes are appreciated! ^-^)
#carlos sainz x female reader#carlos sainz#carlos sainz smau#carlos sainz x oc#carlos sainz x y/n#carlos sainz x you#carlos sainz x reader#carlos sainz fluff#carlos sainz fanfic#f1#f1 smau#smau#fluff#f1 fluff#f1 one shot#f1 imagine#f1 fic#cs55 imagine#cs55#cs55 smau#cs55 x reader#cs55 fluff#cs55 fic
514 notes
·
View notes
Text
Semi-Final Two
Propaganda...
Mr Knightley (2009):
Johnny Lee Miller as Knightley is JUST SO. I mean the way he says "if I loved you less I might be able to talk about it more" IS JUUUST. The dance scene. The tentative shy smiles. The fact you can see in his eyes the entire time " I am completely in love with this woman. She'll never love me back BUT I DO NOT CARE I'LL LOVE HER FROM A DISTANCE ANYWAY" IS JUUUUUUST
We need to appreciate Mr Knightley more for both his snark and for those soft eyes just so full of love for Emma
GIF by dearemma
I was just going to send in the actual dance but the little panic he has when Emma says she knows his secret is just soo charming. There was some thread on twitter a few years ago about how a romcom man's most important quality is knowing how to look at a woman and JLM is just the master of it in this Emma
youtube
I really feel like the pictures say it all. He stands there, head tilted to one side. He is listening to you. His posture is relaxed. His gaze open, frank, candid. He's not trying at all. He just is.And that's why he is Knightley.
GIF by night-unfurls-its-splendour
Some propaganda, not just for Jonny Lee Miller, but the general interpretation of 09 Knightley. I have some excerpts here from my review of the 09 adaptation:
What I really think is great about the 2009 interpretation of Mr. Knightley is what an easy and comforting presence he is, without being apologetic when he scolds Emma. I think this is communicated especially well by how often we are actually shown Mr. Knightley taking his almost-daily walks to Hartfield, how smoothly he comes and goes, and how happy Emma is every time she sees him coming up the path (usually, just at the perfect moment when she needs something to put her back to rights.)
Here is Emma, feeling lonely after Miss Taylor's wedding. And in the background, walking up to Hartfield--there's Knightley. He's always been there for her, and he always will be.
And also this Mr. Knightley is as understated as ever, but I wanna highlight this outfit and why I love it: This is Knightley’s first appearance in the series and it’s the perfect establishing shot that shows the viewer everything they need to know about Emma and Knightley’s relationship and how it has always been. He sort of materializes, out of focus in the background, but Emma immediately knows he’s there. And to accentuate how much Knightley is part of her home and scenery, his clothes (similar shades of pale tan, white and minty green to the wall behind him) almost camouflage him and make him seem at one with the moulding of her home.
Additionally, Jonny Lee Miller captures Knightley’s playful qualities, and his exasperation is so endearing
GIF by christophernolan
GIF by sashajames
GIF by christophernolan
I can’t be the only one tickled by this Knightley’s frustration with Emma! JLM FTW!
Jonny Lee Miller is mesmerizing in any role he inhabits. It’s 2009 Knightly all the way.
no but can you actually go vote for mr knightley he was FOUNDATIONAL for 16 year old me my favourite portrayal of my favourite austen man cannot fall at this hurdle!!!
He is my ultimate Austen Dream Man, I'm with him until the end. Honestly this adaptation is my very favorite of them all (P&P 1995 is a VERY close second) because it made me fall in love with Emma as a story? Honestly no other adaptation or indeed even my reading of the book made me love it quite as much. My crush on JLM goes back to 1995 and I do think he is one of the better actors of his generation - his range alone is just impeccable. The fact that he can go from Sick Boy to Mr. Knightley to Sherlock to Jordan Chase is really something. Of all the actors I know, his range is the most impressive. But i love how bright and sunny this adaptation is. The colors, it is as vibrant as Emma should be! The Kate Beckinsale Emma is dark and terrifying to me, not at all suitable an adaptation. I like the Paltrow Emma a lot, but it's got the same issue the 2005 P&P has for me -- it's just too short. This is tonally just right, and the casting is lovely, and JLM is just at his dashing best. His face is so expressive, he is so capable of communicating so much without saying a word. His open jealousy of Frank Churchill is delightful to watch. His face when Emma tells him his secret is out at the ball! JLM is maybe the most underrated actor of his generation and I LOVE that he has been multiple Austen heroes. I maintain that in a future adaptation of Pride & Prejudice, an older JLM would make an EXCELLENT Mr. Bennet. He would convey the right amount of grumpy but fond beautifully.
Look. Do people realize JLM hates wearing period clothing AND hates dancing? And yet in Emma he's sashaying around in pink jackets looking amazing and is THAT convincing? That's called BRILLIANT ACTING!!
youtube
A tiny bit of Mr Knightley 2009 propaganda but I love that they put in that bit from the book where he looks like he's going to kiss Emma's hand when he's saying goodbye but then he hesitates and doesn't and I just...it's such a tiny detail but conveys so much!
GIF by myforeverworldofmovie
It’s the only Emma adaptation that really hits the romance notes well. Knightley’s crowning moment of awesome really feels like it (when he rescues Harriet from humiliation) and his subsequent dancing with Emma does make you feel a shift in their relations. Love this adaptation. - This Knightley and Emma in particular are equals. They quarrel, not because he’s telling her off, but because they can have an argument because they know each other, trust each other and care about each others opinions, and there is never a sense of domination of one over the other. This adds so much fire to the romance, and it’s so unusual for a romance of that era (or even one written today!!). - Emma is rich, clever and beautiful and as powerful as a woman of her age and situation could be at the time and she married Knightley for no other reason but because he’s her best friend and his company for the rest of her life will enrich her. - He even leaves his house to move in with her!
Captain Wentworth (1995):
Ciaran Hinds has that perfect ruggedness yet friendliness to his face that makes him the perfect charming Wentworth. And all of the longing that he manages to convey in his eyes is so hot.
Wentworth may be angry/resentful with Anne but in general he is charming and the best friend you could ever have. Ciaran gets the pleasant parts of his character and brings them out, while keeping a guarded coolness (protective camouflage) with Anne.
GIF by molinaesque
I dunno if this counts as propaganda or not, but Ciaran Hinds has a face that looks like it was jackhammered out of a shale cliff.
If a line like 'I am half agony...half hope' comes out of a face like that you know that man has a soul for poetry.
I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath. For you alone, I think and plan. Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes? I had not waited even these ten days, could I have read your feelings, as I think you must have penetrated mine. I can hardly write. I am every instant hearing something which overpowers me. You sink your voice, but I can distinguish the tones of that voice when they would be lost on others. Too good, too excellent creature! You do us justice, indeed. You do believe that there is true attachment and constancy among men. Believe it to be most fervent, most undeviating, in
F. W.
I must go, uncertain of my fate; but I shall return hither, or follow your party, as soon as possible. A word, a look, will be enough to decide whether I enter your father's house this evening or never.
This is propaganda for the next round because I need my boy to be a finalist! But this letter is all the persuasion I need to know that he is a winner
youtube
Ciarán Hinds in this is a whole other level of "a good man" He makes Anne's decision at the end so much more perfect.
#hotjaneaustenmenpoll#semi finals#mr knightley#captain wentworth#emma 2009#persuasion 1995#Emma#persuasion#jane austen#ciaran hinds#jonny lee miller
592 notes
·
View notes
Text
Spiral (Alessia Russo X MMA!R)
Request: Could you maybe do something where less isn’t around to help r through something and r is spiraling more and more while needing someone to bring her back. One of Alessia's teammates has to kind of shout at r and tell her to kneel or something for her to be grounded featuring Mary (and Lucy slightly)
Part of The come Down universe
Warming: D/s elements. Blood and violence (mentioned but nothing graphic- R punches a wall several times).
It was easy for people to believe that you had an easy life, filled with nothing more than champagne problems and affluenza.
All they saw were the press conferences and interviews after fights where you were riding high on your success. They didn’t see the weeks where you trained upwards of 18 hours a day and ate so strictly that even your water content was measured.
They didn’t see how difficult it was to balance your career and Alessia’s, and the weeks you sometimes went apart.
They didn’t see the nagging injuries that followed you like old ghosts.
And they thought the 1% of your life they saw was enough context for them to make assumptions about the rest of your life, including your relationship with your girlfriend.
You had never been big on social media, but that didn’t mean you were entirely shielded from it.
Especially not when the date for your title fight against Justin Gathje was announced.
Dana wanted you to hype the fight, to make a comment about how wild Justin was in the cage, and how your far more technical style would be a good match.
And you thought the spare moments you had sitting in Alessia’s national team cubby while she did her final lap around Wembley for the fans was the perfect moment.
But as you flicked through your Twitter app, you, realized very quickly that it was a terrible idea.
Justin had already commented on the fight and accompanied his post with pictures of you in the stands a Wembley dressed in your girlfriend's jersey and one of him sweating in the gym.
I think a championship contender should at least be putting in the work instead of fucking off with a bitch who deserves better. #gonnasilencethegolddigger
You knew that it was a stupid post. It made no sense because the fight was 20 weeks away, and starting training camp now, three days post-fight, would only lead to burnout and injuries.
You knew that it was completely untrue considering you had met Alessia at UNC where you had a nice wrestling scholarship and she had a soccer one. There had been no gold to dig.
But that didn’t stop the general public from hopping on the hate train.
There were thousands of replies, and mentions and posts clogging your feed about how undeserving you were.
About how awful of a fighter you were.
About how Alessia deserved someone who could support her.
But it wasn’t the comments from the general public that bothered you.
It was the ones from her former teammates that dug into your brain and stuck.
Her own family didn’t want her so much they shipped her off to America, so it’s sad she’s dragged a stand-up baller like Lessie into her mess. She didn’t deserve her state championship either. #alwaysridingcoattails.
Her own family didn’t want her
Dragged Lessie into her mess
The words burned into your mind, so you saw them every time you closed your eyes, getting more and more bold each time the number of interactions went up.
1000
15,000
300,000
2,000,000
You launched your phone across the room, uncaring how it smashed into a million pieces on the stone like it would smash the image on the screen.
Like it would shatter the tweet and the shots coming from people who had never met you.
Like it would change how right they were.
You breathed in deeply, trying to quell the growing ache in your chest and soothe the feelings bubbling in your stomach.
Alessia’s scent surrounded you, filling your lungs and coating all of your senses. It was normally like a balm on an open wound or ice for a burn, the remedy to your anxiety and a promise that she was there for you.
That she would always be there.
That promise was part of the reason your relationship took the dynamic it did.
Except this time, her scent didn’t loosen the knot in your chest.
It just reminded you how much you took from her. How much better off she would have been if you had never run into her at UNC.
You shoved yourself out of Alessia’s locker, you didn’t deserve to sit in it and paced the small room.
The walls felt like they were getting closer together, and the air felt too heavy.
You couldn’t breathe.
You needed release.
You paused at the far end of the room, staring at the white concrete.
Your fist hit the cold concrete before you even thought about it, and you relished in the pressure of the hard surface on your exposed knuckles. It was more than when you hit pads, more than when you hit someone else.
It was perfect.
You did it again.
You weren’t enough. You hadn’t been for your parents. You wouldn’t be enough for Alessia either.
Your fist hit the wall again.
That’s what everyone had been saying for months. That’s what your father told you when you tried to make amends.
You could see how right they were.
Stupid worthless
You hit the wall again.
How much better off they would be without you.
“Y/n?”
You didn’t even blink at Ella’s voice.
You weren’t good enough. How could you ever be?
You had been birthed by two drug addicts more interested in their own highs than in raising a child. Your neighborhood MMA gym was the only place you had ever found food and safety. How could you ever be enough for Alessia who had been raised by loving parents? Who didn’t have to scrape and claw for food scraps?
Who didn’t crave the freedom you found in total violence. In the destruction of a human.
In the destruction of herself.
“Y/n stop,”
Hands gripped your shoulder, trying to prevent your arm from moving as you launched it again at the slightly pink wall.
It didn’t work.
Your hand slammed into the wall again.
It wasn’t enough. It didn’t hurt enough to ease the volcano in your chest.
You needed more.
“Y/n please,”
Ella’s voice sounded very close to your ear and stinger arms wrapped around your stomach, trying to force you away.
A guttural sound left your lips as the arms were finally able to pull you away, and Lucy stepped between you and your only solace.
You needed it.
“Calm down,” Mary hissed, her arms tugging you again.
You were too out of it to wonder when she had gotten there.
“Go get Alessia,” Lucy said, looking over your shoulder towards who you assumed was Ella. “Now,”
You fought against the arms restraining you.
Keeping you from the only thing that would make the ripping feeling in your brain go quiet.
The door slammed shut and you were forced back another step by strong arms.
“Y/n you need to relax, you’re going to hurt yourself,” Lucy held her hands up as she took a step towards you like you were a wild animal.
And you supposed you were.
Wild and out of control. Spiraling into oblivion.
Lucy Met Mary’s eyes when you fought harder in the keeper's hold, your eyes wildly flickering as your limbs flailed.
This was well out of their ability to fix.
“We have to do it,” Lucy said, and Mary instantly knew what she meant.
Mary nodded once.
She knew you better than Lucy did, so she knew it had to be her if they wanted it to work.
It was the only thing she could think of to help you.
The thing that Alessia would do for you
They had only seen it happen once.
It was the only time the keeper had seen your dynamic's heavier side. The only time Alessia looked truly dominant, and you looked submissive.
Mary squared her shoulders, drawing up to her full height, picturing in her mind the way Alessia had touched you and the tone that she had used. Soft, but dripping in authority that had shocked Mary.
She tried to remember the words your girlfriend had used, the way her fingers pressed perfectly into your skin to make you melt.
She pulled away from you slightly, drawing her hand from your stomach to land heavily on the space where your shoulder met your neck.
“Y/n,” She said mimicking the sheer dominance that Alessia’s voice held that night. “I think that’s enough darling. Kneel for me,”
You froze.
A shiver ran the full length of your spine at the familiar words, and your shoulders rolled like a physical weight had been added to them.
You blinked as the order filtered through the fog in your brain, registering that though it was familiar, the voice that had given it was not.
Her arm loosened around your middle as all of the fight left you, but she kept the grounding hand on your neck.
You leaned into it, breathing in through your nose and very slowly releasing it through your clenched teeth.
You sagged with each exhale, sinking very slowly until you were kneeling at Mary’s feet.
Your head bowed, and you rested your hands palm up on your knees as another rattling breath left you, pressing back into the hand still on your neck like it was the only thing keeping you from floating away into oblivion.
Mary stood frozen, staring at you as you fixed your posture (Alessia hated it when you slouched) and all of the tension, her eyes darting up to meet Lucy’s.
She hadn’t been sure that it would work. That you would listen to it because she wasn’t Alessia. But now that it had, she wasn’t sure what to do.
She didn’t know what came next, or how to navigate it without crossing your boundaries.
“Good job Y/n,” Lucy said, keeping her voice as soft as Mary’s. “We’re just going to stay here and calm down, alright?”
You let out another shuddering breath, more ripples quaking down your spine, and Mary very gently ran her thumb in circles at the back of your neck, hoping it would help to keep you settled.
She knew it was the touch Alessia always took when you were anxious or nervous, but she was also very much aware that she was not Alessia.
“And then we’ll get one of the trainers to look at your hand after Lessie gets here,” The defender continued, her eyes trained on where your jeans were slowly turning red with the blood from your hand.
“But for now, we’re going to just stay right here,” Mary repeated, letting her thumb graze the nape of your neck.
*******
“Less,” Ella’s voice cut through the sounds of the fans calling for Alessia’s attention, the panic in it drawing the strikers eyes before the midfielder skidded to a stop beside her.
“What’s happened?” Alessia asked, passing the shirt she was signing back to the young girl who had handed it to her.
“Y/n,” Ella panted, her eyes wide, afraid despite the cameras pointed their way. “I’ve never seen her like that,”
Alessia frowned, turning away from the fans and wrapping an arm around Ella’s shoulder to give them some semblance of privacy.
“Seen her like what?” She asked, her tone low with something… darker lingering under the surface.
Ella shook her head, unable to describe it with words. “I need you to come, quickly,”
“Ok,” Alessia agreed, following after the midfielder with little question.
She knew that whatever had happened had to be bad to cause that look. To have Ella say it in front of the fans.
Ella sprinted back towards the tunnel with Alessia on her heels, weaving between equipment people, and players until they reached the locker room.
Leah stood outside the door, directing players to the other showers.
Alessia’s frown deepened. “What’s going on?”
“We thought a smaller audience would be better,” Leah murmured, stepping aside for them. “Looks pretty brutal mate,”
Ella patted her back and she stepped towards the door, steeling herself for whatever was inside as she pressed it open.
Her breath caught in her chest as she took in the scene in front of her.
It looked like something out of a slasher film.
Red covered one of the white stone walls, dripping onto the gray floor in dime-sized circles to where you were sitting. No kneeling between Mary and Lucy, a dark patch forming from where it had soaked into your jeans.
Her jaw clenched at your position.
It was hard for people to understand but kneeling was something… intimate between the two of you. It was a show of the trust that you had for her to take care of you. A way to reinforce the power dynamic in your relationship.
It had taken you a long time to feel comfortable enough to let yourself be vulnerable enough to kneel for her, and she treasured how willing you were now. How you seemed to… crave the position.
For someone else to put you there didn’t sit well with her.
Neither did the way Mary’s hand was holding the back of your neck.
“What happened?” She grit out, her eyes flitting between your form and the two women on your either side.
“we’re not entirely sure. We just caught the tail end,” Mary murmured, her thumb rubbing soothing circles onto your skin.
Your eyes were closed, but Alessia could see the tension in your posture. She could see how on edge you were.
How close you were to subspace.
She snooker her head. “And you thought that this was the solution?”
She wanted to scream at her friends. To give them a lecture about consent and safety and trust (even though you wouldn’t be kneeling for them if you didn’t trust them).
They didn’t know your boundaries. This hadn’t been discussed. What if it went wrong and they didn’t recognize the signs of you passing the point of consent?
She knew you often leaned into the dynamic you shared to calm down. To let go, but she knew your limits. She knew your safe word.
She knew all of the signs to look for, because you craved pain when you felt unstable (a habit that had lingered from your childhood), and you wouldn’t always vocalize your limits.
She worried how far backward you would slip after this.
“It was the only way I could think of to get her to calm down. She wasn’t responding to anything else Less,” Mary explained, her voice very soft and gentle. “I tried to do exactly what you do,”
“We also stayed away from honorifics,” Lucy added. “We knew we were overstepping a bit as it was and didn’t want to push further than we had to,”
Alessia wanted to snort that overstepping was an understatement, but she didn’t.
That wouldn’t help you.
Avoiding honorifics had been a very thoughtful touch.
That would have sent you careening into sub-space, and she doubted either of them could have handled that.
“Alright,” She said, taking a deep breath.
She would need to talk to them later, but right now, her priority was you.
And getting to the bottom of what happened.
Of what changed in the 10 minutes you had been left alone.
She settled herself on the bench, placing her sweatshirt on the ground near her feet to act as a cushion for you, and taking a deep calming breath before she let her eyes fall on you.
“Babygirl,” Her voice came out stern, but not angry, and for the first time, you raised your gaze from the floor to meet hers. “Come here,”
She gestured towards the spot at her feet, and without hesitating, you carefully pulled out of Mary’s grasp and crawled to her.
Her fingers weaved through your hair, and she guided you to rest your cheek on her thigh once you settled on the sweatshirt. “What’s going on sweet one? Talk to me,”
You nuzzled into the soft skin of her leg as her nails dragged against your scalp, trying to remember how to speak.
How to form words that would accurately describe the tearing feeling in your chest.
“Not enough,”
The words were horse as they left your lips, heavy and wet like they had been pulled from the depths of your soul.
Alessia hummed, her nails digging more deeply into your hair. “What’s not enough?”
Your breath rattled in your chest, shaking through you to your core.
At the depths of it, you were not enough.
You would never be enough.
“I’ll go get a doc,” Lucy murmured before you heard the sound of the door.
“What is not enough,” Alessia asked again, more insistent.
“I’m not enough, Miss,” You said, your voice barely above a whisper.
Alessia tutted. “We both know that’s not true,”
You groaned.
It was true. The whole internet believed it.
“It is,” You insisted, pulling away from her warm hold to meet her eyes. “Everyone believes it,”
“Who is everyone?” Alessia pressed, staying calm and even. Being your stability.
“I think this has something to do with it,” Mary said, and your eyes snapped to her, where she was holding your demolished phone, the tweets still lighting up the screen.
You had forgotten she was still here.
“What is it?”
Alessia held her free hand out for it, using the other to settle you back against her thigh.
“Bullshit,” Mary answered, passing the phone to your dominant, moving slowly around you, like she was afraid to spook you.
Alessia hummed, flicking through the images on your cracked screen.
The room was silent as she read the words that had set you off, and you let your eyes slide closed, enjoying her closeness.
Enjoying the ability to let go, and trust that she would take care of it.
You ignored the sound of the door opening again, and feet approaching you and Alessia. You didn’t care if people saw you. You knew that she would defend you if you needed it.
“Sweet girl,” Alessia said, fingers tightening in your hair, and you opened your eyes to meet hers over the phone. “Let them look at your hands,”
Your eyes flickered towards the medics, kneeling in front of you, Lucy standing protectively behind them with Mary.
You hummed, slowly lifting your dominant hand and holding it out towards the medic.
He took it gently between his own and began to examine it with a frown.
“I think she needs x-rays,” He said, looking over you towards Alessia who was still scrolling through your feed. “And I can wrap it after that,”
“Alright,” She said, putting your phone down. “We’ll meet you in the training room in just a moment. Can you three give us a second?”
The medic nodded, retreating with Mary and Lucy.
“Take your time,” Mary paused in the doorway. “Me and Luce will get cleaned up and meet you,”
Alessia let out a sound of agreement.
She waited for the door to close before she very gently pulled you up from your knees and into her lap.
You rested your cheek on her chest, tucking your nose into her still-sweaty jersey.
This time her scent didn’t set you on edge. It joined the feeling of her warm arms wrapped around you and her chin on your head, making you feel safe and warm and cared for, even when you didn’t think you deserved it.
“You know all of those tweets are bullshit right?” She asked after your breathing had evened out. “They’re just trying to get under your skin,”
You made a low noise, neither agreeing nor disagreeing.
“You are deserving because you are amazing. You are an incredible fighter, and a good human despite the shit hand you were dealt,” She continued. “I love you, and I will always be here for you. Whether you are the world champion, or we’re eating spam and crackers on my bedroom floor,”
Your eyes slid closed and you buried your face in her chest, your lips lifting just a bit at the mention of your favorite snack from college.
From when you were too broke to afford dinner on the weekends.
It didn’t entirely fix the crumbling feeling that accompanied each beat of your heart, but her words were like a tether holding you to reality.
She had loved you before you were a UFC star and she was England's Star Girl, and she would love you after.
That was all that mattered.
She squeezed you tightly and kissed your head. “Let’s go get your hands fixed and then we can go back to the hotel and watch Love Island before bed, alright?”
You hummed again.
You knew a talk about your coping mechanism, about the wall you had destroyed, would also be included after you had come down.
But you didn’t mind.
You and Alessia would get through it. Together.
537 notes
·
View notes
Text
Sylvia Plath did not stick her head in an oven for this! When Taylor Swift took the Grammys stage last month to claim her award for Best Pop Vocal Album for Midnights, she saw that spotlight as an opportunity to announce her 11th studio album: The Tortured Poets Department. The follow-up cut to audience members—Swift’s music industry peers, mind you—told us all that we would ever need to know, and the collective disinterest across the crowd echoed through our TVs.
Folks from all walks of life took to social media to express a multitude of reactions. Swifties clamored to their beloved monarch’s forthcoming era, while others lambasted the terminally cringe title and artwork and ridiculed Swift for making a night recognizing musical achievements across an entire industry about herself—knowing perfectly well that it would send her fanbase into a surge that would, no doubt, overpower the excitement around the ceremony itself.
Quite a few people questioned whether or not that moment suggested that a critical—definitely not commercial—tide would turn against the world’s most-famous pop star. And, perhaps it has—but, to most, it will look like nothing more than a single ripple in Swift’s ocean of successes.
Swift remained relatively hush-hush about The Tortured Poets Department up until its release, leaving her fans, admirers and haters alike with nothing but an album title to ponder about. And it’s a bad title.
If you have never been in Swift’s corner, her taking the route of labeling her next “era” as “tortured” was likely catnip for your disinterest. If you are a fan—not necessarily a Swiftie, but even just a casual lover of her best and brightest work—you might be beside yourself about the first Swift album title longer than one word in 14 years.
In terms of popularity—certainly not always in terms of quality—no musician has been bigger this century than Swift, which makes it impossible to really buy into the “torture” of it all.
This is not to say that Swift being the most famous person in the world makes her immune to having multi-dimensional feelings of heartbreak, mental illness or what-have-you.
But, she has made the choice—as a 34-year-old adult—to take those complex, universal familiars and monetize them into a wardrobe she can wear for whatever portion of her Eras Tour setlist she opts to dedicate to the material.
Torture is fashion to Taylor Swift, and she wears her milieu dully. This album will surely get comparisons to Rupi Kaur’s poetry, either for its simplicity, empty language, commodification or all of the above.
And, sure, there are parallels there, especially in how The Tortured Poets Department, too, is going to set the art of poetry back another decade—as Swift’s naive call-to-arms of her own milky-white sorrow rings in like some quintessential “I am going to take pictures of a typewriter on my desk and have a Pinterest mood-board of Courier New font” iPhone fodder. 2013 called and it wants it capricious, suburban girl-who-is-taking-a-gap-year wig back!
Soaking our book reports in coffee or having our moms burn the edges with a kitchen lighter cannot come back into fashion; the cyclical notions of culture cannot make the space for such retreads.
There is nothing poetic about a billionaire—who, mind you, threatens legal action against a Twitter account for tracking her destructive private jet paths—telling stadiums of thousands of people every night that she sees and adores them.
Tavi Gevinson says it well in her Fan Fiction zine: “When 80,000 people are also crying, you become less special, too.” If Swift can return to one of her dozen beach houses across the world, kick up her feet and say “I’m a poet of struggle,” then who is to say that millions—maybe billions—of people with access to a notes app and a social media account won’t dream that dream, too?
Maybe that looks like a net-positive, but it’s inherently damning and destructive to take an art form that has long stood on the shoulders of resistance, of love and of opposition to power, systematic injustice and climate warfare and boil it down to the new defining era of your own 10-digit revenue empire. “My culture is not your costume,” yada, etc.
The Tortured Poets Department does begin with a shred of hope that, just maybe, Swift knows what she’s talking about—as she sneaks in a cheeky “all of this to say,” textbook transitional phrasing for poets, on opening track “Fortnight.”
But “Fortnight” unmasks itself quickly as a heady vat of pop nothingness, though it isn’t all Swift’s fault. “I was a functioning alcoholic, ‘til nobody noticed my new aesthetic,” she muses, attempting to bridge the gap between a behind-the-scenes life and on-stage performance—only for it to occur while propped up against the most dog-water, uninspired synth arrangement you could possibly imagine.
Between producer Jack Antonoff’s atrocious backing instrumental and the Y2K-era, teen dramedy echo chamber of a vocal harmony provided by out-of-place guest performer Post Malone, “Fortnight” chokes on the vomit of its own opaqueness.
“I took the miracle move-on drug, the effects were temporary,” Swift muses, and it sounds like satire. This is your songwriter of the century? Open the schools.
The Tortured Poets Department title-track features some of Swift’s worst lyricism to-date, including the irredeemable, relentlessly cringe “You smoked then ate seven bars of chocolate, we declared Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist / I scratch your head, you fall asleep like a tattooed golden retriever” lines glazed atop some synthesizers and drums that just ring in as hollow, unfascinating costuming.
Aside from the Puth nod, which I can only discern as a joke (given the fact that he is one of the 150-most streamed artists in the world and is one of the blandest pop practitioners alive—I don’t care if he can figure out the pitch of any sound you throw at him), I think Antonoff should stick to guitar-playing. Get that man away from a keyboard, I’m begging you.
Synths can be, if you use them correctly, one of the most emotional and provocative instruments in any musician’s tool-box. There’s a reason why keyboards defined the 1980s; they rebelled against the very oppressive nature existing outside of the cultural company they kept. There’s resistance in electronic music that, while they brandish an aesthetic that, to a layman’s ears, seems like technicolor hues for any infectious pop track, it’s a genre that aches to tell its own story. That is simply not the case here, and that electronica hangs Swift out to dry when she drags us through the lukewarm “I laughed in your face and said, ‘You’re not Dylan Thomas, I’m not Patti Smith’ / This ain’t the Chelsea Hotel, we’re modern idiots” lines, only to hit us with a softly sung F-bomb that sounds like a billionaire’s rendition of that one Miranda Cosgrove podcast clip.
I used to rag pretty heavily on Reputation—mostly because I thought (and still do, mostly) that it sounded like Swift had given up on making interesting, progressive pop music; that, in the wake of her (arguably) best album, 1989, it seemed like she’d lost the plot on where to go next. But as she’s put out Midnights and The Tortured Poets Department back-to-back, I find myself clamoring for the Reputation-era more than ever—at least seven years ago, Swift wrote songs like she had something to prove and even more to lose.
That was the always-obvious charm of Reputation, even despite the downsides—that she took a big swing from the echelons of her own musical immortality, that the comforts of winning every award and selling out the biggest venues in the world were no longer pillowing her aspirations. Even though that swing didn’t land, she still made it in the first place—and Swift is at her best either when she is clawing upwards (Reputation) or faced with nowhere to go but into the studio and noodle with the bare-bones of her own sensibilities (folklore).
You get something like The Tortured Poets Department when the artist making it no longer feels challenged, where she strikes out looking.
The mid-ness of The Tortured Poets Department will not be a net-loss for Swift. She will sell out arenas and get her streams until she elects to quit this business (a phrase decidedly not in her vocabulary, surely).
She will sell more merch bundles than vinyl plants have the capacity to make, and rows of variant LP copies will haunt the record aisles of Target stores just as long as Midnights has—if not longer.
Perhaps, in five or six years’ time, we will speak of this record just as we now do of Reputation. But right now, it is obvious that Swift no longer feels challenged to be good. The Tortured Poets Department is the mark of an artist now interested in seeing how much their empire can atone for the sins of mediocrity.
Can Swift win another Album of the Year Grammy simply because she released a record during the eligibility period? The Tortured Poets Department reeks of “because I can,” not “because I should.”
On “I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can),” Swift tries stepping into the shoes of the country renegades who came before her—the Tammy Wynettes and Loretta Lynns of the world. But her self-aggrandizing inflation of importance, glinting through via a seismically-bland bridge, is backed by a minimal set dressing of guitar, drum machine and keys.
“Good boy, that’s right, come close,” she sings. “I’ll show you Heaven if you’ll be an angel—all mine. Trust me, I can handle me a dangerous man. No, really, I can.” On “Florida!!!,” Swift calls upon Florence + the Machine to help her sing the worst chorus of 2024: “Florida is one hell of a drug / Florida, can I use you up?”
Even Welch, who is a fantastic pop singer-songwriter in her own right, delivers a grossly watery verse: “The hurricane with my name, when it came I got drunk and I dared it to wash me away.”
Not even the typos on the Spotify promotional materials for this album could have foretold such offenses. I won’t even get into the sonics, because Antonoff just rewrites the same soulless patterns every time.
What separates The Tortured Poets Department from something like Reputation is that, on the latter, Swift made it known what was at stake and who she was making that album for—herself, in the aftermath of her greatest long-standing criticisms (“Look What You Made Me Do” triumphs exactly because of this).
On The Tortured Poets Department, there is a striking level of moral nothingness. The stakes are practically non-existent, and the album sounds like it was made by someone who believes that they had no other choice but to finish it, as if Swift fundamentally believes that her creative measures are firmly embedded in the massive monopoly her name and brand currently hold on popular music. That’s how you get meandering pop songs about hookups, wine moms, Stevie Nicks comparisons, Jehovah’s Witness suit mentions, hollowed-out, tone-deaf nods to white-collar crime in lieu of empowerment and, topically, Barbie dolls.
(Don’t even get me started on the Anthology lyrics, which feature these absolute barn-burners: “Touch me while your bros play Grand Theft Auto” and “My friends used to play a game where / We would pick a decade / We wished we could live in instead of this / I’d say the 1830s, but without all the racists / And getting married off for the highest bid.”) This album and its hackneyed grasps at relevance exist as “Did I just hear that?” personified, but in the most derogatory sense of the notion.
My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys” features another low-point in Swift’s lyrical oeuvre, as she sings “I felt more when we played pretend than with all the Kens, ‘cause he took me out of my box”—perhaps a measure of her capitalizing on the Barbenheimer mania that none of us could escape, not even the musician who spent most of 2023 flying across the world from one country to another.
But you, us, the listener—we want to believe that Swift makes these records because she has the artistic will, drive and interest to continue giving us parts of her story in such ways that they exist as an archival of her life.
But the problem is that, on The Tortured Poets Department, Swift is packaging her life into a form that is easily consumable for the 17 or 18 years olds who pour over her music. Just because her Eras Tour film is on Disney+ doesn’t mean she has to strip her songwriting (which we know can be, and has been, phenomenal) down for the sake of it being digestible by a wide spectrum of ages.
And, sure, maybe that makes the work accessible. But on The Tortured Poets Department, Swift makes Zoomer jargon her bag—titling a song after one of the most popular video games in the world and conjuring flickers of “down bad” and “I can fix him”—and it feels like she’s cosplaying because the Fountain of Youth was out of order.
Now that Swift is in her 30s, it sounds like she is infantilizing her own audience more than ever before—that singing to them at a level that could force them to reckon with something more akin with adulthood would be some kind of kink in the coil or her consumeristic threshold, that writing lyrics that sound like they were penned by a 30-year-old would, somehow, deter the interests of the billions of people who adore her.
If making one, continuous coming-of-age album is what Swift has been doing for 15 years, folklore and evermore were hiccups in the timeline—existing as the most fully-formed renderings of Swift’s own insecurities and concerns. They mirrored our platitudes towards an uncertain future with sweet, stirring remarks about isolation and heartbreak and the unavoidable, hard-worn truth about getting older. On those records, her larger-than-life living seemed, for once, to truly feel as close to the ground as ours.
Now, though, Taylor Swift is at the top of the mountain. Far better artists have made far worse records than The Tortured Poets Department, but you can’t read between the lines of this project. There is nothing to decipher from a place of quality.
Sure, Swift’s fan base will pour over these lyrics for the rest of their lives—insisting they know, for certain, which song is about who. But you cannot place a bad album on the shoulders of lore and expect it to be rectified.
We are now left at a crossroads. Women can’t critique Swift because they’ll run the risk of being labeled a “gender traitor” for doing so. Men can’t critique her because they’ll be touted as “sexist.”
And, sure, Swift is probably too easy a punching bag in this case—and most of the time, I would argue she is undeserving of being a victim of such barbs. But, you cannot write about someone being a “tattooed golden retriever” and get away with it and still retain your title as the best songwriter of your generation. You just cannot.
Sisyphus should be glad he never got the boulder to the top of the mountain—because Taylor Swift is showing us that such immortality and success ain’t all it’s cracked up to be. And, when you’re standing on the peak alone, who else is there left to hit?
In a recent interview with The Standard, Courtney Love said that Swift is “not interesting as an artist,” and I think The Tortured Poets Department proves as much. She has nothing to fight for, no doubters left to drown.
So where does she turn? Well, to boredoms of celebrity thinly veiled as sorrow everyone and their mother can latch onto—because we’ve all had to “ditch the clowns, get the crown” at some point in our lives, right?
The billionaire is having an identity crisis, but there are no social media apps for her to buy up. So she sings like Lana Del Rey and writes meta-self-referential songs about looking like Stevie Nicks.
What’s hollow about The Tortured Poets Department is that the real torture is just how unlivable these songs really are. No one can resonate with “So I leap from the gallows and I levitate down your street, crash the party like a record, scratch as I scream ‘Who’s afraid of little old me?’ You should be.” And normally, that wouldn’t be an end-all-be-all for a pop record—but when your brand is built on copious levels of “I’m just like you!” as the demigod saying it to their fans does so from a multi-million-dollar production set, it’s hard to not feel nauseated by the overlording, overbearing sense of heavy-handed detritus we’re tasked with sifting through on The Tortured Poets Department.
Love’s words to Lana, her advice to “take seven years off,” should be applied to Swift. Now, that doesn’t mean that, to make a good album, you must sit on material for years and labor extensively through the sketching, shaping and recording in order for it to be transcendentally landmark. But it’s obvious now that not even Taylor Swift wants to be the head of an empire—that she, too, can’t outrun the damning fate of being plum out of ideas by hopping in her jet and skirting off to God knows where.
See you at the Grammys.
****
#this review is everything#anti taylor swift#taylor swift#travis kelce#3.6 !!!#hope Pitchfork comes for her too#jack antonoff#taylor swift reviews#the department of tortured poets
357 notes
·
View notes
Last Seen Blogs
mikeywayarchive
mikeyway archive
thewaterloser
The WATERLOSER
rhymeswithmeg
what is up the name is meg
picrewpicrew
Picrews!!!