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wardenparker · 1 month

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Detective Tim Rockford with “I thought you liked forehead kisses” 😌 because I love forehead kisses

Tim Rockford. 2,836 words. "I thought you liked forehead kisses." Co-written with @absurdthirst Warnings: Grief, trauma from family death, discussions of death, angst, discussion of divorce, reconciliation Sequel to: “Wait! Please don’t leave!”

The days are shorter right now. He excuses himself by saying that he’s just checking in with you, but that’s easy considering you are still staying in his house. Weeks have come and gone, the crime scene tape has been cleared from the yard and the front door of the house you shared with your sister, but you haven’t been able to go back there, not even to pick up clothes. Opening the door to the house he is once more sharing with you, he calls out your name, turning and closing the door with a decisive click and turning the deadbolt to give you that extra sense of security you need. “Sweetheart? Where are you?”

“I’m in the kitchen.” Such a Donna Reed thing to say, but it’s true. And the semblance of a normal routine is helping to ground you, if you’re honest. The office is letting you work from home while you sort out your family tragedy and try to cope, but the fact is that being back in the house that you and Tim picked out together gives you a sense of safety and security.

He drops his keys on the entryway table and shucks his jacket, his shoulder harness still in place over his button down shirt as he walks into the kitchen. “Hey.” He sends you a soft smile, still trying to ignore how right it seems to have you here. He had been sharing his bed with you, not fucking you, but you had curled into his arms that first night and he hadn’t been able to turn you away when you needed comfort. “How are you doing today?”

“About the same.” No one expected this to be easy for you, but having Tim to lean on for support has helping more than you could possibly know. “But I, um…I made chicken parm for dinner…” It’s the smallest thing you could possibly do to thank him for taking you in, and it turns out that after all these years cooking is fairly soothing for you. The machinations of the kitchen are a comforting routine. So making his favourite dinner was not a very hard leap to take.

“You didn’t have to do that.” His protest is perfunctory, already drooling at the thought of your chicken parm. He’s never found one close to it. “But thank you.” Moving over to give you a hug, he presses his lips to your forehead gently.

It’s such a small gesture, but it warms you through to the point of making you ache. Practically making you melt against him. “What was that for?” You ask, almost like you’re afraid of what he might be getting ready to tell you. It’s been three weeks and you’re still here — maybe he wants you to leave or has finally realized this whole thing is inappropriate. Or worse — he’s realized that you still have feelings for him.

Tim pulls back, worried that he had possibly overstepped. He’s tried so hard, but it’s almost impossible when he’s still in love with you. Never stopped loving you if he’s honestly with himself. He shoots you a sheepish look. “I thought you liked forehead kisses.” He murmurs softly.

“I do.” And your cheeks are burning at the seemingly innocent show of affection. “I just…I’m surprised you remember, that’s all.” It seems like such a tiny thing to you. That fact that he remembers speaks volumes.

“I remember.” Tim answers quietly, his eyes sliding away from your face before he admits he remembers everything about what you like.

“I do, too.” You remember everything. The good and the bad. Including how you pulled the plug on your marriage too quickly. There should have been counseling and compromises. But you had reacted impulsively and he hadn’t fought you. So you had just…thought he agreed. That your marriage wasn’t worth saving after all.

Holding you close for another moment, Tim pulls away. Refusing to take advantage of your emotional vulnerability. “I picked up some clothes for you today.” He murmurs softly.

“You didn’t have to do that.” The day after the attack you had managed to get yourself to Target with the help of an emergency appointment with your therapist, and have been working off those supplies for weeks now.

“I know, but I thought it would be nice for you to have some of your things.” He’s not going to mention that he had the crime scene clean up crew in. It would be okay for you to go home but he doesn’t want you to.

“Thank you.” It’s almost painful to have him move away, but you can’t tell how much of it is grief, how much of it is missing him, and how much of it is gratitude. “Dinner’s almost ready…I had it all set up so you could work late if you need to…I just need to cook off the spaghetti and melt some cheese over the chicken.”

“Thank you.” You’ve been so understanding if he had to work late, probably because he’s working on your sister’s case, but he has news for you. “Sit down for a minute please, I want to talk to you.”

“Is everything okay?” It can’t be. Not if he has that serious tone. But you swallow hard and try not to catastrophize what it could be — that won’t help a single bit. All you can do is sink into a chair with wobbly knees and try not to fear the worst. That the man who killed your sister has gotten away. Or even killed again.

Tim kneels down in front of you again, taking your hands in his. “This afternoon, I arrested the man who murdered your sister.” He tells you softly. “He confessed. There’s no way he’s getting away with it.”

“He—he confessed?” The way you had been prepared for a fight. To have to look the man in the eyes in a court of law and make him admit it or worse. If he actually went free? The absolute terror in your heart that has been clutching into your soul with a merciless grip just slips, and with it comes the outpouring of tears that you’ve been holding back for weeks.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, baby.” You rock forward in a sob and he catches you in his arms, holding you close while you cry in rage, grief and absolute sorrow for the sister that has been taken from you and the life you have lost. “We have him, baby. It doesn’t bring her back, but he’s going to rot in jail for what he’s done.”

Without any concept of how long you cry for, all you know is that Tim stays there — crouched with his bad knees and his worse back — in front of you and holds you the whole time. He’s been the calm against the storm for this entire tragedy. He’s been a rock in the stormiest sea you’ve ever encountered, and you couldn’t be more grateful for the way he’s handled everything. By the time you finish crying, you’re shaking in his arms and really almost collapsed into him. It would be embarrassing if it weren’t the only other person in the world who means this much to you.

You are exhausted by the time you’ve stopped crying. Your eyes are puffy and your nose stuffed up but you are still the most gorgeous creature he’s ever seen. You sit back in your chair and he pats your knee. “Let me make you some tea, sweetheart. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you.”

“I’m okay,” you promise him, despite that clearly not being the truth. You feel like you’ve been hit by a truck even and though you tried so hard to make him a nice dinner — you’re just exhausted.

“I know you are.” Tim murmurs softly, moving over to the kettle and bringing it to the sink to fill with water. It was one you had left, unused until you came back since he lived off coffee and cigarettes, the occasional take away Chinese. “You are a strong woman. But I know what you are going through. I see it everyday, sweetheart.”

“I was so unfair to you.” The regret in your voice is palpable. The sadness and the resignation. Knowing that if you had bent just a little instead of thinking you had to be strong as stone and simply end things, you might have been able to break through and realize that this is what Tim deals with on a daily basis.

“I kept all of this from you.” Tim reminds you. He had bottled up all his emotions towards the job, never letting you see the toll it takes on him. Never letting you understand why he was so driven to solve the case. He had witnessed too many people crying for their loved ones. Had too many mothers and wives, sisters and lovers collapse into his arms sobbing. He moves over to the stove and sets the kettle to boil, turning on the water in the pot beside it for the spaghetti. “I didn’t want it to touch you.”

“I’m so sorry, Tim.” From your place hunched over at the dining room table where you shared so many meals together, your head drops to hang between your shoulder blades.

“Hey…hey…” he moves back over, his hands on your shoulders instantly, squeezing gently. “You have nothing to apologize for.” He promises you. “Nothing. It was me.”

“We should have tried counseling. Or just talking more.” When he comes up in back of your chair you lean back instantly to be closer to him. “I’ve always hated myself for just leaving.”

“You weren’t happy.” Tim reminds you. “I didn’t make it easy for you when we were married, so when you said you wanted a divorce…I just— I gave you what you wanted.” He admits quietly. “I didn’t have the right to beg you for another chance, for anything really.” He had to talk to a therapist after he had killed a man right after the divorce, it was standard police protocol to be released back on the force, but he had worked through a lot of his issues. “I- compartmentalized when we were together, but I had a hard time decompressing. Putting work aside. You deserved so much more, but I just couldn’t give it to you then. I was trying to get those poor victims families some peace. To let the victims rest.”

“And I should have realized how much good you do for those families. For—” A shaky, shallow breath cracks out of you. “For the victims.” For people just like your sister. “And then the second it suits me I come back in and take advantage of the thing that I said I hated?” Shaking your head, you honestly can’t understand why he even bothers with you. He should have just told you to get a hotel room, and instead he’s been sharing his bed with you and fetching your clothes from your house. “I—I’m just so fucking sorry, honey.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for.” He repeats softly, his fingers brushing your neck, feeling your pulse jump and he knows that it’s not the time or the place, but he can’t help himself. “I would do anything for you, sweetheart.” He admits. “I love you.”

Even though the pronounced frown on your face is from the situation and your tears and not from him, it feels like it deepens when your eyes widen and you turn around to face him again. “You mean you used to.” You correct carefully, trying to understand.

His heart aches at the displeasure in your face, aware that you wouldn’t want him to love you anymore. Still, he shakes his head. “No, I mean I still love you.” He confesses. “Never stopped, not even when you left.” He holds up his hands in surrender. “I’m not trying to convince you of anything. But babe, I’m here for you because I love you, and you needed someone who cares about you.”

"You don't have to convince me of anything." The corners of your mouth turn up like a confession of your own, although you're still not entirely sure that you can even wrap your mind around what he's laying out in front of you. "What's the quote? If you love somebody, let them go, for if they return, they were always yours."

“I knew your address.” He’s not done laying everything out. Rolling his eyes at himself and tilting his head. “Slight misuse of resources. But when that call came over the radio, I think I stopped breathing. I know my heart stopped.” He shakes his head. “All I could think was that I had lost you, and you weren’t even mine anymore. But as long as you were safe and happy out in the world, I was okay.” His voice cracks slightly. “Thinking the worst….” He shakes his head again. “I feel so fucking guilty because of how happy I was that it wasn’t you.”

"That...would explain why your young Detective Fallon was curious about our relationship." The question while you gave your statement -- a perfunctory measure since you didn't really see anything but it was a crime in your home with your sister as the victim so you needed to be eliminated as a suspect -- had surprised you but you had answered it honestly and moved on. "He thinks the world of you, by the way." Swallowing thickly, you push yourself to your feet to actually look Tim in the eyes. "And so do I."

“You feel appreciative of me helping you.” Tim doesn’t want to hope, and the look in your eyes gave him doing exactly that. “I don’t want to ever take advantage of you, sweetheart.”

"Baby..." As free as Tim has been with terms of endearment, you have been more guarded. Making sure that what you've been feeling wasn't powered by grief or the fear of being alone. But...it's Tim. This man is still your husband in your heart, even if not on paper. "I didn't leave because I stopped loving you. I never stopped loving you."

He stares at you for a moment, weighing your words and he closes his eyes in acceptance. His hands drift down to his hips and he swallows. “What do you want to do, sweetheart?” He asks softly.

“I don’t know.” You admit quietly, wanting to take another step closer but afraid to move a muscle. “But I know I don’t want to walk away from you again.”

“I had the clean up crew come through your place.” He murmurs softly. “You can rent it, sell it, burn it to the ground.” He huffs, “but don’t tell me about that one. I’d have to arrest you.”

“I’ve already decided to sell it.” Even thinking that Tim was only being nice because of what happened a few weeks ago, you hadn’t known that part of your hesitancy to leave this house was going back there. Even if he wanted you gone, you were finding someplace new.

“I think that’s a good idea.” He knows you will have to wait if you bought it with your sister. Her estate would have to be settled, but you can always stay here. Even if you don’t want to live here permanently again. “We can arrange for packers to come? So you don’t have to be there?”

“It shouldn’t be hard for me to find a place.” Even though you don’t want to. Even though you just want to stay here with Tim in the house you should have been living in for years. “I’m sure you don’t want me taking up your space. Even if you—if we—”

“Stay.” Tim interrupts you immediately. “Please. I want you to stay.” He gives you a small smile. “This is your house too. Always has been. Just- the joy left it when you moved out and I want it back.”

“I want to stay.” And admitting that out loud feels like you could collapse again but this time with sheer relief.

Tim steps closer to you, his arms coming around you again and he kisses your forehead once more. “Then stay, baby.” He whispers lovingly. “You never have to leave.”

However much you might have grown in the time you were apart, or what you might have discovered about yourselves, you’re still standing here in the kitchen of the house you picked out together. With your arms around each other. And with the gratitude that life is still allowed to have bright spots in the inky black darkness. “I missed you, love.”

“I missed you too.” A case had brought you back into his life, a horrible one, but it had allowed you both to compromise. To yield just enough to be able to come back together again. Detective Tim Rockford wouldn’t make the mistake of overlooking important clue to your feelings this time.

______

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evandarya · 10 months

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Inspired by a prompt from @davestridernb in the Discord server.

I Now Pronounce You... Brothers?

Read on Ao3

***

Tim was a self-taught magician. His parents had brought home a book they had gotten on one of their travels. They bought it because it looked old and fit with the other artifacts in the library. Tim found it. It was written in an old language, but it was similar enough to Latin for him to use the Latin-to-English dictionary to read it. When he tried some of the spells in it they worked! So, from the age of six, Tim had been teaching himself magic.

His spells helped keep him hidden and safe as he followed Batman and Robin around Gotham. He was trying to figure out how to slip a charm onto one of the heroes to keep them safe, but never quite managed it before Robin died.

But Tim knew exactly what to do. There was a spell in the book at the very back. The ink was smudged, but he could work it out. Something about a soul transfer to save someone dead or dying. There was more written, but Tim didn't have time to translate it, Robin was already buried!

So that night, Tim snuck out with the book and tools and materials he'd need to perform the ritual and went down to the graveyard.

He drew the circle around the grave, set up the candles and herbs and said the words, and waited... And waited... And waited...

"Aren't you a little young to be performing a soul bond?"

Tim spun around toward the voice and came face to face with a young man sitting crisscross applesauce and hovering four feet off the ground, making himself eye level to Tim. He was young, maybe early twenties, but his hair was already snow white. His clothes were a strange amalgamation of a modern-looking black rubberized suit with white gloves and boots and random pieces of gunmetal grey armor on his left shoulder and forearms. Around his shoulder was a dark blue cape with stars that looked like they were glowing.

"Who are you?" Tim demanded. The man smiled.

"You should know, you summoned me here." Tim scrunched his eyebrows. He was trying to revive Jason, not summon a walking anachronism.

"I didn't summon you, I was trying to do a soul transfer."

The being sighed and shook his head. "You magicians never learn to read the warnings and fine print."

"I read as much as I could! The book said I could give half of my soul to bring someone and it would bring them back from the dead" Tim said, flipping the book around for the man to read. The being leaned in, floating on his stomach now with his legs bent at the knees and swinging back and forth.

"You're using a Latin dictionary, aren't you?"

"So?"

"So" the being drawled in an imitation of Tim's Diamond District accent, "this verb that you translated as 'give' or 'exchange' translates closer to 'merge' or 'trade' and this noun isn't 'soul'. A soul is an immutable object, you can't break it in half or give half away. That word means 'everything.' your heart your mind, your life force. Everything that you are. That's what that word means."

"No, I know this says 'half', like three times."

"That's me, I'm the Half."

Tim could almost feel his brain breaking as none of this made sense. He took a deep breath and when he opened his mouth his mother came out. "What does this say, exactly, then?"

"Uh...direct translation is kind of impossible, but the closest I could get is 'I offer my everything to merge with your everything so I may stand by your side and protect you forever even into death...' and then some summoning for the officiant, that me."

"That sounds like...like..."

"Marriage vows. Wow. You really don't know what you're doing, do you?" The being flipped right side up and gave Tim a look that was equal parts impressed and horrified.

"Am I married right now?"

"No, of course not. A soul bond works both ways."

"Both...ways?"

"You didn't expect to bind your soul to someone else without permission, did you? Ever heard of informed consent? Speaking of, usually, these binds are...well...binding to the binder– that's you –but since it's clear you didn't know what this was when you started, I'm willing to let you out it."

"But then Jason won't– will stay– no. I need to bring Jason back. I don't care what I have to do."

The man frowned. It was the first unhappy expression Tim has seen on his face. "You're willing to bind yourself to someone you don't even know to bring them back? Why him? Why Jason Todd and not --" the being looked to the grave marker to the right of Jason's "Margaret Thompson? Or any of the thousands of people who die every day in this city? You don't know him, you've never even talked to him. "

"Jason--" Tim paused trying to figure out how to explain without giving up Jason's identity to this man. "Jason is very important to a lot of people. People rely on him and with him gone--" Tim thought of how violent Batman had gotten in the last few weeks. "I just need to bring him back."

"You'll be bound to him for as long as you both shall exist. You don't even get out of it when you die. There is no divorce. There is no undoing this later."

"I'm okay with that."

"If he dies again, so do you. You realize that, right? That tying your life forces together means where one of you goes, the other follows."

"I'm okay with that."

"What if you end up not liking him? What if he's a jerk?"

"HE ISN'T!" Tim glared at the man "Jason is kind and good and smart and funny! He helps people and gives them hope. He's a light shining through the darkness, guiding people to safety. And now he's gone and there's no more light and I don't know what to do except I know I have to do something, like an itch under my skin. I have to do this. I have to bring Jason back." Tim didn't know when he had started crying, but he roughly wiped the tears away. "I'm the only one who can."

The man was quiet for a long time, the air itself seemed to be still.

"I didn't know anyone felt that way about me."

Tim gasped. That-that was...

The being sighed and shifted his cape, opening a dark void that Jason-no-Robin stepped out of. He was still in his Robin armor, mask attached.

"You promised you'd stay quiet if I brought you." The man said. Robin turned and grinned at him.

"Come on, Phantom, I had to meet this kid at least once." Robin turned that grin to Tim "You really are something, you know that?" Robin sounded approving, and he was smiling at Tim!

"R-robin?" He stumbled forward a few steps "You're here. You're --" Tim looked Jason up and down. He looked the same as he did, but it was like looking at an image projected onto smoke. His form shimmered and shifted like he wasn't quite there.

"Dead?" Jason said it with a sardonic grin, but Tim flinched. "Yeah. It's an adjustment, but I can do this." Jason's form shifted from the Robin uniform and into blue jeans and a red hoodie that Tim was sure he'd seen Jason wearing in a paparazzi picture. "Much better. So, what were you saying, something about a light in the darkness?"

Tim's fingers twitched. "Jason, you need to come back. Batman is-- he's not the same without you."

Jason's expression cooled at the mention of Batman. "He'll be fine. It's what he does."

"He won't. He's violent, not holding back. He put a man in a coma last week for robbing an ATM. Jason, please. He needs you."

"No, he doesn't!" Jason yelled. "He needs therapy. Like, years and years of therapy. He doesn't need a kid in a cape."

"But he does. He-"

"He fired me!" Jason's form shifted. He looked taller, more angular and it was as if the smoke swirled around him. The man- Jason had called him Phantom- put a hand on Jason's shoulder and his form visibly softened. "He fired me," he continued calmer "and said I was too angry to be Robin. He doesn't need a kid like that."

The air seemed to settle around them. The graveyard was still, the silence pressing in on all sides.

"But I do." Tim broke the silence with a whisper. "I need you because you fight for what's right and you're not afraid to do what needs to be done. I need you because you inspire me to be better. You're such a good person, Jason, you care so much, and it shines through so brightly. And that's what Batman needs, someone to be the light to his shadows."

Jason sighed and his whole form rippled, twisting and curling. "If it means that much to you, then why don't you do it?"

"Me?" Tim physically recoiled at the idea "I can't be Robin. I'm just– Tim– just a kid with a magic book."

"Well, 'Just Tim with a magic book' you managed to pull the Guardian of New Ghosts out of his tower" Jason jerked his thumb over his shoulder at Phantom who had floated a few feet away while they were talking. "If you can do that, I'm sure being Robin would be a piece of cake."

"But I-"

"Nope, no buts. I get to pick who takes up the Robin mantle and I choose you."

"But Batman-"

"Doesn't choose who gets to be Robin. Robin is something you do because it's right. Because no one else can or will. Because the injustice in the world sits under your skin like an itch you can't scratch." Tim recognized his own words coming back to him. "You're Robin, Timmy, whether you realize it or not."

Tim had a thought, a chance to still bring Jason back. "If I'm Robin, then I get to choose who teaches me, right?"

"Dick can teach you," Jason said, eyeing Tim with suspicion.

"But I don't want Dick to teach me. I want you to."

"And I'd be glad to teach you. I'm really interested in seeing what you do but I'm still dead."

"You don't have to be. We can finish the binding and you can come back."

Jason looked torn. "Come back to what, though?" Jason asked "My body is in the ground, it's been what...two, three months? My face has probably been eaten by worms by now."

"No, the spell brings you back to just as you were right before you died."

"Is...is that true?" Jason looked at Phantom for an answer.

Phantom nodded "As long as the binder has enough lifeforce to handle the strain. The spell takes the time you've been dead and subtracts it from the binder's life."

"No. Absolutely not." Jason said, crossing his arms over his chest in a giant X. "You aren't giving up months of your life to bring me back on top of binding your life to mine."

"But I'm okay with it. I want to bring you back, I don't care the cost."

"And what if you're supposed to die in two months? What if that's all the lifeforce you have and croak right when I get brought back?"

"Death doesn't work like that." Tim said "It isn't predetermined. Everything we do either subtracts from or adds to our life force. I'll die when I die, either when my life force runs out or if it is snuffed out."

Jason looked to Phantom.

"He's right."

Jason’s form swirled. "Why do you want this so badly?"

"Because you are so loved, Jason. By me and so many people, and you don't see it. I want you to see it."

Jason closed his eyes then looked to Phantom who regarded him kindly and said "It's your choice."

"Okay," Jason said, then turned back to Tim. "Okay, if we're going to do this, we are going to do it right. I come back and teach you how to be Robin, and we find you a teacher for this magic stuff. You're going to get in trouble, running around raising the dead."

"Okay," Tim said easily.

"I mean it. No more magic until someone, Constantine or Zatara or someone teaches you."

"Okay, okay, I'll get a teacher."

"Okay," Jason said. "You said it was like a marriage." He said, turning to Phantom. "We don't have to kiss or anything, do we?"

"No, a soul bond strengthens the bond between two people, it isn't inherently romantic. Just say the words with honest intent."

"Okay," Tim held out the book and Jason spoke, his voice crackling like a fire, pronouncing the words in a way a human voice never could imitate. Then Tim felt the bond SNAP into place at the same moment a wave of exhaustion crashed over him. Between one second and the next Tim collapsed on the ground and his emotions swirled and his thoughts raced and only half of them were his. And Jason Todd was beside him, funeral suit covered in dirt and grime. Tim reached out a hand and found Jason's wrist, pulse beating, weak but steady. And then the world went black.

***

"--strangest thing--"

"--dug him up?--"

"--found them like this.--"

***

Awareness came slowly. He felt heavy and slow. His mouth tasted like iron and grit and something was tickling his nose. He went to brush it away but his hand hit something hard on the way. Tim peeled open one eye and saw the too-bright florescent lights and shut his eyes again. There was a deep chuckle from his left and the light dimmed. He risked opening his eyes again and looked. Someone was sitting on a little chair next to his hospital bed reading a paperback novel that was folded in half back on itself. They were tall and lithe with black hair that seemed to float.

"Good morning, sleepy head." He said quietly. "I probably should have warned you about the side effects before you went through with it."

"Phantom?" Tim muttered through the oxygen mask. His throat felt like sandpaper. "Where's--"

"He's in surgery. The doctors say he should make a full recovery." Phantom dog-eared the book and set it on the table beside him. "You were found severely dehydrated and covered in dirt. The best guess is you dug him out of his grave. How you knew he was alive in there is beyond me." Phantom gave him a grin. He'd have to come up with a story. Something believable. Later, though.

"What are you doing here? Why do you look like that?"

Before Phantom could answer there was a knock on the door and a nurse walked in carrying a tray.

"How is he--oh, good you're awake." The nurse set the tray down on Tim's rolling table. "I just need to change your fluids. How are you feeling?" She made quick work of the IV bag.

"Tired. Head hurts, throat sore." Tim rasped.

"I'm sure. I'll see about getting you some ibuprofen okay? In the meantime, your uncle can get you as many popsicles as you want. Right, Mr. Nightingale?" The nurse pinned Phantom with a look and he looked sheepish.

"Right. Popsicles are for the kids, not their guardians."

"Alright, I'm all done here. Call if you need anything."

Once she was gone Tim turned back to Phantom. "Uncle Nightingale?"

"They wouldn't let me stay if we weren't related."

"But...but why?"

"It's my job. I'm the Guardian of New Souls and Halfas."

"What's a Halfa?"

"It's what I am, and what Jason will become."

"But..but I. The spell." Tim could feel tears gathering in the corners of his eyes.

"Shh, shh. Rest now." Phantom smoothed his hair and ran his fingers over Tims's scalp. It felt nice. "I'll explain everything when you're better."

Tims's eyes closed of their own accord and he fell back into a dreamless sleep.

#danny phantom #danny fenton #dp x dc #dc comics #batman #crossover #tim drake #jason todd #evandarya writes #prompt fill

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theflyindutchwoman · 5 months

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Is that an apology? Yes. All right. No! Look, because you never would've let me work my magic if I had told you, and then I would have ended up transferring to another station to save you from yourself, and…this worked out so much better. And if you can't see that, I'm sorry not sorry. Okay. I accept your non-apology.

| ANATOMY OF A SCENE - CHENFORD EDITION 5.16 - Exposed

I'm not going to lie… this is one of those scenes that I wish I could fully love… It has so much potential, but, unfortunately, it feels like something is missing. Like, say, a deeper conversation between Tim and Lucy… one where he gets to explain why he is so upset with her in the first place. Is it because she went behind his back to orchestrate the five-player trade, as suggested here? Is it because he worries about how this makes him look, as he implied earlier in the shop? Those are not mutually exclusive but since he never get to properly voice his thoughts on the matter, we never really find out which is it (or if it's both for that matter). Instead, it is skimmed over, as if it was an argument just for the sake of it.

Now, there's nothing wrong with that in itself… Not everything needs to be an arc. But as this 'fight' is connected to two storylines, it needed more depth. And this is where I, personally, feel a bit let down by this. I absolutely loved how Lucy didn't hesitate to put her career on the line to help Tim find a more suitable job, just like he did when he decided to take a desk job for her… They are prioritising the other, which is something neither of them ever had before… And that is extremely special for them, to have this unconditional support and love. In Tim's case, he was asked twice to sacrifice his career. And this time, he has someone who does everything in her power to make sure he can have it all, a job that he loves and a relationship. But none of this is truly acknowledged. We saw Lucy being grateful and appreciative when he transfered for her but not Tim… And I have a hard time believing that he wouldn't be even a little, once the sting fades. That is not to say he doesn't have any reason to be upset… And that's my second issue with this : this could have been used as a setup for the coming angst, the one that is brewing with Sava and Jake, Isabel's return, Lucy's undercover mission… All these episodes have one main theme : how secrecy and lies can destroy a relationship. How this is what actually started to break Tim's marriage with Isabel, long before her addiction drove the final nail in the coffin… So this could have been the perfect opportunity to have Tim confide in Lucy why her going behind his back, no matter how good her intentions were, is triggering some bad memories. Why their promise not to lie to each other is that important. This could have tied this whole arc altogether in a more organic way.

That said, I love how unapologetic Lucy is. She gets where he's coming from - to an extent. But she still stands her ground, simply explaining why she did it. After all, this all started because of the decision he unilaterally took, when he went to Grey and accepted a desk job, without consulting her first. So her worries that he would end up resenting her, their relationship or even just his situation are natural. Honesty works both ways. And that's the thing with them : while they are usually really good at communicating, they can also be selfless and impulsive when it comes to the other, ready to sacrifice themselves so the other can be happy. That, and they're both used to being independent. They just need to find a balance in their personal relationship. And as upset as Tim appears to be, it's quite clear that he is ready to move on right after her first apology. They might be good at arguing but he doesn't like being mad at her, that much is clear. He can't even stay that way too long, even after she turns the tables on him #sorrynotsorry. His smile… He's just so amused and disarmed. He can't even hide it anymore. So much for not being a softy...

(To be continued...)

#the rookie #chenford #chenfordedit #lucy chen #tim bradford #5.16 #Anatomy of a scene - Chenford Edition

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centralperkchenford · 9 months

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Chenford + secret marriage

All these people think love's for show (But I would die for you in secret)

Chenford + secret marriage

As soon as I saw this prompt I knew this was what I wanted to do! I hope you like it! 🫶🏻

“Let’s go get married.” Tim whispers into her hair one morning. Lucy turns around in his arms and gives him a look.

“What?” She asks him with her eyebrows raised. “We are getting married in 4 months.” But Tim shakes his head and leans forward to press his lips to her forehead.

“No. Let’s go get married today.” He says. “I don’t want to wait four more months for you to be my wife. I want to marry you now.”

Lucy blinks at him a little confused. When he had proposed and she had started planning the wedding he said he was fine with waiting and planning a wedding. As long as she was the one walking down the aisle towards him, he was fine. And so she did, the venue was book and paid for. The vendors were paid, she had a wedding dress and even the save the dates were sent out. It was a little late to just cancel the wedding.

“Tim, we are having a wedding in four months that is already paid for. We can’t just cancel.”

“I’m not saying to cancel our wedding. We can still have it but I want to marry you at the courthouse today. Just you and me. I love you so much Lucy and I know it’s just a piece of paper but I want to start the rest of our lives together. Today.”

Lucy stares at him, her eyes searching his face for any indication this may be some sort of pre-marriage Tim Test. But his face is genuine and full of love. He really wants to marry her today.

“Okay.” She says quietly. “Okay Tim. Let’s get married today.”

“Yeah?” He asks a boyish grin on his face. “Okay baby. I’ll set it up.” He kisses her once more on the forehead before he slides out of bed and heads to the living room.

***

They don’t end up getting married that day it’s a lot of bells and whistles to sort through. However two days after Tim proposes the idea they are able to snag a time. They get their marriage license and an officiant. They are told they don’t need a witness which bodes well in their favor since they are doing this secretly.

Lucy must admit it is kind of nice to put on a simple white sun dress and slip on some simple shoes. And even though she is still looking forward to putting on her wedding dress and walking down the aisle. This is nice too, it feels private and intimate. This wedding is just for them.

She smiles when she sees Tim waiting for her, he’s in dress pants and a nice shirt. He looks as handsome as ever. She stands in front of him as the officiant does his thing. She searches his face again like she did two mornings ago to see if he was serious about this.

She sees only love and affection in his eyes shining back at her. Lucy smiles back at him hoping to convey just how much she loves him.

“Do you Tim Bradford take this do you take this woman to be your wife, to live together in (holy) matrimony, to love her, to honor her, to comfort her, and to keep her in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, for as long as you both shall live?“

Tim smiles at Lucy. “I do.”

The officiant turns to Lucy and repeats it. “I do.” Says Lucy smiling softly at Tim and wanting nothing more than to reach out and kiss him.

Soon.

They exchange the rings, they both opted to get silicone rings they could wear to work. Tim slips the thin band onto Lucy’s fingers and brings it up to his mouth to give her finger a quick kiss. Lucy slides Tim’s ring on his finger.

“I now pronounce you man and wife.” Says the officiant and then he steps back as Tim surges forward to kiss her, dipping her down once and bringing her back up. Lucy giggles as he does grabbing onto his shirt.

Her husband.

“Now what?” She whispers. Tim kisses her forward head softly and then reaches down to take her hand.

“Now I take my wife home and show her how much I love her.” He says into her ear as they walk out of the courthouse. She giggles again and she can’t quite believe this is real. That they got secretly married and honestly she doesn’t regret it at all.

“You know we have to keep this a secret right?” She says to him. “You can’t wear your ring at work. Yet.”

He looks over at her with wonder in his eyes, and let’s go of her hand. “I love you so much Lucy. You have no idea how grateful I am that we did this.” He steps down so he’s looking up at her for once. “I can’t wait to marry you in 4 months again.”

Lucy licks her lips as she looks at him and then loops her arms around his neck. “I would marry you again and again if it meant I would be with you forever.” She says. “I love you too Tim.”

He grabs her by the waist without warning and she squeals at the sudden movement. He spins her around and then kisses her and she pours all the love she has for him in that one kiss. Her husband. Her forever.

***

They get married again 4 months later in front of their family and friends. And it’s true what she told him on those courthouse steps 4 months ago, she would marry him again and again if it meant being with him forever. Because even now as he gazes down at her as she reads her vows she knows this is her forever. She said it in the courthouse and she is saying it now she will cherish Tim for the rest of her life. She will love him forever.

They say I do (again) and before Grey can even get his next words out Tim is kissing Lucy. She barely hears the crowd laughing or Grey mumbling Jesus Christ under his breath, but she does hear Tim whisper I love you against her lips.

She sighs happily as he pulls back and tucks her into his side and leans over to whisper into her ear. “I love you.”

She smiles at him and then he’s taking her hand and leading her as their friends and family clap and congratulate them.

And yeah this was definitely a forever kind of thing.

#chenford #the rookie #chenford fanfic #tim bradford #tim x lucy #lucy chen #chenford fic #anon answered

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saingirl101 · 1 year

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NeverAfter Ep 17 As Brian David Gilbert Gifs (SPOILERS!!!!)

I can't believe we are inching closer to the finale of NeverAfter. Still uncertain how all of the plot points will get resolved in the remaining episodes. But regardless, I am pumped after that last episode although the title of this episode is extremely ominous.

As always this is essentially a live blog so:

Tomas and Puss' + Henry and Tim's Reunions:

Finding out that likely the stepmother purposefully put the goose and jack into this world:

Finding out Henry met their jack in the world of timothy's book:

My reaction to Pinocchio playing smoke on the water to the goose to put her to sleep and rosamund playing it in reverse to wake her up:

The golden goose saying she may be able to help tim avoid making his third wish to help him get his book back:

Tim and Pib experiencing cutbacks about the giants and Tim, which seems very suspicious:

The goose and Rosamund's conversation about what she would write in the book and rosamund being like:

Ylfa saying she would have tim keep death in stories and talking about the endings of stories:

PMy reaction to the philosophical quandries between the goose and ylfa:

Pinocchio forcefeeding the cricket water and giving him too much that he does a didney voice:

Pinocchio having a serious convo with the cricket and then he randomly mentions it the wadded up bubblegum in his shoe the music cuts out:

Cricket giving an actual apology to Pinocchio:

Gerard talking to tom Thumb about his marital problems:

Tom Thumb giving Gerard a pep talk about changing for the better and to save his marriage:

Gerard proceeding to yell at tom thumb after asking him to wake him up at 5 am:

Pib thanking pinocchio for not blowing up alphonse:

Ylfa feeling the wolfs heart beating in her chest and smelling blood to track him, after being told they need to track the wolf to entreat with the Baba Yaga:

Finding out the baba yaga respects courtesy, diligence and courage:

Running into the Gander and the Goose making Tim's wish as they are one in the same:

THE GOOSE SACRIFICING HERSELF FOR TIM AND THE GANDER FEEDS ON THE GOOSE:

Tim taking the golden goose's feather and writing about their nonsexual adult sleepover:

Finding out snow white corresponded with Sheherazade and finding out they stole her book:

The gang forgetting about Tomas and his brothers are still here:

Putting Tomas and his brothers in the book for now:

Ylfa tracking Death and finding the baba yaga's house:

Ylfa turning into full werewolf mode;

LOU FUCKING ROLLING A NAT 20 PERSUASION CHECK FOR THE BABA YAGA:

The fucking baba yaga bring up the red mancala pieces:

brennan "the motherfucker: Lee Mulligan knowing none of us will be able to sleep after that episode:

#neverafter #neverafter spoilers #neverafter episode 17 #neverafter the last wish #destinys children #dimension 20 neverafter #dimension 20 #ylfa snorgelsson #prince gerard of greenleigh #mother timothy goose #neverafter puss in boots #neverafter pinocchio #rosamund du prix #neverafter baba yaga #henry hubbard #the golden goose #the gander

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sisterofficerlucychen · 1 year

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in this essay i will explore why mastermind fits chenford perfectly. and yes, i have officially lost my damn mind thanks to them ♡

so this general thought is what threw me down the rabbit hole -- in 5x10 during the montage scene, lucy references the green dress to which tim smiles at. it’s an item that holds a memory for the two of them, perhaps the same type of memory, as tim looked lucy up and down when she walked toward him and asked her to save her a dance. a dance they were both clearly excited for considering ‘the debt’ gets paid at nyla’s wedding and they have their first dance. lucy knew exactly what she was doing when she referred back to it.

Once upon a time, the planets and the fate And all the stars aligned You and I ended up in the same room At the same time

1x01: the planets and fate literally aligned to have both of them at mid-wilshire station. they come from such different backgrounds and just everything they’ve lived through before the start of the series??? like tim serving two tours and the whole rise and fall of his marriage with isabel; lucy not knowing where she’s going in life but knowing she doesn’t want to follow her parents footsteps or wishes so she signs up for the police academy on a whim. also, the fact that percy asked grey to pair jackson with tim and instead of doing that, he paired up lucy and tim together. had lucy and tim not been paired together, their entire relationship would have likely not happened and it would have been a very different outcome for both of them.

And the touch of a hand lit the fuse Of a chain reaction of countermoves To assess the equation of you Checkmate, I couldn't lose

lucy met tim in possibly the worst moment of his life. he had lost himself, losing isabel put him in a really dark path and it was not pretty. he was hurting and it made him mean because tim may be no nonsense but we’ve seen how he is now to what he was then like he still means business but there’s a more playful and patient side to him. which was not the case back at the beginning of the series where he was hurting and was projecting those emotions. like tim’s intro to the series and how he told jackson he was going to make his life a living hell? well, that could have been a tim test tbh, but also felt so out of left field because we know he considers being a training officer something sacred and takes it seriously.

What if I told you none of it was accidental And the first night that you saw me, nothing was gonna stop me? I laid the groundwork and then, just like clockwork The dominoes cascaded in a line

the way the two prank each other has always teetered between being something else. it’s playful and fun but it’s also very much them and even to an extent, intimate? like when lucy filled tim’s lockers with booties when he made sergeant. during angela’s wedding, her attention completely shifted off nyla and grey the moment she saw tim. she clocked him and beelined toward him. why? why? she knows why, he knows why, we all know why. tim wasn’t subtle about taking her in either and they were so flirty with each other in that moment, and then before they walked away from one another, he asked her for a dance and she was pleased by that.

then the prep for going undercover aka chenford’s first kiss. it will never not be funny how these two dumb idiots thought that for going undercover, they needed to practice kissing and i am holding out for the day when nyla finds out and gives them shit for it because it’ll be so funny. but the fact that as they’re working on their cover story, lucy says something she knows will get a reaction from it. it’s completely on purpose. she broke his brain for a second there and as he brought up the suggestion of them having to kiss, she kept playing dumb to make him spell it out.

No one wanted to play with me as a little kid So I've been scheming like a criminal ever since To make them love me and make it seem effortless This this the first time I've felt the need to confess And I swear I'm only cryptic and Machiavellian 'cause I care

lucy is an only chlid and being one myself, i can say that it is extremely lonely not growing up with any siblings and while that may not be the literal definition of that first lyrics, not having any siblings definitely does play into that because you don’t really have anyone to play with as a kid. we also know that lucy craves validation and praise. we saw it so many times while she was a rookie and even nyla says it when tim storms off when lucy goes undercover for the first time as nova.

additionally, lucy caring is key. when ashley broke up with tim and lucy gauged that something was wrong but didn’t know what, she used the opportunity of him leaving his radio behind to send him on a scavenger hunt to places she knew would bring him joy. like it was so devious and cute and she played dumb when he called her on it.

lastly ...

I laid the groundwork and then saw a wide smirk On your face, you knew the entire time You knew that I'm a mastermind And now you're mine

so this is one that i think is coming like when they have the conversation of how and when they fell. tim’s just as perceptive of lucy as lucy is of tim except he’s definitely more subtle about it. like referring back to when she sent him on a scavenger hunt or when jan kept talking about being a minx and how it had “lucy written all over it”. also, the hotel room in vegas when he flat out tells her it didn’t feel like pretend. i could see them coming back to this as well as the fake confession and how tim to a certain extent was aware of her feelings but the fake confession did throw him off because of how he reacted to it when she started laughing.

the end :-))

if you made it this far, ilu???? thanks for coming to my ted talk and entertaining my delusion as i stumbled down the rabbit hole.

#the rookie #chenford #tim bradford #lucy chen #chenford: an essay #i have lost my damn mind #someone send help pls

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bronx-bomber87 · 11 months

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We are ten Eps in! Thank you all for your continued interest. Still surprises me so thank you all :)

1x10 Flesh and blood

Not really an ep with Chenford. BUT it’s a very good Lucy episode. Adore any Lucy driven episode she’s a BAMF as we all know. Love my girl. Fantastic look into her development as character. Also the intro of Angela/Wes. So let’s dig in.

I LOVE that the Captain decides to ride with Lucy. She seems so shocked she has been chosen. While Tim is so good for her, she also needs strong female presence in her training as well. Harper says it best in s2 about her needing that. But we will get there haha With this ep we see no one is more of a BAMF example for Lucy than Captain Anderson. Naturally Tim gives Lucy a hard time for riding with the Capt. making her even more nervous than she already is. Telling her what a weight that'll carry for her all day.

Poor Lucy doing what both Talia and Tim say. Who is she to say no? Both of them are T.O.’s and authority figures to her. Lucy is all jitters for riding with Anderson, so naturally she doesn't stand up for herself but the Capt does.

Capt. Coming in making them get their own gear is hilarious. She puts them both in their place for using her. I love that she does all of this in front of Lucy. Showing her that strength and leadership by calling them out and having them relieve her.

Lucy isn’t mad about it at all. The look on her face is priceless for couple reasons. One She is impressed watching Anderson do her thing by telling them what to do. Second you know she’s enjoying seeing Tim be ordered around like that haha. Especially since it’s for her benefit. Good day to be Lucy Chen haha

Lucy and the Capt get their first call. It’s where we learn she knows how to speak Farsi. What a BAMF. She attempts to talk down a bickering married couple in Farsi. The background behind her as a character is so rich. Truly think she was such an amazing Capt and character. Bummer we don’t get to keep her long. We learn she escaped a bad marriage as well from the call they take. Love what she tells the wife. ‘We can’t control how others are going to react.’ If that ain't the damn truth.

Lucy hears cop cars outside and goes to check it out. Jackson decided to bring in the cavalry, even though Lucy gave the all clear over the radio. Her chewing Jackson out is amazing. The way she legit destroys him for coming is epic. Whew don’t mess with that woman. She’s spicy haha Jackson leaves with his tail between his legs and goes back out on patrol.

After he's left Lucy blames herself for letting the husband upstairs. Where he killed himself. She won’t let Lucy carry that burden though. Her reply to Lucy when she says she let him get away is perfect. ‘Yes you did. But he’s not dead because of that.’

So begins Wopez, they’re so fiery right away. It’s amazing haha this dude has it right. Digging on each other yelling so close. Got that chemistry and fire right off the bat haha

Poor Lucy is having a rough day. First she lets the husband go on their first call. Now she’s let her captain get hit in the face cause she ducks. All her fears she had from this morning coming to life. Tim’s words coming to haunt her.

Minute they get back to station Lucy apologies for ducking. Anderson isn’t even a little mad. Lets her know she should’ve ducked. That she’s a little rusty it seems. Zoe goes on to tell Lucy she was an MP for the marines. Thats how we find out she learned Farsi from that. Lucy is so very impressed. It’s written all over her face.

So nice for her to have such a bad ass role model. Lucy says she should tell everyone her history. If they knew she wouldn’t have cops flying in to save her. We get the best line of the scene. ‘You don’t tell people you’re a bad ass Officer Chen. You just gotta show em.’

She continues her bad ass streak with an unhinged and recently released criminal. He is asking her what he would have to do in order to go back inside. She doesn't reply how he likes so he takes a hostage. Says he's going to kill her so he can go back in for life. Capt tries to talk him down best she can. He doesn’t listen to her at all. She distracts him by asking why he has his safety on if he's so hardened. It takes him by surprise enough that she takes his ass down all by her onesies. We find out after there was no safety and she charged a live weapon. Hence the bad ass continuation.

The scene is lightened up by Tim’s skunked ass walking into the lobby LOL They’re all so disgusted by the smell. His face is priceless as he walks away. He too is having quite the day without Lucy LMFAO.

Lucy comes to see Capt Zoe at the end of shift. Telling her how grateful she was for today, that she learned so much but she’s sorry if she let her down at all. i.e. the husband, getting hit etc.

She really needs to hear this and from her amazing captain no less. Tim is so good for her but she also needs that affirmation as well. The thing Lucy lacks the most in the beginning is confidence. That she’s good at this job, has amazing potential and is impressive. So impressive her captain decided to go on patrol with her over all the other rookies. Over the legacy and over the Rookie she hand picked for her station.

She has a long road ahead of her no doubt. Her arc into the character she is now is incredible. To watch her go from a doubtful non confident person into who she is now is a delight. Anderson sees the same things Tim does in her. The relief on her face is so evident. Especially when she says she’d ride with her any day. ❤️

Twas such a good ep for Lucy. No Chenford to be seen sadly but a really good ep none the less. Definitely not lacking in entertainment value. I do love the show as a whole for a reason. Well that’s all she wrote for 1x10 feel free to comment/like/reblog. So appreciate those of you who do. Make my whole day.

Also I Couldn't find some gifs in the Library no matter the combinations I tried to save my life LOL even 'The Rookie 1x10' came up with Nothing it was insane. So here is the link to the sets I took it from. The ones without credit below the gifs in my review all belong to the link below :) It has both sets I used. Thank you for your amazing sets hopeful this never happens again for future reviews, love crediting via the library. Also thank you to for the still I used as well :)

Per usual please feel free to comment/like/reblog should you chose to do that. Appreciate everyone thats been on this ride with me, I shall see you all in 1x11

#Caitlin rewatches the Rookie #chenford #chenford hiatus #summer rewatch #waiting on S6 #s1 #1x10 Flesh and Blood #the rookie #tim bradford #lucy chen #tim x lucy #eric winter #melissa o'neil #otp: doing my job #tim bradford x lucy chen #lucy x tim

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mollyjeanne615 · 1 year

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Write a song for the “if I fail you scene” but from lex’s perspective and what she’s been saying to Tom

I am having SO MUCH FUN with this

So this would actually be in the show and segue right from this into "If I Fail You." A fun thing with stuff from Hatchetfield is that you can pull from the many motifs that are already established in the show - so there's a bit of "Wiggle" and "Black Friday" in this one and it's very cool. Keep submitting these for sure!

The Hope/The Lie

LEX: Mr. Houston!

TOM: Leave me alone.

LEX: Mr. Houston, turn around!

He turns around. She’s pointing a gun at him.

LEX:

What do you think you’re doing

TOM: Lex, put down the gun.

LEX:

You’re gonna run away

TOM: Are you gonna shoot me?

LEX:

The toy you’ve been pursuing

TOM: Or can I go home?

LEX:

Was never gonna be The thing that saves the day You’ve gotta come with me now

TOM: I’ve had a shitty day, you know.

LEX:

But just put down the doll

TOM: I don’t appreciate the gun in my face.

LEX:

The thing that you can’t see now

TOM: I’m taking this doll to my son.

LEX:

Your son, he didn’t want

That fucking thing at all

TOM: Of course he does. He wants it more than anything.

LEX: No, think about it. Did Tim ever say he wants a Tickle-Me-Wiggly?

TOM: (after a beat) Well, he must have!

LEX:

I’ve worked at that store since I was sixteen I know what kids are like

TOM: At Pizza Pete’s - he…

LEX:

No one’s called about that doll, no one’s walked up to my desk They don’t want that thing They’re into Fortnite

When you stood in the line outside the toy store Did you see any kids?

TOM: It’s a school day.

LEX: It’s Thanksgiving break.

It’s not kids here in the lines, it’s not kids killing each other Or breaking piggy banks for eBay bids

I know your wife died And you want to make it up to your son I know you’re miserable You don’t think you will ever see the sun But that’s your problem, not his You think there’s a way to fix that But I don’t think there is

You think Wiggly can fix the holes in your life. But he can’t - it’s a trick. He promises to fix all the holes, and that’s why it works on adults. You need more things and you need them harder.

You can’t afford the mortgage Your marriage falls apart You think your kids will hate you And that just breaks your heart You think your life is over Cause you’re, what, forty-three? I’m gonna be an actress That’s where I find the hope for me

This is not what you lived for This is starting a world war But you still have time to fix it if you try Hey, that would really be beautiful But if you don’t, it’s your funeral Do you really think that Wiggly’s not a lie

#team starkid #starkid #hatchetfield #hatchetverse #black friday #tom houston #lex foster

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homemade-ghosts · 2 years

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watching as rinis and pws say rina is gonna crash and burn like the other relationships bc they can’t keep ppl together is so 😭😭 the narrative of the season is rina together is the love they both deserve. pw was a plot device from the beginning and rini literally had ricky regressing by the end of s1 yet i was supposed to assume they wouldn’t crash and burn? rina will no doubt have problems in s4 but they’ll prevail unlike others …they can keep couples together but just like with every other teen drama midgames happen before the endgame 😭😭

After all this time, after interviews with the literal showrunner & creator of the show that confirm everything we've been saying, they still don't get it.

Both Rini & pw were built to fall apart and reducing their respective breakups to just being for the sake drama or because "the writers are incapable of keeping couples together" is a disservice to every character involved.

The Rini breakup was a huge sign of development for both Ricky & Nini. For Ricky, it meant letting go of his past, accepting his parents’ separation and embracing change. A part of Ricky resented his parents for not trying “hard enough”, for not “fighting” to save their marriage. Being with Nini was not only a way for Ricky to hold on to the last shred of his past, of his life before things were complex and difficult and confusing and changing -- but it was also a way for Ricky to try to prove, to both his parents & himself, that any relationship can be fixed if you just try really, really hard. Ricky wanted to believe that things don’t have to change if you don’t let them change -- but the more he tried to keep his relationship with Nini together, the more it became obvious that it was breaking apart at the seams. Ricky’s desire for stability & sameness was in direct opposition to Nini’s desire for the unpredictable & the new -- no amount of deleted comments or attempts at getting Nini into the musical were going to change that. In the end, Ricky realized that he & Nini couldn’t give each other what they needed or wanted anymore. When he did the mature thing and broke up with his first love -- this representation of his past/childhood -- it was an indication that he was growing up, finally ready to say goodbye to a part of himself that he outgrew a long time ago. Even if it hurt to realize it, he knew that his mom had been right all along, “Not all couples are meant to be together. Sometimes people change.”

For Nini, their breakup meant independence & room to breathe. She felt suffocated in her relationship with Ricky and she knew that he loved her not for who she was, but for what she represented (”am I something to you and not someone? ‘Cause I feel trapped on this pedestal you put me on.”) + Nini has, canonically, always been the kind of girl who judges herself by what boys see in her (in s1, Kourtney quite literally told her this & in s2, she wrote/sang the lyric “all my life I’ve seen myself through your eyes”). Gone is the girl who needed EJ’s encouragement to feel she was even worthy of auditioning for Gabriella at the beginning of the series. Gone is the girl who ran back to the safety of East High when YAC got too difficult. Now she finally has the confidence & self esteem to really go for what she wants. She realized that it’s her opinion of herself that matters. Ricky wanted her to be someone she hasn’t been for a long, long time -- but now Nini’s life gets to be solely about what she wants.

People who ship Rini (In this, the year of our lord Tim Federle, 2022? Embarrassing.) really do not care about Ricky & Nini as individual characters at all because they hindered each other’s character development and became the worst versions of themselves (Ricky: clingy & vaguely controlling / Nini: neglectful & gaslighting) when they were together.

pw was quite literally built, like you said, to be a plot device for Rina. Gina told Ricky she doesn’t do anything right the first time and EJ being her first relationship/boyfriend is a representation of that. EJ’s inability to share things with, support, listen to, show up for or understand Gina showed her that Ricky can, has & will do all of those things for her and more. EJ showed Gina the kind of love she deserves by not giving it to her.

Ricky & Gina had to be with and breakup with Nini & EJ, respectively, in order for them to be fully ready for each other.

In the immortal words of the great philosopher Taylor Swift:

Sometimes giving up is the strong thing Sometimes to run is the brave thing Sometimes walking out is the one thing That will find you the right thing

#like sorry they can't tell the difference between a layered slowburn who understand each other in a way no one else can #& a couple who can't give each other what they need...but idk what they want us to do about that #hsmtmts #hsmtmts s3 #ricky x gina #rina #asks #anon

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firstdegreefangirl · 1 year

Text

Gotta Leave Us Where We Left It

Tim drops a jar of pasta sauce – meat and cheese – in the shopping cart and reaches forward to put the garlic and herb variety back on the shelf, having made his decision. He’s looking at the shopping list in the front of the basket, Lucy’s neat handwriting outlining everything they’ll need for the dinner party she’s finally convinced him to host for all of their friends next weekend.

He’s lost to his own thoughts, trying to decide if Lucy will notice that he grabbed fresh thyme instead of the oregano that she asked for, in an effort to avoid stopping at a third grocery store on his way home. She probably will, but it won’t stop him from trying. Maybe he’ll be able to talk her into going with him for the next grocery run; it’s always more fun to do his shopping with a sidekick.

He recoils when his knuckles brush up against someone’s hand, narrowly manages to avoid dropping the jar and splattering pasta sauce all over his feet.

“Sorry, go ahead,” he mutters, at the same time as the other person speaks.

“Oh, my bad, I didn’t mean to – Tim?”

He looks up when she calls him by his name, and his heart skips a beat, then starts pounding in his chest.

“Isabel?”

They blink at each other for a long moment, both seemingly stunned into silence. He hasn’t seen her in close to three years, since the day they finalized the divorce paperwork and parted ways on the steps of the LA County courthouse. So much has changed since then; somedays it feels like he’s an entirely different person than he was when he knew her.

“You look … good,” she hedges, when neither of them say anything else.

“So do you,” Tim echoes automatically, before he actually looks at her. But then he does, looks her up and down, and he realizes that he means it. She’s radiant again, like she used to be before …

Before.

The light is back in her eyes, and her face is filled out again, not sallow and sunken in like it was during the worst days of her addiction. Her hands are steady, and her smile reaches her eyes. Her clothes fit nicely, and she fills them out well.

She looks like the woman he fell in love with, all those years ago.

He can still see her now, almost two decades younger, locking eyes with him for the first time across the classroom in academy. They'd both felt the spark, like the jolt from a Taser, and within the month, she’d created a space for herself in the living room of his tiny apartment. Every day they’d spent together felt like the best of his life, natural and easy and comfortable, with fireworks in all the right places.

And then it had all fallen apart. His wife had stopped coming home, first for a couple nights at a time, then at all, until he hadn’t seen her in close to a year. He’d slept alone, in their bed most nights, save for a few he spent on the couch when the hurt and worry were too much for him to bear.

He tries not to begrudge her those last years, knows that addiction isn’t the addict’s fault, that she was sick, she wasn’t trying to hurt him. Some days, that’s easier to do than others, but at the very least, he doesn’t want the ending of his marriage to spoil the good years they had together.

And there were good years, many more of them than the bad ones. Back then, even when things were hard, they worked through them together. He remembers nights sitting up together on the couch, hashing through which in-laws they were visiting for Thanksgiving, negotiating and bickering and compromising until they’d reached a solution, how even their fights had been almost as much fun as making up after.

He’s thinking about the good times, now, looking at her smile, how it still quirks up further on one side than the other. There’s a stack of albums at home, boxed away in the basement, not meant to be on display, but still welcome in his new life. He thumbs through them every so often, but nothing about their past could have prepared him for this onslaught of memories, bittersweet images of the good years layered with flashes of the insurmountable pain that drove them apart.

He looks at her now, standing across the aisle from him, and a decade and a half melts away.

Read the rest on ao3 here!

#tim bradford #isabel bradford #the rookie #lucy chen #katie writes #kw23 #I actually wrote this like two years ago #but it sat in my drafts over one fucking sentence that wouldn't cooperate #so here it is now #uncooperative sentence and all

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guardian-angle22 · 1 year

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oh man, re: your prediction of the timeline of events,

While TK is an emergency contact for Carlos, as his still legal wife, Iris is the one who is responsible for making a life altering decision about saving him somehow

this point is gonna suck the most personally, if it really is this way. it'll annoy me sooooo much. by this point if we haven't gotten any (or for that matter, will probably not be getting any) of tk's emotional reactions to this whole mess, i hope at least we'll be able to have some explosive tk scenes at this part.

i'm not asking for much, i just hope that tk is able to have the space to process this news, and if this is what it takes for tk the writers to realise that hey, actually, this is kinda fucked up, then i'll take it. for the drama of it all, i do see the show going down this route even if i refuse to admit it in my head.

at the very least, i've seen codas pouring in today ono ao3, and i'm so so grateful. if we never get a scene with tarlos discussing about how tk shouldn't be walking into a marriage with someone who lies about such a big part of his life, then at least i hope we'll get some fantastic fics out of it 🥲

Yeah, my prediction is my prediction, but it's not my wish if that makes sense? 😅 and rarely, if ever, are my predictions correct anyway so maybe that will give you some hope about that terrible bullet point I put out there. Given how Tim has talked about the next episode and the comedy of it all and how hilarious we're supposed to find it... I don't have much hope for them giving TK the room to express his emotions about the ~Iris of it all~

What I do think is that we're going to get TK expressing his emotions about Carlos getting hurt. His angry feral kitten mode will activate the moment he sees/hears/finds out about his fiance being missing. He'll team up with Gabriel (I forgot that bullet point in my timeline and honestly it might be the only part of this I'm actually hyped for and we know is happening so wtf was I doing leaving that out?). When Carlos is found, he'll probably have a speech about how much he loves and needs Carlos alive and as his husband. Which, I'm sure Ronen will absolutely slay, whether that's the monologue I wanna hear from him right now or not... so there's that.

Regardless of how the next few episodes go and this story resolves, the fic writers in this fandom are the TRUE M. V. P. S. give them ALL the bowling trophy:

#911 lone star spoilers & speculation #truly fic writers get me through it #2023 is the year in which I try to be better about commenting on people's fics too #because they fucking deserve the love #I'll get over the fact that I'm in-eloquent with my thoughts and socially anxious and suck it up LOL #the iris of it all #negativity discourse all the bad words

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blenderfulla-aus · 2 years

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timberkon stardust au?

kon as yvaine, the star that falls to earth

bernard as tristain, the lost grandchild of the king, looking to find the star for his beloved

tim as victoria, only i give the part more backstory and say that tim’s a time traveler or a space man or something and he was totally going to leave and go back to his time/planet/whatever but then he met bernard and he’s like hm actually i’m fine here 🥰

like he could build a time machine or fix his spaceship or whatever but he's too busy making heart eyes at the cute boy at the shop

bernard proposes during a midnight picnic and tim's a little hesitant bc like there's a lot bernard doesn't know about him

and then bernard offers to get him the star and tim's like well shit i'm gonna marry this man

and then tim's like oh shit im gonna marry this man, how am I going to tell my family

bernard goes off for the star and tim spirals into panic mode and ends up building a space ship/time machine/whatever in like three days so he can get his family there in time for the engagement/marriage

(this is the first time he's spoken to any of them in months. they all think he's dead. so getting a wedding invitation from him is a pleasant surprise.)

also tim knows kon from his time Before he crash landed in bernard's village and they both low-key had crushes on each other when they were working (?) together. also they each think the other is dead.

bernard and kon mostly follow the plot of stardust, bernard dragging kon back to show tim, kon escaping, the witch trying to eat kon's heart to gain immortality, the king's kids chasing kon to get the stone that knocked him out of the sky, etc etc

except instead of bernard (tristain) going back to the village to break up with vtim (victoria), tim starts to get worried about bernard and decides to venture into the land beyond the wall himself and ends up helping bernard's mother save kon from the witch who wants to eat his heart

mostly this is an excuse to write this scene:

"I'm looking for a fallen star - have you seen one around?" Bernard asks, looking around the crater like a star is just going to randomly materialize.

But no, there's just a man in strangely bright, skin-tight clothing. He's got something weird on his head, too - it's not a hat, but two dark circles connected by a piece of something thin and black, and then longer sticks of the same material run down to hook behind his ears. Honestly, the only part of his clothing that Bernard recognizes is his coat, which looks to be made of dark leather.

"That would be me," the guy says, waving his hands in the air melodramatically.

Bernard stares at him for a long second. "You don't look like a star," he feels the need to point out.

The guy just shrugs. "I dunno what to tell you, man. Believe me or don't, it's not my problem."

Bernard studies him. "No, I believe you," he announces after a minute. "No one around here dresses like..." He gestures towards the guy's weird colorful outfit. "...that."

The guy scowls. "What's wrong with how I dress?" he demands, belligerent.

"Nothing," Bernard says, because it's a nice view if nothing else. He wonders how Tim feels about this kind of outfit. "I've just never seen anything like it before. What's it made of, anyway?"

"Spandex," the guy says shortly.

Spandex, Bernard mouths silently to himself. What the hell does that mean? Whatever, he has more important questions right now: "So why are you here? Why did you fall?"

The guy's scowl deepens. "I got hit," he mutters sullenly.

Bernard doesn't think he heard that right. "What?"

"I got hit," the guy says, a little louder but no less disgruntled. He picks something up from beside him - it looks like a necklace of some sort, maybe? - and waves it around. "By this."

"Huh," says Bernard. He doesn't know what else he can say.

The guy glares at the necklace like it's the source of all his problems - which, if Bernard takes his story at face value, it kind of is - then shrugs and fastens it around his neck. "Finders keepers."

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amaradangeli · 2 years

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Okay @heatherelf77, you asked for it...

I have Thoughts about Mr. Tim Bradford in this past episode. So, like if you haven't seen 4x21 'Mother's Day', nope out now...

When Lucy asks if he can see himself married to her, my dude *really* looks at Lucy good and hard, catalogs her earnest face, SWALLOWS HARD, and then looks left while considering it. He's not messing around with her in that moment. He *is* thinking that he could be married to Ashley. Now, I'm not saying he's ready - hell, even he points out that they've only been dating a few months - but he (somehow???) sees a future with her. So obviously, Tim Bradford is a fucking idiot.

This isn't about Tim as much as it's about Ashley, but she's only relevant as Tim-adjacent so here we go... When Tim talks about Lucy thinking he's going to propose there's a moment where she's *desperate* for him to propose. Then, when he tells her he's not going to she goes whole hog on "oh I don't want to get married/have kids" and I swear most women who want BOTH those things have said those bald-faced lies to at least one man they wanted to lock down. Then Mr. "yeah, I can marry her" looks relieved? Dude, you can't even unmix your own messages! I mean, not ready is not ready, but then...

Did you see his face when Ashley says no marriage/kids. I mean, I still believe she was lying her ass off but in that moment, Tim's already rethinking Ashley. How serious about her could he possibly have ever been if his emotions can run the gamut that quickly?

But wait, there's more. This man then pranks "his friend" into think he proposed after seeing that look on her face. He KNOWS Lucy's caught feelings and he's punking her with it. Now, I like Tim and I think he's a good guy, and I know he's got a dead amazing connection with Lucy, and I know they prank each other for funsies, but like, that's gross my dude. Your hurt her for entertainment. The saving grace here was that he IMMEDIATELY let her off the hook. And ALL OF THAT leads me to...

No matter what shennanigans they get up to in the next episode, they now have a whole city-powering-sized reservoir of shit to deal with. Because he knows she's caught feelings, and she knows he knows she's caught feelings, and this isn't a game anymore. It's not fun and light and maybe-one-day. It's here. And yeah, I'm here for a season of pining after one another. Hell, I'd pay for it. Regardless, Tim is oddly insightful sometimes and I think he's going to take one hard look at this and realize they need to throw the breaks on and have a legit conversation and then shit's gonna get real.

So anyway, I'm really looking forward to all that comes next, but Tim Bradford has some explaining to do.

#chenford #chenford discourse #fwiw #I don't think any of these are hot takes #or that I did anything particularly insightful here #but I have a lot of feelings

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notasapleasure · 1 year

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Safe, 8 episodes (2018), part 2/2

Following on from Part 1. Content warning for child death and parental grief.

Episode 4

This is day 4 since Chris and Jenny went missing, and if we thought the Chahals were going through it already, well, just hold tight.

First we have a flashback of Chris leaving to reinforce 1: his closeness to his mother and distance from his father and 2: presumably Neel’s hypocrisy about mobile phone use (cf. the fmaily dinner in episode 1)

Et puis, a rather heavy-handed scene of the school choir singing a song about drowning while Chris’ body turns up at the lake, with the shots interspersed of course.

But then uh, the headmaster notices that the teacher who has been suspended while the police investigate her for csa is on school grounds when she’s not meant to be.

Tim would like for there to not be a fuss.

Tim does not reckon with Neel finally having a chance to be the Man of the Fmaily or whatever this is

Zoe goes to leave, but Neel grabs her hand and pulls her back. Looks like an underage sex scandal is just what they needed to bring them together again!

We don’t really see Neel’s initial response to the news his son is dead, because Zoe is having a freak-out in the doorway now the police are there. Later, everyone sits round the table and looks solemn.

Zoe is adamant: No.

HANDS ;_;

If the csa allegations don’t save their marriage, maybe the death of their eldest child will!

:( (screen brightness UP though eesh)

At home with the grief liason officer :(

When Tilly turns to Zoe, he looks at the liason officer, like he’s checking for permission, and leaves the room. Very. Carefully.

bb :(

also jsyk, this is all pretty much entirely silent, panic attack-adjacent.

Having got that out of his system safely away from any of his loved ones, before whom he can’t possibly show vulnerability, Neel goes outside to try and work out why there are so many police around still.

And because he’s a generous man who knows we deserved some natural light to hit those eyes for a change.

He’s wandering about in a bit of a daze, but Sophie is there to advise:

The police are there looking for Jenny, so kind of connected to Chris.

Episode 5

Trying his best to look after the others! Their neighbour made some food and brought it round.

He manages to persuade Tilly and Zoe to come and try to eat. Then iInadvertantly reminds them all over again by going to set four places instead of three :’)

Truly, a marriage-saver.

I thought it was worth having the progression of expressions there :’) puppy dog eyes.

Before the little memorial service Tilly wanted, the police come to give an update, saying someone (the family who hid the body badly) has admitted to his accidental murder

Ah lads, it’s tough. Something something symbolism of Neel letting himself show emotion and the family drawing together? Also very important eyelashes.

Episode 6

As far as I remember this is the last one that really has much Joplin in it - it’s just tiny snippets of flashbacks in episodes 7 and 8.

It’s NEEL’s turn for a sinister-looking flashback to the night Chris died...

He’s in his car outside the party (it seems), tears in his eyes, looking at his own hands in whock.

Here are the police with more unhelpful news! The guy who admitted to killing your son......literally could not have done it, according to the evidence.

Tilly appears and his demeanour changes immediately to reassure her.

And then the police are like - ‘oh hey, remember how someone framed you to look like a paedo? Well actually the children at the party were fighting over rumours that you are.’

When you already know what’s coming (and if you read my previous liveblog posts of the series, you’ll know I guessed from like...episode 1?), the acting is really good here. There’s a lot of different factors at play making all the characters assume certain things and the way it keeps them quiet actually works well, I will grudgingly admit.

Oh the neighbourhood’s on fire (literally!) stay home and don’t get into trouble Tilly!

Jenny has reappeared (digitally, anyway), and her dad Tom is trying to track her phone down with the help of ‘BO Bob’ (don’t get me started). Unlike actual policeman Herbie’s software in Hard Sun, BO Bob can give you a precise address. Tom: “That’s Neil Chahal’s house!!!” Like somehow Tom really wants to be able to blame Neel for all this.

I understand that plot-wise, they wanted Tilly alone when whoever-has-Jenny’s-phone rummages in the house and Tom goes blundering in afterwards, but do we really think that parents who’ve just lost a child will leave the other one at home alone while they go out to gawp at a burning building?

Anyway, important hairline update:

Meanwhile Tom, having scared Tilly half to death, gives her her phone and tells her to call her parents, while he waits to make sure she’s safe. Whoever broke in (before Tom, that is), smashed the front door and ransacked one room...

You know, taking the Chahals’ scenes alone, and looking at the following screenshot, what Safe makes me think of most is the inverted interpretation of Goldilocks - Tom just keeps barging into the Chahals’ house while they’re trying to have a marital breakdown/mourn their dead son! Will he give them no peace?

Naturally, Neel gets to wondering why Jenny - who was with Chris when he disappeared - has been poking round his place, after a fire and another dead body in the neighbourhood.

Naturally, Tom doesn’t like that.

Looking for reasons to be mad at Neel, Tom notices that the room that Jenny ransacked was Neel’s office...

Tom: “Someone’s after you.”

Zoe: “What if it’s the same person who killed Chris?”

DC Emma: “What if it’s the same person who framed you as a paedophile?”

aaaaaaaand the moment Neel realises he just has to admit to being the world’s biggest plonker. THEE most wally of a man

Well, actually he needs to see Zoe go into a full-on panic attack first because she thinks the same person might hate her family so much they killed her son, framed her as a paedo and is now going after her husband

Idiot. But I thought you all deserved this one without the CC.

Yes, Neel set his OWN WIFE UP AS A PAEDOPHILE. HIS WIFE WHO IS A TEACHER.

“We were going through a rough patch, weren’t we?”

Sure was, mate!

Off he goes for some air, while every else just stands around like a lemon going (⊙o⊙)

Emma would kind of like to pursue the whole...what the fuck was that angle, but Sophie figures they’ll bring him in later for wasting police time. Tom is very indignant that ‘a man like that’ isn’t getting his comeuppance. “He’s a pathological liar!”

I must point out that at this point they are. STILL. in the Chahals’ house. Zoe and Tilly can presumably hear every word.

Later...

Tilly: “I never want to see him again!” Zoe: “He’s your father. He loves you.” Tilly: “How can you stick up for him after what he’s done?” Zoe: “Your father was the kindest, the funniest, the most caring man I ever met...” [me, first time I watched this, screaming at the TV: WHAT DID YOU DO TO HIM THEN??] Zoe: “...and that’s why I married him. That’s why we had you. And Chris.” Tilly: “So what happened?” Zoe: "Slowly you grow apart. And one day, you find yourself doing stupid, terrible things...just so you can feel something.” Tilly: “And that’s what Dad did?” Zoe: “Not just him.”

I just.......what can you do with this? These guys are just into some kinky shit if Zoe remembers how much she loves him because he framed her for sleeping with underage students. I don’t even want to know.

HEY NEEL. EPISODE ONE. WHAT WERE YOU SAYING ABOUT PEOPLE ALWAYS ON THEIR PHONES AGAIN?

Actually he’s processing his grief and reminding himself how much he loves his wife. Sorry babe. Carry on?

oh my god though the love in his voice when he says that in the video. sure whatever I’d probably take him back too*

*I would not, that’s some fucked up shit to frame anyone for let alone YOUR WIFE

But losing your son who you admitted thinking of as a bit of a useless stoner, who you seemed to basically be waiting for him to grow out of his boring teenage phase, apparently puts things in perspective

What better moment to imply a man has something to do with your daughter’s disappearance than when he’s reading messages of condolences at his dead son’s shrine?!

Tom is such a nob smh

(what do you mean I don’t get to complain about Tom because I was trying to get a screenshot of the same grieving man’s boxer elastic?)

Tom, right back at him: “And my daughter is alive!!”

LOW blow dude (he wants to use the chance he still has to save her blah blah)

I am a sucker for the way he softens when Zoe calls him.

She’s been worried sick and needs to admit something of her own. In front of Tom, because otherwise how would our main character be able to unravel the intrigue? Hm?

But it’s ok.

He followed her to the party Chris was at...

And this was the source of him looking teary and shattered in the car that night: Zoe WAS shagging one of her students!

Zoe: “How can you ever forgive me?”

*sad clown music plays*

and TOM JUST BUTTS RIGHT IN AGAIN DEMANDING TO KNOW WHICH TEENAGER SOMEONE ELSE’S WIFE WAS SHAGGING WUWEWUEGAEJKFBHF

“This could have ramifications that could affect me child.”

TOM. GOLDILOCKS. LEAVE THE BEARS ALONE.

Anyway, don’t worry, Ioan was specified as a Year 12 in episode 1, so he’s at least sixteen and therefore a consenting adult NO YOU’RE STILL HIS TEACHER ZOE IT’S NOT OK

For a couple of scenes Neel sits there looking a bit helpless while Zoe sobs her heart out next to him, but in the end they’re fiiiiiine. Even Tilly comes over for a family hug.

And they all lived happily every after!

Let that be a lesson to you all!

If your marriage needs spicing up a bit, try shagging a sixth-former while your other half frames you for shagging a GCSE student. With any luck, one of your children will die horribly and his corpse will be lightly mutilated to really help put things in perspective!

I hate this show. Did I mention I hate this show?

I think, to be honest, on the ‘rewatch’ I saw more things it deserved credit for. It’s a mystery that does bear rewatching, because there’s little to reward you for guessing first time round, but there are subtle clues in the acting when you already know what’s going on. Which is a nice exercise for the actors, certainly, but doesn’t make for a satisfying thriller, for my money. The main problem is still Tom. It would work better as a true ensemble piece about how the mystery around Jenny’s disappearance is exacerbated because everyone has something to hide - which is partly what the show wants to do, but it also wants a Taken-style dad who can rampage around crime scenes gathering his own evidence.

Hey ho. Chinos and eyelashes!

---

Rating

Dead? No

Evil? Now. No. I don’t think that’s the word. But........you just read it. Framed his wife for csa. What. What the. What the fuck.

Affects the plot? Well yes. Do you think Zoe’s ever working again after this?

Oh my god, a rating. Uhh. Aurgh. If you don’t WATCH the show, and just enjoy my screencaps, you might go as high as 4/5. But I did watch the show, so 2/5. He looks amazing, but there are two whole episodes he’s basically not in (LIES imdb) and there’s a lot of...everything else...to wade through.

#adventures in joplin sibtain's imdb page #joplin sibtain #netflix safe #safe (series)#harlan cobin's safe

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lovecolibri · 1 year

Note

SaL anon here friend with my thoughts on Tuesday's episode and some other thoughts I'll get to. So the episode was amazing, emotional, so well acted, and basically hitting every kidnapped lover trope in the book to great effect. Slow, horrifying realization by their other half that something is wrong when no one else thinks so. Team up between them and a close relative who grounds them so they can crack the case. Kidnapped lover has a chance to escape but doesn't take it because it lead to

the other getting hurt. Performing CPR on the kidnapped lover because they FUCKING DIED!! Truly a glorious fanfiction come to life and I loved every moment of that part. It goes without saying that I would have gladly traded less Owen for more 126, but the TK and Gabriel team up was amazing. The serial killer aspects were pretty minimal so I didn't need to skip anything (ngl, after seeing the cookie thing in the preview i was terrified), hell Trudy was deranged but kinda sweet. So here we come to my salty thoughts so feel free to ignore if you want. As much as I loved the episode, it was hardly part of any sort of arc for Carlos, if we can even say that there was one. Aside from the basic setup, nothing in it relied on the previous 3 episodes. You could have had Tarlos fight for any reason and Carlos get kidnapped on a case and it would have played out the same way. So if there is any sort of arc for Carlos its in the previous 3 episodes, and I'm having trouble seeing it. An arc (to me) is character has a problem, things happen, resolution has character come out stronger on the other side (see the top tier Buck tsunami arc, Buck feels useless without his job, he saves Chris, discovers he has value to others outside his job.) So what was Carlos's arc? It was supposedly confronting his past but that didn't really happen. He's there for Iris when he thinks he hadn't been, but he would have been for any friend who went missing. If it was about confronting his reasons for getting married shouldn't we have seen a conversation with his parents? Right now the marriage thing isn't even necessary as backstory, we already knew Carlos had these issues in S2. If Tim was going to introduce 5 million plot holes with this info it needed a payoff. Maybe more will be said later in the season, till then i feel like 4x04 is a beautiful work of fan service to vaguely justify Tim's poorly thought out/executed headcanon.

Hello my friend and I'm sorry I'm so late getting to this! My mom had some issues at work and then got sick and then I got like, a weird (for me) amount of energy to Do Something Productive and spent about 6+ hours yesterday sorting The Box Of Important Papers I have been throwing shit into for years and I couldn't stop or I would never start again and it would remain half-sorted for the foreseeable future. But now I've got some time before I start anything else (or just lay around and read/recover for the rest of the day)!

The Tarlos of Tuesday's episode was sooooo so so good! We got delicious angst without being an over the top serial killer torture fest (and yeah Trudy was enabling her son but you can't look at the way he talked to her and tell me he wasn't abusing her and she wasn't just waiting to be the next one he killed the second she failed to "prove" her love for him. Also, am I the only one that assumed when she said his dad "left" and he burnt himself dissolving "something" that he murdered his dad? ANYWAY), we got some truly beautiful lines from both TK and Carlos about their love for each other, and Rafael really just acted his heart out all episode. I loved every minute of their stuff this episode. I was particularly thrilled with the TK/Gabriel scenes and the way he and Andrea just were SO happy to see TK even without Carlos, and were prepared to just have him over to hang out for a bit was SOOOO sweet and speaks volumes about how much closer they have grown. We love to see it! And the parallels to Carlos and Owen looking for TK when he went missing?! *chef's kiss* Get you a father in law who will listen to your concerns about their child and take them seriously and will follow your lead when you Know Something Is Up.

And honestly, Owen had some lines that did make me laugh! I actually think him and O'Brian play off each other really well and I enjoy their reluctant team up. I am just ABSOLUTELY bored to tears with this stupid storyline for them. One is a fire captain and the other is a motorcycle cop! HOW are they both just being totally removed from their first responder world to push this whole boring ass FBI investigation that, from a lot of the comments I've seen around, no one could give two shits about. There are SO MANY procedurals on that revolve around these investigations and a couple other "firefighter" shows that are more about the soap opera level drama than the fun/occasionally serious and painful rescue calls. The 911verse has always stood out for being different, more hopeful and fun, having drama but not being A Drama, and being full of fun and interesting rescues that tie in with what the main characters are going through. And both shows losing their way SO early in their runs is...disappointing. And frustrating that the people in charge have gotten a lot of feedback about what fans AND the GA tune in for (cool/fun emergencies! Some drama but not too OTT, focus on our main characters and their relationships to/with each other!) and have decided they would rather be like every other show out there than to deviate from what they personally want to do because the audience enjoys something they don't think is The Thing Everyone Should Be Enjoying This Much. (Or worse, turn those earnest things that people loved about the show into a joke because they resent their audience and fanbase that gives their show longevity and keeps it trending and pulls in new viewers for some reason. 🙃🙃🙃) ANYWAY, I am READY for this Owen storyline to take a back fucking seat to literally anything. I've been re-watching season 1 and the difference in TK and Owen's relationship then and now is so disappointing to see. I know Ronen said he and RL have a really good TK/Owen episode (or scene? I don't fully remember) so I'm looking forward to that but I really, REALLY need to see more emergencies and first responder moments on this *checks notes* show very specifically about first responders doing their jobs. VERY excited for Marjan to get a storyline this week!

As for your salty thoughts, I'm with you. I don't *hate* the "Carlos married Iris" storyline but it definitely could have been handled better/more seamlessly (especially watching season1 again and the clues they COULD have dropped without revealing what was going on but didn't), and honestly was not needed as a set up for this episode. Actually, as much as what we got was good, I personally think it would have been better being an entirely separate thing from Iris. Like, if they just wanted to have Carlos getting hurt and TK teaming up with Gabriel to find him, they could have cut the whole thing about Iris going missing and put more emergency calls into episode 3 and had TK and Carlos still in a tiff because they're both stressed about Iris not signing the divorce papers yet, and then had Carlos get trapped while at work on a call! He could have been trying to save someone, hell it could have even been Iris! And we could have seen him talking to this person (even BETTER if it was Iris!) about all this love he has for TK and about TK's love for Gwen, and fighting to get out but not quite being able to make it, and even going into cardiac arrest and needing CPR! He still could have been off-duty with no one knowing he was involved at first so TK could still have the talk with the 126 and the call to Grace, and a moment with the Reyes parents and the ultimate team up with Gabriel. I just think there was a way to tie it more into the premise of first responders while still keeping all the good stuff we got!

And you're right about it not really being an "arc" because we...didn't actually get that much from Carlos about HIMSELF. We got the scene where he first tells TK about being married and why he did it, but we still know NOTHING about if they had a true wedding and told everyone or if it's something that they did privately and it came up later when she disappeared, we have no idea if everyone in the family knew it was a sham wedding or found out later, we still don't know when they decided it was cool to date other people and if they ever lived together, or how Carlos felt about watching his best friend start to change and become someone he didn't recognize, we know NOTHING except it is a Thing That Happened and they didn't get a divorce before she disappeared because ??? "reasons" (even though no one batted an eye about her having a long-term relationship with someone else), then she was presumed dead, and then it was because the US healthcare system is a joke. We didn't get to delve much into Carlos' side of things, just hear his version of Iris's side of things! And as you said, if it was about him confronting his past, WHERE was a talk with his parents?! Where was the discussion about his choice to do this and what they did or didn't say or did or didn't know about it all?!

I'm hoping we get some more in the coming weeks because we still don't have a resolution to this arc since Iris still has not applied for an annulment or signed the papers, we haven't seen Carlos talking to his parents, and we didn't get a big growth moment or anything because we didn't get to see TK talking to anyone about how he was trying to be supportive but he was really reeling from the news and wanted to make sure Carlos felt supported and loved but he also needed to vent about it. Like, the only conflict is about if it can happen soon enough for the wedding in 8-ish weeks, because everyone is on board and everyone is fine with things. IDK it just feels like if this was going to be a big thing, it needed to be A Big Thing which you can do without the people in the couple being awful to each other, but you do kind of need to allow them to have big and occasionally messy feelings, and TALK about those feelings, and show some change from the start of the arc to the end. There was never any really true conflict here, so there is...nowhere to grow from. I don't hate this, I just think it could have been handled a little better and more interestingly but SO MUCH TIME is going to this Owen arc that everything else is suffering instead of giving this plot some room to breathe and filling up the time with more emergencies, and giving Owen a more central arc later on. 🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️

As always, thanks for your thoughts my friend! I'll be working on our song ask next!

#my sweet nonnie friends #sleeping at last anon #911 lone star #lone star spoilers #tarlos #i think maybe it's frustrating because it's good but has the potential RIGHT THERE to be great #and it's soooo close #but instead we have to watch this side story about the FBI that has nothing to do with either of the character's jobs #or about first responders and what they do

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