#don fitzgerald
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Chapter 4- The Catch
Summary: Carentan was a harsh bloody battle. As you and Doc are tending to multiple wounded men, you eventually run into Liebgott while he’s comforting a severely wounded fellow soldier he was partnered with. After the Americans claimed the town, eventually the boys of Easy were pleasantly surprised when they had an evening at a pub when you arrived polished up like a lady with a song in your heart.
A/N: Mature audience, Joe LiebgottxFem!Medic, post D-Day, She/Her Pronouns, Y/F/N, Y/L/N, Cursing/Swearing, Derogatory Slurs, Womanizing Comments, Confrontation, Military Terminology, 1940’s slang, Inappropriate Nicknames, Band of Brothers References, Mentions of Weaponry, Descriptive Wounds/Injuries, Death, Blood/Gore, Smoking, Banter, Pining, Consensual Physical Contact/PDA, FOREVER FLUFF 💚
Chapter takes place Episode 1x4 Replacements
Song selection for this piece:
Good Night, My Love by Ella Fitzgerald
{Provided below at the end of the chapter}
*These stories may not fall entirely in accordance with the TV series timeline. I do not know the real soldiers the actors portray in this series, so please understand I show no disrespect. Some or most of historical events and character interactions in my fanfics are fabricated purely for the sake of the enjoyment of fiction*
~~~~~~~
As you come up on Carentan, you’re met with heavy fire from German snipers hiding inside some of the buildings. Most of you take cover in the ditches on either side of the road but are just made easy targets for the Germans since everyone was still out in the open.
Winters shouted at the troops to move forward to get cover and started to physically lift each soldier he passed to get them moving.
“Get yourselves out of those trenches!”
After finally making entry into the town, American soldiers scatter to wherever they can to get cover from all of the gunfire coming from every direction.
You and Doc on separate ends of the streets trying to keep low to tend to the wounded.
“MEDIC!!”
You race to two soldiers landing on your knees next to them, one on the ground with a trail of blood coming from his helmet, the other crouching over him.
“He’s still breathing, help me carry him!” You call out. You each grab an arm of the injured soldier and drag him behind a building.
While you’re working on the nameless soldier’s head wound, a drug store gets blasted by German artillery not far from where you were, the force from the explosion sending you sideways into the brick wall next to you.
Your ears intensely ringing, it’s all you can hear for a moment until you hear Liebgott’s voice.
“TIPPER! TIP! Answer me, Tip!” Joe calls out to his partner, Ed Tipper who sadly had been in the building when the blast occurred.
You shake your head vigorously in an attempt open your ears and regain your composure. When you finally snap out of it, you look up to see Tipper stumbling out of the destroyed storefront of the pharmacy, the left side of his face completely torn up from shrapnel, and his right thigh blown wide open, the artery clearly lacerated and bleeding out.
Liebgott running, stops dead in his tracks when he sees Tipper.
“Joe?? Is that you??” Tipper calls out trembling.
Liebgott stunned by Tipper’s bloody appearance, slowly approached him carefully setting down is rifle.
“Lookin’ good, Tip.” Joe says reassuringly placing his rifle on the ground, “-lookin’ real good.”
Liebgott gently took Tipper by the arm, leading him out of the building.
“Come here, buddy, you gotta sit down. Come here...Come on...” He slowly helped Tipper to the ground, “Easy, easy...There you go...there you go.”
Liebgott crouched next to Tipper and gently guided his head to rest in the crook of his neck.
Tipper’s breath became ragged and labored. As he started coughing up blood, Joe surveyed the rest of the damage on him. He discovers the right thigh wound, bleeding out and pulsating where the artery was hit, then the right foot exposed through the boot also drenched in red.
“Ah Jesus...” Liebgott whispered to himself stroking Tipper’s hair. “You hang in there, buddy. Okay, we're gonna get you fixed up. All right...okay. Guys, you wanna give me a hand here? Come on.”
He started to lift Tipper as you approached. Before the other two soldiers could help Liebgott pick him up, you push through them grabbing Tipper’s right arm to bring it across the back of your shoulders and assist carrying him to safety.
“Over here, Lieb.” You direct.
You both rest Tipper against the wall as you grab a large dressing from your med bag, putting it directly over his thigh to apply pressure. You knew it would be to no avail since the artery needed to be held closed to keep the blood in and he’s lost so much blood already. Without plasma, you couldn’t do much.
“Tip, I’m right here.” You comfort him, putting your face in his line of sight so he can see you.
Liebgott staring stood up slowly, waiting for you to work your healing magic, but you already knew Tipper’s fate was sealed. You look up apologetically at Joe and shake your head.
~~~~~~~
After the dust finally settled, the town was now under American control. The time in Carentan was short lived, as orders came through for Easy to attack East towards the low ground. Easy went from the Western part of Carentan towards the South, near the village of Douville. You all are confronted with a major German resistance upon your arrival. The Germans launched a strong counter- attack with tanks and armored vehicles. Fortunately, Sherman tank reinforcements arrived, breaking the German lines of contact and shortly abandoned the hill.
A few days later, after a failed reconnaissance mission, Easy was removed from the front lines and sent back to Sainte-Mère-du-Monte to recover from the combat you all had endured. To Easy’s misfortune, Lipton announces you all are to return to combat in September. New orders state Easy is to drop into Holland to liberate the people from German tyranny.
But when Easy approaches Eindhoven, the locals commemorate your arrival with celebration in the streets with banners waving and cheers of appreciation. Women of the village kiss each soldier on the cheeks and mouths as they pass, while the men hug or shake their hands showing their gratitude.
It was chaotic. Everywhere you looked, people were dancing and shouting in the streets while music blared from a band off to the side. You were once again separated from Joe.
You hear Lipton yelling, “Keep moving!!” He repeated over and over amongst the crowd as he ushered the guys up the street.
This was an unusual change of pace for Easy Company. Instead of being met with gunshots and explosions, you’re welcomed with warm smiles and affection from the locals. Some of the guys took advantage of the situation getting in some extra kisses from the local women.
You wondered if Liebgott was kissing any of these women. Afterall, they seemed to be wearing some of their best dresses with make-up and here you were, having looked like a hag for nearly four months since you dropped on D-Day. Why wouldn’t he get his kisses in while he had the chance to get one from a lady looking like she had at least been bathing consistently?
This thought discouraged you. You hadn’t done yourself up since Toccoa. You release a sigh of frustration and continue pushing through the crowd.
~~~~~~~
That evening, Easy got together with some of the new Easy replacements in attendance at what seemed to be a barn made into an improvised pub. There was a dartboard on the wall, and multiple tables and chairs set up. A simple radio playing some popular tunes sat on the bar.
“Hey, Lieb, where’s Y/L/N?” Perconte asked.
Liebgott shrugged. “Last I heard she went to one of the local women’s houses to get cleaned up.”
“Betchya we won’t even recognize her.” Guarnere joked.
The guys all laughed collectively. Malarkey pushed through the crowd trying to get everyone’s attention.
“Hey, guys! Get a look at the bird that just came in!” Malarkey pointed towards the entrance with a wide eager smile.
Everyone redirected their attention to the front of the room. Most of the men of Easy caught sight of an almost familiar woman wearing the standard female Army dress uniform complete with skirt, simple heels, and clean white medic brassard displaying the Red Cross around the left bicep. Hair clean and perfumed pulled back into a neat fashionable bun and a face with fresh make-up and painted lips. You almost had the entire room at a complete standstill when you walked in.
Liebgott’s jaw dropped, (as did everyone’s).
“Who the hell is that?” Talbert asked.
“Floyd, you’re an idiot.” Guarnere asserted.
“It’s our little lady medic, boys.” Randleman pointed out affectionately.
Excited murmurs and whispers filtered across the room.
You start to make your way to Easy in the back. Of course, you’re approached by several other members from other companies there, but you kindly decline their advances so you can get to your own.
“Hey, fellas.” You greet as you near the group of Easy soldiers.
They all inaudibly respond with their own forms of welcome, then all fall silent leaving a heavy blanket of tension in the air between you and them. You look around suspiciously wondering why none of them were making eye contact with you or speaking. Some looked like they were even holding their breath.
“What’s wrong with you guys? It just Y/L/N! Quit acting like you never seen a woman before.” Nixon said addressing the men.
“Yeah, but that’s just it, sir, it’s Y/L/N...dolled up. She don’t normally look like this.” Guarnere explained.
Nixon laughed. “Then it would be gentlemanly of one of you to offer her a seat while I get her a drink. What will you have Y/L/N?” He called out to you.
“Thank you, sir, any beer will be just fine.” You replied with a relieved smile.
“You clean up nice, L/N!” Malarkey commended as he pulled you in for a one-armed hug.
“Thanks, Don.” You respond as your cheeks heat up.
The rest of the guys agree simultaneously, each voicing over the other how great you looked.
You laugh nervously, “Gee, guys, thanks.” Was all you could say.
You weren’t used to this kind of attention from the boys. As the awkwardness lifted and everyone started to resume socializing, your eyes eventually met Liebgott’s.
You each smile at eachother.
“Here you go, L/N.” Nixon handed you a bottle with a wink.
“Thanks, sir. Cheers!” You raise your beer clinking it against his highball glass of Vat 69 whiskey on the rocks.
You finally go to stand with Liebgott.
When you reached him, he gently pulled you in by your waist and leaned in to whisper in your ear.
“You’re a knockout, sweetheart.” He professed with that Joe Liebgott smirk.
You felt his warm breath dance along your neck, making your spine shiver and the butterflies rise in your stomach.
Your breath caught in your chest, and you smiled shyly at him.
“Lookin’ dapper yourself, Joe.” You reply as you readjust his tie.
Your little moment was interrupted abruptly by Guarnere.
“Hey Joe, if you ain’t gonna have a dance with her, how ‘bout letting one of us take her once around the room?” He teased.
An upoar of laughter erupted from the group.
Joe looked at you and raised his eyebrows, “How about it, doll?” He asked.
“Oh, I don’t think I can dance in these shoes, Joe. I tripped twice outside on the way over here.” You admitted.
Joe chuckled then Luz came up to you.
“Hey Y/F/N! Bull here says you got some pipes on ya? Can you sing us a little something?” He bid.
You direct a look of betrayal towards Randleman.
“You said you wouldn’t tell anyone, Bull.” You reminded him sharply.
“It would be a crime and shame to keep that voice a secret, lady.” Randleman declared.
Laughter fills the air.
“So, whaddya say? One song? For us?” Luz begged again.
You look around at all the eager faces of the men in Easy Company, and you smile.
“How about some Ella Fitzgerald?” You suggest.
The men cheered and ushered you over to the upright piano against the wall by the bar.
“Hey, we can’t see her!” One soldier shouted from the back.
“Give her something to stand on!” Another one called out.
Toye placed a chair next to the piano as Liebgott offered his hand to help you up.
When you came into view of the audience, all the men applauded, directing whistles and howls of admiration.
You grimace playfully shaking your head mouthing, “Knock it off!” as you wave them down.
A soldier from the crowd sat at the piano.
“You know, Goodnight, My Love?” You ask him.
The soldier nodded and began playing the selection from memory.
You serenade with all your heart and soul, immediately capturing the room. As you sing, you look from one awestruck face to another, making sure to smile as any good entertainer would do in the movies. You felt like a starlet.
The whole room leaning in listening intensively, some ogling at you from the tables, your eyes connect with Joe’s who’s standing along the front. He grins as he watches you admirably and you can’t help but return a smile.
At that moment on the last line of the song, you lost your balance.
🎶Sleep tight, my love, goodnight, my love
Remember that you’re my sweetheart--🎶
“GASP!”
All the air suddenly left your lungs as you feel your feet leaving the surface of the chair. It all seemed to happen in slow motion as Joe swiftly swooped in catching you bridal style before you can hit the floor. The room in unison choked with concern.
The world went still while Joe was holding you. Your faces so close, your cheeks reddened and once again your breath stuck in your throat somewhere.
“Nice grab, Liebgott!” You hear Guarnere shout. The room laughed and applauded as Joe turned still carrying you, smiling mischievously from ear to ear.
“What a finale!” Compton called out.
“No more booze for her!” Luz teased. More laughter.
Liebgott set you on your feet.
“You good?” He asked. You nod.
“Thanks to you.” You beamed. You leaned in and kissed his cheek to show your gratitude for the rescue.
You heard some of the guys mockingly whistle at you and Liebgott for this little show of affection.
His astonishment had left his mouth slightly agape and his eyes wide making you giggle. He leered playfully at you.
“You missed, sweetheart.” He eluded as he tapped his lips with his finger winking at you.
You raised an eyebrow at him skeptically. With your fore and middle fingers together, you press them to your red lips, kiss the pads, then place them onto Joe’s waiting lips which he gladly kissed. A devilish grin stretched across his face.
“Maybe next time we can have that dance?” He suggested.
“Sure, Joe. At least I know I can depend on you to catch me if I fall again.” You proclaim with a wink and a coy smile.
“I’ll always be there to save you, sweetheart.”
~~~~~~~
For your hearing pleasure,
Good Night, My Love by Ella Fitzgerald
youtube
{Provided by YouTube}
Chapter 5 👇🏼
#Youtube#band of brothers#hbo war#ww2#joe liebgott#joseph liebgott#joe liebgott x female reader#joe liebgott x reader#joe toye#bill guarnere#george luz#eugene roe#doc roe#lewis nixon#dick winters#carwood lipton#denver randleman#buck compton#floyd talbert#ed tipper#frank perconte#don malarkey#101st airborne#easy company#ella fitzgerald#good night my love
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Next big work
#jensen ackles#jensen ackles x reader#spencer reid#spencer reid x reader#criminal minds#derek morgan#derek morgan x reader#zak bagans#zak bagans x reader#ghost adventures#barry fitzgerald#barry fitzgerald x reader#ghost hunters internation#ghost hunters#steve gonsalves#steve gonsalves x reader#CSI NY#CSI New York#Don Flack#don flack x reader
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1956 - JATP - FestHalle in Planten und Blomen - Hamburg / Hambourg
Ella Fitzgerald, Oscar Peterson, Dizzy Gillespie, Roy Eldridge, Flip Phillips, Illinois Jacquet, Gene Krupa, Ray Brown, Herb Ellis, Don Abney
#jazz#poster flyer#jatp#ella fitzgerald#oscar peterson#dizzy gillespie#roy eldridge#flip phillips#illinois jacquet#gene krupa#ray brown#herb ellis#don abney#1956
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The Stork Club (1945) Hal Walker
July 6th 2023
#the stork club#1945#hal walker#betty hutton#barry fitzgerald#don defore#robert benchley#bill goodwin#iris adrian#mary young#andy russell#Mikhail Rasumny
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Oscar Peterson Trio & Ella Fitzgerald - Jazz At The Philharmonic - 1957 • World of Jazz
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Spawn Universe's Cyan Fitzgerald Gets Comic Book Series
Cyan Fitzgerald, from the Spawn Universe, is getting a coming-of-age, four-issue miniseries. Misery will be written by Todd McFarlane and illustrated by Szymon Kudrański. The comic hails from Image Comics and Todd McFarlane Productions.
"Cyan is now a 17-year-old trying to forge a life of her own after the tragic loss of her mother, Wanda, whose character was the inspiration for Spawn's existence in the first place. Now, as Cyan grapples with her grief and seeks to find her purpose, she discovers hidden powers emerging in her. A newfound gift—and curse—for ‘healing’ will force her to distance herself from those she loves most at a time when she needs their support." To make matters worse, Cyan's ability has a tremendous cost as "each touch unleashes the darkest memories and emotions of the person she touches, leaving Cyan to bear the weight of their suffering as her own." (Image Comics)
Misery #1 (of 4), featuring a cover by Don Aguillo, goes on sale on June 5, 2024.
(Image via Image Comics - Don Aguillo's Cover of Misery #1)
#misery#cyan fitzgerald#spawn universe#spawn#todd mcfarlane#szymon kudranski#don aguillo#image comics#todd mcfarlane productions#TGCLiz
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Free Yale online courses that sound interesting
This one is actually my favorite. They put a LOT of full courses on youtube! They also have some courses on Coursera.
Arts & Literature
Introduction to Classic Music
Cervantes Don Quixote -- Youtube
Dante in Translation -- YouTube
The American Novels Since 1945 -- YouTube
Modern Poetry -- YouTube
Milton -- YouTube
Introduction to Theory of Literature -- YouTube
Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Faulkner -- YouTube
History & Social Studies
African American History: From Emancipation To Present (2010) -- YouTube
Introduction to Ancient Greek History -- Youtube
Epidemics in Western Society Since 1600 -- YouTube
Roman Architecture -- YouTube
Philosophy and the Science of Human Nature -- YouTube
Death -- YouTube
Capitalism: Sucess, Crisis and Reform -- YouTube
Introduction to Political Philosophy -- Youtube
Foundations of Modern Social Theory -- Youtube
Global Financial Crisis
The Making of Modern Ukraine
#dark academia#light academia#chaotic academia#romantic academia#adhd academia#dark academia aesthetic#bookblr#books#studyblr brazil#geogblr#yale#collegeblr#uniblr#studyblr
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peace and quiet
pairing: Villanelle x Assassin!F!Reader
tags/warnings: sexual content, car sex, dirty talk, fingering, edging (18+, mdni)
a/n: bet ya didn't see this coming 😏 truthfully, i've had this scenario on my mind for about a month now. i had to write this before i got through the rest of my drafts. im also a bottom!villanelle fan oops enjoy! gif credit.
The last way you wanted to spend your Friday evening was stuck in a Ford Fiesta with the world's most infuriating assassin, Villanelle. But here you both were, cramped and cranky as you wasted hours watching a man go through his nightly routine. Truthfully, you didn't know much about your target except his name, James Fitzgerald. His dossier was light and you suspected that further information wasn't yours to know.
As your handler would say: the less you knew, the better.
Silently, you watched as James moved from room to room in his home; starting in his bedroom, wandering into the kitchen, and finally, settling into the living room. Couldn't the Twelve have a vendetta against someone more interesting?
The blonde next to you must have thought the same thing. Immediately, she turned the radio on, flicking through the stations until she hummed in approval.
"Oh, I love Britney," she muses, beginning to sing along to the chorus of Womanizer as it pumps through the car's surround sound system.
You refrain from groaning.
"Villanelle, I need you to stop." Your voice is strained as your eyes are trained in front of you.
She's completely off-key but sings without a care in the world. Obviously, she's ignoring you and you exhale slowly, squeezing your eyes shut. Villanelle was good at what she did. Great even. But her hyperactive nature and flair for dramatics made you dread any time the two of you had to work together.
It wasn't just her obnoxious nature that made it so difficult for you to work with her. From the outlandish yet stylish outfits she donned to the way she held herself on and off the job, you thought she was stunning. But now, being in such close quarters only seemed to intensify those feelings. Your stomach did somersaults at each pesky thought, unable to get them out of your head quick enough. Entertaining those ideas was a distraction you couldn't afford.
Not in this line of work.
It's just one mission, you find yourself thinking, blinking your eyes open. I just need to get through one mission with her and then—
And then you will work with her again when the Twelve will it. You will still have these terribly ridiculous feelings that you will, once again, have to dissect like you are now. You grit your teeth and instead focus your boring gaze on James Fitzgerald's wrinkled forehead.
Wordlessly, you turn the radio knob towards you, muting the music so you can focus. Villanelle's contralto voice cuts through the silence like a blade and it takes her a few moments to realize what you've done.
"Hey! I was having fun!"
You roll your eyes, tapping your fingertips against the steering wheel.
"I wasn't."
Villanelle scoffs, feigning offense before leaning back. Aggressively, she adjusts her seat, allowing it to fully recline. She lays down, eyes glued to the car ceiling before crossing her arms over her chest petulantly.
You were ready to further accentuate her childishness as she muttered about how you were a 'party pooper,' but paused. James was getting up and walking towards his front door. He was letting someone inside, holy shit! This needed to be documented.
In the dark, you felt for your phone that was supposed to be on the console. Miscalculating, you reached over farther than necessary and instead grabbed—
Villanelle gasped, body arching forward.
Oh.
Your fingers gripped the flesh of her inner thigh, dangerously close to the hem of her shift dress. Blush immediately crawls over your cheeks and you become a stammering mess.
"Oh my god," you ramble, going to remove your hand. "I'm so sorry, Villanelle. I thought that—"
You don't get to finish your sentence. Her hand is over yours and she shoves your palm in between her legs. The wet cotton of her underwear greets your fingers and the heat it emits makes you flatline.
This wasn't real. None of this could be real.
"I know how you look at me."
The statement throws you off kilter and you gape like a fish. Were you that obvious? The idea makes you nauseous; how the hell did Villanelle know your feelings better than you could even comprehend them?
"Stop thinking," she husks and her confidence seems to spread to you like wildfire.
James Fitzgerald and his unannounced guest are long forgotten as you shift in your seat, turning to face Villanelle. Your finger pads inquisitively drag up the length of her clothed slit. Her breathing grows heavier the closer you stroke towards her clit. You can make out her teeth digging into her lower lip and the mischievous glint in her eyes as she stares back at you.
She’s begging you to keep her entertained.
Cautiously, you pull your hand away. The loss of contact squeezes a whimper from her throat, but it dies as she watches you slip two fingers between your lips. You suck slowly, refusing to break eye contact with her before releasing them with a soft pop. You don’t miss the way her tongue darts out to wet her lips.
“Are you going to behave?” Villanelle nods like a bobblehead, practically rutting her body closer to where your hand used to be.
You chuckle. “Good girl.”
Wet fingers glide up her bare leg, meeting at the junction just below her thigh and cunt. Gently, your fingers worm underneath the waistband of her underwear. Painfully slow, you tug them down so that they pool at her knees. They are soaked and the sound of the blonde’s panting is amplified in the enclosed quiet of the car.
"Oh baby," you taunt, watching as she presses her thighs together. You want to swallow her whole.
"Is this all for me?"
"Yes," she sighs out instantaneously, parting her legs as your hand connects back to her cunt.
Your middle finger delicately slides through Villanelle's folds, exploring her velvety flesh. Tracing circles around her labia, you finally brush just underneath her clit. She jerks forward, desperately chasing your touch.
"Villanelle." Her name is a warning on your tongue, tutting gently as you watch her squirm. Your middle finger is fixed in the same position and her fingers curl around your wrist.
"Be nice," she pleads and no matter what your plan was initially, you couldn't deny her further. You nod and gently, your middle finger sinks inside her.
Villanelle tenses momentarily, adjusting to the intrusion before relaxing. She squeezes your wrist, silently goading you to move. You comply, thrusting deeper inside of her.
Your finger moves leisurely at first, more so to savor the first-time feeling of her silky flesh enveloping you. Gradually, you pick up the pace. Her slick drools down the length of your finger and the obscene squelching makes you blush.
Thank god for the dark.
A stream of moans bubbles from Villanelle's throat as her fingernails dig into your wrist. Her other hand moves to her lips, her teeth sinking into the knuckle of her index finger to muffle herself. In response, your finger curls inside of her. She keens, her eyes rolling back as she shoves her hips forward.
"Don't do that," you chide, pumping against the spongy walls of her cunt. "I want everyone to hear how good I'm gonna fuck you."
Her gaze peeks through her lashes, blinking in surprise at the vulgarity of your statement. She's beautifully flushed and the image is seared into your mind. Your ring finger presses inside of her and she gasps, finally removing her hand from her mouth.
"Don't be mean," Villanelle mewls and you can't stop the smile tugging at your lips.
By now, the windows have fogged over in the car. The air between you has risen at least ten degrees higher and you match Villanelle's ragged panting, hyperfocused on every expression she makes. Her hair fans out like a golden halo, illuminating her furrowed brows and parted lips. You want to kiss her, but you instead settle for swiping your thumb across her clit.
Villanelle's chest heaves when you suddenly piston your fingers inside her. She sloppily pushes down to meet your thrusts while her head lolls back against the car seat. By the way her walls fluttered against your sheathed digits, you knew her orgasm was imminent.
James Fitzgerald's departure was also imminent.
Suddenly, the flash of headlights appears in your peripheral vision. A midsized sedan rushes past the front of your rental car. James is driving while his guest in question is in the passenger seat. Your eyes go wide; the memory of exactly why you and Villanelle were here to begin with hits you like a truck.
You withdraw your fingers from Villanelle's pussy and she cries out in both confusion and frustration. Scrambling, she pulls the seat back up so she can properly glower at you.
"What the fuck?" She yells, softening only slightly as she watches you suck your fingers clean before putting the car in drive.
"It's James," you start, pressing the defogger button near the bottom of the dashboard. "I'm gonna tail him."
"I was about to cum!"
You glance at Villanelle quickly as she complains, tossing a cocky smirk in her direction.
"I guess you'll just have to wait then."
#villanelle#villanelle x reader#villanelle x you#villanelle smut#villanelle imagine#oksana astankova#oksana astankova x reader#killing eve#lesbian#wlw#lgbtq#smut#fanfiction#fanfic
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Any recommendations for catchy songs about specific American historical events? Hurricane by The Band of Heathens (unless I'm mistaken, it's pretty explicitlu about Katrina) and The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald are examples.
i love the song hurricane, but i didn't know about the other til now. thank you for the inadvertent rec!
also i don't know about catchy necessarily but i do have a few historical event tunes to recommend.
It's About Blood by Steve Earle is about West Virginia coal mining disasters, at the end of which he lists by name around two dozen victims of specific disasters. this one gives me chills. this whole album Ghosts of West Virginia does actually
Big Time in the Jungle by Old Crow Medicine Show is about snatching up poor, uneducated southern boys and shippin em off to Vietnam. pretty catchy, v fuckin dark by the end
Battle of Blair Mountain by David Rovics is about,, well,, the battle of blair mountain
Seneca Creek by Charles Wesley Godwin mentions the WV flood of 1985 though is about the singer's grandparents iirc
... and as i made this list i realized i sure talk a lot about and revere west virginia for someone whos never lived there (but plans to <3). anyway here's some stuff to balance it
Casey Jones by The Grateful Dead is about a conductor in Tennessee who stayed on a runaway train to let others escape to safety and ultimaetly died (and is catchy as fuck actually)
Battle of New Orleans by Johnny Horton is pretty straightforwardly about the war of 1812
Ohio by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young is about the Kent State Massacre
American Pie by Don McClean was written in response to the plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J.P. Richardson Jr. i feel like everyone knows this song but maybe not the actual meaning, i didn't know til a few years ago. so maybe i'm just behind
anyway if yall know any please add in reblogs or leave in the replies, i love this kinda thing
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Good Omens Aziraphale's Sad Bastard Breakup Playlist
After the breakup, Aziraphale has a new job in heaven, having taken Gabriel’s vacant position. Aziraphale is haunted by sad music reminding him of his time with Crowley. The songs are dramatic, tragic, melancholic, angry, wistful, romantic, and sentimental. How does he listen to music at his new job in the head office? Are material objects allowed? Does he keep a secret stash of tea, cake, and records and a phonograph player in his office? Does he have a celestial radio that can tune in Earth radio stations? Does he sneak off to Earth to hang out in record shops and bookstores? Or more dramatically and emotionally torturously, does he remember every note, every nuance, every feeling, of every song and replay them in his mind? He's stuffing his face with angel food cake and tea while crying and listening to sad bastard songs and hiding from Michael and the Metatron.
See note after list on song selection process.
Songs include:
“Lacrimosa” – Mozart, Requiem in D Minor, Vienna Mozart Orchestra
“Commendatore” – Mozart, Don Giovanni, Amadeus film soundtrack
“Ja, tot katoramu vnimala” – Rubenstein, The Demon, Nicolai Ghiaurov
“D’amour l’ardente flemme” – Berlioz, The Damnation of Faust, Maria Callas
“Liebestod” – Wagner, Tristan and Isolde, Waltraud Meier
“Ach ich fuhls” – Mozart, The Magic Flute, Gundula Janowitz
“Thy hand, Belinda … When I am laid in earth” – Purcell, Dido and Aeneas, Janet Baker
“E lucevan la stelle” – Puccini, Tosca, Placido Domingo
“Celeste Aidia” – Verdi, Aida, Mario Lanza
“Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen” Mahler, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
“Der Wanderer” – Schubert, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
“Love is a Plaintive Song” – Gilbert and Sullivan, Patience, D’Oyly Carte Opera Company
“I am a Courtier Grave and Serious” – Gilbert and Sullivan, The Gondoliers, D’Oyly Carte Opera Company
“The Gentleman is a Dope” – Rodgers and Hammerstein, Allegro, Blossom Dearie
“A Hymn to Him” – Lerner and Lowe, My Fair Lady, Rex Harrison
“Could I Leave You?” – Sondheim, Follies, Alexis Smith
“We Do Not Belong Together” – Sondheim, Sunday in the Park with George, Bernadette Peters and Mandy Patinkin
“On My Own” – Schonberg, Les Misérables, Frances Ruffelle
“As Long as He Needs Me” – Bert, Oliver, Judy Garland
“Stranger in Paradise” – Wright and Forest, Kismet, Richard Kiley and Doretta Morrow
“A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square” – Sherwin and Maschwitz, Vera Lynn
“Night and Day” – Porter, The Gay Divorcee, Ella Fitzgerald
“I’ve Got You Under My Skin” – Porter, Born to Dance, Shirley Bassey
“Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” – Rodgers and Heart, Pal Joey, Sarah Vaughan
“They Can’t Take That Away From Me” – Gershwin, Shall We Dance, Fred Astaire
“Mon Deu” – Dumont and Vaucaire, Edith Piaf
“Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien” – Dumont and Vaucaire, Edith Piaf
P.S.: Aziraphale likes Les Mis because it reminds him of that time Crowley rescued him from the Bastille. Don't tell anyone. It's a big secret.
P.P.S.: “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” reminds him of the time he and Crowley got drunk in the backroom at the bookshop the day the anti-Christ was delivered to Earth. Basically, this song reminds him of every time they went out for drinks or stayed in and drank.
P.P.P.S.: “I am a Courtier Grave and Serious” was the song Aziraphale planned to play when trying to tempt Crowley into learning the gavotte. It reminds him of the ball in the bookstore when he finally danced with Crowley.
P.P.P.P.S.: “Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien” is as close as Aziraphale can get to telling the world and Crowley to eff off. He has no more effs to give. Or at least he’s trying to convince himself he no longer gives a f***. He’s going off to his new job at the head office and Do Good.
Note on song selection:
I selected songs that thematically fit with the relationship between Aziraphale and Crowley. I think the songs tell a story of Aziraphale’s struggle to reconcile his conflicted motivations. They reflect Aziraphale’s fears and desires. He fears being hauled off to hell for disobedience. He fears Crowley’s death and being alone in the world. He desires to be emotionally intimate with Crowley. (Dare he risk physical intimacy with Crowley?) He feels self-righteously indignant, but he’s soft and squishy and weepy and misses his best friend.
I don’t have much knowledge of opera or musical theater, but I have some experience with choir and solo performance. I did a lot of research into opera, art songs, musicals, showtunes, and standards to create a playlist on YouTube. Selections were based on availability, popularity, and sound quality. My big question was whether or not Aziraphale is a strict originalist or if he likes different versions of songs. In some places, I chose newer versions over original versions due to the sound quality of the recordings. I tried to keep selections accessible to a wide audience with varying degrees of musical knowledge. You may not like my choices, so your mileage may vary. You can make your own playlist.
You can listen to it on YouTube.
#good omens 2#neil gaiman#aziraphale#crowley#breakup#sad bastard music#angry love songs#breakup playlist#playlist
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"In 2007, Matt Bomer would have been a little too young to play Don Draper on Mad Men. (Jon Hamm has six years on him.) In most other ways, though, he would have been perfect. He has the kind of chiseled, leading man features, and the charisma to match, that make him seem like a man from an earlier time. His breakout TV role, 2009’s White Collar, even contrived a reason to dress him in Rat Pack-era suits, and he’s appeared in a number of period pieces, most notably Amazon’s short-lived adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Last Tycoon. In that show, and in many of his other roles, he’s also demonstrated a great facility for playing men hiding trauma and other secrets deep below that beautiful facade he shows to the world.
With Showtime‘s new miniseries Fellow Travelers, Bomer finally gets to portray a closer approximation of Draper. In the adaptation of Thomas Mallon’s novel, Bomer plays Hawkins Fuller, a mid-century decorated military veteran turned mover and shaker, who will do anything to conceal the truth about himself, who has a terrifying gift for compartmentalization and denial, and who is married to a woman he loves, but is not as attracted to her as she believes."
#rolling stone magazine#review#matt bomer#fellow travelers#hawk fuller#tim laughlin#white collar#jonathan bailey#john hamm
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book recs for the signs
aries:
energetic, hot-headed, courageous, fiery, competitive, heroic, daring
- the illiad by homer
- east of eden by john steinbeck
- war and peace by leo tolstoy
taurus:
homely, indulgent, sensual, tender, stubborn, stagnant, creative
- my year of rest and relaxation by ottessa moshfegh
- on earth we’re briefly gorgeous by ocean vuong
- the goldfinch by donna tartt
gemini:
lively, witty, superficial, spontaneous, adaptable, curious
- the secret history by donna tartt
- and then there were none by agatha christie
- lord of the flies by william golding
cancer:
nurturing, moody, intuitive, sentimental
- the bell jar by sylvia plath
- the turn of the screw by henry james
- mrs dalloway by virginia woolf
leo:
dramatic, passionate, vivacious, steadfast, playful
- the picture of dorian gray by oscar wilde
- if we were villains by m.l. rio
- the phantom of the opera by gaston leroux
virgo:
meticulous, analytical, modest, critical, complex, distant
- the catcher in the rye by j.d salinger
- the stranger/the outsider by albert camus
- sherlock holmes by arthur conan doyle
libra:
romantic, diplomatic, idealistic, gullible, harmonious, aesthete
- to kill a mockingbird by harper lee
- pride and prejudice by jane austen
- little women by louisa may alcott
scorpio:
intense, perceptive, thoughtful, obsessive, elusive
- inferno by dante
- lolita by vladimir nabokov
- these violent delights by micah nemerever
sagittarius:
philosophical, optimistic, restless, insatiable, adventurous, wise
- crime and punishment by fyodor dostoevsky
- don quixote by miguel de cervantes
- the razor’s edge by w. somerset maugham
capricorn:
ambitious, reserved, dedicated, reliable, resilient, protective, melancholic
- the great gatsby by scott fitzgerald
- great expectations by charles dickens
- anna karenina by leo tolstoy
aquarius:
intelligent, unique, strange, detached, revolutionary, rebellious
- frankenstein by mary shelley
- animal farm by george orwell
- the metamorphosis by franz kafka
pisces:
introspective, yearning, dreamy, artistic, sensitive
- the haunting of hill house by shirley jackson
- the waves by virginia woolf
- the starless sea by erin morgenstern
#astrology#books#virginia woolf#literature#dark academia#zodiac#sylvia plath#charles dickens#mary shelley#kafka#oscar wilde#donna tartt#jane austen#shirley jackson#classics#book recommendations#first post in forever#book recs#edited
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How many of these "Top 100 Books to Read" have you read?
(633) 1984 - George Orwell
(616) The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
(613) The Catcher In The Rye - J.D. Salinger
(573) Crime And Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
(550) Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
(549) The Adventures Of Tom And Huck - Series - Mark Twain
(538) Moby-Dick - Herman Melville
(534) One Hundred Years Of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
(527) To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee
(521) The Grapes Of Wrath - John Steinbeck
(521) Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
(492) Pride And Prejudice - Jane Austen
(489) The Lord Of The Rings - Series - J.R.R. Tolkien
(488) Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
(480) Ulysses - James Joyce
(471) Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
(459) Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
(398) The Brothers Karamazov - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
(396) Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
(395) To The Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf
(382) War And Peace - Leo Tolstoy
(382) The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway
(380) The Sound And The Fury - William Faulkner
(378) Alice's Adventures In Wonderland - Series - Lewis Carroll
(359) Frankenstein - Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
(353) Heart Of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
(352) Middlemarch - George Eliot
(348) Animal Farm - George Orwell
(346) Don Quixote - Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
(334) Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut
(325) Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
(320) Harry Potter - Series - J.K. Rowling
(320) The Chronicles Of Narnia - Series - C.S. Lewis
(317) Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
(308) Lord Of The Flies - William Golding
(306) Invisible Man - Ralph Ellison
(289) The Golden Bowl - Henry James
(276) Pale Fire - Vladimir Nabokov
(266) Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
(260) The Count Of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
(255) The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - Series - Douglas Adams
(252) The Life And Opinions Of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman - Laurence Sterne
(244) Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
(237) Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackery
(235) The Trial - Franz Kafka
(233) Absalom, Absalom! - William Faulkner
(232) The Call Of The Wild - Jack London
(232) Emma - Jane Austen
(229) Beloved - Toni Morrison
(228) Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
(224) A Passage To India - E.M. Forster
(215) Dune - Frank Herbert
(215) A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man - James Joyce
(212) The Stranger - Albert Camus
(209) One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kesey
(209) The Idiot - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
(206) Dracula - Bram Stoker
(205) The Picture Of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde
(197) A Confederacy Of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
(193) Mrs. Dalloway - Virginia Woolf
(193) The Age Of Innocence - Edith Wharton
(193) The History Of Tom Jones, A Foundling - Henry Fielding
(192) Under The Volcano - Malcolm Lowry
(190) The Odyssey - Homer
(189) Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift
(188) In Search Of Lost Time - Marcel Proust
(186) Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
(185) An American Tragedy - Theodore Dreiser
(182) The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
(180) Siddhartha - Hermann Hesse
(179) The Magic Mountain - Thomas Mann
(178) Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
(178) Tropic Of Cancer - Henry Miller
(176) The Outsiders - S.E. Hinton
(176) On The Road - Jack Kerouac
(175) The Little Prince - Antoine de Saint-Exupery
(173) The Giver - Lois Lowry
(172) Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
(172) A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
(171) Charlotte's Web - E.B. White
(171) The Ambassadors - Henry James
(170) Infinite Jest - David Foster Wallace
(167) The Complete Stories And Poems - Edgar Allen Poe
(166) Ender's Saga - Series - Orson Scott Card
(165) In Cold Blood - Truman Capote
(164) The Wings Of The Dove - Henry James
(163) The Adventures Of Augie March - Saul Bellow
(162) As I Lay Dying - William Faulkner
(161) The Hunger Games - Series - Suzanne Collins
(158) Anne Of Greene Gables - L.M. Montgomery
(157) Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand
(157) Neuromancer - William Gibson
(156) The Help - Kathryn Stockett
(156) A Song Of Ice And Fire - George R.R. Martin
(155) The Good Soldier - Ford Madox Ford
(154) The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
(153) I, Claudius - Robert Graves
(152) Wide Sargasso Sea - Jean Rhys
(151) The Portrait Of A Lady - Henry James
(150) The Death Of The Heart - Elizabeth Bowen
#books#book lists#p#im posting this so i can reblog it with my own crossed out list and i encourage others to do the same if you want to#i dont actually know how many ive read yet myself
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1963 - Ella Fitzgerald with the Don Abney trio - Oscar Peterson trio with Ray Brown and Ed Thigpen - New Victoria Theatre in London
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I have two questions!
1 - Have you read all ASOIAF books? If yes, which is your favorite?
2 - What are your favorites books and why?
Thanks in advance ☺️❤️
I have! I think the third one was my favorite.
Some of my favorites books are:
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol
To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev
Oblomov by Ivan Goncharov
Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov
The Manuscript Found in Saragossa by Jan Potocki
The Epic of Gilgamesh
Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
True Grit by Charles Portis
The Castle by Franz Kafka
The Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass by Fredrick Douglass
Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler
Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
Sundiata by D. T. Niane
Paradise Lost by John Milton
Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
At this point I'm just copying stuff down from a book review site I used to have. I used to read a whooooooooole lot, but I haven't much recently. :( Maybe I'll get back to it some day. My favorite author is Virginia Woolf. There's nothing more enjoyable than reading something by her—anything. When it comes to a put-together book, though, I think To the Lighthouse is her best. The others I've read are a joy to read, but the end, they don't necessarily come together as well as a book, if that makes sense. Now I haven't read them all. I've read To the Lighthouse, Mrs. Dalloway, Jacob's Room, and Orlando. If I were to recommend a second one, it would be Orlando, which is a real adventure to read. But her writing is unlike any other. I adore her work.
Lately I've been rereading some of my favorites aloud to my daughter after school. We read The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear by Walter Moers, and we've now gone through four books by Tove Jansson: The Moomins and the Great Flood, Comet in Moominland, Finn Family Moomintroll, and Moominpappa's Memoirs. Next up is Moominsummer Madness before things get dark. lol But she's been enjoying them. I love Tove Jansson. She refused to write anything other than what she felt. (One of the reasons Finn Family Moomintroll was so odd. She felt a million eyes on her for perhaps the first time, and she was nervous. She settled back in after that.) There's also random things in there. In Moominpappa's Memoirs there's a drawing she did that's a send-up of Picasso's Guernica when Edward the Booble saves them at the end. I should put a picture of it, because I'm not sure anyone noticed... At least I can't find anything on the internet (probably searching wrong).
Anyway, that's some stuff.
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LBTE: Jared (145-146)
In which Jared is suspicious of his good fortune and Bryce is defeated by a tiny little baby.
Going to be daily from this point on, or we ain't getting to the end of these before we get to the end of Impaired Judgment (still might be a close call).
If you want to follow along, the series page is here.
145. Divine Intervention
Title implies Stephen is divine, and he thinks that is only right. (Or that I am, which is true inasmuch as I am absolutely pulling the strings. Well. Sometimes. When they don't wander off on me. It's less like being behind the driver's wheel and more like herding cats.)
Normal doesn’t mean nothing has changed, because of course things have. A few guys have been trying to talk to Jared, invite him out, like now that he’s ‘Bullet’s husband’ to them they have to treat him differently.
How dare they.
He’s sure the team philosophy is ‘if I can’t sleep with my wife/girlfriend when I’m on the road, you sure as shit can’t sleep with your husband’. It’d upset the collective sense of fairness.
Legitimately, though, it would mainly be frowned upon for this reason.
They get teased a bit about how lucky they are on roadies — ‘road head’ was unfortunately uttered and Jared wishes he could scrub that one out of his memory — but Jared notices it’s never when the media’s around, not even when the support staff is, carefully cupped in the palms of the locker room. Maybe Gabe told them all not to say anything. Maybe they already know.
Jared, Bryce didn’t tell you shit about the dynamic in the Flames room until he hit his breaking point, you KNOW shit stays in the locker room.
“Bryce says you’ve been tense lately,” mom says over drinks after dinner. “That you’re expecting everything to backfire on you two.”
Tense is a massive understatement. High strung would be closer, yet still an understatement.
“Okay but it’s not—“ Jared says
“Paranoia when they’re out to get you?” dad asks.
“Don,” mom says. “At least try a little harder with your jokes than going with ‘chain email from the 90s’.”
“It’s not a joke,” dad protests. “It’s true. It’s not paranoia if the things you’re worried about can come true.”
Jared does not want to be on his dad’s side in this.
And yet he thinks he’s on his dad’s side in this.
Jared slowly embracing that he is his father’s son, which is good, because goddamn is he his father’s son, and that’s only going to become more and more evident as he gets older.
“You’re waiting for the other shoe to drop,” Gabe says.
“I mean,” Jared says. “Basically.”
“But it isn’t necessarily going to,” Gabe says. “And even if it is, you can enjoy it in the meantime, you know. Be happy with what you have instead of worrying about it possibly being taken away.”
Jared waves a dismissive hand, and Gabe sighs.
Get this gratitude bullshit out of Jared’s face.
“Jared,” Gabe says. “You’re scaring the rookies.”
“How?” Jared says, then realises he doesn’t care how. They need to toughen up if he’s scaring them without even trying. “Never mind. Who cares.”
The death glare keeps showing up. It’s not aimed at anyone in particular, which means it feels like it’s aimed at everyone.
“Because the rookies need to toughen up,” Jared says.
“Oh yeah?” Bryce asks, mouth tipping up. “I remember you being scared shitless of Mike Brouwer.”
I mean, legitimate fear for a rookie. Unless you’re Liam Fitzgerald, who obviously has no sense of self-preservation whatsoever.
Jared picks at a cut on his knuckle. He’s not sure how he got it. He had his hand jammed against the boards in a scrimmage earlier by Bryce of all people, so probably that. He won’t tell him, though. Bryce will react like he gravely injured Jared and then walk around all day looking like he accidentally stepped on a puppy’s tail.
He would be DEVASTATED.
Not worth it, especially since he’s finally started not actively backpedaling if he’s up against Jared in practice. The team has not been merciful about how easy Bryce goes on him. The chirping has genuinely been impressive.
The phrase ‘love tap’ has lost all meaning, it’s been used so much. With an accompanying leer every time, naturally.
“Did you come here to insult our decor?” Jared asks.
“No, but it’s a nice bonus,” Stephen says, and makes himself comfortable on the couch.
“Why are you here,” Jared repeats. “Oh shit, are you two finally—“
“No,” Stephen says. “Shut up.”
If someone mentions the word marriage to him one more time…
“This is an intervention,” Stephen says. “Gabe’s about to wring your neck, and you know what happens when Gabe wants to wring someone’s neck?”
“You want to wring his?” Jared guesses.
“No,” Stephen says. “Of course not, if he wants to wring someone’s neck I imagine it’s wholly deserved and I become fully prepared to wring that neck for him.”
Gabe’s neck wringing threshold is so far beyond Stephen’s that chances are Stephen would have already committed the act before Gabe even reaches the point where he considers it.
“Did you know that you sigh?” Stephen says. “Dramatically, apparently. Every day. Multiple times. You sigh.”
“Um,” Jared says.
“And Gabe asks what’s the matter,” Stephen says. “And you say ‘nothing’. And then you sigh again. Or sometimes you say ‘you wouldn’t understand’. And then you sigh. For weeks this has been going on. Weeks.”
Not little sighs either. These are big ‘ASK ME WHAT IS WRONG’ sighs. But if Gabe does ask, he gets hand-waved and ‘you wouldn’t understand’ed. He’s very tired.
“You’re moping,” Stephen says. “Why.”
Jared sighs.
“Gabe’s right,” Stephen says. “That’s infuriating.”
One sigh for Stephen to reach the strangling threshold. Gabe’s endured dozens upon dozens of them.
“Here’s your problem,” Stephen says. “You overthink everything, and you have ulterior motives for pretty much everything you do—“
“Hey,” Jared says. “Stop making me sound evil.”
“—and you think that everyone else is like that,” Stephen continues, like Jared didn’t say anything. “But they aren’t, mostly. Some are, but most people don’t think much at all about, well, anything, honestly. Certainly not about you.”
Sounds fake.
“Hard lesson to learn, but it makes shit a lot easier,” Stephen says. “You may be the centre of your own life, but you’re peripheral to everyone else, with very few exceptions. Fewer than you’d think, honestly.”
Don’t worry, Jared, you’re the centre of Bryce’s life too.
“Bryce is admittedly a great player,” Stephen says. “But you two aren’t fresh off a Stanley Cup in the fishbowl of Toronto media. Vancouver’s a media heavy market, but not like Toronto. And again, it’s been a decade, and other players have come out since then. Riley and Lapointe was national news. You guys? It’d be news, for sure, but I think it’d be a smaller ripple than you’d think it is. The people who give a shit, good or bad, they’ll care. But the average person, who cared because Lapointe and Riley were a novel situation? They won’t. Old news.”
Obviously there is a reaction when Bryce and Jared came out, but it's pretty contained to the hockey world (with the addition of some non-hockey fan but very online people).
It was also bigger news than it would have been had they formally come out, because the second people sniff out a cover up, speculation leads to higher engagement. (For a recent RL example, contrast how many people were talking about Milan Lucic versus Corey Perry.)
“You sound like you’ve thought about this,” Jared says.
“Of course I have,” Stephen says. “I’m a player agent whose NHLer boyfriend has my name on all his legal documents and vice versa. You think I haven’t thought any of this through? You think we didn’t weigh unintended consequences carefully before we made every decision about our relationship, including the one to come out to the team? Gabe thinks the best of people, but he’s not naive. And I think everyone sucks, so.”
Truly the mentor Jared deserves.
“Oh no, he’s awful at it,” Stephen says. “You think Gabe doesn’t overthink everything? Gabe’s analytical: he’s good with people because he considers every single possible outcome and prepares for it.”
“I do that too,” Jared says. No wonder they get along.
“Analyzing and being judgmental aren’t the same thing,” Stephen says. “Apparently.”
Most judgmental people don’t bother with the analysis part at all, in my experience.
“That one was Dmitry, weirdly,” Stephen says. “He gets quite philosophical sometimes. Usually if pot is involved. Especially edibles. I can’t believe you’re giving me that look. It’s legal. And you live in BC. Have you seriously never—”
Jared are you being judgmental again.
Also, for reference: British Columbia has a reputation for being a province full of pot smoking hippies. Which is saying something when Canada legalised recreational marijuana nationwide. (Though that reputation did precede legalisation by decades.)
“Not smoking pot to chill,” Jared says. “Not happening.”
“You’d probably just get paranoid anyway,” Stephen mutters. “More paranoid.”
He’d be fucking hilarious is what he’d be. (Also probably paranoid! More paranoid.)
“Caution’s understandable,” Stephen is. “It is. I’m never going to be the one to tell you to throw caution to the wind or whatever the hell careless people say. But when caution overtakes your happiness, it’s no longer helpful. You just — you have an NHL career. You live with your handsome, talented, adoring husband, like — truly adoring, that man does not think you have faults.”
I continue to be proud of Bryce for no longer arguing when Jared refers to himself as mean.
“And that team supports you,” Stephen says. “Which — there are much less supportive environments than this in the league, you know that firsthand. And I get that’s going to make you wary and think this might be too good to be true, but that’s not — sometimes you just get lucky, Jared. There isn’t some cosmic balance where some higher power’s like, ‘wait, things are too good for Jared, time to shit on him to even things out a bit’.”
Sometimes a higher power does have to do that, though. For narrative reasons.
“You didn’t toss your hair once,” Jared observes. “Can we really call this a proper intervention without hair tossing?”
“I have to be sparing with it,” Stephen says. “Or it won’t have the desired effect anymore.”
Stephen has retained the lesson.
“Is the desired effect people thinking you look like a nervous horse?” Jared asks.
Jared you are so lucky to have friends.
“I don’t know why I’m about to offer this, because you’re a horrible little gremlin,” Stephen says. “But if it helps I can go over scenarios you’re the most worried about and make sure your agents have solid action plans prepared if they do come to pass.”
This is literally the nicest thing anyone could offer Jared right now. He really hates feeling unprepared.
“But I just called you a nervous horse,” Jared says.
He does not deserve Stephen’s offer at all. And knows this.
He’s systematic about absolutely everything — paper trails, photographic evidence, cell records, digital paper trails. He’s not snide for once, no matter what Jared says, just keeps his head down, hair in his face, writing in a messy scrawl Jared knows better than to comment on, because Stephen may be left handed now, but Jared doesn’t think he always was.
He was not originally left-handed, no.
(No snide with clients, and right now he’s in work mode)
“I sigh, apparently,” Jared says. “I hear it’s really annoying.”
“It’s not annoying,” Bryce says. “I just want you to be happy.”
‘The man does not think you have faults’.
“Worried, I know,” Bryce says. “And like, I get it, obviously. I’ve been on this end too. I just want you to be happy.”
Big earnest eyes. Just telling Jared he wants to be happy. Bryce could weaponise this if he tried, but of course he never would.
My sweet, earnest boy.
“I am,” Jared says. “I am happy. It’s not that I’m not happy, it’s that I keep like, being happy, and then I’m like — suspicious of how happy I am, I don’t know.”
Bryce blinks at him.
“I know how absurd it sounds,” Jared lets him know.
“That’s the most Jared thing I’ve ever heard,” Bryce says.
“Hey,” Jared protests. He can’t just call it a Jared thing right after Jared tells him it’s absurd. Even if it’s absurd. And admittedly kind of a Jared thing.
‘I agree with everything you said, but also: how dare you.’
“45 and Hammer asked if I wanted to come over and play FIFA with them tonight,” Bryce says.
45 is not for the number. Colton has the nickname due to the very famous 19th century handgun the Colt .45. He's called 45 for short.
Hammer (for the surname Hammond) is the one Jared refers to as Langley (another nickname of his, because he’s from Langley, British Columbia, which is a town in the Metro Vancouver area. Local boy, just like Bryce.). Hammer/Langley is the one whose comments Jared and Gabe overheard ‘I’m not homophobic, but I don’t get Math and Bullet. Math’s mean.’
They are attached at the hip; live together, room together, sit together.
Jared will be bad at it, and he doesn’t like being bad at things
You don’t say.
Bryce looks hopeful. Transparently hopeful, those big earnest eyes on him.
“Sounds fun,” Jared lies, and Bryce’s grin practically splits his face.
Soooooft.
Bryce getting to Vancouver-adjustment-them coming out to the team is the shortest arc of the ‘verse, but definitely its own thing, tonally. The arc of ‘everything is unnervingly good and everyone is unnervingly nice (except for Holden Chase)’
Now we jump to...the shoulder, the blanket, and the gaffe.
146. Forbearance
“Murder him dead,” Jared says. “Stone cold.”
“The guys might have a problem with that,” Gabe says. “Leading scorer and all.”
“I don’t care,” Jared says. “Do you think Stephen would help me hide the body?”
“Probably,” Gabe says.
Love Gabe’s pragmatism in the face of Jared's death threats. And of course Stephen would, but you just know it’d be ‘remember that time I helped you hide a body?’ every time he needed a favour, or, you know, just to annoy him, until Jared killed him. (But then who would help Jared hide HIS body? Or save him from Gabe?)
Jared gets it. He does. Bryce is frustrated, and feeling helpless, and in a lot of pain. He had some modified training, things he could do without the use of his shoulder, but it was severely limited compared to his usual summer training, and not even close to enough to burn off all the shit feelings he’s been carrying around. And all those shit feelings are twisted up inside him and driving him nuts.
And he’s driving Jared nuts.
Bryce is BORED. And Jared’s never really been around bored Bryce before — first their relationship was brand new, and then they were long distance, so even if Bryce was dealing with boredom in the day to day (say, contract talks), Jared was exciting! But right now Bryce is bored, and restless, and most of the things he would typically do when bored or restless are off-limits. And Bryce doesn’t really have a high frustration tolerance. At all.
The circumstances of the injury probably didn’t help. Bryce doesn't really deal well with humiliation. He doesn’t like it when people laugh at him. Another understatement. And people are laughing. It’s more in a ‘wow, that’s some seriously shitty luck, man’, not a ‘haha loser’ way, though Jared is pretty sure Bryce is taking it as the latter. And to be fair, how many people throw out their shoulder while babysitting? And not even like, a rambunctious toddler or something. A baby. He was babysitting a baby. Who can’t even hold up her own head yet.
It is objectively funny that Bryce was taken out by a baby. But also a sign of the kind of shape Bryce’s shoulder was in by that point. Periodically, throughout IJ(aoe), Bryce has had shoulder injuries. Jared never really specifies which, but they have always been the same shoulder. And he’s always returned to the ice before it was 100%. Or even 90%. Sometimes before 70%.
Chaz feels guilty, which is utterly absurd. Maia’s like, ten pounds. Bryce could have just as easily done something to his shoulder carrying groceries, or, hell, grabbing a glass from a cupboard. Or, most obviously: at some point in summer training, which is a hell of a lot more strenuous than babysitting Chaz and Ashley’s kid. Jared has told him. Bryce has told him. Jared even asked Ash to whisper it to him in his sleep to see if it sinks in, but she just said ‘what sleep are you referring to, Jared?’ and Jared figured it was a bad idea to retort to a sleep-deprived new parent.
Good call on the last thing, Jared. And yes, Chaz is currently exhausted (training AND a baby) and has responded slightly irrationally to the situation.
Bryce is hiding in the guest room when Jared gets back home, and doesn’t peek his head out. He could be napping, there has been a whole lot of napping lately, so Jared doesn’t check on him. He’s bad enough without adding ‘cranky because Jared woke him up’ to the mix.
Jared would argue he also has a baby right now.
Jared’s just sat down with a glass of water when Bryce drifts in, arm in a sling, and sighs explosively in Jared’s direction, then exits. Gabe invited both of them to that lunch. He could have come, but he said he was ���tired’ and ‘not in the mood’ and that Jared should ‘go have fun’.
A sulky silence is his only answer when Jared reminds Bryce of that fact.
“Then did you literally just come into the living room to make sure I know you’re bored and annoyed?” Jared asks. “Because I am well aware!”
Or a teenager.
So apologetic Chaz: out. Jared can’t vent to Ash, because she’s stressed out as fuck. Raf is too nice to commiserate with. Ditto Grace. Julius was good at first, but now he won’t pick up Jared’s calls or answer his texts except to say ‘busy!’. Stephen’s out for obvious reasons. Gabe is a good ear, but Jared shouldn’t push it, considering the Stephen thing. Erin’s Team Bryce always. Elaine is Elaine.
You know that Jared has discovered all of these things from direct experience.
“I don’t want to hear it,” his mom says when she picks up the phone.
“Hi mom, how are you,” Jared says.
“Great,” mom says. “I don’t want to hear it. Complain to your dad.”
Susan also has some recent experience with the venting.
Jared stares at his phone, betrayed, then calls his dad. Obviously his dad will be up for Bryce bitching.
“Hi bud,” his dad says. “Calling to complain about Bryce?”
As has Don.
Jared gets twenty minutes of updates about every single family member he has. And family friends. And acquaintances. And some of the fellow Canucks dads he met on the Dad’s Trip. And people Jared hasn’t even heard of and is suspicious may not actually exist. He thinks he’s being punished, though he’s not sure why.
This is exactly what Jared deserves.
“How’re you guys?” his dad finally asks.
“Well—“ Jared starts.
“And I don’t want to hear about Bryce’s sulking,” dad says.
Jared just listened to shit about every single person dad knows for twenty minutes and he doesn’t even get to talk about Bryce’s sulking? This is bullshit.
EXACTLY what Jared deserves. Don is very proud of himself right now.
Jared has to commiserate with someone.
“Do you know who the most annoying person alive is?” Jared asks.
“Is it me?” Bryce mumbles.
JARED MATHESON.
“I don’t want it anymore,” Bryce says.
“You have to have it to take your pills,” Jared says.
“I don’t want them,” Bryce says.
Jared takes a slow breath in rather than arguing. That’s what his mom said to do before she stopped taking his calls. “I’ll just leave it beside the bed, then,” he says.
“I don’t want it,” Bryce says, then whines, “Jared!” when Jared puts it down. “I don’t want it. Take it away.”
Jared’s complaining is slightly over the top, but Bryce is, indeed, being a giant pain in the ass right now.
Julius screens his call. Jared knows this because Julius texts ‘I screened your call’
I love Julius so.
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