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lesservillain · 3 months

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iv. someone like you and all you know and how you speak

summary: old friends and halloween shenanigans cw: we see peen. an: i love joyce byers. also pic of matthew lillard is implied to be reefer rick.

Eddie started having night terrors.

They didn’t come every night, but their intensity had you concerned.

The first one had you flying over the back of the couch to get to him. His shrieks turned your blood cold, and watching him shake and convulse was terrifying to witness. In your panic, you wrapped your arms around him to try to ground him and ended up getting hit in the face. After that you asked your teacher for advice on what interventions to do when someone has an episode.

But you weren’t the only one to suffer with pain after getting clocked in the jaw. The days after an episode left Eddie’s body sore from the sudden jerking of his muscles in his sleep. It probably didn’t help that he had also started physical therapy twice a week either, leaving him sore even with his pain medication most of the time.

Needless to say, Eddie was acting like his normal grumpy self most days, even when his friends would come over. Though, he did try and reel it back when he could catch himself or with a subtle nudge from you. By now you’d gotten used to his grumpy attitude and knew it was just coming from a place of hurting. In turn he’s been much more cooperative with you. Progress.

“What the hell are you guys doing?” You ask with a laugh, as you get out of your car. Eddie is sitting on the ground leaning back against his hands with his legs sprawled out. Will and Grant sit on either side of him as Dustin pushes Eddie’s wheelchair on its back wheels, Jeff sitting in it and squealing as Gareth and Mike laugh.

“They’re trying to break Jeff so him and Eddie can get matching chairs,” Grant called, eliciting a laugh from Eddie and Will.

“N’they’re gonna pay for his new one when they break that one,” Wayne calls from the porch, lit cigarette in hand. All around him are pumpkins of all different shapes and sizes, like a little pumpkin patch had grown around him.

“Ah, I see.” You nod.

Grabbing your bag, you walk into the Munson home to get your things settled. Glancing over into the dining room, you expected to see the table already set up for their game night, but were surprised to see it covered in newspaper and knives and spoons.

“Are you guys carving these pumpkins?” You ask, stepping back out onto the porch and pointing at the Wayne’s posse.

“Yep,” Eddie called back. “My PT said it would be a “fun activity” to work on my hand strength," he said with stiff fingered air quotes.

“Yeah, Eddie’s gonna scoop out all the guts with his bare hands,” Dustin says, setting the wheelchair back down to wiggle his fingers.

“Ew gross,” Mike joins in with Dustin’s antics.

“It’s not gross,” you say with a roll of the eyes. “Save the seeds and I’ll bake them for later.”

“Mmm, some roasted pumpkin seeds sounds real good.” Wayne says, putting his cigarette out and standing from his seat. “Save me some a’them when you make em.”

“Of course!”

“Hey, should we show her what we found earlier?” Your ears twitch when you hear Will lean into Eddie’s side. He looks at you over his shoulder, then back to the group before nodding.

And that’s how you ended up following the boys through the woods around the Munson house. Grant pushed Eddie’s chair through the woods, which wasn’t as terrible of terrain as you had expected. If the slight bounce bothered him, Eddie didn’t say. You stayed steady next to him, only moving to let them go ahead of you when the mostly thinned out trees were too close in some areas.

After a few minutes and a lot of loud conversation between the boys, you came to a small clearing that dropped off into a cliff. It made you nervous to see the boys get so close to the drop, especially when Grant pushed Eddie almost to the very edge.

“Hey, be careful, please,” you called from behind them.

“Come on, come see how far down this is!” Jeff called, his toes right on the cliff’s edge. You take a couple steps forward, just enough that you can see the water sloshing at the bottom.

To see it made you dizzy, so you tried to focus your eyes elsewhere, instead taking in the breathtaking view of the lake below. You could see boats, houses, and even a man fishing off of a dock behind his house. If there was a railing or something to hold on to out here, you could see yourself coming out here to sit with Eddie on a nice day.

“Woah, shit!” Your heart stops beating as you watch Will pull Mike’s stumbling body back from the ledge, and you’re instantly done with this whole adventure.

“Alright, I get the idea. Field trips over,” you say, walking over to Eddie’s chair and pulling him back. “We better go carve those pumpkins before it gets too late and the kids have to go home.”

There’s some groans of protest, but they all follow your lead back to through the woods.

“You have to admit it was pretty cool, though, right?” Eddie says, his head tilting back just a bit to look at you. He was smiling. It was something he started doing more and you couldn’t help the way it made your stomach flip every time he did it.

“Yeah, it was definitely a nice view,” you agreed with a sigh.

“Maybe when it gets warm out we can try jumping from it.” You hear Gareth say to one of the other boys. You recall the large drop from where you all stood at the top and a shiver went down your spine.

“I wouldn’t...unless you really want to get your own wheelchair to match Eddie's,” you say back. Gareth doesn’t let out another peep for the duration of the walk back.

“Okay, since Eddie is on scooping duty make sure you give him your pumpkins once you’ve got the tops off.”

The boys are sitting in their normal gaming formation, except for where Eddie and Gareth have swapped sides so Eddie can sit next to you. The pumpkin that the boys picked out for Eddie sits in front of you since you offered to carve it for him.

“What are you going to draw on it?” You ask him as you cut into the top of the thick pumpkin with force.

“I’m not sure yet,” he says indecisively. “Something scary for sure.”

“How about Mrs. O’Donnell?” Gareth nudges Eddie’s side, and the boys at the table all grimace.

“Fuck no. As terrifying as she is, I’d rather carve a demoba--”

Eddie catches himself mid sentence, horror written all over his face as he looks directly at Dustin. Mike and Will share similar pale faced expressions as Dustin. The tension at the table could be cut with a knife and you weren’t sure how to defuse the situation.

“Well,” Grant is the first to break the silence, “I think that, whatever we all decide to do, that we could make it into a competition. Let the newbie decide who has the best design.” He was looking straight at you and you were caught off guard by the new label.

“Oh, come on, that’s not fair,” Gareth chimes in before you can say anything, “Will is like, one of the best artists in the whole town. He’s definitely gonna win.” Will sat up straight in his chair, before shrinking down with a smile.

“Hey, now, let’s not forget who designed these bad ass tee shirts,” Eddie says, gesturing at himself.

“You made those designs?” You ask surprised. Eddie nods with pride.

“Yep, when Hellfire was founded in ‘82. We scrounged up enough money to go to a print shop and have these bad boys made at the beginning of the school year. Wasn’t cheap, so we’ve always tried to be extra careful with them.”

“Awe, that’s so cute,” you giggle.

The table erupts in a defensive roar about how it is apparently not cute that their club has tee shirts that they take very good care of. No one was convincing you otherwise.

You blew them off and distracted them by having them give Eddie their pumpkins. They all watched with amusement as Eddie reached down into each pumpkin and pulled the slimy, seedy guts out of them. Eddie’s button nose scrunched up with disgust, contrasted by the wide grin that touched his eyes. His tongue poked out in concentration as he swirled around the inside of the pumpkin, plopping the guts into bowls and pots with each one.

By the time he had gutted each pumpkin of their contents, Eddie looked like he was done for the rest of the night.

“Eddie, do you want to save your pumpkin for another night?” You ask quietly, leaning in so only he could hear. He looks at you, brown orbs darting back and forth between your eyes carefully before smiling at you.

“Yeah, please?”

“Of course.”

“See, I told you that Will was going to win!” Gareth shouted, his hands falling at his side with a huff as the rest of the group laughed at his bitching.

“I’m sorry, it’s really good! That’s the most detailed pumpkin carving of a vampire’s face I’ve ever seen.”

“Thanks,” Will said bashfully.

“Gareth, I don’t know why you’re bitching. Your jack-o-lanturn’s eyes aren’t even the same size.” Eddie razzed, goading Gareth until he flipped him off.

“Awe, I thought the mismatched eyes were cute,” you said teasingly, and Gareth froze, turning away from your eyes to stand by Will, who gave him a pat on the back.

As you all stood around admiring the hard work of everyone’s carved pumpkins, the sound of loud music playing grabbed all of your attention. It progressively got louder, sounding like it was coming from down the driveway.

“What the hell?” Jeff said with a tilt of his head.

Everyone seemed more confused than anything, but you clocked the look on Eddie’s face as he looked between the trees of the winding driveway. There was a fear there that you’d only seen in his face during his night terrors, and everything in your body was telling you that you needed to get him and everyone else inside.

“Come on guys, lets go—”

The loud revving of the engine drowned out the sound of whatever song the driver was playing. The car came over the bump at an alarming pace before slamming on its breaks once it got up to the clearing. Headlights blinded all of you, and your body moved on its own accord to stand directly in front of Eddie.

The engine cut off abruptly, the lights dimming enough to reveal fire engine red sports car with a black stripe down the middle. You could barely see the fuzzy dice hanging from the rear view mirror through the heavily tinted windows.

“Holy shit,” you hear Eddie say behind you. The fear had left his features, replaced with an elated shock that left you wanting to ask several questions. But before you could question him, Eddie maneuvered around you and the rest of the guys heading straight toward the mysterious car.

Just as Eddie approached the car, the driver side door swung open. A man only a few years older than you with blond, spiked hair stepped out. The man had to be at least 6’5, his face covered in piercings and he had an over all aura of trouble.

“How the hell did he get this address?” You hear Jeff question Grant and Gareth.

“Rick!” Eddie shouts excitedly.

“Holy fuck, dude,” Rick says, pushing up his sunglasses and slamming his car door shut. He runs up to Eddie and embraces him tightly, bending down to be at his level. Rick pulled back, looking Eddie up and down before bringing his hand down on his shoulder a few times.

“Damn, that dude really did a number on you, huh?”

Eddie visibly shrinks, shrugging his shoulders. “Yeah, you could say that.”

“Who the hell is that?” You ask Jeff quietly, taking a few steps back to be standing next to him.

“That’s Reefer Rick,” he says with an annoyed tone. “He’s Eddie’s friend. Got Eddie into dealing in school.” Your neck almost breaks with how quickly you look at Jeff.

“Dealing? Like, drug dealing?”

Jeff looks at you and nods. “Uh, yeah? You didn’t know about that?”

“Um, no. I didn’t.”

“It was just weed,” Jeff as an attempt to save face, “Aaaaaand sometimes random pills that Rick would give him to sell. But nothing serious.”

“Oh, okay. Just weed and pills. Which are both totally illegal to sell but it’s cool right?” Your blood was starting to boil with this new information. You don’t know why you’re even upset, it’s not like you really cared if people smoked weed or whatever.

Really it’s the idea of Eddie getting in trouble after everything he’s been through. Drug dealers are notorious for being sneaky and conniving, right? What if this guy thinks Eddie got money in the settlement and is here looking for a handout.

“Hi," you say in a clipped tone to the man as you approach him and Eddie. You give him just your first name, extending a hand out to him with faux pleasantry as you settle next to Eddie in his chair. “Who are you?”

“Oh, hey, this is Rick,” Eddie says to you with excitement. “Rick, this is my…caregiver.”

Rick takes your hand, looking you up and down before giving you a loose handshake. “Well, hello nurse,” Rick smiles, maintains eye contact with you as he continues to hold your hand..

After a beat Eddie clears his throat, and Rick retracts his hand from yours. You don’t miss the subtle shift in Eddie’s chair, making him close enough you can feel his arm against yours. You took the hint, and stepped back until you were behind his chair. Rick laughed lowly before looking back to Eddie.

“Well, I’m glad you have someone who can take care of you,” Rick says with a cheshire smile. “Especially since I’m sure Wayne is back at work. Must be expensive to live all the way out here.”

“Eh, we had it built out here as part of the settlement, so it’s paid for. He still has to pay the bills, though.” Eddie’s voice trails off at the end. “Wish I could do something to help…”

“Yeah, I don’t blame ya,” Rick says as he scans the land, nodding his head to the guys as he does. “I’m sure you’re not interested in getting back into the business with me given…well, everything.”

“Ah, yeah…I owe you an apology…” Eddie looks up to Rick with a guilty expression.

“For what? Oh, you mean my house?” Eddie nods and Rick waves him off. “Nah, don’t sweat it man. I took everything with me when I went to Vegas so if anyone went in there snooping they wouldn’t have found anything anyway. It looked like they had sent someone in to clean though. Looked nicer than the day my parents—I mean, the day I bought it.” Eddie nods, letting out a breath that he was holding as Rick talked.

“Well that’s nice that your house that you bought is all clean,” you say, grabbing onto the handles of Eddie’s wheelchair, “And since he’s isn’t interested in your business endeavors, I guess that means you don’t need anything from Eddie then, right?”

Rick looks down at Eddie, then back up to you with a curious look. His tongue rings peaks out from between his lips as he plays with it, before popping it back in his mouth to speak.

“Well, I was just coming out here to see a dear old friend of mine. But, there is one thing that I want to speak with him about. In private.” He leans down to eye level, eyes squinting with how tightly he smiles at you.

You open your mouth to protest immediately, but you feel Eddie push against the wheels, his chair moving away from you as he motioned Rick to follow him.

“Give us just a second.”

You stand in the same spot, speechless as they move far enough away that you can’t hear the conversation between them. A hand on your shoulder pulls your attention, and Dustin motions you back over to where the guys are huddled together.

“He’s an idiot,” Grant whisper yells into the huddle.

“Yeah, but he’s obviously lost his best salesmen for the high school territory,” Mike argues. “Wouldn’t be surprised if he was asking if one of us would want to start dealing for him.”

“He better not. You guys better not,” you say with a pointed finger at the boys who were still in high school.

“Trust us, we won’t,” Dustin said with a firm tone.

“Well, whatever he wants, it’s probably not good.”

“Well…”

“Jeff, no.”

“Hey, he’s the whole reason Eddie even stayed in high school. He probably would have dropped out if Rick hadn’t convinced him to keep trying.”

“He only wanted Eddie to keep trying so he could keep selling drugs to high schoolers!”

“That’s a pretty good point.”

“What’s a good point?”

All heads turned to Eddie, who was just behind you with an amused smile on his face. Rick wasn’t with him, still standing back by his car with a lit cigarette in his hand, eyes watching you carefully.

“Oh, we were just…”

“We were saying that you two should decorate her car for the Trunk r Treat festival. And the point was…that you could wear a mask and no one would know it was you?”

Everyone looks at Dustin like he has two heads. Where he even came up with that…you had no idea.

Eddie’s curls bounce as he shakes his head. “What? Trunk r Treat? What are you guys talking about?”

“Oh, the Trunk r Treat is what the town is doing instead of regular trick r treating since the roads are still pretty messed up. Everyone is gonna pull their cars into the fairgrounds and let the kids trick r treat there.”

“That sounds like fun,” you say, looking at Eddie with a hopeful smile. “It would be nice to get out of the house for a little bit. You said Halloween is your favorite holiday, right? I think it would be fun!”

“You guys are serious, aren’t you?” The mood shifts when Eddie speaks. “You seriously think it would be a good idea for me to go out into public? On Halloween night?”

“That’s why I said you could wear a mask!” Dustin seems to be the only one who isn’t affected by Eddie’s tone. “And no one knows you’re missing part of your leg. It would be perfect.” Dustin gestures to you, “And you’ll have your guardian angel with you. If anyone does give you shit she can pack you up in the car real quick and you can say ‘I told you so’ to us at the next Hellfire meeting.’”

Eddie’s jaw rolls in frustration, a heavy sigh leaving him as he leans forward in his chair.

“Hopper will be there,” Will chimes in. “Him and my mom are going to decorate the back of his old police cruiser. I-I could tell him you’re going and I’m sure he’d keep an eye out on you.” The boys look from Will to Eddie as they wait for his response.

“I…I…Let—let me think about it. Okay? No promises.”

The boys all perk up at Eddie’s potential compliance. Chatter about costumes and getting together at Mike’s parents house has everyone forgetting about the concerns of Rick’s arrival.

You remember though. You hear Rick laugh to himself from where he’s leaning against his car. Looking over your shoulder, you watch as he flicks his cigarette away and opens the door. Stopping about halfway in, he looks at Eddie then to you. He sends you a wink, then gets in without another word.

After about a week of convincing from all the Hellfire boys, you, and even Wayne, Eddie finally caved in and agreed to go to the Hawkins Trunk r Treat. Wayne talked with Hopper about trying to get your cars parked next to each other during the whole event just in case. And Wayne also promised that him and his friend Ben would stay close by in town if anything happened. Eddie didn’t really have much of a reason to say no.

You on the other hand had to come up with an excuse as to why you wouldn’t be spending Halloween with your best friend.

“We ALWAYS have movie night! You can’t just call in sick or something?” Tonya pleads with you as the two of you split each others Chinese take out. You shrug your shoulders, the feeling of guilt creeping up like bile in your throat.

“I’m sorry Tonnie, I can’t. Honestly, I’m surprised you haven’t made plans with Charles for the night.”

“He probably would have asked but he knows that we always spend Halloween together.”

“I’m sorry, Tonya, but we’re big girls now. Sometimes things need to change…”

Her lower lip pouts at you, and you can tell by the way her eyes are glassy that she’s genuinely upset. If it were anyone else, you would be spending time with her in a heart beat. Ever since the two of you became friends, Halloween has been your thing.

You’d always been scared of the holiday after when happened with your parents, but over the years Tonya has been able to slowly tear down your fears and make the holiday enjoyable again. Now that you’ve gotten the chance to potentially to the same with Eddie and his fear of going in public again, you feel obligated to follow in her image.

“I’m really proud of you, you know?” She miles as you as she dabs the wetness from her eyes. “I can’t believe how much you’ve changed. Your parents, your grandparents…they’d be really happy to see you working so hard. With school, work, and still helping me out here…Oh, come here!”

She stands from her seat and rushed to hug you, which you return with equal adoration. For a split moment you want to tell her everything. About Eddie and everything he’s been through. About how you’re starting to prefer being at the Munson house over anywhere else. About how if anyone has come out of their shell, it’ Eddie. About how you’re not really sure about Sam, and how you don’t want to admit that there might be a reason why you’re feeling that way…

“Weren’t kiddin’ about your trunk being big, huh?” Eddie and Wayne peer into the trunk of your car as you pop it open. “I’m sure you won’t have any issue gettin’ it in and outta here. Want me t’help ya get in, son?”

“Can I try first?”

Wayne nods and Eddie maneuvers himself to the passenger side of your car. You’re already standing there waiting with the door open for him, holding it in place.

The Trunk r Treat was this coming weekend and the Hellfire boys were going to help decorate your trunk before Friday’s game. All you and Eddie had to do was get the materials and the candy. You saw Wayne hand Eddie some cash thinking that you weren’t looking, but you had no intention of letting Eddie pay for anything. This was for him, so why stress him out when you know that money is a touchy subject for him?

Eddie gets his chair in position and locks the wheels. Grabbing the “oh shit” handle and the side of the door, he lifts himself up from his chair and pauses for a moment. His face is scrunched up from pain after already having physical therapy this morning. It was hard not to get him to over do it now that his mobility has started to improve, but you would rather him learn his limits than go back to being bedridden.

A few deep breaths and a quick shift of his foot puts his ass on the edge of the seat of your car. There’s a loud thump where his head bumps the low slope of your cars door, but he just rolls his eyes and laughs it off, much to your joy. You think about how two months ago when you started caring for him that he probably would have thrown a fit and fell in it if he were to go through this exact scenario now.

“Good job, Eddie,” you praise. He looks away from you bashfully, muttering a small thanks under his breath. Even if he wouldn’t admit it, you know deep down Eddie likes to be told he’s doing good. You’ve noticed it in the ways he reacts to you commenting on all of his achievements; the coy smiles and the way he starts to fidget with his rings when you sing his praises.

Wayne grabs Eddie’s chair and puts it in the trunk. “You gonna be able to get this thing out when ya get there?”

“Yep! I’m used to lugging wheelchairs around by now. No biggie!”

Wayne nods and rounds the car to Eddie’s side. As the two men talk, you hop into the passenger seat and start the car.

“Now don’t go and give her any trouble, Eds.”

“I know, I know,” Eddie says, rolling his eyes. “If anything she’s gonna give me trouble. I just know she’s gonna be having me dress up in every costume they have there.”

“That’s not true,” you say defensively. “I actually already know what I want you to go as, so if you don’t fight me on it then you’ll only have to try one costume on.”

“Why does that not make me feel any better?”

Wayne barks out a laugh before closing the car door. He waves the two of you off as you make your way down the driveway until he’s no longer in site.

“Okay, let me make sure I’m understanding you right.” Eddie holds up the large, white, round costume that you handed to him, eyeing it skeptically. “You want me to dress up as…an egg?”

You laugh through your nose involuntarily, trying and failing to keep your composure. In your hand you hold what can only be describe as a “sexy devil” costume that consists of a short red dress, a pair of devil horns, and devil’s spear.

“Yeah, and I’ll be the devil, see? We’d—” you snort again, “We’d be deviled eggs!”

A smile cracks on Eddie’s face, more amused at your inability to contain your own laughter rather than at your poor excuse for a Halloween costume idea. He give you a half serious look as he hands you back the egg costume without another comment.

“Awe, come on,” you say as you take the costume from him, “you have to at least admit it was funny.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. What’s the real idea that you have?”

You swap the costumes out from the rack for the ones you really wanted to do. Handing Eddie the long nightgown, you hold up what would be your costume; a long red cape and a plaid blue dress with a ruffle under the skirt.

“Okay, so obviously that’s red riding hood,” Eddie says pointing to your outfit. “But what exactly is—” You hand him a wolf mask, which he takes from you and examines carefully.

“You’ll be the Big Bad Wolf, disguised as the grandmother,” you explain after a long moment of silence.

“Yeah, I gathered that,” he sasses. He takes a few more moments to think it over, and you watch the way he looks at your costume, then to you. There’s a shift in his demeanor that you can’t quite interpret, and before you can think too much into it he finally speaks.

“Alright, I’ll do it,” he says, placing the costume pieces in his lap. “Better than the deviled egg idea.”

“Well, maybe next year I can sway you into the deviled egg. But I guess this works, too.” Eddie straightens in his chair, and you swear you could see a small blush on his cheeks.

After you gathered everything for your costumes, you and Eddie did a little more shopping around for some stuff to decorate your trunk with. Streamers, hanging bats, fake spider webs, and enough candy to feed a small village fill your arms and Eddie’s lap all the way to the check out counter.

As the girl behind the counter rings out your items, you notice she keeps taking glances at Eddie. He’s too busy looking at the check out candle to notice, but you keep an eye on her just in case.

“Is that all for you?” She asks with a pop of her gum. You nod and she give you your total. As you reach for your wallet in your purse, Eddie shift in his chair, pulling out his own wallet.

“I got it,” he says, taking a $20 bill from the billfold.

“Nope,” you say, pulling out your own money and handing it to the cashier.

“No, please. I want to pay--”

“It’s okay, Eddie. Save it and buy us a pizza or something sometime when I don’t feel like cooking your dinner.”

The girl behind the counter’s gum popped loudly as she held your change in her hand. Eddie shrank back in his chair, stuffing the $20 back into his wallet. You took your bags from the counter and plopped them in Eddie’s lap, much to his surprise.

“Here, if you want to help, you can carry these.”

As you push his him out of the shop, Eddie asks you to stop before going off the curb.

“What’s up?”

“Can we go into the Goodwill over there?” He nods down the strip of stores where the sign to the second hand shop is displayed in the window.

“Sure,” you say without a second thought, “Lets put these bags in my car and then we can go in there.”

The store is a little busier than you expected. Everyone from kids to adults were checking out the shelves for their last minute home made costumes and accessories to wear this weekend. It made you happy to see so many people excited about the event.

The boys told you that Halloween can be a big deal in Hawkins. But after the earthquake, those who still remained wondered if there would even be a Halloween this year. Apparently the mother of one of their friends, Lucas, joined the city counsel and pitched the idea in a city meeting and most everyone was on board.

“The only person who protested was Mary Cunningham,” Dustin told you in a hushed tone. “She said it wasn’t safe to have all of the towns kids in one spot for ‘easy pickings.’” Mary Cunningham was the mother of Chrissy Cunningham, the girl that was murdered by Victor Creel in Eddie’s trailer before he attempted to kill Eddie himself. Wayne never told you this, but, according to the boys, Mary Cunningham is still convinced Eddie was the one who tried to kill Eddie, despite the evidence that supports that it was Creel. You hoped that she wouldn’t show up to the event this weekend.

“No way!” Eddie pulls a tee shirt from one of the racks. You’re standing next to his chair rather than behind it to make room for people to go around you in the tight, over stuffed isles. You turn your body, hand on his shoulder as you try to let a lady and he kid move behind you.

“What is it?”

“It’s a Black Sabbath tour shirt! This one’s from a tour they did in the 70’s though. Like a tour they did in Europe. I wonder how it ended up in this dump of a Goodwill?”

“Sounds like it ended up here so that you could buy it.”

Eddie looked at the shirt solemnly. Most of his attire that he had consisted of plain tee shirts and pajama pants that had come from packs at the store. All of his clothes and other personal belongings had been swallowed up by the earthquake and destroyed.

“Well…” he said after a few moments, “It is only 50 cents…”

“Perfect!” You pluck the shirt from his hands and fold it over your arm. “Keep looking. Maybe someone’s metal loving uncle passed away and his family brought his clothes here. I’m gonna go look at some pants for you.”

“There’s that beautiful smile that I love to see,” Sam says as you push the door of his office open. You gave him a small smile, setting his coffee down on his desk. He stood up, rounding the desk to embrace you in a tight hug, his lips meeting the top of your head to leave a kiss there.

“Morning,” you say, taking a step back from him when he loosens his grip. “Sorry I couldn’t bring you one of these before today. Hopefully you made it through the week without.”

“Barely,” he said with a sarcastic huff. “Have to admit I missed seeing you more, though. Been busy with midterms?”

You give him an exhausted nod. Between getting everything together for this weekend, helping Tonya deep clean the house before her trip with Charles, and dealing with your midterms, you’d been properly worn down to a barely functioning human.

“Awe, poor thing,” Sam cooes at you, his hand cupping your face to rub his thumb against your cheek. “Sounds like you deserve a little fun weekend. My buddy is having a get together at his house weekend and I’d really love for you to come.”

“This weekend?” You ask. Sam nods. “Oh, no I-I can’t. It’s Halloween weekend and…I spend it with Tonya every year. It’s been our tradition since we were kids. Sorry.”

“Oh, that’s okay. I’ve been wanting to meet her and this Charles guy you hate so much. We can do a double date. Maybe some haunted houses or something?”

“No! No—I, um, I don’t do haunted houses.” That wasn’t a lie.

“That’s fine, maybe a movie at the drive in?”

“Sam, I’m sorry. It’s not exactly a tradition where we let other people take part in. Charles wont be there either.”

Sam’s shoulders slump as he sighs, his lips tightening into a straight line.

“Okay, I get it. I’m not going to step on any toes. But…” Sam looks up at you through his lashes, “make it up to me next weekend?”

You breathe in, then out. It suddenly hits you that…you don’t really want to make it up to him net weekend.

“Sure.”

The Munson household is a busy one this cool, autumn Saturday. Eddie and the guys are in his room getting ready for the night. Their collective laughter and talking over each other is the only thing louder than the volume of the music that they have blaring. Even with the door closed you find it hard to think over the noise.

Wayne and Ben are in the kitchen prepping dinner for everyone before the nights festivities. They were joined by the infamous Hopper and Joyce Byers who brought the food by when they dropped off Will and Jane. The same Jane who was occupying the hall bathroom with you right now.

“They were trying to get you to dress up as one of the guys from Devo?”

Jane nods with an annoyed look. “Yes. They wanted me to wear a stupid red hat. I told them no, and said I wanted to go as Pat Benatar instead. She is my favorite singer.”

“Great choice,” your head bobs in agreement. You take a little more of the blue eye shadow on the tip of your finger and smudge it over her eyelids. “What’s your favorite song?”

“Heartbreaker,” she whispers shyly with a smile.

“That’s a good one! I think We Belong is mine.”

“That one is a good song, too. It’s a love song.”

“Yeah, I guess you could say I’m a sucker for a good love ballad,” you shrug, washing your hands of the make up that stained your fingers. “Now, where is the wig you said you got?”

Jane helped you zip up the back of your dress just as there was a knock on the bathroom door. You pulled the red cloak over your shoulders as she opened it, her dad standing just on the other side of the doorway.

“Jesus, kid, is that enough make up?” He says, his voice raising a distraught octave.

“Oh, look at you!” Joyce pushes past the disgruntled Hopper and into the bathroom. She looks Jane up and down, her excitement a clear contrast to Hoppers.

“You look just like her in those pictures! I’m glad we were able to find this fabric to make this jumper.”

“Joyce, she looks like a—“

“Woah, Pat Benatar!”

Will and Gareth poke their heads around the corner of the door frame, both of them dressed like characters from Star Wars whose names you can’t quite remember.

“Oh, you boys look adorable!” Joyce squeezes Will's cheeks, much to his dismay. Gareth lets out a snicker at will’s expense, only stopping once he’s caught your eye. Then, like usual, he slinks back out of sight.

In his place Mike and Dustin pop up. Dustin is dressed like Darth Vader, his helmet in his hand as they barge into the bathroom. “Are you two ladies ready to go yet?”

“I think so,” you say, quickly clearing up the mess that you’ve made in the Munson bathroom.

“Wow, El, you look badass!” Mike says, putting an arm around her for a side hug.

“Thank you, Mike. She helped.” Jane says, pointing in your direction.

“Oooh, I get it,” Dustin suddenly says as if he’s had an epiphany, eyes narrowing as he looks you up and down.

“Get what?”

“Your’s and Eddie’s couple’s costumes.”

The eye shadow pallet drops from your hands with a loud clutter. “Wh-what are you talking about?”

“What do you mean ‘what am I talking about?’ You and Eddie are going as Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf, right?”

“Well, yeah, but…”

“That’s, like, a classic couples costume!”

“Oh, that’s so sweet!” Joyce says, her hand on her heart as she looks up at Hopper. “Didn’t you and Margaret Sanders go as the wolf and Red Riding Hood to John Collins’ Halloween party one year?”

Jim nods with a big, mustached grin. “Yep.”

“I feel like an asshole.”

Eddie’s voice in the hallway catches your attention. Jim moves out of view, making room for Eddie’s chair as Jeff and Grant follow behind him.

“You sound like one, too,” Jeff laughs from behind him.

Eddie was being his normal grumpy self today. Enough that you were worried that he might call the whole thing off and not go. But, he seemed to manage to push through. Although you worried that the amount of people occupying his house was stressing him out a bit.

As Jeff pushed him past the door, Eddie turned to look inside the overcrowded bathroom. Even with all of the bodies in the way, his eyes were on you in an instant. He didn’t say anything, more so looking at you like a deer caught in headlights until he was completely out of view.

“Foods ready!” Ben calls from the kitchen. Doesn’t take much more convincing than that for everyone to file out of the bathroom and into the kitchen. You take the opportunity to finish putting everything away before joining in the chaos.

Loud chattering fills the kitchen as everyone moves around the table to get their food. When you do come out of the bathroom, you see someone’s already put Eddie in the recliner, his tv tray set up in front of him as he patiently waited for everyone to finish getting their plates.

“Hey stranger,” you say, stealing his attention from whatever daydream he was having.

“Hey,” he said with a tight smile. You eyed him suspiciously.

“What hurts?”

He’s still for a moment, before he sighs and gives you a more genuine smile.

“I’m just having those ghost pains or whatever.” His hand rubs over the clothed end of his thigh where his leg was severed.

Ever since he started physical therapy two weeks ago he’s been complaining of pains in his leg where it's not there anymore. You asked your professor about it, and she said it's not uncommon for amputees to have phantom pains. There’s not much you can do about it other than try to distract the person having them.

“I see. Well, maybe eating something might help. Is anyone getting you a plate?”

Eddie shook his head with a shit eating grin. “I told them that you’d wanna do it.” You rolled your eyes, but he was right.

There was still a weird feeling that resided in you about being there for anything other than being Eddie’s caretaker. Even after two months of Wayne’s warm hospitality, a month of being taken in by the Hellfire boys, and being treated as if you’ve always been around by Joyce and Hopper, you still felt like an outsider looking in.

People on foot walked by as the cars loaded in through the entry gate of the Hawkins fairgrounds. You were sure that just about everyone in this town was showing up tonight. It made you buzz with excitement to see all the costumes and decked out cars.

“Excited?” Eddie asks you, his eyes darting around at the crowds. There was an indecipherable tone to his voice.

“Of course,” you say, the car moving up a bit to keep up with Hopper's cruiser in line. “Are you?”

“Is Eddie excited about Halloween?” Dustin’s head pops between yours and Eddie’s from the back seat. He slaps his hand on Eddie’s shoulder and gives him a little shake. “Eddie is probably the biggest fan of Halloween I know. He made a whole one shot campaign based on our party trying to escape from Michael Meyers.”

“What? No way, that sounds awesome. Halloween is probably my favorite Halloween movie.”

“It is a classic,” Eddie says with a grin. “Although, I will say that Friday the Thirteenth did freak me out for a while after I saw it for the first time. Still can’t believe that it was his mom the whole time—”

“His mom the whole time?” The two of you say it in unison. You look at each other for a moment before laughing. Dustin makes an audible gagging sound from the back seat and Eddie wastes no time reaching back to swat at him. You shush the both of them as Hopper pulls ahead, making your car next in line.

“Hi, folks,” the older gentleman says, shining a flashlight into the car and almost blinding you. “Hop took care of your cover charge and told me to make sure you guys get the spot next to him.” The man hands you a paper with the number 66 printed on it. It looks like it’s cut in a way that lets it hang from your rear view mirror, most likely to keep track of the amount of cars coming in to participate in the event.

As the man gives you instructions on how to find your spot inside, you cant help but you notice the subtle way he glances to Eddie in the passenger seat. You’re not sure if the man recognizes Eddie or if he’s trying to, but you don’t stick around long enough to find out. Eddie slips on his wolf mask once you take off inside of the fair grounds.

It doesn’t take you long to find your spot. The Hopper-Byers group is all helping out to set everything up for Joyce and Hopper to pass out candy. The back of the cruiser is set up to look like a tent, with a fake fire, a stuffed bear, and a blue blanket meant to be a lake side view.

Dustin pulls Eddie’s chair out from the back seat of your car, helping him out as you pop open your trunk. The effort they put into their theme almost makes you feel self conscious of your trunk, the ‘theme’ looking more like a Halloween store exploded rather than anything cohesive. But then you remember it was put together by Eddie and his friends, and you decide you love it just the way it is.

“All right!” Joyce calls out once your cars are all set up. She sets a plastic bowl in Eddie’s lap and starts pouring candy into it. “Let’s get this party started!”

“Joyce don’t start getting to crazy before the kids get here,” Hops says teasingly as he pulls on his trapper hat. To go with their theme Hop and Joyce are dressed up like campers, which, in hind site, was probably a good call considering how cold the nights have been getting in Hawkins. You were already starting to regret your costume choice as the breeze hit your legs where your dress didn’t cover.

“Isn’t that the point?” Jane asks. “Is she not supposed to scare the kids?”

“Not enough that they wont come around to get candy,” Will retorts.

He’s half paying attention to the conversation as he looks around. Suddenly his hand shoots up, waving and shouting to the Hellfire guys as they walk through the cars. They all gather together and migrate to stand around Eddie, bags and pillowcases out towards him.

“Trick r treat!” They say in a sing song unison, laughter breaking out among them. Eddie’s head drops in the mask, his body shaking as he joins in with the guffaws of his friends.

As you watch them interact, you wonder what faces Eddie is making under the mask. Recently, you’ve felt like you’ve been able to see the real Eddie slip through the cracks. By now you can tell when one of his smiles is fake or genuine, as well as when his anger is real or just out of pain. But, with the plastic mask to hide behind, will he still feel the need to keep himself so reserved tonight?

It didn’t take long for the night to get going. Spirits were high as children, teens, and adults all made their ways between the cars to fill their bags with candy and other goodies being passed around.

You could admit you were a little nervous when Joyce gave the bowl of candy to Eddie earlier. But, either no one could tell it was him under the wolf mask, or no one cared enough to say anything.

Eddie seemed to be enjoying himself, too. After a while he started to compliment the different costumes in a scary wolf voice, which the kids that came by loved. He even went out of the way to put candy into the trick r treater’s bags, not caring about the scars on his hands being seen.

“Gonna need another refill,” he says to you as the last group of kids move on down the line.

“Roger that,” you say, jumping up to grab another bag of candy from your trunk, pushing the fake spider webs to the side.

Some of the bags slid to the back, so you have to really reach in to get your hands on it. Just as you get a grip on the plastic bag, you feel something pulling on the skirt of your dress. You pinch the plastic of the bag, dragging it out with you as you stand up straight.

Looking over your shoulder, you see that Eddie’s hand is holding on to the hem, pulling it taut over your ass. You’re about to ask what he’s doing when the chuckling from a group of passing boys reaches your ears.

“Thanks,” you say to Eddie, smoothing out the skirt of your dress. His mask looks up at you, and his hand quickly retracts from where it was holding on to you.

“Y-you’re welcome,” he says, voice muffled by the mask.

As you pour more candy into his bowl, a group of three young girls approaches Eddie.

“Trick r treat,” the girls say, holding their bags out for Eddie.

Eddie is still for a moment, grabbing the candy wordlessly and placing it into the girls candy bags. When he gets to the last girl, he hesitates before letting the candy drop inside.

“Where’s your brother, Lady Applejack?” Eddie suddenly says, still using his wolf voice.

The girl's eyes go wide, shifting between her two confused friends before nodding to the side. The two girls move on to Joyce and Hoppers truck, leaving Lady Applejack behind.

“Munson?” She whispers with bemusement. “Is that you under that creepy mask?”

“The one and only,” he says, his hands gesturing wildly to himself.

The girl looks up and down at you, then back to Eddie. “I didn’t know you had a girlfriend.”

You shuffle in your spot awkwardly. You’d gone the whole night with no one saying anything besides Dustin, and you were hoping that it would stay that way.

“We’re not dating,” Eddie says neutrally. “She’s my caregiver.”

“Caregiver? Is that not the same thing as a girlfriend?”

“Basically.” The words spill out of you like vomit. “It’s all the non fun parts of being a girlfriend without any of the perks.” The girl laughs, but Eddie remains still.

“I like her, Munson. You should keep her around.”

“You know, you never answered my question,” Eddie says, clearly desperate to change the subject.

“Huh? Oh, you mean about Lucas?”

Lucas. That was the friend that the boys bring up a lot. He’s a member of Hellfire but hasn’t been to any of the meetings.

“He’s probably still at the hospital with Max. Our parents tried to get him to come out tonight since my mom was the one who put this whole thing together. But…” The girl trails off, looking down at the ground as her attitude fades away. “You know, he still feels guilty. About…what happened.”

Eddie nods slowly. Max was another victim who got out alive like Eddie, but she’s been in a coma since March. Eddie doesn’t talk about her, even if the boys bring her up when talking about Lucas.

“Erica, come on!” One of the girls friend’s call, motioning her to join them.

Erica shifts back into her previous demeanor, looking at you and Eddie once again. “I gotta go. Nice seeing you, Munson and Munson’s girlfriend.” Before Eddie could correct her, she was taking off with her friends.

“Sorry,” Eddie says to you, but refusing to look your way.

“It’s fine. If anything I should be apologizing.” You plop back down in your folding chair with a huff. “Dustin said something earlier about our costumes being a couple’s costume and I’ve been cursing myself for over looking that.”

“Dustin would say something like that,” Eddie grumbles under his breath.

“They’re over here!” Dustin’s voice calls out from a few yards away, his Vader mask in his hand as he motions two people behind him. A guy and a girl dressed as Wham! follow an excited Dustin to your car.

“Speak of the devil,” Eddie says, slumping down in his chair. “And he’s brought his mommy.” You look at Eddie confused. The pair were definitely not old enough to be Dustin’s parents, maybe older siblings at best.

“Dustin, are you sure we’re at the right car?” The girl asks, shooting you a nervous smile.

“Yes, this is the right car. I literally came here in it,” Dustin shook his head and reached into his bag. After fumbling around a bit, he pulled out a full size milky way and presented it to Eddie.

“Snagged this for ya from the Martin’s car,” he said with a toothy grin. Eddie grabbed the candy and examined it and you could feel the smile he had from under his mask.

“Good work, Henderson,” Eddie says, looking up at the boy. Dustin salutes him before standing to the side, looking at the couple behind him with an I told you so expression.

“Holy shit,” the guy says, his law slack.

“Is that really you, M—” The girl cuts herself off before she can finish. The two move closer to Eddie, speaking in hushed tones.

“How’re you doing? Dustin told us that him and Mike have been over to your new place,” the girl asks. You don’t know why, but the way her hand rests on his shoulder irritates you.

“Yeah, he told us the lab set you up with a really nice house. Still not enough after what we all went through in my opinion..”

“Steve,” the girl cuts him off sharply.

“What? We haven’t seen the guy in six months! Am I not supposed to talk about it?”

“It’s fine, Robin,” Eddie says.

“It’s not fine,” you interject. All eyes are on you now, stunned as if they just noticed you were there.

“S-sorry, we didn’t mean to leave you out,” the girl stutters.

“Yeah, uh…” Steve looks you up and down before straightening his posture. “You must be the caretaker that Dustin’s told us about. Name’s Steve. Steve Harrington.”

Steve Harrington stands in front of you, offering his hand for you to shake. You take his hand and introduce yourself. Steve Harrington is handsome in a similar way to Sam you think.

The feeling of eyes on you makes you turn your head. The light catches just right you can sort of make out Eddie’s eyes through the holes of the mask.

“What did you say?” You ask, looking back up to Steve after zoning his question out.

“I just asked if you were free sometime. Maybe we could get a bite to eat before you go over to Eddie’s some time?”

“Oh, sorry,” the words poured out of you again. “But I’m seeing someone.”

You’re not sure if it’s just you, but it suddenly felt like the air got thicker. You could feel Eddie’s eyes bore holes into you, but you couldn’t bring yourself to look at him.

“Shit, my bad,” Steve says, taking a step back. “I thought Dustin said you two weren’t together.”

“We’re not,” Eddie says in a clipped tone.

“Yeah, we’re not, Eddie and I. I’m, uh, I’m seeing a guy from my school. Sam…”

“Ohhhh, okay,” Steve nods, “Gotcha. Well, if things don’t work out—OW!”

“Take a hint, dingus!” Robin whisper yells at Steve. She looks back to Eddie with an apologetic look. “We should probably go, but call one of us some time and we’ll sneak some movies to you, okay?”

Eddie wordlessly nods, his focus on the bowl of candy in his lap now. Steve and Robin give their goodbyes and move along, bickering between themselves as they go. Dustin lingers with you and Eddie for a moment, unsure of what to do with himself.

“Do, uh…"Dustin clears his throat, attempting to lighten the mood. "Do you guys want to go check out the fair at all?” Dustin points with his thumb over his shoulder. “There’s some pretty cool stuff at the back. A haunted house, some games…you know, fun stuff. I’ll, uh, sit and watch the candy.”

You look over to Eddie waiting for his response. After several moments Eddie finally nods, lifting the plastic bowl and handing it to Dustin. You rise from your seat, moving out of the way so Dustin to take your spot.

When you turn to see if Eddie is ready to go, you find that he’s not there. Instant panic sets in, as you look out to the crowd to find him. For a split second, you can see the furry hair on the back of his mask a few cars away. Bobbing and weaving through the clusters of people, you grab the handles of his chair and stop him, making him jerk forward.

He looks back, body tense until he realizes it’s you, his shoulders slumping forward.

“Where did you think you were going?” Anger evident in your tone.

“What do you mean? I thought you were right behind me.” The cutting tone of his voice hits a nerve.

“Eddie, I…” You can feel a whole lecture on the tip of your tongue. But the more you think about it, the more you realize that Eddie is his own person. As much as you’ve grown to want to protect him, he probably knows more about these fairgrounds and all of these people than you’ll ever know. He was a fully functioning person seven months ago, not needing anyone’s assistance just to get through a crowd of people.

“Do…do you want me to leave you alone?”

The two of you stand in the middle of the moving bodies without a word. It feels like the two of you are in slow motion as people move past you.

Eddie sits up, shaking his head. “No.”

That’s all you needed to hear. Grabbing onto the handles of his chair, you push him through the crowd at a leisurely pace. It takes a few minutes for hm to say something, but the paper mache ghost from Ghost Busters hanging off of a cars trunk catches his attention.

“Woah, that’s awesome!” Eddie points it out to you.

“Do you think they made that?”

“I bet they got it at a Halloween store.”

Conversation flowed like that between you as you both rated the cars out of 10 as you passed. There were more cars like yours that decorated just enough to be passable, but a good majority of the citizens of Hawkins really do mean business when it comes to Halloween.

“They made their car look like a dragon!” Eddie shouts over his shoulder to you. “How is that not the best car?!”

“It’s totally an awesome car, but, I’m sorry, the literal hearse with a guy dressed as Dracula in a coffin was hands down the best.”

Eddie slumps back in his chair in frustration, his mask looking up at you dramatically while you push him. You smile down at him, happy to see him having so much fun. He jerks forward and clears his throat, mask moving quickly as if he’s looking for something.

“Oh, look they’re selling popcorn,” Eddie nods to a booth set up off to the side of the cars. It looks like a girl scouts group of some kind, all the girls at the booth wearing patch covered sashes over their costumes. The sign on the booth read “Twenty-five cent popcorn. Proceeds go to Hawkins Rebuild Fund.”

“Hmmm,” you hum curiously. “We should get some. I could use something salty to cleanse my palate from all the candy.”

“Yeah, I think I might puke if I even think about a Reese’s Cup right now.”

You grab a bottle of water and a bag of popcorn to split between the two of you. Not wanting to stop your perusing of the cars, you continued on with Eddie popping a piece under his mask for him and then lifting a few pieces up to your mouth for you to much on.

Continuing on, you finally reach the back end of the fairgrounds. A few fires were going with groups of people gathered around. They talked over cider or roasted marshmallows to shove between graham crackers, adding their favorite candy pieces to complete their sweet treats.

A few games were set up. Kids and tipsy grown men bobbed for apples in a big trough of water. A partially enclosed area was set up for smaller kids and their exhausted parents to take a break away from the older kids.

But in the very back was a make shift haunted house, it’s entrance painted to look as if you were walking into a large jack o lantern. Around it were several tarps meant to cover whatever the haunted house was put together with, various paper decorations taped to it to make it look more festive.

“We should go in there,” Eddie says excitedly. “Wonder if it’s dark enough I can take this mask off for a bit.”

“I don’t know Eddie…” you say hesitantly. You weren’t the biggest fan of haunted houses. Being scared from a movie is one thing, but the lack of control you could have in a haunted house made you uncomfortable.

You also never knew what was going to set you off. The last haunted house you went to with Tonya and some friends in high school was set up to look like an actual house. It didn’t really bother you until one of the actors snuck up behind you, whispering in your ear. It immediately took you back to…

“Awe, come on. Don’t tell me you’re scared?” Eddie teases. “I doubt that Hawkins could make an actually scary haunted house. I bet they have one of those rooms where they make you feel peeled grapes and tell you that it’s eyeballs.”

“I��m not scared,” you say with a level tone, “I’m more worried about you. What if you have a night terror and end up needing me to sit at the end while you sleep tonight?”

Eddie freezes, his eyes wide and looking into yours through the holes in the mask. You feel like you said something wrong, but you’re not sure what.

“I-I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

Eddie starts to laugh, clearly trying to get a rise out of you. It both relieves and pisses you off.

“Eddie, you’re such an asshole! I thought I hurt your feelings!”

“You did, little red,” he feigns offense, his hands resting over his heart. “I can’t believe you would make fun of me. I’m wounded. How will you ever make it up to me?”

“Oh my god,” you say with exasperation. “I’m so sorry Mr.Wolf. I guess I can be brave and take you through the haunted house if that will suffice.”

Eddie fake sniffled and nods. “Yes, I think I may be able to forgive and forget your offense if you lend me your company inside this estate.”

The two of you get in line, chatting for the few minutes it takes to get to the front. When it’s finally your turn, the lanky teen at the door looked down at Eddie.

“Uh, be careful with your chair, man. Should be good, but, uh, there might be some bumps between the rooms. That alright?”

Eddie nods and the boy ushers the two of you inside. It looks like the haunted house might be made of several sheds or storage units placed together to make a long string of rooms. A lot of the rooms were more silly than scary, but a few people dressed in costumes were able to get some scares out of you and Eddie.

Well, you more than Eddie.

You hadn’t even realized that you were leaning so close to him. It was a reflex to bury your face against him when you got scared, laughing the whole time as you pushed on to the next room. He didn’t seem to mind, probably too busy laughing at your reactions to care.

You wondered if the actors were talking with each other, because it felt like more people were trying to scare you the further into the haunt you went. By the end you were practically strangling Eddie, your arms wrapped around his shoulders with your face against the back of his neck as he guided you both through the exit that exited to the other side of the fairground lot.

“They were so mean!” The words came out in strained huffs as you tried to catch your breath, still laughing from all the nerves. Eddie probably would have been keeled over with how hard he was cackling. He lifted his mask briefly to wipe the tears from his eyes, his hair sticking to his forehead with how much he was sweating under the plastic.

“Holy shit,” he barks out. “That was sooooo worth it. I want to see how bad you get scared in a haunted house that’s actually scary.”

“I can’t believe you’d want to put me through that after everything I’ve done for you,” you say with faux offense.

“Can’t help it,” he says with a shrug, “I guess I’m a bit of a sadist.”

“Hmmm why does that not at all surprise me.”

The rest of the night went on without a hitch. The guys showed up again eventually, making base between yours and Hopper’s car to trade candy. Jane told you that she got lots of compliments on her costume and thanked you over and over for helping her with her make up. Joyce took the opportunity to get everyone together to take pictures. Apparently Will’s older brother, Jonathan, left one of his cameras with them to take pictures while he’s off at college and Joyce took that task very seriously.

“Let me get one with the two of you!” She says to you and Eddie. Eddie looks at you and you shrug.

“Do you want to lean on me?” You ask him.

“What do you mean?”

“So you can have a picture not in your chair. I can hold you up--oh we can make it look like you’re trying to eat me?”

Eddie stands, leaning against you as you have your arms around him in a tight hug. Joyce takes a few steps forward to get his chair out of frame, giving you both the go ahead to make a pose. Eddie lets go of you, posing with his hands as if he was about to grab you, the mouth of his mask about an inch from your face. You hold on to him with one arm, letting him lean into you as you let your other hand fly back with fake terror.

The bright flash from the camera has you grabbing Eddie fully once again. You were able to feel his leg wobbling, still not used to holding up his whole weight. Eddie plopped back into his chair, letting out the breath he had been holding.

After a while the festivities began to wind down as cars started making their exit. When Eddie’s back started to hurt from being in his chair for so long, you decided to join the rest of the crowd and leave. Dustin helped load Eddie up in the car as you cleaned up any mess that had been made.

“Dustin, why don’t you ride with us?” Joyce calls over from their car. “Eddie’s probably tired and ready to get home. You’re staying at the Wheeler’s anyway, right?”

Dustin looks at Eddie, whose mask was up enough to let his face breathe, to you, who looked like you were ready to climb into bed and pass out. Gears turned under those tight curls. A vision of the two of you “accidentally” falling asleep in each others arms on the couch and waking up all embarrassed, until you inevitably confess your feelings for each other and get married and grow old together was clear as day in his mind.

“Yeah, sounds good. Thanks Mrs.B.”

“Do you even want to attempt a shower?” You ask Eddie with a yawn, eyeing his devil faced pumpkin that the two of you carved that sits next to the front door.

“I feel gross after sweating in that mask,” he yawns in reaction to your yawn, fumbling to get his keys in the lock. “But, honestly, I’ll probably fall asleep sitting in there.”

Eddie pushed the door open, and wheels inside. You can barely get a foot in the front door when Eddie stops abruptly. You follow his gaze to the couch, and are surprised to see Ben leaning against Wayne. His head rests on Wayne’s shoulder, Wayne’s bald head lays against Ben’s head as the two of them snore intermittently.

Eddie turns slowly back towards you with wide eyes. You place your finger against your lips, giving him a silent shush as you slowly maneuver his chair to his room. Eddie doesn’t say a word, even after you close the door to his room. He’s as pale as a ghost, still looking as you as if he was waiting for you do to…something.

“What’s wrong?” You ask him, and he flinches. He finally blinks when he realizes that you’re not going to say anything, tension leaving his body until he’s visibly exhausted.

“Nothing, I just…ugh I really need to shower. But I’m so tired.” He sprawls out in his chair, hands running over his face and through his matter hair. The icky feeling of being outside and around people begins to make your skin crawl, too, as you feel a shower calling your name.

“Well, the longer we wait, the more tired you’re going to be. Let’s get you in there so I can go home and take one, too.” Eddie perks up, looking at you with knitted brows.

“You’re not staying the night?”

“Well, my sleeping spot is currently being occupied,” you say with a cheeky grin, nodding toward the living room.

Eddie presses his lips together, deep in thought as he tries to come up with an solution so you don’t have to make the 30 minute trek home.

“You could…sleep in my bed? I could sleep in Wayne’s room. If the love birds wake up, they’ll just have to deal with it.”

Thinking about sleeping in Eddie’s bed makes your chest flutter in a way that you hate. Well, rather, you want to hate it. But you really don’t. The idea of being in his bed with him penetrates your mind, and you think of anything else to push it away. Like how you’d finally told him about Sam earlier in the night. You still needed to psycho analyze his reaction to the news, which was how you usually passed the time in the car.

“I’ll think about it.” Eddie nods, accepting that as your answer for now.

You set up the shower for Eddie, hardly a word between the two of you with the combined low energy. You quietly snuck Eddie’s dirty clothes into the laundry room as he showered, taking a few minutes to pick up the kitchen in hopes to lessen the work load for Wayne tomorrow.

When you returned to the shower, Eddie had just turned off the water. He was humming a song to himself, probably to keep himself awake as he went through the motions of his shower.

He pulled the curtain open, and slowly blinked at you. You understood his message, taking the few steps to stand beside him. You went through your drying routine, getting his back and gently squeezing and scrunching his curls in a towel to dry them. There was no way he would be able to blow dry them tonight so you just took your time getting them as dry as possible. Eddie would start to doze off until the resistance of his hair pulling would wake him again.

The two of you got into position for Eddie to stand and pivot into the chair. You held on to him, and he held onto his towel, waiting for your count to stand. A quiet one, two, three had him pushing off of the shower seat with his leg.

But he was still tired, and he began to lose his balance. One hand shot to hold your arm, and the other grabbed the bar attached to the wall. You felt his body starting to go down and reflexively turned him towards his chair. His grip on the wall threw you off, causing you to fall into him when he finally let go and landed in his chair.

You braced yourself against the arm rests as the floor was slick under you. The top half of your body was pressed into his, mimicking the closeness of an hug. When you went to pull away, you felt his grip on your arm tighten.

“Don’t move.” He says next to your ear.

“What?”

“My towel fell.”

You snort, resting your forehead against his shoulder, wet curls pressing into your skin. “Why do you have such a hard time keeping a towel on?”

Ever since the first shower where he almost lost his towel, at least once a week his towel seems to find its way out of Eddie’s hands and onto the floor.

To Eddie’s defense, it was hard for him to maintain his grip, and you couldn’t hold him up and keep his towel in place, so it was something you’d become accustomed to. If he could feel his towel slipping Eddie would usually give you a heads up so you could keep your eyes above belt level.

After a beat you can feel Eddie’s smile against your cheek. “Only around you,” he says with a sarcastic tone. You suck in a breath, and hope he can’t feel the heat that rises to your cheeks at his playful comment.

“I’m starting to think you do it on purpose.”

Eddie shakes his head. “If you close your eyes and move, I can reach the towel myself.”

“Okay,” you say, positioning your feet so you can stand up straight.

As you move your foot back, it bumps against something and catches you off guard. Reflexively, you open your eyes to look back and move your foot accordingly. Once you find your footing again, you shift to face forward once again. But, in your sleepy haze, you forget a crucial move; closing your eyes again.

Still looking down, your eyes manage to land directly where they’re not supposed to.

It was like a car crash. You knew you shouldn’t gawk, but the site of Eddie’s dick as it lay against his leg had you frozen in place. It was long, reaching half way down his hairy thigh, and thick. What made it worse was that he looked half hard; whether on it’s way to full mast or starting to soften you couldn’t be certain.

Suddenly you became very aware at how revealing your costume was and how close your body had just been against his. Hell, you’d been touching and leaning against each other all night. Was he like this because of you? Surely not. You scold yourself for even thinking about it.

Regaining your composure, you push away from his chair and get your footing. You snap your eyes closed so quickly, hoping that he didn’t notice that you were looking. It felt like you had been staring for an eternity, the image of it seemingly tattooed into your corneas even as your eyes were closed, but in reality it was no more than a second.

Even if you had seen it, you’d assured him plenty of times before that it wouldn’t be the first dick you’ve ever seen and it wouldn’t be the last with the field of work you were going into. But you also respected his privacy, maybe understanding a little more as to why he didn’t want you to see. If he said anything, you wouldn't make a big deal about it.

“Okay, you’re in the clear,” he says, his voice not giving any hint to if he knows what you saw. You open your eyes as he’s backing away and back into his room to get dressed, leaving you to clean up. Which you do quietly, willing Eddie’s dick out of your mind but failing as you pick up.

By the time you joined him in his bedroom, he was still in his chair, fully dressed and his head nodding forward as he tried to fight off sleep.

“Ready to get in bed?” You ask him in a low voice so not to startle him.

He looks up at you drowsily, “Are you gonna stay the night?” You shake your head and his pouts up at you.

“I’m sorry, Eddie. I’ll be okay getting home. I’m…feeling very awake now.”

And you head plenty to think about on the drive home. It didn’t feel long enough to analyze everything, your thoughts spilling over as you stare up at your ceiling fan in bed.

thank you for reading.

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x nurse!reader #eds #eddie munson fan fic #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson fluff #eddie muson st #disabled!eddie munson #eddie munson angst #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x y/n #make me better #mmb!eddie #mmb!eddie munson

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ell-does-stuff · 27 days

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MAKING A BIG OL POST OF EVERYTHING I GOTTA SAY ABOUT THE NEW SPOOKY MONTH BECAUSE HOLY SHITTTT THERES A LOT

‼️‼️SPOILERS OBVIOUSLY‼️‼️

THE THIEVES ARE BACK WOOOOOOOO!! IVE MISSED THEM SM

also eepy lila

while gathering images for this ive noticed that the "pile of dexter" as im calling it is staring at the thieves the whole time they're in the attic (specifically fat thief)

is he somehow still alive???? just possessing a pile of dead doll????????

so cool to see the big ass spider get some actual relevance!! def gonna be important next episode for sure

ROSS'S DAD!!!!!!!!

also jaune is so pretty with her hair down like omggg... love to see her being such a supportive friend to lila as well

"are you throwing away dad's stuff mom?" WAAAAAA MY POOR BABYYY IM GONNA CRYYY

HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN HI KEVIN

theyre so me

DEXTERRRRJRJRJRHSHSHDBBDBSB!!+!!!!!(!!

"this cat looks sick im taking it to the vet" BULLSHIT i know what you are. 👁️👁️

DEXTER'S MOM!?!?????!?!?!?!?!!!??? i had no idea she would ever show up like wow i did not expect to see her at all

poor little babies and their lack of parents

ok sorry ik im joking here but MAN this scene made me feel bad 😭😭😭

THE FUCK.

pretty sure this dude is the same guy as the "costume bob" in the last episode??? i felt bad for him last time but here he seems like kind of a pathetic and weird ass man ngl lol

RADFORRRRRRDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD!!!!!(!!(;+;!;(;;(;??;(;;!!(+!!++!(++!

HES SUCH A GOD DAMN SILLY NERD MAN LIKEEEEE "he even sounds like he does in the movies!!!!!!" BROOOO I LOVE HIMMMMMMMMMM DJJDGWHDHSHFH

he is EXACTLY how i pictured he would be!! my brain is not gonna shut up about him for the next few days i just know it HAHAHAH

also my caramelpopcorn (thats their ship name right?? or was it candycorn??? i forgor lol) heart is completely full, i loved actually seeing him and kevin canonically interact, they are perfect <3

HES IN THE CANDY CLUB OUTFIRTBD RJSHNF EBDJFBSBDJC EJDUFBEBW DKXN SCUEBFNFBRJSJCJCHDB!!!!(!!!!!;+;(;!!(+!!

"im... uh... like an uncle!!" "i just wanna help the children..." BROO??? feeling kinda bad for frank rn, these are like the only kids he genuinely cares about and hes being turned away from em

ik hes a shady guy but STILL

GREGOR LOOKS SO GOOFY DOING THE DANCE JDBDHSHFHD LIKE WHY DOES HE LOOK LIKE THATTTTT

also i made this gif myself yall better like it

aaaaaaaaaand dexter's mom is dead.

like son like mother i guess 💀

love how ignacio's door has small little boards on it from when they bashed it with a hammer HAHAHHA

also, looking at the inside of ignacio's house, is that john's family on the little table there???

one of the images in the arg gives a better look at this, but i had no idea it was in IGNACIO'S HOUSE of all places. why does he have that??? and right by the gun too.... what is this silly cult man planning......

(the arg image in question if yall were wondering)

"we understand you" "we're here for you dude" "thank you guys, i just wish things weren't so..." HATZGANG FRIENDSHIP WAAAAA!!!!!

also ROY HAS BEEN THROUGH SHIT MY POOR GUYYYY i wanna hug him mannnn 🥺

IMAGE LIMIT IS KILLING ME SO IM GONNA REBLOG THIS WITH MORE SHIT TO SAY BECAUSE I AM NOT DONE MANNN‼️‼️‼️‼️

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thoughts-and-gayers · 4 months

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here's how the freaky mortys theory can still win. (aka, what i'm calling the friendly mortys theory.)

(carrying over a lot of connections made by @trucknoisettes and @glitteringcrab)

so, its no secret that evil morty tends to play up his 'mortyness' when he needs to appear innocent. most recently seen in unmortricken, where he pretends to be morty prime and the first words out of his mouth are "aw jeez".

its also no secret that morty's been ping-ponging a bit between s1/2 personality and s5/6 personality.

i posit that the moments where he's seen acting more like the cliche morty is the moments where its actually evil morty overcompensating, and the moments where he actually acts like morty prime are, yknow, morty prime.

this would, of course, require that they be swapping places off-screen throughout season 7.

or, and this is where i get full tinfoil-hat, theyve been doing it even longer than that.

while rick was off having his anime crow arc in season 5, morty was doing... something. the show doesnt really dwell on it, except mention that morty was on the citadel at some point. its entirely possible that morty got to talking with people on the citadel, maybe even making some friends. maybe one of those friends just so happened to be the president.

evil morty didnt have a clear reason to invite our rick and morty to dinner before he destroyed the citadel. i doubt that he had a soft spot for rick c-137, but maybe, just maybe, he had a soft spot for morty prime. the morty who stood up to his rick and had been complaining about being left by him only a few days ago.

obviously morty hadn't known EM's actual plan. he probably didnt know too much about EM at all. but there's no way that EM, the character who just wants to be alone, would invite a total stranger along with him out of the cfc.

but no. morty declined.

what if the second seat wasnt a toilet. what if he had built a second seat in order to take morty with him, but lied to protect his reputation.

so imagine, our morty, morty prime is reeling from everything that happened. and as horrified as he is, maybe he also understands. just a little bit.

and evil morty, he built his base, he's finally left alone, but maybe he's also a bit lonely. after all, the robot butler also clearly was programmed for conversation.

so, maybe partway through season 6, evil morty talks to morty prime. they make up. they agree to switch places on occasion. after all, morty needs a break from all the bullshit sometimes, and EM is probably curious what morty's family, and indeed rick c-137, is actually like.

and so when evil morty comes to that base where rick and morty are, morty obviously isnt going to act like they know each other. so he overcompensates just like EM can, but in the other direction.

like, come on, can you really believe that morty prime would act like that with no provocation? he may have a violent side, but it doesnt just come out of nowhere. and yes, the blood vortex was horrifying, but clearly EM isnt here to attack either of them right now.

now, if he was, say, exaggerating his dislike of EM so rick wouldnt get suspicious, then this makes a lot more sense. morty's not really a good liar! in fact, they could even be swapped right then! this seems more like what EM would say in this situation, doesnt it?

now, while i was reading @trucknoisettes unmortricken analysis, i was wondering why morty would jump from being openly hostile to EM to agreeing to temporary mind control, but if the hostility was all an act? if he already had some precedent for trusting EM? well, a whole lotta things start making sense.

so, to summarize this wild speculation:

- evil morty and morty prime have been friends since after season 5 episode 9

- at some point in season 6, evil morty made up with morty off-screen.

- after making up, the two of them started switching places on occasion throughout season 6 and 7

- morty prime's hostility to evil morty in 7.5 was an act

and perhaps ive taken a few too many liberties, but yknow. i'm here to have fun and ship evil morty x morty not make perfect sense.

#rick and morty season 7 #rick and morty spoilers #rick and morty theory #rick and morty #morty smith #evil morty #rick sanchez #freaky mortys theory #ram #ram season 7 #unmortricken

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politemagic · 1 month

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Sleep Token Living in a Haunted House

These headcanons are based on this meme I made the other night. I had a lot of thoughts on the eepies living in a haunted house, a lot of them are inspired by the show Ghosts if you've seen it. I had a lot of fun writing these so I hope you like em♡

1.45k words (she got lengthy so i added a keep reading)

➺ Thanks to a few years of communing with an ancient deity, Vessel has become quite attuned to the spirit realm. Everywhere he goes, he can sense the presence of the souls unable to move on from the mortal plane.

➺ When they first step foot in their new home, Vessel immediately feels like he’s being suffocated by the amount of activity in the house. He tries to identify the spirit, but there’s too many to even keep count, the grand foyer a whirlwind of translucent figures in various period attire.

➺ When they sit down for dinner at the end of the day, Vessel decides to tell the others about their spectral roommates. After observing them for the better part of the day, he hasn’t picked up on any signs that they’d be malicious, they honestly just seemed to carry on with their lives despite being dead.

➺ II just shrugs. From what Vessel's told him in the past, there are ghosts just about everywhere you go, and they haven't bothered him yet. He imagines it won't be much different living in a haunted house, if the spirits are as tame as Vessel seems to believe they are.

➺ Really, II just feels bad for Vessel. He knows that he'll be able to live in peace, unable to see, hear, or even sense the ghosts, but he knows Vessel isn't afforded that same luxury. He just hopes he will be able to find some form of solace from the constant commotion Vessel was describing.

➺ III is way too excited. As a kid, he always dreamed of living in a haunted house filled with a bunch of ghost friends. He’s always secretly been a little jealous of Vessel’s gift, but if he lived in a haunted house… Maybe he could find a way to communicate with them himself.

➺ Two days later, Vessel knocks on his door only to find III seated in the middle of a ring of candles, mumbling some words he knew were just gibberish. His interruption earns him a pointed glare as III explained to Vessel that he wanted to make sure that the ghosts knew it was okay to talk to him, so he wanted to reach out first.

➺ In the long run, it might have been better for the ghosts if they had left III alone.

➺ One night, he was trying yet another method of communication with the ghosts after exhausting most of the suggestions he found online. The Ouija Board started out as a joke, a housewarming present from Espera given after they had been filled in on the house’s haunted status. But III decided it was worth a shot.

➺ He had been at it for about a week at that point, and he was starting to think that Vessel was full of shit when he said the house was haunted. That was, until he sat with his fingers resting on the planchette and asked if he should give up.

➺ The planchette drifts slowly over to the “No” and III was over the moon. Using the Ouija Board suddenly became his favorite activity.

➺ He asks them any questions he thinks of. He’ll ask for opinions on things like his outfit or if a classic novel was worth the read. “They were there when it came out, I figured they’d know!”

➺ The ghosts plead with Vessel to get him to stop (in my own personal hc the ouija board emits a sound or something that beckons the spirits and they actually find it really annoying).

➺ When Vessel tried gently suggesting III use Google instead, he insisted that he preferred “Ghoul-gle”. (i'm so sorry). Vessel knew better than to try and dissuade him any further.

➺ IV is equally as excited as III, but it’s more from a root of curiosity than a root of fantastical dreams. He’s always been fascinated by ghosts, sometimes even wondering if he might be a little “sensitive” himself, though he never experienced anything like what Vessel described.

➺ He spends a lot of his time as they’re settling into the house researching the different people who have died in the house. He’ll print out news articles and stuff to show Vessel, asking if that person still haunted the house.

➺ He has a note on his phone where he keeps track of the different ghosts and what he knows about them. He tries to keep track of where the different ghosts tend to hang out, so he can be aware of who might be around any time he’s wandering the house. (in the US version of Ghosts Jay has a note on his phone that’s all the different specifics of how ghosts work. I think he would have that too for sure)

➺ IV would never openly admit it, but sometimes, when he’s alone, he’ll talk aloud to the empty rooms. He doesn’t try as hard as III because he’s overhead Vessel tell him to ease up a few times. But he secretly wants to talk to the ghosts so badly, and thinks it just isn't fair that Ves is the only one with the ability (he doesn’t think it’s fair to him or to Vessel).

➺ The ghosts were constantly talking Vessel's ear off, excited to finally have someone who can hear them! They'll ask him to do different things for them, like open a window, turn on some music, or leave the television on while they're out of the house.

➺ Vessel is still navigating the best ways to set boundaries with the ghosts so he can, you know, live his life. He already lives in the service of Sleep, he really doesn’t need to be serving the will of these ghosts on top of that.

➺ Sometimes he’s very receptive to their requests, and other times he can be quite crass in his denial. Slowly, they begin to work out some systems as to what they can ask for and when they can ask him about it, and for the most part they’re very respectful of his space and offer their own help when they can.

➺ Outside of Vessel, the ghosts have also taken a shine to II (probably because he’s the most chill™), taking it upon themselves to help him in any ways they saw fit. It could be anything as menial as closing the door when someone forgets to shut it all the way so that he doesn't have to get up from his seat, or once he swore he felt a sudden, cold presence engulf him when he complained about the heat while practicing his drumming.

➺ As you can imagine, III was very jealous when he walked into the kitchen one evening to see a coffee mug carefully floating down from the top shelf as II fixed himself a cup of tea.

➺ He was pouty the rest of the day, not understanding why they would prefer II. When II tried to suggest that maybe it was because he left them be, III insisted that II just didn’t understand them the way he did. “Maybe if you bothered to talk to them, you’d learn they were real chatterboxes!”

➺ IV expresses his silent jealousy of II's status as the ghosts' favorite non-medium in the house differently than III. Instead of moping, he pays attention to the little things Vessel did for them, and he makes a point to do them himself as well.

➺ He winds up becoming quite a talented baker after learning that the ghosts loved the smell of cookies. The aroma of his chocolate chip cookies quickly won over a few of the ghosts. (I’m just gonna say it. I think there’s a female ghost from like the 1800s in that house with a little bit of a crush on him. He’s attractive, thoughtful, and knows his way around a kitchen. That’s what dreams are made of right there)

➺ Though IV really won them over when he snuck into III’s room and threw the Ouija Board away.

➺ III decided that he didn’t like ghosts anymore when IV showed him the picture of the “Thank you ♡” left in the steam on the mirror after his shower.

Bonus bc I like the idea:

➺ One night at dinner, IV makes a playful jab at III but instead of hearing the expected laughter of his friends and bandmates, he swears he hears the laughter of a woman.

➺ Later, IV asks Vessel about it in private. He laughs and confirms that yes, he did indeed hear ghost laughter. Evidently the former lady of the house found his comment to be very amusing.

#these were just some silly ideas rattling around in my brain but i hope you enjoy them!!!#if you have thoughts please please please share them i want to read them <3 #also consider this my formal invitation to anyone to come scream with me about sleep token #this is my first time posting anything like this for sleep token im surprised it took so long?#sleep token #sleep token headcanons #worshitposting #sleep token vessel #sleep token ii #sleep token iii #sleep token iv #em's stcu #(gang pls don't let this flop)

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desire-mona · 1 month

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dps boys (and keating's) favourite songs (aka me projecting because i love music) (also modern au because you cannot limit me to music before 1960 you just cant)

i made a playlist of all these songs in case you wanna give em a listen, you can find it here. if you totally disagree with me or wanna add more then absolutely let me know!

neil: talia - ride the cyclone (the musical)

yes i KNOW it's obvious to choose a song from a musical BUT. ride the cyclone is special, i think he'd really like the lack of an ensemble and enjoy the dark premise despite the comedic nature of a vast majority of the show. also i totally think his favourite performance would be by gus halper bc of the use of the projector. mischa or noel is definitely a dream role of his.

todd: vincent - james blake ('s cover, og by don mclean)

don mcleans lyricism is like catnip to poets and it has gone unacknowledged for far too long. a lyrically gorgeous, vaguely queer sounding song about a tortured artist, covered by someone with an ANGELIC voice. can you name anything more todd? not to mention the piano is so far beyond moving, nothing short of a masterpiece.

charlie: dear prudence - siouxsie and the banshees (again - a cover, og by the beatles)

firm believer that charlie was an avid beatles hater for a WHILE until eleanor rigby grew on him, much to his dismay. is now a casual beatles enjoyer, only due to the fact that their vocals annoy him. so a cover by siouxsie sioux (whom he most definitely has a crush on) is basically a blessing in disguise. loves the instrumentals, loves the vocals, loves all of it. insists that its better than the original and will ultimately die (correct) on that hill.

meeks: love on the line (call now) - her's

as much as i love and adore meeks, i have been loyal to my headcanon that he is an annoying music snob since day one. of course, this culminates in his favourite song being by THE indie pop/rock band that pretentious people love to bring up the death of. he is no exception, any time the band is mentioned he will without fail go "did you know that they died in a car crash?" either way, id be lying if i said this was a bad pick. the upbeat vibe mixed with the actual meaning of the song being about a guy wasting all his money on a sex hotline? it makes the whole song so fun, and thats right up his alley! super danceable too, which plays a huge part.

pitts: bad fruit - jean dawson

will mona ever shut up about jean dawson? signs point to no. anywho, if you've followed along with my pittsie musings then you KNOW that i consider pitts to be the most well versed music guy to ever step on welton academy campus. realistically, im sure his favourite song changes on a day to day basis, but he always comes back to this. jean dawson makes art that ive seen few do similarly, everything he brings to the table i find so incredibly unique and well crafted. definitely pitts' biggest music crush.

cameron: '39 - queen

absolutely, 100%, without a doubt, an extremely guilty pleasure. i take his parents as the type to ban queen in their household (for reasons that im sure youre able to pick up on) but i ALSO take cameron as a sucker for classic rock, match made in hell. of course, since brian may does the vocals on this song instead of freddie, he can listen on the dl and be fine. also, the concept of time travel in music is SO!!! INTERESTING!! would absolutely go on a 10 minute long tangent about the story and meaning of the song, which only mittsie would actually listen to.

knox: lavender buds - MF DOOM

fine, FINE. i'll give knox a proper headcanon, but i wont be happy about it. i think i would listen to MF DOOM a lot more if i was a former bully, but thats not actually based off anything so dont take that as an insult, avid listeners. honestly i dont really have an in depth explanation for this one, just look at the lyrics and youll understand.

(this repeats 3 times)

i also take him to be a big r&b/ blues enjoyer, also based off nothing at all, so the sample probably appeals to some sense of nostalgia.

keating: clair de lune - claude debussy

yes, even modern keating's fav song would be classical, you can rip that from my cold, dead hands. this song was based off the poem by the same title by paul verlaine, which i'll include because it is just so damn beautiful.

Your soul is a select landscape

Where charming masqueraders and bergamaskers go

Playing the lute and dancing and almost

Sad beneath their fantastic disguises.

All sing in a minor key

Of victorious love and the opportune life,

They do not seem to believe in their happiness

And their song mingles with the moonlight,

With the still moonlight, sad and beautiful,

That sets the birds dreaming in the trees

And the fountains sobbing in ecstasy,

The tall slender fountains among marble statues.

Paul Verlaine, 1869 (originally written in french, so this is a rough english translation)

now the song itself does SUCH a good job at capturing the beauty and moving parts of this poem, and it fits perfectly with a plethora of different emotions. i know without a shadow of a doubt that its his kryptonite. is that me projecting because i love this song and i love keating? absolutely, but i still think its true either way.

#desire mona #media #please please please listen to the playlist all these songs are wonderful i promise #dead poets society #neil perry #todd anderson #charlie dalton #steven meeks #gerard pitts #richard cameron #knox overstreet #john keating #mona talks music #banger

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myriadparacosm · 4 months

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Black Beats Black - IV. Dentelle de la Reine Anne Part.2

Part 1. (Sorry Tumblr can't handle the size) Chapter I. - II. - III. Read on my AO3

“I could drop my pot of ink from here… it will kill him.”

Next to him, Evan leans a bit further into the window to squint down at the people crossing one of the castle’s bridges. It’s easy to spot Lupin walking with Evans and Pettigrew– just as natural for Regulus to slowly push off the edge of the window. He sits back down amongst the opened books and the brewing cauldron between them. They are in one of the highest towers to be left alone as it’s rarely used except for the hidden snogging, though with the cold no one wants to risk their tongues frozen together. Perfect for them to experiment and study in peace with no eavesdropping.

“Better use a cauldron, squish him like an insect,” he advises. “It’s difficult to piece a brain back together.”

Regulus glares at Lupin who escapes through one of the heavy doors before he can decide on the perfect murder. After reminiscing with Sirius and now that they have clarified everything that was needed - Regulus has prepared his share of the Animagus potion and even freed space in his potion’s pouch made to transport potion without shaking them. Despite Sirius and Barty’s night, Which-Must-Not-Be-Remembered, Evan is still friendly though he more than often likes to remind them that he is here if they even look at each other.

He coughs petals and grabs some to put them in their dedicated bag to use them for more experiments. Some flowers are also there and neither ever wilt.

“Do you know why Em’ is avoiding Sirius?”

“Isn’t it obvious?”

Emmeline hasn’t changed but she is staying away from Sirius outside from when they all hang out in the Room of Requirement. She doesn’t appear to hate him and he doubts that she has a problem helping him ever since their adventure to the Kelpie’s Dance. It’s been two weeks since that. Regulus still has the mandrake leaf in his mouth and they have managed to come up with a potion within days that should eliminate the poison and also hold the coughing for a few hours.

“She carries a torch for him.”

“What?” Regulus startles, looking up from the potion they are brewing. “Emmeline?”

“Not romantically,” Evan says, turning a page of the book, “this happened with all of us, don’t you remember?”

Whilst Regulus, Barty and Evan almost immediately hit off, which was followed by Dorcas helping them before Pandora dropped herself on their laps– Emmeline has only really been friends with them starting third year. She wasn’t alone as Slytherins tend to stay as tight groups and it’s by the clamorous lot of girls. Contrary to what most people thought, Emmeline was at the head of the group even if she appeared distanced if not absent. She watched them though but they only managed to get close when they started working on their first arithmancy project.

Emmeline kept offering Regulus to work on arithmancy together and she always seemed quite happy but it’s only when Pandora mentioned at random that maybe she has a crush on him; which would have make sense if Emmeline hasn’t started partnering with Evan during potion or gossiping with Barty and laughing at any of his joke even if at first the depraved ones surprised her. Dorcas sort of confronted her too, as she assumed that Emmeline had a crush on her because she always sat with her in the common room and complimented her works, and she gently let her down but Emmeline quickly corrected her that she has no interest. Pandora offered to kiss, just like that, but was also shot down, quite funnily from what she said but Emmeline refuses the story to be shared.

They quickly understood that Emmeline has what you might call ‘fall in friendship’. Though it’s not related to her own disinterest in love. Like for all of them, Emmeline appears intense once she is interested in someone but she only means it platonically, easily blushing only because she is happy. She is quite embarrassed about this part of her and she avoided them up until they dragged her back in their group.

“Oh. Right. I forgot that,” Regulus admits and automatically steers the potion. “Sirius?”

“Are you really surprised? Your brother is alright once he shuts his mouth.”

He rolls his eyes. “Please, don’t try to fool me. I know you two like to chit-chat about these rancid books.”

“I don’t!”

“Yes you do. Sirius is maybe a worse romantic than you but I have tried one of your books and I know you’re not that different,” he replies with a smile at his glare. “Pirates, uh?”

“Do I need to remind you that I’m the one deciding whether you two stay married?” Evan hisses with his cheeks red. “Or that the whole school would feast on that gossip if it ever got out?”

Sirius Black is already rumoured to either be a Gryffindor spy in Slytherin or a Slytherin King to be with Regulus. Better leave it aside that Evan obviously likes Sirius but only holds a grudge because Barty likes to say dumb things out loud.

“Well, I wouldn’t have thought that Emmeline would like my brother that much.” Any of his friends really. “So she is avoiding him now.”

“You know how she is,” Evan says. “She is probably trying to be discreet about it considering how Sirius might think the same as us.”

“Him and his fat ego certainly will take it that way.”

Sirius actually doesn’t make the connection. He asks Regulus if Emmeline has tons of homework or started a painting that took up most of her time since he has barely talked to her; she often finds an excuse to leave when their number diminishes. That’s the only reason why Regulus decides to talk to Emmeline. Sirius might ask her what’s wrong and who knows how that will go.

The Slytherin dorm isn’t openly hostile to them but many people look at them with a wary look. Snape or his minions haven’t tried anything on them yet but who knows how stupid they can be even at their lowest. Sirius, often if not always, lets his door appear so they have started to mingle in the Room of Requirement instead; it probably doesn’t help with their reputation.

“Are you free Em’?”

Emmeline moves her eyes away from her new painting to greet Regulus with a smile. “Of course. Is everything alright?”

“Everything is fine.”

It was still an abandoned classroom up until Emmeline started her art club during fourth year. They have all helped her clean it even if it was just a small wand movement. Regulus has almost considered practising the piano or even ballet, which he has liked to do even if it’s their parents hammering them into them but they have stopped once they got to Hogwarts. The upcoming war is more important. Sirius also got these classes but preferred to draw, which is considered as a meaningless skill compared to music.

“What are you painting?”

“Just… my current inspiration.”

They are alone for now and Emmeline is the most frequent one, even getting detention because she left the club in the middle of the night. The painting is still at its early stage but Regulus can recognize a tower next to what appears to be water. The shades are for most, dark and icy, for now.

“Do you mean Sirius?”

Emmeline’s brush is squashed on the painting before she quickly withdraws it. She stares at the smudge of black before clearing her throat.

“I can salvage this later…” She trails off, putting down her tools, with red cheeks.

“He has only noticed that you are busy, perhaps avoiding him,” Regulus reassures and holds back his amused smile when she looks at him, embarrassed. He sits down on the ottoman. “You’re making a portrait of my brother?”

She nods before brushing her dark hair behind her ears. “I showed him yours and he quite liked it. And he agreed to let me paint one of him. I hope to finish it– soon.”

“It looks like a good start.”

Regulus knows the basics of arts but it has never called him more like Sirius. It’s definitely going to be pretty anyhow considering that Emmeline is the one painting; though how she pictures Sirius is still a bit of a mystery as all the colours are so far leaning toward dark.

“Is it obvious?”

“To us, yes,” Regulus admits. “Though I never thought that you would like Sirius that much.”

“Don’t you think it’s weird?” She mutters, rubbing her bottom lip with her teeth.

Regulus frowns, slightly surprised that she seems to feel embarrassed or for him to have a real problem with that. He isn’t jealous, to his own surprise, and if anything he is elated that all his favourite people have accepted each other further than appearance. If Emmeline actually liked Sirius then it would be sad for her considering that his brother is spoken to, to death. Regulus wishes Sirius would fall in love with someone else as wonderful as Emmeline and not a stupid jerk.

“No. Of course not,” he says. “I can actually understand how you two would get along. Sirius can act as rebellious as he wants but I know he isn’t as disattached to what we were taught. He loved the violin but only when he could play what he enjoyed so he was awful with our personal professor. I’m– I wish he didn’t throw all our childhood away but I know it was harder for him than for me.”

“Now that you two are talking, you will make many more good memories and perhaps it will help Sirius too,” she says with a small thoughtful smile. “The violin, though..? That’s interesting.”

“You wouldn’t think so, right? I don’t know if he completely forgot about it or not.” She nods but it hasn’t cleared her spirit completely so Regulus considers his next words. “Sirius isn’t the type to lie, even though he perfectly can. So I didn’t think– that everything would go as smoothly as it is now. Sirius could have been awfully difficult to deal with. With the circumstances and what happened with his friends, I doubt Sirius has the strength to play nice with anyone. If you all hated him or didn’t give him a chance, he would think he deserves it.”

“I find this unnecessarily sad,” she admits.

“But that’s exactly why I’m sure that Sirius sees you as a friend, just like you do.”

Emmeline nods and tilts her head before closing her eyes. “I feel like I’m already mourning him… I can’t imagine what you must feel,” she whispers. “I have barely gotten to know him and yet it’s so easy. I’m scared that– all of this attention will feel unwarranted to him but I also don’t want to regret him when I have barely even known him.”

Regulus swallows down and takes a deep breath before opting to ignore the heavy subject. “You do sound like you have a crush on him.”

“A friendly one,” she argues with flushed cheeks. “We have already settled on that, haven’t we? Friends! I do not-”

“I’m only teasing you,” he chuckles and she purses her lips with a menacing squint. “It’s rather cute.”

“I just hope that Sirius doesn’t assume that either. You all understood me but what if he finds it weird that I don’t… care for a lover. I do not want to bring that up considering his position.”

“He will understand it,” Regulus says without a doubt. “I’m sure that either way it will feed his ego, even if he doesn’t need it, and make him happy. He might tease a tad bit.”

Emmeline sighs. “But isn’t Marlene McKinnon his closest friend, outside of his dormmates? I’m nothing like her… Or any of his original friends. None of us are. Wouldn’t he find it weird that someone like me wants to be– close friends when only a few weeks he never knew me?”

“You do not plan to steal McKinnon’s spot or anyone else, do you? Then you shouldn’t worry about that. I still doubt that Sirius’ old friends will ever try to talk to him.”

“Didn’t you say that Potter wants to talk with Sirius?”

“He is only pestering me because he is scared that Sirius will talk about whatever secret broke their little group,” he argues. “Maybe he really is avoiding Potter but Lupin will be nearby and who knows how that will affect Sirius so it’s better to forget about him.”

“But he hasn’t told you, right?”

“No. I doubt he will.”

Emmeline sighs. “This is so unfortunately complicated.”

He watches her, offering a hand that she squeezes with a shy gaze. “Are you worried that Sirius won’t be happy that you want to be friends with him? From what I have seen, I should be jealous of how you two get lost in conversation while I’m right there.”

“Oh, Reg-”

“So I can assure you that he values you. Pandora always surprises him and he enjoys this kind of game, just like Barty who I worry might start an enormous prank with him that will close the school.” She chuckles and he smiles. “Evan was more difficult because-”

“Barty also didn’t help.”

“When has he helped willingly?” He snorts. “But thankfully they found some common ground. Even our Purebloods upbringing, being above each other and how backwards our supposed evolved society works— they talk without attacking each other and I noticed that despite the subject they are somehow giving each other hope too.”

“Every empire falls at some point,” she whispers and squeezes his hand.

He nods. “Dorcas is more similar to Sirius I suppose, they match each other and I can see that they are having fun. You were here at the Kelpie’s Dance, they were in their own little world. I guess McKinnon is also more of this type but this doesn’t mean that Sirius can’t see you as a proper friend. Salazar, Barty and him get along which doesn’t terrify me enough so please be the best of friends just so Sirius doesn’t end up in Azkaban.”

Emmeline considers it with a frown before nodding. “They would.”

“But really, you should just tell Sirius that you really like him,” Regulus says. “We are all friends with you and I doubt that he will find it weird that you have no interest in love, if you want to specify it.”

“I think so too… But it’s so strange for some people.” She purses her lips before clearing her throat. “Friends satisfy me and I don’t see why I should marry anyone. I love all of you. I made the mistake of mentioning it before and the looks they gave me.”

“Who?”

She shakes her head. “It’s alright, I dealt with it in third year. But you’re right, I should talk to Sirius.”

“He misses you.”

Emmeline blushes with a chuckle. Regulus smiles and squeezes her hand one last time. He doesn’t know how this conversation went but he is sure that it happened since Sirius commented out of nowhere that Regulus picked the right friends. He doesn’t have anything to complain about so he focuses back on his heavy old latin reading that might concern the Hanahaki. It has become a kind of ritual that Regulus sleepovers - not because of the list.

They manage to come up with one potion that should kill the Hanahaki but Sirius only got a stomach ache from it. His coughing hasn’t increased despite what happened when he hallucinated but it’s still here. Regulus isn’t sure but he feels like more petals are coming up in his throat, building up for his series of coughs. It’s relieving and a bad omen since it means that the bond is working but the Hanahaki fights back.

Only one week left before they take the Hogwarts Express for the short, yet determinant, break. His parents answered to his insignificant letter, only meant for Kreacher to get his message, only to talk about what Regulus should do and some meaningful comments about his upcoming destiny. The war might be close but he doesn't care about it - not when Sirius is right here. Once his brother is healed then perhaps he will care about this blasted mess.

It’s probably because they are this close to this dangerous jump into the future that Regulus is too distracted to shield himself from a sudden explosion. He was just about to join Sirius for dinner in the Room of Requirement when he finds himself glued to a liquid that keeps bubbling from a knight’s armour that fell to pieces.

“Hah! Got you!”

Filch rounds the corner, finding Regulus' knees deep into the sticky mixture and trying to shake it off his hands, with James Putain de Potter.

“Oh, Reg’,” he says with the fakest worry ever, “I told you to be careful with these potions.”

Regulus is going to make him his glasses the moment he gets a chance– but first he cursed him as loudly as he can before he needed to justify that he wasn’t some part of this stupid prank.

“Then what is that?” Filch asks with a mean smile, taking out a small potion from where Regulus’ bag spilled when he fell. “This looks exactly like what Mister Potter had.” Potter winks at Regulus with an impish smile. Filch doesn’t hear him despite the many complaints. Regulus has no idea how he slipped that potion in his bag, he couldn’t have thrown it or one of them would have noticed, plus with the explosion it should have been triggered. His bag is the safest option but he would have noticed Potter slipping behind him.

He gets detention with Potter - because apparently Regulus doesn’t have enough on his plate. Because the break is nearing, the detention is barely the day after so Regulus has digested nothing which leaves him in a horrible mood. With Fitch on his ass, he was sent back to the Slytherin dormitory which meant that he didn’t even see Sirius. Not that he wants his brother to hear about this especially when his friends are teasing him enough about Potter.

It’s in Care of Magical Creatures that they need to do the detention and Regulus is late on purpose even if he really likes the class and Professor Kettleburn. His parents had complained that he picked this course but Regulus enjoys it too much to drop it off. It’s cold so he hopes that whatever they have to do will be quick because this only diminishes his patience to deal with Potter.

“Fancy seeing you here.”

“I will cut your tongue and feed it to a hippogriff.”

“Now what an inspiration!” Kettleburn exclaims as Regulus glares at Potter. “But this time we only need to rework the paddocks and prepare portions to feed all our magnificent friends. Mister Black, can you guide our new guest? I need to check on the unicorns.”

“Of course, Professor.”

He lists the creatures they need to check also on or will require immediate feeding before wandering off in the forest. Regulus decides to finish this list as fast as he can and then feed Potter to the hippogriffs; the head of the pack likes him, even got to pet him once, so he can indulge his favour.

“I didn’t know you liked this class,” Potter says with quick steps to follow him.

“Don’t talk to him.”

“It’s great, really,” he chirps with a small laugh. “You always surprise m-”

“Shut up,” Regulus barks, twisting on his feet to face him with a burning glare. “You bloody planned this, didn’t you? You better back off because I know a lot of creatures ready to eat you alive.”

Potter still follows him in the shed, diligently picking up what Regulus does before he walks out. “I told you that I needed to speak to you!” He points out. “You left me no choice.”

“I understand why Sirius is avoiding you now,” he huffs out, dropping the bag of cabbages for the flobberworm before throwing some in the group. “Don’t put that here! It’s for the streelers!” Potter does as he says, even if Regulus’ tone is as sharp as a whip, and somehow manages to keep his smile on. It goes like that for a moment but he has never been infamous for keeping his mouth shut.

“Look Regulus, I’m sorry that I pulled off but you really left me no choice,” Potter says, sounding almost sorry which is why Regulus dropped a large box on his foot. “Ouch! What was that for?!”

“Didn’t see you. It was in the way of the hay.”

Potter sighs but continues to follow him through all the tasks. “I tried to talk to you politely so you really left me no choice but force you in the same spot with me for a time, alright?”

“You could have left me alone instead of being your idiotic self.”

“I can’t figure out where you’re hiding with Sirius but he also doesn’t want to talk to me and I really need to.”

“Write him a letter. We need something for the fire-place.”

Regulus tries to elbow him when his arm is grabbed but Potter quickly traps him against the crups’ fence.

“Regulus, I’m trying to solve what happened with Sirius, alright?”

“Let me go.”

One of the crups is tugging on his pant’s leg. Potter stares at him, lips pursed, before straightening himself and taking a step closer. Regulus considers climbing over the fence because rolling in a sea of crups would be better than whatever is going on.

“You have no idea how happy I am that you and Sirius are talking again,” Potter says. “I wish I had been here to see that but– things were difficult. We never meant to kick him out of the dorm and we could have talked to him but… It was hard on Remus.”

“And I’m supposed to feel bad for you all?” Regulus sneers.

“No,” he replies before wetting his lips. “Well, maybe. What happened was really difficult to understand because I frankly still can’t believe it and I should have been here for Sirius too. That’s my bad.”

“Oh really? Almost made me think otherwise.”

Potter huffs out, almost laughing and his face doesn’t fully lose it as he observes Regulus. There is a smudge on his left glass that he probably could clean. If he starts considering what he can touch though there are many other options that are far more entertaining.

“I’m trying to solve what happened,” Potter whispers as his eyes drop to the ground. “We all got hurt and I didn’t try to reach out for Sirius. Which is what I’m trying to do now because we haven’t really listened to him… Marlene is going bonkers too because Sirius avoids her too. Even Remus is open to talk.”

He quickly closes his eyes and swallows these treacherous ideas. Potter is an enemy, no matter how he looks, the amount of warmth he exudes like a salamander. This is a dangerous trap. Regulus pushes him off as far as he can before shoving him so he lets go of his arm

“Like I said,” he articulates with a precarious voice. “Write a letter.”

Potter lets him storm off but shadows him quickly and even takes the bag of fresh meat from his hands. “I get it that you are on Sirius’ side Reggie-”

“Don’t call me that.”

“But everything went so fast. Remus needed time.”

“So what?!” He exclaims. “It’s not my problem what happened! And you’re right, I’m on Sirius’ side. At least I know better than to throw him away like some forgotten toy that you have no use for anymore!”

“That’s what I’m trying to solve!”

“Yes, well maybe Sirius isn’t open to that anymore,” he hisses and furiously picks up hay before stomping away.

“He can’t just stay out of the dorm!” Potter says and pursues him. “I know you haven’t slipped him in the Slytherin dorm even if with your frie-”

Regulus needs to clear his throat because his voice is muddled. “Because the problem is now me and my friends and not yours?!”

He startles, stepping back, with wide eyes behind his glasses. “Wait, that’s not what I meant-”

“Of course that’s what you meant! Sirius is choosing to be with me right now and you can’t swallow that because you think you’re better than us, the screw-ups!”

Potter almost steps back, shaking his head, with a weak retort. “That’s not-”

“That’s exactly what you think,” Regulus spits out despite the rash climbing up his throat. “You are all better in your red and gold better than us little snakes, right? This must kill you to see that Sirius is staying with us. In fact he chooses to be with me! Have you ever thought that he just doesn’t want to talk to you again? Of course not, what matters is what everyone else thinks! Lupin is hurt? Well Sirius too but apparently that’s not important.”

“I never thought that! This was hard for everyone,” Potter argues. “I even tried to tell Sirius to talk to you before! I know you’re not like Snivellus-”

Regulus coughs. He forgets about it for a moment too busy wrestling with his thoughts and emotions, picturing how far he can throw James Potter in the lake, and how his brother is dying while all they care about is some stupid secret. Except that Potter notices his cough, eyes trailing after the petals trickling down his lips, and gasps with a shock that only stains his handsome face.

“Petals?”

Regulus quickly steps back, hand flying to his mouth, but Potter follows him like a mad man. His words are swallowed by more coughs. He shakes his head and stumbles on his own feet before focusing on getting away.

“Are you coughing flowers?” Potter croaks out, voice louder at each syllable. “Wait, isn’t that– that’s the Hanahaki!”

Potter still calls him when Regulus is rushing to the castle, coughing petals. He sprints through the corridors with his heart trying to burst out of his chest - it doesn’t help the petals that he tries to swallow. His first proper breath is only when he manages to close the door of his dorm behind him.

“Reg’! Are you alright?” Emmeline asks, standing up from her game of chess with Barty.

Evan looks up from Barty’s laps, frowning and sitting up. “Didn’t you have detention?”

“A date with Potter,” Barty jokes, moving a chess piece.

“He knows.”

“Who? What?” Emmeline frowns. “Please breathe before you faint.”

“Potter!” Regulus hisses, throwing his bag down. “I coughed!”

She gasps. “He saw?”

“Yes! He even knew that it was the Hanahaki!”

“Did you try to tell him it’s not?” Evan asks. “You could have gotten that from something else.”

Regulus freezes before groaning, falling against the door. “I–”

“You ran away?” Barty supposes. “Well that’s compromising.”

“Maybe we can come up with something,” Emmeline retorts. “The after-effect of a potion or-”

“Potter is smarter than he looks,” Regulus hisses. “I should have knocked him out or obliviated him… I could still do that.”

“Is that so bad if he knows?” Barty asks. “It’s not like he knows that you are actually bonded with Sirius who has it.”

His focus has been bitingly settled on James Potter and his infuriating face which is why he completely missed out on his throat twisting around a mouthful before he starts coughing. Regulus doesn’t consider that he has the Hanahaki– Sirius does and Regulus tries to find the cure.

“Merde,” he curses and furiously shakes his bangs with his hands before glaring at the discreet golden ring. “I didn’t think of that. He doesn’t know about the bonding.”

“You don’t think of much around Potter, actually become stupid once we mention him.”

“Like you’re any better Bartemius!” Regulus snaps.

“I am,” he proudly replies, “did you see who is on my lap?”

“Alright,” Evan cuts and lets Barty kiss his cheek. “So Potter might think you have the Hanahaki. What were you talking about?”

“He was pestering me about Sirius. Even dared to complain that Sirius is with us now.”

“Hah! He is going to think you are in love with Sirius!”

Emmeline slaps Barty’s head. “Not funny,” she chastens.

“Wait, Potter is still trying to talk to Sirius?” Evan asks.

“He is trying to make me feel sorry for them.”

“Well, I’m not picking his side but it might be a good thing for Sirius.”

“What?” Emmeline says with a frown. “Are you saying Sirius should go back to his friends?”

“No.”

Evan raises his hand but it doesn’t help Regulus’ scathing mood. “Look, perhaps his friends have decided to forgive him or whatever. But Sirius’ Hanahaki could be slowed down if he and Lupin talk again.”

“It won’t happen,” Regulus argues, crossing his arms. “Lupin rejected Sirius one way or another and I’m confident that it’s closely related to this ugly bastard in the first place.”

“I’m not saying that it will solve the Hanahaki,” Evan says and stands up. “We all looked through enough to know that the curse won’t disappear like that. Some people actually died even when the feelings were requited.”

“Really?” Barty frowns. “Is it stupid?”

“It’s hard to satisfy. If you don’t believe that they really love you back then in a way you’re also telling that to the flowers,” he explains.

“That’s why they can’t know that Sirius has the Hanahaki,” Regulus reminds. “Lupin will probably try to be all sorry for himself and try to save Sirius but there is no way that it will work. Potter might piece it together if he knows that Sirius has the Hanahaki.”

“It’s too risky,” Emmeline agrees, eyes jumping to the ground before she grimaces and looks up. “Actually,” she whispers with a sorry smile, “I think Lupin and Sirius already talked.”

“What?!” He hisses. “How did I not know that?”

“Because I’m not sure.”

“If he rejected Sirius another time he would probably be dead,” Barty points out.

She shakes her head. “I didn’t come to watch the Quidditch game, remember? And I crossed the path of Lupin with Pettigrew, looking like they were heading there,” she explains. “But they seemed to be arguing, though I’m not sure about what but Lupin seemed mad.”

Regulus squints at her and needs to focus to relax his jaw before he breaks a tooth. “And?”

Emmeline twitches with guilt and joins her hands nervously. “Well I thought I might check on Sirius, considering that he would probably not want to watch the game with everything going on… I found him choking in a corridor.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?!”

“Reg’ calm down,” Evan quickly says and steps in. “Sirius was fine after, right?”

Emmeline quickly nods. “Yes! It wasn’t– it wasn’t as bad like at the pub, I promise Regulus… I cleared his lungs so he could breathe again but he was dead tired so I brought him to his room.”

“Why didn’t he tell me?” He hisses. “Why didn’t you!”

“Because I didn’t want to stress you more!” She exclaims. “Maybe Sirius would tell you, I didn’t know.”

Barty clears his throat. “The point is that it could have only been triggered by Lupin, right?”

Regulus clenches his fists and looks at her. “Did he talk to Sirius?”

“I’m not sure. But they could have easily crossed paths,” she admits. “Sirius probably won’t tell.”

“Well, that clears this up,” Barty says, lounging in the bed with crossed legs. “Sirius’ friends knowing about the Hanahaki will make Lupin try to save him, if he doesn’t want him dead.”

“Even if Lupin loves him back… If he confesses to save Sirius then his feelings won’t be seen as honest for the Hanahaki, we have proof of that over history.”

Evan sighs. “Right. I didn’t consider that.”

“That’s exactly why I’m not going to help Potter talk to Sirius,” Regulus says. “Lupin rejected him once already and I’m not risking my brother’s life just for the chance that they might make up. Even if they did, if Lupin doesn’t love Sirius back and tells him then he will still die.”

“Regulus… I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” Emmeline says.

He tries to not glare at her, forcing himself to look down. “Don’t do it again. Please,” he clips before taking a deep breath. “Well, now I have to deal with noisy Potter. Better that he thinks I have the Hanahaki.”

“Tell him it’s me.”

“What?” Evan spins to Barty and his wide grin. “What are you saying?”

“In case Potter pesters you about it and come on, it’s obvious he will, if you need to be in an unrequited love with someone let it be me.”

Regulus deadpans at him. “Why on Earth would I fall in love with you?”

“Hey! Who cares about that detail?”

“Fiore mio,” he purrs and Regulus gags out. “Picture Potter trying to help Reggie, especially because you’re Sirius’ brother, he will try to figure out a solution. If he comes mad at me then I will have a free shot at punching him.”

Regulus sighs out, stomping into the bathroom because he needs a change of clothes, and Emmeline pinches the bridge of her nose.

“Of course that’s why you want to do that.” She sighs. “We aren’t sure that Potter will try anything, if we are lucky he might not jump to the conclusion that Regulus actually has the Hanahaki.”

“Wait, wait, wait a second,” Evan blurts out. “I actually want to see Barty punch Potter.”

“You’re no help!”

“None of you are helping,” Regulus snaps. “And Potter can go to hell! He isn’t going near me any time soon.”

“Except in your dreams,” Barty sings out but he is cut by a slap.

“Sirius doesn’t need him, none of them. He can try to pester me again but this time I will make him mute for the rest of his life.” Regulus growls before taking a deep breath, walking out of the bathroom once he finished putting on clothes for the evening. “I’m going to see Sirius now. We have plans.”

“Wait, Re-”

He walks out of the dorm without listening to Emmeline. It’s his second mistake. First, he froze at the Kelpie’s Dance instead of helping Sirius and now he obviously indulged in speaking to Potter which is why his brain completely left him helpless out there. The advantage of him and Sirius not talking was that at least Regulus was free of any Potter’s presence and shenanigans.

If only his stupid heart could be smarter than this. First year he was too young to understand that liking James Potter and his sunny laugh, charming eyes that can’t see beyond his nose and charisma like some kind of stupid golden god. Eleven year old Regulus was a fool and he wouldn’t want to slap him but apparently his younger self just had to be enamoured enough that he can’t be moved on. Regulus would throw himself down some stairs to put some sense into his treacherous heart but now he needs to cure Sirius’ stupid weeping heart.

Sirius still doesn’t tell him the full story. Regulus lets it go only because it’s a full moon, which means that they need to prepare the animagus potion and they have to do it tonight. His brother assuredly leads them out of the castle, showing him even more secret passage and promising at least a hundred more, as they head out for the Forbidden Forest for the potion preparation. They are lucky that there are no clouds, otherwise they would need to wait another month, but somehow Sirius doesn’t bear looking at the full-moon.

Regulus can see that he seems sad, quite anxious, as he leads them almost at the opposite of the more visited parts of the Forbidden Forest. He even jumps when he hears a distant howl and Regulus would have joked if he is scared of werewolves, as if there would be one around Hogwarts, if it wasn’t for his pale face. Sirius insists that he is fine, only cold and itching to get back to bed, so they hurry.

His brother places the phial under a perfect moon ray once they find a dew untouched by human or sunlight that they fill in a silver teaspoon. Regulus spits the mandrake leaf into the phial, grimacing at the after taste and finally freed from the rough texture against his inside cheek, before putting one strand of hair and the chrysalis of a Death’s-head Hawk Moth.

“Are you sure that your bag won’t move it?”

“Sirius, I know my bag,” he replies. “It’s perfect and completely stable, it’s made to keep potions.”

The phial is immediately sealed and slipped in his potion pouch, charmed to keep the potions safe and sound without any feeling of the outside - be it movement, light and temperature. The perfect tool to prepare potions as needy as this one.

“Alright, let’s hurry up to the castle.”

“Do you have something else to do?” Regulus asks with a frown as his brother hurries off. “Sirius!”

“Sh!” He hisses and turns around. “Whisper.”

“Then reply to me,” he huffs out, joining his steps thanks to Sirius slowing down before speeding up.

“I just want to get back to the castle because it’s freezing.”

With Sirius’ jumpy behaviour and his lack of enthusiasm, it’s probably a lie. Regulus fears that he forced him to be at his side; after all, he could easily prepare the animagus potion by himself. To be honest, he probably would have never been interested in becoming an Animagus before that. Not that it’s a useless skill, if anything it’s quite brilliant and could be useful, but it never crossed Regulus’ mind. Sirius showing him Padfoot, proudly and quite playfully, made him realise that it’s worth the try. This would give them a connection, even if he is convinced that the Marauders are all animagi, but Sirius helping him is special and whether or not they find a cure then Regulus will hold on that memory alone.

“Sirius, talk to me,” he says, trying to keep the pleading out of his voice, as he takes a hold of Sirius’ arm to force him to slow down and look at him. “Are you scared of something?”

A long faraway howl echoes through the night. It seems sad, lonely even, which is why it shouldn’t make Sirius startled and aghast. He looks around like he might spot the wolf, before fiercely dragging Regulus behind him.

“Yes. I am.”

He tries to follow his speed but he is still confused. “Why? You are the one who told me that you know the Forbidden Forest! You convinced me!”

“I’m not scared of that!”

“Sirius-”

“I just want to sleep, alright?!” He snaps but his voice isn’t there, only quiet and whiny. “Just… Let’s go back. Hopefully we will still be lucky and storms will come soon so you can finish the whole process.”

He doesn’t push it. Sirius stays wordless up until they are in the Room of Requirement before finally babbling out about the rest of the process, mentioning that it’s a pain to wake up at dawn to cast the spell and that he almost missed it a few times. Regulus can see that he is nervous or stressed so he lets him do it, answering at the right times and following with questions to help distract him.

The Hogwarts Express pulls up at the train station on a rainy day. It’s not a storm and Regulus is a bit disappointed. He has no inkling about his animagus form whereas Sirius showed off that he dreamt of a dog on the first night. Regulus is convinced that the dog attacked or at least pursued him in his dream. He feels weary but tries to keep himself upright.

The only flaw in his secret message with Kreacher is that the elf doesn’t have a way to write back. He manages to read the code even if the letter is in his parents’ hands but their replies are always sealed by them; Kreacher has never opened them probably because it would be noticed. Once they reach the 9¾ platform, they will go to the bathroom and hopefully Kreacher will wait for them there with some of their affairs. If he isn’t there then they will simply apparate with Alphard’s pocket watch, which will be triggered at 3:05pm. Their uncle probably left this small window so they can say goodbyes to their friends.

There is only Dorcas and Emmeline with them. It’s a short break which makes it quite peaceful. Most people wouldn’t bother to make the trip back but when you have controlling parents like Emmeline, or doting ones if you’re lucky like Dorcas, then you will take the train. Apparently Potter and Lupin fall in that category. The latter looks dreadful even behind his blank face, eyes quietly shifting toward Regulus, his brother and friends, and the book open in his hands appears useless considering he hasn’t flipped one single page ever since they arrived there.

Potter has a lack of manner compared to him. He has been painfully obvious in his stalking. As if staring and moving his face around is a way of communication. Regulus thankfully has his friends around him so Potter stayed back but he often caught him watching. It’s annoying, especially since he appears worried, but he sticks to his initial plan to keep him away as much as possible. From him and Sirius likewise.

His brother isn’t as impassible as he wants to be about them so he keeps his eyes on Dorcas or Emmeline, chatting about the simplest thing. Regulus is up to the task to glare at Potter with the hope that it will push him under the rail of the train. McKinnon joins them a bit late, rushing through the rain with a few curses and pushing herself under their shared umbrella. When she spots Sirius, she seems ready to go see them - slightly furious - and Potter looks like he will follow but the Hogwarts Express arrives right on time.

On the ride back, they picked a compartment for themselves. Regulus closes the door magically just in case a parasite, like James Potter, tries to burst in. He wouldn’t put it past them and he only remembers now that Sirius was supposed to run away with James at first - whether that’s why he tries to talk to his brother or not.

Regulus is woken up by Emmeline, who smiles at him, whilst Dorcas tries to hold back her laugh.

“We’re here,” she says with a quiet voice. “Better leave the train as soon as you can, right?”

“Right,” he croaks out, voice hoarse, as he sits up and startles when Sirius falls on his laps, snoring.

“He drooled on you,” Dorcas snickers and points on his shoulder. “But we didn’t want to separate you two.”

“Urgh.”

Regulus slaps his cheek until Sirius tries to fight back. “Get up you lazy arse, we’re there. And I will drop you here.”

“Tu es chiant,” he groans, sitting up before grunting when Regulus throws his luggage in his laps. “Hey!”

“I said hurry!”

“Fine! You better run before I kick your arse!” Sirius barks.

“Wait!” Emmeline shouts.

Dorcas freezes and lets go of the door handle. “What?” She asks, turning to look at her. “What is it?”

“Your mother,” she blurts out. “She’s here!”

“What?” Sirius hurries to the window but Dorcas stops him.

“She might see you through the window!”

Regulus swallows. “Are… Are you sure?”

“Yes. I’m sure,” Emmeline confirms with a voice clean of emotions. “She is alone.”

“Bloody hell, what is she doing here?!” Sirius exclaims.

“Calm down,” Dorcas says. “You can outrun her, I will distract her or something?”

“Why is she here?” Regulus repeats. “I didn’t tell them anything. How could she know–”

“Dorcas is right, you ought to run before she notices you. At what time is the portkey?”

Sirius flips out the pocket watch from his pocket, opening it. “At 3:05. It started ticking now that it’s 3.”

“Alright, let’s just walk as far as we can. You get through the barrier and rush to the toilets at King’s Cross,” she says with confidence. “She might not spot you in the crowd.”

Regulus gasps when he feels himself shaken. Sirius is at his side, hand around his arm, with a concerned frown. Something must be written on his face because he purses his lips with a tortured smile.

“Reggie, if you don’t want-”

“What? I’m going,” he snaps, grabbing his luggage, “we’re going.”

“Re-”

“We need to go. I’m sure Kreacher is going to be here,” he quickly says and yanks the door open.

James Potter blinks down at him, face twitching with a tensed smile. “Oh-”

Sirius coughs harshly behind Regulus who immediately straightens up when he spots Lupin at Potter’s side, probably looking at Sirius. It’s oblivious they were waiting for them

“Back off!” Dorcas snaps and pushes them to shove right into Potter.

He falls into Lupin who tries to not fall but still hits the person behind them. The corridor is already full of students trying to go out, not as many as usual, but it’s enough for it to be crowded and for Dorcas to spread chaos through it as she keeps pushing them back.

“Go,” Emmeline insists and pushes them out of the compartment.

Potter tries to fight back, though with less conviction compared to her aura, and even calls for Sirius and Regulus between his attempts at pleading Dorcas to let him pass. Regulus drags Sirius by his hand, rushing through the corridor and pushing people away as he tries to calculate which exit out of the train is the best for them; the closest to the barrier to leave the 9 3⁄4 platform and escape their mother.

A lot of people curse at them when they push through but he gives them no attention. They have changed three wagons already and he thinks the next exit is the right one for them. Sirius is behind him but Emmeline might have stayed with Dorcas to stop at least these two parasites.

“Hey!” A student squeals when Regulus barrels out of the train with Sirius. “Careful!”

He catches his breath once they are mingling in a small crowd of students and parents. “Do you have everything?”

Sirius nods and opens the pocket watch before slipping back inside. “We got four minutes.”

“The toilets are not far once we get through the barrier.”

“Are you sure Kreacher will be here?”

“Hopefu-”

“Regulus Arcturus Black!!”

His heart plummets. A brisk cold smothers his whole body and he feels like he is falling but he is held.

“Putain de merde,” Sirius swears and pulls him back.

Walburga Black strides furiously through the crowd with her eyes hateful and burning like a vicious Crucio.

“And you,” she growls, louder than the brouhaha and shrieker than any happy squeals. “Sirius Orion Black!”

“Run,” his brother says and tugs him. “Reggie, run!”

Sirius yanks him and almost makes him fall but Regulus manages to find his footing as they run toward the barrier. Their mother screams at them and her heels clink stronger than before, perhaps even crushing the stone, but his brother doesn’t let go of his hand as he speeds up.

“Padfoot!”

Regulus looks behind to see James Potter rushing to them too with a quick panicked look at their mother. Sirius only pulls on his hand harder.

“Come back here immediately!” Walburga screams.

They are close to the barrier, only needing one last desperate dash to reach it. The guard just deemed the passage safe to traverse for the next student to go through without getting Muggle’s attention.

“Oh Merlin!”

A rough crash cuts through the air, distracting everyone from their initial focus. Sirius slows down just a tad to look behind his shoulder. He completely stops with a wide ecstatic smile. Regulus turns to look and freezes too.

Their mother is lying on the floor next to a toppled cart with two big luggages. She is still alive but clearly in pain, it’s not enough to distract her as she immediately tries to sit up with a deadly hiss and glare at Emmeline.

“Salazar,” Regulus gasps out.

“My apologies!” Emmeline shouts with a panicked voice, hands in front of her mouth, as her parents run to her spitting alarmed apologies. “I’m so sorry Madam! I didn’t see you!”

Sirius blurts out her laughing and tugs Regulus before he can follow. The guard is still in surprise but he notices their duo rushing toward them. He doesn’t manage to stop them even shouting at them but Sirius jumps straight into the barrier with Regulus still in his hand.

They don’t stop even if the landing is a bit clumsy. The toilets are not a completely safe destination considering the Muggles around but they still burst in it, out of breath. Regulus glances around, throat dry and clumped with all the events. The door closes behind them and Kreacher appears with two big luggage.

“Master Regulus. Master Sirius.”

“Kreacher! Thank Salazar,” Regulus says and crouches with a trembling smile. “Thank you so much-”

“Kreacher got Master’s message,” he articulates with a vicious glance at Sirius before looking at Regulus. “Kreacher gathered all Masters’ affairs in secret but Kreacher doesn’t understand where Masters are going.”

“Oh Kreacher-”

“2 minutes Reggie,” Sirius whispers.

“Kreacher I’m sorry, we need to go and I won’t be able to write to you again.”

Kreacher slowly blinks, looking down at the luggages. “Kreacher doesn’t understand.”

Regulus can’t help but hug him. The house-elf has always been his first and most precious friend. It’s probably why Sirius never handled living at Grimmauld Place - he had no allies whilst Regulus at least had Kreacher.

“I will miss you and I will try to see you again, alright?” He says, taking a good look at the confused face of the elf. “It’s not safe for me and Sirius to go back there-”

“Did you tell our mother that we were here?” Sirius asks, tone sharp. “Answer Kreacher.”

“Sirius!”

“Master Sirius is mistaken. Kreacher left Grimmauld Place without telling anything or even to Mistress Walburga.”

“Kreacher would have not told her,” Regulus hisses.

Sirius rolls his eyes, taking out the pocket watch, and turns his back to them. Regulus can discern the ticking and quickly takes out from his coat’s pocket a worn-out white tissue with messy embroideries and stubborn but clean stains.

“Master Regulus?”

“A gift for you Kreacher,” he whispers and forces it into one of his hands.

Kreacher looks at it, panicked, and tries to pull away. “This is Master Regulus’ old handkerchief!”

“Yes and now this makes you free.” Regulus nods. “Do you understand? Kreacher I’m freeing you.”

“Kreacher wants to stay at Grimmauld Place! Kreacher loves serving the Noble and Ancient B-”

“Kreacher,” he raises his voice. “Listen to me! In case you want to go somewhere else, you can from now on.”

He can see that the elf has trouble understanding what is happening. It’s a lot since he already got to sneak behind his real masters for Regulus and now Kreacher must realise that he might never come back to his home. He doubts that he will but if he safely can then he will make the trip to at least check on him. The handkerchief is the first one Regulus ever got and it’s with it that he tried his first attempts at calligraphy and embroidery with Kreacher’s help, now it’s his lucky item that he kept on him at all times.

Kreacher stares at him without any emotion and the handkerchief in his loose hand.

“Where is Master Regulus going?”

“Less than a minute,” Sirius says and grabs the big luggage, with his initials on the handle, beside Kreacher.

“I can’t tell you,” Regulus sighs out. “But I will try to reach out to you, I promise. Kreacher please understand.”

“Kreacher doesn’t understand why Master Regulus doesn’t want to come back to Grimmauld Place.”

“Because it’s not safe for us, not anymore.”

“Reggie.”

“Fine!” He snaps and takes his own heavy luggage, jungling with his second one from school. “Kreacher, stay safe please.”

“Is Master Regulus saying goodbye?” Kreacher whispers with his eyes reddening by the minute.

Sirius softly grabs Regulus’ hand, pocket watch in his other hand ticking like a clock, and he squeezes it back. He sighs out and tries to fight the uncomfortable feeling crawling through his eyes but this really feels like he is throwing away too many good memories at once.

“I will see you if I can Kreacher, I promise,” he articulates, “but for now it's goodbye.”

“Mas-”

Regulus falls ass first. Sirius almost loses balance because of that but manages to sidestep him as he bursts out laughing. The nausea isn’t strong but still affects him more than Regulus expected, his brother’s mirth is still the one bothering him the most.

“You better not be laughing at Krea-”

“Em’ hit Walburga with a cart!” Sirius wheezes. “A cart!”

Regulus guffaws with him before even realising it. He recalls the shout of their mother and the sound of the cart falling to the ground but the way she laid on the platform is even more absurd because Walburga Black does not fall.

“You alright there?”

He coughs in surprise, trying to calm himself down with a last hiccup of mirth, whilst Sirius keeps snorting with lips pursed. It takes him a second to recognize the man looming over them, albeit their striking aura is only because of their height - Alphard still has the same kind playful smile with soft eyes.

“Uncle Alphard?” Sirius gasps out, cheeks flushed from their recent hilarity.

“Good afternoon Sirius.” Alphard grins and offers his hand to Regulus. “Rough landing Reggie?”

He clears his throat and grabs it. “Just a bit surprised.” His uncle has more strength than he thought, almost jumping mid-air from that pull.

“Thank you for the portkey,” Sirius says and offers it to him. “Here is your pocket watch. It’s still the same one.”

“Well, I’m sentimental,” Alphard grins and glances at it. “And sorry for that rush,” he says and rubs a hand between Regulus’ shoulder-blades which surprises him. “This is all a bit expeditive but I didn’t want your parents to track you down.”

“Well, though luck. Walburga was at the train station,” Sirius drawls out.

Alphard shakes his head in surprise before playing with one of his long, ridiculous Regulus wants to say, moustache. “I was afraid they might have contacts in the ministry… Even if we pass through the French Ministry of Magic the British Ministry had to be notified,” he sighs. “This is probably how she sniffed you out. Sacrebleu, we are going to be late if we don’t go drop to the Ministry now.”

“The Ministry?” Regulus frowns. “Why?”

“The Trace will still be active on you, Regulus,” Alphard explains. “Sirius’ birthday is coming soon but they could have followed it to find you anywhere you go. That’s why I had to declare you under my care but the Ministry still needs your inputs… Are you alright though? She didn’t do anything?”

“No, no,” Sirius chuckles. “Emmeline hit her with a cart when she was screeching at us.”

“A cart?!” Their uncle bursts out laughing, a deep one with a melodious rhythm, and his tall frame folds slightly as he puts his free hand on his Sirius’ shoulder. “Morgana, I would have loved to see that!” Sirius smiles at him and looks at Regulus, looking fonder. He is surprised when Alphard brings them both in his arms to hug them. “Oh, how I have missed you two. Mes petites terreurs.”

Regulus is a bit stiff, surprised by it, but he relaxes himself in his grasp with Sirius softly knocking their heads together. The affection is welcomed but still a wonder as it’s been years since they have even seen each other. He figured that Alphard would prefer Sirius, during the family dinners he has always been closer to him; although Regulus was never talkative either and tried to stick to Kreacher’s side.

Alphard doesn’t appear to have changed much although he has more wrinkles than before. His hair is as black as theirs and his silver eyes, a well-known trait only belonging to the Black’s lineage, and he is quite touchy. He is still chuckling about their mother and her experience with a cart at the Ministry where Sirius and him are interrogated over this decision of changing custody and also checking if they aren’t bewitched to follow their uncle. They don’t give them any troubles so they are quickly off and their uncle apparates them in the middle of nowhere beside a muggle device.

Their uncle takes the luggages to put them in a space in the back of the car. Sirius appears familiar with cars, immediately climbing in one of the back seats with a sign at Regulus to follow, whilst he has only heard about them from Dorcas.

“Put the belt on,” Alphard says and smiles encouragingly at Regulus. “Don’t worry, these are safe. I’ve been using them for years.”

“You really are living as a Muggle?” He asks and tries to not obviously startle when the car starts to shake and leaves the side of the bumpy road to take it.

“Partly yes. I have a floo but I have sealed it for now, until we’re sure your parents can’t storm through. The Ministry should update us tomorrow.”

“I don’t think the Potters would have done that,” Sirius points out with a frown at him. “I wouldn’t have even thought of it…”

“Well, if you had left and I stayed behind, they probably wouldn’t have cared,” Regulus argues. “They need one heir. Which means they would have probably left you with”

“You weren’t going to run away together?” Alphard asks with a curious look at him through the mirror in the middle of the car front.

“I would have offered,” Sirius argues.

Regulus huffs and crosses his arms. Alphard glances at Sirius before focusing back on the road. They continue in silence for a little moment with the landscape unfolding to more up and downs, forests and mountains.

“Well, it’s also easier for me as Black. I might be exiled from the family but paper-wise I’m still one and that made the process easier. I also pulled some strings to ensure your safety with the Ministry.”

“Like what?” Sirius frowns and leans in the middle. “Do you think they will really try to drag us back? Or Regulus at least?”

“This is going to make news,” he points out. “The two heirs of the Black family running away? This will shake some things up. If something happens to me you two will inherit everything I have so you won’t have to return there.”

“Oh… That’s,” Regulus trails off with a puzzled look at Sirius who seems as surprised. “That’s a lot Uncle Alphard but-”

“None of that Pureblood manners, call me uncle or Alphard,” he cuts. “And truly I have enough for the both of you. I’m glad you contacted me when I left the family, I had to figure things out on my own and I wouldn’t want to wish that on you two.”

Sirius purses his lips and leans back against the backseats. Regulus is as speechless as him at all the preparation. He hasn’t even thought of the details with the Ministry, the only thing that mattered was to get out of there for Sirius. If anything, Regulus could have stayed behind and closed himself off as he always did. This, right now, is completely out of his comforting habits.

“Thank you,” Regulus articulates with a wobbly smile because there are many emotions to divide and bury, “tonton?”

Alphard looks excitedly at him with the mirror. “Your French is still perfect!”

“Yes well, when it’s beaten into you,” Sirius growls with his chin in his palm.

Their uncle hums and they finally spot a village in the landscape.

“Where are we?”

“East, near the border to Germany, if you want to be exact,” he says. “It has the most beautiful landscapes. Most are muggles, which is also a nice change, so you will have to be a bit careful when you go out. It’s not that isolated and one of the neighbours is going to show you all the nice spots for your age.”

It looks rather nice. It’s not like Regulus is fond of big cities or anything. “Why not apparate us home? Do you use no magic?”

“I do,” Alphard replies. “But like the floo, I have also blocked the house to be found by apparating and harmful letters. It’s safer.”

Regulus nods but he is relieved that they might at least get some letters. He will need to write a letter to Emmeline and Dorcas to thank them for their help. Alphard has been banned from the family, loudly, which means no one tried to contact to him and he doesn’t sound like he tried to do so either way; though now there is risks that their parents might try to retrieve them and that Alphard thought of written them in his will isn’t a good omen. Hopefully the Ministries will manage to do something but the Black are the more, if not the most, important Purebloods family so who knows how that will go.

“I have to ask but is there a reason why— you suddenly needed to run away?” Alphard asks with a cautious look. “You don’t have to say but I hope you know that I wouldn’t kick any of you out. No matter the reason.”

Regulus glances at Sirius, who squirms with an uncomfortable purse of his lips.

“Because Sirius’ personality is ‘how much bent can I be before it becomes a crime’.”

His brother whirls with wide eyes and flushing cheeks before swatting him. Regulus returns the favour and they soon are tugging at each other’s hairs while trying to stomp on their feet.

“Hey! Hey!” Alphard calls just as the car jumps on a cobbled road. “No fighting in the car! Let go of each other’s hairs. Both of you.”

“He started it!” Sirius shouts.

Regulus tugs even harder at his hair and hisses in pain when his foot is stepped on.

“You two, stop this now. You might break something and I don’t want to cause an accident.”

“Fine,” Regulus growls out and shoves Sirius who reiterates in the same way. “Crétin.”

“Abruti.”

Alphard laughs and shakes his head with a big smile. Some people are in the small animated street, it’s more a town than a city, and they appear to recognize Alphard or his car as people greet him on their road who returns the waves and nods. Sirius anxiously squirms in his seat, looking outside before glancing at the back of Alphard’s head.

“Is it— a problem?”

Alphard frowns. “Well, yes. I know how to drive this muggle transport but I’m not sure I could repair it or have the right reflexes if you br-”

“No I meant about the bent thing.”

“Oh,” he chuckles and shakes his head. “Of course not. Though being with the same gender or not doesn’t mean there is no risk of, er, getting a disease or pregn-”

“Please let’s just change the subject,” Regulus groans out and Sirius shoots him an incredulous look.

“You bloody brought that up,” he accuses.

“Yes, well have you seen yourself?” He scoffs back.

“No fighting!” Alphard warns before they restart.

His house, half-timbering, is at the end of the village it seems. It’s not as big as Grimmauld Place but comfortable looking with two floors painted in a radiant green except for the wood. There is a large door on the left part of it, looking like an extension of the house.

“There is a garden and a small field in the back,” he says once they walked out of the car. “Let’s bring all your luggages inside then I will show you everything.”

Sirius takes his luggage and Alphard is about to grab the two biggest ones just when the neighbour’s house opens and a woman steps out.

“Alphard ! Barnabé est encore dans mon jardin !”

“Encore?!”

“Oui !”

Their uncle sighs.

“Who is Barnabé?” Regulus asks as the woman appears to notice them, eyeing them with an avid curiosity and she quickly signs at someone inside her house.

“One of my geese.”

“Why do you have geese?” Sirius articulates as he tries to hold back his laugh. “And why is it in her garden?”

“Because Barnadé hates being alone,” he sighs out and hands Regulus keys. “Go inside, I will go catch him then I will bring these two inside, they are too heavy for you two. J’arrive Hélène !”

Hélène waves at them and stumbles on a shy ‘hello’ before she appears to be too embarrassed, quickly whispering to Alphard when he reaches her.

“What is the use of a goose?”

Sirius shrugs and turns toward the house. “Give me the keys.”

Regulus throws it at him and stares at his brother walking to the door. He focuses back on the luggage with a tired quiet sigh, almost this close to just going to bed even if it's barely the start of the evening. The luggage that Kreacher prepared for him is really heavy. He manages to put it down without crushing one of his feet, glancing at the boy who is walking up to him.

“Hum, do you want help?”

The English is understandable despite the nonexistent accent but Regulus admires the attempt. The door from the neighbour is still open so he probably came from there. They seem to be the same age although the boy is tall, not dreadfully, but enough to show that he hasn’t fully grown into his limbs. The blond smiles nervously at him with a look at the car and the last luggages, starting to furiously blush. Regulus starts to find it funny so he stays quiet, openly staring at him.

“Erm, nice the meet you,” he squeaks out, balancing his arms with a slight panicked laugh. “To meet you? I’m Nathan.”

Alphard didn’t tell his neighbour that Sirius and him speak in French then, it shouldn’t make him that amused but Nathan appears to really try hard as he points at the luggage.

“Help?”

“Reggie! Move your arse because I’m not going to carry your stuff, lazy twat.”

“Alphard said he is going to take it,” he argues when Sirius runs back to his side with a menacing squint until he notices their guest.

“Oh, hello.”

Nathan’s eyes widen on Sirius, blushing harder like he is going to explode. “Bonjour ! Hum– Hello!!”

Regulus snorts at his volume and French accent and quickly turns to his brother who looks curiously at Nathan. Sirius glances with an accusing look.

“Are you torturing him?”

“How would I do that?”

“You didn’t tell him that we speak French!”

“Do we?”

Sirius elbows him with an exasperated hiss before offering his hand with a smile to Nathan, whose eyes widen like saucers. “Hi, sorry we actually speak French but my little brother here is an arse. I’m Sirius.”

“Oh, oh, it’s fine,” he gasps out and shakes his hand, completely ignoring Regulus now that his eyes landed on Sirius, “I’m Nathan.”

“This little prick if you haven’t noticed is Regulus.”

Nathan laughs far too loudly at his joke and Regulus has the thought to just glare for that. Of course their neighbour’s possible son is already under Sirius’ charm. In fact, he hasn’t let go of his hand and Sirius tilts his head at it with a grin.

“I see what you meant by ‘bent’,” Alphard whispers in Regulus’ ear who can’t help but let out a genuine laugh at that.

His uncle grins at him proudly before the goose in his arm honks and startles all of them. Nathan shakes himself off, letting go of Sirius’ hand like it burnt.

“Oh they look so much like you Alphard,” Hélène exclaims with a happy gasp. “They could be your sons. Hum, how do you say ‘welcome’?”

“Thank you, that’s nice of you,” Regulus answers in French, only to mess with Nathan, and she seems thrilled that he does.

“They learnt it since they were children,” Alphard comments. “Reggie, take Barnabé and don’t let go of him while I bring the rest inside. One of his eyes is blind so be careful he doesn’t always know where he goes. Also he is heavier than he looks.”

“What?!”

The goose is pushed into his arm just as Sirius laughs. Barnabé stays still but looms over Regulus with clumsy movements.

“Sirius, take the cake from Hélène please.”

“It’s to welcome you here!” She smiles and hands him a plate with a tall cake. “It’s a Kugelhupf, one of our famous desserts here!”

“Oh, thank you.”

“Alphard you all need to eat dinner at our house once, I would love to cook all for you,” she excitedly offers before smiling at Nathan. “And you seem to be the same age so you might show them where to have fun here!”

Nathan laughs nervously and barely looks at Sirius before glancing at the ground.

Barnabé starts honking in his arms and Regulus grimaces at it, unsure on how to hold it since it’s trying to jump, and they quickly say their goodbyes to their neighbours. Alphard tells him to put the goose outside, by the kitchen’s door.

“But be careful of the chickens!!”

Regulus hesitates at his fussy tone but manages to step outside. There are a myriad of chickens walking around in the garden, clucking and picking at the grass, and they don’t appear mean or threatening. He quickly puts down Barnabé who starts flapping his wings and he jumps back when the goose seems ready to rush at him but he only tries to climb on his shoes.

“Are you scared Reggie?” Sirius guffaws from the kitchen’s window.

“I would like to see you here,” he seethes.

Alphard appears beside Sirius and nods gravely. “Barnabé has some abandonment issues, that’s why he tries to go to Hélène’s garden when I leave. Just push him and come back inside before the chickens attack you Reggie.”

“The chickens?”

“Dreadful creatures. I would rather have dragons,” he mutters and walks away leaving Sirius and Regulus baffled.

“Alright, he is mad too.”

Their uncle prepared them each a bedroom. They are similar, facing each other, with a large bed and the space for their clothes and to work. In his living-room there is an antique piano that Regulus can play if he wants, Alphard says as he remembers that he had classes. His house is warmer than Grimmauld Place ever was, colourful and soft, with the stairs in front of the large living room with two couches and one voluminous seat. He uses magic to start the fireplace but other than that everything appears to be Muggle.

Alphard mentions that once they have the Ministry’s confirmation, he will bring them out to shop a bit. Though he assures them that they are free to rest and do whatever they want. He seems quite happy that they are here and whilst he is tactile, he starts to ask Regulus before touching his shoulder or even hugging him when he decides to go to sleep. Sirius follows him too, probably more tired because of the Hanahaki and he even coughed several times. He quickly said that he only had a cold and Alphard prepared a grog for them both.

Regulus sleeps like a baby the first day and in the morning Alphard is already up and ready for the day, grumbling about cursed chickens. He prepares a coffee for him, mentioning that Sirius told him that Regulus prefers tea except for the morning. There is a lot of familiarity, as if their uncle never forgot about them even if the last time Regulus saw him he had been at best 6 years old. He asks him about what he does here and all the animals in his backyard. Compared to the chickens, Barnabé and his wife - Maria, who is very shy of strangers and is more dependent than Barnabé who sometimes cries when he can’t find her - are simply for pleasure. Though apparently they are good guard dogs too, Alphard mutters that chickens could eat someone if they want to and he advises Regulus to only go outside with him to be sure nothing happens to him.

He is pretty sure he is exaggerating but he indulges in his words and asks to show him what he does to keep himself busy. They had the time to feed the chickens and gather some of their eggs, all the while Barnabé sticks to Regulus’ side like some kind of lost puppy. Alphard mentions that he is considering getting a cow to have milk because he likes to work with his hands and get dirty to have food in his plate - the opposite of the Black family - and points out a chicken he plans to kill and prepare for them this week because it has a nasty infection starting in his eye so it’s apparently better to kill it now before it gets to another one or worse.

An owl swoops by with a letter just when they come back inside to find Sirius in the kitchen eating the breakfast Alphard prepared for him with Hélène’s klougof, toasts and drinks. Alphard takes it and casts various spells before handing it to Sirius.

Apparently, Potter took Regulus’ advice and wrote a letter to Sirius. He doesn’t know if it’s good since Sirius runs to his room to read it. It’s a bit hard to not feel left out but Regulus is aware that he should leave his brother some space. Thankfully Alphard offers him distractions without asking more questions. He offers to teach him cooking, how they will make homemade pasta today with some of the tomato sauce he made over the summer.

They talk easier than Regulus ever expected. Alphard is closer to Sirius personality-wise and like his brother planned to, he cut ties with their family by disagreeing with them. The more they chat though, the more comforting it starts to be and Regulus feels like Alphard understands him as much. He talks about his own childhood and how at first he never did much but obeyed before he learnt better.

“It’s going to be ready soon,” Alphard says. “Go fetch Sirius, please, in case he fell asleep.”

Sirius is in fact more awake than ever. Regulus freezes a bit at the look on his face, wide eyes empty of any clear emotions as he sits with his knees against his chest on his bed. He hasn’t brushed his hair so the letter sitting beside him must have taken all his attention.

“Sirius?” He needs to step closer to catch his brother’s attention who quickly clears his throat and rubs his eyes. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” he croaks out.

Regulus glances at the letter and hopes that Alphard can wait a bit more. He sits in front of Sirius who finally looks at him even if it’s with red-rimmed eyes.

“What did he write?”

He sighs out and settles his face against the top of his knees. “James said that… They all want to talk to me. About what happened and– that he is sorry that he didn’t try to talk to me before.”

“All?”

Sirius nods, face still hidden, and his throat sounds full and sticky. “James, Peter and-and Remus.”

Talking about Lupin would only torture his brother so Regulus crosses his knees. “Didn’t you avoid Potter at Hogwarts too?”

“For good reasons.”

He purses his lips. Sirius has hidden the possible meeting with Lupin and how Emmeline found him choking in a corridor and Regulus wishes he had shared about it. It’s not out of retaliation that he won’t speak about how many times Potter pestered him but on the off-chance that Potter believes Regulus has the Hanahaki, it will probably be more useful that it stays unsaid rather than shared. Sirius is already tortured over what happened with his friends and Regulus adding that he is bothered by one of them indirectly will only add more guilt.

“Does that mean you will talk to him now?”

Sirius chuckles without real pleasure and looks up with a tearful smile. “You know… James is actually worried about where I am, where we are, because I was supposed to go to his place.”

Regulus frowns. “He is mad at you for that?”

He shakes his head. “No. He said that he should have reached out to me because I will always be welcomed at their place, even his parents are asking about me…”

His next words feel dreadful and tighten around his throat. “Do you want to go there?”

Sirius looks at him with vulnerable eyes, wetting his lips before shaking his head. “No,” he articulates as he starts to tremble.

Regulus scooches over immediately, reaching out to hug his brother even if he stays tensed in his initial position. He rubs a hand over his back and tries to not appear as relieved as he is. It’s a nasty satisfaction that Sirius still stays at his side even if another place is open to him.

“I don’t know what happened with your friends, Sirius,” he carefully says. “But I doubt that they are all innocent. They never tried to bring you back to the dorm and… You look sick.”

“I’m not going to talk with them,” he roughly replies.

“Really?”

Sirius coughs, immediately pushing him off to lean to the opposite side as he empties himself in a bed next to his bed. Regulus clutches his free hand and tries to not let his eyes linger on the opened letter; it looks quite long.

“What I did is unforgivable,” he articulates with a rough sob. “I can’t– I can’t go back like I never did that. I can’t believe that I did it and even if they are open to talk now then what will I say? I didn’t mean to? It wasn’t me? I can’t lie to them!”

Regulus observes him but Sirius avoids his eyes, rubbing his sobbing eyes, as he tucks himself against him. He needs to hold himself to not fall as he squeezes his brother. The door creaks just so lightly and he notices Alphard peeking before closing the door to leave them alone.

“Sirius… I really doubt that wha-”

“I almost killed SnIvellus.”

He freezes before quickling restarting to rub Sirius’ back. “What do you mean?”

“I– We have a way.” He clears his throat and digs his face against Regulus’ shoulder. “We have a secret passage to go to the Shrieking Shack but we have to go through the Whomping Willow.”

The Shrieking Shack is the birthplace of many legends around Hogsmeade and even people at Hogwarts are scared of some vengeful ghost screaming from there. Regulus has no idea how to go through the Whomping Willow and has seen it managing to knock down the fastest flyers.

“Is that why Snivellus is spying on you all?”

Sirius shrugs. “He is always lurking…”

“Did you… try to trick him into approaching the Whomping Willow so he can be squished?”

His brother stays still with his eyes on the bed’s sheet. Regulus could almost think that he is dead until finally he breathes out.

“I didn’t think he would believe me. I thought that I could tell him how we got to the tunnel but he would never trust me– that he would do something else out of frustration or that he might attack me and I could hit him with a well-deserved curse.”

Regulus frowns. “But Snape did as you said?” Sirius nods against him. “So he discovered the secret passage and that’s why Potter and all were mad?”

“That’s a part of it,” he whispers. “But I never thought that Snivellus would believe me.”

The Marauders must be hiding something in the Shrieking Shack. Regulus really wants to figure it out but Sirius has asked him to not overthink it– maybe they all go there to shift as animagi and Snape found them transforming. He could easily send them to Azkaban.

“You… wanted to trick Snape by telling him the truth about the Whomping Willow?”

“I don’t bloody know what I was thinking,” he snaps with a sob. “If that wasn’t clear already.”

Regulus can’t help but remember their parents. That time when Sirius asked their father if he could get more paint, he was barely six and still a child scared to disobey who worked on their classes without much complaint. Regulus has been practising the piano and his father asked him to pause so he can answer.

“Do you remember,” Regulus wet his lips. “Do you remember the cupboard in the corridor?”

Sirius looks at him. “What cupboard?”

“At Grimmauld Place,” he says. “You asked for paint one time– and Father told you that you can get more from the cupboard beside the stairs.”

“I don’t… I don’t remember that.”

Regulus can still see it clear as if it happens in front of him right now. “I was surprised because Father immediately told you: ‘Yes. You can find some in the cupboard.’ I never saw the inside of it and they have never let us draw much… You were shocked that he replied to you because they always complained about your painting as a useless skill.”

“What? Reggie, I don’t get it.”

“Just– just listen to me,” he insists and his voice quivers. “You didn’t move and then Father rose from his seat. I thought he would beat you but he only led you in front of the cupboard. ‘Go on, Sirius, open it’ he said but you looked terrified of it.”

“I stared at it for hours,” he articulates with a shaky frown.

“You were.”

The same happened to Regulus who had made the mistake to ask for a small candy, after a rough session of piano with his tutor, to his mother. She had smiled like a predator and accepted like it happened every day, saying that there are some in the cupboard. Regulus has also stared at the cupboard’s door, afraid to trust but torn by desire.

“Why are you reminding me that then?”

“I think… that’s what you did with Snape,” Regulus admits. “You told him the truth, what he wanted, but knew he wouldn’t trust you so he would be t-”

“I’m exactly like them.”

“What? Sirius, no-”

“Regulus. Leave me alone,” Sirius warns, white as a sheet, and heaving loudly. Regulus tries to reach out but his hand is slapped away. He tries to talk but Sirius furiously shakes his head and gasps, screams at him to get out. Sirius stays in his room the whole day after he manages to kick Regulus out of his room. Alphard prepares a plate for Sirius, leaving it in front of his door without a question though he asks Regulus if there is something he can’t do or not. Regulus himself isn’t sure and forces himself to eat a bit when Alphard insists.

He feels like he has to Sirius but his brother doesn’t open his door or reply to him. Sirius only comes out for dinner but changes the subject whenever Regulus tries to apologise. To him, it all makes sense what he tried to do with Snape and if he hadn’t told Regulus that Snape believed him then he would have never thought so. Snape must have been desperate or particularly stupid to believe Sirius or perhaps he planned to be hurt for Sirius to be punished. Potter and the rest of his friends probably never expected Sirius to do something as dangerous as that, risking someone’s life and their secret. Regulus isn’t sure what to think but if Snivellus had died– then it would have been a blessing. He has seen enough in the Slytherin dormitory.

Sirius wishes them goodnight and goes back to his room after showering. Regulus doesn’t feel up for much and turns to bed early too.

“Regulus.”

His fingers freeze over the piano’s keys. “Yes, Mother?”

“You have not finished the garden,” she seethes. “Finish what you started. Now.”

Regulus swallows and stands up. “Yes Mother.”

His feet are heavy, fighting against his will, but they bring him to the garden of Grimmauld Place. The air is smothering and bites at his eyes like poison. He spots a slightly big black cat with a thick tail and digging furiously at a patch of dirt before hissing furiously when they come close. It has disturbed a group of wolfsbane and moonflowers, completely turned over the dirt.

“Bloody cat!” His mother hisses. The cat spits back but jumps away at her hex before climbing up the tree and disappears in it. “Damn these parasites,” she growls before turning to Regulus. “Well, Regulus? Finish what you started.”

“Yes Mother,” he says with an empty breath as he tries to not cry.

Sirius’ dead face looks up at him, buried in the recently dug up dirt. Regulus falls to his knees, bare hands pushing back the soil over his brother’s dead eyes staring right at him. His mouth is painfully opened with flowers bursting out from all his orifices. One wolfsbane is slowly digging its way in the corner of his eyes. Regulus trembles but his mother leans over him as he diligently covers his dead brother.

“That’s the flowers you picked Regulus,” she spits. “It’s your choice. They are hideous. But you wanted it. Thanks to you at least we have good manure– our family’s disgrace will have a use at last.”

The bed is drenched in sweat and Regulus tumbles from it as he screams for Sirius, he manages to stumble out of his room to charge into his brother’s room.

“Reggie?” Sirius croaks out before gasping at the sudden weight crashing him down. “Wha-”

“I’m sorry! Please, please– don’t leave me,” he cries out.

Sirius holds him to sleep. They repeat this over the next nights without a question or a comment and Regulus’ bed is left cold. If Alphard notices it, he doesn’t say.

Their uncle hasn’t mentioned anything about their coughing either but he always prepares them some tea with honey and lemon. Their new home, which surprises Regulus himself that he thinks of it that way, is great. Once they receive the Ministry’s response, Alphard brings them both to Paris for a day. It’s a great day that ends with Regulus getting to pick a familiar for himself, to which Sirius whines but Alphard tells him to be patient.

Regulus has always wanted a familiar but their parents only have an owl because it’s useful and neither Sirius nor him ever got the chance to have one. The cat that Regulus had found when he was younger had been killed so he never tried to get one ever again. Sirius never really mentioned if he really wants one, albeit he looks a little jealous when Regulus gets to pick a ferret for himself.

Alphard doesn’t mention the reason for this sudden gift until they are back home and they find Nathan in their uncle’s garage, the part added to the house, with a motorbike. Which Sirius immediately recognizes as a 1959 Triumph Bonneville T120, which Regulus has no idea how he can since it looks dirty and absolutely not working. Though Sirius has mentioned to him that he wants a motorbike once he gets out of Hogwarts, planning to make it fly as one crazy experiment, and Regulus has no idea Alphard even knew about it.

Their uncle explains that since Sirius’ birthday is coming up, he decided to give him his gift in advance - but that he missed enough of Regulus’ birthdays to offer one in advance. Nathan is an apprentice mechanic, and unable to not ogle or blush next to Sirius, so he is here to help him to repair the motorbike. Sirius appears completely ecstatic at the prospect of learning about mechanics and how to take care of his motorbike and drags Nathan to their home everyday to work on it. Regulus enjoys watching just because the to-be mechanic doesn’t seem to stop embarrassing himself around Sirius and almost knocks himself unconscious because Sirius has no tact and is too focused on his bike to notice that cleaning with his shirt is almost a free show for their neighbour. Alphard joins the watching with Regulus several times.

They eat once at Hélène, with her husband Yves, and Nathan who tries to act natural but his eyes always drift toward Sirius. Regulus manages to spook him several times when their gazes meet. On another day, Alphard brings them to a small forest not far from there that grew on a small mountain to gather chestnuts that he plans to cook with cabbage and a chicken. Sirius starts throwing chestnuts at Regulus first, who reiterates in the exact same way before they are rolling in the colourful leaves. They get back home in one piece and help Alphard cook.

It feels like they are at home.

“Reggie!” Sirius bursts out in his bedroom, mid-afternoon. “There is a storm!”

He sits up on the bed, hesitating for a second before closing his book. “You mean–”

“Did you cast the spell?” He whispers with an excited look. “At dawn and dusk?”

“Yes, every time without a fail.”

“Then the time is here!” Sirius cheers and throws him a jacket. “We’re taking my bike, his first ride!”

“What? Why not here?” He asks, keeping his voice down. “Alphard is busy in the backyard so he won’t see.”

“What if you are a gigantic thing? We don’t want to break the house. It’s better outside, trust me,” he promises as he grabs some clothes to put them in a bag. “Come on, let’s go!”

Regulus follows him downstairs after taking his potion pouch, putting on a jacket and his shoes the fastest he can, just as Sirius shouts that they are going to try his bike. Alphard doesn’t have the time to say anything before they are out. He puts on the second helmet that Sirius spent a day decorating and climbs cautiously behind him before holding on to his brother’s waist as instructed.

The rain wipes in their faces and the thunder growls around them but Sirius only laughs, speeding up through the paved road as they head toward the forest where they gathered chestnuts. He even goes off road and Regulus grimaces at all the bumps. All the trees shake with the wind and they are hit by more leaves than necessary. Sirius is still thrumming with excitement and Regulus finds himself smiling to him despite the cold and the bad weather.

“You need to undress.”

“What?!”

Sirius gestures at him. “Shifting the first time will vanish your clothes, trust me. But if you want I brought a spare. You never know what will happen to them.”

“We’re in the middle of a forest!” He shouts back.

“Exactly! And no one will go on a walk with that weather! Come on, I saw you naked, before it’s not a problem.”

“No way!”

Sirius rolls his eyes before sputtering when his hair hits his face with the wind. “Fine. Lose your clothes then!”

Regulus glares at him before storming behind a rock. “If it’s a joke Sirius I swear-”

“I lost my uniform like that!”

He sighs out and quickly undresses even if the cold bites him in the ass. The potion is a striking blood-red. His eyes look up at the sky with the small question on why he even ended up in this position.

“Sirius?” He shouts.

“Yeah? You alright?”

“I’m fine.” He breathes out despite a furious chill.

“Do you want to go back home?” Sirius asks.

“No,” he says. “I’m going to drink it.”

“I’m right here Reggie, it will be alright!”

“I know.”

It’s not painful, almost as easy as blinking, but he is lost for a moment. He cautiously walks out of the rock, sniffing the air before startling with his fur raised at the steps closing on him. Regulus needs to look up, far more than he is used to, to spot Sirius with a wide grin on his face.

“Reggie?”

He glances down at his black paws before hissing at a sudden lightning strike that sounds too close to be alright.

“I’m not even surprised that you’re a cat,” he chuckles and crouches with his hand reaching out. “Though you seem bigger than the normal cats.”

Regulus can only meow out and sniffs his hand before Sirius swipes him in his arms with a loud hiss of protest. His brother only cackles and scratches his neck– which oh is the right spot.

“Oh wow, purring sounds actually nice,” Sirius says with a small coo in his voice and avoids Regulus’ attempt at scratching his face. “Hey! Be nice or I'll leave you here… You need a name and Twatass doesn’t sound good when you look this cute,” he muses. “I read that cats have a pouch of fat, I thought it was because they are lazy. But some people call it a love’s pouch because if you take care of your cat and it’s healthy and happy, then the bigger will be the pouch filled with love.”

Regulus meows and tries to grimace at how stupid that sounds just as Sirius raises him with his hands to be face to face. His brother frowns at him playfully.

“But you, Reggie, you are full of mean thoughts.You almost blinded one of my eyes with a chestnut right here,” he coos. “So your name will be Meanpouch-”

Regulus manages to swat a big scratch over Sirius’ annoying face.

They only have one day left before their trip back to Hogwarts. He wants to shift, finally believing him when Sirius told him it can be like a stubborn scratch once you do it the first time, but he doesn’t want Alphard to know; not yet at least. For now it will stay a secret for him and Sirius.

His brother and Potter have written to each other almost every day after their second night here and Regulus isn’t sure of what it means but Sirius’ mood is overall better. That’s why he is standing in front of the running fire with the letter that just arrived, ready to throw it in there. This wasn’t from Potter, the owl had been different and the writing is unfamiliar. Regulus has seen enough of the letters to be certain that it’s not Potter.

Maybe he opened it. Only to check the name at the end. It might be Remus Lupin who wrote the letter. He is tempted to read all of it, just to figure out what kind of curse he will throw first at his face.

“Reggie?” He startles, clutching the letter in hand before turning to face Alphard. “What are you doing?”

“Nothing.”

His uncle squints at the letter before observing him. “Is that letter for Sirius?”

Regulus swallows. “Yes.”

“And you opened it?”

“I– I only wanted to check who it was.”

“Is it the boy that caused the Hanahaki?”

Regulus’ eyes widen and let out a weird croak. “What?”

“Sirius told me,” his uncle confirms and walks up to his side. “When you had your nightmares and slept with him. I came to check and Sirius told me what was going on.”

“Really?” He gasps out. “But– he didn’t tell me.”

“Probably didn’t want to worry you. You two are the same like that,” he points out with a fond smile. “I also noticed your regular coughing. Did you think I didn’t care if you two were sick or not?”

Regulus shakes his head. “I just thought that you were giving us space,” he admits, still in shock. “What else did he tell you?”

“The bond that you two have, which means you also have the Hanahaki. That’s a smart way to slow it down but it won’t save Sirius…”

“Do you know of a way?”

Alphard stares at the fire with a small shake of his head. “I have tried to look for one since Sirius told me this– sad mess. So far nothing though.”

“Oh…”

“But you can’t hide Sirius’ letter from this boy,” he says. “Your brother won’t like it.”

“What if he rejects him again? This will– It will kill Sirius,” he argues. “I would rather have him live mad at me than dead!”

Alphard softly pulls him against his side, hugging just the lightest possible to leave Regulus a way out if needed. “Let me check on that then. I know a spell.”

Regulus hesitates and glances at the cursed letter in hand. Sirius will soon be back home from his short drive with Nathan at some shop for his motorbike. He briskly hands it over before storming upstairs.

When Sirius comes back home, Regulus can hear from his room that Alphard casted the same spells as last time to check on the letter but it has already been a bit teared up probably from the owl’s claws. He isn’t sure if his brother buys it but he climbs up without a complaint. Regulus’ door is open and they see each other but Sirius quickly looks down and slips in his room with the letter in hand.

Regulus purses his lips before sighing and turns back to the writing of his own letter. The one option he really didn’t want to see happen but he supposes this time there is no choice. Even if it means dealing with James Potter regularly. If Sirius and the Marauders are back together– then Regulus, or Meanpouch, will be right there too.

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selfshipprompts · 8 months

Note

any tips for easy/super low budget ways to feel closer to an f/o (that aren’ picrews/art/fanfic)? I remember I saw a “marry a fictional character” website a while ago that got shut down long before I could use it. I have a good few f/o’s but I want to feel closer to ‘em and don’t really know of any methods :(

Glad to see you’re back! and it’s ok if you don’t have any answers

i know its not a helpful answer, but i genuinely believe that theres no wrong way to feel closer to your f/o(s) , so you should do whatever you feel is right! ..especially since everyone is different and has their own ideas on what feels right, and what works! so..

i can only give my own personal experiences, but im sure others can give their methods too! ->

something pretty specific i do is take a plush of my f/o with me when i go out, and take photos so i can put them in my scrapbook! its fun picking up pamphlets and keeping tickets n whatnot when travelling to document our adventures together. in my brain, its like.. its nice to have something between us that isnt online, yknow? even just travelling together and taking photos is really fun ^^ doesnt have to be a plush tho, could be any merch or even a printout or something :b

wearing stuff that reminds u of ur f/o is another one i like !! i like to buy rings, necklaces, earrings, etc. that remind me of my f/o so i can wear it and have a piece of them with me! could work for articles of clothing too, or you could make your own stuff! like ive made kandi bracelets with my f/os name and related words on haha but it doesnt have to be directly related to your f/o as long as it reminds you of them!

another thing i like to do is play games as my f/o? like.. if it has a character creator then i can try and make them ofc, otherwise just the case of "what decisions would my f/o make" or imagine it as an AU where we're in this other world having an adventure together.. AUs in general are just super fun imo, even if its just a "what if" or roleswap, finding ways to be together in different situations can make you think about how you work together n stuff!

im kinda just listing off stuff i do. i like collecting screenshots of my f/o in their source and making colleges, or drawing over them with lots of cute stickers and hearts using photo editting apps :] teaching yourself new skills for them is fun too? im slowly getting more into website building so i can make a neocities shrine for my f/o LOL

anyway! if anyone has their own methods of feeling close to your beloveds, be sure to reply or reblog! or send an ask, its always nice to keep the convo going! take care xx

#thankyou btw! steadily trying to be more active :) x #advice column #asks #anon #not an imagine

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pansy-picnics · 7 months

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i would love to see and here more about emery !

old ask i just dug up but oughhghh em emmy my beloved…,,,..ive been trying to work on alina development recently as well as a few other things but ACTUALLY now that u mention it i just realized i don’t think i ever talked abt florence here!!! she’s emery’s bio mom!!!

honestly when i first made emery i told myself i wasnt gonna develop anyone from her bio family mostly because i KNEW i would get attached to them. but alas i DID and i HAVE.

don’t ask me about her dad tho. he’s out of the picture and idk what he did but whatever it was he was probably the problem. em’s ginger genes run strong but otherwise thats the only remnant of his existence

florence (flora for short) was very spiritual and hardworking, as well as open minded, down to earth and creative….she was a talented writer and enjoyed dabbling in poetry and fiction. flora was struggling, but she did her best to care for emery with what she had, and would always try to make up for the times she couldn’t be there.

she was only alive for the first few years of her daughter’s life, so she didn’t get to encounter the. frankly gorier side of emery’s passions; but emery was a curious kid who asked a lot of questions about everything and florence was always happy to answer. she would’ve supported them just as much as varian and hugo do, though she’d definitely be a bit unsure of how she would’ve tried her best. em loves florence very much and always has very fond memories of her, she basically gave up everything for emery :’3

i’m not exactly sure how florence died but it was definitely something related to an illness,,,, flora was already in poor health before emery was born and they weren’t well off enough to afford any extensive medical care. seeing their mom like this impacted emery in a lot of ways, and it subconsciously ended up pushing her towards her interests in biology and medicine.

when they do officially adopt emery varian and hugo try to dig up as much information as possible on florence as well. they see that em has that strong connection with their mom and they can’t bear to imagine them just growing up and forgetting about it,,,, so they spend a lot of time in the library learning as much as possible and telling her about it, to make sure she never forgets where she came from :((( <3

all that said though don’t worry bc flora is in fact alive and well in a modern au…i think for some reason she wasn’t able to take care of em full time, so varian and hugo coparent with her. her and rapunzel are best friends and she and emery get to hang out a few times a month so flora can take her out for lunch and emery can infodump about neurosurgery procedures or something

they watch gray’s anatomy and make fun of it together

#tangled ask #pansy rambling again #tangled kids #emery #florence #varian #vat7k hugo #ask #pansy-art #varigo #hugo rottewange

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libras-interactives · 2 months

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Do you have any OC’s for Lackadaisy who didn’t make it into the fic or who were made after you started writing? I love hearing about all of them so much

;v; wagh

So 2~3 of these kitties are connected to Devil's Moon characters but probably won't show up (or at least, will only be mentioned), and two arent related to it at all.

Viviana Carmina Holst - Slyvester's wife, who Ive thought so much about but may not even show up "on camera" LOL. A calico with auburn hair she keeps in a fairly old-fashioned style, to match her more modest dress. She's thin and has big, bright green-brown eyes.

She's quite sociable, observant, easygoing and a terrible cardshark. She loves company and doesn't get it nearly as much as she'd like; they live in a modest yet well-decorated home outside St. Louis city limits. Carmina comes from a large Italian family. She was the first of her siblings to be born in America. She's always been known as Carmina to them (there were already three Vivianas in the extended family), and Vivi to her husband.

Because she and Slyvester could not have children, they adopted three nephews after the boys' parents passed (Carmina's side). The boys are now grown and the two oldest are quite successful. The youngest still lives with them to help his mother, as Carmina is disabled and Slyvester works a lot, and they've yet to find a live-in nurse that suits them.

Carmina and Slyvester grew up together in the same Italian-majority neighborhood; his family is Danish and was one of the few non Italians on the block. Carmina's parents approved of him bc he agreed to convert, they knew he wasn't a drinker, and they were relieved their sickly daughter was able to get married and have someone take care of her for the rest of her life.

Flynn's Family - I've thought a lot about them but I don't think they'll be super relevant or come up, alas. His older brother Seamus is fairly important to the business, but rarely makes himself known. He has some pretty bad physical and mental damage from the war, so tends to be anti-social, plus years of Flynn's emotional manipulation have taken their toll. Tomas was the youngest and the golden child, died in the war. Flynn couldn't stand him. Sorcha was older than Tomas but younger than Flynn, I'm still unsure what happened exactly, but she's not around her parents anymore. They didn't really dote on her like they did the boys, or Tomas.

Their mother was tall and slender, while the father was more stout and broad, and a little shorter - only Seamus had his build and coloring, the rest of the children were looked and were built like their mama. All of them had orange and black markings but the Flynn we know is the only chimera.

I keep wanting to think of more for the family - their history, and appearances and whatnot, but then I pull back because it "won't be relevant" in Devil's Moon ... well, might do it anyway bc I just like writing family dynamics and drama, lol. I already wrote a ton about Carmina so might as well.

Okay these two are 100% not UTDM related and from an Arkham Horror board game/kinda tabletop bc we rp'd it a ton. The setting is 1920s anyway, and I forced my friends to play and make lackadaisy OCs (it was my birthday damn it 😂). These two characters rotted a crater in my brain for 2 weeks straight and I still like em a ton. Sister Marguerite was mine and Father Elijah was initially my partner's but I have since stolen him haha.

Sister Marguerite, formerly Adelaide Whitaker. Wheeww... so much to say here but I'll condense it. Originally from a wealthy East Coast family, she was forcefully sent to a "wellness and manners" sort of school for "esteemed ladies" that was really just a ruse to hide her pregnancy. It wasn't a Magdalene asylum/laundry, though. She lost the child, but a handful of nuns showed her such kindness (and she'd had religious-fixated OCD for years that her family actively made worse anyway) that she converted to Catholicism and began the process of becoming a nun once she was old enough. She's happy with her current life, enough that her OCD has lessened somewhat, but ofc there are still bad days. She often fixates on physical purity, baptism and "healing water"; most of her sisters chalk her "peculiarities" up to her extreme devotion and are willing to overlook her bad, spiraling days bc shes v dear to them. She's a good-hearted woman, quiet, and doesn't scare easily. Puts others before herself again and again.

As a cat, she's white with unsettling sectorial heterochromia, big slender ears, and an odd face. Lackadaisy cats are generally pretty cute but she's meant to be more "homely". Her eyes are more unnerving than striking. This is the photo that was the first inspiration for her, though this kitty is very cute, haha. If she were human I think she'd have bright eyes and a very plain face. I've drawn her but my art is pretty oof! I need to keep practicing bc her face and headshape in particular are kinda different.

Actually considered reworking her backstory to be one of Jack's many siblings; he did have a sister who ran off, but thats kinda irrelevant in UTDM rn. If anything itd be mentioned in an epilogue.

Father Elijah - A handsome man from a good Midwestern family. They were disappointed when Elijah joined the church, feeling like he was wasting his potential. He's always felt close to God and wanted to help others, but he's also a deeply scholarly person and loves theology, even if some things he studies would be considered heretical. This doesn't necessarily mean he's open minded, especially to those he considers "irredeemable", but he's always polite, protective of his flock and usually a pretty affable guy.

Elijah certainly has some kind of mental stuff rolling around in his noggin; I don't want to call it disorder or illness, especially since he doesn't really have a name for it at the time period (like Marguerite with her OCD). In the tabletop, they came to Arkham together as allies and quickly became rather ... obsessed with each other. He's very fixated with Marguerite, believing her to be a pinnacle of what a godly person should be, and later believing she can actually speak to angels (or is one??). He wants so much of her attention, to hear her opinions and interpretations of faith. To say he puts her on a pedestal is an understatement. Calling it "romantic" interest isnt the whole picture, and too simple for... whatever the hell he's got going on. Marguerite admires him deeply but in a more "inspired" way. Platonic is also too simple for what she's feeling, but her attachment certainly isn't as deep as his.

As a cat he's an orange tabby with pretty blue eyes. Meant to be a really tall good looking dude, a contrast to Sister Margy. Maaany women in the church have admired him but he's never considered or indulged in feelings like that until Marguerite; he doesn't even consider his appearance much. Just tries to keep tidy. I also terribly drew him real quick for the tabletop. I think his ears should have kind of a cute shape and he's got extra fur around his face :3 Still not sure on what sort of tail he'd have, though.

Shoutout to tabletop!Father Elijah who dual wielded a pistol and giant crucifix on the regular, constantly threw himself into danger to save Margie and slowly became twisted by the dark powers he was trying so hard to stop 👍🏽 One of my favorite scenes was both of them jumping into a portal together, then getting separated bc we rolled poorly and they both got HP/Sanity down to 0. Elijah woke up in the hospital in extreme pain, left without fully restoring HP and ran all the way back to the church to find Marguerite. They held each other at the altar for a while and she gave him her rosary bc he lost his crucifix in the void. and they promised to never leave each other again and stayed attached at the hip in spite of the usual eldritch horrors. normal arkham horror things. I'd love to make Arkham LCG cards for them; theyve already got custom cards for the 2nd edition board game (but now my other fixations and nerdness is showing so ill stop here).

(shoutout to that poor eldritch-corrupted NPC who sister marguerite believed needed a baptism to restore him, so father elijah held the dude down while he almost drowned and margeurte prayed over him and one party member witnessed all this and told the others so EVERYONE avoided "those catholic freaks" for the whole session sdkdskfs)

#most of my lackadaisy OCs went to UTDM in some way soooo yeah lol #its my baby what can i say #i also made canon Lackadaisy investigators for Arkham Horror 2nd #id LOVE to make investigators for the card game bc its so cool but alas i dont get to play much #so im not confident in investigator balance and abilities and such #god this is so niche even for this blog lol #anyway weird priest and nun my absolute beloveds #libra says #need a tag for when i talk really dumb shit #anons !!

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cursed-princess-club · 2 months

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my apologies if this is out of place on your blog- it's one of the few CPC blogs I know- but am I the only one who feels weird about the whitewashing Frederick's character is going through in fandom right now? like demonizing the CPC (a place literally made of the oppressed) in favor the white, cis, het, oh-so-innocent-and-pure boy? and making it seem like he was completely in the right to be racist to Gwen (unintentional racism is still racism!) and that everything he did was 100% justified and explained.

Again, sorry if I sound like an SJW (can't believe I'm using that term in 2024) but this just really rubs me the wrong way.

NOOOOO I get where you're coming from, you're valid in feeling that way. (also it's totally okay to send me asks! i enjoy talking about cpc :D and i'll do my best to answer them!)

white boy favoritism is definitely a Thing in fandom and. yowch. generally we've seen characters ignorant towards how people on the braided island look where even the cpc thought that gwen was cursed at first (shoutout to molly for being normal about leelathae!). if i remember correctly leelathae's implied that she's human which makes me wonder about the lore... plus I don't really know how defined witches are with their stances in Hashtag Society but i feel like there's probably a social stigma or something there too... are all of them "evil"? are they born witches? do they all have similar traits? Who knows.... and yeahh the braided island inhabitants are a fictional race, but also the coding! the other pastel kids resemble their white father more, and they're technically mixed, while gwen is visibly more like her mother. like being more visibly indigenous or latina but if you were gwen in cpc. which makes me think yk

by definition the cpc is a disabled support group!!. (club my beloved) personally i also like to add queer in there too heh... and also majority of them being women! so they are meant to be representative of the oppressed,, Even if they're all rich princesses. (but i think that's just more because of the setting lol, since they're treated/treat each other like... well... normal people... so i feel like them being rich isn't a point trying to be made. slightly off topic but this is something ive thought of haha) I DO understand what you mean tho and why it rubs you the wrong way. frederick a flawed character that shouldn't be put on a pedestal. same with the others, they're flawed! and i like em. i like frederick! they all grow and change and i like watching their progress! (it does really suck how ignorant the people in universe are though about other races... may be a worldbuilding thing again. i wonder about the other fantasy races in cpc! how different are the wizards and witches seen? and fantasy racism is a whole other topic i don't know if i can bring justice to in a discussion gadiufnhdam)there's a lot that can be argued about how they function and the name and how they treated frederick and tori's argument too but i digress </3 (i'm open to opinions though!) i gotta think more about the worldbuilding and stuff kek

OVERALL!! frederick isn't perfect, the club isn't perfect, but i don't think any of them should be demonized for it because to me that's the whole point!! that nobody's perfect! lol lmao xd welcome to the club yk. imperfect people are just people n stuff

#cursed princess club #cpc meta #cpc confessions #?perhaps...#cpc asks #man i could go for some ritz crackers rn #got those cravings randomly #I DO GET YOU ANON #trying to be unbiased </3 #nobody let me cook #i just see like. frederick's outburst as something that happened that had consequences he didnt expect #very very harmful consequences #like a bunch of circumstances lined up to hurt gwen in the most amplified way #because his throwaway comment snowballed into gwen having this big realization since #1. she's unaware of society's Beauty Standard and 2. she's supposed to marry him lol and 3. her sisters are considered pretty but.#she's apparently not #which SUCKS to be hit with all at once #that something that wasnt even said to her face did this much damage #when frederick didnt actually wanna hurt her

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unlimitedtrees · 10 months

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nearly all of the character designs from 'UNITRES Dreams'

(once again, this post didnt have a “read more” part in da original cohost post, so im putting it here... click more if U Dare !!)

so, trying to get back into making art again, i decided to draw brand new references of all the character designs from my game, UNITRES Dreams. cus why not. anyways these references arent Perfect.. some of em ive made better reference sheets before (while for this i just wanted to draw em all together with a sort of consistent color style and their current, up-to-date designs) and also i didnt get to draw Every character as it is Too Much and i am Too Lazy to draw all of the enemies and boss designs ... so ive just included the enemy and boss sprites for now.. but ill probably draw new art for them sometime.

Anyways. let me tell ya a bit about making Character Designs for this game. as ive talked a bit about in my post about making Character Sprites , making stuff for the game is hard because i am pretty much the Only person working on the game and i have to split my time working on the sprites between working on Every Other Aspect Of The Game , meaning i dont get to spend as much time making the artwork as detailed and polished as id want to.

and the same thing goes for making the Character Designs. sadly, i didnt get to make as many Actual Characters as i wanted (you can tell which are the Actual Characters as theyre the ones i Actually Redrew Here). when the project started, i only really had the Main Three Playable Characters in mind.. in fact most of the other Actual Characters didnt even Exist until the Very Very End of development.. which is the part im sad about. i just didnt have enough time to think about adding any complex new characters or figure out how i would Make a new character design . Which leads me to the Other Characters... which includes Most (but not All) of the Bosses and Enemies. Their designs are well , Basic . their designs werent really thoughtout ;they were created to serve a single purpose: to be made quickly so that the game could Have enemies and bosses. if i were remaking this game now, id probably remove or even completely Redo a Ton of the enemy designs (except the post-UNITRES Dreams enemies ... im kind of proud of them Lol !!)

thats just how things were. i didnt have enough time to focus on making character designs, so i didnt get to make a Ton of them and i had to make them Fast . in fact, early on in development, i hadnt really had much experience making character designs (as , before UNITRES, i didnt really make too many Original Characters for my games before), so i struggled experimenting and making characters for a lot of its development. And The Designs themselves .. a lot of them (even the ones i like) are pretty simple. Most characters are comprised of simple shapes and details , making them easy to draw and animate. and a lot of the early designs used Very Few Colors , which made drawing them quicker.

Despite All Of This , However, i am actually pretty proud of a lot of the designs ive made for this game (Especially the ones with the fancy new drawings i made here ..). while theyre simple, and while i wish i couldve made More characters with more unique designs , i really like the designs i got to make for this game ,with some of em being my favorite to draw even when im bored .. and i just felt like id talk about em.

And Well , Im Gonna Talk About Em !! click da 'read more' thingy if u want to Read More ..

the Main three characterz

"trees"

so first off , let me talk about "trees". before i can get into their Actual Design , let me tell u a bit of history so u can understand why theyre designed the way they are.

So . around November 6, 2018 , before UNITRES was really a thing , i designed the very first version of Trees that u can see above. while i didnt know what the game was going to Be , i had a Basic idea of what i wanted the Character to be from the very beginning. you see, Trees (the character) ,while having the same name as me , is Technically Not a self insert , Kind Of . I designed this character near the beginning of when i started entering a Very Low Point mentally in my life (which involves some personal stuff im not going to get into , Aswell as this point happening Around when Among the Others released) and i thought Very Negatively of myself . And So , this character is sort of an exaggerated version of the negative thoughts i had about myself at the time .

the main characteristics of the character was they Did Not Show Their True Emotions , instead bottling up their feelings and showing a very Fake , happy version of themself. theyre also kind of Fucked Up in the head and try to hide it . anyways theres more stuff going on with them that you can probably extract from both the games and the old descriptions in this concept art , but i wanna leave that as a surprise for when i get to make my next game. There Are some outdated things from the descriptions in the concept art , such as an idea where Trees would be Always Facing Forward , hiding away their backside. And Also , you may notice theyre referred to as "it" and "his" in this , which has well. Changed . teehee.

as for The Design Itself , i wasnt really sure what i wanted to go for at first. this character was actually one of the Few first Actual Character Designs i made at that point , so i didnt really have any idea on what to do. One day , i thought up of a Little Bear Looking character , and i tried drawing that character .. only for it to Sort Of look like a little fox-like character. and i imagined this character emoting mainly by very subtle details , such as the Hat and Ears changing shapes based on their emotions ..

Anyways , later that month , i drew the very first sprite of Trees , which ended up being used as the Idle sprite for the UNITRES tech demo. i wont be sharing What that sprite was originally for , as im saving it for Something , but i Will show you Trees' sprite evolution:

from left-to-right , it starts with the very first Trees sprite. Then there's the first revision, which was done when UNITRES Dreams started development. Then there's the second revision , done for the Newgrounds update in 2021. And finally, there's the TREES' ADVENTURE version, which is the current version of the sprite.

with the first version, the sprite is Pretty Close to the first concept art. However , iremoved the blue part in the tail as i couldnt get it to look good in sprite form (or i just forgot to include it.. idont remember). I also removed some details , such as the little hair and the red blush, as i couldnt really include them on such a small sprite.

Anyways , so how did the design mutate into the current design ? Well , over time , i ended up drawing their ears and tail Longer , and ended up giving them longer and longer limbs (as it was Hard to animate them with the tiny limbs they had). Eventually , it got to the point where i decided to just redo the sprites to make em consistent with how i was drawing them , and thats how i got the second revision.

But Then , i started consuming media Other Than Sonic ! i think the main thing that infected my brain was Spinel from Steven Universe ... while Trees' design Did have a bit of the sort of rubberhose , silly limbs before (along with a Bit of contorting their form , as u can see with the expressions in the original concept) , when i saw the steven universe movie , i saw spinel and was Immediately like " Oh My Goodness Gracious . I Need To Make My Character As Silly As Her". And so , I leaned more into the silly , stretchy limbs . You can see this in the following sprites:

Anyways , as i kept drawing them and consuming more Non Sonic media , i ended up experimenting more with their design and adding some small elements from my inspirations .. one of the other main inspirations was Wander Over Yonder ,where i decided to draw Trees' hat to be more Silly and Big , like Wander's hat. i also ended up perfecting how i drew Trees , giving them more Sharp lines , Bigger and Sillier "hands" and "feet" , making their tail Huge , and just giving them a nice silhouette that i like . By the time of the Newgrounds update , i realized Trees' sprites were kind of Outdated , so i ended up redrawing Most of their sprites , and ended up with the version you can see in the current version of UNITRES Dreams ..

And well , Im Really Really proud of how their designed turned out . I Like to draw them a lot. and i think the way their design evolved has ended up fitting with their Actual Character really well .. the sort of Round , Soft elements such as their Big , Blobby hands/feet and their cute , silly face make them look , on the surface , cute and Silly . But then you have the more Sharp lines and elements , such as with their head and tail which i think makes their character have a bit of depth .. if that makes sense .

Idk . im not good at words or describing things . i just think their design now works really well with what i want to go for . and hey , a lot of my friends have drawn them and have drawn them Really Really Well .. i particularly like how people interpret their design .. with some people leaning into the more Soft , cute elements of their design , while some have drawn them Really Really accurately .. its really cool and im thankful for everyone whos drawn them before ..

Last Thing ill mention about their design (and i guess this goes for Most of the other designs) : Most of the characters in UNITRES aren't really supposed to be any Specific Species . Theyre all just sort of weird , ailen-like characters who do not abide to any sort of rules or reality or whatever. Trees is just Trees ; they're not supposed to be a Fox or any sort of Real animal or species or whatever, and that goes for every other character.

??????

so here's the very first designs of ?????? , who for now ill unofficially refer to as The Pink Character. When i first started development on UNITRES , i Knew i wanted there to be Three main characters: Trees, and two mysterious characters. and when i started work on UNITRES Dreams (back when it was known as UNITRES - BRAND NEW WORLD Edition) , i needed to create designs for them .. However , at this point i was still learning how to Properly Make Character Designs , and so i created the first sketch above ,and then created their first sprites , which . Well. I Ended Up Not Liking Their Design Very Much !

So . The whole point of this character is that they dont really know their own identity , with them not even having a Real Name . Their design was Supposed to be sort of Ambiguous .. However i was Not Sure what to do for their design . i wanted to make it so you couldnt really tell what their gender was (as originally , they were a girl ... but they do not have No Gender anymore) . However , when people first started testing the game , they just . thought they were a guy.

anyways . i just Did Not Like This Design . they didnt really have a Clear Silhouette .. they just didnt look like an appealing or memorable design to me. and i also i didnt like their color palette. So . when the game became UNITRES Dreams , i decided to completely redo their design . And Well ..

This is the first drawing of the new design. At First , i wasnt sure about their design , with things such as them being Pink and Having A Skirt, i was worried about Some People immediately being like "Oh , Theyre A Girl !".. but you know what ? Ive grown Very Very Attached to this design .. i think theyre both Cute and Recognizable , while still fitting the sort of character i was going for . Their sillouette , while not as Recognizable as the other characters , has enough goin on to where i think it is a bit recogniable and easy to read while still giving them a sort of Mystery regarding their identity .. if that makes sense . And their more monochrome palette compared to every other character helps sell that , i think .

i think theres probably some people out there who see this character as a girl , but i think theyre a good Non Gender Having character design . just cus theyre pink doesnt mean they gotta have Gender ! anyways , i love them. theyre my silly little strange creature. i hope you love them too .. there is so much i want to explore with this character in a future game .. and i think their new design has really stuck with me.

???

So , ??? , who i will refer to unofficially as The Blue Character, is supposed to Sort Of be the opposite of Trees (the character). they're Very Tired and Chill , not really too crazy or anythin. and i wanted their design to illustrate that, and well , out of every design ive made , theirs was pretty much perfect from the very moment i created them.

I dont know if i have any old concept of them on hand, but i Do have both the original sprites ,aswell as the newer ones which are pretty much the same as the old sprites , but more polished and with redone colors..

And, well. Yea . they didnt really change much ! The only aspects that changed was that i removed like , Two details that i felt cluttered up the sprites too much , that being the little Tired Eyebag/ whatever its called line beneath their eyes, along with the little Red Dot that was on their boots. Other than that , their design was pretty much Perfect. they were also pretty easy to make , as , with them being a sort of Opposite version of Trees , theyre pretty much based off Trees' design , except with a bunch of differences to make them feel like their own character (such as different body/head shape , a big silly hat , and Actual Boots).

there's nothing much for me to say about them. they're perfect.

the really gay ones

suzy, wavey, and their little Shine Catcher

Alright . so before i can explain These characters , u need a little bit of History .

So. when UNITRES - BRAND NEW WORLD Edition was "finished" , i went on to help with RRThiel and his game, MEGA MAN PERFECT BLUE. as you can see here, i worked on various backgrounds and tilesets for the game. Anyways , at one point , ithought itd be cool to remake the Intro Stage in UNITRES , as a sort of tribute to the game and also as a little extra thing for the new update i was planning on making (which ended up becoming UNITRES Dreams).

at first, this was Just going to be two levels based off the Intro Stage from Perfect Blue , However , later in MMPB's development , one of the backgrounds I did for one of the levels ended up being Completely Redone by other people on the team ,as my background didnt really fit the game's style .. However , i still really liked this background .. so I decided to reuse it for a new level in UNITRES , with it also being a tribute to the level in MMPB (though its a lot more loose compared to the Intro Stage level , Lol).

This level ended up becoming Greenhouse Frenzy in UNITRES , and i ended up turning what once was just going to be a two level bonus into an entirely new campaign with its own story in UNITRES Dreams. and with it being a whole new campaign , i wanted there to be New Bosses and New Enemies ..

So , for Greenhouse Frenzy - Section 1 , I was planning on a new boss ... and this boss was going to be ... Mr. Sauceman !

You See , for UNITRES Dreams i wanted to go Hard with including all sorts of little tributes to my friends and the people who helped with the game . Mr. Sauceman , being one of the composers of the game , let me use his character from the game hes working on as a boss in the game , and i thought itd be nice to have him be in Greenhouse Frenzy ,since that level is pretty much a big tribute anywayz.

So , Originally , i wanted the Sauceman boss to start out with a little Fake Out . You See, the MMPB level that Greenhouse Frenzy is based off has a robot master that i asked RRThiel if i could use for the level , but he said no. So , I decided for this boss that i would create a silly character Inspired by the robot master from the MMPB as a silly little joke , but then Mr. Sauceman shows up and that character explodes . And So , I Designed Suzy , a character who , while inspired a bit by the character MMPB , was made to be a bit different and also to be used for a silly little fake-out intro and to die in 5 seconds . You can see this on the reference sheet , where she didnt even have a name and is just referred to as "GF2 Fakeboss".

However . Two Things Happened : 1) I Grew Kind Of Attached To This Little character I Designed , And 2) I Ran Out Of Time. i couldnt implement the fakeout that i had planned ... and i didnt have a boss fight for Greenhouse Frenzy - Section 1.... So. I decided to just. Make her the boss fight of GF1. it just made sense ! i Originally had planned a boss fight based on the Magik Master boss from Chaotic Carnival , but reusing the character design for the silly fakeout ended up being quicker , and so she ended up being an Actual Character in the game.

And Then There's Wavey . she is a robot. i originally designed her as an enemy for the Intro Stage tribute level (a.k.a , Perfect City) , as i wanted it to have its own enemy. Her design is also Some What inspired by one of the robot masters from MMPB , though not as much as Suzy's is.

Anyways , despite Suzy and Wavey being inspired by characters from MMPB , i wanted them to be different and have their own sort of Character . And well .. their actual Personalities are different to the ones from MMPB , at least . In UNITRES Dreams , there is a hidden "Storybook" mode , which contains various stories which add a bit of Worldbuilding into the game .. and one of the stories details Suzy and Wavey . Basically , Suzy is a lonely gardener , who lives alone on her own strange little planet , who then travels across the galaxy to the Perfect City , where she ends up meeting Wavey , a military robot who Suzy becomes fascinated with ..

Anyways . my writing aint exactly the best , and i Refuse to go and reread the stuff i wrote for the storybook mode in unitres . but i tried my best to make suzy and wavey their Own sort of characters , having their own identity compared to the characters theyre based on. Oh , and by the way , suzy and wavey are gay LOL !! and they have a little baby plant that they raise . this is also told in the storybook but i unfortuately didnt get to explore this Much outside of that in the game... though there Is a secret you can find in one of the levels.

So. what do i think of these characters and their designs ? Well. Honestly. Im Not Sure . when i designed them both , i still wasnt Totally comfortable with character designs as i am now , and honestly . theyre not my Favorite designs . Wavey in particular is just . Well . Shes Just Metal Sonic in A Hat . she has her own little differences , but i cant lie . i probably coulda done better with her design . and suzy i think hasnt aged as well either . Idk. Also. In Case You Cant Tell , I am BAD with coming up with names . I Genuinely cant do it. i came up with both of their names on a Whim . i justdidnt know what to call them and i was running out of time LOL !!

anyways. last things ill mention are : the plant is a species known as Shine Catchers, which appear as enemies in Greenhouse Frenzy. Oh , and also , here's some concept art of them Lol !!

(oh , and i also forgot to mention: originally , suzy had green dots on her "hair", but i didnt know how to properly draw them on the sprites , so i left it out)

the Silly ones (a.k.a my favorite ones)

Millie

So . Millie is the most self-indulgent design Ive created .

Here's how it went: one December day in 2020 , I was sitting around bored as hell , when all of a sudden , the Silly Brained part of me Saw an idea pop up: A Tall , Hot , Cute Clown Man . And Instantly , I KNEW I had to draw him . But I Was in the middle of a Zoom call ... So . I opened up IbisPaint on my old Android phone , and drew the First sketch with my fingers that you can see above . And Instantly I Knew : I Had Done It . I Made Perfection .

More ideas grew , and i realized : I Could Do Something With This ! So , later , I came up with a whole reference sheet for him , and started planning on something: I was going to make More characters for UNITRES Dreams . You see , at the time , I was working on the v3.0.0 update for the game. This was Very Very late in development , before i even Planned there being a Newgrounds version (and before ninjamuffin convinced me to Make the newgrounds version LOL !!). Anyways. for so long , iwas disappointed that i didnt get to make a whole lot of original characters for the game .Most of the characters were either Enemies or Bosses. there was Barely any NPCs (aside from the guest character apperances).

i Also Realized: Chaotic Carnival , one of the most Important levels in the game , needed More love . So. I decided i was going to make new NPCs just for it , so that the level could feel even More alive and lived in. And that's when i created the Silly Trio , which started with Millie.

As for Millie's design , there isn't much for me to say. he is perfect. i love him and he is one of my favorite things ive designed. Yes , it Is self indulgent . Yes , i Do Want Him Carnally . teehee. Anyways , after designing Millie , i knew i had to design more characters .. which leads me to..

Goldian and Ellie

Goldian is a tall , polygonal magician man. He is in love with Millie. They are canonically dating.

Ellie is a bunny-like clown girl. She likes to entertain people with magic. I think she might be asexual , but i wasnt very sure when i created her.

Anyways. there isnt much for me to say. i Could get into some of the Character Lore perhaps . Millie , Goldian , and Ellie are all characters with troubled pasts.. they all had to run away from their homes due to circumstances , and they managed to find the mythical Chaotic Carnival, where they all met and decided to become entertainers. It gives them purpose , to see people happy. And they work under the Magik Master , a strange magician who has the ability to bend reality at will. They're all like a sort of Found Family .

that's all ill say about them. theres so much more i want to do with them in the future... i love these characters so much. theyre my favorite designs ever.

Oh ! Iforgot to mention . these characters (including millie) names also suck LOL ! Im not good with coming up with names !! all their names i came up with at the last minute

All The Other Characters I Forgot To Mention

the magik master

nothing much to say about them. theyre one of the first bosses i created, and i Kind Of like their design still , though i might consider redoing it so it fits with the rest of The Silly Ones ..

vie

nothing much to say about Vie . she's a flower girl, who spreads flowers to every level in the game. she got the flowers from the Suzy's Greenhouse ..

Misc. Concept Art

#TreesThinks #UNITRES #UNITRES Dreams #art #artists on tumblr #character design #characterdesign #gamedev #game dev #game development #indiegame #indie game #indie dev #indiedev #indie development

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