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awkward-sultana · 11 months

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5 Times Joel Engaged in Minor PDA + 1 Time He Engaged in Major PDA

Pairing: Joel Miller x Reader

Word Count: 6.6k

Warnings: Implied smut, use of Y/N, medical terminology and mentions of medical conditions (child death/miscarriage, head injuries) and operations (stitches,) injuries, drinking/alcohol, cursing, mentions of death, guns and shootouts, PDA (mostly kissing), panic attacks, unwanted advances from minor male characters.

Summary: Joel Miller has always had a bit of trouble with PDA, but he's learning.

I. You loved Jackson, loved this new normal you had never even considered possible in your 30 years of life. You had only been 10 when the outbreak happened, all scraped knees and tangled hair, giggling over notebooks and glitter pens. Now, after losing your entire family, being expedited through an intensive medical training program, and trekking across the country with a feral 14 year old and a loaded gun of a middle aged man, you felt about 100.

Here, in Jackson, surrounded by laughing children, smiling parents, and a wall that seemed to keep out the rest of the world, you felt like maybe you could discover some semblance of the normal you had before.

Even you, Joel and Ellie had bloomed into the little family you dreamed of having on those warm nights when you couldn't sleep for the sound of death in the distance. It had been rough, the three of you settling into your small home in Jackson, especially between you and Joel. It had all culminated one night in a screaming match in the barn between the two of you when, like you knew he would, he tried to run away, afraid to lose another family. You had told him to leave and never come back, so goddamn angry he would abandon Ellie like that, make her lose another person when you had both promised her you'd give her a good life with two people who loved her. Joel had left, shattering your heart and sending Ellie into a spiral that resulted in quite a few fist fights with older kids. Thankfully, she had had Dina to ground her. You had no one. You didn't let Ellie see your heartbreak after he rejected you, didn't let her take on the weight of someone else's world again. Joel had ended up returning a week later at 3 AM with soft words you didn't know he was capable of, promises to never leave again, and a ring you didn't pry about, not wanting to know where he got it. You had forgiven him almost instantly like the lovesick idiot you were, but it took a few days and a few rancid curses and half hearted shoves from Ellie before he found forgiveness from her.

Now, your normal was beginning to lay a foundation. Ellie was attending school, Joel had found his footing as a handy man and patroller, while you were at the medical clinic, using your medical education from one of the last remaining hospitals in the US and learning from the more experienced doctors already set up in Jackson.

Things were as perfect as they could be. Except for one or two things that irked you a little bit. Most specifically, Joel's complete aversion to PDA. You were young, pretty (of course you were pretty, you looked like your mom and your grandmother), and had a growing appetite for physical affection now that you found a man who spoke to every part of you. Joel, on the other hand, struggled quite a bit with physical affection in public settings. He was affectionate in private and had no problem keeping up with you behind closed doors, but out in public...let's just say, people were honestly shocked when they found out you were a couple, and not just because of the age difference.

While it was something you had long ago made peace with, you still found your mind wandering down other avenues of possibilities, such as now as you finished putting away the last of the files at the clinic. It was Friday afternoon and the clinic was closing early because there were no patients on the schedule and it was the first day of fall, so everyone wanted to get outside while the sun was still up and enjoy the beautiful weather before the winter chill settled in. The other staff had taken off before you, eager to go and be with their families. You were happy to stay behind and close up, as Ellie was staying after school to help out with one of the teachers and Joel was on patrol until late.

"Need any help?"

Cursing hysterically, you whirled around at the sound of a male voice behind you. Greg, one of the farmers stood in the doorway, having the courtesy to look bashful for scaring the hell out of you.

You took a moment to catch your breath, putting a hand to your pounding heart and letting out a startled laugh. "Jesus. Sorry. No, thanks, Greg. I appreciate it but this is all confidential information. I'm actually almost done anyway."

He grinned and you had to admit that he was handsome. "Is anything really confidential in Jackson?"

You laughed again, seeing his point. Nothing was private in such a small town. Sometimes 300 people felt more like 30. "Even so, I know at least four people in these files who would be pissed if anyone besides their doctors saw their medical information."

Greg held up his hands in a well meaning acknowledgment of defeat. "Totally understand. I actually have a question for you."

More than used to having citizens pull you aside and bashfully ask for medical advice, you set down the stack of files in your hands and turned to fully face Greg, your stethoscope swinging on your neck.

"Sure. What the problem?"

"What are you doing tonight?"

You blanched, but recovered quickly. This wasn't the first time a man in Jackson had asked you out since you had arrived in Jackson, and you were sure it wouldn't be the last. Greg was the second this week. Of all the gossip that seemed to travel around Jackson, the fact that you weren't interested in dating didn't seem to be part of it.

You pasted on what you called your 'patient smile.' "I'm flattered, Greg, but I'm not really looking right now."

He chuckled. "I'd be careful with that. Pickins' are pretty slim here. Wouldn't want to find yourself runnin' out of time." You pursed your lips and narrowed your eyes, not impressed by his not so subtle implication that you were already over the hill at 30 years old.

"I'm actually not too worried. Again, I'm flattered, but I'm not interested." When Greg took a step closer, you instinctively backed up further into the room. You didn't know if he was purposefully being intimidating, but you weren't a fan either way. "Any way I can change your mind?" he asked.

"She said she wasn't interested."

You jumped at the deep voice coming from the doorway and Greg turned, neither of you having heard Joel come into the clinic. He stood in the doorway, his rifle slung over his shoulder and his brow furrowed deep. In his heavy boots and heavier coat, he looked even bigger than normal.

"Hey, Joel," Greg chirped, somehow unaware of the menace in the room. "I'm just chatting with y/n here. Thought you were on patrol."

Joel was walking through the room this time, sticking to the perimeter, his eyes not leaving Greg. "Horse started limpin'. Doc Jetson's takin' a look at her." Joel had made it to your side and had angled his body toward you, the front of his coat brushing your shoulder. He looked ready for a fist fight. You were just shocked he was being this obvious about getting close to you in a semi-public place.

"Well," Greg continued, somehow missing the obvious body language of the two people in front of him. "I was hoping to talk y/n into changing her mind." A bright, boyish smile. "Got any tips?"

"Don't think it's going to work out for you this time, bud," Joel responded, no longer looking at him. He was now reaching very deliberately across your chest and pulling the stethoscope from around your neck and tossing it gently on the counter next to you. "You ready?"

You nodded, still baffled at his behavior. His hand on the small of your back sent a thrill up your spine and you allowed him to usher you past Greg, who was staring at the both of you with raised eyebrows.

Outside, the sky was frosted and there was a glorious bite in the air. You had been in the clinic all day and the sharp temperature change made you shudder and wrap your arms around yourself.

Joel looked down at you and quirked an eyebrow. "You bring a coat?"

"No, Bev Lanson's daughter fell out of her bed and needed stitches in her scalp at 5 this morning so I didn't get to grab one."

"And Ellie said she never saw you at the mess hall for lunch."

You grimaced at the chiding, but a glance at Joel showed his mouth was quirked up in amusement and he was shaking his head. "Hold this." You only just caught his rifled as he hauled it over his shoulder and plopped it in your arms to take off his coat.

It was heavy and warm as he settled it around your shoulders. You grinned like an idiot as you held it around your shoulders and leaned into him. While he didn't put his arm around you, he let you lean deep into his side as you walked through the town.

II. You exploded out of the clinic, making three women who were headed to 5 AM morning patrol jump and look at you like startled deer, their rifles clattering together as they stumbled against each other. You ignored them and Dr. Hansen's voice behind you as you stormed down the steps and down the road toward the barn.

Your chest was tightening. Your lungs were constricting. Your heart was a hammer in your chest. You were having a panic attack. The first since you got to Jackson and the first in months. Your last panic attack had been when you though the fireflies were going to tear Ellie's brainstem out. Flora's baby hadn't made it. Only two months left on a seemingly health fetus and she had miscarried. Jackson didn't have the equipment for an operation, so you had done your best to stem the bleeding, then held her as Dr. Hansen finished up. She had been bawling so hysterically you thought she was going to pass out and you were the only person she would let hold her.

It was the first time in Jackson that something had felt so truly hopeless. Was this the future here? Watching people die? You had come to Jackson to escape that and now you wrist deep in the blood.

You sucked in a violent breath as you approached the sheep pen, a new sense of panic settling in when you realized breathing was getting more difficult.

In...Out...In...Out.

You closed your eyes and repeated the mantra in your head as you leaned against the rails of the paddock, gripping the splintered wood in your palm.

"Y/N?"

Starting violently, you whirled around and ran straight into Joel's chest. When he grabbed your arms to steady you, you jerked back, your body defaulting to fight or flight. He held fast, pulling you back into his chest, even as you shoved at him.

"Calm down, honey. Take a breath. Just like you taught me."

You closed your eyes again and took another deep breath, but it only whistled through your lungs in a weak gasp. Gripping the lapels of his thick coat in your hands, you tried again, shutting your eyes tight and bending your head in concentration. Joel took a step forward until the top of your head was pressed to his chest. After a few more deep breaths, he cupped your face in his callused hands and pulled your head up to rest your forehead against his heart. You listened to the strong beat beneath his sternum and the soothing words he murmured into your hair, felt the bite of his zipper against your palms and the scent of hay on his flannel.

After what felt like a lifetime, your breathing returned to normal and your heart resumed it's regular beat.

"There, honey. Good. Good."

Pulling your head from his chest, you opened your eyes and stared up at Joel's bearded face, his eyes creased with worry but strong with resolve. Leaning forward, you buried your nose against the exposed patch of skin beneath his shirt and took a deep inhale. The two of you stood like that in comforting silence until you cleared your throat and pulled lightly at his grip. He let go of your face, but cupped your shoulders and pulled back slightly to look down into your eyes.

"What happened, baby?"

You cleared your throat again. "Nothing. I mean...I'll tell you later. I have to get back before Dr. Hansen finds me and calls me a pussy." A grizzled old army surgeon, he didn't take lightly to what he perceived as weakness.

"I'll walk you back."

That took you a bit by surprise, but you wouldn't say no. One of the first things Joel had ever told you when you met - after nearly blowing your head off - was that he didn't do comforting or coddling. He had gotten better, but he was always visibly uncomfortable.

He didn't press any further as you walked down the road back to the clinic, but he reached his hand out to brush it against yours and eventually tuck it into his own.

You took another deep breath when you got to the porch of the clinic, bracing yourself for Dr. Hansen's inevitable speech.

"You sure you're okay?" Joel asked again.

"Yeah," you answered, not actually lying this time. "Yeah, I'll be fine. Thanks."

Before you took a step forward, he took the back of your neck in a gentle grip and laid a long kiss to your temple.

As you trudged up the stairs, you turned and gave him a sultry look over your shoulder. "You can just talk me through anything, can't you?" You squealed and laughed, jumping through the door as he reached out to pinch your ass.

III. "Hey!

When Joel didn't immediately turn around, you looked around for something to throw at him. Spotting a bucket of freshly picked apples, you picked one up, tested the weight with a little toss, then hurled it at the back of his head.

He turned immediately, looking every bit the grumpy old man as he glared at you and rubbed the back of his head.

"What the hell was that for?"

"You didn't answer me."

"I didn't hear you."

"Hence the apple."

Joel rolled his eyes as he picked his way through the sheep he had been corralling into the paddock. Slipping yourself through the gaps in the fence, you leaned back against it and gave him an innocent smile.

Crossing the paddock, he fixed you with an exasperated but amused look. "What do you want?"

"What do you want for dinner tonight?

He snorted. "That's what you threw an apple at my head for?"

You rolled your eyes in response. "Ellie left for that nature trip with her class this morning so we can make whatever we want." For a feral cat of a child, Ellie could be surprisingly picky.

That seemed to peek Joel's interest. "Hmmm. How about steak and potatoes?" You grinned, having started prepping this morning knowing he would choose that. "Perfect."

You stood in companionable as Joel got the sheep settled and fed. You piped up again, "Ellie won't be getting back until Sunday night."

"That's what I heard."

"And neither of us are on shift this weekend."

"Yeah, 'bout time."

"I wonder what in the world we'll do all weekend."

Joel shrugged, your innuendo flying straight over his head. "No clue. Probably catch up on the sleep I haven't gotten for the past 20 years."

You rolled your eyes. "Joel...Joel." His head shot up from the stubborn sheep he was trying to push around with his knees. "What?"

"We're alone for a whole weekend, with no reason to leave the house, for the first time since we got here and all you can think about is sleeping?"

It took him a long moment, but then his mouth turned up into a sly smile and he maneuvered around the sheep to stand in front of you.

"Did you have something else in mind, darlin'?" His broad hands settled on your hips.

You pretended to think. "I'm not sure. Sounds like sex isn't on my husband's mind half as much as mine. Plenty of other single men to choose from--"

You squealed and laughed when Joel plucked you up off the ground and sat you down on the top rung of the fence. You hooked your feet around the bottom rung and clutched his shoulders for balance. He squeezed your hips and gave you a narrow eyed look, oblivious to the stares you had garnered. "Brat. Try it and I'll suddenly remember how to brawl."

"I've seen you brawl at least ten times since I've met you."

"Should've seen me in my twenties."

You squeezed his shoulders, kneading your nails into the thick material of his coat before murmuring quietly, "All I care about is that you know how to brawl with me." Joel groaned and hauled you down for a long, desperate kiss to your mouth. Turning, he tried to adjust himself as discreetly as possible before walking back out into the pen. You remained on the fence for a little while longer, heart glowing every time Joel walked past to give you a peck on the knee and a sultry look that promised many things.

The two of you turned in about three hours early that evening, your carefully prepared steak barely touched.

IV. "Where'd you get that dress, y/n?"

You turned away from the carrots on the counter to Ellie, who was flopping down the hallway of your home with her usual puppy-like grace.

"Oh, Mrs. Sawyer made it for me for delivering her new grandbaby. Do you like it?" It was short and airy, made you feel feminine and beautiful after spending day after day in scrubs. It was unseasonably warm today, probably the last warm day before fall fully settled in. "Yeah, I like it a lot," she answered as she swiped a carrot off the counter.

You gave her a side eyed smirk. "Want me to ask her to make you one?"

Ellie blushed and sputtered. "What? No! No way! I mean...I'm okay. Seriously. Where are you going?"

"Maria, Leslie and Megan invited me to the bar. And no I'm not sneaking you a beer."

Elli glared and grumbled something as she headed to the front door, trying and failing to dodge the hand you reached out to ruffle her hair. As you turned back to your food prep, you heard Ellie say hello to Joel as he walked into the house, heard his answering grunt of greeting. The door closed behind Ellie and you heard Joel stride across the wood floors until he was standing right behind you. You shuddered when he traced his hands lightly up the sides of your thighs, inching the dress up your legs. "I like this dress," he rumbled, laying a long kiss to your hair.

"Yeah, me too. Brenda Sawyer wanted to pay me somehow." He was pressing in tight to you now, cradling your hips back against his, your dress above your waist now. He nuzzled another kiss to you hair. "I'll have to thank her. Where you headed all dressed up?"

Your grip tightened on the hilt of the knife as he slowly kissed down your neck, his hands kneading your hips. "Tipsy Bison with Maria and, um, some other women. Drinks." Joel gave your hips a squeeze one final kiss to your shoulder before pulling away. "I'll go with you." You looked over your shoulder and raised an eyebrow. "Really?" He raised an eyebrow right back. "Yes, really. Why is that so shocking?"

You shrugged and went back to chopping carrots. "No, it's just you've never gone with me before. I guess you're usually on patrol." He struggled being idle.

"First time for everything. What time you going?"

"I was thinking about 30 minutes?"

"Plenty of time."

The knife was pushed out of your hand and the carrots swiped to the side. You shrieked and laughed when Joel whirled you around, shoved your dress back up your hips, and plucked you up onto the counter. You wrapped your arms around his broad shoulders as his mouth found yours.

A quick 20 minutes later and narrowly avoiding a second round, you two were walking into Tipsy Bison, which was already in full swing. Joel had walked a little closer to you than normal, his fingertips brushing the hem of your dress as you walked. After a brief brush of his hand on the small of your back, you went your separate ways in the bar, you heading toward a booth with the women who had invited you, and Joel toward his brother and some other men he often found himself paired with on patrol. As much as you would have liked to stick by his side all night, you were happy he was trusting people enough to make friends. Despite the fact that he fucked you hoarse nearly every night, you felt a bit like a proud mom sometimes.

As the night went on, the drinks flowed and the laughter became louder. The warm weather seemed to settle in everyone's bones and everyone was on the small dance floor, from the 70 year old carpenter shuffling with his three toddler granddaughters to the fifteen year old girl shyly asking her classmate to dance. You and your friends had made your way out to the floor as well, your drinks sloshing onto the floor as you laughed and danced like teenagers. When a slow song came on and the lights dimmed, the string lights on the ceiling coming on, you began to make your way back to your booth, but a warm hand on your wrist stopped you. Turning, you found Joel standing behind you. You frowned in confusion. "You okay?"

He frowned right back as he tugged you toward him, pulling your arm around his shoulder and sliding his other hand across your waist. "Does something have to be wrong for me to dance with you?"

Smiling big, you tightened your arms around his shoulders and pressed tight to his front as his callused hands settled on your hips, massaging your skin through the thin fabric of your dress. "Joel Miller knows how to dance?"

He chuckled as you both began to sway to the beat. "I never said that." Grinning back, you massaged the nape of his neck and nuzzled you cheek against his shirt, closing your eyes and listening to the strong pulse of his heart. When the song ended, he wrapped your hand in his and led you back to the bar, shouldering through curious looking patrons. Maybe it was the whisky, but he was handsy for the rest of the night, pulling you between his legs as he sat at the bar talking with some of the other guys from his normal patrol, his arm around your waist as he laughed and sipped his whisky. Around midnight, it was you who tugged on his hand and informed him it was time to go. You only made it around the back of the bar before your dress was around your waist for the second time that night.

V. It had been a long, busy day at the clinic. All the doctors and nurses were called in to treat all sorts of injuries, allergies, bites, coughs, stomach aches, bloody noses, etc. By 6 PM, all you wanted to do was collapse into bed, but a pile of charts was waiting for you and you had already been hounded twice about being behind. Scrubbing your hands over your eyes, you reached for the folder at the top of the file.

"Y/n?"

You turned as Maria came into the clinic, red cheeked and huffing like she had run there.

"Yeah, hi, what's wrong?"

"It's Joel. Sally's gun went off close to him, grazed him on the side of the head. He says--"

You were already shoving past her and sprinting down the road, your heart hammering beneath your ribs. You heard Maria call after you then curse, but you didn't stop, dodging people and moving past the guards through the now open gate.

The patrolmen had stopped a few hundred feet from the entrance. A few had dismounted their horses and were gathered around someone with their head down. "Move," you ordered, putting every ounce of hard earned medical authority into your voice. The crowd parted and you saw Joel standing there, his head bent and his gloved hand prodding at a serious laceration at the side of his head. Your heart flew into your throat as you stopped in front of him and pulled his hand away from his head. "Stop doing that," you snapped.

Joel rolled his eyes but did as he was told, letting his arm fall to his side but keeping his head bent so you could take it in your hands and turn it this way and that. You cleared your throat, not fully trusting yourself to speak, but knowing you had to nonetheless. "Decent laceration, nothing serious. Worse than it looks. Few stitches should be fine."

"Can you make it to the clinic, Joel?" Tommy asked, earning an irritated look from his big brother. "Yes, I can make it back to the damn clinic. She didn't blow my head off." Then he turned back to you. "And what are you doing out here without a gun or an escort?"

You gave him a furious glare. "Don't start. C'mon before you faint." With that, you turned on your heel and strode back toward the gates. There was some shuffling and mutters before you heard the group following behind you.

You got back to the clinic a few minutes before them and grabbed the suture kit, laying it all out for when they arrived. Hearing heavy boots come up the stairs and Joel tell Tommy to "get off me", you turned in time to see Joel poke his head in, then quickly duck back out. You came to the door. "What?"

He cleared his throat, looking a little green. "It...It smells. I'm gonna be sick if I have to go in there."

"You're nauseous?"

"Yeah, I guess."

The anxiety flared back up but you slammed it back down. "Then your head wound is worse than I thought. You might have a concussion. Fine, sit down on the bench."

He did as he was told, this time not yelling at Tommy for guiding him with a hand to the elbow. He sat down with a grunt, pulling off his gun and disarming it.

"Ya'll good here?" Tommy asked and you nodded. "Yeah, I'll patch him up and put him to bed."

"I don't need-"

"Be quiet."

Joel scowled at you and then at Tommy, who didn't bother hiding his grin before turning away toward Maria, who was waiting at the bottom of the stairs.

You unloaded your kit in silence, cleaning up the dried blood before running a lidocaine pad over the cut. It really wasn't too bad, but it was over his old scar and would be tricky to suture at the angle you were now at. After a few minutes, you very gently prodded the skin around the cut. "Feel that?"

"No ma'am."

"Good, tilt your head to the side and don't move or I'll sew your ear to your head." You heard him chuckle, but he once again did as he was told. Stepping closer to him, you angled his head to the side. You were so focused you almost didn't notice his hands come up and begin massaging the backs of your legs in slow, sweeping motions from the tops of your thighs to the back of your knees. When he got close enough to your backside to make you shudder, you gave his hair a little tug. "You're distracting me."

Joel only hummed in answer, his eyes closing almost in relaxation, as if you weren't sewing his head shut. His hands settled at the backs of your knees, his forehead resting against your chest as you finished up your work. He didn't let go of you immediately, instead pulling his head up and resting his chin between your breasts, blinking lazily up at you. You let yourself wrap your arms around his neck and stare down at him, the forceps and scissors still in your hands.

"You were shot."

"Yep."

"Don't let it happen again."

His mouth curved in an amused smile and his hands squeezed your knees. "Yes, ma'am."

"Now go to bed."

He seemed to open his mouth to object but you cocked your eyebrow in a withering glare. Sighing, he stood with your help, gave you a chaste peck on the head, and grabbed his rifle before moving off toward your home.

+ I. "Wait, so are you and Joel actually, like, married?"

You blinked at Maria's question. You had never actually never been asked that before, as most people didn't even know you were together. You often wore the ring he gave you, if not on your hand, then on a thin chain around your neck, and you had never bothered getting a ring for Joe, as you wouldn't even know where to get one. You did refer to him as your husband and he told you he thought of you as his wife and referred to you as such whenever it came up.

When you were younger, you had, of course, had the girlhood dreams of a big white wedding and a storybook marriage, but when the virus struck, it all seemed so trivial. Now...you weren't really sure how you felt.

"I mean, I guess not," you finally answered with a shrug. "Never really considered making it official."

"What're you two yappin' about back there?"

Both you and Maria flinched in your saddles when Chet barked back at you, nudging your horses faster to keep up with the rest of the patrol. They had been short a man today after Will sprained his ankle, so you volunteered to step in since the clinic was slow and fully staffed. Joel had groused about it, but you were excited to go beyond the walls for even a few hours. And nothing had happened on patrols in months, so you weren't particularly worried.

"Do you want to make it official?" Maria prodded when the two of you got a little closer to the rest of the group, but still far enough back to have some privacy.

"Again, never really thought about it. We've just been getting settled and making sure Ellie gets settle." Another shrug. "It just hasn't been a priority."

"Do you want it to be a priority?"

You gave her a hard side eye. "What's with the sudden investment in me and Joel's relationship? When we got here you didn't even like-"

"RAIDERS!"

Your stomach dropped, panic barreling up your spine into your heart as chaos ensued. Shots rang out and people shouted as horses screamed and reared up in surprise. You scrambled for the gun at your hip, pulling it out just in time to get a raider in the knee and finish him off with one to the head. More shots sounded, closer this time and there was another cry of pain as eleven more raiders closed in.

Pain burned through your arm and you cried out, dropping your gun, which went off as it hit the ground. Your horse reared up in surprise, sending you out of the saddle and sprawling to the ground. When your back met the grass, the pandemonium faded away, overwhelmed by a deafening ring as your head snapped back on your spine and your brain slammed against your skull. Groaning, you tried to breathe through the pain.

It all came roaring back when a massive weight fell into your gut, pushing the air out of your lungs in a massive below. The unblinking eyes of the raider sprawled over you stared back at you and you heaved him off with a grunt. Pushing to your knees, you just avoided a riderless horse as it galloped past you, back toward the commune.

There was still shouting, gunshots, shrieking horses and grunts of pain. As everything came back into focus, you managed to reach out and grab a raider by the ankle, sending him sprawling onto the ground in front of you. He turned onto his back, eyes wild as he leveled the barrel of a pistol between your eyes...

His head snapped back and his gun dropped from his hand, his whole body going limp from the bullet in the back of his head. Blinking against the sun, you could see the group of people running from the direction of Jackson, each of them stopping sporadically to steady themselves and fire off a shot. It was Joel who slowly lowered a rifle aimed in your direction, his eyes wild and his chest heaving.

The group was on you in the next second, falling on the last remaining raiders as they attempted to escape, leaving their dead behind. You hadn't made it to your feet yet, the pain in your arm screaming even as the pain in your head receded. It was Joel who finally hauled you up despite your cry of pain when he grabbed you under the arms.

"What is it? Where? Where does it hurt? Show me! Show me!!" You had never heard him sound so frantic as he ran his hands roughly over your body, unzipping your jacket to look for blood on your shirt.

"My-My arm. It's my arm."

His hands became gentle as he took your arm in his hands and cradled it for Dr. Hansen as he bustled over with a medical kit.

"Just a flesh wound," he said gruffly. "Let's get her back to the clinic. You'll need quite a few stitches. Thank christ you're the only injury."

Joel rounded on you, taking your other arm in his hand and placing a hand on your back to guide you back toward Jackson with the rest of patrol following close behind.

An hour later, you and Joel walked out of the clinic, your arm freshly stitched but still burning in pain. Joel had watched over Dr. Hansen like a bear until you thought the two of them would come to blows. You were exhausted and just wanted to shower and sleep forever. Joel had been quite since you had gotten back and you had a feeling he would blow up when you got back to your house, ban you from ever going on patrol again, and sleep outside your bedroom door with his rifle.

"Joel," you finally prodded as you stepped onto the porch of the clinic, his back to you as he stared out over the town, hands on his hips. "Are you okay?"

Silence.

You sighed. "Joel, will you please--"

"Let's get married."

You blinked, not sure if you had heard that right or if you had rattled your brain more than you thought.

"I'm sorry?"

He turned to face you, his face completely serious. "Let's get married. Right now."

"Joel, what are you--"

He strode toward you and cupped your face so tenderly you could have cried. He let out a trembling breath as he leaned his forehead against yours. "We should have gotten married the day we got to Jackson. It didn't seem important then but now...I didn't know why."

You reached up to grip his wrists. "It doesn't matter to me if we make it official in any way or any of the legal stuff. Is that what's bothering you?"

"You could have died today."

That realization settled into your stomach for the first time and you barely suppressed a shudder. "I could have."

"We've both almost died a hundred times since we've met, and every day I wondered...would they have buried us next to each other? Would anyone have known that we loved each other after we're gone?"

For the first time in a long time, you were speechless, enamored by this man who made you weak.

"I just..." he took a shuddering breath. "I-I love you on purpose. And I want everyone to know. I want you to know."

You opened your mouth once. Twice. "I...okay. Yes. Yes."

"Yes?"

"Yes."

"TOMMY!"

His shout sent your brain reeling again and you nearly fell as he let go of your head and whirled around.

Tommy poked his head out from behind the horse he was leading to the barn. "Yeah?"

"Where's Pastor John? Y/N and I are getting married."

"What?"

"Pastor John? Where is he?"

"I heard that part." Tommy had abandoned the horse to a passing woman and headed over, his face comically confused. "You're getting married?"

"Yeah."

"Right now?"

"Yes! Right now!"

Joel had grabbed your hand in his and was pulling you down the stairs toward the church.

"I...okay." Tommy trailed behind the two of you, cupping his hands around his mouth and calling out for Pastor John. You had drawn a crowd by this point, Jackson citizens wandering out of the buildings and murmuring excitedly as Joel beat a warpath toward the church and you stumbled after him, grumbling at Tommy to stop yelling before you punched him.

Finally, Pastor John appeared out of the mess hall, adjusting his glasses and straightening the collar of his flannel like it was a full cassock. "What's all the hollerin' about?"

"Y/N and I are getting married," Joel stated as he came to a stop, causing you to run into him with a grunt. "Right now."

Pastor John blinked and looked at you as if for confirmation. You leaned into Joel and nodded happily, the reality of the situation finally beginning to settle. You were getting married. Joel wanted to marry you. And he wanted the whole town to see.

"Ah, okay," Pastor John finally said, adjusting his glasses again. "I guess we should head on over to the church."

The mass of people at your back grew with every step you took through the town until you were all 300 of them were tittering like school kids behind you.

"Move! MOVE! No, you get out of my way. Y/n!"

You turned in time to see Ellie shoulder her way through the crowd until she was at your side, her chest heaving like she had personally shoved aside all 300 people to reach you. She stared up at you with huge eyes. "Were you really going to get married without me?"

You cupped her face in your hands. "Baby, I didn't even know I was getting married until five minutes ago."

"Can I be your bridesmaid?"

You laughed. "Of course." She gave you a massive grin and threw her arms around your middle, holding you tight and you could hear her sniffling against your chest.

Twenty minutes later, every citizen in Jackson, from the oldest to the youngest, had squeezed into the small church with you and Joel at the front with Pastor Joe, Elli standing behind you holding a handful of daisies she had ripped from the ground outside the sheep pen.

"...I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss your bride."

You expected a small, chaste peck on the lips, but Joel took your face in his hands and swooped down to take your mouth in a kiss so intense you had to grip his shoulders to stay upright. The church exploded in applause and cheers and Joel pulled you back upright, giving you one more chaste kiss before giving you the biggest smile you had ever seen on him. Taking your hand in his, he walked you down the crowded aisle.

He never let go of it again.

#The Last of Us #The Last of Us HBO #Joel Miller #Pedro Pasal #Joel Miller x Reader #TLOU #Joel Miller fic #Joel Miller x Y/N #Joel Miller x You #The Last of us fanfiction #Awkward-Sultana #5 + 1 #TLoU fanfiction

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myfictionalboyfriendsandme · 11 months

Text

Wuthering Heights

Pairing(s): Chavez y Chavez x Reader

Prompt(s): A cowboy being secretly fond of you… they share a book with you even though they can’t read

Word Count: Around 2,900

Warning(s): nothing super crazy, talk of malnourishment, talk of traumatic experiences but nothing specific

Rating: T

Author’s Note(s): There isn’t nearly enough content for this man, so enjoy!

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It was after dinner when they all relocated for reading and writing time.

The boys who had already been living at the Tunstall farmstead all moved to their regular spots. John took his place in the rocking chair near the fireplace. Doc remained at the dining room table across from Richard, his writing book and his pencil in front of him. Steven sat in the wooden chair that was situated against the brick to the left of the fireplace while Charlie settled down directly in front of him on a bench.

(Y/N) smiled at the routine of it all. Whenever they gained a new person on the ranch, she could see the confusion on their face as John explained to them they would learn to read and write if they expected to stay. 'They are tools that will help you survive in the new world.' John would say. She thought it was amazing that he wanted to help these young men become more successful than any of them ever thought they would be.

They all had different experiences and backgrounds, some more educational than others. She and Richard were taught how to read and write by their mother and their grandmother back in Vermont. Doc knew how to read, he just had to work on his writing skills. He was quite a fast learner, already making leaps and bounds towards being able to write on his own. Steven and Charlie never learned how to read or write, but these sessions were good for them. Both of them had only been around for a few months and she could tell they were also improving. She couldn't tell if that came down to the fact that they were also fast learners or if they just had a really good teacher.

Probably the latter.

She was about to move to her designated spot, to the right of the fireplace on a cushion on a raised section of brick (she liked it because she could lean against the wall while also leaning into the warmth of the fire), when she noticed Chavez hadn't moved. He stood against the wall that divided the dining room from the parlor, probably observing everyone's actions, not really knowing what to do. (Y/N) knew it was hard being the new person around, but she was determined to make sure he felt welcome.

Chavez had been with them for about a week now and he had barely said two words to anyone, excluding herself and John. Today was the first day that he had left his room during working hours and tonight was the first night that he was able to join them for dinner and reading time. For the last week, either John or (Y/N) had taken dinner to him so he could eat while he remained comfortable in bed. He was still malnourished, but not nearly as bad as when he first arrived. (Y/N) could tell he had seen things that were probably extremely traumatizing for him. Most of the time when she would sit with him in his room he would just stare off into the distance, as if he was deep in thought. John had explained that it seemed like he was in a bad place and ultimately he just wanted to help him find his way back to a better one, but to do that they had to work slowly.

As everyone was settling in, (Y/N) made her way to Chavez and looked up at him. He had a good eight inch height difference when compared to her. "You can sit next to me." She put on her friendliest face without making it seem like she was trying too hard. "It's the best seat in the house and I'll let you sit next to the fire, make sure you stay warm."

She knew he had been perpetually cold since he had arrived. The first night he slept directly in front of the fire, unwilling and quite possibly unable to even think about moving away from the warmth it provided. She could understand why, his skin had felt like ice. It was only after she gathered almost every blanket in the house and draped them around him that he had stopped shivering. After that night, they had moved him to a bedroom on the second level of the house so he could sleep in a real bed, but she knew he still longed for the fireplace.

———————————————————————————————————

The third night, after the other boys and John had already gone to bed, (Y/N) stood perusing the book shelf that was situated in a little alcove to the right of the stairs. It wasn't uncommon for her to be found downstairs reading in front of the fire. She had always been a night owl, especially when compared to the other men of the house, so she was almost always left to her own devices after the sun went down. Occasionally Doc would join her if he couldn't sleep or if he felt like talking before he went out to the bunk house, but anyone else was unexpected, which was probably why she was so surprised to hear footsteps coming down the stairs.

They were very faint. Honestly, they were so faint that she almost thought she was imagining them. Then out of the corner of her eye, she saw Chavez appear at the bottom of the stairs, his body wrapped in a buffalo hide blanket. He looked around before quietly maneuvering his way to sit on the floor in front of the fire. He hadn't seen her. Not that she assumed that would be a problem. Since she was the one to take care of him that first night, she was one of the only people in the house that had gained his attention. He didn't seem to fully trust anybody just yet, and who could blame him with what he'd been through, but (Y/N) was set on making sure he felt comfortable.

At that moment, she decided she wasn't going to let him sit alone.

She quickly grabbed the book she had been looking for - Wuthering Heights - and cautiously made her way to the fireplace into his peripheral vision. He was just sitting there with his legs crossed, the blanket wrapped tightly around him, and his eyes glued on the flames. In the light of the fire, the dark circles under his eyes became even more prominent than they were before.

"Hi." She moved to the floor and sat down beside him, setting the book down on the bench behind them. "Can't sleep?"

She watched as he took a long, shuddering breath. After a moment of silence, she thought he might not answer her but he wrapped the blanket tighter around himself before whispering. "Tengo frío." His voice was hoarse and scratchy from lack of use.

(Y/N) nodded in understanding. "Let me get you a cup of tea. It'll help." She stood up and walked to the kitchen. Lucky for her, she had already been preparing her favorite tea so she could enjoy a drink while she read. She grabbed two ceramic mugs out of the cupboard and poured the steaming liquid into each before making her way back to the fireplace. "I like to drink tea while I read." She carefully sat down and put the mugs on the floor in front of them. "John introduced me to this one. He calls it English Evening."

"Thank you." Chavez whispered.

"You're welcome." She smiled and picked up her mug, lightly blowing over the top of it.

All was silent except the crackle of the flames, but it wasn't uncomfortable. The atmosphere in the room just felt... content. She turned around and grabbed Wuthering Heights. "I was going to read." She looked at him, the firelight dancing across his tanned skin. "I could read to you if you like. I read to the other boys all the time."

After a few more moments of silence, he did something she wasn't expecting. He looked at her and gave her a small, one sided smile.

"It's called Wuthering Heights." She smiled back at him before opening it to the first chapter and reading out loud. "1801. I just returned from a visit to my landlord - the solitary neighbour that I shall be troubled with..."

Every once in a while Chavez would reach down and take a sip of his tea before gently placing it back on the ground. She was glad he liked it. With how sick he had been when he arrived, it was good for him to drink something soothing. She also noticed that he started to look over at the book in her hands, a slight hint of curiosity in his eyes. He shifted his body closer to hers so he could look over her shoulder. She positioned the book so that it was in-between them, giving Chavez a better opportunity to follow along with her as she read on.

———————————————————————————————————

After that night, (Y/N) and Chavez meeting downstairs to read together became the new normal. The boys would go to bed, (Y/N) would grab Wuthering Heights from the bookshelf before making them two cups of tea, and Chavez would silently make his way down the stairs to sit in front of the fireplace. (Y/N) would start a conversation about something random before she started reading (to try to get him to talk to her - it was working!), they would each take a couple sips of their tea, and then they would read until each of them got tired.

(Y/N) was excited to have Chavez finally join them for reading and writing after dinner. She realized it hadn't been long since he arrived at the Tunstall farmstead and she knew he needed to recuperate, but it was nice having everyone together. It was their family time, and he was a part of their family now.

She grabbed the newspaper from the counter in the kitchen and made her way towards John, Chavez trailing behind her. She handed the paper off to John and motioned to the spot next to the fire. Chavez sat down and immediately leaned against the brick of the fireplace, still looking around and making observations about everyone else in the room. (Y/N) grinned to herself as she watched him. He looked much more alert now that his health was recovering, and it wasn't just the mental changes that seemed to be improving, but the physical ones, too. His skin had retained a healthy glow and there was a new light found in his eyes.

It was very refreshing.

She leaned towards him and started whispering. "John will start reading first before handing the paper off to someone else, then we all take turns."

He looked at her and nodded.

"Lincoln County New Years Dance." John began as he straightened out the paper in his hands. "A dance will be the big social feature for Lincoln on New Year's Eve..."

(Y/N) smiled as John continued to read. As she told Chavez before, she always read to the boys in the house. They always told her she had a beautiful voice. According to Doc, her soprano sound was like a delicate set of silver bells in the winter wind (he was forever the poet of the house). She loved reading to the boys because she knew it made them happy, but there was a part of her that loved switching roles every now and then. She cherished the time after dinner when the boys would take turns reading to each other because it was a chance for her to just sit and listen. It was one of her favorite ways to relax at the end of the day.

John had finished reading his section of the newspaper and looked up at the boys, trying to decide who to hand it off to. He leaned forward in his rocking chair and stood up, making his way to Steven. He handed the paper to the young man and showed him where to pick up. Out of all the boys, Steven was the one who knew the least. He was making excellent progress, but he still required quite a bit of help. John would kneel down next to him and use his finger to lead Steven's eyes across the page. They had to stop on every word to sound it out, but (Y/N) didn't mind. She loved witnessing someone learn.

Once Steven had finished, the process repeated for Charlie. John knelt down next to the bench Charlie perched on and moved his finger across the page. Charlie didn't need to pause on every single word, it was more like every third or fourth. His reading was still choppy, but there were certain smooth passages that (Y/N) was really happy to hear.

Eventually, John made his way back to his rocking chair and held the newspaper towards (Y/N) and Chavez. "Chavez, I believe it's your turn."

(Y/N) saw Chavez' head look up and over towards John, eyes slightly wide. She smiled at him, trying to be as encouraging as possible. She was excited to finally hear him read. She had thought about asking him to do it during their nightly reading sessions when he'd follow along over her shoulder, but she didn't want to scare him off. Just from listening to his one word responses throughout the week she knew she was going to love the sound of his voice. It took everything in her not to beg him to speak more just so she could listen to him talk.

After her shining smile of inspiration, she expected him to take the paper and read aloud to his heart's content. What she wasn't expecting was his response.

"I don't know how to read." He whispered.

Her eyes widened in faint surprise. She had no idea. When they read at night, he seemed so invested in 'Wuthering Heights' that she didn't even question his reading ability. She'd even seen his eyes moving across the pages.

John nodded. "Then we shall teach you. You happen to be sitting next to the second best teacher in the house." He winked and smirked at (Y/N).

She snapped her attention to him and started laughing, along with the rest of the boys in the room. Rolling her eyes, she looked back at Chavez. "I would be honored to teach you, Chavez. We can start tomorrow."

———————————————————————————————————

That night after the rest of the boys had gone to bed, (Y/N) was in front of the fireplace on the floor with their book and two cups of tea. She heard his footsteps move down the stairs and towards her before he sat down next to her, immediately grabbing his mug of English Evening.

"I had no idea." She spoke, looking at him sip his tea. "Why didn't you say anything? I could've started teaching you days ago."

Chavez stared into the fire. She wasn't expecting a long response.

"I just can't believe I wasn't considerate enough to even ask you." She continued. "It's just that I saw your eyes move across the pages and I-"

"You have a beautiful voice."

She paused. She hadn't been expecting that. Though, that seemed to be a common theme for her in the last week.

She tilted her head at him, a slight blush highlighting her cheeks. "Thank you."

He continued watching the flames lick the sides of the bricks. "I didn't say anything because I enjoyed listening. Your voice is very soothing." He moved his eyes from the fire to her.

(Y/N) couldn't help but smile at him. She was surrounded by boys who always treated her with the utmost respect. They gave her compliments, they helped her around the house when they could, and they protected her to the best of their ability. She knew everything they did was genuine, but for some reason, her heart skipped a beat when Chavez spoke to her. It wasn't like that with the other boys. This feeling was different.

She had always been described as an incredibly honest person (mostly by her older brother, Richard), therefore, she didn't hold back when it came to expressing her feelings to others. This moment with Chavez was no exception. "You make me feel so..." She trailed off, not really knowing how to finish the sentence. Would he think she's crazy?

"Different?" He asked.

She let out a sigh of relief. "Yes." She nodded. "But different in a good way."

He smiled softly. "Me, too."

As they spoke, she suddenly noticed they had drifted closer to one another. In fact, they were so close that she could feel his shoulder length hair tickling the side of her neck. What was happening to her? It was like she had been hypnotized.

"I like spending time with you." Chavez said, his dark eyes bright from the glow of the fire.

She didn't think her blush could get any deeper. "I like spending time with you, too."

She suddenly couldn't take it anymore and looked away from him, her eyes fixed on the fire. She did not normally act like this. She had never encountered something, or someone, that made her feel anything less than confident, but with Chavez she was second guessing everything. Her hand moved to the floor in-between them so she could lean her upper body weight against it, but before she could do anything, she felt something else on the ground. Quickly looking down, she realized she was touching his hand.

He didn't pull away.

He did the exact opposite actually.

She left her hand where it was, and ever so gently, he moved his hand so it was on top of hers before giving it a gentle squeeze.

———————————————————————————————————

Translations

Tengo frío - I’m cold

#young guns #young guns imagine #young guns x reader #chavez y chavez #chavez x reader #chavez x you #chavez young guns #chavez y chavez young guns #lou diamond phillips #western #cowboy #reader insert #young guns movie #young guns 1988 #80s #80s movie #80s movie imagine

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altschmerzes · 8 months

Text

augh. the fuckening continues. Some More Stuff has gone down with my shitty shitty dad. yes. the one that died. It Continues To Go Down, Some Fucking How.

if you saw me talk about this somewhere else already sorry lmao. i don't even know why i'm like. i know there are people who i want to know things about how my life is going and who are invested in how i'm doing who follow me here and wouldn't have seen this elsewhere so it's like. sort of a bulletin and also i'm still just. it's circling around in my head kind of inescapably so. here's this. sorry for the continued oversharing re: The Fuckening, hopefully this'll be the last of it but apparently there is no way to remotely guarantee that he will stop pulling shit like this despite literally no longer being alive.

theres been a whole Thing where my dad had a life insurance policy through his work and the people from his job contacted our family and said that my sister and i were listed as the beneficiaries on the policy and so they needed the death certificate and our information to get that taken care of. i have been the one primarily in contact with the lady handling it, we emailed and talked on the phone a few times. and then recently my sister got something in the mail from the insurance people and i didn’t and we wondered if it was a problem with my address being canadian or my name change and so i called the insurance company today to get that sorted. according to them, based on the information provided by his work, I Am Not A Beneficiary. it’s just my sister, im listed as a contingency in case something happened to them before him or whatever i guess. so now there’s. that. going on. which, like. it makes sense, my sister is the one he had a relationship with and that’s a choice i made and it’s not like im owed anything but it’s still like. once again my sister is everyone’s favourite and im Nobody to my family unless they’re directly reminded i exist. except that like. he did remember i existed. he deliberately and specifically listed me as the backup and it was like- i felt weird about the whole thing already. Really Weird about it but this did not. make me feel Less Weird.

and it's like i just. why couldn’t the HR person from his job have read the fucking form correctly if that’s what it said this whole time. why was i listed as a CONTINGENCY beneficiary in the first place. i knew that man, i knew how his mind worked, i remember how every time i saw him when we WERE speaking he would inevitably bring up my brother and how my brother wouldn’t talk to him and how much that sucked. listing my sister for this policy and then adding me as a Backup Plan was like. this wasn’t about wanting to take care of my sister and just not thinking of me at all. so it’s like all the rest of it and now just. knowing, like knowing this was a choice he made to Punish Me for not being involved in his life. because his focus was never on what he had it was always on what he didn’t and how unfair and horrible it was that he didn’t have it. if he just hadn’t thought about me at all his partner of 11 years would be listed as the contingency if they Needed him to have one, the only reason to have put my name down like that was to Make A Point and to get back at me for walking away from him and it just?

like who does that. i cant get my mind around it. there is literally no reason for my name to have been included the way it was except to make a point and that’s what im upset about, not the inheritance stuff, it’s just. he was a vicious, petty, vindictive person and he got one last shot in to hurt me the only way he could because i wouldn’t talk to him. that letter he sent last year to my grandmothers house, this, he like. he hated me, i think. some part of him was so angry at me that he hated me and wanted to hurt me in any way he could even just by writing my name down like Not You Though, The Other One Is The One I’m Acknowledging As My Child Who I Want To Care For And Protect In The Event Of My Death, But I Need It To Be Clear It’s NOT You on paperwork he probably never thought anyone else would see. how pissed and resentful do you have to be for that to be something you think to do.

just like. was it not enough. was what he did to me when i was a kid not enough. why do things have to KEEP happening. why does he KEEP needing to find ways to hurt me as bad as possible because that is the outcome he wanted. was to hurt me as bad as he could in whatever way he could. just. what the fuck.

yknow in my like. ninth grade english class there was this one super insane day after it was made extremely clear that my teacher had no control over the class and wasn’t gonna try and rectify that where these two kids who hated each other got in this big fight like. mid-class. and the way this fight took place is one of them was shouting across the room and the other was, and this is not a joke, repeatedly changing the name of a wifi hotspot on his phone, as a way of responding to her. this is about that level of petty, immature bullshit. conducting a fight with someone by changing the name of a wifi hotspot. getting back at your bitch of a daughter who won’t talk to you by filling out HR paperwork so that it’s SUPER clear you only meant the other one and NOT this one SO THERE. etc. what a fucking child.

#long post #gav gab #gd. sorry for this. i'm still just trying to like. get my mind around it.#abuse cw #death cw

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justatalkingface · 11 months

Note

One particular thing I've noticed about Hori's writing style is that most of the time, he takes the lazy way out.

Like take Kotaro for example. Hori just made him into an abusive pos that could've been entirely different.

Like say he was actually a good father, but Nana leaving him made him depressed. This can still lead to Tomura hating heroes because his grandmother was a hero but abandoned his dad, and the abandonment made him sad.

And then there's Endeavor's "atonement", instead of building up his downfall and have everyone who knows him leave since they don't want to associate with an abuser, everyone just instantly forgives him while painting an image of if the abuser is sorry, the victim trying to expose the past should just keep his mouth shut.

This again goes with the fact that Hori's just making a beeline to the next major plot point that we're not allowed to take in this new info and let it all sink in that the forgiveness or seeing how abandonment can effect someone feels rushed, out of place, or just lazily taped on.

You... aren't wrong, actually. I've said before that MHA has a bunch of complicated, complicated themes, themes that were introduced at that start of the story, and Hori gave those themes proper focus for a little while...

And then he stopped. Makes me wonder if he just got burned on complicated ideas after that, and just turned to simple concepts to make his life easier rather than putting something deeper that he'd have to put more work into. Like, one of the big things I rag on about is corruption, right? And what do I want about corruption? More.

Unironically, I want at least a volume's worth of content, if not more, just about corruption, to give this fundamental part of the story the focus it deserves. Apply that to all the other things that feel undeveloped, and the size of MHA just... soars. Mangaka culture for Jump, from everything I know, is hellish, soul crushing, body wrecking, toxic bullshit, and I'm curious if Hori actually knew what he was getting into when he ended up with this super popular product.

The consensus is that, Post War, Hori basiclly gave up on a proper story just so he could be done and free, and the stuff your mentioning? That stuff happens around the War Arc, either just before it or even in it proper. How much of that is him just feeling the strain, backing away from what he had planned for simpler, shorter story lines?

One the other hand, he seemed to have lost his taste for more complicated messages well before the War Arc even happened, in favor of simpler, more cliche options (looks at Overhaul Arc meaningfully, and the way Izuku got a super power up seemingly designed to happen and never be mentioned again, all through the power of heroism, friendship, and the OOC power of the arc specific character, just in time to beat the villain who at the last minute transformed into a giant monster, with all the energy of a dubiously canon anime movie), so there is that.

It's hard to tell, though, and this is the kind of thing we'll never really be able to know for sure, because so much of it happens with the writers and the editors and all the pressures and influences we, the readers, don't know about.

#ask

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caxycreations · 9 months

Text

Nowhere Else to Put This

WARNING: VENT, STRONG LANGUAGE

I don't know where to start or where to end

so fuck it

just

gonna go.

I have no job. I've tried, before, several times. Worked at a cotton gin when I was 16, got fired 3 hours in because my supervisor kept telling me to sit down and watch how to do the work, and the manager kept coming by RIGHT as I was sitting back watching. So I got fired 3hrs in for "not doing anything besides watching a man four times my age do ten times my work".

Worked at a burger stand after that, lost that job when they closed down a week later. Unemployed for years after that, then mom talked to her boss and managed to get me a job working in-home care, specifically for my grandmother, who was a client of the company. That was great. $11.50 an hour to keep my grandmas place clean, hang out and chat with her, and run errands? I was already doing that, so all that changed was that now I got paid for it.

Eventually snagged a second job, remodel work for the local walmart, and wound up quitting because it felt so fucking pointless. Two of the managers insisted that the local workers could be dropped because this walmart was so small they could do the work with a third of the team in half the time, and made sure to remind the local workers (aka me, mom, my cousin, and my friend, along with 6-7 others out of the 30-man team) that we were completely expendable, and entirely unwanted.

So I quit that job, focused entirely on the in-home care job for a while longer.

And then I moved. Stupid, idiotic, worthless idea. I moved away to live with my boyfriend in Oklahoma, who promptly dumped me two goddamn weeks after I moved, revealing he only wanted me out there to "save me from that dead-end town", and he had actually been thinking of breaking up with me for a month or more, but wanted to "save me" first.

I wind up there for six months, applying everywhere I can, trapped in his house because nobody will hire me and I can't leave on my own because my anxiety prevents me from driving. Finally, my Dad saves the day, finding out what happened and driving for a day solid to get there and bring me back home.

And I still couldn't land a job. A town where everyone knew me, everyone knew my dad, his word could get ANYONE a job there

Anyone but me. Because everyone heard about the gin situation, and saw me as lazy, all because one person several years ago told me to sit down and watch, and another person misread the situation, and the first never stood up for me.

Now I live with Mom. I'm 25, I've lived on my own multiple times in the past, and moved away once before, and I still wound up back here.

I have problems. I have undiagnosed autism (literally proven, tested and proven, but I pissed off the guy who handled my test and he said he would not diagnose "such a smart-mouthed kid" (context: he wanted me to make a story using random bits and bobs from a plastic bag, and I got frustrated after the sixth time of explaining to him that being put on the spot was making it impossible)

I have diagnosed anxiety (been on anti-depressants, relaxants, and even had a doctor outright TELL me that I should get a support animal to help manage it)

There are things I absolutely can not do on my own. I can't drive. I can't deal with the general public in person. I can't even manage to say hi to a stranger.

And it fucking HURTS.

I need to see a dentist, I need to see a doctor, I need to be re-tested for autism by someone who actually fucking cares so I can get that diagnosis on paper instead of people looking at me like an asshole for saying I'm autistic without documentation.

And the only person who can help me do so is my mom, who consistently neglects both myself AND my little brother, because she can't be bothered to deal with any kind of inconvenience to her desire to sit in bed all day and play Spades on her phone, or to go mow the lawn for the 400th time this week just so she can tell us to do everything because "i've been outside all day".

I try to do what I can, I try to earn what I can. But it doesn't fucking work. I try to stream, and so many people say "oh advertise more, you'll be seen by more people" but that's bullshit. I'm lucky to get one new follower in six months. I've got an internet following 700-people strong across all my platforms, and over 100 of them on my Twitch, and I still struggle to get so much as 6 people viewing on a stream at any given time.

But twitch isn't everything, I also do art commissions, writing commissions, and once-upon-a-time did VRChat Avatar commissions!

I stopped doing Art comms because I'd charge $30 for the same thing others were charging $70-$100 for, and I barely got any interest, and the interest I did get, people would ask me for so much more than I was capable of. So I dropped it to just headshots. Five bucks or less depending on the quality asked of me, and it STILL doesn't get me anything.

Writing comms? I've gotten ONE writing comm request in the 7 years I've been offering them, and you wanna know what it was? Some fuckin weirdo asking for, of all things, an NSFW PAW PATROL FIC. I'm sorry, my moral compass might be grey half the time but even on my most morally defunct day I wouldn't write that for any amount of money.

avatar comms? I was actually half good at! Got a few people ordering from me, and it was good money cause I could land $60-$70 comms that took like 2-3 days to do. But then I lost access to the popular model, and people stopped wanting the work, and the few that still did wanted me to do things with models I physically could not do. One client had an asymmetrically patterned oc and INSISTED on using the Terris Wolf, which btw, is LOCKED as a symmetrical texture. The texture wrap is literally just one half of the model, mirrored onto the other half, and the only way to fix that would be to fully unwrap the model in Blender and make a whole new custom texture, WHICH I CAN'T DO because every time I open Blender I get an actual physical headache looking at it. So I stopped because people kept asking me for things I couldn't do, even things that were in my ToS as "Cannot/Will Not Do".

I have no work. I have no income besides the pathetic $50-$60 I make every 3-4 months from streaming.

And when I vent about this, so many people say "I wish I could help you, but I'm going through so-and-so"

I don't want a handout! I accept tips and donations sure, but it's because I can't fucking afford to turn them down! Do you think if I had any reasonable income I'd be asking people to give me money for nothing besides the goodwill of helping me? NO! Because I don't want to be a charity case!

I have a very, VERY capable mind, and very capable hands, and a willingness to learn whatever skill or skills I need to in order to do a job. The problem is I can't work public jobs, I need something that doesn't require driving, and all the work-from-home stuff is either "work hard and one day you might make minimum wage if you're lucky!" or "requires X years experience, bachelor's or greater degree in X field, and must hold X certification"

There are "entry-level" DATA ENTRY jobs that demand certifications! Can you believe that??? Certified, for what? Pushing fuckin buttons? Data entry isn't that fuckin complicated.

I just

I want to earn income.

I hate being given something for nothing. I hate feeling like I owe people, or like the only reason I have something is because someone else decided I was worth it.

I'm worth it to me, I want to buy myself things, I want to be able to afford replacements and repairs when things break or wear down, I want to be able to pay for my own groceries, I want to be able to buy my own clothes, and I want to earn the money used to do so.

I hate feeling so fucking useless, so hopeless. I've spent YEARS improving the few marketable skills I do have, and it's led to a state of living where I can't even afford to buy groceries without asking my boyfriend to pay for them, and I fucking hate it. It's not his responsibility to provide for me, it's mine, and I'm tired of relying on everyone around me for the most basic shit.

Sorry to spill this here. Nowhere else fucking cares and the people I normally vent to have heard this all before and I don't want to bother them with it.

#vent #venting #hopelessness #painful #anger

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trashexplorer · 1 year

Text

BLCD Review: Cosmetic Playlover

Title: Cosmetic Playlover (コスメティック・プレイラバー)

Author/Artist: Narashima Sachi

Release Date: 2022/11/26

Cast:

Itou Kento x Kobayashi Chiaki

Takatsuka Tomohito

Oono Tomohiro

Synopsis: Trash

“No or stop, you unexpectedly say cute things.”

The beautiful assistant, Natsume, is forced to do pair sales with his junior Sahashi. Sahashi, who doesn’t take Natsume or his work seriously, overtook him in sales and annoys Natsume as he’s trying to act as a good superior… Once his act gets discovered, he’s threatened into becoming his sex friend?! Plus, he carelessly flipped Sahashi’s switch on!

“Is it all right if I get serious?”

This is a story set behind the cosmetic shop counter, with feelings of love appearing as Natsume finds his heart beating fast, although it irritates him.

Review Proper

When I was a wee young lass of years six, my grandmother called us out from our seaside exile to come live with her in the main house after my father’s death. I was a child of the sea, so adjusting to life in the city was difficult. The main house was just rows upon rows of hallways and rooms, and it was always deathly cold—concrete. Even at that tender age, I knew that the house was shrouded in mystery, but it probably was just a reflection of our equally mysterious family. Every morning on my way to school, I would pass a small, oddly framed family picture along the hallway which showed my grandparents sitting on a red velvet couch while my father, uncle, and my aunt stood behind them. By the time I became a freshman in highschool, everyone in that picture had already passed...except for my aunt who had her face scratched out of it. She had been missing even before anyone from our generation was born, so no one knew where she was or how she’s doing. She was our family’s biggest mystery and, quite possibly, the answer to every other mystery. She was the only one who knows our family’s history, after all. More years pass, and we’ve lost the house along the way, completely eradicating any chance our questions had of ever being answered. Now, we have all learned as a family to leave our curiosities to rest and focus on the present.

But who would’ve thought that at age twenty-five, another big mystery would find itself in my hands?

The mystery of how Cosmetic Playlover ever got green-lit for a BLCD adaptation and multiple manga sequels, that is.

I mean, I knew it was gonna be bad from the Sakura Riko-looking art alone, but I didn’t know that it was gonna be that bad. I’m not even comfortable branding it as something that came out in the 2000′s ‘cause that would be an insult to some of them. Oh, I know. This is FUCKING SHOUJO SMUT PLOT BUT WITH TWO DICKS.

Specifically:

THIS FUCKING THING. NO WONDER I WAS SO PISSED OFF.

“Omg, Chesk. You’re overreacting.” No, I am not. Cause they have sex like 15 pages into the first chapter and right after Sahashi unzips Natsume-san’s pants, he gives it a squish squelch with a finger then puts his dick in it??? HOW WAS HIS ASSHOLE ALREADY WET??? EITHER HE HAD A PUSSY OR HE HAD DIARRHEA. See, I could forgive things being rushed in the manga ‘cause pages, ya know? But I expected the BLCD to give them more time, BUT NOOOOOO. THEY WANTED TO MOMOSE AN THE SHIT.

Anyway, I won’t talk too much about the plot here. It’s really just your run-of-the-mill shoujo smut with a rapist, black-mailing, edgelord top and a simp for a bottom. 👍 Their climax wasn’t even worth noting. Natsume-san was getting wrongly accused by stealing this one guy’s customers, so he keeps harassing him and Sahashi finds Natsume-san’s notebook with all his customers’ info on them and says the notebook was persuasive evidence that he wasn’t stealing the customers. EXCUSE ME??? WHERE ARE YOU TAKING THIS CASE??? AUDIT???

Moving on to the technicalities of things, I actually listened to this mainly because this would be Chiaki’s debut (Sugar Drug’s was actually released the same day, but I’m not too keen on Takuma being on top). Oddly enough, I think I have almost all of the CDs he’s been cast as a supporting role, so I was looking forward to him leading this time. How did he do, you ask?

Wow.

That was

Bad.

Ngl, this was even worse than Horie Shun’s debut. I’m not sure what happened here ‘cause he acts pretty decently in his other CDs, but he even struggled with stuff outside the bedroom. He never got his surprises right, for one thing. Both the timing and the sounds he made were so unnatural. But the most unnatural bit of it all were his moans in bed. He goes to deep but also uses vowels too big at every given chancee, it just—HE REALLY JUST “AHHAHUHUH” THE WHOLE TIME IT WAS SO FUNNY I KEPT LAUGHING THROUGHOUT THE BEDDINGS I’M SO SORRY. I can see that he’s trying to emulate the Tachi of maybe 2013, but he really doesn’t know how to do it properly. I would’ve preferred it if he just went the quieter route, if that’s how it was just gonna end up as. 😬 His moaning drowned Itou Kento out a bit that sometimes I just forgot that he was there lmao. Hopefully, he did better in Sugar Drug ‘cause Taku’s not that uhh great as a top, so if they both underperformed, that CD’s doomed lmaooo

Itou Kento did well here even though I kinda didn’t like how he started. This is a higher tone than what he usually uses, and I could just visualize what kind of shape his mouth was making that it just bothered me. Thankfully, grew on me after a while. His topping style here was a little reminiscent of Nakajiki’s usual, and I found that endearing. My man learned topping from his top. *wipes tear

The rest of the supporting cast did great too. I found it so funny that Takatomo was acting as a man much older than the two leads when he’s literally the same age as their actors lmao. Our other Tomo’s also showing potential. I’ve seen his name pop up quite a lot recently, and it’s just a matter of time before he gets a lead role. Hope he learns from this.

Yea, so this was bad overall. If you’re a fan of this series, why? I wouldn’t recommend it because of the acting. It unfortunately sticks out like a sore thumb. I’m not sure if Mari—MARINE?! NO FUCKING WONDER! Yea, this’ll probably have sequels since the manga has 7 volumes and is still ongoing, and Marine loves that weird shit, so... Do I have any other recommendations? I don’t think I’ve ever listened to another BLCD that revolved around cosmetics. That was actually a good concept, ngl. But did this expound on the cosmetics? No lmao.

#blcd reviews #blcd 2021 reviews #cosmetic playlover #marine entertainment #narashima sachi #itou kento #kobayashi chiaki #takatsuka tomohito #oono tomohiro

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singbluesilverblog · 3 months

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HOW WE MET (Abby's Version)

Hi friends! This is my first *official* blog post, and the two of us wanted to put together posts about our friendship & how we met / how we got into Duran Duran from each of our perspectives! :)

Kal and I have so many eerie coincidences in our friendship, it’s insane. Seeing the same angel numbers, texting each other the same exact things at the same time, verbally saying the same thing on FaceTime, finding out both of our first "crushes" as kids were Greg (me) and Murray (Kal) from the Wiggles (don't laugh.) You name it, it’s probably happened with us. We both have gone though eras with The Beatles, The Police and Queen (even both having fixations on Queen specifically during our sophomore years of high school). Even with getting into Duran Duran, she got into them July 9th, and I got into them July 11th, all because of the SAME John Taylor edit we both independently saw on TikTok that randomly came up on our FYP before we met, as well as seeing Duran Duran in concert exactly a week apart (stay tuned for posts about that!)

Now, to clarify, the two of us have always known about Duran and have listened to them very casually. The two of us have ALWAYS loved old music (I grew up listening to a lot of Elton John, Bon Jovi, Elvis, The Beach Boys, Metallica, Frank Sinatra, The Beatles, Mötley Crüe, and Sam Cooke thanks to a mix of my parents and my grandmother) When I started collecting records when I was 11 (I'll be 21 in May, for context) my Mom gave me her copy of DD's Arena she got in 1984 as one of the albums to “start out” with, along with a few others. (She was a Roger girlie, and her twin sister (my aunt lol) was a Nick girlie! They also had a mutual friend who was a John girlie) Like any girl at that age, I thought they were cute! I loved that it was a live album, which I thought was unique. And, of course, everyone knows Hungry Like The Wolf, come on.

2022 rolled around, along with Season 4 of Stranger Things. I remember scrolling through TikTok in August and stumbling across a Steve Harrington edit with Girls on Film as the audio. I IMMEDIATELY fell in love with the song, it became one of my most listened to tracks that year if I recall correctly. I later posted on my instagram story on November 11th 2022, a mirror selfie of me in my college bathroom with Rio as the music for it. Coincidentally, it was eight months to the day before my fixation started. Weird!

After I was sucked into the Duraniverse by that incredible JT TikTok edit, I made the best decision ever by making a Duran instagram account at the end of July 2023 called thegirlonfilm, after one of my favorite songs that really started it all for me. “I needed to talk to people about them,” I thought to myself, as none of my local friends really knew about them or liked them, and if they did, it wasn’t on the level that I was on. I started joining Facebook groups and started blacking out on eBay, buying posters, books, cds, magazines, vinyls, funko pops, tour brochures, cassettes, you name it. I wanted to do nothing but listen to them and gush about them, blowing up my Pinterest by saving thousands of pins of them. I then snagged tickets for my middle school best friend and I to see them together in Philadelphia not even two weeks later. My feelings for them were VERY similar to my extreme Beatles hyperfixation in early middle school to mid-high school.

Around early August, my account was slowly taking off, and I began following more and more accounts. I started following an account called 111ngel, which was recommended to me as I already had a few mutuals who were following them. We liked each other’s posts here and there, no big deal, occasionally commenting on each other's posts and edits. In early August they tagged me in an edit they made of Nick & John, dm’ing me saying that “they hoped it was okay that they tagged me because they didn’t have many Duran Duran mutuals.” Of course I was okay with it, I was excited that someone actually tagged me in something, and we eventually struck up a light conversation that turned into us talking to each other everyday for the next 6 months.

Flash forward to now, Kal is the bestest friend I could ever ask for, even though we’ve never met irl and she lives over 15 hours away in a different time zone than me. (I’m on the east coast, she’s in the midwest). She's one of the sweetest, kindest, funniest and most caring people I have ever met, and she never fails to make me laugh until I cry. We have a never-ending list of inside jokes and just stupid stuff that makes us giggle. She was there for me consistently through the worst heartbreak of my life, and has been there for me regardless ever since. We have our “Duran Nights” which consists of us staying up on FaceTime together until 4 AM watching interviews, documentaries and concerts, talking about things going on in the Duran community, going Brittany Broski-level feral over John and Simon, or giggling about crap we find on Pinterest (and me destroying her in word hunt on iMessage games hehe) She’s so comforting to be around, as if we knew each other in a past life. We both agree that we're 100% each other's platonic soulmates, as we clicked almost immediately and have such a deep friendship. I’ve never met someone that I could be so transparent with, and she’s really the only person I can TRULY be myself around without the fear of judgement. She's the Simon to my John, the Lennon to my McCartney, the Moon to my Sun. Very thankful for having her in my life. :) <3

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genderkoolaid · 2 years

Note

Are we sharing examples or transandrophobia? I want to share especially as an autistic trans man and how that intersect. Tw for like mentions of r@pe but no detail. These specific incidents actually run through my mind almost constantly. I came out for the FIRST time when I was 16: -people refused to use the name I had chosen despite me pointing out that's stupid because out cis male friend had changed his name just because he didn't like it and all I was doing was dropping one letter

-my best friend told me that if I slept with a girl who thought I was a "real" man and after she found out I was trans I would have been a rapist for consensually going down on a girl who "thought I was a real man"

-I had a random girl in my class "ask if my ex bf knew I really had a dick" when I said I was trans

-my parents said "no matter what, you'll always be our little girl"

So, I went back into the closet for the most part. I went by She/They and was always like "im not a girl" but people pretty much brushed me off and I didn't pursue transition bc I was afraid of how people would treat me. I came out AGAIN at 21, this time really putting my foot down that I AM MALE.

-My aunt started to refer to my info dumping as "mansplaining" so I stopped sharing my interests with her

-People began to actively misgender me, whereas before some people would at least try to use they as well as she, I only get called she now and never they

-I started to get harassed in public for holding my partner's hand even tho we're both trans

-People really go out of their way to gender me now. "When I was a girl" nobody ever ma'amed me. NEVER, ever.

-People like to assume I'm mentally ill for being trans or that someone must have pushed me to be trans. Their pea brains implode when I say actually I really struggled to come out in the face of everyone telling me not to and I'm trans because I realized I'd die from trying to harm myself if I didn't accept who I already am

-I got sent a lot of death threats and rape threats. A lot. Mostly online, of course, but it really took me aback the negative reaction I had from the WLW spaces I was in when I said I was leaving because, well, I'm not a woman. Crypto terfs, man.

-My uncle said to me, and I quote "Keep this trans shit away from your grandmother, she has enough to deal with" I asked him what he expected me to do when I grew facial hair and muscles and lost my tits. He didn't answer, he probably didn't care.

-My aunt, who claimed to be the most accepting, still misgenders me and acts personally offended when I tell her she's not progressive for doing the bare minimum to show me respect, and not even consistently.

-My aunt ALSO told me I was the reason SHE wasnt getting HRT for her early menopause because "T is gonna make you angry and I don't want to be around that" (T made me calmer and less likely to EXPRESS my anger, actually. I have to find different ways to let it out now bc I kinda just CANT feel angry or sad the same way anymore)

-None of my family has called me to ask me how I'm doing since i came out. They all kinda avoid talking to me, but won't say it, I've noticed though.

-My partner's mom told me she wanted me to go to therapy. I said I'd go for my PTSD as it was causing problems between her and I, she said "No, I want you to go for 'this'" Meaning, she wanted me to go to therapy for being trans. My partner got upset at this and said that absolutely would not be happening because being trans isnt a mental illness

-cis people look at me in TERROR when they misgender me, like they're waiting for me to freak out at them or physically assault them. It actually really hurts my feelings tbh, out of everything those moments sting the most. People I don't even know very well assuming the worst of me for being trans.

Idk just the pure hatred people have towards transmascs and then for people withing our own communities to act like these things don't happen on the daily and don't drive us to have among the highest suicide rates out of any other demographic... It hurts. It really hurts, I want to cry over it and then still this little voice in my head, the voice THEY put there, says to me "Boys don't cry. if you show the slightest sign that these things hurt you, they won't take you seriously"

Thank you for sharing your experiences.

#m.#ask box #experiences with transandrophobia #rape tw

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iguessitsjustme · 1 year

Note

Hi ~

Hope you’re having a great day -

For Talk about ~ #1 & #5

Hi! I am having quite possibly the most lazy day I've had in a very long time. It's been great but also it feels wrong somehow.

Talk about the first time you watched your favorite movie.

I have two favorite movies, but i honestly don't remember the first time I watched one of them so I'm going to tell you about the first time I watched Howl's Moving Castle. So my Papa had just recently gotten remarried and I had yet to meet his new wife, but I was curious. (There was some other family drama happening around this time and I'm not including specifics but it is important to understand why I was curious about my new..step-grandmother?) So because I don't post real names here, we're gonna call my Papa's new wife S. So it was summer, and my older brother was going to a music camp and it happened to be in the state that my Papa and his new wife lived. So we took a family trip to go drop my older brother off at his music camp. We got there a bit early so we stopped by my Papa's new home and I got to meet S. S is very different from my Nana and also very similar. Both strong, independent women who are also kind. But my Nana's kindness was...softer. S is very gung-ho, seize control of the situation, make sure everyone is welcome. I was young and wasn't really sure what to make of this new woman that I now had to call family. I didn't know what to call her or what to expect. I don't know if she could sense my apprehension or if she just knew that the best way to entertain children was to put on a movie, but she asked if we wanted to watch Howl's Moving Castle. I had already seen a few Studio Ghibli movies at that point, so of course I said yes. So we watched it and it was truly magical. They made me stop about halfway through the movie because it was time to go to dinner then drop off my brother at the music camp. I didn't want to drive any more to drop off my brother just to come back, so we said our goodbyes and S took me back to their apartment and let me finish the movie. Now, in all honesty, I'm still not sure what to make of S. She can be a bit judgemental of strangers sometimes, but my family is the kind of family that embraces you once you become one of us. Back when I was living with my parents a few years ago, I would drive with my mom ever Friday to go visit my Papa in his nursing home and we would go out to eat with S after. S is the reason I have a couch. S also literally gave me her DVD after I finished watching Howl's Moving Castle because I loved it so much. Didn't even think about it for a second. I watched that DVD so much that it no longer works.

5. Talk about the best birthday you’ve had.

I am not really a birthday person. I had parties as a kid, but as I've gotten older, I don't really care for my birthday so much so I don't really remember them that well. (To clarify, I don't dislike getting older and I don't dislike my birthday, but I do dislike attention which is unavoidable on birthdays). Oddly enough, today is my older brothers birthday. I digress. I'm gonna go with this past birthday I had only because my best friend got me this teddy bear fuzzy jacket and it's the best thing I've ever worn. Possibly the best thing I've ever owned. I feel like a warm and cozy fashion icon when I wear it.

Make me talk about myself

#rae irl #thanks for the ask #long post #i didn't really mean for that first story to be so long but it is #anyway everyone wish my older brother a happy birthday #i spoke to him for 45 minutes yesterday and completely forgot #in my defense i didn't know the date it was yesterday

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sunnyie-eve · 1 year

Text

Macking Each Other(Pt.4)

Series: Never Leave You | OBX

Paring: (JJ Maybank x OFC! Rafe Cameron x OFC!)

Word Count: 2564

Warnings: mention of abuse, JJ being jealous, friends kissing,

Last | Next

"What you boys up to?" Callie finds JJ and Pope after being bored at home.

"Just hanging. What brings you here cupcake?" JJ asks as she walks up to them.

"Cupcake? I got bored at home so I decided to come find the magnificent troublemaker JJ Maybank." Callie wraps an arm around his waist.

"So what did you and John B find?" JJ asks her.

"That it had nothing to do with the lighthouse. So I told him it might be something else. That he needs to slow down and think things through." Callie leaves out the part where John B kissed her.

"Anything else happen?" Pope asks.

"Deputy showed up took John B in and my aunt paid for him." She keeps it simple. "Thank you, guys, for driving off and leaving us by the way." She adds.

"Sorry, princess but we had to get out of there." JJ puts an arm around her shoulder.

Pope watches JJ closely as he looks down at Callie. He knew the look in his eyes because that's how he looks at Kiara.

After some time John B shows up to pick them up then they all head off to get Kiara as well. They all end up at an old cemetery of one of John B's great-great grandmother. The guys try opening the door that wasn't going to move whatsoever.

"A snake!" JJ shouts making Callie move away quickly as he starts to bark at it.

"Why the hell are you barking at it?" She asks confused.

"They're scared of dogs. Everyone knows that, Cupcake." He tells her.

"Yeah, but you aren't a dog JJ." Callie hits his back to shut up but he keeps barking, "Stop barking at the snakes." She smacks him more.

"Just making sure it's clear." He tells the group.

"We're not getting in there, all right? It's not budging. We should probably just go." Pope says as the girls look at the hole.

Kiara looks at Callie who looks at her as if they were speaking to each other, "Callie can get through." Kiara speaks up.

"What? No, no, no, no. You think she's gonna fit through that hole? That hole?" John B looks at the girls.

"I'm small enough and this is about you dad. So now someone help me move some of this crap so I can get through." Callie walks up to the hole and they all help her clear the way.

"I'm gonna boost you, cupcake. I've seen it in the movies several. Ready?" JJ gets in a ready position.

"You already helped boost me to hide from cops. Now let's do this." Callie goes and gets through the hole looking around.

"You alive? You got a heartbeat and everything?" John B asks her.

"No, I don't actually but I need more light." She tells him so he holds his lantern through the hole for her.

That was just enough light for her to see a FedEx envelope that said For Bird and she knew it was from John B's dad left for him. "Johnny..." She hands it off to him before she climbs out with help from JJ.

"Code red." JJ sees people approaching so they hide.

"I'm out." Callie runs off and Kiara follows behind her.

When they get to the gate Pope gets stuck on it and his shorts rip off as they try to help him get down.

Back at the house opening up the package they find a map with specific coordinates and an X marks the spot. With a tape recorder holding a recorded message from John B's Father, it turns out the X relates to the exact location of the Merchant shipwreck.

The next day the plan was to get into Kook territory to track down the map coordinates and figure out exactly where the wreck is located. As they pull up to the hotel JJ brings out the gun making them tell him to put it away.

JJ leads the way to a computer, given the power is out on the Pogue side of the island. With 400 million on the line, the stakes are high. In order to even get that deep in the water JJ brings up a drone in the salvage yard. The plan was for Kiara to distract the worker while the other four sneaked in and grab what they need to get moving.

"Why didn't we send you with her? I mean two hot chicks would really distract him." JJ glances over at Callie as they all watch Kiara.

"Really?" John B looks at him, "Because Kiara volunteered since Callie crawled through a hole for us."

"Plus she's got those flirty eyes. They're better than mine." Callie watches.

"I say different." John B and JJ both say at the same time making Callie and Pope look at them before Callie says it's their chance to go.

JJ didn't have the exact numbers for the lock and a dog shows up. John B runs off to the side and JJ and Callie rush a different way while Pope grabs a pipe trying to scare the dog.

"Here boy!" Callie starts to whistle trying to get the dog away from Pope. She sees a red rag so she grabs it, "I got a toy, boy!" She says making the dog go towards her and JJ, "Wait, no. I was just kidding. Shit! Okay, sit!" She shouts as they run off together.

"You just had to, Cals!" JJ shouts.

"Oh, like you wouldn't have thought to do that as well!" She shouts as he takes her hand to lead the way.

"Okay, maybe I was going to do that before you did it. This way!" They rush up a ladder into a boat ducking down in the hope the dog would go away.

"When we get caught because we will, what's the story?" Callie asks looking at JJ.

"I'll come up with one. You trust me, right?"

"Depends but yeah I trust you." She nods her head fast before someone shows up.

"Follow along." JJ looks at her so she nods her head. "Wait, Bobby. Don't shoot. It's me JJ. Luke's kid." JJ stands up with his hands up so Callie does the same.

"What are you doin'? Who's this with you?" Bobby asks confused.

"An old friend that moved back but I swear, okay. I didn't want to, okay. My dad made me and Callie wanted to help me. He told me Captain Leo kept his cutting torch. You know, after he got fired. He said if I didn't get it for him, he was gonna... he was gonna hit me again." JJ makes himself cry so Callie grabs his hand in a comforting way.

"Son of a bitch. Come on down. I almost killed you two." Booby tells them so they get down.

"I'll just come up with somethin'. Tell him I couldn't find it. Sorry." JJ tells him as he and Callie walk hand in hand away. They glance at each other and smile a little.

Callie uses her other hand to wipe away the tears he formed, "It's easy to make yourself cry when you have something true to go off of." Callie squeezes his hand.

"You played along well."

"All I did was hold your hand." She laughs.

"In a meaningful way but I know it was real too." He squeezes her hand back.

"Now, that we're out of his sight let's rush some. Hopefully, someone got what we needed." Callie jogs pulling JJ behind her and making him laugh.

Back with the group they find John B got the equipment to look for the ship. To kinda celebrate but mostly to just eat because they were all starving they head to Kiara's dad's restaurant.

"God, this is so good." Callie moans eating her food.

"Callie, catch." John B throws a fry at her but she fails so JJ tries as well failing.

Kiara and John B dance for fun making JJ look at Callie, "Come on." He pulls her up to dance as well so Pope ends up sitting out alone watching Kiara.

After a good amount of time, Callie said she should head home and will see them tomorrow. JJ ended up heading out with Callie wanting to crash at her place again because he loved her bed.

"Meet you in your room." JJ heads around the house to climb up to her room while she goes through the front door.

"Showing up late again, I see." Joey speaks up.

"Where's aunt Tess?" Callie asks.

"Went out with a friend to eat. Why are you late?" Joey stood up from the couch.

"Joey, it's the summer and I'm hanging out with friends." Callie chuckles, "I'm heading off to bed. It's been a long day and tomorrow is another busy day. Night." Callie starts to leave but Joey grabs her.

"If you show up late again, I'm going to make you never want to show up late again." His hand moves to her throat.

"Yes, sir." She whimpers going to her room as he lets her go.

Walking into her room JJ was already in her bed ready to go to sleep. She locks her door and then gets ready for bed. "He told me about the kiss you failed to mention the other day." JJ speaks as their backs were facing each other.

"He did? I didn't say it because it didn't seem important."

"It's not important you kissed one of your best friends?" JJ says making Callie rolls over.

"For starters, he kissed me. I didn't kiss him. The only best friend I have kissed was you. And I don't like John B like that."

JJ rolls over now to face her, "Then why were you flirting with him on the beach?"

"I can't flirt with him for fun but you can flirt with Kiara for fun... Got it." She sits up quietly laughing.

"I didn't say that." He does the same.

"Then explain to me." She waits for his answer and sees his gaze go from her eyes, to her lips, and back to her eyes, down to her lips again, "J-," His body leans forward pressing his lip's against hers.

JJ's arm snakes around her waist pulling her closer to him and Callie wasn't trying to get away from him as she parted her lips for him to explore her mouth. The idea of Callie kissing another guy made JJ feel a rush of unflinching rage.

Callie drew away from the kiss, out of breath, "Oh, fuck." She groans wondering why she did that.

"I-I'm sorry." JJ apologizes embarrassed.

"Don't be, we both participated in it." Callie lays back staring at her ceiling.

"But I kissed you first." JJ does the same groaning, "I fucked up."

"Don't feel sorry or stupid, JJ. I kissed you back because I wanted to... And I would love to do it again but I just got back and..." Callie sighs.

"I get it. You want to go slow."

"Yes, mainly because something in my past has me worried and scared of some things." She turns her head to look at him.

"You have no idea how long I've waited to do that." JJ laughs a little. "Since the cat's out of the bag, I used to have the biggest crush on you. Then I saw you again and it all started coming back."

"I had a crush on you too. Hey, I know the whole rules of no macking each other and no keeping secrets. But can we keep this a secret?" Callie asks hoping he will agree.

"Yeah, and we can forget like this ever happened."

"No, I-I don't want to forget this happened." Callie tells him shocking him but he smiles.

"So tomorrow how about I just go back to flirting with you and you act like you don't like it?" He rolls over to face her.

"I'd like that." She cuddles into him.

"What is this right here?" JJ goes to touch something as they check out the ROV before taking it to the crash.

"Don't touch that." Pope slaps his hand, "I'm trying to work this thing."

"God bless geeks, Pope. Truly, man. What would we do without you to control the drones?"

"It's not a drone. It's an ROV." Pope corrects JJ.

"Shut up. Shut up. It's too early for that right now." JJ makes Callie chuckle.

"Hey, once we get footage of the wreck, we'll bring it to a lawyer in town and file a formal claim." John B comes up with Kiara.

"It's bullshit. Why do we have to do that?" JJ groans.

"There's this thing called maritime salvage law where you can't just go to the ocean floor and scoop a bunch of stuff up." Callie leans on JJ's back.

"I know. It's just lawyers aren't cheap." He reaches back trying to grab her side.

"Well, as soon as they see the footage, they'll work for a comp." John B lets him know.

"I've noticed this tether is really long. In the wrong weather, it could get pushed around." Callie adds.

"Then we'll go at dead calm." John B says as thunder happens so they say they just have to wait for the right weather.

Pope says he has groceries runs today and JJ wanted to go with him so Callie said she wanted to just tag along with them.

"You boys get these groceries over to Figure Eight. Get straight back here when you're done. No fishin'. I promised delivery by this afternoon. Rich folks don't wanna wait for you lazy sons of... Oh, JJ, thank you. sons of bitches." Pope's dad tells the boys.

"I'll make sure they do their job, Mr. Heyward on time." Callie helps take some bags from him.

"Thank you, Callie. Really keep an eye on JJ for me." He hands her two bags.

"Will do." Callie salutes as she puts down the bags.

When it was time to drop off all the groceries it was Callie's job to sit at the boat to watch it. "This is unbelievable." She sits looking around.

When Pope comes back Callie could tell something happened just by the way he was walking before she could see his face. "What the hell happened?" She asks as he gets in the boat.

"I don't want to talk about it." He says as they wait for JJ.

When JJ does get back he asks the same thing but he gets an answer that was Rafe and Topper jumped him. Pope finally has decided to do something back to them and it came to Topper's new boat sinking it.

"You actually did it." Callie says proud of him.

"Wow. I'm so proud of you right now." JJ tells him as well.

"JJ, Cal, you can't tell anybody. I'm serious, guys. Not Kie, not John B, nobody." Pope tells the two.

"Our lips are sealed." They tell him before they head off to meet up with the other two to go surfing.

For the night they all just crash at John B's place for tomorrow. At the moment three out of five were asleep. Kiara, JJ, and Callie all lay on the hammock while the other two were in lawn chairs next to them.

"Cupcake." JJ whispers not sure if Callie was sleeping next to him.

"What?"

"Are you going to get in trouble for not going home? I hear what Joey told you last night." He turns his head to look at her dark silhouette.

"Most likely, yeah. But my aunt could lie for me as well saying I told her." She feels JJ take her hand into his.

"You're lucky you have one adult who has your back."

"Yeah, but I'm scared she might leave me one day when she can't take it anymore just like my mom did." Callie feels her eyes watering up.

"I can promise, I'll never leave you." He squeezes her hand.

"I promise, I'll never leave you again." She rests her head on his shoulder falling asleep.

#obx #outer banks #obx ff #obx jj #obx john b #obx kiara #obx sarah #obx pope #obx rafe #jj maybank #john b routledge #kiara carrera #pope hayward #rafe cameron #sarah cameron #jj mayback imagine #obx jj maybank #rudy pankow #rafe cameron imagine

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daisychainsandbowties · 1 year

Note

how did you figure out that you’re nonbinary and that you specifically use they/them pronouns? /genq

oh okay so figuring out gender was a ‘casper is stupid for 17 entire years’ situation.

i basically came out of the cradle insisting that it was cringe and terrible of my parents to think of me as a girl. i was, emphatically, a Pokémon obsessed little guy since i could form entire sentences. but it was 2002, and frankly i was more concerned with how far i could spit and collecting spiders off the bushes to be worried about it. my parents (bless) were 100% cool with getting my clothes in the boys section & letting me do whatever i wanted (except get ice cream from the ice cream van every day. their one and only instance of homophobia 😔) so i didn’t really suffer, especially, beyond scowling at people in school when they dared to refer to me.

it was pretty clear to me when i was 11 that having a cursed body was, indeed, going to be a curse. not worth mentioning how terrible and evil 11-14 was for me physically, tho to be fair i also took up swordfighting then so swings and roundabouts.

but yeah, around when i was 9 i knew there was a huge massive problem but then my mom got cancer (multiple myeloma) and… yeah gender crisis took a backseat while we watched her almost die about three times (pulmonory embolism, stem-cell transplant, getting shingles with no immune system bc chemo). my grandmother looked after me while Hospital.

unhelpful to the anti-trans-kids-existing demons bc she was also like intensely indulgent of my refusal to wear anything but my brazil football jersey. she let me eat nothing but artificial cheese slices put on a single slice of white bread and then microwaved because i had the massive trump card of not being allowed to see my mother for almost six months. i think she was grateful that i seemed to find the whole situation too serious to cry over. my best friend was a boy & he was pretty willing to be like ‘ok cool. ur not a girl. can we go on the trampoline?’

& then, when things calmed down & i was about 16/17, i had come out as gay (good for me) about two years before & then i realised i was oh fuck A Bit More Complicated than that i spent a while agonising over it. really a long walks on the beach pondering my gay ass type deal.

but then, just when i was kind of starting to vibe with being enby, I got really really sick, which lasted aboooout 5/6 years where it was just an old school platforming game but titled ‘casper tries not to die while trying to get a degree & two masters’). very do not pass go do not collect 200 of the universe to Do That. but hey.

so it was around Pandemic when i finally got the brainspace to actually think, & i realised that i was definitely trans, probably nonbinary. i experimented for a while with different pronouns. realised my ‘dumbass nickname everyone has to call me’ was my ACTUAL NAME (never underestimate my stupidity and ignorance) & yeah at first i was thinking of going the hormones path (do not ever please god don’t get me started on how hard that is in this stupid bastard country. 5 years waiting period, on average. have to get diagnosed formally by a team of psychiatrists with what is characterised as a ‘mental illness’. have to ‘live’ - as Some Fucker sees it - as your ‘chosen’ gender for like two years AND be out to basically everybody - realistic and safe i say sarcastically i say while looking into the camera like i'm on the office - oh look i got started. anyway. bullshittery)

but eventually i realised huh nope i just wanted top surgery (same fucking deal with the health service tho) & for people to use they/them generally (i am not too fussed w/ pronouns for myself tho. like, a lot of my friends use he/him because frankly i deserve it most of the time with the himbo behaviour. professionally i insist on they/them for consistency. i get congnitive dissonance with she/her as in i get a weird shock & want to laugh & wonder who the fuck they’re talking about for a sec before i realise it’s me. but like, miffed too much i am not).

also gender is a big pendulum for me it’s an elliptic orbit sometimes for a few weeks i’m like a feminine guy and other times i feel like a masculine gay & sometimes i feel like the autism creature (bc i AM an autism creature, always).

but i have, essentially, felt nonbinary always. trust me i have a pic of blue-eyed blond 5y/o me sitting on my bed in my Pokemon-themed room wearing a Manchester United jersey and holding my PS2 controller in my hands with a profoundly vacant and himboish expression on my face. it did fully take me 17 whole years to have my ‘oh’ moment about it, but a lot of that was profoundly indulgent parents who were you can’t even imagine how determined to not raise me the way they were raised - which meant, apparently, that if i wanted to be a spider-collecting, bug obsessed pokémon-fixated little guy who kept snapping branches off the bamboo and fashioning makeshift swords out of them - well then that was the creature they’d send to school every day.

i think the tldr here is: casper stupid. gender a concept.

#anon #'gender' i don't know her #casper lore dump

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starlightswitch · 11 months

Text

What She Left Behind

@flashfictionfridayofficial Here we go with another half-built world...

“Aha!”

Zak and Mara immediately spun to look at him, Zak up from the floor where he was looking under furniture, Mara from the closet she was going through.

Joby, still on his tiptoes in front of one of the kitchen cabinets, waved a piece of paper triumphantly.

Mara closed her eyes and said in a not-really-patient patient voice, “That’s not the crystal.”

“No, but I found something, is my point.” Joby motioned them both over. “Something we had to look for. I don’t think most people put a scrap of paper they’re not really concerned about in their kitchen cabinet. Under their mugs. Where no one’s going to find it unless they know where to look or are looking very carefully.”

“Are you going to read it to us?” said Zak. “Or are you just going to tell us the meaning behind it?”

Joby held it up in front of him, opening his mouth as if he was going to dramatically read what it said, but then his eyebrows wrinkled and he closed his mouth and gave the paper a look like it was his child and he was not impressed with its behavior.

Mara started to march over to him, her attitude making it obvious that she was going to grab the paper from his hand and read it herself, so Joby clutched it tighter and hurried up and read it. “Sweet bean, don’t let them dig up my flowers.”

After a minute, Zak said, “That’s all it says?”

“…yeah,” Joby said slowly, still studying the paper as if there might be more, encoded in the words he’d read.

“That can’t be it,” said Mara.

“Do you want to see the paper?” Joby waved it at her.

“No, I mean, that can’t be all it means. Why would she hide a paper that says that? Why not leave it more openly? Or just say it? Are there even flowers?”

“Yes,” said Callia.

Everyone spun to look at her this time. Honestly, they’d sort of forgotten it was her house they were in.

Her inherited house, that is. From the grandmother in question.

“They’re in the back of the yard,” Callia went on from her seat at the table. “Nothing fancy, just wildflowers she let grow because she liked them. And sometimes she’d try to transplant things there. Sometimes it worked.”

Slowly, looking at the paper again, Joby said, “Who’d she mean by ‘they’?”

“I don’t know,” said Callia, but her voice had a little bit of a bite to it. “Anybody who might come looking for something?”

Mara swallowed audibly. “Why do I feel like…”

Zak nodded slowly. “Like you said. If it was just about the flowers, why would she hide that?”

“Because she didn’t want anybody who came looking to find it, either?” said Callia. But it didn’t sound like she believed it from the sound of it. Or from the look in her eyes.

Mara snorted. “The army would have found it. You don’t think the army would be more thorough than a bunch of teenagers?”

Callia pressed her lips together.

There was a very long silence. Someone had to say something to move things forward, and of course Joby was the one to do it. “I think she buried it under the flowers.”

“Well,” said Zak, sounding uncomfortable, shifting a little on his feet, “if there’s a lot of flowers, how are we supposed to know where under the flowers?”

“We might have to dig them all up,” said Mara, straightforward. But she didn’t move toward the yard like she was going to do it.

Callia started to say something, but she dragged the sound out so long it sounded like a flat whistle or a hiss, twisting her bracelet with her other hand. Slowly she spelled it out. “You think she buried this crystal where she was letting flowers grow, so she’d have a reason to not let people dig them up. And she left me a note to make sure I didn’t let people dig them up. But she would want me to let you dig them up?”

“I’m not claiming she would want us, specifically, to dig them up,” said Joby. “Like she knew who we were going to be. Just… whoever picked up where she left off.”

“And not dig them all up, either,” said Zak. “Just enough to find the crystal.”

“But you’re saying she’d want you to do that. If she met you. And knew who you were. And why you were here.”

“Yes,” said Joby.

In a voice that wasn’t the strongest, but it was steady, Callia said, “Okay.”

They didn’t have to dig up all the flowers. Zak decided to start right in the middle of the patch of flowers, and they hadn’t moved far when they found it. Joby used his shirt to rub the dirt off the crystal and held it up a little. It sparkled when the sun hit it.

Callia had followed them out and stood watching. “My grandma was part of… what you’re part of?” she asked.

“Yeah,” said Zak.

“Our families are too,” said Mara.

“It’s kind of turned into a family thing over the years,” said Joby.

Callia took a long breath. “Maybe I should join you.”

“If you want,” said Mara.

“More the merrier,” said Joby, his voice– fittingly– not coming out as light as the expression.

Callia stepped closer and held out her hand for the crystal. Mara shot a look at Joby, but Joby closed the distance between them and handed it over.

Callia closed her fist around it. It warmed against her palm.

#my writing

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bisexualbumblebee-writes · 1 year

Text

Grief- Steve Harrington x OC

Steve Harrington x Ella Warner

Description: Grief was a nasty thing. It caused people to lock themselves away from the world to isolate themselves. It was up to the people that loved them to help them break from their confines and help them learn to heal. And for Ella, that person was Steve.

Word Count: 2k

Ella hadn’t left her bed in days. Well, specifically, she hadn’t left her bed since Wednesday, the day of Barb’s funeral. That’s right, Wednesday was finally the day that Barb Holland’s parents were ready to have a funeral for her. They’d gotten an answer for what happened to her, so she could be put to rest.

It was such a beautiful day. The sun was shining, it wasn’t too hot or too cold, and the nature around Hawkins was gorgeously green. There wasn’t a better day Ella could’ve imagined Barb would want her funeral to be on. And yet, despite the gorgeous day, Ella still couldn’t help but cry. Even as she was getting ready for the ceremony she shed a few tears. Her parents had been kind enough to drive her to the cemetery, though they didn’t really know her well. Not many people were in attendance since Barb didn’t have a lot of friends in life, but she recognized those there. Aside from Barb’s parents, the Wheeler family, Jonathan Byers and Steve Harrington were there.

As soon as Steve noticed her he shot her a small smile, seemingly noticing her already bloodshot eyes. He held out an arm for her, and she walked over to him. She allowed him to wrap a comforting arm around her shoulders, resting her head on his shoulder. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed Nancy glance at her. The older Wheeler looked surprised to see the two of them so close together. Ella was too overwhelmed with emotions as her eyes landed on the white casket in front of her to care. Steve’s hand on her shoulder gently squeezed it as the pastor began speaking.

Despite the fact that it was a small ceremony, several eulogies were given. Barb’s father, her grandmother and her uncle all gave eulogies. Finally, one those were done, Ella took a shaky breath and stepped forward when the pastor gestured for her to. In the days leading up to the funeral Barb’s mother had asked Ella if she could give one since she was her daughter’s closest friend. She pulled a few notecards out of her coat pocket then glanced back at Steve. He offered her a reassuring and comforting grin, which is what made her finally begin.

Steve refused to leave her side the day of the funeral and the wake afterwards. Ella couldn’t have been more thankful for it because she genuinely needed all the support that she could get. As Steve, Jonathan and Nancy knew, she’d been the last one to see Barb alive at Steve’s house. She’d only left her friend for a moment to go get her a drink, and it only took those few seconds for Barb to disappear. Everyone knew that she carried that guilt with her, which is why she relapsed into her depression after the funeral.

It was now Saturday, and she hadn’t seen anyone save for her parents since then. Even then her parents only saw her when they had to check on her and make sure she wasn’t dead or malnourished. Thankfully they’d given her some grace and allowed her to take the rest of the week off from school, which is why she hadn’t left her bed. She didn’t eat much and only really got up to use the bathroom. In fact Ella couldn’t do much more than just stare at her window or, when she was feeling froggy, her wall when she turned over.

She had been doing the latter when a knock sounded from her bedroom door. Her brows furrowed in confusion; her dad was supposed to be at work by now and her mother had some errands to run. Had one (or both) of them stayed home for some reason? Ella quietly called for the knocker to enter, expecting it to be her mom or dad. She listened idly as the door opened with a small creak, then closed again when they stepped inside.

“Hey,” Steve greeted gently, which obviously surprised her. She turned around with raised eyebrows. The boy was still standing in front of her door with a plastic bag on indiscernible items.

“Hey,” she muttered softly, knowing it was quiet enough that he could hear her.

“How are you feeling?” He asked in the same tone, walking over to the bed.

“Not great,” the girl answered honestly, knowing he’d instantly see through any lie she tried to tell. Steve hummed in response, setting the bag on her nightstand before climbing on the bed. He sat against the wall that the head of the bed stood in front of, carefully moving her head so it could rest on his lap. It was very early into their friendship that he discovered that she found the position comforting, especially when he played with her hair. That’s what he did once they were comfortable.

Neither of them spoke for a few minutes. Ella knew that he was waiting for her to speak first before he even attempted to say anything, as he usually did. She appreciated it, but at the same time she also knew she couldn’t say anything without crying again. Of course Steve would never comment on it because it was such a delicate situation.

“Ella, you know you can talk to me, right?” He asked softly, finally breaking the silence and making her look at him. That was possibly the first time he’d broken a silence between them.

“It’s not good to keep things in, you’ve told me that,” he continued as he grabbed her hand. “You helped me with Nancy, now let me help you.” It was almost as if he could hear exactly what she had been thinking. And that was what opened the floodgate.

“I… She was my best friend, Steve,” she whimpered, clutching his hand as tears began slipping down her face rapidly. In an instant the boy carefully maneuvered the girl into a more comfortable position than what they were already in: a hug.

“She was probably so alone and scared when she died. And I wasn’t there for her,” she continued between sobs. Steve carefully shushed her as one hand stroked her hair.

“It wasn’t your fault, Ella,” he muttered firmly without hesitation. When she shook her head he cupped her face in his hands, forcing her to look at him.

“Ella, none of us knew what was out there, you especially,” he reaffirmed. “You didn’t know that the Demogorgon thing was nearby and you didn’t know that going to get a drink was going to be the last time you saw her. Barb wouldn’t want you to blame yourself for something you couldn’t control, and you know that.” Ella knew that he was right, but that didn’t stop her from crying. Her head laid on his shoulder as she sniffled.

“I miss her so much,” she mumbled weakly.

“I know. I can’t pretend to understand what you’re feeling, but I can do everything I can to help you feel better,” he responded.

“And how are you gonna do that?”

“Well, it’d probably be best if you started with a shower.”

“You trying to tell me something, Harrington?” She half joked.

“No,” he drawled out, which finally made the girl laugh as she shoved his shoulder. “But seriously, I read somewhere that showers help people feel better. Besides, I don’t think you want to go out without showering.”

“We’re going out?” Ella groaned out, earning an amused grin from him.

“Yes,” he mimicked her groan as he answered. “You need sunlight. We’re gonna be in the car most of the time anyways so you literally have no reason to complain. Now get up.” The girl rolled her eyes and stuck her tongue out at him, but did as he said.

Once she was out of the shower he was waiting in the living room with that same plastic bag in his hands. He led her out to his car, opening the door for her before climbing into the passenger seat. After she was buckled he started the car then began driving. That’s when Ella’s curiosity got the best of her.

“Hey Steve, what’s in the bag?” The boy hummed absentmindedly then glanced at the bag that now sat in the console before facing the road again.

“Oh, I figured you probably haven’t eaten today so I grabbed a few things. You can go ahead and eat if you want, I don’t mind food in the car.” The girl stared at him for a moment, then moved the bag onto her lap and began going through it. To be honest, she shouldn’t have been as surprised as she was to see her favorites in it. Reese’s Cups, Pudding Pies, Cool Ranch Doritos, a bottle of raspberry soda, and several other things.

“Steve, you can’t possibly expect me to eat all of this,” she laughed.

“Well, duh. Not all at once,” the boy answered as if it were obvious. “I just didn’t know what you’d be in the mood for.” Ella had to admit that she was touched. Not only had he remembered all of her favorite foods, but he bought all of them so she could have a variety to choose from. A small smile appeared on her face as she pulled out the bag of Doritos and opened it, holding a chip in front of his lips. Steve chuckled quietly as he ate it, offering her an appreciative hum.

She continued to feed him chips while eating a few herself, eyes staring out of the window as she waited for them to arrive at whatever their destination was. Music played softly in the background, and every so often the peaceful silence was interrupted as one of them made a comment about what they saw or what music was playing. It wasn’t until almost an hour later, as the sun was setting, that she realized that they weren’t actually going anywhere. They were just driving around town. Ella was confused about the (seemingly) random gesture until she remembered Steve’s words from when they were still at her house.

‘You need sunlight. We’re gonna be in the car most of the time anyways so you literally have no reason to complain.’ When he originally said that, she hadn’t expected their entire trip to just be the car ride itself. But, surprisingly, she wasn’t complaining. She definitely didn’t think she was ready to talk to anyone quite yet (her parents and Steve were obviously the exception). Besides, the car ride was rather peaceful.

What was it about car rides that was so comforting? Was it the fact that it was with someone she trusted? Someone that truly cared about her and her wellbeing? Steve was definitely that person for her, and had never been more obvious until this moment. That brought a smile to the girl’s face as she just sat there and stared at him. It didn’t take him long to notice it, and a small laugh escaped him.

“What?”

“Nothing,” the girl answered absentmindedly as they finally reached her house once again. “Thank you for all this, Steve.” Her voice was relatively quiet, but it was more than loud enough for Steve to hear considering he wasn’t expecting her to speak much (if at all).

“It’s no problem, Ella,” he answered honestly. When he parked, they just sat there for a few minutes. It was clear that neither of them wanted her to leave the car yet because that meant that their time together would be over. Ella bit her lip in thought for a moment as she glanced at the dashboard clock, then she looked at Steve.

“Hey, there’s still an hour left before dark,” she mentioned, making him face her. “I don’t mind taking another lap around town.” A toothy grin appeared on the boy’s face.

“Me neither.” With that, he moved the gear shift back to D and began driving once again with both of them smiling wide.

Grief was a nasty thing. It caused people to lock themselves away from the world to isolate themselves. It was up to the people that loved them to help them break from their confines and help them learn to heal. If Steve was the one to help Ella, she knew that she would eventually be okay.

#stranger things #stranger things imagine #steve harrington #steve harrington imagine #steve harrington x oc

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thatsatricky1 · 3 months

Text

† 𝕽𝖊𝖙𝖗𝖎𝖇𝖚𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓 † Prologue

Synopsis: Y/n a once prodigy child, later on detective, finds herself working on the case of her brother’s murder, also a former detective himself. Leading down a long winding hole of crime, death, gore and mixed feelings she never thought would surface with all that was happening. Mixed feelings that should never even be entertained.

Pairing: Ateez Ot8 x AFAB (F) Reader

Genre: Crime, Horror, Mystery, Romance & Thriller.

Warnings: Death, dementia, family trauma, murder, serial killers.

Disclaimer: This does not depict an accurate picture of Ateez and this is strictly fantasy.

Word Count: 1,2k+

It had been exactly 273 days since my brother’s death. Nine months. Nine months of trying to figure out his unfair death. Then again it really only took a few weeks to understand how and why he’d died. I was apparently brighter than the general police and justice system. Though that is pretty easy to do these days because of the corruption that’s always lingering there, that’s just more common these days.

My parents knew I’d been ‘special’ since I was a child, having strived to put me through any and every course they could to continue my educational path to success. The only one who truly understood me was my older brother, having known even with my ability to learn at an incredible rate that I didn’t want to be overworked like a dog, to just live in the moment like a proper kid.

He’d always tried to get me out of things I didn’t want to do. It was fruitless as my parents ignored his arguments. Though his efforts were in vain I still appreciated it even if I’d just been a kid at the time. Appeasing my parents was easier than getting argued with day in and out.

Unfortunately or fortunately however one perceives it, my parents passed. One day they were there the next they were on the news, even made it on the newspaper. A dull car crash, a drunk driver on the other end. Of course it had hurt, they may have caused my childhood trauma but that didn’t mean I didn’t love them. It was hard to swallow, but with time we learned to live with it.

It was like whiplash. One moment I was getting hounded by my parents to do more, learn more, be better. The next, gone. My brother and I moved in with my grandparents at ages 17 and 14. They’d been a complete 180 compared to my parents, whether that be because of them wanting us to digest and find our way after our parents passing or just to let us be kids. Maybe even both.

It was refreshing not having to do everything, take everything in my own time. Get to do what other kids got to do. Though even with my parents gone, old habits die hard as after just one year I started to learn everything and anything again but this time of my own free will. This time only what I wanted to specifically learn.

Peace lasted for about three years. In the second year of living with our grandparents, we had to find a home for my grandmother. Dementia was different for everyone; some went years with a steady and slow decline but others declined much faster. My grandmother being the later option. It took only three months for her to decline so much to a point where she was just better off with 24/7 care by professionals even if none of us preferred that option.

Then in the third year of living there, my grandfather had two heart attacks, the first was okay. He’d ended up fine besides a contracted right arm, he’d always joked about it being fine since he was left handed. Though the second had been too much for him, having passed.

At that time my brother had turned 20 years old, having saved his money those three years and gotten a good job. I was 17 years old, already finished with school early and deciding what degree I wanted to go for. My grandfather was the sweet old man he’d always been, he’d written in his will that we got the house, much to my aunt’s misfortune and anger. The only thing he’d wished from us that we’d known from talks here and there was to look after our grandmother if anything happened to him, and that’s exactly what we did.

My brother somehow managed to become a detective, fairly quickly. He was also bright and learned fast, just differently. Shitty pay if you asked me, but it was enough to get us by, seeing as we already had a house without debt chasing us because our grandparents had paid off their house years ago, only having to deal with the bills like electricity, wifi, water, food ect.

I had many interests, hobbies and shit like that but ended up following in my brother's footsteps by also becoming a detective. Hence why I know about the shit pay. Easy job, more time for myself. I somehow ended up being my brother's apprentice working underneath him, some would say that is a conflict of interest. But it didn’t usually change much, other than him being over protective.

That’s where it leads to last year. My brother was freshly 23 and I was 20. I’d officially gained my job title and no longer worked under my brother, but beside him. Though we started to take on different cases. We would often help one another with certain cases, mainly him being nosy about mine.

That was until my brother died. He’d been working on a fresh case, barely seeing the light of day. Besides going out for our everyday lunch. When he didn’t show up on that Wednesday for lunch I knew something was wrong. It was the same day I found him.

Due to conflict of interest I was not allowed to investigate his death, nor was my department. The case was given to another department, who promptly gave a bullshit answer and tucked it away as if they didn’t know who I was, who his sister was. I didn’t make a scene or anything useless like that, instead putting my actual time to good use on my brother's case that I’d taken into my personal hands off record.

One thing you wouldn’t think was a thing, was the fact that Seoul had serial killers like no other. By the fact that they are all connected in a way. Besides here and there, those were the ones that easily got caught. It was laughable, the fact that serial killers had made their own organisation. Then again, why not.

I was thankful that I’d kept a low profile as a detective. I could have easily made a name for myself, but I didn’t. There was no need to act cocky and show off when I could quietly get my cases done and over with. This ended up good for me in the long run because no one would know me, suspect me as I solved my brother murder.

I know who killed him. I intended to act on it, and not in a legal way. But no one would know that. Though for the sake of my brother and the last case he was working on, I wasn't just going to take down his murderer, no. I was going to do much more than that if provoked. On one hand I want them to provoke me and on the other I just want to be done with it after these past nine months. It’s in their hands to see how they react to it.

Which leads to now, I will finally get justice for my brother passing. No one would get away with this. This will inflict retribution.

Chapter one

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