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criminalmindzjunkie · 4 years

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The Reward of Suffering (Part Six)

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Summary: Spencer comes face to face with a ghost from the past.

A/N: Hey... how y’all doin? Long time no see, huh? Sorry about that - hopefully this extra long update will make up for my absence. This has definitely been my favorite part thus far, and I had so much fun writing it. I hope you guys enjoy reading it. You guys know the drill by now: SPOILERS for season 12. Also, shoutout to @zhuzhubii for posting the absolute best set of gifs right in time for this update - you’re the coolest.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem! Reader

Warnings: cursing, mentions of death, mentions of rape, mentions of mental illness, kidnapping, choking

Word Count: 10.3k

With every clack of my heels on the concrete floors, the nervous feeling in my gut grows into full blown nausea. It’s been nearly two months since I last walked these halls, but somehow it feels like a lifetime has passed. Considering everything that transpired in the last forty-eight hours, it makes sense that I feel that way.

I hadn’t been on the team when Lindsey Vaughn first came into the picture ten years ago, but that didn’t mean that she wasn’t familiar. At the time, I thought nothing of the kind neighbor that I sometimes passed in the stairwell on my way to Spencer’s apartment. I mean, why would I? I had no reason to be suspicious. Our interactions never went beyond the usual pleasantries – polite smiles and the occasional greeting – and I never gave her a second thought.

Maybe if I had, Cassie wouldn’t be dead, and Spencer’s mother wouldn’t be missing.

I shake my head at the thought. Now isn’t the time to ruminate on what ifs. I would have plenty of time to blame myself when all of this is over. Instead of torturing myself, I focus on trying to steady my breathing as I come to a stop just before I reach the interview room of the Milburn Correctional Facility.

I know what lies beyond that door, and I’m equal parts excited and worried. Excited, because I’d finally be able to see Spencer after two long months of daydreaming about when I’d finally hold him in my arms again. Of course, it was very possible that Spencer wouldn’t want to see me. After all, I promised to keep his mother safe, and instead of doing that, I let myself get swept up in moving in to my apartment, and now Diana was God knows where.

I was so sure that he wouldn’t want to see me that I’d initially suggested that Emily be the one to go to the prison and get him. My idea was met with a sad smile and a pat on the shoulder.

“I think that if it was anyone but you standing there when they open that door, it’d break his heart.”

Her reassurances did little to assuage my nerves. I spent the entire ride here running over every possible scenario that I could imagine, scrambling to form some kind of game plan. But now that I was here, any semblance of preparedness left me the second the guard reached for the door handle.

“You ready, ma’am?”

Yes.

No.

I don’t trust my voice, so I settle on nodding my head. The door opens with a groan, rusty hinges creaking in protest, and with shaky legs and a heart that threatens to beat out of my chest, I step into the doorway.

It’s like the world stops turning on its axis when his eyes meet mine. Those familiar pools of caramel stare back at me with such an intensity that I force myself to look away, petrified at the prospect of seeing disappointment in them.

I trail my eyes over his frame, drinking in every inch of him - every bruise and every scrape feeling like a dagger to my heart. My eyes linger on the bandage adorning his left arm, before trailing down to the one on his leg. Emily had warned me about happened, about Spencer injuring himself in order to secure his safety. It was smart of him - that I knew - but that didn’t mean that I wasn’t horrified.

His hair has gotten longer, and his curls hang limply around his face. The usually clean-shaven Spencer I once knew was a thing of the past - replaced now by a more disheveled, scruffier version.

Clean-shaven or not, he still looks just as breathtaking as always.

I hesitantly raise my eyes up to his again. He’s staring at me still, mouth parted in shock. He doesn’t look angry, just confused, and that fills me with a tiny sliver of hope.

“Hi, Spence,” I murmur, voice thick with emotion. It’s not until I speak that I realize I’m crying, and I hastily wipe at my cheeks with my shirtsleeve.

The dazed look in Spencer’s eyes washes away when he hears my voice and he blinks hard.

“What… H-How are you…?” he trails off, eyes moving up and down my body.

It feels so fucking good to hear his voice again, and I find myself unable to hold back a sob.

“M’ here to take you home,” I choke out.

It’s like all the tension in Spencer’s body is expelled at once and his shoulders slump in relief. I open my mouth to elaborate, to explain how Emily had managed to pull this off, but I’m stunned into silence when Spencer’s body collides with mine. I hadn’t even had time to process that he was moving before his arms snake around me, tugging me forward until there’s no space in between our bodies. Spencer’s hands collect fistfuls of my shirt, clinging desperately to the fabric as he nuzzles his face into the crook of my neck.

Once I get over the initial shock, I’m hugging him back, arms locked around his torso in a vicelike grip. He doesn’t smell the same – the usual fragrance of cinnamon and vanilla is long gone, replaced with that of some generic detergent – but the way his broad shoulders feel underneath my palms is something so familiar that I can’t help but smile against his chest.

This is still my Spencer.

Spencer lets out a shaky breath against my skin and I let out an involuntary shudder at the feeling.

“Missed you so fucking much,” Spencer whispers. “I-I can’t believe you’re here. Thought I was imagining it.” Spencer takes a shaky breath in, nuzzling further into my neck. His next words are muffled from the way his lips press against my skin, but I’m still able to make out the quiet ‘I’m sorry’.

“You’re sorry?” I hiccup, eyebrows scrunching up in disbelief. I attempt to pull away so that I can look at him, but Spencer only tightens his grip on me. Something about it makes my chest feel incredibly warm, but I push that feeling aside for now. “I’m the one that’s sorry. I should’ve done more – I should’ve visited more often. I let myself get busy, and if I’d just been more careful, then your m-mom… she wouldn’t be-”

“Stop that,” Spencer interrupts, and this time he’s the one that pulls away. He holds me at arm’s length and those beautiful brown eyes lock with mine. “This is absolutely not your fault.”

Spencer’s hands come up to cup either side of my face and his thumbs wipe away at the tears on my cheeks. “You’ve done so much for me – for her. I’m sorry that I took you off the list. Things were getting so bad here, and if something would have happened to you…” Spencer pauses, closing his eyes and leaning down until his forehead rests against mine. “It was never because I didn’t want to see you, I promise. And… And your letter - I can’t even begin to explain how much that helped. I’m sorry that I couldn’t write back. I didn’t know what to say. Especially not after…”

He doesn’t elaborate, but I’m able to fill in the blanks myself. I bring my hand up and rest it on top of his.

“S’okay, Spence. I know,” I whisper. “You don’t have to explain anything to me. I understand.”

Spencer hums and a ghost of a smile tugs at the corners of his lips.

“Time to get you out of here, Doc.” I remove his hand from my face and give it a reassuring squeeze. “Let’s go get your mom back.”

Spencer opens his eyes and for the first time in two months I’m on the receiving end of my favorite smile in the whole world.

I lead him from the room, never once removing my hand from his. Now that I have him back, I don’t ever want to let go.

For the second time today, the clacking of my heels against the concrete floor is the only sound that can be heard. Spencer moves silently beside me, his face pulled into a somber expression as we stalk down the long corridor. His hand brushes against mine, and I long to reach out and intertwine our fingers like I had only hours before. I suppress the urge, stealing one last, poorly concealed glance at him before I settle my gaze on the door at the end of the hall.

In the last several hours, the entire case had been flipped upside down. We’d been wrong all along – Scratch wasn’t to blame for the shit show that had transpired over the last three months. It’d been an easy enough mistake to make. After the incident with Tara’s brother, Scratch was the obvious choice. Pair that with the fact that Spencer had been drugged and we had no reason to suspect anyone else.

Cat Adams was the last thing on everyone’s mind when Mexico happened. It’d been over a year since Spencer outsmarted her in that restaurant, and she was very much out of sight and out of mind. She was in a maximum-security prison, for fuck’s sake. That alone should have rendered her unable to carry out a scheme this convoluted.

But apparently that meant nothing, because Cat had somehow managed to be the mastermind behind this whole ordeal, perfectly orchestrating the entire thing from her cell in solitary confinement – using Lindsey Vaugh as her metaphorical puppet on a string. We’d sorely underestimated Cat, and our arrogance had come back to bite us all in the ass.

A guard that stands at the end of the hall opens the door for us, and I feel an intense rush of foreboding as we step into the room. The sound of the guard closing the door behind us brings a sense of finality to the situation; there is no turning back now. Either we walk out of here knowing Diana’s whereabouts, or we miss the mark completely and loose Diana in the process.

I cast a worried look at Spencer, whose eyes are trained on the double-sided glass. The tension has returned to his shoulders, and his fists are clenched tightly at his sides. There’s a sort of fiery determination in his eyes – a sort of menacing resolve that I’d never seen in him before.

Spencer looks intimidating, and nothing like the Spencer that was led from the courtroom three months ago. I pull my eyes away in favor of looking through the glass.

Reid had been able to see through Cat’s mind games the first time, but the Cat that sat on the other side of that door is a far cry from the one he encountered a year ago. If she’d looked cold and calculating before, she looks downright deranged now.

“Are you sure you want to go in there alone?” I ask after a moment. “I could-”

“No,” Spencer cuts me off. His tone is hard and definite, warning me not to argue. “I can’t ask you to do that. Emily shouldn’t have made you come in the first place.”

“Emily told me to come with you because she knew that there was nothing she could do to make me stay.” I pause long enough to shoot him a weak smile. “Hope you enjoyed your three-month break from me, because I’m going to practically glued to your side from now on. You’ll be dying to get rid of me in a month’s time.”

Spencer’s lips twitch, threatening to turn up into a smile.

“I sincerely doubt that.”

“We’ll see,” I breeze. “But I’m serious, Spence. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll be here the whole time – I’m not letting you go in there alone, and I’m not going to leave you.”

“Promise?” Spencer asks, finally pulling his eyes away from the window in favor of looking at me. There’s a sadness in his eyes that wasn’t there before, and the weight of his gaze is so heavy that I worry I might buckle under it.

I reach for his hand and hook my pinky finger around his, lifting our intertwined hands to eye level.

“I promise.”

Spencer’s pinky finger squeezes mine and he closes his eyes.

“I don’t deserve you.”

“You deserve the world, Spence.”

For a moment I think he’s going to say something else, but then Spencer’s lips press into a tight line and he only nods in response. He releases my hand and I let it fall limply at my side. Spencer rolls his shoulders back, and that stony expression returns to his face. He reaches out and pulls open the door, and I follow closely behind him at he steps over the threshold.

It’s as if I’m invisible; Cat doesn’t even spare me a glance when I enter the room. Her eyes, narrowed and sparkling with amusement, hone in on Spencer immediately.

“Spencie,” she greets, smiling deviously up at him.

“Where’s my mother?” Spencer asks, completely devoid of emotion.

“I missed you.”

“What did you and Lindsey do to her? How did you-”

Cat raises a hand, effectively cutting him off. She points a finger at him, and the smile that she previously wore is replaced by a grimace.

“Now, stop. You don’t get to walk in here and hiss at me like I’m the criminal. No – we’re going to do this my way.” Cat kicks the chair that sits on the opposite side of the table and Spencer reaches out to grab it. “Have a seat.”

Spencer complies and Cat’s smile returns.

“How was prison? Did you like it?”

“No.”

Cat hums.

“It’s not fun, is it?”

“Unlike you, I didn’t deserve to be there,” Spencer retorts.

Cat leans forward, crossing her arms before resting them on the metal table.

“How did you stay sane? A brain like yours needs stimulation in such a gray place.”

“I worked in the laundry room and I played chess.”

“That’s three, maybe four hours, tops. What about the other twenty?”

“I read.”

Cat shakes her head. “That’s still not enough. You have to… go someplace.” She taps the side of her head. “Up here. Or else you go crazy. Do you want to see where I go? I’ll show you.” Cat crooks a finger at Spencer, and I tense at the gesture. The idea of that psychotic bitch getting any closer to him makes my skin crawl. I clench my fists together and the feeling of my nails digging into my palms is enough to ground me.

Spencer leans forward, mimicking Cat’s relaxed position. She reaches a hand out towards him, and before I can think better of it, I speak up.

“Hands off,” I warn.

Cat halts her movements and fixes me with an irritated expression, looking me up and down distastefully before turning her attention back to Spencer.

“Close your eyes,” she instructs him. Spencer complies. “Good. Now keep them closed. Sit back and relax. When you open your eyes, I want you to look at me like I’m the first woman you’ve seen after being in prison for three months.”

I clench my jaw at that. Something stirs in my chest – something foreign and possessive that has me bristling. I tense, watching closely as Spencer opens his eyes and smiles that beautiful smile at Cat. My stomach turns painfully at the sight.

“Hello, Cat,” Spencer greets her, and all the contempt his tone previously held is gone – replaced with a neutrality that bordered on happiness.

Cat lets out a pleased laugh.

“You’re here!” she exclaims, throwing her arms out as she gestures about the room. “You’re really here.”

“There is nowhere else I would rather be,” Spencer replies, sounding startlingly genuine.

This is all an act, I remind myself. Spencer’s just playing a part. None of this is real.

Cat crosses her arms and raises an eyebrow at him.

“You’re good at this. You’re so good at this that I almost believe that you don’t want to kill me.”

“I don’t want to kill you,” Spencer says with a shake of his head.

“No?”

“No.”

Cat narrows her eyes at him.

“What if I let your mother die?” she inquires. “Then would you kill me? Or would you just…” Cat trails of as she leans forward. “… Hurt me? Would you pin me down and leave bruises that don’t go away?”

I swallow hard against the bile that threatens to crawl its way up my throat. Spencer might not want to kill her, but I do.

“Is that what you want?”

Cat shrugs her shoulders.

“I guess I just want to know if you would – if you could.”

Spencer gives a small shake of his head.

“No.”

“No?” Cat taunts, cocking her head to the side.

“It’s not the kind of man I am.”

Cat’s face drops and her eyes narrow into slits.

“Do me a favor and tell your little chaperone over there to step aside, because we’re going to play another game. And this time, we’re going to find out exactly what kind of man you are.”

Spencer’s eyes flit to me and he nods towards the door. I open my mouth to argue, but the pleading look in his eyes has me clamping it shut. It’s okay, his eyes seem to tell me. I know you promised, but I’ll be fine.

Cat waves at me as I reluctantly move towards the door. When the door clicks shut behind me, Spencer takes it as his invitation to continue.

“Let’s play,” his voice sounds through the speaker to my left.

“Let’s!” Cat exclaims before resting her head in her hand.

“So, is it the same game as last time?” Spencer inquires. “I answer every question you ask honestly?”

“No,” Cat sighs out. “This time you get to ask the questions.”

Spencer raises an eyebrow at her. “About what?”

“Well, I know a secret about you. And you can ask me as many questions as you like to figure it out. But you only get one guess as to what it is. If you guess correctly, I take your phone, I call our friend Lindsey, and I tell her to release your dear mother unharmed. If you don’t…” Cat trails off, before mimicking bringing a gun up to her mouth and firing.

Crazy fucking bitch.

“Is there a clock?”

“There’s always a clock.” Cat holds out her hand, eyes flicking down to Spencer’s watch. “Give it to me.”

I cringe when Spencer hesitates – I know what he must be thinking. That’s Gideon’s watch. The only thing he has left of him. I’d never seen Spencer without it in the two years I’ve known him.

Spencer reluctantly slips the watch off of his wrist and hands it over.

Cat smirks and slides the watch onto her arm.

“Now, you’ll have four hours.”

“Do you want to give me a hint before we start?”

Cat chuckles. “Do I look like a girl that gives hints?” “Actually, you do.”

Cat takes pause, looking Spencer up and down before speaking.

“Okay, how about this; it’s a secret you’ll never admit to.”

“I know what the secret is.”

Cat quirks an eyebrow up at Spencer.

“You do?”

He nods. “Why else would you put me through all this?”

“Ooh, phrasing it in the form of a question that way it doesn’t count as a guess. Very smart, Doctor.”

“I’m gonna walk you through a scenario, and your face is going to tell me how close I am,” Spencer murmurs, an amused smile on his lips. He leans forward to rest his elbows on the table. “From the moment I arrested you, you watched and waited for the right time to take your revenge. When you learned I was going to Mexico, you took it. You and Lindsey framed me for murder so I’d be put in a prison and treated like a criminal, and then you kidnapped my mother so I would know how it feels to have a parent manipulated, because you want to prove that you and I are the same. Am I right?”

Cat feigns a yawn in response.

“Mm. Sorry, I couldn’t hold that in any longer. What were you saying?”

“Psychopaths tend to get bored easily.”

“You’re right. Let’s speed this up,” Cat sighs with a roll of her eyes. She pushes away from the table, standing up and walking over to Spencer’s side of the table. I fight the urge to barge in when I see her take a seat on his lap. Cat runs a hand down Spencer’s chest before she continues. “Shall we? What do you think about all the pain you’ve suffered in your life? What would I capitalize on, do you think? Is it… the death of your mentor, SSA Jason Gideon?”

I can see the way Spencer’s jaw clenches and it makes my heart lurch painfully in my chest.

“No, because we caught the man who killed him.”

“What about Agent Morgan and your guilt over not visiting his little boy?” Cat whispers in his ear as her hands fiddle with the collar of his suit.

“I was in prison.”

“Yeah, but you had time before that. Why didn’t you go?” she presses as she grazes her nails down the length of his throat. I see red when her hand loosely circles around his neck. Spencer absolutely loathes being touched by anyone other than those closest to him, and I’ve no doubt that he’s horribly uncomfortable.

“Truthfully, I got distracted. I was trying to figure out a way to help my mom. She didn’t have time. Morgan, Savannah, and little Bobby did. So, there’s absolutely no shame in admitting that. Morgan would understand.”

“I agree. That’s why that’s not the secret,” Cat divulges, brushing her nose against the side of his face before pulling away and standing up. I let out the breath that I’d apparently been holding and allow myself a moment to run a shaky hand through my hair. If I was getting this frazzled from being a bystander to this conversation, I can only imagine how Spencer must be feeling.

When I look back up at the mirror, Spencer’s looking over his shoulder at me through the glass. I know he can’t see me, but I can’t help but feel guilty for losing my cool.

“Good job, Spence,” I murmur to myself as I pull out my phone. After a few rings, Rossie answers.

“Go ahead, Y/N. You’re on speaker.”

“Cat has an extremely deep background on Spencer. She knows about everything – Gideon’s death, Derek leaving the team, his mom’s condition,” I inform them, tapping my foot nervously against the concrete.

“She’s throwing him off-balance.”

“Yes, but Spencer also purposefully gave the wrong name of Derek’s son and she didn’t correct him,” I point out.

“She must’ve gotten her hands on Reid’s confidential FBI file,” Emily chimes in. “It would mention pertinent team information but it wouldn’t name Morgan’s son for confidentiality reasons.”

“We were thinking she’s been getting help from someone inside the prison. This goes deeper than that,” Rossi sighs.

“Call us if she says anything else of any importance,” Emily signs off. I mumble a quick goodbye before pocketing my phone and turning my attention back to the window.

“Working deductively, the secret wouldn’t be any of the topics you’ve already volunteered, because you wouldn’t want to make it easy on me,” Spencer reasons. He clasps his hands together and sits back in his seat before raising an eyebrow in challenge.

“Genius, truly,” Cat taunts sarcastically as she twirls the watch around her finger.

“So, what is left that I wouldn’t want to admit?” Spencer muses, eyebrows drawn together in contemplation. Cat shrugs her shoulders at him and another moment of tense silence passes.

“Love,” Spencer utters, and Cat’s incessant twirling of the watch comes to an abrupt halt.

Got her.

“Is that what this is all about – love? For my mother?” Spencer whispers, and when Cat fails to respond, he shakes his head. “No, not for her. For you. You want me to admit that I’m actually in love with you.”

Cat purses her lips together.

“Don’t get me wrong – I love my fairy tales as much as the next girl – but I’m not delusional,” Cat says as she crosses her arms.

“Are you sure about that?”

“Very sure. So sure, in fact, that I had Lindsey leave a clue for you in that little scrapbook in your apartment.”

I scrunch my face up at that. The clue in question had been a message inscribed on the back of an old photograph;xx-xy. We’d originally deduced that the message, the female and male chromosomes, was to confirm that Lindsey was working with Scratch. But now? Now I didn’t have a clue what Cat was talking about.

“I couldn’t have you come all the way down here and make a guess until I was positive. That is…” Cat pauses for dramatic effect, a sly smile on her lips. “… until I tested positive.” Cat punctuates her words by placing both hands on her stomach, and the action makes me raise a hand up to my mouth in shock.

No. There’s no fucking way.

“What, you’re pregnant?” Spencer asks, confused.

“No, we’re pregnant.”

I feel my knees buckle upon hearing the admission and I blindly reach for the chair to my left.

This cannot be happening.

“No,” Spencer says, shaking his head adamantly.

“Oh, yes,” Cat replies. “Mazel tov.”

“Here you are, ma’am.”

I reach for the file, my movements stilted and awkward.

“Thank you,” I mumble to the guard, who gives me a peculiar look before leaving the room. I waste no time in flipping through the file, heart pounding wildly in my chest as my eyes skim over the page until –

Positive.

I slam the file down on the table.

“Fuck!” I yell out in frustration. I’m thankful then for the thick, concrete walls, because neither Spencer nor Cat show any sign of having heard my little outburst. I place both palms down on the cool metal of the table, my breaths coming out in haggard puffs as I try to rationalize it all.

“- not possible,” Spencer’s voice coming through the speaker snaps me out of my thoughts. I cut my eyes to the window to find Spencer pacing the room. “Even if you are pregnant, the baby’s not mine.” Spencer comes to a stop behind his chair and shoves his hands in his pockets.

“Except for the part where it is.”

“That’s completely preposterous. You’ve been in prison,” Spencer points out as he once again takes a seat across from her.

“So have you.”

“And we’ve never-”

“I know. We’ve never…” Cat trails off with a suggestive waggle of her brows. “Ask me how I did it. Come on, ask me.”

Spencer rolls his eyes, but he indulges her nonetheless.

“How did you do it?”

“I had Lindsey dose you in Mexico. You lost time. And I gave her very specific instruction on how to get you in the mood,” Cat admits.

“What?” Spencer snorts cynically. “Did she pretend to be you?”

“Why, would that have worked?”

Spencer leans forward and shoots Cat a cruel kind of smile.

“No.”

For a split second Cat’s face falls, but only for a moment and then she goes right back to smiling that wretched grin.

“Yeah, I know, I know. Believe me, I know exactly where I stand on the Spencer Reid hot or not list,” Cat sighs. “So, ask me again.”

“How did you do it?”

“I told her to pretend to be Y/N.”

For a second I think that I misheard her – the blood rushing in my ears almost overpowered her admission – but the way Spencer’s entire body tenses before he looks back at the window tells me that I didn’t.

Why me?

Spencer gulps hard before he turns back around. I find my way to the chair nearest me and collapse into it.

“How do you know about her?”

Cat gives him an unimpressed look.

“It wasn’t hard, seeing as she’s your very best friend in the whole wide world,” Cat teases as her eyes wander from Spencer to the glass behind him. She waves at me, endlessly amused, before turning her attention back to Spencer. “But that isn’t all that she is to you – is it Spencie? At least, Lindsey didn’t think so. At first, she thought the two of you were tangled up in some kind of sexy little tryst. But then I had Lindsey do a little digging, and, well, that’s when we found out about the boyfriend.”

“Stop.”

“Oh, it seems I’ve struck a nerve!” Cat trills gleefully. “Shall we call her in here to join us? I know she’s just on the other side of that glass. I’m sure she’d love to hear all about how pathetic little Spencer Reid pines after her like a school boy with a crush.” She pouts her bottom lip out in mock sadness. “There’s just something about unrequited love that really tugs at my heart strings.”

Oh.

For the second time since arriving here, my hand comes up to cover my mouth as I struggle to process Cat’s words. She can’t be right, can she? Spencer had never done anything that eluded to him seeing me as any more than a best friend. Perhaps she got it wrong. Lindsey saw me come and go and she just assumed it was something that it wasn’t. There was no way that Spencer -

“I said stop.”

The underlying plea in his voice is enough to make tears well in my eyes. If what Cat is saying is true, that means that Lindsey . . .

“All it took was Lindsey saying she was Y/N for you to crumble like a house of cards. You really made it too easy.”

“You’re lying.”

Cat chuckles. “Listen to you, you’re not even trying to deny it.”

“It didn’t happen,” Spencer argues, voice so quiet that I have to strain to hear it.

“Hey, I was thinking, if it’s a boy, we should definitely call him Spencie Jr.”

Spencer pushes back from the table so abruptly that both Cat and I flinch, and he’s almost out the door when Cat delivers one final dig.

“-But if it’s a girl, I think we should call her Y/N. I mean after all; she played such a huge role in in her own conception!”

The sound of the door slamming behind him as he trudges into the room is enough to make me bolt up from my seat. Spencer comes to a stop at the center of the room, eyes wide and full of remorse as he looks over at me.

“I-I… I’m…”

I try my best to muster up a smile but I worry that it comes out more as a grimace.

“Later,” I murmur, and Spencer winces before nodding his head in defeat. I walk over to the table and open up the file. “She’s not lying about being pregnant.”

Spencer joins me at the table, eyes skimming over the document.

“She’s three months, and the timeline matches, but that doesn’t mean-”

Spencer yanks the file off the table and hurls it at the window, shoulders rising and falling rapidly as he runs a hand through his disheveled hair.

I take a step back and Spencer curses under his breath.

“I’m sorry. It’s not you,” he sighs. “I just… need a minute.”

I press my lips together and nod.

“Take all the time you need. M’gonna go call Emily,” I murmur.

Spencer closes his eyes and lets his head hang low.

“Yeah, okay,” he whispers dejectedly, and the despair in his voice is enough to stop me in my tracks.

“Spence?” I call out. He looks up at me from underneath his lashes, more than a little bit timid and scared. “I’ll be right back, okay? I’m not leaving you.”

I open the door and step out of the room, but it doesn’t close before I hear the quiet ‘thank you’ drift from within.

Spencer waits until the door clicks shut behind her to push away from the table and head back into the interrogation room. He couldn’t bear the thought of her overhearing any more than she already had. As far as Spencer was concerned, Cat had just singlehandedly ruined the one good thing he had going for him, and at this point, he had nothing left to lose.

“Let’s pretend you’re telling the truth,” Spencer starts. “That means I guessed it, right? The secret, the one I don’t want to admit to? It’s my child?”

Cat looks up at him with bored eyes and Spencer feels his unease begin to give way to rage.

“Is that your guess?” Cat asks. “You only get one, remember?”

Spencer takes pause, before shaking his head.

“No. It’s too easy,” he decides.

“Believe me, getting pregnant with your baby was not easy,” Cat mutters, and Spencer’s lips press into a tight line. The implication of it is enough to make his skin crawl. He feels violated and absolutely disgusted, but still he tries to school his impression into one of indifference. Spencer thinks about his mom, scared and confused, and that’s enough incentive to make him focus on the task at hand.

“You misunderstand. It’s too easy emotionally,” Spencer explains in a clipped tone as he sits down. “Because I can take your child from you. The child I had absolutely no role in creating, but a child that I would care for better than you.”

“That’s rude,” Cat seethes as she slowly lifts her head from off of the table.

“It’s true. You can’t be a mother, Cat. I’m not trying to insult you – it’s your psychological makeup. You literally do not have the emotional skills to care for another human being. You’d lose interest in your own baby the way a six-year-old loses interest in a pet hamster. This baby is simply a means to an end, which is to keep me here and playing your game, guessing like a fool and assuming something that I never should have assumed in the first place.”

“And what would that be?”

“My mother’s already dead,” Spencer says, and the words taste positively foul in his mouth. “She was dead before I walked in here”

Cat’s lips pull into a frown.

“She’s not dead-”

“Yes, she is,” Spencer reiterates as he rises from his chair.

“No, because that would be cheating and I don’t cheat. You cheat!” Cat panics, voice growing louder the closer Spencer gets to the door.

“I’m done playing,” Spencer says as he turns away, reaching for the door knob.

“Get back here!”

Spencer pulls the door open. “Goodbye, Cat.”

He has one foot out the door when;

“I’ll let you talk to her!” Cat yells out as she slams her fist down on the table.

Spencer lifts his eyes up from their spot on the floor, and it’s with a jolt of surprise that his eyes meet Y/N’s. It feels to him like it always does when he sees her – like some great relief that floods through his entire body in an instant. He feels guilty for it, now that she knows, but that doesn’t stop him from basking in it. The feeling grows when a triumphant smile graces her lips, one that says you’ve got her, Spence. You’ve got her right where you want her.

Spencer is positively rejuvenated by that smile.

He reluctantly pulls his gaze away from her and focuses back on Cat. He’s come too far now to fuck it all up.

Spencer pulls his phone from the depths of his suit pocket and hands it to Cat. He watches on as she dials the number, and his heart beats so fast that he wonders if she can hear it. The sound of the dial tone ringing fills the room, and Spencer can only hope that the call will be long enough for Penelope to trace.

“You’re early,” a voice that’s unmistakably Lindsey’s calls out. Spencer lets out a shaky breath of relief.

“Yeah, I know.”

“Did he guess?”

“No, not yet,” Cat sighs. “We need proof of life.”

“All right, hold on,” Lindsey says, exasperated, and her words are followed by several seconds of muffled rustling and what Spencer deems as some sort of liquid being poured.

“Spencer!”

His heart practically bursts out of his chest as he lunges forward, yanking the phone out of Cat’s hand and bringing it up to his ear.

“Mom - mom, are you okay?”

“I don’t… know-”

Spencer opens his mouth to reply when the gut-wrenching sound of an explosion rips through the tiny phone speakers, distorted and so loud that it makes Spencer’s ears ring.

“Mom!” Spencer desperately yells into the phone, but all he gets in reply is a ‘gotta go’ from Lindsey before the line goes dead. Spencer growls out a string of swears, throwing his phone down on the table before leaning over the table.

“What the hell was that?” he yells, and he’s vaguely aware of the sound of the door opening, but he can’t focus on anything other than his own rising panic.

“I don’t know,” Cat replies, opening her mouth to continue but Spencer cuts her off.

“Lindsey said you were early. Was that a signal?” he bellows.

“Spence, come on,” Y/N tries to interject. Spencer feels her hand on his shoulder but he shrugs it off before bringing his fist down on the table.

“Was that a prearranged signal to kill my mother?!” Spencer snarls, eyes wide and teeth barred. He feels positively feral, images of his mother in all sorts of terrible states of distress flashing through his mind like some grotesque picture show. “Tell me the truth!”

“No! I am!” Cat shouts back.

“Tell me the truth!”

“I am!” Cat spits out, eyes flashing angrily. “You wanna know the truth? Your mother is an Alzheimer’s-ridden moron who’s getting dumber by the day and if she’s dead, it’s your fault!”

Something comes over Spencer then, and in an instant, he’s shoving the table out of the way and pushing Cat against the wall. His hands find purchase on her throat, not dissimilar to how hers had on his hours before, but instead of dragging his fingers against her neck, Spencer’s clamping down on it as hard as he can, taking great pleasure in the way she gasps for air as his hands tighten. Everything around him fades away until all that he can focus on is that way that her pulse feels under his hands – the way it starts off strong, before tapering, slower and slower until he can barely even palpate it anymore.

“I’m going to kill you,” Spencer hears himself whisper as he presses down hard on her windpipe. “M’gonna fucking kill you.”

Cat’s eyes are fluttering closed now, and Spencer shouldn’t enjoy the way the light in her eyes starts to dim. He shouldn’t but he does – in fact, it prompts him to press harder and harder and –

A harsh yank pulls Spencer away from Cat, and as soon as his hands begin to loosen Cat splutters in an attempt to catch her breath.

“Spencer, she is pregnant,” Y/N yells in his ear, and just like that his tunnel vison fades away and Spencer feels the adrenaline leave his body. He only realizes that his hands are still on Cat’s throat when Y/N yanks at his arms again. “Fucking let her go, Spencer!”

His entire body goes limp and he allows himself to be drug away from Cat and out of the room. Spencer’s heart still pounds and his blood is still roaring in his ears, but the satisfaction has given away to shame. He steals a glance at cat as he’s being pulled from the room, and despite her ruffled appearance, she’s grinning at him – smiling as if to say see? I told you that you were just like me.

Spencer stumbles into the other room, steadying himself on the wall to keep from faceplanting onto the cold hard floor. Now that the adrenaline has expelled itself from his body, he’s left shaky and panting and ashamed.

The feeling of Y/N’s eyes on him as he braces himself on the wall only exacerbates his mortification. What will she think of me now? Will she think me to be some kind of monster? Spencer wouldn’t blame her - he’s held that same opinion of himself for months now.

Spencer stands there, face turned downwards as he catches his breath, and when he can take the weight of her gaze no longer, he darts out of the room and down the corridor.

Being alone is preferable to being a disappointment, Spencer thinks as he flees the room.

It doesn’t take long for her to find him sitting in the floor, knees to his chest with his face downturned. Spencer hears her before he sees her, and he prepares himself for the yelling that’s surely to come.

She surprises him when she slides her back down the wall until she’s sitting beside him, legs sprawled out in front of her. He doesn’t look up – fearful of what he might see when he looks into those beautiful eyes of hers. There had been love there, before all of this happened. Not the kind of love that was reflected in his own, but it was love just the same and Spencer thinks that it might kill him to see that love replaced with disgust. So he doesn’t look. Instead, Spencer just sits there, slumped over and pathetic, hoping that she doesn’t pick up on the fact that his hands are shaking.

“Richmond County police just reported a gas station explosion. One victim – male. Whatever Lindsey did, we have to assume that your mom’s still alive,” Y/N murmurs. Spencer lets out a shaky breath and his grip on his knees tightens. It’s good news, and he’s grateful, but it does nothing for the overwhelming guilt that’s eating away at him.

“Hey,” she whispers when he doesn’t reply. “Can you look at me, Spence? Wanna see those pretty brown eyes. Please?”

Spencer chokes down the sob that threatens to come out. He shakes his head.

“I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened in there. That… That’s not me. At least, I don’t want it to be,” Spencer whispers. “Emily should’ve sent someone else with me. I never wanted you to see me like that.”

Her small, incredibly soft hand comes to rest on his own and Spencer closes his eyes at the feeling. Y/N flips his hand over and intertwines their fingers and Spencer can’t help but think that’s she’s showing him way more kindness than he could ever deserve. But he’s selfish, unable to deny himself of the feeling of her hand in his, so he clings onto her hand for dear life.

“I’m so scared that this is who I am now,” Spencer mumbles, prompting her grip on his hand to tighten.

“No, Spence. Don’t say that,” she chastises him. “You’re the best guy I know. Everyone has a breaking point – Cat just knows how to bring you to yours, is all.”

“You… You don’t know…” Spencer trails off, still unwilling to look her in the eye.

“I do know, Spence. I may not have been able to visit, but I asked about you every day,” she says as she shuffles closer to him. Spencer can smell her perfume now, subtle and sweet and comforting. “I know that two inmates, Frazier and Duerson, killed your friend in front of you. I know that they wanted you to move heroin for them, and I also know that if you didn’t, you would’ve been next. Anyone in your spot would’ve done the same.”

“You wouldn’t have.”

“Hell yes, I would have,” Y/N persists, and Spencer can’t help but to look up at her from behind where his unruly curls fall into his face. “I would have, Spence. If someone was threatening my life, you bet your ass I would have done the same thing. It doesn’t make you a bad person – doing whatever it takes to survive does not make you a bad person.”

She must pick up on the hesitancy that lingers in Spencer’s eyes, because she decides to continue.

“You know who does think like that? That – that in you doing what you had to do in order to survive somehow makes you a psychopath?” Y/N pauses long enough to point her thumb towards the direction of the interview room. “She does.”

Spencer watches the realization wash over her face, and for a split second he’s terribly confused. It isn’t until a ghost of a smile pulls at her lips that he catches on, and when he does, he has to stop himself from doing something terribly stupid like kissing her.

“She does,” Y/N reiterates when she sees that Spencer finally caught on. “Because she knows.”

“That’s the secret,” Spencer thinks aloud. He pushes himself to his feet and begins to pace down the corridor. “The one that I don’t want to admit about myself.”

“Hold up, Spence. Let’s talk through this, because she will not lose to you twice. She already said that this wasn’t about the two of you being the same.”

Spencer scratches the back of his next, nodding to himself.

“Then she’s all about the game. She thinks that I cheated the last time because I lied about her dad, so it’s integral that she beats me by following the rules.”

“But, Spence, she’s the one that makes the rules. She can change them to ensure that she wins.”

“-Which means that I’m locked in-”

“Like she is.”

“She needs me locked in, playing by her rules, a game I can’t win, so she-” Spencer pauses then, and an actual, honest to God smile creeps its way across his face – the kind of smile that was only reserved for Y/N. “I got it.”

Spencer doesn’t elaborate, because he doesn’t need to. He can tell with one look that she understands, because somehow, she always does. Spencer offers her a hand and hoists her to her feet.

Spencer almost laughs as the two of them step back into the room. Of course, she would be the one to figure it out. It seems like she’s always saving him, these days.

“Guess that’s one way to get you to put your hands on me.”

Spencer feels a twinge of guilt, but he pushes it to the back of his mind as he holds a hand out to Cat.

“Dance with me.”

Cat lifts an eyebrow at him.

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want the people watching to hear what I’m about to say.”

Cat is still suspicious, but she takes his hand and lets him pull her to her feet anyways. Spencer puts his arms around her and the two of them begin to sway back and forth. Spencer suppresses the urge to pull away when her hand lowers and intertwines with his own. It’s rough and calloused and cold – a direct contradiction of Y/N’s – and Spencer positively loathes it.

“You had eyes on me while I was in prison, didn’t you?”

“Spencie, don’t ruin the moment,” Cat groans.

“I don’t want to, but I’m on the clock. Answer my question, am I right?” Cat places her head on Spencer’s chest, her hair smelling of some generic bar of soap, and Spencer wishes more than anything that he was smelling the familiar notes of honeysuckle and vanilla instead.

“Yes, you’re right. I wanted to make sure things were just as uncomfortable for you as they were for me.”

“That’s how you timed everything so perfectly. Like sending my mom and Lindsey to visit me when I thought I was at my lowest.”

This piques Cat’s interest and she lifts her head up until her eyes meet Spencer’s.

“Thought? You’re sure you weren’t?”

“No, I wasn’t. Because I didn’t feel bad – I felt scared at how much I enjoyed poisoning the other prisoners. I had a hundred ways of getting myself out of that situation, and I picked the one that would cause them the most pain.”

“Well, look at that,” Cat hums. “You might end up saving your mother’s life after all.”

A moment of silence passes as Spencer contemplates his next move. Before he can get the words out, Cat breaks the silence.

“They won’t get there in time. They must be on their way, right? Your team is too good to wait around, but you know me. I always have a contingency plan,” Cat murmurs, hands dipping under Reid’s suit jacket. She rubs her palms across his chest in slow circles and Spencer tries hard not to squirm. “They’re walking into a trap, and the only way out is if you give me your phone and you guess – right now.”

Cat removes her hands from Spencer’s chest, crossing her arms and fixing him with a pointed look. Spencer reaches down and pulls the phone from his pocket, passing it to Cat who wastes no time in taking a seat at the table once more.

Spencer’s skin tingles, half from anticipation, half from fear. They’ve come too far for him to misstep. He thinks of his mother – of how the next two minutes will determine her fate, and Spencer clenches his hands into fists at his sides.

Here comes the moment of truth.

“When we first sat down, you said you were going to show me what kind of man I am. And you have.”

“Every time I dial a number, you’re getting warmer.”

“At first, I was furious, because the secret had to be the baby inside you. How could it be anything else? But then I realized that somehow, you knew I liked hurting those men.” Cat dials another number, prompting Spencer to continue. “Now, I know it’s both things.”

“So, which is it, Spencie? Come on, don’t fumble it now. You’re at the one-yard line.”

“You’re not pregnant with my child. You got pregnant with Wilkins to put me in as compromised a position as possible. But it should be mine – I wish it were mine. Because you and I… we deserve each other. That is the real secret.”

By the time Spencer finishes speaking, tears are steady falling down Cat’s cheeks. With a shaky hand she presses the call button, and Spencer watches on with bated breath as the phone rings.

“Kill her.”

When Cat receives no reply, she pushes out of her seat and begins to pace around the room. “Lindsey, I said kill her.”

“You bitch,” Lindsey curses, sounding positively heartbroken in the way only a jilted loved could. “You’re pregnant?”

“Lindsey, sweetheart, it’s complicated, okay?”

“No, it’s not,” Lindsey whispers, and then the sound of the dial tone is all that’s left.

Not a second later, Y/N bursts through the door; the figurative light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.

“We’re clear.”

Spencer snatches his phone from Cat’s hand before turning to face Y/N.

“Is my mom okay?”

“Yeah. She’s fine.”

“We do deserve each other, by the way,” Cat calls out, prompting Spencer to pivot and face her. She slides back into the seat and shrugs her shoulders. “You guessed right.”

Spencer falters for a moment, but then a voice in his head is reminding him that he deserves the world. And that voice sounds a lot like Y/N.

“You lied, by the way. You were going to kill my mother regardless.”

“Yeah, I think you really liked hurting those men. Once you cross that line, you can’t ever go back. And you’ll never get her to love you, either. You and I are too fucked up to be loved.”

Spencer takes two steps forward before he bends down, reaching out and clutching Cat’s forearm in a tight grip. Without breaking eye contact, he slides his watch off her wrist and back on to his own.

“Watch me,” Spencer whispers, and without so much as a parting glance at the broken women sitting at the table, Spencer walks towards the light.

The elevator ride up to the bullpen is a quiet one, not unlike the jet ride before it. I had about a million questions that I was dying to ask, but I thought it best to let Spencer stew in silence. The poor guy had been through enough in the last twenty-four hours – he didn’t need me hounding him on top of all of that. Besides, I wasn’t entirely sure where to start in the first place.

So, Spence – how was prison?

I heard you got the shit kicked out of you. How interesting, so did I! Wanna trade war stories?

I hate to put you on the spot like this, but was that little tidbit about you being hopelessly in love with me true? Just curious.

As wonderful as all of those conversation starters were, I didn’t really think that now was the time to breech any of the aforementioned subjects. So, instead, Spencer and I communicated in stolen glances and shy smiles, and that more than sufficed for the time being. We had all the time in the world to talk later - there was no need to rush.

I can practically feel Spencer shaking with anticipation when the elevator ride comes to a close, and the two of us share one last, longing glance before the doors open and Spencer steps out and into the arms of his mother.

There’s not a dry eye in the house when Spencer and his mother reunite, and it takes Emily ushering us all away to keep us all from devolving into sniveling messes right in front of the elevator. We all scatter about the bullpen, and after a quick trip to the bathroom I meander to Emily’s office.

“Derek Morgan – you are a sight for sore eyes,” I whistle as I walk into the room, not stopping until I’m pressed up against two-hundred pounds of rock-hard abs.

“Ah, little bit. I sure have missed you,” Derek laughs as he presses a kiss to the top of my head.

“To what do we owe the pleasure? I’d be hard pressed to believe that you just decided to drop in at three o’clock in the morning.”

Derek lets out a sigh and the smile drops from his face.

“I wish I was just here to say hello, but we may have bigger problems. I got a text from Penelope saying that Reid was out of prison and that he wanted to see me. And that he was staying in an FBI safehouse where he was putting his mother up for the night.”

I cast a glance at Emily, who shakes her head.

“I didn’t approve of that,” she explains, and just like that, a weary feeling settles over everyone in the room.

“I think we all know what this sounds like,” Derek says.

“A trap.”

“I know we’re all tired, but we may have a new lead on Scratch.”

“Somebody did a bang-up job of cloning my cellphone to send Morgan a text luring him to a nonexistent safehouse. And whoever that somebody is has mad skills,” Penelope explains.

“The kind of skills Scratch has,” Stephen mutters, earning a round of murmured agreeances.

“Were you able to trace where the hack came from?” Luke inquires, earning an affronted glare from Penelope. She shakes her head at him before turning to Derek, who’s watching on with a shit-eating grin on his face.

“Do you see what I have to put up with?”

Derek chuckles and gives Luke a pointed look.

“Alvez, you’ll always get a location with this one.” Derek reaches forward and rubs Penelope’s shoulder, and it’s impossible to miss the way Luke’s eyes zero in on it.

“Down boy,” I whisper at him. “Green isn’t your color.”

“Shut up.”

I roll my eyes good-naturedly before turning my attention back to Emily.

“Obviously, Morgan can’t come with us. He’s a civilian now.”

“We’ll miss you out there,” JJ chimes in.

“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss it out there in the field with you guys. I think about it every day. But between my old friends and my new friends, you guys are gonna go out there, you’re gonna handle your business, you’re gonna make people feel safe, and then you’re gonna go home. And that’s all that matters.”

“Civilian life has turned you into a sap,” I tease.

“Is it just me, or has this one gotten mouthier since I left?”

Penelope pats him on the arm.

“Someone had to fill the silence.”

After everyone has the opportunity to tell Derek their goodbyes, it’s a mad dash to get everything we need to roll out. I pull my hair into a ponytail and shuck off my blazer, only to replace it with my Kevlar. I’m in the middle of securing the last strap as I hurry down the hall when I come in harsh contact with the front of someone’s chest.

But it’s not just someone – it’s Spencer.

“I thought you left already?”

Spencer lets out a strained chuckle.

“Uh, yeah. I was on the way out when Penelope texted and said Derek was here. Mom’s sitting with Anderson while I go talk to him.”

I nod in understanding.

“Good ole Anderson,” I manage to say, trying hard not to cringe at my awkward choice of words.

“Yeah,” Spencer mutters, shuffling his feet as he looks anywhere other than my face. “There’s a case, I’m assuming?” he says, gesturing to my vest.

“We think we have a lead on Scratch, actually.”

Now, that gets Spencer’s attention. His eyes finally settle on me, and his brows furrow.

“Why didn’t anyone tell me? I need to go with you-” Spencer makes a move to brush past me, put I stop him with a hand on his chest.

“Back it up, Spence. There’s absolutely no way Prentiss will sign off on that, and even if she did, I’m still saying no.”

“And I’m supposed to listen to you?” Spencer tries to keep his face neutral, but his lips twitch as he fights back a smile.

“Mm. What I say goes, and I say that you need to go home and not even think about work for at least a month. You certainly could use the break.”

“A whole month, huh?”

I nod, looking up at him with a faux serious expression.

“I better not see you around here for at least that long, or there will be repercussions.”

Spencer finally does smile at that, and I can practically see the way he’s mulling over his next move in his head.

“Does… Does that prohibition extend only to the work place?”

I tilt my head to the side.

“I’m lost.”

Spencer scrunches his nose up and his eyes dart across the hall before eventually settling back on me.

“It’s just that, well, I don’t really know where this leaves us. Will I still see you outside of work, or is that all messed up now?”

“Why would that be messed up?”

Spencer closes his eyes and he lets out a haggard breath.

“Are you really gonna make me say it?”

Even though he can’t see me, I smile up at him anyways.

“On any other day I absolutely would, but things are a little… hectic right now. How about we put a pin in this conversation until things slow down a bit?”

Spencer slowly opens his eyes and they roam over my face, searching.

“You’re not uncomfortable? Considering everything that, uh, she said about me? Especially the part that pertained to you?” Spencer asks, meek and unsure.

I shake my head.

“I think you’ll find that I am very much the opposite of uncomfortable,” I reply. We stand there for a moment longer, just basking in the fact that after three long, miserable months, we’re finally together again.

Spencer opens his mouth to say something, only to be cut off by Emily calling my name from further down the hall.

“Duty calls,” I chuckle, pulling away from Spencer. “Tell you mom I said hi, and I’ll be by to visit once you have time to get settled in,” I call over my shoulder.

I make it a good ten feet down the hall before Spencer’s tugging at my hand and pulling me flush against his chest. He hesitates for a moment, and a flash of uncertainty clouds his eyes, but then he’s pushing it down and pressing his lips to mine.

Spencer’s lips are slightly chapped, but so, so warm as they move against mine. My response is instantaneous – I don’t hesitate for a second before I’m kissing back. The kiss is slow and tentative, as gentle and tender as it is intoxicating. It’s everything that a kiss should be and it ignites a fire in me that has me grasping at Spencer’s shirt, desperate for more. The hand that isn’t cupping the side of my face presses firmly against the small of my back, urging me forward until absolutely no space is left between us.

Every drag of his lips against mine acts as gasoline to a flame, and I can’t help but think that Ray Bradbury said it best. It is a pleasure to burn.

I’m the first to pull away, but it isn’t because I want to. What I want is to stay just like this – entangled in Spencer Reid – until not an inch of our bodies lay unexplored by the other. But when Emily calls out my name yet again, I force myself to stop.

“I really need to go,” I murmur regretfully, and Spencer nods.

“Yeah, I know.”

But that doesn’t stop him from going in for one last, delicious kiss. This time when we break away, it’s his doing. I don’t have the self restraint to pull away twice.

“Pinky promise you’ll come back to me in one piece?” Spencer says as he lifts his pinky finger up in offering. I link mine with his, and I smile a dopey grin at him.

“Of course, I will,” I reply. “After all, you and I are due for one hell of a conversation.”

I shoot him a wink before I’m running down the hall and slipping into the elevator just before the doors close. My teammates all shoot me curious looks, but I pretend like I don’t see and I lean against the wall, trying and failing to slow the rapid beating of my heart.

It’s Stephen who approaches me when we all file out of the elevator and into the parking garage.

“Spencer Reid wouldn’t have anything to do with that love-sick look on your face, would he?”

I attempt to school my expression, but one pointed look from Stephen has me devolving into a fit of giggles like I’m a goddamn school girl.

“Possibly.”

“Possibly my ass. When we get done with this case, I expect a full explanation,” Stephen chuckles as he climbs in the back of the SUV.

“You gossip like a teenager, Walker,” I tease as I climb in after him.

“What can I say? You kids keep me young.”

I let out a loud laugh at that.

“Best shrink a girl could ask for.”

If suffering brings wisdom, I would wish to be less wise.

- Unknown

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writtenonreceipts · 4 years

Note

5. “You haven’t even touched your food. What’s going on?” For rowaelin, Aelin finding out she’s pregnant. It can be an au, or in their actual world. Thanks so much!

/AN: Thanks so much for the prompt, anon! This got away from me! I’m sorry? But not really, I had fun with it, even though I don’t feel like it’s my best. I’d never really thought I would write canon/post canon but here we are...enjoy my dears

It hadn’t even occurred to Aelin that anything could go wrong with the day. It was after all ten years since the war had ended. Ten years since there was even the smallest promise of peace in her home. Ten years.

It was supposed to be glorious.

Kneeling over the toilet Aelin emptied the contents of her stomach, again, and did her best to even out her breathing. If there was anything less glorious to be doing--this certainly was it.

Her Fae enhanced ears caught the sound of footsteps coming toward her. Lorcan. Quick and efficient. Grabbing a hand towel, Aelin wiped her mouth and stood. She made sure her dress was fit properly and left the bathroom. The last person she wanted seeing her so weak and vulnerable was Lord Lorcan Lochan.

Granted she could just use his full title on him and call it even.

“Aelin?” Lorcan called from the front door of her chambers.

“Come in,” she replied. She used her magic to take away the cent of vomit, but she didn’t know if it actually did anything because Lorcan’s nose twitched as he entered. “What?’

“Darrow said that it’s time,” Lorcan said. He eyed her with a frown. His dark eyes were intent and unyielding. Even after all this time she still wasn’t quite used to his silent calculations, the information he seemed to glean from a room with ease and efficiency. Aelin was suddenly grateful he had become so smitten with Elide that he’d changed his life completely. Even if he was an ass.

“As if we haven’t rehearsed this enough,” Aelin muttered. Her stomach rolled again. Damn nerves. She was a queen and had been doing quite well at it thank-you very much. There was no reason for her to feel so ill and anxious at the thought of the festivities tomorrow.

“Are you all right?” Lorcan asked. His frown deepened as he looked her over. “You don’t look well. Have you eaten today?”

“You sound like Rowan,” Aelin grumbled. She went to her armoire and found the ring Rowan had given her one year after their secret nuptials. The familiar weight on her finger, settled her somewhat. “I’m not hungry either, let's get this over with.”

She didn’t add the fact that just the thought of eating made her want to crawl back into bed. And she would be able to do just that in forty-eight hours.

The elaborate ceremony was slated to take place tomorrow evening, the exact day when the war finally ended. Apparently Aelin needed to practice walking down a straight line to the balcony that overlooked the castle courtyard. After she addressed her people she would then unveil a sculpture. She’d asked Rowan to commission the sculpture so she had no idea what it would be of, but she had to trust the buzzard to take well to the task.

When Darrow finally relented that they’d done enough preparation for the following day, Aelin excused herself to her private quarters. Lorcan following after.

“Don’t you have a wife and baby to go and se?” Aelin called over her shoulder.

“Yes, but their not as high-maintenance as you, so I think it’s alright if I’m a little late,” Lorcan replied.

When Aelin shot a glare over her shoulder at him she caught a brief smile on his lips.

She had a response perched on her lips but something else snared her attention. It was a familiar scent of pine and snow and home. Her mate.

Before explaining anything to Lorcan she sprinted the rest of the way to her rooms, flinging the doors open.

Standing in the center of her room was the one person she had been desperate to lay eyes on these past few weeks. Her husband had been travelling, preparing the outlying villages for the celebration, and bringing the commissioned statue back to Terrasan.

“Fireheart,” he said, a broad grin spreading across his face.

Aelin didn’t wait before throwing herself at him, burrowing her face in his shoulder.

Chuckling Rowan wrapped his arms around her, pulling her closer to him.

“I missed you,” she whispered. She looked up at him and giggled when he started peppering her face with kisses.

“And I you, my heart,” he said before finally pressing a long kiss to her lips. He pulled away so he could rest his forehead against her, his beautiful eyes staring right into her soul.

Aelin could have stood their for hours, days, millennia. Just this brief exchange could make up for her nausea from this morning and her anxiety about the coming day.

“I asked for our meal to be delivered here,” Rowan told her, “Elide and Lorcan will take care of the festivities for tonight.”

Aelin raised an eyebrow. “Lord Lorcan Lochan agreed to that.”

“It took bribery,” Rowan admitted.

Aelin threw her head back and laughed before leaning up on her toes to kiss her mate. She slanted her mouth eagerly over his, grateful to have him back with her. Despite the promises they’d made to each other years ago about never being apart, things had come up in their kingdom, in their world.

Rowan ran his hands down Aelin’s sides, nipping at her bottom lip.

By the time their food had arrived from the kitchen, they were free of several layers of clothing and warm with lust.

Sun was barely setting behind the mountains, casting pink and gold rays across the sky. It was this time of day that Aelin loved most. The simple beauty of the sky was enough to remind her how far they’d come.

Rowan sat across from her telling a story about the mess he and Fenrys had gotten into while trekking across the mountains just days before. Even in their other forms, they’d somehow managed to not only start an avalanche of late spring snow, but get holed up in a snow cave.

Aelin smiled as she pushed food across her plate. Her appetite hadn’t come back all day and she was swimming with nausea again, not matter how much of her own magic she tried to apply to herself. She needed to send a message to Yrene for a remedy.

“Fireheart?” Rowan asked. “You haven’t even touched your food, what’s going on?”

She looked up and shrugged. “You’re far too entertaining for your own good King.”

Rowan’s eyes narrowed. “You’re hiding something from me.”

Scoffing, Aelin cut a piece of venison just to appease him. She brought it to her lips and gave him a pointed stare, but before she could take a bite the scent of the cooked meat and spices ausulted her nose and she was up and running to the restroom before she knew what had happened.

She emptied the scant amount of food in her belly and sank back onto her knees only to find herself leaning against Rowan’s chest. One of his hand was curled in her hair to keep it pulled back while the other rested on her stomach, keeping her close to him.

His warm breath brushed against her ear. “Are you alright?”

Aelin nodded and let herself melt into her mate. “I haven’t been feeling well all day,” she admitted.

Rowan raised a hand to her forehead, her cheeks, feeling for a fever. He grunted.

“I’m fine,” Aelin insisted. She made to pull away from him but he kept her close.

“You’ve been flaring your magic lately,” he said.

“Because I’m exhausted. Planning this celebration has take too much out of me,” she said. She hated to sound the way she did, but between the vomiting and the fears about tomorrow she really didn’t feel too guilty about it. “Besides it’s probably just my--”

Aelin froze.

Her cycle.

How long had it been? Since settling into her Fae form the bleedings hadn’t come as often but they were brutal. She couldn’t remember exactly how long it had been. Three months? She couldn’t be pregnant. After all this time of trying and hoping. After losing the last pregnancy.

Aelin twisted in Rowan’s arms. He looked utterly confused as to what was going on. Couldn’t he see? Couldn’t he tell? Of course...she had been using her magic so often to keep her going throughout the day that perhaps it was masking the scent.

Tentatively, Aelin dropped the shield she’d been putting up over herself. As soon as she did, Rowan’s gaze sharpened.

“Aelin,” he whispered.

Her gaze dropped to her stomach, nothing looked different. But the more she thought about it, the more her mind flooded with emotion and she settled one hand over her belly.

Rowan dipped his nose in the crook of her neck, breathing deeply, his teeth nipping her skin gently. Aelin shivered at the contact and forced herself to look at her mate once more. She twisted enough so she could draw his chin up and look into his eyes as they knelt together.

Emotion laced Rowan’s eyes and told her all that she needed to know.

She let out a weak laugh as tears slipped down her cheeks. Rowan was quick to catch them with his lips before pressing a soft, tender kiss to each corner of her mouth.

“I’m pregnant,” Aelin said, needing to hear the words out loud.

“You’re pregnant,” Rowan confirmed.

Throwing her arms around her mate, Aelin didn’t hold back her sobs. This was beyond anything she could have ever imagined for herself. After the hell her life had been, right up until she’d met Rowan. Her grip tightened around him. He had been her saving grace. Always and forever.

She pulled back enough to look into his eyes and wipe away his own tears.

“To whatever end,” she said.

“To whatever end.”

The statue that was unveiled the next day was simple. And yet it was no less glorious. Commissioned from a woman in a small country Aelin had visited many times now. The statue was of two women, their faces blank so as to allow the viewer to see themselves there. One of the women was carved to be wearing a fine dress that flowed behind her. The other held two swords.

Two princesses, two queens, one war won.

The country of Eyllwe, Aelin decided, had a way of bringing her home.

As always thanks for reading!

tags: @tottenhamboys20 @morganofthewildfire @aelinchocolatelover @more-espresso-less-depresso-xx

#aelin and rowan #rowan whitethorn #rowaelin #rowaelin fanfic #throne of glass #answered #prompts #throne of glass fanfiction #kingdom of ash #post-canon #aelin galathynius

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animagician · 3 years

Note

Hello hello! I'm writing research paper for school about the DSMP and it's possitive effects on pop culture and people and I was wondering if I could use you as a source as someone who has gained positively throughout the rise of the DSMP's popularity and has actively benefited from its popularity (I'm ofc gonna talk about SAD-IST and Derivakat but I can only really go off my bias for them as there aren't other papers I can cite). So when life gives to lemons you make potato salad and I'm just basically going the extra mile and creating my own source to cite. If you say no, it doesn't matter all that much to me, I'll just go back to plan A but I thought of this while writing and thought it'd be a cool idea./gen

I'll ask the questions in anon because I don't want my teacher to find my Tumblr lol.

How did you get into the fandom?

You have, as if writing this, 91.6K subs on YouTube with your too video at 1.1M views by just talking about a Minecraft role play server, did you think you'd get that popular or was it more of a passion project?

What about the story or server inspires you?

Is this just a steping stone or do you think you'll continue making Minecraft centered content for a while?

Thank you for your time! ^_^

hello school is a bitch and so i am more than happy to help (if this is the person's teacher reading this i am so sorry for swearing. iw ill be continuing to do so however)

I got into the fandom via Wilbur! I'd become a fan of Soothouse just before it died (RIP) and was fairly active in the preDSMP Minecraft fandom, watching HermitCraft and nothing else. Then, as my interest in Minecraft gradually waned, Wilbur started to make Minecraft videos again (though I confess, I wasn't around for the EARLY early stuff), and this reignited my interest in the fandom. Wilbur led to Tommy, Techno had always been an interest of mine though (as I said) Minecraft content had started to take a backseat - and all of these things culminated in me being so goddamn excited about this dumb minecraft roleplay server that i *had* to make a video about it, even though all i really did at the time was make SMP survival let's plays.

honestly? i never even expected to get 10k, and that was my end goal when i started youtube. making content is, was, and will be incredibly fun for me, i do it in my free time and the channel is a passion project in the purest form of the word. HOWEVER, once the channel started to really do well, i set my sights FIRMLY on 1 million and will not be truly satisfied until i, as the kids say, hit that

as for what inspired me, it's just the storytelling ability that these creators have as well as the genuine feeling that they managed to convey through a medium that looks and feels anything but real (i actually am probably going to elaborate on this in my 100k video for a long bit but in the meanwhile this is a good summary)

honestly, i just want to keep talking about the shit that excites me. i want to have the creative freedom to think of an idea that makes me wanna get out of bed and actually be able to do that - a great example could be the clips channel video, or talking about the wilbur songs. those topics were genuinely incredibly fun to research and talk about, and if my interest remains within minecraft, yeah, i'll be making minecraft stuff for a while. if not though, i'm gonna try and pivot and hope to god that an audience as fickle as mine cares enough to join me on a journey that really, only i will be able to navigate.

hope that helps!

#animagician

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thegothicviking · 3 years

Text

As re-entering a link from herzeleid.com never seem to work (??) I usually copy and paste the actual text. Remember a transcription of Flake chatting with fans that I posted from early 00'? Before this Paul had a similar if not the same chat. I have already too long post in tumblr now so it will be broken down in 2 parts!

PAUL CHAT WITH FANS part I

Transcribed by Jeremy Williams

Taken from Rammstein.com chat

October 26 , 2005

_____________________________

Mod: Hello to you all. Thanks for coming out. Paul will be here in just a few minutes. And then we're going to get started.

Paul: Let's go!

niti: +++

Mod: Sorry, there was a technical problem. But the chat will start soon.

niti: +++

**atomrt: how do you chose the sounds for each song because all of them fit perfectly?**

Paul: Thanks a lot! Sometimes that works out well, sometimes not so well.+++

**maria: Your album covers have always sparked a lot of controversy. Which cover is your favourite and why?**

Paul: The cover for Sehnsucht was the most dramatic in my opinion.+++

**Benzramm: What was coming out of the fake penis during the live act "Bück Dich"? **

Paul: That was water with Ouzo to make it milky.+++

**Beurgueur: Good evening, Have you ever thought to write a metal-opera based on rammstein’ story?**

Paul: Hopefully not. We have enough theater elements already.+++

**MafiUndomiel: I was at River Plate Stadium in Argentina, 1999, when you toured with KISS. You did almost surpassed KISS music and show with your impact, and many people was really impressed. I still remember the silence during Du Hast, as Till was singing the refrain. What do you remember of Argentina, of this show? **

Paul: Yeah, that was unbelievable. It's a shame that we can't play in South America this time. Flake was seriously ill.+++

**MafiUndomiel: Did Till write Te Quiero Puta on his own, or had some kind of external help? I know it's not very complicated, nor elaborated in the lyrics, but it's not easy to put two or three sentences together if you don't know the language... believe me! I'm still trying with German!**

Paul: He had some help from his girlfriend and from Flake's friend from Chile.

Paul: But Till can already speak Spanish so well that he only had a few questions about grammar.+++

**monkeyman: What type of gear do you use when recording in the studio?**

Paul: This would take two hours to list. Too much for now. Sorry.+++

**Hugo: Why did you choose almost the same cover for the japanese version of Reise, Reise and Rosenrot? **

Paul: Because we thought it would be a shame to use the cover only for the Japanese edition.+++

**MafiUndomiel: There are many bands that edited DVD and VHS with the footage they got when they recorded their albums, the creative process and all that stuff. Since many R+ fans are really interested in knowing "Rammstein's kitchen", have you considered releasing something of that kind?

** Paul: I filmed some of the footage during Reise, Reise and it will come out sometime on a DVD as bonus material.+++

**blastedop: What happened to Live DVD? It was delayed? **

Paul: Yeah a little bit, but we're going to try to do it this year.+++

**MafiUndomiel: I wanted to know how did you put your setlists together when you go to a country you've never been... you mix old and new material, or you prefer to show your new material above all, and play only the "classics"? **

Paul: We play a mix of both old and new.+++

**Jenna: As you are possibly the most successful band from Germany (singing in German) that you are expected to represent German music and culture to the rest of the world? **

Paul: It was never our plan to play all over the world.

Paul: Sometimes we wonder ourselves how this all happened.+++

**beurgueur: what american film director would you enjoy to make a ckip with **

Paul: Tarantino.+++

**Benzramm: Did you ever get hurt when you were working with fire on the live acts ? **

Paul: Sometimes.+++

**aeon: One Rammstein member said you had a movie project with Werner Herzog. Do you think this project will be carried out and would you like to act in something different from Rammstein videos ? **

Paul: It's been awhile with WErner herzog. Maybe it will work out, there's still a plan to do it.

Paul: +++

**Rammsteinizied: Dear Paul: What is your favorite live performance effect? (like the flamethrowes in Feuer frei or the bow in DRSG) **

Paul: The nose flame throwers that we use in Feuer frei!+++

**MafiUndomiel: Which was your first guitar? Do you still own it? **

Paul: It was a Telecaster copy. A cheap one. I gave away my first guitars at an auction for a good cause. No idea whether it worked out.+++

**Straya: This has been in my mind for a while now, and I must ask. From the sample songs on the official site, it seems Rosenrot might be your 'hardest/loudest' albums, the songs seem 'hard', in a way, like Ich Will, Feuer Frei, and Mein Teil; what do you think of this? **

Paul: I don't think so. There are fewer sequences so the guitars come out better.+++

**Synthema: Do you still feel that being in Rammstein is almost like being in a six-way marriage? Does the band still function as a tight a unit or have things drifted apart? **

Paul: Yeah.

Paul: We're still together. Knock on wood. We've been together for 10 years and now that we've gone through our crisis, we feel better than ever.

Paul: We've got money, success, beautiful women and all the rest.

Paul: Things can only get worse.+++

**Jenna: Do you think your videos help to stop you taking yourselves too seriously? **

Paul: We've always taken ourselves less seriously than many people think. our best friends know this.

Paul: At the moment, we don't feel like making any humouress videos.+++

**whiskeypapa: When writing a song, how many/what kinds of revisions does the song go through before finally making it onto an album? **

Paul: Some songs make it out directly as we conceived them. With other songs, we make 20 versions and they still don't make it.

Paul: +++

**Noora: HI! I'm a fashion and design student from Finland and I was wondering about your stage costumes...How much do you participate in the designing and making of the outfits that you use on your tours? I understand that every album has its own look. Do you first design the outline of the look as a band and hen consult a designer and maker? Thanx and welcome back to Finland! :)**

Paul: Most ideas come directly from the band. For the last outfit, we had the idea to combine Bavarian folkloric outfits with industrial.

Paul: Because Bavarian folklore is not very cool and we like to mix things that you're not supposed to.+++

**Beurgueur: Have you ever thought in what your life would be now if rammstein never was created?**

Paul: No. We don't think that way.+++

**minx: It’s been stated in several interviews that the band has two pyromaniacs in the group, but is there anyone who is not so fond of fire?**

Paul: Everybody in the band has a different specialty.

Paul: Each of us is really equally important.

Paul: It doesn'T matter what each does, it could be better when two are on vacation during preparation and actually help us to make a good video this way.+++

**Badeend: Who thinks of the titles of the cd's? Is it some kind of democraty or is it 1 man that decides?**

Paul: We make the decision as a group but it's not really a democracy. More like a board of directors.+++

**Biz: How have older industrial bands (such as Laibach or KMFDM) influenced you?**

Paul: A lot.

Paul: Also Ministry.+++

**minx: What is the oily black/brown liquid that you are all covered with on stage? Is it a fire retardant liquid?**

Paul: No.

Paul: That's a secret.+++

**minx: Why did you wear a paper bag over your head at the concert in Tallin, last November?**

Paul: I wanted to display an Iraqi prisoner.

Paul: There's a photo of a guy behind barbed wire and he's holding his son but he has a bag on his head.

Paul: That photo really had an impact on me.+++

**aeon: Why do you only do signing sessions in London and Paris? Why not in other big cities f Europe or even Germany? Or is anything planned? **

Paul: Actually we've only planned for Paris. London snuck in at the last minute.

Paul: I don't know any more signing sessions details right now.+++

**Badeend: Did you take gitar lessons or did you teach it on your self?**

Paul: Self-taught.

Paul: +++

**minx: I am going to be at the signing in London on Sunday. Do you enjoy doing those types of promotional events or are they just ‘hard work’?**

Paul: Sometimes it's a lot of fun but other times it can be exhausting.+++

**Synthema: It could be said that the "Rosenrot" photos are quite a departure image-wise from what one would expect from the band. Was this something that was decided by the band for a particular reason, or is this the sort of decision that is out of your hands? Does your management or record label have much control over how you present yourselves, or is that left to you?**

Paul: We don't like to repeat ourselves.

Paul: Usually the band always has the last word on these amtters. But weR'e not always interested in all of the details.+++

**Badeend: What is the new instrument you used in the song Te Quiero Puta?**

Paul: Trumpet.+++

**beurgueur: do you think you'll be on stage again when you'll be 60? (like rolling stones for example...)**

Paul: Hopefully somebody will die first. Then we won'T have to worry about that.+++

**minx: Do you do you all do own make-up for the shows?**

Paul: Yes.+++

**OK-River: Will Rammstein play again "Bück Dich" in a concert, or it is something of the past?**

Paul: I wouldn't say no.+++

**blastedop: Rosenrot is so diferent from Reise Reise. How is this possible if these songs are from Reise Reise recording season?**

Paul: I don'T think so. Listen to the whole album.+++

**Benzramm: Are you a sort of scared when flake is going with his boat in the public ? **

Paul: No.

Paul: But it was always Oli last year.+++

**whiskeypapa: Which of your songs invokes the most emotion from you?**

Paul: Seemann.+++

**MsBehaviour: Greetings from Finland and good evening! My question is, you have been playing together as a band for quite a many years now, and there is a big difference in the sound of Herzeleid and the sound of Reise Reise. Does this "evolution" come naturally to you, or do you make conscious decisions as to where to direct your sound? How do you feel about the change?**

Paul: There are some of us who want to stay the same.

Paul: There's some of us who want to always change.

Paul: These parties fight each other and the result is a new album or a black eye.+++

**MafiUndomiel: Have you heard a cover version of Keine Lust made by a Russian guy called Miguel? What did you think about it?**

Paul: Not yet, unfortunately.+++

**Badeend: Do you have a private jet or do you have to rent a plane?**

Paul: When the record company pays, we fly Business. When we have to pay, it'S Tourist class. Sometimes, when the connections are difficult, we rent a litlle jet.+++

**luna: First "Snow White" now "Rose Red". Do the members of Rammstein have a fondness for fairytales?**

Paul: Who doesn't?+++

**Synthema: Do you still enjoy performing live after all these years, or is it more of a chore now?**

Paul: If we didn't like it, we wouldn't have been around so long.+++

**Benzramm: Is there a double meaning in the songtexts of your songs ? **

Paul: Yeah. But the subtleties and double-meanings get lsot in translation.+++

**Badeend: What is your favorite song or cd?**

Paul: Kill Bill 1.+++

**DRS2G: Is "Hilf Mir" inspired by a Heinrich Hoffmann's tale?!**

Paul: Yes.+++

**Synthema: Have you ever felt that the success of Rammstein has been a negative thing for you in your personal life? That it makes it difficult to decide who to trust and who not to?**

Paul: It is difficult to stay normal despite money and success.

Paul: We fight this on a daily battle but we usually win.+++

**Beurgueur: from a viewer: what guitar do you use for your c tuning, and what guitar does richard use for this?**

Paul: I play a Gibson Les Paul and Richard plays ESP guitars.+++

**Benzramm: Did you really go to the mountains for the videoclip "Ohne Dich"?**

Paul: Yes. The was the funnest video of them all.

Paul: The thin air up there was difficult.

Paul: I'm impressed by mountain climbers who go even higher.

Paul: It was difficult for our crew and us.+++

**MafiUndomiel: how did you and richard decided who was going to be lead and who rythm guitars?**

Paul: Good question.

Paul: We're both stubborn.

Paul: It's a fight every time but we're still doing alright up to now.

Paul: Actually, the winner is supposed to be the one who plays the best solo.+++

**Badeend: Do you still have to take guitar lessons to play better?**

Paul: No.+++

**blastedop: Do you visit fansites? How about a Top 10 Fansites in the official page?**

Paul: From time to time.+++

**Badeend: Why did you pick just that girl for the Texas vocal in Stirb nich vor Mir?**

Paul: It was our producer's idea.+++

**MafiUndomiel: Paul, is there any country that you´d like to visit or going on tour, and you haven´t yet? Why?**

Paul: Yes, we would love to go to Turkey, Mongolia, Iraq. We know we've got lots of fans there.+++

**Jenna: Which current musicians (Not youselves, I'm sorry) do you think are creating the best work at the moment?**

Paul: System of a Down, Muse, Snoop Doggy Dog, Eminem, Slip Knot, etc.+++

**Rammsteinizied: Dear Paul, How do you feel about us fans?**

Paul: It's an honour.+++

**Minx: Do you have a favourite guitar part in a particular song you really enjoy?**

Paul: +++

**DRS2G: Will "Rosenrot" be the 2nd single from your new album?!**

Paul: Yes.+++

**Straya: I'm wondering how this question has not come up yet... but, plenty of people are asking if you guys will tour in America and Canada. I don't mean for this to be one of those annoying questions. But, has anything be talked about?**

Paul: I'm certain that we'll tour North and South America with our next album.+++

**rammsteinuk: I read in a recent interview that there were some arguments within the band during the production of 'Mutter'. Have there been any more strong disagreements like this since?

**Paul: Thankfully not. There's always stress when six stubborn people meet, but nothing serious.+++

**minx: Most influential musician on yourself?**

Paul: Laibach, Ministry, Metallica, Nirvana.+++

**blastedop: Did you like Benzin video? Schneider didnt.**

Paul: I don't think it's that bad.

Paul: We've had three really good videos in a row, so it'S hard to keep the standards so high.

Paul: I'm glad that there's some variation, next time we'll improve.+++

**whiskeypapa: First, Reise Reise saw a "country moment" with Los, and now Rosenrot has Te Quiero Puta. If you could make a fusion of Rammstein and any other world music (for fun), what would it be?**

Paul: Yes, I interested in all combinations of things that don'T fit together.+++

**Biz: Are there any downsides to being famous?**

Paul: We're famous but we can still buy groceries in Berlin without bodyguards.

Paul: We've got nothing to complain about.

Paul: Our band is famous around the world but we still have normal lives, thank God.+++

**minty: Paul are you looking forward to the world cup next year? who will win?**

Paul: Yes. It doesn'T look good for Germany right now.

Paul: I hope that a miracle happens.+++

**aeon: Do you hope your music will still be appreciated in many years from now or it doesn't matter to you ?**

Paul: I think that we're relatively timeless.

Paul: But that'S probably what every band thinks and two years later nobody cares ...+++

**DRS2G: Was it good to be directed by Jonas Akerlund?!**

Paul: Yes, he's just a cool guy.+++

#I have had this in my draft since forever #I'm sorry if I have already posted this #paul landers #rammstein interview #rammstein #christoph schneider

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uwua3 · 4 years

Note

Hi Bunnie! Can I please have a drabble where Taichi, Tenma, and Juza (basically the Ō High trio) are caught up in a big argument with their soft!s/o and how they make up afterwards? So basically angst with hints of fluff at the end. Thank you so much!

ah... angst is my favorite trope to write! thank you so much for this request~ i just know i’m gonna have so much #Fun ✨! i hope you enjoy it, have a great rest of your day and i love you!!! (･ω<)☆

summary: love is a choice, not a feeling

warnings: angst, arguments, anxiety, blood, break–up(?), bruises, falling out of love, fighting, lying, mental illness, panic attack, physical violence

author’s note: each of three (3) stories follow lyrics to who by lauv ft. bts !! ♡ making this a song fic :D none of taichi, tenma, or juza’s storys align with one another in the same universe, fyi! please be conscious of tw warnings listed above and know you are loved no matter what *ଯ( ॢᵕ꒶̮ᵕ)ॢഒ*♡ + dialogue from tenma’s part follows iu & oh hyuk’s conversation in the song, “can’t love you anymore” for anyone curious :)

word count: 1,438 (taichi), 1,114 (tenma), 1,235 (juza)

music: i don’t know – seventeen (taichi), can’t love you anymore – iu ft. oh hyuk (tenma), if you do – got7 (juza)

who.

🍁🛹 nanao taichi

OUTLINES OF YOUR EYES AND VISIONS OF YOU

I THINK I NEED A MINUTE

TO FIGURE OUT WHAT IS, WHAT ISN’T

Inferiority, that was what Taichi fell victim to. It didn’t matter where he was or what he did, Taichi would never change to be good enough. Not for the stage, not for Mankai, and... not for you. How could you love Taichi when he couldn’t even love himself?

You had no reason to love him, not after all he’s done, not when he couldn’t be more. Even when Taichi was lacking, you still chose him time and time again. But, why? You had to have some ulterior motive, some plan, some elaborate scheme, to use him—to break him like he deserved.

With time came paranoia, and with that came distrust. No matter how much his heart beat for you, Taichi’s overwhelming fears paralyzed him to the point of no return. What was real? What wasn’t? Did you love him for who he was, or who you thought he was?

Who was Nanao Taichi? Who were you?

THESE CHOICES AND VOICES,

THEY’RE ALL IN MY HEAD

After all, was it really okay for Taichi to do this? To accept this love even when he didn’t believe he deserved it? Was it okay for Taichi to wholeheartedly say “I love you” first even if he was aware you could have anyone else? Being in love with you was both a blessing and a curse, because while it was the happiest he had ever been, Taichi was afraid it was all a lie.

Taichi didn’t know if he’d be able to recover if you ended up leaving. Pathetic, right? He woke up every morning searching for comfort and peace in your presence, and fell asleep every night to dream of your existence. You were his source of love in all aspects of any reality, no matter where he found himself. What would happen if you disappeared one day and never came back? What would Taichi do?

Could a person like him be in love like this? Taichi couldn’t help but begin to doubt your intentions even if his heart knew you would never be a bad person like that. Taichi’s insecurities had taken over his mindset for the worse, and its effects on your relationship was becoming more and more parasitic by the day. Both of you could see it even if it took a while for anyone to acknowledge it.

When the argument happened, it was a long awaited conversation meant to be had.

SOMETIMES YOU MAKE ME FEEL CRAZY

SOMETIMES I SWEAR I THINK YOU HATE ME LIKE

You found Taichi at his breaking point. Where the thoughts became too loud, where he couldn’t hear you over his own anxiety. Even if Taichi was your boyfriend, it almost felt like he was a stranger with how little you saw him. Every excuse in the book was used just so he wouldn’t see you, and you wanted to know why once and for all what was wrong.

You soon found out everything that made up Taichi was wrong. You nearly didn’t recognize him, tired and unable to fake a smile as well as before. His room reflected his chaotic state of mind, messy and unorganized with no coherence whatsoever. Taichi sat at his desk, mindlessly fidgeting with a yo–yo with his eyes blankly staring ahead. Minature origami surrounded every surface to his name, and you realized how severe Taichi’s mental health had become.

A pang of pain struck your heart when you called his name, only for Taichi to not respond. It took a moment before Taichi shot up, stumbling out of his chair to greet you with an exhausted grin. Taichi held up his arms, about to give you a hug like always. “O–Oh! I didn’t see you there! I thought we had our date tomorrow—”

“Taichi, are you okay?”

Taichi’s smile wavered then fell, his fist clenching around his plastic yo–yo so hard to the point you questioned how it didn’t crack. His knuckles were white and his eyes anxiously watched for every little change in your facial expression, as if waiting for some sign of anger.

“Of course I am, why wouldn’t I be?” Taichi lied through his teeth, moving forward to put his hand on yours. You moved back, and that seemed to put him on the edge, making Taichi almost feel betrayed by your hesitation.

“We... we haven’t seen each other in so long... You always cancel on me, saying you have practice. What is this, then? Have you even been going to rehearsal?” You snapped, all your frustrations of being ghosted boiling over. As you began pacing the room, you narrowly missed the clothes strewn on the floor and knick knacks Taichi must’ve fidgeted with.

“N–No, but...” Taichi gulped, pulling at his dirty shirt collar, willing himself to breathe. Did it suddenly get so difficult to find air? Any other time, Taichi would’ve made a joke about how you made him breathless, but his heart was pounding too fast and everything was dizzying. Before Taichi could ask you to stand still and give his head a break, you kept going, not able to keep it together anymore.

“Why have you been ignoring me? It’s okay if you need space, but, let me know! One day, you just disappeared and never came back.” “But, I’m right here.” “No, you’re not. Not, as the Taichi I know.”

Silence hung over you two uncomfortably, the atmosphere tense. The moment you turned to leave, Taichi broke.

I NEED A WALK, I NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE

‘CAUSE I NEED TO KNOW

“Who said you knew me?”

You paused, holding onto the door knob before slowly turning, meeting Taichi’s eyes. “Do you actually love me? Or, am I some charity case to you?” Taichi laughed, but it was humorless like everything was to him recently. You were quick to respond, but Taichi was faster, letting everything tormenting his mind out into the real world.

“The moment I’m not who you dreamt of, I’m in the wrong. It’s my fault, I know! Goddamn it, I know!” Taichi’s voice cracked as he fell back into his desk chair, trying to maintain his breathing to be even despite the tears. “I love you, so much. But, do you feel the same? How do I know you’re not lying? Why would anyone choose to love me? I don’t... I don’t deserve you, even if I love you.”

When you rushed in front of him, recognizing the signs of a panic attack, Taichi fell forward to grip your shirt, his fists shaking and head bowed low. Taking in a shuddering sob, Taichi tried to focus on the sound of your voice to be okay.

“I... I never wanted you to see me like this. I’m so sorry, I’m sorry.” Taichi cried after suppressing his emotions after so long of feeling numb. You rested your hands on his shoulder, trying your best to encourage him to breathe.

“Taichi, it’s okay. Can you hear me?” You asked, to which Taichi feebly nodded with his eyes squeezed shut. “Okay, can you please breathe after me?” You exaggerated your deep breaths in and out, eventually helping Taichi to mimic your pattern and stabilizing his anxiety for the moment.

Taichi thought when worst came to worst, you would already be gone. You didn’t run away even when Taichi’s anxiety got the best of him, you stayed. Taichi clung onto you a little bit tighter at that thought, even if he didn’t need to.

Maybe, you did love him.

After a while, you pulled back and Taichi’s arms automatically looked for you. Taichi hid his face in your shirt again, exhaling quietly at your warmth. You ruffled his hair affectionately, petting it softly to remind him you were there. Taichi was still somewhat shaking, drained from the panic attack and how strong it was.

“Taichi, I’m going to take a walk, okay?” When Taichi raised his head, eyes wide at the fear of you using this as a reason to leave, you placed a gentle kiss on his forehead.

“I’ll come back, I promise. When I do, let’s talk about everything. No more secrets, okay?” You reasoned, making Taichi eventually nod. You two linked pinkies, making it a promise that this was a new start for both of you.

Right before you closed the door, Taichi called out to you, weakly smiling. “I love you.” You didn’t hesitate to respond, knowing your love for Nanao Taichi to be true. “I love you, too.”

Taichi believed you this time.

🌻☀️ sumeragi tenma

WHO ARE YOU?

‘CAUSE YOU’RE NOT THE PERSON I FELL IN LOVE WITH, BABY

“Hello?”

Tenma could tell it was you on the other end of the line, with your heartbreaking silence ruining the city for him. Leaning his head on the glass of the taxi window, Tenma watched the dazzling and glamorous skyscrapers pass by slowly in the late night traffic. While the driver tapped his fingers against the steering wheel, the star power of Japan’s biggest idols were advertised in every billboard high in the sky. Tenma waited for your answer to his sighed greeting, catching his own face smirking back at him from a commercial playing near by.

“Where are you?” You finally asked, your voice just the same as Tenma’s: exhausted. What had you done all day that made you this tired? Even Tenma didn’t know... weren’t boyfriends supposed to know? Tenma looked around, lost in the middle of Tokyo, a city that he could never keep up with despite being born in the center of it all.

“In a taxi.”

“Are you almost home?” Your voice cracked towards the end, and Tenma quickly sat up once he realized something was wrong. Before he could ask what happened, Tenma suddenly leaned his head back onto the seat, closing his eyes. He couldn’t bear to accept what he had done—or, not done—this late into the evening.

“Oh god, I’m sorry.”

WHO ARE YOU?

‘CAUSE SOMETHING HAS CHANGED

“For what?” You both knew the answer, however. Tenma couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud. The date displayed upon the dashboard of the cab seemed to remind Tenma of everything he had done wrong. It was your one–year anniversary, and Tenma had forgotten until now.

“Just, for everything.” Tenma forced out, his visage suddenly no longer the splitting image of teen fame anymore. He looked much more normal, no longer sporting a wealthy air to him but rather a troubled kid with the public eye watching his every move. Luckily, no paparazzi stood outside his vehicle’s tinted windows, flashing their cameras to publish any negative headlines. Instead, it was just Tenma, his taxi driver, and you waiting for him at home.

“Please come home, Ten.” You whispered, sounding like you were begging for this one small thing from him out of his busy schedule. Tenma ran his hand through his hair, trying not to lash out and hit the closest thing around him. He didn’t need a scandal to his name, especially since that meant ruining your reputation and Tenma had already made you hurt enough. Acting like the perfect romantic boyfriend was so, so easy on screen... how come he couldn’t do it in real life?

“Why should I?” Tenma angrily retorted, and that’s when he knew he made the biggest mistake of his life. You couldn’t hide it this time, and a pained cry was muffled behind your phone as you tried to not care as much. Tenma didn’t know why he snapped at you when all he felt was frustration and shame at himself.

“Am I not a good enough reason to stay?”

“Of course you are—”

“Then, why won’t you come home?”

“...”

“Do you love me?”

I do, but I don’t deserve you. “I left my wallet back at the studio. I might not make it back tonight.”

YOU’RE NOT THE SAME

I HATE IT

“Goodnight, then.”

“Tenma, wait—by the way... Nevermind.”

“What is it?”

“I don’t think we’re in love anymore, Tenma.”

Tenma opened his eyes, staring at the ceiling of the taxi as it slowly moved forward. Why was it so blurry? Tenma thought, pulling his hand back only reveal a tear upon his finger. He was crying in public, how could a Sumeragi do this? But, Tenma couldn’t stop, he simply just dropped his cell phone into the seats and listened for the click of the call ending. It came after a few moments or so, and Tenma could feel a pair of eyes glancing at him from the review mirror.

Before Tenma could tell him he couldn’t do autographs at the moment, the driver silently passed him a tissue. Tenma took it gratefully, trying not to sob in front of a complete stranger. The driver seemed satisfied before he turned off the radio in the background, clearing his throat before speaking.

“What’s the matter, son? Do you want to talk?” He asked, but it didn’t sound ill–intentioned like an interviewer. It held a fatherly tone, one that automatically made Tenma want to trust him. Taking a minute to compose himself, Tenma slowly began retelling what had happened during his most recent call, his hands still shaking from the aftermath. As traffic stalled, the driver listened to Tenma’s relationship problems carefully before sighing, tapping his fingers against the wheel.

“Boy, how old are you?”

“Sixteen, sir.”

“You are too young to be this heartbroken.” The driver said, pausing to turn and gesture for the car to pass them. “Well, first thing’s first, do you love them?”

“With all my heart, sir.” Tenma responded without hesitation, knowing his love for you was truth.

“Then, why didn’t you say so back then?” The driver commented exasperatedly, his old wisdom and infinite experience with relationships making Tenma’s boyish actions seem like child’s play. Tenma sighed, putting his face in his hands as he admitted the inevitable that had been eating away at him for a while now.

I’M SICK OF WAITING FOR LOVE

I KNOW YOU’RE NOT THE ONE

“They deserve better. All I can give them is love, but, even I can’t do that right. What if I’m not the one for them even if I love them?”

“Listen, boy, and listen good. They love you for one reason only: because it’s you. They chose to love you, not anyone else. You may not be the future, but you’re the one right now. Isn’t that enough?”

Tenma truly took in the words, feeling a sense of comfort he didn’t know he needed after all this time. Without wasting a second, Tenma rapidly passed a large sum of bills with the most excessive tip ever, profusely thanking the driver. Before the taxi driver could refuse such money from a young teen, Tenma opened the car door and left, slamming it shut with random adrenaline.

The driver stuck his head out the window, yelling down the street, “Where the hell are you going, kid?!”. Tenma looked over his shoulder, already halfway down the sidewalk with his phone screen open to your contact. He smiled, not his classic Sumeragi grin, but a true, genuine smile filled with hope to make things right.

“To go celebrate my one year anniversary!”

🍁🍰 hyodo juza

FEELIN’ HYPTONIZED BY THE WORDS THAT YOU SAID

DON’T LIE TO ME, JUST GET IN MY HEAD

Juza hated everything to do with fighting. You could never count on Juza to throw the first punch, to start something with someone, to look for trouble anytime. Yet, you couldn’t help but despise his violence, even if it was provoked.

Juza had too many scars on his fists to forget his reputation around O High, but he didn’t mean to hurt anybody. Especially, not you. But, how could Juza say that when he came to see you after every back end alley way fight? It hurt you to see your boyfriend like this, used as some entertainment for no good thugs. Juza fell to the bait every single time, no matter what you said to convince him otherwise.

Juza promised he’d never hurt you, but how could he keep getting into physical fights like this?

WHEN THE MORNING COMES, YOU’RE STILL IN MY BED

BUT IT’S SO, SO COLD

You couldn’t sleep last night, not when Juza showed up at your door, bruised and dazed. You knew how strong of a fighter Juza was, so his opponent must’ve been formidable if he could barely find his way to your house. It was too late for a school night, but here he was, finally deciding to ask you for help.

“Sorry, I wouldn’t have come, but...” Juza raised his hand, the bandage messily done and already falling off. Juza was always amatuer at first aid for some reason, and you could see the rough cuts underneath the blood–stained cloth. You couldn’t leave him alone at god knows what hour, so you invited him inside.

Juza made sure to never let it become a habit to rely on you, so you helped out whenever you could, even if it pained you to see him so hurt like this. Underneath the yellow bathroom light barely illuminating the cramped space, you rummaged in your cabinets for the first aid kit as Juza sat on the closed toilet, fidgeting with his school uniform jacket.

When your eyes lingered on the torn hem of his blazer for a moment too long, he ducked his head to focus on your bathtub curtain. “Better not to ask.” Juza simply stated, and you believed him. You held in a sigh and took out the minature white box to start working.

Juza didn’t flinch whenever you disinfected his wounds, and you wondered how much pain he really felt. When you asked him to stay (more for your sake than his), Juza agreed and thanked you softly. Seeing such a sweet boy bandaged in your bathroom nearly made you cry, so you just nodded and kissed the band aid by his lips.

Juza waited until you were fully asleep until he closed his eyes. “I’m sorry.” Juza whispered out loud.

You woke up to Juza still sleeping, his breath quiet and arm wrapped around you gently. You were about to smile, but you couldn’t bring yourself to after seeing his bruises had gotten even worse.

How could you keep doing this when it took everything in you not to cry from Juza getting hurt?

WHO ARE YOU?

‘CAUSE YOU’RE NOT THE PERSON I FELL IN LOVE WITH, BABY

Juza didn’t come to you after that. Perhaps Juza knew how affected you were by his late night challenges, or he couldn’t wake up to your disappointment anymore, but he was gone. During the day, you attended classes with O High’s delinquent as usual. However, after school hours weren’t yours anymore. It must’ve been hierarchy season, where arrogant boys thought they had a shot against the Hyodo Juza.

Even if Juza didn’t come by anymore, you still couldn’t sleep. How could you when all you thought about was if Juza was okay? Did he make it back to the Mankai dorms that night? Who’s making sure he’s okay? Is he even okay? Every time you closed your eyes for a split second, you’d see Juza’s gentle smile with a band aid on the corner of his lips. Day became night and it was all the same, since you were awake to experience it all.

You kicked off your blankets, throwing your pillow off your face as it landed with a thud on the other side of your pitch black room. Turning on your phone screen, your tired gaze read the time of 1 A.M. Juza was surely still awake, it wouldn’t hurt to just call him... right? You unlocked it as your finger hovered over Juza’s contact, hesitating.

What would you even say? That you missed him? Did Juza even miss you? You called Juza anyways, anxiously listening to the rings go through before hitting voicemail. Juza always answered your calls before... what happened?

“Meet me soon. We need to talk, you know where to find me.”

WHO ARE YOU?

‘CAUSE SOMETHING HAS CHANGED, YOU’RE NOT THE SAME, I HATE IT

You were right to bring your first aid kit.

Behind the fence was a sunset casting a boy’s shadow across the pavement. Juza hopped the gate easily, landing beside you and avoiding your judgement in the process. You knew exactly why—all because of that unmistakable mark on his face. He couldn’t even hide it.

“Heard your voicemail. Is everything okay?” Juza roughly cleared his throat, settling to lean next to you. You shook your head, unable to find the words in the moment. You just held your hand out and Juza’s put his on top of it automatically, fingers tensing before holding yours. When Juza squeezed your hand once, you wished he could be with you forever, away from all that violence and high school fights.

“You didn’t answer my call. Why?” You questioned, straight to the point. Juza never lied to you, so he looked away and frowned, trying to phrase it in a way so you wouldn’t worry. “Better if—” “If I don’t know, right?” You interrupted with a sharp tone. Juza winced, knowing your anger was justified.

“Juza... I’m so tired.” You started, knowing it was both physically and mentally. “I love you, but I don’t know if I can do this anymore.”

Juza’s eyes widened, standing up straight and putting both your hands in his. You shuddered and tried to keep your breath steady, looking towards the ground. You never noticed how scuffed his shoes were, you wondered what they’ve seen.

“What? I thought we were happy, I love you—”

“Do you really? Then, why do you keep fighting?”

Juza didn’t have an answer. Even he didn’t know himself.

I’M SICK OF WAITING FOR LOVE

I KNOW YOU’RE NOT THE ONE

“I can’t be with you if I don’t even know if you’re okay.”

“I always win—”

“That doesn’t matter! I just want you to be safe, why do you entertain them? What would your family think?!”

“Don’t. Don’t... bring them up.”

“Juza... this isn’t right for you. Please, give it up.”

“I can’t lose—”

“So, you’re choosing to lose me, instead?”

You didn’t wait around this time. “Call me when you change your life for the better.” You left, leaving behind a boy with a broken heart this time.

Juza stared at his hands, their surfaces uneven and calloused from all his years of violence. Something had to change, Juza couldn’t lose you.

When you received a call from Hyodo Juza, you accepted it.

128 notes · View notes

thermaflute · 4 years

Text

Forever Together

a/n: Ahhhhhhh this is my first collab with the BNHA POCuties and I hope I did alright. Fun fact about me: I’ve never actually been to a wedding so I was a bit all over trying to figure this out. Despite all the rewriting I did on this I still had a ton of fun on it and it made me realize I need to write more fluff. Please give my buddies works a read here, everyone worked super hard on this collab!

Synopsis: It wasn’t easy for either of you to admit that love wasn’t an awful emotion, it was even harder to confess that maybe you felt love for each other. The real challenge however, was getting the two of you to say the two simple words that would bind your complicated selves forever.

Word Count: 3.1k

Your hands jittered against your dress, tears threatening to form behind your eyes. The mirror in front of you revealed absolute decadence, your dress was a marvelous white, lace trimmings all around. Your usual hairstyle now in its natural state, you looked gorgeous. But your insides churned with intimidation. It was going to be a small wedding, yet you felt as if there were a sea of people out there, waiting to see you. You feared they’d be able to tell that you were scared.

You two had started talking about marriage a long time ago. Well, rather how you detested it. You two were friends in high school, you were in general studies, and he was in the hero course. He often came to you about his problems because he needed a perspective from someone out of the hero loop. He was a bit aloof but you never seemed to mind, and you two surprisingly connected well into your second year. That day’s conversation started over some left over cake from a group project you had, you mentioned your preferred cake, he mentioned his. You stated that if it were up to you your wedding cake would be f/c, if marriage was your thing at all. He agreed with you, and you both confided that you thought love was a joke that led nowhere. Love was a finicky pursuit that would inevitably end in disappointment and heartbreak.

That disappointment never came. Neither of you were proud to admit it, but the two of you started to feel...things...for each other. It wasn’t immediate, it was slow and gradual. You went to college, he joined the Hero workforce, and neither of you stopped caring for each other. He made time to visit your dorm, and when you could, you would bring him lunch at his office. He always made room for you, and you always made room for him. That’s just what friends do.

Except, friendship was a boundary that was quickly dissolving. You found yourself yearning for his presence and days that he couldn’t make it felt so unnatural. His conversations with you would make you smile beyond your face, and you found yourself addicted to hearing his laughter. He was kinda beautiful, oddities and all. You despised the nervous feeling you began to get around him, so you decided to be honest.

“I mean, where the fuck did he get the idea that I wanted to study with him like? First of all, you worry about you, second, you not finna catch me getting an F for your dumbass like you’re not even cute.” Shoto didn’t respond, he simply stared at you with a small smile, and you quickly realized that you were ranting. “Ah I’m sorry for ranting, how was your day?”

“You’re fine, I like hearing about your day. However, to answer your question, it was alright. It got better when I saw you though.”

Your eyes quickly glanced at him before looking away and you feigned a joking attitude. “Ha, you do miss me, I thought you forgot about me the second you walked out the door.”

He eyed you, clearly missing the joke, “I could never y/n, I think about you everyday.” There was nothing for a few seconds but the sound of laughter in the hallway and a poorly managed club screaming outside. “I didn’t mean to say it like that.” It came out very harshly.

“Oh you’re fine, I knew what you meant.” You looked away for a minute, the tension getting worse. You had to end this “I’ve been thinking about it for a while and I may have caught some feelings for you Shoto.”

He frowned at you and your blanket that was wrapped around him caught on fire. He quickly put it out and glared at you, “You...You make me feel sick y/n.” He left, leaving you with a burnt blanket and a pitiful sadness. For nearly two weeks, he avoided you, making sure to leave you on delivered and telling reception to not allow you up. The truth was, he felt the same, and he knew he made a mistake when he told you that, but he genuinely had no clue how to tell you he was interested in you without it sounding like a curse on your life.

You were unavoidable, the fact you two didn’t accidentally cross paths until the cafe was astounding. So much of your interest and favorite spots combined so it was inevitable that he would run into you again. You saw him sitting alone at the usual table and decided that if he was going to ignore you, he was going to have to give you a proper response first. You sat in front of him, immediately startling him. He quickly grabbed his things and mumbled an apology underneath his breath.

"Wait! I know how you feel about all that, trust me I'm not happy either but I just wanted to be honest. You’re really important to me, and it’s nearly impossible for me to fall for someone but you made it in. I don’t regret liking you either, because you’re genuinely a good guy but blowing me off for two weeks has me reconsidering if you’re even that. Do you know how long I’ve been crying? God, you didn’t have to insult me now Shoto."

"I didn’t insult you?"

"How else am I supposed to inter-." You thought about who you were dealing with and realized you'd been going about this the wrong way. "Okay, well if you're not insulting me I need you to elaborate on what ‘You make me feel sick’ means."

The stoic man in front of you seemed to look frustrated with you cornering him. But he understood the sudden drop in your friendship with him was upsetting you. "I told you too much. I shared too much of my time with you. You gave me entirely too much of your own, and now I feel ill when I see you. I feel even worse when I don't. You told me that you were interested in romance, and that sickness engulfed me. I-” He seemed as if he was straining to talk to you, he was clearly flushed and you can feel the heat radiating off of him. “I think I have feelings for you as well.”

You two sat at the cafe in silence, both radiating very murky energies. Passerby’s stared at you and the Pro Hero in confusion, both of your boring holes into anything else that wasn’t each other's eyes. You broke the silence first, “Shoto, I don’t mind the feeling. I know we shitted on it for a few years now, but uh, it’s not awful.”

“It’s not,” he responded, still staring painfully somewhere else. The cafe was still busy around you, but for some reason it felt like you two were the only one’s there. It felt like that often with him, even in this weird ass situation you were still comforted by his presence.

“Do you want to go out?” You finally asked him, he was sweating bullets. You two looked like highschoolers, it was honestly embarrassing how difficult that was for the both of you. He gave you a quick sorry and quickly left with all of his stuff. You stared at the empty seat in front of you in half disappointment and half awe. He really just got up and left, again.

You look back on that so fondly now, you two were young adults, unsure about the world and each other. Too scared to label the affection you already gave each other. To think you would be walking the aisle for that man in a few hours was not only ironic, but kind of terrifying. Sure your commitment issues got better, but they weren’t exactly gone. You loved Shoto with your whole being but something about getting married scared you shitless.

You reverted back to the safety of your memories, and quickly checked to see if you still had the screenshots from when you first got together. You remember trying to act cool about it but you immediately called up every friend you had to tell them the news.

You giggled at the messages, feeling the warmth of the past wash over you. You two really blossomed, slowly but surely breaking down boundaries that neither of you even realized was there. Days turned into weeks, weeks to months, and months to years. Your mutual “experiment” with love seemed to be really stable. After a while of being together, of course others began to question what was next.

The light filtered through the blinds of your apartment, your senses slowly came on to the rest of the world, dragging you from a dream that was already fading into obscurity. You feel your body get closer to skin, and you breath in the lovely scent that you’ve come to adore. You felt kisses on your shoulder and a slow sigh from behind you before the sheets became soft again, you were fading back into sleep.

“Can I talk to you about something?”

Your heart jumped. “Sure.”

“I had something longer prepared for this after a talk with my mother but after laying here with you, I think it would be better if I just said it. I’ve been thinking a lot about marriage lately. I know it’s a large commitment, but I can’t see myself anywhere else with anyone else but you. I love you more than life itself. ” He snuggled closer into you and wrapped you tightly. “You don’t have to answer now, I just wanted to let you know how I felt.”

You rolled around in his arms to look at him, his hair was all over, his eyes were lidded and clearly still exhausted, but he was so sincere.

Your sleepy voice came out as a croak, you extended your hand up to stroke his hair back, revealing his forehead. You scrunch your face up at him and act as if you’re thinking. “I don’t even like you though.” You gave him a slight giggle, and kissed him. “I would love that baby.” You feel some tension leave his body and he smiles at you with glossy eyes. How long was he thinking about this? He leans into you and plants a kiss on your nose and you both fall back asleep, entangled together with thoughts of forever.

Forever. The word felt so solid when you were with him, like it wasn’t something that could falter or fade. But whenever you thought about it too long you grew terrified, the word became too solid. It felt inescapable. You know it’s just the fears speaking, but you just didn’t want to find out that things could be different. As the days grew closer and closer, your anxiety worsened as things around you changed.

“Yes, this is my Fiancee, y/n.” “I saw a few houses near that park you like, would you like to check it out with me?” “Have you decided on what colors to decorate the venue.” “Fuyumi wants to know if she can handle the catering and the flowers? Are you alright with that?” “Well since you’re indecisive I’m just going to book them all and we can just go everywhere for the Honeymoon.” It seemed as if everyday he was reminding you that this wasn’t a dream. It was always the slightest things, the easiest questions that would leave you with the realization that this was for real. You two were no longer teens that were scared to hold hands, but real adults that love each other enough to put it on a legally binding paper. No amount of movies, girl talks, or family could have prepared you for the stress you were going through.

You snapped out of your thoughts again and looked at the time. You had to walk out soon and your nerves were fried. The movies made this seem so easy but here you were, glued to the chair, trying to find any reason under the sun to either go through with this or run away. The door to your dressing room opened and in came your friend, the maid of honor.

“Well you don’t look too happy.” They looked partially stressed from all the running around but was still checking in on you before everything started.

You tried to make a face that looked reassuring but you ended up just looking like you were going to cry.

Your friend held you, careful to not harm your dress. “You got this y/n, you look too pretty to be this sad on your special day.”

“I know, I’m just really nervous.”

“Well don’t be too hard on yourself, Shoto isn’t exactly doing any better.”

You look at your friend confused, they take the hint that you weren’t aware this whole time that he’s been really frazzled.

“Well Izuku had to quickly get a backup suit. Shoto was so stressed that he burnt through his suit. Seeing as your dress is still in one piece, I think you’re fine.”

You felt oddly comforted by your fiance's stress, in the oddest way possible it was nice to know that this wasn’t difficult for just you. “Oh, that’s kind of funny.”

“I know right, man's been so worried about this forever, I guess it’s just all coming out now. See, y’all are literally the same.”

You look around with a small smile already starting to feel better. “Thank you.”

“No problem, that’s what I’m here for! However, Imma really need you to hurry up because Izuku said he’s starting to literally steam through the suit and they really can’t get another backup.”

“Fine, I’m coming.” You stood looking down at all the white underneath you, you felt the anxiety creeping up and swat it away just as quickly. “I got this.”

You barely heard the music, or saw anybody on the way down the aisle. Your mind completely blanked, only remembering the sensation of an arm locked around your own and the vague feeling of a bouquet in your hand. You focused only on the man in front of you, he looked happy to see you. His hetero chromatic eyes that always brought you peace once again managed to make you feel calm.

Eijiro began his spiel, he was so happy to hear that you guys were getting married and practically begged to officiate. You both agreed, thinking it was beyond sweet that he wanted to do this for you two. As the red head continued his speech, you slipped away into a revelation that forever wasn’t a terrifying word anymore, it was actually something rather nice to look forward to.

Shoto held your hand and returned to appearing mostly stoic to anyone else that wasn’t you. You learned to tell when he was happy from the occasional slight smile, but mostly through his eyes, they had a particular gleam in them when he was emotional. He seemed well composed, but after years of all that Hero training you could still see the small wisps of steam lifting off his suit.

"Do you take Y/n to be your wife, to cherish in friendship and love today, tomorrow, and for as long as the two of you live, to trust and honor her, to love her faithfully, through the best and the worst, whatever may come, and if you should ever doubt, to remember your love for each other and the reason why you came together with her this day?”

For a split moment he saw you how you used to look and remembered the second he fell in love with you. You were in your uniform still, leaning over a railing, making a joke about how fun it would be if he made an ice ramp to slide down. You were at ease with him, and it always made him feel at peace with you.

"I do.”

“Do you take this ULTIMATE manly man Shoto to be your husband, to cherish in friendship and love today, tomorrow and for as long as the two of you live, to trust and honor him, to love him faithfully, through the best and the worst, whatever may come, and if you should ever doubt, to remember your love for each other and the reason why you came together with him this day?

You laugh at the redheads words, the audience does the same. You realize that no matter what anyone else saw him as, he was always your hero. Sure he's never saved you from a burning building, but he was the first to save you from just feeling alone. Whether it was a tutor, a cry session, or just some fun, he was always there for you. You want to always be there for him, and even if you can't do it perfectly, you promise that you'll always try.

“I do.”

"Well alright then, you two are officially married! You may now kiss the bride.”

You lunged at your now husband, completely forgetting that he was technically supposed to be kissing you. He didn’t mind it at all and returned your kiss with equal admiration and love. Though you two will probably continue to be complicated for the rest of your lives, you can at least do it together.

“Forever right?”

You smiled at him in tears, the audience was full of excitement and fervor but it all felt silent and peaceful to you. “Forever.”

#BNHA POCuties collab #todoroki x reader #shoto todoroki x reader #bnha x black reader #bnha x poc!reader #boku no hero academia #tooth rotting fluff

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schrijverr · 3 years

Text

'Till Death Do Us Part

Part 3 out of 13

When Alex has to bring Philip to work, he and Thomas discover that they both have something in common: they lost their love. They form an unexpected bond and connection about this that grows into something more.

A medium burn with parental feelings about Philip and flowers.

On AO3.

Ships: Jamilton

Warnings: grief and mentions of unhealthy coping, terminal illness and death.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter 3: Virginian Spiderwort Means ‘Momentary Happiness’

“Eat lunch,” a sandwich along with a muffin and coffee was dropped on Alex’s desk, who jumped slightly in his seat and looked up.

“What?” he asked dumbly.

Thomas rolled his eyes: “You’ve been at it since six, I don’t even know why you were in that early that’s ridiculous, who comes in that early on a Thursday? And I haven’t seen you leave once. You need to eat, so eat, dumbass.”

“How do you know I started at six?”Alex asked.

“I didn’t, you send me an email around then, so I made a guess and you just confirmed it,” Thomas shrugged, ignoring Alex’s squawk, “Now eat.”

Alex picked up the lunch and started eating, while Thomas dropped into the chair opposite of him and watched him, sipping his own coffee.

“You’re just gonna sit there and watch me the entire time? Where is your lunch?”

“Already ate it and yes,” Thomas answered, “I know how this goes, you’ll come up with a good sentence and stop eating to write it down and then it’s a few hours later.”

Alex looked guilty and chastised, so he closed his laptop, which he had been staring at, and focused on Thomas: “So, how have you been?”

“That’s so awkward, I feel bad for us both,” Thomas cringed.

“Well, I’m sorry that I am not a great conversationalist,” Alex threw up his hands in defeat.

“According to Angie you are,” Thomas immediately regretted it, he didn’t want Alex to know he and Angelica talked about him.

“Yeah, but most of the time people I’m talking to aren’t you.” Fuck, was that too revealing? Did Thomas know he was struggling, because of stupid feelings?

“I’m sorry my face upsets you,” Thomas rolled his eyes, misinterpretingthe comment“Anyway, how did you get in so at six, I’m pretty sure schools don’t start that early. Where did you put Philip?”

“Oh, Pip is with Eliza and Maria for the week,” he said, “Eliza is so busy after the opening of the orphanage and they thought having a kid comfortable with them there would help the others get out of their shell and Pip had missed his Aunties. He’s staying till Wednesday.”

“And you decided that working abnormal amounts was smart when you got a bit of a break from your usual responsibilities?” Thomas judged, not so silently.

Alex grinned sheepishly and shrugged: “It’s what I do best, but I’m not being a complete dumbass, I leave a a somewhat normal time, I swear.”

“Hmmh.”

“I’m serious, I promised Angie I’d leave each day before six and she checks, it’s terrifying,” Alex shuddered and Thomas laughed: “Hear, hear.”

After that Alex quickly ate his lunch while they talked about the latest meeting, which lead to Alex complaining about Lee and Adams and how they could go fuck themselves.

When his lunch had completely disappeared, Thomas got up to leave. Before he could, however, Alex called out: “Hey, Thomas?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks again. For, you know, checking up on me,” he said awkwardly, “If you, like, ever need help or something, call me, okay?”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Thomas promised, not thinking the day he would take Alex up on it would come anytime soon.

He was wrong in that assessment, because that Monday he called Alex, hands shaking and eyes blurry.

“Thomas? What is it? I’m already at work.” Of course he was, it was only 6:15 in the morning, who wouldn’t be at work at that time.

“Can you-” a shuddery sigh that he hated, “Can you tell Wash- Washington that I’m not coming- coming in today?” he asked.

“God, Thomas, are you alright?” the worry was evident in Alex’s tone.

“Not really,” Thomas sounded small, “I didn’t want to bother you, but Jemmy is away and I normally can handle this stuff, but it was all unexpected and now I’m here on my fucking kitchen floor calling you. Fuck.”

“I’m coming to you.” Alex said.

“You don’t need to-”

“Yes, I do. Come on, I’m not leaving you like that. You’re getting a motherfucking patented Hamilton hug, live with it,” Alex told him, “I’ll be there as soon as I can, hang in there.”

“…Okay,” the line went dead.

Alex hurried to Washington’s office, for once grateful that the man liked to come in early on Monday’s to ‘kick off the week right’ or whatever.

“Come in.”

“Sir, I’m taking the day off,” Alex burst in, “Thomas is not coming in either, he just called me. I thought, I’d let you know.”

Washington looked surprised: “You and Thomas…?” he trailed off curiously.

“Nothing like that, sir,” sadly enough, he added mentally, “He helped me out in a rough spot and I’m returning the favor. We found we had something in common.”

“Well, then go. An honest man always returns his favors, son,” Washington shooed him out of the office.

“Not your son and thank you, sir,” Alex said gratefully, before rushing off.

The drive to Thomas’s, admittedly very impressive, house took about thirty minutes and Alex was out the car and on the driveway immediately as he practically ran to the door and knocked: “Hey, hey, Thomas. It’s me, open up.”

After a moment the door swung open, revealing a Thomas Alex had never seen before.

He was in sweatpants and a loose tank top, his eyes were red-rimmed and his hair a mess. But above all, he looked small, hunched in on himself and lacking the confidence and arrogance that usually clung to him like a second skin.

Alex didn’t waste a second gathering him up into his arms. It wasn’t as comforting as it could have been because Thomas was a fucking giant and therefore could not fit into Alex’s arms completely, but that didn’t stop him from trying.

Thomas clung to him tightly, chocked off sobs being ripped out of his chest as he cried.

They just stood there in the door opening. Alex couldn't really move Thomas around like the other had done him, so he just had to wait.

“Sorry,” Thomas said after a while, his voice raw as he broke away.

“No sorry, not today, okay?” Alex told him, “Now, why don’t we set you down on the couch, yeah? It’s more comfy and definitely better than the porch.”

“Yeah, sounds good,” Thomas agreed and numbly walked over to a living room, Alex trailing behind him.

Thomas collapsed on the couch, looking like a miserable heap and Alex had to pause and think of a plan of attack. He’d been a Lieutenant Colonel, he could do this. First, he needed to know the situation.

He sat down next to Thomas: “Hey, dude, can you tell me what happened? You said it was unexpected, what hit you out of nowhere?”

“Phone,” Thomas gestured vaguely to the kitchen, then didn’t elaborate beyond a, “Got an email.”

Okay, not much information, but a lead.

Alex went to the kitchen, there was an uneaten bowl of soggy cereal on the counter and a phone on the floor. He threw the cereal away and toasted some bread before he picked up the phone and read the start of the email:

My dearest, Thomas

I hope the future finds you well. Yes, the future! I found this site in which you can write emails that will be send 10 years later, so I do hope you’re still using the same email address or this will be awkward.

You may be wondering why today? It’s not a particular date for us, but I’m writing you this email because I know I won’t be there when you read it.

I had another attack today, but you know that of course, though maybe you’ve forgotten all the attacks through the years. We’ve been doing this for over three years already and I know I have not been writing the dates down.

But none of that now, this was supposed to be a pick-you-up, because I love you, dearest.

Alex stopped reading, this was not for his eyes. He quickly did the math. Thomas had said she’d died seven years ago, this was written ten years ago, so they still had three years together at this point.

God, he couldn't imagine what it was like to know your lover was dying and you could do nothing to stop it, just prepare for the inevitable.

The toast popped out the toaster and Alex locked the phone, before putting the toast on a plate and getting a glass of water. He walked back to the living room and handed Thomas the food as he gently said: “Come on, you can’t be sad on an empty stomach.”

That got a small amused huff from the Virginian, which Alex counted as a win.

He ate slowly and in silence and Alex just waited for him to gather himself. This was not a date on where you expected the missing to hit, there were no fun rituals – like on a birthday – to keep or something to celebrate or commemorate.

Just sadness.

Sudden sadness.

Alex looked at Thomas, who softly chewed on his toast. He didn’t think dragging Thomas outside today would be good for him. He needed time to process the message, to think of what his late wife wanted him to know for when she wasn’t there.

He now regretted not reading the rest of the message, just so that he could have a grip on Thomas’s thoughts, but he knew it had been the right thing to do.

When the plate was empty and the glass gone, Alex announced: “Okay, we’re having a sad couch day, but you need to tell me how to operate your TV and where you keep blankets, because you need a blanket nest to be sad in, alright.”

Thomas blinked at him owlishly for a moment, then shook his head with muted amusement and whispered: “TV is just normal and there is a guestroom, second door upstairs, I keep the blankets there.”

“Good,” Alex got up, “Are you alright for a moment?”

The other only nodded. Alex didn’t like how quiet Thomas was. He might not be the loudest person, but there would always be a presence hanging around him that made him feel like the loudest person in the room and that was now completely gone.

Alex rushed through the house, dropping of the plate and glass in the kitchen and putting on the kettle, before taking the stairs two steps at a time.

At times like these he was happy he had top surgery, because catching your breath with a binder on fucking sucked and running overall was a bad idea.

The guest room was less extravagant than he’d expected. It was decked out for comfort and stylish, but it wasn’t over the top. Actually the whole house was more stylish than expensive just for the sake of being expensive, something Alex hadn’t realized before.

Of course, the only befores there had been were company parties that Thomas had offered to host wherein he showed off on purpose.

Now that he thought about it, he hadn’t seen pictures during those parties either.

He grabbed the blankets and some pillows from the guest room and went back downstairs carefully, he didn’t want to trip or drop the blankets, but he also just wanted to be nosy.

The walls were still void of pictures.

It tugged at Alex’s heart, his own walls had been bare before he’d met John and all his other friends and they’d filled it up over the years of happy moments, but Thomas had nothing. Though he didn’t have time to dwell on it now, he had more important matters to attend to.

Thomas was still in the same position he’d left him in, staring at the still turned off TV. Alex dropped the blankets on the floor, only scooping one out of the pile to drape over Thomas’s shoulders, before finishing the tea.

How strange, he mused as he made the tea, me and Thomas are neither tea drinkers, except on days like these, except with each other.

He walked back to Thomas and handed him the mug, relieved when the other took it gratefully and let the steam warm his face as he burrowed into the blanket slightly.

Alex was still concerned about the hunched over position, which was rich coming from him, he knew, but getting lost in work and fucking up your posture was different than getting lost in grief and fucking up your posture.

So, he gently pushed Thomas back into the pillow of the couch and Thomas went easily. For all the man could fight him on every little thing at work, he wasn’t putting up a fight now and Alex was glad for that fact, even if it was slightly disturbing.

Taking the blankets, he draped them over Thomas and himself after he’d grabbed the remote and put on a nature documentary.

Thomas gave him a bemused look and Alex was never more relieved that Thomas was judging him, anything was better than that empty look in those usually lively eyes.

“It’s soothing,” he shrugged, “and low effort.”

“Fair,” Thomas nodded, his voice hoarse and raw, making Alex regret not putting honey into his tea, because it sounded like it hurt.

They sat in silence as they watched a frog hop over a leaf while the narrator told them slightly horrifying facts about the creature in a monotone voice.

After about an hour of animal facts and nature relations, Thomas spoke up: “She asked me if I had any kids yet.”

Alex looked up, but didn’t speak, just let Thomas figure it out.

“We wanted kids, I think maybe me more than her to be honest, though she loved being an aunt,” he went on, “But with her condition, well, pregnancy was just too risky and when we knew just how serious it was… Neither of us wanted to make an adopted child go through losing a parent again, so we never had kids.”

He took a shuddery breath: “And then she asked if I had them, she hoped I found that and I don’t know-”

Tears were falling again and without thinking Alex pulled Thomas into his side and Thomas didn’t protest as he burrowed his head closer. He whispered: “I always knew she wanted me to move on from her, live a good life, but hearing it again after having time to process her being gone. It’s- it’s different.”

Alex just ran a soothing hand over Thomas’s back as he thought about that. After a second he slowly said: “Knowing and accepting are different things and sometimes one is harder than the other.”

Thomas mulled over his words, then said: “Well, I hate accepting.”

He didn’t tell Thomas that moving on was good, that it was healthy. Both of them knew that well enough, they must have heard it a thousand times from concerned friends. It was always meant well, but sometimes you just didn’t want to hear it, not in moments like these.

“She told me she had something to say to me, but she didn’t know what just yet and that she had to think about it and tell me when she figured it out, because she still had time,” Thomas broke the silence again.

“That- that must be hard to read,” Alex told him.

The other nodded into his side, then said: “I think I know what it is though…”

“Do you want to share?” Alex asked.

“Yeah, she- I never realized this, but she started telling me how I would do great things and I better have a picture of her with me so that she could see it. I keep her in my wallet. I always thought she meant in the world. Big responsibility to have on my shoulders, but I tried. For her.”

Thomas fiddled with the blanket, he wasn’t looking at Alex, but he seemed content to curl up in the shorter man’s side.

“But I’m suddenly startingto think that’s not what she meant,” the words sounded small and Alex’s chest constricted painfully. He didn’t know how he would react if something he’d believed about John for years would be ripped out from under him one day without warning.

“What do you think she meant?” he asked, trying to keep Thomas talking, maybe if he said it out loud it would make more sense than when it swirled around in his head.

“I- I think she meant that I would- ugh- it’s- you had to-”

“Take your time.”

“She was always telling me about the great things in life, but she loved The Lord of the Rings, those books and movieskept her company throughout all the hospital visits. Her favorite quote was: ‘Saruman believes it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that’s not what I found. I found it is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folks that keep the darkness at bay’,” he explained.

There was a moment of silence in which Thomas hesitated.

“It might be stupid, but I think she subconsciously absorbed that. That for her the great things were the small things,” Thomas said, “I once took her on a simple picnic and she said it was the greatest day of her life.”

Alex nodded along, he could already see where this was going, but he let Thomas set the pace of the conversation.

“I think she meant that I would get to do all the little things that made life great, have all the milestones we never got to have, but she phrased it in her own Martha-esque way,” there was a smile in his voice as he said that.

“Did she always have her own way of saying things?” Alex asked, hoping to keep whatever was bringing that smile to Thomas’s face going.

“Yeah,” a success, “she read a lot and she listened to a lot of music. She played guitar, wrote her own lyrics too. She was great with words, much better than me. I think she just consumed so many ways people expressed themselves through words that she had her own dialect. It was completely English, but just slightly different. It’s hard to explain.”

“I get it,” Alex assured him, “She sounds wonderful.”

“Oh, you would have liked her,” Thomas said, sounding strangely proud of that fact, “She took the time to make fun of my magenta suits in her email to me,” Alex snorted at that, “And you both take no shit and it’s easy to talk to you.”

Alex was shocked at that, no one told him he was easy to talk to. He had opinions and would let you know immediately, making you debate if you disagreed with him. Sure, he could be charming, but he made you think when you talked. It wasn’t easy.

He said nothing.

“Apparently she wrote it while I was next to her,” Thomas suddenly said.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I was asleep in a chair. It was after one of her attacks, I think I remember this one, because it suddenly got way more serious after that, it was the heaviest we had in months,” his voice trailed off into a whisper, “We’d thought she was doing better.”

God, Alex couldn't imagine and that voice felt like a punch in the gut, his arm reflectively tightening around Thomas.

“Fuck, in the email she said she still has time,” Thomas breathed, “I know it was still a while after that before she- she died, but- God, it fucking hurts, Alex. We knew we didn’t have forever, but reaching thirty would have been fucking nice.”

There was that all familiar anger at what could have been if faith hadn’t decided to be so cruel. Alex knew it oh so well and just watched as Thomas clenched his fist, but didn’t get up. The anger drained out of him almost as quickly as it had come and his heaving breaths turned into sobs.

And if that wasn’t familiar as well.

Alex quickly brought up the other arm and pulled Thomas into a hug. They were cocooned in blankets and cuddling on the couch and it should be weird, but it just wasn’t.

It seemed Thomas was done talking now, because he stayed silent as the time dragged on. Once Alex realized he wasn’t going to talk, he started humming. Alex had never done well with quiet, though he didn’t mind that much, but he more thought it would nice for Thomas to have something other than his thoughts to focus on.

They sat there until their stomachs decided it really was time for lunch. Alex offered to make it so that Thomas could stay seated, but while Thomas gratefully accepted his offer to make lunch, he followed him into his kitchen and sat at the table.

His eyes fell on the phone that Alex had left on the counter when he had made them tea. His fingers twitched, but he didn’t move any further than that, conflicted look on his face. Alex let him figure it out on his own and just focused on making French toast.

In the end he picked up the phone and stared at it for a moment, before putting it down on the table, screen down.

He pushed the French toast around his plate for a while, Alex didn’t say a thing, just watched him patiently. If Thomas didn’t want to eat that would be bad, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world for just a day.

It might be bad for Alex to let Thomas indulge in bad habits, but he promised himself he would make sure it was a one of thing. He managed to make sure Philip ate and slept enough despite his own inability to take care of himself, he could do the same for Thomas.

Thomas ate a few bites, it was hard to pretend to care about food right now, but Alex had tried and he knew Martha would hate him neglecting himself.

God, Martha and her stupid- No, he couldn't think that, she meant so well, but it just hurt. She should have told him.

Though that might have been worse.

He looked at his phone again, uncertainty creeping in. Would Alex think it was a bad idea to read the email again? He just wanted to know if he hadn’t imagined it. He hadn’t really committed it to his memory like all her other writings through the tears, but he doubted he would be able to read it without crying all over again.

An idea suddenly came to mind. It was a stupid idea, but Alex had seen him suggest multiple stupid ideas so it wasn’t anything new.

“Can you read it to me?” the words were out before he even realized.

“What?”

“The email,” he clarified, “Can you read it to me?”

“You’d want that?” Alex seemed unsure and Thomas could feel the doubt creeping in.

He shook it off, he’d made up his mind: “Yes, I just want to know the whole thing, but I can’t really read it, because I’ll start crying, so you have to.”

Alex hesitated for a moment: “Alright, if you’re sure…”

“I am.” Thomas unlocked the phone and handed it to Alex, trying to ignore how his hand shook slightly.

After a deep breath, Alex started:

“My dearest, Thomas

You may be wondering why today? It’s not a particular date for us, but I’m writing you this email because I know I won’t be there when you read it.

But none of that now, this was supposed to be a pick-you-up, because I love you, dearest.

I know I tell you all the time, but maybe you haven’t heard this in a while by now, so I’m telling you again. I love you so incredibly much and you deserve all the love in the world and I hope you have someone to remind you.

It might seem strange for your wife to hope you have found love again, but I truly do hope you went on to live a happy life with people who love you and make you happy.

God, maybe you’ll have kids.

If you do, tell them that their Aunt Martha is watching over them from the stars. I promise to guide their little feet home to you safely and sing them lullabies when they’re having a nightmare, just a song between them and the moon.

I don’t want my passing to be the end for you. I have seen your soul and I know there is so much in store for you, I just can’t place my finger on what, but I still have time to figure it out and I’ll tell you when I do.

Now that I’m writing this, I honestly don’t know what to tell you. I thought I would have a hundred pages ready for you, but I don’t.

You know that moment when you have dinner with someone, but you’ve been with each other the whole day, so you can’t ask them how their day has been? It’s kind of like that.

I have seen you the entire day today and if I hadn’t I can tell you in person in a bit, but by the time you’re reading this, you’ve had time to make new memories without me and you can only tell them to my grave or my picture.

This is so morbid. Sorry, dearest.

I could take more time to think about what I want to write you, but I have this strong urge to finish it now. It’s almost like I’m running out of time. I am, in a way. But I still have tomorrow, the doctors said I’ll make it through the night with no problem and I’ll be discharged tomorrow. They say I have a good chance at a few more years and by God I hope they’re right.

It’s ironic how you’re asleep in an uncomfortable hospital chair by my side as I’m writing this.

You stress too much. It makes you look old. I know I’ve always joked about you being an old man, but you don’t have to make it a reality by aging from the stress.

I hope the creases by your eyes become more pronounced than the ones on your forehead. I hope so many things for you and I hate that I can never give you all the care you’ve given me.

You’re a good man, Thomas. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

I know you worry. You worry too much, just like the stress. Just promise me you won’t give in to all the doubt you create for yourself. Appearances aren’t everything, I know you care about style (the magenta suits are really taking it a bit too far, you are lucky I love you, you ridiculous man), but try comfort every once in a while as well, okay?

Now, I’m sounding like my mother, God this whole email has gotten out of hand…

Not that I had much of a plan to start with. I saw this and just had to write to you, to tell you how worthy you are and how much I wanted to have a forever with you.

It feels rude in a way to write you like this, you might have moved on, created a new life and I’m disrupting it from beyond, but I know you, Thomas, I know you so well that it hurts sometimes and I also know that you have a hard time letting go.

I hope you have that life we could never have.

I hope you’ve found a job that makes you happy, with a spouse that cares for you and a picket white fence that America tries to sell in every movie with a happy ending.

But I fear that you got stuck on us, on me.

And while I am flattered if that is the case (and not bitter if it isn’t, God I’m so happy for you if I’m wrong, dearest), then I want you to know it’s okay to move on, it’s okay to live.

God, this is one depressing sappy mess.

But we’re both kind of sappy depressing messes, aren’t we? You brought me flowers to the hospital today, you remembered my favorites are Virginian Spiderworts. Did you know they mean ‘momentary happiness’?

Momentary happiness, like I said: depressingly sappy.

I don’t know if I told you the meaning, but it is an interesting bouquet to bring to a hospital bed of someone terminally ill, you know? And I love you for it. Never change, Thomas, never change. Stay my sweet little dork, I beg you. If someone tries to change you, tell em no or I will come beat them up for you.

I will forever protect you, I promise.

I think this is good and if it isn’t you won’t really get to leave a review, so I’ll be safe either way. So, this is it, this is goodbye, for now at least. I still have the luxury of giving you a hug when you wake up and I’m gonna keep doing that till the end.

Stay strong, I love you,

Martha, your beloved wife”

In the end they were both crying and Alex was impressed with himself that he had managed to make it to the end. The email gave him more questions about Thomas, but he it wasn’t really the time to ask about his late wife’s protectiveness.

He cleared his throat after a moment and said: “Martha was amazing.”

That got him a surprised chuckle as Thomas’s breathing started to become more regular. He swallowed and agreed: “God, she was.”

“Tell me more about her,” Alex requested. He remembered how nice it had been to tell Thomas about John and he found himself curious about the woman that had enchanted Thomas.

“She was the most intelligent woman I’ve ever met, and I know Angelica,” Thomas started, Alex let out a small amused huff, “Martha- Martha was the kind of person you had to look at, you know? When she walked into a room, it got brighter.”

Thomas perked up considerably when talking about Martha. He was still slightly curled into himself on the kitchen chair, but he was at least making eye contact with Alex.

“I used to be overly anxious – still am, but I’m managing – and she was always there for me when I needed it. She was a spitfire, she talked when I couldn’t and stood up for me,” Thomas confessed, “I try to embody her when I need to make a presentation.”

Alex was taken aback by it: “I didn’t know you got anxious.”

“It’s better when arguing with you, I have to think too hard on how to counter you to think about stressing,” Thomas tossed out casually, immediately hoping that wasn’t too revealing, he’d already compared the man with Martha once today.

But Alex just smiled happily, though it seemed unconscious to Thomas’s eye.

“Martha never argued with me like you do, though,” Thomas mused trying to save himself, “She would just roll her eyes at me whenever I did something she found unnecessary.”

“Like what?” Alex raised a brow with amusement.

There was probably too much glee in the man’s eyes for the question to be innocent, but Thomas didn’t care: “Well there was one time a lady stopped me on the street and she asked if I did a lot of desk work, which I did, so I said yes. Then she asked me if it made my back hurt-”

“Naturally also yes,” Alex nodded.

“Indeed, so then she asked me if she could touch me and at this point I’m scared, but too far in to say no,” Thomas tells him, “So she just put her hand on my back and starts praying.”

“She blessed you?” Alex sounded delighted and disbelieving.

“Yes and I did not want to be there. So, I was sending Martha ‘come help me, please’-looks, but she just shook her head and watched me. I think she would have stepped in, if she didn’t think it hilarious,” Thomas rolled his eyes fondly, “She always asked me if I felt blessed whenever we visited a church afterwards.”

“That is hilarious,” Alex giggled at the story and Thomas felt a strange sort of pride that he made Alex giggle like that. He’d heard the other laugh before, but never giggle. It was a light sound that eased some of the pain in Thomas’s chest.

He smiled at Alex and admitted: “Maybe in hindsight it was.”

There was a natural pause in their conversation, until Alex asked: “How are you feeling?”

Thomas thought about it for a moment. The ache he’d felt in his chest when he had seen the email that morning had dulled. It was still sharper than on most days, but it didn’t feel as overwhelming and never ending as it had done.

“Better,” he answered honestly.

“That’s good to hear,” Alex said, “Do you want to go back to the couch and watch a movie? This time I’ll even let you pick.”

“Sure,” Thomas agreed easily.

“Great, do you have popcorn or something?” Alex asked, already moving around in his kitchen to check the cabinets, not even waiting for an answer.

“Upper left,” Thomas said after a while of watching Alex struggle to find it.

Alex looked up to the shelf, then back at Thomas, before he huffed: “This is just discrimination against short people.”

Thomas laughed, before getting up to grab the popcorn.

They stayed on the couch for the rest of the day, Thomas leaning into Alex’s side, neither of them caring.

For dinner Thomas made Mac-’N-Cheese and they ate while having a passionate discussion about whether the characters in the horror movie they’d watched had made the right decisions.

When Alex said he was going home, Thomas felt kind of sad about it.

“Goodbye, Alex. I- Thank you. For coming. You didn’t have to do that, but it was nice, so thanks,” he said awkwardly.

“Hey, anytime,” Alex smiled, “Besides, it was the least I could after what you did for me and-” he hesitated, “and you’re actually not that bad of a company now I know you better, so-” he shrugged, “did it with pleasure.”

Thomas smiled, it was genuine and crinkled his eyes in the way Martha had adored. He didn’t know Alex melted at the sight too.

“You’re not that bad either, Alex,” he said softly.

“Well, I see you at work,” Alex cleared his throat and stepped away then he looked back and added, “Don’t come in if you’re feeling shitty tomorrow, okay.”

“I won’t,” and Thomas found it wasn’t a lie.

Again, this is not a guide on how to deal with grief, for the love of god don’t take advise from fics. I have tried my best to make it not shit and somewhat accurate, but I can promise nothing.

I debated posting the letter separate of the fic, but it’s important to the fic and the chapter title, so I kept it like this even if it’s a bit clunky. I only decided here to make the flowers important and I thought it very descriptive of their realtions, since both knew it would end sooner than later, no matter how happy they got to be during their time together.

Also, the blessing thing actually happened to me, slightly different, but it happened. And no, I do not feel blessed and yes it was awkward and none of my friends came to my rescue.

#RR writing #tw: grief #Hamilton #Hamilton AU #alexander hamilton #thomas jefferson #george washington #Martha Wayles Jefferson mentioned #Jamilton #'Till Death Do Us Part #'Till Death Do Us Part Part 3 #'Till Death Do Us Part AU

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groovybaybee · 4 years

Text

Greener - I

cw: mentions of abuse (not this chapter and nothing too intense but better safe than sorry) also alcohol consumption

(6k)

Spago, 7pm, reservation under my name, have fun saucy xxx

Oh, Lucy. Lovely, wonderful, maddening Lucy. Not only would she select my date for the evening, she, of course, would make a decision about when and where.

In all honesty, I do not mind. I would gladly allow that girl to run my life, she pretty much has made all the big decisions for me anyway. Lucy had been the one who forced me to enter our school’s talent show and sing in public for the first time. I lost hard, unable to compete with Anthony Piaz’s flaming diabolo tricks, but I was grateful to her, nonetheless. Lucy was also the one who made me move out to Los Angeles with her, telling me we needed to be with the stars if we wanted to be like them. It might sound cheesy, but that girl can be very persuasive when she wants to be. Since we were teenagers, she told me all about how we were going to make it big, I would be a singer and she would produce all my music.

Lucy has always been a dreamer, but she is the most dedicated and ambitious person I know, plotting out every detail of every day to make sure she could get to where she wanted to be. Her and I had understood that we could not just rock up in America and instantly start working for record labels. We would spend hours in her room, writing and producing songs every weekend, sending them to local and national radio stations, record labels, anyone we could think of.

Then one day, the universe fell into place. Our song, Penny, started to gain some traction. I will never forget the day we heard our song played on the radio for the first time. I never could forget it with the video of the two of us screaming and crying and laughing and hugging being sent to my phone every time I get frustrated.

‘They never gave up, and neither will we’

Luce has always been good like that, putting things in perspective when I start spiralling out.

Truthfully, Lucy has always been a bit of a hero to me. The voice of reason, even when I did not want to hear it. I trust her with my life. So, when I was offered a contract with a record label, I had insisted that she aid in the production, knowing that once the world could see her talent there would be no stopping her. And there never has been. Though we still work together on projects and tracks wherever we can, both of us have been blessed with opportunities to work with some of our idols in the music industry. However, it still feels the most special when it is just her and me working together.

Knowing that she always has my best interests at heart, agreeing to be set up on a blind date by her was easy. It was only afterwards that the doubts had started to creep in. Of course, Lucy knows me well, probably better than anyone, and so her choice of date for me would undoubtedly be my type. I know that they will be charming and funny and most likely have a smile that makes me want to swat them directly in the face for being so cute. However, it would be impossible for her to know the other person so well, so me showing up may not be what they had hoped for.

They could want to meet someone girly, polished, calm. While I can be those things sometimes, pretending to be anyone but myself would only lead down an unfortunate and embarrassing path in the long run. This self-assuredness, in theory, is lovely, but does not stop the nagging feeling in my stomach that whoever I am meeting at the restaurant will not be pleased to see me.

Trying my best to shake this thought, I get ready for my date. Landing on a simple black dress (knowing my tendencies to spill anything in my grasp), partnering it with a silver chain necklace, a few matching rings, and some thickly heeled silver boots. I put on a touch of makeup, style my hair, and spritz myself with perfume before grabbing a coat, stuffing the pockets with my necessities, and getting in the Uber I had pre-emptively ordered. I am going to be early but that suits me just fine.

Arriving at the restaurant, nestled beside Rodeo Drive, I thank the driver and exit the car. Spago is far too fancy for me to feel fully comfortable, a small part of myself always believing that my life is some sort of coma dream and one day I would wake up back home, older and having done nothing with my life. Despite my instinct to run and feign illness, I enter the restaurant and tell the matre d’ Lucy’s name. He gives me a pleasant smile and leads me through the bustling restaurant to an empty table on the patio outside. Thanking him, I seat myself at the table beside a sheltered, freestanding fireplace, taking a second to appreciate the warmth of the toasting embers against the slight breeze of the evening under the dwindling sun.

Looking out to the chair across from me, panic and excitement swirl around in my stomach. Wondering what they will be like and whether we will get on has me desperately searching around the quiet outside space for anyone who works here to urge them for a glass of wine. I manage to locate someone, but the thought instantly leaves my mind when I notice a person trailing behind them. They head straight in my direction and my head snaps back to the table, trying not to have their first impression of me be my crazy wine-hungry eyes. I take a deep breath, and a second to remember Lucy’s message: ‘have fun’.

Turning to meet my date as they stop at our table, a smile slips across my lips without my telling it to. Yep, Lucy definitely knows me. The man in front of me is the epitome of tall, dark, and handsome, but with an added dash of unreservedness, dressed in a black dress shirt, the collar of which pokes out over a baby blue suit jacket, trousers matching. My eyes land on his hand, ringed fingers clutching a bouquet of yellow roses. I cannot deny it, the sight sends a little zip of happiness through my body. Travelling upwards, I land on his face. And pause.

If this is a very elaborate prank, I have to give it up to Lucy. This is incredible. I remember her telling me that she was working with him on a track for his second album, but I would not have thought they were close enough to discuss love lives. If so, surely she would have snapped him up for herself. The amount of conversations we had spent discussing our celebrity crushes and he always popped up on both of our lists. There is no way this is happening. This just proves that I am, in fact, comatose.

“Hi,” he speaks with a tentative smile.

On the off chance that I am not in a simulation, I stand up and greet him, still unable to form words as he presses a kiss to each of my cheeks.

“Lucy said you liked yellow,” he says almost sounding nervous, looking down at the bunch of flowers in his hand.

“I do,” I say softly, shaking my head to bring me back to reality while he is looking away from me. “They’re, uh, they’re beautiful.”

He hands me the flowers and my brain almost completely malfunctions, unable to comprehend that I am sat, on a date, with a man I have been fawning over from afar for over a year. Sure, I have always known of him, but something about him kicking off his solo career and dressing differently, acting differently, it was all just incredibly attractive. Something so sexy about his confidence. An opinion I had expressed to Lucy many times in varying degrees of enthusiasm, her use of the word ‘saucy’ in her text to me suddenly making a lot more sense.

“Thank you, really,” I say, looking up from the flowers to him, a full head taller than me. “Sorry, I’m being weird, Lucy just… is full of surprises,” I admit, meeting his gaze as he observes me cautiously. He must think I am crazy, or incredibly rude, most likely both.

“I’m Violet,” I quickly introduce myself and gesture for us to sit. He does, with a relieved smile which I mirror.

“Harry,” he says gently.

Duh.

Harry Styles. I am on a date with Harry Styles. The man I had admitted to wanting to let ‘break my heart and sex me back together’. Not one of my best lines, I will agree. And he is even better looking in person. His hair is kind of messy in a very put-together kind of way. His eyes are deep and their hold on me is strong. And his lips kink up at the edges, pulling joy out to his cheeks as he watches me, almost assessing me.

“Yeah, I’m actually a fan of your music,” I admit shyly, hoping that he finds it endearing rather than psychotic.

“Likewise. To be honest, I can’t believe I’m sat here with you,” he speaks deeply.

This has to be a prank. No way on Earth did Harry Styles, Harry Styles, just say that to me.

“I didn’t realise you and Lucy were so close,” I confess, allowing my confusion and curiosity to spill out of my mouth at lightning speed.

“Oh, yeah, first day we met it was like instant sibling rivalry, you know? Straight away bullying each other,” Harry explains with a low, breathy chuckle. God, even his laugh is sexy.

I will admit to being relieved to hear that their feelings for one another were strictly platonic, not wanting to step on Lucy’s toes even if she had been the one to set us up. Something about hearing this new information allows my most recent conversations with her to make a lot more sense, her being the one to let me explain in detail all the disgusting things I would let this man do to me while she just laughed. That sly devil.

“How long have you two known each other?” he asks, sipping at the glass of water on his side of the table.

“Oh, since we were kids, think our souls are melded at this point,” I tell him, earning a captivated smile that reaches up to his eyes. “Do you do this thing a lot?” I ask, fascinated as to how I ended up in this situation. When he looks at me blankly, I hurriedly add, “Blind dates?”

“Not really, only one other time and it was… interesting,” he says, eyes glazing over as his mind flashes back.

“Me neither,” I start, bringing his attention back to the present in hopes to prevent him from reliving whatever terrible memory I had just triggered, “I do have a very important question for you though,”

“What’s that?” he asks with a grin that matches the one creeping on to my face.

“Are you a wine person?” I ask, faking sincerity.

“Oh, yeah,” he nods, laughing at my intensity.

“Good, ten points to you,” I smirk as we both glance down at the drinks menus, after a moment of reflection I speak up, “Want to just get the cheapest? Don’t think my palette could tell the difference.”

Harry lets out a small laugh and agrees happily, ordering a bottle of chardonnay for the two of us when the waiter circles around to us. My mind begins to spiral as I watch Harry pour us each a glass, wondering how I ended up here, what I think of him, what he thinks of me. Brain almost about to short-circuit[AH1] , I cheers my glass with his and take a long sip of white wine, desperate for a touch of Dutch courage.

We sit in a comfortable silence for a few moments, eyes locked as we drink in our surroundings, allowing the madness of the evening to sink in for our brains to process. There is a gentle smirk on each of our faces, enjoying the mischief of our mutual friend.

“I really loved the album by the way,” I confess to him, only to be rewarded with a bright and grateful smile.

“Thank you,” he says softly, an excited buzz coming from him as he shifts in his seat to lean his elbows on the table, chin resting on his interlaced knuckles. “I listen to The Lady Grey Project at least once a week,” he admits, and if I look closely (which I do) I can see a light rosy flush appearing on his cheeks.

At this point I reckon a rhinoceros could stampede into the restaurant and I would not bat an eyelid. Of course, he listens to my album regularly, this is a dream, in all honesty I am just shocked he does not have a tattoo of my face on his body somewhere. I say a silent prayer that I will be allowed to remain in whatever simulation I am in.

“You’re too kind,” I smirk, having to use my wine glass to hide as much of my blushing face from him.

“Can I ask where the Lady Grey name came from?” he asks curious about my stage-name, watching intently as I swallow and place my glass down. “Sorry if I’m being too nosy by the way, tell me to fuck off if you want,” he says, causing a light laugh to tumble from my lips.

He watches me with a soft gaze that makes me want to melt into a puddle underneath the table. Does he like me? No, he is probably just being polite.

Calm down crazy.

“Um, well, Lucy and I used to spend days in her room making music, and all we would eat was Cadbury’s Fingers and all we drank was Lady Grey tea, it was kind of our fuel you know? And then it just kind of stuck, and we used to joke about who Lady Grey was and I don’t know, I sort of idolised the character we created,” I explain as best I can.

“So, you became her?” Harry asks softly, his smile never faltering once while I spoke.

“Yeah, Lady Grey and Lucy Hind were going to take on the world together,” I say, looking down at the tablecloth, a slight feeling of embarrassment for oversharing my childhood dreams. It probably seemed so silly to him.

“And you are,” is all he says.

When I look up at him, his eyes are so gentle and comforting, and staring into them feels like stepping into a warm bath.

The waiter arrives back to our table to take our orders, preventing me from drooling over how idyllic this date is becoming. Harry apologises for the two of us, neither having even looked at the food menu yet, and asks for another minute. Eventually, we order our food and the conversation continues to flow easily, finding out about each other’s passions for not only music, but art in general, both discovering that the other loves to draw and paint despite having very minimal talent for it.

We talk about what we are working on, both giddy at gaining secret information about the other’s new projects. He whispers to me that he has a new album coming out at the end of the year, in return I tell him I have a small tour happening in a few months, a few intimate venues across the country. He tells me he would love to come to a show. I mentally let out a scream.

We discuss our hometowns throughout the main course, both hailing from the north of England, giggling over the surprising culture shock of living in LA. Conversation moves to talking about our families and still feeling homesick.

“I’ve been writing about home a lot recently,” I admit, finishing my second glass of wine, “I miss the colour green so much,” I laugh honestly, missing the miles and miles of fields and trees I could see from my family home.

“I get that completely,” he says, refilling my glass without me even having to ask, “I miss my little village and knowing everyone there. LA can feel a bit lonely at times,”

There is a pregnant pause, silence falling over the two of us as I give him a small nod, understanding wholly the feeling of moving across the world. It is scary and isolating and you really have to push through and commit to your work to ensure it was all worthwhile. However, that does not leave much room for forging any kind of relationship other than professional. Harry is right, it can be very lonely sometimes.

I find myself watching him, eyes a little bit softened by the wine and the evening light. Seeing his face flicker under the crackling firelight feels like I am seeing him for the first time, as though his features are completely new to me and I get to meet a whole new person. He really is breath-taking. Something about getting to know him allows me to see his personality in his physicality; patient eyes and dimples that deepen every time I nearly knock over my glass and insist that I am not drunk, that this is just how I am. Finding myself smiling while I watch him, I remind myself to act like a normal human being and sip at my wine.

But he watches me right back.

When desert rolls around, both of us are too full to appreciate anything fancy, sadly deciding to call it a night. After insisting that we split the bill, threatening to get his bank account details somehow and send him a direct deposit, we leave the table.

“Man, I shouldn’t have worn this dress, looks like I’m smuggling a watermelon,” I say, rubbing my bloated belly slightly as we walk through the restaurant, now significantly emptier than when I had arrived nearly three hours earlier.

“I like it,” Harry tells me, biting back a smirk, “Wrote a song about watermelons, actually,”

“Really? You’ll have to let me hear it sometime,” I say, thanking him as he holds the door open for me to walk through.

“Do you, uh, do you need a lift home?” Harry asks once we are outside, wrapping our jackets a little tighter around ourselves in the early autumn air. I pause to look at him and assess the sincerity of his offer. When he looks at me with nothing but kindness and caution, I nod, finding his trepidation incredibly endearing.

“That would be great, thank you,” I say softly, failing to mention that I would say yes to any offer he made so long as it meant I could spend longer getting to know him.

“Cool!” he says with so much enthusiasm that I have to bite down on my bottom lip to keep from smiling too big, utterly smitten with him. Harry clears his throat and pulls out his phone, calling his driver to come and pick us up. “He’ll be five minutes,” his voice is back to its low rumble when he turns to me, a light flush spread across his cheekbones. I pretend not to notice, instead fixing my attention to the roses in my hand.

“I’ve had a really nice time,” I tell him, hoping that in showing some vulnerability it will ease his embarrassment. It works. As I look up at him, he meets my gaze and smiles down at me gently.

“Me too. I think you’re really cool to be around,” he says tenderly, taking a step closer to me so that he is less than an arm’s length away. “More than exceeded my expectations for tonight,” he teases.

“I think part of me still thinks this is a prank,” I admit, breathing a laugh as I find myself gravitating closer to Harry, silently praying that he will kiss me.

“I know, I was listening to Penny on the way here to keep me sane,” his voice has dropped to just above a whisper, his face less than a foot from mine.

“As if,” I laugh incredulously, finding myself stepping back slightly so I do not deafen him.

“I was!” he defends with a chuckle, “I love that song,”

“Sorry,” I breathe, “I just didn’t think anyone really listened to it, except maybe my parents,”

“It was the first song of yours I ever heard,” he says, closing the gap between us again, “Thought how talented you were, even wanted to cover it.”

Back into the simulation you go.

“Wanna make sweet music together?” I tease, my voice a little low and breathy as the space between us rapidly reduces.

Harry exhales a chuckle, eyes flitting between my own and my lips.

He is fully going to kiss you.

Or at least he would, if that had not been the moment Harry’s driver decides to pull up to the curb, startling us both. Gaze fixed to the ground to hide my certainly bright pink cheeks, I shuffle into the car when Harry opens the door for me, sliding in shortly afterwards.

“Where to?” Harry asks, clearing his throat slightly.

I tell him my address, watching as he and his driver share a small nod before we set off.

The first few minutes of the ride are, I will admit, awkward. The only sound to be heard is the crinkling of the paper surrounding my flowers, my hands fidgeting nervously.

He was going to kiss me. He totally would have kissed me if we were alone for just one more moment.

An assertive person would kiss him now.

Would he want that? Would I want that? For our first kiss to be in the back of his car as we drove through my neighbourhood. I’m not so sure. Harry feels special, like he deserves a bit more romance than that.

I continue to fiddle with the paper in my lap.

“What’s your favourite flower?” I ask curiously, eyes fixating on the bright yellow petals.

“Quite like apple blossoms,” he tells me. His voice is soft, and I can tell his head is turned to look directly at me.

“See, I never would have guessed that.” I confess. Upon hearing him breathe a laugh, I follow it up with a mirrored tone, “What? You’re a mysterious dude.”

“Very mysterious,” he jokes as I look back up at him. There is a warmth in his eyes as they shimmer with laughter. It is almost as though the small amount of time focussing on something other than him has erased all memory of his face. Suddenly, excitement courses through my body. His stupid, happy face making my stomach squeeze itself.

“A real enigma,” I smirk after gathering myself.

There is silence again in the car, our eyes softly locked on the other’s, even as we pull up beside my house.

“This is me,” my voice is barely louder than a whisper.

“I’ll walk you,” Harry says, our gaze still unmoved.

For a moment, my mind drifts to Harry’s driver. I wonder what he makes of us sitting in the back of his car despite reaching our destination. Perhaps he thinks it is sweet, two kids still so nervous enough around one another that we both refuse to make a move. Maybe he thinks we are crazy and should just get out of the car like normal people would.

I nod my head slightly, more so trying to encourage myself to get moving rather than Harry. In all honesty, I would love little more than to just sit here and look at him, to feel whatever tension there is between us for a moment longer. But I steal myself away from that thought and open the car door.

Harry, ever the gentleman, sees me to my front door. It is a little old-fashioned but incredibly charming, nonetheless. I turn to face him once we reach the doorstep, craning my neck a little to meet his eyes.

My gaze lingers a moment on his lips, and I wonder if I should kiss him. Or would he not like that? He seems like he would not be opposed to a woman making the first move, but he is also the type to open doors and walk people to their homes. What if he wants to be the one to initiate? I doubt he would find me kissing him to be emasculating, but what if he recoiled at the thought? Maybe I shouldn’t kiss him. Maybe I should invite him inside. I will admit, the idea of ending the night with him sounds idyllic, but what if that gives the wrong impression. What if he is the type of guy who cares about a woman’s sexual habits? I never would have him pegged for that sort of person, but you never know.

Nerves and paranoia form a whirlpool in my brain, sucking me in until I am so overwhelmed that all I can physically do is stare at him, trying not to allow my eyes to widen too far in fear of looking like a maniac.

He looks down at me with a gentle gaze, his right hand lifting and fingertips gently grazing the side of my left hand. His thumb brushes across my wrists, his eyes flitting across my face until I am convinced that he has stopped on my lips. The palpable energy from outside the restaurant returns.

“Can I—” Harry starts but I interrupt him.

“Yes,” I say hurriedly, my heart beating a little louder in my chest at the thought of his lips against mine.

Thank goodness he’s making the first move. If it were up to you, you would be standing here for days.

“Great,” he smiles broadly, quickly retracting his hand from mine and reaching into the inside pocket of his suit jacket, “Lets make music sometime.”

Harry hands me his unlocked phone.

You absolute fucking idiot, V.

I quickly input my phone number and hand it back to him with a small smile.

“Great,” he grins, part of me hating how adorable he is, the majority simply hating how dim-witted I am.

He wasn’t trying to kiss you.

“Hang out again soon?” he asks brightly.

I just nod and return a polite smile. He beams down at me before bidding me goodnight and walking back to his car.

As quick as physically possible, I unlock my front door, dash inside and shut the door behind me.

Idiot, idiot, idiot.

I sink to the floor, back pressed to the door. He wants to work together. While that notion alone would have had me fainting before tonight, I cannot help but feel a little disheartened to have misread the situation.

He didn’t want to kiss you.

My mind quickly scans through the whole evening, wonder at which event I began to misinterpret the signals. Maybe he was going to give me a hug outside the restaurant. Maybe he actually was going to kiss me, but then I laughed in his face and stepped away from him. Did I put him off me that quickly?

Pulling myself off the floor, I put the flowers in a mug of water, telling myself I will deal with them tomorrow once I am over the embarrassment.

* * *

I barely sleep, tossing and turning and reliving every stupid detail and mistake I undoubtedly made.

“You absolute cow!” I shout with a laugh when I spot Lucy walking towards me.

She just laughs along with me, a slight bashful blush arising in her cheeks as she steps closer to me.

I had text her when I got home last night, asking her to meet me first thing and she had agreed. Meeting at the dog park between our houses had been my idea, desperate to see her new Dalmatian puppy, Pip. I had arrived early, pre-emptively getting Lucy and I lattes, knowing fully well that no matter what time I got there I would still beat her by at least ten minutes.

“Thanks, gorgeous,” Lucy greets, taking the coffee I had extended to her.

“Hello, sweetpea,” I say in a higher pitch than my natural tone, crouching to welcome the excited dog. Pip wags her tail aggressively, desperately trying to lick my face. I giggle as my face scrunches at all the attention she is giving me, “I know, I know, it’s been a whole two days since I saw you, how could I neglect you like that?”

“She pissed on my shoes. Right little dickhead,” Lucy muses as I stand up, giving the pup one last scratch behind the ears. My eyes drop to her feet as we begin to walk through the park. “Not these ones, idiot,” she laughs.

“Don’t call me an idiot, I have a bone to pick with you,” I reply, trying my very hardest to chastise her but just giggling through it, faking sincerity always having been difficult for me, “What was it you told me? ‘Its just a date, no biggie’?”

“Something like that,” she mumbles, feigning shame but smirking as she looks at the ground.

“Harry Styles,” I mock, “Harry fucking Styles. You could have warned me, mate! I thought about him in the shower before dinner, thought I must have slipped and bumped my head when he rocked up,”

Lucy laughs as continue through the park, walking out on to the open expanse of the field. Pip excitedly yaps at the dogs playing in the distance, a little too young to join them just yet. We walk in bemused silence for a moment until we find a bench and take seat on it, sipping intermittently at our cooled down coffees.

“How was it then? Complete disaster or did you hold it together?” Lucy asks.

“Well, I thought I was holding it together, we were even kind of flirty,” I begin. Remembering last night stirs up excitement in my stomach, contrasting my skin crawling with embarrassment, “But he never kissed me. He walked me to my door, got me to give him my number and left,”

Luce nods, letting me give her the gist of the previous night, not pushing for more information as I bounce one of my legs anxiously. “He got your number though?” She offers, always looking on the bright side.

“Yeah, because he wants to make music together,” I say, a small smirk interrupting my words.

“Make music or make music?” She teases, wiggling her eyebrows dramatically.

“I don’t know!” I laugh, giving her a gentle push when she keeps leaning closer to me and putting her creepy moving eyebrows in my eyeline, “We complimented each other and stuff, and it became a bit of a joke but now I’m worried he was serious and I just made a fool out of myself… I did have half a bottle of wine,” my tone more serious now.

“One, you’re a delight when you drink. Two, I bet Harry was such a fucking flirt, ‘Oh yeah, baby, lets make symphonies with our bodies’,” I cannot help but crack a smile at her, surprisingly accurate, impression, “And three, even if you did misread things, it sounds like he would be up for working with you, and if I remember correctly, you said you’d give your left kidney to sing a duet with him,”

“I’m never drinking sambuca again,” I mutter, shuddering at the memory of that night, drunkenly screaming as Sweet Creature played over the speakers of the bar.

“I say text him,” Lucy shrugs as if the solution is so obvious that she cannot understand why the two of us are even having this conversation.

“Ah,” I breath, “That’s another thing. I was a bit distracted by the whole ‘not wanting to kiss me’ thing that I forgot to ask for his number.”

“Idiot,” Lucy giggles, picking up Pip as she paws at her leg and setting her between the two of us on the bench, allowing me better access to pet her freely, “I’ll text it you,”

“I can’t text him out of the blue, won’t that look psycho?” I stress.

“No,” Lucy says, again so plainly it is as though she cannot believe she is explaining something so simple, “Pretty sure Harry likes confident people anyway.”

“Why would he want to date me then?” I mumble, eyes fixed on Pip’s as her mouth hangs open, tongue rolling out happily as she gets attention from the both of us.

“Maybe because you can throw it back like no one I’ve ever seen,” Lucy teases.

“Fucking hate sambuca,” I grumble half-heartedly.

The text from Lucy arrives on my phone a few hours later, just as I step out of the shower. I have to wipe a few droplets of water from the screen before it allows me to unlock it.

Don’t puss out x

Underneath is what I can only assume is Harry’s number. I stare at the white screen for a while, contemplating whether or not to text him. Should I? Luce said he liked confidence, and I wanted him to like me, or at least not think of me as some blob of flesh he sat through dinner with. What would I say? What possible message could I send that did not make me sound like a creep?

Hey it’s Violet. Lucy gave me your number, promise I didn’t ask for it

No, that sounds rude.

Hi, it’s Violet from last night. Lucy gave me your number, hope you don’t mind. I’d love to make sweet music with you

He could read that two ways. Either he would read it as me just wanting to work together, or that I wanted to see him with no clothes on. Neither option appeal despite both being shamefully accurate.

The condensation on my bathroom mirror has almost vanished by the time I set my phone back down. Desperate to go about my day without worrying, I head across the landing and into my bedroom.

Despite having lived here for well over a year, the Los Angeles heat never fails to stifle me, even as autumn creeps into view. The humidity seeps into my bare skin as I flop back on my bed, urgently searching for a reason to get back up and be proactive with the work I need to get done today. That in itself should be reason enough, but the temperature in my room seems to counter any sensible thoughts in my brain. So, I let my eyes close for a moment.

However, Lucy’s words keep circling around in my mind.

‘Don’t puss out’

That is what I always do. Deciding to grow a backbone, I stand up and march back into the bathroom to pick up my phone. I quickly unlock it, ignoring the notifications on my lock screen, assuming its just my manager prompting me to get my act together. I quickly copy the phone number from Lucy and make a contact for Harry, set on typing a message to him and pressing send before I can overthink how keen I will most likely come across.

You are keen.

Selecting his contact, my phone takes me to a chat with him, however, it is not blank like I had expected. Instead, there is a white bubble of text, a smaller bubble beneath it, both timestamped seven minutes ago.

I know films and tv shows always say you should wait at least three days before messaging but I reckon it’s all bollocks. I had a really good time last night and would love to hang out again. I understand if this seems a bit eager so I’ll leave it up to you. Whatever you fancy I’m up for – Harry

Also I don’t know why I signed that off like it’s an email but I’m going to stick with it so I seem confident – Harry

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gingerest-ale · 3 years

Note

YOUR PUNK AU ART has me on the floor. Absolutely spectacular!!!!! If you want to elaborate on your artistic choices I for one would LOVE to hear it <3

THANK UUUU!!!!!!!! also again i want to give credit to thee lovely castielsweedgarden (tumblr won’t let me tag them) for the original concept, the original post is here and their tag for alt!natural posts is here all their content is SO DAMN GOOD please check it out

OK ARTISTIC CHOICES. So for some background I’m a costume designer so I actually spent a lot of time doing research for these outfits and also I pay way to much attention to detail so get ready for an infodump because im a nerd.

DEAN

ok so my headcanon for the jacket (and if u read the og post this will make more sense hgafkgsjk) is that Dean stole it from John the night he and Sam ran away and he starts to modify it and make it his own and put patches on it that would piss off John and thats why he keeps wearing it because he took this thing his dad loved and made it his own and that is the ultimate “fuck you” to John.

Dean keeps his hair in a really short crew cut because i really enjoy Dean teasing Sam about their hair being long

Sam and Dean dye their hair in motel bathrooms and Dean changes colour every other month meanwhile Sam just dyes their hair black because “i dont want to damage my hair with bleach Dean”

I had a lot of fun with the patches and most are pretty self explanatory BUT i want to draw attention to:

the handprint patch on Dean’s shoulder right above where the actual handprint is

the patch that says “i love my non binary child” is the first patch that goes on the jacket because Dean wants to support Sam and it is thee ultimate patch that would piss John off

The bee patch was a gift from Cas <3

Deans shirt is ripped from hunting but he likes the aesthetic of it

The chain around his neck is silver or iron or some other useful ghosthunting metal

also the tattoo on Dean’s hand is inspired by this one fic its so good please read it

Dean wears a bunch of jewelry and you can’t see it but he also has a bunch of tattoos

SAM

Sam wears platform boots and it makes them like 7 feet tall but its ok its what they deserve

I said this in the tags but ill say it again: Sam got the spiked choker because they were tired of getting strangled by monsters all the time and honestly i think a lot of canon!Sam’s problems could be solved if he just wore a spiked choker

Anytime Dean teases Sam about their fashion choices Sam always tells him thats its for practical reasons. The rosary? Its for making holy water in a pinch. The ripped fishnets? they’ll just get ripped anyways. The platform boots? its too intimidate monsters. The spiked choker? Its self defence Dean come on, it’s a purely tactical decision, no aesthetic reason at all.

Sam modified the sweater themself. Spent the long hours in the car embroidering an exorcism onto a cropped sweater (it didn’t use to be cropped, but a werewolf clawed into the bottom part of it and well. here we are) in pink thread and sewing some black lace onto the hem.

why yes, Sam’s skirt does have a blood splatter on it!! you would think this would get Sam some suspicious looks, but their aesthetic is so Like That that people assume its just painted on in an attempt to be edgy. People who assume this are wrong.

Sam likes wearing revealing clothing because it lets other people see how insanely strong and muscled they are and alt!Sam loves being absolutely intimidating to people.

Like. Imagine. This seven foot tall giant shows up, wearing all black and spikes and you can see their insanely muscular thighs under the fishnets and oh god why do they have so many scars you Do Not Want To Mess With Them.

to be clear I think alt!Sam is just as much a sweetheart as canon!Sam is but they dont try to make themself look smaller

CAS

The shirt Cas is wearing says “BOB the man, the myth, the legend” and it is very much based on a shirt my lovely gf has.

The reason cas is dressed Like That is because he woke Jimmy up in the middle of the night and the tshirt and sweatpants and the socks are Jimmy’s pyjamas and of course he had to grab his coat and put on his crocs shoes before leaving the house to get possessed by an angel, he’s a sensible man!!!

ok so i need to talk about the crocs because some people seem unhappy about them. Castiel does not care about human fashion standards. He does not care about how he is perceived by others. Crocs are sturdy, comfortable, practical shoes to him and thats all that matters, why are you laughing Dean? They’re waterproof!

I honestly don’t know why i drew Cas with hoop earrings it just felt right but my current headcanon is because he say Beyoncé wearing some or something.

ok trench coat doodles time!!!!! there are many of them and i wont go into all of them but here are a few noteworthy ones

the one on the top right is based off a lil doodle one of writers did for a fan I think??? I can’t remember someone please link the post ;;

dean just doodles lil bees and hearts all over the place because they make Cas happy

theres a badly drawn Leviathan on there. in case you were wondering what that is

so many games of tic tac toe were played on the trench coat. Sam always takes the circles. Sam always wins.

the big heart on the bottom right contains a doodle of the poodle Dean found hot on that one terrible episode. I’m not sorry.

I did draw an airplane with gun arms. it’s an inside joke i have with my gf. No i will not elaborate. I think that Dean drew that on there because he thought the idea was funny.

bottom left corner has cool sun wearing sunglasses because we are all kindergarteners

the SW and DW drawn on the coat are because they put their initials on the places they call home.

Thank u for your ask my apologies for writing ten million words about it please enjoy

#spn #altnatural #can u tell i have adhd

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serenasoutherlyns · 3 years

Text

Full of Surprises ch. 1-3

casey/alex, past alex/olivia. semi-au & fuzzy timeline, set post season 9. cross-posted from ao3 so the first three chapters are coming at ya all at once. TW for series-typical violence, SA, and discussions of mental illness. less graphic than the show. Fluff, romance, angst! First three chapters are totally SFW.

And yet, as she scanned the place, she caught someone she recognized. Sitting at the bar, bent over a notebook, was Casey Novak; her deep red hair tied back in a casual ponytail, an empty highball glass in front of her, chewing on the end of a click pen.

1 .

This wasn’t where Alex would usually find herself. Or at least, it didn’t used to be. Maybe it was now.

Emily had spent her evenings sat at a booth in the back of the local pub, watching and sketching. The books she’d filled, she kept them safely tucked in a box in the back of her closet, initialed “EC.” Alex couldn’t find it in her to draw much anymore.

Anne was alone more than not, spent long evenings reading philosophy, went running early mornings, yoga classes, taught herself guitar, filled hours on hours with ideas and exhaustion. Alex didn’t spend much time poring over The Republic these days, her guitar was long covered in dust.

In law school, her friends had a favorite table in the window of a little cafe, they would go from morning coffee to afternoon study to sharing bottles of red wine, coming and going as they pleased, debating with hopeful glimmers in their bright eyes. Late into the night, arm wrapped around Sylvia’s waist, listening to her classmates carry on, she’d watch the candles burn down. Sylvia had called her Lexi, whispered in her ear on night walks in the cold Cambridge air to their little apartment, gentle hands soothing her most anxious times. Alex hadn’t felt like that in years.

College weekends were spent at punk shows in basements, though she knows now nobody would believe it, young Alex Cabot (the nickname had been coined in those years, sharper edged than the elaborate Alexandra) knew how to have some fun, at least back then. She’d dyed her hair black and worn studs on her collar, had a reputation for being a player, and it seemed like the back of her right hand was constantly stained with marker residue. Sticky floors and lipgloss on her neck, so many firsts all at once.

Her evenings during her years in the DA’s office were usually full of work, except the odd night when she’d meet the detectives for a drink at their haunt or head out with the other ADAs to some upscale cocktail bar. Two different crowds with two different mentalities, the detectives were dedicated to a fault, while the prosecutors were insufferably full of themselves. The detectives would tire her out by 11:30, but she’d find an excuse to leave the ADA excursions before 9. Far more special were the many evenings spent in Olivia’s apartment drinking two beers each and filling the quiet air with soft laughter and conversation.

But a little library themed speakeasy? Not her typical place. Well. No time like the present to change one’s habits. She’d been recommended it by an old law school friend a couple weeks ago, bumped into him on a whim in a coffee shop, was surprised she wasn’t dead, had been there last night, said it was right up her alley. Its illicit vibe wasn’t exactly to ADA Cabot’s tastes, no. But it scratched something in Alex, that hadn’t been satisfied since those basement nights and cozy cafe afternoons. From the place’s shelves she’d pulled a book of Pre-Raphaelite poetry and sat in a comfy chair with a scotch and a San Pelligrino, pleased, at least, to be out of the apartment for the evening.

She didn’t need the money, but she’d been copyediting textbooks freelance, filling up her time with grammar and word choice. She’d been reading a lot of fiction. She adopted two extremely fluffy cats. It was a pleasant, if mundane, life. It turned out, Alex had realized, that there were plenty of eager and capable young attorneys who could do her former job as well as she ever had. She felt, finally, like she deserved a bit of a rest. Needed one, really. Someone would do the prosecuting. The thought of stepping back in the courtroom, looking at the bench, examining witnesses, made her feel sick to her stomach, though she had once loved that life. It wasn’t her anymore— maybe it never really had been. She decided this was her kind of place after all. This iteration of Alexandra Cabot would drink bubbly water in secluded speakeasies while reading poetry.

Alex didn’t expect to see anybody she knew, not somewhere you needed a password to get into, where the music was indie folk and old jazz from a vintage record player, the drinks had names like the “Lady Brett” and the “Daisy Buchanan,” and most of the patrons were dressed in flannel with their noses buried in old books. And yet, as she scanned the place, she caught someone she recognized. Sitting at the bar, bent over a notebook, was Casey Novak; her deep red hair tied back in a casual ponytail, a half-empty highball glass in front of her, chewing on the end of a click pen.

This was surprising. Alex, though she hadn’t ever known Casey well, before her first brief return to life as Alex Cabot, only as one of the white collar ADAs (they ran in a bit of a pack, didn’t shy away from imitating the lifestyles of those they prosecuted). After knowing her as a prosecutor, Alex would expect to see Casey in a sports bar watching a game, or in some chrome-gilded bar with high ceilings drinking designer cocktails and cheering on a verbal showdown between her colleagues. Or in the center of a showdown like that. Not alone, writing in a moleskine, wearing a red flannel over a simple black dress. Casey was striking, Alex realized, before she realized she’d been looking a little longer than was considered normal. She hoped she didn’t seem like a creep watching from afar. She considered getting up, saying hello, but felt that Casey may not even remember her, may not want to be disturbed as she wrote, may not even recognize her anymore. She’d changed her appearance when she’d gone back to being Alex Cabot, cut her hair in a short bob, dyed it dark brown, wore thick rimmed glasses and simple clothing, too painful to be the formal blonde she used to be. Barely the same woman who’s once-murderer Casey had put behind bars those years ago.

Alex didn’t have to consider talking to Casey, however, because almost as soon as she returned to her book, she heard the sound of rubber soled sneakers against the old hardwood floors and a voice beside her.

“Hey stranger,” she said.

“Hi Casey,” Alex said as she slid her bookmark into place and looked up at the familiar face with a smile. “Care to join me?”

2 .

“I almost didn’t recognize you,” Casey said as she sat down. “I’m allowed to, uh, talk to you right? Though I guess if I wasn’t you wouldn’t acknowledge me, which would be fine, by the way.” There was the Casey Alex remembered, her words getting ahead of her.

“It’s fine, I’m me again,” Alex said calmly, “It’s really good to see you, though I wouldn’t have imagined you to be the writing type, or the underground-library-bar type” Alex gestured to the leather notebook in Casey’s left hand.

“I’m full of surprises, Alexandra Cabot.” Casey said in a tone that suggested she was sarcastic, yet convinced Alex she was telling the truth. Alex sipped her water.

“What were you working on?” She asked, not wanting to pry, but very eager to catch up, to know why she was alone in a place like this.

“Oh, nothing, nothing interesting. Just some little bits and pieces.” Casey replied.

“Not argument notes on a Saturday night, I hope?” Alex asked, though she knew that she would’ve done the same thing back when she was in the DA’s office. Casey looked pale, uncomfortable for a moment. “I’m sorry,” Alex said, trying to soothe any pain she may have caused, though she couldn’t fathom why. “I don’t mean to bring up work when you’re trying to relax.” At this, Casey just looked confused.

“Alex, have you not heard?” Casey said, searching for signs of recognition in the woman’s eyes, but finding only further confusion continuing, her voice low, “I was censured a few months ago. I can’t practice law for at least three years.” Alex’s eyes opened wide and she set her glass down on the table between them. “I’m surprised the rumor hasn’t reached your circles yet, though I admit I’m glad I get to be the one to tell someone for a change.” Alex noticed Casey cross her arms together over her chest, closing herself up, making herself seem smaller.

It was quiet for a while, the sounds of Ella Fitzgerald on the speakers, quiet conversations, and pages turning filling it. “I’m sorry, no, I hadn’t heard. That’s too bad. Do you want to talk about it?” Casey grinned at the suggestion, oddly intimate for the two women who, while they hardly knew each other, had shared some of the most intense moments either of them had experienced in a courtroom.

“I think I’ve gone over it enough in my head, but uh, thank you.” Casey said, her voice wobbling on the thanks, “You know, you’re the first person so far to actually ask me that?”

“I’m sorry.” Was Alex’s reply. Surely Casey had people who were interested in her feelings?

“The circumstances were,” Casey trailed off as she looked for the right wording, “I was at fault, for sure. But I was just trying to do the right thing, and I made a mistake.”

“Nothing shocking, I hope?” Asked Alex, still trying to ascertain the nature of the censure, wondering about what the woman sitting across from her could’ve done.

“I violated due process, technically.” Casey replied, attempting to gauge Alex’s reaction, but seeing that it continued to be contemplative rather than condemning, continued, “I shouldn’t’ve, but I think all of us have done worse in our time. But I was not in Donnelly’s good graces, so…” instead of ending her sentence, Casey sipped the last of her drink and looked up at Alex nervously, hoping the woman wouldn’t judge her too harshly.

“Oh man, Casey. That’s really tough. I’m sorry.” Casey searched for any sign of disapprobation in Alex’s tone, but finding only genuine concern, relaxed.

“So I’ve been doing other stuff for a little while. Using my undergrad,” she said, truly sarcastic this time. “What about you Cabot? What’s keeping you from your old haunt? And what’s with the brunette look?”

Alex wanted to answer, but wasn’t going to let Casey get away completely with deflecting. “You didn’t answer my question, Novak. What’s in the notebook?”

Casey laughed. “You really are relentless.” Alex just raised an eyebrow smugly while sipping her drink, as if to say, go on. “It’s a poetry journal. I’ve kept one since college.”

This admission broke the unflappable Alex Cabot’s reserve and she couldn’t keep herself from a few giggles. “I apologize,” she said, “for laughing at you. Just, the idea of Casey Novak the poet would not have occurred to me.”

“Like I said,” Casey started, “I’m full of surprises. And nobody has laughed at me in a long time,” she continued, beginning to laugh herself. “Believe it or not, I have an English degree.”

“Ok, ok, stop. I’m not sure I can take many more shocks tonight,” teased Alex.

“And you, didn’t answer my question. What’s with the brunette? You look beautiful,” Casey said before realizing what she was saying, shutting herself up before she said anything embarrassing.

“I needed a change,” Alex said, “Something to distance myself from my old selves. I never dyed my hair before, or switched up my look at all really. Just, a change.”

“I get that.” Casey said, and Alex felt like she really did get it, somehow more than anybody else had to this point. She’d seen a few old colleagues and friends, and they all had looked at her with this mixture of fear and pity that made her wish she was invisible. But Casey seemed to say something deeper in just three words.

They talked together late into the night, about books and drinks (Casey had been a bartender in college, her knowledge on pairings was unparalleled) and everything but law. It was close to 2:00 am when Casey started to yawn.

“I’m really glad I ran into you, Alex,” she said as they left the bar, her voice scratchy from talking quietly, a subtle accent that Alex couldn’t quite place showing through under the influence of sleepiness and her light buzz. It was adorable, Alex found herself thinking.

“Me too, Casey,” Alex replied, and before she could turn to start walking towards her apartment, only a block or so away, she was met with a hug. It was brief, but Alex took in the scent of Casey’s coconut shampoo, sweet and pleasing.

“I wouldn’t have expected you to be much of a hugger either,” Alex said as she pulled away, brushing her hands on Casey’s elbows.

“I guess you have a lot to figure out,” she said, playfully, as Alex handed her into a cab.

As Alex walked up the stairs to her apartment (she could afford a bigger place, but this one, this one felt right), Alex replayed the evening and regretted not asking for Casey’s phone number before she left. When she pulled her keys out of her pocket to unlock the door, she found a piece of paper, with a number and a note:

text me, so I can learn some of your surprises.

3 .

Alex was awake.

The same old dreams kept her restless. It had been a bad night, she’d slept less than 3 hours before she woke, startled, as the sun just began to rise, 5 am on a Saturday in September.

Foggily, she attempted to reconstruct the details of her pieced together dreams, her therapist, Julia, had convinced her to keep a journal. She said the nightmares of being shot, of nobody recognizing her, those made perfect sense, classic PTSD symptoms. With what happened to her it would’ve been stranger to not suffer it. But these hadn’t been those dreams.

Clare Cartwright, age 15 stood in line at the coffee shop. Her face was pink with tears but nobody saw anything out of the ordinary except for Alex, watching her from a table. Clare’s cheeks were wet and covered in running mascara but the barista didn’t bat an eye as she ordered an iced chai and sat down alone with her laptop. Tears turned to sobs turned to screams, thrashing, but she just kept typing, sipping her tea, nobody did a damn thing. Alex tried to rise from her seat, go to the girl, hold her and scratch her back while she cried, but the heavy weight of her own body kept her seated, powerless to do anything. She tried to yell across the room, tell her that it was going to be ok, she was going to put whoever hurt her behind bars, protect her from them forever. But when she opened her mouth all breath was sucked out of her lungs, she collapsed. Clare’s cries echoed ceaselessly.

Trevor Hamilton, a 20 something pro, had been turning tricks all night but one guy had taken it a little too far. He was sure his neck, hips would be covered in nasty bruises the next day. Oh well. Nobody believed a pro who cried rape. He stuffed his cash in his briefs and made his way towards the van he slept in with three other guys but before he could get there, he fell, body bloody. Nobody heard a sound but Trevor must have been shot. His blood was cold as it poured out of him onto the sidewalk but he stood up. He wasn’t dead. In the morgue, Melinda Warner ruled the cause of death a fatal gunshot wound to his back, probably a stray bullet, but he’d had sex the night he died, maybe an angry John. Alex told everyone that he wasn’t dead. Trevor whispered in her ear, asked her how could she let them say he was dead, how could she let them get away with saying such a thing like that, how could she let them call what had happened to him sex. Alex repeated herself over and over but all she got in return from the detectives were sympathetic looks of confusion as they sent her home for the day. She must’ve been too tired, Alex heard Olivia tell Elliot, maybe her mind was acting up again, sleep deprivation can kickstart psychosis. Someone would check in on her that night, make sure she wasn’t relapsing. Alex knew she wasn’t hallucinating, because Trevor had spoken to her in the clearest voice she’d heard in months. Alex wept for Trevor the whole way home and then some but nobody seemed to notice.

Annabelle Lamm wore a fuzzy pink nightgown when her grandmother brought her into the precinct one snowy night. Olivia called Alex to come to the precinct, they needed a warrant for the apartment, they found fluids in the girl’s hair of all places, grandma handed them an envelope full of pictures of Annie that nobody in the family admitted to taking. It was a no brainer warrant, Alex didn’t even mind waking up a judge for it if it meant getting whoever had been hurting this little girl as soon as possible. When Alex arrived to the building, Olivia wasn’t there and all the lights were off. Alex clicked on a lamp, wondered if Liv had found another ADA and rushed off without telling her anything. But the room was unfamiliar, empty, concrete. In the center of the room standing perfectly still was a 5 year old girl in a pink fuzzy nightgown. Alex ran to her but couldn’t get any closer. The little girl had a hollow expression and didn’t move an inch. Alex kept running and running but her feet stayed in the same spot, powerless.

Yeah. Powerless. As she awoke she felt like she was still running, head still spinning, still heard screams.

She wrote it all down in her journal. Julia had said that it was unusual for people whose jobs involved consistently levels of high stress and disturbance to have the severity of symptoms she had; that there was usually a tolerance that was built up to being horrified. Alex had either never had that tolerance or it had been washed away during the years she’d spent in WITSEC because her very brief return to the practice of law had nearly broken her.

“Sleep deprivation can kickstart psychosis,” Olivia had told her once when they first worked together, ostensibly referring to a case of statutory rape where the perp didn’t recall a single piece of the event; but Alex knew the comment was pointed at her, not the perp. Olivia could tell that Alex’s patience was growing thin, her mind unfocused; she must’ve deduced that Alex wasn’t sleeping much. But Alex already knew the warning signs.

Alexandra Cabot, age 16, sat shaking in a hospital room. It was almost finals week, she’d pulled a few all nighters, it was nothing serious, she’d told her school counselor a week prior when her friends had noticed her speech patterns growing muddled. She stayed up another 24 hours and the last thing she remembered was her roommates grabbing her wrists and pulling her inside off the balcony. After that, the school had installed locks on all the windows. Alexandra was freezing in her hospital gown, brain numbed out from the IV antipsychotics she was attached to. A few days in the hospital to take care of her injuries (she was informed that she had thrown herself against the wall while school officials took her to the ER), then a summer of residential treatment, hopefully she would be able to return to boarding school in the fall. Her father looked at her with a shattered expression, her mother treated her with cold indifference, her friends didn’t talk to her. Major depression with psychotic features.

Alex knew the consequences of not sleeping enough. She considered taking her cup of mint tea and heading back to bed, cuddling up to her cats, reading a book maybe, just trying to screw her head on right. Her body fought her though, nervous energy ran through her veins, so she elected to have a walk instead. Besides, it had been years since she’d had any serious episode. Anxiety, sure, and the occasional month or so of depression, a few close calls, but regular therapy and medication kept her more or less in the clear since college. Her family, her therapists, had suggested she go into a different kind of law, something stimulating but less distressing like, intellectual property, but she had refused, felt called to prosecuting. But her experience was what made her a great prosecutor, and it was why she had been so adamant about the proper handling of cases involving those suffering from mental illness, especially victims, but perps as well. She knew how it felt, more than she admitted to almost anybody, but she also knew there were paths through it.

The same old nightmares, but Alex was a different person. The old Alex would’ve thrown herself even harder into work than usual, won her cases even more viciously, assuaged her feelings of powerlessness by asserting control. This Alex knew that complete control was unattainable.

The September air was cold this early in the morning, but bracing. The contrast between her thermos full of hot tea pleased her, she pretended she was a dragon as she breathed steam. She smiled to herself at the thought and at the bright orange sun rising through the treetops in the park by her apartment. This had been the right choice, sunrises were her favorite magic. Content covered her like a well fitting dress, shaking off the nerves slowly. The most dedicated joggers and newsstand operators were the only other people out this early, the quietest time in the city. Alex’s phone buzzed.

Casey: Nice coat, Cabot.

Alex looked up from her phone, confused. What? Maybe it was delivered late. She’d seen Casey two days ago for coffee— they’d developed a friendship. Texts, coffee, nothing too deep; but then it had only been a couple weeks since they’d run into each other at the library bar. Alex liked Casey. She was funny and a good listener, and she always had something to say. She didn’t walk on eggshells around Alex either, making Casey unique among her friends. She’d tried to meet up with Liv right when she’d gotten back to the city the second time, but the way she looked at her cut way too deep, like she was a hero, like she was a victim. Both of those she may well be, but she needed to be treated as a friend. Casey did that for her, down to playfully teasing her over her eccentric habits. Another text:

Casey: Turn around, Clueless.

Not many people had ever called Alexandra Cabot clueless. Alex turned around, and Casey waved at her excitedly from the jogging path and without waiting for Alex’s reaction began to run up to where she was sitting. Alex was surprised to see her, happily so. She knew Casey was athletic, but didn’t take her to be the 5:30 running type. She wore tight leggings and a running jacket, and the biggest smile Alex had seen from her. She looked beautiful in the soft early light, Alex thought, then immediately blushed at that thought.

She’d never been one to shy away from her sexuality, especially when she realized the destructive role repression had played in her life before she came out. Alex had been out since college, but she tried very hard not to crush on straight women. She knew she couldn’t control who she was attracted to, but it always made her feel a bit dejected, so. Nip that in the bud.

Alex didn’t have much time to consider the ethics of her thoughts, because Casey was right in front of her, grabbing her hands.

“It’s so good to see you! A second surprise encounter, must be fate, Cabot,” Casey said in a quiet voice, a wink in her words.

“Something like that,” Alex replied, “What are you doing out so early?”

“I could ask the same of you; I’m just finishing up my run. You are wearing a fancy coat and looking deep in thought, in fact, you are being far more suspicious than I am, look at how many people are out here jogging, I mean,”

“Oh my god,” Alex cut her off with an eye roll, “Ok, stop cross-examining me.”

Casey gave Alex a genuine laugh, “Old habits die hard.” She paused for a second. “You look pale, did you sleep?”

“Thanks, Casey.” Alex gave her a playful glare. “If three nightmares in three hours counts, then yes, I slept.”

“Oh you poor thing. I’d hug you but,” She gestured to her sweaty figure. “You wanna get breakfast? I’ll pop back to my apartment, shower, and meet you at yours in say, half an hour?”

Alex started slightly at the familiarity, but responded, “Yeah, sure, sounds fun. Uh, here I’ll text you my address.”

Did Casey blush? Alex couldn’t be sure due to her post-run glow and the chill in the air. “Sorry if that’s too familiar, I know we usually plan these things out, and I guess I just assumed you didn’t have plans, it’s totally fine if you don’t want to, you know, runner’s high and all,” but Alex cut her off again with a raise of her eyebrows.

“Are you retracting the offer, Novak?” Alex couldn’t resist the urge to tease the woman in front of her. “Because if I recall correctly, I said yes.”

Casey grew more flustered, replied with a quick, “Nope, still happening, see you in half an hour,” and took off running, leaving Alex behind as she laughed in disbelief.

#law and order svu #calex #cabenson #alex cabot #casey novak #olivia benson #svu #svu imagines #alex cabot x casey novak #alex cabot x olivia benson #svu fanfiction #fanfiction #author #casey novak poetry nerd

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cuttlefishkitch · 4 years

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hello! i haven't talked to you before, but ron said that i could ask you for some advice on writing eds? (i'd like to know things to avoid/common things that could come up in everyday life that would be good to mention/the sort of aids and stuff they'd have maybe?/anything else you think is relevant)

Hi! Sorry this took so long, a combination of ADHD and chronic pain slowed me way the fuck down. Thank you for being patient!

EDIT: WEIRD HEEL THINGS I FORGOT!!

So, before I get into this I should probably say I technically haven’t been diagnosed with Ehlers Danlos Syndrome (EDS for anyone reading) because it’s one of those syndromes that takes forever to get diagnosed with (it took a friend of mine’s mother over 30 years to get dxed). Many doctors, and everyone I know who does have EDS agree with me that it’s probably what causes my chronic joint pain and some of my other chronic issues. But just because three separate doctors have said “Yeah Probably” doesn’t mean I’m diagnosed!! Only a geneticist can do that!! And they had two-three year waitlists BEFORE the apocalypse happened.

I am diagnosed with Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS), Small Fiber Neuropathy, and potentially misdiagnosed with Fibromyalgia (once I get properly tested for EDS I might get undiagnosed with this because I don’t have most of the main symptoms of Fibro, but I got diagnosed with it anyway because it’s what doctors misDX you with when they don’t know what’s wrong with you and don’t want to do more tests).

All that said, I’ve done a lot of research about EDS (mainly because it’s the only thing that explains all my symptoms since doctors seem incapable of doing so), and know a few people who have either confirmed or suspected EDS, so I’ll link to some stuff, talk about the symptoms that often come with EDS, explain how the symptoms I have affect me, because just because someone’s not diagnosed doesn’t mean they aren’t having symptoms, and probs elaborate a bit about writing physical disabilities and chronic pain in general because it’s super important to me!

So RESOURCES aka how to make sure your post never sees the light of day because you’re linking things and tumblr hates it when people give other people information!!

Youtubers! If you want to know about the day to day of living with EDS or any disability or chronic illness I super suggest finding a youtuber that makes videos about their life. My EDS favorites are

Jessica Kellgren-Fozard

Annie Elainey

Amy Lee Fisher

Websites! If you’re asking random folks on tumblr I’m assuming (and hoping) you’ve already done the basic WebMD google searches and looked over the seemingly ridiculous lists of symptoms and related conditions, so here are a few websites that are made more for people than for doctors.

The Ehlers Danlos Society

OhTWIST (That’s Why I’m So Tired)

ChronicPainPartners (the fact that they have an entire section of articles called “Dealing with Doctors” should really tell you something)

Books! If you feel like doing actual reading! I suggest reading books written by people with Ehlers Danlos, to get a feel for how they portray themselves. I’m not saying steal, but it’s probably a good point of comparison to see how your portrayal feels. (haven’t actually read these b/c my ADHD doesn’t let me read)

Ria Ruse by Morgan S. Ray (a superhero book with a disabled super MC!!)

Mysteries of Maybelle by Imani Benfell (Imani is still in high school and has already written and self-published a book cause she didn’t have enough representation for herself how cool is she!!)

Bodies in Motion by Liana Brooks (tw for pregnancy problems and miscarriages in the link, because it’s a blog post talking about integrating EDS symptoms into the story without explicitly naming them as such)

OKAY, now for some rambling about EDS SYMPTOMS!!!

Ehlers Danlos is one monster of a genetic condition in complexity and variety. There are THIRTEEN different identified types of EDS, it often comes with Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS) and/or POTS, and can lead to various other conditions like gastroparesis, chiari malformation, craniocervical instability, and/or bad teeth. So if you’re going to be writing a character with EDS consider what other comorbid conditions they might also have. I’m mainly going to be talking about Hypermobile EDS (hEDS) because it’s what I probably have and what I’m most familiar with. That said there is a lot of overlap in symptoms with the other varieties.

I started typing this section and realized I was going to have to break it down even more so we’re going to talk about Chronic Pain, Unstable Joints (Dislocations and Subluxations), Skin Things, Mobility Issues, and Other Weird Shit and how those things get addressed separately.

Gonna get the Other Weird Shit out of the way first. Because EDS is a malfunction of connective tissue it can fuck up all sorts of random things. For instance, I and many other people w/ hEDS have trouble swallowing. Shit gets stuck in my throat, I sometimes choke on and have to cough up food, and pills can be hard to swallow, which sucks cause I take A Lot Of Pills. If it doesn’t cause full-on gastroparesis it can cause IBS or other digestive problems b/c the digestive tract is mostly made of connective tissue. It can potentially cause heart problems even if they aren’t as big of a risk as in some other forms of EDS. Premature osteoarthritis is common because what you need is more joint pain. And Fatigue OH BOY THE FATIGUE. And of course the headaches, can’t forget those pesky migraines can we!

AND piezogenic papules!! I completely forgot!! Piezogenic papules are little white bumps that appear when you put weight on your heel. In some people they hurt, but in others they don’t. They’re technically tiny little herniations of fat peaking through the fascia in the heel. They were added as part of the diagnostic criteria for hEDS in 2017!

Now for Skin Things cause it’s not as big a thing in hEDS as it is in other forms. Basically, in a lot of forms of EDS, the skin is extra stretchy and extra delicate. It bruises and tears easily, people with the extreme versions of this can accidentally scratch something into an open wound if they aren’t careful. My skin is pretty soft and sensitive, I def have the typical velvety skin, and as is pretty par for the course of someone with hEDS my skin is a little stretchy, and sorta delicate. I’m not as tissue-papery as some people get, but I almost always have at least one mystery bruise or scrape b/c existing is hazardous. Most of scars are also pretty normal, unlike the extremely papery and atrophic scars (though I have a few tiny acne scars that are atrophic) that are common with other kinds of hEDS. Something that I DO have is Lots of Stretch Marks, all over my thighs, and even down to my calves. Which wouldn’t be abnormal, except for the fact that I’ve never been over 145 lbs and I’ve never been pregnant. Having a lot of stretch marks or striations in the skin without due cause happens because the structure of the skin isn’t as strong as it is in people with a normal amount of connective tissue.

I don’t have to worry as much about my skin but people that do are usually very careful with adhesives because they can irritate or tear the skin, which sucks when you need a lot of bandaids cause your darn skin won’t do its job.

Now on to the meatier stuff and since I’m mostly working backward let’s do Mobility Issues!! These can happen in loads of ways, but a lot of what causes these in people with EDS are the other two things I wanna talk about. Unstable joints lead to increased risk of injury when doing stuff people with fully functioning joints can do.

For context, I’m an ambulatory wheelchair user, meaning I can walk, but a lot of the time it’s better if use a chair. Mine is mostly for my POTS symptoms, but the fact that my legs aren’t also in absolute agony is a big plus. I use a custom manual wheelchair with a SmartDrive (b/c I’m very fucking fortunate and have good insurance) whenever I leave the house and have to be “walking” for more than a few minutes at a time. I can’t fully self-propel in a manual chair because it would be damaging to the joints in my arms and hands, but the smaller chair is easier to maneuver in less than accessible spaces (like almost everywhere). There was about a month-long span where I used a very cheap and very bulky electric chair while I was waiting on the ideal set up I have now. Before that, I also briefly used, and sometimes still use, an up-right posture cane.

People with EDS have widely varying mobility issues because of how uniquely it can manifest. My cane only gave me a little help with balance because if I used it in any prolonged capacity any pain it took away from my legs was relocated to my arms, and as an artist, my arms are more important to me!

If you’re going to write a character with EDS having mobility issues as a result of their EDS the best thing to do is to narrow down their specific needs. Are their knees complete and utter garbage but their shoulders and wrists strong? Maybe they can get away with using a cane. Can they not stand for longer than 5 minutes because of the vertigo from their POTS? Maybe they need a manual wheelchair. Would propelling themself damage their back and arm joints? An electric chair might be necessary! Plenty of people with EDS use all sorts of combinations of these aides to get around their life, consider how your character’s good and bad days would be. Do they have back up plans if they overestimate themselves? There can be a lot to manage, but don’t let it scare you off! Sometimes I try and make it into a resource management game (because I’m a game designer and that’s what I do), to make evaluating my energy and mobility needs more fun!

But now let's tackle some of the reasons those mobility aides might be needed. Unstable Joints.

Ever stepped wrong and rolled your ankle? It hurts for a few steps and then kinda fixes itself, or maybe it bothers you for the rest of the day and you put it up and ice it when you get home? When I was walking around outside my house that would happen AT LEAST once a month, usually more. Some times I’m sitting wrong and when I get up my knee isn’t a knee anymore and decides to just give out from under me. My knuckles are made of unruly popcorn and they Don’t Want To Stay Home!! Oh! And my shoulder is more often out a little out of its socket than it is fully in.

Unstable joints lead to Dislocations and Subluxations of varying intensity, and some people get them more frequently than others. Some can be severe enough to necessitate hospital visits and even surgery, some subluxations are so banal (like my fUCKING SHOULDER) that you just learn to live with the pain.

If a character is going to be in high action, combat-heavy scenarios, chances are they’re going to be popping out joints left and right. Hell, depending on the severity of their joint laxity they could be doing the same sitting at a desk. Again, it’s incredibly varied. I’d suggest setting some sort of baseline for yourself, of what a character’s joints can and can’t stand up to, and maybe do some research on which joints are most likely to pop out in general (hips and shoulders are big culprits being the wacky ball and socket motherfuckers they are). Then maybe have something pop out or hold up every so often when it shouldn’t cause hey! EDS is kinda just like that! Unpredictable!

Some ways people manage joint laxity is with braces, KT tape, and physical therapy. Braces come in many different forms, since I’m currently getting pretty much no treatment for my shitty joints I use mostly compression braces made for sporty people. It really is amazing how much a bit of tight fabric can do to keep my wrist in place.

More specialized braces often have solid parts to prevent the joints from hyper-extending (bending the wrong way) and causing further damage. If you ever see someone with what looks like diamond shaped rings around a bunch of their finger joints, chances are those are Ring Splints, and are there to keep the finger shaped like a finger. I want to get my hands on some and get some on my hands Very Badly, because my fingers hyper-extend SO MUCH when I type, and it makes my hand pain way way worse.

KT tape is another thing people often use. It’s stretchy tape you put on your skin and it basically functions kinda like a second ligament as well as reinforcing the joint and keeping the bones mostly where they’re supposed to be. The problem with this is a lot of people with EDS have very sensitive and fragile skin like I mentioned before, so KT tape can cause allergic reactions, chronic skin irritation, or just straight up take the skin with it when someone goes to remove it. Hence a lot of folks are really careful with it.

Physical Therapy is kinda the best (and only) treatment for joint laxity aside from Very Invasive and sometimes Highly Experimental surgery. It focuses on strengthening the muscles around the joints so they can do the work all those bone ropes made of body glue can’t. The problem is finding a physical therapist that 1) knows what EDS even is, 2) knows you have it, and 3) knows how to treat it without doing stuff that’ll Phucking Hurt You Worse!! Because exercising wrong with EDS can do Permanent Damage!!!

Again most folks use a combination of all of these things, or have next to no access to them b/c healthcare sucks.

Anyway, on to one of my favorite topics, Chronic Pain!! One of the reasons this post took me so long!!!

Chances are if your character has chronic pain as a result of their EDS there are gonna be some things they hate, including stairs, rain, thunderstorms, stairs, hills, uneven terrain, oh and did I mention stairs??? It’s going to vary person to person, but almost everyone I’ve met with pain from EDS has complained about their knees. For me the most debilitating pain is in my fingers and wrists. They’re by far my least stable joints but I use them constantly for stuff like drawing, typing, and sewing.

Because my joint pain is so wide spread, like most people’s with hEDS, it effects every single part of my day to day life. I can’t carry a heavy ceramic plate, open a bottle, or even use my computer without pain. It’s practically impossible for me to get comfortable in any position be it sitting or laying down, and as you can imagine that makes it hard to sleep a lot of the time. Moving too much hurts, but so does sitting still. I’m constantly taking braces on and off or cracking/stretching my joints so they pop back into place and hurt less.

Also being in pain makes everything else That Much Worse. I get tired way faster than I did before my pain was this bad (I had chronic pain for a while before actually realizing it wasn’t normal to not be able to walk down the block without feeling like your foot bones are trying to escape). My sensory issues and anxiety disorder are more easily aggravated because my base level of comfort is way worse. It fucks with my depression. And OH BOY does it make my ADHD worse because being in pain is fucking distracting as hell and makes it harder to make decisions and switch tasks. Also my ADHD often makes my other symptoms worse cause I forget to take my meds, don’t drink enough water, or can’t find my fucking braces because the item eating black-hole that comes with ADHD stole them. The intersection of mental and physical disabilities is probably a rant for another time though, so back to chronic pain.

Does it suck? Yes, undoubtedly. Is this incredibly debilitating? Of course it is, I spent the last several months unable to feed myself without assistance because there was a staircase between my room and the kitchen and I could only manage to climb it once a day. Is it overwhelming? Definitely, I’ve frequently broken down crying from a combination of pain and frustration because I’m having a bad day and there’s no relief to be found. Am I able to predict when it’s going to rain with uncanny accuracy because any change in barometric pressure makes me feel like every bone in my body is trying to kill it’s neighbors? You bet your fucking ass I am!! Does it sometimes make me irritable, angry, and occasionally dismissive of when abled people get cold or a temporary injury because the stuff they’re complaining about is my life every single day and all avenues of treatment and recovery I have could take years and still not entirely solve my issues? Yeah, and while I deserve a little extra patience I also have to be sure to check myself because I don’t want to turn into someone who’s nasty to be around. Do I sometimes need to sleep for 17 hours straight because it’s raining, I have migraine, and I’m in too much pain to be conscious? Yup, sometimes a few days in a row. Does living in constant pain mean I’m unable to do all the things I want to and does that sometimes make me wanna curl up in bed and never leave? Yeah, it happens.

But! And here’s the big important but, that’s not everything! I still write, draw, and talk to my friends!! It might take me a little longer but I get there. I’m still happy and excitable and make the time to write out five page long posts about EDS because it’s something I’m passionate about! My chronic pain doesn’t stop me. I refuse to let it. I never really wanted to go mountain climbing anyway, so I’m perfectly happy being able to make it up and down the six steps in my house, even if sometimes I have to sit and bump down them on my ass, or crawl up them like a cat. Chronic pain isn’t all I am. It isn’t a fate worse than death. It isn’t the only thing your character should talk about (though I do talk about my pain a lot cause I’m a complainer about almost everything). You can have your character be hindered by their pain, realistically they would be. You can have them seek comfort, support, and relief. Other characters can commiserate and be sympathetic, but it doesn’t mean their whole life is going to be one big pity party, that would be incredibly fucking boring. I know I’d be bored out of my mind.

All that said dealing with chronic pain, especially from EDS, is Complicated. Physical Therapy is the gold standard, but like I said before it can be a long and difficult process, and isn’t always accessible. Stabilization methods like I talked about before can help prevent pain, or reduce it by keeping bones mostly where they belong. Heat and cold help joints, relax muscles, and reduce inflammation but keeping them applied is rough and the relief doesn’t always last. Doctors prescribe anti-depressants, anti-anxiety, and sometimes even anti-epileptic medication to help manage pain, but everyone’s mileage with those varies. And I’m not at all qualified to talk in-depth about narcotics or other heavy duty pain-meds, but suffice to say the war on drugs fucked shit up for people that legit need that kind of help BIG TIME.

Now for my closer/bonus rant about EDS and Disability Writing in General!

Everyone always says write what you know, so if you really want to do disabled people justice, get to know disabled people! Make friends with disabled people, get involved with advocacy groups, consume content made by disabled creators both about disability and not! Disabilities are so fucking diverse, even EDS is such a complex disorder, and comes with so many potential co-morbidities, that practically everyone with it has a unique experience. There’s no way I can fully explain everything in a tumblr post. Hell, even if I could talk to you for hours probably couldn’t give you enough info to answer all your questions (especially since I’m still in diagnosis hell :,) ), so talk to a wide range of people with EDS and other disabilities!! I know it sounds like a lot of work but trust me, disabled people are some of the strongest, raddest, coolest, people you will ever meet that it won’t feel like it.

And don’t be afraid either, the fact that EDS and other disabilities are so wildly varied means that you have a little bit of wiggle room with your character’s experience. There’s so little disability rep out their I think people are WAY to scared to try their hand at writing it. So long as your character is a fully developed person in addition to being disabled, you give some logical thought as to how it would affect their life, and you don’t make their disability the butt of any joke it isn’t difficult to avoid ableist writing. PLEASE WRITE MORE DISABLED PEOPLE AND PEOPLE WITH CHRONIC PAIN/CHRONIC ILLNESS!!

Okay that’s it, again sorry it took so long for me to get back to you! My fingers were being little pests about it, and my ADHD (which is honestly more disabling than everything else a lot of the time lmao) was being an asshole! Hope this helps, and feel free to ask me more questions if you need clarification! It might take me a bit but I do love talking about this stuff.

#neela-chaan #ehlers danlos syndrome #EDS #hEDS #hypermobile ehlers danlos #disability #writing advice #disability writing #Chronic Pain #asks #SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG IM JUST SLOW #also i'm sorry the formatting is such a wreck #my adhd won't let me go back and fix it #and i've already spent way too much time

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